Hello folks welcome and/or welcome back to the Game Trade Reviews. Where I play a game upon a certain Spartan’s request in exchange for making them play one of my things and then we both yap about it. The Game Trade Reviews have been going on for quite some time, predating this whole ass blog’s existence. I could not tell you how many we’ve done total, but I can say this marks the 5th one I’ve done for this website. 5 is a special-ish number. So for such a special-ish number let’s talk about a series near and dear to my heart: Pokemon.

I’ve been a fan of Pokemon for a long ass time. I still remember when I got my hands on Pokemon Sapphire for the Game Boy Advance when I was like 4 or some shit. I couldn’t even read yet but I was still enthralled. I was so into it that my parents regretted giving it to me and took my whole Game Boy away. It was a losing battle.

Pokemon was very much my shit in elementary school, still a solid interest in middle school, and it’s a big part of how I bonded with my closest friends from high school. Including a certain Spartan I do these reviews with. Would the Game Trade Review exist at all without Pokemon? Perhaps not. So it’s only fitting that a Pokemon game get featured in it. But wait a second, why is this game part of the Game Trade? If I love Pokemon so much wouldn’t I want to play this game unprompted without ever needing it featured in a trade? Well… there is a reason. Stay tuned and I’ll explain all about that, and how my experience went with this whole ass game. I’ll also be covering the Teal Mask and Indigo Disk DLC. So much shit to talk about yeesh. Welp, let’s get into it.

I finished this game in 2025, a bit late to the party I know. As for when I started, it was close to the game’s release date in 2022. I pre-ordered it. When I first played it I decided to start things off with a Nuzlocke, my way of bringing a fun challenge to an otherwise easy game. Only problem is Nuzlocking is barely a thing in Violet. The delineation between areas is often ambiguous, and you can’t really get a random first encounter. But I tried any way. It didn’t go very well. I reached a point where I had to take on the fire type Team Star member using a grass starter and some other pokemon that weren’t especially well equipped. I knew I could win if I did sufficient grinding, but I really wasn’t in the mood for such tedious activities. As such, I stopped playing entirely. Two gym badges in and I was already burned out on it.

Truth is Pokemon was already losing its grip on me long before then. I have fond memories of Pokemon Y, mainly because of my battles with my high school friends. But was it really that good of a game? Eh, kinda… Then I played Pokemon Moon, it was aight. Then I played Pokemon Ultra Moon, which is basically the same game. I couldn’t bring myself to finish that one. First time that ever happened. I was not impressed at all by Pokemon Shield. Such a rushed awkward transition to the Switch, and they even made the PvP worse by cutting the time limit so severely. I was also salty about all the Pokemon they cut, though I’m not quite as bothered by that any more. But hey, this is the second mainline Pokemon game on the Switch, surely they figured things out by now? One would think. The reality’s a bit more complicated. There’s a lot to talk about with this one so I’ll take it one step at a time.

1. The Story
2. The Pokemon
3. The Characters
4. The Aesthetic
5. Assorted Other Things to Touch on Before Gameplay
6. The Gameplay
7. Teal Mask
8. Indigo Disk
9. Conclusion

The Story

It seems like every mainline Pokemon game has a similar general formula. You’re some youngster that gets a free Pokemon and you’re sent on your way. Take down 8 gym leaders, deal with some bad guys along the way, have some subplot with a rival, and eventually become the champion. Simple enough. To this game’s credit there’s a little more than that going on this time. The main story’s divided into 3 quest branches. There’s the typical gym leader path, as per usual. There’s the Team Star path, where you kinda deal with bad guys but we learn they’re actually not bad guys. And then there’s the weird thing where you fight titan Pokemon to help save your friend’s dog. As one does.

I’m not going to spend too much time in the weeds of each individual story. The gym leader stuff is pretty standard, at least from a story perspective. The other two are less standard but not mind blowing. I guess it’s an interesting twist to make Team Star a bunch of disaffected bullying victims rather than a truly villainous group. Some parts of the story could be genuinely touching if I had more emotional investment in the characters involved.

I could say a similar thing about the Path of Legends story line. The whole thing where Arven has issues with an absent parent so he’s heavily emotionally invested in saving his old dog is potent. They’re dealing with some genuinely difficult topics in a pretty mature way. Perhaps these stories provided some insight and comfort to youngsters playing this game struggling with similar issues. I can’t just discount that.

After you complete the three quest lines everything comes together for the final stretch. Nemona, Penny, and Arven, once cordoned off to their separate quest lines, now unite to help you explore the mythical Area Zero. What happens from there depends on what version of the game you play. I can’t speak for what happens in Scarlet. In Violet you find out Arven’s dad is secretly dead as hell and we’ve been led around by a robot version of him the entire time. Gasp! As for what happens beyond that? Eh… I barely remember, which means it didn’t leave much of an impression on me. I guess we had to fight the robot daddy for some reason? I mean, I’m all for fighting robots, feels like we’re just charging straight ahead into major issues with the AI push. A different discussion for a different time. Actually wait, when else am I supposed to talk about this?

You see, the problem with AI is that we’re raising a generation of people that have no clue how to actually write whatsoever. If I grew up with and employed ChatGPT for all my school essays this blog would not exist. Cosmia blog good according to Cosmia, therefore AI bad. QED. Well, I doubt an AI proponent is going to be convinced by that argument. That requires reading, which they probably aren’t doing much of. That being said, this blog post is probably going to get scraped for data by some AI any way. I’ll become one of the countless unwitting writers they train on. Perhaps in some small indirect way my words will become part of someone’s college essay. Perhaps it has already happened. Just remember, AI can only write as well as it does because it learned from countless people’s efforts. To be fair, I wouldn’t be able to write as well as I do without a bunch of people’s help either. However, I did not need to eat the entire internet to pull it off. I could keep going, but I’ll stop here. I’m not going to derail this whole blog to hash out this mostly unrelated topic. Please just be mindful of what gets sacrificed at the altar of convenience.

Any ways, that’s about all I feel the need to say about the base game’s story line. Actually pretty impressive for a Pokemon game. They tried something new-ish and it kinda worked. Still, it’s a Pokemon game. Even at their absolute best the story ain’t THAT strong. Only so deep you can go while still being a AAA game marketed towards kids. Even the most emotionally touching moments can only last so long before the game moves on. Can’t be too much of a downer after all. I can’t be too harsh though, they went further than I ever expected them to. As a result they produced what is quite possibly Pokemon’s best storyline to date.

I also have some things to say about the DLC’s storyline, but I’ll save all DLC talk for later in the blog. For now I’ll just focus on what the base game has to offer.

The Pokemon

Usually I talk about characters here, and I will, but in this case I got to talk about the new cast of critters you use. Every generation brings a whole new bundle of Pokemon, 114 this time. That number’s pretty much fine honestly. But when you consider how many of them are essentially regional variants it’s less impressive. It’s not the most innovative cast of Pokemon, but there are still some highlights.

For example, clodsire. Clodsire’s a new variant of quagsire that has embraced the quadrupedal nature of his salamander brethren. Getting down and dirty, mucking things up, and seeming content and unbothered the entire time. Even when they’re losing they’re not *that* stressed about it. Quagsire is probably my favorite Pokemon, and Clodsire gives them a run for their money. It’s like a brilliant innovation in Quagsire technology. The only thing holding me back is acknowledging my favorite Pokemon as something originating from this fuck ass game. Quagsire is still the OG I suppose.

I might as well take this moment to thank that certain Spartan for a generous donation. To help sweeten the pie on my restart of this game he offered me some well bred eggs. Some eggs hatched as the OG wooper, some hatched as the brown kind. All of them were adorable. This way I could take the game on the best way possible, with a wooper squad.

I would have spent the entire game just wooping it up. Sure I may run into minor issues occasionally, but I totally could have finished the game with that team. Ultimately, I chose not to. Instead of having a full team of ‘Sires I introduced some other team members into the mix. Ultimately I had two Clodsires, Cat and Communism, and a Quagsire for my team. Surprisingly enough, there were other Pokemon I liked enough to put on the team as well.

Of course I can hardly talk about the Pokemon cast without acknowledging the starters. And honestly? Not too shabby. Certainly better than last generation any way. I actually like the fire starter a good amount, which is a bit unusual for me. They’re usually my least favorite, but this time it’s Quaxly. And Quaxly’s a duck, so I can’t hate it. Of course, you can already tell from the screenshots which one I went for.

As it happens I like cats, and I also like weed. As such, it’s only natural I go for the weed cat. Not only is the base form cute, but it has easily the best middle stage evolution of the bunch by far. Seriously, I think even the people that prefer the other starters can agree to that point. Middle evolutions are usually the goofy middle child, but I’d argue Floragato is the best designed stage in that line. As for the final evolution… well, it grew on me.

I also tried some other new pokemon out. Like Bramblin, the ghostly tumble weed Pokemon. Given my affinity to ghost types and peculiar designs I enjoyed this addition. However, they really couldn’t come up with anything interesting to evolve it into. It went from a small tumbleweed to a uh, bigger tumbleweed with a jack-o-lantern face. Brilliant. That wouldn’t bother me so much if it wasn’t for a different issue, that it’s not a particularly strong Pokemon. So it goes. There are a decent number of grass/ghost pokemon at this point, I pretty much like all of them. Game Freak doesn’t want to make any of them good for whatever reason. Hate to see it.

So now I must mention my favorite new pokemon that isn’t a remix of a pre-existing pokemon: Tatsugiri. Part sushi, part dragon, all deadly. I caught the first one I came across and named her Maki. Partly because that’s a sushi thing, but it’s also in honor of the Ultimate Assassin, Maki Harukawa. Just like that Maki, this Maki’s quite talented at killing stuff. Even if she’s supposed to be at her strongest piloting a Dondozo, the above average speed and special attack gets you plenty far on its own.

Those are some highlights for me. Overall this generation doesn’t have too many outright bad additions. The face of that dung beetle mon is rather unsettling, but even then its evolution is kinda cool. But I pretty much talked about all the new Pokemon I have interest in already. There are some others that fall under “yeah they’re neat” but not too much beyond that. Could be better, could be worse.

By the way, not sure where else to put this so here’s my team right before I fought the Elite Four.

The Characters

So with the Pokemon out of the way let’s talk about the human cast and… honestly, I have more to say about the DLC characters than the base game ones. Like, Nemona’s cool. Her chipper enthusiasm and hyperobsession with battling makes her a plenty likable rival. Like she’s a bit of a goofy weirdo about it. Presented as a genuine challenger (kinda) but not taking themselves too seriously. I’m pretty sure I’ll remember her for a while. I can’t say that about whoever the fuck the last 3 rivals were. There was some chubby kid and uhhh… no wait the blonde guy’s the Sinnoh one. Marnie’s cool too. You get the point, gotta like Nemona. I like Penny and Arven too well enough. Penny’s got her snarky lines sometimes. Arven’s got his daddy issues. They’ve got their decent character arcs. And the fact that they have character arcs at all is a bit remarkable for a Pokemon game. I guess it kind of happened sometimes in the past. I think N had something, that Wally kid kind of did, but not like this. There isn’t *that* much here either, but it’s more than before. And I appreciate that change.

The good/goodish characters aren’t just in the central cast either. I liked most of the gym leaders and even the ones I didn’t like so much weren’t too bad. Well, I have mixed feelings about Ryme in particular. It’s cool we get an old Black lady as a gym leader, but it feels a bit too much like a minstrel show. Don’t really want to delve too deep into that. I’ve certainly seen worse. They’re probably attempting to be inclusive in their kinda clueless fashion. Whatever. It’s goofy but I kinda like it and kinda don’t and I don’t want to dwell on it too much more. Moving on. 

I’ve got to give a special shout out to my guy Larry. In a game full of gym leaders with their face turned forward on the map we only get the back of his head. He keeps a low profile. You might think he’s just a customer at the restaurant when you first walk inside. (I already knew he was so that didn’t work on me). But when it comes time for the battle he’ll take the stage in Larry style.

This isn’t the first time the normal gym leader was designed to be a relatively normal dude. Norman from Gen 3 was just kind of a dude and your dad. Cheren was one of the rivals from Gen 5 I remember now! But in Black and White 2 he was a gym leader instead and he’s just kind of anime guy with glasses so it works. So they’re pretty normal and fit right into their world well enough. But Larry takes that idea in a different direction. Larry represents an archetype that is abundant in Japan but not abundant in Pokemon games: the tired businessman. A dude with a deadpan expression and a receding hairline making it clear he’s treating gym leading like any other job. He’s bringing the Eeyore energy the game needss. He’s so aggressively normal that he wraps around to being weird because he’s so out of place. 

Of course Larry being the overworked businessman that he is can’t just stop with his gym leading role. He’s secretly an Elite Four member too! I was aware of his existence as a gym leader beforehand but he wasn’t aware of this part, so it was a pleasant surprise. Maybe one could argue it’s lazy that they’re not even designing a fourth Elite Four member. I say it’s acceptable because it’s my guy Larry.

I got to give him some credit for changing his outfit for the occasion. He’s wearing a bluish gray undershirt now instead of the more ashy gray from before. He also has clouds on his tie and gloves with a compass on them. It’s remarkable how he changes his outfit to suit the occasion but not very dramatically. He’s not negotiating on the suit. It’s the Larry way. Honestly I wouldn’t call Larry being reused as an Elite Four member as half-assed. Like on some level it maybe is but I’m cool with it. The part that’s really half-assed is that everyone just keeps cycling through and battling in the same bland ass room one by one. The Elite Four is supposed to be one of the pinnacles of the game and they’re just being economical with the space or whatever. If you’ve played the previous games you’ll know full well what I’m trying to get at. In the older games we got something flashy or at least something with a bit of color and personality. This time we just kinda get a room.

The screenshots above are from the Elite Four in Black and White 2. This is just one of the rooms and everyone gets their own spot. These games were released in 2012. Pokemon Scarlet and Violet were released in 2022. So 10 years later we go from that to this.

Ten years of Pokemon style progress baby! For the record I actually like the Elite Four this time around. Like, character wise. We’ve got two of my favorite characters in the game in Rika and Larry and they all get to play off each other. Before the Elite Four was all just kinda in their cool decorated rooms separately and there’s only a vague indication that they know or care who the other members are. This time it’s an Elite Four community. But even as they try something new in one respect they’re just totally half-assing it in other respects. Even if you keep reusing the same room couldn’t they have at least made it a nicer room? It’s just one of the many details that conveys a half-assed attitude. Who cares if the Elite Four get a cool room? They’ll buy it any way. Can’t put love and care into every detail, we got tight deadlines to meet! I guess that design philosophy isn’t entirely wrong. After all, Scarlet and Violet are officially the second best selling Pokemon games of all time. They did it by selling slightly more than the third place Sword and Shield. They both sold over 26 million copies. Maybe they’ll use the money from those sales to make the next gen games actually look good. Maybe.

Okay clearly I’m getting a bit sidetracked, there’s a proper place for those rants later. For now let’s get back to characters. Like I got to give some special mention to Rika. Obviously. Rika is one of those characters that manages to attract people of all sexualities to her. A lot of dudes like her, a lot of women do too, and I’m sure there’s quite a few NBs et al. that are all in on her. Handsome and beautiful simultaneously, good personality, and excellent choice in main Pokemon. What’s not to like?

That pretty much covers all the non-DLC characters I want to talk about. There are plenty of others, some of which I also like, and some of which I’m indifferent to. There’s really not that much to say about them. Violet does well in the character department compared to other Pokemon games, but that only goes so far. There will be some standouts that fans will remember for years to come and a lot of whatevers that will get swept along just like all the other old whatever Pokemon characters.

Do you remember the name of that Black and White Elite Four lady I showed the screenshot of earlier? Her name’s Shauntal. If you don’t remember I don’t blame you because I didn’t either. But now I do because I wrote this blog and shit she’s kinda cute. Thanks Pokemon Violet, I now remember that Shauntal exists and I probably will do very little with that information. Because she’s one of those many neat looking but not much else characters that Pokemon has created and moved on from. Most of this game’s cast will have the same fate. Nemona and Penny might last. Rika could last. Certain DLC characters might last. Otherwise… maybe the anime will do some other characters a favor? Maybe.

By the way, I don’t have anywhere obvious to put this but shout out to this random NPC trainer.

The Aesthetic

Okay, so the story’s better than average by Pokemon standards, the new Pokemon are mostly fine with a few standouts, and I’m not really complaining about the characters either. So far so good right? Well, it’s time to put a wrench in that. For starters I have prepared a slideshow, a piece I shall call, “Landscapes in Violet”

I think this is a fair representation of how this game looks. I didn’t just go out of my way to pick the blandest screenshots possible, some of them actually look pretty good. But it’s also safe to say that a lot of them don’t. This is the latest entry in the franchise, on the most powerful hardware this series has ever lived on. And yet… well, honestly I’m hard pressed to think of a Pokemon game that looks worse than this. Now credit where it’s due, some of the lighting effects are pretty good. The character models look mostly fine, though I find the protagonist model a bit unsettling. Some of the interior designs look pretty good too, just look at Larry’s restaurant/gym spot. But what are we dealing with the majority of the time? Landscapes with few if any points of interest and mediocre textures. A whole lot of empty space with a bunch of Pokemon aimlessly wandering around. It would be one thing if it felt like a lived in environment, but no. Who knows where the hell these Pokemon get their food. Who knows what so many are hanging around the same space for. They’re just kinda walking around most of the time.

One problem in particular arises with the way Pokemon battles are handled. In most previous games you’re taken to a separate arena of sorts when you encounter a Pokemon. In this game they took an innovative step by having you fight right in the spot you encounter them. Well, innovative-ish, I’m pretty sure they picked that up from Legends of Arceus. This is a cool idea and could arguably make the experience seem more immersive. After all, you don’t get transported to an alternate location when you fight in the real world. The only problem is there’s a whole lot of jank that comes with it. The main culprit is the wonky ass camera. Like sometimes when you play FromSoftware games the camera goes out of control when you’re stuck in a bad corner and can’t see things properly. In Violet you can get those kind of janky angles from the start.

Even when the camera angles are on point the battles aren’t great looking. Some moves have cool particles effects, others look blander than ever, and the Pokemon themselves often look rather stiff and devoid of personality. Like seriously, we don’t even need to compare this game to other Switch titles. Compare the battle visuals to Battle Revolution on the Wii and this game falls short. Man that game was my shit back in the day.

There is so much potential with a series like Pokemon in Switch’s hardware. Occasionally you see the glimpse of the good looking stuff that shows what this game could be. Most of the time it just looks phoned in. I’m hard pressed to think of a first party Nintendo Switch game that looks worse than this. Does it even exist?

Assorted Other Things to Touch on Before Gameplay

So let’s talk about the soundtrack for a bit. I’m writing this blog a couple months after I finished playing the game. I didn’t remember the soundtrack too well so I decided to relisten to some of the songs. And… well, yeah, it’s a Pokemon soundtrack. I really don’t understand the workings of music well enough to describe it well, but it fits right in with the previous body of work. Not to say it’s all samey as ever or anything. I don’t think Pokemon had snazzy guitars like that Team Star theme too often before. But still, it’s Pokemon alright. And Pokemon has some good music. This one’s no exception.

I must give a particular shout out to the Blueberry Academy Elite Four theme. Now that’s some good techno. Is techno even the right term here? Eh, something like that. Its got a good level of intensity for the moment while still just being a fun catchy song to listen to. While it’s not quite enough to dethrone the first Team Plasma theme for me, I still give it high marks.

On another note I feel I should give a bit of explanation to a couple of my Pokemon’s nicknames. Namely Fish the Meowscarada and Communism the Clodsire. I named my cat starter that happens to be female after a female cat of my own, Fish. Why did I name my cat Fish? It seemed like a funny name to my preteen self so it stuck. Fish was an interesting creature. Rather shy at first but she warmed up to me. Still never liked getting picked up and rarely had much interest in my lap. She mostly liked to laze around and usually only got yappy in the quest for food. She was a pretty big cat but she had a sort of squeaky voice. She drove my mom insane sometimes. She was my best friend during the pandemic. I didn’t get to see her off when she died. I miss her dearly.

You know, I’m glad I’m done with Pokemon Violet now, but it’s a shame I won’t get to spend any more time with Fish any more. Even a digital version. Rest well kitty.

As for Communism the Clodsire uh, well, it all started when I saw Paldean Wooper’s Pokedex entry:

It’s dangerous for Wooper to travel alone. They line up in groups of three or four and help each other as they walk around the wetlands.

Going in groups and helping each other out? THAT SOUNDS LIKE COMMUNISM!!!111!!!! Kinda. I’m not going to go into much depth on this matter. I don’t consider myself a communist, though I don’t have much against them. I’m honestly not sure what I’d consider myself. I could read a bunch of left wing theory to figure out exactly what sort of ideology I most subscribe to. Then I look at my good ole’ home country of America and what we’re going through and it doesn’t seem to matter much. We’re so deep in Not-Communism at this point even getting some modest social democracy would be tough. Alas. Maybe we’ll get a healthcare system that doesn’t suck one day.

So yeah it’s a joke name. That being said, I wouldn’t say this topic is completely irrelevant to Pokemon. Who decided to release Pokemon Scarlet and Violet, arguably the most ambitious Pokemon game to date in scope, in just 3 years after Sword and Shield? Did the people working on the game collectively decide it was ready to go? Obviously not. It was a buggy mess at launch (still kinda is) and it looks like… well, you already saw right? That didn’t happen because the people making it were lazy. It happened because some big wigs decided they needed the game released on schedule. Perhaps that was the right move from a business perspective. I mean, it sold rather well and the exta time to cook probably wouldn’t boost sales too much. Also have to consider coordination with the anime production and other parts of the franchise right? Who cares if Game Freak’s workers probably got run into the ground pumping it out? Who cares if it’s about as smooth and polished as a sea urchin? People buy it any way so the machine keeps chugging.

The Gameplay

So this is a Pokemon game, that hasn’t fundamentally changed. They’ve tried mixing up the core gameplay in spinoffs and the like, but the main games have been remarkably consistent. You get your first Pokemon, which is pretty much always a fire, water, or grass type. Then you build up a team that can defeat all the gym leaders, bad guys, tough mons, and whatever else comes your way. Then you fight the elite four, then the champion, then you become the champion, and then there’s some post game stuff but you’re mostly done already. That gameplay loop hasn’t really changed much. I think it’s fair to say this game makes more changes to that structure than usual, but it doesn’t fundamentally upend the structure. We still got the gym leaders, though we have much more flexibility with the order we fight them than usual. But they have fixed levels and some of them are hard to reach without Miraidon upgrades so there’s a certain order we’re incentivized to fight them in. Roughly. Like you’re probably not going to fight Grusha before Katy the bug type lady. You might fight Grusha before Tulip, I know I did.

The Pokemon battle system itself isn’t dramatically different either. Every Pokemon has 4 move slots available to them, and moves like flamethrower work the same way they always do. It’s still super effective against grass type and not very effective against water type. If a Pokemon uses flamethrower its damage is calculated the same way it always is. Math that involves type matchups, whether or not the user has STAB (same type attack bonus), how strong their special attack is, how strong the opponent’s special defense is. You still got EVs and IVs and natures and all that stuff to add a layer of technicality to the game for anyone interested. The fundamental building blocks that make up Pokemon battles did not change. This isn’t to say it’s exactly the same as before, but the differences are by and large in the details.

Before I go any further, I must say I don’t think the lack of major core gameplay changes is necessarily a bad thing. I don’t have a problem with that Gym Leader-Elite Four-Champion gameplay loop. I’ve been playing these games for years, it’s a solid formula. Sure it can wear a bit thin after being repeated so many times, but it’s not like you have to throw it out completely to make a good game. Some people might say that, that it’s so stale that you need to flip the table over. Those folks probably wouldn’t be playing Pokemon either way. If you ask me, the best way to improve Pokemon is to take that solid foundation and build some good shit on top of it.

More than anything else in these games I’m fond of Pokemon battling. I made some of my best friends of my life (including a certain Spartan) bonding over Pokemon X and Y battles in high school. There are so many different Pokemon with cool and/or interesting designs, and they all have their own unique/unique-ish ways to be played. Even a single Pokemon can be played in a bunch of different ways if you change up their moveset, ability, or stats. (Admittedly some Pokemon have a lot more flexibility than others). For a game primarily marketed at kids (and people holding onto their childhood memories for dear life) there’s a surprisingly strong amount of depth to the gameplay. It’s simple enough to play, but if you want to be a real Pokemon master it can go deep.

So what’s changed? Well, first let’s look at the most obvious new addition, the Tera Type. It seems like every new Pokemon game decided they need to add some sort of special super move to the mix. First it was Mega Evolutions, which were kinda gamebreaking but also pretty fun to use. I liked how it gave some underrepresented Pokemon a new life, but it also made some already strong Pokemon even more busted. Then it was Z-moves, which was just kinda whatever. Then both of those got cut and we got dynamaxing instead, which was also just kinda whatever. This time around dynamaxing got cut and we got Terastalization instead. Yeah.

I don’t have strong feelings about terastalization. I think it’s safe to say the previous gen super moves were cooler looking, but terastalization has an advantage. It’s better balanced. Changing STAB moves from a 1.5x multiplier to a 2x multiplier isn’t unreasonable. Changing the Pokemon’s type with terastalization opens up some interesting rug pulls and strategies. It’s not some instant win button. Sometimes it might be more advantageous to have your base type instead of being stuck with the tera type. Even if terastalization gives you a leg up it doesn’t make you unbeatable. Overall I think it’s a good addition even though the hats look kinda goofy and we’ll probably never see it again. I’m sure I’d appreciate it more if I got into this gen’s competitive battles and saw how it could turn a match around. As far as the base game goes I didn’t feel the need to use it super often. It’s a nice inobtrusive addition that adds a layer of depth to the combat. I don’t exactly love it, but I can’t knock it.

So besides terastalization how did Pokemon battling change? Well… let’s see… they replaced hail with snowstorms, which boosts an ice-type’s defense by 50% instead of doing a little damage per turn. I think it’s fair to say that’s a buff for ice types, but why couldn’t you just have both the damage and the defense boost? Sandstorm still does it that way right? Welp, ice types are going to need more than that to actually be good. So that’s one thing. Let’s see what else… OK, Recover, Slack Off, and Roost got their PP cut in half. I would say that would give Galarian Corsola an advantage against Corviknight, but you can’t even use Corsola this gen! Fuck! There is probably only one person in the world who knows what I’m talking about, and that’s enough.

But seriously, Recover got nerfed, Scald got its distribution limited so Toxapex can’t use it, you can’t even use Ferrothorn this gen. There seems to be a concerted effort to make defensive playstyles weaker. Why exactly? Were they breaking the game before? I don’t think so, but they did slow the game down, and some people find that playstyle annoying to deal with, so that’s reason enough I guess.

Beyond those balance changes just look at the group of Pokemon we got this gen. We got quite a few new overloaded offensive Pokemon to break the game with. For instance there’s Gholdengo, a walking noodle man that’s immune to status effects and has 133 base special attack. It has a move called Make It Rain that has 100% accuracy and 120 BP, limited only by the fact that it’s a steel type move. How the hell is a defensive pokemon supposed to beat that? Better hope you got a strong enough Earthquake or some shit. It’s hard to imagine any full stall team taking that thing down without significant casualties or a major outplay. And that’s just one of the many new deadly offensive Pokemon this generation introduced.

So what kind of new Pokemon do defensive players get to play with? Well, Clodsire’s a respectable addition. It has good special bulk, Unaware, and the typing and movepool it needs to be useful. Perhaps in a previous generation that would be enough to get it to Smogon’s OU. Dondozo’s a good addition too. It also has access to unaware, great physical bulk, and a moveset that’s good enough to be useful. They managed to make an early game rock type that doesn’t suck with Garganacl. All they needed was to give it Recover, a useful ability, and Salt Cure to guarantee anyone can get worn down. Then there’s Ting-Lu, a tanky ass legendary Pokemon that actually could beat Gholdengo. When I lay it out like that it’s not THAT bad, but most of these Pokemon only work because they’ve got enough offensive presence to bite back. Who’s the new Toxapex now that they nerfed that thing? Absolutely nobody. Not saying we needed more Pokemon that just sit around and watch you die, but I like using Pokemon like that sometimes. Now they’ve got less longevity and a whole lot more nukes to deal with. Welp.

Yet details like that hardly matter at all when you’re just playing the game as usual. I played through the entire base game with two Clodsires and a Quagsire on my team and I didn’t have much trouble at all. Not to say I never struggled at all, but most of my hardest fights were the ones I was underleveled for. I have to give Game Freak some credit here, the NPC trainers seem to have improved AI to some extent. You see some trainers use strategies that you hardly ever saw outside of competitive play. Like they’re actually using held items now, shit’s wild. They make brain dead decisions less often than they used to as well. Thanks to that I’ve had a handful of battles that felt like an actual fight. To an extent where a 9 year old spamming Fire Blast could conceivably get frustrated occasionally maybe. Personally I would’ve been happy to get challenged more. I don’t think I ever needed more than two attempts to beat anyone in this game. I’m not saying this game needs to be Dark Souls or whatever. I know that’s never happening outside of self-imposed challenges and fan-games. I don’t think they neccessarily should do that either. However, Game Freak gave me the occasional taste of a legit fight, and it would’ve been nice to see that more often. The veterans need stimulation too.

Besides that what else is there to mention… right, the wild encounters. So this time around Game Freak has done something a bit different, they removed random encounters altogether. All the wild Pokemon you want to catch are now roaming around aimlessly for you to walk into. You could argue it’s more immersive this way. And it probably would be if you saw the Pokemon behave more like actual creatures with lives more often. Occasionally you get a taste of that. Like how the cute little sandiles swim through the sand partially covered. But most of the time they’re just kinda hanging around. This also makes shiny hunting easier except when it comes to Pokemon that barely look any different as a shiny. With this new approach I encountered more wild shiny Pokemon than ever before. Also this happened.

Another notable change is that trainers won’t fight you unless you walk up to them and ask them to. After all, unwanted trainer encounters causes friction, and we can’t have any friction! Yeah, whatever.

Let’s see what else, right picnics. So you can host a picnic with your Pokemon buddies, make goofy looking sandwiches, and this is now the only way to get eggs apparently. The nice part is that it’s also a way to get egg moves on your Pokemon even after they’re born without them. I mean, it’s kind of cute I guess. I don’t hate it. What I do find annoying is that I inadvertently boosted my Friendship stat with my Pokemon. This means they occasionally survive attacks that would otherwise knock them out with the power of friendship like a damn shonen anime.

I’ve got some completely unearned victories under my belt thanks to this mechanic. There’s no way to turn it off besides like, not picnicing with your Pokemon and/or going out of your way to reduce the friendship stat afterwards. This isn’t the first game to have this mechanic, so I guess it’s a staple now. Welp, fine.

The last thing I’ll note for this section is Miraidon. In this game instead of a bike you get to ride a bike shaped Pokemon, which is honestly a fun idea. Not only can he go decently fast, but if you feed it enough special herbs it can do some other tricks too. It can climb, it can glide, it can jump, it can swim, and if you play the DLC it can learn to fly too. An excellent companion to help navigate this open world. I actually enjoyed moving around with Miraidon quite a bit. If only this game had nicer landscapes to traverse.

Teal Mask

Oh hey, the DLC actually does have some nice landscapes to traverse. Well, they’re not amazing or anything, but they certainly look better on average. This applies to both Teal Mask and Indigo Disk, but let’s focus on one part at a time. Teal Mask takes us to Kitakami, a homely island that’s more traditionally minded than Paldea. Soon after we arrive we’re introduced to this DLC’s power sibling duo: Kieran and Carmine.

If we just go off first impressions I’d say Carmine’s an asshole and Kieran’s kinda dopey. That doesn’t entirely stop being the case later, but I think it’s fair to say my impressions of them evolved considerably. Their impression of the protagonist evolved considerably too. First impressions are important, but a lot can change when you give someone time to get to know them. These two are a prime example that.

Before I get too deep into that, let’s talk about someone who makes a far stronger first impression, Perrin. I’ve been aware of Perrin well before I met her in-game. After all, she’s designed by Take, who I hold in high esteem. Before he got involved with Pokemon he did the illustrations for Katanagatari and Zaregoto, which I’m rather fond of. Then when he got into Pokemon he went ahead and produced some all time greats. Like Nessa’s probably the most gorgeous Pokemon character to date as far as I’m concerned. Then he went ahead and brought us Scarlet and Violet’s hottest character in the form of Perrin. Am I just saying that because I have a thing for midriffs? I mean, that’s certainly part of it, but the whole design’s a W. So I was plenty interested in getting the chance to see what she’s about.

So yeah, I like her. Unfortunately for me, the price for my simp ass hanging out with her is catching 150 Pokemon. Fucking hell. Usually when I play these games I don’t catch anywhere near that many. I generally won’t catch a Pokemon I don’t plan on using. Not unless it’s a shiny or some shit. Seems kinda fucked up to just have them sit in the PC for eternity. But if that’s the price for hanging out with Perrin I guess I’m going to pay it. During those tedious hours I spent filling up my dex I sometimes found myself wondering what I’m doing with my life. All the productive tasks I could tbe doing instead. All the books, video games, movies, anime, manga, visual novels, whatever the fuck else I could be engaging with. I could be doing a whole lot of other things and have a better time. And yet I committed myself to putting those worries aside and seeing it through. For the sake of this review and for the sake of spending more time with a particularly cute anime lady. Is there something wrong with my priorities? Shit, maybe. Oh well, either way it’s over and done with now. So was it worth it in the end? Well…

Before I get too deep into Perrin’s quest line I’ll go back to talking about the main story of Teal Mask. After all, I cleared that part first. So here’s the deal, you’re here on some study abroad type shit and you partner up with Kieran for the journey. We learn a bit about Kitikami’s local history/legends, particularly about a certain ogre and the three guardians that supposedly protected the villagers from it. The ogre is seen as the villain in these folktales but Kieran developed some sort of affinity for it. I guess he admires the ogre’s strength and senses a kindred spirit with the lone figure.

From here on out things get more complicated. We get invited to check out the local Festival of Masks. They got stalls and mini-games and everything! Beyond the festivities the player character and Carmine notice a strange visitor to the festival. The visitor flees into the mountains but ends up dropping its special mask in the process. The Teal Mask. Wow a title drop! Any ways, the player character and Carmine try to sort the issue out while leaving Kieran out of it, which leads to some tension.

I’m an only child, so I can’t say I know what it’s like to have a sibling. Well, kinda. There was a period of time where my dad was dating someone who had two kids so they were kinda like my step-siblings but not exactly and our bond wasn’t that deep. I suppose actual siblings don’t always have deep bonds either, shit can be complicated, but still. So I don’t actually know what it’s like, but I suspect people who do have siblings can relate to this dynamic.

When we first meet Kieran he’s pretty heavily reliant on Carmine. He’s hiding behind her when we first meet him. While he doesn’t exactly agree with everything Carmine says or does he isn’t very assertive about it. For Carmine’s part she’s perfectly willing to help him out and take the lead. However when the player character and Ogerpon show up it throws a wrench in that dynamic. Kieran stops being her meek and subservient little brother and lets jealousy flourish. She doesn’t really know how to handle the change. To be fair to her, it would probably be difficult for anybody to handle. Yet Carmine’s abrasive personality certainly doesn’t do her any favors. It must be difficult to be a sibling at odds with one another. Especially if you still live together. You can’t exactly sever ties, you’re going to have a bond regardless. But if things can’t flow like they usually do and you don’t know how to fix it that must be a difficult feeling.

She may not fully get Kieran, but she worries for him all the same.

So what’s going on with Kieran? Well, he’s bothered by multiple things. He’s not happy about Carmine and the player character hiding what they learned about Ogerpon from him. He’s bothered by the Ls the player character keeps handing him in battle. He’s frustrated by his own perceived weakness. And when Ogerpon, someone he felt some sort of parasocial bond to, goes with the player character instead he has a hard time handling it. Honestly I was tempted to just let him have Ogerpon, not like I was planning on using it. Alas, the game doesn’t give you that option. So he continues to spiral. His initial admiration for the player character morphs into an envious obsession with getting one over on you.

Kieran’s development over Teal Mask is interesting to me. Seeing any character development at all used to be a rarity in the Pokemon world. Seeing character development that goes off in a negative direction even more so. Usually NPCs aren’t that bothered by losing to the player character. They can get frustrated but they somehow seem to instinctively know they’re just another step on the player’s journey. But Kieran isn’t satisfied with that role. For some people that might make them like him less. For me, it makes me like him more. He’s bringing something unique to the table, something I haven’t seen before in a Pokemon game and don’t see much of outside of it either.

Teal Mask’s main story ends with the conclusion of the school trip. Carmine sends us off with a rather sweet send off and some guilt tripping to buy the other DLC. For Kieran’s part, he gives us a strong hook of his own…

When I bought the DLC I already got both as a bundle, but if I didn’t… well, honestly that probably would’ve worked on me. I ended up liking Carmine quite a bit so I can hardly imagine saying no to her. I’ll comment more on her later. I was also interested to see what Kieran was cooking. Gotta play Indigo Disk to find out y’know.

So that’s what I did, but before that, I had some unfinished business to take care of. As much as I like the sibling duo I can’t forget about Perrin. I put some work in catching Pokemon along the Teal Mask journey, but I was still below 150. So I had to grind. Honestly, as tedious as catching so many Pokemon can be, there is one part I appreciated about it. In this game the Pokedex doesn’t just give you information about the Pokemon, it shows you a picture of how they live in the wild. These details bring the world to life in a substantial way. Now if only we could actually see the kind of stuff we see in the Dex photos in-game…

It’s a nice touch. I particularly find the Hypno one amusing. They’re really leaning into the creepypasta angle with that one. By the way I think I spot a rodent in that group. That means the game officially gets a rodent quota pass!

Any ways, when you actually catch 150 Pokemon Perrin is pretty surprised. I guess she just threw a big number out there to get you to buzz off, but that won’t stop this neurodivergent adult simp cosplaying as a brown girl for some inexplicable reason! Turns out Perrin’s on the hunt to snap some photos of a rare creature, a particularly strong Ursuluna called the Bloodmoon Beast. She’s been feeling a bit of a creative slump and was hoping finding the big guy would ignite something. So we join her on a night expedition and have a good time.

I’m going to let that scene speak for itself. So in the end our reward for catching 150 Pokemon is some time hanging out with Perrin, a bear, a growlithe, and a choice scarf. Honestly not a bad deal, mostly thanks to the Perrin part. The choice scarf’s nice too, I didn’t really use the other mons. I just wish the quest went on a bit longer. I spent a lot more time doing the work to unlock the quest than actually experiencing it after all. If this was for damn near any other character in the game I would’ve felt like I’ve been ripped off.

So that’s the first half of the DLC down finally. I liked it for the most part. I didn’t care that much about the Ogerpon story but I was interested in the character story weaved into it. Was it worth the money? Eh, maybe. It’s certainly better put together than the sprawling main game. Doesn’t give you the nagging sense that it’s an unfinished. At least, not to the same degree. It also serves as a good setup for what Indigo Disk has in store.

Indigo Disk

The second half of the DLC takes us to a completely different location: Blueberry Academy. We go from relaxing traditional-ish minded island to whatever the hell this is.

What kind of natural resource development are we talking here? Is this place secretly part oil rig? Is that how they got the budget to build this thing? Questionable implications aside, I have to admit this place is cool. Even just the entrance makes a strong impression. I mean, I went to a high school by the water, but this is something else. Wonder how much the tuition costs… Any ways, the pink haired girl we see in that third pic is named Lacey. She’s apparently the daughter of Clay, one of the Unova gym leaders. Can’t say I see the resemblance much. Maybe she dyed her hair? Guess they have similar eye brows, and those gemstones on her hair clip are kinda like the one on Clay’s cowboy hat. She’s also got an Excadrill for some reason, and that thing kicked my ass the first time I fought her.

Gotta give her credit for handing me one of my very few Ls of my entire playthrough there. Sure I can say she caught me unprepared. I didn’t exactly have my full star team with me. I brought some weaklings along because I was still filling out Kitikami’s pokedex when I decided to pay Blueberry Academy a visit. But those are just excuses. An L’s an L nevertheless. Problem with relying so heavily on Clodsire to tank shit is that Excadrill kicks their ass.

Apparently it doesn’t matter if you win or lose against her here you get to see the inside of the academy any way. And they got quite the setup.

Well, this is a cool idea. It hardly makes any sense that these biomes could be right next to each other in open air. Even if the humidity and temperature were well regulated within each biome that sharp transition is pretty much impossible. Air doesn’t just stay in a straight line. Setting the scientific absurdity aside, it’s a cool concept. It still has that janky looking quality to it that tends to plague the rest of the game’s landscapes. It looks better than Kitikami outside and worse inside. Still better than Paldea on average, so that’s nice. The concept is there, a more capable 3D modeler could’ve done something incredible with it. Instead we get this looks good if you squint but even then not that good thing. But seriously, how high is that tuition cost? And who the hell are Carmine and Kieran’s parents? They must have some sort of prestige to get them into this place.

Any ways, soon after you step inside the Terrarium you get to see Perrin again. It’s always good to see her. The less good part is that she wants you to catch 200 Pokemon this time. Needless to say that was a slog. To get to 200 you pretty much need to catch starters. To catch starters you need to get a shit load of points from doing random bullshit to pay for the biome upgrades. Each biome gets a separate upgrade and I needed 3 to get over the finish line. And what do we get? Scoops on the locations of a couple Area Zero Pokemon I won’t use. I don’t even get to hang out with Perrin while doing so this time. She talks a bit at the end once you caught them both but it’s nothing like the previous camping trip. I feel like I got ripped off. The Teal Mask Perrin quest was worth my time-ish but this one definitely wasn’t. Fucking hell. At least it ends with some good lines.

Fortunately, Indigo Disk’s main story line didn’t disappoint. It actually exceeded my not-particularly-high expectations. So let’s get into it.

So Carmine’s back. She said we’d see each other again and we did. I’m a sucker after all. We get another battle with her for the hell of it, which is fine. Carmine’s not exactly the toughest opponent. She can do some damage but she’s not a premiere threat. Instead she’s premiere at saying goofy lines in the middle of battle. By the way, the whole things where major trainers drop lines in the middle of battle is a great touch. I feel like the older games would have benefited from that too. Gives the characters a chance to show more personality, and makes it feel more like a Pokemon battle from the anime.

It’s not immediately obvious when you first meet her, but Carmine’s fundamentally a goofball and I love her for it. As you can see she doesn’t exactly handle losing with full grace. She’s like “I’m not saying you should let me win butttttttttt-” maybe I should’ve just let her get some KOs to feel better about herself. But nah, I took her seriously and dispatched her seriously. I guess that’s the more respectful road in a way. Still when she loses she’s like “Damnit you’re strong” but she’s still rocking with you. As for her brother? Welllllllll

OK Kieran’s turned into an asshole, that much is obvious. But he’s an asshole with much cooler hairstyle, so it balances out. So yeah, he did not take the events of Teal Mask well. Now he’s obsessed with being the strongest and he’s running himself and everyone around him in the League Club ragged to do so. Not ideal. I’ll get more into that later, but this is around where Drayton shows up.

Drayton’s a chill guy. Some may argue a bit too chill. He chilled out enough that Kieran caught him lacking. He’s the smart but lazy type basically. And he pisses Carmine off for whatever reason. Honestly it’s not clear to me exactly why that is. I guess his carefree attitude irritates her. I’m not sure if anyone has written a fanfiction shipping Drayton and Carmine. They probably have. I’m not sure if they’re actually a good pair in practical terms, but it would be very funny. That’s enough for me. Drayton’s also got a good thing going with Lacey, that one seems like it has a much higher chance of actually happening. Alas, explicit romance isn’t really a thing in Pokemon so let’s move on.

Drayton’s a clever guy, clever enough to know he can’t solve the club’s problem on his own. The brutal hypercompetitive culture Kieran’s bringing to the club is exhausting for him. But Kieran won’t listen to Drayton and chill out. Kieran’s deep in an opposing attitude. The fact that he beat Drayton just confirms that he’s in the right. Drayton could probably put a bit more effort himself and take that spot back, but doing that won’t improve the culture. It’s just feeding into it more. To be fair to Kieran, his new approach has shown results. There’s power in the grind. However, he’s missing something important. Even though the player character didn’t intend to, they played a huge role in Kieran’s heel turn. As such, it’s only natural that we get him out of it. Drayton knows Kieran’s obsessed with the player character. He knows we’re strong. So he sics us on Kieran in hopes that we’ll knock him down a peg. Honestly, it’s a solid plan. He barely has to lift a finger himself, he just has to nudge people in the right direction. Everyone can see he’s manipulating the situation, but Kieran wants to battle us any way so they let it happen.

Of course you can’t just go and fight Kieran right away. He’s the champion of Blueberry Academy after all. Blueberry Academy’s League Club has a mock-Elite Four structure. The highest performing students in the club become Elite Four members. If you want a shot at the champion, you got to take the Elite Four down first. That’s how it always goes, and that’s how it is here too. Except now they’re top students at an elite boarding school, young prodigies. These guys are the biggest challenge the main story has to offer. I decided to refrain from using potions and revives during our battles out of respect.

But before I get into that, let’s get into more stage setting with Carmine. She invites us to her dorm room to have a private chat about her brother.

The situation is getting to her, probably more so than anyone else. She can only helplessly watch her little brother slip away from her. She’s worried about him. Hard to ignore this situation after hearing her say all of that. By the way she lets you visit her room whenever after this point, even when she’s not around. I feel a bit… improper doing so, but her room’s full of great details.

Any ways. According to school rules visiting students aren’t really supposed to participate in the Elite Four challenge. Thanks to the Elite Four guys being loose with the rules we manage to get in any way. The Elite Four members are divided one per biome, and you can take them on in any order you want. They’re not quite like the Paldea Elite Four. They’re kind of like a gym leader/Elite Four hybrid. You have to clear some sort of challenge before the final battle. Guess it doesn’t make much sense to take on the Elite Four if you can’t even handle their grunts.

One interesting aspect of Blueberry Academy is that all the battles inside are Double Battles. Just like the VGCs. Personally, I prefer Singles but I like this change any way. It switches things up and forces me into doing something I’m not used to. I had to adapt. Thankfully, one of my main team was designed for this moment. Good ole’ Maki. See, Tatsugiri is designed to be a Double’s pokemon. Her good type, respectable special attack and speed make her usable in singles, but her signature ability Commander is completely useless outside of Doubles. Because it allows her to one specific thing and one thing only: hop into a Dondozo and make it a force of destruction. When Maki goes Commander mode she cannot attack by herself, but the Dondozo is powered up enough that it can balance out. And if V Gonta my Dondozo faints Maki can pop right out afterwards and continue the battle. It’s not exactly unstoppable, but I pretty much always get at least a kill or two with this strategy unless something goes horribly wrong. I also brought along a Milotic a certain Spartan helped me catch. I didn’t really need a Milotic on my team, but I’m quite fond of it. So I used those 2 additions mixed and matched with the team I used to take down the Paldean Elite Four. I changed things a bit depending on which member I was fighting. It worked out pretty well for the most part.

For my first Elite Four match I decided to go with Lacey. She’s not usually the type of character I’m particularly drawn to, but I like her quite a bit for whatever reason.

So uh, I lost to her my first time. I’ll admit it, I wasn’t showing her full respect that first round. I still had an oddish and a seel on my team because I was hoping to evolve them for the Pokedex entry. She made me pay for that mistake. It was a close fight, but I lost to her. Again. Even when I rematched her with a full real team I only won by the skin of my teeth. She’s a tough opponent that has good answers for my team. For me she was the biggest challenge I faced in the entire game. Poor Kieran.

Either way, that’s one down. Next up I defeated another part of the Elite Four.

Honestly, the part that challenges the Elite Four is integral. They wouldn’t be elite if they had nobody to beat. Either way I decided to do Amarys next for whatever reason. I like Amarys, she’s probably the best designed Black character Pokemon has ever produced. I could argue Nessa still has that spot, but Nessa’s ethnic ambiguity complicates matter. She could be South Asian for all I know. Except neither of these ethnicities actually exist under those words in the Pokemon world so whatever. Not just her design that’s cool. I like the part where she feeds my motorcycle dinosaur some special food and it can fly. Thanks! She’s also just a cool character in general.

I’m probably showing too much dialogue in the slideshows. I’m barely even talking about most of it. Honestly I just like the writing quite a bit, I got the screenshots saved, and I’d like to show them off. So yeah, Amarys isn’t just some hard ass. She’s not exactly the biggest player here but she’s got her fair share of nuance and personality any way. More than I can say about a lotttttttttttt of Elite Four members. Also, I complained about the Paldean Elite Four arena but I’m not complaining about these ones. These ones look nice, and they all got different colors to suit the respective members.

Any ways, my third match was with Crispin, the fire chef guy. He’s probably my least favorite of the Elite Four but I still like him. He was probably the easiest one for me to beat though. That’s what happens when I got a team full of water and ground types I guess.

Drayton calls himself the best for last, huh? I’m sure this conversation changes a little bit depending on the order you fight these guys in. That’s a good touch. And hey, he does make for a fun fight.

At the end of the day Drayton just wants to have a good time battling and he wants Kieran to have a good time too. As carefree as the dude seems to be he’s proven himself to be highly observant of people. He offers interesting insights about every other high ranking member in the club, and things end up going in the direction he wants them to. What a guy. I honestly have a hard time deciding if I like him or Kieran better. I guess I like Drayton more but Kieran’s probably the most interesting character in the series.

So it’s time for the long awaited battle. The thing this whole arc has been building up to. Battling with Kieran at last. I must say, he has quite the impactful preamble.

Kieran’s brought a tough team this time. He swapped out some of his old team for stuff that’s more competively viable. He’s using rain dance strategies and items. He’s fighting like someone using every tool at his disposal to win. I’m not sure if he knows about EVs and IVs though. TBH I don’t bother with EV training while I’m playing the story. Shit’s tedious and you don’t need it against the NPCs, not even Kieran. Honestly I liked this battle, I could see how it could be a major challenge. Certainly a bigger challenge than Geeta. But for me… eh? Dragonite did some serious damage, I had a hell of a time taking that thing down. But then that Politoed stayed on the field and it was kinda useless after that but he never switched it out. So I had a much easier time with the rest of his team. Keeping his politoed alive the whole time and picking off the rest of his team one by one. Also I don’t think the AI was trained to respond to Water Absorb Clodsire properly. If I recall correctly he tried to throw some water on my Communism multiple times. Dumbass robot. That’s why you lost man. You lost the love, got hard headed, and tried to challenge a guy whose been playing Pokemon for two decades as a main story NPC. The game wouldn’t let you win bud, sorry. You don’t get to be an asshole and get rewarded in Pokemon. They’ve got to teach moral lessons or whatever. As for real life? Well, guess we’ll just have to see how this regime plays out.

OK so there’s a couple things beyond this point. We get invited to Area Zero again, this time with Carmine and Kieran and that Briar lady I’m not going to talk much about. It feels a bit rehashy but it’s a fine group to hang out with. Kieran tries to use the Terapagos to finally get his W but that doesn’t work so it finally sets in for him. So he takes a leave of absence from the school. Honestly, fair. He clearly could use some time off.

Then there’s the epilogue thing. It’s where you catch the special event pokemon, pecha kucha. That’s not actually what it’s called but I don’t really care at this point. The fun part was that it brought the main Paldea gang to Kitikami. It’s fun seeing these characters get a chance to interact for the first time. Probably won’t happen again. Great. I liked the resolution to Kieran’s story. He learned to accept that battles are fun whether you win or lose again thanks to Nemona. He was an MVP helping you out against the mochi invasion. Afterwards he decides to rejoin school and get back into things with a fresh perspective. Carmine stayed with him during his leave of absence and happily joins him on the return. They stick together. By the way, they did Carmine dirty in that epilogue. Why the hell did she have to be mochi’d up from the start? She barely got any real lines until the end. What a fucking waste!

Oh right. Also there’s this thing where you can bring Terapagos, the big legendary of Indigo Disk to the crystal pool and then some timey wimey stuff happens. You get to meet the real Professor Turo, the one that’s not an AI for the first and only time.

So in Violet you get a future Cyclizar, and presumably in Scarlet you get a Cyclizar from the past. So it went from dinosaur to lizard guy to mecha dinosaur. Interesting evolution path. Also great dad. He’s like “Oh yeah I’m leaving my son all alone. Welp. Any ways.” Even so Arven still finds something to admire in him. Arven’s a good guy, unusually good for his circumstances.

Alright, so what else before I wrap things up? Well, I haven’t said who’s best girl explicitly yet, and there’s a tradition where we’re supposed to decide that. I think it’s fair to say that Kieran’s probably the most interesting best written character overall. But he’s uh, not a girl. I mean, he could be, deep down inside. But probably not. So who’s best girl? Well, we got plenty of strong candidates. I honestly figured I’d end up picking Perrin. I did think she was the hottest going into this game, and when you play the game her personality’s plenty lovable too. But there’s not that much of her relatively and she put me through some tedious shit just to hang out. Instead my choice is a sleeper pick who I probably should’ve seen coming all along. Carmine bb.

She’s not always the most considerate person but she tends to be considerate when it really counts. And that uh, really counts. Honestly she just made me laugh more often than anyone else and that has to count for something. Definitely doesn’t hurt that she’s got the long black hair going for her. I’m always a sucker for that.

Conclusion

This game was exhausting and this review was exhausting to make. It kind of feels like Genshin Impact. They expanded the scope of the world and gave you a pile of Stuff To Do with no real end in sight. I didn’t even mention all the stuff you can do. The good news is, some of that stuff is actually quite good. There’s some really good writers involved in this project. The problem is pretty obvious though. The whole thing’s undercooked. I can see a great game under this all if they make the experience a bit tighter and more polished in all sorts of respects. I hear the Switch 2 update helps with a good chunk of stuff, but there’s plenty they could’ve accomplished without a hardware update. I’ve played plenty of other first party Switch games and pretty much every single one of them was better put together than Pokemon’s Switch entries. These games needed more time in the oven to reach their full potential. Period. But they sold any way so I guess we’re all just collectively fine with it. As for me I’m not so sure if I’ll be buying Pokemon anything again any time soon. We’ll see. I’m sure take will come up with some new character to tempt me next gen, but maybe the fanart will be enough.

You know, I could say more but honestly I’m already up well past my already-late bed time finishing this up. I usually spend time doing a read through and editing this whole thing to make sure it’s up to par, but you know what? I don’t think I need to. I’m sure I made some mistakes of some sort within this big ass review. But I have a deadline to meet and it’s probably good as is. So yeah.

As for my overall rating of this game… Hm. I think the DLC’s better than the base game. It’s a tighter experience and the characters are especially good here. As for the base game well… It certainly has its moments, but again, read all the comments above. It has some great peaks, but large portions of the game are just a slog. So let’s see. 6/10 for the base game. 8/10 for Teal Mask. 8.5/10 for Indigo Disk. 7/10 overall. That sounds about right. OK. There. With that I can finally put this mammoth of a game behind me. I don’t necessarily regret the time I put into it. At least not all of it. But hot damn am I glad to move on. I’ll end this review with one last detail that I liked.

So yeah that’s a blog. IDK what the next one will be. I mean, I have some ideas, but who knows which one will come out first. Could be something I haven’t thought of yet. Thanks for the woopers Spartan, this playthrough would be noticeably worse without them.