The last games Eevee couldn't be obtained in were Black/White, and Game Freak has given it and its evolutions virtually nothing of note to make them feel fresh or interesting since then (unless you count Eevium Z, but how often did you use that over other Z-Crystals?).
Am I joke to you?
Look, I love the Eeveelutions as much as the next guy (especially Umbreon, Espeon, and Sylveon), but they seriously either need something awesome to incentivize me to train them again next gen or a break from the games altogether.
Yeah, thinking about it I don't think I ever really used an Eeveelution or seen many players use one aside from one playthrough from BrainScratchComms where they used an all Eeveelution team (but that was obviously the gimmick so does it count of using Eeveelution as a Type filler that GF seems to imply is their role?). At this point the only additional gimmick I can see GF giving the Eeveelutions is just going all in on their "Elemental" gimmick. Like there's a way they can learn every move of the Type they are (even if it doesn't make sense, we can just assume they create an elemental construct of what they need to do the attack), give them an Ability which makes them an "avatar" of their Type (boost power, increase accuracy, increase chance of secondary effect, weaken weaknesses, strengthen resistances, etc.). I wouldn't let players change their stats (they I do support GF reajusting some Eeveelution stats) so there would be some idea what the player has to work with.
And no, I don't want new regular Eeveelutions; they'll just get stale themselves in another couple of generations.
But we've haven't had a new Eeveelution since Gen 6...
So if the Gen 9 games follow the same formula that Sword/Shield did, I'd like for the Eeveelutions to be given the same treatment that the Legendary Birds got this generation - inactive during the base game, then reintroduced in the form of regional variants about a year later. I keep visualizing a regional Espeon based on a solar flare and an Umbreon based on an aurora (the latter's Shiny coloring in Gen 8 already kind of reminds me of the Northern Lights as is), just to give a couple of examples (and they'd be great ways to introduce Fire/Fairy and Ice/Poison respectively). Of course, the chance of Game Freak doing this is slim to none, but it's about the only way I can think of to make them feel exciting and fresh to see again.
Slim to none? More like 0% chance to never. While indeed there isn't anything saying a Pokemon with branched evolution needs to have all evos have a regional variant if one does, that does at least feel like GF's thinking as shown with the Galarian Slowpoke family. If one Eeveelution gets a regional variant, they all do and that's not a can of worms GF is going to open up. Heck, this is also a problem giving the Eeveelution super forms, they'd have to give each one it own separate form (though at least giving them all a Mega Evo would feel like its a one-and-done deal). It's probably why it was Eevee that got the Z-Move and Gigantamax, at this point it's easier to do special gimmicks with Eevee than all of the Eeveelutions.
I personally think another way they could keep the Eeveelutions "relevant" is if they did what they did in Alola with the "Eevee Users", have some kind of side quest involving a group of characters who all just so happen to use the Eeveelutions (and a team themed around what that Eeveelution is representing). I've myself come up with dozens of story ideas, from mundane to a few wild/crazy ideas, so I think it's definitely something fun that can be done with the Eeveelutions to give them some more involvement then just dex fillers.
And as for the Kanto starters in that hypothetical scenario... give them a break too, and when reintroducing them, don't give them any preferential treatment at all. One generation every 7 years or so of Charizard not being shoved in our faces at every opportunity isn't going to kill us, I promise.
Yes, rest the Kanto Starters. Heck, rest all the other region Starters, or at least save involvement of them for the post game. Main game should be about the new Starters of the region.
.....who am I kidding, at best we'll start to get unevolvable Cap Eevees on top of Cap Pikachus.
Nah, Cap Pikachu is because of Ash's Pikachu. If Eevee was to get unique variations (which I don't see the point of doing) it'll probably be given bows themed after its Eeveelutions (either for each one or in Gen groups so they'd only need to make 4 at this moment: Gen I, Gen II, Gen IV, & Gen VI).
this is one of the things that gets me about lgpe - the entire point of eevee is that it evolves! it's literally in its name. the dex classifies it as the "evolution pokemon". from gen 1, it's always been the mon with multiple evolutions, & i suspect that's a major part of what makes it so iconic. if you take away eevee's ability to evolve, you might as well have made let's go pokemon dunsparce or spinda or something.
I think a neat idea was if the Let's Go Eevee was a special Eevee that, instead of permanently evolving, you could evolve it forward, backwards, and sideways before battle; a reference to Red's Eevee in the Special/Adventure manga. True it'll only be able to evolve into Flareon, Vaporeon, & Jolteon, though you could still have the special moves that reference the other five.
This is gave me idea, what if the create a regional Eevee with regional Eevolution with those Physical type that we've been asking before? Things like Fighting type Umbreon, Poison type Vaporeon, and so on.
Just tried to do that and... yeah, a lot of my choices felt forced. It wouldn't work, and as
Worldie mentioned the Galarian Bird Trio changes was the idea of playing with their names & theme (plus there was only three of them).
Also, why make Regional Variations of the Eeveelutions when they could just make new evolutions, ones who would be better made to match its Typing then trying to force an older Eeveelution's theme to being that Type?
Yes SWSH are not the best games in the world. Let's accept it and move on. I had some fun with them and while not great, I really wish people would stop beating a dead horse and bandwagoning because the topic is popular to hate on.
It's funny as SM were apparently rushed for the 20th anniversary yet in my opinion were better than SWSH (again, don't hate those games, I just think Gen 7 is better). I think the franchise just needs to take a few years off at this point to cool down, even though that will never happen because MERCHANDISING
We could accept it and move on... if GF would just learn their lesson and not rush games.
Gen VII likely was built atop the Gen VI engine, so that probably saved them a lot of development time and they were familiar with the engine. So with that thought, if they keep the Switch around long enough, Gen 9 will probably be on par with Gen 7 (and maybe 5 now thinking about it). Though hopefully with being closer to Nintendo HQ any new system they would have to work on would be a smoother transition...
But yes, I think by now many of us agree that Pokemon is not a series that does well with yearly releases, some games need some years in the development oven. Now I can see why for this period in time they did yearly releases due to circumstances outside of their control (though there was also bad planning & decisions on their part like not properly preparing for the 20th anniversary & deciding to want to release a new generation instead of Z version (which they were totally making, don't believe Masuda, he lies all the time)), but after Gen 8 there's really no need for the yearly releases so I'm hoping they do return taking some years between releases (heck, this does look to be their plan with the Sword & Shield release + DLC games).
