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The huge problem with the argument for Pokemon Let's Go appealing to casuals.

Are you excited by this new detailed cinematic 3D adventure take on Kanto?

  • Yes

    Votes: 7 50.0%
  • No

    Votes: 7 50.0%

  • Total voters
    14
  • Poll closed .
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Not open for further replies.

TwilightSpooky

I am da one
It comes down to the core concept and appeal. As Game Freak has pointed out several times, mobile devices are meant to be general purpose electronic devices and provide not just gaming, but music, movies, internet, social media, a variety of different forms of entertainment. So mobile gamers aren't specifically interested in gaming, they just see it as one part of a full entertainment package. Furthermore, they're relatively unwilling to spend money on mobile games. Compare that with the Switch, which is designed first and foremost to be a gaming device, one that you can play when you're out and about and then come home and play it on your TV. So the market that's buying a Switch is likely going to spend much more time playing than mobile gamers would. The business model for traditional console also presents a higher bar to entry, each full scale retail game costs $60 to play them, so they require a heftier investment of money to enjoy. With all this in mind, there probably won't be a lot of mobile gamers willing to cross over. They likely got Go because you can play it for free and alternate between that and whatever else they want to do, whereas for Let's Go they have to be willing to fork over $360 just to play Let's Go. To a mobile gamer this wouldn't be seen as a good value, it doesn't suit their needs. That's why it's unwise to target them.



No, they've never really done this. Balancing what everyone would want would mean things like including multiple difficulties again, having a large degree of optional content in their games while still making it accessible enough for casual players to easily zip right through it, and not forcing simplifications because they think the fanbase needs their hand held. Such a game doesn't currently exist yet.

And they don't need two games to accomplish this, they just need one game that's flexible enough to allow different fans to experience it in whatever way they want it to. So the split is unnecessary and will just lead to further toxicity.



While it's true they aren't completely accountable for fan behavior they are accountable for making design decisions that appeal to or isolate groups of fans based on their personal interests and that is the main cause of the toxicity. The whole point of them making games is to make a product people enjoy so they can make money, if people aren't enjoying what they're offering they're not doing their job correctly.
There's a lot of assumptions in your first point. I don't think Gamefreak is banking sales on only solely mobile gamers. The whole Pokemon Go is a gimmicky add on that will likely work. Are you taking into account all the switch owners who play Pokemon Go on handheld and on their phones? Consider those who play Go and catch perfect shinies now they can transfer them to a playable core game, possibly transferring them to future games. Or how about younger players who haven't yet decided if getting a Switch was quite worth it but now that they can integrate Go will make that decision. Doesn't hurt that the game will be released right before the holidays. And like I said there are plenty of fans that aren't the target base for this game that have already got their preorders (myself included). You can have your opinion but you don't have any actual evidence that what you say will drastically impact sales and neither do I. Only time will tell, though if I had to wager I'd say the game will do well enough. I will add that the retail price of a Switch game shouldn't be an issue. Console games are more expensive than handhelds, it's always been that way. Never stopped me from buying Stadium on the N64. (man I feel old)

Again a lot of this is just opinion. You're correct that they've never had those elements in one game all at once but like I've said they have tried putting elements that appease the different fans in one game, unsuccessfully. Yes a game like that would seemingly be nice though I could see how it wouldn't work. However Gamefreak doesn't apparently think its workable. Maybe it doesn't need separate games but if it works, what's the problem? Plus since they're selling two games they'll be making more profit.

I disagree entirely. Gamefreak/Nintendo never made a promise to 100% please every fan all of the time or swear they would never pander or focus on one particular group. So one group doesn't get what they want, I reiterate don't like it, don't buy it. Gamefreak is not intentionally trying to isolate players and create toxicity they are simply trying to sell a product to a large, diverse, group of people. The toxicity you speak of is caused entirely by fans and no one else. I do agree that If people aren't enjoying their games in mass then yes it would seem they'd need to go back to the drawing board but that's not the case. Obviously people are still very much enjoying the pokemon game franchise even if there is in fighting within the community. And honestly speaking, I don't even know what toxicity you're referencing. Imo the pokemon gaming fan base is pretty chill. It's only in the competitive battling scene is where I see the most argument and even then it's tame. Then again I've been involved in a lot of other infamous fanbases/fandoms.
 

Bolt the Cat

Bringing the Thunder
There's a lot of assumptions in your first point.

Assumptions? No. Generalizations? Yes. This behavior has all been documented across 20 years of sales, so it's not really an assumption, there's plenty of evidence indicating this. However, I will admit I'm generalizing the market and not everyone falls neatly into this pattern, there are definitely exceptions to the rule. But in business, you have to generalize to some degree. If you're trying to profit you need to figure out how to attract large groups of people to your product so you're going to look at how the audience behaves as a whole.

I don't think Gamefreak is banking sales on only solely mobile gamers. The whole Pokemon Go is a gimmicky add on that will likely work.

Solely? Probably not. But the fact that they integrated Go into this game, adapted its mechanics to the main games, and overall intentionally simplified the game for a casual audience strongly implies that Go players are the primary target audience for this game and where they expect most of their sales to come from.

Are you taking into account all the switch owners who play Pokemon Go on handheld and on their phones? Consider those who play Go and catch perfect shinies now they can transfer them to a playable core game, possibly transferring them to future games.

They already buy the handheld games, so as long as they don't do anything too disruptive they should buy the game regardless.

Or how about younger players who haven't yet decided if getting a Switch was quite worth it but now that they can integrate Go will make that decision. Doesn't hurt that the game will be released right before the holidays.

If they were considering a Switch to begin with, they probably wanted other games besides Pokemon. You usually don't buy a console for just one game, again that's poor value compared to smartphones.

I will add that the retail price of a Switch game shouldn't be an issue. Console games are more expensive than handhelds, it's always been that way. Never stopped me from buying Stadium on the N64. (man I feel old)

Again, this is Economics 101. This has been shown billions of times to the point where it should be common sense. Here's an article on the concept if you're not familiar:

https://top.quora.com/How-can-I-understand-the-relationship-between-demand-and-price

Again a lot of this is just opinion. You're correct that they've never had those elements in one game all at once but like I've said they have tried putting elements that appease the different fans in one game, unsuccessfully. Yes a game like that would seemingly be nice though I could see how it wouldn't work. However Gamefreak doesn't apparently think its workable. Maybe it doesn't need separate games but if it works, what's the problem? Plus since they're selling two games they'll be making more profit.

Again, it's not just about including everything but being flexible about the content and not shoving it down the players' throats. Game Freak has never really done this. They force you to progress through the game a certain way. They force you to play the game at a set difficulty level. They force you to put up with tutorials for everything regardless of whether or not you know how to do them. You're simply not going to be able to please as many people by forcing them to have a homogeneous experience with everyone else, for it to really be broadly appealing they need to create a way for different people with different preferences to have different experiences with the same game. Give the player a wide variety of content and let them decide what they want to do.

I disagree entirely. Gamefreak/Nintendo never made a promise to 100% please every fan all of the time or swear they would never pander or focus on one particular group. So one group doesn't get what they want, I reiterate don't like it, don't buy it. Gamefreak is not intentionally trying to isolate players and create toxicity they are simply trying to sell a product to a large, diverse, group of people.

Pleasing 100% of the fans is impossible anyway, but they should still try to please as many people as possible. Their design decisions are intentionally turning off certain groups of fans and limiting their audience. Maybe they're not doing this intentionally, but they're still unnecessarily turning off people that enjoy the core concept of Pokemon and that's what's causing the arguments and the toxicity.
 

Sαpphire

Johto Champion
I'll probably address more points later - really can't guarantee I'll feel like it - but if we actually wanted to talk about the economics of the situation you should probably be discussing it fully aware of the fact that this "economics 101" relationship between price and demand only holds constant for the specific context in which you're analyzing those variables, and since a release on a brand new, home-ready console is a completely different context from a 3DS release, there's no reason to expect demand to be intrinsically lower just because the new games are more expensive, given that the context of the Switch is still one of "cool new technology that's selling like fire and had the best first year in console history"

And, of course, we have to acknowledge that this is basic Econ 101 (or, for me, it was course coded as Econ 012!) because it truly is a basic assessment and there are dozens, even hundreds of external and internal factors in each context that can cause demand to fluctuate wildly and move the general demand curve entirely rather than moving us along that curve which is when the price relationship is more directly impacted - factors like perceived quality and word of mouth promotion, competing releases or lack thereof, the efficacy of the marketing strategy attached to the games, critical reception, initial sales and the impact they have (fear of missing out, etc), the expected life cycle and sustainability of the product, etc

And then when it was alleged that they're making these games "less valuable" based on not including features that, um, specifically you and a few other players want, that was a very subjective assessment and can be easily countered by pointing out that being on the Switch at all - and being in HD, and some of their extra little features - already make them inherently more valuable, and there's probably genwunners out there two whom these are subjectively very valuable in contrast to your own subjective value assessment

Just like, wanted to point that out specifically since the highly contextual nature of price and demand and like economics itself was being rather left out and I really strongly feel like we don't have enough information to make any economical and price-based arguments about these games as it pertains to their casualization and their intended audience pretty much at all, especially since we cant assume that mobile customers are unwilling to pay for this when the context shifts completely from mobile to console, or that they're unwilling to invest in the console for other games, or that there's not potentially significant overlap between the mobile and console markets
 

dss_live

Water and Fairy-type master
Pleasing 100% of the fans is impossible anyway, but they should still try to please as many people as possible. Their design decisions are intentionally turning off certain groups of fans and limiting their audience. Maybe they're not doing this intentionally, but they're still unnecessarily turning off people that enjoy the core concept of Pokemon and that's what's causing the arguments and the toxicity.

There are people who like sour and people who like sweet. Some who like both. You can try all you want to find the perfect balance between those two and get both to like the same piece of candy, but that's pretty much impossible. At the same time, they can create both sour and sweet candy, giving something for both audiences. And that is perfectly fine, it does not mean they alienate one of the other. They're simply saying "oh, you like sour? here is something sour"; "but what about me?" ,person who likes sweets, "oh don't worry, we have something sweet for you instead".

Why does everything always have to be for everyone. You can push and stuff something full of as many things as possible, but there will always be stuff that turns of group A,B,C, ..., Z and god only knows how many more groups, each disliking something completely different, from insignificant stuff to big stuff.

The reality is simple. They're making 2 different games for 2 different audiences. They're not pushing anyone away, they're not going "well screw you guys". The sweet candy just ain't redy yet, so be patient it will come, what's wrong about people alrdy enjoying some sour stuff in the meantime.

Besides, this game is a spin-off series, even if it becomes it's own series of games. Aside from the fact that this time gamefreak is developing themselves, there is zero difference between these games and the mystery dungeons games, or the pokemon ranger games. Or hell, detective pikachu , even. Those games were made with different audiences in mind. And that's perfectly fine.

This entire argument seems to come down to wanting every game to be made to your liking. I didn't like mystery dungeon , or pokemon ranger, i didn't complain about them because it's fine for games to exist that don't speak to me. I played the hell out of the main games, and regardless of whether i'm gonna like let's go or not, i'll play the hell out the next main game.
 

Bolt the Cat

Bringing the Thunder
There are people who like sour and people who like sweet. Some who like both. You can try all you want to find the perfect balance between those two and get both to like the same piece of candy, but that's pretty much impossible. At the same time, they can create both sour and sweet candy, giving something for both audiences. And that is perfectly fine, it does not mean they alienate one of the other. They're simply saying "oh, you like sour? here is something sour"; "but what about me?" ,person who likes sweets, "oh don't worry, we have something sweet for you instead".

Why does everything always have to be for everyone. You can push and stuff something full of as many things as possible, but there will always be stuff that turns of group A,B,C, ..., Z and god only knows how many more groups, each disliking something completely different, from insignificant stuff to big stuff.

The reality is simple. They're making 2 different games for 2 different audiences. They're not pushing anyone away, they're not going "well screw you guys". The sweet candy just ain't redy yet, so be patient it will come, what's wrong about people alrdy enjoying some sour stuff in the meantime.

Besides, this game is a spin-off series, even if it becomes it's own series of games. Aside from the fact that this time gamefreak is developing themselves, there is zero difference between these games and the mystery dungeons games, or the pokemon ranger games. Or hell, detective pikachu , even. Those games were made with different audiences in mind. And that's perfectly fine.

This entire argument seems to come down to wanting every game to be made to your liking. I didn't like mystery dungeon , or pokemon ranger, i didn't complain about them because it's fine for games to exist that don't speak to me. I played the hell out of the main games, and regardless of whether i'm gonna like let's go or not, i'll play the hell out the next main game.

Maybe if the different preferences were contradictory you'd have a point but for the most part nothing really contradicts each other in Pokemon. The only real issue is open world vs. deep story, that's about it.
 

dss_live

Water and Fairy-type master
Maybe if the different preferences were contradictory you'd have a point but for the most part nothing really contradicts each other in Pokemon. The only real issue is open world vs. deep story, that's about it.

They use the same formula, but with key differences. Tailored to a different audience. These key differences is the sour/sweet. Something that is clearly not a "small" thing which this whole thread (and plenty of posts on other threads) points out.

A jelly bean is a jelly bean, but one can still be sour and one sweet. Or both can be sweet but different flavors, probably fits better. Still, those differences are things tailored to a specific audience.

Sidenote: open world and deep story aren't contradictory. One doesn't stop the other.
 

shoz999

Back when Tigers used to smoke.
Going back to the original topic. Do some of you guys think, from a business point of view, that GameFreak is genius for applying Pokemon Go Mechanics and taking away other already-casual features, like wild battles, in favor of shortening the experience from an already casual-friendly RPG series could appeal to casuals even further or do you think GameFreak forgot what appeals to casuals from the Pokemon GO craze that had massive losses over time, forgetting that having a good hook, a balanced difficulty, and the quality fun and easy-to-understand experience appeals to casuals more in the long run that lead to many people having Pokemon as there first RPG experience over the more complicated or extremely long traditional Western or Japanese RPGs, not shortening, or to some fans downgrading, already casual-friendly features as a shorter experience with so many cuts in it's corners does not always equal casual friendly.
 

Nockturne

Well-Known Member
To be honest I think only time will tell. These games do seem to be something of a gamble (I'm someone who buys pretty much every Pokemon games and I'm still on the fence) but if the GO market pays off I think it will have been a pretty genius move. If GF are able to add another branch to the Pokemon family tree by capitalising of GO's popularity and peoples desire to see nostalgic locations/characters in their home console glory by remaking something that has (basically) already been remade, that's super cheeky but more power to them. But like I said time will tell, maybe they'll bomb and they'll go down in history as a misstep or maybe they'll be a runaway success and we get to look forward to 10 years of "Hoenn remake remakes confirmed!!1!!" jokes until Let's GO Plusle and Minun drop :D:D:D
 

Kein

AKA Silktree
They won't bomb. The trailer already has 11.7 million views, compared to all the ORAS/USUM trailers with under 3 million views.
 

Ariki

Well-Known Member
Going back to the original topic. Do some of you guys think, from a business point of view, that GameFreak is genius for applying Pokemon Go Mechanics and taking away other already-casual features, like wild battles, in favor of shortening the experience from an already casual-friendly RPG series could appeal to casuals even further or do you think GameFreak forgot what appeals to casuals from the Pokemon GO craze that had massive losses over time, forgetting that having a good hook, a balanced difficulty, and the quality fun and easy-to-understand experience appeals to casuals more in the long run that lead to many people having Pokemon as there first RPG experience over the more complicated or extremely long traditional Western or Japanese RPGs, not shortening, or to some fans downgrading, already casual-friendly features as a shorter experience with so many cuts in it's corners does not always equal casual friendly.

That was a super long descriptive question that I’ll try to address (fingers crossed hope to die!)

I can’t say if it is a genius move by Gamefreak just yet. All we have to go off of is the popularity of Go, the presales and anectdotal evidence of those who played the demo at E3.

The real test will be when the public plays the game at launch.

I think casualising the games even further will help lower the entry level for people into the Pokemon franchise. Consider this: the battle mechanics of Gen 3 onwards are such a hurdle to get one’s head around in comparison to the mechanics in Gen 1 and Gen 2, this is a considerable barrier to get one’s head around, not only does one have to learn type match ups, but then there’s abilities and natures. The description of natures are such it’s automatically clear to the player which stats are affected. Gamefreak could definitely do more work in that area (not casualise, but educate).

As for the removal of wild battles: I am literally surprised that anyone would be sour grapes over this. I remember, and to this day, I spend a lot of time avoiding wild battles. The Pokemon Go mechanic of catching Pokemon turns this on its head. And I am confident that Gamefreak has balanced this enough to ensure that we needn’t worry about running out of Pokeballs.
 

Kein

AKA Silktree
I think casualising the games even further will help lower the entry level for people into the Pokemon franchise. Consider this: the battle mechanics of Gen 3 onwards are such a hurdle to get one’s head around in comparison to the mechanics in Gen 1 and Gen 2, this is a considerable barrier to get one’s head around, not only does one have to learn type match ups, but then there’s abilities and natures. The description of natures are such it’s automatically clear to the player which stats are affected. Gamefreak could definitely do more work in that area (not casualise, but educate).
Natures' effects have been shown on the stats page since HGSS. This has been carried over to LGPE.

I agree that abilities may seem daunting to newbies, assuming they don't just ignore them (which they can do and still ace the main story). But held items are optional, and they don't seem to be present, either.
 

Sαpphire

Johto Champion
Natures' effects have been shown on the stats page since HGSS. This has been carried over to LGPE.

I agree that abilities may seem daunting to newbies, assuming they don't just ignore them (which they can do and still ace the main story). But held items are optional, and they don't seem to be present, either.

There's more than enough room for ahold item to be included on the status screen; it's more likely that the Pikachu for the one status screen we've seen just wasn't holding anything.

Plus, haven't we only seen it during a move being learned from level up anyway? That might impact the amount of information shown and the layout presented.
 

Nockturne

Well-Known Member
I think the rationale people are using to say hold items have been removed is from the part of there game play video when they brough out Onix to ride it. There was no "Give item" option when a Pokemon was selected in the menu. You could only check its status, move it around, ride on it etc
 

Sαpphire

Johto Champion
I think the rationale people are using to say hold items have been removed is from the part of there game play video when they brough out Onix to ride it. There was no "Give item" option when a Pokemon was selected in the menu. You could only check its status, move it around, ride on it etc

I mean, that's fair, but that's still just speculation as it could be a result of a number of factors - including, perhaps, not having an eligible item to give it. I don't think we really know yet.

That doesn't seem like a logical casualization step, either, so I'm not sure why such a feature would see removal in these games. There are dozens of items that only function when held, including some pertinent to evolution, so I know it would never be a permanent change - since I know plenty of people will "worry" about it.

I guess we'll see!
 

Kein

AKA Silktree
Not having an eligible item? Any non-key item should work.

Held items aren't a thing in Go. That alone isn't a proper reason to exclude them from these games, but they could be viewed as inconvenient for Go players.
 

Mega Altaria

☆~Shiny hunter▢~
Not having an eligible item? Any non-key item should work.

Held items aren't a thing in Go. That alone isn't a proper reason to exclude them from these games, but they could be viewed as inconvenient for Go players.
Also more will have to be invested into bag space just to accomodate these items. I personally think it’ll be better to introduce status conditions so that tougher Pokémon like Blissey and Dragonite will be easier to defeat.
 

Sαpphire

Johto Champion
Not having an eligible item? Any non-key item should work.

But who's to say they haven't narrowed the definition of hold items in this game to accommodate for the differing role of Poke Balls and berries and such? I dont think we can outright say, just yet, that the feature is altogether gone. Maybe what constitutes an eligible hold item has changed.

For the record I actually think literally any major change to hold items is phenomenally stupid and they should reconsider if any have been made, but there are a few different ways it could have been changed as far as we know.
 

MidnightMelody

Hopeful for Gen 8
It appealing to casuals to me could just mean all the complicated stuff is removed from battles. Which is actually nice to hear. My issue with FF 13 was how annoying the combat was over a simple turn based or action jrpg combat. Just pick one. Let's GO have hard battles like gyms and the league would not be shocking. I see casual being more of an invite to a series but at the same time its possible this could also be the first time we have a difficult setting for fans that know how to play. I can't see them making it so casual you never lose is what I am saying since even nooby gamers will want a challenge.

Personally I'd like to see Let's GO do well and become it's own sub series. Would that mean no regular remakes? Maybe? But hear me out what would you rather have? DP Remakes or Sequals set in Sinnoh with an all new story. I'd choose the latter.
 

BCVM22

Well-Known Member
Would that mean no regular remakes? Maybe? But hear me out what would you rather have? DP Remakes or Sequals set in Sinnoh with an all new story. I'd choose the latter.

I don't think they'd find themselves mutually exclusive. I think if LGP/E are so successful as to inspire Game Freak to spin them off into their own separate branch of games, they'd hire enough developers so as to keep producing the traditional core titles, including new titles and remakes, and the Let's Go!-centric games, all concurrently.
 

PocketMonsterRealm

Since Crystal
The idea that pokemon is for everyone may require introductory games for those who are new to the games as the pokemon games grow like they have from gen 1 to now gen 7 coming on 8. Keeping the old fan base is important while growing the fan base is just as important. The idea is to reach all ages of old and new players. I think worrying about the Let's Go games changing pokemon mainline games forever is a little out of place. That's just my opinion though. Perhaps the Let's Go games will prevent too cling-y future aspects in the mainline games.
I do like the point that was brought up that our phones are a general gaming competition because our phones can do so much more than gaming consoles (handheld or tv) and the pokemon company obviously have been thinking about how to go about that fact. Didnt really think much about that because i generally enjoy games more on consoles than on phones because they are better games in my opinion.
 
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