I know it is unlikely, but the rematch rosters is making me feel some hype about this franchise again. Before the leak I was pretty much content with the fact I would have to wait for rom hacks to play future series titles, but now I have seen the 14 million possibilities and there might be one that can produce a future Pokémon game with difficulty modes. Who knows though, we'll probably get auto revives for important battles or some shit for next gen.You see, to them, difficulty modes already exist: in the form of team compositions. I don't remember which one, but I think there was an interview before Sword/Shield where their idea of making the game harder is "you start using less or weaker Pokémon".
They think adding proper difficulty modifiers is pointless... and besides, given what they did in BW2, it's best that they don't try.