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Why does SWSH feel so incomplete?

Dragalge

"Orange" Magical Girl
I got that vibe more from Gen VII than with SwSh. A lot of you guys aren’t scouring the Wild Area and grass patches for every included Pokémon, item, or den. That’s where a core component of this game is at. Now, there is a lack of sides like competitions, PokeStar Studios, Poké Olympics, Underground, etc. And don’t tell me camping and curry making are side quests, that’s BS.

Seriously though, Alola was more bare bones than Galar.
What is there to exactly explore in the Wild Area? A few generic lakes? A couple of rock formations? A tower that doesn’t get use unless some event is happening? It’s just your everyday generic field with a few things here and there. And having a diverse amount of Pokemon isn’t fun to have when some of them are locked behind weather and low encounter rates.
 

Ignition

We are so back Zygardebros
I got that vibe more from Gen VII than with SwSh. A lot of you guys aren’t scouring the Wild Area and grass patches for every included Pokémon, item, or den. That’s where a core component of this game is at. Now, there is a lack of sides like competitions, PokeStar Studios, Poké Olympics, Underground, etc. And don’t tell me camping and curry making are side quests, that’s BS.

Seriously though, Alola was more bare bones than Galar.
The appeal of exploring the Wild Area wears off after the first or second time through. The reality is there’s not that much to explore. Getting every item and Pokémon takes little time to do. The dens have some longevity but that’s only if you care for competitive or G Max forms which there aren’t that many. I got all the available ones in the span of ~3 days. Even though I can put the lackluster story behind me, I find it hard to justify putting the game card in my Switch again after I completed my Dex. I never felt this with SM.

SM definitely had more available to do than SwSh. The UB side quest alone gives you more to do than the twins’: catch 5 UBs plus the 3rd legendary, see old faces with Annabel and Looker, & more insight on Nanu and his relationship with the aforementioned. Outside of that you have Title Defense, obtaining 6 other legendaries (Tapus, Type:Null, Zygarde), getting the second Cosmog, exploring the rest of Poni, the Battle Tree (with features even more returning characters with the most noteworthy being Red & Blue), obtaining Mega Evolution, & several side quests and battles. SwSh has Dens, the Champion Cup, & the twins’ plotline. I also found myself not rushing through Alola because after major battle you had a reason to revisit old areas whether it’d be a new Ride Pokémon or getting a new item. You rarely have reason to return to old towns in Galar outside of the mandatory story.
 

shoz999

Back when Tigers used to smoke.
You guys are looking at the Wild Area too much like Breath of the Wild and less like a Safari Zone. In my opinion, it's the best Safari Zone there is despite some small but incredibly annoying flaws. Now if you want to talk about exploration, you need to talk about the entirety of the Galar region as the Wild Area is just one part of the region even though it makes a huge chunk of it. Alas, it's the "exploration" of the Galar region where you can truly see how rushed the game is. You know how SwSh has a messy story? Well SwSh in my opinion barely has any environmental storytelling.
 

Wulava

danger chili pepper
Staff member
Moderator
In the other thread, I pointed out how Galar was the biggest region to date, yet it felt so small. And for me, one of the primary reasons is the Wild Area.

"Dungeons" (such as the Victory Road, mountains, caves, etc.) and routes had to be removed/replaced in place of the Wild Area. Also, in effect, there were less Trainers to battle and the pacing is a lot faster (since the Wild Area can be ignored).

I mentioned how Poni Island did it way better. The Wild Area could have had more varying biomes (caves, coves, marsh, woods). The should've extended into a coastline. There could've been a small settlement in there, or scattered trainers you could battle.

Camping didn't have petting. Curry is just Pokeblocks and Poffin. There were no big side features (bases, contests, etc) as mentioned by others. Cities felt a bit empty, especially Wyndon. The post-game is also barren.

SWSH, however, feels like a Chapter 1. It felt like it'll have a sequel rather than a 3rd version. With Bede and Marnie being new Gym Leaders, Sonia being a new professor and Hop studying to be one as well. Then all the other Gym Leader uniforms being available. Then the datamine pointing to two more Legendary/Mythical Pokemon after Eternatus.
 
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Orphalesion

Well-Known Member
I got that vibe more from Gen VII than with SwSh. A lot of you guys aren’t scouring the Wild Area and grass patches for every included Pokémon, item, or den. That’s where a core component of this game is at.

So are suggesting the core of this game consist of picking up revives and tiny mushrooms in some patches of grass?

...that's not very good.
 

Dr. Eeviil

Well-Known Member
SWSH, however, feels like a Chapter 1. It felt like it'll have a sequel rather than a 3rd version. With Bede and Marnie being new Gym Leaders, Sonia being a new professor and Hop studying to be one as well. Then all the other Gym Leader uniforms being available. Then the datamine pointing to two more Legendary/Mythical Pokemon after Eternatus.

You're right, I had that same feeling but didn't know how to say it. There's just not much there, there.

BTW, I really dislike the dual sequel trend, like Ultra Sun/Moon, instead of the 3rd version, like Yellow.
 

Victreebong

Gives 'em the slip..
So are suggesting the core of this game consist of picking up revives and tiny mushrooms in some patches of grass?

...that's not very good.

I mean, that’s what it is. No more involved then the years of harvesting berries or clicking on beans in the Isle of Beans.
 

Aduro

Mt.BtlMaster
I definitely think that there's a lot lacking. Fewer mons to catch. Very few good stories told with the characters. In fact most of the dialogue just felt like game mechanic exposition.
And the region itself doesn't take long to explore because of the of puzzles or complicated dungeons. The world is quite small and empty.

The only exciting new feature are the max raid battles. Which I genuinely enjoyed at first. But even that turned into a slow grind when I started really trying to fill out the dex. I do enjoy getting the chance to catch a pokemon with a hidden ability that I haven't caught yet. But I do not enjoy having to battle two snorlaxes and three pokemon I've already caught to get a chance to encounter a pokemon that has a chance of having a hidden ability that I have a chance of catching on my first try. It started to feel like a chore when I was about a third of the way through catching the available hidden abilities.


The wild area is quite shallow as a location. When you get down to it, you're just going around in a circle to the same spots over and over again. You don't have a decent variety of gameplay or different areas like Poni Island. It doesn't have an interactive gimmick like the HGSS Safari Zone.

I did kind of feel like X & Y was similarly shallow and barren. But my expectation were much higher for this game since it was the first main-series console pokemon game. And at least that one had some puzzles, and the NPCs weren't quite so robotic. And it had major improvements in graphics, as well as novelties like trainer customisation. Mega Evolution felt like something taking the game forwards, while after Megas and Z-Moves, Dynamax just feels like this gen's gimmick.
 

Baggie_Saiyan

Well-Known Member
I mean you know what playing through Shield almost finished that my opinion on the games has actually swayed quite a bit. It's a Pokemon experience I was dying to have as kid and I got it! You practically go through the gym challenge un disturbed and the Wild Area being bare I find good because it's an area full of Pokemon with no people and buildings. Like I genuinely just roam around the WA because it so calming and cool to see all the Mons especially the ones that chase you I like to play a mini game and see if I can outspeed them lol.

All I all I don't feel like the games are empty to me know. I said these won't have re playability but I played through Shield enjoyed it immensely and can see myself playing these again.
 

Leonhart

Imagineer
RedBlastoise said:
The wild area could have had more uses and Gamefreak could have added more features to it to make it a place that you could spend more time in during the post game. Being able to hunt down Pokemon there is good and all but they could've added some kind of side activity there similar to the underground area of Sinnoh.

I thought that the Wild Area was fine for what it was. The plot of the main storyline is a bit underwhelming in my opinion, but I chalk that up to my own expectations being too high. Another problem that these games seem to have in my opinion is the highlighted emphasis on battling given all the new battle mechanics that were introduced in these games. As someone who prefers doing side quests and collecting Pokemon, I find that the focus on battling to be rather unimaginative.
 

Ophie

Salingerian Phony
Speaking about the Wild Area, I felt there should have been some story within the Wild Area, with other characters going in and out of it. Rather, we have only one scene set there, in which Bede taunts Hop and the two run offscreen. It makes the Wild Area seem like something that was added on without some other departments' knowledge rather than an organic part of the world. The towns may be small, but they do at least feel full of life, partially because there are a lot of NPCs in all of them and because story happens in almost all of them (Ballonlea is the only one where it doesn't--you just go to the stadium, finish the challenge, and leave).

Alola's routes were also on the short side, though they felt longer because you met recurring characters there, and some facilities were located on them. Some even had Pokémon Centers. Would've liked the routes to be more like Galar Route 9, which is quite rich and fun because it actually IS quite long and hadsmultiple segments that play differently and have different Pokémon.

But yeah, all in all, this game felt rushed for the holidays, which is a shame because everything felt like they had a lot more planned for it and that this turned out pretty far from how Masuda and Ohmori and Turner and such envisioned this game to be.

Something I want to point out though, is that while the story for X and Y were some of the weakest (and I'd say they're worse than Sword and Shield, as I found most of the protagonist's kid posse insufferable due to them being one-dimensional characters who never develop--except Tierno, whom I liked the most because of that), I found Kalos to be one of the best from an artistic standpoint. Every route felt distinct from each other, all of the towns were absolutely beautiful (something I would say the same of for Galar, really, and Galar does a better job of maing every town look very different from each other), and the music was top-notch. It's why I felt disappointed that places like Coumarine Town and Dendemille Town had very little reason to return to, and it's because they're such beautiful, scenic locations. I have the same disappointment with places like Ballonlea and Spikemuth. They're very pretty, but they're also horrendously underused.

I mentioned how Poni Island did it way better. The Wild Area could have had more varying biomes (caves, coves, marsh, woods). The should've extended into a coastline. There could've been a small settlement in there, or scattered trainers you could battle.

SWSH, however, feels like a Chapter 1. It felt like it'll have a sequel rather than a 3rd version. With Bede and Marnie being new Gym Leaders, Sonia being a new professor and Hop studying to be one as well. Then all the other Gym Leader uniforms being available. Then the datamine pointing to two more Legendary/Mythical Pokemon after Eternatus.

The hand-drawn Galar map actually shows a coastline in the Wild Area to the southwest of Watchtower Ruins. In the game as it is, there is no southwest at all. It seems the train going from the Wild Area Station to Motostoke Station would've passed along a bridge that went over the Wild Area. (There also appears to be a building along the train tracks between Galar Mine 1 and Motostoke, though I'm guessing that wound up in-game as the inaccessible power plant visible along Route 4 that Sonia spoke of.)
 

DaddyOak

Well-Known Member
What i also never understood is why gamefreak never used this method again to make cities feel more lively. this effect was pretty cool imo dozens of people walking off screen and new ones coming in

x and Y did it like very little but the effect was lost there since there where barely any npc's walking.

not to mention even withouth this castelia city is the most interesting city of a pokemon game period so much stuff to do there + seasons affecting small shops.

would have been nice if big cities in sword & shield used this effect.

96N6bhe.jpg


than again considering that most cities in sword & shield look like holly wood film sets in wich you barely can enter anything, didnt fix their n64 trees since early trailers and didnt even have the time to remove a mouse cursor from the credits I guess nice details are a bit to much to ask for
 
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Captain Jigglypuff

Leader of Jigglypuff Army
I don’t think they’re incomplete but I’m guessing why others think that they are is probably due to the games only having three available Legendaries that are catchable without hacking and no new Mythicals unless they are better protected this time around and are hidden so well in the coding that no one has discovered them yet.
 

WishIhadaManafi5

To Boldly Go Where No One Has Gone Before.
Staff member
Moderator
I thought that the Wild Area was fine for what it was. The plot of the main storyline is a bit underwhelming in my opinion, but I chalk that up to my own expectations being too high. Another problem that these games seem to have in my opinion is the highlighted emphasis on battling given all the new battle mechanics that were introduced in these games. As someone who prefers doing side quests and collecting Pokemon, I find that the focus on battling to be rather unimaginative.
Agreed. Haven't played the game just yet, but the over focus on battling isn't all that fun, since I'm not a fan of competitive battling. That's me too, along with breeding Pokemon.
 

airaid

Breeding Geek
They're just trying to not overload their new game on its new system by cramming it full of content.

Or holding back for a proper sequel.
 
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