BDSP Pokédex speculation

[swiftgallade46]

If the Alola games could have 807 Pokémon on the 3DS, I don't see why a game on the more powerful Switch can't have 898. Legends Arceus can be given a limited amount of Pokémon if your goal is to make the original Sinnoh Pokédex, but BDSP has to be more than a faithful remake.

You’re missing the point. Whether or not we believe or agree with GameFreak’s reasons for making this rule going forward is irrelevant. They have made the decision and made the statement regardless of what their reasons are behind closed doors. You’re welcome to get your hopes up based on what’s possible, but I’d rather go based on what’s likely.

 

[RileyXY1]

If the Alola games could have 807 Pokémon on the 3DS, I don't see why a game on the more powerful Switch can't have 898. Legends Arceus can be given a limited amount of Pokémon if your goal is to make the original Sinnoh Pokédex, but BDSP has to be more than a faithful remake.

Except it's clear that Game Freak does not want to ever do that ever again. There will never again be a Pokemon game with all the Pokemon in it, unless you count GO.

 

[Puddle]

If the Alola games could have 807 Pokémon on the 3DS, I don't see why a game on the more powerful Switch can't have 898. Legends Arceus can be given a limited amount of Pokémon if your goal is to make the original Sinnoh Pokédex, but BDSP has to be more than a faithful remake.

My understanding of Dexit is that it's a time-saving and cost-cutting measure. 898 Pokemon could fit on a Switch cartridge, but from the Pokemon Company's perspective it isn't worth the extra time and money, not when the games will sell like hotcakes anyway. Dexit also encourages players to buy HOME subscriptions so they can still keep all their Pokemon in one place. It's sad that the wishes of the hardcore fanbase aren't being respected, but it's a canny business decision, and one which the main target audience - children - likely aren't bothered by.

A full National Pokedex in BDSP might be extremely unlikely, but that isn't to say there won't be any new Pokemon in the game. Sylveon, Mr. Rime, Regieleki and Regidrago might be there. Maybe some starters or legendaries from other regions that you can transfer in via HOME. There could even be Mega Evolutions, or new forms for Dialga and Palkia, for all we know. The Pokemon Company said they're re-creating the region and story faithfully - they didn't say anything about the Pokedex.

 

[Jimothy]

So I don’t know about time-saving or cost-cutting— maybe, I’m not a developer. My main understanding is “oh my god that’s so many.”

A quick Google indicates that Home’s form dex before Crown was 1253. Now some of those are redundant— Arceus and Silvally forms are recolors, for instance. Some of the more minor gender differences. There’s probably just one Hat Pikachu that gets reskinned into the others.

But Giratina’s two forms are wholly different Pokémon. Same for megas, fusions, both Meowstics, etc. I don’t play many other RPG’s, but I kinda doubt any one Final Fantasy has anywhere near as many enemies/heroes in its battle system. It just seems like a lot of information to stuff into a cartridge, and a lot of variables to keep track of, no matter how much time and money you dedicate to a project.

I don’t doubt that there are other factors that led to the decision and I’m sure TPCi wants to incentivize Home subscriptions, but it still boggles the mind just how many Pokémon there really are and I can’t think of any other games that I’ve played that even attempt to include anywhere near as many characters, playable or otherwise.

 

[Silktree]

I expect the missing Pokemon to be added to SwSh via a patch (assuming I'm right about VGC sticking with SwSh for the Dynamax metagame), but if BDSP the entire roster from the get-go, they're going to have a hard time justifying another Dexit. Plus, you can just look at BDSP and tell that they aren't meant to be battle-compatible with SwSh.

 

[SeanWheeler]

I expect the missing Pokemon to be added to SwSh via a patch (assuming I'm right about VGC sticking with SwSh for the Dynamax metagame), but if BDSP the entire roster from the get-go, they're going to have a hard time justifying another Dexit. Plus, you can just look at BDSP and tell that they aren't meant to be battle-compatible with SwSh.

If they have a hard time justifying Dexit, I'm good with that. I would rather not have another Dexit. When I found the Photodex to not be in the National order in New Pokémon Snap, I was disappointed. Also, what makes Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl not battle compatible with Sword and Shield? Their titles fit together perfectly as "Brilliant Diamond Sword" and "Shining Pearl Shield" so why not let them be compatible?

 

[swiftgallade46]

I expect the missing Pokemon to be added to SwSh via a patch (assuming I'm right about VGC sticking with SwSh for the Dynamax metagame), but if BDSP the entire roster from the get-go, they're going to have a hard time justifying another Dexit. Plus, you can just look at BDSP and tell that they aren't meant to be battle-compatible with SwSh.

I hadn’t even thought of this, but yeah. If they go back on Dexit now then they’re just going to have to do again later and face this whole song and dance all over again.

 

[RileyXY1]

I expect the missing Pokemon to be added to SwSh via a patch (assuming I'm right about VGC sticking with SwSh for the Dynamax metagame), but if BDSP the entire roster from the get-go, they're going to have a hard time justifying another Dexit. Plus, you can just look at BDSP and tell that they aren't meant to be battle-compatible with SwSh.

I don't think that any more Pokemon will be added to Sword and Shield unless they release more DLC, which is unlikely.

 

[Kallyle]

Why is there a choice between both now? This franchise has been able to have every pokemon up until Ultra Sun and Ultra Moon, and that was on an handheld. If anything, with stronger hardware like the Switch and beyond, it should be able to continue to have every pokemon in it and have even bigger game worlds.

Where is this "they have to choose between both" coming from? How did just introducing 89 more pokemon in Sword and Shield break anything? How is it better hardware somehow leading to less pokemon?

And no one is asking for every pokemon to be in the regional dex, that's ridiculous. People just want all pokemon to be in the game's code, so that they can use them either in postgame or in the main story by trading from another copy.

If the Alola games could have 807 Pokémon on the 3DS, I don't see why a game on the more powerful Switch can't have 898. Legends Arceus can be given a limited amount of Pokémon if your goal is to make the original Sinnoh Pokédex, but BDSP has to be more than a faithful remake.

Because moving to a console and developing a game for it proved to be too much for Game Freak to meet their yearly deadline and have every single Pokémon in the game on top of wanting to keep Dynamax (which really shouldn’t have been the priority since it’s meant to be SwSh exclusive, but it is what it is). Dexit is merely a band aid and a symptom of the time constraints imposed on them.

I expect the missing Pokemon to be added to SwSh via a patch (assuming I'm right about VGC sticking with SwSh for the Dynamax metagame), but if BDSP the entire roster from the get-go, they're going to have a hard time justifying another Dexit. Plus, you can just look at BDSP and tell that they aren't meant to be battle-compatible with SwSh.

I hadn’t even thought of this, but yeah. If they go back on Dexit now then they’re just going to have to do again later and face this whole song and dance all over again.

I don't think that any more Pokemon will be added to Sword and Shield unless they release more DLC, which is unlikely.

On the off chance that Game Freak ends up patching in the rest of the Pokédex into SwSh (I'd say a 5-15% chance), it would have to happen during a gap year where there’s no mainline games planned. Furthermore, this would probably be the last hurrah for the concept of “all Pokémon in one game” in order to ease us out of it, which really should have been the next step after Gen VII’s approach anyways instead of LGPE being the first mainline game to have Dexit so we wouldn’t expect it to happen in SwSh.

I will always stress that Dexit itself isn’t what I have a problem with, but rather when it happened and how they treated the situation afterwards. After LGPE first introduced us to the concept of a limited roster of creatures in the game, people assumed that things would go back to the way they were before because of how unconventional LGPE were despite being considered a mainline title. Instead, we only found out about this after our first look at the Wild Area during the Treehouse event at E3. Not only did the concept of a limited roster start in Let's Go, but so did the shorter single player battle time and the always-on Exp. Share, meaning the common complaints about the previous games seem to now be a staple of the series. There's also the fact that Pokémon HOME exists which is nothing more than a more expensive Pokémon Bank with a slightly bigger storage capacity and the GTS placed in there after removing it from the games, basically keeping Pokémon hostage in a generation if they don't show up in any game. In addition, people expected a trade off in regards to SwSh when we first heard of the roster being cut, perhaps with something like a Battle Frontier or a cool side-activity where you can use your Pokémon in an alternative way to straight up battling and competitive play. However, SwSh was pretty linear with very little side activities and only one or two mini games (Rotom Rally and the curry making feature) which aren't too involved and don't really rely on using your Pokémon in an active manner. Even Galar's Battle Tower was dumbed down and seemed to only exist out of obligation.

Don't get me wrong, anyone who expected Breath of the Wild from SwSh were practically setting themselves up for disappointment. However, only giving the base game the bare minimum after such a tough decision on Game Freak's part after the nostalgia overload and the overly casual nature of LGPE definitely made Gen 8 one of the worst possible times to make Dexit the company policy going forward. Not that there was ever a good time to start the culling, but the way it was handled and acting like everything was still business as usual didn't do Game Freak and TPCi any favors in terms of public relations.

 

[Almonds]

I'd be fine if they just had the Platinum dex + Sylveon, Mr. Rime, the new Regis, and maybe Alolan/Galarian forms like Alolan Raichu available in the code. Sounds faithful and expansive enough to me.

 

[Puddle]

So I don’t know about time-saving or cost-cutting— maybe, I’m not a developer. My main understanding is “oh my god that’s so many.”

A quick Google indicates that Home’s form dex before Crown was 1253. Now some of those are redundant— Arceus and Silvally forms are recolors, for instance. Some of the more minor gender differences. There’s probably just one Hat Pikachu that gets reskinned into the others.

But Giratina’s two forms are wholly different Pokémon. Same for megas, fusions, both Meowstics, etc. I don’t play many other RPG’s, but I kinda doubt any one Final Fantasy has anywhere near as many enemies/heroes in its battle system. It just seems like a lot of information to stuff into a cartridge, and a lot of variables to keep track of, no matter how much time and money you dedicate to a project.

I don’t doubt that there are other factors that led to the decision and I’m sure TPCi wants to incentivize Home subscriptions, but it still boggles the mind just how many Pokémon there really are and I can’t think of any other games that I’ve played that even attempt to include anywhere near as many characters, playable or otherwise.

Maybe it's not so much a question of cutting costs, but rather, not wanting to go above what would be considered a normal video game budget. And it could be argued that that is completely reasonable. 1253 is a staggering amount of characters to program into a game, for sure!

 

[RileyXY1]

I'd be fine if they just had the Platinum dex + Sylveon, Mr. Rime, the new Regis, and maybe Alolan/Galarian forms like Alolan Raichu available in the code. Sounds faithful and expansive enough to me.

I don't know if they'll even have the Platinum dex.

 

[SeanWheeler]

I don't know if they'll even have the Platinum dex.

Why wouldn't they have the Platinum expanded Dex? The Diamond and Pearl Dex with it's lack of Fire-types had hurt Flint's team. And we've seen a Porygon-Z in the trailer, which is a Pokémon from the Platinum Dex. I really don't see them giving us half a National Dex to be faithful to the originals. This is a remake, not a port.

 

[RileyXY1]

Why wouldn't they have the Platinum expanded Dex? The Diamond and Pearl Dex with it's lack of Fire-types had hurt Flint's team. And we've seen a Porygon-Z in the trailer, which is a Pokémon from the Platinum Dex. I really don't see them giving us half a National Dex to be faithful to the originals. This is a remake, not a port.

But still, I am slightly concerned that they would because most of the marketing for this game so far has focused on how similar it is to the originals.

 

[SeanWheeler]

But still, I am slightly concerned that they would because most of the marketing for this game so far has focused on how similar it is to the originals.

Most initial marketing for remakes would be about how similar they are to the originals. E3 could probably show some new stuff.

 

[RileyXY1]

Most initial marketing for remakes would be about how similar they are to the originals. E3 could probably show some new stuff.

It was never like this in the past. In ORAS we already saw Primal Kyogre and Groudon, but we didn't know what they were. ORAS was referred to as new world, as was never described as being faithful to the originals, unlike with BDSP. With BDSP they chose to use a graphics style similar to the originals rather than using the style of Sword and Shield, and they even left the protagonists' designs completely unchanged, a first for a Pokemon remake.

 

[SeanWheeler]

Retaining the original designs are a first for a Pokémon remake, and the chibi designs are an odd choice. But I think I saw a trailer comparing ORAS to the originals. And the DexNav from ORAS had a screen styled after the Ruby/Sapphire overworld, with the tall grass and water from the original GBA games. Just because the original trailer is showing how faithful BDSP are to the DS games, doesn't make it completely the same. We can already see the 3D that's different. And the ability to walk diagonal which you couldn't do until X and Y.

 

[Mr. MoonStone]

I think the games will follow the Platinum dex rather faithfully, but I hope there is some variation from the originals other than an added Sylveon.

 

[SeanWheeler]

I think the games will follow the Platinum dex rather faithfully, but I hope there is some variation from the originals other than an added Sylveon.

Yeah, like adding Heatran, Regigigas, Cresselia, Phione, Darkrai, Shaymin and Arceus. I want a completed Sinnoh Pokédex.

 

[Mr. MoonStone]

Yeah, like adding Heatran, Regigigas, Cresselia, Phione, Darkrai, Shaymin and Arceus. I want a completed Sinnoh Pokédex.

I can't help but wonder if the new Regi's from the Crown Tundra will be added though? I could see them trying to contain them to just SWSH for an incentive to get them, but I wonder if they'll be transferable to these games?