Official Pokémon Sword and Shield speculation thread (Updated June 5th, 2019)

[KrisiChiki]

I wouldn't call the graphics a slim upgrade from SM. Looking at various comparison screenshots/videos of SM, LGPE and SS, I can say there is a significant improvement. @Lixarion posted a good example. If the shadows cast by clouds is any indication, we might even get some dynamic shadow/light effects! Not to mention that there may be surprises and other beautiful areas that are kept hidden for now.

My only gripe is that the Pokemon models don't seem to have had any noteworthy updates so far. I expected that Game Freak would continue to use the models from Gen 6, but I was hoping they would at least update the idle animations and add more movement and life into them. I'm kinda tired of seeing the exact same idle animation for Pikachu since 2013. I take that they probably didn't update the idle animations of the Pokemon affected by Sky Battles either.

 

[Gablegames]

Ok so I'm not sure but didn't someone say this was supposed to be the biggest region yet. With what we see now I wouldn't say that it is. But if it is the uk upside down then it would make sense that there is a northern ireland island off the right side where you can see a boat by the light house. This would help with the fact that I only see 5 maybe 6 gyms.

Also if its going to be with where the starters secondary typing giving them an advantage over the other then I think we will get
Fire/electric
Water/ice
Grass/ground or rock

 

[VelVoxelRaptor]

Galar’s the Sword, Kalos is the Shield XD

 

[Grass Type Gardenia]

Gen 8's Galar Region in a nutshell

KICK by DonLawride on DeviantArt

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View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3w_vz8SdxUM

 

[Virbank Video]

Probably best not to base the ‘region looks smaller than expected’ argument on a not-to-scale illustration of the region from the very first reveal trailer. Come on.

 

[Joker901]

I wouldn't call the graphics a slim upgrade from SM. Looking at various comparison screenshots/videos of SM, LGPE and SS, I can say there is a significant improvement. @Lixarion posted a good example. If the shadows cast by clouds is any indication, we might even get some dynamic shadow/light effects! Not to mention that there may be surprises and other beautiful areas that are kept hidden for now.

My only gripe is that the Pokemon models don't seem to have had any noteworthy updates so far. I expected that Game Freak would continue to use the models from Gen 6, but I was hoping they would at least update the idle animations and add more movement and life into them. I'm kinda tired of seeing the exact same idle animation for Pikachu since 2013. I take that they probably didn't update the idle animations of the Pokemon affected by Sky Battles either.

Oh please, we are on the Switch. The graphics are truly meh. The texture is bad in most of the scenes (look at the pokeball logo on the soccer shirt of the player in the last scene, it's pixaleted at best), during the wild battles the background is not clean at all, sometimes the shadows disappear (the pokeball shaking in the snowy field clearly doesn't have it). Pokemon go back to 3ds graphics with those black lines all around them after looking alive in Let's go. That art style is really good but the graphics are poor most of the time, while watching the trailer, I was thinking, why youtube went low quality? Imagine my face when I discovered it was FHD.

 

[Gablegames]

As far as the legendaries go they more than like will be 2 wolves based on Sköll and Hati sons of fenrir who was tied to the yggdrasil (conection to x and y) it also ties in because Sköll and Hati chase the sun and the moon with gen 7 being sun and moon then they would be folowing behind it in gen 8

 

[Gablegames]

Probably best not to base the ‘region looks smaller than expected’ argument on a not-to-scale illustration of the region from the very first reveal trailer. Come on.

I understand that its not to scale but if you look based on the amount of towns and gyms then there seems to be a part of the region missing.

 

[Synthaphone]

View attachment 116316

Wow, the jump from LGPE to Sword/Shield is super apparent to me, just in how much richer the colors and shadows are- between the proportion differences and the less impressive shadow rendering, that screenshot of LGPE feels like a blandly lit dollhouse in comparison. I feel like Sun and Moon were a little more ambitious style-wise than LGPE, but Sword/Shield feel like a step up from that as well.

I understand some of the gripes when it comes to the art style, even if I don't have much of a problem (the mostly empty and identical brick walls in that Manchester city are the only thing slightly putting me off at the moment, I hope they add more variety to those- that one little Pokemon food ad is a nice start, at least) but I saw someone complaining that the grass is made up of 2D planes that are rotated different directions. Like... you wanted each blade of grass to be fully modeled?? I don't think any game does that, its a ridiculous waste of resources and would make rendering way more difficult.

 

[The Haymaker]

At first, I really didn't think (and hoped) that the big stadium scene is of a gym because it seemed unusual, and the Grass gym looked much smaller than the massive stadium, but now I think it actually might be the Grass gym.

It's hard to day for sure, but if you look closely, right next to the protagonist's left hand, it looks like the leaf logo on the Grass gym entrance. Then there is another on that same sideline/wall to the right of the protagonist. Thoughts?

 

[Grass Type Gardenia]

At first, I really didn't think (and hoped) that the big stadium scene is of a gym because it seemed unusual, and the Grass gym looked much smaller than the massive stadium, but now I think it actually might be the Grass gym.

It's hard to day for sure, but if you look closely, right next to the protagonist's left hand, it looks like the leaf logo on the Grass gym entrance. Then there is another on that same sideline/wall to the right of the protagonist. Thoughts?

View attachment 116319

Also, have anyone noticed the date for #Pokemonday on the number at the back of the player? 227 = February 27th?

 

[Knightwolf09]

At first, I really didn't think (and hoped) that the big stadium scene is of a gym because it seemed unusual, and the Grass gym looked much smaller than the massive stadium, but now I think it actually might be the Grass gym.

It's hard to day for sure, but if you look closely, right next to the protagonist's left hand, it looks like the leaf logo on the Grass gym entrance. Then there is another on that same sideline/wall to the right of the protagonist. Thoughts?

View attachment 116319

I still stick to my theory that gyms will be tournaments in this region. As reference to football leagues, except it's pokemon battles. Ooooooo what if you actually have a team you're in?

 

[Synthaphone]

I'm a little worried that if all the gyms are stadiums, they'll end up looking and feeling identical and won't have any sort of fun visual distinctions or puzzles that past gyms in the series have had. I hope they find some way of making them feel special and unique, because even though I had a lot of gripes with Kalos, I way prefer those gyms where one's a rock climbing wall, one's a treehouse, one's a dollhouse, etc. than all of them being the same standard stadium. It could hurt the feeling of progression too, since I feel they'd get repetitive if what I'm afraid of ends up happening.

I'm staying hopeful that they'll surprise me though, since we haven't seen the inside of any of them except possibly the grass one, and we've seen very little gameplay footage at all so far.

 

[TheElderKing]

Given that the gyms look like stadiums from the map, I thought they were the same.
Maybe the stadiums will hold different events/side quests other the gym challenges, though I’m doubtful and think they integrated GC with the sport/stadium gimmick. Even the whole music in the presentation on the starters and after the show of the logs was reminding of sports stadiums’ cheers.

I don’t mind that they worked on gym challenges to make them different, given their experiment with trials...but On first look challenging gyms with that kind of outfit is not that appealing.

Though we don’t knew what’s behind the whole new mechanic, so I’ll wait for more news.

 

[danilkp1234]

So let's start speculation on when the next trailer is. I mean there is probably more to show than LGPE

 

[Grass Type Gardenia]

Here are my guesses for the Gyms

Manchester Gym: Steel Type (Female or Male)
Kilburn Gym: Grass Type (Male or Female)
Blackpool/Liverpool Gym: Water Type (Female)
Llanberis Gym: Ice Type (Female)
Birmingham Gym: Dragon Type (Male)
Buxton Gym: Rock Type (Male)
Nottingham Gym: Fairy Type (Male)
London Gym: Poison Type (Female)

 

[The Haymaker]

Yeah, I'm glad that I'm not the only one to notice the new music while Masuda and Ohmori were talking. At first it seemed vaguely familiar so I wasn't sure and didn't want to seem stupid, so I didn't mention it. Maybe someone will extract it and clean it up or just recreate it, although that would be impressive.

I didn't really get sports vibes from either of the two themes, though. It just has a sense of grandeur like a lot of Pokemon music does.

Also, please give us a Dark-type Gym this time, GF.

 

[Knightwolf09]

Thanks, you guys got me theory crafting this early in the morning. I think I get what the gimmick of this region is. It's not like megas, or z-moves type of gimmick, but a new type of battling, Team Battles. Kinda like the battle agency in Ultra, you can have your own team of 3 consisting of other characters and you battle in this tournament like setting. Each stadium has their own team that specializes in certain types as the home team of that town, as well as team captains that'll be the equivalent of gym leaders. And as you beat every home team in the region, the final league will be like the championship cup of the region. It's pretty much a football league!

 

[Joker901]

Woo...people are fast:

My Grookey fake evolutions by RZGmon200 on DeviantArt

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Scorbunny Fake evolutions by Teatros on DeviantArt

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Sobble Fake Evolutions by Mat4265 on DeviantArt

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[ThreeT]

I'm kind of sad that they didn't give us pokedex entries like previous games in the main website. Though that may be for later as they haven't shown much of the game to us yet. In fact, we haven't even seen gameplay of the actual starters. Overall, understanding how they behave and act gives us a good indication of how the starters will evolve and will probably affect my decision in choosing them.