Today, the internet is flooded with hands-on previews of Pokémon Scarlet And Violet, which will be released next month. But not from us, because we’re on Nintendo’s Naughty List. Instead, we read everyone else’s coverage and collated all we learned along the way. Corporations, take note. With that in mind, here are some new facts about Pokémon Scarlet and Violet.
The Game is Huge
So we thought Pokémon Scarlet And Violet would be popular, but the overall tone of today’s news is, “Woah! It’s even greater than we imagined.” During the hour-long demo, the good boys and girls were limited to a tiny area of the larger map, which turned out to be far too large for them to explore intelligently in the time period.
During previews, gamers had access to the legendary Koraidon, which allegedly travels incredibly quickly, yet the environment still seemed massive. And, again, this was only a minor portion of the overall game. Someone at Polygon compared it to Breath of the Wild
Legendaries Early?
We’ve come to anticipate the Legendary Pokémon to appear after we’ve faced the seventh gym or so in prior Pokémon games. While Nintendo has yet to clarify when Miraidon and Koraidon will appear in Scarlet and Violet, rumour on the street is that it might be as early as…the beginning. Two distinct people that played the game have told me that they believe this will be the case.
This is fantastic news because they appear to be quite fast. Even better, they change forms automatically, so if you’re floating through the skies (with no stamina metre to worry about) and fly into a cliffside, they’ll transition to climbing up the side themselves. Then they’ll auto-boat into the water.
No NPC battles?!
A Pokémon game’s annoyance NPC trainers have always kicked off bouts just because you got too close to them in Pokémon games. Thank heavens for that. Such trainers will signal if they’re eager for a fight when exploring Paldea’s open area, but now it’s up to you to set them off. Which seems only fair given that it has been their turn for the past 27 years.
New Raid Mechanics
Raids are still theoretically turn-based, but it only applies to you and the Pokémon. You can all fire attacks anytime you wish, or even at the same moment, as one of the four persons battling (actual or AI).
To preserve some feeling of balance when Terastallizing your monster, you’ll need to perform a few ordinary assaults first. And what about the previously mentioned applauding, which increases the attacks of others? That is something you can do at any moment, not simply when your Pokémon is KOd, as previously indicate
Day and Night Cycles
The time of day in Scarlet And Violet will be determined by an in-game clock rather than by a real-world clock. The same is true for the weather. Those concepts seem enjoyable in principle, but they’re a pain in the arse when you can only play at specific times of day or live somewhere with bad weather.
As you might guess, various Pokémon will come at different times of day, but it will all be on Paldea’s own clock. Storms can now come at any time, and your tiny trainer will duck and shield their head as you seek shelter.
Giant Vehicles
Starfall Street’s Team Star territorial takeovers are the most startling of the game’s three pathways (the gym one, the discovering gigantic monsters one, and the combating Team Star one). They appear to be inspired by Far Cry, and entail defeating all of the Pokémon of the baddie trainers in a camp before facing off against the boss. Previously, we saw Mela, one of Team Star’s supervisors, arrive in a crazy contraption dubbed the Starmobile. It appears that we will have to combat this creature in some way, not simply the Pokémon on board, despite Nintendo’s request that previewers remain quiet about it.
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Face Customization
The oddest thing to come out of today’s previews is that you can alter the shape of your face whenever you want, even when running about in fields, but if you want a new haircut, you have to go to a salon.
I’m fascinated by what this implies about the world of Pokémon, where individuals can seemingly completely rebuild their facial features and head-bones yet require the assistance of someone else with a new parting.