Pokémon Sword and Pokémon Shield

[Moonface]

Nintendo and The Pokémon Company have announced the latest entries in the series: Pokémon Sword and Pokémon Shield.

Pokémon Sword and Pokémon Shield will launch later this year for Nintendo Switch.

   The Galar Region!   

Pokémon Sword and Pokémon Shield will be set in Galar, an expansive region with many environments—idyllic countryside, contemporary cities, thick forests, and craggy, snow-covered mountains. The people and Pokémon live together in this region, and they’ve worked together to develop the industries here.

You’ll visit the various Gyms in the Galar region, aiming for the enviable and admirable title of Champion!

   Meet Your First Pokémon   

Your adventure in Galar will begin by choosing one of the three new starter Pokemon!

GROOKEY A mischievous Chimp Grass-type Pokémon that is full of boundless curiosity.

SCORBUNNY A Rabbit Fire-type Pokémon that is always running about, bursting with energy.

SOBBLE A somewhat timid Water Lizard Water-type Pokémon that shoots out attacks as it hides itself in the water.

[Dragon Lord]

The game itself looks pretty decent, but good lord could those starters be any more atrocious? It seems like every new game they make, they're just like, 'Guys, how can we make the starters look even worse and even more stupid than the last ones?"

If that's an early sign as to what the rest of the new Pokemon will tend to look like... Yikes.

[Moonface]

Yeah, the designs don't excite me much either yet. I don't hate them, but they don't feel memorable to me.

The general consensus seems to be that Galar is based on the UK and that the starters are themed around athletics/sports.

[queenzelda]

Personally, I like the Scorbunny the most out of the trio showed. Though the internet seems to lerve the water lizard for some reason. :p

[Moonface]

I'm torn between Scorbunny and Grookey for who I'd pick, but as always it'll be their final evolutions that make me decide which starter I actually go for.

I did see one comment saying that Scorbunny should've been called Scorchare instead.

[Monocle]

FIRE. BUNNY.

AAAAAAAAAH

i know what I'm picking

[Moonface]

So does anyone have any hopes for what this game might add to the formula?

[Dragon Lord]

My only hope for the game is that they do not take any aspects from GO/Let's Go. Go back to the formula that the main games have been built on all these years and stick to it. I don't want a dumbed down experience that makes the game so boring it brings you to tears. I was bored watching people play Let's Go because it was so god awfully dumbed down and easy.

I'm also hoping that the evolutions of those starters won't look like something a five year old threw up. Like, I know I've been ragging on Pokemon designs for years, and for the most part they have been god awful over the last few generations, but those three starters take it to a whole new level, and I really don't want to see a repeat of the past couple of gens where the evolutions of the starters look worse and worse. If they have to make them all look like garbage, then please load the game up with Gen I-IV (and a couple of Gen V) Pokemon so that there's some choices to pick from that don't make me want to stab myself in the eyes with rusted butter knives.

I'd also love to see them add a very hard/Hardcore mode to the game so that we can actually maybe sort of get a challenge out of a Pokemon game for once. Though I know this won't happen because Nintendo is all like, "gotta maek teh pokemanz 4 da kidz!"

Also the reason why the internet loves the water starter is because the second it was revealed, it became a meme thanks to this expression on its face.

It's the new version of that "shocked Pikachu" meme.

[queenzelda]

Personally, I would like a more adult story. I'm sick of getting treated like a kid & Pokemon Sun/Moon is a BIG example of how that was done. I mean with S/M I felt like I was on a huge school field trip & the professor was my teacher. Like how it is in the show, except the kids were who I ended up battling against, instead of being in the same class as me (like in the anime). :p

I also hope that one of the evolution's doesn't get stuck looking too boyish/girlish like with the whole Poplio evolution nonsense. *facepalm*

[Moonface]

I don't think they would implement the catching techniques of Let's Go where it replaces the typical formula that every other game had before it. If they want to include it, then it should be how I suggested in the Let's Go thread:

When entering a wild encounter, the player should have the choice to either weaken the Pokemon by battling it like in old games, and then doing the Pokeball throwing mini-game to perform the capture, or they can avoid the battle aspect entirely and just use fruit to try and increase their chances of capturing a Pokemon like it works in this game. It would also help to get EXP without having to capture Pokemon and then release them, which seems to be the only way you're going to be able to get EXP in this game when there's no one left to fight in the world.

I understand they went with just the capture aspect for this game because of its tie-in to GO, but I think the next best evolution for it is what I just said. It would appeal to players of the OG games while also keeping the approach this game takes without forcing anyone to pick one over the other.

It's a little outdated as I didn't know everything about Let's Go at the time in regards to earning EXP, but that aside, have the option to fight or feed the Pokemon, then let the capture system be the method from Let's Go of timing your throw. I don't think the capture part of Let's Go would be a bad change to make globally, but battling for captures needs to remain either as the only way to weaken a Pokemon, or as one of two options that can be used. Nintendo should absolutely not ditch wild battling in favour of Let's Go's feed captures.

Wild Pokemon roaming the map in Let's Go could come across and I would prefer that rather than wandering through the grass playing russian roulette. I also think it made the overworld look better, feel more alive, and more like how it would generally appear in reality. Not everything is going to be hiding in the grass like a raptor from Jurassic Park 2.

I don't think the story will be as friendly as S/M was because it seems we're going back to classic gyms, and not simply doing trials on an island. Given that this game will have Pokemon being used for labour purposes I wouldn't be surprised if there's a plot element of slavery being used. My prediction for now is the Team in this game is either going to be abusing Pokemon for labour or they're going to be trying to liberate Pokemon claiming using them as labour is wrong.

[queenzelda]

I don't think the story will be as friendly as S/M was because it seems we're going back to classic gyms, and not simply doing trials on an island. Given that this game will have Pokemon being used for labour purposes I wouldn't be surprised if there's a plot element of slavery being used. My prediction for now is the Team in this game is either going to be abusing Pokemon for labour or they're going to be trying to liberate Pokemon claiming using them as labour is wrong.

So it'd be a return to either Team Rocket (for Pokemon labor abuse) or Team Plasma (trying to save Pokemon from abuse) essentially, if you think about it.

[Moonface]

I'm not well versed on what the motives behind every Team were so thanks for telling me of those two. I'm not surprised to see those motives have been used before, and since they have I'm hoping neither of my predictions are right, or at the very least, don't feel like a carbon copy of either of those Teams.

[Hotspot]

I like Scorbunny, and Groble the most, I'm not a fan of monkeys, so I don't like Grokey. lol
I like Scorbunny the most though, which is fitting since I love fire types. (Except the monkey ones.)

[Moonface]

Scorbunny is starting to grow on me as my favorite starter design. I'm starting to get conflicted on whether I prefer Sobble or Grookey as my second favorite.

[Karo]

So I am excited to heck about these games and I am really looking forward to it! I am actually really digging the graphics and the trainer designs not so much the starter designs because body shape they are all pretty similar. I'm hoping they'll expand on even more customization options for our trainer in this game though that might only be me, but I enjoy collecting costumes. I personally blame Animal Crossing and Splatoon. As for the region itself I think its interesting how we are going to the UK and I am loving the variety of environments we are going to be able to go through.

As for the starters I don't think they are the worst, but I feel like the little animation they did gave them each a bit of a personality comparing to some previous gen. I'm most likely either going with Scorbunny or Sobble as I have never been particularly fond of monkeys! I've heard people thinking their going to be a theme of industrialization and nature. I honestly would love to see them mixing up the formula, by doing something different with the story. We are for a fact getting our usual call to adventure become the champion of the elite four, but I am hoping they'll throw us a curb ball with this or if we are going to go with the traditional formula I hope they think about doing it like how they did BLack & White.To this day I still think BW had the best story of any Pokemon game it felt exciting and interesting to me and I loved how they connected the stories together and how they did our rivals.

Another hope I particularly have is the return of some post game battle frontier mechanic and hopefully a difficulty setting! I would love to be able to choose a hard mode or maybe a mode where each trainer is particularly crafted to have perfect IV and EV and the team built cover weaknesses! It doesn't have to be random trainers but imagine if the gym leaders or E4 had this? Competitive POkemon player would rejoice! Pokemon Let's GO was suppose to be an introduction to the series and in the trailer they said they wanted to try new things and I think a difficulty mode for the veteran trainers out there would be perfect! Gamefreak themselves know that they exist! Also I am hoping for a graveyard and maybe a darker tone overall nothing to put it in T range, but maybe E10.