Sword & Shield **Official news only** DLC Crown Tundra 22nd October

[Celever]

It’s odd to me to think that if Butterfree had been created 2 years later in the release of Gold & Silver we would all be incredibly hyped by its reveal, but because it’s a member of the original 151 it’s being fairly widely slammed. Butterfree was a terrible Pokémon in battle who needed a buff, and now it got a buff. It’s a fairly obscure Pokémon at this stage who deserved to get back into the limelight. And to top it off, its gigantamax form is far and away the best we’ve seen yet. I don’t see why this gen 1 vs everything else factionalism detracts from Butterfree specifically.

And all of the other new gigantamax forms are not only reasonable but fairly necessary simply due to the nature of franchises. Pikachu and Meowth are the main Pokémon characters of the anime and every now and again will have flashy gigantamax battles against each other, which will be awesome to watch. Eevee is a new series mascot and with the route they chose to take receiving the special Pikachu (save file detection), Eevee necessarily also had to get one so that one version of LGPE wasn’t made objectively better than the other one a year after its release. Charizard is also a significant series mascot, and now that megas have been removed it needs a gimmick to keep it battleworthy.

It’s simply the nature of franchises that the oldest characters become the most famous, not because of pandering but because they’ve had the most time to gain icon status. Pikachu was an icon overnight, but it’s taken decades for Eevee and Charizard to get to the same level in the mainstream where a pretty large percentage of the population could at least name them. Even though Lucario, Greninja and Incineroar are all cooler than Charizard and are on their way to becoming fairly iconic, they’re not there yet, so it’s simply less smart to pander to them in the short term.

Would I like to see a Corsola gigantamax into a full coral reef with Wishiwashi swimming in it, or Meowstic complete its imagery and receive a gigantamax with a scratching post wand and a broomstick? Absolutely, but they’re not gonna give the gimmick to every Pokémon we want every time, and right now they’re focussing on Gen I. That’s fine, and eventually they’ll have done something for just about all of the niche Gen I picks and essentially be forced to move on to other Pokémon. I don’t mind waiting until that time comes.

Also, its flawed to characterise GameFreak as a single, Gen I pandering entity. Most of the staff working on the games now didn’t work on Gen I or even FRLG, so where’s the emotional attachment?

Only gripe I have so far is that the champion uses a non-native Pokémon as his ace. All it says, to me, is they didn’t have confidence that they could design another Garchomp or Metagross, another Pokémon worthy of being used by a champion. Which also makes me wonder in some ways which Pokémon we’re receiving as the newcomer in the next smash bros, since no new Pokémon revealed so far is deserving of getting in. It will probably just be another starter again which would be annoying, because we need more Lucario-style mascots in the series.

 

[The Shadow Knight]

Man, I'm kinda hoping that the Fatchu enabled Pikachu will have the LGPE starter BST and Light Ball compatibility...

 

[hypno28]

...Sorry but I'm squinting really hard on that one, especially since these so called gimmicks are tied directly to the lore of each generation, and even then that typically isnt the end all be all. Megas had nothing to do with Lysandres plot, nor did z crystals have anything to do with Ultra Space or Necrozma, both of which were big parts of the story and filled with lore along the way.

The fact that there's "lore" and plot related to this garbage doesn't make that "lore" believable. That's the whole problem. Because GF's priority is whatever flashy gimmick they come up with to sell more, that then has to be "explained" in the game, and since it's absurd, the game becomes more absurd. If they focused on making the region more physically believable and both it and the pokemon better fleshed out and explained (assuming they did it competently), the games would be better and people would, in the long run, like them much more. Instead we get a series of gimmicks, each one even stupider than the previous one, and an apocalyptic story involving a legendary and totally lacking credibility every single time.

 

[LordHelix]

Absolutely, but they’re not gonna give the gimmick to every Pokémon we want every time, and right now they’re focussing on Gen I. That’s fine, and eventually they’ll have done something for just about all of the niche Gen I picks and essentially be forced to move on to other Pokémon.

The problem its not right now, its for 6 years. Kanto had the most megas, alolan forms are only from kanto, nostalgia bait kanto references plague both gen 6 and 7

Yea it makes sense because there pokemon are very popular but doesnt mean we wont hate it any less. Especially when they emphasized that lets go would be the kanto nostalgia bait for the casuals and gen 8 would be for "hardcore" fans

What part of pikachu form #72 (which design is based off, you guessed it, original KANTOOOO sprite), charizard form #3 and all the galarian forms besides obstagoon being from kanto says hardcore?

And im not even talking abt the obscure stuff, even popular fan favourites are getting nothing. Wheres Mega Flygon? Wheres Garchomp? Wheres gigantamaxed Hydreigon or Metagross? Wheres Volcarona? Gigantamaxed Lucario? Galarian Arcanine?

How much do you wanna bet mewtwo or mew get a gigantamaxed form while gen 2-6 pokemon get shafted yet again and get no forms

 

[Kurona]

GF specifically said Dynamax is just a Galar thing, so them not merging the Mega Pokemon designs into it is setting up a precedence I was hoping they would avoid. Don't get attached to any Gigantamax forms, because now that they've shown they're perfecting willing to discard designs and replace them with another these "equalizer" gimmicks (Mega Evolutions, Z-Moves, and not Dynamax/Gigantamax) have officially joined the list of mechanics that GF makes and then throws away for next gen. We'll have to wait until their region remakes or they feel like it'll earn them brownie points to see any of these mechanics again... and to be discarded again... not to mention they'll also keep on introducing more and more "equalizer" gimmicks each gen instead of working on one all-inclusive one they can carry to each generation and just add upon it...

I must admit, whenever this point is brought up for Pokémon, I struggle to understand how it's any different to Mario Sunshine's F.L.U.D.D. or Metroid Prime 2's Dark/Light system or Zelda: Twilight Princess's Wolf transformation. Different games in a series will have their own unique gimmick and when it comes to the next game, is likely to discard it and move on to a next one. Should we start complaining about how Nintendo discarded Galaxy's gravity and planet gimmick? Are we going to start saying that it's monstrous how the most recent Zelda game didn't include Wind Waker's sailing after we got so incredibly attached to it?

I don't understand why Pokémon in particular must pre-occupy itself with retaining everything it's ever done, taking up space and dev time for older, hereditary concepts just because they were there before rather than focusing on something that's interesting, new and fits the new game. This also very much applies to the Pokédex situation: we don't exactly see or expect every successive Kirby game keep every character or enemy it's ever made; we don't see or expect Monster Hunter to retain every monster it's ever had in every successive game; so why should Pokémon be any different?

A new game in a series is not going to have every single thing the last one had, and that's fine. There's no need to treat the loss of a mechanic as if Game Freak is some awful monster discarding everything you love when literally any game franchise out there does the exact same thing and never gets flak for it. If you miss Megas, fine -- I do too, a lot; in fact I don't like how the Dynamax mechanic looks in many aspects. But there's no problem with moving on and doing something else, as every successful game franchise does.

 

[DHR-107]

It’s odd to me to think that if Butterfree had been created 2 years later in the release of Gold & Silver we would all be incredibly hyped by its reveal, but because it’s a member of the original 151 it’s being fairly widely slammed. Butterfree was a terrible Pokémon in battle who needed a buff, and now it got a buff. It’s a fairly obscure Pokémon at this stage who deserved to get back into the limelight. And to top it off, its gigantamax form is far and away the best we’ve seen yet. I don’t see why this gen 1 vs everything else factionalism detracts from Butterfree specifically.

Only gripe I have so far is that the champion uses a non-native Pokémon as his ace. All it says, to me, is they didn’t have confidence that they could design another Garchomp or Metagross, another Pokémon worthy of being used by a champion. Which also makes me wonder in some ways which Pokémon we’re receiving as the newcomer in the next smash bros, since no new Pokémon revealed so far is deserving of getting in. It will probably just be another starter again which would be annoying, because we need more Lucario-style mascots in the series.

I think most people are not annoyed at Butterfree. They are annoyed at the other releases in this trailer. And quite rightly. Had we gotten the 3 event mons, Butterfree, Charizard and then maybe a Gen 8 or hell any other Gen Pokemon Gigantamax, they would have had a fraction of the negative feedback. There is already somewhat of a dissonance between Old fans vs New fans. Most of us as the "1%" of fans who actively seek out and talk about the games with other like minded people are getting very tired of the constant Kanto/Generation 1 pandering. Every game since BW1 has had a degree of it. BW2 had wild Eevees etc, XY had a forced Pidgey encounter, ORAS (may have gotten away with this somewhat?), SM had Alolan formes (and half the Ride Pokemon were Gen 1), SwSh has all but one Galar confirmed Pokemon as Generation 1 Pokemon (It being Obstagoon) AND there are now more Kanto Gigantamax formes than Galar ones! The thing that doesn't make sense to me is that "New Fans" have no penchant for Generation 1, and most old fans are starting to turn against the tidal wave of support Generation 1 is getting.

You made 600+ other Pokemon. People like those too. The number of hardcore "genwunners" is realistically tiny compared to the entire fanbase, so why are they trying to drive this "Kanto was best" narrative constantly. We just had Kanto remakes, we had Pokemon GO. I love that Gen 5 has a lot of representation in these games so far, but I would not at all be surprised to see Kanto fully represented at this stage. Even with Dexit.

I also strongly agree with your second point. The Champion not even having a native Pokemon as his ace stinks. I get they wanted the Champion to be something a bit different, but now most people will obviously pick the Water starter to combat it. Diantha also struggled with this, but Gardevoir was a slightly easier pill to swallow because Ralts has always been popular (not Charizard popular mind you).

We're in a strange place at the moment regarding the series overall. I hope that going forwards we will get some more interaction from later gen Pokemon. I thought Obstagoon was the start of something different. Impidimp still not being announced (though I now think this is entirely intentional). But we've circled back around to once where we began.

I don't understand why Pokémon in particular must pre-occupy itself with retaining everything it's ever done, taking up space and dev time for older, hereditary concepts just because they were there before rather than focusing on something that's interesting, new and fits the new game. This also very much applies to the Pokédex situation: we don't exactly see or expect every successive Kirby game keep every character or enemy it's ever made; we don't see or expect Monster Hunter to retain every monster it's ever had in every successive game; so why should Pokémon be any different?

The issue with this is that they kept repeatedly telling the fanbase to look after your Pokemon, and giving us mechanics to keep bringing us stuff forwards. They wanted people to keep hold of Pokemon for years. So this is a bit of a neck snap in comparison. I'm kinda here or there on Z moves, but megas were cool and interesting. I am sad to see them go, as Pokemon like Beedrill will now once again be entirely irrelevant when their Mega gave them a chance to shine.

 

[TMan87]

I must admit, whenever this point is brought up for Pokémon, I struggle to understand how it's any different to Mario Sunshine's F.L.U.D.D. or Metroid Prime 2's Dark/Light system or Zelda: Twilight Princess's Wolf transformation. Different games in a series will have their own unique gimmick and when it comes to the next game, is likely to discard it and move on to a next one. Should we start complaining about how Nintendo discarded Galaxy's gravity and planet gimmick? Are we going to start saying that it's monstrous how the most recent Zelda game didn't include Wind Waker's sailing after we got so incredibly attached to it?

I don't understand why Pokémon in particular must pre-occupy itself with retaining everything it's ever done, taking up space and dev time for older, hereditary concepts just because they were there before rather than focusing on something that's interesting, new and fits the new game. This also very much applies to the Pokédex situation: we don't exactly see or expect every successive Kirby game keep every character or enemy it's ever made; we don't see or expect Monster Hunter to retain every monster it's ever had in every successive game; so why should Pokémon be any different?

A new game in a series is not going to have every single thing the last one had, and that's fine. There's no need to treat the loss of a mechanic as if Game Freak is some awful monster discarding everything you love when literally any game franchise out there does the exact same thing and never gets flak for it. If you miss Megas, fine -- I do too, a lot; in fact I don't like how the Dynamax mechanic looks in many aspects. But there's no problem with moving on and doing something else, as every successful game franchise does.

My take on this is that, in other franchises, the game's gimmick is properly represented all throughout the game. FLUDD is ubiquitous in Sunshine, as is gravity in Galaxy, so you're literally surrounded by the gimmick and it becomes part of the game itself.
My memories of TP are a bit rusty, but there were entire lengthy sequences as Wolf Link, so you had plenty of time to appreciate the transformation.
And I never played MP2 so I can't comment on this one.
The point is: after playing the game, the gimmick had you sated. It was correctly weaved into the game, giving you plenty of time to appreciate it.
Pokémon does not implement that, since very few mons received Megas/exclusive Z-moves/GMax forms. It feels scarce and even sometimes random, lessening the overall experience.

As for other games you mentioned, they are (at least to me) meant to be separate entries of the same franchise, with little to no relation to one another, whereas Pokémon has this feeling of continuity (and seems to be consciously building upon it with remakes/ORAS Delta episode wham lines/references to older games), but since you remove gimmicks, this continuity feels once again arbitrary. Should every game only have a new roster like Gen V did, I think the loss of mechanics would be much less of an issue, since every opus feels like a fresh start anyway.

Since I don't wanna end this on a rant, I'll just say that GMax Butterfree was a nice surprise among the rest. While it probably won't end up good, at least the forgotten bug will have its time in the limelight.

 

[Kurona]

The issue with this is that they kept repeatedly telling the fanbase to look after your Pokemon, and giving us mechanics to keep bringing us stuff forwards. They wanted people to keep hold of Pokemon for years. So this is a bit of a neck snap in comparison. I'm kinda here or there on Z moves, but megas were cool and interesting. I am sad to see them go, as Pokemon like Beedrill will now once again be entirely irrelevant when their Mega gave them a chance to shine.

Yes, and while cool in the GB and DS eras; it was always something that was going to be unsustainable as we not just got more Pokémon and forms, but as hardware improved and the work needed to bring everything forward increased exponentially. So at some point, I'm sorry, there needed to be a neck snap and it needed to do this. And it'd be better to acknowledge that it's because of how Pokémon previously was rather than acting like it's such a uniquely terrible thing.

My take on this is that, in other franchises, the game's gimmick is properly represented all throughout the game. FLUDD is ubiquitous in Sunshine, as is gravity in Galaxy, so you're literally surrounded by the gimmick and it becomes part of the game itself.
My memories of TP are a bit rusty, but there were entire lengthy sequences as Wolf Link, so you had plenty of time to appreciate the transformation.
And I never played MP2 so I can't comment on this one.
The point is: after playing the game, the gimmick had you sated. It was correctly weaved into the game, giving you plenty of time to appreciate it.
Pokémon does not implement that, since very few mons received Megas/exclusive Z-moves/GMax forms. It feels scarce and even sometimes random, lessening the overall experience.

Very fair, and I would agree with a lot of that. Pokémon has a lot of work to do to improve upon itself and its gimmicks, and the one-game-a-year thing among others is not helping.

 

[Volt-Ikazuchi]

Gen I may have been swallowed whole by the power creep of later gens, part of it by questionable and short-sighted design decisions.

Here's the thing. You know how Farfetch'd got a massive boost to its base stats? Just make real adjustments, and I mean across the board. Maybe even some nerfs.

I understand this is a massive time-sink, heck, it's why my Stadium 2 hack is taking forever and a half to make.

Regarding the more blatant issue, as someone already said, there are bad mons that need help in all gens. Gen II is even worse because it also gets the nostalgia pull but with none of the love Gen I gets.

Galarian Stantler when?

 

[Yung Dramps]

Y'know what? Considering the incredibly messy marketing cycle for this game, I'm starting to wonder if come Gen 9 or DP remakes or whatever Pokemon has in store for us in the future they'll just go back to giving us big info dumps that leave little to nothing to surprise us in the end. If I was a top-tier Game Freak PR manager, right now I'd be thinking to myself "This relatively spoiler-free approach has caused more problems than it's worth".

Because here's the thing: For all we know, behind the scenes all our demands have been answered. There could be plenty of non-Kanto Galarian/Gigantamax forms, but they haven't shown them to us. There could be oodles of postgame content, but they haven't shown them to us. And while I still think that people who are unsure should just be responsible human beings and wait a few days before buying to make sure what they want is in the game, that doesn't prevent any of the headaches this marketing choice has made for GF.

 

[Volt-Ikazuchi]

Y'know what? Considering the incredibly messy marketing cycle for this game, I'm starting to wonder if come Gen 9 or DP remakes or whatever Pokemon has in store for us in the future they'll just go back to giving us big info dumps that leave little to nothing to surprise us in the end. If I was a top-tier Game Freak PR manager, right now I'd be thinking to myself "This relatively spoiler-free approach has caused more problems than it's worth".

Because here's the thing: For all we know, behind the scenes all our demands have been answered. There could be plenty of non-Kanto Galarian/Gigantamax forms, but they haven't shown them to us. There could be oodles of postgame content, but they haven't shown them to us. And while I still think that people who are unsure should just be responsible human beings and wait a few days before buying to make sure what they want is in the game, that doesn't prevent any of the headaches this marketing choice has made for GF.

Here's the thing. I know GF's word isn't worth much since "We've had to cut some mons to improve animations.", but if they just *said* "We're focusing on making the game deep and providing good post-game content." I'd be cool.

No need to show stuff, just tell people they're actively aware of that demand and that they're addressing it.

Instead of it, the PR is fumbling over and over. Some of the actual content is good, mind you, I liked Butterfree's G-Max form for example. I just think that putting KANTOOOO front and center all the time is hurting them more than helping them.

 

[Yung Dramps]

Here's the thing. I know GF's word isn't worth much since "We've had to cut some mons to improve animations.", but if they just *said* "We're focusing on making the game deep and providing good post-game content." I'd be cool.

No need to show stuff, just tell people they're actively aware of that demand and that they're addressing it.

Instead of it, the PR is fumbling over and over. Some of the actual content is good, mind you, I liked Butterfree's G-Max form for example. I just think that putting KANTOOOO front and center all the time is hurting them more than helping them.

Yeah they could do that too! Maybe even say "Don't worry, we won't just be giving Galarian forms and Gigantamaxes to Kanto Pokemon. Other gens will be represented, but we'll leave you to discover who!"

 

[earl]

The fact that there's "lore" and plot related to this garbage doesn't make that "lore" believable. That's the whole problem. Because GF's priority is whatever flashy gimmick they come up with to sell more, that then has to be "explained" in the game, and since it's absurd, the game becomes more absurd. If they focused on making the region more physically believable and both it and the pokemon better fleshed out and explained (assuming they did it competently), the games would be better and people would, in the long run, like them much more. Instead we get a series of gimmicks, each one even stupider than the previous one, and an apocalyptic story involving a legendary and totally lacking credibility every single time.

Those are 2 divorced issues. The apocalypse plot (a mainstay since gen 3) and justifying the mechanic in-game are rarely attached in any meaniningful way, not to mention neither gen 6 nor 7 could be considered chiefly about megas/Z-moves story-wise. Yeah they had a presence but it wasn’t like “this mega stone has enabled yveltal to truly destroy this world, have I mentioned the origins of megas yet?”. Like it seems what you really want is a deep fleshed out pokemon plot, which honestly isn’t gonna happen. Closest you’ll get is the super half-baked morality of BW1 or the family drama of SM (and team skull, gotta love them).
Also, a good plot neither advertises well (with what we have revealed so far we could have a masterwork plot and world building but it’s hard to convey one or the other) nor sells merch and generates online buzz, 2 things they’re definitely gearing up to do right now.

 

[Codraroll]

Yes, and while cool in the GB and DS eras; it was always something that was going to be unsustainable as we not just got more Pokémon and forms, but as hardware improved and the work needed to bring everything forward increased exponentially. So at some point, I'm sorry, there needed to be a neck snap and it needed to do this. And it'd be better to acknowledge that it's because of how Pokémon previously was rather than acting like it's such a uniquely terrible thing.

Here's the thing. You know how Farfetch'd got a massive boost to its base stats? Just make real adjustments, and I mean across the board. Maybe even some nerfs.

I think this is another, legit, view to have on Dexit: the problem not being that it happened in the first place, but that the opportunity wasn't used to actually fix things.

Metaphorically, Pokémon was always designed like a big pile of content, and whenever something turned out imbalanced, it was solved by piling up more things. For instance, when priority moves were being a problem, they weren't changed (beyond the Gale Wings nerf), but Psychic Terrain was added. Few (but some) actual changes were made to fix imbalance, they usually just threw on more stuff to the pile to address the issues. The pile itself served as the base content to be put into every game, with all its flairs and flaws.

Of course the pile eventually grew too big to manage. But Game Freak's chosen solution wasn't to sort through the pile, to make adjustments to it, to replace what didn't have to be there, or to re-evaluate the "design by pile" strategy. Instead, they decided to bring the pile down to a manageable size by removing half of it, chucking a little more stuff onto it, then declaring that this would become a periodical solution from now on.

So many things are still not addressed. The sloppy "pile it up" philosophy seems to still be in place. Despite claims that this would give them more time to focus on each individual Pokémon, in reality a disproportionate amount of focus still goes to the same handful of Gen I Pokémon, effectively resigning the other generations to a fate as "Pokédex fluff". Individual Pokémon models and animations have not been tweaked, they're still reusing what's already in the pile while creating more stuff to throw on it as well. They aren't doing anything to solve the issues, they are just ignoring the symptoms by shaving off chunks of the pile, while still relying on the rest for content.

Half or so of the Pokémon in the game are gone, with their abilities, base stats, movepools, evolution levels, physical appearance and so on being of no concern to the development of Sword and Shield. But they are still just shoveling those attributes into the game for the Pokémon that made the cut, flairs and flaws included. Time will tell how much more they will add to the pile for existing Pokémon, but I don't really have high hopes of an actual rework, which would be needed at this point.

TL;DR - Dexit was a pretty controversial affair to begin with, and it really didn't help that it seems to have been done pretty half-assedly.

 

[Eve]

https://www.eurogamer.net/amp/2019-...g-first-two-hours-of-pokemon-sword-and-shield
This is really neat! The game tells you when mons have good IVs apparently, and the fact you can just wander into things that will destroy you without cheese strategies could be really interesting, especially for speedruns.
Also swinub confirmed

 

[Ironmage]

The talk of "reused animations" from some of the more "vocal" parts of the fanbase is of course total hooey

Let the fighting begin, I suppose.

 

[Siggu]

https://www.eurogamer.net/amp/2019-...g-first-two-hours-of-pokemon-sword-and-shield
This is really neat! The game tells you when mons have good IVs apparently, and the fact you can just wander into things that will destroy you without cheese strategies could be really interesting, especially for speedruns.
Also swinub confirmed

The take-away from it all, though is that Pokémon Sword and Shield haven't really been done justice with the Pokémon Company's apparent desire to keep much of it a secret.

Regardless of whether it's better or worse than recent entries, this is still the matter at hand.

The game could be great, but they failed to create much interest because of how little we know.

I wouldn't like to wait until the ROM leaking to finally decide on whether to buy a game or not... but this stance made me decide this. I hope they reconsider it and go back to the "reveal as much as possible" style of Gen VII.

It's not Pokémon-related but it reminds me of Nintendo Labo in that the pre-release information was not well-managed ("Do we put focus on that they can program their own toys? Nah, let's put focus on the three or four toys that are pre-programmed")

 

[Vinc2612]

Also swinub confirmed

Where is Swinub confirmed?

 

[Volt-Ikazuchi]

https://www.eurogamer.net/amp/2019-...g-first-two-hours-of-pokemon-sword-and-shield
This is really neat! The game tells you when mons have good IVs apparently, and the fact you can just wander into things that will destroy you without cheese strategies could be really interesting, especially for speedruns.
Also swinub confirmed

D-Did I just see a Raid Pidove?

I like the "Strong mon" feature. It's like what you could get in ORAS without actively chaining up dexnav for it. I remember getting nearly wiped by a Lv. 14 Steel Wing Taillow right after Petalburg. Fun times.

And considering you can see them in the overworld, you can actively prepare for it somewhat. Really liking this feature.

 

[The Shadow Knight]

Where is Swinub confirmed?

 

[Count Bleck]

Hey guys. Remember when i said LGPE was Sword and Shield beta? Because I do.

Not only is the sensing strong pokemon in thenoverworld there, but IGN just conformed that while in the Wild Area, the mobile PC box makes a triumphant return!

 

[Siggu]

Hey guys. Remember when i said LGPE was Sword and Shield beta? Because I do.

Not only is the sensing strong pokemon in thenoverworld there, but IGN just conformed that while in the Wild Area, the mobile PC box makes a triumphant return!

I hope it's accessible all the time and not in the Wild Area.

I guess that it being always usable could reduce the game's difficulty, but that's what makes using more than 6 Pokémon enjoyable and not a time sink.

 

[Count Bleck]

I hope it's accessible all the time and not in the Wild Area.

I guess that it being always usable could reduce the game's difficulty, but that's what makes using more than 6 Pokémon enjoyable and not a time sink.

Thats true, but i think for areas like the the villain hq or championships you shouldnt be able to completely swap out your party for 6 healthy pokemon like no ones business

 

[Siggu]

Thats true, but i think for areas like the the villain hq or championships you shouldnt be able to completely swap out your party for 6 healthy pokemon like no ones business

Well, for the former, what exactly is stopping you from going back to the Pokémon Center and THEN keep kicking evil butt?

On the latter, I agree... to an extent, as healing between battles is a thing. On being able to change compositions for each member, I could understand disabling it... though I'll be honest and say I've yet to beat Let's Go's Elite Four as I've been too busy with other games, so I don't know how it's handled there :P

Either way, I'm very happy they didn't forget about this. If they didn't forget about making Pokémon chains off caught mons instead of encountered ones, I'm pre-ordering ASAP.

 

[Zowayix]

You can switch Pokemon from the Box in the middle of the Elite 4 in Let's Go, which is super cheesy but kinda sorta balanced out by the fact that the Box doesn't heal and it doesn't give you much of an advantage unless you already trained up more than 6 Pokemon to begin with (which provides its own difficulty).