Eleiyas

Pokémon Violet is a good Pokémon game - but it is not a good game, if that makes sense. It's arguably one of the most fun and most modern Pokémon experiences we've had, which is why everyone is giving this a 10/10, however it is marred by technical issues; poor graphics, poor performance, scummy marketing practices that are a decade-outdated and more. Despite the Switch supporting 1080p, 60fps, this game runs (docked) at 720p, 30fps - yet the thing is, you'll barely ever get those 30fps, because of the constant stuttering and assets loading in in the background. In certain areas and cities, you will be lucky to get 20fps, let alone 30fps. The graphics, despite being much better than some past titles, still pale in comparison to nearly any other modern game - heck, Breath of the Wild still looks better and that game is a good few years old now. Anything in the distance becomes a blur of muddy, tiled texture-work, while when you get close it just slaps the higher-fidelity texture on, with zero fade-in. It's incredibly jarring. One of the most crazy things is that this game makes Legends: Arceus look fantastic - and although they were developed at the same time, Arceus did come out first, meaning the older game does look better. It's also still debateable whether they should have settled on Let's Go: Pikachu/Eevee art-style and graphics, rather than this semi-realistic look they are currently going for (and kind-of failing at). This doesn't even cover the terrible coding this game seems to have, with NPCs and Pokémon dropping to 3fps when they go more than 1 metre away from the player, while when entering a city, the models will pop into existence mere centimetres from the player. In terms of other cons, the National Dex cut does still affect these games, so be prepared for scummy DLC that re-adds a bunch more mons in. There's also the topic of the dual-version release, which is still just as scummy as it always was. Scarlet and Violet, just like Sword/Shield and Brilliant Diamond/Shining Pearl, are the exact same game, just shipped with 2 lines of code differing between versions. As many dataminers have proved, you can actually get Violet to run as Scarlet using an extremely quick memory edit - which is ridiculous. This practice should have ended when the internet became accessible (DS era) - but it still exists in full force, to get unknowing/hardcore fans to pick up the dual pack and dual-DLC-pack for the extra $$$. Not to mention the Pokémon Home and Switch Online subs as well. Now, as I said, these games are fun and are arguably the best Pokémon games in a long time. For once, the story is actually darn good. Like, really darn good. Finding Pokémon in the overworld and such is also really nice and exploring Paldea on-top of the box-legend is a neat feature - although I would have preferred the Let's Go version where we could ride any Pokémon we owned. A big issue concerning the story elements though, is that there is no level-scaling. You can do everything out of order, which is a fresh-take on the formula, but the lack of level scaling means that if you do do things out of order, you might find yourself with level 30 mons against the "8th" gym with level 45-50s, or you could have level 60 mons against the "1st" gym that has level 14-15 mons. Essentially, if you don't want to get stomped, or don't want to do the stomping, you need to look up a "recommended guide/path" - which then makes the game extremely linear, just like every game before it. Also, because Gym Badges only work based on the caught-level, there is a high probability the player will take their level 5-10 starter and a couple of "route 1" mons and power-level to 50+, simply by exploring the map and catching/battling higher-level mons. I know I keep going kind of back and forth between pro and con here, but that is ultimately what the game is like. For every step forward, there are 1 or more steps backwards. Getting competitive Pokémon and power-levelling to 100 is easy with Raid Dens and such - but then you find out that certain options that were staples, like "battle mode" or "battle animations" have been completely removed for no apparent reason. Finding nearly the entire Pokédex, either in the wild or in Raid Dens is amazing, but then, due to the terrible pop-in and draw-distance, you will be zooming around on the box-legend and getting into so many tedious and unwanted wild battles, because you will not see the Pokémon you slammed into, before you slam into it. Overall, I'll rate Pokémon Violet (and Scarlet as they are the same game) a 6/10 on my end. They have potential, but should not have been released in this state - and for how long do we have to keep saying "it's a step in the right direction" before we get the game we actually should have on the Switch?

This is a scam, plain and simple. It's the exact same game, sold twice with 2 lines of code differing between them. Either cough-up for Switch Online, or cough up for the second game; Heck, even microtransactions are less scummy than this. So, as I did with Sword/Shield, this also gets a 1/10.

I'm giving this "dual pack" a 1/10. Each game on its own merits a 5/10. So, why am I giving the dual-pack a 1/10 when that doesn't seem right? It's simple. Back in the past, in the "early days" of Pokémon, there were massive differences in the different games. The best example is Sapphire/Ruby. You had different Pokémon, a different evil team, different story elements, different legendary, etc. In these particular games, you are basically buying the same game twice. It's a scam to be honest. The only differences between Sword and Shield are 2 or 3 different Pokémon, a different Gym leader and a different box-art legendary. So, 4 different Pokémon total and a different Gym leader. Everything else is the same. There are no story differences, no evil team differences, no area differences, nothing. The only time it is warranted to buy both versions is if you have 2 kids and you buy one version for one kid and the other version for the other kid (or in a couple). Otherwise, don't buy into this scam GameFreak have been running since the 3DS days, you only need 1 copy of either game. You can trade with other people for the 4 different Pokémon.

Unfortunately, these are the most average Pokémon games to have ever been released (not including mobile titles). These are games that are on the Nintendo Switch, the most powerful home console ever produced by Nintendo (Full HD), with other console-specific titles such as Breath Of The Wild, Mario Odyssey and Luigi's Mansion 3. Compared to the games I just mentioned, Sword and Shield pale in comparison in every single way. The story is incredibly lackluster, with Leon and Sonia essentially doing all the cool things while you are simply told to "go do the gym challenges and leave this to the adults"... essentially Leon and Sonia are playing the game while we do the busy work. I understand why as it doesn't make sense for a 10 year old kid to be "saving the world" as was the case in previous titles, but it makes these games seem too linear and it's upsetting to think that Leon/Sonia are having all the fun, while we rush through the gyms one after the other. This is only slightly alleviated in the post game, where we finally get to enjoy some different narrative. This leads on to one of numerous controversies that have surrounded these games since pre-launch. The inability to turn off the now infamous EXP-share. If you spend any amount of time in the Wild Area grinding or doing raids before doing the gyms, your core team will be so overleveled by the time the gyms come around that you will one-shot every single Pokémon you come across, making the gyms simple roadblocks to be steamrolled over. Myself and many others after having spent an hour or 2 in the Wild Area after its discovery have had some Pokémon (especially the starter) be upwards of 10 levels higher than the gym I was challenging. One attack is one fainted enemy, even including the last Dynamax Pokémon a gym leader will send out. This leads on to controversy #2, Dynamaxing. Mega evolution and Z moves were removed for... making your Pokémon big for 3 turns. WOW, what an improvement! What innovation! Yeah, no, it pales in comparison to mega evolution and even z moves. Controversy #3: the removal of the national dex (now infamously known as Dexit). It was stated by GameFreak that they removed over 400 Pokémon (53/54% of the nat dex) in order to improve graphical fidelity and the animations. We now know this was a blatant lie. Both the models and animations are imports from the 3DS (thanks dataminers!), with some seriously shoddy ones like ... the now infamous (... a lot of infamy in this game) double-kick animation where the model isn't animated at all, it is simply pushed upwards, then brought downwards again. Really low effort and laziness from GameFreak, seeing as Genius Sorority nailed the animations back in the days of XD: Gale of Darkness, or even Colosseum on the Gamecube! Controversy/issue #4: Look at Breath of the Wild or Mario Odyssey, then look at Sword/Shield. The graphics on these new Pokémon titles look like they were meant to be on the 3DS. Muddy textures, shoddy artwork in a lot of places (infamous Wild Area trees); not all the textures are bad and some areas of the game look damn gorgeous, but it's really a mixed bag between shoddy and amazing. For the Switch, capable of 1080p 60FPS, these Pokémon games run at 720p 30FPS a lot of the time, even lower when in the Wild Area and connected to the internet. Myself and others have had 720p 10FPS in this scenario, which is downright mind-blowingly bad, especially when comparing to Breath of the Wild which can run at 1080p 60FPS, while also having much better graphical quality. Now, in order to not go over the 5000 character limit, here are other issues in brief: #5 - Removed moves for no real reason #6 - A lot of unused code left in the game out of laziness (all movesets are in for every single Pokémon, but not the models) #7 - Game has revealed a lot of issues with the Switch (bricking/SD card corruption) #8 - Changing the date and time to spam raids to get perfect Pokémon and infinite money #9 - Each Pokémon form has a different model, not one model with different textures, leading to huge game-bloat. #10 - Games now cost £60/$60 without warranting the increase in price #11 - #GameFreakLied #12 - Beloved features axed for no reason (no Pokémon following you, no rideable Pokémon) #13 - Towns feel huge, but a lot of buildings cannot be entered, or are simply copy-pasted #14 - Hilariously bad draw-distance which introduces the worst pop-in since Fallout76 #15 - Some of the worst battle backgrounds from any Pokémon game (white void) I could do more, but that's enough crapping on the games. These games do introduce a heft of QoL improvements and there is no denying it. EXP candies, Nature Mints, Egg Moves from breeding, fly from anywhere, bike going on water, etc. These QoL improvements, topped with the fact that "it's more Pokémon!" and "Pokémon is inherently fun!" is what is making people see these games through rose-tinted glasses.

7/10 does not mean bad, in fact this game is rather good. As someone who abhorred Fortnite and barely found any fun in PUBG, I can honestly say that I am not a huge fan of the Battle Royale games/modes. This game is different and I am really enjoying it, despite the fact that I am rubbish at it. i like the different characters, I like the fact I am always in a squad and can be saved by better players and I like the "hero-skills". My main irk is that like most BRs, there is no matchmaking, meaning me, a noob, can get matched with people with hundreds of kills and who have dumped tens, if not hundreds of hours into BRs. Somehow, it is still fun!