Pokémon Scarlet and Violet: everything we know about the ninth generation
Pokémon Scarlet and Violet
Pokémon Scarlet and Pokémon Violet. At first glance they almost seem like the titles of two fan-made Pokémon games, those with the endings taken in weight by the transliteration of a title in English into the Japanese alphabet. "Poketto Monsta Baioretto". But no: they are really the new games of the main Pokémon series, the one that already in 2022 promises to present us the ninth generation of pocket monsters.After the controversies that have surrounded Pokémon Sword and Pokémon Shield, but also the very recent Pokémon Legends: Arceus, we would have liked it if The Pokémon Company had given Game Freak a break, to allow the Japanese team to rearrange ideas and maybe take stock of the features that fans have appreciated most in the last chapters and, above all , on those they liked least. But these emotional evaluations do not go well with the numbers of a brand that grinds millions of copies with each new iteration.
And so here we are again, ready to take stock of what we know about Pokémon Scarlet and Pokémon Violet, after the announcements of the presentation of Pokémon Day 2022, in the meantime trying to understand what surprises it could have in store for us this ninth generation Pokémon.
An open-world map
The Pokémon Scarlet and Pokémon Violet region map will be open-world Pokémon Scarlet and Pokémon Violet will be the first chapters of the series completely open world. After experimenting with the wilds of Galar and Hisui's open map structure, the main series finally looks set to take a plunge. Although we have some doubts about what the result will be.We do not know if Game Freak has worked on this episode alone or if it has received the support of other teams within Nintendo with whom it shares the new headquarters; what is certain is that the transition to the open world seems definitive. "Trainers will be able to explore an open world where city and nature merge without borders", states the official website. And immediately afterwards he states that "Pokémon from this region can be found everywhere, such as in the skies, in the seas and on the roads".
We see some examples in the announcement trailer, where Psyduck, Magnemite and Larvitar run around. The new region, still unnamed, seems to revolve around a large city in the center of a valley, at the foot of a snow-capped mountain range. An inhabited complex that is configured as a real city-fortress on three levels: in the lower one we find a monumental door flanked by what has all the air of a Pokémon Center placed outside the city so as not to slow down the phases too much of external exploration; an elevated intermediate floor which houses what appears to be the residential center; and, finally, the level of the main building, a sort of castle with a large Poké Ball between its towers, which stands imposingly in the center of the cliff.
The possible residence of the Pokémon Professor of Pokémon Scarlet and Pokémon Violet We still know nothing of the functions of the building, but it is clear that it will have a central role: it could be the "stadium" of the new Pokémon League, or the headquarters of an important organization within a city that could easily be the capital of the region, much like Lumiose City it was for Kalos in Pokémon X and Pokémon Y. Outside the walls, the trailer showed us other buildings: a sort of power station, probably wind-powered; a small villa with a fountain in Dratini, possibly the residence of the Pokémon professor on duty; and the protagonist's house, where we see the map of what looks like a continent-island, like Australia, or perhaps more of a peninsula, like the Iberian one.
Small curiosity: the cut-out of the frame on Nintendo Switch OLED clearly wants to indicate a connection between the coach / trainer room of the game and the real world room where the policeman of the live part of the trailer is located -action. Here we would like to point out the insistence on two elements in particular, two types of fruit: oranges and grapes. We see them on a small table and immediately after they are stylized in logos on the crests on the sides of the entrance door: we leave the speculations to you.
As for the biomes shown in the video, we have not seen anything new or particularly surprising: prairies, woods, swamps, caves, deserts. The density of elements looks the same as seen to Galar and Hisui, and even the quality of the textures didn't make us cry out for a miracle. There are some timid improvements, but cleanliness and fluidity need to be reviewed. We are waiting for a more advanced build to get involved in what will surely be the most discussed topic of the coming months: the technical sector. Also because those motion animations deserve justice. And even those poor Swablu perched on an electric cable.
Release Date
The release date of Pokémon Scarlet and Pokémon Violet has not yet been announced precisely. However, there is talk of the end of 2022, so we should have new information soon. Obviously exclusively on the consoles of the Nintendo Switch family.The starters
The three starters of Pokémon Scarlet and Pokémon Violet As usual there will be two protagonists of Pokémon Scarlet and Pokémon Violet: a child She is a girl. And, listen, listen, they will also have a different suit to wear according to the version of the game chosen.The choice of the first adventure companion, or the starter, will be among the three classic elemental types for the series: grass, fire and water. The grass Pokémon will be Sprigatito, the Grass Cat Pokémon always looking for attention: a feline that, according to its name, would not surprise us if it ended up evolving into a spriggan, a sort of elf-tree from Celtic mythology. Then we have Fuecoco, the Fuocodile Pokémon: literally a fire crocodile, which according to the description of the official site could prove to be rather slow. Finally, there is Quaxly, the Duckling Pokémon, a water-type pirate version of a Farfetch'd who loves to do things right despite losing his trusty medicinal leek. None of them made us crazy for originality, but we will see how their evolutionary forms are declined.
Pokémon Home
After the release of the games, it will be possible to connect Pokémon Scarlet and Pokémon Violet to Pokémon HOME, the subscription service that allows you to bring all your Pokémon together in the same place. It is also possible to import Pokémon from other regions, but at the moment it is not clear which and how many of them.Fighting system
Just like in Pokémon Legends: Arceus, the battles of Pokémon Scarlet and Violet should take place on the map The official information stops here, but we can afford a small note on the combat system, which will be that of the classic chapters, both for statistics and for mechanics. The official site talks about "the essence of the Pokémon series games", where to face "wild Pokémon in battles and then capture them": if anyone had any doubts about the presence of a system in the style of Pokémon Legends: Arceus, this simple phrase should dispel them in rather definitive way.From the Legends series, however, the system of battles without transitions, or at least with minimal transitions, seems to return: the battles, in short, will mainly take place on the place where we are. On the presence of the traditional gyms and league, however, it is too early to unbalance.
Pokémon Scarlet and Pokémon Violet arrive damn soon. Not so much compared to Pokémon Sword and Pokémon Shield, given that the eighth generation now dates back to 2019. As for the awareness that the main series seems to struggle to find a coherent direction, from a technical-artistic point of view certainly, but also on the front of its conceptual identity. The announcement trailer for the new chapters did not give us much reassurance about it, but we have seen very little and there is still time before the release. Plus that crazed clock in the trailer ...
