The Pokemon Company has revealed the 9th generation of Pokémon games, with the reveal of the Switch game, Pokémon Scarlet and Violet. The games don’t have a firm release date yet, but are due in late 2022. These games use the new Pokémon Legends Arceus engine, so the visual got a definite downgrade in some ways. That may help the game perform better on the limited Switch hardware. That big shift to an open world that the devs are teasing may be the big reason.
Yes, you heard that right, there’s a fully open world this time around. It seems as though the evolution of the Wild Area from Sword and Shield has finally come. The fact that Game Freak is already coming out with such a large title not even a year after Pokémon Legends: Arceus has already seen some criticism. Some folks are concerned that the new game won’t run well and will look much worse. And that may be true, but the trailer does show some lighting and rendering improvements on the monsters themselves. That, if combined with gameplay refinements, could help make up for the lower quality. Hopefully we don’t run into the same controversy from Sword and Shield with all the lackluster attack animations and other cut corners.
Announced During Pokemon Day 2022’s Pokemon Presents, these two new Game Freak-developed games will feature a new region and its three starters have already been revealed. This new region will have a much larger focus on a more living world. The developer says that “Pokémon can be seen everywhere in this wide-open world – in the skies, in the sea, and on the streets.” This change will apparently remove borders from the game’s towns, effectively blending the traditional town structure with the Wild Areas. There’s some very clear influences from the last game here.
Check out the trailer for Pokémon Scarlet and Violet down below.
