I’ll start out with the best part of this game; the catching mechanics are the best we have ever seen.
It is extremely fun and exciting to catch Pokémon in various ways and work on the challenges to complete the Pokédex.
However, that is about all that’s good about the game. The battle mechanics are utterly disgusting. It makes no sense and often seems to choose whose turn it is to attack based on randomness. The whole “Agile” and “Strong” style doesn’t seem to matter. I’ve had opponents use strong style and attack 2 times in a row and I’ve used Agile style 3 turns without being able to go twice. Ive also been attacked with a regular move one turn and an Agile attack the next turn which somehow did more damage without a city or debuff.
The damage mechanics have been completely redone as well in a very frustrating way. I’m guessing they did it to mix things up and balance out players who greatly over level their Pokémon, but it’s to the point where it’s not consistent and you can’t even begin to predict what damage you will do/receive. I have level 30-40 Pokémon who will not be able to one shot a level 4 bidoof and I’ll get OKO’d by Pokémon 10 levels under me with an attack that I resist randomly.
I can’t describe to you the amount of frustration in playing a game that appears to rely on randomness to decide victors of battles. And when you get hit 3 times in a row by a Pokémon you would regularly steam roll, you will understand my pain.
Last thing I will say is the story is bland and very long. The climax of the story seems to go on forever with endless dialogue. The climax battle scenes are pretty cool, but I was so tired of reading bland dialogue for 90 minutes before it even started that it kinda killed it for me.
Overall, I would recommend you pass on this game if you are on the fence about it. Don’t reward the developers just because the game has the title of “Pokémon”. They need to put out better all around products to earn your money, this aren’t it.