So after a good few months of silence following the announcement of Pokemon Sword and Shield, we have our first batch of brand new information on the 8th generation of Pokemon. Nintendo live streamed a 15-minute feature today (watch here) on some of the brand new things you can expect from the games come November 15th.
It was a bit of a mixed bag, and there’s some stuff which I can see the Pokemon community at large rejecting, but honestly, there wasn’t a great deal for me to hate on here, let’s get into it.
New Pokemon
Ok, so let’s kick off with the thing you probably care the most about, the new Pokemon. This showcase revealed to us 7 of the new Pokemon from the Galar region, I’m going to take a look at them one by one and let you know what I think.
Wooloo: It’s a big fluffy sheep ball. I think it looks nice and cute, the tiny little horns on its head are a nice little touch (and hopefully means it will evolve). I think it does a good job of capturing the English vibe these games are going for and will fit seamlessly into the world.
Gossifleur: The more I look at this one, the more I like it. The two flowers on its head do a great job of looking like hair and work really well with the design of its face to give me a good sense of charm from it. I’m not entirely sure how it’s supposed to move with just a point to stand on, but we’ll see.
Eldegoss: The evolution of Gossifleur, it takes all of the things I like about Gossifleur and gets rid of them. It has its charms, the new face it’s got looks a little mischievous and the big ball on its head actually fits well with the rest of the design. My main problem is how all of the colours seem to have got dulled from Gossifleur and leaves Eldegoss just a little more boring to look at.
Drednaw: I don’t know if I’ll get more fond of it with time, but something about Drednaw’s design just doesn’t quite seem right to me. Something about the cylindrical shape of its head and the slightly strange colour scheme just make it look a bit like it doesn’t fit in the Pokemon world. I’m sure my opinion will evolve once I’ve seen more Pokemon from this region, but right now I’m not overly fond of Drednaw.
Corviknight: It’s a black, 
armoured raven with glowing red eyes and looks like it wants to kill me. I freaking love it. Every part of its armour is so brilliantly designed to fit the style of a raven of death and the whole thing just looks seamless, even down to the little covers of armour on its toes. This thing looks like it’ll rip you to shreds as soon as it looks at you and I love it.
Zacian: The first of the two cover legendaries, Zacian is the one for Sword, and while I think there was a better way to represent it than just sticking a sword in a dog’s mouth, I quick like the overall design of this one. The colour scheme really strikes me as beautiful here, especially with the lighter blue and red, with what looks like a crown on its head and golden wing-like things on it’s back, the whole design of Zacian seems so aerodynamic, like it’s evolved over time to have a body that allows it to move with the sword perfectly.
Zamazenta: First off, let’s take a second to appreciate how great that name is. Now looking at the rest of the design, I think I like this one too, although the pair of legendaries as a whole does have a problem. While I admittedly didn’t like it at first, now I’ve seen the official artwork, I actually quite like Zamazenta’s beard shield thing, and it shares many of the same qualities as to what draws me to Zacian so much. However, that brings me to the problem, which is that I just think the pair look too similar. Look at all the previous cover legendaries, all of them look so strikingly different where each one brings out different emotions in you, that’s the point of them, to be opposites, but here the colour scheme and body design just look so similar that it just doesn’t really fit with what the rest of the franchise has done. That said, individually, I do still like both Pokemon.
Dynamax Pokemon
And the award for most over the top name for a feature in a video game goes to…
So this generation’s battle gimmick (because since Mega Evolutions we just HAVE to have one apparently) is Dynamaxing, which is a fancy way of saying making your Pokemon flipping massive, increasing their power in the process. It’s stupid, absolutely bloody stupid, but I kind of love it for that reason. Yes, it’s a pointless gimmick that will never be seen again past Gen 8, just the same as Mega Evolution and Z-Moves, but seeing a 10-year-old kid have to grab a Pokeball bigger than their head and throw it only for a 50 foot tall Magikarp come out is a visual just too brilliant to hate.
Even the name “dynamaxing” is stupid, but stupid in an over the top, fun kind of way where you can’t help but smile at it. Given that it only lasts three turns it might have some interesting tactics behind it depending on what the specifics of “more powerful” are, but I don’t think it’s going to live up to Mega Evolution as a beloved feature.
The Wild Area
FINALLY!
A massive open area where Pokemon roam about the place, with a huge variety of terrain and direct camera control to wander about it. Perfect. One of the biggest cries has been for Pokemon to go “open world” and while I don’t think a full open world experience would work, this is a brilliant compromise.
Having vast open spaces between town and cities where there are Pokemon running around all over the place seems like a wonderful addition. Although we didn’t get anything confirmed just yet, it also looked like there were new ways to hunt down Pokemon in these wild areas, with the video showing trainers sneaking around, whistling into the grass and chasing down certain Pokemon, there could be a huge variety of stuff to do in these areas.
Gyms Return & Main Characters Revealed
Lumping these two together because there’s not a great deal to say about them.
As most of us expected Gyms will be making a return in Sword & Shield, and we got to take a look at what they will be like. Disappointingly, it seems they may be going more down the anime root of just a big open battlefield where you challenge the Gym leader, hopefully, this isn’t the case and we get puzzles and challenges like we used to, but there was no indication of that here. A nice little touch is also the fact that not only is every Gym a stadium packed with supporters, but it’s also being filmed on TV. I doubt it’ll have any impact on the actual gameplay, but it’s nice that a little touch that I felt was missing for so long is finally being added.
We were also introduced to all of our favourite trope characters. Firstly we have the champion Leon, who looks a bit like a teacher that’s trying too hard to be cool, but honestly, any champion that isn’t named “Arthur” and wearing a suit of armour is fine by me. Then there’s your friendly rival Hop, admittedly it didn’t specify “friendly” in the trailer, but the few interactions that were shown between Hop and the main character seem like they were friends, which is fine, I don’t mind the rival being friendly, but it would be nice to see the trend bucked for once.
Then there’s the Professor, who this time is a lovely old lady named Magnolia, personally, I hope they make her a sharp and slightly bitter lady because I think it would be funnier and also it would bounce really well off of the assistant Sonia, who looks much warmer and welcoming.
Release Date: November 15th 2019
Pretty much what we all expected, but it’s nice to have it in writing.
So that’s that! There are all my thoughts on the new information we received today about Pokemon Sword & Shield! Let me know what you think of the info, and what your hopes are for more features to be revealed in the future in either the comments below or on Twitter @10ryawoo. Stay tuned tomorrow for my WWE Super Showdown predictions!
The Strong Style Smark 