SPOILERS! Impressions on Scarlet/Violet

[Mario With Lasers]

It's been a couple days since release (or two weeks for the one-eyed sailors), guess it's time for this thread. So, what do you all think of the game?

Bugs: Ok I'll be honest: I do not have a Nintendo Switch. So I sailed the high seas. My PC is obviously better than a Switch, thus I did not see a single bug that was reported on Twitter, which got me wondering if people weren't just fishing for them. However, the games do have issues, to the point even I felt some ridiculous framerate drops and had to restart the game. The overworld still looks ugly with those poor-ass textures, and every single NPC starts walking at 5FPS once they are more than twenty feet away from you. This is ridiculous, and I have no idea how they managed to do this. However, I did not pay for the game so all in all I am unaffected. Still, I hope they at the very least release a patch to fix the so-called memory leak and all the other weird shit going on, because this game does have potential and feels a lot more alive and "soulful" than Sword/Shield. I honestly think this is the future of the franchise, it just needs proper investment.

Character design: Overall I think I liked every human design in the game. The characters aren't really deep but they all do their job, and their visuals are great... except for Penny and Nemona. Penny feels kinda off-place with her color scheme (and honestly, you know that Eevee backpack is smelly), and I didn't like her using slang too much; what teenager still uses "epic" in 2022 TYOOL ffs. Meanwhile, Nemona went waaaay too far in her battle obsession, to the point I just rolled my eyes whenever she appeared on-screen. A shame, because I liked her design otherwise. Also, why is everyone gay in this game holy shit

Overworld: I don't know how to feel about the utter lack of dungeons and buildings in this game. I mean there is exploration and it's nice and all but I like that feel of finding some bumfuck cave in the middle of nowhere and having to take a look, y'know? The cities also look terrible with no walling whatsoever, Cascarrafa being the worst offender being just beside a desert. Cities feel more like big public squares in the middle of the wilderness than proper urban centers, almost like we were back in PLA times.

Victory Road: Bread and butter and typical pokemon, can't complain much. The Gym challenges were a cool addition, even though they were absurdly easy and didn't even had much connection with, well, anything else. Glaseado Gym having no city was irksome too, it's like GF didn't know where to put the final gym so it was just there.

Geeta's team is honestly underwhelming. Kingambit should have been her ace, Glimmora simply doesn't have that "oomph" expected of the final Champion pokemon. Half the team feels like pushovers too, I'd replace Ava with Baxcalibur (and then make Doctor Garchomp, Ph.D, Hassel's ace), Gogoat with Arboliva (the cooler Grassy Terrain-related pokemon), and Veluza for Palafin (seriously why doesn't anyone have it???). Hell, they could even have made Palafin her lead and ace, if they wanted to be silly. Or even better, given all of them Terastal and let whoever is sent last to be the Tera. It's the Champion, for heaven's sake, let her go bonkers.

Path of Legends: It was a really easygoing path, although it also felt a bit short.This path was tied to Korai/Miraidon's abilities so you couldn't stretch it for too long, I guess. I think my only big issue with it is that the Titan battles were too easy. The HMs should buff the Titan stats like the Totem mechanic, so at least they'd put up more of a fight.

Also, the False Dragon Titan not being a proper double battle was criminal. I understand the game can't handle wild double battles, but then just choose another final Titan that isn't so obviously Doubles-oriented!

Operation Starfall: I really think they dropped the ball on the difficulty of Star autobattles. 30 pokemon in 10 minutes is nothing, I honestly can't see how even a 4yo would have difficulty passing it (even if not at first try). It should have started at, I dunno, 50 in 5 minutes and then a +20/+1min increase per squad defeated. Anything not to make it a walk in the park. The squad boss battles, on the other hand, were top-notch. A total banger. I'm still sad playable Revavroom doesn't get any of the cool abilities, though.

I really thought the climax was dumb while half-watching the leaker stream, but now it does make sense. Penny couldn't beat them because of the damn Code so she had to play by it. Still, the whole Cassiopeia disguise was so poor I'm impressed the game kept it for longer than Clavell's lol. Playing it myself, I don't feel the bullying theme was tacked on, either. It felt realistic even, each of them had a "reason" to have been bullied (but they never showed Penny, I guess?), they wanted to fight back but were blamed by the whole mess, and in the end the Director understood the situation thanks to his investigation so they all got a happy ending (and the bullies still left the academy).

Finally, Penny's Terastal speech in battle was really eggy lmao. "Become what you really want to be" yeah right, of course it's the kid with blue hair


I'll take the final path tomorrow, so I'll finally meet Sada in person. Hopefully the plot/gameplay still holds up.

 

[MrHands]

I overall like the games but this has more to do with the Pokémon formula in an open world environment being fun, not so much the games actually being good.

It's like getting a sandwich from Subway. Yeah sure it tastes good because you're hungry and it's specifically the kind of sandwich you want, but it's still made badly overall with sub par materials by employees who don't really want to be there.

I mean bugs yes, but also stupid design choices like adding sleeping animations to every Pokémon yet not using those animations in battle or things like removing most character customization. Almost every single Pokémon has been featured on the Switch at this point so there's no real reason for Dexit to continue, other than to sell Home and DLC. There's also commonly requested series staples like the Battle Tower etc that get cut every generation. SV continues the one step forward two steps back tradition Pokémon has had since XY. The game is terribly made by almost every single metric. It's baffling that this company is left in charge of the world's most profitable franchise.

 

[Dialganet2]

I have only reached the first Pokemon Centre, so I will reserve the right to review my judgement later on.

I am completely unspoiled (I only actively know the starters first stage, the Legendaries, and the Pokemon I've caught so far).

New designs I've encountered (Fidough, Oink Oink Normal mon, the parrot, the brawling Pika-clone, Flamigo, the Watery Diglett - sorry I can't remember names yet) looks promising. But that's to be expected.

Everything else is...inexcusably terrible, I guess? PL:A was miles ahead in terms of environment interaction, animations outside of battling, battling itself, and environment rendition quality.
I have had Balls hung in the air for no reason (I guess it is because myself and the relative pokemon were at different heights, but as soon as I threw the Poke Ball the slope disappeared), space-warping bugs mid battle, and one egregious instance where I was catching I think Buizel and the world literally capsized: suddenly, the sky was beneath Buizel's feet.

Honorable mention to the 3 year old intentional decision that, when you walk close to a Mon, if you find yourself in a blind spot, the Pokemon downright disappears (was an issue in SwSh, happened to me with the legendary just outside the cave).

Since Dexit has been a thing I have not given GF a penny (always second hand copies and/or gifts received), but since it seems irreversible for no reason (if they took the time they saved to make a game work like SV...try again), why the hell is Wingull in every single iteration of the games? Is it Pikachu famous? It was also obnoxiously everywhere in USUM, so maybe the Pokemon selection should be done a tad better?

So far I've enjoyed getting back in a new adventure, but that's to be expected and the bare minimum. I think I am actually enjoying it because I went in blind, and not a lot more.

If this is meant to be a mix of SwSh and PL:A, it is a badly concocted one. It has been four years and I am still waiting for a valid reason to cut content and corners (I am not referring only to Dexit here).

I would also like to see more abrasive reviews, since any other game performing like this would venture on a 4/10 average considering all sellouts. So far, only one major reviewer has given it what it deserves.

But hey, the Pokemon formula is fun. As I said, I reserve the right to change my views upon getting forward in the game. But so far it is a 3/10 at best.

 

[Perriechu]

Gonna move my post over from the Story Leaks to here and embelish a little;

Victory Road

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This is probably the storyline that was the least creative, simply because it has been done to death. I appreciate that they do try to mix things up a bit and shake up the formula, but ultimately collecting 8 badges, doing the E4 and beating the champion is a little stale and for Scarlet and Violet it's no different, but there are small things I enjoyed.

I enjoyed the Gym Challenges, as mundane as they felt they did add character and a feeling of individualism to not only the gym leaders but to also the towns/cities. We were able to somewhat assimilate into the local community and get a feel for how they live, and even if a small detail, it was really magical. It was so much better than just battling 2/3 trainers and then the leader. I don't want to shit on SWSH too much, but following how dire that gym challenge was, it was refreshing. They essentially meshed the Trial challenges from SM with traditional Gym Challenges and, for the most part, it worked. But overall, it was still generally quite stale. I wish they shook up the actual battles more, I enjoyed what they did for Ryme's gym battle where it was a double battle that gave boosts intermittently (Although could've done without them tbh) - and to give SWSH a shoutout, Raihan's gym battle was interesting, as they mixed up his type speciality with a battle type (Weather) rather than just straight up dragon. Hopefully in the future they can maybe retire types all together for Gym Battles, and focus on having weather teams, terrain teams, double battle strategies, Trick Room teams etc, considering VGC is all doubles that focus on these strategies, I'm surprised they haven't embedded these into the main game in a diluted way.

The Elite 4 was also fairly basic battle wise, but I did like how they were introduced to us early on, their characterisations were hit and miss for me, personally. I enjoyed Hassel and Rika but Poppy was literally introduced to us once for 3 seconds and then.. Larry was just there. He was easily one of the more boring gym leaders, so seeing him be the "Gym leader who received a promotion" was.. really uninspiring. Iono, Ryme, Tulip and Grusha were all far more interesting, it would've been better to see one of those as the Gym Leader who came into the role. (Although if I'm totally honest, I would've liked Eri from Team Star to be the E4 member, but it wouldn't have made sense given the story progression)

Now, let's get onto Geeta - as a character, I didn't find her overly interesting - design-wise, sure, she's great to look at, but her team/character were a bit boring. Her team was especially weird - Kingambit and Glimmora made sense, they're solid 500+ BST mons that hadn't been used yet, but then Espartha and Veluza? These two were used by Tulip and Kofu and then two Gen 6 Pokemon (Kalos confirmed?), two not very good ones at that - it really didn't make sense, no great synergy, low BSTs and low attack power.

Personally I would've made her team; Kingambit, Glimmora, Gholdengo, Baxcalibur, Arboliva and Armarouge. A decent coverage team, all above 500BST and would've share members with other leaders/E4 (I would swap Hassel's Baxcalibur with either Tatsugiri or Cyclizar) as a side note, I find it odd how Ceruledge and Armarouge weren't used by any of the relevant characters (Idk about rematches yet)

As for Nemona, I enjoyed her a lot. She was a solid rival, which was very refreshing after the last few generations of absolute flop/unlikable rivals (I actually enjoyed Hop but his character didn't live up to what they were aiming for) Her team, again, was a little odd. I would've removed Goodra and Lycanroc and added Ceruledge and Dachsbun, potentially.

Ultimately it was an okay story, they did what they could, there's still steps they could take to make it more gripping and enticing but you can tell they're trying to switch it up.

Path of Legends

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This was probably my favourite story, Arven's character is a little strange and erratic, he basically insulted you at your first meeting and then next time you were expected to help? But the development from that point onwards was enjoyable.

His story actually made me cry lol, if there's anything I'm a sucker for it's dogs and storylines that focus on a specific Pokemon they own, not just a legend or a general "i wanna be stronger!!" he had purpose, and a very achievable goal. I do wish they explored his relationship with -Don a little more, since he seemed to really dislike it, and what exactly happened in Area Zero, I haven't played the 4th story yet, so I'm expecting to find out why Mabosstiff was attacked/left in a temporary vegetive state - but I think a bit more hype/anticipation could've easily been built from his story, but overall I very much enjoyed it.

The titans themselves weren't that big-a-deal, I don't understand why we battled them twice, as the Herba Mystica didn't seem to make them harder? Or if they did, it wasn't noticeable, they should've made their second fight like the Totem Fights but with a bit more difficulty (Since it was 2 v 1) Funnily enough out of all the fights, Arven probably made me struggle. I had to break my "no item" rule for him.

Starfall Street

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I had already seen the conclusion to this story, and I wasn't very surprised, but I did really enjoy the development and exploration of these characters, it was totally cliched, which is why it wasn't my favourite storyline, but in terms of characterisation it was my fav. I enjoyed all members, but I wish we had like.. more impact of the bullying? It seemed to build to a lot of nothing. The "event" they were working towards ended up just being.. nothing? Does this school have no Safeguarding? It seemed a little all over the place, but I appreciate they were trying to shake up the villain formula - I do miss the cataclysmic world-ending events of past villains, but I guess they're a better group than Team Yell. (And potentially Team Skull)

Conclusive Story Thoughts

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Overall I very much appreciate what Gamefreak tried to do, there are a lot of issues with the storylines themselves, but they did try to flesh things out a lot better than previous titles, which is something I personally appreciate them doing because I like to relate, I like to see development and I like to see that they are pushing the confides of what Pokemon characters can develop and amount to.

Now moving onto to Gameplay, Graphics and so on.

I touched on the character designs a little above, but I do like them - there seems to be more of an effort to make the characters in the game stand out as opposed to SWSH which was just very myopic in its view, as there wasn't a lot of wiggle room when they were "sports" themed. Team Star probably have the best overall designs, given that they are meant to represent disgruntled 2000s teenagers, I think there's a solid attempt. There's a massive distinction between them and someone like Iono, who is a little older but still in the same age range. The teachers also have pretty distinct designs that match their personalities, although I do feel like the whole teacher bonding aspect is something that could have massively been expanded on, as well as the relationship building technique.

Bugs and Performance issues have all pretty much been echoed already - the bugs are minor and don't really bother me that much, but there should be a little more care given. The performance aspect is what I really take issue with, I get that people have different experiences, I think I'm more on the "good" spectrum in that I haven't had any ridiculous lags, but it still doesn't make it enjoyable at times, exploring the areas around the bigger cities is really tough as the lag seems to hit the most there. I've seen others have better experiences and I've seen others have worse, but overall I don't think anyone has had a clean playthrough, since the performance is tied to the game itself and not the console (Although this does it make it possible to patch, why they haven't acknowledged this and given us a timeframe of a patch is beyond me)

In terms of the overworld, I do have issues, but I also do have a lot of praise for it. I praise GF for making it genuinely explorable, and large, there's a lot to seek out and it makes exploring a genuine fun aspect where I can just lose track of time doing shit, but it does feel a little cut and print at times, and I agree with OP that the cities aren't embedded well, perhaps creating them as walled off areas which have loading screens would've helped with the performance issues, but also given the city some form of "outskirts" that would've branded it more. As the cities are pretty non-explorable I do feel that a Legends Arceus approach with just a "base" would've made more sense (Although working in the Gym Leaders would've been tough)

And moving onto my final gripe which is the Dex size, I know we're never going to have the Nat Dex back, but I still feel that the Regional Dex should be more than 400.. it makes it so running into Pokemon is so repetitive and tedious because there's a lot of species duplication generally all over. I think for a game of this magnitude we should've gotten a regional dex size of around 500-550, with DLC bringing it up to around 750-800. I get that the models are re-done so there's more texture and aren't as "smooth" as SWSH, it feels like an actual justification for a dex-cut.

Anyway, I hope that by the time the DLC rolls around that they've managed to patch up the performance issues and salvage what's left, considering this would be a top tier Pokemon game without the massive drawbacks, IMO.

 

[R_N]

Alright just beat the game, various thoughts

Performance:
Look there's no dancing around this. It's super noticeable. It's IMPOSSIBLE not to notice, it's just a question of what are you going to run into. Even when the Memory Leak isn't causing:

• Increasing slowdown
• Massive increase in model pop in
• Causing pokemon even close to the camera to go into low poly mode despite also being in a low populatoin area
• Texture pop in
• Breaking the lighting

The whole game is just constantly something. A little bit of lag there. Some pop in here. An after taste of delayed loadings. Broken lighting.
I don't even care about stuff like the camera kind of clipping around sometimes, or some of the models clipping through the landscape, that's part & parcel with most open worlds. But there's just a lot of other little things.

The way the game handles scene transitions is also bizarre. There's always this part where the image hangs and is moved down a bit before a laggy cut to black then to the next thing. And the worst part is it isnt just cutscenes its accessing the box. It sucks!

Also, weirdly? I think it was more pronounced at the start of the game followed by everything from around the late-mid game on for me. Even with frequent save & quits to the main switch menu I really felt like I was encountering way more issues during those points. Leaving Mesagoza for the first time to about Larry, it was comparatively chill. You still noticed it but it was one of those things where I was telling myself "you know, maybe you were exaggerating at the start, this isnt THAT terrible" then BAM. The game would never let me forget.

The one saving grace is it wasn't so bad that it prevented me from enjoying the game, but like. Oof.



THE CREDITS HAD FRAME STUTTER ARE YOU FOR REAL

Character:
I pretty much loved everyone? THe designs are super varied and interesting, it was always fun seeing a new gym leader or star boss. Sometimes it was ridiculous and sometimes it was just plain good, but far more hits than misses.
Highlights:

• Larry
• Arven
• Ryme
• Tyme
• The home ec teacher
• Geeta
• Nemona was good too
• Rika
• Mela and her fucking boots lmfao that walk cycle.

I think one thing that kind of was lame, though, was that since the shtick of the game was the Treasure Hunt it means most trainers you fight are students at the academy. Now to their credit, they made due with it. There's a LOT of variety in the trainers wearing the uniforms (kids, older folks, skinny, buff, fat, various skin colors and hair styles, etc), but it does feel lacking to have far less trainer classes over all.

I do wish we got more time with the Gym Leaders. They should add league cards in the DLC or something. They're all interesting and I liked their little blurbs and vignettes, i Just wanted more (I know there's a little rematch stuff in the post game at least).

Talking about the main 3 under spoilers

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Nemona is girl ash turned up a notch. It's surprisingly endearing, though there's not truly much too her. It is fun to have a rival who is just in it for the battles and the love of battling; you can really feel how truly excited she is at the prospect of having someone who can match her. Probably my "least favorite" of the trio but that's because in a list of 3 someone must be last.

Penny's a slow burn. They have to string you along a bit, and you still get a glimpse of her personality before the reveal, but once she's going she's really fun. She benefits the MOST from the final area by far, having her as the straight man to the other 2 dweebs let her shine a lot. The sheer exhaustion she is going through, it's wonderful. Shot her up to my favorite easily.

Arven's just a dork, and that's great. As I was playing the game he was my favorite before Penny took over. The love for his dog is great and it's nice how much he appreciates you but still puts in some work himself. He even got the kill on one of the titans for me while i was micromanaging, which was cool. And woof, felt bad for him by the end....

also clive owns. whoever he is.....!

Story:
I've finished all four routes, but not done the post game. I know the post game's mostly unrelated though so good enough to talk about them.

Victory Road

Well. I mean. It's not really a story, per say. That's what the other 3/4ths of the game is for. This is mostly just the light hearted counter balance to all the drama and in that respect it's fine. Like I said I liked all the gym leader vignettes and Nemona's enjoyable enough. Love my man Larry!
But I did expect there to be........something? Anything? To deal with Nemona's home situation (touched on in the final story) or Geeta's...anything. But no the former's just an excited strong gal and the latter is just....a polite woman.

It is a little weird to me that we are introduced to Geeta saying she'd leave something in Nemona's hands and then there's no follow through on it, though.

Oh and I really loved the "interview". It's fun how the past few generations have really played with how the whole League system works region to region. Rika's great.

Starfall Street

I knew going into this that it was about bullying and that people were complaining about it, but I enjoyed it quite a bit. I guess it was a little goofy how often they talked about the bullying or said the word "bully" but whatever. That's part of the territory. I liked the ultimate twist about what happened on That Day 18 Months Ago.
More importantly, I liked all the characters in it. They're very earnest, dorky friends with each other and all the little flashbacks or post-defeat scenes were great. Likewise I did enjoy the bits with Clive and "Cassiopia" a fair amount. The ending of it, with Clavel trying to protect Penny and the whole STC thing was also really sweet I felt. It was just all really nice.


If I had complaints its:
-wow the "deputy" had an insane amount of power to complete cover up the truth of the incident
-to the point where literally NOBODY asked why the headmaster and every teacher left at about the same time like Clavel??? Bro????? Maybe investigate a little before CAssiopia forced your hands??
-there's not a single bully anywhere in the modern school ( okay i'll give this one a pass, narratively we need a good school so whatever but still lol)
-While the """open""" nature of the game means you can do things in any order, I think they should have made Ortega the intended final base to take on instead of Eri. Ortega is the one that has the critical revelations for the entire path but this means that it cant be brought up anywhere else and also that Eri's is just your standard post-fight breakdown where Clive wonders about the true scope of the incident.
-Clavel has 6 Premiere balls on him and uses 6 Pokemon in his battle. He does not have them in Premiere balls. ????

Path of Legends

An Arven character piece. He warms up to you quick, the titans had some solid gags to them and i was a blubbering mess over Maschiff. I suspect they thought you would complete this one first (I did) since it doubles as a prologue to the finale and encourages you to finish the other paths.
It was cool how Arven joined you for each one, and then his final team was all the Pokemon he caught along the way.

Also boy, wandering around that old lab at the lighthouse was...rough.

A Way Home

First off, really funny how the end of POL emphasizes strong Pokemon (so we should get Nemona) and machine security systems (so we need Penny) and then proceeded to have Penny turn on the lights and absolutely nothing else. Sada opened the door to the entry way and then we just turned off gate switches by pressing buttons. Like I'm glad she was here because the dynamic between the trio was really enjoyable, but....

Anyway the whole new area was really cool. It has an amazing vibe as you slowly making your way around this huge spiral into the very depths, then the labs and that final battle zone like hello???? And your pals following you around and talking in the background was really cool. Honestly, it kind of felt like I was in a different game entirely sometimes, especially the proper finale.

The actual story of it was interesting too. And personally I think it gets more interesting when you read some of the articles and book entries in the library and know that even with the "Time Machine" explanation something isn't adding up. It adds another layer of melancholy to AI Sada's fate, certainly.

If I had one complaint, it's one that they kind of couldn't really do anything with. The reveal of the AI Sada, the Time Machine, the death of the original and the oncoming death of the AI, it's all very quick. It didn't feel jarring, and in this case I think it's MEANT to be a lot to take in at once, but it also means nothing has time to breathe and now we're having a tearful farewell to AI Sada.

Arven just can't catch a break, huh?

One of the documents mentions "That man" walking out, which I assume is Tuvo (in Scarlet) and probably "that woman"/Sada in Violet. I wonder if they might bring in the other professor for the DLC....

ED SHERAN JUMP SCARE!!

over all pretty enjoyable and clearly paid to the strengths of SWSH's character-focused DLCs. If they maintain the open world style moving forward, I'd like them to keep building on this and maybe add more through-lines between them.

Gameplay:
I still think there should have been level scaling of some sort, BUT

but!

I do think that, shockingly, the open world aspect helped actually balance out EXP Share for once in their life. I was still over leveled in spots, but I was thinking over the things I did and I think a lot of that had to do with me capturing a ton of Pokemon. Towards the end I wound up skipping trainers, but that felt very natural; they're scattered by design and you have to opt into fighting them. Compared to SWSH where I was fightin tooth & nail. The game was helped a lot by the actually legitimately smart decision to not have Star Bases or Titans give any EXP.
And more importantly the end game I was actually underleveld! It was great! Friction, baby! Even with exp share and doing all the routes I was still below Nemona and only on par with some of the forced encounters in the final area and i was way below the Final Boss. I was using items, i was careful of switches, it was great. I think nuzlockes and solo challenges of this game will be pretty interesting just because of the sheer number of bosses.

And shoutouts to Team Star too because they had some interesting fights and the Starmobile being a "boss encounter" meant you had to really deal with what they threw at you. Wish I could have revavroom do some of this stuff....

Exploring the world was....okay. I'm never a big exploration guy, but it's not like I'm fully against it. The world of Paldea had some nice variety to it, there was always cool items to find, pokemon spawns were plentiful. The Glaseado cave system was actually very enjoyable. I wish there were more caves or like...dungeons, or something.
Gliding kind of sucks, but climbing rocks is great.

City Design was both a step up and down. Upwise these are big cities that FEEL big; they're full of people and shops and items and stuff. But sometimes they still feel overly small. Can't go into any of the buildings (probably a smart move considering the state of the world), most of the shops are SANDWICHES, a lot of NPCs dont give you things since there's just items scattered around. The cities feel alive but there's not much to experience. Older games usually offset this with some set dressing or items, but that was lesser here. Like there's a mining town but only like 2 NPCs mention it in passing. I think i still prefer this to SWSH's cities though.
Also weird you can jump on all the buildings but there's rarely anything up there. Come on man, this is Mario 101.

Incidentally i think 400 is a fine dex size. You get a pretty solid amount of variety area to area, I think. There's always a couple new species and overlapping on lines is usually via evolutions. Could probably up it to 450 but whatever. and it's still a lot to collect.


Music:
Full of bangers. I'm so glad that the music in the areas is actual music and not atmospheric loops, that was the worst part of LA.

The ed sheeran song was okay i guess. I don't really get why it's here at all, though. Flex that money somehow, i guess.


Over all I was honestly not thinking the game was going to be that great but still worth at least experiencing (if only to complain with full knowledge). And it's got issues. But I think that the game itself is pretty good, and you can tell that there was ambition into this that honestly they almost reached. Almost. Still a bit ways off, I think. But it felt complete, it felt like they had ideas and they happened and it mostly stuck. Just seeing the characters interact or the cutscenes happ--OH M YGOD I FORGOT ABOUT THE BIZARRRE JACQ CUTSCENE AT THE START? Why is everyone in that cutscene like 3 frames per second but the moment the cutscene ends, in the same exact environment, everyone runs at full frames per second. What happened here bro????

 

[Rarycaris]

These are the first Pokemon games I've been largely disinterested in finishing. I loved Legends: Arceus and I'll probably go and play it again. I didn't love Sword and Shield, but I was motivated to finish them. I just don't feel that drive this time around, even though I'm having more fun with competitive battling on Showdown than with any prior generation.

The performance issues are a constant low level annoyance. I can forgive it on occasion, but it completely takes the fun out of exploring when it's happening all the time, and what optimisations have been done are incredibly janky and obvious. Maybe this is me falling out of RPGs, but I also just find the game incredibly slow. The concept is great and I *want* to love these games, but there's something about the execution that is just not working for me.

 

[Omastar68]

I also feel it's too slow, w/ some bugs. But it feels like a much bigger world...region...than before(as in ever before.) I think it's maybe too easy to find low level items on the ground. I spent many hours early on doing that only(and still have done some even today, but there's way less to pick up and I mostly do raids after beating it for competitive.) I guess I didn't have to but...w/e. I like this game though.

 

[Mario With Lasers]

Just finished the final path, now I have depression. Thanks Game Freak

And I take everything I said about bugs back. Area Zero has some RIDICULOUS framerate drops, jesus christ son.

 

[Codraroll]

I haven't been too bothered by bugs/graphics issues yet, so I won't spend much time fretting over them. I acknowledge they exist, and that they detract a bit from the experience, but I'll be willing to focus on other things for now.

Oh, and SPOILERS up until the first Gym or so.

I must say ... these games are the first main series games in a long time that I find better than their predecessors without a sliver of a doubt. Scarlet and Violent absolutely dunk all over Sword and Shield. It's not even close. They are rapidly climbing up my list of favourite Pokémon games. Maybe not all the way to the top, but definitely up there.

So many times now, I've found that the games are doing something right that they haven't previously. A little experience that had me go "Oh, I've been waiting for this for so long, and now they're doing it!" To mention some examples:

• Letting you walk with your starters for a bit before choosing between them. You get to see them in motion and exude some of their personality without being overly bogging down with cutscenes.
• Rewarding early exploration. Previous games have put the player on rails in the early-game, or let early locations be largely devoid of useful stuff. You can sometimes cross a patch of grass and pick up a Potion or Poké Ball, but that's it. Early town exploration is likely to be entirely fruitless. See Aquacorde Town in Kalos or Iki Town in Alola, for instance. You can walk around the place, but there's absolutely nothing to find. Talking to every NPC awards you with squat all except a feeling of having wasted time. However, Scarlet and Violet has a few nooks and crannies with useful items for players who want to explore, even while in the middle of the tutorial section. You can find TMs and Rare Candies quite early, making it feel worthwhile to walk around and check things out.
• Letting players roam while still in the tutorial. There was the expected bit of story railroading as you follow Nemona up the hill to the lighthouse. Some nooks and crannies to explore, of course, but you're on a set route. And then, at the lighthouse, Nemona just points to a city in the distance and tells you to meet here there. And then she's off, and you're left with a comparatively vast area to check out for yourself. You're still hemmed in by some geographical boundaries, but still ... holy moly. You've got an area much bigger than SwSh's Wild Area to roam freely. There's a town you may or may not check out. Items to find, including TMs, useful held items, multiple trainers to fight, and ...
• Early-game Pokémon variety. And how. I had found a team of six Pokémon I wanted to use, before the halfway point of the tutorial. Just look at this. That's the equivalent of Routes 1 and 2, which tend to be completely devoid of interesting things to find, and usually populated by crapmons. Here, you've got a veritable smorgasbord of neat Pokémon to try out.
• Trusting the player to navigate. As I mentioned, you crest a hill and see the city in the distance. Then you're trusted to find your way there. Not that it's very challenging to find the way, and you cannot get anywhere you aren't supposed to go, but it's nice to have the freedom. Contrast Alola and Galar, whose Routes were all corridors, and yet the game wouldn't shut up about telling you where to go. I really like the "see that city? Let's meet there." approach. Not to mention that you can see the city from afar as well. Great design.
• Giving the legendaries a bit of lore early. If you step off the path, you will find the gate wherein the legendary quartet is sealed. It's right there in the cliff side. It's not shoved in your face either, you have to go far off the intended path to find it, but it's there for the intrepid explorer to find. Lovely.
• The Auto Heal button. Finally a non-tedious way to use Potions. It's so convenient. I find myself using Potions much more often now, instead of heading back to the Poké Center when I'm out and about. Of course, the region is also so big that sometimes the nearest Poké Center is quite far away. And it automatically clears your bag of the lesser Potions too, which is a great way to reduce clutter.
• Gym battles having a really great atmosphere. Finally. Gyms aren't big maze-like buildings with a leader waiting all day long at their center. You fight in a picturesque arena in the middle of town, after completing a challenge somewhere nearby. The Gym building itself is only there to tell players where to find the place to initiate the challenge, which itself utilises the town's surroundings.
• Trainers in the early-game having rare Pokémon, giving you their dex entry early so you can go there and find it for yourself. I met a guy with a Gible just outside Mesagoza, for instance.
• A day/night cycle and passage of weather that isn't restricted to the real-time clock. Finally. Now I can evolve my Snom and my Happiny in the same play session.

Sure, there are downsides too. A few usual Game Freak-isms that made me go "why would you want it to be that way?!?", such as the removal of the Set battle style. The overworld isn't looking overly pretty. Ice-types are still confusingly missing for way too much of the game. Dexit still hurts. Most towns are quite empty and don't really reward exploration (NPC mini quests like in PLA would have helped greatly here). And again, the graphics. But overall, these games left me really impressed. Not completely wowed like this is cutting-edge game design or something, but it's much better than I have come to expect from main series Pokémon games in a long, long time. I really hope the series manages to iron out the bugs and continue on a path like this in the future, because if they continue to improve, these games will eventually be really good. I already can't wait to see what improvements we can expect from the DLC.

 

[Kaiziku]

Hands down my favorite in the series. We all know the technical issues, mine weren't as bad as others were, but still wildly unacceptable. Therefore, I'm going to go over everything major and minor about this game for me.

Pros:
Fantastic characters, especially Nemona. First rival I've liked since Blue. Larry is every single working adult, and I love that. Arven annoyed me a bit until you find out why he is the way he is against Miraidon. Tulip is bae, the gym leaders in general have different and interesting personalities, overall refreshing.

The new pokemon designs, even the controversial starters, really grew on me. I avoided as many leaks and spoilers as possible, I only knew of the starters first forms. Really happy that a lot of the pokemon were still childish and silly, but had some really cool designs. Namely Iron Valiant is in my top faves now, and both of Charcadets evos. Kingambit too. Not just the pokemon, but the way the world was designed feels a bit more alive than some open world games. I wish there was something like dynamic events, or seeing npc trainers battling and such, but overall not trash.

I really like the elimination of the move tutor, and the introduction of the TM crafting. Makes it worthwhile to go and "hunt" Pokemon besides the pokedex. Needs some work, I wish I could see the material names even if i haven't gotten any of the mats yet, and sorting by what my Pokemon can learn would be better, but still nice.

Dialogues and overall feel of the game was great. Story made sense for once, and I felt like I actually went on my own journey.

There's some others, but nothing really standing out besides these for me.

Cons:
Mainly a gameplay features and design changes which I don't like. Who the heck decided to change breeding? At what point was making it a grueling nightmare a good idea? I don't even mind it being a picnic thing, but no indicators that I've seen so far, can't leave the picnic while my pokemon make love, and I'm stuck making sandwiches (interesting mini game, but meh overall). I like to breed starters and surprise trade randoms. Not doing that for awhile because this is a nightmare.

I get we're supposed to be school kids, but when I leave the academy, why can't I change out of my uniform? Who decided to give us all this freedom, and then restrict me to 4 outfits? Extremely disappointed in that decision.

Post-game lacking hard, but it isn't horrible so far. I need stuff like battle tower or give me back battle frontier. Not sure why they keep taking and giving it every other gen. I'm gonna do that Academy Ace tournament just to mess with teams, but that's going to get boring fast. I don't need an infinite loop, but I like battle grinds of some sort, and I don't really see that happening.

Some other stuff, but don't want to get to long winded. Game is great, just needs a massive technical overahaul, but it really is a fantastic game underneath, mixed with some really stupid ideas.

 

[R_N]

Cons:
Mainly a gameplay features and design changes which I don't like. Who the heck decided to change breeding? At what point was making it a grueling nightmare a good idea? I don't even mind it being a picnic thing, but no indicators that I've seen so far, can't leave the picnic while my pokemon make love, and I'm stuck making sandwiches (interesting mini game, but meh overall). I like to breed starters and surprise trade randoms. Not doing that for awhile because this is a nightmare.

You don't need to make sandwiches to cause them to make eggs.

That said your best bet is probably to either make a sandwich that increases Egg production (which will uptick eggs FAST) or eat one at a shop before you go on a picnic

 

[Antihaxxer]

just some thoughts

Finished the 4 roads, was very happy about pokemon diversity, especially new pokemon, love the free open world, I was getting KO because I went to a zone without the right level ... Love Gym Leaders, Star teams, love the Academy and all the teachers ! Let's Go mode is something intéresting (but why no evolution if lvl up ?)

But cities are ... big and empty ? Graphics are still meh ...
Lack of small sides quests like in Sun/Moon ?
The Pokedex is nice but you can't filter :(

The online mode wasn't used

 

[R_N]

I did hours of online co-op yesterday and I am absolutely flabbergasted that it ran really well.

Like we all know how the game can get as is, right? So your first thought would immediately be a barely holding it together mess? But no, even with 3 people all at once, on different parts of the map or in the same spot, it was actually extremely smooth. I didn't even see the model glitches, shockingly. Even the Raids ran smoothly.
For all intents and purposes it was like playing solo, but there were 2 other guys also running around. The only really odd part was that Area Zero wouldn't show the other person on either screen, even though we were both down there and seeing the same Pokemon and if one got into a battle would could see the pokemon they're fighting turn to them or chase them.

I've had laggier sessions of animal crossing with one (1) person on my island. It's wild.

My main criticisms are more on a feature level:
-You have to commit to a group so you can't just have someone drop in later you have to cut it then restart the room
-You would think you could, if you wanted, just interact with one of the people in your world for Trades and Battles but no. Still have to go through the code system.
-For some reason, the Charcadet item guy doesn't change. So the Violet friend was still only able to trade for Ceruledge's item even if I was right there with him.
-The game doesn't tell you which Raids are your friends until you interact with it; I suppose this is so you cant "steal" a friends raid without permission but it's just a little awkward. You can still get some LP out of though.
-God almighty why is there not just a friends list.

 

[berry]

obvious spoiler warning

After taking a small Pokemon hiatus to come into these games completely blind, I think that my experience with scarlet was heightened because I had no idea what to expect. I think that most of the new mons that I've seen have generally good designs, with my favorites being maushold, annihilape, and the assorted ancient pokemon. On the dead horse that is graphics and glitches, I came in expecting something pretty poor and it was pretty spot on, but I don't exactly play games for graphics so it's not a dealbreaker for me.

On the storylines, I definitely thought Titans were the most enjoyable. I thoroughly enjoyed both Arven's story and actually seeing the titans (especially great tusk, I had a donphan on my team and spent a solid 5 minutes trying to find out how to evolve into it). The battles were underwhelmingly easy, but I'll take the "children's game" out for most of Pokemon's difficulty issues. Victory road was just standard pokemon game formula, so I didn't expect much, but Nemona was generally annoying. I enjoyed the gym challenges, but they weren't anything exhilarating. I think the gym leaders were some of the most lovable characters, with the water, electric, ice, and normal gyms sticking out in my mind. Starfall was by far the worst story, with what I thought was a generally lame team and boring bases. I felt like I just spammed R and didn't get much out of it, there weren't more evil team grunts to face or puzzles or base challenges like in old games.

On the area zero episode, i think seeing all of the new ancient pokemon was exhilarating. I thought area zero was a well designed area and the final boss fight was interesting, if even a bit odd. The final bossfight was the first time I had real difficulty with anything in the game, with my mons being slightly underleveled to the point where I had to scrape by using revives. Not knowing any of the ancient pokemon's types going into the battle was definitely the most difficult part.

On the general postgame, what I've seen so far has been really really underwhelming. The gym and star re-challenges were pretty barebones, and I was disappointed that it doesn't seem like you can do the gyms or elite four again after you beat them. I was honestly disappointed when the star bases were just reduced to single rematches, I felt like there was huge potential for each of them to be a new battle facility with each of the star bosses becoming a frontier tycoon of some sort. Generally team star seemed like a giant wasted opportunity. The champion tournament seemed underwhelming as well, knowing that gamefreak has the potential to do something like the pokemon world tournament in bw2. I'm still working my way around the region and removing the stakes to find the legendaries, but it doesn't seem like there's much to do once you complete the dex. Raids are okay and definitely better than their SWSH counterpart, but there isn't really much to do once you figure out how to use type advantages and level 100s to beat 5 stars. I think the lack of any battle facility except for the tournament is super disappointing (and it seemed like there were so many places that it could be slotted in, either the star bases or the giant chunk of unused land in the northeast) but maybe I'm just pampered by my nostalgia for heartgold and soulsilver and their overly extensive postgame. I wish they did more with the postgame, the regular game seemed pretty standard outside of how bad and boring the evil team was. I'm assuming there will be some DLC announced in the upcoming months that expand to the untouchable northeast region of the map.

While the game was fun to play and explore just as any new game is, I think that stepping back and thinking about it definitely made me realize how barebones it was and how pokemon games in the past have done pokemon notably better. I'm not disappointed because I enjoyed pieces of the game (mostly the new mons and I had enough fun with new open world situation), but I think that there wasn't anything notable about a large chunk of it. It noticably lacks depth (the one example I was thinking of was not being able to go into buildings or no overworld npcs that aren't major characters actually doing anything of importance or interest) and to me that's super disappointing. I think it goes into the category of games that I'm happy to have played, but I don't see myself restarting or replaying it like I would have with most other pokemon games before it.

tldr: new mons are cool, game lacks depth that was present in pre-switch pokemon games and the postgame absolutely sucks

 

[DrumstickGaming]

Even if this thread is literally built on the game being spoiled, I'm going to do the opposite and try to keep the story stuff vague apart from a couple postgame elements. I've completed the Pokedex in the postgame and done a bunch of the side stuff so I think I can give you an informed opinion. I went into Pokemon Scarlet and Violet more or less blind, and that's how I think a prospective buyer should best experience it.

This is the best Pokemon game ever made to me, and I encourage you to try and take your mind off the technical aspects and go in with an open mind. In my probably 50 hour or so playtime, I encountered only a few bugs I think? Like one time a mon phased through a rock, the hitbox romance on this game's bike equivalent can be a little suspect, and the map inexplicably closing when I open it for a bit before going back to normal on one occasion (obviously the worst one). The game also doesn't seem to really have collision detection when battles are taking place, and if lighting clouds / shadows are moving over the environment it will look silly as heck - just like the sandwich making. I won't deny it can look a little janky sometimes and you can see where some corners were cut. But if you can just get past the fact that the game can have some performance issues...they didn't really affect my personal enjoyment of the game consistently enough to be a hinderance.

With what this game's sub-3/10 user score would have you believe, I never fell through the floor or anything, I think the worst I saw was my friend's game crashing once, but with how many hours you can sink into this game, I consider occasional hiccups minor at best unless the game is crashing every half hour. With a less than 3/10 user score, you'd expect this game to be Atari 2600 E.T. the Terrestrial. News flash: it's not, and people should stop acting like the most critically acclaimed games out there don't have glitches here and there (hi Skyrim). Yes, this game isn't the most stable thing out there, but considering the deadlines they were under, at absolute worst, I'd call the performance average: not great mind you, but I don't think any bugs I experienced were truly consistent enough to be even remotely as egregious as the Metacritic idiots would have you believe.

The story is so, so GOOD. Like, it had no reason to be this good. It's ultimately some simple plots for the most part (won't say more than that), but everyone from the main characters to even the minor freaking optional TEACHERS are fleshed out to a reasonable extent. This is the first time I think I can call the characters actual characters that you like to see grow and change. BW1, previously my favorite Pokemon game, has nothing on Scarlet and Violet's character development. Even the nurse at school has a memorable personality. How in the holy heck do you go from SWSH's literal dumpster fire, most condescending-to-kids-intelligence writing I've ever seen to an actual thought provoking narrative that has just enough substance for you to chew on but doesn't go overboard with complexity and forget what makes Pokemon appealing in the first place - that being you battling your cute monsters - is something I applaud the development team on.

The gameplay, as always, is pretty great. I won't deny that I wouldn't have minded having level scaling with your progress, but there is also a certain thrill with wandering into a new area and going "wait this guy means business, hecc it" and lends itself well to self-imposed challenges. What also helps is that forced EXP Share genuinely feels like a positive in this game. I think you have to try to outlevel the last couple bosses in the story. Even with some of the best Pokemon from past games in my team, like Gyarados and Mudsdale, I found myself just barely getting through some of these fights underleveled, and that was pretty breathtaking and refreshing. I didn't lose a battle in the maingame (only wiping to a random high leveled trainer postgame because I was Pokedex filling and some guy had a Gengar that swept me) but I came DARN close at points. This game will not hold your hand, but it also won't beat you down to exhaustion, to the point where beating the game feels rewarding while simultaneously being tough enough to keep even veterans like me engaged, at least from my experience. I don't think I used any if all TMs or did many raids, and while I skipped many trainers, I never truly felt like saying "absolutely not, this is too hard." Even when I felt close to that yardstick, it was because of my own lack of preparation, and not due to bad design (hi Pokemon Colosseum!) And holy moly did they streamline tutorials. The classes are optional, but they also give you actual rewards (usually EXP Candies) making them worth your time. It's un-intrusive and great.

I love the Pokedex in this game. The little portraits of all 400 Pokemon was incentive enough to fill out, a carryover I like from the Alola games sort of. I do wish you could see your current position on the map and a Pokemon's position in the Dex simultaneously, but it's small potatoes. Aside from stuff like the mons in trees the Dex quest was thoroughly enjoyable aside from maybe the last 50, and they give you so many rewards for doing so beyond the standard Shiny Charm, it's awesome.

Music was hit or miss (most notable miss: the Gym Battle theme imo) but there are definitely some great tracks in there. I definitely enjoyed overworld music more than most other Pokemon games. Good stuff, not my absolute favorite soundtrack I don't think though. I don't like how they pointlessly changed breeding to picnics. We've had breeding for seven generations and NOW you feel like changing the Daycare mechanics with all this overcomplicated sandwich nonsense and the Eggs automatically going to an unspecified box? Yeah, not a big fan of that.

Postgame is alright. Dex quest I covered above - good stuff. You have a ton of optional classes you can do (two of which unlock postgame). The tournament is also fun. I do miss the lack of a GAME FREAK battle or a Battle Tower, but maybe that comes with DLC and their exclusions are the only things other than breeding that felt kinda off to me in retrospect.

Overall, 8/10 game at absolute worst if you like your games optimized, 9/10 if you don't mind the occasional hiccup, but if you're like me and thought SWSH and Legends: Arceus made you feel like the franchise could never feel truly satisfying to play beyond the junk food mentality, hopefully this game will make you reconsider and in that regard I kinda wanna say 10/10 though that is biased, haha. In any case, I am excited for the future of the Pokemon franchise again!

Please play Pokemon Scarlet and Violet. Please.

 

[CTNC]

Just a warning if you want to skip past negativity, I'm going to be pretty negative because the little things add up. The last bit is a positive note about a funny glitch though.

I overall like the games but this has more to do with the Pokémon formula in an open world environment being fun, not so much the games actually being good.

It's like getting a sandwich from Subway. Yeah sure it tastes good because you're hungry and it's specifically the kind of sandwich you want, but it's still made badly overall with sub par materials by employees who don't really want to be there.

I mean bugs yes, but also stupid design choices like adding sleeping animations to every Pokémon yet not using those animations in battle or things like removing most character customization. Almost every single Pokémon has been featured on the Switch at this point so there's no real reason for Dexit to continue, other than to sell Home and DLC. There's also commonly requested series staples like the Battle Tower etc that get cut every generation. SV continues the one step forward two steps back tradition Pokémon has had since XY. The game is terribly made by almost every single metric. It's baffling that this company is left in charge of the world's most profitable franchise.

I'm really feeling the one step forward two steps back. They took a ton of steps forward and I'm usually oblivious to the steps back because I still love Pokemon and there's the Battle Facility after the main game, but a lot of the steps back were very noticeable. Glitches, annoying menuing changes, and the removal of Set Mode being the most obvious. One of the first problems I had was the minimap spinning so up is where you're facing instead of north. I thought I'd ba able to change that like in Breath of the Wild, but nope! The Minimap is useless to me! Couldn't Game Freak have asked the Zelda team for help with that? They both work for Nintendo! If you want to soft reset for a starter with good IVs or a good Nature, the beginning area shows massive flaws. If you stand in the wrong spot when you save and the shadows will face one way then suddenly shift, you can tell the oranges aren't attacked to the trees because of the leaves rustling in the wind and the oranges staying still, and the starter will move as though you have the default uniform on even if you already changed it. Seeing Sprigatito stand on air and clip through my jacket baffles me because the game's first impression is so bad! Another major problem for me that hasn't been mentioned much here is trainers have gone from got to kill 'em all to something I barely notice. I liked going out of my way to "share the long lasting fun of stall" with everyone I could find, but just keep forgetting. I used filling the Pokedex as training because I wanted to do that sooner or later, but it's not the same. I miss bloodthirsty trainers that challenge you on sight.

I love Pokemon and I love exploring open worlds, but I don't like this combo of Pokemon and open world. The world is too big for Pokemon IMO and a lot of it is the same mountainous grasslands with items randomly thrown around. I liked Legends: Arceus's world, so I know open world Pokemon can work because I loved the world of Legends: Arceus. Maybe these changes to the main games just aren't for me though.

Also, the Subway example is funny but pretty good because I feel like the subs are overpriced and some people are terrible at understanding that a little mustard doesn't mean a thick line. That said, the cookies are really good, so I'm not complaining too much.


On a positive note, glitchyness always has its up sides and the best one was my Paradox Wooper/Clodsire. After the Flying Titan, my Wooper hopped up and down in celebration. Then Wooper appeared again for evolution.... while it was also still standing where it was celebrating. Wooper Evolved into Clodsire and he disappeared (probably back to their Pokeball) after I chose not to teach him Amnesia and the camera turned back to my unevolved Wooper! Clodsire clipping into Wooper a little was the cherry on top. (BTW, he was evolved after the combo of cutscenes.)

Edit: A really nice detail is that Pokemon look at their opponents, as in looking up or down to their faces. Pretty cure with Clodsire. It's janky with trying to face Corviknight though because of how much they move up and down.

 

[manyproblems]

I haven't played since X and Y, but recently bought a Switch and gave Scarlet ago. Yet to do post game but still some spoilers

Likes
- Exploring everything, the overworld is huge
- Being given the legendary early to help move around the map is great
- Easy access to strong Pokemon, e.g. Garchomp, Salamence, etc
- Titans storyline was good
- QoL changes since I last played, no cut scenes when running into a Pokemon/trainer, more mobility, etc.
- Multiple storylines,
- Didnt want to put the game down

Dislikes
- Game is 99% outdoors, missed opportunity to do some indoor puzzles like all the old games.
- Cities are useless
- Rival - this is not a rival, this is a friend. Bring back Gary Oak and his bullying.
- Terra types - Its just a waste of time but far less obnoxious than what I imagine dynamax was.

Uninspiring
- The game still lives off being able build and train a team, catch everything and explore everywhere, instead of actual gameplay. There is little depth or thinking required to navigate through the game. Gym missions
- Found I didnt want to use any new Pokemon aside from Annihilape. Ended up using all old Pokemon + starter.
- Star missions, 0 creativity and repetitive.
- FPS/visual glitches dont bother me too much but its pretty bad.

 

[Magcargo]

Just a warning if you want to skip past negativity, I'm going to be pretty negative because the little things add up. The last bit is a positive note about a funny glitch though.

I'm really feeling the one step forward two steps back. They took a ton of steps forward and I'm usually oblivious to the steps back because I still love Pokemon and there's the Battle Facility after the main game, but a lot of the steps back were very noticeable. Glitches, annoying menuing changes, and the removal of Set Mode being the most obvious. One of the first problems I had was the minimap spinning so up is where you're facing instead of north. I thought I'd ba able to change that like in Breath of the Wild, but nope! The Minimap is useless to me! Couldn't Game Freak have asked the Zelda team for help with that? They both work for Nintendo! If you want to soft reset for a starter with good IVs or a good Nature, the beginning area shows massive flaws. If you stand in the wrong spot when you save and the shadows will face one way then suddenly shift, you can tell the oranges aren't attacked to the trees because of the leaves rustling in the wind and the oranges staying still, and the starter will move as though you have the default uniform on even if you already changed it. Seeing Sprigatito stand on air and clip through my jacket baffles me because the game's first impression is so bad! Another major problem for me that hasn't been mentioned much here is trainers have gone from got to kill 'em all to something I barely notice. I liked going out of my way to "share the long lasting fun of stall" with everyone I could find, but just keep forgetting. I used filling the Pokedex as training because I wanted to do that sooner or later, but it's not the same. I miss bloodthirsty trainers that challenge you on sight.

I love Pokemon and I love exploring open worlds, but I don't like this combo of Pokemon and open world. The world is too big for Pokemon IMO and a lot of it is the same mountainous grasslands with items randomly thrown around. I liked Legends: Arceus's world, so I know open world Pokemon can work because I loved the world of Legends: Arceus. Maybe these changes to the main games just aren't for me though.

Also, the Subway example is funny but pretty good because I feel like the subs are overpriced and some people are terrible at understanding that a little mustard doesn't mean a thick line. That said, the cookies are really good, so I'm not complaining too much.


On a positive note, glitchyness always has its up sides and the best one was my Paradox Wooper/Clodsire. After the Flying Titan, my Wooper hopped up and down in celebration. Then Wooper appeared again for evolution.... while it was also still standing where it was celebrating. Wooper Evolved into Clodsire and he disappeared (probably back to their Pokeball) after I chose not to teach him Amnesia and the camera turned back to my unevolved Wooper! Clodsire clipping into Wooper a little was the cherry on top. (BTW, he was evolved after the combo of cutscenes.)

Edit: A really nice detail is that Pokemon look at their opponents, as in looking up or down to their faces. Pretty cure with Clodsire. It's janky with trying to face Corviknight though because of how much they move up and down.

You can stop the minimap spinning by clicking on the right stick.

 

[CTNC]

You can stop the minimap spinning by clicking on the right stick.

That stops the "map map" from spinning when you're viewing the map. (which is invaluable and something I did ASAP) The bottom right minimap isn't affected and the right stick is zoom in/out in the overworld and is therefore practically useless to me because I can't read a map that's spinning! The only useful thing about the minimap is shows where north, south, east, and west are on the edges so I can at least try to go where I want to go.

 

[Kanburi]

I'm sort of midway through the game, and I'm sure there'll be more to add to both lists as I get through the game, but for now...

Likes

• Autoheal: great feature, hopefully they don't get rid of this next generation, but I wouldn't hold my breath.

Dislikes

• Pokemon Box: Instead of just selecting multiple Pokemon and then going to all boxes to quickly move around, I have to now manually scroll through boxes that take forever to load just to move them? What's with using the - button to select multiple Pokemon instead of just using Y to choose the select mode? I feel like I'm missing something because this is way just way too inconvenient.
• Bag: L and R have always been to swap through bag compartments and the left and right arrows to go through pages of a compartment. But now I have to scroll through each and every individual item to find one item that I need? Again, I definitely feel like I'm missing a command.
• Picnic: Amie, Curry, Picnic. They've realized that Amie and Curry were useless "features" that were wild unpopular and instead of removing them completely, they just tried to make them useful by making breeding and Powers accessible via Picnics only. Bring back daycare and Mr. Bonding ffs.
• Open world: I'd always been skeptical about open world in Pokemon, but Legends Arceus made me think it might be workable. And then they go ahead and shit the bed again. The world is massive, and it looked like there was a lot to explore, until you realize that it's just land everywhere. Nothing to actually "explore". No puzzles, no random old haunted building in the middle of nowhere (more on buildings next), no caves or dungeons. On the plus side, they did give us Koraidon/Miraidon early on to travel a bit quicker.
• Buildings: This is criminal. Buildings are actually useless in this game. The only buildings you can enter are your house, gyms, the academy, and a sandwich shop? The gyms don't even serve a purpose since the battles and "tests" (which are more a nuisance than tests) are outdoors anyway. You literally only go in to register. The sandwich shop's only purpose is to give you new recipes, and every other shop you can enter is just to go in and a menu pops up. You don't even get to see the interior of the shop. How about just having some random employee stand outside at the counter and handle all that instead of wasting my time with the "get off Miraidon, enter shop, exit shop" animation?
• No "fixed" path: As much as they want to convince us that there's no fixed path and progression to the game, there very much is. I exited east from the academy to Artazon and I thought I was doing alright since my Pokemons' levels were on par (mind you, I'd been "exploring" and battling/catching a ton of wild Pokemon), so I took out Mela as well, which was nice and challenging. Lo and behold, Artazon was actually the gym with the second lowest leveled Pokemon. So I flew back to academy and went west, and was overleveled for everything. On the topic of being underleveled/overleveled...
• "Rival": I'm not sure since Nemona never calls herself your rival (not yet anyway), so maybe there's no rival this game? But if she is, they're really just making "rivals" a peer or a companion. Sad.
• Grinding: No, it's not the process that's the issue, grinding is a part of every Pokemon game and that's fine. But with how vast and empty the world is, finding trainers to battle is a quest and a half in and of itself. Way more challenging than those gym "tests", but I digress.
• Let's Go: Apart from the name bringing back nightmares of the worst game in Pokemon history, it's actually quite a nice feature. Except your Pokemon can't evolve this way. No big deal, I thought, since passive EXP was a thing in Legends Arceus as well and you can just go into your Pokemon list and press X to- nope. Not in this game. Add this to the list of actual decent features and QoL improvements that they removed after one game for no reason other than to make our lives difficult.
• Quick catch: Speaking of Arceus, they brought back outbreaks, but not the ability to catch Pokemon without engaging in battle. What's up with that?
• Battle animations: So they just remove the option to turn them off. New animations are nice for the first 5 or so battles, but there's just no need to keep seeing them throughout the game.
• Team Star: 10 minutes to KO 30 Pokemon when you can send 3 out at a time via Let's Go? Like the gym "tests", this is just a nuisance.
• Terawhatever it's called: Decent concept I suppose, the designs are poorly done, and the cutscenes take too long. Megas were the best gimmick and they've just been getting worse every generation. Or maybe not, this probably has the edge over Dynamax/Gigantamax.
• Those fucking chants during gym battles: They were cringe in Galar and they're still cringe in Paldea. Just no. Minor issue though, since I just turn off my sound for that.

I don't understand why this company insists on going out of their way to unnecessarily make things more difficult to use by removing things that are in my muscle memory and bringing back garbage features that only 2 players have ever used outside of the tutorial and tweaking them to make them useful.

 

[R_N]

I've seen multiple people say there's no caves but there absolutely are multiple, large caves in the game. I think they're kind of neat, the Glaseado Cave in particular spreads over nearly the entire damn ice mountain and twists in on itself and everything. It took quite a while to climb through for me. The Alfornado cavern is also surprisingly large and interesting to wander around (and somehow get lost in....), and there's a few other minor caves spread around like the one that's tucked away in an alcove and is full of giant pillars, or the mines.

 

[Bull Of Heaven]

I missed a lot of caves at first because I started just beelining everywhere once Miraidon had enough skills. Maybe other players did the same.

Anyway, I've played through Violet and started Scarlet, so time for some thoughts I guess.

Performance

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I've only run into two significant issues so far. In Violet, the game crashed the first time I went into the restaurant for Larry's gym battle. In Scarlet, when I beat one of the gym trainers in the Olive Roll, he walked directly into where I had left the ball, and I couldn't move it anymore with him inside (not finding a way to quit the test, I ended up resetting the game). The game autosaves so often that neither of these was all that big a deal.

Otherwise, it's been... fine? Not that I don't think people have legitimate complaints; it's fine to expect a game to run well. But it's mostly been fairly smooth for me. Let's put it this way: So far, these games have run better for me than Elder Scrolls games ever have, and I have hundreds of hours in those.

Besides, weird bugs are kind of a classic part of the heritage of this series.

Stories

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Victory Road is obviously kind of bland, but I think that's absolutely fine. For a long time now, Pokemon has been kind of stuck between a rigid traditional formula and anything more innovative, with different fans having different preferences. Having a basic traditional gym challenge next to two more interesting stories seems like a good way to try to give most players something they'll like.

Most of the gym leaders are cool. Nemona is a silly character, but likable enough. Having the Elite Four pop up in the gyms now and then seemed like a lazy way to get around the usual criticism that Elite Four characters are boring because we don't really know them. I didn't expect it to work on me, but it kind of did.

Path of Legends is solid. Arven starts off abrasive and weird, but is a great character before long, and his relationships with the professor and Mabosstiff can definitely stir up some emotions.

I've seen Starfall Street criticized a bit, but I actually think it's my favourite of the three, despite the bases not being interesting. As you learn more about Team Star, it turns out to be a fun twist on the "evil team" formula. Clavell goes to silly lengths to investigate Team Star, but it's great to see the authority figure step up and take responsibility for for his institution's failing, and to do it in an empathetic way. There's probably a great message for kids in there somewhere. And sure, I figured out quickly that Penny was both Cassiopeia and the big boss, but I can imagine that being a good twist for the kids.

While I'm thinking about the kids: We've got stories focused on inattentive parents, a bond with a beloved pet, bullying, empathy and mutual support, and a push to excel in one's chosen activities, all packed together. Good stuff.

And then the last storyline... I don't have much to say that hasn't been said already. But what an adventure.

Oh, bonding with Miraidon throughout the story was great too. I thought it was weird to have the legendary around so early, but it works.

Open World

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I still don't think that open world is my preference in Pokemon. I guess I just got used to corridor routes and treating each one like a checklist on subsequent playthroughs. And, I don't know, I've now prioritized story over exploration in both PLA and Violet, with the exploration occasionally feeling like a chore that gets in the way of advancing the story.

Actually, I think that's it. I'm used to checking everything when I go through a Pokemon game, so I don't know what do when that's such a huge task. But this time I just made myself stop trying to check everything, and the experience was a bit better for it.

Maybe I just still need to get used to open world Pokemon, then. Decent chance I learn to love it eventually.

Anyway, zooming around later and finding areas that were brand new to me (the spot with the dragon tamers, the bamboo forest, etc.) was neat. Paldea doesn't have as many varied environments as we might like, but it's got some stuff tucked away here and there.

New Pokemon

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Honestly, I'm a tiny bit disappointed. I mostly like the new mons, but for the first time since Gen 5, I think there are a few duds. And this is the first time that the new Pokemon design has seemed a little lazy to me at some points. Dunsparce But Longer. A Flamingo. 2-4 Incredibly Generic Mice.

That said, there's still a lot that I like here. I'm now on my second playthrough and there's still too much new stuff that I want to use; a good problem to have. The criticism above is real, but minor. Also, new Pokemon tend to grow on me over time, so I'll definitely give them a chance.

The starters and legendaries are all solid. I didn't pick my starter until the game was almost in my hands.

The paradox Pokemon are fun, but I do have one nitpick. Why do the Scarlet ones get to have varied and interesting names, while the Violet ones are all just Iron ______?

My early favourite this gen is probably either Dachsbun or Chien-Pao.

Terastal

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So it turns out I badly misunderstood this mechanic before release. Knowing that there were raid battles in the game, and not reading leaks, I thought that Terastal would be a Dynamax-like super transformation with a type change on top. That seemed incredibly broken. Now that I know it's just the type change, a lot of my concerns about it are eased. I still don't think I'll like it as much as Mega Evolution or Dynamax, but I can imagine it adding and interesting twist to some battles.

Misc.

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Auto-heal is great, but they seem to have removed some other small conveniences from the party screen. Odd.

I might be the only person on this forum who preferred the traditional day/night cycle (more immersive, easy to plan around), but oh well, I seem to have lost that one.

Are These the Best Games Yet?

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Gonna soapbox for a moment: While recent Pokemon games have had significant flaws, and Game Freak are certainly not beyond criticism, people online lose credibility with me quickly when they rant about Game Freak being lazy, having no incentive to improve anything, and just watching their money printer go brrrrr. There's never yet been a main series Pokemon game without clear evidence of real care put into it.

Scarlet and Violet have their issues, and the crunch is obvious in some ways. Even the new Pokemon designs, which are usually one of the main strengths of recent gens, are sometimes underwhelming here. But they also do a lot to move the series forward. The gameplay builds on PLA's innovations, and the stories seem like they had more work put into them than any others yet.

I don't think I can really weigh in on whether they're the best Pokemon games. No new game will ever make me feel exactly the way I did as a child playing Gens 2 and 3. Those gens might not be better in any objective sense, but my subjective experience playing them gives them a quality to me that I don't think anything new will ever have. So Scarlet and Violet are definitely not my favourites. But they have a lot going for them. A-Tier, maybe?

 

[Codraroll]

Are These the Best Games Yet?

That's a question I've asked myself too. And my conclusion is that ... I don't feel comfortable comparing.

Despite how the games tend to stay the same from generation to generation, they also change over time. Every time something changes on a conceptual level, the harder it becomes to make a direct comparison to earlier games. If you go too far back, the games have so little in common that any ranking would have to be full of asterisks and conditionals and "we're not considering this because ..." and so on.

My favourite Pokémon games so far are BW2. They're more tightly packed with features than any other Pokémon games, they have good progression, I seem to recall the plot wasn't too bad, and Unova is a gorgeous region. Linearity aside, of course, but they took steps to fix that in BW2. But just as I can't really compare BW2 to the Game Boy games due to those games being designed on an entirely different footing, I find myself unable to compare BW2 to SV for similar reasons. Too much has changed since then. The games aren't designed on the same premises. They aren't really comparable. SV can compare to other 3D mainline titles, but I don't feel like comparing them to the 2D games of old. I can't hold up BW2 in one hand and SV in the other and tell which is the "best" one. They are too different for that. Perhaps each game can only be compared three generations or so back.

So it feels right to compare SV to the games from XY onwards for me. And hoo boy, does it knock them all out of the water. XY was nice and very streamlined, but lacked in content. SM presented a nice region on a hardware that really wasn't prepared for it (resulting in an utter lack of explorability, with every route being a corridor), with a gameplay that chugged to a crawl due to all the forced cutscenes everywhere. USUM did too little to remedy those flaws. SwSh was like an unholy combination of all the worst parts of XY and SM. BDSP was a sad port of the worst games to come out of the DS era, doubly sad because it was only a stupid executive decision away from maintaining the spirit of one of the best games to come out of the DS era. PLA was really nice in some aspects, but felt kind of empty and lacked the grandeur of a real main series title (what with not featuring much battling at all). LGPE doesn't even bear mentioning. So yeah, not the best bunch of games to compare against, but still, SV holds up way more than favourably. I'm not sure if it's even possible to rank it as "the best games yet", but I can confidently say they're the best main series games of the 3D era by a long shot.

 

[MrHands]

That's a question I've asked myself too. And my conclusion is that ... I don't feel comfortable comparing.

Despite how the games tend to stay the same from generation to generation, they also change over time. Every time something changes on a conceptual level, the harder it becomes to make a direct comparison to earlier games. If you go too far back, the games have so little in common that any ranking would have to be full of asterisks and conditionals and "we're not considering this because ..." and so on.

My favourite Pokémon games so far are BW2. They're more tightly packed with features than any other Pokémon games, they have good progression, I seem to recall the plot wasn't too bad, and Unova is a gorgeous region. Linearity aside, of course, but they took steps to fix that in BW2. But just as I can't really compare BW2 to the Game Boy games due to those games being designed on an entirely different footing, I find myself unable to compare BW2 to SV for similar reasons. Too much has changed since then. The games aren't designed on the same premises. They aren't really comparable. SV can compare to other 3D mainline titles, but I don't feel like comparing them to the 2D games of old. I can't hold up BW2 in one hand and SV in the other and tell which is the "best" one. They are too different for that. Perhaps each game can only be compared three generations or so back.

So it feels right to compare SV to the games from XY onwards for me. And hoo boy, does it knock them all out of the water. XY was nice and very streamlined, but lacked in content. SM presented a nice region on a hardware that really wasn't prepared for it (resulting in an utter lack of explorability, with every route being a corridor), with a gameplay that chugged to a crawl due to all the forced cutscenes everywhere. USUM did too little to remedy those flaws. SwSh was like an unholy combination of all the worst parts of XY and SM. BDSP was a sad port of the worst games to come out of the DS era, doubly sad because it was only a stupid executive decision away from maintaining the spirit of one of the best games to come out of the DS era. PLA was really nice in some aspects, but felt kind of empty and lacked the grandeur of a real main series title (what with not featuring much battling at all). LGPE doesn't even bear mentioning. So yeah, not the best bunch of games to compare against, but still, SV holds up way more than favourably. I'm not sure if it's even possible to rank it as "the best games yet", but I can confidently say they're the best main series games of the 3D era by a long shot.

I feel like it comes down to quality of life creep vs gameplay.

In pre-3d games (gen 5 or earlier) technology limited gameplay so Gamefreak packed the games with features and things to do to make up for it. I hit 999 hours in Pokémon Diamond and I don't think I even did everything there was to do.

Now in the 3d era (gen 6 onward) technology has allowed massive QoL updates that make previous games feel unplayable but at the cost of features that we saw in previous games. After 60 hours I think I "beat" SV in its entirety. Cut features like 6v6 battles without timer, Battle Tower etc sort of gut post game content to anyone who isn't into VGC.

The awkward question is if the freedom of movement, breeding changes, wandering Pokémon vs random battles, etc make modern games better than past games. I hate to say it given dexit and other cut features but I'm finding it harder and harder to want to play older Pokémon games. Yeah BW2 / HGSS are fantastic but good god they are slow and grinding isn't "fun".

That said Rom hacks play on 2x speed with QoL features missing from the original released added so overall I'd play a Drayano hack over anything Gamefreak did alone but it's a really odd position the official games are in. I refuse to call SV better than HGSS or BW2 but I'll be honest, I think I'd rather play SV.

 

[Magcargo]

So my PC broke the other week, so I've been putting a lot of time into my copy of Violet w/o really getting into the game's overall reception from other sources barring this site. I did see the occasional drama headline by some gaming journalists channel, but apart from that, I went in this game w/ a blank mindset. I played the game in different way from most, where I caught nearly 20 Pokemon, and rotated them on and off on a regular basis. I EV trained every Pokemon I used except my Starter (which I mostly EV trained, but its not quite perfect in speed). Perhaps this is "new game syndrome" but my experience with the game has been quite positive. This game has a lot of components that I feel are worth talking about so I'll go in them in order.

Victory Road
Pretty standard Pokemon fare, where you collect the 8 gym badges and become champion. I liked most of the gym leaders and gym challenges a bit more than other Pokemon games since you interact with the gym leaders more during the challenge and most of the challenges feel larger in scope due to taking place outside, touring you around the city, etc. Feels like there is more variety overall here. My favorite gym leaders were Iono and Larry. Iono's gym challenge was pretty funny and despite just being "Where's Waldo", I found the minigame to be the most entertaining. I also liked her personality and stuff like her icon plastered all over Levincia. At first, Larry threw me off, since he seemed like just a normal ass businessman with nothing going on, but after I realized that was the entire joke, I liked him a lot more haha.

Gyms were unfortunately not very difficult for me. I got fully evolved Pokemon like Pawmot, Ceruledge, and Gallade by the second gym + made my stats better via EV training, so none of the early ones posed any challenge. I did struggle with Larry the first time since I was trying to use Breloom in that battle, but he caught me off guard by getting 4 consecutive paralyses in a row with Glare and forcing me to switch around until he reverse swept me with his Staraptor (which was still faster than my max Speed Gallade). I was able to rectify this in the next attempt by using Nuzzle first w/ my Pawmot and taking him out from there. I do like the Tera Pokemon being from a different generation and trying to cover for the gym's main weakness. Kinda subverted my expectations since the gyms are usually the best way to show off the new Pokemon, but I liked this decision to not do that this time around.

E4 + Champion were pretty standard. Larry & Hassel threw me off, but overall fairly easy battles, though I think that's largely since I was using the right Pokemon like Ceruledge. The champion was a dissappointment though, even though their theme is banger. Final battle against Nemona was pretty challenging though due to the level jump and I mostly won due to getting insanely good luck like multiple back-to-back crits.

Path of Legends
My pick for the best path story wise. You go around the region fighting some of Paldea's Titan Pokemon, like in Sun and Moon, and get some really cool upgrades to the legendary to make exploring more fun. Its kinda like unlocking HMs in a way. The story here was pretty good too & I liked Arven trying to help Mabosstiff get better. Sadly, the Titan battles were extremely disappointing and all of them felt like jokes. I do like the concept of facing a daunting enemy Pokemon with an AI partner & its not like Arven's support wasn't helpful, but the enemy Pokemon has to actually be daunting lol. Arven's final battle was pretty hard though, which I liked. Caught me off guard with how bulky some of his Pokemon were.

Starfall Street
So I saw a lot of people here saying that this path was bad early on and I'm not sure what they are on about? Storywise and battlewise, I liked this path the most. Yeah, all the "twists" are obvious and whatnot, but the game plays it off for laughs. I felt this path used the whole "school" premise of the game the best and conceptually, I did really like reporting to an anonymous hacker who was operating behind the scenes. They even pay you in the Pokemon World's version of Crypto, LP, as opposed to Pokedollars lol. In general, I do like how over the top the story is here and thought Penny was pretty relatable. I don't know how to feel about bullying anymore so I won't touch on that aspect of the story.

Most of the battles were decently hard too, though some of the strategies in the later fights were... questionable. The Fairy-type team Star Leader, for example, set up Misty Terrain and immediately got rid of it with Steel-Roller which I found very weird.

The Way Home
Favorite part of the game tbh. Liked seeing the main casts interactions and going deeper and deeper into Area Zero. I'm really hoping the DLC expands on the third Legendary's involvement in the plot.

General Gameplay
Pretty fun, big step up from Sword and Shield. Miraidon enables a far greater degree of exploration in the overworld and makes the act of just moving around in the overworld feel much more fun. Overworld encounters can sometimes be annoying, but because the battles take place directly on the overworld and not in a separate battle screen, they are significantly less intrusive than in past Pokemon games. As I mentioned before, I did EV train almost every Pokemon in my team and while the process was tedious, especially for a rotation of 20+ Pokemon by endgame, it wasn't as bad as in other Pokemon games due to most of the encounters being fairly controlled + overworld battles feeling much faster overall.

Let's go is kinda a cool feature, but it was a bit finicky. Still, its free EXP and a good way to grind stuff like Pokemon Materials so I can't really complain. TMs being craftable is a mixed bag. I'd see why an Open World game would go back to single use TMs and using Pokemon materials to craft them and I do think it was the right choice, but it may make creating competitive teams take a bit longer.

I like that shops sell very good battle items like Leftovers and Power Boosting items. I was able to give almost every Pokemon I used an equipable item that they could use effectively. Now, I mostly relied on the classic items, like the 20% power boosting items or Leftovers, but I was able to try a few other cool options, like giving Gallade Scope Lens or Pawmot an Assualt Vest (which is just an overworld item, not something you can buy in the shop until post-game). My one complaint is that some items like Toxic Orb are post-game only, which sucks. I also like that you could eventually buy mints to fix your Pokemon's natures, which I did for some of my Pokemon.

Terrastalization
Mostly didn't use it during general gameplay since long animation & you'd need to go back to the Pokemon Center to charge it. It was useful during some of the harder fights like against the Elite 4 and Nemona to secure a KO which I wasn't sure I'd get, but it certainly wasn't an auto-win button. Against Larry, my Pawmot still wasn't strong enough with Terastal Electric to automatically drop most of his Pokemon and got KO'd by his Staraptor. Against Hassel, Terastalizing my Tinkaton was actually a detriment since it let his Dragalge KO me with Sludge Bomb when I would have lived the hit otherwise. I did catch a fair few of the special tera Pokemon like Lucario and Kirlia, but I didn't use Tera on those Pokemon at all so I wasn't able to fully utilize their alternative typing.

Pokemon
Had a lot of fun using the Pokemon this time around. Almost every Pokemon I built had some time to shine during my playthrough, which I was pleasantly surprised by. Bellibolt was an extremely powerful tank that made up for his lack of Speed and Coverage with supercharged Electric moves that were basically as powerful as super effective coverage moves. Gallade was a powerful Pokemon throughout the adventure since it evolved at level 21 and got Sacred Sword + Leaf Blade + Aqua Cutter automatically, giving it a variety of options. Scope Lens also let it get a lot of crits too on these strong coverage moves. Tinkatin was meh, but after she evolved into Tinkaton, she was extremely potent due to Metal Coat boosted Gigaton Hammers and Thunder Wave, which was useful in wild battles and espicially against Nemona, since it prevented her from reverse sweeping me with her Quaquaval. Ceruledge honestly wasn't anything special early on since he didn't have Bitter Blade, but he became drastically better as soon as he did and was critical in the E4. Iron Treads was extremely relaible due to his high stats all around and good typing. Almost every other Pokemon I trained had some time to shine, which was quite nice.

Picnics
I used this to get a Shiny Iron Valiant, Shiny Iron Hands, and Two Shiny Iron Jugulis, so I like it. Sandwich eating animation is a bit weird though? Looks like they are throwing up lol.

Tera Raid
Pretty ight, banger theme. More fun than Sword and Shield raids since its asynch, but higher difficulties can be tough. I only use Iron Hands w/ Belly Drum + Drain Punch so anything that resists Fighting is hard for me.

Overall, had a pretty positive experience so far with the games. I think it is a great leap forward for the franchise.