Pokémon fans have had a lot to celebrate with Scarlet and Violet so far. New ‘mons like Fidough and Cetitan are capturing the hearts of many trainers, but not everything shown for the next game has been received so warmly. Legends: Arceus improved a lot of things to create a smoother, addictive gameplay loop, but it appears that some of those changes are being undone for Scarlet and Violet.
ResetEra forum member Personablue started a thread addressing these concerns. Based on the latest trailers, it looks like four quality-of-life changes have been reverted. Pokémon will again be able to learn new moves during battle and see their XP calculated on a screen after; in Legends: Arceus, they learned new moves outside battle and had XP calculated in the background. Arceus also let you select a Pokémon and throw your Pokéball before the battle began, whereas Scarlet and Violet requires you to bump into a Pokémon on the field to initiate combat. Lastly, Arceus shows full contact during attack moves, but Scarlet and Violet are back to the previous Sword and Shield-style of battle, which relies heavily on menus.
These QOL changes generally made the pacing of Arceus much faster, something that appears to have been undone for Scarlet and Violet. Upon presenting these to other ResetEra members and asking if they’re disappointed, Personablue found that they are not alone in being unhappy. Many replies mourn the loss of the changes made by Arceus.
Scarlet and Violet is making plenty of changes of its own though. In addition to new Paldean regional variants of existing Pokémon, Generation 9 is also introducing the Terastallize mechanic. This actually changes a Pokémon’s type mid-battle, which should really shake things up for the competitive scene. Powered-up Tera Pokémon will also be available to take on with friends in new Tera Raids.
We’ve got a few months to go before we can try out all the new stuff. Pokémon Scarlet and Violet’s release date is Friday, November 18, and it’ll release exclusively on Nintendo Switch then. You can get a Tera Flying-type Pikachu by picking up the game during the launch window.
