Pokémon Fans Get '#GameFreakLied' Trending As Sword And Shield Drama Intensifies Yet Again

Dear oh dear, these Pokemon hommies are legit tyrants.

I just want this game to hurry up and release. Then all the whiners will buy it, play it and forget the drama. It's a Pokemon game people, not your livelihoods.

I think at this point it's more about a corporation trying to mislead it's future clients than about pokemon fandom. anyway just wait for the game before you throw stones

The entitled attitude of some gamers never fails to dissapoint.

no matter how this reviews I can see it being one big poo storm.

be those upset if it scores good and those upset if it scores poorly. one thing I have learned is pokemon has some of the most rabid and toxic fans in gaming

No one deserves Pokémon, it's a product that one buys with ones money. I don't understand where this "you don't deserve it" attitude comes from, you don't earn it with your adoration or hype, and you don't not deserve it because you make your dissatisfaction with the product known. It's ridiculous.

With so many problems in the world, it's hard to fathom why those entitled fans get their undies all up in a bunch about a video game. I'm still getting it on Friday.

I am confused. How do similar polygon counts refute the claim of "higher quality animations"?

@RupeeClock That's what I read somewhere too, but when I went to tell a buddy this the other day I couldn't remember where I'd seen it. Do you have a link referencing this you could throw my way? I'd be super grateful

The fact that they have been reusing models and animations from X&Y is precisely why so many fans are agitated about the lack of previous Pokémon being accessible. And I don't understand why any sensible person would take issue with the reusing of such assets. We can't expect Game Freak to keep redesigning 3D models from scratch for around 1100+ Pokémon models (and counting), inclusive of alternate forms.

Gen VII also did away with the National Dex, but all previous Pokémon were still accessible via trade/transfer etc.; they simply no longer had a Pokédex entry.

The fact that the first "proper" home console Pokémon game barely has more Pokémon than Gen III and less than half accessible than Gen VII (that we know of) is why so many hardcore fans are... temperamental, to put it mildly.

At the end of the day, I'm just going to enjoy the games like I always do. I wasn't pleased with how lazily the Let's Go games were thrown together, but I still enjoyed them nonetheless (and am trying to complete LG Pikachu before playing Shield on Friday). I see no point in fretting or hurling abuse at anybody about it even though I can be quite passionate concerning the franchise's shortcomings as well. It's a hobby, people.

The manic hysteria and antagonistic behaviour is totally unwarranted.

In my estimation, the main area where Game Freak have outright lied though, is when they stated that Pokémon Bank would be used to transfer old Pokémon to future games. I haven't, for instance, been able to transfer any of my Pokémon to the Let's Go games, and it won't be possible to transfer most of my Pokémon to Sword/Shield either, but I voted with my wallet and stopped paying the subscription fee as I was skeptical about their intentions and suspected that it was something of a scam.

And if people think that Sword/Shield isn't worth supporting either, they can vote with their wallets too, and hey, maybe they might take a hint.

This isn’t exactly new: see the E3 PS3 Killzone demo for example.

Who cares, they are all going to buy it anyway

@WarpSpawn
I also wondered about that xD That doesn't have anything to do with the models.
You can also argue that the animations from for example the camp make them higher quality. (they didn't say battle animation)

We need a time machine so those snowflake kiddos can get legally spanked

There’s another hashtag trending in Japan too that Nintendolife would censor if I post it.

The game is a mess. Social media has been more negative than positive.

If this was EA the “fans” would be up in arms with what GameFreak is doing. Instead they’re dismissing the criticisms. Pokémon will continue to go down hill if you continue to enable poor development practices.

@m8e3point1415 : At least some of us will be busy enjoying our hobby rather than being needlessly hysterical.

Pokemon fans don't seem to be pokemon fans.

I wasn't really bothered about this game, but I'm now considering buying it to support gamefreak against the entitled mob.

@redd214 this argument is hilarious. If someone criticized Pokémon being for children, people would be up in arms how it’s made for all ages.

Honestly other than a few cool designs this game is not what I'd hope for from a console Pokémon game. The wild area is a step in the right direction, but not nearly as bold or exciting enough to justify purchasing the game. I see nothing wrong with voicing said opinions when something looks bad.

@redd214 so because it's for children it's fine that it's a subpar product? Okay

They aren't 'fans' at all. Not willing to even try the game before they insult and abuse the makers of the game series they purport to love so much. Absolutely preposterous. Don't buy it if it isn't to the impossible standards you're demanding! Sigh.

@Clamango because all of the worlds problems pertain to everyone right?

@RupeeClock I feel silly now, didn't even think to look there! I'll go have a hunt, thank you.

Didn't anyone read this? You can't catch higher level Pokémon. Let's say your more leveled up Pokémon in your party is LVL 25. And you encounter a LVL 28 Pokémon. You won't be able to catch it.

That's it. Was it a shiny? Don't matter, can't catch it.

I read this in reddit and had to check in my copy (I got it early, just today). And right they were.

This is getting worse everyday. That and seeing the Pokémon in battles not being respected by scaling. Like that Wailord image where it's smaller than an average trainer.

But this was pretty clear from the start, wasn't it? If they were new models, you'd expect them to look... well... different. Their pose and models look exactly the same like they did in XY and SM. Heck, the reason why GF made high resolution in the first place was because so they could reuse them every game. So yeah, they lied, but I thought that was obvious from the start.

@suikoden well, if the Sonic fanbase and franchise has any indication, you got plenty of time before Pokemon would even tank, especially if the next good thing about Sonic is the successful redesign.

@Samwise7 Im not a fan of pokemon at all. However, compared to titles like Fire emblem, Zelda, and Mario the innovation of the series and graphical fidelity are subpar.

The game looks lazily made.

Do they realize that by talking about Game Freak and Pokémon, they're likely giving them free marketing? No such thing as bad publicity.

Sometimes trying to discredit something just makes it more popular. For example, I wasn't very interested in Horizon Zero Dawn until people in a certain website tried bashing it nonstop, they got me curious and I eventually bought and liked the game.

When people truly dislike something, sometimes the best course of action is to not talk about it, or you'll make it better known.

I watched a let's play online of the first couple of hours of the game and it looks like a step up from the 3ds games. It is a good game. Maybe, one day in 10 years time, they might be able to create a multi-region game with all of the pokemon in it, but for now, why not just enjoy this new game for what it is going to be; another solid Pokemon experience with better graphics than ever

I’m not one of the people going off on GF for ‘lying’ or harassing other people with my opinions on this, but I am a little concerned that game freak hasn’t spoken up about the dex at all. Clearly it’s something that a big portion of fans are concerned about, and I think addressing it would help people feel better. If what some of the leaks online say are true (no global trading/the textures looking as low res/big performance issues) then I’m not sure how I feel about things- I’ve loved Pokémon for a long time, and I want the series to continue to do well, with quality games. Reusing sprites and animations is absolutely fine- ‘work smarter, not harder’ is a good rule of thumb in game design. But GF’s social media and interviews and trailers going along like a huge portion of their fan base isn’t worried about the quality of the game I say a little...off. I think if they’d address these issues and talk with their community things would calm down a lot. Right now things are festering with speculation, and there’s nothing from the devs to lead people to think otherwise. Communication is extremely important. I’d say, for anyone afraid/upset/angry that the leaks are accurate, take a deep breath and wait a few days. Once the game is out, you can watch a let’s play and decide if it’s right for you.

The fact that Nintendo is denying access to review copies to multiple reviewers who traditionally got the game early with previous releases is certainly not a great show of good faith on their part. They KNOW something is wrong with their game and they don't want too many people telling others the kind of problems their game has even before it goes live.

@Olmectron You can't be serious. That sounds incredibly stupid.

@SmileMan64 what a ridiculous notion lmao

#AlcremieandChill, everyone.

@redd214 to be fair, the amount of people that are actually livid in reality is likely a fraction of those that are publicly complaining. Everything just seems more dramatic/intense online.

Rabid Pokémon fans will only accept that Game Freak release actual Pokémon at this point.

Also, I know it was mentioned that the game will use higher quality animation and data assets, but game balance was the most important reason in eliminating Pokémon. I think people are forgetting about that and taking the game assets explanation as the main reason.

I am not a Pokémon fan at all, but that Pokedex is ridiculous. The amount of balancing it must take to ensure these games are "fair" from a competitive standpoint must be an efing nightmare! So I don't blame Game Freak for doing a little trimming.

Maybe, after the game releases, one will find that a particularly cut "favorite" might actually be replaced with something better. In a roster as big as Pokémon, I am sure there is a huge amount of redundancy among the various Pokémon, so I would think finding a new Pokémon that is just as capable won't be that hard.

Then again, maybe I just don't get it since I am not a fan. I try, but I just can't get into "catch 'em all" RPG games.

They should be grateful that it's the first mainline Pokemon game to be released on a home console. They'll be the same people who're gonna cry when Nintendo stops releasing a Pokemon game on home console.

I wonder if we're really entitled for wanting our games to be as fun and content-filled as possible. No, I don't agree that hurling insults at developers is the way to go, and believe that everyone who is (understandably) miffed about it should just, yknow, not buy it.

But that's not to say that we're not allowed to publicly criticize the actions that Game Freak and The Pokemon Company have taken during this pre-release period. There have been so many flat-out lies, from Pokemon Let's Go and being told they want to prevent what happened in Gold, Silver, Crystal to Ruby, Sapphire, Emerald to happen again. They lied that they're working on higher fidelity animations. They either lied about the comments, or are incompetent when it comes to managing. I'm not calling the modelers incompetent.

The notion of "you can't judge a game you haven't played" is entirely stupid, though. You don't eat moldy bread because it looks moldy, right? You don't go see a movie if you don't like the trailer. If games are to be treated the same as other media as forms of art, then it also has to start abiding by these rules. We can't be equal "but I'm more equal than you".

How much free time do people have???????

@redd214 Looking at this objectively. I feel that if people have been lied to, they have the right to be upset.

Cause from my understanding is that they cut the national dex so they could have improved animations right? I mean I'm a hardcore smash player and if sakurai cut 30 characters due to "improved" animations and it ended up being the same animations with the same triangle count, essentially the same models and animations. I would also be rightfully pissed. i'm not buying the game anyway but i get the frustration.

I remember the day when people would just play a game for the fun. People keep comparing new games to earlier made games, but it’s a new game for a reason right? A new game is something new, not to be compared to some old thing. It’s not like the pokemon games continue on in story either.

I’m getting both games and going to play them with an open mind.

I really hate people being so selfish and arrogant all the time. Game Freak put a lot of effort into making the game. People should be thankful over anything really, cause if they didn’t make it, people wouldn’t be able to play it at all.

@GamingFan4Lyf : I don't see why they couldn't keep the move sets from past games, balancing be damned.

But I don't play competitively so I don't know how broken the games could possibly be without making any sweeping changes.

Wow, I’m a POKEMON fanboy, but this is taking it a bit too far. I own all of them since the beginning. I even have them stored in my bank. I just want a new Pokemon. I never cared about the graphics or what not. I just played and loved it. Can they make changes? Yes. Is it going to hinder me from buying it? No. These people are giving Pokemon fans a bad name.

Stop defending GF, stop saying “who cares”. I care, we care about Pokemon and how it is being handled and ignored. It’s being considered a B-series at this point by Nintendo and GF. Even on the 3DS, look at what was being done with other Nintendo IP, look at what has been accomplished with FE, Zelda, Mario, Smash, Luigi etc.. on the Switch. Then you have GF being “excited” for us to try out the damn camera in the wild area. A freaking movable camera in 2019 and they’re exited for us to “try” that? They’re just out of touch and the fact that Pokemon has been treated as a mediocre franchise for the last few entries is being shown and accepted. This is not what the Switch entry for the biggest media franchise on earth and one of the most beloved and celebrated series on Nintendo hardware is supposed to be. It’s lazy.

This list has some other examples of just the all around “We don’t give a sh**” approach that GF is taking.

https://amp.reddit.com/r/pokemon/comments/dv438w/complete_list_of_all_problems_known_so_far_in/

These people complaining are not random people, they’re people who have followed Pokemon for decades and want it to be a respectable franchise.

Game development is complex. So is translation. Words spoken in a different language in response to questions in a language the answerer doesn't speak can result in a lot of missed meaning. Lost in translation.

We do not know what challenges Game Freak has faced developing Sword and Shield, but I do know modeling and animating is very time consuming work, and there are certainly hundreds of new models and thousands (perhaps tens of thousands) of animations for new pokemon/variants/dynamax/humans etc. in and out of battle.

Those saying "GF should hire more people" have never heard of Brooks' law.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brooks%27s_law

@Ashunera84 Maybe GF should hire more competent people.

Clearly theres alot of fans who are not happy with how the product turned out! Look how they changed the sonic movie for the fans that really care

@Omarzy I don’t care about all of this

Whatever the truth behind this whole mess is, a few things are clear to me.

1. Game Freak needs some transparency. Even if it's a bad reason, getting everything on the table should be priority number one.
2. A good portion of Pokémon fans seem to have completely forgotten how to be decent human beings. It's actually embarrassing for me to call myself a Pokémon fan when I see others acting so childish.
3. It's. A. Video. Game. They are inconsequential. They are temporary. There are much bigger issues that plague society and the world. Losing so much sleep and energy over one isn't healthy.
4. Comments are a mistake.

"Neither Game Freak or The Pokémon Company has commented on this 'discovery' as of yet, so it seems unwise to jump to conclusions before hearing what they have to say."

Yet here you are making a good old article about it.

No, we don't "believe" we've been lied to. We quite literally have proof. The placement and number of tris for the models are identical.

@Omarzy If you have followed Pokémon for decades you're clearly too old for Pokémon right now. Simple.

Pokémon is meant to be a simple game to fight, catch and train Pokémon. Nothing more, nothing less. Wanting every single feature of a different game to be added to Pokémon ("we want an open world game!", "we want free camera control!", etc.) is just not Pokémon.

I'm going to buy Pokémon Sword and enjoy every second of it.

@SmileMan64 tell that to EA and BioWare, and Blizzard.

@Snaplocket "hiring another company to help make it" quite literally is adding a lot of people to the project...

Look, there are many great games out there, but name one - just one! - that has as many character models and animations as Pokemon since it went 3d.

@Shepdawg1 Seeing your points 2 and 3 side by side is quite amusing. I always overestimate people's ability to see how ironic their own statements can be.
I beseech you to not vilify people who are rightfully angry about being lied to.

@Ashunera84 Xenoblade Chronicles 2

@RupeeClock Solution: have the levels scale with the player's progress.

@Silly_G I won't even try to lie and say I would understand Pokémon move sets, but from what little I played, I don't see where individual Pokémon per type are any drastically different than another of the same type.

Sure some Pokémon have status effects another can't, but elemental attacks are elemental attacks, physical is physical, buffs are buffs, and de-buffs are de-buffs.

Again, not a fan, so this comes from extremely basic knowledge of playing maybe an hour of a Pokémon game just to try it out.

@sanderev I reject “you’re too old”. Aside from Fire Emblem, there isn’t a single -that I can think of - first or second party IP that is inherently more “mature” than Pokemon. If I don’t hear “you’re too old” for Mario, Zelda and Donkey Kong, then I shouldn’t have to hear it as an excuse for Pokemon, especially when the entries up to and including the DS entries were just so much better. I’m not “too old” because I want GF to do better than upscaled PS2 animations and visuals. Also at least trying to make it look like you’re still passionate about the franchise would help.

@Olmectron Yeah, I read that on a Discord server the other day and just hoped that it was somehow a weird misunderstanding. But wow, that actually really sucks.

Is it just me or do people defending the game have almost nothing constructive to say? I've seen endless comments insulting people for have critique, or saying useless things like "don't like it don't buy it" and that they're not real fans. Fans can have critique.. fans want the game to be good... Why would someone who doesn't care about the game even notice things like this? These aren't good arguments. If you don't notice that there's been a drop in passion and quality in a game you love this much, then maybe you should question if YOU'RE the real fans.

@Jugdral because they’re fanboys/immature and feel personally criticized when people criticize GamFreak.

Bad PR geez I guess Nintendo will need to give them a training or something
I guess balancing everything would be a nightmare and most people don't even complete the regional dex anyway
But that was a bad ideia, they would get caught eventually
...but the game still looks good to me actually
Fire Emblem looks bad in battles, specially the battalions around; DQ11S has aliasing and enemy pop in; BotW drops frames and resolution
Anyway, reviews are out in one hour, let's see

I don’t really care about graphics, I care that it’s fun. This is my first Pokemon. If the game is fun, I will buy it.

Wow that's not very cash money of Gamefreak!

People wanting good value for money are "entitled" now are they? If you want to play the game, then great, but don't insult people who are dissatisfied with the games, it makes you just as bad as some of them. Some are happy with the game, some aren't, it's all opinions. Can't we all just be civil, without resorting to name-calling?

EDIT: And yes, people can still be fans of something AND critique it. Often the biggest critics of something are fans, because they love it too much.

It's funny how the people criticizing a product/company are the ones called "kids", "entitled", "deserve to be spanked" by the supposed coherent adults.

@Prof_Yoshtonics I got the game yesterday morning (because my store where I order games happily ignores launch dates) and finished it in roughly 13 hours, not because I play so quickly but because the game is short (it is, even Sun and Moon took me almost 20 hours to finish)

Like I already said in a different topic, Pokédex aside there are other issues like removed functionality, removed move, graphical glitches, crashes, bugs and heavy framedrops, what I also said was that I don't believe GameFreak fixing it because the 3ds games had their own issues (like framedrops) and even then they never bothered to fix it, it was already a miracle they fixed the save bug in X&Y.

I wanted to like the game, but even Let's Go felt more polished and that game wasn't perfect neither.

People can go hide behind the excuse that people that complain are whiners, or don't deserve the game and so on, too many defenders are fine with LEGIT issues with the games, even when there is proof they are wrong and I'm not even talking about the huge cut in the Pokédex, but about that they also act the same.

The problem number 1 are the people that defend this, I've seen this so many times with other franchises in the past, some died because of what they have become and others just plainly became bad games, because people will buy it anyhow.

Same happens here.

Problem number 2 is GameFreak, I really hoped they would not go the EA route and lie into peoples faces, they did and that is unacceptable.

I played the game, and people can call me a whiner if they wish too that shows more how blind they want to be to the issues with the game, than it tells me about how I am because the only 2 reasons I am truly vocal about this is because I hate liars that mess up a fine game franchise, and second I dislike when people call out others for being whiners, crybabies, elitist and so on purely for telling the truth.

Purely for caring about a franchise GameFreak does not deserve to make anymore because of what they do to that franchise.

The end.

@Zuljaras they won't look at the real gameplay, or just ignore all the issues anyhow.

The game itself aside from all the issues is fine, but that's like saying burned food is tasty because well you used good ingredients.

S&S has some good ideas (Wild Arena) and some bad (Giga big Pokémon battles)

Then there are the issues aside, performance issues, bugs, graphical glitches, pop in, framerate issues (no GF won't fix this at all believe me), lack of certain moves and animations, the game being shorter than most previous Pokémon games (shorter than Platinum, Black and White 2, Sun and Moon to name few), removal of Z moves and mega evolutions...

Sigh... and of course the "not even 50% of Pokédex" issue.

Unless you ignore the big mountain of issues, I want to like the game but I can't oversee this, and for me it is the first time a Pokémon game had so many issues that any of my enjoyment from it melted away because of the issue the moment after.

Sigh again

I tried and did ignore the Pokédex issue for those 13 hours, but the game has just too many other issues.

And no 3ds games aren't holly neither, but I don't remember any main Pokémon games being such a mess on so many regards.

The review will be interesting that’s for sure.

At the end of the day, obviously the "real fans" are content with the quality that gamefreak is putting out. It's apparent that "not real fans" have complaints and want a change in the series. I stopped playing pokemon because it's the same thing every game. Mario 64, Mario Sunshine, Mario Galaxy, and Mario Odyssey are all different games with a standard formula with different enhancements and changes to keep the series moving forward.

We as the consumer need to express our concerns, not cause we are entitled but because we care about the franchise and want to see it improve. I express my concerns by not buying the game, but after playing persona 5 and seeing the enhancements they did for the RPG genre. I can't play a pokemon game unless they make some adjustments and change up the formula.

I'll never get why they said all those lies...
We can even leave alone the models until further evidence, but...

"We are working hard on improved animation" - the animation style of SwSh is the same semplistic one of the previous entries.

"We are planning to have more balance between the Pokémon" - Asked in an interview about it, reply with "there is Dynamax" which has nothing to do with it.

"We heard the feedback that Let's go was too easy and we value such feedback" - Confirm ExpShare in the new games is mandatory (the only semi-option to influence the game difficulty in Sun and Moon).

They only had to say none of that and, while some backslash was still inevitable, they would have got half of it if not less.

This the last story of this kind I am going to bother with - VERY BORING EVERYONE!!!!!

Reading these comments....
Look, I'm not gonna insult you for buying the game. You care about pokemon. So do I. Please at least have the decency not to insult me for NOT buying it. It's okay to criticize a company. It's okay to want a franchise you enjoy to have quality products. It doesn't make anyone a whiner or entitled, there's a reason news sites like this even exist. This isn't an advertising platform, it's meant to inform people of the good AND bad.

Be thoughtful. Be kind.

@Chunkboi79 Xenoblade Chronicles 2 isn't even close. It might have half the models and 20% of the animations, and I doubt more than a handful of those models have the polygon counts of most Pokemon.

@Jugdral people on one side of any debate aren't "all" anything. Is there a drop in quality and passion? I see no evidence of either. How do you quantify these things?

What people like me want are for those raging at Game Freak to do is not just join the mob chorus without at least trying to understand it from another angle. Did GF actually seek to mislead? Probably not. So what are some possible explanations that don't include toxicity like "lazy" or "bad"?

Honestly I never really cared about graphics or cut Pokemon but I DO care about the fact GF has been going absolutely crazy with this bad PR stuff. However, I do realize they're a tiny developer studio that's hardly at fault here. I'm sad to think that Pokemon has fallen victim to greed of the higher ups, The Pokemon Company perhaps? We all know Junichi Masuda (I believe? Forgive me if I've got the wrong name) got pretty much burned out after his development freedom has gotten limited. I can't recall if it was said openly or if it was rumors and assumptions. It seems plausible to me- just compare how good gen 5 was even in the smallest details, and then XY came out which felt rushed and barebones. Imo GF is basically told to release Something, doesn't matter what. As long as it has a Pokemon in its title it's fine--TPC releases new merch and anime, it sells. Alls good. Except that's it's not because this has become a cycle that eventually leads to situations like this.
Games are getting spread thin, diluted almost. As if they were told to avoid putting too much content in one and make 2 or 3 games instead. At least half of Sun/Moon story content was originally planned for XY.

But someone made a different decision.
Well I digress. To reiterate, I'm really pissed they mislead their fans but I don't support harassing the developers and I wouldn't put the blame on GF. They're (imo) pretty much the victims here, stuck under their greedy overlords' boot.

@YozenFroghurt

But it's not useless. According to what they said, future Pokemon games will have other Pokemon from earlier games, so even if you can't use a Pokemon in this title, you still can in future games. They didn't say that your children can use all of them in a single game

@Ashunera84 Source?

I think I'll give the game a try and base my opinion on that.
If you feel aggravated, then the only option at this point is to vote with your wallet and don't buy it. Of course then you don't have the option of weighing in on the gameplay, but I doubt that will stop people.

@Ashunera84 They outright said they didn't reuse models. If they did then that means they intentionally lied.

Hopefully I won't notice and just enjoy the game as if I hadn't heard anything.
It will probably end up being one of the best selling games on Switch regardless.

@Olmectron Thank you. I think I read that same Reddit post.

The amount of Game Freak butt kissers is incredible, they're so blind to the actual problems this game has. That Reddit post laid it out well in an intelligent, mature manner. They were using what was data mined from the game, they weren't pulling this out of thin air. They have actual evidence.

The people defending Game Freak are a bunch of bullies, insulting and harassing anyone who dares voice a different opinion or bring up legitimate concerns. And then they have the nerve to say that those fans are the vicious ones! When they're actually the vicious ones. What a bunch of nasty hypocrites. Game Freak defenders are acting like cult members and they don't even seem to realize it.

Apparently Sony paid me to be vocal about my disappointment according to users on this site. Lol
https://www.reddit.com/r/pokemon/comments/dv438w/complete_list_of_all_problems_known_so_far_in/?utm_medium=android_app&utm_source=share

Someone lied to me! That's it I'm out!

@Snaplocket Bro those studios would make a bomb freakin pokemon game! Just finished Ys 8 myself and that was an incredible experience. I think I would put Monolith in charge of pokemon, they seem to have the most experience in RPGs. Their environments are out of this world and the scale of all their games are mind blowing. After I beat XCX's story I had to stop cause i got too intimidated by the grind and the extra stuff I had to do to beat the massive tyrants (I think that's what they are called).

I can't believe you, all of you!
There's an article on this... and nobody tagged me?!
Seriously, though: I don't have much to add, the situation speaks for itself.
As always: harassing Game Freak over this is bad.
Bee, ae, dee. Period.
That said, the evidence is right there. Like, all over the place.

As usual, gamers go over the top with their vitriol, but at the same time, I do think it's a very valid point how slow the progress of the Pokemon series has been, and that has been highlighted even more by how after over 20 years of waiting, the first home console mainline game doesn't feel like that big of a jump at all.

OMG Enough with the Pokémon topics...

@Thumbsofsteel The games come out in two days. There are going to be Pokemon topics.

I once was quite a big Pokémon fan due to the anime (Thanks Netflix on Wii) but that’s lessened over the years. The last Pokémon game I bought was X.

Now with all this drama, that’s going to change.

@Jugdral The thing is that it's far easier to criticize than it is to enioy something. It only gets easier with a mob.

I've been a huge supporter of the right to criticize, and I can even see where people are coming from on some fronts, and even agree! But as someone who's been looking forward to Sw/Sh, the backlash has been far more exhausting than the actual disappointment. Add to that, I've been around long enough to see when fans get a bit too passionate.

I mentioned elsewhere that this feels familiar to how folks treated Metroid Prime Federation Force: A game that caught the ire of Metroid fans; not because it was actually a legit, terrible game (it was actually decent, if not good), but solely because it showed up during a mainline Metroid drought. It (and Next-Level Games) got a worse shake than it deservered for the wrong reasons.

Yes, this is a different circumstance, but folks werent tearing this game apart this badly until they said "No NationalDex" (whether or not it's justified at this point is debatable). The kicker is that GF may not even be "lying" about their reasoning, but many are determined to prove that they are in hopes that shouting loud enough will get the NationalDex back. Because that's what all this is really about.

It'll be interesting to see what happens in Gen 9 in response to all this...

https://askagamedev.tumblr.com/post/186632316431/what-do-you-think-about-the-pokemon-sword-and

I highly recommend reading this it's pretty insightful

Another thread.. more entertainment.

The entitlement of fans is ridiculous. They offer a product, they owe you nothing. If you don't like what they've done, don't buy it, it's simple.

I agree with those who are criticizing the games (not with those threatening developers' lives), but the "funny" thing is that I'm not going to buy them not only because of all these issues, but because I'm tired to buy an incomplete game that will be replaced by a definitely improved version a year later. I think this should be the first thing that fans should criticize (obviously the fact that these games are showing more and more troubles each day makes all this worse).

Corps lying. Products not meeting deadlines. Products not meeting expectations. Never expect more out of any human than you give. Build a bridge and get over it. People have real lives with real problems. All this Pokefraud is a pissing into the wind.

@Snaplocket That was a great mario game! My favorite is Mario Odyssey solely for the fact I couldnt stop smiling when I was playing it

@Aquamine-Amarine Criticism is a good thing, and can be quite productive. I’ve seen very little criticism about S&S. Instead what we have seen have been accusations and assertions, such as Game Freak “lying” or being “lazy”. That isn’t productive, nor is something demonstrable.

@Ragdoll72 Not buying it doesn't null our opinions, nor does it change the fact that a series I have loved for twenty years is being very poorly handled. Of course I'm going to have an opinion.

There is no entitlement. Pokemon games are a product. I have bought at least one game from every pair since Gen I (save for LGP/E). I am darn well entitled to have an opinion.

@Maelwolf Graphics and lack of innovation.

Good Lord the entitlement of some people is ridiculous. When you pay your £50 the only thing you are entitled to is a functioning game. I have no doubts this game will be great fun absolutely regardless of which specific made up monsters are in it. If you have bought a Pokemon game before then guess what, Game Freak owe you nothing!

In hindsight they would have been better doing a hard reset with 150 brand new pokemon and absolutely no old ones. They would have been fully justified too.

Lied to? Are you really arguing that the model of this yellow mouse is more similar to the model of a previous yellow mouse than they said it would be? Really? How different could they possibly be! Who cares? Pathetic.

@Clamango isn't that whataboutism? dismissing one problem cause another exists?

If this is true, my Switch will be placed on eBay. I am tired of last-gen games. If I am going to pay 60 dollars I want something worth the price. My PS3 NBA 2k15 still looks better than 2k 20 on the Switch. I could buy half of a dozen PS3 games that look better for 60. To bad Pokemon Sword is already preinstalled on my Switch... Nintendo needs N64 games to make up the difference.

I don’t understand how being unsatisfied with what one views as subpar efforts of a multi-billion dollar company makes one ‘entitled’. Game Freak isn’t doing anyone a favor, they want customers to shell $60 for a game, so it’s natural to believe they should put some effort into it.

To the people are calling out pokemon fans for being entitled and what not...Just go f*** yourself at this point. You are part of the problem, because you are a blind sheep will follow GF to the gates of Hell if they asked you too.

Sword and Shield are going to be some of the biggest disappointments of the year, and I am so looking forward to the game not selling well so I can rub it in yalls face and show that yes, people were actually miffed and it's not just some "Internet rage" thing your claiming.

I honestly don't really think it is important if they lied about something like that. I know how much of savages people can be on social media when they don't like something.

@AlexSora89 What if I tag you now, too late? 😉

I'm going on Twitter and replying to every #GFlied w/ a simple
"OK, gamer." 😎

And just think... most of these people are close to, if not OF the age to vote for the leader of their country. A very sobering and scary thought.... but not at all surprising.

@Chunkboi79 did you have one? No? Didn't think so.

There are 92 total species in XC2 (according to XC2 wikia) 65ish blades, 7 playable characters. Most species have only one model, a few have model variations, a few have variations in textures or colouring. There may be 100 or so variations of human/nopon NPCs, but they mostly share the same animations as the others of their race.

There are 807 pokemon in gen 7, I don't think a single one of them shares an animation with another, at least 100 of them have appearance differences based on gender (Bulbapedia), roughly 140 different forms and 17 Alolan variants, most of which have unique animations from different forms and variants, 46 mega evolutions, and one with a randomly generated skin texture. Some pokemon have different models in the Gen 6-7 games that are used outside battle.

There are roughly 100 new pokemon and variants (probably more). There are also over 650 remaining moves that mostly have unique visuals. There are numerous animations for each pokemon (battle, pokemon amie, cutscenes) that needed to be added to for the open world and camping, and these areas are where most changes and additions were likely made.

@Primarina
Well, if you are happy buying a complete game and then buying it again, almost the same game but 'more complete', after only a few months and at the same price, good for you. I became tired of this after Platinum...

This makes me nostalgic for 1988 when I railed against Nintendo for re-using assets from Doki Doki Panic to make Super Mario Bros. 2. It totally ruined the game for everyone forever and its existence was thankfully forgotten.

@Wolfgabe that is an excellent article.

@QueenKittenWrite Calling people “part of the problem” for disagreeing with you is why you are being called out as entitled. Reviews are in, people love it, maybe it’s time for you to find a different franchise to follow if it bothers you this much?

So many babies over a freaking national Pokedex/not all Pokemon returning. Grow up or get a life.

@Primarina
I think there's a misunderstanding. First of all, same genre doesn't mean repetition. Second, I'm not talking about the franchise. Diamond is different from X, X is different from Silver, Silver is different from Moon, and so on. But I think it's objective that Platinum is Diamond/Pearl+something more, Ultrasun is Sun+something more. They are the exact dame game, with a few differences and MORE CONTENT. So yes, I can play Moon and be happy with it, but I think it's legit to be upset if after a year the same game, but with more content, arrives in the shops, and Moon becomes "old". So why should I buy Shield when I know that in late 2020/early 2021 UltraShield2 will arrive?

@Harmonie and that is fine, but show them with your wallet. If it's being "mishandled" then don't give them money.

@Ashunera84 I never was out to prove anything. I also decided to add all of the enemies by level. Including different variations of bosses, there's some blades in there, some human models. The enemies itself just by level (not including basic NPC's, nonplayable NPC's, playable characters, Nopons, non-enemy blades) it included an even 1300 enemies. Now we can research it to our hearts content but that doesn't even touch on the 40 hour expansion. It's pretty clear including the variations on some models they're pretty close.

All those models had to be developed from scratch so if Gamefreak is reusing models then it shouldn't be an issue.

I think the real issue is that if you look at the timeline for releases, Game Freak is trying to maintain an almost yearly release for Pokemon Games and that just isn't sustainable. The games are too big and eventually quality was going to take a hit.

Perhaps it might be good for them to take an extra year off to work on the issues, and try again with Pokemon Armor and Mace.

@RupeeClock They made this game in 2 god damb years. They didn't have time to fix it and work on the damn game. What it shows game Freak is releasing this game to meet fan demand. If people weren't so pushy and impatient the game would be fine. Why are people so frustrating to deal with sometimes?

@Omarzy
Ultra Sun was one of my favorite games, ever.
Pokemon was something I avoided and now enjoy as an adult player in my spare time. How you can not see enjoyment and quality in that title, the last mainline game in this franchise, is beyond me.

Maybe time to try out Yo Kai Watch series for a change of pace for a bit while Pokemon hopefully evolves the next few games, then maybe come back and enjoy it again as a new feeling?

Yawn....Yawn...Yawn .

@msvt That's actually a good idea, I was going to try out Digimon cyber slueth since I've heard a lot of really good things about it.

How DARE GameFreak's newest game exclude my absolute favorite Pokemon I play in all my games: Unowns! This is a disgrace how they treat their true fans!!

GameFreak should just go first party and only sell hardware to play PC games on.

@Chunkboi79 I have a digomon game for the PS1 (haha!!) a student of mine bought it as a gift for me when I refurbished my old systems.

it is pretty decent, more of an RPG but worth a look.

Also worth noting; I have over 600 (!) hours into Pokemon Ultra Sun!! Moving on to the older titles now starting with Platinum. Wished I had been on board with these 'Mon's since day 1 but I was a jaded gamer and seemed too kiddy to me at the time

Such a rewarding game experience and the turn based setup makes is so great for portable, one move at a time, walk away, work, etc. and come back, type gameplay loop.

@Snaplocket if you don't know all that much about game development, you can't possibly know if any of those companies would be better at making a Pokemon game.

As someone else linked, try actually hearing it from a game developer:

https://askagamedev.tumblr.com/post/186632316431/what-do-you-think-about-the-pokemon-sword-and

@Chunkboi79 you are here to prove GF is bad and/or lazy.

XC2 does not have 1300 enemy models, and suggesting it does is absurd. The expansion was exactly that - added content for an added price. Great game, great DLC, but not even remotely close to Pokemon in character models.

@Primarina Don't worry, I never wanted to start an argument. Although I think this happened more than twice: I count Crystal, Emerald, Platinum, US/UM and partially B2/W2. And however everyone can spend his/her money how they want.

Let me preface by saying that I am a huge fan of Pokemon and i'm buying both games because I know i'm gonna love it. I hated the fact that we haven't had the National Dex in game for a long time but that's from an organization standpoint so not a deal breaker. I understand new Pokemon don't work with old game but this is the first time that Old Pokemon won't work with these new games. To me at least, not a deal breaker, but GF did say that the reason was due to making all the models new and high quality. So if that wasn't true, I would be heartbroken. Just say sorry GF, i'm sure we would forgive you.

Pokemon: a game series aimed primarily at kids but enjoyed by adults who have a healthy relationship with their inner child.

Evidence: the mountain of promotional toys, bed covers, plushies, build a bear and cartoon series.

Embarrassing behaviour: getting upset that a game aimed at kids isn’t being marketed at a toxic fan base who, much like Star Wars fans are never actually happy with anything that isn’t Pokemon Gold/Silver, a game they first played as kids.

Lol the tantrums are reaching peak hilarity.

@Ashunera84 I didn't say that they had 1300 models I said enemies. I am saying for that amount of enemies itself and not even including other models of NPC's, nopons, playable characters, and blades.

The fact that Nintendolife's review mentioned that they depend too much on 20 year old game design says enough for their work ethic

@msvt I don't hate pokemon, I actually find the series very charming. I've played fire red, Soul Silver, Emerald, Y, and Let's Go. I just feel very burnt out of the same gameplay loop. Like the magic isn't there anymore :/ That's why I am looking for a change, something to breathe new life into the franchise.

@m8e3point1415 I think it's the right decision not to keep dragging around 20 years of history. It's a bit like the Star Wars films de-canonising the EU - you just cannot support that kind of baggage without the whole thing collapsing under its own weight.

But leaving that aside, there is no excuse for abuse. "Fans" are not entitled to get what they want. GameFreak should be free to make a terrible game. I mean, it should do badly, if it's terrible, but there's normal disappointment and there's internet disappointment.

@rjejr
Well, the video I embedded is right there for everyone to see.

Dangit! How will I be able to catch all 807 Pokemans now?

Interesting that me, as a pkmn fan and player from day one, gives not a sh** about there being no national pokedex in this game, nor do I care that the models aren't all "brand-new-rebuilt-from-the-ground-up-with-that-new-pokemon-smell". These seem like trivial things to be whining about! Is this not a game built for ppl to play and have fun with? Or is this some socio-political device that all of the video game SJWs need to complain about? Get over it and play, or don't play, the game... in the end your internet screeching will hold little to no sway over the final product.

Remember those future proof models? Let’s say that those models couldn’t work on switch and they had to make them again, taking up development time. If this is how it happened, I completely understand. But would it hurt to give us an good, honest explanation.

Gosh, and here was me thinking it was just a video game. No biggie, don’t like it? Don’t buy it, not really a hard concept

@Clamango With the heat death of the universe always slowly approaching, I don't know why you have the spare mental energy to worry about other people complaining about a pooey video game.

@Chunkboi79 number of enemies is irrelevant...

"Depending on 20 year old game design" to one person is "staying true to what made it great" to another. This is subjective. You can like or dislike or not feel the "magic" all you want, and that's totally fine, but don't try to say Xenoblade having 1300 uniquely named enemies is akin to Pokemon having 1100 unique models and 1000 animation sets (of a dozen or more animations each - not counting humans or moves).

The funny thing is, Game Freak probably did rebuild all of the pokemon from the ground up to be nearly identical and occasionally improved from the 3DS versions because the the way Switch handles graphics is not backwards compatible with the way 3DS did it. Chances are GF didn't lie about anything at all despite all the people out there trying to rile people up and "prove" they are just reusing assets.

I agree with comments #7, #8, #14, #19, #31, #44, #76, #85, #101, #109, #134 and #155.

Nothing wrong with re-using the 3DS models, they still look really good.
It is wrong to claim you're totally reworking animations/models when you aren't.
And if you are re-using assets anyways, why isn't the whole pokedex here?

When they said that there were "new animations", they weren't lying.
I never heard Game Freak saying they wanted to rework everything. Why would they change iconic and already perfect gestures and mimics or an already perfect polygon model? Pretty farfetch'd dreams these Pokémaniacs have.

@Ashunera84 You're doing a lot of assuming, I am not saying that the 1300 different enemies means all of the models are different. All I was saying is that despite the variations there's 1300 different enemies in Xenoblade Chronicles 2 not including other models at all. I am going to assume it's pretty close (yes I am also doing a lot of assuming). I am not going to sit here and act like Pokemon doesn't have a ton of models. XC2 regardless of the amount of models, which I am not going to take the time to try to validate the claim that Xenoblade has as many models as Pokemon. However, now that almost half of the national dex got axed what's the excuse now for having the same cookie cutter animations, models, and empty not dynamic environmental design.

However, Sakurai had to rebuild every character in Sm4sh. Now granted they didn't have as many character models. The development team did improve upon animations, textures, and other effects in the process. To rebuild assets the same exact way and then say "we're focusing our resources on new and improved animations" doesn't make any sense.

@Chunkboi79 Xenoblade has much less than half of gen 7. Objectively. Less than Sword and Shield.

Please read the article that was linked twice now. Please, educate yourself. I've explained it. I have game developer friends. A game developer explained it very thoroughly in that article.

Why was it axed?

Switch is not backwards compatible with 3DS, so assets had to be modified substantially or entirely recreated, both of which take a lot of time. Junichi Masuda said they were remaking models from scratch. There is no reason to believe otherwise. He also said they were making new animations and improving old ones. This is objectively true, with 100 new pokemon and character and NPC models and animations for moves.

As I said, anyone is more than welcome to dislike the game, but saying cutting half the pokemon is lazy reeks of ignorance.

@Prof_Yoshtonics Uhhhh, maybe all the mouth breathers will buy it but I’m not interested. If it had the full Pokédex then screw it, I’d bite. But as it is? Heck no.

@Ashunera84 Marketing materials will always lead people to believe that the devs are the good guys. Sorry but I’m leaning towards the laziness/rushed aspect. We all know they are gonna make another Pokémon game after this. Why didn’t they put in the extra year to make SS really stellar, a game to remember?

Oh, because all these drooling Pokémon fans don’t care about quality, otherwise they would stop buying the garbage that Game Freak churns out, year after year.

@Unit_DTH Interesting that people can have different opinions about the same topic. Your internet shrieking isn’t changing the world, either. Please step off your too high horse.

@Yorumi I linked why it "can't just read the data" earlier, as did someone else. Most game devs from any competing company could tell you.

There are more than just pokemon movement animations in the game. Pokemon Colosseum models were MUCH lower quality. There's definitely some rose coloured glasses thing going on for you.

@Mr_Muscle this isn't marketing material. Read it and understand, or don't and enjoy being wrong in your anger.
https://askagamedev.tumblr.com/post/186632316431/what-do-you-think-about-the-pokemon-sword-and

As long people hold grudges there always salty and a pain..

@Yorumi they were subjectively higher quality because you liked them more and that's it. No technical reason they were higher quality.

But there weren't as many. Pokemon didn't really walk, or fly or have emotions or really anything other than enter battle/faint animations, maybe 2-3 attack animations, an idle animation, and maybe 2 "being hit" animations.

Have you used Pokemon Amie or Pokemon Refresh? There are more animations for playing with your pokemon in that alone than there were in the entire Colosseum game. They have the same number of battle animations, and have walking/running/flying etc. for outside battle or for the new camping feature.

@Ashunera84 Sorry, what anger? I’m not buying the game so I don’t even have a dog in the race. But I do enjoy pointing out people that blindly defend this BS.

@Yorumi Breloom punched with its tail. Many moves both then and now used generic animations. I played a ton of Colosseum and literally have it a foot away from me right now. Stadium, on the other hand, had more move-specific animations. But it also had only 151 pokemon (251 in 2), much lower polygon counts, only 1/4 the moves, and never made a leap to a new console.

@Mr_Muscle you've clearly taken a side despite logic pointing out that "gamefreaklied" is, itself, a lie, and that sensationalizing those claims is a disservice to reasonable discourse. I'd say you have a dog in this race, for whatever reason.

I can't speak for others, but I certainly don't "blindly defend" anything. I'll reserve judgment for when I actually play the game. I didn't blindly defend Borderlands 3's embarrassing release problems (many of which persist) despite loving that franchise, but I will happily point people towards facts and reason when they spout useless drivel like literally every attempt at "proof" that GF is lazy or lying.

Eh... "higher quality animations" has just about nothing to do with polygon counts, it's about movement of skeletal rigs over time. And "similar" polygon counts mean there are changes to the models as well. Where is this lie? I feel like "people" don't know what a lie is, and all they count on is that it sure sounds powerful to accuse someone of it.

(Apologies if this was all covered in comments, this is just a drop in and leave kinda thing...)

@Ashunera84 If you can disprove the lie, go ahead. However, you are yet to fill anyone in on any credible source other than a link to an iffy article and "my friend is a dev so I must know what I'm talking about." Yeah sure, my friend is the President of Insomniac Games, but I still don't claim to know his job better than him, and I certainly don't use that as leverage in conversations with others.

I don’t think I’ve seen so much hate over something so little... but I’m a newbie to Pokémon, so I’m not qualified to know better

@Galenmereth "The funny thing is, had Game Freak listened to all its fans for all these years, we'd be left with a complete mess of a game not accessible to anyone, anywhere, but the most fanatically involved minority."

Yes, a Pokemon game with difficulty settings, skippable tutorials, easy-to-use multiplayer, and a robust post-game would be an unplayable mess.

There are genuine problems with the Pokemon franchise that Game Freak has been ignoring. Dexit was simply the straw that broke the Camerupt's back.

@Mr_Muscle lmao... my "too high horse", probably wanna learn those old adages and how they are worded. I wasn't shrieking, I was stating my opinion, again "MY OPINION" not anyone else's, about those that are shrieking and about the fact that this, ultimately, is an argument over assets of a video game and people complaining about something that should not impact their day to day lives enough to garner this kind of animosity. These are games meant to be enjoyed by all people regardless of whether or not they are reusing old assets, or just updating them. Have we gotten so off course that we can't just be excited to play a new game? Or do we all have to be so overly opinionated that companies disdain even bringing a new game to market?
I wasn't trying to add to the din of the internet's shriek, but whenever anyone posts online that is what it becomes. Oh well. Have a nice day!

@Unit_DTH I don't think I need to know half of what you wrote, but thanks.

You're really milking it now, NL.

@Ashunera84
... I didn't use the word "all" anywhere in my post. I also did not generalize, I specifically said "almost" so everyone wasn't included. This is to say the majority of posts I've seen have been that way. Your post is ironic because it's saying you want people to stop being a mob chorus and listen to what others have to say, but you're responding to my post, which is me, someone who thinks Pokemon is being lazy, saying I've not seen almost anyone refuting it.

@Galenmereth I don't agree fully, seeing as how the only issues aren't with the lag and such, and you can find many other things with the trailers and datamine, but this is a fair stance.

@DTFaux I definitely don't condone harassing people, I don't get why anyone would go to that level. (although you can argue that people who defend Pokemon have been harassing some people criticizing Pokemon by ganging up on their posts and making fun of them, but that's not something I want to argue.)
I personally don't care very much about the Pokedex, so maybe my opinion doesn't matter, but I've personally seen a lot of people way too passionate and toxic on both sides. I've felt like Pokemon started to get lazy since after gen 5 (starting with XY I mean), but it wasn't a popular opinion to have until recently. I've been watching for years as everyone culted behind Pokemon for everything, and people, even fairly well followed Pokemon youtubers, would call out random people in their videos for daring to think anything could be wrong with perfect pokemon. I think pokemon has been lowering in quality, and even more so since their apps, they seem to have very little passion for this. Let's not forget they've been working on a few apps right beside this.
I've seen people say that the dex is just what started this, and I agree with that. Whether the critiques are justified or not is up to interpretation, but imo GF is long overdue for some criticism, because it seems to me like they think they can do whatever they want and people will still buy it. Which is still true. So they least the fandom can do is give some critique.

So much hate in these comments today.

Y'all need to stop trying to censor criticism and hide behind the proverbial "shield" of, "Pokemon Fans are all insane" or "Gamers are just so entitled".

If your internet company went from offering unlimited data, to capping at 50gb of data and charged you more, saying "Well, now the internet speed is CRAZY fast!" and you find out that, no the internet speed isn't any faster, they just hiked the price up, cut your data, and lied to your face about it, you'd be no doubt infuriated and feel betrayed (As well you SHOULD feel that way!). This is the same type of scenario in a different, non game-centric situation.

Without criticism, we cannot grow and be better. A good example of something taking criticism and just absolutely making the best possible change is the Sonic Movie. The character design was uncanny as heck and didn't appeal to classic OR modern fans (generally speaking). They took time, delayed the final product, hired someone who is a massive fan of the property, and FIXED IT. He looks AMAZING now! We wouldn't have gotten this if there was no criticism.

So before you hastily type up a reply to curse me for defending the criticism, maybe take a moment to reflect on what COULD be if there was no criticism in the world.

I love that this is all over, not only a game, but a game that was always primarily aimed at children. People need to check their priorities.

@Mr_Muscle some weird logic you got going on here. Are you trying to prove yourself wrong?

Everyone claiming GF is lying is claiming to know Masuda's job better than him. I'm not. I'm pointing out what actual game devs have said on the matter.

Ask A Game Dev has been giving excellent insights into game development for years. It's not "iffy".

"Updating your engine so it uses modern physics, modern shaders, better animation based solutions, different kind of lighting etc REQUIRES you to check every single old asset you are importing, thats unavoidable! Maybe the polycount needs to be changed, maybe the rigs are acting funky, maybe the textures dont work well with the new lights, maybe all new materials for every creature need to be made." - Xavier Garcia, EA. Just one example.

@JugOfVoodoo
Difficulty settings - not really an elegant solution - here's why: https://www.google.com/amp/s/indiewatch.net/2016/06/08/why-difficulty-settings-are-bad-design/amp/
Skippable tutorials - a tiny fraction of games are spent in tutorials in the long run. While I personally like to be able to skip them, it's rarely more than a minor inconvenience.
Robust post-game - Pokemon defined the robust post-game. Finishing the Pokedex. Battle Tower. Competitive battles and tournaments. ORAS and USUM had meaty post-game chapters. And despite any efforts they may make in that direction, 90% of players are finished with the game before they even get there.

@Azikira constructive criticism is good, and Sonic does look great now, but toxic criticism (combatively suggesting GF are a bunch of lazy liars with) is not. The saying "A little knowledge is a dangerous thing" applies very heavily to this situation.

@Ashunera84 I fully agree that toxic criticism isn't good. The extremes for both sides of the argument are, I'd like to say the very vocal minority for the situation. I'm sitting solidly in camp "disappointment" as I don't think the cuts are worth the additions, but I'm also not going to literally send threatening messages to anyone on the development team. I feel like my criticisms are valid and I've gone in very level-headed as to not totally skew my arguments.

Yeah, this is why I stay away from twitter and the like. There's always a group of people making a huge drama about something, as if their "campaigns" mattered. And worse when it gets people jumping on a bandwagon without checking their facts.

I don't care about about Pokemon at all, but I hope this doesn't turn out like the stupid MK11 microtransaction hate bandwagon that got a lot of people riled up about a non-existent issue that some individual made up based on wrong data.

Honestly, i dont mind thaaat bad the dexcut, even with a good bunch of my pokes removed. What i really mind is the comments of GF of this decition and the evidence surfaced online that contradicts it. I liked the idea of investing in "high quality animations" that could last other 6-8 years and eventually have the rest of the pokes in future gens. But all of this seems to much to really stand for GF. Heck, smash bros, zelda to name other games, hired external studios to help in the development cycle. I cant believe that this couldnt be done with the biggest and more profitable franchise in the world. I love pokemon but i wont support swsh. I hope to change my mind with the revisions.

@Wolf_Link the evidence isn't really evidence of anything if you understand game development. It's a fundamental misunderstanding of the process.

It's interesting to me that people criticizing these games are actually able to point to all the very obvious flaws that they don't have to conjecture about: all of the evidence is out in the open. And yet, the people defending these games resort to an ad hominem in almost every comment I see here, with absolutely nothing to actually disprove the criticism.

In the words of Murray from Stranger Things: CHILDREN, CHILDREN

@AlexSora89 I tried watching that video but 3 minutes was all I could take of that guys voice, too nasal or fake YTer or something.

Just don't buy it. It obviously wasn't enough of a priority for a company that makes so much money on the franchise they could have doubled or tripled the staff with plenty of money to spare but they were too cheap.

@QueenKittenWrite what the heck are you talking about? I pointed out that calling players that disagree with you “part of the problem” is why people are calling you entitled. Do you understand that? You are asserting that there is a problem, and that anyone that disagrees with you is part of it. That is a bald assertion you have not backed up, the burden of proof is on you.

As for your other strange rant, my point was that if you are getting this upset over a subject, really any subject, it’s probably healthy to take a step back. You seem to be having some emotional issues with this topic, and that can be detrimental to your mental wellbeing.

I wish you well, hopefully you don’t let this continue to affect you so negatively.

Criticizing a product isn't entitlement or whining. It's the reason critics even exist.

Be kind, stop insulting people over having different interests.

And stop calling people sheep or shills for enjoying it.

Eh, I was going to buy but having looked at gameplay as well as issues, there's no chance unless there's a serious patch for the poor textures, animations, pop in and graphical errors. Doesn't matter how much work they had to put in if it is true they reanimated every single one from scratch, they still need to finish the game! Can't believe the asinine attitudes of those backing this garbage as if it's the next coming of a prophet.
Also, on a personal gripe, I really wanted them all ti be to scale in the wild and have some interact with the environment. Imagine going to a hidden area post-game and seeing Rayquaza flying around like in Shadow of the Colossus? Obviously there couldn't be too many legendaries like that having their own area, it would be too much which is why SotC was what it was. This is why dex cut didn't bother me, because it still could be great and the number of monsters would grow again. They could even use the same engine in sequels but just change region, wild Pokemon and such. That way it could all be done and fun, but this is not acceptable. I have already made the few people I know that were going to buy this aware of the issues because I honestly don't feel this is a finished product.

To think the actual reasoning is right here, which even says the models and animations aren't the main reason:

https://www.nintendolife.com/news/2019/06/pokemons_junichi_masuda_explains_the_decision_to_limit_sword_and_shields_pokedex

I think it's shameful that it's glossed over.

@rjejr
Who, Arlo? Are you kidding? Arlo is Nintendo personified.

Sounds like alotta people need to grow up...I'll be picking up both copies tommrow.

@LUIGITORNADO game isnt a mess.game will sell well

@AlexSora89 Which one is Arlo, the 1 with a face like a shield or the 1 w/ the sword in his mouth?

I think we can quite happily classify this particular comment section as a bloodbath!

Wow.

This is going to get me in trouble, But someone has to say it! GET A FREAKING LIFE! There more things In life to worry about then some stupid video game. It's these types of gamers that make me hate the modern gaming culture.

@AstralSoul13 Really? I don't even recall not being able to at least re-catch the old mon in this game or trade for it. I'm thinking of like restarting one of my Ultra Sun/Moon to catch and/or breed new Pokemon to add to Pokemon Home when it comes out but with all these changes I'd rather not invest the time in the off chance they change something that hinders my plan of a living dex with my new trainer name on the Switch.

@rjejr
It's... the blue... muppet.

@AlexSora89 LOL

I asked my kids if they watched Arlo, they said no, maybe once.

If my kids don't watch Arlo, I don't know Arlo. 😉

@Prof_Yoshtonics What a pawn.

@BionicDodo Being made for children is not a valid excuse for a subpar product, and never will. Lose the argument.

@rjejr
Arlo is amazing, though. He's just fun to listen.

@AlexSora89 "to listen"

Well what he's saying may be fun, but I can't listen to that voice. Nothing personal against Arlo, he just has one of those YT voices I abhor. It's like how my wife feels about open mic poetry nights. She had to stop going to them w/ me b/c every open mic poet has the same exact open mic poet speech pattern. It never bothered me until she brought it up, but she's right, it's aggravating.

@rjejr
Next thing I know, you'll be hating on Luigi for that exact reason.

@AlexSora89 Nobody can hate Luigi for any reason.

@rjejr
Atta boy!