Pokemon Scarlet & Violet - 18th Nov 2022! **OFFICIAL INFO ONLY**

Pikachu315111

Ranting & Raving!
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I think we're getting sidetracked with this definition of God discussion. How about we believe what we want to believe, cause does it really matter?

Anyway, so spent a few days casually looking through reactions, discussions, theories, and plenty of memes about Scarlet & Violet. Most I believe we either discussed on here in one form or another, but there is one thing which I think we could squeeze some discussion out of: Past & Future Theme Inspirations.

With one of the focus of the games being "Past" and "Future" (mainly the the Professors & Legendaries), that brings to question what other features & mechanics in the game may draw inspiration from these themes. Some quick ones that come to mind:

Super Mechanic: You know, your Mega Evolution, Z-Moves, & Dynamax equivalent. We've yet to see it or any hint on what it might be (and I'm going to assume there is one). So, I think it's a good place to start, how would the theme of "Past & Future" be implemented into a Super Mechanic? One thing to keep in mind is that whatever it is there would likely be two versions of it: a general one that any Pokemon can use (like elemental Z-Moves & Dyanamax) and one designed for specific Pokemon (like signature Z-Moves and Gigantamax); also, If Gigantamax is any hint, the specific Super Mechanic would come with a form change.

For the general one, well I can think of a few things (yes, this discussion topic does bring a bit of speculation discussion; I'm hoping it doesn't get too out of hand that it causes this thread to be closed sooner rather than later).
One idea that popped into my head parallels another Super Mechanic I didn't mention: Legends: Arceus Strong/Agile Styles. WAIT! Before you say anything, I know, and I agree, the Styles do not work outside Legends: Arceus due to how stats are handled in that game. Rather, I'm thinking of another turn-based RPG that uses a duel battle system: Bravely Default. In that game series there's the "Brave and Default" mechanic. "Brave" lets you perform multiple actions in a single turn but the character then cannot act for the number of turns equal to the number of bonus actions done (basically, the character used moves they would have done in the FUTURE in a single turn). "Default" has the character skip their turn, in addition to them entering a defensive stance to take less damage that turn, next turn they've gained a BP which now allows them to use the "Brave" mechanic but without having to recharge next turn for the number of extra BP they have (so in other words, the character stores up PAST moves so that they can attack multiple times later on without needing to recharge afterwards). Now obviously such a system can be really broken for Pokemon, so some tweaking would need to be done so that it doesn't come down to the player with the fastest Pokemon OHKOing their opponent.

For the specific one, starting out maybe some Pokemon will have a special move they can only perform while doing a "Brave" or after having entered a "Default" stance. On top of that, either choosing that special move or doing some other additional requirement could transform the Pokemon into a Super Form that's either what the species could become in the Future or is summoning forth a Past power from its ancestors. Not sure what additional traits that Super Form will come with, I'd like it to do what Mega Evolution did with it gaining stat boosts and possibly changing Type & Ability, BUT Gigantamax was pretty successful with only increasing HP and giving the special GMax Move.


Regional Variants: This one I feel is fairly more easier to imagine incorporating a "Past & Future" theme. Basically some Pokemon will be given forms based on the idea what were they like some point in the past, and others will be given forms based on speculation what that species could evolve into becoming in the future. Now, from that alone you're probably wondering how those would count as Regional Variants, and I'll admit I'm just shoving these forms under the Regional Variant tag for simplicity sake. Obviously these Pokemon wouldn't be roaming around the region due to being from the past/future, or at least naturally. From UItra Wormholes to Space-Time Distortions, Pokemon has given itself plenty of explanations why a past/future Pokemon has suddenly appeared (or at the very least let them make a new excuse to better fit the story). It's this Youtube video that got me into thinking about this very topic with me expanding upon it:

Time Travel: While Pokemon is no stranger to time travel, it's always been kept to a minimum. Like the only "major" instances I can think of is the Celebi Event in HGSS and the multiplayer side story in Pokemon Ranger: Guardian Signs. Otherwise Pokemon has kept from doing a game where a good portion of the game takes place or involves travelling to the past/future in order to protect the past, save the present, defeat Lavos and bring on a good future. Well, I guess now is good as any time! Of course with Time Travel that could take shape in many different forms depending on (1.) how far away from the present time they would want to go and (2.) would they only want the present & different time or include many different eras. And that's not going into how would they travel to the past/future (riding the Legendaries in bike form?) or what story reason would they need to. Also, when it comes to making the future, do you make it just an "advance" version of modern times, a utopia, a post apocalyptic wasteland, or a mixture of these like something you'd see in the cyberpunk genre; what kind of future is depicted would obviously alter the story of the game as either being a strange land to explore or something that needs to be changed.

Battle Facility: Finally, could maybe the post game Battle Facility have this theme somehow included into it (and in more ways then just the Super Mechanic & Regional Variants)? Like, could we have another White Treehollow/Black Tower scenario? Maybe get some Time Travelling involved where you need to advance through it through different eras (and different battling rules & characters) in order to both create positive change and make a name/legend for yourself?
 
I think we're getting sidetracked with this definition of God discussion. How about we believe what we want to believe, cause does it really matter?

Anyway, so spent a few days casually looking through reactions, discussions, theories, and plenty of memes about Scarlet & Violet. Most I believe we either discussed on here in one form or another, but there is one thing which I think we could squeeze some discussion out of: Past & Future Theme Inspirations.

With one of the focus of the games being "Past" and "Future" (mainly the the Professors & Legendaries), that brings to question what other features & mechanics in the game may draw inspiration from these themes. Some quick ones that come to mind:

Super Mechanic: You know, your Mega Evolution, Z-Moves, & Dynamax equivalent. We've yet to see it or any hint on what it might be (and I'm going to assume there is one). So, I think it's a good place to start, how would the theme of "Past & Future" be implemented into a Super Mechanic? One thing to keep in mind is that whatever it is there would likely be two versions of it: a general one that any Pokemon can use (like elemental Z-Moves & Dyanamax) and one designed for specific Pokemon (like signature Z-Moves and Gigantamax); also, If Gigantamax is any hint, the specific Super Mechanic would come with a form change.

For the general one, well I can think of a few things (yes, this discussion topic does bring a bit of speculation discussion; I'm hoping it doesn't get too out of hand that it causes this thread to be closed sooner rather than later).
One idea that popped into my head parallels another Super Mechanic I didn't mention: Legends: Arceus Strong/Agile Styles. WAIT! Before you say anything, I know, and I agree, the Styles do not work outside Legends: Arceus due to how stats are handled in that game. Rather, I'm thinking of another turn-based RPG that uses a duel battle system: Bravely Default. In that game series there's the "Brave and Default" mechanic. "Brave" lets you perform multiple actions in a single turn but the character then cannot act for the number of turns equal to the number of bonus actions done (basically, the character used moves they would have done in the FUTURE in a single turn). "Default" has the character skip their turn, in addition to them entering a defensive stance to take less damage that turn, next turn they've gained a BP which now allows them to use the "Brave" mechanic but without having to recharge next turn for the number of extra BP they have (so in other words, the character stores up PAST moves so that they can attack multiple times later on without needing to recharge afterwards). Now obviously such a system can be really broken for Pokemon, so some tweaking would need to be done so that it doesn't come down to the player with the fastest Pokemon OHKOing their opponent.

For the specific one, starting out maybe some Pokemon will have a special move they can only perform while doing a "Brave" or after having entered a "Default" stance. On top of that, either choosing that special move or doing some other additional requirement could transform the Pokemon into a Super Form that's either what the species could become in the Future or is summoning forth a Past power from its ancestors. Not sure what additional traits that Super Form will come with, I'd like it to do what Mega Evolution did with it gaining stat boosts and possibly changing Type & Ability, BUT Gigantamax was pretty successful with only increasing HP and giving the special GMax Move.


Regional Variants: This one I feel is fairly more easier to imagine incorporating a "Past & Future" theme. Basically some Pokemon will be given forms based on the idea what were they like some point in the past, and others will be given forms based on speculation what that species could evolve into becoming in the future. Now, from that alone you're probably wondering how those would count as Regional Variants, and I'll admit I'm just shoving these forms under the Regional Variant tag for simplicity sake. Obviously these Pokemon wouldn't be roaming around the region due to being from the past/future, or at least naturally. From UItra Wormholes to Space-Time Distortions, Pokemon has given itself plenty of explanations why a past/future Pokemon has suddenly appeared (or at the very least let them make a new excuse to better fit the story). It's this Youtube video that got me into thinking about this very topic with me expanding upon it:

Time Travel: While Pokemon is no stranger to time travel, it's always been kept to a minimum. Like the only "major" instances I can think of is the Celebi Event in HGSS and the multiplayer side story in Pokemon Ranger: Guardian Signs. Otherwise Pokemon has kept from doing a game where a good portion of the game takes place or involves travelling to the past/future in order to protect the past, save the present, defeat Lavos and bring on a good future. Well, I guess now is good as any time! Of course with Time Travel that could take shape in many different forms depending on (1.) how far away from the present time they would want to go and (2.) would they only want the present & different time or include many different eras. And that's not going into how would they travel to the past/future (riding the Legendaries in bike form?) or what story reason would they need to. Also, when it comes to making the future, do you make it just an "advance" version of modern times, a utopia, a post apocalyptic wasteland, or a mixture of these like something you'd see in the cyberpunk genre; what kind of future is depicted would obviously alter the story of the game as either being a strange land to explore or something that needs to be changed.

Battle Facility: Finally, could maybe the post game Battle Facility have this theme somehow included into it (and in more ways then just the Super Mechanic & Regional Variants)? Like, could we have another White Treehollow/Black Tower scenario? Maybe get some Time Travelling involved where you need to advance through it through different eras (and different battling rules & characters) in order to both create positive change and make a name/legend for yourself?
This is me, but I wouldn't play a Pokémon with a non-traditional turn-based combat system. Legends Arceus was fine because in my oppinion, Legends Arceus = Mystery Dungeon, so it's fine that it has it's own combat system, it is a Spin Off, after all. But for the main franchise it won't work (to me, at least). The core of Pokémon is it's combat system, one that has been implementing novelties through the years but always maintaining the same core gameplay. This is different from Final Fantasy, for example, where the franchise never had a defined combat system to begin with and they enjoyed changing it from game to game, so it's community already knew what to expect.

I don't care what they add in terms of shenanigans, because this mechanics work as a separate layer from the combat system (like MEvos, D-max and Z-moves, none of them alter the combat system itself), but to morph this aproximately 30 years old turn based combat system into another thing, is like playing an hypothetical Super Mario Bros. 4 for it to be a shooter.
 

NealIRC

Banned deucer.
I'm so excited about Riddler_Khu's riddle of a coin pokemon that might evolve into a treasure chest. That hints at a nice (abandoned) castle or tower.
 
I just hope the story is actually good/interesting for once. :/ Why can't we have a supper good story like mystery dungeon? Surely they have enough money for it.
 

AquaticPanic

Intentional Femboy Penguin
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Community Leader
Regarding story, I am very interested to see the version differences this time around (which is certainly not something I ever expected to say about a Pokémon game pair)

It may be just having too high hopes, but with the fact that we have different professors in the two games and with the whole future/past theme that the games seem to have, I wonder how far different they are from one another. I don't expect the story itself to be largely different, but moreso in terms of aesthetic and presentation. Something akin to how gen 5 handled areas like Opelucid City or that one desert area, but in a larger scope to drive home more the theme.

I'm also very much expecting the version exclusives to be theme-significant this time around, which ios to say, Scarlet getting "older" mons like Claydol or Golurk while Violet has more "futuristic" mons like Magnezone or Porygon, while something like Relicanth being in both games. I personally like the theory that we're getting "Retro" and "Neo" forms depending on the game to make mons either more ancient-spired or future-inspired.

If anything I'm left wondering if Scarlet/Violet regions have a Hisui/Sinnoh thing going on and whether they even take place at the same timeframe. It'd be a very fun twist imo if Violet took place years after Scarlet, being kind of a sequel and a prequel released at the same time. Yknow, kinda doing something interesting with the two version gimmick for once
 
If anything I'm left wondering if Scarlet/Violet regions have a Hisui/Sinnoh thing going on and whether they even take place at the same timeframe. It'd be a very fun twist imo if Violet took place years after Scarlet, being kind of a sequel and a prequel released at the same time. Yknow, kinda doing something interesting with the two version gimmick for once
The footage we've seen doesn't seem to indicate that a significant amount of time has passed between games. Unless we're to believe that in the who-knows-how-many years between Scarlet and Violet, the only thing that changed was that someone painted all the orange things purple.
 

Codraroll

Cod Mod
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In terms of story, I am not expecting much. For better or worse, Game Freak has got a formula down and they're following by the numbers for every "conventional" Pokémon game. Same with the version differences; they will be cosmetic at best, with the versions being identical except for some different NPCs and different text boxes appearing in a few scenes, but with pretty much the exact same things happening. Think of the differences of the Ultra Recon Squad in US and UM, for instance. For all intents and purposes, no actual differences exist.
 
Yep, I loved when Gold and Silver had different sprites for the Pokémon. They should do something like that again, since visuals are far more important than some details they seem to change and no one notices or cares about (myself included). Problem is this can't be done anymore because of 3D models, so they should get rid of these models, which are worse than classic sprites so it'd be another improvement, and make different sprites for different versions of the game again.
 

Pikachu315111

Ranting & Raving!
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It may be just having too high hopes, but with the fact that we have different professors in the two games and with the whole future/past theme that the games seem to have, I wonder how far different they are from one another. I don't expect the story itself to be largely different, but moreso in terms of aesthetic and presentation. Something akin to how gen 5 handled areas like Opelucid City or that one desert area, but in a larger scope to drive home more the theme.

(...)

If anything I'm left wondering if Scarlet/Violet regions have a Hisui/Sinnoh thing going on and whether they even take place at the same timeframe. It'd be a very fun twist imo if Violet took place years after Scarlet, being kind of a sequel and a prequel released at the same time. Yknow, kinda doing something interesting with the two version gimmick for once
With the Past/Future theme I would be disappointed if they didn't have some locations where at least their aesthetic is different between versions. Like a few ideas:
  • Scarlet could have an ancient temple location that has been preserved & maintained, meanwhile in Violet all that's left of the temple are ruins and damaged underground passageways.
  • Scarlet could have a construction site, meanwhile Violet will have the building/structure/whatever that's being built finished.
  • Scarlet could have an "old west"-like town, meanwhile Violet it's a ghost town.
  • Scarlet could have a natural history museum, meanwhile Violet would have a science museum.
  • Scarlet could have gardens with irrigation channels, meanwhile Violet would have greenhouses.
  • Scarlet could have some routes where the road is dirt/cobble, meanwhile in Violet they would be paved/tiled
  • Scarlet could have a locomotive train, meanwhile Violet would have rapid transit. Similarly they could have Scarlet having sailboats while Violet has motorboats.
  • Scarlet could have a White Forest/Treehollow, meanwhile Violet could have a Black City/Tower.
However, I think that would be the most they would do. Games where the stories take place years apart is really stretching things, especially if they have the same character like Nemona looking & acting the same.

Yep, I loved when Gold and Silver had different sprites for the Pokémon. They should do something like that again, since visuals are far more important than some details they seem to change and no one notices or cares about (myself included). Problem is this can't be done anymore because of 3D models, so they should get rid of these models, which are worse than classic sprites so it'd be another improvement, and make different sprites for different versions of the game again.
Uh huh.

OR, another idea, they could just give each Pokemon two different idle poses between versions (or have both with each version preferring to put the Pokemon in one of the poses).
 

Pikachu315111

Ranting & Raving!
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Sirs GameFreaks already has issues delivering finished products in time and you two would want them to have to put twice the effort in animating / drawing? :worrywhirl:
They moved to across the street from the main Nintendo offices, they could just walk over, knock on their door, and ask for a cup of their graphic designers. I'm sure there are a few who are either between projects or are on unannounced projects they could temporarily be moved from.

Or, being partial owners of a multi-billion dollar company & franchise, hire a few more people.

They could also just not release games within a year of each other and have development spend another year or so in the oven, probably can find the time then.
 
They moved to across the street from the main Nintendo offices, they could just walk over, knock on their door, and ask for a cup of their graphic designers. I'm sure there are a few who are either between projects or are on unannounced projects they could temporarily be moved from.

Or, being partial owners of a multi-billion dollar company & franchise, hire a few more people.

They could also just not release games within a year of each other and have development spend another year or so in the oven, probably can find the time then.
Let's be honest we both know none of these 3 is happening ;) I don't need to go over the reasonings, we argued about them a million times.
 
With the Past/Future theme I would be disappointed if they didn't have some locations where at least their aesthetic is different between versions. Like a few ideas:
  • Scarlet could have an ancient temple location that has been preserved & maintained, meanwhile in Violet all that's left of the temple are ruins and damaged underground passageways.
  • Scarlet could have a construction site, meanwhile Violet will have the building/structure/whatever that's being built finished.
  • Scarlet could have an "old west"-like town, meanwhile Violet it's a ghost town.
  • Scarlet could have a natural history museum, meanwhile Violet would have a science museum.
  • Scarlet could have gardens with irrigation channels, meanwhile Violet would have greenhouses.
  • Scarlet could have some routes where the road is dirt/cobble, meanwhile in Violet they would be paved/tiled
  • Scarlet could have a locomotive train, meanwhile Violet would have rapid transit. Similarly they could have Scarlet having sailboats while Violet has motorboats.
  • Scarlet could have a White Forest/Treehollow, meanwhile Violet could have a Black City/Tower.
However, I think that would be the most they would do. Games where the stories take place years apart is really stretching things, especially if they have the same character like Nemona looking & acting the same.



Uh huh.

OR, another idea, they could just give each Pokemon two different idle poses between versions (or have both with each version preferring to put the Pokemon in one of the poses).
The real problem with idle poses when it comes to 3D models is that no one seems able (me neither) to conceptualice how to do it properly, while providing those poses of charisma. Poses like this:



Work because it is an static image, but try to imagine a 3D model with this as idle:

https://archives.bulbagarden.net/media/upload/7/7f/Spr_2s_227.png[img]

And I sincerely don't know how Game Freak or any other company could solve this. And it is important, because the way sprites were designed back then helped when it came to give emotion or character to the mons. You can see them in "battle pose", angered, ready for battle, etcetera, whereas now you see a Rhyperior and...

[img]https://archives.bulbagarden.net/media/upload/5/51/Spr_6x_464_m.png

It's just there, standing. But you can't do this either



It would be absurd to have a model like that 100% of the time xddd

Then you have mons that are actually fine, but look trashy because of both, 3d models AND the color selection. Look Inteleon, for example:



I hate it. But this mini sprite



Is clean af.
 

AquaticPanic

Intentional Femboy Penguin
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I feel like its kind of odd to complain about models right at this point in time where they have been getting improvements. I get the complaints for XY to SWSH to an extent but Legends has given more depth and brand new textures alongside new animations and having different idles for in and out of battle, and from what we have seen from SV, they are continuing on this. The difference between SWSH Magnemite and SV Trailer Magnemite is pretty big of an improvement.

I do miss Sprites and think Models can be improved upon, but we are already seeing those improvements. We all like to meme on SwSh for the high quality animations thing but while I agree that visually SwSh wasn't huge on this front, Legends' reduced dex has worked greatly to its advantage when it comes to the mons themselves. You get to see stuff like segmented wings on Bugs, cracked rocks on Probopass and Rhyhorn, scales on the fish mons, etc; and one of my favourite updates is Flareon's tail getting fuzzier. And from what we have seen of SV? Textures are only going up from here onwards.

On a closing note, we are already also seeing designs that wouldn't be able to be done with sprites. Miraidon's eyes would not be able to be replicated in a sprite without being lost in translation
 
Weak data point in favor of "SV won't reset moves the way BDSP and LA did":

When you transfer a Pokemon from Go into Home that isn't compatible with any of the Gen 8 games, it defaults to its USUM moveset and shows so on mobile. It would make no sense for this to happen if SV were going to reset moves - the player would see four moves that they'd never get to use anywhere.
 

Plague von Karma

Banned deucer.
I hope this is the game Pokemon looks at the general stat creep and realises the numbers don't work anymore. I know a lot of people talk about nerfing certain Pokemon, but I think what really needs to be done is a re-evaluation of a lot of old mechanics that have stuck.

An interesting point a person brought up to me is that Pokémon has used the same multipliers for basically everything for over 20 years. During this time, the ol' stat creep has happened, and with bigger numbers come bigger answers from that multiplication. The best thing I can think of doing here is halving what you normally have, so 1.5× -> 1.25×, so on, so forth. A single Swords Dance is enough to swing for game nowadays, the rest of the stat stages shouldn't be overkill and instead be a useful thing to aspire to. This whole mechanic was made without stat-boosting items in mind and I do think it's becoming progressively more problematic. Look at most of the Pokemon that get banned nowadays, it's almost always because they can hold a certain item or boost and go balls-to-the-wall. That shouldn't happen, it should be something that assists in a broader game plan rather than something that makes it immediately a one-note kill button. I don't know if I'm articulating this well.

I think Pokemon is at it's most fun when your monsters are having a sustained fight. An OHKO should be rare and super hype, a 2HKO should be uncommon, 45% should be a scary chunk of damage that determines a big part of the game. Couple that with some quick, snappy, detailed animations, and you can have an immersive brawl rather than an uninteractive beatdown.

Now I do also think recovery should be toned down. The best thing I can think of is making Recover a 33% thing, not a 50% thing. I don't think the PP is a big deal, it's really just the fact you can recover so much back in one instance and fish for a favourable RNG call. But that's kind of a cold take, and I think PLA started doing this. It's a good sign of things to come, methinks. There's a lot you could do here.

The point I'm making is that the numbers just need neutralising, I guess. Make it more evened out rather than polar extremes.
 

Yung Dramps

awesome gaming
One way or another, SV comp is gonna be incredibly fascinating. This generation will effectively be the true first post-dexit competitive game built from the ground up with that huge change in mind rather than how it was in SWSH where it was obviously done mid-development and as such the full extent of what Game Freak would like to do in such a scenario wasn't really known. Even then they managed to slip through some big changes like the gutting of Toxic distribution and the first ever direct stat nerf in Aegislash so you gotta wonder if they'll go further with stuff like that and do even more fundamental reworks and rebalances
 
One way or another, SV comp is gonna be incredibly fascinating. This generation will effectively be the true first post-dexit competitive game built from the ground up with that huge change in mind rather than how it was in SWSH where it was obviously done mid-development and as such the full extent of what Game Freak would like to do in such a scenario wasn't really known. Even then they managed to slip through some big changes like the gutting of Toxic distribution and the first ever direct stat nerf in Aegislash so you gotta wonder if they'll go further with stuff like that and do even more fundamental reworks and rebalances
I agree that this could be an opportunity for them to focus on competitive, and there have been changes which suggest they might be paying it some amount of attention, but based on their track record I'm not optimistic. There have been regional dex VGC metagames for almost as long as there has been official competition (I've personally never enjoyed them), and nothing has ever stopped them from being able to ban pokemon or institute nerfs. Ironically the biggest thing dexit affects is the unofficial competitive metagame, by restricting what's possible for players to do on their own. If we get a good year for competitive I'll be pleasantly surprised and throw myself back in, but I'll wait till they unveil whatever gimmick shows up to pass judgement.
 
I agree that this could be an opportunity for them to focus on competitive, and there have been changes which suggest they might be paying it some amount of attention, but based on their track record I'm not optimistic. There have been regional dex VGC metagames for almost as long as there has been official competition (I've personally never enjoyed them), and nothing has ever stopped them from being able to ban pokemon or institute nerfs. Ironically the biggest thing dexit affects is the unofficial competitive metagame, by restricting what's possible for players to do on their own. If we get a good year for competitive I'll be pleasantly surprised and throw myself back in, but I'll wait till they unveil whatever gimmick shows up to pass judgement.
Tbh while I do get the skepticism, I would say that with USUM and now SwSh it has shown that GameFreaks (or TPCI, honestly probably TPCI) is really trying their hardest to make the game "competitive". Multiple QoL attempts, addition of new in-game methods to reduce or completely remove any necessity to gen mons, constant "competitive pokemon" mystery gifts after big tournaments, localized streams for all events, supported non-official tournaments on Twitch/Youtube, copies of already obtainable or "other version" legendaries distributed via events, possibility to obtain "other version exclusives" of both legendaries and regular pokemon via gameplay means or just transferring from Go... it's a huge list of improvements.

And it's not out of sheer charity bear it.

Everyone by now has realized that E-sports = money. TPCI has been trying VERY hard to get Pokemon to E-sports tier.
The TCG is already becoming slowly more popular, and while the VGC still has a long way to go, they have definitely shown their intention to also make it "a thing".
During gen 7 it was a miracle if we had the finals streamed (on top of gen 7 being on a basically uncapturable legally device). Since gen 8 started, I can see VGC matches almost every week between Victory Road, Nugget Bridge and the official Pokemon channel on Twitch. Even despite the covid, they've hired actual casters (some of them being former world champions or similar), as I mentioned they even hired or partnered with foreign streamers in order to get localized.
They even had some attempts at a "banlist" and "format changes" during the lifespan of SwSh, trying stuff like "let's just ban the 10 most used pokemon" or "have a format with no dynamax" or swap around the number of restricteds, all of which shaked a bit the meta for their duration. (Ironically iirc the no-dynamax format was one of the most stale)

I am 100% confident more "attempts to competitivize" will happen.

Now, whenever they'll be good or bad... heh, I can't help with this one. But I am confident that they have all the intention to attempt to push Pokemon toward E-sports status.
 
An interesting point a person brought up to me is that Pokémon has used the same multipliers for basically everything for over 20 years. During this time, the ol' stat creep has happened, and with bigger numbers come bigger answers from that multiplication. The best thing I can think of doing here is halving what you normally have, so 1.5× -> 1.25×, so on, so forth. A single Swords Dance is enough to swing for game nowadays, the rest of the stat stages shouldn't be overkill and instead be a useful thing to aspire to. This whole mechanic was made without stat-boosting items in mind and I do think it's becoming progressively more problematic. Look at most of the Pokemon that get banned nowadays, it's almost always because they can hold a certain item or boost and go balls-to-the-wall. That shouldn't happen, it should be something that assists in a broader game plan rather than something that makes it immediately a one-note kill button. I don't know if I'm articulating this well.

I think Pokemon is at it's most fun when your monsters are having a sustained fight. An OHKO should be rare and super hype, a 2HKO should be uncommon, 45% should be a scary chunk of damage that determines a big part of the game. Couple that with some quick, snappy, detailed animations, and you can have an immersive brawl rather than an uninteractive beatdown.
This post made me think of Pokemon GO and their approach to PVP, as simplified as it is. The type effectiveness multiplier is 1.6x (60% more) and 0.625x (60% less) for resistances, where immunities are treated as double resistances and can stack to become triple resistances. (EDIT: STAB does 20%.) Stat boosts start at 4/4 and can go up and down 4 stages (4/8, 4/7, 4/6, 4/5, 4/4, 5/4, 6/4, 7/4, 8/4), though they only exist as secondary effects of moves like Power-Up Punch and other more RNG-based moves. The actual battle system is much simpler with smaller numbers and breakpoints but also ends up pretty drawn out in practice, where most of it is tapping to use your "fast move" which can usually do a little damage but hit quickly, though some do a lot of damage and hit slowly, and all this builds up energy for your 2 charge moves. There is a sort of memorization and prediction metagame to this where you have the option to store overcharge before using a move or use a shield twice to block damage (but not secondary effects), but you don't know which move the opponent chooses beforehand, and you can also bait with a well timed switch, though you can't switch again for some time. A recent example of this in action is the recent Europe championships if you want to see how this all plays out in practice.

Overall though they've taken inspiration from GO for a whole game and some features, I don't think gamefreak is going to be asking niantic for advice when it comes to the classic battle system, but it's interesting to think about. Though not based around competitive, Legends had some experimental changes that I wouldn't mind staying around, like passive damage splinters being treated as 25 BP moves of their type. I feel like gamefreak would be aware enough to go through more balancing with the growing focus on competitive, as they've mentioned internal tournaments in the past, and this recruitment interview with a 2017 graduate mentions the trend has still continued in SWSH development and getting excited about dynamax.

In general there are actually quite a bit of these developer interviews that seem to have been added recently this year with a mention of Legends, and while it's supposed to be positive to get people interested in working there, there's also some insight on their development philosophy like having a long debugging period for people who can't update their games, taking the risk to fix trees floating in general after they were all placed, and generally letting people have leeway with their roles and learning new things.
 
Weak data point in favor of "SV won't reset moves the way BDSP and LA did":

When you transfer a Pokemon from Go into Home that isn't compatible with any of the Gen 8 games, it defaults to its USUM moveset and shows so on mobile. It would make no sense for this to happen if SV were going to reset moves - the player would see four moves that they'd never get to use anywhere.
it's probably just still using the same exact script for move erasure as was used pre-update

there's 0 reason to change it, regardless of their plans for reset moves
 

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