The recent Pokemon Presents buried the lede a little bit when discussing Scarlet & Violet. While it was obvious the talk of the town would be Fidough, the bread dog designed to give you yeast infections, the bulk of the Paldea focused Presents fixated on the Legendaries and the world itself, but halfway through proceedings, there was a tone switch. More information started coming at us thick and fast, like it was hinting to the listener 'the hype stuff is over, this bit is for the nerds'. As a fully paid up member of the nerds club, I leaned in with anticipation. Then the bombshell dropped. This time around, Pokemon will have three stories, which all happen simultaneously. This is the biggest shake-up to the formula Pokemon has ever promised.
I've been burned by Pokemon a lot, and not just from hugging Charmander too much. Change for the series has been slow, frustrating, and laden with caveats, despite its huge success. It's been one step forward and three steps back at times. Pokemon's the love of my life but it makes me mad. I love it, want it, hate it, I just don't understand. Still, when it comes to Pokemon, I choose optimism. Three storylines is not a major ambition for a game of Pokemon's pull or revenue, but it's way beyond anything attempted so far (certainly in a mainline game), that this might be the something that eventually had to give.
We know just one of the three stories so far, which means there's a lot of opportunities for the rug to be pulled out from under us. This single story is the regular story, eight gyms, Victory Road, becoming the very best like no one ever was – you know, it's a whole deal. You can tackle the gyms in any order (though without scaling), which feels like a great idea being executed terribly, but I suppose we should reserve judgement until we see it in practice. The other two are a complete mystery, but if they're as in depth as the gym battle saga (Pokemon Sword & Shield had just one story and I took around 25 hours to become the Pokemon Champion), then this is a very meaty offering indeed.
Pokemon usually has a Legendary-based endgame, but this time around you get the Legendaries at the start, so maybe that's part of the general shake-up. We can make some guesses as to what the other two stories might be. It has been suggested that one could be the villainous team's arc, but traditionally this has linked in with the gym saga, be it Giovanni owning the eighth gym or Team Yell's link to Spikemuth. If it is its own thing, that likely means the biggest villain story yet. There's also clearly an academy in Paldea, which could be part of a school-sim story, while the time travel aspects established in Legends: Arceus will no doubt return. With Scarlet the 'past' game and Violet the 'future' by way of their aesthetics, surely time is going to play a part in this story. And with that, Chris Nolan just came in his pants.
We're also asked which story we'll tackle first, although it seems likely we can mix and match across the game. What this means though is that these aren't endgame tag-ons. They will be part of the main game, for us to dip in and out of as we wish. Legends: Arceus dabbled in sidequests, and while they were pretty basic, its well past time Pokemon started spreading its wings with this narrative structure.
Pokemon Scarlet & Violet is in a strange position. Pokemon has never been stronger as a brand, but the title still feels under huge scrutiny, with so many of us expecting it to take the giant leap Pokemon has been due for years. It remains to be seen if it will live up to expectations, but it's certainly making the right noises in the meantime.
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