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[Deleted member]

Hey guys I just got back from Toy Story and Far from Hom- oh, people are talking politics. Oh joy...

Not in my case doh.

I just shared the news about ny cousin getting a daughter born at 3am.

The other people were talking about Pokémon I think.

 

[Roguewolf]

Its my birthday 25 this year

Happy birthday koopacrown boy/girl
Hope you have the greatest day

 

[BlondeLombax]

Hey guys I just got back from Toy Story and Far from Hom- oh, people are talking politics. Oh joy...

I know, right?

Whatever, Soldier’s still got my vote for the office.

I actually have no idea what’s going on right now

 

[Noipoi]

Bloo’s a nice name.

Fosters nostalgia,

 

[ZephyrZ]

The Pokémon series is going through a major shift, so is the fanbase.

I try not to comment on the national dex controversy anymore, it always ends up in arguments and no one’s willing to listen to my points. But I’ve been thinking about this for a while and I thought I’d get it all out in one big ol Poke-post.

While I kinda speak pretty objectively here, these are all still my opinions. It’s cool if you disagree.

Spoiler: big ol Poke-post

Do I even have to say what’s going on with the Pokémon community right now?

After the incredibly controversial Nintendo treehouse presentation where we learned not every Pokémon would be in the new games the fanbase has been going insane. Memes about smuggling Pokémon into Galar and N64 trees and hovering Wingulls. And most of all, constant #Bringbackthenationaldex posts. And after Masuda’s recent message (which was basically “no lol”) it’s gotten even worse. Suddenly Sword and Shield are games birthed from Satan’s butthole, and if you like them you’re a baby eater who should be burned alive!

...Okay that’s an exaggeration. But it certainly seems like that sometimes.

But this sudden shift in tone wasn’t completely random, the national dex was simply the straw that broke the Camerupts back.

Let’s take it back to almost a decade ago. 2010.

Pokémon Black and White came out, to...mixed reactions. Some praised it as one of the best Pokémon experiences yet! Others raked it over the coals for daring to be a Pokémon game without Pikachu and Charizard! Gamefreak wanted gen 5 to be a bit of a soft reboot, so for the first time since gen 1 the only Pokémon available during the main story are the new ones. At the time, people hated this. And while most agree this game was pretty cool now, back in the day you’d think it was spawned from Cthulhu’s urethra. “A garbage Pokémon? An ice cream Pokémon?? These games are ****! Where’s Mewtwo?” It’s all you seemed to hear about these games. Nothing about the cool story, or the fun characters, or the bad *** that is Hydreigon. All people seemed to care about was the ice cream Pokémon and how it replaced Eevee. I’m pretty sure the modern idea of a genwunner was spawned in this era of the series.

Masuda (who is now seen as an evil Thanos monster for snapping away everyone’s Pokémon, but in 2010 he was the guy responsible for black and white) had to have taken this hard. He poured his heart and soul into these games, he’d do interviews and write on his blog and just go on and on about his ideas and how excited he was. And I’d say his work payed off! But no one was focused on that. All that mattered was Trubbish. If I spent years of my life on my magnum opus and people only payed attention to one aspect that isn’t a big deal in the first place, I’d be devastated. Now I can’t say for sure, but I think this is where some of the modern problems of Pokémon came from. But we’ll get back to that.

Flash forward to 2013. Pokémon X and Y are not only the newest generation of Pokémon games set to release in October, but they’re in the THIRD DIMENSION! That’s right, the game’s have jumped from the DS to the 3DS and are now in 3D! I still remember how I felt seeing a 3D main series Pokémon game for the first time. It was really something special. Now throughout these games hype season expectations were sky-high. Black and White 2 were amazing, and we all expected these games to follow that trend. But upon the game’s release we realized that wasn’t quite the case. Don’t get me wrong, the games were fine. But they were just that, fine. They were decent enough, serviceable, run of the mill Pokémon games. The last pair of games were amazing, these were okay. That’s not what I was expecting.

These games felt rushed. The story was virtually non existent for the first half of the game, then clumsily shoved in your face during the second half. The box legends of the games did nothing substantial in the story except for being captured off screen by Team Flare (Speaking of Team Flare, their the worst team in the whole series). It just felt incomplete, like there was more to be done here. Were these problems fixed in the Z version?

No. There was no Z version.

X and Y were also very affected by the black and white backlash. In Unova there were no past generation Pokémon. In Kalos there’s nothing but past gen Pokémon! You like Hoppip? There it is! Poochyena fan? He’s right over there! You like Stunfisk? No you don’t. No one likes Stunfisk. But he’s here anyway. Sure there are 70 new Pokémon, but who cares about new Pokémon? All the oldies are here! You never have to worry about a Unova situation again!

But most of all, more than any other region. There. Was. Kanto. The regional dex? Pumped full of Kanto. You like the Kanto starters, here ya go, we’re just giving them away! That fancy new mega evolution gimmick? The majority are from Kanto. Charizard and Mewtwo got two megas. Because they’re from Kanto, and that makes them perfect. Gamefreak clearly saw people on Facebook were pissed that Zubat wasn’t in Unova, so they made sure they never left Kanto out again. Stroking that Kanto nostalgia boner 24/7. We’re still feeling the ramifications of this to this day.

X and Y were deeply impacted by fan backlash. They were a turning point for this series, but not the ultimate turning point. That comes later.

One year later, Omega Ruby and Alpha Sapphire released. The culmination of fan demand that rivals the cries for Ridley in smash, Hoenn was finally confirmed and by that November we had the games in our greedy paws. These games, while feeling more complete than X and Y before it, still suffered from some of the same problems. Namely lack of difficulty and barren post game content. Which was made worse by the teasing of the battle frontier. Why put in a reference to the battle frontier if you never intended to implement it!?

Well the answers simple. Masuda, now a changed man from the Black and White backlash, seems to think that mobile games are the future. According to him, in this modern world where kids have so many entertainment options in the palm of their hand, why would they feel compelled to waste their time in a post game facility? They’ll play the story and be done with it, so what’s the point of adding anything after the story? Ignore the millions of older fans who would love post game features, they don’t matter. We all laughed at his ideas on mobile games, but little did we know his opinion would be validated in just a few years.

Both X and Y and ORAS had a plethora of issues. But we excused them by saying things like “it’s their first 3D game, give em a break” “they had to make hundreds of models, so they had less dev time” and other similar sayings. We always made excuses for Gamefreak.

In 2015 there was nothing. We were all positive there would be a Z version to fix up X and Y, but there was no such thing. During Pokémon’s year long absence Yokai-Watch got pretty big with Japanese children, Gamefreak’s target audience. And even though Pokémon is so big absolutely nothing could destroy it, I still believe Gamefreak got a little shook.

2016 was an absolutely huge year for Pokémon. But not for the reasons you may think. Before we get to that, let’s dive into the main topic. For their 20th anniversary Gamefreak launched the 7th generation of the series. Taking place in the bright and sunny alola region, Pokémon Sun and Moon enter the ring!

These games were a vast improvement on X and Y. Everything they did Gen 7 did better. Better story, better evil team, better music, better characters, harder difficulty (okay it was still easy but it was slightly more difficult) it was definitely a step up. And yet, their were still problems.

While I personally enjoyed the story of Lillie and her family drama, I agree with the sentiment that it was way too intrusive. You couldn’t walk five steps without somebody stopping you. And these cutscenes weren’t exactly well animated. Tell me if this sounds familiar.

Fade in. Hau takes three steps, stops, turns, takes three more steps towards you. “Hey main character! I sure do love malasada! Here’s some revives!” Hau then walks three steps, stops, turns, and walks three more steps off screen. Fade to black.

That’s it. That’s every cutscene with every character. Aside from the few pre rendered ones which actually look pretty good, this is what you’re doing for most of the game. If you like these characters like I do, it may not be so bad. But if you hate these guys the experience is probably excruciating. Not to mention your character has the exact same reaction to everything. You just got a Z Crystal? . Team Skull kidnapped a Pokémon! . Lusamine’s about to destroy the world with her alien fetish! . The player characters actually seem to emote in Sword and Shield, so that’s a plus. Alola also lacked meaningful post game content, and while it was more difficult than X and Y it was still piss easy.

So while Sun and Moon were most certainly a step up in every way from the games before it, they still weren’t amazing. The hype for sun and Moon was incredible, we were whipped up in such a frenzy we nearly lost our minds. Every new trailer, every new theory or leak, every new Pokémon got us even more excited. And we swore the line used in the first trailer “It all comes together!” meant this game was gonna be the ultimate Pokémon game. So when it was just another Pokémon game, we were pretty disappointed. Well I wasn’t, but others were. In the end Pokémon Sun and Moon were fun. And while that’s all I need, others not so much. But Sun and Moon weren’t the only Pokémon games released that year.

What if Pokémon were in real life? Okay not actually in real life, but on your phone? That’s right, it’s time to talk about POKÉMON GO! The game that saved/killed the series!

I wasn’t alive for the original pokemania. The cultural phenomenon that hit the world in the late 90s when Pokémon first got big. The all encompassing excitement for these pocket monsters that was shared by everyone, from the school playground to the workplace. But I imagine it was similar to the summer of Pokémon Go. It was insane, everyone was doing it. And I do mean everyone. With normal Pokémon games you needed the game and a Nintendo console. With Pokémon Go all you needed was a phone. And everyone has a phone! That means everyone could get in on this trend, and it certainly felt like it. My mom was into it! I don’t think my mom has ever played a video game in her life, that’s crazy!

And yet, as much fun as we were having, little did we know what was happening behind the scenes. Masuda (The evil goblin monkey responsible for killing all your Pokémon) had felt that mobile games were stealing away all the kiddies for a while now. And Pokémon Go’s success sealed the deal. He now had real evidence that mobile was the way to go. A huge chunk of the Pokémon series’ total revenue earned in their entire existence was from Pokémon Go. That’s a big deal, and Masuda knew. He was probably saying a lot of “Told ya so”s back at Gamefreak HQ.

After winning back the hearts of children from Yokai Watch, Pokémon was at the top again and Gamefreak knew what they had to do. Kids and casual players are the big money makers, they’re the ones we need to market to.

Cue 2017, where everyone’s dreams of Gen 4 remakes were dashed by the reveal of Ultra Sun & Ultra Moon. That’s right, if you enjoyed Pokémon Sun and Moon you can now enjoy it again with very little changed!

...why?

These games sparked a truckload of questions. Why do they exist? Why aren’t they DP remakes? Why aren’t they Pokémon Stars? And most surprisingly, Why aren’t they on the Switch.

Nintendo’s newest hybrid console was doing amazing. After launching with Zelda’s newest legendary title and with the promise of a new Splatoon and a new 3D Mario in the way, They were on top of the world. Especially after the failure that was the Wii U, this was great to see.

Seeing as how this console was a hybrid between a home console and a handheld, many were wondering if Pokémon, one of Nintendo’s premier handheld series, would make the jump. And by wondering, I mean screaming. And in an almost sad attempt to make up for the mostly confused reactions to USUM, Gamefreak Confirmed that the next Pokémon games would be on the Nintendo Switch. Much to the fans joy!

We put up with the Ultra games for the whole of 2017. We put up with how they were the same damn games as before with an even worse story. We put up with the slightly improved but still not great post game. We put up with Mantine Surf and Alola Photo Club. We actually enjoyed the new Ultra Beasts and the Ultra Necrozma fight, they were pretty cool. We put up with everything, because we knew they games we truly wanted were coming.

Well...they weren’t coming yet.

We arrived in 2018 on a rainbow of hope. For the first five months of the year we would filled with dreams of the next generation! The first home console generation! Sure there was a dumb rumor that said the next games were Kanto remakes that incorporated Pokémon Go mechanics, but that’s stupid! They would never do that!

...right?

May 30th 2018 was a terrible day. I woke up with a crappy song stuck in my head, I saw a boring Star Wars spin off, I came home with a splitting head ache, I felt terrible, and to top it all off. To end this terrible day. The Pokémon game i’ve been waiting for...wasn’t coming this year.

Instead we got LET’S GO PIKACHU & LET’S GO EEVEE. Kanto remakes that borrow elements from Pokémon Go and are all around super casual!

...yay?

Needless to say this is not what I wanted. The fanbase wasn’t having that much fun either. Motion controls? In my Pokémon games? Blasphemy! How could this be the big Pokémon Switch game? Well it wasn’t, the big switch game was coming in 2019. This was just something to cash in on the sweet, sweet casual market in the meantime.

You see, Pokémon Go was a huge hit. And one of the reasons it was a huge hit was because at first, it was only Kanto Pokémon. Whether you like it or not Kanto is the most recognizable region of Pokémon. If you walk up to some random guy on the street and say “name one Pokémon that isn’t Pikachu” they’ll probably say someone from Kanto. So to have only the Pokémon everyone recognized in an app everyone could play, it really brought in the casuals. These guys weren’t epic gamers, these guys were your parents and your nieces and nephews. So they decided to make a game for these dorks. Get some casual cash, and maybe get them to buy the next game.

And don’t get me wrong there’s nothing wrong with casual gamers. I think it’s wonderful that video games are reaching more people than ever before. I’m just not that big a fan of mobile game mechanics in my home console games. That’s just me.

Every time someone aired a grievance or concern about these games they’d get the same response. “These games aren’t for you. Wait until next year” as if the games were immune to criticism. Another example of fans waving away problems with the games because the big one was coming later.

Throughout 2017 and 2018 we powered through These games, because the game we wanted was coming next.

When LGPE released and I played it, it became apparent to me that it was not worth the uproar. These games were fine, if a little boring and safe for my tastes in Pokémon. It didn’t matter either way though, because the games I really wanted were on their way! At least I had Smash to keep me occupied until then.

We rode into 2019 on an even bigger rainbow of hope than before, knowing for sure that this was the year! This was the year our dreams came true!

February 26th 2019 was an amazing day. I woke up early in the morning, too early actually. I spent the hours by watching it’s always sunny and Brooklyn 99, until it was finally time. I rushed downstairs to grab my favorite flavor of ice cream vanilla chocolate chip, I turned on that Pokémon direct. And I watched in complete awe as I was shown my next Pokémon adventure. POKÉMON SWORD & SHIELD! I chose my starter (which would change eventually but that’s another story) I chose my version (Sword, baybee) and I got ready for November!

Finally, after two years of games I didn’t want. This game is for me! This game is exactly what I needed! And honestly I still feel that way, even after everything that’s happened.

After months of no news and an awesome Pokémon direct, every seemed to be in place for these games to be amazing!

And then disaster struck.

I don’t need to give you another recap, point is now everyone hates this game and I’m dumb bad dumb baby bad bad for liking it.

Right now I’m gonna break this game down into what I feel are the major goods and bads. It sounds simple but trust me, it gets complicated.

Let’s start with the one that’ll get me the most upvotes on r/ Pokémon. THE BAD:

The graphics: While I don’t think they look quite as bad as people make them out to be, they are pretty underwhelming. The Pokémon models new shading looks really great imo, but the overworld textures leave...a lot to be desired.

The animations: The Pokemon animations as they are right now are serviceable. Yes, even double kick. Do you really expect them to animate a four minute action sequence for 600 different Pokémon for a base negative twenty power move? However, the day I stopped giving the animations a pass is when they said they cut Pokémon for better animations.
...Are you kidding me? We’ve got Wingull hovering like drones and you cut precious Qwilfish for this???
This uh...this ain’t it chief.

More Kanto pandering: The champion of the region has a Goddamn Charizard. Unless there’s a secret new gimmick and Charizard gets a new form, that’s bull ****. Cut it out.

Dynamax: Pokemon get beeg. I admit there could be more to this, and I’m interested in seeing more, but as of right now that’s it.

The lack of national dex support: Yeah, this is really dumb. Unless there’s something in this game that was so incredibly crazy they just had to cut out Pokémon so this game could function, there is no real reason to not allow certain Pokémon to be transferred. And they’re not even gonna patch em in later? They’re just gonna rot in Pokémon Home until I get lucky with the next games? Come on guys...

And here comes the part that’ll get me crucified. We all know that saying anything good about Pokémon Sword and Shield is illegal, so after this I’m gonna hafta go on the run. Get those torches and pitchforks out, start the angry mob and get ready to lynch me, cuz here comes THE GOOD:

The graphics: Told ya it’d be complicated. Compared to other games on the market these games aren’t exactly graphical triumphs. But compared to other Pokémon games they’re beautiful! Especially the models. I know they’re reused but that shading man! It gets me. Maybe I have low standards but I think this game looks great.

The animations: I told ya it’d be complicated. Why didn’t you believe me? The character animations have been greatly improved in my opinion. Look at Sonia twirling her hair, look at Nessa waving at the crowd, look at Hop and Leon. Even your character emotes this time. Everyone is bursting with personality!

The Pokémon: I love these guys, one of the reasons I play Pokémon is for new monsters. I don’t even care about the old ones if I get great new ones. And these guys do not disappoint. Sobble, Scorbunny, Grookey, Corviknight, Yamper, Wooloo, even Impidimp! I adore all these babies and I cant wait to train them!

The Characters: I am very, very interested in the story this time around. Maybe it’s because the character design is so strong. How will Hop and his brother Leon interact? Is Leon actually the villain? Who are the evil team? How will the legendaries play into this? It makes me so excited!

Dynamax: There’s more to this feature that meets the eye. It’s a combination of Z Moves and Megas, it makes your Pokémon Kaijus for a time, and if leaks are to be believed this feature hides secrets. Secrets that I can’t wait to discover.

The Wild Area: I love this. I love this so much. An open world area in a Pokémon game? Hell yeah! I can’t wait to just spend hours wandering around this place. Gamefreak makes very, very slow improvements over time. And I fully believe this is the first step to a fully open world Pokémon game...in like, 12 years.

Max Raids: Teaming up with your friends to take on giant Pokémon roaming the world. That’s rad.

The music: We haven’t heard much, but from what we’ve heard I think this soundtrack is gonna be incredible. Gym leaders get their own unique battle theme, that’s awesome!

The little things: When I play Pokémon I self insert. It’s a fantasy I get to live out where my life isn’t ****, I’m a trainer in an amazing world! And the little touches add to that fantasy. In gym battles, the crowd cheers when you knock out a Pokémon. And they sing along to the gym battle music! There’s even a little animation of you and your Pokémon celebrating after you beat a gym leader! And the gym leaders talk smack while you’re battling! And it’s all just so good!!!

Look. These games definitely have problems. Big problems. Problems that make the game unplayable to some people, and that’s okay.

But I really hate when people act like there’s absolutely positively zero redeeming qualities in this game. And I hate it even more when people act like the folks who do see redeeming qualities in this game are nothing but gamefreak bootlickers. Like it’s impossible to see anything fun in this game. Like they refuse to acknowledge that there is good in this game. You think it’s ****, therefore everyone must be and if they don’t they’re the product of nosferatu snorting coke while pregnant.

On the flip side, not everyone who’s upset is a toxic, mindless rage monster. There are legit issues with these games and they deserve to be criticized.

I just wish the fanbase would stop attacking each other, y’know? But this is the Internet, that ain’t happening any time soon.

The Pokémon fanbase, and the series as a whole is about to undergo a metamorphosis. An evolution, if you will.

After years and years of making excuses for the games by saying “the big one is coming next”, the big one has finally come and a ton of folks aren’t satisfied. This national dex policy change has upset many, and a lot of them straight up won’t buy the game. But for every person leaving the fanbase ten more come in. Boycotts probably won’t work, this game is gonna well amazingly regardless. At most it’ll sell 15 million instead of 15 million and one. Gamefreak is gonna get off Scott free with this. Maybe they’ll listen, and for gen 9 they’ll have a big everyone is here moment where they reveal every Pokémon is transferable. It’d be nice, but I don’t think so. They clearly don’t like this decision, but they’re sticking to their guns and in the end their sales won’t be impacted enough to make them care.

If this change really is permanent, I believe the fanbase will adapt. They’ll be mad for years, but you can’t be mad forever. Everyone that wants to leave will have left, and the fanbase will consist of those who don’t really care about the change and those who came in after the change. The Pokémon series will continue, it’ll probably be doing even better than it’s doing now, but it won’t be the same. Unless someone on the inside changes their mind, the era of having every Pokémon in one game is over.

Gamefreak has stated that their current priority is TOWN. Yeah, that game no one cares about. Why would they not prioritize the next big Pokémon game? Well, I don’t think Gamefreak dislikes making Pokémon games. But I think they want to be known for more. I think if you do the same thing for decades, even if you still love doing that thing, it’s natural to want to stretch your creative wings and try something different.

The problem comes from the fact that Gamefreak simply doesn’t have enough time.

They were juggling Ultra Sun and Moon, Let’s Go, TOWN, and Sword and Shield at the same time. And for a small studio that is a lot of manpower split between different projects. So why don’t they hire more people? They simply don’t want to.

Yeah, that’s stupid.

They like being a small studio, yet they want to develop tons of things at once. Why don’t they get another studio to help? They simply don’t want to.

Once again, that’s stupid.

But that’s how it is. You can try and make your voices heard but if this is how they wanna run things you can’t change anything. The games won’t be delayed, the anime and merchandise depend on the game releasing at a certain time. I still think patches are the way to go, but I don’t think they’ll go for it. Pokémon is too big and too many people just don’t care for it too fail. I’m not saying don’t criticize, do that all you want, but I don’t think it’ll amount to anything. Or maybe I’m just a Debbie downer, who knows.

Personally, in my eyes the pros of Sword and Shield outweigh the cons. I’m gonna buy it, and I’m gonna have the time of my life. For you, that may not be so. And that’s also okay. There’s no need to fight about this, y’know?

I hope Gamefreak expands their work force, or has another studio help one day. If they want a million projects then fine, but you have to have the recourses or it’s not gonna work out the way you want it. We could get truly amazing Pokémon games, games worthy of the title “biggest multimedia franchise on earth”, but they have to try harder. They have to expand their workforce and they have to really step it up. I believe it’ll happen one day, we’ll see.

In conclusion, be kind to each other. Things are about to get weird in this series and tearing each other apart isn’t gonna make things any better. If you’re buying the game, then have fun! I hope to play with you come November. If you’re not buying the game, then you do you. It’s not like I can stop you.

Attacking other internet people really doesn’t get you anywhere, so cut it out. That goes for both sides.


TLDR: I spent hours on this, I’m not letting you off the hook that easy. Scroll back up and read. Thanks.


If you’ve read up to here, then thank you. This isn’t really meant to be a message, I’m just rambling. Wanted to get this off my chest. I have no clue what the future holds for Pokémon. I have hope that it’ll get better, but I’m not psychic. We really just gotta wait and see. But whatever it is, I’m in for the long haul. This is my favorite series period, it’s one of the defining aspects of me as a human being. I can’t just abandon it, wherever this ride takes me I’m going.

So uh, yeah. Thanks for reading. Have a lovely day!

Bye!

On one hand, I agree that all the aggression and insults need to stop. As important as it is to so many of us, at the end of the day we all need to remember that Pokemon is just a silly game about collecting fictional monsters, and it's not worth attacking anyone over - even Masuda, as out of touch with his audience as he can be sometimes.

But on the other hand you smacked talked the Zard so you're a poo poo baby head.



Okay jokes aside I remember having an argument with someone back in the Gen 5 days. He was upset that "kids today won't know what Charizard is" because Kanto pokemon weren't in Black/White, all the while I was defending Charizard's absence from those games wasn't going to erase it from existence. Funny how the fandom got to the point where it is today...

 

[Noipoi]

On one hand, I agree that all the aggression and insults need to stop. As important as it is to so many of us, at the end of the day we all need to remember that Pokemon is just a silly game about collecting fictional monsters, and it's not worth attacking anyone over - even Masuda, as out of touch with his audience as he can be sometimes.

But on the other hand you smacked talked the Zard so you're a poo poo baby head.



Okay jokes aside I remember having an argument with someone back in the Gen 5 days. He was upset that "kids today won't know what Charizard is" because Kanto pokemon weren't in Black/White, all the while I was defending Charizard's absence from those games wasn't going to erase it from existence. Funny how the fandom got to the point where it is today...

History truly repeats itself.

It’s like pottery, it rhymes.

 

[Deleted member]

Aw man

had such a ****in awesome night with my bro

we ate snacks

drank a **** tone of coke

played smash

and watched wolf of wall street

 

[Deleted member]

Just finished my first exam.

Only two left today.

 

[BlondeLombax]

The Pokémon series is going through a major shift, so is the fanbase.

I try not to comment on the national dex controversy anymore, it always ends up in arguments and no one’s willing to listen to my points. But I’ve been thinking about this for a while and I thought I’d get it all out in one big ol Poke-post.

While I kinda speak pretty objectively here, these are all still my opinions. It’s cool if you disagree.

Spoiler: big ol Poke-post

Do I even have to say what’s going on with the Pokémon community right now?

After the incredibly controversial Nintendo treehouse presentation where we learned not every Pokémon would be in the new games the fanbase has been going insane. Memes about smuggling Pokémon into Galar and N64 trees and hovering Wingulls. And most of all, constant #Bringbackthenationaldex posts. And after Masuda’s recent message (which was basically “no lol”) it’s gotten even worse. Suddenly Sword and Shield are games birthed from Satan’s butthole, and if you like them you’re a baby eater who should be burned alive!

...Okay that’s an exaggeration. But it certainly seems like that sometimes.

But this sudden shift in tone wasn’t completely random, the national dex was simply the straw that broke the Camerupts back.

Let’s take it back to almost a decade ago. 2010.

Pokémon Black and White came out, to...mixed reactions. Some praised it as one of the best Pokémon experiences yet! Others raked it over the coals for daring to be a Pokémon game without Pikachu and Charizard! Gamefreak wanted gen 5 to be a bit of a soft reboot, so for the first time since gen 1 the only Pokémon available during the main story are the new ones. At the time, people hated this. And while most agree this game was pretty cool now, back in the day you’d think it was spawned from Cthulhu’s urethra. “A garbage Pokémon? An ice cream Pokémon?? These games are ****! Where’s Mewtwo?” It’s all you seemed to hear about these games. Nothing about the cool story, or the fun characters, or the bad *** that is Hydreigon. All people seemed to care about was the ice cream Pokémon and how it replaced Eevee. I’m pretty sure the modern idea of a genwunner was spawned in this era of the series.

Masuda (who is now seen as an evil Thanos monster for snapping away everyone’s Pokémon, but in 2010 he was the guy responsible for black and white) had to have taken this hard. He poured his heart and soul into these games, he’d do interviews and write on his blog and just go on and on about his ideas and how excited he was. And I’d say his work payed off! But no one was focused on that. All that mattered was Trubbish. If I spent years of my life on my magnum opus and people only payed attention to one aspect that isn’t a big deal in the first place, I’d be devastated. Now I can’t say for sure, but I think this is where some of the modern problems of Pokémon came from. But we’ll get back to that.

Flash forward to 2013. Pokémon X and Y are not only the newest generation of Pokémon games set to release in October, but they’re in the THIRD DIMENSION! That’s right, the game’s have jumped from the DS to the 3DS and are now in 3D! I still remember how I felt seeing a 3D main series Pokémon game for the first time. It was really something special. Now throughout these games hype season expectations were sky-high. Black and White 2 were amazing, and we all expected these games to follow that trend. But upon the game’s release we realized that wasn’t quite the case. Don’t get me wrong, the games were fine. But they were just that, fine. They were decent enough, serviceable, run of the mill Pokémon games. The last pair of games were amazing, these were okay. That’s not what I was expecting.

These games felt rushed. The story was virtually non existent for the first half of the game, then clumsily shoved in your face during the second half. The box legends of the games did nothing substantial in the story except for being captured off screen by Team Flare (Speaking of Team Flare, their the worst team in the whole series). It just felt incomplete, like there was more to be done here. Were these problems fixed in the Z version?

No. There was no Z version.

X and Y were also very affected by the black and white backlash. In Unova there were no past generation Pokémon. In Kalos there’s nothing but past gen Pokémon! You like Hoppip? There it is! Poochyena fan? He’s right over there! You like Stunfisk? No you don’t. No one likes Stunfisk. But he’s here anyway. Sure there are 70 new Pokémon, but who cares about new Pokémon? All the oldies are here! You never have to worry about a Unova situation again!

But most of all, more than any other region. There. Was. Kanto. The regional dex? Pumped full of Kanto. You like the Kanto starters, here ya go, we’re just giving them away! That fancy new mega evolution gimmick? The majority are from Kanto. Charizard and Mewtwo got two megas. Because they’re from Kanto, and that makes them perfect. Gamefreak clearly saw people on Facebook were pissed that Zubat wasn’t in Unova, so they made sure they never left Kanto out again. Stroking that Kanto nostalgia boner 24/7. We’re still feeling the ramifications of this to this day.

X and Y were deeply impacted by fan backlash. They were a turning point for this series, but not the ultimate turning point. That comes later.

One year later, Omega Ruby and Alpha Sapphire released. The culmination of fan demand that rivals the cries for Ridley in smash, Hoenn was finally confirmed and by that November we had the games in our greedy paws. These games, while feeling more complete than X and Y before it, still suffered from some of the same problems. Namely lack of difficulty and barren post game content. Which was made worse by the teasing of the battle frontier. Why put in a reference to the battle frontier if you never intended to implement it!?

Well the answers simple. Masuda, now a changed man from the Black and White backlash, seems to think that mobile games are the future. According to him, in this modern world where kids have so many entertainment options in the palm of their hand, why would they feel compelled to waste their time in a post game facility? They’ll play the story and be done with it, so what’s the point of adding anything after the story? Ignore the millions of older fans who would love post game features, they don’t matter. We all laughed at his ideas on mobile games, but little did we know his opinion would be validated in just a few years.

Both X and Y and ORAS had a plethora of issues. But we excused them by saying things like “it’s their first 3D game, give em a break” “they had to make hundreds of models, so they had less dev time” and other similar sayings. We always made excuses for Gamefreak.

In 2015 there was nothing. We were all positive there would be a Z version to fix up X and Y, but there was no such thing. During Pokémon’s year long absence Yokai-Watch got pretty big with Japanese children, Gamefreak’s target audience. And even though Pokémon is so big absolutely nothing could destroy it, I still believe Gamefreak got a little shook.

2016 was an absolutely huge year for Pokémon. But not for the reasons you may think. Before we get to that, let’s dive into the main topic. For their 20th anniversary Gamefreak launched the 7th generation of the series. Taking place in the bright and sunny alola region, Pokémon Sun and Moon enter the ring!

These games were a vast improvement on X and Y. Everything they did Gen 7 did better. Better story, better evil team, better music, better characters, harder difficulty (okay it was still easy but it was slightly more difficult) it was definitely a step up. And yet, their were still problems.

While I personally enjoyed the story of Lillie and her family drama, I agree with the sentiment that it was way too intrusive. You couldn’t walk five steps without somebody stopping you. And these cutscenes weren’t exactly well animated. Tell me if this sounds familiar.

Fade in. Hau takes three steps, stops, turns, takes three more steps towards you. “Hey main character! I sure do love malasada! Here’s some revives!” Hau then walks three steps, stops, turns, and walks three more steps off screen. Fade to black.

That’s it. That’s every cutscene with every character. Aside from the few pre rendered ones which actually look pretty good, this is what you’re doing for most of the game. If you like these characters like I do, it may not be so bad. But if you hate these guys the experience is probably excruciating. Not to mention your character has the exact same reaction to everything. You just got a Z Crystal? . Team Skull kidnapped a Pokémon! . Lusamine’s about to destroy the world with her alien fetish! . The player characters actually seem to emote in Sword and Shield, so that’s a plus. Alola also lacked meaningful post game content, and while it was more difficult than X and Y it was still piss easy.

So while Sun and Moon were most certainly a step up in every way from the games before it, they still weren’t amazing. The hype for sun and Moon was incredible, we were whipped up in such a frenzy we nearly lost our minds. Every new trailer, every new theory or leak, every new Pokémon got us even more excited. And we swore the line used in the first trailer “It all comes together!” meant this game was gonna be the ultimate Pokémon game. So when it was just another Pokémon game, we were pretty disappointed. Well I wasn’t, but others were. In the end Pokémon Sun and Moon were fun. And while that’s all I need, others not so much. But Sun and Moon weren’t the only Pokémon games released that year.

What if Pokémon were in real life? Okay not actually in real life, but on your phone? That’s right, it’s time to talk about POKÉMON GO! The game that saved/killed the series!

I wasn’t alive for the original pokemania. The cultural phenomenon that hit the world in the late 90s when Pokémon first got big. The all encompassing excitement for these pocket monsters that was shared by everyone, from the school playground to the workplace. But I imagine it was similar to the summer of Pokémon Go. It was insane, everyone was doing it. And I do mean everyone. With normal Pokémon games you needed the game and a Nintendo console. With Pokémon Go all you needed was a phone. And everyone has a phone! That means everyone could get in on this trend, and it certainly felt like it. My mom was into it! I don’t think my mom has ever played a video game in her life, that’s crazy!

And yet, as much fun as we were having, little did we know what was happening behind the scenes. Masuda (The evil goblin monkey responsible for killing all your Pokémon) had felt that mobile games were stealing away all the kiddies for a while now. And Pokémon Go’s success sealed the deal. He now had real evidence that mobile was the way to go. A huge chunk of the Pokémon series’ total revenue earned in their entire existence was from Pokémon Go. That’s a big deal, and Masuda knew. He was probably saying a lot of “Told ya so”s back at Gamefreak HQ.

After winning back the hearts of children from Yokai Watch, Pokémon was at the top again and Gamefreak knew what they had to do. Kids and casual players are the big money makers, they’re the ones we need to market to.

Cue 2017, where everyone’s dreams of Gen 4 remakes were dashed by the reveal of Ultra Sun & Ultra Moon. That’s right, if you enjoyed Pokémon Sun and Moon you can now enjoy it again with very little changed!

...why?

These games sparked a truckload of questions. Why do they exist? Why aren’t they DP remakes? Why aren’t they Pokémon Stars? And most surprisingly, Why aren’t they on the Switch.

Nintendo’s newest hybrid console was doing amazing. After launching with Zelda’s newest legendary title and with the promise of a new Splatoon and a new 3D Mario in the way, They were on top of the world. Especially after the failure that was the Wii U, this was great to see.

Seeing as how this console was a hybrid between a home console and a handheld, many were wondering if Pokémon, one of Nintendo’s premier handheld series, would make the jump. And by wondering, I mean screaming. And in an almost sad attempt to make up for the mostly confused reactions to USUM, Gamefreak Confirmed that the next Pokémon games would be on the Nintendo Switch. Much to the fans joy!

We put up with the Ultra games for the whole of 2017. We put up with how they were the same damn games as before with an even worse story. We put up with the slightly improved but still not great post game. We put up with Mantine Surf and Alola Photo Club. We actually enjoyed the new Ultra Beasts and the Ultra Necrozma fight, they were pretty cool. We put up with everything, because we knew they games we truly wanted were coming.

Well...they weren’t coming yet.

We arrived in 2018 on a rainbow of hope. For the first five months of the year we would filled with dreams of the next generation! The first home console generation! Sure there was a dumb rumor that said the next games were Kanto remakes that incorporated Pokémon Go mechanics, but that’s stupid! They would never do that!

...right?

May 30th 2018 was a terrible day. I woke up with a crappy song stuck in my head, I saw a boring Star Wars spin off, I came home with a splitting head ache, I felt terrible, and to top it all off. To end this terrible day. The Pokémon game i’ve been waiting for...wasn’t coming this year.

Instead we got LET’S GO PIKACHU & LET’S GO EEVEE. Kanto remakes that borrow elements from Pokémon Go and are all around super casual!

...yay?

Needless to say this is not what I wanted. The fanbase wasn’t having that much fun either. Motion controls? In my Pokémon games? Blasphemy! How could this be the big Pokémon Switch game? Well it wasn’t, the big switch game was coming in 2019. This was just something to cash in on the sweet, sweet casual market in the meantime.

You see, Pokémon Go was a huge hit. And one of the reasons it was a huge hit was because at first, it was only Kanto Pokémon. Whether you like it or not Kanto is the most recognizable region of Pokémon. If you walk up to some random guy on the street and say “name one Pokémon that isn’t Pikachu” they’ll probably say someone from Kanto. So to have only the Pokémon everyone recognized in an app everyone could play, it really brought in the casuals. These guys weren’t epic gamers, these guys were your parents and your nieces and nephews. So they decided to make a game for these dorks. Get some casual cash, and maybe get them to buy the next game.

And don’t get me wrong there’s nothing wrong with casual gamers. I think it’s wonderful that video games are reaching more people than ever before. I’m just not that big a fan of mobile game mechanics in my home console games. That’s just me.

Every time someone aired a grievance or concern about these games they’d get the same response. “These games aren’t for you. Wait until next year” as if the games were immune to criticism. Another example of fans waving away problems with the games because the big one was coming later.

Throughout 2017 and 2018 we powered through These games, because the game we wanted was coming next.

When LGPE released and I played it, it became apparent to me that it was not worth the uproar. These games were fine, if a little boring and safe for my tastes in Pokémon. It didn’t matter either way though, because the games I really wanted were on their way! At least I had Smash to keep me occupied until then.

We rode into 2019 on an even bigger rainbow of hope than before, knowing for sure that this was the year! This was the year our dreams came true!

February 26th 2019 was an amazing day. I woke up early in the morning, too early actually. I spent the hours by watching it’s always sunny and Brooklyn 99, until it was finally time. I rushed downstairs to grab my favorite flavor of ice cream vanilla chocolate chip, I turned on that Pokémon direct. And I watched in complete awe as I was shown my next Pokémon adventure. POKÉMON SWORD & SHIELD! I chose my starter (which would change eventually but that’s another story) I chose my version (Sword, baybee) and I got ready for November!

Finally, after two years of games I didn’t want. This game is for me! This game is exactly what I needed! And honestly I still feel that way, even after everything that’s happened.

After months of no news and an awesome Pokémon direct, every seemed to be in place for these games to be amazing!

And then disaster struck.

I don’t need to give you another recap, point is now everyone hates this game and I’m dumb bad dumb baby bad bad for liking it.

Right now I’m gonna break this game down into what I feel are the major goods and bads. It sounds simple but trust me, it gets complicated.

Let’s start with the one that’ll get me the most upvotes on r/ Pokémon. THE BAD:

The graphics: While I don’t think they look quite as bad as people make them out to be, they are pretty underwhelming. The Pokémon models new shading looks really great imo, but the overworld textures leave...a lot to be desired.

The animations: The Pokemon animations as they are right now are serviceable. Yes, even double kick. Do you really expect them to animate a four minute action sequence for 600 different Pokémon for a base negative twenty power move? However, the day I stopped giving the animations a pass is when they said they cut Pokémon for better animations.
...Are you kidding me? We’ve got Wingull hovering like drones and you cut precious Qwilfish for this???
This uh...this ain’t it chief.

More Kanto pandering: The champion of the region has a Goddamn Charizard. Unless there’s a secret new gimmick and Charizard gets a new form, that’s bull ****. Cut it out.

Dynamax: Pokemon get beeg. I admit there could be more to this, and I’m interested in seeing more, but as of right now that’s it.

The lack of national dex support: Yeah, this is really dumb. Unless there’s something in this game that was so incredibly crazy they just had to cut out Pokémon so this game could function, there is no real reason to not allow certain Pokémon to be transferred. And they’re not even gonna patch em in later? They’re just gonna rot in Pokémon Home until I get lucky with the next games? Come on guys...

And here comes the part that’ll get me crucified. We all know that saying anything good about Pokémon Sword and Shield is illegal, so after this I’m gonna hafta go on the run. Get those torches and pitchforks out, start the angry mob and get ready to lynch me, cuz here comes THE GOOD:

The graphics: Told ya it’d be complicated. Compared to other games on the market these games aren’t exactly graphical triumphs. But compared to other Pokémon games they’re beautiful! Especially the models. I know they’re reused but that shading man! It gets me. Maybe I have low standards but I think this game looks great.

The animations: I told ya it’d be complicated. Why didn’t you believe me? The character animations have been greatly improved in my opinion. Look at Sonia twirling her hair, look at Nessa waving at the crowd, look at Hop and Leon. Even your character emotes this time. Everyone is bursting with personality!

The Pokémon: I love these guys, one of the reasons I play Pokémon is for new monsters. I don’t even care about the old ones if I get great new ones. And these guys do not disappoint. Sobble, Scorbunny, Grookey, Corviknight, Yamper, Wooloo, even Impidimp! I adore all these babies and I cant wait to train them!

The Characters: I am very, very interested in the story this time around. Maybe it’s because the character design is so strong. How will Hop and his brother Leon interact? Is Leon actually the villain? Who are the evil team? How will the legendaries play into this? It makes me so excited!

Dynamax: There’s more to this feature that meets the eye. It’s a combination of Z Moves and Megas, it makes your Pokémon Kaijus for a time, and if leaks are to be believed this feature hides secrets. Secrets that I can’t wait to discover.

The Wild Area: I love this. I love this so much. An open world area in a Pokémon game? Hell yeah! I can’t wait to just spend hours wandering around this place. Gamefreak makes very, very slow improvements over time. And I fully believe this is the first step to a fully open world Pokémon game...in like, 12 years.

Max Raids: Teaming up with your friends to take on giant Pokémon roaming the world. That’s rad.

The music: We haven’t heard much, but from what we’ve heard I think this soundtrack is gonna be incredible. Gym leaders get their own unique battle theme, that’s awesome!

The little things: When I play Pokémon I self insert. It’s a fantasy I get to live out where my life isn’t ****, I’m a trainer in an amazing world! And the little touches add to that fantasy. In gym battles, the crowd cheers when you knock out a Pokémon. And they sing along to the gym battle music! There’s even a little animation of you and your Pokémon celebrating after you beat a gym leader! And the gym leaders talk smack while you’re battling! And it’s all just so good!!!

Look. These games definitely have problems. Big problems. Problems that make the game unplayable to some people, and that’s okay.

But I really hate when people act like there’s absolutely positively zero redeeming qualities in this game. And I hate it even more when people act like the folks who do see redeeming qualities in this game are nothing but gamefreak bootlickers. Like it’s impossible to see anything fun in this game. Like they refuse to acknowledge that there is good in this game. You think it’s ****, therefore everyone must be and if they don’t they’re the product of nosferatu snorting coke while pregnant.

On the flip side, not everyone who’s upset is a toxic, mindless rage monster. There are legit issues with these games and they deserve to be criticized.

I just wish the fanbase would stop attacking each other, y’know? But this is the Internet, that ain’t happening any time soon.

The Pokémon fanbase, and the series as a whole is about to undergo a metamorphosis. An evolution, if you will.

After years and years of making excuses for the games by saying “the big one is coming next”, the big one has finally come and a ton of folks aren’t satisfied. This national dex policy change has upset many, and a lot of them straight up won’t buy the game. But for every person leaving the fanbase ten more come in. Boycotts probably won’t work, this game is gonna well amazingly regardless. At most it’ll sell 15 million instead of 15 million and one. Gamefreak is gonna get off Scott free with this. Maybe they’ll listen, and for gen 9 they’ll have a big everyone is here moment where they reveal every Pokémon is transferable. It’d be nice, but I don’t think so. They clearly don’t like this decision, but they’re sticking to their guns and in the end their sales won’t be impacted enough to make them care.

If this change really is permanent, I believe the fanbase will adapt. They’ll be mad for years, but you can’t be mad forever. Everyone that wants to leave will have left, and the fanbase will consist of those who don’t really care about the change and those who came in after the change. The Pokémon series will continue, it’ll probably be doing even better than it’s doing now, but it won’t be the same. Unless someone on the inside changes their mind, the era of having every Pokémon in one game is over.

Gamefreak has stated that their current priority is TOWN. Yeah, that game no one cares about. Why would they not prioritize the next big Pokémon game? Well, I don’t think Gamefreak dislikes making Pokémon games. But I think they want to be known for more. I think if you do the same thing for decades, even if you still love doing that thing, it’s natural to want to stretch your creative wings and try something different.

The problem comes from the fact that Gamefreak simply doesn’t have enough time.

They were juggling Ultra Sun and Moon, Let’s Go, TOWN, and Sword and Shield at the same time. And for a small studio that is a lot of manpower split between different projects. So why don’t they hire more people? They simply don’t want to.

Yeah, that’s stupid.

They like being a small studio, yet they want to develop tons of things at once. Why don’t they get another studio to help? They simply don’t want to.

Once again, that’s stupid.

But that’s how it is. You can try and make your voices heard but if this is how they wanna run things you can’t change anything. The games won’t be delayed, the anime and merchandise depend on the game releasing at a certain time. I still think patches are the way to go, but I don’t think they’ll go for it. Pokémon is too big and too many people just don’t care for it too fail. I’m not saying don’t criticize, do that all you want, but I don’t think it’ll amount to anything. Or maybe I’m just a Debbie downer, who knows.

Personally, in my eyes the pros of Sword and Shield outweigh the cons. I’m gonna buy it, and I’m gonna have the time of my life. For you, that may not be so. And that’s also okay. There’s no need to fight about this, y’know?

I hope Gamefreak expands their work force, or has another studio help one day. If they want a million projects then fine, but you have to have the recourses or it’s not gonna work out the way you want it. We could get truly amazing Pokémon games, games worthy of the title “biggest multimedia franchise on earth”, but they have to try harder. They have to expand their workforce and they have to really step it up. I believe it’ll happen one day, we’ll see.

In conclusion, be kind to each other. Things are about to get weird in this series and tearing each other apart isn’t gonna make things any better. If you’re buying the game, then have fun! I hope to play with you come November. If you’re not buying the game, then you do you. It’s not like I can stop you.

Attacking other internet people really doesn’t get you anywhere, so cut it out. That goes for both sides.


TLDR: I spent hours on this, I’m not letting you off the hook that easy. Scroll back up and read. Thanks.


If you’ve read up to here, then thank you. This isn’t really meant to be a message, I’m just rambling. Wanted to get this off my chest. I have no clue what the future holds for Pokémon. I have hope that it’ll get better, but I’m not psychic. We really just gotta wait and see. But whatever it is, I’m in for the long haul. This is my favorite series period, it’s one of the defining aspects of me as a human being. I can’t just abandon it, wherever this ride takes me I’m going.

So uh, yeah. Thanks for reading. Have a lovely day!

Bye!

As someone who only recently got into Pokemon through Sun and Moon, this whole controversy has little effect on Sword and Shield. The graphics are also nothing that I'm worried about; remember, Lemmy had no face in Ultimate last year. Thanks for lessening my growing anxiety in terms of the safety of Game Freak.

Still torn on my SwSh starter, though. Gonna have to wait and see the final evos.

 

[Deleted member]

Sword & Shield seems like anything but a bad game.

And besides, it's not the first time that we got some Pokémon unavailable in a main game (gen 3 pulled a similar thing).

It is fine if you don't want to buy the game, but let people who do enjoy it.

 

[Noipoi]

As someone who only recently got into Pokemon through Sun and Moon, this whole controversy has little effect on Sword and Shield. The graphics are also nothing that I'm worried about; remember, Lemmy had no face in Ultimate last year. Thanks for lessening my growing anxiety in terms of the safety of Game Freak.

Still torn on my SwSh starter, though. Gonna have to wait and see the final evos.

Thanks for reading that whole thing, took me five hours and when I was done I thought “why did I write this? No one’s gonna read all this crap.”

Sword & Shield seems like anything but a bad game.

And besides, it's not the first time that we got some Pokémon unavailable in a main game (gen 3 pulled a similar thing).

It is fine if you don't want to buy the game, but let people who do enjoy it.

Don’t you get it?

I don’t like it, therefore no one can./s

 

[Deleted member]

Spoiler: Kind of an intense and maybe odd question, but I have the need to ask it

Does some people here dislike the idea of people being born?

Yes, this sounds pretty strong... But I've sadly met people who do IRL.

 

[osby]

Spoiler: Kind of an intense and maybe odd question, but I have the need to ask it

Does some people here dislike the idea of people being born?

Yes, this sounds pretty strong... But I've sadly met people who do IRL.

It's really a heavy topic for here, but I guess some people want extreme birth control measures because human population is getting too big for Earth to sustain us.

I don't have a problem with it, though I find it foolish to have more kids than you can realistically take care of.

 

[Deleted member]

In a bit more than half an hour I will have to be out again for the next exam.

While the past one went well, I hope this one is English so I can get through it pretty easily.

 

[ZephyrZ]

Personally if I were to ever have children, I'd rather adopt one who already needs a home then bring a new one into existence.

Chances are though I'll probably never be in the position where I think I could handle a kid.

 

[Noipoi]

Havin two kids and adopting two kids.

Perfectly balanced, just how purple daddy likes it.

 

[PLATINUM7]

Havin two kids and adopting two kids.

Perfectly balanced, just how purple daddy likes it.

Sounds like a study.

 

[Deleted member]

Just came back from the English exam.

That thing is a locked 10 mark.

 

[Cutie Gwen]

It's really a heavy topic for here, but I guess some people want extreme birth control measures because human population is getting too big for Earth to sustain us.

I don't have a problem with it, though I find it foolish to have more kids than you can realistically take care of.

I mean the actual issue there is bad management of food and stuff, not overpopulation

 

[Professor Pumpkaboo]

Spoiler: Kind of an intense and maybe odd question, but I have the need to ask it

Does some people here dislike the idea of people being born?

Yes, this sounds pretty strong... But I've sadly met people who do IRL.

This world dont need more people

 

[Deleted member]

Well, I have around two hours left before the next and last exam of today.

 

[Professor Pumpkaboo]

damn, dragon quest builders is sneeking up on me hella fast

 

[Deleted member]

Hopefully my AMA doesn't start around 15:30 since my last exam today is at that time.

 

[Professor Pumpkaboo]

You think they will add more then miku in this switch project diva game or are they gonna continue to shover her songs down out throat? I oh so wish they would give the others attention

 

[SnakeFighter64]

History truly repeats itself.

It’s like pottery, it rhymes.

Ah yes. One cannot truly build a ceramic jug unless it rhymes in its construction.

 

[Deleted member]

The Pokémon series is going through a major shift, so is the fanbase.

I try not to comment on the national dex controversy anymore, it always ends up in arguments and no one’s willing to listen to my points. But I’ve been thinking about this for a while and I thought I’d get it all out in one big ol Poke-post.

While I kinda speak pretty objectively here, these are all still my opinions. It’s cool if you disagree.

Spoiler: big ol Poke-post

Do I even have to say what’s going on with the Pokémon community right now?

After the incredibly controversial Nintendo treehouse presentation where we learned not every Pokémon would be in the new games the fanbase has been going insane. Memes about smuggling Pokémon into Galar and N64 trees and hovering Wingulls. And most of all, constant #Bringbackthenationaldex posts. And after Masuda’s recent message (which was basically “no lol”) it’s gotten even worse. Suddenly Sword and Shield are games birthed from Satan’s butthole, and if you like them you’re a baby eater who should be burned alive!

...Okay that’s an exaggeration. But it certainly seems like that sometimes.

But this sudden shift in tone wasn’t completely random, the national dex was simply the straw that broke the Camerupts back.

Let’s take it back to almost a decade ago. 2010.

Pokémon Black and White came out, to...mixed reactions. Some praised it as one of the best Pokémon experiences yet! Others raked it over the coals for daring to be a Pokémon game without Pikachu and Charizard! Gamefreak wanted gen 5 to be a bit of a soft reboot, so for the first time since gen 1 the only Pokémon available during the main story are the new ones. At the time, people hated this. And while most agree this game was pretty cool now, back in the day you’d think it was spawned from Cthulhu’s urethra. “A garbage Pokémon? An ice cream Pokémon?? These games are ****! Where’s Mewtwo?” It’s all you seemed to hear about these games. Nothing about the cool story, or the fun characters, or the bad *** that is Hydreigon. All people seemed to care about was the ice cream Pokémon and how it replaced Eevee. I’m pretty sure the modern idea of a genwunner was spawned in this era of the series.

Masuda (who is now seen as an evil Thanos monster for snapping away everyone’s Pokémon, but in 2010 he was the guy responsible for black and white) had to have taken this hard. He poured his heart and soul into these games, he’d do interviews and write on his blog and just go on and on about his ideas and how excited he was. And I’d say his work payed off! But no one was focused on that. All that mattered was Trubbish. If I spent years of my life on my magnum opus and people only payed attention to one aspect that isn’t a big deal in the first place, I’d be devastated. Now I can’t say for sure, but I think this is where some of the modern problems of Pokémon came from. But we’ll get back to that.

Flash forward to 2013. Pokémon X and Y are not only the newest generation of Pokémon games set to release in October, but they’re in the THIRD DIMENSION! That’s right, the game’s have jumped from the DS to the 3DS and are now in 3D! I still remember how I felt seeing a 3D main series Pokémon game for the first time. It was really something special. Now throughout these games hype season expectations were sky-high. Black and White 2 were amazing, and we all expected these games to follow that trend. But upon the game’s release we realized that wasn’t quite the case. Don’t get me wrong, the games were fine. But they were just that, fine. They were decent enough, serviceable, run of the mill Pokémon games. The last pair of games were amazing, these were okay. That’s not what I was expecting.

These games felt rushed. The story was virtually non existent for the first half of the game, then clumsily shoved in your face during the second half. The box legends of the games did nothing substantial in the story except for being captured off screen by Team Flare (Speaking of Team Flare, their the worst team in the whole series). It just felt incomplete, like there was more to be done here. Were these problems fixed in the Z version?

No. There was no Z version.

X and Y were also very affected by the black and white backlash. In Unova there were no past generation Pokémon. In Kalos there’s nothing but past gen Pokémon! You like Hoppip? There it is! Poochyena fan? He’s right over there! You like Stunfisk? No you don’t. No one likes Stunfisk. But he’s here anyway. Sure there are 70 new Pokémon, but who cares about new Pokémon? All the oldies are here! You never have to worry about a Unova situation again!

But most of all, more than any other region. There. Was. Kanto. The regional dex? Pumped full of Kanto. You like the Kanto starters, here ya go, we’re just giving them away! That fancy new mega evolution gimmick? The majority are from Kanto. Charizard and Mewtwo got two megas. Because they’re from Kanto, and that makes them perfect. Gamefreak clearly saw people on Facebook were pissed that Zubat wasn’t in Unova, so they made sure they never left Kanto out again. Stroking that Kanto nostalgia boner 24/7. We’re still feeling the ramifications of this to this day.

X and Y were deeply impacted by fan backlash. They were a turning point for this series, but not the ultimate turning point. That comes later.

One year later, Omega Ruby and Alpha Sapphire released. The culmination of fan demand that rivals the cries for Ridley in smash, Hoenn was finally confirmed and by that November we had the games in our greedy paws. These games, while feeling more complete than X and Y before it, still suffered from some of the same problems. Namely lack of difficulty and barren post game content. Which was made worse by the teasing of the battle frontier. Why put in a reference to the battle frontier if you never intended to implement it!?

Well the answers simple. Masuda, now a changed man from the Black and White backlash, seems to think that mobile games are the future. According to him, in this modern world where kids have so many entertainment options in the palm of their hand, why would they feel compelled to waste their time in a post game facility? They’ll play the story and be done with it, so what’s the point of adding anything after the story? Ignore the millions of older fans who would love post game features, they don’t matter. We all laughed at his ideas on mobile games, but little did we know his opinion would be validated in just a few years.

Both X and Y and ORAS had a plethora of issues. But we excused them by saying things like “it’s their first 3D game, give em a break” “they had to make hundreds of models, so they had less dev time” and other similar sayings. We always made excuses for Gamefreak.

In 2015 there was nothing. We were all positive there would be a Z version to fix up X and Y, but there was no such thing. During Pokémon’s year long absence Yokai-Watch got pretty big with Japanese children, Gamefreak’s target audience. And even though Pokémon is so big absolutely nothing could destroy it, I still believe Gamefreak got a little shook.

2016 was an absolutely huge year for Pokémon. But not for the reasons you may think. Before we get to that, let’s dive into the main topic. For their 20th anniversary Gamefreak launched the 7th generation of the series. Taking place in the bright and sunny alola region, Pokémon Sun and Moon enter the ring!

These games were a vast improvement on X and Y. Everything they did Gen 7 did better. Better story, better evil team, better music, better characters, harder difficulty (okay it was still easy but it was slightly more difficult) it was definitely a step up. And yet, their were still problems.

While I personally enjoyed the story of Lillie and her family drama, I agree with the sentiment that it was way too intrusive. You couldn’t walk five steps without somebody stopping you. And these cutscenes weren’t exactly well animated. Tell me if this sounds familiar.

Fade in. Hau takes three steps, stops, turns, takes three more steps towards you. “Hey main character! I sure do love malasada! Here’s some revives!” Hau then walks three steps, stops, turns, and walks three more steps off screen. Fade to black.

That’s it. That’s every cutscene with every character. Aside from the few pre rendered ones which actually look pretty good, this is what you’re doing for most of the game. If you like these characters like I do, it may not be so bad. But if you hate these guys the experience is probably excruciating. Not to mention your character has the exact same reaction to everything. You just got a Z Crystal? . Team Skull kidnapped a Pokémon! . Lusamine’s about to destroy the world with her alien fetish! . The player characters actually seem to emote in Sword and Shield, so that’s a plus. Alola also lacked meaningful post game content, and while it was more difficult than X and Y it was still piss easy.

So while Sun and Moon were most certainly a step up in every way from the games before it, they still weren’t amazing. The hype for sun and Moon was incredible, we were whipped up in such a frenzy we nearly lost our minds. Every new trailer, every new theory or leak, every new Pokémon got us even more excited. And we swore the line used in the first trailer “It all comes together!” meant this game was gonna be the ultimate Pokémon game. So when it was just another Pokémon game, we were pretty disappointed. Well I wasn’t, but others were. In the end Pokémon Sun and Moon were fun. And while that’s all I need, others not so much. But Sun and Moon weren’t the only Pokémon games released that year.

What if Pokémon were in real life? Okay not actually in real life, but on your phone? That’s right, it’s time to talk about POKÉMON GO! The game that saved/killed the series!

I wasn’t alive for the original pokemania. The cultural phenomenon that hit the world in the late 90s when Pokémon first got big. The all encompassing excitement for these pocket monsters that was shared by everyone, from the school playground to the workplace. But I imagine it was similar to the summer of Pokémon Go. It was insane, everyone was doing it. And I do mean everyone. With normal Pokémon games you needed the game and a Nintendo console. With Pokémon Go all you needed was a phone. And everyone has a phone! That means everyone could get in on this trend, and it certainly felt like it. My mom was into it! I don’t think my mom has ever played a video game in her life, that’s crazy!

And yet, as much fun as we were having, little did we know what was happening behind the scenes. Masuda (The evil goblin monkey responsible for killing all your Pokémon) had felt that mobile games were stealing away all the kiddies for a while now. And Pokémon Go’s success sealed the deal. He now had real evidence that mobile was the way to go. A huge chunk of the Pokémon series’ total revenue earned in their entire existence was from Pokémon Go. That’s a big deal, and Masuda knew. He was probably saying a lot of “Told ya so”s back at Gamefreak HQ.

After winning back the hearts of children from Yokai Watch, Pokémon was at the top again and Gamefreak knew what they had to do. Kids and casual players are the big money makers, they’re the ones we need to market to.

Cue 2017, where everyone’s dreams of Gen 4 remakes were dashed by the reveal of Ultra Sun & Ultra Moon. That’s right, if you enjoyed Pokémon Sun and Moon you can now enjoy it again with very little changed!

...why?

These games sparked a truckload of questions. Why do they exist? Why aren’t they DP remakes? Why aren’t they Pokémon Stars? And most surprisingly, Why aren’t they on the Switch.

Nintendo’s newest hybrid console was doing amazing. After launching with Zelda’s newest legendary title and with the promise of a new Splatoon and a new 3D Mario in the way, They were on top of the world. Especially after the failure that was the Wii U, this was great to see.

Seeing as how this console was a hybrid between a home console and a handheld, many were wondering if Pokémon, one of Nintendo’s premier handheld series, would make the jump. And by wondering, I mean screaming. And in an almost sad attempt to make up for the mostly confused reactions to USUM, Gamefreak Confirmed that the next Pokémon games would be on the Nintendo Switch. Much to the fans joy!

We put up with the Ultra games for the whole of 2017. We put up with how they were the same damn games as before with an even worse story. We put up with the slightly improved but still not great post game. We put up with Mantine Surf and Alola Photo Club. We actually enjoyed the new Ultra Beasts and the Ultra Necrozma fight, they were pretty cool. We put up with everything, because we knew they games we truly wanted were coming.

Well...they weren’t coming yet.

We arrived in 2018 on a rainbow of hope. For the first five months of the year we would filled with dreams of the next generation! The first home console generation! Sure there was a dumb rumor that said the next games were Kanto remakes that incorporated Pokémon Go mechanics, but that’s stupid! They would never do that!

...right?

May 30th 2018 was a terrible day. I woke up with a crappy song stuck in my head, I saw a boring Star Wars spin off, I came home with a splitting head ache, I felt terrible, and to top it all off. To end this terrible day. The Pokémon game i’ve been waiting for...wasn’t coming this year.

Instead we got LET’S GO PIKACHU & LET’S GO EEVEE. Kanto remakes that borrow elements from Pokémon Go and are all around super casual!

...yay?

Needless to say this is not what I wanted. The fanbase wasn’t having that much fun either. Motion controls? In my Pokémon games? Blasphemy! How could this be the big Pokémon Switch game? Well it wasn’t, the big switch game was coming in 2019. This was just something to cash in on the sweet, sweet casual market in the meantime.

You see, Pokémon Go was a huge hit. And one of the reasons it was a huge hit was because at first, it was only Kanto Pokémon. Whether you like it or not Kanto is the most recognizable region of Pokémon. If you walk up to some random guy on the street and say “name one Pokémon that isn’t Pikachu” they’ll probably say someone from Kanto. So to have only the Pokémon everyone recognized in an app everyone could play, it really brought in the casuals. These guys weren’t epic gamers, these guys were your parents and your nieces and nephews. So they decided to make a game for these dorks. Get some casual cash, and maybe get them to buy the next game.

And don’t get me wrong there’s nothing wrong with casual gamers. I think it’s wonderful that video games are reaching more people than ever before. I’m just not that big a fan of mobile game mechanics in my home console games. That’s just me.

Every time someone aired a grievance or concern about these games they’d get the same response. “These games aren’t for you. Wait until next year” as if the games were immune to criticism. Another example of fans waving away problems with the games because the big one was coming later.

Throughout 2017 and 2018 we powered through These games, because the game we wanted was coming next.

When LGPE released and I played it, it became apparent to me that it was not worth the uproar. These games were fine, if a little boring and safe for my tastes in Pokémon. It didn’t matter either way though, because the games I really wanted were on their way! At least I had Smash to keep me occupied until then.

We rode into 2019 on an even bigger rainbow of hope than before, knowing for sure that this was the year! This was the year our dreams came true!

February 26th 2019 was an amazing day. I woke up early in the morning, too early actually. I spent the hours by watching it’s always sunny and Brooklyn 99, until it was finally time. I rushed downstairs to grab my favorite flavor of ice cream vanilla chocolate chip, I turned on that Pokémon direct. And I watched in complete awe as I was shown my next Pokémon adventure. POKÉMON SWORD & SHIELD! I chose my starter (which would change eventually but that’s another story) I chose my version (Sword, baybee) and I got ready for November!

Finally, after two years of games I didn’t want. This game is for me! This game is exactly what I needed! And honestly I still feel that way, even after everything that’s happened.

After months of no news and an awesome Pokémon direct, every seemed to be in place for these games to be amazing!

And then disaster struck.

I don’t need to give you another recap, point is now everyone hates this game and I’m dumb bad dumb baby bad bad for liking it.

Right now I’m gonna break this game down into what I feel are the major goods and bads. It sounds simple but trust me, it gets complicated.

Let’s start with the one that’ll get me the most upvotes on r/ Pokémon. THE BAD:

The graphics: While I don’t think they look quite as bad as people make them out to be, they are pretty underwhelming. The Pokémon models new shading looks really great imo, but the overworld textures leave...a lot to be desired.

The animations: The Pokemon animations as they are right now are serviceable. Yes, even double kick. Do you really expect them to animate a four minute action sequence for 600 different Pokémon for a base negative twenty power move? However, the day I stopped giving the animations a pass is when they said they cut Pokémon for better animations.
...Are you kidding me? We’ve got Wingull hovering like drones and you cut precious Qwilfish for this???
This uh...this ain’t it chief.

More Kanto pandering: The champion of the region has a Goddamn Charizard. Unless there’s a secret new gimmick and Charizard gets a new form, that’s bull ****. Cut it out.

Dynamax: Pokemon get beeg. I admit there could be more to this, and I’m interested in seeing more, but as of right now that’s it.

The lack of national dex support: Yeah, this is really dumb. Unless there’s something in this game that was so incredibly crazy they just had to cut out Pokémon so this game could function, there is no real reason to not allow certain Pokémon to be transferred. And they’re not even gonna patch em in later? They’re just gonna rot in Pokémon Home until I get lucky with the next games? Come on guys...

And here comes the part that’ll get me crucified. We all know that saying anything good about Pokémon Sword and Shield is illegal, so after this I’m gonna hafta go on the run. Get those torches and pitchforks out, start the angry mob and get ready to lynch me, cuz here comes THE GOOD:

The graphics: Told ya it’d be complicated. Compared to other games on the market these games aren’t exactly graphical triumphs. But compared to other Pokémon games they’re beautiful! Especially the models. I know they’re reused but that shading man! It gets me. Maybe I have low standards but I think this game looks great.

The animations: I told ya it’d be complicated. Why didn’t you believe me? The character animations have been greatly improved in my opinion. Look at Sonia twirling her hair, look at Nessa waving at the crowd, look at Hop and Leon. Even your character emotes this time. Everyone is bursting with personality!

The Pokémon: I love these guys, one of the reasons I play Pokémon is for new monsters. I don’t even care about the old ones if I get great new ones. And these guys do not disappoint. Sobble, Scorbunny, Grookey, Corviknight, Yamper, Wooloo, even Impidimp! I adore all these babies and I cant wait to train them!

The Characters: I am very, very interested in the story this time around. Maybe it’s because the character design is so strong. How will Hop and his brother Leon interact? Is Leon actually the villain? Who are the evil team? How will the legendaries play into this? It makes me so excited!

Dynamax: There’s more to this feature that meets the eye. It’s a combination of Z Moves and Megas, it makes your Pokémon Kaijus for a time, and if leaks are to be believed this feature hides secrets. Secrets that I can’t wait to discover.

The Wild Area: I love this. I love this so much. An open world area in a Pokémon game? Hell yeah! I can’t wait to just spend hours wandering around this place. Gamefreak makes very, very slow improvements over time. And I fully believe this is the first step to a fully open world Pokémon game...in like, 12 years.

Max Raids: Teaming up with your friends to take on giant Pokémon roaming the world. That’s rad.

The music: We haven’t heard much, but from what we’ve heard I think this soundtrack is gonna be incredible. Gym leaders get their own unique battle theme, that’s awesome!

The little things: When I play Pokémon I self insert. It’s a fantasy I get to live out where my life isn’t ****, I’m a trainer in an amazing world! And the little touches add to that fantasy. In gym battles, the crowd cheers when you knock out a Pokémon. And they sing along to the gym battle music! There’s even a little animation of you and your Pokémon celebrating after you beat a gym leader! And the gym leaders talk smack while you’re battling! And it’s all just so good!!!

Look. These games definitely have problems. Big problems. Problems that make the game unplayable to some people, and that’s okay.

But I really hate when people act like there’s absolutely positively zero redeeming qualities in this game. And I hate it even more when people act like the folks who do see redeeming qualities in this game are nothing but gamefreak bootlickers. Like it’s impossible to see anything fun in this game. Like they refuse to acknowledge that there is good in this game. You think it’s ****, therefore everyone must be and if they don’t they’re the product of nosferatu snorting coke while pregnant.

On the flip side, not everyone who’s upset is a toxic, mindless rage monster. There are legit issues with these games and they deserve to be criticized.

I just wish the fanbase would stop attacking each other, y’know? But this is the Internet, that ain’t happening any time soon.

The Pokémon fanbase, and the series as a whole is about to undergo a metamorphosis. An evolution, if you will.

After years and years of making excuses for the games by saying “the big one is coming next”, the big one has finally come and a ton of folks aren’t satisfied. This national dex policy change has upset many, and a lot of them straight up won’t buy the game. But for every person leaving the fanbase ten more come in. Boycotts probably won’t work, this game is gonna well amazingly regardless. At most it’ll sell 15 million instead of 15 million and one. Gamefreak is gonna get off Scott free with this. Maybe they’ll listen, and for gen 9 they’ll have a big everyone is here moment where they reveal every Pokémon is transferable. It’d be nice, but I don’t think so. They clearly don’t like this decision, but they’re sticking to their guns and in the end their sales won’t be impacted enough to make them care.

If this change really is permanent, I believe the fanbase will adapt. They’ll be mad for years, but you can’t be mad forever. Everyone that wants to leave will have left, and the fanbase will consist of those who don’t really care about the change and those who came in after the change. The Pokémon series will continue, it’ll probably be doing even better than it’s doing now, but it won’t be the same. Unless someone on the inside changes their mind, the era of having every Pokémon in one game is over.

Gamefreak has stated that their current priority is TOWN. Yeah, that game no one cares about. Why would they not prioritize the next big Pokémon game? Well, I don’t think Gamefreak dislikes making Pokémon games. But I think they want to be known for more. I think if you do the same thing for decades, even if you still love doing that thing, it’s natural to want to stretch your creative wings and try something different.

The problem comes from the fact that Gamefreak simply doesn’t have enough time.

They were juggling Ultra Sun and Moon, Let’s Go, TOWN, and Sword and Shield at the same time. And for a small studio that is a lot of manpower split between different projects. So why don’t they hire more people? They simply don’t want to.

Yeah, that’s stupid.

They like being a small studio, yet they want to develop tons of things at once. Why don’t they get another studio to help? They simply don’t want to.

Once again, that’s stupid.

But that’s how it is. You can try and make your voices heard but if this is how they wanna run things you can’t change anything. The games won’t be delayed, the anime and merchandise depend on the game releasing at a certain time. I still think patches are the way to go, but I don’t think they’ll go for it. Pokémon is too big and too many people just don’t care for it too fail. I’m not saying don’t criticize, do that all you want, but I don’t think it’ll amount to anything. Or maybe I’m just a Debbie downer, who knows.

Personally, in my eyes the pros of Sword and Shield outweigh the cons. I’m gonna buy it, and I’m gonna have the time of my life. For you, that may not be so. And that’s also okay. There’s no need to fight about this, y’know?

I hope Gamefreak expands their work force, or has another studio help one day. If they want a million projects then fine, but you have to have the recourses or it’s not gonna work out the way you want it. We could get truly amazing Pokémon games, games worthy of the title “biggest multimedia franchise on earth”, but they have to try harder. They have to expand their workforce and they have to really step it up. I believe it’ll happen one day, we’ll see.

In conclusion, be kind to each other. Things are about to get weird in this series and tearing each other apart isn’t gonna make things any better. If you’re buying the game, then have fun! I hope to play with you come November. If you’re not buying the game, then you do you. It’s not like I can stop you.

Attacking other internet people really doesn’t get you anywhere, so cut it out. That goes for both sides.


TLDR: I spent hours on this, I’m not letting you off the hook that easy. Scroll back up and read. Thanks.


If you’ve read up to here, then thank you. This isn’t really meant to be a message, I’m just rambling. Wanted to get this off my chest. I have no clue what the future holds for Pokémon. I have hope that it’ll get better, but I’m not psychic. We really just gotta wait and see. But whatever it is, I’m in for the long haul. This is my favorite series period, it’s one of the defining aspects of me as a human being. I can’t just abandon it, wherever this ride takes me I’m going.

So uh, yeah. Thanks for reading. Have a lovely day!

Bye!

If you want my perspective, I still think people are gonna buy Pokemon Sword and Shield. If some fans hold Pokemon up to a high standard because it's one of the highest grossing video series in the world, then we'll also do well to remember it's one of the highest grossing series in the world. At most, it probably just wont sell as well as previous entries and Game Freak will learn from their mistake next time. Maybe they'll actually do Pokemon Gun so they can make an improved version of the game with fan complaints in mind.

As an Erdrick supporter, I can get what you're going through. I walked away from debates and waited for the content I wanted, and I got way more than I expected. Only thing to do is wait for Pokemon to do the same.

 

[SnakeFighter64]

Spoiler: Kind of an intense and maybe odd question, but I have the need to ask it

Does some people here dislike the idea of people being born?

Yes, this sounds pretty strong... But I've sadly met people who do IRL.

That’s... as someone who desperately wants kids, I am kind of scared of people like that. I hope they don’t get into power here. Hopefully we can find some way to shut them down.

 

[Gentlepanda]

The Pokémon series is going through a major shift, so is the fanbase.

I try not to comment on the national dex controversy anymore, it always ends up in arguments and no one’s willing to listen to my points. But I’ve been thinking about this for a while and I thought I’d get it all out in one big ol Poke-post.

While I kinda speak pretty objectively here, these are all still my opinions. It’s cool if you disagree.

Spoiler: big ol Poke-post

Do I even have to say what’s going on with the Pokémon community right now?

After the incredibly controversial Nintendo treehouse presentation where we learned not every Pokémon would be in the new games the fanbase has been going insane. Memes about smuggling Pokémon into Galar and N64 trees and hovering Wingulls. And most of all, constant #Bringbackthenationaldex posts. And after Masuda’s recent message (which was basically “no lol”) it’s gotten even worse. Suddenly Sword and Shield are games birthed from Satan’s butthole, and if you like them you’re a baby eater who should be burned alive!

...Okay that’s an exaggeration. But it certainly seems like that sometimes.

But this sudden shift in tone wasn’t completely random, the national dex was simply the straw that broke the Camerupts back.

Let’s take it back to almost a decade ago. 2010.

Pokémon Black and White came out, to...mixed reactions. Some praised it as one of the best Pokémon experiences yet! Others raked it over the coals for daring to be a Pokémon game without Pikachu and Charizard! Gamefreak wanted gen 5 to be a bit of a soft reboot, so for the first time since gen 1 the only Pokémon available during the main story are the new ones. At the time, people hated this. And while most agree this game was pretty cool now, back in the day you’d think it was spawned from Cthulhu’s urethra. “A garbage Pokémon? An ice cream Pokémon?? These games are ****! Where’s Mewtwo?” It’s all you seemed to hear about these games. Nothing about the cool story, or the fun characters, or the bad *** that is Hydreigon. All people seemed to care about was the ice cream Pokémon and how it replaced Eevee. I’m pretty sure the modern idea of a genwunner was spawned in this era of the series.

Masuda (who is now seen as an evil Thanos monster for snapping away everyone’s Pokémon, but in 2010 he was the guy responsible for black and white) had to have taken this hard. He poured his heart and soul into these games, he’d do interviews and write on his blog and just go on and on about his ideas and how excited he was. And I’d say his work payed off! But no one was focused on that. All that mattered was Trubbish. If I spent years of my life on my magnum opus and people only payed attention to one aspect that isn’t a big deal in the first place, I’d be devastated. Now I can’t say for sure, but I think this is where some of the modern problems of Pokémon came from. But we’ll get back to that.

Flash forward to 2013. Pokémon X and Y are not only the newest generation of Pokémon games set to release in October, but they’re in the THIRD DIMENSION! That’s right, the game’s have jumped from the DS to the 3DS and are now in 3D! I still remember how I felt seeing a 3D main series Pokémon game for the first time. It was really something special. Now throughout these games hype season expectations were sky-high. Black and White 2 were amazing, and we all expected these games to follow that trend. But upon the game’s release we realized that wasn’t quite the case. Don’t get me wrong, the games were fine. But they were just that, fine. They were decent enough, serviceable, run of the mill Pokémon games. The last pair of games were amazing, these were okay. That’s not what I was expecting.

These games felt rushed. The story was virtually non existent for the first half of the game, then clumsily shoved in your face during the second half. The box legends of the games did nothing substantial in the story except for being captured off screen by Team Flare (Speaking of Team Flare, their the worst team in the whole series). It just felt incomplete, like there was more to be done here. Were these problems fixed in the Z version?

No. There was no Z version.

X and Y were also very affected by the black and white backlash. In Unova there were no past generation Pokémon. In Kalos there’s nothing but past gen Pokémon! You like Hoppip? There it is! Poochyena fan? He’s right over there! You like Stunfisk? No you don’t. No one likes Stunfisk. But he’s here anyway. Sure there are 70 new Pokémon, but who cares about new Pokémon? All the oldies are here! You never have to worry about a Unova situation again!

But most of all, more than any other region. There. Was. Kanto. The regional dex? Pumped full of Kanto. You like the Kanto starters, here ya go, we’re just giving them away! That fancy new mega evolution gimmick? The majority are from Kanto. Charizard and Mewtwo got two megas. Because they’re from Kanto, and that makes them perfect. Gamefreak clearly saw people on Facebook were pissed that Zubat wasn’t in Unova, so they made sure they never left Kanto out again. Stroking that Kanto nostalgia boner 24/7. We’re still feeling the ramifications of this to this day.

X and Y were deeply impacted by fan backlash. They were a turning point for this series, but not the ultimate turning point. That comes later.

One year later, Omega Ruby and Alpha Sapphire released. The culmination of fan demand that rivals the cries for Ridley in smash, Hoenn was finally confirmed and by that November we had the games in our greedy paws. These games, while feeling more complete than X and Y before it, still suffered from some of the same problems. Namely lack of difficulty and barren post game content. Which was made worse by the teasing of the battle frontier. Why put in a reference to the battle frontier if you never intended to implement it!?

Well the answers simple. Masuda, now a changed man from the Black and White backlash, seems to think that mobile games are the future. According to him, in this modern world where kids have so many entertainment options in the palm of their hand, why would they feel compelled to waste their time in a post game facility? They’ll play the story and be done with it, so what’s the point of adding anything after the story? Ignore the millions of older fans who would love post game features, they don’t matter. We all laughed at his ideas on mobile games, but little did we know his opinion would be validated in just a few years.

Both X and Y and ORAS had a plethora of issues. But we excused them by saying things like “it’s their first 3D game, give em a break” “they had to make hundreds of models, so they had less dev time” and other similar sayings. We always made excuses for Gamefreak.

In 2015 there was nothing. We were all positive there would be a Z version to fix up X and Y, but there was no such thing. During Pokémon’s year long absence Yokai-Watch got pretty big with Japanese children, Gamefreak’s target audience. And even though Pokémon is so big absolutely nothing could destroy it, I still believe Gamefreak got a little shook.

2016 was an absolutely huge year for Pokémon. But not for the reasons you may think. Before we get to that, let’s dive into the main topic. For their 20th anniversary Gamefreak launched the 7th generation of the series. Taking place in the bright and sunny alola region, Pokémon Sun and Moon enter the ring!

These games were a vast improvement on X and Y. Everything they did Gen 7 did better. Better story, better evil team, better music, better characters, harder difficulty (okay it was still easy but it was slightly more difficult) it was definitely a step up. And yet, their were still problems.

While I personally enjoyed the story of Lillie and her family drama, I agree with the sentiment that it was way too intrusive. You couldn’t walk five steps without somebody stopping you. And these cutscenes weren’t exactly well animated. Tell me if this sounds familiar.

Fade in. Hau takes three steps, stops, turns, takes three more steps towards you. “Hey main character! I sure do love malasada! Here’s some revives!” Hau then walks three steps, stops, turns, and walks three more steps off screen. Fade to black.

That’s it. That’s every cutscene with every character. Aside from the few pre rendered ones which actually look pretty good, this is what you’re doing for most of the game. If you like these characters like I do, it may not be so bad. But if you hate these guys the experience is probably excruciating. Not to mention your character has the exact same reaction to everything. You just got a Z Crystal? . Team Skull kidnapped a Pokémon! . Lusamine’s about to destroy the world with her alien fetish! . The player characters actually seem to emote in Sword and Shield, so that’s a plus. Alola also lacked meaningful post game content, and while it was more difficult than X and Y it was still piss easy.

So while Sun and Moon were most certainly a step up in every way from the games before it, they still weren’t amazing. The hype for sun and Moon was incredible, we were whipped up in such a frenzy we nearly lost our minds. Every new trailer, every new theory or leak, every new Pokémon got us even more excited. And we swore the line used in the first trailer “It all comes together!” meant this game was gonna be the ultimate Pokémon game. So when it was just another Pokémon game, we were pretty disappointed. Well I wasn’t, but others were. In the end Pokémon Sun and Moon were fun. And while that’s all I need, others not so much. But Sun and Moon weren’t the only Pokémon games released that year.

What if Pokémon were in real life? Okay not actually in real life, but on your phone? That’s right, it’s time to talk about POKÉMON GO! The game that saved/killed the series!

I wasn’t alive for the original pokemania. The cultural phenomenon that hit the world in the late 90s when Pokémon first got big. The all encompassing excitement for these pocket monsters that was shared by everyone, from the school playground to the workplace. But I imagine it was similar to the summer of Pokémon Go. It was insane, everyone was doing it. And I do mean everyone. With normal Pokémon games you needed the game and a Nintendo console. With Pokémon Go all you needed was a phone. And everyone has a phone! That means everyone could get in on this trend, and it certainly felt like it. My mom was into it! I don’t think my mom has ever played a video game in her life, that’s crazy!

And yet, as much fun as we were having, little did we know what was happening behind the scenes. Masuda (The evil goblin monkey responsible for killing all your Pokémon) had felt that mobile games were stealing away all the kiddies for a while now. And Pokémon Go’s success sealed the deal. He now had real evidence that mobile was the way to go. A huge chunk of the Pokémon series’ total revenue earned in their entire existence was from Pokémon Go. That’s a big deal, and Masuda knew. He was probably saying a lot of “Told ya so”s back at Gamefreak HQ.

After winning back the hearts of children from Yokai Watch, Pokémon was at the top again and Gamefreak knew what they had to do. Kids and casual players are the big money makers, they’re the ones we need to market to.

Cue 2017, where everyone’s dreams of Gen 4 remakes were dashed by the reveal of Ultra Sun & Ultra Moon. That’s right, if you enjoyed Pokémon Sun and Moon you can now enjoy it again with very little changed!

...why?

These games sparked a truckload of questions. Why do they exist? Why aren’t they DP remakes? Why aren’t they Pokémon Stars? And most surprisingly, Why aren’t they on the Switch.

Nintendo’s newest hybrid console was doing amazing. After launching with Zelda’s newest legendary title and with the promise of a new Splatoon and a new 3D Mario in the way, They were on top of the world. Especially after the failure that was the Wii U, this was great to see.

Seeing as how this console was a hybrid between a home console and a handheld, many were wondering if Pokémon, one of Nintendo’s premier handheld series, would make the jump. And by wondering, I mean screaming. And in an almost sad attempt to make up for the mostly confused reactions to USUM, Gamefreak Confirmed that the next Pokémon games would be on the Nintendo Switch. Much to the fans joy!

We put up with the Ultra games for the whole of 2017. We put up with how they were the same damn games as before with an even worse story. We put up with the slightly improved but still not great post game. We put up with Mantine Surf and Alola Photo Club. We actually enjoyed the new Ultra Beasts and the Ultra Necrozma fight, they were pretty cool. We put up with everything, because we knew they games we truly wanted were coming.

Well...they weren’t coming yet.

We arrived in 2018 on a rainbow of hope. For the first five months of the year we would filled with dreams of the next generation! The first home console generation! Sure there was a dumb rumor that said the next games were Kanto remakes that incorporated Pokémon Go mechanics, but that’s stupid! They would never do that!

...right?

May 30th 2018 was a terrible day. I woke up with a crappy song stuck in my head, I saw a boring Star Wars spin off, I came home with a splitting head ache, I felt terrible, and to top it all off. To end this terrible day. The Pokémon game i’ve been waiting for...wasn’t coming this year.

Instead we got LET’S GO PIKACHU & LET’S GO EEVEE. Kanto remakes that borrow elements from Pokémon Go and are all around super casual!

...yay?

Needless to say this is not what I wanted. The fanbase wasn’t having that much fun either. Motion controls? In my Pokémon games? Blasphemy! How could this be the big Pokémon Switch game? Well it wasn’t, the big switch game was coming in 2019. This was just something to cash in on the sweet, sweet casual market in the meantime.

You see, Pokémon Go was a huge hit. And one of the reasons it was a huge hit was because at first, it was only Kanto Pokémon. Whether you like it or not Kanto is the most recognizable region of Pokémon. If you walk up to some random guy on the street and say “name one Pokémon that isn’t Pikachu” they’ll probably say someone from Kanto. So to have only the Pokémon everyone recognized in an app everyone could play, it really brought in the casuals. These guys weren’t epic gamers, these guys were your parents and your nieces and nephews. So they decided to make a game for these dorks. Get some casual cash, and maybe get them to buy the next game.

And don’t get me wrong there’s nothing wrong with casual gamers. I think it’s wonderful that video games are reaching more people than ever before. I’m just not that big a fan of mobile game mechanics in my home console games. That’s just me.

Every time someone aired a grievance or concern about these games they’d get the same response. “These games aren’t for you. Wait until next year” as if the games were immune to criticism. Another example of fans waving away problems with the games because the big one was coming later.

Throughout 2017 and 2018 we powered through These games, because the game we wanted was coming next.

When LGPE released and I played it, it became apparent to me that it was not worth the uproar. These games were fine, if a little boring and safe for my tastes in Pokémon. It didn’t matter either way though, because the games I really wanted were on their way! At least I had Smash to keep me occupied until then.

We rode into 2019 on an even bigger rainbow of hope than before, knowing for sure that this was the year! This was the year our dreams came true!

February 26th 2019 was an amazing day. I woke up early in the morning, too early actually. I spent the hours by watching it’s always sunny and Brooklyn 99, until it was finally time. I rushed downstairs to grab my favorite flavor of ice cream vanilla chocolate chip, I turned on that Pokémon direct. And I watched in complete awe as I was shown my next Pokémon adventure. POKÉMON SWORD & SHIELD! I chose my starter (which would change eventually but that’s another story) I chose my version (Sword, baybee) and I got ready for November!

Finally, after two years of games I didn’t want. This game is for me! This game is exactly what I needed! And honestly I still feel that way, even after everything that’s happened.

After months of no news and an awesome Pokémon direct, every seemed to be in place for these games to be amazing!

And then disaster struck.

I don’t need to give you another recap, point is now everyone hates this game and I’m dumb bad dumb baby bad bad for liking it.

Right now I’m gonna break this game down into what I feel are the major goods and bads. It sounds simple but trust me, it gets complicated.

Let’s start with the one that’ll get me the most upvotes on r/ Pokémon. THE BAD:

The graphics: While I don’t think they look quite as bad as people make them out to be, they are pretty underwhelming. The Pokémon models new shading looks really great imo, but the overworld textures leave...a lot to be desired.

The animations: The Pokemon animations as they are right now are serviceable. Yes, even double kick. Do you really expect them to animate a four minute action sequence for 600 different Pokémon for a base negative twenty power move? However, the day I stopped giving the animations a pass is when they said they cut Pokémon for better animations.
...Are you kidding me? We’ve got Wingull hovering like drones and you cut precious Qwilfish for this???
This uh...this ain’t it chief.

More Kanto pandering: The champion of the region has a Goddamn Charizard. Unless there’s a secret new gimmick and Charizard gets a new form, that’s bull ****. Cut it out.

Dynamax: Pokemon get beeg. I admit there could be more to this, and I’m interested in seeing more, but as of right now that’s it.

The lack of national dex support: Yeah, this is really dumb. Unless there’s something in this game that was so incredibly crazy they just had to cut out Pokémon so this game could function, there is no real reason to not allow certain Pokémon to be transferred. And they’re not even gonna patch em in later? They’re just gonna rot in Pokémon Home until I get lucky with the next games? Come on guys...

And here comes the part that’ll get me crucified. We all know that saying anything good about Pokémon Sword and Shield is illegal, so after this I’m gonna hafta go on the run. Get those torches and pitchforks out, start the angry mob and get ready to lynch me, cuz here comes THE GOOD:

The graphics: Told ya it’d be complicated. Compared to other games on the market these games aren’t exactly graphical triumphs. But compared to other Pokémon games they’re beautiful! Especially the models. I know they’re reused but that shading man! It gets me. Maybe I have low standards but I think this game looks great.

The animations: I told ya it’d be complicated. Why didn’t you believe me? The character animations have been greatly improved in my opinion. Look at Sonia twirling her hair, look at Nessa waving at the crowd, look at Hop and Leon. Even your character emotes this time. Everyone is bursting with personality!

The Pokémon: I love these guys, one of the reasons I play Pokémon is for new monsters. I don’t even care about the old ones if I get great new ones. And these guys do not disappoint. Sobble, Scorbunny, Grookey, Corviknight, Yamper, Wooloo, even Impidimp! I adore all these babies and I cant wait to train them!

The Characters: I am very, very interested in the story this time around. Maybe it’s because the character design is so strong. How will Hop and his brother Leon interact? Is Leon actually the villain? Who are the evil team? How will the legendaries play into this? It makes me so excited!

Dynamax: There’s more to this feature that meets the eye. It’s a combination of Z Moves and Megas, it makes your Pokémon Kaijus for a time, and if leaks are to be believed this feature hides secrets. Secrets that I can’t wait to discover.

The Wild Area: I love this. I love this so much. An open world area in a Pokémon game? Hell yeah! I can’t wait to just spend hours wandering around this place. Gamefreak makes very, very slow improvements over time. And I fully believe this is the first step to a fully open world Pokémon game...in like, 12 years.

Max Raids: Teaming up with your friends to take on giant Pokémon roaming the world. That’s rad.

The music: We haven’t heard much, but from what we’ve heard I think this soundtrack is gonna be incredible. Gym leaders get their own unique battle theme, that’s awesome!

The little things: When I play Pokémon I self insert. It’s a fantasy I get to live out where my life isn’t ****, I’m a trainer in an amazing world! And the little touches add to that fantasy. In gym battles, the crowd cheers when you knock out a Pokémon. And they sing along to the gym battle music! There’s even a little animation of you and your Pokémon celebrating after you beat a gym leader! And the gym leaders talk smack while you’re battling! And it’s all just so good!!!

Look. These games definitely have problems. Big problems. Problems that make the game unplayable to some people, and that’s okay.

But I really hate when people act like there’s absolutely positively zero redeeming qualities in this game. And I hate it even more when people act like the folks who do see redeeming qualities in this game are nothing but gamefreak bootlickers. Like it’s impossible to see anything fun in this game. Like they refuse to acknowledge that there is good in this game. You think it’s ****, therefore everyone must be and if they don’t they’re the product of nosferatu snorting coke while pregnant.

On the flip side, not everyone who’s upset is a toxic, mindless rage monster. There are legit issues with these games and they deserve to be criticized.

I just wish the fanbase would stop attacking each other, y’know? But this is the Internet, that ain’t happening any time soon.

The Pokémon fanbase, and the series as a whole is about to undergo a metamorphosis. An evolution, if you will.

After years and years of making excuses for the games by saying “the big one is coming next”, the big one has finally come and a ton of folks aren’t satisfied. This national dex policy change has upset many, and a lot of them straight up won’t buy the game. But for every person leaving the fanbase ten more come in. Boycotts probably won’t work, this game is gonna well amazingly regardless. At most it’ll sell 15 million instead of 15 million and one. Gamefreak is gonna get off Scott free with this. Maybe they’ll listen, and for gen 9 they’ll have a big everyone is here moment where they reveal every Pokémon is transferable. It’d be nice, but I don’t think so. They clearly don’t like this decision, but they’re sticking to their guns and in the end their sales won’t be impacted enough to make them care.

If this change really is permanent, I believe the fanbase will adapt. They’ll be mad for years, but you can’t be mad forever. Everyone that wants to leave will have left, and the fanbase will consist of those who don’t really care about the change and those who came in after the change. The Pokémon series will continue, it’ll probably be doing even better than it’s doing now, but it won’t be the same. Unless someone on the inside changes their mind, the era of having every Pokémon in one game is over.

Gamefreak has stated that their current priority is TOWN. Yeah, that game no one cares about. Why would they not prioritize the next big Pokémon game? Well, I don’t think Gamefreak dislikes making Pokémon games. But I think they want to be known for more. I think if you do the same thing for decades, even if you still love doing that thing, it’s natural to want to stretch your creative wings and try something different.

The problem comes from the fact that Gamefreak simply doesn’t have enough time.

They were juggling Ultra Sun and Moon, Let’s Go, TOWN, and Sword and Shield at the same time. And for a small studio that is a lot of manpower split between different projects. So why don’t they hire more people? They simply don’t want to.

Yeah, that’s stupid.

They like being a small studio, yet they want to develop tons of things at once. Why don’t they get another studio to help? They simply don’t want to.

Once again, that’s stupid.

But that’s how it is. You can try and make your voices heard but if this is how they wanna run things you can’t change anything. The games won’t be delayed, the anime and merchandise depend on the game releasing at a certain time. I still think patches are the way to go, but I don’t think they’ll go for it. Pokémon is too big and too many people just don’t care for it too fail. I’m not saying don’t criticize, do that all you want, but I don’t think it’ll amount to anything. Or maybe I’m just a Debbie downer, who knows.

Personally, in my eyes the pros of Sword and Shield outweigh the cons. I’m gonna buy it, and I’m gonna have the time of my life. For you, that may not be so. And that’s also okay. There’s no need to fight about this, y’know?

I hope Gamefreak expands their work force, or has another studio help one day. If they want a million projects then fine, but you have to have the recourses or it’s not gonna work out the way you want it. We could get truly amazing Pokémon games, games worthy of the title “biggest multimedia franchise on earth”, but they have to try harder. They have to expand their workforce and they have to really step it up. I believe it’ll happen one day, we’ll see.

In conclusion, be kind to each other. Things are about to get weird in this series and tearing each other apart isn’t gonna make things any better. If you’re buying the game, then have fun! I hope to play with you come November. If you’re not buying the game, then you do you. It’s not like I can stop you.

Attacking other internet people really doesn’t get you anywhere, so cut it out. That goes for both sides.


TLDR: I spent hours on this, I’m not letting you off the hook that easy. Scroll back up and read. Thanks.


If you’ve read up to here, then thank you. This isn’t really meant to be a message, I’m just rambling. Wanted to get this off my chest. I have no clue what the future holds for Pokémon. I have hope that it’ll get better, but I’m not psychic. We really just gotta wait and see. But whatever it is, I’m in for the long haul. This is my favorite series period, it’s one of the defining aspects of me as a human being. I can’t just abandon it, wherever this ride takes me I’m going.

So uh, yeah. Thanks for reading. Have a lovely day!

Bye!

noi this isn't just a pokepost it's longer than my entire end-of-year essay and commentary combined

 

[Professor Pumpkaboo]

Its your boy Ryujis birthday today!

Spoiler

 

[Deleted member]

By the way, y'all, I'm on Chapter 20 of FE Fates Conquest. If you're ever thinking of playing this game, make sure you have a plan before diving into this map like I'm doing because this is easily my least favorite map in the game.

You've got narrow platforms, you got flying enemies to attack you on these narrow platforms, you have flying enemies with bows and arrows so you can't just send a strong flier against them, you have wind that can move you and enemies onto the narrow platforms infested with rushing enemies, you have enemies with skills that seal your stats, you have enemies that can debuff your stats and freeze you in place, and you got Fuga himself who's just an asshole you have to fight in every route you play.

Straight up, I'm getting Fuga just so I can kill him off because this **** is obnoxious.

 

[Dyllybirdy]

noi this isn't just a pokepost it's longer than my entire end-of-year essay and commentary combined

Holy ****, I just saw it.

Did he jut write an entire ****ing book's worth of Pokemon stuff
I'm impressed.

 

[Ramen Tengoku]

noi this isn't just a pokepost it's longer than my entire end-of-year essay and commentary combined

Dude, this thing's longer than something Jones would post, which is quite the accomplishment ngl

 

[Deleted member]

noi this isn't just a pokepost it's longer than my entire end-of-year essay and commentary combined

Noipoi for writing staff.

Also where are these essays you've written Panda. Link?

 

[Deleted member]

I'm gonna dab.

dabs

 

[Dyllybirdy]

I'm gonna dab.

dabs

Ah well crap.

 

[Gentlepanda]

Also where are these essays you've written Panda. Link?

by end-of-year essays i mean boring university stuff

you won't catch ol panda writing essays longer than 100 words around here, no sir

 

[osby]

I'm gonna dab.

dabs

We need another direct.

 

[Deleted member]

View attachment 229899

Ah well crap.

You can't stop le dab.

Now to wait for my food to arrive at the desk of the university bar I'm in.

 

[Kirby Dragons]

I'm gonna dab.

dabs

Yo, you better stop with that. Next time you do that, I'm calling the police.

 

[Deleted member]

We need another direct.

We need JDCabrera's AMA.