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

[BackSet]

It will be far worse than that, I'm afraid. The failure of Pokémon Sword and Shield will be so profound that the Earth itself will crack beneath Nintendo's headquarters, plunging it into the depths of the molten core. Microsoft and Sony will embark on a technological arms race in an attempt to fill the gasping vacuum of power, but in their wild, obdurate frenzy, they will resort to measures that dramatically hasten the effects of climate change across the globe. Ice caps will dissolve. Coastlines will flood. People will be left stranded, to starve by the hundreds, and then the thousands. The Earth will become a sweltering, suppurating sore of a world; a futile pit of misery and anguish in which the only hope one can have is for the swift arrival of the Reaper.

And then Dune happens... somehow.

 

[Oriden]

I have found out over the Internet that Pokémon Sword and Shield were considered #1 most hated video games of E3 2019 by most voting users because some of the Pokémon unavailable in those games cannot be importable there, making the total Pokémon species and Pokédex entries as limited to lesser number, while all Mega Evolutions and Z-moves are instead replaced by Dynamaxes, Max Moves and Max Raid Battles for the mainly-focused gameplay mechanics. However, it is unknown whether the games will become commercial successes or failures. If they're commercial failures, do you think that one of the owners, whether Microsoft, Sony or the other will acquire the own rights to Pokémon franchise, or will the Pokémon franchise end? Please let me know what you think, thanks.

That is... such an extreme conclusion to jump to.

1. The games will not be commercial failures. We know pokemon well enough by now to know that the games will sell no matter what.
2. One game not selling as well as expected will by no means end the franchise, nor result in Nintendo/GameFreak/Creatures all agreeing to hand it over to one of Nintendo's competitors. Remember that the franchise is more than just the games- even if Sword and Shield were to flop, the merchandise and media derived from it would still make enough money to tide them over.

People really gotta stop saying that the series will end over one game or that another company will or should take it over under any circumstance.

 

[thomaswiencek]

Oops, we've regret it.

 

[FlashFire926]

Masuda last tweet is from 8 days ago at E3. No good morning, no working on music, no weather update, no fan arts retweet. Now, this is news. XD

How frequently does he tweet normally?

 

[Oriden]

How frequently does he tweet normally?

Daily.

That poor man must be so stressed right now. =/

 

[NealIRC]

I have found out over the Internet that Pokémon Sword and Shield were considered #1 most hated video games of E3 2019 by most voting users because some of the Pokémon unavailable in those games cannot be importable there, making the total Pokémon species and Pokédex entries as limited to lesser number, while all Mega Evolutions and Z-moves are instead replaced by Dynamaxes, Max Moves and Max Raid Battles for the mainly-focused gameplay mechanics. However, it is unknown whether the games will become commercial successes or failures. If they're commercial failures, do you think that one of the owners, whether Microsoft, Sony or the other will acquire the own rights to Pokémon franchise, or will the Pokémon franchise end? Please let me know what you think, thanks.

Nah, Nintendo is just hella rich.

 

[FlashFire926]

Daily.

That poor man must be so stressed right now. =/

Okay now, that's a pretty big deal.

I honestly hope Masuda leaves GF. It's clear from many interviews that his idea of pokemon game to make things very easy and casualize the games because of his perceived notion of sales being lost due to people shifting to phone games.

 

[Cainhxrst]

yeah. I'm guessing he's gonna lay low until it's safe for him to tweet again without his mentions getting flooded with #bringbackthenationaldex and other things

 

[BackSet]

Okay now, that's a pretty big deal.

I honestly hope Masuda leaves GF. It's clear from many interviews that he's his idea of pokemon game to make things very easy and casualize the games because of his perceived notion of sales being lost due to people shifting to phone games.

Er... just to make sure we're on the same page what is the definition of casual in this context?

 

[FlashFire926]

Er... just to make sure we're on the same page what is the definition of casual in this context?

• Decreased difficulty. X/Y, ORAS, and LGPE suffered from this. ORAS gutted a lot of the gym leader teams compared to the original games.-
• constant handholding. This was problematic in all the 3DS games. Sun/Moon always had that point on your map, as if the player is dumb as bricks.
• mandatory, unskippable, long tutorials
• removing features more geared towards the hardcore (like battle frontier, trainer rematches,etc, and the post game in general)
• Box Legendaries that are ridiculously easy to catch. They even give you a free one mid game in ORAS.

Just an overview of what I mean when I say they're "casualizing" the games, and there's more on top of this too,

Also, just take a look at my previous post's edit.

 

[Zeta]

mandatory, unskippable, long tutorials

Series has been out 20 years with no major gameplay changes and there's still not an option that goes:

* "Have you played Pokemon Before?"
Y<
N
"Are you sure?"
Y<
N

skips forward 40 minutes of useless crap

It'd be like if every Mario game opened with a 30 minute cut scene of Toad explaining how to jump.

 

[Poke Dragon]

I hope that Game Freak forces us to catch the legendary Pokemon through the Dynamax battles, that's really enough to make them harder to catch.

 

[Knightwolf09]

Okay now, that's a pretty big deal.

I honestly hope Masuda leaves GF. It's clear from many interviews that his idea of pokemon game to make things very easy and casualize the games because of his perceived notion of sales being lost due to people shifting to phone games.

Except Masuda is only the producer, not director. He may have his say in some stuff, but it's under the direction of Ohmori, who for some reason people ignore.

 

[Esserise]

Okay now, that's a pretty big deal.

I honestly hope Masuda leaves GF. It's clear from many interviews that his idea of pokemon game to make things very easy and casualize the games because of his perceived notion of sales being lost due to people shifting to phone games.

Ehh... for one thing, we don't really know how Game Freak work internally. People tend to assume that Masuda is some monarch and that everyone else there secretly hates his guts and wishes he would keel over already so that they could finally concentrate on making the True Game for the True Fans, but I strongly doubt that his decisions aren't thoroughly discussed among the rest of the producers, or that he's totally deaf to input.

Alternatively, maybe he really is the one calling every single shot - in which case, well... his decisions have been making them shitloads of money for the past few years. Think they'd wanna' keep that guy around...

At any rate, that quote... look, as someone who likes ORAS considerably more than HGSS, I'd rather have a remake that tries new things and makes an earnest attempt to update itself to modern standards than one that prioritizes the tacking on of extraneous stuff like the Pokéathlon over fixing any of the original games' problems.

Decreased difficulty. X/Y, ORAS, and LGPE suffered from this. ORAS gutted a lot of the gym leader teams compared to the original games.

Only the first three ORAS Gym Leaders are toned down. After that I think it's about the same as it was in RS until you get to Winona, at which point they actually start going up a few levels in comparison to the original games.

 

[SinnohEevee]

I have found out over the Internet that Pokémon Sword and Shield were considered #1 most hated video games of E3 2019 by most voting users because some of the Pokémon unavailable in those games cannot be importable there, making the total Pokémon species and Pokédex entries as limited to lesser number, while all Mega Evolutions and Z-moves are instead replaced by Dynamaxes, Max Moves and Max Raid Battles for the mainly-focused gameplay mechanics. However, it is unknown whether the games will become commercial successes or failures. If they're commercial failures, do you think that one of the owners, whether Microsoft, Sony or the other will acquire the own rights to Pokémon franchise, or will the Pokémon franchise end? Please let me know what you think, thanks.

It's Pokémon, it can't fail.

 

[blitzle stan]

There is absolutely no way they will fail enough to merit selling the property. That's a ridiculous idea for one game's impact. It could, however, sell noticeably less than past titles... Which would merit a pause, reflect, and change-things-up situation.

 

[Plubio]

Masuda last tweet is from 8 days ago at E3. No good morning, no working on music, no weather update, no fan arts retweet. Now, this is news. XD

I'd leave Twitter if my mentions were mostly a mass of boiling rage and insults, honestly.

 

[Zweilous]

I will say, on ORAS I'm a little miffed that they didn't include some of the options Emerald gave the Gym Leaders since it did make those battles a bit more fun. Wattson's Manectric in particular is an odd one for me since it's his ace in every other Pokémon media aside from RS, yet it was excluded completely.

 

[Oriden]

Okay now, that's a pretty big deal.

I honestly hope Masuda leaves GF. It's clear from many interviews that his idea of pokemon game to make things very easy and casualize the games because of his perceived notion of sales being lost due to people shifting to phone games.

In a way, I agree... but I don't think I agree that Masuda should leave GameFreak. Yeah, his logic that "people don't have time so we didn't bother putting features in" is dumb, but I think that he's also the reason why they're making the games compatible with mobile apps, which is a very smart move. He's taking that "people are busy" logic and inventing a way that people can still play pokemon while they're doing other things (like sleeping). Don't have time to play Sword or Shield today? Well you can just hop on Pokemon GO and see what's nearby to capture so you can play with it later! (Logic that would be applied better if everything was available in-game to actually be played with.)

I know some people might hate it, but we may see some of those side features that people want just... adapted into their own mobile games instead. Which could be a good thing, especially if most of them are also available on the Switch for those who don't like to play games on their phone for whatever reason.

...on that note, I would be pretty impressed if HOME was phone accessible. Imagine being able to look at your pokemon and trade them from anywhere at any time.

 

[Fairy Type Arceus]

How are the japanese fans reacting to all of this dexit stuff? They angry to? Or is it a lost cause and they're ok with it?