Pokémon Legends: Z-A Trailer Confirms Starters And Mega Evolutions, Coming Late 2025

Looks actually alright imo (for a Pokemon game at least) graphically and also seems to run fine.
Wonder what the gameplay loop/exploration will look like when the entire game takes place inside a city

Also two Gen 2 starters is an interesting decision. Wonder why they didn't go with a Gen 4/7/8 starter instead

Certainly interesting to not choose Piplup or Snivy for the theme of Kalos.

This game doesn't look exactly finished but what were you expecting with Legends Arceus AND Scarlet/Violet both being released a couple years ago, and this was likely a project worked on alongside Gen 10 so it wasn't TPC's focus. Hopefully it'll be a $50 game but since it's Pokemon it's sure to be $60.

The only good thing about the Pokemon Presents is that this pretty much confirms Gen 10 will not be this year so maybe it won't be completely unfinished this time.

I feel like the battling is a step back from Legends Arceus. At the very least I don’t like how zoomed out the camera is.

Why did they removed cyndaquil?

The framerate looked really rough and the battle system seemed really clunky.
This wasn't a flattering 1st look in my opinion.

It had to step down due to allegations against it.

Late 2025 means we won't be seeing Gen 10 for a while.
Good.
After the swing-and-a-miss of Scarlet/Violet, Gen 10 should have as much development time as humanly possible.

@AndreyBoarao Cyndaquil was in Legends Arceus

If the whole game is based in one big city then my hype has dropped off a cliff.

I predict, like the last time, this Legends game will have elements of the battle system that will be way, way better than the base games, but that the base games will continue to not implement them and suck ass.

Not having the same combat system as PLA and not being set in the past are at least addressing two of the things I don't like about that game, but going to need to see more to convince me to get this one.

Plus it's nice to see Chikorita finally get some love. One of my favorite Pokemon ever but it's always been pretty aggressively useless, hopefully whatever it gets in this one helps.

@AndreyBoarao The best assumption is Cyndaquil's not in this because it was used as an Arceus starter. Bit random they've used two starters from the same generation this time though, it's not shaking things up the way we thought they could.

Did anyone notice Eternal Floette? Guess they ended up running a hotel. 😂😂

...they could have replaced Totodile with Popplio or something to make it match Arceus more, right? I wonder why they chose these starters

I'm glad ma boi Tepig is in it but I was really hoping for a Black and White announcement....

It looks okayish but I need to see more before I'm sold. The Mega Evolutions already are a point against it for me, that just doesn't belong in Pokémon imho.

I'll hold off on judging it for now though. They can still win me over.

@PikminMarioKirby You make the games sound much worse than they actually are.

I liked what I saw, but I need to see more because it didn't exactly grip me the same way that Arceus did.

Hoping two Gen 2 starters means we're getting Johto remakes...

I was initially concerned when I heard the game takes place exclusively in one city of X/Y, but it appears they're making sure the city is truly as open as we originally imagined it being back in 2013. The Wild Areas is an interesting approach, and it's also interesting how the battles are being handled this time around. Having two Johto starters is...a bizarre choice. Have nothing against them, but I would've thought they'd include a starter from a different gen to match how Legends Arceus did it.

My primary concern really is the visuals and potentially framerate. Both Legends Arceus and Scarlet/Violet suffered major framerate issues, to a point where they can be unplayable at times. My expectations are hoping the framerate is at least dropping at more tolerable/smaller amounts, but what I actually hope for is a consistent 30 FPS bare minimum. Also, for the love of Arceus, make sure this game is nowhere as buggy as Scarlet/Violet was. Regardless, looking forward to playing this when it comes out!

Arceus' style was refreshing and the ability to go through a whole region meant lots of variety. Exploring caves, traversing rivers, clambering up mountains... that exploration was part of what made Arceus so frigging awesome.

This... doesn't look like any of that. Kinda worried.

I was late watching Pokemon Direct so I speed up the video by 2 times to catch up.
The handphone stuffs just zero interest for me, glad I already speed up + double tap to skip the handphone stuffs.
The Legend Z-A looked decent to me, not sure it will be more interesting than Legends Archeus considering the place of Z-A only inside the Lumiose city, not the outside of the whole world of Pokemon X/Y.

So... are we gonna have... Mega Meganium?

What was the final bit even teasing lol

@Dringo I'm with you on that, the game looks good and interesting, but I still can't picture the wild areas being as expansive as all the island locations we had in Arceus, they look very small.
I'm sure it's just a feeling, I can't see them dialing it back so much from what was done before, but it does leave us worried for now

>Tue 15th Oct 2024 "I will laugh 'til my lungs pop and eat a shoestring if GameFreak makes the Gen 2 starters available in Gen 10 except the Cyndaquil line."
>The Gen 2 starters are in trailer except Cyndaquil.
Jesus Christ, looks like I'm going to eat a shoestring today. See you all.

Still hoping for a quick 'n' easy HD port of X/Y to release ahead of Z-A later this year. There's a whole generation of young fans who would have never played them (not to mention many of the Switch devotees who slept on the 3DS/Wii U).

Plzplzplzplzplzplz...

This is a game made for OG Switch. I honestly don't know if it candle handle what they are trying to do with the new battle system.

I honestly thought it would be mid year. Late 2025 was a surprise to me. Hopefully that extra time will help but I doubt it.

I’m surprised everyone loves it…

Personally, don’t know what I was expecting… but I wanted a game that felt, fresh.

ZA seems… stale.

Meh, fairly unimpressed with what I saw. This is like the bare minimum they could've shown. Two Johto starters is certainly a choice, and I don't really like any of the three that much (maybe some good variants will change that). I guess I'll choose Totodile. No new Pokemon or Megas shown whatsoever. Only remotely interesting announcement is the real time battling system, that is something Pokemon needs to experiment with. And WTF did they do to AZ?

Pretty much showed the bare minimum they could've and the game feels like it might be bare minimum effort. We had a gap year for this? There should still be some cool stuff in the usual June/August trailer but right now there's not much hype about this reveal.

I don't find modern urban environments particularly interesting to explore, especially with this kind of art style, unless you can interact/free-roam inside the buildings more than them just being resource shops and base locations. I need to be able to run through the library, the supermarket, the bank, the museum, catching Pokémon as I go. I'm not expecting this game to enable that, so I'm less hyped than for the setting we got for Arceus.

And the whole parkour thing? One minute TPC is hoping to teach kids to brush their teeth, the next they're inspiring rooftop running and jumping. While I get the idea adds an element of fun and excitement, but I think I prefer Pokémon when it takes the more wholesome approach.

Personally, I'm happy to see the game based in an open city rather than the entire Kalos region. A more dense and feature rich area such as a city should hopefully make scenery and areas seem less dull because I found the areas in Arceus (and SV) were a little bit barren and felt like a slog to traverse.
Anyway, a few other points-

• looks like we'll be collecting zygarde cells that are hidden around the city. I hope it's more fun than collecting spirits for Spiritomb
• I like there's wild areas where you can still battle, catch and train. Also glad they aren't hostile because I got real sick of that in PLA
• Before anyone says 'why isn't it on Switch 2'. Keep in mind TPCi tend to release a game long after a new console releases (BW2, USUM). Besides, it'll run on Switch 2 anyway. Probably best to let GF work with what they have rather than throw them immediately into Switch 2 development
• I do like that it's a sequel to XY. XY felt like it had several loose ends that needed tying up- the ghost girl, the letter at the train station, Zygardes origins, AZs story etc

Bad graphics, poor performance, sound effects that are 30 years old and no voice acting.

That's what you would expect from this small indie studio.

Man, I feel like the minority here, I’m really excited for this! X was my first Pokémon game, so I have a soft spot for Kalos already, and I thought the game looked great! Maybe a little rough around the edges, but I couldn’t see anything too bad with it. Battle system looks amazing, I’m very excited for this.

Hmmm, I'm not sure how I feel about this yet. If I'm being honest, I didn't really enjoy Legends Arceus as much as any of the other Switch era Pokemon but I hope this one will vibe better with me.

The game looks very good graphically, I'm a little concerned that it looks less open that Legends Arceus, but I'm still excited.

Graphically and performance-wise, I'm expecting about as much as I did from Legends: Arceus, which I'm fine with.

Gameplay-wise, I'm very intrigued about the new battle system. It should be a lot more engaging than the traditional turn-based method.
I'd better get my Fennekin though!

Darn it, how am I ever supposed to give Chikorita a chance if they keep putting it up against my favorite 0 IQ reptile? Other than that, the game looks a little flatter and less open than I was expecting, but I didn't notice any major visual flaws or performance issues, and the new battle system seems pretty cool.

To get the low-hanging fruit out of the way, the game is extremely ugly, and I'm not hopeful about the performance considering how much Scarlet/Violet ***** the bed in any area that was even remotely populated. But Legends Arceus was ugly and performed poorly too, and I still liked it, so that's not a deal breaker.
Any spin on the old battle system is welcome. I remember in Arceus it was all about manipulating the turn order with strong and speedy strikes, which was cool, but in practice most fights boiled down to which pokemon could steamroll the other first.

Being able to maneuver in battle and replacing the turn order with an ATB system looks really promising. Potentially we'd have to start using our brains again lol, but we'll see.

I'm calling it here and now though: despite the game being set in a city, there will be sub 20 interiors we can enter in the entire game.

Love having our attacks mapped to the ABXY buttons now.

@LadyCharlie Exactly my thoughts, let Pokémon actually let their mainlines cook. I haven’t bought a Pokemon mainline in years because of how rough they look.

@AndreyBoarao (Beat me to it!) Yeah, it all has to wait until the investigation into Typhlosion concludes.

@LikelySatan Username checks out with that opinion, big L

Man this looks rough as hell. Looks like a bunch of individual assets acting independently of one another as usual, instead of creating a coherent universe where everything interacts together.

Can't really tell this game apart from arceus or the one with the pokemon that turns into a bike, game freak should aim for a different art style, specially with this spin offs. Time for a shake off!

So there's the November game. No game for February, but I'm sure we'll have multiple in 2's launch lome up to make up the difference

@Zaruboggan That confused me as well. I’m gonna be that guy and say I have a sneaking suspicion that it’s a Gen 10 tease.

@IronDaughter Technically, Z-A is still Gen 9, so no need to stew your laces.

Looks like a must have. Looking forward to it.

A decade late, but the closest thing to a third version of the Gen VI duology is finally here I suppose.

Jesus, it looks like another copy and paste of previous games.
Can Game Freak try to improve it? At least a little bit?

Tempted to pick Chikorita to make it harder seeing as how PLA was too easy.

@LeJuiceCup I mean, ofc it's not the popular opinion. It's a Nintendo site and a new Pokemon...mod? Season? Is this one game or two versions of the same game for sycophants who buy both versions to trade with themselves? I bought Arceus because it had some integrity and released as an honest, one off game. I mean, still thought it was a low effort, pathetic joke, considering how much money the series makes...but at least it has a bit of integrity. Like, a waft of it.
This looks like a fan game.

My only complaint so far from what I have seen, is the wild zones. That green barrier is annoying to look at in this setting. I really hope the barrier can be turned off, but I doubt that.

Yeeeep I’m hyped.
Also I have fond memories of Pokémon X&Y, Me and my sister got both on launch day and that was the first Pokémon game I ever beat.
Also the more ARPG combat system is really interesting since the Pokémon franchise never tried that before. And the fact that you can actually catch Pokémon even after they faint is pretty cool.
Also when was AZ so tall and lanky?

Also guys the game is coming out in late 2025.
Chances are all the kinks will be ironed out by the time of release.

Weird to see two Gen 2 starters. I'm definitely going for Totodile and/or Tepig. No hate for Chikorita though but it's definitely going to be my least choice out of the 3.

Really wonder how the game would go with it just being around Lumiose City though this could be a mini sanbox game. Hopefully there are other unique areas

Eh....think I'm going to wait until the next mainline entry. I looks interesting but it's one of my least favourite gens, and I just don't like Mega Evolutions. Cool you went into OP mode, I would do that but the Pokémon I like didn't get given one/I haven't found the very specific stone for this one yet.

It looks pretty rough. This needs some more time in the oven. Hopefully they take the time to polish things out.

I’m excited that it is a sequel, as I didn’t expect that or get a sense of that from previous trailers. Looks interesting. I may need to dig out X and beat it though lol.

Tl;Dr - I'm cautiously optimistic and love that this is a sequel to X/Y, but I need to see more first.

I'll need to see more on this one before truly passing judgment, but so far I think Pokemon Legends: Z-A looks promising! I like the modern city setting; I know some can feel that cities can "gate" gameplay, but that depends on the implementation. The catch mechanics I enjoyed in PLA are still there, plus it looks like the game may lean more heavily into battles this time around; this was one of my few complaints with PLA. And of course, Mega Evolution, my favorite Pokemon gimmick, is returning.

I'm also okay with the release being pushed off until later this year. Not only because this gives me more breathing room to play my backlogged copy of Pokemon Scarlet, but also because I think Gen 10 needs to wait longer before making an appearance.

Headline references the starters, article says nothing about them :/

A single grand city has potential for a setting, but this looks like an incremental improvement over SV at most, with cookie cutter mountain geometry replaced by building geometry. And with trademark clunky GameFreak animation & traversal. A generic teleporter to warp you to the rooftops is an unbelievably lazy solution. They couldn’t find a better way to move vertically in the entire Pokemon universe?

The one thing that got a pop from me, fully real time battles, was immediately followed up by showing the 30ft long rock snake Onix, standing only about twice the height of the player. Just incredible how stubbornly they refuse to scale gameplay space to allow for the size extremes of their IP, Pokemon. This entire generation and they still haven’t been scaled right.

It honestly feels like there are at least a dozen people who have never commented before who have shown up to these articles just to bash the announcements.

@AndreyBoarao He had his turn already

These are the best graphics Pokemon has ever had, and they're still underwhelming.

@BrazillianCara impossible

This is the first pokemon game I am truly foaming at the mouth to play now! I like pokemon but I have never really been hyped for the games pre-release.

@LeJuiceCup meh they're closer to correct than anyone defending this company.

You know, I thought I was pretty underwhelmed by this trailer, but there's nothing like popping my head into a good old-fashioned internet comments section to remind myself how truly, proudly miserable other people are about this franchise. Good lord. It looks fine

@UltimateOtaku91 Well it's not going to be an open world game, it's going to be an open city game similar to GTA. You either get open city or open world, if you get open world then the city would be smaller with a few buildings and major restrictions, if it's open city then there will be more buildings and places to visit and you could enter almost any buildings but the outside part of the city would be limited. You can't have both open world and open city.

@Serpenterror Yeah maybe I'm being a bit too unrealistic with my expectations, I enjoy the Pokémon games for the exploration of the different biomes and Pokémon types that match those biomes. But with a city it all looks the same (wild areas) so far, hopefully there's some kind of seasons so there's parts where is snows or rains etc which then changes what Pokémon appear.

@squidduforeal

Cause it's the cool thing to do, to dunk on Pokemon.

Some people can't get over the fact the series will always be "baby's first RPG" and will never change from that format.

Looks like fun, but graphically looks as bad as PLA and PSV, Pokémon games really need a stronger artistic direction and color palette. Hope the dynamic resolution and fps ceiling are high so the Switch 2 can force the game to look and run well on it.

This trailer definitely looked like a first look more than a full overview. It surely had a very long development time....
Okay, maybe this game will be a bit more "AAA" compared to Legends: Arceus, I mean, how could they otherwise explain the "late 2025" release date? To polish a game like they never did before? Come off, it's not like it has the most detailed assets to work with...
Or maybe it was announced too early last year? I don't know, they're always making games...

Looks good.
The Mega evolutions are back and that's really good.
Totodile!!!
I like the new combat system.

Bruttissimo

@iLikeUrAttitude Especially if this was recorded on Switch 2 Devkit. Outch.

@PikminMarioKirby Gen 10 is most likely coming in 2026.

With so many spin-offs getting focus, it seems we are looking at a 3 year interval between Mainline games from now on.

It wouldn't be a bad thing, if they kept on supporting the current mainline games with more expansion/DLC releases.

At best this makes me want to replay Arceus. The cityscape doesn't feel adventurous to me.

@sanderev Sure, I’m less worried about the size and scale. I just can’t see a beach area or a volcano area (or equivalent) fitting in this.

@ZZalapski Technically, "generations" aren't even a thing that exists in any official capacity. They're a completely fanmade attempt to categorize the Pokemon series into neat little boxes, which failed the moment that the fandom claimed that the Switch game Let's Go Pikachu/Eevee were somehow in the same generation as the 3DS game Sun/Moon.

@sanderev Just feel I’ll get bored exploring (and a big part of Legends was exploration) identical looking places.

Equally, the whole research mechanic made it worthwhile catching duplicate ‘Mon. I assume there’s no need to do that this time