"Pulling a Game Freak"

[Lanstar]

As of late, I'm noticing this phrasing being used a lot by the fanbase: "Pulling a Game Freak", or "Pull a Game Freak on us", and of similar vein.

This phrasing seams quite new, too - I only faintly remember it being used at the start of Gen 8. Maybe it was commonly used earlier than that, but propably no earlier than Gen 6 or 7. Wherever it originated, it seams to have various meanings, but there is one uniting theme to it: Sabotage.

Like, people fear they might "Pull a Game Freak" by taking away or messing up an existing feature taken for granted from a game, sabotaging the perfection of it. Or they might take a feature they advertised, and "Pull a Game Freak" on it, sabotaging it by either limiting it's ability to function well, or just not execute it properly. There might be other meanings for this phrasing, but this how I interpret it, at least.

What do think about people using this phrasing as of late? Do you feel offended when people use it? And do you think the use and existence of the phrase is justified?

However critical I am about Pokemon games as of late, I personally don't really use the phrase - But I do see the point people make when they use it, and don't feel that offended when it's used.

 

[RK9]

I think it's laughable that people think someone would intentionally sabotage their own product.

Then again, people genuinely believe in conspiracies or see conspiracies in the most realest things nowadays so can't say I'm surprised.

I personally don't mind the usage of the phrase. People should do what they want to do, but some people really just miss the mark and embarrass themselves instead.

 

[Lanstar]

I think it's laughable that people think someone would intentionally sabotage their own product.

Then again, people genuinely believe in conspiracies or see conspiracies in the most realest things nowadays so can't say I'm surprised.

I personally don't mind the usage of the phrase. People should do what they want to do, but some people really just miss the mark and embarrass themselves instead.

I never thought the term 'sabotage' permanently involves 'intentionally destroying' something. It can also mean ruining something in the perspective of various fans for whatever reason that makes no sense. You can sabotage the something without knowing it - at least that works in my definition.

Then again, maybe there's a better term for"Pulling a Game Freak' than sabotage. Maybe it's a definition of its own! x)

 

[Puddle]

Considering how much I've been enjoying the recent games, saying that someone "pulled a Game Freak" sounds like a compliment to me.

The only problems I have with the Pokémon series at the moment are to do with pricing, and the fact that Pokémon can get stuck in the HOME app. And we don't know how much control Game Freak had over those decisions, if any.

 

[swiftgallade46]

I have yet to encounter this phrase anywhere and seeing it would probably make my eyes roll to the back of my head.

 

[Norzan]

I think they mean Gamefreak making decisions that make sense in their minds, but not in minds of a lot of fans. The whole Battle Frontier thing in ORAS is a prime example of this.

 

[WyndonCalling]

Well, I do think it's undeniable that the main series titles have picked up a reputation for not revisiting particular mechanics, to the point where I think we've all accepted/internalised it - I do seem to recall a genuine expectation that RSE-style Secret Bases would be a recurring feature years ago, but I think we've all now resigned ourselves to the fact that it's just Hoenn's 'thing'.

Now, I understand that certain mechanics may need to stand by the wayside to allow new innovations to take centre-stage - I'm quite happy to leave Z-moves behind in Alola and I don't think anyone doubts that Dynamax won't appear in all future titles - but there's an awful lot of popular features that are a great fit for the series and inexplicably haven't recurred all that much. Follower Pokémon, day/night cycles, underwater exploration, Mega Evolutions and more were all great, popular additions that complemented the core gameplay, and it's disappointing that they're used so sparingly (not to touch upon Dexit, perhaps the most bad-feels move on GameFreak's part since RSE's lack of backwards compatibility). I know we're all used to these mechanics making only sparse appearances, but maybe we shouldn't be? Perhaps we should expect the whole pie each and every time, as opposed to a different composite slice of what the series has to offer.

 

[Sheep40]

It's perhaps the ultimate end result of pokemon's popularity TBH.

The fandom has reached critical mass.

 

[Silktree]

To me, the term means that Game Freak take veteran players for granted. They don't have to do much to get them to buy their $60 games (hi BDSP) even if they have complaints. One could call it Stockholm syndrome, but that'd be excessive in the context of games.

 

[Esserise]

I think they mean Gamefreak making decisions that make sense in their minds, but not in minds of a lot of fans. The whole Battle Frontier thing in ORAS is a prime example of this.

Yeah, for me I’ve only heard it used in the sense of “Why does [moderately useful/well-liked feature] seem to come and go on a whim?”

 

[WyndonCalling]

It's a slight tangent, but something I think worth pointing out; fans can absolutely be unreasonable in their expectations of new releases and crass and abusive in their expressions of disappointment, but those expectations almost never materialise out of thin air. Players expected Sword and Shield to look like Breath of the Wild because, well, Breath of the Wild is a Switch game from the same parent company with similarly stylised visuals. They expected some kind of NatDex accessibility because it's a recurring feature of main series titles.

Invested fans are often pretty bad at thinking outside the box and can respond poorly to genuine novelty (some people didn't like that Alola's trials replaced the Gym system despite also being a series of 'tough', type-based battles which punctuated player progression), but the corollary is that the things they do want often have reasonable precedent.

 

[Sheep40]

It's a slight tangent, but something I think worth pointing out; fans can absolutely be unreasonable in their expectations of new releases and crass and abusive in their expressions of disappointment, but those expectations almost never materialise out of thin air. Players expected Sword and Shield to look like Breath of the Wild because, well, Breath of the Wild is a Switch game from the same parent company with similarly stylised visuals. They expected some kind of NatDex accessibility because it's a recurring feature of main series titles.

Invested fans are often pretty bad at thinking outside the box and can respond poorly to genuine novelty (some people didn't like that Alola's trials replaced the Gym system despite also being a series of 'tough', type-based battles which punctuated player progression), but the corollary is that the things they do want often have reasonable precedent.

They demanded a cross between stadium and a main series game with a budget pokemon has never had.

 

[WyndonCalling]

They demanded a cross between stadium and a main series game with a budget pokemon has never had.

What was Sword and Shield's budget?

 

[Puddle]

I'd be interested to know whether Game Freak's budget has increased at all since the series transitioned to 3D. I don't know a lot about game development, but I'd be willing to bet that 3D models are a lot more costly and time-consuming to make than sprites. If their budget hasn't increased sufficiently to accomodate this, that might explain why recent games have been falling short in some people's eyes.

 

[WyndonCalling]

I'd be interested to know whether Game Freak's budget has increased at all since the series transitioned to 3D. I don't know a lot about game development, but I'd be willing to bet that 3D models are a lot more costly and time-consuming to make than sprites. If their budget hasn't increased sufficiently to accommodate this, that might explain why recent games have been falling short in some people's eyes.

Well, quite - and while this may explain certain omissions, it doesn't oblige fans to temper their expectations. A budget misallocation doesn't change the fact that Breath of the Wild is a game on the Switch at the same price point, nor do time pressures change the fact that NatDex accessibility is a recurring feature of main titles. There are very many factors that may explain why a game is in a certain state, but this shouldn't necessitate that players stop comparing and contrasting to other, very much comparable titles and making reasonable judgments about the end result.

 

[Chip Clip]

I'd be interested to know whether Game Freak's budget has increased at all since the series transitioned to 3D. I don't know a lot about game development, but I'd be willing to bet that 3D models are a lot more costly and time-consuming to make than sprites. If their budget hasn't increased sufficiently to accomodate this, that might explain why recent games have been falling short in some people's eyes.

The budget probably has increased, I think the number of developers that worked on the games increased significantly in recent years and that alone calls for an increase of budget (note: I may be wrong about this, I remember reading about this but I will have to look for the source when I have more time!)

Players expected Sword and Shield to look like Breath of the Wild because, well, Breath of the Wild is a Switch game from the same parent company with similarly stylised visuals. They expected some kind of NatDex accessibility because it's a recurring feature of main series titles.

People forget that Botw took five years if people want that type of quality they are going to have to wait a significant amount of time. Some say that wait would be worth it, I personally wouldn't mind waiting (as torturous as it would be lol). However, when you have a franchise that prints money consistently like Pokemon, nobody at NIntendo/GF/TPCi is going to advocate for long development cycles.

Like, people fear they might "Pull a Game Freak" by taking away or messing up an existing feature taken for granted from a game, sabotaging the perfection of it. Or they might take a feature they advertised, and "Pull a Game Freak" on it, sabotaging it by either limiting it's ability to function well, or just not execute it properly. There might be other meanings for this phrasing, but this how I interpret it, at least.

I think a lot people are still salty that mega evolutions got axed and they find things like z-moves and Dynamaxing as just lame attempts to change up battle mechanics. I think a bigger crime is taking away things like the vs recorder and changing the battle timer to 20min. Those changes actually hinder the competitive community/fans and I feel sorry for them.

 

[Circus]

I don't think it's particularly great phrasing, and a bit unnecessarily harsh, but it's not harmful (so far), so ehhh.

I think the main problem with GameFreak is that they're stuck in a weird state between Nintendo's general "Innovate at all costs" and "there's this formula, it ain't broke so no need for fixin'"

The last few generations they try to come up with a new surface level gimmick to change the experience (Megas, Z-Moves, Dynamax / Gigantamax) but these are fundamentally competitive changers and have very little actual effect in the main games (they're only likely to have a significant impact in a challenge-less run in the gym leaders and E4).

While the actual bits that could use some more reworking / be added to add more value to the single player experience are more or less left behind - like difficulty levels, randomizers, Battle Frontier or other post-game facilities, etc.

And the thing with Nintendo, is that they know to put away games that are starting to get repetitive - or to completely break away from the conventions when needed: see Odyssey completely changing the basic 3D formula stablished by SM64, Sunshine and the Galaxies (and even then each one of those had their own massive changes within themselves), or BotW which is a lot more freeform that any other Zelda game.

Pokémon has had the same basic formula for 25 years now and they have a mostly 1 ~ 2 year cycle. I guess Legends: Arceus is supposed to be their experimental change of pace? We'll have to see how that goes.