Pre-Release Pokémon Scarlet and Violet — Pre-release Discussion Thread (UPDATE: new trailer, see threadmarks)

[Brofield]

If this doesnt happen i will be disappointed

Welp I guess NPS is done and over with despite teasing more mini shrinking courses, but I guess it's early yet to discuss a new entry in the Legends games.

Looks like the Northeast is where we may get DLC, maybe they can pull a Sinjoh Ruins and connect Paldea to another region (Kalos?).

Might not be so farfetch'd

 

[totofogo]

Spoiler

Just like the rest of the game.

The irony here is astounding

 

[Hocot8]

I'm too adhd to watch the presents again but did they say anything about the towers that litter the map? There are a bunch of 2 tiered towers, a few 1 tiered towers, and the ruined one we saw in the trailer.

 

[Yoshifan31]

what's missing from this is that previously the entirety of pokemon games were cakewalks, and this new format gives players the chance to make their own fun for at least a little while. gf taking a step back and letting the player work out what they want to do when really appeals to me because their approach to linearity doesn't work for me at all, and I have to assume their scaling would be too generous

We can agree to disagree but I don’t think the games being easy justifies completely breaking the difficulty curve just so “players can have their own fun for a little while”. This aspect was still satisfying for past Pokemon games simply because you have access to new evolutions and moves as your levels go up. Let’s say that you go out of your way to get a Starmie early-mid game ish, you get the TMs, you BoltBeam your way through a higher level gym… Congratulations, you completely trivialized the whole mid game part where stuff like 60 base power moves are relevant. This kind of diminishing returns in open world games can be very annoying

Now the last Pokemon game I played was Moon and apparently the later games still had this problem of being too easy or things like gym leaders, elite fours and champions not even having full teams. Even then, it’s not completely unprecedented for Pokemon games to have decent challenge at times. The Battle Tower/Frontier stuff is the closest the games ever were in terms of having PVE competitive level battling. Other than that you had a few small difficulty spikes like Sabrina/Koga, Whitney, Kanto early gyms if you picked Charmander, etc. A simple scaling system that makes gym leaders match your average level, or even go a few levels above, would at least guarantee that you won’t have as many complete cakewalks where your overleveled starter carries you

 

[Bowser Sr.]

The new forms are ugly but I think they're atleast funny enough that we'll be able to have a laugh at our goofy critters wearing burger king crowns or balloons or what not.

 

[Deleted member 341]

Spoiler

Just like the rest of the game.

at least you are consistent, I'll give you that

 

[Paxie]

Looks like the Northeast is where we may get DLC, maybe they can pull a Sinjoh Ruins and connect Paldea to another region (Kalos?).

y'all can't keep doing this to yourselves every gen

 

[Comic Obsessed]

at least you are consistent, I'll give you that

Consistently great.

Unlike, you know.

 

[Hero]

The graphics look super rough... we really need a Switch 2 already.

But that being said, it looks very fun and I can't wait to play it.

Pokemon Hogwarts, let's go!

 

[ILikeFeet]

Yes? Lol. Where did I say otherwise?

I interpreted your comment as someone (probably TPC) giving resources to GF, hence the low effort.

I'm too adhd to watch the presents again but did they say anything about the towers that litter the map? There are a bunch of 2 tiered towers, a few 1 tiered towers, and the ruined one we saw in the trailer.

no mention of the towers. given the map, I wouldn't be surprised if they're ubisoft towers

The graphics look super rough... we really need a Switch 2 already.

But that being said, it looks very fun and I can't wait to play it.

Pokemon Hogwarts, let's go!

don't blame switch for GF's lackluster visuals. Xenoblade 3 wasn't that long ago

 

[Weebos]

y'all can't keep doing this to yourselves every gen

Oh I don't think we're getting a whole ass second region, just maybe a vaguely French themed area that "borders Kalos".

 

[Rooster]

The graphics look super rough... we really need a Switch 2 already.

But that being said, it looks very fun and I can't wait to play it.

Pokemon Hogwarts, let's go!

It's not like a more powerful system is going to impel Game Freak to create something that looks contemporary. It's entirely possible to create something more visually impressive on current hardware too.

 

[Hero]

don't blame switch for GF's lackluster visuals. Xenoblade 3 wasn't that long ago

It's not like a more powerful system is going to impel Game Freak to create something that looks contemporary. It's entirely possible to create something more visually impressive on current hardware too.

That's true. But more powerful hardware would mean they could at least slap some AA and better shadows on their lackluster graphics lol

 

[EvilChameleon]

Hoping we get a good anime series set in Paldea instead of this world tournament nonsense that we got in lieu of a series set in Galar.

 

[Deleted member 2349]

We can agree to disagree but I don’t think the games being easy justifies completely breaking the difficulty curve just so “players can have their own fun for a little while”. This aspect was still satisfying for past Pokemon games simply because you have access to new evolutions and moves as your levels go up. Let’s say that you go out of your way to get a Starmie early-mid game ish, you get the TMs, you BoltBeam your way through a higher level gym… Congratulations, you completely trivialized the whole mid game part where stuff like 60 base power moves are relevant. This kind of diminishing returns in open world games can be very annoying

yeah, that's fair. in general I love getting owned by stuff that I am not intended to see yet (like stumbling into super hard enemies in corners of the map in early ff games) and going back and rolling over early areas after leveling up a bunch elsewhere. my favorite open worlds are ones that feel like they could exist without the player, and large parts of the world being contingent on the levels of my guys is a turn off in that respect

also breaking the game in the way you described seems super fun for me but I see why most folks wouldn't like it. I just bristle at gf's guiding hand because they are absolutely terrible at backing up and letting me have a good time

 

[ILikeFeet]

That's true. But more powerful hardware would mean they could at least slap some AA and better shadows on their lackluster graphics lol

they aren't limited by hardware with aliasing. they intentionally don't use it like some other nintendo devs

---

I just noticed that Beartic's pubes. for the longest time, I didn't notice it, but the lack of any contrast is what hid them

 

[Deleted member 341]

Except that level scaling absolutely makes sense for a Pokemon game, or we would have the very common open world problem of the game’s difficulty curve completely falling apart once you get past the initial challenge

Now I can’t comment too much on the status of level scaling in games because apparently the main reason why people complain about this mechanic so much is due to its implementation in Elder Scrolls games which I haven’t played. Something about early game enemies becoming too spongey when their level scales with yours. Then they will say that something like Souls games do it right since when they offer you non-linear progression, every boss is challenging in their own way so they don’t need scaling in order to maintain their difficulty.

An open world Pokemon game isn’t comparable to any other successful non-linear game that doesn’t have scaling because Pokemon is not an action game at all, it’s a pure turn based RPG where stats matter a lot. Once you manage to beat a gym underleveled thanks to your use of competitive strategies or whatever, that’s it, you broke the game. No other gym will have this kind of challenge, the lower level ones especially will be total cakewalks.

The whole appeal of an open world Pokemon game is to go wherever you want instead of following an intended path like it was for multiple gens now. You start the game, you catch normal/flying/bug types in early routes, your starter carries you, you don’t have decent typing coverage until mid game, you get your full team, you beat the champion. Now what if the open structure let you go to the late game routes right away to get a Dratini instead of a Pidgey, then you beat the Dragon gym which has level 10 Dragon types for once but later the basic early game Flying gym has a bunch of fully evolved Flying types and isn’t a cakewalk. You get to go where you want and grab the Pokemon you want without the difficulty curve completely falling apart as a result of that. To me this sounds way more interesting than sweeping through every gym after you managed to beat an overleveled one

I don't like the framing of how a good turn based, open world RPGs should be designed.
A good open world can have level scaling but it doesn't need to. They can design the areas around a varying degree of level scales and challenges without just giving everything the same difficulty. By either clever level design, quest design, enemy placement, events or skill checks for example.

For example you arrive in an area where there are mostly Level 20-25 Pokemon. You fight some, catch some and then see a NPC on the way who gives you some clues to a cave where a big, hard Pokemon who is probably level 30-40 awaits its prey. After his initial warning you have two possibilites. Either check for yourself or come back later. This gives you a goal you are constantly reminded by..."maybe I am ready now?". Thats good, organic design.

What is the harm? It is exciting to know that there are challenges I can't face yet but I have still the possibility to see for myself if its really as hard as what the NPC implies it to be.

A lot of folks are argueing that you come into an area and you are instantly outleveled... but this shouldn't and probably won't be the case.
They can design the game around this with ease without interrupting the flow of exploration while still keeping you on your toes.

Scaling in a Pokemon RPG implies I'll never lose and I'll never will have to make decisions or face consequences as long as I have the correct Pokemon types at hand.

 

[Apopheniac]

Is beating the gyms out of order not simply a matter of running them over with our ATV legendary?

Ride Pokémon are separate from your team in SM and Arceus. I would imagine the legendary has some type of plot line you have to complete before they can be used in battle.

 

[Hocot8]

no mention of the towers. given the map, I wouldn't be surprised if they're ubisoft towers

I thought that but there are couple that are very close together. The different tiers are also strange, but yeah I guess logically they are just "Ubisoft" towers haha.

 

[Deleted member 2349]

Scaling in a Pokemon RPG implies I'll never lose and I'll never will have to make decisions or face consequences as long as I have the correct Pokemon types at hand.

this is my worry, yeah

 

[Kevin]

I always had a weird relationship with the Pokemon series. The last one I played a LOT of was Pokemon Gold/Silver and I really liked those games but I always felt they were lacking in story content and gameplay variety and I think this is a trend that really continued with the series.

We have so many Pokemon games now and I feel like they are always "Almost Good" but never "Great". I have not played any of the Switch entries because they always looked solid but still lacking in visuals, story, interesting world, character development, etc. I am often times reminded that the point of the game is catching and fighting Pokemon but is it wrong for me to want something more after like 100 of these games?

Anyways onto this new game... I think it looks like it could be the best Pokemon game on Switch. There are some fun looking mechanics like the vehicular Pokemon, the world looks a bit more interesting, more towns and it seems like there might be at least a little more story. I think as far as Pokemon games go, this one could be the best one yet. It's no Zelda: Breath of the Wild in terms of scope but I think this could be a good "Jump In" point for me. I'll definitely keep an eye out for the reviews and if people really dig the game, I may give them a go.

 

[Hero]

they aren't limited by hardware with aliasing. they intentionally don't use it like some other nintendo devs

---

I just noticed that Beartic's pubes. for the longest time, I didn't notice it, but the lack of any contrast is what hid them

I kind of get why some devs don't like AA, since it can soften the image and has a performance cost. And truth be told, I don't mind jaggies. It's the shimmering, especially on those panning shots of the school, that really irks me lol

Also, I never noticed that about Beartic, either

 

[totofogo]

I interpreted your comment as someone (probably TPC) giving resources to GF, hence the low effort.

Oh, yeah no just they (the new forms) seem to be minimally scoped

 

[puddleths]

Ride Pokémon are separate from your team in SM and Arceus. I would imagine the legendary has some type of plot line you have to complete before they can be used in battle.

Who said anything about battling with them?

 

[ngpdrew]

Except that level scaling absolutely makes sense for a Pokemon game, or we would have the very common open world problem of the game’s difficulty curve completely falling apart once you get past the initial challenge

Now I can’t comment too much on the status of level scaling in games because apparently the main reason why people complain about this mechanic so much is due to its implementation in Elder Scrolls games which I haven’t played. Something about early game enemies becoming too spongey when their level scales with yours. Then they will say that something like Souls games do it right since when they offer you non-linear progression, every boss is challenging in their own way so they don’t need scaling in order to maintain their difficulty.

An open world Pokemon game isn’t comparable to any other successful non-linear game that doesn’t have scaling because Pokemon is not an action game at all, it’s a pure turn based RPG where stats matter a lot. Once you manage to beat a gym underleveled thanks to your use of competitive strategies or whatever, that’s it, you broke the game. No other gym will have this kind of challenge, the lower level ones especially will be total cakewalks.

The whole appeal of an open world Pokemon game is to go wherever you want instead of following an intended path like it was for multiple gens now. You start the game, you catch normal/flying/bug types in early routes, your starter carries you, you don’t have decent typing coverage until mid game, you get your full team, you beat the champion. Now what if the open structure let you go to the late game routes right away to get a Dratini instead of a Pidgey, then you beat the Dragon gym which has level 10 Dragon types for once but later the basic early game Flying gym has a bunch of fully evolved Flying types and isn’t a cakewalk. You get to go where you want and grab the Pokemon you want without the difficulty curve completely falling apart as a result of that. To me this sounds way more interesting than sweeping through every gym after you managed to beat an overleveled one

Good, I say. Let me break the game. Don’t artificially pump up other areas to preserve some sort of challenge (which Pokemon has never really had nor cared about). Let the areas be distinct, with low level monsters in some and high level monsters in other. Let me brave a really treacherous area early and obliterate lesser areas as a result. Let me have a unique experience of my own design and not just one that your algorithm decides is “fun”.

 

[frog]

Pokemon is so sick

 

[meatbag]

Scaling in a Pokemon RPG implies I'll never lose and I'll never will have to make decisions or face consequences as long as I have the correct Pokemon types at hand.

Maybe if the scaling is the horrible level scaling found in Skyrim. But what if say the gym leaders scaled but the wild Pokemon didn’t? Areas with level 50 Pokemon will remain like that. And the gym leaders don’t have to scale up to level 99; you can designate some gym leaders as “easy” and they have a lower level cap.

There are ways to implement level scaling that doesn’t just make everything equal to your level. Because I agree that way is boring.

Good, I say. Let me break the game. Don’t artificially pump up other areas to preserve some sort of challenge (which Pokemon has never really had nor cared about). Let the areas be distinct, with low level monsters in some and high level monsters in other. Let me brave a really treacherous area early and obliterate lesser areas as a result. Let me have a unique experience of my own design and not just one that your algorithm decides is “fun”.

You can have all this and still have level scaling. Like for me I really only want level scaling for the gym leaders

 

[Plum]

What people are saying: "We want some sort of scaling for gym battles specifically."

What this is being interpreted as: "We want every single wild Pokemon, trainer, and gym fight to be scaled to your level at all times."

I seriously don't get how this happens lol

 

[Romancedawn]

This looks good. Not super excited even though I love all the new and old Pokemon shown. I'm going to miss the action aspects from Legends. Pokemon chasing and attacking me, dive rolling out the way, actually throwing the ball, etc. Can we just throw our pokemon out to collect things in the world? Loved that feature.

 

[Deleted member 2349]

What people are saying: "We want some sort of scaling for gym battles specifically."

What this is being interpreted as: "We want every single wild Pokemon, trainer, and gym fight to be scaled to your level at all times."

I seriously don't get how this happens lol

I feel like you kind of have to scale the other stuff at a certain point, right? like trudging through a high level area only to get to a gym leader with a team of level 15 guys would be weird

 

[Maronic03]

I feel like I live in some kind of bizarro reality when I see people complaining about the lack of level scaling.

 

[Hero]

I've never liked most implementations of level scaling.

Instead, I think it would be cool if they had your normal difficulty Gym battle for the badge, then a much harder (optional) rematch for a TM or some other reward. Maybe unlock the Gym leader's costume for your trainer lol

 

[ngpdrew]

Maybe if the scaling is the horrible level scaling found in Skyrim. But what if say the gym leaders scaled but the wild Pokemon didn’t? Areas with level 50 Pokemon will remain like that. And the gym leaders don’t have to scale up to level 99; you can designate some gym leaders as “easy” and they have a lower level cap.

There are ways to implement level scaling that doesn’t just make everything equal to your level. Because I agree that way is boring.


You can have all this and still have level scaling. Like for me I really only want level scaling for the gym leaders

I could compromise on the gym leaders, but I still really wouldn't want to do that. There were rare instances of sequence breaking in some of the classic generations and it was always neat to beat a higher leveled leader before a lower leveled one. It never really mattered that the lower leveled leader was a cakewalk once you did things out of order. If the leaders have level scaling, then who cares which one you do first? It loses a lot of that "wow" factor that you get when you do something before a game recommends.

 

[Sheldon]

What people are saying: "We want some sort of scaling for gym battles specifically."

What this is being interpreted as: "We want every single wild Pokemon, trainer, and gym fight to be scaled to your level at all times."

I seriously don't get how this happens lol

As others said before, a mix of both would be the ideal end point for the concept of open world pokemon. Set levels in the field, scaling for gym leaders tied to number of badges. Even with even scaling of levels and number of pokemon at each stage you could still have some gyms be harder than others by virtue of having more fully evolved mons, better move sets or fewer weaknesses. Pokemon's battle system has a lot of knobs to twiddle, which makes VGC so enduring, and those lend themselves perfectly to a finely tuned PvE experience, too.

Given historic precedence I don't expect GF to get there immediately, but, step by step, eventually.

 

[shoichi]

I enjoyed the content of the presents today. Kind of hoped we at least another stage of evolution for the starters, but guess they want to slow roll that out a bit longer.

for level scaling if it was implemented, it depends how they do it. I kind of hope maybe they do some type of background calculation of the average of your Pokemon to determine the level of wild/trainer/gym Pokemon you see but also not go below a certain level to keep it in range so everything isn't way under leveled around you. Like what happens is you have a lvl100 and the rest are lvl1's how would level scaling work at that point. If its like WoW, I think level scaling was done in a way of everything scales with you in that zone, and adjust as you go to other ones but there is a level cap per zone/expansion usually so high level players can go back to old ones to farm content. Also it only needs to figure out based on 1 player.

 

[puddleths]

Level scaling would've been my preference. I wanted to fight a level 12 Tyranitar for my first badge and a level 60 Lechonk to gain access to the league.

 

[NabiscoFelt]

Scaling in a Pokemon RPG implies I'll never lose and I'll never will have to make decisions or face consequences as long as I have the correct Pokemon types at hand.

That's just a normal Pokemon game though

But on a serious note, I do think the lack of level scaling brings more interesting challenge than the presence of it would. Because let's be real, level scaling in Pokemon doesn't mean everything will be an even level of challenge, it means everything will be hilariously easy

 

[Zellia]

I wonder if following the gym storyline is supposed to be a more linear experience that will guide you through the gyms in order, while the other two storylines are more about exploration? So while you can technically do the gyms in any order, there is an intended 'guided' experience.

I'm just trying to figure out why no level scaling though for gyms. I don't care about or even necessarily want scaling outside of this, but it seems like an odd choice to not do it in gyms.

 

[ngpdrew]

What people are saying: "We want some sort of scaling for gym battles specifically."

What this is being interpreted as: "We want every single wild Pokemon, trainer, and gym fight to be scaled to your level at all times."

I seriously don't get how this happens lol

I would argue against both (and some are certainly not communicating the former explicitly).

Running to an end game area, somehow surviving, then finding out that the local boss has a level 10 Pansage isn’t fun. It crushes any immersion in the world you may have, and flattens out the experience so that basically everyone has the same experience (with a few tweaks here and there).

 

[Phendrift]

Spoiler

Didn’t the leaker who got everything right say the gimmick was past and future forms?

 

[Sheldon]

I would argue against both (and some are certainly not communicating the former explicitly).

Running to an end game area, somehow surviving, then finding out that the local boss has a level 10 Pansage isn’t fun. It crushes any immersion in the world you may have, and flattens out the experience so that basically everyone has the same experience (with a few tweaks here and there).

It wouldn't be a level 10 Pansage. It would be the first or second evo of a pseudo-legendary you won't see again and have a chance to catch the adult form of in the wild until much, much later. And it'll probably have a mid-game STAB and one or two effective moves, compared to the low power baby's first water/grass/fire attack you'd face in the easiest gym.

There's no reason to throw world-building out the window with scaling gyms. They'd retain their characteristics and gimmicks. A dragon trainer won't suddenly bring out an early route bird or rodent because their challenger only has one badge.

Spoiler

Didn’t the leaker who got everything right say the gimmick was past and future forms?

Better asked, and answered, in the spoilers thread.

 

[Deleted member 2349]

There's no reason to throw world-building out the window with scaling gyms. They'd retain their characteristics and gimmicks. A dragon trainer won't suddenly bring out an early route bird or rodent because their challenger only has one badge.

I think the crux of the argument is the level of the thing, not the actual pokemon

 

[Plum]

Maybe if the scaling is the horrible level scaling found in Skyrim. But what if say the gym leaders scaled but the wild Pokemon didn’t? Areas with level 50 Pokemon will remain like that. And the gym leaders don’t have to scale up to level 99; you can designate some gym leaders as “easy” and they have a lower level cap.

Are you thinking of Oblivion? Cause Skyrim actually had a really good level scaling for what the game was going for.

I feel like you kind of have to scale the other stuff at a certain point, right? like trudging through a high level area only to get to a gym leader with a team of level 15 guys would be weird

I would argue against both (and some are certainly not communicating the former explicitly).

Running to an end game area, somehow surviving, then finding out that the local boss has a level 10 Pansage isn’t fun. It crushes any immersion in the world you may have, and flattens out the experience so that basically everyone has the same experience (with a few tweaks here and there).

It wouldn't be weird if the game was truly designed to be as open as Game Freak touts it to be. If that were the case, there wouldn't be entire areas that only high-levelled players can realistically enter; there would be more high-levelled Pokemon, sure, but you'd be able to explore freely if you wanted to.

I mean, if you're worried about everyone having the same experience, then having a gym and world setup that means you have to do the whole "Grass-to-Rock-to-Dragon," thing anyway is exactly that worry. That's why people want level scaling here, because if gyms are still tiered as they are in the earlier games, then there's significantly less reason to go out of your way to explore when you could just go through

That and, as Sheldon says, level scaling does not have to mean "Level 10 players get Level 10 gyms no matter if it's a grass-type gym or a dragon-type gym." It means "Level 10 players going to the Dragon-type gym will be able to beat it, but it will be harder than if they had gone to the grass-type gym." And, in different teams, it means "Level 50 players who decide to go back and finally do the Water-type gym will still have to try a little instead of steam-rolling it with no strategy."

 

[Deleted member 2349]

Are you thinking of Oblivion? Cause Skyrim actually had a really good level scaling for what the game was going for.

I really hated the level scaling in Skyrim and think it made an already bland (by elder scrolls standards) game even more monotonous

It means "Level 10 players going to the Dragon-type gym will be able to beat it, but it will be harder than if they had gone to the grass-type gym." And, in different teams, it means "Level 50 players who decide to go back and finally do the Water-type gym will still have to try a little instead of steam-rolling it with no strategy."

but this sounds pretty good. I just 100% don't trust gf to do it like that

 

[Plum]

I really hated the level scaling in Skyrim and think it made an already bland (by elder scrolls standards) game even more monotonous

but this sounds pretty good. I just 100% don't trust gf to do it like that

Eh, to each their own. I feel like Skyrim had a fairly decent difficulty scaling for the kind of game it is. The game itself is repetitive and really shallow, definitely, but I never felt like my progression meant nothing like it did when I played Oblivion. Now that was a game with absolutely awful level scaling.

As for not trusting GF to do it like that, I wouldn't either lol. But where I stand is that the lack of scaled gyms automatically makes the game less open than even a poor implementation of level scaling lol

 

[Sheldon]

I think the crux of the argument is the level of the thing, not the actual pokemon

Why would it be? I mean, you could make the it level 20 compared to level 10 for the easiest gym, but the in-world fantasy is that gym leaders maintain different teams to provide appropriate challenges to trainers at varying points of their badge collecting journey. So each gym would of course have fully beefed up killers in its stable, but also relatively recently hatched stock of future heavyweights that have just started training.

Seeing a low level mon isn't immersion-breaking once you realize how taking on a dragon gym without a ice type attack right off the bat is much more daunting than marching your grass starter over to the ground gym or water gym first. Still, you might luck into a fairy mon early and then the long trip to Dragon Cave Town might seem inviting compared to a gauntlet of super effective attacks awaiting your starter in the Fire Gym.

 

[Deleted member 2349]

did they confirm how battles work? they aren't separate from the open world again, right?

 

[ILikeFeet]

did they confirm how battles work? they aren't separate from the open world again, right?

battles are in the open world like Legends. we knew this since the first trailer

---

they show off these images in the portion about the stories, so I guess there's a plot involving vehicles and one more about the history of the region. maybe the evil team as well. maybe the first one is the evil team

 

[Boyfriend]

did they confirm how battles work? they aren't separate from the open world again, right?

they seem to take place on the overworld just based on the arenas we've seen, but i don't know that we've actually seen a transition from field to battle yet

 

[Brofield]

battles are in the open world like Legends. we knew this since the first trailer

---

they show off these images in the portion about the stories, so I guess there's a plot involving vehicles and one more about the history of the region. maybe the evil team as well. maybe the first one is the evil team

Can't wait for Pokemon to have its Mad Max moment