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Sword and Shield Discussion Thread

Azure Sage

March onward forever...
Staff member
ZD Legend
Comm. Coordinator
This is a thread for all of our thoughts on Sword and Shield, especially coming off of that direct. I'll begin.

I was blown away, and I'm super excited. Everything we saw looks amazing. I'm super stoked to have open regions with free camera control, it was one of my biggest hopes for the games. The new Pokemon are cute and cool. I love the sheep and the raven ones a lot. The new legendaries are cool looking, too. I was already planning on getting Sword, but now I definitely am. I also love the character designs. The game looks gorgeous and all of the characters we've seen are well designed. The new gyms are super cool, too. I can't believe we all thought it was gonna be soccer. They pulled a fast one on us! Dynamax looks incredibly hype, and I am all for it. The raid battles are really neat, too. I expect those to be intense.

All in all, it's shaping up to be a fantastic pair of games. I'm looking forward to seeing the fashion options (if we can't remove our hats again, imma cry) and the starter evolutions. I'm still Team Sobble for now.
 
As with any Nintendo Direct, I went in ready to be somewhat disappointed.

We didn't see too much during the initial reveal so we knew we still had to see what the battle gimmick was going to be, among other things.

Gimmicks in Pokemon can be make or break for me, Mega Evolution in X & Y made me think of Digimon and I really didn't like the Z-Moves in Sun & Moon (or the horde battles, or the island trials or Alolan types or Moon being night when it was day and vice-versa), but Sword and Shield's Dynamaxing mechanic looks pretty okay.

Dynamaxing seems to be like a hybrid of Mega Evolution and Z-Moves, more limited in battle than Mega Evolution, but every move becomes much stronger like a Z-move... that's fine.

Dynamaxing makes sense within the region too; if Pokemon battles are the main source of entertainment in Galar and held in stadiums then summoning giant Pokemon is a good way to fill up the empty space and bring on a spectacle.

Game Freak seem to be getting a lot out of the Dynamaxing because it will also be used in the local and online multiplayer raid battles, I think those raids will be cool and it's a nice variation on the raids in Pokemon Go.

I also think those raids will lend themselves very well to online events and legendary Pokemon distribution, so that could be a lot of fun too.

All in all, I'm happy with Dynamaxing.

I also love the the animation for the trainers throwing the giant Pokeballs like beach balls, it's very cute!

Now, onto other things.

The one thing I'm not entirely clear on is how the 'wild area' works. I'm loving that we have roaming Pokemon like in Let's Go and that we have a 3D camera, but are there only a couple of these types of areas?

We saw in the reveal and in this Direct that the trainers had wild Pokemon encounters with none-roaming Pokemon in tall grass, so maybe it's a bit of both?

The official word seems to be that the 'wild area' is one large open world portion of the map which branches off into cities and other locations... so kind of like Hyrule Field in Ocarina of Time?

Either way I'm excited to see how Game Freak handles a large open world area.

As for the new Pokemon themselves... OH MY GOD WOOLOO IS SO FLUFFY AND I WANT ONE!!

Wooloo is definitely my Galar darling. I want a whole flock. I loved Mareep too but somehow Wooloo is even cuter!

The others were cool too, Corviknight was a particular standout and I like that he is a taxi service, that's one gothic ride.

The legendaries though...

I actually like them.

I think I actually prefer Zamazenta over Zacian.

Zacian reminds me of the wolf from Dark Souls that attacks you with his dead master's sword, it looks pretty clumsy with having the sword in its mouth the whole time, I figured it would have had a sword for a tail or something but clearly not...

Zamazenta has a cooler name in my opinion and actually looks like how I expected it to look, a wolf with a giant lion-like mane posing as a shield, he actually kind of reminds me of Mega Houndoom.
I like him but both Zamazenta and Zacian look cool so I'm happy as far as legendaries in Sword and Shield go, it has been a while since I've liked both legendaries in a generation.

The characters were a little disappointing, it's nice to have another female professor and her assistant Sonia is waifu material (I can hear the DeviantArt fetish scene exploding as we speak) but Leon and Hop are a little meh.

Leon reminds me of Lance from Indigo's Elite Four and I think I'd have preferred him to be Lance but maybe he'll be written well enough for me not to care and like him regardless.

I'm glad there wasn't any trace of the rumoured armour evolution (because I would have unleashed the Digimon memes) and I'm very glad we didn't see any 'Galar forms', I hate Alolan forms, I like my Pokemon to be definitive.

I'm also happy that there wasn't a big sports-leaning in the content, I was worried in the reveal that everything would have a sport theme to it but that doesn't seem to be the case, phew.

All in all I'm very happy with what I've seen, they showed just enough to hype me but not enough to spoil anything, I'm gonna be looking forward to more news, I'm so glad that I didn't see anything I disliked this time around.

I can't wait for them to start selling Wooloo plushies...
 

Doc

BoDoc Horseman
Joined
Nov 24, 2012
Gender
Male
I found the dynamax aspect a little underwhelming tbh. Like it’s just bigger Pokémon. Like Spirit said, it’s like a combination of Mega evolutions and Z-moves, but imo less interesting. I understand the reasoning for them and think the way they’ll work in raids is kind of cool. I just personally would have preferred it if they made the concept a little bit more visually interesting.

I really like the new pokemon we were shown. Corviknight is our new goth queen (inb4 everyone names theirs Poe). And I was personally a fan of Drednaw. I doubt I’d have it on my team but I’ll probably want to catch one.

I wish the sword legendary had a sword actually incorporated in to its design instead of just carrying a sword. As is, it feels shoved in there. Regardless, I still think the two have a cool aesthetic. They’re not my favorite legendaries but they certainly aren’t the worst.

The map and wild areas look dope, I’m really hyped for that. We didn’t see much new in terms of cities and towns, but I’m still loving the diverse aesthetic of locations.

Personally, I skipped over the trainers and characters because that’s something I want to experience in the game. I don’t want to find them all and be like “oh okay, this is THAT person.” The designs I saw were cool though.

All in all, I’m hyped to learn more about Sword and Shield. Hopefully next time we can see a few more new Pokémon.
 

Azure Sage

March onward forever...
Staff member
ZD Legend
Comm. Coordinator
I forgot to mention the Corviknight taxi. I like what it implies; HMs are still gone. Good riddance. In retrospect, I really don't like them. They just take up space in my party's moveset, and not having them means some of the world is closed off. Ride Pokemon in Sun & Moon were so much better, and I'm happy to see the series continuing with something like that.
 

el :BeoWolf:

When all else fails use fire
Joined
Feb 5, 2016
Gender
Centaleon
"Corviknight is a taxi service" The medieval black knight in corvid form is how I'm getting to work in the morning. Cool design.
I'm loving the idea of the wild area, glad they kept the roaming idea of Let's Go in some way.
and raids definitely have me interested. I really want to port over my team from ultra sun.
I'm convinced Milo is a Ditto. The legendaries are ok. A little too similar though, but not bad. Thankful HM's still seem to be dead as they should. I think this is the first time since gen 4 I've been this excited for a pokemon game. I'll be waiting for the starter's final forms before making that choice
 

Azure Sage

March onward forever...
Staff member
ZD Legend
Comm. Coordinator
tumblr_inline_psmqrntX7A1r4olk8_1280.jpg


I saw this and I wanna point out that the kid in blue is not wearing a hat! Since raid battles are only done with other players, this means hats CAN be removed! Thank you Arceus!

I also feel like noting this kid in blue looks oddly shorter than the others... Is it just the way he's standing? Or are there height options now? That would be really cool.
 
I was extremely pleased with all the new Pokémon designs we saw in the Direct. I thought Gen 7 had some weaker new designs with a few exceptions, like Salazzle, so this is a welcome return to form. Corviknight looks especially fantastic. It's great to have another Steel/Flying Pokémon right up there with Skarmory.

As for the legendaries, most people seem to prefer Zacian over Zamazenta, but I disagree. Yeah, a wolf with a sword in its mouth is badass, but I love the shield mane Zamazenta has going. Definitely my pick.

The Wild Area is what I and so many others have wanted for years. We get a place to catch Pokémon that are clearly visible on the outside field with a free camera to control. That is huge and probably the most exciting thing we learned in the Direct.

Not sold on Dynamax. It looks more interesting than Z-moves with it lasting up to three turns, but I still think Mega Evolution did it best. I liked the changed up designs of older Pokémon. Still, the option to participate in raids is welcome, and I'll definitely give it a try.

As for the story aspects we saw, I thought Sonia looked extremely cute. Leon is a bit underwhelming design wise, but maybe he'll be fleshed out more. Unfortunately, Hop looks like another friendly rival, which is a bummer. And Milo has no nose! Maybe he's related to Krillin from Dragon Ball.
 
Joined
Feb 7, 2014
Location
Ohio
Gender
tree
Dynamaxing: No
Roaming Pokemon: No
Open World: Probably not
Raid Battles: Alright I guess, nothing I would bother with
New Pokemon: Not good, but an improvement over Gen7
Characters: Still blank and soulless like last time. I already know I'm going to hate Hop
 

Woyogoyo

The Oncoming Storm
Joined
Aug 22, 2012
Location
Sacred Realm
As if I wasn't riding the hype train enough already. It looks like it's taking a few cues from BotW, which I love. Really looking forward to seeing the starter evolutions eventually. The raids, depending on how they're done, could be great or awful. As someone who plays a lot of MMOs, I think that teaming up with a group of randos will likely go horribly wrong, especially since it seems like only one person will be able to dynamax and catch the pokemon. It seems like the kind of thing that'll require good communication, something not often found in groups formed of total strangers. Overall though, I can't wait 'til November.
 

*M i d n a*

Æsir Scribe
Joined
Aug 18, 2009
Location
*Midgard*
Gender
Entity
I looked at a long video and really liked what I saw. I'm really excited as I was back when X and Y were coming out. I didn't feel this excited with Sun or Moon, though, but those were good games, too, not gonna lie. But this sole game is what nearly made me get the Switch earlier today. I didn't though, because I will wait till this game comes out.
 

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