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Sword & Shield is currently the 4th best selling Pokémon game, on track to be the second of all time.
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In that case, it's pretty good, but I didn't know the series was THAT frontloaded :O.
Well better this than Let's Go games I guess. At least this one has some grand new pokemon designs and isn't a soulless remake that somehow has less content than the last time you remade the game over 10 years ago.
Anyway this one was always was going to be one of the better selling ones, post Pokemon Go world. HD Pokemon and the first new generation game on one of Nintendo's hottest platforms ever. Not having it's legs cut off by a third version will help as well, as Sun and Moon probably would have passed X and Y had it not only had a year on the market before Ultra Sun and Moon came out.
I've said my piece on the game, underwhelming and needed longer in the oven so it didn't feel as rushed as it was, the main campaign is one of the series worst and the wild area, whilst it has potential, needed to be fleshed out a bit more and had some of it's ideas thrown out (Don't use Skybeams if your going to have Sandstorms and Blizzard block them out whilst in the wild area). Hope the DLC saves it, but I hope that gets delayed now as well due to the whole COVID situation. I don't want the DLC to be half-baked as well just because they had a deadline date to hit.
...
Also, XY getting love? The only love I see for Kalos is either.
A. From The Anime (Which is generally seen as one of the better runs of the show, minus the contraversial ending)
B. For The PSS being the best online system the series has had (Which has been around since Sun and Moon dropped the ball with Festival Plaza, and then resurged when Sword and Shield dropped the ball AGAIN with Y-Comm and tying GTS to Pokemon Home).
I have not seen a newfound love for the campaign, region or characters at all. We didn't enter the timeline where the day Sword and Shield came out, out of the ground sprouted millions of people that says Tierno is the best pokemon character ever.
Anyway this one was always was going to be one of the better selling ones, post Pokemon Go world. HD Pokemon and the first new generation game on one of Nintendo's hottest platforms ever. Not having it's legs cut off by a third version will help as well, as Sun and Moon probably would have passed X and Y had it not only had a year on the market before Ultra Sun and Moon came out.
I've said my piece on the game, underwhelming and needed longer in the oven so it didn't feel as rushed as it was, the main campaign is one of the series worst and the wild area, whilst it has potential, needed to be fleshed out a bit more and had some of it's ideas thrown out (Don't use Skybeams if your going to have Sandstorms and Blizzard block them out whilst in the wild area). Hope the DLC saves it, but I hope that gets delayed now as well due to the whole COVID situation. I don't want the DLC to be half-baked as well just because they had a deadline date to hit.
...
Also, XY getting love? The only love I see for Kalos is either.
A. From The Anime (Which is generally seen as one of the better runs of the show, minus the contraversial ending)
B. For The PSS being the best online system the series has had (Which has been around since Sun and Moon dropped the ball with Festival Plaza, and then resurged when Sword and Shield dropped the ball AGAIN with Y-Comm and tying GTS to Pokemon Home).
I have not seen a newfound love for the campaign, region or characters at all. We didn't enter the timeline where the day Sword and Shield came out, out of the ground sprouted millions of people that says Tierno is the best pokemon character ever.
It's just never seemed itbecause before X & Y what it had was essentially two fronts which made the otherall figures look like a longer spread.
Most games are frontloaded, to be fair
Congrats to game freak! Those are great Numbers
Personally I skipped the game since I only play them for the sp campaigns and it seems the overall opinion is that this game is shit in that department. May pick it up if it has a deep discount which will be.... Never :)
Personally I skipped the game since I only play them for the sp campaigns and it seems the overall opinion is that this game is shit in that department. May pick it up if it has a deep discount which will be.... Never :)
Given a lot of people (i.e those that don't scream how X&Y ate their dog) consider Sun & Moon to be worse, I'm confused as you what jump you're on about. The structure of the game was terrible due to the insane handholding, it was significantly easier, had less Pokemon available, worse online features, less exploration, even less post-game, QoL improvements regressed, features were missing. And then USUM was worse still by barely improving anywhere and failing in the one area where S&M actually did well (the villain).
X&Y take far too much unneccesary shit for being "too easy" or having bad characters (areas which at worst they're only in the bottom third of the franchise). They were the first Pokemon games with full 3D movement, they had every single Pokemon fully modelled and animated (models which they are still using virtually unchanged), they had hands down the best online system in the entire franchise, they added trainer customisation, made huge QoL changes for competitive, introduced beloved extra features like Pokemon Amie and Super Training. Relative to the series since X&Y were ambitious titles, the problem being that they are now villified as "the start of the decline" because they were lacking in a number of areas compared to Black & White 2 - they really did nail home the idea that Game Freak's first entry on a console is a clunky transitional step.
Realistically though if you're calling them the start of the decline, that means everything that followed was worse. Like the generations that proceeded it, X&Y should have got a significantly polished 3rd version to get rid of the jank and fix up the story. Imagine if Diamond & Pearl never got Platinum, just how shit would gen 4 actually be seen to be? They were borderline unplayable at times, but look how they polished up for Platinum and how well that solid base was then used for Black & White 2. S/M/US/UM were the utter failures of the 3DS Pokemon generation, they should have been comparable to B/W/B2/W2 and they weren't even close. X&Y were better than Ruby & Sapphire and Diamond & Pearl.
i still have to finish the game and then get the DLC (i stopped after a few hours to play other games), but that's a really impressive result for the game considering it's the first $60 mainline game. the expansion pass and there not being a new mainline pokemon game game should give the game some bigger than usual legs for 2020 and 2021.
User Banned (1 week): hostility towards other members, trolling, history of this behaviour in similar threads
Hey, next game, next game, they now have experience with HD.
Because that's the main issue right, the content is fine. Story is fine, who needs a new formula, approach is future proofen. Ignoring fan criticism over and over again is fine. That engine is fine in 2020. Why should they bother about the legendaries when nobody would play that content.
Who needs a battle frontier, we don't need that.
Exp share for you maddam, Exp share for you sir, oh and Exp share for you era because you ban those with Pokémon criticism.
Who needs difficulty nowadays, you know what, the games should be even more easier.
I am too "lazy" to even write this post my bad era.
Too lazy to even care about caves I am.
Oh and I forgot to mention the post game and how much I love it. I want even less of that. As Joey Ravn already pointed out, less content is more quality.
I wanna help Serebii one day because I admire him and the fact how similar he is to game freak when it comes to dealing with criticism regarding the Pokémon franchise. Constructive criticism is fine as long as it is positive criticism.
Because that's the main issue right, the content is fine. Story is fine, who needs a new formula, approach is future proofen. Ignoring fan criticism over and over again is fine. That engine is fine in 2020. Why should they bother about the legendaries when nobody would play that content.
Who needs a battle frontier, we don't need that.
Exp share for you maddam, Exp share for you sir, oh and Exp share for you era because you ban those with Pokémon criticism.
Who needs difficulty nowadays, you know what, the games should be even more easier.
I am too "lazy" to even write this post my bad era.
Too lazy to even care about caves I am.
Oh and I forgot to mention the post game and how much I love it. I want even less of that. As Joey Ravn already pointed out, less content is more quality.
I wanna help Serebii one day because I admire him and the fact how similar he is to game freak when it comes to dealing with criticism regarding the Pokémon franchise. Constructive criticism is fine as long as it is positive criticism.
Sun and Moon were harder and had much better postgame than XY. They finally ditched grid based environments which was a bigger jump than BW>XY in terms of overworld which already used 3D models except for NPCs. It also had much better story and characters, improved amie into Refresh, improved customization and made it more visible thanks to no more chibi style and trainers visible in battles. RS and DP were better than XY as they had more side content and in the case of DP also a lot more postgame, and both had a better main game too.
Opinions and all.
Congrats to Gamefreak! I really liked the game. It was fun raiding with my friends and seeing Pokemon just walking around.
You know, sarcasm only works if there is a shred of sincerity behind it.
The sad part is I've seen people unironically say those first two paragraphs.
"I mean no one NEEDS a post game."
Ultra Sun & Ultra Moon is the hardest Pokémon game thus far.
Totem Pokémon with their boosts was a great idea, especially calling support Pokémon that can boost them up such as Lurantis summoning Castform with Sunny Day to boost it with its Leaf Guard ability and Solar Blade move and various other similar strategies. Ultra Necrozma too would have likely wiped you if you didn't go in knowing how it would be
Yep yep.
Sword and Shield did regress in difficulty and story, but it's very false to paint it as a trend when in reality generations fluctuate a lot in different aspects all the time as they always receive different focus
hes been like this for years...just pure salt
Cool, maybe they'll listen to criticism and make the next entries even better and these ones were just a trial run for the Switch.
Catching a few random extra creatures is not better post-game than XY
USUM had me hyped that SwSh would continue onwards with the difficulty that USUM had.
Then they cut the EXP toggle.
USUM was really good, when standing on it's own. Shame they made the story worse than SuMo, and didn't really add much in the end.
It had actual extra areas and fights compared to XY which only had a small town
They seem to make third versions harder because they're the type of game that attracts the more hardcore part of the fan base, so I'm expecting the DLC to really up the difficulty as well, especially since the first expansion has a focus on battles.
I still haven't bought SwSh, and what I have heard from many people who have played it has only reinforced that I did the right thing there. What I want from Pokemon is not in SwSh.
And they are gonna have to go above and beyond w/ DLC for me to buy.
BUT, I have stated to myself that if they put in a Hard mode with the DLC, I will buy it, no questions asked.
Hey at least you didn't buy it anyways knowing you wouldn't enjoy it just to then complain even more like some other people :p
Hopefully they learn a thing or 10 from the criticism and maybe the next ones will sell even more.
Harder? That's a joke. I had 3 Pokemon faint the entire game, and that includes totems. I had to stop fighting trainers along the way because towards the end I was 10-15 levels above everyone else, and I never grind. I never even used the Z moves once in the entire game (as a challenge, and to see if there was more dialogue relating to not using them just like near the start). Trainers right near the end of the game will still using less than 3 Pokemon and not fully evolved, a goddamn Butterfree with low IVs shouldn't be able to solo mostly everything at the end of the game. And to top it off I don't think I ever once bought healing items until the post-game because they were not only given out like candy, but any time you reached a point where your Pokemon might be even remotely close to low health your entire party got a full heal for free.
Customisation was significantly worse outside of skin and eyes. You want clothing that isn't summer clothing? Too bad. I spend far too much time customising characters in games I play, never once did I like my Sun & Moon character because I had either a choice of t-shirts or dressing like a hoodlum. Sun & Moon's post-game was a boring ass beast hunt that lasted an hour (find beast, use Sleep Powder, throw Beast Ball for 90% catch rate) and a rubbish battle facility proceeded by a dull area with more weak trainers. It didn't even have a place to properly grind levels. X&Y had better battle facilities in addition to the Friend Safari, a hell of a lot more legendaries, the Looker stuff and a bunch of small tasks.
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I mean, going back to gyms and a weak story isn't exactly an original or interesting focus, but that's just me.
Most people agree it was harder, it's not just me.
And while the clothing selection was smaller, XY's was wasted on small chibi characters that barely let you see your clothes, on top of not allowing you to remove your hat rendering any hairstyle change basically useless (for male characters at least).
The UB episode was story focused and told a pretty good story that shed light on unexplored concepts for the series. And then you had Poni Wilds, Poni Gauntlet, and a cave to explore. Battle Tree was better than Maison thanks to a lot of cameos from past characters. You had the Dexio (hope I got the name right) battle, the Anabel battle, the Red or Blue battle, the Guzma battle, and Champion title defense battles with tons of unique new teams and some exclusive trainers even.
Story and Difficulty are probably the very top of my list of what I want from a Pokemon game nowadays.
I can tolerate a bad story with good gameplay (Pokemon has gotten so easy it may as well not have gameplay), or tolerate bad gameplay for a good story, I can't tolerate a lack of both.
Collecting and competetive multiplayer I do not care for.
Sun and Moon are among the best Pokémon games for a reason!
In some ways, Sword & Shield's story is the most realistic, much to its detriment.
Rather than being a kid who shows up and saves the world, you're a kid who wants to help but keeps getting dismissed to "leave it to the adults".
Most realistic
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High imo. It'll sell a few more millions this fall. If it doesn't reach 23M it'll be very close.
You do realise HGSS remade Crystal's stuff as well. A precedent was set. That's why people expected the Battle Frontier.
Congrats to Gamefreak, I guess.
For me personally I'm disappointed. It means future games will continue to follow GF's current process of making the games as easy and hand holding as possible, with mediocre story telling, lack of post-game content, narrow corridors for routes and lack of dungeons. I just wish GF would start considering their adult player base as well in the design process.
I can at least say its far superior to SM and USUM but nowhere near HGSS and BW2.
Who knows maybe the DLC will improve the game and may surprise me.
For me personally I'm disappointed. It means future games will continue to follow GF's current process of making the games as easy and hand holding as possible, with mediocre story telling, lack of post-game content, narrow corridors for routes and lack of dungeons. I just wish GF would start considering their adult player base as well in the design process.
I can at least say its far superior to SM and USUM but nowhere near HGSS and BW2.
Who knows maybe the DLC will improve the game and may surprise me.
Hey, so now that we've reached that sweet spot where the Sword & Shield controversies are mostly blown over though still fresh in our minds, I have to ask — is getting flooded with replies on Twitter "harassment"? Like, I get and totally agree that some people on that side of the discussion took things way too far and it's not necessary to drudge that all up again, but I was seeing replies to Masuda's tweets unrelated to Pokémon (as well as tweets related to Pokémon both by employees and promotional accounts) referred to as one of those things where the criticism can't be taken seriously because it's gone too far, and even that it's harassment. I am, with complete sincerity, asking someone to explain to me why that was and continues to be framed in that way. I must be out of step with something because it seems almost like an accepted fact.
To be clear, I'm not including blatant personal attacks. Anyone throwing insults or worse around deserves to be criticized for that behaviour, of course. But I truly fail to see how a large swath of people reaching out to Masuda or official accounts via social media to express disappointment in their work somehow constitutes harassment. Like, that's what social media is for. Interacting with the public is the only reason to have a public social media account. Again, I'm not defending people who take things to an extreme. But even hypothetically, some variation of, "Pokémon is shit now! Bring back the cut Pokémon or we boycott! #dexit" falls outside of the realm of harassment to me. Is it a pleasant interaction? Of course not. And I would assume the amount of these messages contributes to the perception of them as harassment, but then I can't reconcile that with the notion that they will be dismissed outright merely on the basis of the disrespectful nature of the criticism or the channel through which it is delivered. Surely a media conglomerate as large as TPCi operates in a colder, more capital-driven fashion than such a move would imply.
I should also mention that I absolutely understand that the criticisms are rooted in upper management decisions, and developers and other employees without sway in that process could very well be (and likely are) demoralized by that negativity, which directly undermines such a movement. And that sucks for everyone! But harassment? We've all heard the stories of bad actors doing bad things in the midst of the controversy, and those absolutely constitute harassment (and libel.) But somebody getting ratio'd? That's harassment?
Maybe I'm just picking at things said when emotions were running high, or a rhetorical dramatization... Maybe it is categorically harassment and I'm dead wrong! It wouldn't be the first time. I just don't know, which is why I've gotta ask. And I realize now that I probably missed the boat for this discussion, because it's neutered without actual posts to point to, but the absolute chaos in the pre-release threads meant there was little room for my glorified tangent (and the thought of trudging through them for evidence gives me a migraine, not to mention the inevitable argument that would follow.) Can anyone humour me and sort me out on this one? Completely sincere here. This has been a consistent element of Sword & Shield discussion on ERA that I've been waiting to ask about for too long.
To be clear, I'm not including blatant personal attacks. Anyone throwing insults or worse around deserves to be criticized for that behaviour, of course. But I truly fail to see how a large swath of people reaching out to Masuda or official accounts via social media to express disappointment in their work somehow constitutes harassment. Like, that's what social media is for. Interacting with the public is the only reason to have a public social media account. Again, I'm not defending people who take things to an extreme. But even hypothetically, some variation of, "Pokémon is shit now! Bring back the cut Pokémon or we boycott! #dexit" falls outside of the realm of harassment to me. Is it a pleasant interaction? Of course not. And I would assume the amount of these messages contributes to the perception of them as harassment, but then I can't reconcile that with the notion that they will be dismissed outright merely on the basis of the disrespectful nature of the criticism or the channel through which it is delivered. Surely a media conglomerate as large as TPCi operates in a colder, more capital-driven fashion than such a move would imply.
I should also mention that I absolutely understand that the criticisms are rooted in upper management decisions, and developers and other employees without sway in that process could very well be (and likely are) demoralized by that negativity, which directly undermines such a movement. And that sucks for everyone! But harassment? We've all heard the stories of bad actors doing bad things in the midst of the controversy, and those absolutely constitute harassment (and libel.) But somebody getting ratio'd? That's harassment?
Maybe I'm just picking at things said when emotions were running high, or a rhetorical dramatization... Maybe it is categorically harassment and I'm dead wrong! It wouldn't be the first time. I just don't know, which is why I've gotta ask. And I realize now that I probably missed the boat for this discussion, because it's neutered without actual posts to point to, but the absolute chaos in the pre-release threads meant there was little room for my glorified tangent (and the thought of trudging through them for evidence gives me a migraine, not to mention the inevitable argument that would follow.) Can anyone humour me and sort me out on this one? Completely sincere here. This has been a consistent element of Sword & Shield discussion on ERA that I've been waiting to ask about for too long.
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Also what drives you is not the sense of adventure but what society expects of you (competitive results) and what adults tell you to do. Most realistic pokemon.
Undeserved. But it's pokemon, and pretty much most first party is selling gangbusters and breaking records on switch.
Glad diamond is beating it, so far!
Glad diamond is beating it, so far!
Highkey sad its making alot of money
Pokemon is one of the few series where if a new game does bad, they'll 101% make efforts to do better with the next one rather than ghost it
Pokemon is one of the few series where if a new game does bad, they'll 101% make efforts to do better with the next one rather than ghost it
If I made this post I'd be pilloried :D
Are you saying that a games company should direct its staff to do certain things with peoples replies? On social media?
I fixed it for you. No need to thank me.
Slow, boring, monotone slogs that took me inhumane amounts of effort to finish
Add to that the abysmal online menus and it pisses me off just to remember their very existence
Not in the slightest. I'm asking why Masuda getting hundreds of Dexit-centric replies on Twitter constitutes harassment. The bit about TPCi is just my musing about why they would choose to ignore criticism of their product because of this behaviour (as I've seen some people say), whether or not it is indeed harassment. Sorry, it's late. I am trying to dance around directly quoting people so as to not kick off an argument, and that's very difficult when sleep deprived.