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Smogon and Gamefreak...?
- Thread starter Quataaaa
- Start date
I doubt they care about competitive battling, seeing how they just went ahead and give regigigas some retarded ability without even thinking that doing so would make a legendary pokemon worse than a starter pokemon... And i doubt they're really thinking "i think this pokemon should go to NU so i shall give it a shitty ability" when they did that.
The only improvement for competitive battling was the splitting of the attacks into physical and special instead of having them all special/physical based on typing. While i was playing leaf green i constantly wondered what the heck was nintendo thinking to give gengar so much sp.att but its STAB moves are all physical, or why dragonite is physical but its best STAB move is like aerial ace (fly is just... useless)
Personally i HOPE that they will create more competitive pokemon with counters and different strategies, like what the CAPS are doing (although their pokemon may be so overpowered because they know exactly what is needed for a pokemon to be competitive) and not just give us another generation of pokemon that centralise on some new overpowered skill like sneaky rock that deals damage to pokemon who resist stealth rock...
The only improvement for competitive battling was the splitting of the attacks into physical and special instead of having them all special/physical based on typing. While i was playing leaf green i constantly wondered what the heck was nintendo thinking to give gengar so much sp.att but its STAB moves are all physical, or why dragonite is physical but its best STAB move is like aerial ace (fly is just... useless)
Personally i HOPE that they will create more competitive pokemon with counters and different strategies, like what the CAPS are doing (although their pokemon may be so overpowered because they know exactly what is needed for a pokemon to be competitive) and not just give us another generation of pokemon that centralise on some new overpowered skill like sneaky rock that deals damage to pokemon who resist stealth rock...
If they didn't care about competition, Spikes, TSpikes, and SR wouldn't exist. They're absolutely useless in-game, but valuable competitively. To an extent, LO wouldn't exist either, I've tried using it in-game before, there just isn't a point. You have to heal your Pokemon far too often for OHKOs or 2HKOs you'd normally get anyways. It was DESIGNED to be a purely competitive item from it's uselessness without your HP being maxed every game.
Good point. I think that between these additions in gen 4: stealth rock, toxic spikes, Life Orb, good spinblockers like rotom-a and giratina... and not adding any viable spinners... the message was clear. They wanted the metagame to be more offensive.
But to me, they didn't get it perfect - they should have added more viable spinners, and the game would be better without stealth rock (a move that single handedly makes 10+ pokes unviable for ou)
I doubt they pay people to go on internet forums and snoop around. TCPi probably checks competitive sites once in a while but Gamefreak won't exactly give Cress recover instead of moonlight because its not used enough on Shoddy.
Nope.
While GF may not know or care about smogon specifically I'm sure they care about competitive battles.Nearly every company that makes a game that is played competitively will go on fan sites to see how the game has turned out. It's the best way for them to discover any glitches or balance issues they may have missed.
The thing with pokemon though is that double battles seem to be the standard everywhere except for the US. Pokemon in general are less overpowered in double battles. So we may not get "fixes" for things we want because no one else (read: Japan) is citing them as an issue.
Also, if anyone is surprised that someone from another country knows about a game in advance they are just being old. We have this thing called the internet now.
The thing with pokemon though is that double battles seem to be the standard everywhere except for the US. Pokemon in general are less overpowered in double battles. So we may not get "fixes" for things we want because no one else (read: Japan) is citing them as an issue.
Also, if anyone is surprised that someone from another country knows about a game in advance they are just being old. We have this thing called the internet now.
If they didn't care about the metagame, Everstone breeding, Power items and overworld abilities (Synchronize, anyone?) wouldn't exist.
And Goddamn I'm happy they do. Woe the Ruby days I had to bred an entire box full of Absol to get an Adamant one. Not even factoring the IVs.
And Goddamn I'm happy they do. Woe the Ruby days I had to bred an entire box full of Absol to get an Adamant one. Not even factoring the IVs.
I think from the evidence we can gather thustly:
While their predominant market isn't competitive battlers, most of the game is geared towards the feel of the game rather than how they'll work out competitivley (I.e. Cresselia having moonlight over recover due to keeping in theme, Bibarel being the greatest troll ever e.t.c.)
Having said that, the competitive market is given some consideration, usually postgame, with things like Life Orb, Toxic Orb, Toxic Spikes, and various other things which are useless to casual players.
In conclusion, they give us some, but not total consideration, as would be expected due to the percentage of competitive gamers buying the game. And so, while it is possible, and maybe even probable they check the larger competive sites for feedback and observation, i wouldnt be too suprised if they didn't.
(Warning, the above was an opinion which attempted to balance the two seperate viewpoints demonstrated in the thread, and not in any way should be regarded as something more than this.)
While their predominant market isn't competitive battlers, most of the game is geared towards the feel of the game rather than how they'll work out competitivley (I.e. Cresselia having moonlight over recover due to keeping in theme, Bibarel being the greatest troll ever e.t.c.)
Having said that, the competitive market is given some consideration, usually postgame, with things like Life Orb, Toxic Orb, Toxic Spikes, and various other things which are useless to casual players.
In conclusion, they give us some, but not total consideration, as would be expected due to the percentage of competitive gamers buying the game. And so, while it is possible, and maybe even probable they check the larger competive sites for feedback and observation, i wouldnt be too suprised if they didn't.
(Warning, the above was an opinion which attempted to balance the two seperate viewpoints demonstrated in the thread, and not in any way should be regarded as something more than this.)
Why would they think that? The official website in the US announced Gen 5 ...
Checking Smogon? I very much doubt it. Checking japanese competitive sites? Sure.
They seem to give us a lot of cool things for the game that have no place ingame or if you plan to beat your friends. Yes, Garchomp was a mistake as was Stealth Rock, but that kind of mistakes happen often in every game.
Magic The Gathering has had it's own share of mistakes, some almost killed the game at a certain point and they worry for the competitive scene more than anyone else.
They seem to give us a lot of cool things for the game that have no place ingame or if you plan to beat your friends. Yes, Garchomp was a mistake as was Stealth Rock, but that kind of mistakes happen often in every game.
Magic The Gathering has had it's own share of mistakes, some almost killed the game at a certain point and they worry for the competitive scene more than anyone else.
Here's a question that if you answer, you will probably figure out the answer:
If you were an executive officer in charge of one of Nintendo's biggest and most important game franchises, would you choose to ignore/fail to perform such cursory market research as checking the most popular fan websites?
Yes Pokemon's greatest fan base and GF may both be Japanese, but English is an important international language (where as Japanese frankly isn't), and a great majority of international players do play from English. If there was no money in the international market base, GF wouldn't put so much effort into games and events abroad.
I would be surprised if they didn't know about smogon, and at least have some cursory understanding of what kind of net community it is. An endeavor like pokemon requires a lot of market research-- from in depth surveying at home and abroad to game testing. Performing brief scans of popular websites is something that can be done by a company on an almost automated basis depending on how good their research team/technologies are.
If you were an executive officer in charge of one of Nintendo's biggest and most important game franchises, would you choose to ignore/fail to perform such cursory market research as checking the most popular fan websites?
Yes Pokemon's greatest fan base and GF may both be Japanese, but English is an important international language (where as Japanese frankly isn't), and a great majority of international players do play from English. If there was no money in the international market base, GF wouldn't put so much effort into games and events abroad.
I would be surprised if they didn't know about smogon, and at least have some cursory understanding of what kind of net community it is. An endeavor like pokemon requires a lot of market research-- from in depth surveying at home and abroad to game testing. Performing brief scans of popular websites is something that can be done by a company on an almost automated basis depending on how good their research team/technologies are.
I think GF actually does care about the competitive battling scene, due to, as others mentioned, the hindering items, Life Orb, entry hazards, and Leftovers even. Entire pokemon are made simply for competitive battling, such as Blissey and Shuckle, who suck in-game. The physical-special split is another example of this.
Having said that, I feel that they're trying to hide this underneath appeal for casual players. They are subtly hinting at things like IVs, EVs, natures, and stuff like breeding tactics, but it's not made blatant. We get the benefits of it, while casual players don't even notice. It's the best of both worlds.
Sometimes, however, there are mistakes. I think Regigigas and Garchomp are the main examples of said mistakes. SR was not a mistake, I think they feared that Yanmega would be broken if it weren't for that move, the same goes for fliers in general, which is why they made it a rock move.
They care, all right, a LOT. They just are in denial, and make mistakes at times.
Having said that, I feel that they're trying to hide this underneath appeal for casual players. They are subtly hinting at things like IVs, EVs, natures, and stuff like breeding tactics, but it's not made blatant. We get the benefits of it, while casual players don't even notice. It's the best of both worlds.
Sometimes, however, there are mistakes. I think Regigigas and Garchomp are the main examples of said mistakes. SR was not a mistake, I think they feared that Yanmega would be broken if it weren't for that move, the same goes for fliers in general, which is why they made it a rock move.
They care, all right, a LOT. They just are in denial, and make mistakes at times.
Great point.
Let's not forget that although market research itself is complicated, there are simpler aspects to it. You can hire someone with no college education and for $10 an hour (or w.e. this is in yen) to check smogon once a week, record the aggregate opinion, and forward that on to higher ups. The higher ups can then consider the opinion of smogon, along with lots of other market factors, and come to a conclusion on how the game should play. And of course, the opinion of the masses of eight year olds that buy the console games will be given the most weight, and smogon will be given much less weight.
I don't think GameFreak does any sort of testing to determine if the competitive metagame is balanced. That would require too much time, with the sheer number of Pokemon and moves out there. Even a large community of thousands of people haven't been able to settle on a balanced metagame (we're still testing Salamence, what, 3 years after D/P came out?). However, competitive battling has been a big part of Pokemon since Gen 1, and they clearly recognize this. I do think they put the effort into creating the elements that make a successful competitive game. Rather than balancing all the Pokemon, they have designed it so that every strategy can be stopped by one means or another. I think it says a lot that outside of the 670/680 BST Ubers, Darkrai, Deoxys, and Lati@s, we've had to ban very few Pokemon to create an enjoyable and relatively balanced metagame.
But with that in mind, it is far easier to appease 8-year-olds than to appease competitive battlers. Give them the cute-looking pokemon, cool animations, and whatnot that they like, GF can (and will, and has) at the same time give us what WE want.
Right...
I don't know whether they keep tabs on Smogon, but I'm certain that they know about the more popular English fansites, such as Bulbapedia, Serebii, and of course, Smogon.
They must spend some time balancing the game, though I really doubt they go to the same lengths we do.
If Game Freak were truly interested in making a balanced game then each new Pokemon made would be truly viable for competitive play. As this isn't really the case, I don't think they go out of their way all that much to balance out the game, and I'm pretty sure they don't come on sites like this to get information for what the fans want. To be honest, if Gen 5 truly ruined the competitive environment, and not 1 competitive player bought Black or White, they'd still be raking in the cash. You need to remember that the competitive battling community is a tiny percentage of the people who play the game, and IVs/EVs and Nature weren't added to the game purely for the sake of competitive play.
The game is extensively and meticulously balanced, in 2v2.
The problems we come across in competitive battling are mostly a result of this shift towards 2v2 gameplay.
Stealth Rock is the greatest centralizing force in 1v1 ever. In 2v2, it's non-existant, especially in the VGC. With only 4 pokemon, and often only 2-4 switch ins total in a game, Stealth Rock is probably one of the weakest moves in the game.
Moves like Icy Wind are godsends in 2v2 and often win games, but in a 1v1 matches they are never used for obvious reasons.
Dragons like Salamance and Garchomp are uber-quality attackers in 1v1, but in 2v2, Outrage hits a random target, and only one at that. All Dragon moves except Twister only hit one target, and that really goes a long way to balancing their strength in a 2v2. You can hit one pokemon hard, but you can't pick which one. That's obviously overpowered in 1v1.
There are numerous examples of moves and abilities that show that tons of time has been spent balancing doubles rather than singles.
The problems we come across in competitive battling are mostly a result of this shift towards 2v2 gameplay.
Stealth Rock is the greatest centralizing force in 1v1 ever. In 2v2, it's non-existant, especially in the VGC. With only 4 pokemon, and often only 2-4 switch ins total in a game, Stealth Rock is probably one of the weakest moves in the game.
Moves like Icy Wind are godsends in 2v2 and often win games, but in a 1v1 matches they are never used for obvious reasons.
Dragons like Salamance and Garchomp are uber-quality attackers in 1v1, but in 2v2, Outrage hits a random target, and only one at that. All Dragon moves except Twister only hit one target, and that really goes a long way to balancing their strength in a 2v2. You can hit one pokemon hard, but you can't pick which one. That's obviously overpowered in 1v1.
There are numerous examples of moves and abilities that show that tons of time has been spent balancing doubles rather than singles.
BUT it should be noted that out of the fully evolved pokemon, 151 are NU, and 133 are between UU and Uber. So 133 are viable in one or two of three metagames. It's possible that they intended to make multiple metagames... i.e. a lower metagame where venusaur and absol are strategically effective, and then a higher metagame where ho-oh and lugia are balanced as walls.
AND we shouldn't forget that a lot of the NU pokemon matter in-game, or as part of the story, or are a fun gimmick.
So it's hard to say. One thing to consider though is that I think that generation 1 has the highest percentage of useless NU pokemon. If you really look at generation 1, you have your studs like Gengar, Machamp, Snorlax, Alakazam (sorry lol I think zam is viable in ou), Jolteon, etc. Then outside of them there are just scores of fully evolved pokemon that have awful base stat totals and are totally useless. I think that gamefreak realized the quality gap that had been created, and created more pokemon that could hang with the Gengars and Machamps. And eventually plenty of gen 1 pokemon were given evolutions that could hang with the ou crowd.
Magic could actually be a good source of insight. Unlike Game Freak, which has a very opaque development system and almost never provides information about its creative process, Wizards of the Coast is very transparent. Individual designers and developers have blogs where they provide tons of anecdotes about where cards come from. They even admit when decisions have to do with sales, like sometimes making more powerful cards rarer than weaker ones.
Pokemon, like Magic, has much higher sales among casual players than among competitive ones. As several people in this thread have referenced, Generation IV sold around 15 million copies worldwide, while the number of those who have ever visited Smogon numbers in the thousands. However, most Wizards employees really love their game and enjoy the competitive aspect of it. They sometimes produce cards aimed directly at competitive play, even as counters for specific tournament decks, because they want to make the game more fun. It costs them nothing as long as they make the game fun for children, and it can make a big difference to serious players. It would not surprise me at all if, for example, Infernape developers specifically discussed disrupting Skarmbliss.
In short, the first priority is making the game fun for the middle schoolers who keep it on the map. But I would bet that several of Game Freak's 70 or so employees lurk regularly on these forums. Some may have even tried Shoddy (note that Wizards of the Coast Creative Director Randy Buehler had a famous run, while holding that job, on the Vintage Proxy tournament scene, a Magic sub-subculture with a similar "under the radar" outlaw-factor to Shoddy). Like Magic R&D at Wizards, GF is a small developer with just a few eyes on each job, and those eyes belong to real people who are aware of what a cool job they have. They think about this stuff a lot.
Somewhat counterintuitively, this is not actually true. Neither are above anecdotes about Regigigas being bad as a counterexample of concern over competitive play, etc. Actually, numerous ludological studies show that competitive play is more enjoyable when there are some "bad" alternatives which must be discarded. In non-customizable games like chess and Go, this comes in the form of extremely large decision trees, much of which consist of very bad options (like placing yourself in checkmate). In customizable games like Magic and Pokemon, this comes at least partially from the existence of good and bad options in the customization process.
For example, suppose we gave Arceus the moveset of Smeargle, with no species clause. Every Pokemon is equally viable, and the metagame would have the option to be completely diverse. Wizards has published data (and no doubt Game Freak has acquired similar insight) suggesting that people would enjoy this much less.
Furthermore, analysis of professional-level Magic tournaments (which are far more competitive than Pokemon, given the higher stakes) has shown that consistently successful players do the best in moderately diverse metagames, while minimally diverse (only one or two viable decks) and completely diverse (extremely large number of viable decks) have more "random" results relative to rating, record, etc. In other words, for Pokemon, the best metagame, both for fun and for competition, is one in which there are a large number of Pokemon, many but not all of which are competitively viable. In other words, exactly what we have. I find it impossible to believe that this is a coincidence.