Official Pre-Pokémon Sword & Pokémon Shield Speculation & Leaks thread

[Myth]

I am sure that the Metroid Prime 4 delay doesn't have anything to do with no reveal of the next Pokemon games in January.

Pokemon is bigger than Metroid and generates much higher selling numbers. If they really had a problem to show off some MP4 stuff in a direct, then they would've waited for later like March/April anyway and let the Pokemon games take the spotlight first before the path is clear to show Metroid and not immidiately falling in Gen 8's shadows. Putting both into one direct would be just a bad decision marketing wise. Better would be a Pokemon direct with Gen 8 and twthree months later when the game is ready to show something the usual Nintendo direct with MP4.

Sorry, but are you talking about what I said? Because I didn't say anything like that. If you are talking about what Poke Dragon said, I think maybe he didn't know that the development of Metroid was totally restarted, and neither the reasons. But it certainly had nothing to do with the Pokémon announcement.

 

[Cainhxrst]

yeah I don't think the MP4 delay affects pokemon in 2019 much.

Apparently the decision to restart development was made in December, so I feel that it's possible Nintendo shuffled their 2019 lineup a bit to accomodate, but I don't think anything major happens at a result. At most, if pokemon gen 8 wasn't planned to be the star of their e3 this year, it probably is now

 

[Plubio]

Yeah. With Metroid Prime 4 delayed Pokemon Gen 8 is the Switch's big seller this year.

Honestly, Metroid was never a top seller. Nor it will be.
Animal Crossing and Pokémon are the big hitters this year, I'm sure it was the plan since the begining.

For example, Animal Crossing New Leaf alone has sold ~12 million units since it was released in 2012.
The combined Metroid series sales is about ~18 million units.

Kinda sad because I love Metroid, but is not really that popular. shrug

 

[Desdar300]

The crown & sceptre rumor was a fun example of the fanbase latching onto something because they wanted it to be real. Completely of the opposite of a lot of the fanbase writing off the lapras screenshot from LGPE as fake because nobody wanted to believe we were getting a grid based, kanto game

I subscribe to this.
The idea of Kanto and Alola again didn't sound all that appeasing and neither did there only being two fighter left for Super Smash Brothers ultimate's base roster yet they happened.
It's best to expect the unexpected

 

[Myth]

the decision to restart development was made in December

Seriously? Where did you get this information from?

 

[Cute Charm]

I highly doubt there was a direct planned at all and I also doubt it was affected by the Metroid set back. Why even schedule a direct about a game that is anywhere between 0% and 10% redone? Pokemon day still seems to be the most likely day we'll get info on it now that January 8th is long gone. It could just be that since the christening of the day they've now decided to just announce the first main series games on that day, followed by the "second versions" in May or June a year or two later. Like I said before, XY being announced in January kind of ruined us on having to wait on things. Anyone remember that Diamond and Pearl took almost 2 years from the time Muchlax showed up to the game being released in Japan?

As for the UK region, it would be cool, but at the same time I kind of want more American regions other than New York/New Jersey and Hawaii before more European regions. I'd even take a Canadian region first.

What IS the difference between this and medals?

It won't be a set list of achievements like medals were. Once you finish something you can just keep doing it until the obligatory next gen server reset. Think daily/weekly missions in MMORPGs, but instead you just connect to the internet once a week and get a randomized list of missions. The scoring process can be like the weekly progress thing in Go where it resets every sunday at midnight and you get things based on how many missions you managed to get done in that time. Random items, clothing, money, ETC. That way people can still do things other than just run around bored because the game ran out of things for them to do other than to look for shinies, fight online/locally, or pet their pokemon.

 

[Cainhxrst]

Seriously? Where did you get this information from?

View: https://twitter.com/imranzomg/status/1088841313447866370

 

[Myth]

I feel I should say that nobody was directly relating the announcement of Pokémon with the postponement of Metroid (I think).

What I said was that people seem more confident about a Nintendo Direct going on after Metroid's postponement announcement because fans expected news about this game (Metroid Prime 4) in the supposed January Direct. And for obvious reasons, giving news like that (about the dev restart) on a Direct would not even be a possibility. So, that's why some people are more confident (and rightly, the way I see it) that given the bad news, a Direct may be coming soon. It's not about the Pokémon announcement specifically.

I personally believe we can have news about the game on a Nintendo Direct, that's why I asked that question, just out of curiosity.

What Extroth said was that some people are also considering the possibility of a supposed Direct planned for January - to mainly give information on Metroid - may have been canceled. And that, for the reasons I will explain below, isn't totally impossible, although I find it unlikely.

And also that a supposed February Pokémon Direct could be the first Direct of the year, instead of a Nintendo Direct, which is unusual. Or that they could put all the rest of the stuff that would be announced along with the supposed Metroid Direct on a February Nintendo Direct along with the Pokémon announcement. I also find that unlikely for some reasons, but no one here is directly relating the announcement of gen 8 with the postponement of Metroid.

Certainly the postponement of Metroid had nothing to do with the Pokémon game. And I think the Pokémon announcement will not be affected by the postponement of Metroid.

I highly doubt there was a direct planned at all and I also doubt it was affected by the Metroid set back.

As far as I know, we don't know yet when the decision on restarting Metroid development was made. Also, it probably wasn't something easily solved, it was probably something that took some time, especially since it involved negotiations/talks with Retro Studios (which by the way, is not at its best moment, so it may have taken even longer).

Why even schedule a direct about a game that is anywhere between 0% and 10% redone?

Honestly, I don't think anyone even expected this game to be released this year. We were just waiting for news about.

View: https://twitter.com/imranzomg/status/1088841313447866370

Thank you! But then, we can't tell when exactly the decision was made. Only that, apparently, may have been made at or after December.


Edit - Sorry, but I had the feeling of being misinterpreted. Corrected some of the English errors.

 

[Oriden]

I highly doubt there was a direct planned at all and I also doubt it was affected by the Metroid set back. Why even schedule a direct about a game that is anywhere between 0% and 10% redone? Pokemon day still seems to be the most likely day we'll get info on it now that January 8th is long gone. It could just be that since the christening of the day they've now decided to just announce the first main series games on that day, followed by the "second versions" in May or June a year or two later. Like I said before, XY being announced in January kind of ruined us on having to wait on things. Anyone remember that Diamond and Pearl took almost 2 years from the time Muchlax showed up to the game being released in Japan?

As for the UK region, it would be cool, but at the same time I kind of want more American regions other than New York/New Jersey and Hawaii before more European regions. I'd even take a Canadian region first.


It won't be a set list of achievements like medals were. Once you finish something you can just keep doing it until the obligatory next gen server reset. Think daily/weekly missions in MMORPGs, but instead you just connect to the internet once a week and get a randomized list of missions. The scoring process can be like the weekly progress thing in Go where it resets every sunday at midnight and you get things based on how many missions you managed to get done in that time. Random items, clothing, money, ETC. That way people can still do things other than just run around bored because the game ran out of things for them to do other than to look for shinies, fight online/locally, or pet their pokemon.

Haha, sorry but I get a chuckle every time someone mentions Pokemon Day as being the most likely day for news. XD

Let's not forget this beautiful countdown that happened on the twitter last year-

View: https://twitter.com/Pokemon/status/968235628256157696

So friendly reminder not to get too hyped up for a Pokemon Day announcement, especially if a countdown starts on the twitter again. Sun and Moon was announced on Pokemon Day, but it was also the 20th anniversary so there was more reason for it. =3

 

[techitisJ]

Yeah Idk if I could see the announcement happening on Pokmeon Day. I could see it happening before or after though. It will be interesting if anything with that changes now, after Nintendo has announced that Metroid was delayed. Honestly, after e3 didn't have anything for us last year for Metroid at all, I honestly didn't think we would get Metroid this year either. But that's for sure we won't see it this year now, unless they rush and ruin that game. So it makes me wonder if they might do the Pokemon announcement earlier, or at least something to get Switch owners excited after Metroid.

 

[Oriden]

Yeah Idk if I could see the announcement happening on Pokmeon Day. I could see it happening before or after though. It will be interesting if anything with that changes now, after Nintendo has announced that Metroid was delayed. Honestly, after e3 didn't have anything for us last year for Metroid at all, I honestly didn't think we would get Metroid this year either. But that's for sure we won't see it this year now, unless they rush and ruin that game. So it makes me wonder if they might do the Pokemon announcement earlier, or at least something to get Switch owners excited after Metroid.

I don't know, Pokemon seems to go pretty independent of everything else- even gets its own Direct. And I think other people have established that Metroid isn't that popular, so I don't think Nintendo expects a massive backlash from the delay that would provoke them to push Pokemon out early to recover from it. It's probably within acceptable loss territory.

 

[techitisJ]

I don't know, Pokemon seems to go pretty independent of everything else- even gets its own Direct. And I think other people have established that Metroid isn't that popular, so I don't think Nintendo expects a massive backlash from the delay that would provoke them to push Pokemon out early to recover from it. It's probably within acceptable loss territory.

Yeah they are pretty independent, would be really weird if they did announce something like Pokemon after that news. Idk

 

[Myth]

I don't know, Pokemon seems to go pretty independent of everything else- even gets its own Direct. And I think other people have established that Metroid isn't that popular, so I don't think Nintendo expects a massive backlash from the delay that would provoke them to push Pokemon out early to recover from it. It's probably within acceptable loss territory.

I think depending on how this game will be, and how Nintendo will manages it, might end up being very popular after all. Metroid is a relevant series, if the game be good and innovative, will certainly become popular, like what happened with BotW (Zelda has also never been so mainstream like it is now).

But I also don't think that anticipates the Pokémon announcement, I agree that "it's probably within acceptable loss territory". The game probably would not even be released this year anyway.

 

[Bolt Strike]

And even if they were developers, while I believe Nintendo has great developers, I'm not sure if they would know what the Pokémon community expects of a Pokémon game (an open world isn't enough. It's just a example, I don't think the game will be open world).

Nintendo actually listens to their fans pretty well, and usually if the fans complain about something long enough, Nintendo will eventually give it to them. They're making Metroid Prime 4 after fans have been demanding it for years. They brought back the sandbox Mario games after complaints about too many linear Mario games. Smash Ultimate included highly requested characters like Ridley and King K. Rool. Nintendo probably has a very good idea of the things that the Pokemon fanbase expects.

Also, open world would still be a massive improvement over what we have now.

I think Game Freak is ambitious too, and I don't think they do "cheap games". But I agree that they have been following some bad methodologies in the 3DS era (like the smartphone thing).

Yeah, I don't see it. At all. I haven't seen a single aspect of any main game in the last 5 years that could be remotely described as "ambitious' by any stretch of the imagination. The game worlds are all small, cramped, and linear. There's very minimal extra content. The graphics are simplistic. There's no part of the recent games that look like they took a significant amount of effort to do, and in fact the series is lightyears behind other IPs in those areas. So no, I don't see any kind of legitimate ambition from Game Freak.

 

[SinnohEevee]

It’d be way to stagnant to have it match with real weather. Most players will end up experiencing the game in only one season.

The change could be weekly. A month should be the upper limit.

This.
Unless you can time-travel.

 

[SinnohEevee]

Which would be better: a game including the whole UK, or one the only includes England? Would a game with the whole country do justice to Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland?

 

[Oriden]

This.
Unless you can time-travel.

Pokemon TARDIS and Pokemon DeLorean ;D

Makes sense that seasons didn't become a lasting thing after B/W, though- but it kind of ruins Deerling's gimmick, so I hope that they could find some way to implement it reasonably... they could do some cool stuff with seasons, like have the wild pokemon for an area swap out depending on what season it is. Maybe an option to just control the seasons yourself, since I don't think there's any "naturally occurring" timeframe that would work super well otherwise. Or just add one area that changes season periodically and you could capture Deerling there in each of its forms and bring it back there to change it... otherwise it's form-locked everywhere else. Granted, adding an area just for one pokemon isn't my favorite idea in the world (hate Glaceon and Leafeon's rocks only applying to them) but if there were other pokemon in that area that weren't available elsewhere in the game... mmmaaaaybe? Could be a way to add more pokemon to a game without overloading the routes.

 

[Oriden]

Ooh- what if they introduced more pokemon that could unlock certain areas? Like... well, Solgaleo and Lunala, in a way. Not that I'm crazy about adding more legendaries, but since they'd make the most sense- give us some legendaries that can take us to special areas, and that could be their special ability/gimmick and we could just use them to keep those areas accessible in future games. Such as the "special area that changes seasons periodically" idea in my previous post.

 

[Myth]

Nintendo actually listens to their fans pretty well, and usually if the fans complain about something long enough, Nintendo will eventually give it to them. They're making Metroid Prime 4 after fans have been demanding it for years. They brought back the sandbox Mario games after complaints about too many linear Mario games. Smash Ultimate included highly requested characters like Ridley and King K. Rool. Nintendo probably has a very good idea of the things that the Pokemon fanbase expects.

I know that, Bolt. What I meant, is that I don't think Nintendo's developers would know everything the Pokémon community wants, because they have no experience with Pokémon games, nor with the fanbase. Even if they were temporarily helping Game Freak with this game. Like, if it be an open-world game (again, I find that unlikely), they could think that because of that, it could be a "BotW" Pokémon game, when it could not.

Also, open world would still be a massive improvement over what we have now.

Not necessarily. Making an open-world game that regressed in other things apart from exploration (such as post-game, story, depth etc.) would not be a improvement.

Yeah, I don't see it. At all. I haven't seen a single aspect of any main game in the last 5 years that could be remotely described as "ambitious' by any stretch of the imagination. The game worlds are all small, cramped, and linear. There's very minimal extra content. The graphics are simplistic. There's no part of the recent games that look like they took a significant amount of effort to do, and in fact the series is lightyears behind other IPs in those areas. So no, I don't see any kind of legitimate ambition from Game Freak.

We totally disagree here. I find the latest five-year's releases (ORAS, SM, USUM, Let's Go) to be below the series average, for sure. But I believe Game Freak had ambition regarding all of them, even if a little (ORAS, and mainly USUM). Even with USUM, there were improvements that a "no ambitious" developer would not care to do, like the graphical improvements at the beginning of the game. ORAS could be a common remake of RS, just with graphical improvements as well, as many other companies usually do with their games, but its also had a lot of new content. So yeah, as much as I find those latest releases to be below the series average (especially if we're comparing them to the DS games), I still believe there was ambition in developing them, by those reasons and many others.

Game Freak is also different from other companies, and the Pokemon games are also different from other games. I see ambition in everything that Game Freak does, even though it has left a lot to be desired lately. I think the philosophy they had in the 3DS era (about smartphone audience), and some other things (such as the likely hard adaptation to the 3D development) can be blamed for much of that. I think things will change on the Switch.

 

[PkmnTrainerV]

(First of all I really wish I could go back to the old interface...)

The crown & sceptre rumor was a fun example of the fanbase latching onto something because they wanted it to be real. Completely of the opposite of a lot of the fanbase writing off the lapras screenshot from LGPE as fake because nobody wanted to believe we were getting a grid based, kanto game

Well, on my experience with this thread, not everyone wanted it to be real. UK citizens were the most vocal about the 'leak' and anything mentioning the UK for obvious reasons. But I personally felt it went a bit overboard.

I remember somebody saying so in this thread. Unfortunately, I had to manually sift through about 50+ pages to find it because the search function is currently disabled.

For anyone else wanting to search again- You can use google to search the Bulbagarden Forums by putting:
Site:forums.bulbagarden.net/(maybe the thread link if you want to be specific) [Whatever you want to search for]
It can search for exact phrases if you type [whatever you want to search for] in quotation marks.

Haha, sorry but I get a chuckle every time someone mentions Pokemon Day as being the most likely day for news. XD

Let's not forget this beautiful countdown that happened on the twitter last year-

View: https://twitter.com/Pokemon/status/968235628256157696
So friendly reminder not to get too hyped up for a Pokemon Day announcement, especially if a countdown starts on the twitter again. Sun and Moon was announced on Pokemon Day, but it was also the 20th anniversary so there was more reason for it. =3

Atleast it was helpful in giving us patterns they’re hesitant to break XD.

Ooh- what if they introduced more pokemon that could unlock certain areas? Like... well, Solgaleo and Lunala, in a way. Not that I'm crazy about adding more legendaries, but since they'd make the most sense- give us some legendaries that can take us to special areas, and that could be their special ability/gimmick and we could just use them to keep those areas accessible in future games. Such as the "special area that changes seasons periodically" idea in my previous post.

I just had an idea for the Diamond/Pearl Remakes! What if Darkrai takes us to a special Dream Realm?