Melven Gines

One too many time it would it might be said that this game is "not that bad." Honestly, it's not that "good" either. Amidst all the hyperbole exaggerating any opposition to this game and downplaying any actual issues, I went in with the lowest expectations I've ever had for any mainline game of this franchise. And even then, I was left dissapoitned. Gamefreak's attempt at spicing up the main goal of challenging the Pokemon Gyms with FIFA-esque flair wind up gutting the overall story. While most previous games offer more of an adventure by having you deal with an antagonistic organization posing a notable threat along the way, this game seemingly shoehorns this conflict towards the end of the game, only teasing it every once in a while and gradually spoiling the "twist reveal" of the true main bad guy. Instead, you're given Team Yell: the weakest antagonistic gang in the series that lack even the charm of Team Skull and are only carried by both their unique battle theme and Marnie, a rival trainer who herself is one of the few high points of the game. Dynamaxing, this game's major gimmick, is an underwhelming replacement for Mega Evolutions that offer a three-turn powerup for the Pokemon of your choice that also essentially turns all their moves in lesser versions of Sun & Shield's "Z-Moves". The routes are not very interconnected like the early games, forcing you to traverse a group of cooridros like a pair of horseshoes broken up by two huge chunks of land known as the "Wild Area". Others have sited this to be their biggest source of gameplay hours, but it felt rather barren here aside from the few pokemon that will poke up from the grasses. Perhaps the one point of contention I may have with those similarly dissapointed games would be how much I dislike many of the new Galarian Pokemon themselves. Sword and Shield opened up with what looked like the least compelling starters to me, with their evolutions not faring much better. The fossils Pokemon were too focused on being freaky to be genuinely compelling. One of the possible pseudo-legendary lines, the Dragapult, look exceedingly underwhelming to me, while Grminsnarl's line might be one of my most hated Pokemon to date. It might be surprising to know that I actually held back on letting this further influence my score. It's a shame to see a weak core game deprived of the series' previous bells and whistles lauded for being the first mainline console game of the franchise. I've never had such a huge desire for the next game "needing to be better" ever since X & Y, and with this occurring twice in a row with their opening console offerings, I am left very skeptical of Pokemon's future at this point.