- Joined
- May 13, 2019
Beat the game. That was um, that was something alright...
The Pros:
Once you get past the furbait garbage the new mons are neat as expected. Used Centiskorch, Flapple, Cramorant, Copperajah, Arctozolt and Polteagist. No matter what happens I always get a great sense of joy traveling around with a ragtag group of oddballs.
Camp. I didn't expect to enjoy this as much as I did but there's something about getting to see your whole team out of their balls and interacting with each other in real time that's genuinely charming. The idea of a giant centipede on fire, worm dragon with apple rind wings, spaced out waterfowl with a portion problem, massive metal elephant, horrific science experiment gone wrong and specter made of fucking tea all having a sense of camaraderie is amusing in itself.
The Wild Area, while simplistic and rather small, was a nice feature as an "escape" from the main story and raid battles were addicting for a while.
EXP Candies are wonderful for quickly catching up new members without having to waste any time.
The name rater and move reminder not only being combined into one NPC but also being readily available in every Poke Center was a godsend, as was remembering moves not requiring items anymore.
They really captured the feel of England, both real and fiction. Loved the Glimwood Tangle in particular, the more mischievous, asshole-y fae side of the Fairy type was something sorely lacking up until now, and that location and the new mons within it captures such qualities perfectly. They aren't all gay pink sunshine and rainbow bullshit dammit.
The Cons:
Characters were mostly annoying/forgettable/fapbait. Special shout out to Not Hau for never shutting his fucking mouth and making every battle with him twice as long by having to throw in a quip after every goddamn turn.
What semblance of plot there was, it was an utter joke. Makes the exposition dump in X/Y look like Shakespeare. It's like they wanted to combine old and modern versions of Pokemon storytelling and failed miserably at both. It goes from just being about getting the 8 badges like in gen I-II (only replace Team Rocket with, well, nobody, Team Yell isn't even worth the mention), to suddenly whipping back to the modern "gotta stop the big bad legendary" plot beat at the very, very end.
Music was easily the worst in the series, what didn't sound awful just flat out didn't fit the area or the events transpiring. There were only a couple tracks I legitimately enjoyed, and for Pokemon (who's music I usually listen to for hours on end) that's a special level of disappointing.
While the game was more or less balanced for it, permanent EXP Share was annoying when I was trying to remain lower level, or when I wanted to give one mon who was falling a little behind more EXP to catch up without others getting it at the same time. Yes, you could box them, but there was always the risk of getting OHKO'd by something you didn't expect. Should've just left the option there istead of needlessly taking away player choice.
TMs are fucking useless now (in other words if your mons' level-up movepool sucks, have fun grinding raid battles until the TR you want drops or buy them for absurd amounts of Watts that take forever to accumulate).
Outside of the Wild Area the handholding and railroading is just as insulting as ever if not worse to the point where you barely have to buy potions they heal you that frequently.
It goes without saying at this point but the presentation blew. Pop-ins everywhere, frame drops everywhere (online Wild Area becomes a slideshow to the point of outright freezing frequently at points), camera barely pans upwards in Wild Area, the infamous mouse during the credits, just lack of polish at every corner. This absolutely was a 3DS shoddily ported to the Switch last minute and nobody can tell me otherwise.
In conclusion, it felt like for every improvement, every sparkle of greatness, there were another 3 globs of mud to blot them out. Such a sorry excuse of a game, Pokemon or otherwise... I can only hold on to the fool's hope that things get better from here due to the games being made from the ground up on Switch after this mess.
The Pros:
Once you get past the furbait garbage the new mons are neat as expected. Used Centiskorch, Flapple, Cramorant, Copperajah, Arctozolt and Polteagist. No matter what happens I always get a great sense of joy traveling around with a ragtag group of oddballs.
Camp. I didn't expect to enjoy this as much as I did but there's something about getting to see your whole team out of their balls and interacting with each other in real time that's genuinely charming. The idea of a giant centipede on fire, worm dragon with apple rind wings, spaced out waterfowl with a portion problem, massive metal elephant, horrific science experiment gone wrong and specter made of fucking tea all having a sense of camaraderie is amusing in itself.
The Wild Area, while simplistic and rather small, was a nice feature as an "escape" from the main story and raid battles were addicting for a while.
EXP Candies are wonderful for quickly catching up new members without having to waste any time.
The name rater and move reminder not only being combined into one NPC but also being readily available in every Poke Center was a godsend, as was remembering moves not requiring items anymore.
They really captured the feel of England, both real and fiction. Loved the Glimwood Tangle in particular, the more mischievous, asshole-y fae side of the Fairy type was something sorely lacking up until now, and that location and the new mons within it captures such qualities perfectly. They aren't all gay pink sunshine and rainbow bullshit dammit.
The Cons:
Characters were mostly annoying/forgettable/fapbait. Special shout out to Not Hau for never shutting his fucking mouth and making every battle with him twice as long by having to throw in a quip after every goddamn turn.
What semblance of plot there was, it was an utter joke. Makes the exposition dump in X/Y look like Shakespeare. It's like they wanted to combine old and modern versions of Pokemon storytelling and failed miserably at both. It goes from just being about getting the 8 badges like in gen I-II (only replace Team Rocket with, well, nobody, Team Yell isn't even worth the mention), to suddenly whipping back to the modern "gotta stop the big bad legendary" plot beat at the very, very end.
Music was easily the worst in the series, what didn't sound awful just flat out didn't fit the area or the events transpiring. There were only a couple tracks I legitimately enjoyed, and for Pokemon (who's music I usually listen to for hours on end) that's a special level of disappointing.
While the game was more or less balanced for it, permanent EXP Share was annoying when I was trying to remain lower level, or when I wanted to give one mon who was falling a little behind more EXP to catch up without others getting it at the same time. Yes, you could box them, but there was always the risk of getting OHKO'd by something you didn't expect. Should've just left the option there istead of needlessly taking away player choice.
TMs are fucking useless now (in other words if your mons' level-up movepool sucks, have fun grinding raid battles until the TR you want drops or buy them for absurd amounts of Watts that take forever to accumulate).
Outside of the Wild Area the handholding and railroading is just as insulting as ever if not worse to the point where you barely have to buy potions they heal you that frequently.
It goes without saying at this point but the presentation blew. Pop-ins everywhere, frame drops everywhere (online Wild Area becomes a slideshow to the point of outright freezing frequently at points), camera barely pans upwards in Wild Area, the infamous mouse during the credits, just lack of polish at every corner. This absolutely was a 3DS shoddily ported to the Switch last minute and nobody can tell me otherwise.
In conclusion, it felt like for every improvement, every sparkle of greatness, there were another 3 globs of mud to blot them out. Such a sorry excuse of a game, Pokemon or otherwise... I can only hold on to the fool's hope that things get better from here due to the games being made from the ground up on Switch after this mess.
