And well, my statement refers to a specific statement by Masuda; when people critiqued that there was little/no post-game to LGPE, he responded by saying that he hoped they'd spend a lot of time playing with and grooming their Pikachu/Eevee. Which, sorry is pretty ridiculous, because at least to me, petting a virtual pretend animal is severely lacking in enjoyment when compared to caring for a real-life pet and cannot at all be a substitute for a post-game storyline (then again, I think GF should work on making proper, long and satisfying main quests before they worry about the post game...)
Wow that is ballsy, especially considering the interaction is fairly limited... right? I mean I spent probably a total of 30 min interacting with Eevee, but I thought it was basically an Aimie port; you exhaust the novel animations pretty quickly. Couldn't agree more on the response. If I wanted to show affection to a pet, I'd go give it to my living, breathing one.
For my part, I always found the storylines in Pokemon to be good, in the sense that they gave you motivation and direction, then got out of the way for you to build your team and go to town. Unless they radically re-invent the difficulty curve of these games, I do not really see a reason to invest in the main story beyond giving a new, unique narrative, because I have always felt the story was just a distraction for your constant internal battles between using different Pokemon or moves. Pokemon is about creation, not experience, would be one way of looking at it.
Not to say I do not want a good story or more of it! What I do not understand is why they have not made a bigger push prior to this to make the games more feature dense (which I think would translate into a better main story and post-game). I have always had this sense that GF is very conscious of wearing off the charm of this series, but since they've branched out into almost every medium under the sun... why? Why not swing for the fences? Your player base is so rabid for that, I can't even count the number of knock-off, free to play, MMO versions of Pokemon that have sprung up over time. And that's not even counting the straight-up homages.
But, if the games where to integrate these features in a meaningful way, and make raising your Pokémon just as important as training it, I would enjoy it as a mechanic.
I think I would too, especially since Pokemon breeding has been a profession in the game world for so long, but they are functionally identical to other trainers, except they exclusively use baby Pokemon... is that sadistic? It seems like it should be commented on at least lol.
I would just prefer it be done when someone has a dynamite idea for how to do it, and not just stitch it onto the game after everything else is in place. Integration. Problem is, that means major change, and I just do not see GF being capable of that. They basically have a cash cow, and when you are making money hand over fist, you do not mess with the magic unduly, but someone does need to remind them that stagnation is tantamount to death. Movimiento es vida.