A Top 3 Pokémon Game
User Rating: 9 | Pokemon Shield NS
My thoughts and feelings on the internet community are very mixed. Because sometimes I do truly believe that review bombs are a great way to invoke change, they help large corporations fundamentally realize that there game is flawed, cheap, or just unfun. Fallout 76, I completely understand is a game that needed to be called out by the community for its overall lack of necessary features for a console game. This does not fall under that category. Pokémon Shield (Which I personally play), has not only been a completely enjoyable experience, but I dare say has been a top 3 experience for me. Now, when arguing with some of my friends, it has become clear that many people expected or even demanded this game to be the next Breath of the Wild. Which, mind you, is a game that had over 6 years of game development time and was considered a passion project. To compare the expectations of that to Pokémon Sword and Shield is just unrealistic. Instead, you should fundamentally look at Sword and Shield as a successor to Pokémon Sun and Moon, and outside of one legitimate (but I find underwhelming) critique, is better in all regards. First off, the story itself is far more of an engaging and small scope game, which I love, it doesn’t have to be something overly complicated or high stakes, it is a sporting event, which is exactly how Pokémon should be! These Tournaments should be annual event for people to come together and watch the newest trainers. Leon, Hop, Bebe, Rose, and Olenna are all compelling characters (for a Pokémon game mind you, I’m not expecting Fallout NV level dialogue from Pokémon.) it has a coherent story that just happens, while the beginning section drags on, once it’s done I barely noticed it for the rest of the game. The world is large too, the wild area is easily the heart and soul of the game and it pays off, max-raids, strong Pokémon, items abound. It is a fun wild area to interact with other players and just have a good time, I am really excited when this finally has a hardcore end game community and I can just battle strong trainers like crazy. Each gym has a nice challenge, but it’s not over bearing, each one takes between 10-25 minutes and doesn’t break up the pace of the game. I do wish they allowed for EXP share to be disable, but they curve up the levels enough that I don’t mind it too much. I run Nuzlocke so it’s not like I am ever going to complain about not grinding. The only legitimate critique I have seen is the National Dex, anyone complaining about graphics needs to take a good hard look at Pokémon Black, because that crap (visually, I love the gameplay) came out in 2011, which there is no excuse for. But my response to the National Dex is, why on Earth do you need to capture 900 Pokémon you psychopath. That is not necessary, 450 is plenty, I guarantee I am never going to catch all of them, and I’m not heartbroken to see Ekans be scrapped. Bad Pokémon exist in the game, who cares if they are not available, and even some of the better ones like Johto starters aren’t that great, I will knock it off a point for that, but that’s my only critique. If you are one of those people who refuse to buy the game on “principle” and have liked every other game of Pokémon. You will like this one, just buy it; play it, and don’t allow the internet to rile you up into hating something just because it’s trending on twitter. 9/10.
