Unpopular opinions

[S.A.C. Martin]

pokemon was better before they turned to the open world playstyle, legends arceus is a horrible game. Gamefreak has forgotten how to make a good pokemon game.

No, the problem is Nintendo and their hardware - the Switch was old tech when it first came out and has suffered massively in the last couple of years across third party titles.

Scarlet/Violet was a massively ambitious game that had to be scaled back significantly and run deliberately poorly to work at all on the Switch.

You can see this from the Tera leaks. There was this YouTube video where the SV engine and its original intended graphical package was shown off and it was like night and day.

When Game Freak realised that the art style and the frame rate had to be cut back for SV, you could see in what came out little hints of frustration in the limitations that were set.

I am guaranteeing you all, the graphical upgrade to SV when Switch 2 drops will restore the base game to what it always should have been.

And there will be a mass reevaluation of Pokemon Scarlet/Violet, because it was the graphics and frame rate that were the biggest issues.

Switch 2, on the other hand, is running 120 frames per second in handheld mode, something absolutely unheard of prior to this year. Better than the steam deck in that respect. On a HD TV, Switch 2 games and anything with a graphics upgrade is going to look amazing.

Which is why, with all respect, Gen 10 - coming off the back of three extremely experimental titles for Game Freak and Nintendo (PLA, SV, PLZA) is going to slap incredibly hard IMO. They’ve worked out the direction, they’ve worked out what’s possible, they’ve had three years of fans complaining bloody hard about SV’s issues and how much we loved elements of PLA.

I have faith that Gen 10 is going to blow our tiny little minds…









(Of course, this could all be copium on my part…!)

 

[ScraftyIsTheBest]

(Of course, this could all be copium on my part…!)

Well, I'm not the kind who's extremely optimistic or pessimistic, but I do think Gen 10 has potential to be pretty great on the Switch 2. Not just because of the better hardware and because of how they've experimented with every game in the Switch era, but also because this current generation is a longer one than usual.

Sword and Shield and Scarlet and Violet were subject to the usual three-year cycle, which definitely squandered their potential. But at this rate, now that we know for a fact that Legends: Z-A isn't coming out until Fall 2025, which means it's the mainline Pokemon series game for this year, that means the earliest Gen 10 is coming out is 2026, and on the Switch 2. And the fact that they (to my surprise) made a Switch 2 edition for Z-A and are updating SV for the Switch 2 suggests that they've been given more opportunity to get their hands dirty with the Switch 2 and what it's capable of, and in general given an extra year of time Gen 10's debut games will have, these games will likely be in a better state than SwSh and SV ended up in.

While I am critical of where the Switch era games have fallen short, I do see great potential in them and this era has, in an odd way, been the most interesting era for me to witness because every game has shown some interesting concepts that I feel have the potential to be great when fully realized, and I've enjoyed every one of them in spite of their shortcomings.

I feel Gen 10 will, at the very least, be a real step forward in a notable way, and while it's debatable whether it'll blow peoples' minds, or if it'll be on par with the rest of what the Switch 2 can offer, I feel it'll really feel even closer to being the console-scale Pokemon game I dreamed of seeing since I was a kid in the late 2000s playing Diamond and Pearl, and be a game that really feels the part, even if I do think there may still be room for improvement.

 

[ant4456]

I want Pokemon to be open world and I think that just trying to make linear Pokemon forever would be a waste of the series' potential, and the gaming enthusiast backlash to open world games in general is cringe and misguided

 

[Volt-Ikazuchi]

pokemon was better before they turned to the open world playstyle, legends arceus is a horrible game. Gamefreak has forgotten how to make a good pokemon game.

Pokémon started to decline way before the open world era.

This is also very subjective, as you didn't point out what makes a good pokémon game in your opinion.

I want Pokemon to be open world and I think that just trying to make linear Pokemon forever would be a waste of the series' potential, and the gaming enthusiast backlash to open world games in general is cringe and misguided

I'm not going to say all open world games are slop. Just 95% of them.

The obvious issue with Pokémon as an open world game is that Game Freak can't even make a split path without the level curve collapsing (Hi, Johto!) so how does that even work in an open setting?

I'll tell you how it doesn't, the way SV did it. Good lord what a mess.

 

[Sixfortyfive]

> "open world," "nonlinear" game
> all NPC battles have predefined levels, railroading the player onto an obvious optimal path anyway

 

[Cheryl.]

This just makes me sad thinking of the time before Scarlet and Violet were released and my clown ass was huffing that hopium that you could fight all the gym leaders in any order finally without there being an obvious path level-wise. Maybe one day...

 

[tada]

No, the problem is Nintendo and their hardware - the Switch was old tech when it first came out and has suffered massively in the last couple of years across third party titles.

Scarlet/Violet was a massively ambitious game that had to be scaled back significantly and run deliberately poorly to work at all on the Switch.

You can see this from the Tera leaks. There was this YouTube video where the SV engine and its original intended graphical package was shown off and it was like night and day.

When Game Freak realised that the art style and the frame rate had to be cut back for SV, you could see in what came out little hints of frustration in the limitations that were set.

I am guaranteeing you all, the graphical upgrade to SV when Switch 2 drops will restore the base game to what it always should have been.

And there will be a mass reevaluation of Pokemon Scarlet/Violet, because it was the graphics and frame rate that were the biggest issues.

Switch 2, on the other hand, is running 120 frames per second in handheld mode, something absolutely unheard of prior to this year. Better than the steam deck in that respect. On a HD TV, Switch 2 games and anything with a graphics upgrade is going to look amazing.

Which is why, with all respect, Gen 10 - coming off the back of three extremely experimental titles for Game Freak and Nintendo (PLA, SV, PLZA) is going to slap incredibly hard IMO. They’ve worked out the direction, they’ve worked out what’s possible, they’ve had three years of fans complaining bloody hard about SV’s issues and how much we loved elements of PLA.

I have faith that Gen 10 is going to blow our tiny little minds…









(Of course, this could all be copium on my part…!)

It's not the hardware that's at fault, it's talentless developers that are. They put out masterpieces in the GBA, DS and 3DS eras on less powerful hardware. They can't figure out a way to put in every single pokemon on the Switch.
Furthermore, the game was more open world and encouraged exploration in the top down games than it ever has been since the jump to 3D sprites. As for what i think is a good pokemon game, it's one that focuses more on the pokemon and the lore of the given region instead of the people in it and trying to make them more important.

 

[Sixfortyfive]

I don't begrudge people for wanting to hold a twelve-figure dollar franchise to higher standards, but don't fall into the trap of glossing over shortcomings that have always been there.

Mainline Pokemon games that happen to also be technically proficient well-optimized showcases of their respective platforms have always been the exception, not the rule. There's almost always some kind of cut corner you can fixate on if you want to, and if you go all the way back you have stuff like RBY that is so janky it's sometimes charming.

 

[S.A.C. Martin]

It's not the hardware that's at fault, it's talentless developers that are. They put out masterpieces in the GBA, DS and 3DS eras on less powerful hardware. They can't figure out a way to put in every single pokemon on the Switch.

There is no way you could describe any Pokemon game in any generation as a “masterpiece” - they all have their flaws and there were games which did similar things better (the existence of Golden Sun and Golden Sun: The Lost Age on GBA pretty much sums up my feelings on the matter).

Furthermore, the game was more open world and encouraged exploration in the top down games than it ever has been since the jump to 3D sprites.

I am trying to think of what game could possibly be described as “open world” prior to PLA and SV. All the mainline Pokemon games had some level of restrictions that prevented “open world gaming”, which I think we should be clear, the earliest actual examples of this in terms of video games are considered to have the following:

1. Open Worlds should at some point in the course of the game give the player controlled character or team the option to move freely within the setting of the game.
2. The OW should project the feeling that events and landscape continue to exist and function even when the player is not there.
3. The OW should feel continuous and physically logical within the construct of the game universe.
4. The plotline should be relatively non-linear at the least incorporating sidequests which must be sought out within the OW. These elements serve to flesh out the world and propogate the illusion that the player is an actor in this place.
5. The player controlled element should be an agent of the OW (e.g. a hero, team of heroes).

Pokemon games definitely hold some of these elements throughout their history but not all of them at any one time, SV is the game that has arguably gone furthest in developing this.

As for what i think is a good pokemon game, it's one that focuses more on the pokemon and the lore of the given region instead of the people in it and trying to make them more important.

I mean, can we really argue Gold/Silver/Crystal is about the Pokemon and not Silver/team Rocket/Lance…that Pokemon Ruby/Sapphire is not about Max and Archie…that XY isn’t about Lysandre and AZ…that most Pokemon are’t designed as tools for the main bulk of the game’s battling scenarios? I don’t think we can.

 

[tada]

There is no way you could describe any Pokemon game in any generation as a “masterpiece” - they all have their flaws and there were games which did similar things better (the existence of Golden Sun and Golden Sun: The Lost Age on GBA pretty much sums up my feelings on the matter).



I am trying to think of what game could possibly be described as “open world” prior to PLA and SV. All the mainline Pokemon games had some level of restrictions that prevented “open world gaming”, which I think we should be clear, the earliest actual examples of this in terms of video games are considered to have the following:

1. Open Worlds should at some point in the course of the game give the player controlled character or team the option to move freely within the setting of the game.
2. The OW should project the feeling that events and landscape continue to exist and function even when the player is not there.
3. The OW should feel continuous and physically logical within the construct of the game universe.
4. The plotline should be relatively non-linear at the least incorporating sidequests which must be sought out within the OW. These elements serve to flesh out the world and propogate the illusion that the player is an actor in this place.
5. The player controlled element should be an agent of the OW (e.g. a hero, team of heroes).

Pokemon games definitely hold some of these elements throughout their history but not all of them at any one time, SV is the game that has arguably gone furthest in developing this.



I mean, can we really argue Gold/Silver/Crystal is about the Pokemon and not Silver/team Rocket/Lance…that Pokemon Ruby/Sapphire is not about Max and Archie…that XY isn’t about Lysandre and AZ…that most Pokemon are’t designed as tools for the main bulk of the game’s battling scenarios? I don’t think we can.

There's a reason why people speak so fondly about gen 4 games and were mad with how Gamefreak botched the remakes. Gen 3 was close to perfect but i doubt many people would disagree that gen 4 was probably the best pokemon generation to exist. The story was well thought out, the legends in the game made sense and the overall gameplay was great. I know i'm breaking my rules a bit here but you don't hear anyone talk about any other character like they do Cynthia from back in the day.
Pokemon doesn't need an open world, it needs structure and a bit of exploration instead. Finding one's way through the caves is a part of the journey. Give me that rather than these open fields full of nothing and cities with buildings that I can't enter and explore. That being said, nothing is preventing anyone in older generations from grinding out a few levels to go on the path they want. The suggestions you're making for a pokemon game make it where it's not a pokemon game anymore.

 

[ant4456]

This just makes me sad thinking of the time before Scarlet and Violet were released and my clown ass was huffing that hopium that you could fight all the gym leaders in any order finally without there being an obvious path level-wise. Maybe one day...

For all the "hopium" you had I was busy playing and loving the game and saying "They made an open world Pokemon that works" and I stand by that

 

[ant4456]

It's not the hardware that's at fault, it's talentless developers that are. They put out masterpieces in the GBA, DS and 3DS eras on less powerful hardware. They can't figure out a way to put in every single pokemon on the Switch.
Furthermore, the game was more open world and encouraged exploration in the top down games than it ever has been since the jump to 3D sprites. As for what i think is a good pokemon game, it's one that focuses more on the pokemon and the lore of the given region instead of the people in it and trying to make them more important.

 

[Ironmage]

I hold the position that an open world is just a metroidvania devoid of content. If exploration is supposed to be the focus, then make the actual exploration engaging and challenging. If the goal is to allow for events to be done in different orders, make those orders feel distinct by having those events be encountered with significantly different ability pools depending on order. Heck, that last point is done better by a stage select screen from games a decade before I was born than any grand open world I've had the displeasure of playing.

 

[ant4456]

I hold the position that an open world is just a metroidvania devoid of content. If exploration is supposed to be the focus, then make the actual exploration engaging and challenging. If the goal is to allow for events to be done in different orders, make those orders feel distinct by having those events be encountered with significantly different ability pools depending on order. Heck, that last point is done better by a stage select screen from games a decade before I was born than any grand open world I've had the displeasure of playing.

you misunderstand open worlds, and for a while I did too

open worlds aren't about pushing exploration. they're literally, quite simply, about aura and giving a feeling to the player

the point of an open world is not actually to change how the player plays the game. elden ring plays almost the exact same as dark souls except you travel between micro levels and then big levels between the areas. but it's all more memorable because it's in an interconnected world and you got to go to each piece yourself

this doesn't make elden ring not "gigantic dark souls level but with less density of content", but it also makes it "dark souls but fucking AURA."

this is what open world critics don't understand. it's literally just cool. that's it.

why does new super mario bros bother to have 8 world themes when at least 5 of them in each game play the same way? why do games bother to hide that they're a game and push towards immersion? why do games sometimes have an hour long cutscene?

because it's art and art is about inspiring a feeling and not the player doing a mathematically correct assessment of what is positive gameplay and avoiding negative gameplay, and that the human brain is not objective. if the human brain was objective then we would only play roguelikes and call of duty, games that generally are kinda just optimized towards dopamine

 

[Mad Ram]

It's not the hardware that's at fault, it's talentless developers that are. They put out masterpieces in the GBA, DS and 3DS eras on less powerful hardware. They can't figure out a way to put in every single pokemon on the Switch.

Or, you know, it could have been rushed dev cycles that they've been having to deal with at least since X and Y giving major console releases in some cases just barely over two years of dev time rather than the industry average of four to five rather than just miraculously every single one of the over 200 people working on the game being incompetent. Funny as it is for some people to believe, Game Freak isn't in the same place as it was 30 years ago where it has to have the music guy learn programming because one of their six programmers quit. Frankly the mythologized understanding of the development of gens 1 and 2 have been disastrous for understanding the issues plaguing modern Pokémon.

 

[Ironmage]

you misunderstand open worlds, and for a while I did too

open worlds aren't about pushing exploration. they're literally, quite simply, about aura and giving a feeling to the player

the point of an open world is not actually to change how the player plays the game. elden ring plays almost the exact same as dark souls except you travel between micro levels and then big levels between the areas. but it's all more memorable because it's in an interconnected world and you got to go to each piece yourself

this doesn't make elden ring not "gigantic dark souls level but with less density of content", but it also makes it "dark souls but fucking AURA."

this is what open world critics don't understand. it's literally just cool. that's it.

why does new super mario bros bother to have 8 world themes when at least 5 of them in each game play the same way? why do games bother to hide that they're a game and push towards immersion? why do games sometimes have an hour long cutscene?

because it's art and art is about inspiring a feeling and not the player doing a mathematically correct assessment of what is positive gameplay and avoiding negative gameplay, and that the human brain is not objective. if the human brain was objective then we would only play roguelikes and call of duty, games that generally are kinda just optimized towards dopamine

So if you don't happen to find it cool then there just straight up isn't a point to having one? And this is supposed to convince me that them being put into everything nowadays is a good thing?

 

[ant4456]

So if you don't happen to find it cool then there just straight up isn't a point to having one? And this is supposed to convince me that them being put into everything nowadays is a good thing?

Yeah if you don't like open worlds you are in the minority since most people think it's cool and positive aura.

Shit look at the Mario Kart World material; they spend 30 seconds showing P Switches in the Direct and have two instances of "you can fuck around in the world while waiting for friends", but a lot of what the open world is for is to make the world feel interconnected, alive, and the aura of having tracks designed in a large world rather than individual.

If that isn't cool aura for you (which valid), then there is essentially no purpose. But to the majority of people that's cool as fuck.

Also like idk what you're trying to say here. "If you don't find it cool then there is no point" is something you could say for so many things. Personally I think a lot of games include bossfights for no reason other than aura to the point I think a lot of games would be better if they just cut them, especially in the 2000s. But to a lot of people bossfights are memorable and cool, so I'd just be being wrong to insist on not having them.

Personal taste is a thing more news at 11

 

[Ironmage]

Yeah if you don't like open worlds you are in the minority since most people think it's cool and positive aura.

Shit look at the Mario Kart World material; they spend 30 seconds showing P Switches in the Direct and have two instances of "you can fuck around in the world while waiting for friends", but a lot of what the open world is for is to make the world feel interconnected, alive, and the aura of having tracks designed in a large world rather than individual.

If that isn't cool aura for you (which valid), then there is essentially no purpose. But to the majority of people that's cool as fuck.

Also like idk what you're trying to say here. "If you don't find it cool then there is no point" is something you could say for so many things. Personally I think a lot of games include bossfights for no reason other than aura to the point I think a lot of games would be better if they just cut them, especially in the 2000s. But to a lot of people bossfights are memorable and cool, so I'd just be being wrong to insist on not having them.

Personal taste is a thing more news at 11

Bluntly, I'm real tired of personal taste only being valid justification for the majority. No, making something open world or whatever does not make up for content that was cut to insert the new popular thing. Companies chasing ever-wider audiences leading to a homogenized scene should be condemned, not celebrated. Given infinite development resources, sure, put in optional open-world elements. But if you want to make a mainline pokemon game, focus on the stuff that actually defines a mainline pokemon game.

 

[S.A.C. Martin]

There's a reason why people speak so fondly about gen 4 games and were mad with how Gamefreak botched the remakes. Gen 3 was close to perfect but i doubt many people would disagree that gen 4 was probably the best pokemon generation to exist.

Look sonny Jim, I've been here for all nine generations so far and my god, Gen 4 was slow. Like painfully slow. Great story, great new Pokemon, for sure, but the games were bloody slow.

Gen 3 was not "close to perfect", it did "Dexit" before "Dexit" was a thing...that and the amount of water in Hoen, blah blah blah...

No game in Gen 4 makes my top five Pokémon mainline games. Gen 5 though, BW2 is a masterpiece of design and gameplay and its postgame is just on another level to everything else.

Pokemon doesn't need an open world, it needs structure and a bit of exploration instead. Finding one's way through the caves is a part of the journey. Give me that rather than these open fields full of nothing and cities with buildings that I can't enter and explore. That being said, nothing is preventing anyone in older generations from grinding out a few levels to go on the path they want.

I don't think anyone is disagreeing we want caves, we want spalunking, we want to go into buildings, we want to fly, swim, dive, etc etc, but BoTW and ToTK prove you can have open world and structure and exploration together. Don't throw the Elekid out with the bathwater, as they say.

The suggestions you're making for a pokemon game make it where it's not a pokemon game anymore.

Look, I'm sure you're a good guy but you cannot be serious with that point.

 

[S.A.C. Martin]

But if you want to make a mainline pokemon game, focus on the stuff that actually defines a mainline pokemon game.

My god, the stuff that defines a Pokémon mainline game isn't set in stone.

We've had:

• Gym leaders
• No gym leaders
• Elite four
• No elite four
• No champion
• No league at all, in fact
• Past
• Present
• "Future" ish
• All of the pokemon
• Some of the pokemon
• Only new pokemon
• Only old pokemon
• Bike
• New bikes
• No bikes
• Bikes that are dragons
• Boats
• No boats
• Water, lots of it
• No water at all
• Three legends
• Two legends
• a fuck ton of legends
• A legendary trio
• A legendary trio and oh wait a fourth member
• A legendary quartet
• How about no legendaries other than the box legendaries
• A dickhead of a rival
• A literal dickhead of a rival
• A sickly rival
• a do gooder rival
• a team of friends
• no friends at all
• one starter from three
• two starters evolved
• one starter fixed with no evolution
• the same but eevee
• eevee but you get to choose what to evolve it into
• you can dive now
• now you can't
• sky battles
• Ha they're gone now
• mini games
• no mini games
• you have a mother and an absent father
• you have a mother and a father who's a gym leader
• you have neither because you're an outcast
• you have a family and the dad is absent because dead
• you have single battles
• you have double battles
• you have triple battles
• you have rotation battles
• no wait it's just up to double battles now
• nope, everything is single or double now
• oh wait everything is double battles
• mega evolution
• megas and z
• they're gone now, now everything is giant
• and now everything is crystal instead

Like seriously, the only thing Pokémon about Pokémon every generation is that it is always reinventing itself along some pretty flexible guidelines about what we want to see every generation.

There are no rules or guidelines for what constitutes a mainline Pokémon game. It's always changing.

I like change.

 

[Volt-Ikazuchi]

you misunderstand open worlds, and for a while I did too

open worlds aren't about pushing exploration. they're literally, quite simply, about aura and giving a feeling to the player

Since this is all so vague and subjective, am I not correct in saying that open worlds give me a feeling of boredom and have the aura of an anime filler?

Yeah if you don't like open worlds you are in the minority since most people think it's cool and positive aura.

Ah yes, appeal to the masses. Truly the standard of which art is judged by.

Honestly, the big point you're missing is why AAA gaming is running full-steam into a brick wall. Trading content for aura and viral quip bait is what's making a lot of games outright bad in pretty much every conceivable way.

It's precisely why the term slop is in vogue. Open world gameplay is one of the many checkboxes shareholders want ticked so they know they're probably going to get an return on their investment. And a LOT of open world games don't benefit from it at all.

I'll hammer the point home by pointing out that this is explicitly the opposite of art.

Judging by your definition, sports games filled to the brim with lootboxes bullshit are peak art with more aura than a DBZ character. Do you see how insane this sounds?

 

[Volt-Ikazuchi]

BoTW and ToTK prove you can have open world and structure and exploration together.

It also alienated a good chunk of the franchise by getting rid of its most iconic features (Dungeons and item-based progression)

Pretty bad example to be fair, and I really like BotW.

 

[ant4456]

Bluntly, I'm real tired of personal taste only being valid justification for the majority. No, making something open world or whatever does not make up for content that was cut to insert the new popular thing. Companies chasing ever-wider audiences leading to a homogenized scene should be condemned, not celebrated. Given infinite development resources, sure, put in optional open-world elements. But if you want to make a mainline pokemon game, focus on the stuff that actually defines a mainline pokemon game.

Personal taste isn't only used for the majority lol there's plenty of niche games like SMT that still are made

It's just you're saying "why do AAA game developers that got here by appealing to the majority of the audience appealing to the majority of the audience" and that's just a question that answers itself.

Why is Legends ZA going Action RPG? Because Action RPGs are really fucking in, and this is something mass Western audiences have been begging for for a long ass time.

We have plenty of indie, AA, or just niche franchises within AAA publishers that are for smaller demographics, or even just spinoffs. But there's no reason Pokemon wouldn't be one of the franchises to try to do what people want. That's like its job

Since this is all so vague and subjective, am I not correct in saying that open worlds give me a feeling of boredom and have the aura of an anime filler?

You're correct but also the majority disagree with you so it lowkey doesn't matter

Ah yes, appeal to the masses. Truly the standard of which art is judged by.

Since when was this about the standard by which art is judged by lmfao

Honestly, the big point you're missing is why AAA gaming is running full-steam into a brick wall. Trading content for aura and viral quip bait is what's making a lot of games outright bad in pretty much every conceivable way.

It's precisely why the term slop is in vogue. Open world gameplay is one of the many checkboxes shareholders want ticked so they know they're probably going to get an return on their investment. And a LOT of open world games don't benefit from it at all.

That's why Elden Ring didn't win GOTY and why 90% of the people saying "x game is slop" didn't also buy that game, right?

People call anything they don't care for slop. It really doesn't matter.

Do you know how many people call Pokemon slop? When I was growing up people said Pokemon is the Call of Duty of JRPGs because every game was the same and they had little artistic merit. People who don't care about X and see that it is made to appeal to Y who they don't understand go to Z: It's slop.

I'll hammer the point home by pointing out that this is explicitly the opposite of art.

Not really

Judging by your definition, sports games filled to the brim with lootboxes bullshit are peak art with more aura than a DBZ character. Do you see how insane this sounds?

That isn't my definition at all you are just saying shit atp Lowkey

 

[ant4456]

I hate musical segments in a movie so I don't watch Disney movies but I don't go "Then what's in it for me?!" when Disney keeps making movies with musical segments because most people like them and think they're great I don't think this conversation should be so difficult

Like I basically just described that open world games are personal taste and that if you don't get it, you just don't get it, and it's not for you. Sucks that that is the trend and you don't like it, but that's Life!

I hate roguelikes and if you asked me two, maybe three years ago I'd have told you roguelikes are "indie game slop" but I realized that's silly and I don't go and say "Balatro is unartistic slop and Nubby's Number Factory is chasing trends and the masses are wrong" unless behind closed doors to vent annoyance because a lot of people like something I don't doesn't make it worse. Like this is just a normal part of being a fan of a multi-faceted media with people doing different things, sometimes the thing on top is something you don't care about. And it's up to you if you want to basically disrespect the people who enjoy something and the artists who made it because you don't get it, or if we can just joke about personal taste and at the end of the day go "Yeah it's not for me but it's good people enjoy it"

Especially when we aren't even talking about like. Gacha games, something that can be argued to be a genuine societal ill. We're talking about a genre that is usually a singleplayer game with a single payment or a large DLC expansion lol

 

[S.A.C. Martin]

It also alienated a good chunk of the franchise by getting rid of its most iconic features (Dungeons and item-based progression)

Pretty bad example to be fair, and I really like BotW.

Again, I’ve been here since…well…The Legend of Zelda (god I feel old) and although I think we all agree, having proper dungeons is better, BoTW was a breath of fresh air and Zelda is also not a fixed point in time with only very strict rules in place.

But would I like dungeons back? Oh absolutely. I also wanted Megas back in Pokemon and oh look…

Point is, if every generation is the same, they’re not generations and they’re not interesting. Change is necessary.