A New Limited-Time Pokémon Sword And Shield Distribution Event Has Begun

The more I reflect on Sword and Shield, the more I grow to despise them, especially after playing Legends Arceus.

Oh right! I still have to do the expansion pass!

Only 'worth' downloading if you want a free Choice Scarf.

I recently went back to Shield for the expansion pass and to get Master ball ranking on the single and doubles battle tower. Dracovish is a pretty good mon, I'll gladly take this.

A distribution for the event-exclusive monkey would be appreciated.

People are underestimating the power of Dracovish. That thing has the strongest water attack in the entire game, and can decimate teams if it somehow gets a +2 in speed. Which is why it comes with choice scarf.

Hey cool one my favorites of gen 8 I already have one though. Mostly with the same move set and item. Seriously dracovish can be a monster in competitive I recommend not sleeping on this one!

@RubyCarbuncle that already happened last year

People can hate on swsh all they want but for me this is the game that got me into competitive pokemon and I will forever love them for that. Also base game just plain sucks, once you get the expansion pass its a whole different beast, the game was just not complete without it.

I've owned a few Pokémon games because I've always wanted to get into such a popular series, but I'd always quickly lose interest. I bought Pokémon X and played it for maybe 30 minutes. I got Let's Go Pikachu and played it for maybe around 5 hours. I got Shining Pearl and played it for like 15 minutes. It's kind of a waste of money to keep getting them, but I always bail before giving myself a chance to really stick with it. I put it down after the first play session, and then I think about all the other games I could be playing instead, and then I never pick it back up.

So naturally, I did what any sane person would do, and I picked up my fourth Pokémon game. I am absolutely addicted to Legends Arceus and can hardly put it down. It's so freaking satisfying, and the gameplay loop is addicting. Once I finish, I'm planning to go back to the other ones I already have and give them a fair chance. I'm really gonna stick with it this time. And despite all the criticism, I honestly might pick up Sword and Shield at some point. I don't really like playing games on old hardware, so if I make my first playthrough of a "traditional" Pokémon game the one on Switch that has some open-world elements, I think I'd be satisfied enough with it. At the very least, I'll probably be getting Scarlet/Violet. I'm somewhat interested in Snap and Mystery Dungeon, but I don't know if they're for me or not.

Maybe none of the other games will grab me. But, I'm glad I've finally found at least one Pokémon game that really resonates with me. I felt so left out when all my high school classmates--the popular kids and sports jocks--were all playing Pokémon Go, something that was actually super nerdy and even Nintendo, but I just couldn't get into it myself. It also sucked seeing Pikachu and so many other Pokémon characters in Smash and just having no attachment to them whatsoever. I never picked any of them.

I just caught my first Pikachu in Legends Arceus, and it felt kinda surreal for the first time in my life to be like, "Ayyyyyy, there he is baby, let's goooo!" when I couldn't care less about him before. I really wanna get into the franchise as a whole if I can. It's a weird feeling to desperately want to like something because everyone else likes it and you feel like you should too, but you're just not a fan of it no matter how hard you try. But, I'm getting there...kinda.

@RubyCarbuncle Agreed. There are plenty of games I haven't liked, but I don't go out of my way to repeat it online. Some people just can't separate themselves from negativity.

@RubyCarbuncle " I wish these people would stop commenting if they don't like them. If I don't like something I don't say anything it really isn't that hard."

This response to people complaining I really don't like. Sure I get that you hate seeing negative comments but if people don't voice their opinions of something then changes to games won't happen. Do you think No Man Sky would be a success now without people voicing their opinions?

Now there is a point where you can go way too far. When someone begins to insult someone's appearance and start sending death treats then that is the point where you should just don't say anything. We get that you may not like things in a game but as soon as you go down that path you lost any argument you may have no matter how valid they are.

Already have a great shiny battle ready one but sure i will grab this if i can remember later.

Thanks for the heads up NintendoLife, I wouldn't have known otherwise.

Already loaded and downloaded.

@RubyCarbuncle Yeah, pretty crazy people would bring up things they don't like about Sword & Shield on articles about or closely related to Sword & Shield. Pretty annoying to talk about a subject when the articles relate to that subject, right?

@Silly_G Especially since the Pokémon Club Newsletter can't seem to figure out how to distribute emails... haven't gotten a single one from them with the box checked for emails.

@shoeses : Precisely why I’m irate about it. I did manage to get the Shiny Zacian/Zamazenta codes that were distributed by EB/GameStop Ireland though (and I’m not Irish ).

@Silly_G I did too thankfully. At this point they should just make public Mystery Gift codes for the special Zarude & Shiny Celebi and run it for a year since they messed it up twice, somehow.

It's hard to defend or support Pokémon when they can't even get mass emails right, even more frustrating as a fan & someone who grew up on their stuff. (Especially when there's a single missing Pokémon in your Home Dex because of it.)

Not to continue the trend of being the downer in a SwSh thread, but another side to this; isn't this rather redundant by this point? The game has been out for years now, anyone and everyone intent on getting the thing has done so already and it can be found rather simply in the regular game as is. There isn't much special about this one other than I'm going to assume it's in one of those Cherish Balls, if you are such a hardcore collector to care about those.

They got a new generation coming literally this year. Seems a little late to be pushing for SwSh content NOW is all I'm saying. Especially some tournament mon from two years ago that will relatively shortly be out of style in the new game(s).