Nintendo Announces Pokémon Sword and Pokémon Shield

https://swordshield.pokemon.com/en-us/

by occamschainsaw • 7 years ago

64 62 7 years ago

swordshield.pokemon.com

uodtl3• 7 years ago

Looks like they will keep sacrificing playability and enjoyability for graphical greatness.

TremendousJudge• 7 years ago

why do you think that?

brootstrap3• 7 years ago

I feel like they should be able to pull off a nice looking pokemon game. Think Breath of the Wild but pokemon! This looks pretty close to that no?

uodtl3• 7 years ago

Why should BOTW be the objective? It was a pretty meh game. And dungeons were terrible.

Explaining myself to the user below: weapons breaking too often, combat is crap, very limited amount of types of enemies, etc.

slantyyz• 7 years ago

Can't you have both?

To me, the thing that makes playability and enjoyability worse on games like this is the grinding they make you go through before you can even do anything.

jefft255• 7 years ago

Why? I don't see any indication of that in the trailer. I just hope that it is a classical turn based pokémon game like I loved to play.

jamesgeck0• 7 years ago

What are you basing that conclusion on? The trailer didn't show any UI.

deskamess2• 7 years ago

That is not Nintendo's m.o. They sacrifice graphics more often than not.. their consoles are legendary for being on-par graphic-wise with the competition from 5 years ago. Their gameplay though is awesome. As a Switch user and playing BOTW and other properties, it has been great.

Someone12343• 7 years ago

It looks nice.

I'm still waiting for an "open world" style Pokemon game. For example take the Zelda: Breath of the Wild game/engine as a starting point and make a Pokemon game.

There's nothing inherently wrong with an on-rails game, and Pokemon games are well known for it. But it feels like the type of theme where exploration being a cornerstone would be fantastic.

I was hopeful after Pokemon Go's success (a game pinned on exploration) and Breath of the Wild, that that would be a natural progression.

saagarjha2• 7 years ago

That would certainly be interesting. I think they might have to modify the traditional 8 gym/Pokémon League system, though.

Someone12343• 7 years ago

I agree, they would definitely have to find a new progression system.

They could make it a "Team Rocket" based game. Instead of focusing on Gyms, you're trying to stop Team Rocket from liquifying the environment for example.

I like Gyms, and I don't think "on-rails" Pokemon games should go away (there's obviously a large market for them). I just want a game where I can go explore and be surprised/find hard to locate Pokemon.

Just feel like the whole theme of Pokemon just naturally flows into that style of game.

ahoy• 7 years ago

I was just thinking today that nintendo has been remarkably conservative with their main-line pokemon games. The core gameplay has changed very little since 1996. I guess they can't be blamed for not changing a winning formula but it's still interesting.

cbhl• 7 years ago

I really liked the juxtaposition of the "Technology is Incredible" guy from Pallet Town in the original Red/Blue/Green versus Let's Go Eevee/Pikachu.

The side games are where all the cutting-edge development happens. Someone comes up with an idea, and builds a prototype. If it works well, it gets integrated into the main-line games.

Pokemon Snap tested, "can we render a pokemon in 3D". Pokemon Stadium I and II tested "can we do a 3D battle system". Eventually these made their way into the 3DS titles. More recently, the catching mechanics in Niantic's Pokemon Go made their way into the main-line Let's Go Eevee/Pikachu.

NathanKP• 7 years ago

I mean a lot of people forget that Nintendo was founded in 1889. A company that old has obviously changed a lot over that time, but the changes that they have made and are making are slow and careful. What I respect about Nintendo is that they stick to the winning formula when it makes sense, and come out with new things when its the right time. They are obviously in it for the long run, and willing to adapt gradually but effectively

izzydata3• 7 years ago

The open world style of Breath of the Wild seemed amazing at first, but I failed to get into it like I had every other Zelda game. It didn't feel like a Zelda game to me.

It may be more successful to make that style of game, but it would alienate fans of the traditional style of the game like myself.

Someone12343• 7 years ago

You're likely correct.

But I'd argue that BotW was the most popular Zelda game ever, so while it did upset some of the fanbase it brought in more new people than it lost in traditionalists.

With Pokemon, they already have multiple branches of games running side-by-side. I would think that if they did an open world game, it wouldn't be part of the main franchise but rather its own new branch.

A new line of games would likely give them more freedom to break away from the typical formula as well (e.g. not gym-based progression).

chimeracoder2• 7 years ago

The open world style of Breath of the Wild seemed amazing at first, but I failed to get into it like I had every other Zelda game. It didn't feel like a Zelda game to me.

I like open-world games (e.g. Far Cry 5), so I enjoyed Breath of the Wild, but I'd agree that it felt like functionally a completely different style of game altogether. It's a distinct genre, so I'm surprised that they went that route.

setr• 7 years ago

gamefreak has done tons of spinoffs, and relatively big budget ones at that, before; I really don't think alienation is much of a concern. See Pokemon Snap, Stadium, Colliseum, Hey You!, Ranger, Mystery Dungeon.

And those are just the ones that aren't pokemon-themed skins over arcade games like pinball.

Zelda is a quite different as they've done a lot less with other mediums than the core series (they still tried ofc, but it hasn't been nearly as effective or impactful). Also BotW is closest we're going to get to WindWaker, the greatest of the Zeldas

fixermark• 7 years ago

It's an interesting take. For me, I felt BotW was a return to the original form: the first game clearly had a path of progression in mind, but didn't technically stop you from picking up (or refraining from picking up) the wooden sword and tooling around on Death Mountain right from the start if you wanted (granted, you couldn't actually challenge Ganon unless you did beat all 8 dungeons, unlike BotW).

As of approximately Ocarina of Time (if not Zelda 2), Zelda games have been a lot more "on rails" in the sense of a well-defined path of progression that is difficult to break (generally because of the need for some artifact or some plot-point to develop that opens the next path point). BotW gave me a clear directional hint (key for modern game design; we're well past the point where most players lack patience for "Here you are; I won't explain the rules; try not to die" game design), but if I wanted to ignore the hint and go run off into the sunset or try to rodeo a Lynel in my shorts with three hearts, I could.

tnecniv• 7 years ago

My biggest complaint with BotW was that the pacing was odd. It was clear they designed everything in the world to be completed on the time scale of a subway ride.

I understand why they did this, given that it was the launch game of a new handheld platform, but it felt limiting from a design perspective. Most of the puzzles just weren't that challenging and the dungeons were rather lackluster instead of being big events.

ocdtrekkie2• 7 years ago

Breakable weapons was the biggest demotivator to me. I really enjoy just dropping into a classic Zelda game and being able to enjoy myself, without worrying about breaking my good weapons or whatever. Wind Waker has a dungeon with 100 levels of enemies, and it's actually fun to start the game up just to play through that.

mcphage3• 7 years ago

it would alienate fans of the traditional style of the game like myself

Some fans of the traditional style. I've been playing Zelda games since the original, and Breath of the Wild quickly became my favorite.

anth_anm4• 7 years ago

Zelda works in that framework.

Pokemon could use changes to the formula, but open world just doesn't sound very good.

Razengan• 7 years ago

I'm still waiting for an "open world" style Pokemon game.

Hopefully when we have persistent, shared AR worlds once everybody has always-on AR glasses.

ArtWomb• 7 years ago

I like the setting, Galar, complete with Tudor-era details ;)

Your average Pokemon super fan is in say the 6-10 year old age range. But strategy elements of RPGs can be difficult to grasp so young. With kids often getting "stuck" after a few easy battles and making little progress beyond.

I think that's why the Mystery Dungeon series was so popular, despite being "off-brand". More of a Roguelike exploration scenario. And focuses on creating an emotional bond with hyper-kawaii styled "virtual pets". Rather than achievement of battle supremacy.

danShumway• 7 years ago

If you're OK with dumping your own ROMs and modding them, Crystal Clear[0] already exists. It scales trainers as you collect badges, so you can tackle gyms in any order.

It works surprisingly well, even for such an old game. The fact that you can just fly anywhere as soon as you get a couple of badges means that the sidequests and caves feel less like chores and more like just stuff to do when you get bored of battling gyms. The scaling ironically reduces grind, because it means most trainers you fight will give you decent chunks of EXP, and you can always skip a trainer and come back for them later without trivializing the battle.

I walked away from it kind of wishing that Nintendo would just carbon-copy some of its design decisions for future games -- I can only imagine how much more interesting that formula would be in a game where I didn't already have the majority of the content memorized.

[0] https://docs.google.com/document/d/1yvciS0eLrTdQfLGVQEBkhZwz...

smush• 7 years ago

Pokemon set in Industrial Era England, eh? Better than it could have been. I just hope this one's mechanics lean closer to XD than, say, Moon.

Slippery_John• 7 years ago

I'm really disappointed that they're re-introducing the random encounters system. Let's Go was such a breath of fresh air with being able to see them walking about. I would often find myself hurrying off somewhere but stopping because I saw a pokemon running about that I hadn't caught yet.

izzydata3• 7 years ago

I do like the visible Pokemon, but the Let's Go style of catching wild Pokemon prevented me from buying the game. It seems like they could have had visible encounters plus wild Pokemon battles.

joshschreuder• 7 years ago

Yeah it's not like they couldn't have the best of both worlds. It's like they heard the backlash over the wild battle system and threw out the whole lot instead of considering which parts really work.

dmix2• 7 years ago

It'd be nice if I could "rent" a Nintendo Switch to play this, like they used to have at Blockbuster. I wouldn't want to buy the whole system otherwise. Although it is pretty cheap.

zolthrowaway2• 7 years ago

Not to sell you on something you don't want, but I adore the Switch. My favorite aspect of it is that I hit the power button and I am instantly in my game. I feel like it's easy to play in 10-15 minute chunks when I have a little bit of free time available. I play in handheld mode probably 80% of the time and I find myself taking it with me more than I did when I had the original DS. On top of that, this system has the best 3rd party content of any Nintendo console since the 64. I'd really recommend it if you have interest in it at all.

neuronic• 7 years ago

this system has the best 3rd party content

Really? I adore the system as well but... it seems rather bloated with mediocre and outright terrible "indie" content. There is a distinct lack of AAA quality games aside from Nintendo originals (Mario, Smash, Zelda...). 2 years of Switch were enough to finish those to a satisfying end. A couple of ports like Stardew Valley don't really help the case either.

I just finished adventure mode in Smash and consider only two games to buy right now: Octopath and Undertale, where only the former is a new original Switch title. Im not jumping at those either. The games that seem attractive in the store are often available on other systems as well.

deskamess2• 7 years ago

Overall I love the switch. I do dislike two things.

-Left joycon drift

- Parental control scheme... it is console based rather than user/mii based. So it is very hard to cordon off a game like SkyRim to the teen/adult mii account. You cannot restrict playing hours bu mii - you have to restrict the whole console.

Sundog• 7 years ago

Can always buy a used one and resell it when you're done

dmix2• 7 years ago

True, good idea.

cm2012• 7 years ago

The Switch is nice because it's so easy to hook up a game of mario kart to your TV if a friend comes over - each Switch has two controllers built in.

dorchadas2• 7 years ago

Plus it's portable. That's the key for me -- I can easily take it when I travel. Which means I can meet some random person and just start playing Mario Kart or whatnot with them while traveling. It's kinda great.

anth_anm4• 7 years ago

Pokemon is recycled garbage and I WANT IT NOW.

Nintendo Announces Pokémon Sword and Pokémon Shield

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