In this blog post, I will be reviewing the Nintendo game Pokemon Sword.
This new region of Galar was very controversial; however, I think the game was very well done. The main issue people had was there not being a national dex of all the Pokemon, but with close to 1,000 monsters and growing I think it is very reasonable to leave out some that do not really fit the region. Especially since some more ‘mons were added into the game in the DLC’s that unlocked new parts of the region. Another issue with the dex is they had all the Pokemon appear in the wild and be able to see all of them fully animated, and cutting a few out defiantly cut the time it would take and possible lag of the over world being quite literally overrun with creatures. There is actually a very logical reason for this to happen now. With the introduction of Pokemon Let’s Go! Pikachu and Eevee on the switch (and possibly Sun and Moon, I am unaware because I never got a chance to explore these regions as I did not have the 3DS) the creatures appeared as animated 3D models. With only the few 151 Kanto Pokemon (and even less that appear in the wild) this feature would have been no problem to pull off by the Gamefreak team; however, when that number gets multiplied by 10, you not only run into workload problems but also potential bugs and glitches that this would lead to, so it only made sense that at some point they would decide to limit the number of ‘mons in one place at one time.
Of course, my opinion on Galar might be a bit biased as It was my first normal Pokemon game since Let’s GO! Eevee was a bit different than how Pokemon games usually work. Then again I am here to express my opinions, and they are mostly positive, but I will try to be as honest as I can. For one thing, I loved the story, it was very immersive and never left me bored. I also really liked Hop’s story arch as it was relatable to be the overlooked little sibling. The gym leaders where all full of personality and you could really tell what they were all about. While Marnie was not the most challenging Rival, I really liked her design; however, Team Yell was a bit dumb in my opinion, and really did not pose much of a threat. It did add a bit of depth to the fact many people wanted Marnie to win and would do whatever they could to ensure her victory. It has been a while since I played the main story, but I think Marnie also gets stronger as the game progresses. Although I think I managed to have an undefeated run of the main story arch, I still did not feel I was being babied to get to win. Especially the later battles in the game, they kept me on the edge of my seat, which is exactly what I like to see from this kind of game.
On another note, the music in this game was incredible! It really added the feeling of being in a battle in a coliseum (or maybe not in Pieres’ case, sorry Pieres.) It just really added to the emersion of the game and made the right emotions all tie together correctly. Also on Bede’s note, I thought he was a girl a good way into the game, and apparently, other people had this same confusion, so maybe that could be cleared up a little bit better, or maybe Beder- I’m sorry.
This is getting kind of long so I will continue my review in next week’s blog…
