Since I've been playing US&M lately, I couldn't help but pay attention to the most recent Pokemon news; and oh boy, is there a lot of hype and excitement indeed on that front. Many a Pokefan is yearning for a Pokemon-related announcement at the upcoming E3, or a soon-to-come Pokemon Direct that would unveil the much-expected first Switch Pokemon instalment; and while such high hopes seem to be mostly wishful thinking, there are a couple of interesting rumours floating around.
Then we have Nintendo insider Emily Rogers "believing" that a Pokemon game will come to the Switch in 2018, and that this game will be an RPG and boast two versions. She also later stated that she didn't specify whether said RPG would be "a core game, a spinoff series, a remake of an older game or a Gen 8 game." In other words, this new pair of Pokemon games could be any of the aforementioned things. My guess is that if those games indeed exist and are in the pipeline, they will either be entries in a spin-off series or Gen 4 remakes. The spin-off series in question is most likely to be Pokemon Rangers or Pokemon Mystery Dungeon, if we assume that Roguelikes can be widely classified as RPG. The first two instalments of the latter came out in two versions, so there's definitely a precedent here. As for remakes of Diamond and Pearl, they've been hyped and demanded for such a long time that I can very well imagine GameFreak tackling them to try their hand at developing for the Switch, while at the same time giving fans what they want and not risking messing up and blotching a core game. Three birds with one stone! Of course, that mysterious new pair of games could also be brand-new spin-offs. Or it could also simply not exist, just like the western version of Mother 3 teased by the same Emily Rogers. Once again, only time will tell.
Then we have the most egregious rumour of them all, namely the Italian tranlastor 'leak' on 4Chan: a de facto announcement that a Pokemon core game is indeed coming to the Switch very soon, replete with story elements, new mechanics and artwork. Now this is nothing but a complete hoax, methinks. Making a living in the translation business is quite hard, and I cannot believe for a second that a translator who scored a gig with Nintendo would ruin their chances of ever working for them again, as well as their reputation in the translation business, by dumping crucial information about such an important game while simultaneously making themselves so easy to track down and identify. And talking about leaks and 4Chan, we also have the Starter 'leak', which features very cute and convincing Starter designs, but definitely wouldn't be the first occurrence of fake Starters gracing the internet. Then again, there were also genuine Starter leaks in the past years, so... Yeah. Once again, only time will tell if there's any semblance of truth in those flashy Gen 8 leaks.
Have you seen the *new* rumours? The one about it being a Kanto remake? With a bunch of integration with Pokemon Go?
ReplyDeleteIf not, see here: https://nintendoeverything.com/rumor-pokemon-switch-reveal-happening-soon-unconfirmed-details/
First off: I like Kanto and all, but seriously, ENOUGH with Kanto! Where's the love for Sinnoh?
Second off: Pokemon Go? Online Hub? NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!
And third: Pokemon that follow you. If this applies to all Pokemon, then it means that I'll buy, regardless of the fact all the other points make me think eating a dirty sock is a lot more appealing.
If this is true, screw you Ninty and GF. Screw.you.
And overall: thank goodness for my PS4 and Digimon. The worst digimon gets nowadays is making a weaker tittle that reuses most stuff from Cyber Sleuth and still charges full price. But at least the developers admitted it was just a smaller project to tide us over until they make new high res models for PS4 and Switch (so yeah, they're dropping the Vita). Should have charged less for it, but hey, at least they made a completely new story and added tons of digimon.
USM did a lot less than that, so if pokemon can get away with it, I'll forgive Digimon. It will be on sale for 20 euros in 2 or 3 months (it went for 30 last month), unlike Nintendo and their non-existent sales, so hooray for Digimon.
And screw Pokemon Go. Gads I hate mobile games!
I just realized I might have given the idea that Digimon is coming to Switch, which it's not confirmed to be! Just speculation since dropping the Vita means they'll lose handheld appeal, which they probably don't want. But I guess it depends on how well the PS4 exclusive next order sold. They do have a monopoly on monster raising with Sony, and that has its own appeal.
DeleteBut they did confirm they were working on updating all the assets, which is why Hacker's Memory used so much recycled stuff in the meantime.
To be honest, I'm fine with the idea of a remake/reboot of Pokemon Yellow; but that's mostly because (ironically enough) Kanto is the Pokemon region I know the least, having run through it only twice since I discovered the series.
DeleteAs for Pokemon Go integration, which is the point that seems to worry people the most, I fancy thinking that it will be a complimentary feature similar to the PokeWalker in Heart Gold and Soul Silver. Maybe you'll have the possibility to capture extra 'Mons in Go and then tranfer them to your Switch, or something like that. Some people seem to think that Go's gameplay could be implemented in those new games, but I honestly don't see how this could work given the dual nature of the Switch. Like, are you supposed to walk around outside with your bulky Switch to capture 'Mons? What if you only play the Switch in docked mode? If some Go gameplay is indeed implemented in those games, I cannot see that implementation going any further than an option to thrown a Pokeball by swinging the joy-cons or swiping the screen with your finger.
Anyway, this is the meatiest leak we've seen in a long time, and I'm quite curious to see if those Let's Go games are indeed a thing. If it turns out that they are real indeed, I'll probably have more to say about them; until then, let's wait and see! ^^