Pokémon Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl

[Moonface]

Experience the nostalgic story from the Pokémon Diamond™ and Pokémon Pearl™ games in an adventure reborn on the Nintendo Switch™ system.

Adventures in the Pokémon Brilliant Diamond and Pokémon Shining Pearl games will take place in the Sinnoh region. Rich in nature and with Mount Coronet towering at its heart, Sinnoh is a land of many myths passed down through the ages. You’ll visit many different locations in the Sinnoh region, while striving to become the Champion of the Pokémon League.


The original story has been faithfully reproduced, and the sense of scale in the originals’ towns and routes has been carefully preserved. People who played Pokémon Diamond and Pokémon Pearl can revisit familiar places and relive familiar scenes once more. For those setting out through Sinnoh for the first time, plenty of new encounters and surprises await.

These remakes include easy-to-understand, player-friendly conveniences of the modern Pokémon series, plus up-close-and-personal Pokémon battle scenes.

Whether you played Pokémon Diamond or Pokémon Pearl back in the day or you’re encountering these games for the first time, there’s something for everyone to enjoy.

Well, this seemed to be the remake everyone was really hoping for, and if you were one of those people then consider your wish granted!

I haven't got any nostalgia for these titles, but I will say that the art style is actually really nice, especially in the environments. It looks like the character models are different in battles than in the overworld, which I guess was done to not need to drastically redo the Pokemon, but wasn't used for the overworld because they wanted a different art style.

Since I've not played the originals, what do people who did play them think of them? Also, what does everyone else think about these remakes?

[Dragon Lord]

Gen 4 was alright. Probably the last gen that had a better balance between good looking Pokemon compared to shit looking Pokemon before Pokemon designs started to take a major nosedive in Gen V and up.

As for Diamond and Pearl... eh. They were alright. Gen IV really shined when Platinum came out though, and it's too bad they didn't decide to do a remake of that one as well. Platinum was to Gen IV what Crystal was to Gen II. Gold and Silver were really good on their own, but Crystal elevated Gen II to a whole different level.

[Moonface]

What's the major differences that Platinum has that D/P lacked? I've never played a generational title and its corresponding third entry, so I don't really know the intricacies between them.

[Maniakkid25]

There was a story segment dedicated to Giratina in another dimension. That was the major draw IIRC, though there may have been others I'm forgetting.

[Dragon Lord]

It'd take a long time to list them all out, so here is a list of changes between the versions.

The main ones I really remember is that the female player character had a much cuter design. They were given more wintry clothes (since the Gen IV region was supposed to be colder), and there was a lot of snow added around places, I think.

Some move animations were changed and most looked a lot better from what I remember (you'll have to forgive me, it's been a long time since I played Diamond and Platinum).

Overall Platinum just received a lot of really nice touch ups around the game, with some QoL improvements and a lot of animation improvements to give the game a little more life.

[Moonface]

I think some of those differences could be put into these games, like the area redesigns and such. It'd be neat if the clothing changes are made as optional choices for a player to choose from. I definitely can't see any decent reason to not implement some of those changes, especially since these are remakes and would easily get away with taking a few creative liberties with things.

[ShiraNoMai]

Yeah I was gonna say, aside from the story side stuff, the visual upgrades from D/P to Platinum will be applied and more, much like how any of the other remakes did so as well (FireRed/LeafGreen, HeartGold/SoulSilver, etc), so that gets covered.

D/P/P were my least favorite adventures and experiences I've had with the series. This was the first series of games I also didn't get all versions for, and I never finished it (I was severely underleveled for the Elite Four and the grinding in that game was absolute ass (no re-battles, highest level wild Pokemon was no where near good enough to gain worthwhile EXP)). That all being said, I will be trying these remakes out as I intend to try and finish them this time around.

[Karo]

So honestly I'm not really that excited about this graphically I'm not a big fan of chibi 3D remakes of the D/P/PT graphics over the Sword & Shield artstyle or the lets go artstyle. I probably will pick it up at some point, but I really don't think I'm going to be picking it up at anytime soon and much like Nikki I believe Platinum was the first time I started getting burnt out on Pokemon and not finishing it like I'm pretty sure on my platinum run I got to the elite four, but never finished it and that been kind of a reoccurring thing with me ever since.

[Moonface]

I believe Platinum was the first time I started getting burnt out on Pokemon and not finishing it like I'm pretty sure on my platinum run I got to the elite four, but never finished it and that been kind of a reoccurring thing with me ever since.

Did you finish any Pokemon games after Platinum? If not, what do you think Pokemon would need to do to be refreshing enough for you to finish one of the games again?

[Karo]

I believe I still finished Emerald and maybe one of Pokemon Black mainly cause the story was interesting and I wanted to see it till the end and I'm not really sure what refreshing needs to do exactly?

[Dragon Lord]

(I was severely underleveled for the Elite Four

I'm curious about this, as someone who never struggled against the Elite Four in Gen IV. Do you remember what starter you chose? Or happen to even remember what team you were running? 

I never found any struggles for levels in Diamond or Platinum (can't remember 100% if Platinum had re-battles). Then again I'm the type of person who finds my six as soon as possible so I can spend the rest of the game building them up, instead of switching out Pokemon a lot. You starter also makes a huge difference in Gen IV, as Chimchar/Monferno/Infernape are so far ahead of the water and grass starter than it's not even funny. Infernape can easily solo the entire game in D/P/Pl, even easier than Blaziken in Ruby/Sapphire. Especially when you realize that Infernape has type advantage over 5/8 of the gyms, is neutral against two of them and only has the water gym to worry about, but Infernape's speed and attack is high enough to deal with them with little to no problems, and I think there might have been access to Thunder Punch as well by that point, though I don't remember for sure.

Anyways, point is, Gen IV was probably the first gen where there was a very clear-cut best starter, while the other two were pretty... trashy. So yeah, I can see someone struggling quite a bit more going through the game with one of them instead of picking the MVP monkey.

[Moonface]

Pokémon Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl Release Date & Box Arts Revealed
Nintendo has announced that Pokémon Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl will release on November 19, and revealed the official box arts for the games:



There will also be a dual pack featuring both games:

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Not really feeling these box arts; the BD one is pretty bad. Dialga just looks derpy rather than menacing, and not much stands out because of the overuse of blue; on the other hand, Pialka at least stands out more although it still has the same problem with its facial expression as Dialga does. At least on the dual pack the colour issues aren't there and it catches the eye a lot more.

[Dragon Lord]

Yeah, I have to agree with you, these are some rather trash box arts. Especially compared to the Pokemon Legends one. Nintendo not even trying with these remakes at all.

[Moonface]

I just hope that the in-game models have a better look to them. I don't know specifically what the story is for these legendaries but I don't think I could take the threat they pose seriously if they look the same as the box arts. It's just the eyes that are really failing them because of the straight line above the eye; if you took just the eye you wouldn't get any hint of the tone being presented. Looking at images of them on Google, it seems that the angle is what makes the eyes here fail to show expression because a lot of their other art has them at an angle where the eyebrow is angled downwards, which gives the eye the menacing look that is lacking on these box arts. It kinda highlights the problems that some Pokemon have being translated into 3D, because the designs don't always work from every angle because the original design was a 2D one that didn't need to accommodate more than a single angle.

[Mr EliteL]

Neat there'll be a double pack, but yeah "Eeeugh" and "Aaaahh" aren't selling it for the boxarts here.