FA+
Shop
Pokemon Sword/Shield
6 years ago
The main reason I'm making this journal is because I've had a lot of friends already message me about the topic and I just want one central place to store my response- yes, I saw about Dynamax. I... don't really have much interest in it? I have less interest in Sword/Shield than I did before the Direct, anyway.
There's a variety of reasons, but the main ones are that I don't really see Dynamax covering any ground I'd be interested in, or at least not more than a fraction of it. From the looks of things, it just works in battle, and sets a Pokemon's model size to about 60 feet or so tall for 3 turns (unless it's an enemy Pokemon in a Raid). Which (among several other elements, for example the fact that I'm way more interested in the process of growth than just the result) just doesn't really line up that well with the sort of things I actually like about macro stuff. I mean, it's nice, sure, but it's more disappointing than interesting, to me. And I'm pretty sure I wouldn't want them to change it to better suit my interests, because that would end up making the game 1: really weird and 2: probably make it really bad at being a fun 8-20 hour JRPG experience.
Maybe it'll lead to some more macro Pokemon art? But there's already lots of macro Pokemon art at around that scale, and I figure the ones who'll draw it the most are the ones who'd have otherwise been drawing... macro Pokemon art. So it doesn't really change much for me on the furry side of things either.
And on the gameplay side, it feels like the less interesting parts of both Mega Evolution and Z-Moves combined.
Besides that, the Wild Area looks absolutely barren- that might just be a case of them hiding a lot of content that would otherwise clutter the screen enough to diminish the view (it definitely looks scenic), but if that's anywhere near final, eesh. Breath of the Wild's open world worked great because there was always something new to see and interact with waiting around a corner, and you never knew what bizarre new thing you might find- worst case, you could be pretty sure you'd get a Deku Seed out of it if nothing at all else. I definitely don't see anything like that in Wild Area so far.
I wasn't super sold on any of the new designs they showed off either, but, they've shown like 5 Pokemon out of presumably way more than that, and most of these were the early-game stuff. I'm not at all bothered on that front, and don't consider that a mark against Sword/Shield. Nothing really offended me (except Corviknight's name and lack of armor, at least TalonFlame just owns its lack of effort and doesn't pretend it's some clever wordplay that isn't there, geez), and at least a couple designs seem like things friends would enjoy.
Sword and Shield look like they're be fine. They'll be new mainline Pokemon games- some additions, some subtractions, standard excellent level of quality for the series (with the aforementioned concerns RE: Wild Area content). But I, personally, VDO, didn't see anything that made me more interested in the games, and there was a decent amount that made me less interested. Which is fine! It's not a game made specifically for me. And maybe later trailers will show things that get me back on board. And people seem to be getting pretty hype for it, judging by how many people excitedly messaged me about it. So that is good! I am okay with the Direct, even if I didn't care much about what I saw.
One definite plus for me, though- Growlithe shown off in the trailer while talking about old region Pokemon being in. A huge worry I had during the Sun/Moon hype period was that all the rumors about Alola Arcanine being a weird water-type which inexplicably sacrificed all its floof for fins might turn out to be true, and we'd just be seeing un-floof Arcanine going forward. Anyone who's grabbed the VDODex ( Very NSFW, https://www.furaffinity.net/view/30656214/ ) definitely has seen that I am super into the idea of making things better via Arcaninification, but I like Arcanine's base design, and it wasn't yet clear how much or how little the Alola forms were going to serve as replacements or alternatives for the base designs!
Comments closed on this one because there's not much more to say and it's not a topic I really want to discuss much further at the moment- no need to apologize if you excitedly messaged me about this (thank you, if you did! <3), I appreciate the thought and absolutely do not blame you for not expecting me to have such a surface-seemingly anti-VDO response to bigness!
There's a variety of reasons, but the main ones are that I don't really see Dynamax covering any ground I'd be interested in, or at least not more than a fraction of it. From the looks of things, it just works in battle, and sets a Pokemon's model size to about 60 feet or so tall for 3 turns (unless it's an enemy Pokemon in a Raid). Which (among several other elements, for example the fact that I'm way more interested in the process of growth than just the result) just doesn't really line up that well with the sort of things I actually like about macro stuff. I mean, it's nice, sure, but it's more disappointing than interesting, to me. And I'm pretty sure I wouldn't want them to change it to better suit my interests, because that would end up making the game 1: really weird and 2: probably make it really bad at being a fun 8-20 hour JRPG experience.
Maybe it'll lead to some more macro Pokemon art? But there's already lots of macro Pokemon art at around that scale, and I figure the ones who'll draw it the most are the ones who'd have otherwise been drawing... macro Pokemon art. So it doesn't really change much for me on the furry side of things either.
And on the gameplay side, it feels like the less interesting parts of both Mega Evolution and Z-Moves combined.
Besides that, the Wild Area looks absolutely barren- that might just be a case of them hiding a lot of content that would otherwise clutter the screen enough to diminish the view (it definitely looks scenic), but if that's anywhere near final, eesh. Breath of the Wild's open world worked great because there was always something new to see and interact with waiting around a corner, and you never knew what bizarre new thing you might find- worst case, you could be pretty sure you'd get a Deku Seed out of it if nothing at all else. I definitely don't see anything like that in Wild Area so far.
I wasn't super sold on any of the new designs they showed off either, but, they've shown like 5 Pokemon out of presumably way more than that, and most of these were the early-game stuff. I'm not at all bothered on that front, and don't consider that a mark against Sword/Shield. Nothing really offended me (except Corviknight's name and lack of armor, at least TalonFlame just owns its lack of effort and doesn't pretend it's some clever wordplay that isn't there, geez), and at least a couple designs seem like things friends would enjoy.
Sword and Shield look like they're be fine. They'll be new mainline Pokemon games- some additions, some subtractions, standard excellent level of quality for the series (with the aforementioned concerns RE: Wild Area content). But I, personally, VDO, didn't see anything that made me more interested in the games, and there was a decent amount that made me less interested. Which is fine! It's not a game made specifically for me. And maybe later trailers will show things that get me back on board. And people seem to be getting pretty hype for it, judging by how many people excitedly messaged me about it. So that is good! I am okay with the Direct, even if I didn't care much about what I saw.
One definite plus for me, though- Growlithe shown off in the trailer while talking about old region Pokemon being in. A huge worry I had during the Sun/Moon hype period was that all the rumors about Alola Arcanine being a weird water-type which inexplicably sacrificed all its floof for fins might turn out to be true, and we'd just be seeing un-floof Arcanine going forward. Anyone who's grabbed the VDODex ( Very NSFW, https://www.furaffinity.net/view/30656214/ ) definitely has seen that I am super into the idea of making things better via Arcaninification, but I like Arcanine's base design, and it wasn't yet clear how much or how little the Alola forms were going to serve as replacements or alternatives for the base designs!
Comments closed on this one because there's not much more to say and it's not a topic I really want to discuss much further at the moment- no need to apologize if you excitedly messaged me about this (thank you, if you did! <3), I appreciate the thought and absolutely do not blame you for not expecting me to have such a surface-seemingly anti-VDO response to bigness!
Comment posting has been disabled by the journal owner.
