SPOILERS! Impressions on Scarlet/Violet

[Worldie]

Its kinda like unlocking HMs in a way

Have you ever thought of why they called them Herba Mystica?
You're actually collecting HMs to teach new field skills to your cover lege

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 gimmick there is probably to throw you off with the strong steel hit, expecially as the fairy Starmobile special attack actually confuses and it'd be counterintuitive to have misty terrain on.

 

[Antihaxxer]

Have you ever thought of why they called them Herba Mystica?
You're actually collecting HMs to teach new field skills to your cover lege

I feel dumb ! But probably because I played in French ... and they didn't understand the pun ... It's called Epice Secrete in French and HM are called Capsule Secrete "CS" ... So "ES" and "CS" ... Bad job translators

 

[R_N]

I feel dumb ! But probably because I played in French ... and they didn't understand the pun ... It's called Epice Secrete in French and HM are called Capsule Secrete "CS" ... So "ES" and "CS" ... Bad job translators

In japan they're called "Secret Spice" rather than Secret M_____ to match their "Secret Machine" so I think it's genuinely just a coincidence.

 

[Kanburi]

In japan they're called "Secret Spice" rather than Secret M_____ to match their "Secret Machine" so I think it's genuinely just a coincidence.

Not quite. The romanization of 秘伝 is hiden, though coincidentally HM in Japanese also uses the same kanji. In any case, it's still HS (Herba Mystica) and HM (HM).

 

[RocketSurgery]

Since I've beaten the postgame now, time to write out my thoughts on the game.

Overall, I have very much enjoyed Scarlet. It's been a fun experience. I am not sure where I would rate it compared to other games -- my USUM run is still my favorite because it was my monotype run with Marshado -- but I am happy with the game, and I hope that DLC will make it even better. There's a lot that could be improved and fixed, of course.

Open world experience: Overall, I enjoyed this open world approach to the game. Compared to PLA, I definitely appreciate not having to return to a central hub, and enjoyed the freedom to go nearly anywhere right away. I didn't use the opportunity to try and go chuck Pokeballs at Frigibax and hoping for a critical catch so that I could breed an obedient psuedo to start the game with, but I like that in principle I could have. I do think I would have preferred some kind of level scaling system to make it easier to do story points out of order. The wild Pokemon don't need to scale, but having different level ranges for each of the bosses depending on the order you did them would have been nice (as opposed to scaling to your highest level mon). I did manage to do a few things out of the 'intended' order, but they were mostly pretty minor except for the last four gyms. The exploration is nice, and the world feels decently lived in. As expected, the scope of exploration is nowhere near as extensive as Breath of the Wild, and without a hero's path mode it's a bit difficult to find spots I haven't explored yet, though I am still stumbling on caves I've overlooked and such. The fact that the shops are basically all just menus instead of models detracts from the experience a little, since it was unexpected compared to past games or PLA, but far from the biggest limitation of creating an open world game on the three year cycle. I certainly hope that GF can improve upon this formula for something on the Switch (whether another Legends Game, gen 10, or something else).

New Pokemon: New mons are the best part of every generation for me, and I am glad that gen 9 did not disappoint. While only a few paradox mons managed to bump anything off of my favorites of each type list, with Flutter Mane being my favorite of the SV mons, a lot of the mons are new favorites, including Palafin, Ceruledge and Armarouge, and Glimmora. There are a few duds (every dog, except maybe Mabostiff, the dung beetle's stupid face, orthworm, crocalor, quaxly line), but overall a solid line-up. I love the paradox concept as a way to do something ultra-beasty and as a new spin on refreshing old designs. Because of the storyline structure, I actually ended up using 4 teams, covering a lot of the new mons, which was super fun. In fact, across the four teams I happened to use all new fire types but Chi-Yu.

Version Exclusives: This was perhaps the most difficult version choice for me since the franchise started. Usually I base my decision on the non-breedable exclusives and ghost types, and unfortunately SV put these two criteria in conflict. Both sets of Paradoxes have some great designs, and while thankfully they are infinitely obtainable, having unlimited access to them for things like shiny hunting or mark hunting is somewhat desirable. It was really hard to choose, and ultimately it came down Flutter Mane being the only ghost type paradox and liking its design a lot. However, this meant passing up easy access to Ceruledge, which was one of the more general version exclusives pulling me towards Violet. I partly made my decision based on the early leaks of the paradoxes, and now that I've used them in-game I'd say the competition is even closer, so I do like a lot of the future paradoxes. Flutter mane still tips the balance, but it was closer now.

On another aspect of this topic, I feel like the open world environment makes differences between versions now have a much larger impact on the experience. When all mons were just hidden in random encounters in the grass, it was fine, but now that mons actually occupy the environment the effect of version exclusives is more noticeable*. In particular, because ghost is my favorite type, it would bring me much more joy to have dreepy and drakloak lounging around than deino and zweilous, and after PLA I would have liked to have clouds of Misdreavus and Mismagius instead of Drifloon and Drifblim. I do wish the old gen Pokemon version exclusives were made known ahead of official release, so that this could have factored into the decision. (*Similar issues would have come up in SwSh, but I didn't notice it as much back then because I didn't care as much about the version exclusives).

Graphics: The Pokemon themselves look fantastic, following the more textured updates from PLA. For the humans, I preferred the style in SwSh, but it might not have meshed well visually with the Pokemon. The move animations themselves are not as nice as PLA due to the fact that PLA only had a select number of moves, but for the most part they are fine. I think the environment does not look as good as it did in PLA (despite PLA's weird purple tint everywhere), and that was a bit of a letdown. Some of the difference there is due to art style. While I am generally in favor of the 3 year cycle, and I'm not too fussy about graphics, the performance issues and quality of the environment did make me feel like the game maybe needed a bit more time in the oven. (Or alternatively, I would have gladly sacrificed BotW2 if TPC could hire their devs and environmental design teams).

Performance issues: for the most part, the performance issues did not seriously mar my experience of the game, though I did feel like they were more noticeable and intrusive than PLA. In particular, I loathe accidentally opening the seasonal outfit menu, which feels like it takes forever to load. Several other menus feel a bit slow. Tera raid battles can also be a hot mess at times. I have been fortunate to not have any game crashes, but there have been several moments where the game just straight up froze for a second or two. I really hope they can improve some of these issues through future patches.

 

[SamuraiCelebi]

I finally, finally managed to finish Scarlet.
(The open world nature of the game makes me really dizzy, so I was only able to play it in very short bursts every other day.)

Overall, I guess it was...fine?
There's not really a lot I can say that hasn't already been said at this point.

Victory Road was boring and pretty easy, but I wasn't expecting much from the traditional gym challenge.
(Well, the level jump versus Champion Nemona was a little more difficult than I was expecting, but it was still very manageable.)

The Path of Legends was probably my favorite story--I liked teaming up with Arven against the Titans, and he had an admirable goal.

Starfall Street was pretty predictable, but all of the characters involved were surprisingly likeable.
I didn't expect to like Penny or Director Clavell, but they quickly became my favorites!

The final story was short and sweet, and it was nice to see the protagonist and their new buddies interact.

Yes, the game is really buggy and probably needed another year of development, but overall, I think I had fun.

As a final thought...only one thing really pops into my head.
It's been in there ever since I finished a few hours ago, so here you go~

Hide

 

[Bull Of Heaven]

Now that I've played through the games, I'm getting started on competitive teambuilding, while also looking back at what some streamers and YouTubers were doing in the early days. It's given me two separate things I want to talk about here: Tera Raid Battles, and some meta comments on the discourse around the games.

Tera Raid Battles

Yeah, I'm not really enjoying them all that much. I didn't love Max Raid Battles either, but so far I'm finding these worse.

"You don't have to wait for other players to move" sounded nice when it was announced, but I'm finding the battles a little too chaotic in practice. It's always annoying when my move selection is interrupted by the opponent doing something, or there's a weirdly long stretch where I just can't do anything. When I do get to move, I feel more rushed than I ever did in SWSH raids. The waiting in Max Raid Battles was never that bad anyway, and so far I don't think this fix is worth it. I do like the new cheering mechanic, though, and maybe I'll feel better about the raids overall when I've had more time to get used to them.

As for the rewards, the main thing I'm grinding for right now is Tera Shards, and it's a slog. 50 Shards for a single use is a lot, and it doesn't help that they're type-specific. The closest thing I can think of to a SWSH equivalent is Dynamax Candy, but no Mon ever used more than 10 of those, and the same candies worked on every Mon. Maybe I wouldn't mind the extra grinding if I enjoyed the raids more, but right now this is rough. I might just end up building fewer teams in-game than I expected.

The Tera Shard system is enough of a step back from SWSH to make me vaguely hopeful that, assuming we get DLC, it makes Tera Shards easier to farm. But who knows with Game Freak? Maybe the grind is what they want.

Discourse

This isn't about what I see here on Smogon. It's relatively tame here.

It's rough to look back at SV content and discussion and watch so much negativity flare up throughout. It's obviously fine to not like the games, or to criticize them whether one likes them or not, but a lot of it seems needlessly toxic. There's a big difference between "I'm not enjoying this game" and "lmao sad Pokemon fans will buy anything Game Freak shits out".

After thinking things over for a bit, I think the lines I'd like to see the community draw are:

• Criticizing the games: Okay
• Insulting or criticizing other people for liking the games: Not okay
• Sensible criticism of Game Freak: Okay
• Obviously silly criticism of Game Freak (e.g. "they put no work into this," "they have no incentive to improve anything"): Should be treated as obviously silly

But I'm not very hopeful about the community drawing those lines, and I think my interest in engaging with Pokemon content online is starting to dip a little because of all the nonsense.

I've also thought a bit about how we got to this point, and honestly I think some people haven't figured out that they just don't like Pokemon anymore. Obviously I don't mean to say that about everyone who criticizes or dislikes SV, but look around the internet just a little and you start to see people who go over the top spinning any little bit of news about an upcoming game as a disaster, and who can never seem to be happy with any decision Game Freak makes.

I saw someone in a YouTube chat saying something like "Pokemon games just aren't for us older generations anymore". But they never were [primarily] for older fans; that person probably just wasn't in an "older generation" when the older games came out. I obviously wouldn't say that Pokemon is just for kids, since I've never yet grown out of it, but people grow out of their old interests all the time and that doesn't mean there's anything wrong with either them or the things they used to like.

I also wonder whether some people just have trouble adjusting to how their Pokemon-playing experience has changed over time. I said in my earlier post that I couldn't really compare SV to the old games because the best experience I've ever had with Pokemon was playing Gens 2 and 3 as a kid, but I don't think that means those games are necessarily better. There's just a kind of childhood wonder that doesn't exist in the newer games for me. And that's fine, I enjoy the newer games as they are, but I do think my Pokemon-playing experience has already peaked a long time ago. I wonder whether some people go through something similar, but think that they feel differently about the new games only because the games are bad, and don't consider how the life stage they're in can affect the experience.

Maybe that's why I see so many people, presumably younger than me, praising Gen 5 as the unrivalled peak of the series that none of the newer gens can even begin to measure up to, even though both BW and BW2 got plenty of criticism in their time. I mean, I've seen plenty of reasonable and accurate criticism of GSC here in this forum, but those games still feel special to me anyway. But I'm not about to bash other games for not being what GSC are to me.

And I don't mean to deny at all that SV have their flaws. I don't personally care much about the flaws that have gotten the most attention (I just find it kind of funny when the framerate is bad, for example), but it's valid for other people to have a more serious problem with them. I'd just find the toxicity kind of exhausting, and would like it to settle down. And unless/until it does, I don't think I'm happy with the state of the Pokemon fanbase right now.

 

[R_N]

Honestly I've wound up liking Tera Raids significantly more than I thought even despite their insane jank especially when online.

Even at their most jank they still resolve faster than Dynamax Raids, the AI partners are loads better, and the shield mechanic is significantly better. I had a whole roller coaster of emotions on Tera Raids and somehow landed on an upswing mostly on the back of belly drum strats being extremely OP lol.


Honestly the actual issue I have with Raids are the rewards. They might be easiesr but its still a time commitment and some are more annoying than others, especially the 6 star raids or when going online, and it sucks when your rewards are a paltry number of crystals and materials and then a bunch of exp and money. I mean those are nice, but it feels bad. If you're not giving out TMs then there should be WAY more materials and significantly more crystals especially at 5 & 6*s

 

[Worldie]

SURELY the dlc will give us faster ways to grind Tera crystals than this.

SURELY COPIUM

 

[P Mystery]

SURELY the dlc will give us faster ways to grind Tera crystals than this.

SURELY COPIUM

My ultimate copium is telling myself that the Battle Tower will return with gen 3-to-7 style rules, replacing the old 100 and 200-win streak prizes of Lansat and Starf Berry, which are currently available by other means, with rewards of 100 and 200 Tera Shards of each type.

I suspect that I'll still be disappointed come DLC.

 

[Codraroll]

I've also thought a bit about how we got to this point, and honestly I think some people haven't figured out that they just don't like Pokemon anymore. Obviously I don't mean to say that about everyone who criticizes or dislikes SV, but look around the internet just a little and you start to see people who go over the top spinning any little bit of news about an upcoming game as a disaster, and who can never seem to be happy with any decision Game Freak makes.

I saw someone in a YouTube chat saying something like "Pokemon games just aren't for us older generations anymore". But they never were [primarily] for older fans; that person probably just wasn't in an "older generation" when the older games came out. I obviously wouldn't say that Pokemon is just for kids, since I've never yet grown out of it, but people grow out of their old interests all the time and that doesn't mean there's anything wrong with either them or the things they used to like.

I also wonder whether some people just have trouble adjusting to how their Pokemon-playing experience has changed over time. I said in my earlier post that I couldn't really compare SV to the old games because the best experience I've ever had with Pokemon was playing Gens 2 and 3 as a kid, but I don't think that means those games are necessarily better. There's just a kind of childhood wonder that doesn't exist in the newer games for me. And that's fine, I enjoy the newer games as they are, but I do think my Pokemon-playing experience has already peaked a long time ago. I wonder whether some people go through something similar, but think that they feel differently about the new games only because the games are bad, and don't consider how the life stage they're in can affect the experience.

After SwSh, I was starting to wonder whether I'd outgrown Pokémon myself. I found very little to enjoy in those games. The gulf between what I thought Pokémon could be and what it was had grown wide as an ocean. All the power of the Switch at their disposal, and this is what they created? A clearly half-assed story, a region mostly made up of hallways, a drab and empty area to explore, and an approach to storytelling that grabs you by the shoulders and shoves you in the desired direction all throughout the game. I did not enjoy it much, to put it like that. Then BDSP came out, and it wasn't exactly polished. It was a game that for some reason stayed faithful to some of the worst games in the series, purposefully overlooking the improvements of the version that has been hailed as one of the best. If those games were representative of the franchise's visions, then maybe it wasn't for me anymore.

However, SV have brought me right back on board. The stuff I liked about Pokémon is still there. The stuff I disliked is much less present, or at least less notable. And they've brought in some new ideas too, which mostly hit the mark.

I guess my play style is very laid back. I like to just roam around and stumble across stuff to do. To backtrack and explore. To find trainers to battle, rare items to collect, or fun new Pokémon to catch. Finding new approaches to the way forward. Maybe retrace my steps a bit if I feel I've gone too far ahead. And SV plays right into that play style. At times, I've used four different teams of six Pokémon. Not for the challenge, just because the stuff I did got me so far ahead of the curve that I decided to play with a team of weaker Pokémon for a bit. And of course because it's awesome to see your Pokémon grow and become powerful, and with multiple teams you get to have those "power boost" moments several times more often. I've played this way in other Pokémon games too, but it can quickly run into a problem: what to do when the game feels too easy with Team A, but Team B can't overcome the challenging battle ahead? The games since XY or so limit you to the closest patch of grass, where you grind until you've gained enough strength. You end up running in place, because you can't proceed forward, you've done everything there is do do behind you, and there are no other ways to go.

SV, on the other hand, lets you just set out in a random direction in search for more stuff to do. You go climb that mountain, cross that river, check out that forest, swim that ocean, defeating wild Pokémon and trainers as you go. Before long, your Pokémon will have gained enough strength, and you go back where you were to make another effort.

Sure, it has problems in that it doesn't really show you where the next challenge should be, and that you may end up grinding to overcome a challenge far beyond where you should be in the game. The Poké Center nurse recommended I go challenge the Ice gym after claiming four Gym badges. The Ice gym is Gym 8. Sure, I could have done that, but then Gyms 5, 6, and 7 would have felt a bit underwhelming afterwards. SV has some very strange flaws. But it mostly works still. I think I can see three reasons why I enjoy it so much:

• The freedom to roam. You can go mostly anywhere, at any time. That also means you've got plenty of space to mess around. Even the fields right outside the cities feature plenty of stuff to explore. But there are also hidden mountainsides, little islands, deep crags, and high plateaus for you to check out, and they usually have something worthwhile to find. And Paldea is huge compared to the other regions. You will always have somewhere new to run around.
• A "what you see is what you get" approach to the Pokémon selection. You don't have to run through forty encounters in a patch of grass in case there's a Pokémon with a 2.5% spawn chance there. Upon reaching an area, you can very quickly tell what there is to find there. No need to roll dice to map the content. You don't have to run in circles around a small area to find what there is to see, or wait for the right weather to hit the right location. You go, you explore, you find.
• Multiple story lines that engage in different ways. I think this was a genius invention. Earlier games put you on a linear path from Gym to Gym, with the stuff in the middle either being a distraction or filler. Now, as you go through the game, even when following the "intended" path, you get some variety to look forward to. The three types of "badge milestones" have you interact with the environment in very different ways, and you get different prizes for it too. It also means that each story line keeps you occupied with something different between the beats of the other two. If the game had been all about chasing Titan Pokémon, it'd be too repetitive. Doing all Team Star bases in order, likewise. And all Gyms. But this structure breaks it up very nicely, and helps underscore the freedom and variety of the game.

I also see evidence of effort in this game that hasn't been as clear in the previous few main series titles. New Pokémon models and animations, well-written storylines, Pokémon that interact with their environment, and lots of QOL goodness. Sure, I could point out many flaws in the game too, and still there are moments where I wonder "why couldn't they have done something like this instead?", but I definitely think the games are good enough for me. They really come close to the type of Pokémon game I dreamed of as a kid. And I have really high hopes for the franchise going forward, if they continue to improve upon this framework. Can't wait to explore the next new region already.

 

[Noah3475]

I write this as someone who has not got through most Pokemon Scarlet, let alone cleared it, so please take anything I publish here relating to these games with a grain of salt.

The type specialties of major trainers in these games appear to be unbalanced. One of the foremost things I look at in a video game is its boss battles, so this caused me concern. Five gym types are weak to Skeledirge's STAB, including the first two gyms in order of level, not to mention Skeledirge having a defensive advantage against Larry. Between eight types, there will be some weakness overlap, but six advantageous gyms are easily too much. The Elite Four's specialties are Ground, Steel, Flying, and Dragon. Three of these types are weak to Ice. I could see something like a Floatzel with Ice Punch easily sailing through a majority of the Champion Assessment. In addition, has it occurred to anyone that five of Geeta's Pokemon are weak to Skeledirge's STAB moves? Are these feats as easy as they look on paper, or am I exaggerating a design flaw?

 

[Worldie]

I write this as someone who has not got through most Pokemon Scarlet, let alone cleared it, so please take anything I publish here relating to these games with a grain of salt.

The type specialties of major trainers in these games appear to be unbalanced. One of the foremost things I look at in a video game is its boss battles, so this caused me concern. Five gym types are weak to Skeledirge's STAB, including the first two gyms in order of level, not to mention Skeledirge having a defensive advantage against Larry. Between eight types, there will be some weakness overlap, but six advantageous gyms are easily too much. The Elite Four's specialties are Ground, Steel, Flying, and Dragon. Three of these types are weak to Ice. I could see something like a Floatzel with Ice Punch easily sailing through a majority of the Champion Assessment. In addition, has it occurred to anyone that five of Geeta's Pokemon are weak to Skeledirge's STAB moves? Are these feats as easy as they look on paper, or am I exaggerating a design flaw?

You're looking at the incomplete picture. This game has 18 gyms, not 8. There is a "boss fight" for every element.

 

[Nexor]

Skeledirge can hit almost any pokémon for at least neutral damage with its STABs. But it is also slow and is weak to 5 types at least.
I personally don't like Skeledirge very much, in my opinion it is nothing special when you consider the other available fire types.

Meowscarada in comparison is the best non-legendary grass pokémon in the game, and Quaquaval is also pretty decent (actually my favourite of the 3 starters).

Just my opinion...

 

[Hugin]

I liked the new TM system. They're common enough that you should end up with 1 of each, and it's reasonable to craft more if you decide 2 of your mons need the same move, but you don't teach Bulldoze to every mon "just because" and you also don't have to hold on to them until the end of the game. Deciding to teach Dig to Clodsire is reasonable, but deciding what to fill out Mabosstiff's coverage with involves actual tradeoffs.

 

[Suspicious Derivative]

Let’s kick off the new year with a review! I have beaten the main game of Violet. Time to make a review of the game, or at least summarize my thoughts on it. I wanted this to be short, but as usual, it got longer than expected.

I started playing the game on December 16th, almost a month after the release. I then beat the main story on December 28th. It took me around 36 hours of playtime.

I was initially not too happy about the games due to their early announcement and release date. It felt way too early for a new generation. Then I got quite hyped for the games during the summer, but I ended up gradually losing most of my hype during the final months leading up to the release. Once the games had been leaked/released, I heard about the performance issues which didn’t exactly increase my hype. Because of all this, I decided to not get the game on the release date. In addition to this, I feel that I spoiled myself way more than intended on the new Pokémon (and other things in the games to an extent). Though I still went in maybe 70-80% blind.

I was still interested in the game though, and I always intended to get it eventually. After almost a month, and after talking to my friend DrumstickGaming who had played the game and was a big fan of it, I decided to get it. And you know what? I’m glad I did.

First of all, I have some short thoughts on various features and things in the game. What I like, what I don’t like and what I have mixed or neutral opinions on. It contains lots of spoilers (obviously).

Likes

• The Let’s Go feature, way better than following Pokémon since it actually does something. It isn’t exactly broken either since you get less Exp from it than from regular battling.
• I really like the images in the Pokédex for the Pokémon you have caught, those are fun to look at.
• The game kept several QOL improvements from L:A. The most notable for me is that can still nickname your Pokémon directly on the party screen! I’m really glad this seems to have become the new standard in the series. They also kept the way relearning moves work, which is excellent. And several other things.
• Graphically, most (if not all) Pokémon models have been improved regarding shading and other details, which is neat.
• There’s a minimap on the overworld screen! With a compass! Now they just need to add a clock and a weather indicator and we’re all set.
• There are 18 bosses in the main game, and each of them is a specialist for a different type, which means all 18 types represented among the bosses. I think that is really great.
• Terastal in general is a really cool and pretty good mechanic, I definitely prefer it over Dynamax/Gigantamax. I also like how it is completely fair since it is the same for all Pokémon. It was not just given to some species (which Megas were) nor is it accessible for all Pokémon, but some of them have special variants of it (which happened for Z-moves and Gigantamax). I didn’t use Terastal that much during the main game, but I still like it a lot.
• When the player falls from a height, the Rotom phone will activate and catch you before you hit the ground. The game even thought of small safety measures like that!
• Seeing wild Pokémon directly on the overworld is great, and one thing I especially like is seeing them in groups. Notably the groups where one Pokémon is a leader, like a flock of Murkrow being led by a Honchkrow.
• Field moves. You use the cover legend for all of them, but you still need to unlock them by beating the Titans. Yet another example of HMs done right.
• Titans in general. Much better than the awful noble bosses in L:A.
• I like how you need to speak to trainers in order to battle them, it feels like a step forward. The fear of being ambushed and getting into a battles you do not want to have is gone.
• Poké Centers are out in the open, which is very convenient. And there are quite many of them too.
• I like how you can fly to any Pokémon Center you have visited (and some other areas which are warp points). Seeing as the region is pretty big, I really appreciate how there are so many warp points. I also like how you don’t need to “unlock” the Fly/warp ability, it is there right from the beginning.
• The Team Star base battles. Really fun and creative. I was super amazed the first time I went to a Team Star base. Yet another way to do a boss fight right.
• The regional dex is great, and the Pokémon variety is solid too. I think 400 Pokémon is good enough regarding the dex size, though I wouldn’t have been against having 50-100 more Pokémon in it.
• The Ace Pokémon for the Gym Leaders are of a different type than their type specialty, but during the battles, they Terastal their ace into their specialty type! Really cool.
• In Alfornada, there are images of the minisprites from Gen 1 on the building with the observatory. I thought this was really cool.
• That also made me think of the following: there seems to be very little fan pandering to Gen 1 in the game, which is excellent.
• At first, I was annoyed by the map. When I opened it, the map rotated depending on my current position instead of always being shown in the same way (with north being up). Then I found out that pressing the R stick made it automatically change so that north is always up, which is great.
• Paldea as a region. Really large with lots of varied environments, which is what I like the best about Pokémon regions.
• Snow replaces Hail. I have always been slightly annoyed by how the snowy weather in Pokémon was Hail and not Snow, but now it finally changed it and it is great. Plus, it gives a Defense boost to Ice-types and it does no longer damage non-Ice types at the end of every turn! Fantastic.
• The music. Great as always. One thing I especially like is how the battle theme for wild Pokémon varies depending on which area you are in! Right now, I’d say my favorite track is the overworld music in Area Zero.
• I have yet to do any Hyper Training in the game, but I met the Hyper Trainer and noticed that the minimum level for Hyper Training has been lowered to 50. It means less grinding, and that is fantastic.
• Speaking of which, I really like how they kept several features from past games which makes it easier to raise Pokémon for competitive or semi-competitive battles. Notably Hyper Training, infinite Vitamins, Ability Capsules/Patches and Mints. I like how easy it is to get those items, you can actually buy Mints at regular stores.
• Adding to the above, I like how several good and useful hold items can be bought at regular stores, like Leftovers and Life Orbs.
• Actually going to the school and doing the classes was surprisingly fun. I preferred to be out in the wild and focusing on the treasure hunt, but I still felt obliged to do all the classes. I couldn’t let my player character do like the wild Slaking and become a truant! Even better, some of the things they taught were actually new to me. I also liked how you got to know some of the characters better, how it gave some extra lore for the games, and how you got some nice rewards as well. I consider it to be the fifth storyline of the game.
• Speaking of the academy, I like how Nemona, Arven or Penny is always in the classroom with you during the classes. Another small detail which I really appreciate.
• In Area Zero, I really like how you travel together with the others. It reminded me of several other Switch games I have played where you have one or more NPC companions who travel with you in the overworld, and I like that a lot.
• The atmosphere in Area Zero. Really unique, and the music just makes it even better.
• Story and characters. Prior to playing the game, I had heard that the story was going to be really good… and it was. I had spoiled myself on some things, but it didn’t ruin my experience at all. There were many great moments, several unexpected surprises and it was all held together very well. I really liked the concept with three different storylines followed by a fourth. I also like how they had a simpler and more down-to-earth story, just like in S/S. And I like how there was no real “antagonist” in the games. Overall, I think this is the new best story in the series, beating both B/W and S/M.
• The way they handled the main legendary. You get it early on, but you can’t use it for battles until the end. And you get chosen by it because of your actions of kindness towards it, not because you are the fated hero or something. This is an approach I prefer when it comes to stories and how legends are handled in Pokémon games.

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Dislikes

• Dexit. Over half of all existing Pokémon cannot be used in the games. Enough said.
• The release date. I am still bitter about it. I wish the games had been released at some point during this year instead. A later release date might also have allowed them to improve the games in terms of both performance and gameplay. I will never be a fan of the yearly releases for Pokémon games and I sincerely hope there’s no new game next year (DLC for ScaVio is fine though), will elaborate a bit further on this later on.
• Picnics. Just like camping, they feel like a failed attempt at making a good follow-up to Amie/Refresh. I didn’t use them a lot, which is partly because I didn’t like them that much.
• Battle animations can’t be turned off. I usually play with them on during the main game, but I turn them off during the post-game (always before I start battling at Battle Facilities. As it is now, battles in the game can sometimes feel a bit slow, and making something mandatory when it has been optional in all past games feel like a bad decision.
• When opening the Pokédex, it always goes back to the beginning instead of “saving” where you were at the last time you opened it. This makes it annoying to complete the Pokédex since I have to keep scrolling every single time I open it to see which Pokémon I should go after next.
• Another annoyance with the Pokédex is that when you look at where a Pokémon can be found in the wild, it does not show your location, which means you have to do a manual comparison of where you are compared to where the Pokémon can be found.
• I want to like how the levels of wild Pokémon are displayed on the overworld if you focus on them, and how they can be displayed at all (unlike in S/S) but I think they should be displayed at all times. The focusing in itself is pretty bad, it feels like you need to be in a very specific angle for it to work. It can be hard to pull it off if you want to check the level of a nearby Pokémon which is fast and/or aggressive. I think they should do like in the Xenoblade games and display the levels on the overworld all the time.
• Aggressive wild Pokémon. Annoying as always. I didn’t like them in L:A, I don’t like them here either. I don’t like being forced to battle when I’m trying to do something else. This needs to be fixed. They need to add some way to avoid wild Pokémon altogether, like bringing back Repels? What I really want them to do is to always let the player choose when to have a battle, not the game.
• It is also annoying when the wild Pokémon “chain” you into multiple battles in a row: you are in a battle with one Pokémon (or trainer) and another Pokémon walks into you during the battle, forcing you to start a new battle immediately afterwards. This just slows down things since you are forced to run (or battle) a Pokémon you might not have any interest in fighting. I wish the overworld would “pause” when you are in a battle, just like in S/S and L:A. That would fix this problem.
• It seems like you still can’t nickname Pokémon with a different OT/ID (I tried this with the Wooper you get from an in-game trade, and the nickname button wasn’t there at all). Which is a shame. Even worse, it seems to be a step down from S/S where you could nickname any non-Event Pokémon with a different OT/ID at least once. Or maybe you just can’t nickname a Pokémon with a different OT/ID if it already has a nickname, but it is possible otherwise? Haven’t been able to test this. Either way, if they could just fix this, they will finally have perfected nicknaming in Pokémon.
• There are very few Double battles in the game. The only ones I have encountered at all have been at the Ghost Gym. I like Double battles and I think there should be more of them, not less. So this is a letdown.
• When you see a shiny Pokémon on the overworld, there are no sparkles or anything that indicates that it is a shiny, apart from the color scheme being different. This does not bother me all too much on a personal level as I don’t hunt for shinies, but I would have preferred if there was a sparkle on the overworld like there was in L:A.
• I appreciate how you can glide and climb with Miraidon, but the execution is terrible. I wish you could glide for as long as you want to instead of just suddenly starting to drop after a while. Climbing also feels inconsistent as Miraidon often has trouble clinging to the surfaces. The climbing feels much worse than in L:A since Miraidon will automatically slide down if you aren’t attached to the wall, whereas in L:A, Sneasler would at least stand on the wall when it wasn’t climbing (from my memory at least). I’m not sure if this is because of technical restrictions/difficulties or something else, but it needs to be improved.
• The Elite Four. Disappointing in several ways. I was not happy about how you got to face them in a set order, I would definitely have liked it better if you could choose your order like in the Unova/Kalos/Alola games. At least their level differences here weren’t that big, the jump was just one level between each of them. I was also disappointed to see that they were type specialists despite the fact that there already was a boss for each of the 18 types. The good thing is that they used the types that were previously used by Titans (and Geeta’s ace is a Rock-type, which means they sort of represent all five Titan types). I was further disappointed to see that unlike the Gym Leaders, the Elite Four members all use an ace matching their specialty type, and they Terastallize it into their specialty type as well. I think it would have been better if the Elite Four had teams with mixed types, and if they had specialized in some kind of alternate battle strategies instead of types. It feels like there’s a lot of missed opportunities with them. But I liked them as characters, and Geeta did at least have a mixed team.
• Another thing I learned is that you can apparently not rebattle the Elite Four during the post-game.
• The cover art for the games. After the great cover for L:A, we’re back to “slap a legend on it and call it a day”. At least it is better than S/S, though that doesn’t exactly say much since the covers for S/S are really uninteresting even by Pokémon cover art standards.
• There are no real warp points in Area Zero, and while you can warp between the entrance and the stations, it is a bit limited compared to the rest of the overworld. This makes it a bit more annoying to re-explore it during the post-game.

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Neutral / mixed

• No Battle Facilities. This would normally be a negative since I like battling in battle facilities. But I’m kind of tired of making new teams for facilities, so I’m not sure if I would have bothered with it if there had been one. Being forced to play with animations on would have made it a bit of a slog as well.
• DMax/GMax has been removed. I knew they would be gone and I’m okay with it since I didn’t care too much for them, but it still annoys me how there has to be a new super mechanic every generation while the old one(s) gets discarded.
• On that note, Terastal is very obviously going to be removed in the next generation (I will be very surprised if it is kept) or maybe even the next game? I wish they could stop introducing a new super mechanic every generation, they should keep the previous one and expand on it before introducing a new one. Or just not have them at all if they are not going to keep them around.
• Set mode has been removed. I generally play on Shift mode so this doesn’t bother me too much, but I always appreciated having the option to change, and it is a shame for those who play on Set mode.
• I really like how they kept the new time system from L:A, but I don’t like how there’s no way to change the time in-game, like you could do through resting in L:A. It was especially annoying since there was one late-game event that could only be done during night, forcing me to wait for a while before I could do it. This is something they need to add.
• I love encountering Pokémon on the overworld and I definitely prefer it over random encounters, but it is annoying when you accidentally walk into a Pokémon and start a battle. This happens fairly often for me, especially with small Pokémon. The system with encountering Pokémon on the overworld is great, but it needs to be improved even further.
• Tera Raids. I haven’t done a lot of them since I just didn’t care much, but they seem okay. They felt a lot smoother, faster and easier than the Dynamax Raids. I have yet to try one at 5-6 stars so I don’t know how difficult those are.
• Being unable to enter most buildings is a mixed bag. It makes things a lot more convenient when shopping, but it takes away a lot of the immersion as it makes the buildings feel more like backdrops or decorations.
• On a similar note, the way you travel between different rooms/areas at the academy. Convenient, but it feels very artificial.
• The way TMs work in the game. I was always a huge fan of the infinite TMs in Gen 5-7, and I did not approve of how Gen 8 started to move away from it with the TRs. I think the way TMs work in Gen 9 is acceptable, it could have been better but it is fine enough as it is.
• Character customization. I appreciate how it exists, but I could barely be bothered to care about it this time.
• No voice acting. The games are still acceptable without it, but it wouldn’t hurt to have it. I guess I have gotten used to it since most other Switch games I have played recently featured voice acting to some extent. The major cutscenes in Violet felt very empty without voices.
• Like in all previous Pokémon games for the Switch, the Exp. Share can’t be turned off. I wasn’t too bothered by it this time around, but I would definitely have preferred if it could be turned off.
• Trainers on the field will have a white text box if they are on your level or weaker, and a black text box if they are stronger than you (something I learned the hard way). This is a neat concept, but it doesn’t seem like the execution is perfect. Sometimes, I have faced trainers with black backgrounds but with teams that have been at much lower levels than my party. I guess it is based on the strength of the current area in general? This is another great concept that needs to be improved.
• The Gym tests were a bit hit or miss. I liked the Normal and Electric ones the best. The Ghost one was also fun, mostly because it involved Double battles. The Grass, Water and Ice ones had great concepts, but were a bit too easy to actually complete. I didn’t like the actual test for the Psychic Gym, but the battles were fun. I thought the Bug test was way too simple. I have heard that you can re-do some of the tests during the post-game, so maybe I’ll go back and do that to see if they have gotten any better.

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Next, some specific topics that I want to talk about a bit more in deeper detail.

Pokémon

This was originally going to be at the top of the things I like, but I felt that it needed a section of its own.

If you know me, then you already know what I am going to say here. I love the new Pokémon. They are so amazing, unique and creative. To me, new Pokémon are always the best part of a new generation, they are the main reason I got this game and they did not disappoint. I am always in awe of how creative Game Freak are when it comes to making Pokémon. They are the biggest reason I am still a Pokémon fan.

Before I started playing the game, I had spoiled myself on far too many of the new Pokémon. But there were still plenty of surprises when I played the game. For instance, I had not seen the final evolutions for the starters, seeing all of them in the actual game was great. I have seen almost all of the new Pokémon now, the only ones I have yet to see are the minor legendary group (or at least that’s what I assume they are). I will try to keep unspoiled on them until I see them in the game (I’m planning to try to catch them soon).

My current favorites from the new Pokémon are mostly the ones I have used. My top four right now are Tinkaton, Meowscarada, Pawmot and Dachsbun. From the ones I have yet to use, some that I like a lot are Kilowattrel, Maushold, Espathra, Arboliva and Dondozo. I also like Miraidon a lot, haven’t used it that much for battles though.

The new evolutions are cool as well. Just like for S/S and L:A, I was very surprised to see that they added new evolutions to old Pokémon. But I guess this has become a new standard. And I like them. I have yet to use any of them, but the one I like the best is Annihilape. Primeape is one of my favorites from Gen 1, and I think Annihilape feels like a continuation of the concept of Primeape in a really great way.

I like the Paradox Pokémon too. I think they are similar to the Ultra Beasts in that they are a unique type of new Pokémon. But while the Ultra Beasts relied on being alien and not looking like traditional Pokémon at all, the Paradox Pokémon go in the opposite direction as they look like actual Pokémon, yet that’s what makes them different. This is further increased by how they look like other Pokémon. You think you see a Delibird or a Hydreigon, then it turns out to be an Iron Bundle or an Iron Jugulis instead. Their names are also really odd because they have “normal” names, like Iron Moth instead of Fepolilla or something more Pokémon-like. My favorite so far is Iron Valiant, but they are all really interesting.

I also want to give a shout-out to the Toedscool line. It is so utterly bizarre in every way. I don’t even know what to say. Definitely not what I expected the new “mushroom” Pokémon to look like.

The only thing I find a disappointing about the new Pokémon is the low number of regional forms and evolutions. Wooper/Clodsire and Tauros are the only ones. Yes, I know Tauros has three different forms, but still. I really wish there had been more Paldean forms. Both Alola, Galar and Hisui had larger numbers for their regional variants, so this feels like step back. When I played, I once had a dream that I was playing the game and got to face a Paldean Haxorus. I was a bit disappointed when I woke up and found that it wasn’t real (though regular Haxorus is still awesome). But that’s pretty much the only negative thing I have to say about the new Pokémon.

So yeah. I love the new Pokémon.

Open World

ScaVio are the first Pokémon games that are truly open world, and I want to say some things about that.

Within modern gaming communities and gaming journalism, it feels like “open world” has become equal to “good”, while “linear” is equal to “bad”. I saw one preview for ScaVio which had listed “open world” under the positives of the game (don’t remember if this was further explained within the preview itself). Anyway, this is not something I agree with. I think open world games can be bad, and linear games can be good. If the preview had said “open world, and it’s a good open world” instead of just “open world”, it would have been more convincing.

Playing through Violet made me realize that when it comes to Pokémon (and video games in general), I prefer linearity. Or at least some sort of clear progression. This is probably a very unpopular opinion, but I like being told where to go next and having a clear goal of what to do next in the game. Too much openness just makes me experience overchoice which can make me indecisive to the point where it feels like I don’t get anything done in the game (though I do, it just doesn’t feel that way). Why don’t I just do what I am supposed to do then? Because I like doing optional things in games (as long as they are fun), I generally try everything that can be done in a game to see if is fun and worth doing.

While I prefer linearity or clear progression, I don’t think open world games are downright bad. They can still be good. For instance, I liked BOTW, but that was mostly because I thought it was a good game, not because it was open world. In fact, I would have liked it even better if it had been more linear.

Regarding Pokémon, I never had a problem with past games being linear. Unlike many other fans, I liked the linearity of Gen 5-8. I also liked the clear progression of Gen 3-4, while I always found the non-linear aspects of Gen 1-2 to be vastly overrated and overhyped. But on the whole, I think what I like the best is a combination of linearity and open world. Basically, a linear open world, or “open zone”. I think L:A nailed this, the game gives you a clear goal, it has solid progression, but also large optional areas to explore if you want to. For all the things L:A got wrong, that was one thing it got totally right. From the older regions, I think Unova, Sinnoh, Hoenn and Kalos did this the best, they had clear progression but they also featured several optional areas along the way.

In past Pokémon games, non-linearity has always been pointless at best or harmful at worst. When it was announced that ScaVio were going to be open world, I got very worried. I know most other fans have wanted an open world Pokémon game for a very long time, but I never asked for it. I was not excited. I was worried. Now that the games are out, we know how it turned out. How did it go for ScaVio and their open world?

Let’s take a look at it. Apart from in the very beginning and the end of the main story, the game doesn’t tell you where to go next. But at the same time, you can’t really go wherever you want either since the game doesn’t have level scaling, and some paths might be blocked or hard to get past until you get the right upgrades for Miraidon. Yet at the same time, there is a set path which you are supposed to take (if you want to do things in the right order), one for each of the three stories. But the game doesn’t tell you in which order you are supposed to do the bosses. There are some hints in the beginning and you can get some clues from the description of the bosses, but that doesn’t help a whole lot. Since the levels don’t scale, you might be underleveled for one boss and overleveled for another. Ultimately, the non-linearity and the open world is both harmful and pointless at the same time. That doesn’t sound good. Does this mean that Violet is a failure and a bad game?

No. Despite being open world, and despite all of the problems I talked about above, the game just… works, somehow. I can’t really explain it. I think it is because it encourages exploration, and the levels actually progress, which makes it feels like you are getting somewhere (compare this to Johto, where you are still fighting wild Pokémon at level 20-25 around the 8th Gym). You can also sort of see the levels of wild Pokémon on the overworld (but not without issues) and you can see which trainers are weak and which ones are strong (but again, it isn’t perfect). So, to my own surprise, I actually liked the open world in the end. Didn’t really expect that.

But I won’t deny that I think it could have been better. If there had been either level scaling, or if the game had told you in which order you are supposed to do things (something like this: “You are supposed to tackle the bosses in this order, but feel free to do them in any order you want!”), or if there had been some sort of level recommendations for the bosses (like this: Cortondo Gym – Recommended level: 15), I would have enjoyed it more. But even so, it worked. I think that if Game Freak have 1-2 or maybe all three of these things in their next games, or if they go back to having a linear open world like in L:A, it could be perfect.

Performance

I know people are tired of hearing about the bad performance of the games, but I want to share my thoughts and experiences with it as well. Note that I started playing after the 1.1.0 patch, so I have no idea how it was to begin with.

Anyway, to put it simple: Violet has the worst performance out of any Switch game I have played. And out of any Pokémon game I have played, for that matter.

In the beginning, it wasn’t all bad. It was there, and it was certainly notable, but it didn’t bother me. I can live with some performance issues as long as the game is fun to play. And the game was fun, so it was all fine. As I played, I noticed that it was worse in some areas than in others, it also seems to be dependent on the current situation (like how many Pokémon are on the screen, or the current weather). Sometimes it runs just fine and at other times it is really laggy and slow. Either way, it was something I could live with. But then

my game crashed. And that’s not okay.

I have had my Switch since mid-2018, none of the 16 games or the 2 non-games I have played on it prior to Violet have ever crashed, so that makes this a negative. As for this crash, I had saved almost right before it happened, so I didn’t lose any progress.

I talked about this with DrumstickGaming and he told me that it might have happened because I had played for a long while without turning off my Switch (only put it in sleep mode), so that might have been the reason. I don’t know though. I decided to turn off the game and the console more often after this crash happened, and I have yet to experience any more crashes.

I want to talk a little about other things related to performance as well.

Some of the game physics are pretty bad. For instance, when I was traveling to Alfornada (taking the long path from the northeast, where you have to travel on small cliff bridges high up in the air), my trainer fell down from the heights to the lower level. This happened twice, both times were after trainer battles where I had been positioned right on the edge of the cliff. That was annoying. And once when I was in Alfornada, I jumped down from a building with Miraidon, only to got stuck in the air for a few seconds, then I got warped up to the top of the building I had been standing on earlier. There have also been other situations where I have been annoyed by the bad game physics. In general, I think Game Freak needs to work a bit more on their game physics when it comes to their open world games. I saw some issues in L:A too, and it doesn’t seem like they have been improved that much.

Next, the graphics. My opinion is the same as for Sword and L:A; the graphics are pretty bad for the Switch since the console is definitely capable of much better

but by my standards, I think the graphics in Violet are fine.

So I don't consider the graphics to be a negative.

When I played, I encountered several graphical glitches (like seeing through the ground when standing in certain areas), but they didn’t really bother me. Still, Violet is definitely one of the graphically least impressive Switch games I have played, just like Sword and L:A. I also think the unimpressive graphics would have been more acceptable if the performance was better. That’s one edge Sword and L:A has over Violet, they also have bad graphics for being Switch games, but solid performance for the most part.

Ultimately, the bad performance is something I can live with. It doesn't ruin the game for me, but it is still a negative. I am more tolerant regarding the graphics, they are not a negative in my eyes.

How I played

Since the game is open world, you can for the most part play through it however you want, and do the bosses in any order. I tried to do things in the “right” order to an extent, but I didn’t succeed. In the beginning, I mostly went for the bosses I had a type advantage over. I also tried to find hints in the descriptions for each of the bosses, but it wasn’t super helpful since not all of them had hints.

Here’s the order I did things in, starting with the Gyms.

Gyms:

• Bug
• Water
• Normal
• Psychic
• Electric
• Ghost
• Ice
• Grass

The in-game dialogue from Nemona in the beginning more or less confirmed that the Bug Gym was meant to be the first, so I started with it. Afterwards, I had no idea where to go next. I decided to go for Water since I had a type advantage over it. Then I went for Normal even if it felt a little early since the description for the Normal Gym indicated that it should be done as 4th or 5th. After that, I went for Psychic, again due to the type advantage. Continued with Electric since I wanted to get it done, then Ghost, Ice and finally Grass. I had spoiled myself on Grass being the second Gym, but I saved it for last just for fun. Another reason I didn’t do it earlier was because I didn’t feel that I had a good enough type advantage over it.

My team levels matched the levels of the Gym Leaders teams for the first four Gyms, but I was overleveled for the last four.

In comparison, the order you are supposed to do them in is the following:

• Bug
• Grass
• Electric
• Water
• Normal
• Ghost
• Psychic
• Ice

The only ones I got right were Bug and Ghost, the latter was mostly a coincidence.

Looking at how they are placed within the game, I think it would make more sense if Ghost and Psychic were swapped since the Ghost and Ice Gyms are very close to each other. Apart from the Bug Gym (and Normal to an extent), I felt that there was very little in the game which told you the order you were supposed to do them in.

Larry was the hardest Gym Leader for me. I faced him quite early on and I had no real type advantage against him. Still, he wasn’t that hard, just a bit more challenging than the others.

Next, the Titans. I did them in the following order:

Titans:

• Rock
• Flying
• Ground
• Steel
• Dragon

The in-game dialogue from Arven hinted towards the Rock Titan being the first one you should do, so that’s just what I did. I passed by the Flying Titan on my way to the Water Gym, and since the regular wild Pokémon in the area were at fairly low levels, I went back to do it after the Gym. I then did the Ground Titan since I had a type advantage over it (though not to the extent I had expected since it was part Steel-type), though I waited a bit since there were Braviary at level 56 in the vicinity when I first went there to scout. I did the Steel Titan next, again due to type advantage. I saved the Dragon Titan for last since I had visited the lake earlier and seen that the Pokémon there were at much higher levels than my team at that point.

I was massively overleveled for the Steel Titan, but I think I was actually slightly underleveled for the Ground Titan. My levels matched the others pretty well, though.

And here’s the real order:

• Rock
• Flying
• Steel
• Ground
• Dragon

I mixed up the Steel and Ground Titans, but other than that, I did them in the right order! So that’s cool. The hardest was probably the Ground Titan because it wasn’t pure Ground, making it a bit harder than expected. But all of them were still easy on the whole.

Finally, the Team Star Bases. Here’s my order for them:

Team Star:

• Dark
• Fire
• Poison
• Fairy
• Fighting

The in-game description for the Dark Base hinted at it being the one you were supposed to do first, and since I had two Fairy-types and one Fighting-type on my team, I started with it. I then did the Fire Base since it was quite easy to get to, even if I didn’t have any real type advantage over it. It seemed like the Poison Base was supposed to be done third, so I did it afterwards. I was then about to do the Fighting Base as the fourth because of type advantages, but I arrived at the nearby area and saw that the wild Pokémon there were at very high levels, so I decided to do the Fairy Base first. The text also made it sound like the Fairy Base was supposed to be done fourth. So I did the Fairy Base fourth, then the Fighting Base fifth and last.

I think I matched their levels in most if not all instances, which was great.

It turns out I actually did them in the right order! Somehow. Though the descriptions helped a lot here, as did the levels of the wild Pokémon that were close to their bases. The Fighting Base (or at least Eri) was the hardest.

Next, my in-game team. It consisted of Meowscarada, Dachsbun, Pawmot, Tinkaton, Revavroom and Cyclizar. I named them the Eternal Adventurers. Here's a photo of them:

On the whole, this team was very different from my usual in-game teams, I stepped out of my comfort zone in several ways. I also used a Clodsire as a reserve member for some of the battles where it had a type advantage. And then I used a Squawkabilly for one Gym just for fun. I’m planning to make a longer post about the team in the in-game team thread sometime later on (hopefully soon), so I’ll leave it with this for now.

Regarding difficulty, I found the game to be balanced or easy for the most part, as expected from a Pokémon game. I was either overleveled or even leveled against most opponents, the only exception was against the battle against Arven at the end of the Path of Legends. At least one of his Pokémon was a level above my team at that point.

The hardest three battles (in order) were Eri, AI Turo and Penny. Eri’s Revavroom gave me trouble since I was using an all-Physical team, it had Stamina and was seemingly immune to Crits (I did not get a Crit on it when I used Flower Trick on it). AI Turo was tough since I had no idea what types most of his Pokémon were, and he overwhelmed me in the beginning as his lead took down two of my team members before I could do much. Penny was troublesome because some of her Eeveelutions spammed Baby-Doll-Eyes, that’s also tough for an all-Physical team.

I have heard that breeding has supposedly changed compared to past games, but I have yet to try it so I don’t know how it works. I haven’t tried the multiplayer features either, and I’m not sure if I ever will. I don’t have NSO and I have no plans to get it since I won’t use it much.
I played through the game rather quickly compared to how I usually play. I didn’t exactly rush it, but I didn’t exactly take my sweet time with it either. I guess you can call it a speedy slowrun? Either way, there were three reasons for this. I had lots of free time, the game was fun to the point that it was hard to stop playing… and I wanted to be done with it quickly so I could move on to other Switch games.

Various other things

Is this the best Pokémon game yet?

This is hard to say. The answer is both yes and no. But in the end, I think I’m mostly leaning towards no.

Let’s compare Violet to the other Pokémon games for the Switch. Or at least the two I have played (Sword and L:A).

• I enjoyed Sword a lot and I really like it, the DLC just made it even better. It was really fun and enjoyable despite its flaws.
• I liked L:A too, but I don’t find it super amazing. It was… okay, I guess. An average Pokémon game, not more. I feel that the more I look back on it, the less I can appreciate it. My opinion on it has gotten more negative over time, sadly. Definitely my least favorite Pokémon game for the Switch and quite possibly my least favorite Switch game out of the ones I have played.

As for LGP/E and BD/SP, I skipped them since they didn’t interest me. LGP/E feels like the polar opposite of what I want out of a Pokémon game, skipping them was the best possible decision. BD/SP on the other hand are probably okay, they are just not what I want out of Pokémon right now (or at all). So I skipped them as well.

In comparison, how does Violet fare? I think it actually does very well. It is easily better than L:A, no contest. When compared to Sword, I think they are about even. They are quite different and do things very differently, yet I still find them to be about equally enjoyable in the end. Maybe one of them will end up above the other once I wrap up what I have planned for the post-game in Violet, we’ll see about that.

Next, let’s move further into the past. How does Violet compare to the older Pokémon games?

During the past year, I have played several older Pokémon games: Emerald, D/P/P, HG/SS, Black and Black 2. Apart from HG/SS (which I didn’t play very much), I think those are all solid games. When compared to Violet, I think they have some advantages, but also some disadvantages. The Switch games in general have some great QoL improvements that the older games lack. But the older games also have some features that I miss in the Switch games. It is hard to do a fair comparison.

In the end, I don’t think Violet is the best Pokémon game, but it is still very good and fun to play.

Outgrown Pokémon?

I saw some other people talk about this and I want to chime in my own opinion as well.

I don’t think I have outgrown Pokémon, I still enjoy the games (both new and old), I had lots of fun with Violet and I had fun with the other (older) games I have played during the past year. However, I think I am growing tired of Pokémon. I have been sort of burnt out on the series for a few years, yet I have still played the games a lot lately… and the yearly releases doesn’t exactly help. Especially not now when we got two new main series games in 2022. I have also stopped buying all new Pokémon games, which I did all the way from R/B to US/UM. But for the Switch, I have only bought 3 out of the 9 games that have been released so far (and the Expansion Pass for Sword). I have planned to take a long break from the series sometime soon. We’ll see when that happens, though…

After dexit becoming a thing, I have thought about quitting Pokémon entirely, but every new game I play makes me unsure if I am ever going to quit. And if I ever will be able to quit, for that matter. Speaking of dexit, it is time for the usual question: have we gotten anything for it yet? Even if I really like Violet, the answer is still going to be no. We have gotten another fun and enjoyable game, so that’s cool. But we had that before dexit as well, so it is nothing new and notable. I wouldn’t have minded another year of development if that meant the game could have had all Pokémon. Or if they get added with DLC, that would be fine too. Definitely not expecting that to happen though.

Going forward

I have beaten the main game of Violet, but I am not in any way done with the game. I’m going to continue playing it and do some of the post-game things. I am currently working on the Pokédex, I have way over 300 species registered already, so there’s not a lot left. However, I won’t be able to complete it fully yet since I have nobody to trade with, and the games don’t have Home support yet. But once the games get Home support, I’ll go back to Violet and complete the Dex in full.

I also saw there was some sort of post-game story(?) involving the Gym Leaders, Nemona and Geeta, which I will take a look at. I think I saw something about a tournament being tied to this as well? Either way, it sounds cool. I’m planning to make a new team as well, and once all of this is done, I’ll see what else there is to do.

Once I feel done with Violet for the time being, I will go back to other Switch games. First out is XC3 which I started on a while ago, but took a break from in order to focus on Violet instead. In terms of other Pokémon games, I have two other projects in the works. First of all is my Battle Facility project, which is currently on Platinum (and Emerald, kind of). There’s still a lot left on it, so I’m not sure if I will be done with it this year, it might continue until 2024 or even further. I also have my ongoing playthrough of Black 2 which I have been playing on and off since July… but I don’t have that much left on it now. I’m hoping to wrap it up within the first months of this year.

What’s next for Pokémon?

As said earlier, I don’t like the yearly releases. I sincerely hope there’s no new main series game this year. I would be okay with DLC for ScaVio though. DLC for Pokémon feels like a winning concept, I liked the DLC for S/S a lot and I think it can work well for ScaVio too. Whether I get it or not will depend a little on what it contains, but there’s a big chance I’ll get it. I have only ever gotten paid DLC for four different video games, but I have never experienced a game getting worse with DLC. So it feels like it has potential to be great if it were to happen.

I would also be okay with sequels to ScaVio, but if so, I hope they aren’t released until 2024 at the earliest.

Final opinion on the game

I liked Violet despite its flaws. It had its fair share of positives and negatives, but I think the positives outweigh the negatives by far, and the game was really enjoyable in the end. It was the most fun I have had with a new Pokémon game since… Sword, actually.

Did I find my treasure at the end?

Yes. Both in the game and outside of it. Never expected that.

Those are my thoughts on Violet. I have probably forgotten some things, but I think I have included everything important at least.

To summarize, I’ll say something similar to what I said after playing through Sword three years ago: I found Violet to be a very fun and enjoyable Pokémon game despite its flaws, I'm very happy that I got it and played through it.

 

[DullVanessa]

I've played both Scarlet and Violet recently, so I'll go ahead and dump my thoughts here

Gameplay

Gameplay is very much still Pokemon. The new Terastal mechanic is cool, but it's not used very well by other characters in the game. It would've been more interesting if the gym leader rematches had the opposite Tera type to mix things around, that way it would be a harder challenge. Tera Raid Battles aren't very good. They feel very unbalanced once the 5-7 star raids start appearing, as the difficulty feels more ramped up. You would need actual competitive ready Pokemon to even last the 5-7 dens, which I feel isn't very good if a casual player wants rewards. Shiny hunting is made easy, but you can only get the items through these difficult raids. I caught like four shinies randomly as I wandered around Paldea. The Titan fights were very fun. One thing I'm not a fan of is how the game doesn't have level scaling, since on both of my runs, I got stuck at the Fighting Star member.

Story/Characters

The characters for this region have been really cool. Nemona's a great rival, Arven is okay, Penny's pretty cool, and a lot of the Gym Leaders are really memorable and fun! (Some examples of the Gym Leaders are Kofu, Larry, Iono, Grusha, etc). The Team Star members were also pretty great, and I do like what they did with the Professor(s). The Victory Road, Path of Legends and The Way Home plotlines were great, but the Starfall Street plotline just kinda existed for me. It wasn't bad by any means, but it didn't have a lot of interesting things for me.

Music

A lot of the music is really good. I love what instruments they chose. The composers did really good aswell (including Toby Fox, of course). My favorite tracks were Cascarrafa, all the themes within Area Zero, even the Champion theme. One track I'm not entirely happy with is the Gym Leader theme, mostly when it uses the Galar backing vocal track. It does fit but it also doesn't feel like it fits if that makes sense.

New Pokemon

I love a lot of the new Pokemon this generation introduced. Floragato and Meowscarada, Tinkaton, the Tandemaus line, Skeledirge... Most if not all of the new Pokemon are great. The Paradoxes are really cool and I love a good majority of them. The only Pokemon I'm not that big of a fan of the version exclusive Tauros forms (it would've been just fine if it was just the Combat Tauros), Pawmo and Pawmot, and Iron Jugulis. One thing I do wish they did was give Revavroom "Starmobile" costumes that changed it's typing, ability and stats.

Performance

A lot of the faults of the game are entirely on performance, and they are incredibly hard to overlook. Massive amounts of pop-in on the world are hard to overlook, and frame drops are super common. Crashes aren't often, but are very annoying. Tera Raid Battles sufferfrom menu lag, which gets incredibly annoying when trying to get the Herbs. I personally blame this on The Pokemon Company rushing shit.

Overall, I still had a fun time with SV. My only big issues were the Tera Raid Battles and the performance. I would probably give the game a 6 out of 10. I don't hate it, but it could've been better.

 

[Bull Of Heaven]

I considered doing a long post, but I don't have it in me. So instead, after a couple of months to get used to the new Pokemon, here's a rough tier list:

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S: Favourites
A: Also like them a lot, near-favourites
B: They're good, I like them
C: Mixed feelings, or (more likely) I don't think about them much at all
D: Not really a fan