#h blog

[supertrainstationh]

More PKMN Violet thoughts...

I mentioned in a previous blog post how I preordered Pokemon Violet to ensure I had it delivered to my house in time to stream on my my Twitch channel on release day instead of gambling on questing from store to store to find a copy like I did for Pokemon Legends: Arceus, and how it was unusual for me to preorder video games under any circumstance.

But maybe it's more interesting that I had enough faith that the new Pokemon Violet and Pokemon Scarlet games would meet my expectations to actually pay money in advance to secure a copy in the first place.

I've been playing Pokemon since the original games first came to North America, and Pokemon Sword and Shield were the first games in the series I found myself uninterested in after seeing the preview materials and hands-on impressions. What I saw painted a picture of games that lacked the quality I required for me to spend my money and time on them.

I found that the graphics and presentation unimpressive, that certain features that would otherwise be taken for granted were lacking or absent, and that the overall package reflected lapses in quality, with plenty of rough edges that would have never been expected from a mainline game in the Super Mario or The Legend of Zelda franchises.

When I shared this opinion on Pokemon Sword and Shield, I sometimes got push-back saying I was being a "graphics snob", which is absurd given that my main video game platforms have been Nintendo systems, even when the competing PlayStation and Xbox systems have significantly outclassed Nintendo's in terms of high performance visuals for more than fifteen years.

I was also told I was being unfair for judging Pokemon Sword and Shield based only on trailers and pre-release materials. If those weren't enough for someone to judge whether or not they'd enjoy the game, then Game Freak and The Pokemon Company didn't do their job, and that's not my problem.

The other thing I was told was that I was jumping on a "hate bandwagon", and participating in part of an irrational movement to defame the games.

If anything, my long running interest in having a Pokemon region inspired by Great Britain had me crossing my fingers for the most impressive game reasonably possible, and it was only reluctantly that I began to admit to myself that I wasn't compelled to buy Pokemon Sword and Shield.

Reviews and impressions once Pokemon Sword and Shield released confirmed my concerns.

However good and fun those games may be, that release not only suffered from the fairly conservative approach Game Freak has taken to modernizing the Pokemon games, but also suffered from being rushed by the urgency to provide guaranteed best-sellers in the form of mainline Pokemon RPGs for Nintendo Switch during a time of uncertainty in that system's long term viability.

Another factor I feel contributed in a rushed development timeline for Pokemon Sword and Shield was the need to renew the cycle of the Pokemon business model, in which new generations of the main RPG games form the basis for new anime, merchandise, and spin-off games.

Some said that as a hardcore Pokemon player, I was being overly critical, but as someone who plays Pokemon RPGs mainly for the story, and has zero proficiency or interest in competitive breeding or battling, I'm about as casual of a fan as someone can get in terms of gameplay habits and interests.

One thing I heard often from fans of Pokemon Sword and Pokemon Shield that were sticking up for the games were them saying that I had unrealistic expectations, arguing, "Well, it's a new Pokemon game just like on 3DS, but now on Switch in HD, what more could you possibly have been expecting?"

To my lasting delight, Game Freak answered that question for me with the reveal of Pokemon Legends: Arceus.

That's what I was expecting from a truly progressive, home console quality Pokemon game.

While there are still some issues with how the game presents it's plot to us, one of those being by the habit of its script to include events or situations which the developers are either unwilling to, or unable to, animate on screen in the form of a cutscene.

This leads to shameless cuts to black in which events unfold merely through text set against sound effects, before fading back in to show the aftermath.

But within the limits of what the low performance Nintendo Switch hardware can reasonably and reliably generate, the world of Pokemon Legends Arceus is vividly portrayed, and teeming with life.

Just as important to me, Pokemon Legends: Arceus was willing to part with conventions of past Pokemon RPGs, some of which were not so much expertly crafted game design choices, as much as they were limitations of the late 1980's Game Boy hardware that the original Pokemon games were designed for, that were carried forward as series staples.

People from Game Freak and The Pokemon Company were unusually forward in explaining that the reception to Pokemon Legends: Arceus would shape the future of the Pokemon video game series.

After voicing my disappointment with Pokemon Sword and Shield, and admitting that if future Pokemon games followed this format, I would have to bow out from being a fan of the games, I was excited by Pokemon Legends: Arceus, and decided to make sure I was there on release day to support it.

I even went as far as to say that Pokemon Legends: Arceus was something of a last chance for the gameplay of modern Pokemon RPGs had to retain me as a player, as I was more than happy to let future games pass me by and accept that my interest in the franchise was now limited to spin off material and appreciation for the world and its creatures and characters.

While certain elements of controlling the characters and operating the interface were complex in a way that pushed me out of my comfort zone, this was a necessary evil of a more sophisticated game that eschewed old-school RPG simplicity, and I was pleased with the result.

If Pokemon Sword and Pokemon Shield reflected the innovations and advances that were later seen in Pokemon Legends: Arceus, even with all of that later game's imperfections, I would have accepted these as the growing pains of a franchise slowly transitioning from being a low-tech handheld RPG to something worthy of a modern, if low-power, home console AAA release.

It was my hope that the ideas introduced in Pokemon Legends: Arceus would form the basis for future "main series" Pokemon RPGs, and even speculated that Game Freak was so overly cautious about significantly overhauling the Pokemon formula that they would only allow for these changes to be implemented into a spinoff game to see if the public accepted them or not before basing the main series around them.

When a Pokemon Presents was announced in 2022, I know I wasn't the only Pokemon fan crossing their fingers, actually hoping and praying that a new generation of the Pokemon RPGs would not be announced at that time. I, like others, was hoping for Game Freak to take as much time as possible to develop the new games based on the lessons learned from Pokemon Legends: Arceus.

When Pokemon Scarlet and Violet were revealed, and looking significantly far along in development, to the point where it was clearly being worked on in tandem with Pokemon Legends: Arceus, I very quickly formed a speculative hypothesis that I still stand by now.

I think that if Pokemon Legends: Arceus bombed at retail, and the reaction to its changes to the traditional formula weren't taken kindly to, they would have scrapped Pokemon Scarlet and Violet as we know them today without revealing them to the public, and instead worked on a more conservative build of those games (or different games entirely) based on the Pokemon Sword and Shield model, which I feel no shame in calling a HD 3DS-style game.

So with the release of Pokemon Scarlet and Violet nearly upon us, I'm just happy to live in a world where I'm actually excited enough about these games to have paid in advance to have it delivered to my home on launch day.

If simple graphics and limited tech alone were enough to ward me away from Pokemon, I wouldn't have fallen in love with the original games in 1998, which were released on a system that was technologically already out of date when it launched about a decade earlier in the late 1980's.

I look forward to sharing my first-hand experiences with Pokemon Violet as I play it on my Twitch channel when it comes out on Friday, November 18th.

[edluv-skinandbones]

so real

[injuredsoullessfrog]

[andiv3r]

"If you could have any superpower, what w-"

Shapeshifting. Shapeshifting shapeshifting shapeshifting. I'm a transgender therian, what the fuck did you think I would pick.

[xmel-bones]

˚₊‧꒰ა Przeczytaj ໒꒱ ‧₊˚

Motylki aktywne na wrzesień - zostawcie coś po sobie જ⁀➴

Moje kochane gąsieniczki też zachęcam ʚɞ ⁺˖ ⸝⸝

Zaobserwuje was wszystkich ᐟᐟ☆

Chudej nocy ୨ৎ Życze wszystkim szybkiego ugw

｡☆✼★━━━━━━૮︵⭒‿᧔☪︎᧓‿⋆︵౨━━━━━━★✼☆｡

Post wstawiony: 01:46 18/08/2024r.

[6wiros]

[3m0g1rlyyy]

Sometimes i look at my $elfharm scars and think “Damn it wasn’t even that deep”

[magg0t1nfested]

“where do you see yourself in 10 years?”

dead.

[wowlookwhosspirallingagain]

i crave being someone’s first choice so bad. why does no one ever choose me over others?

[han1w]

zajebales raz to zajebisz wiele razy:

[yikes-belly]

I love when we don’t acknowledge it. I make a pan of lasagna and we sit at the table with the nice tablecloth and candles lit and you chatter about your day. I serve you another slice. We talk about what we should do this weekend. I serve you another slice. Your cheeks look rosy in the candlelight and the wine is making me warm and affectionate. I serve you another slice. You’re complaining about the jerk at work but you’re also looking a little full. We’ve finished the lasagna and I bring out the cheesecake. We don’t acknowledge it but you look up at me with heavy, dark eyes as I put some down in front of you. I do most of the talking while we eat dessert. You’re concentrating now on finishing everything I give you, keeping up the charade that you’re not stuffed to the gills with most of the meal I’ve made for the two of us. I know you’re at your limit but I play oblivious and ask if you want more. My resolve almost breaks as I hear the faintest little whimper, but I keep playing the game, not letting you know yet how good you look, how full. I clear our dishes and I let you wait, heavy, bloated with food, probably unable to get up and help though we haven’t acknowledged that yet either. In a minute I’ll take mercy on you, maybe ask you innocently: is everything alright? You’ll deny it at first, because that’s fun for us; you know that I know that you’re packed tight and turned on about it, but you don’t want to admit it to me yet. And you’ll finally put a hand on your belly and look up at me pleadingly.

“I’m so full”

“Oh?”

“I ate too much”

“Aw, my poor baby”

“My tummy hurts”

And the dam breaks and I’m all over you. We held out long enough, and your sore tummy needs my attention. I did this to you, after all. We both know that you’ll eat anything I put in front of you, you just can’t help it, can you? It’s fun to pretend that I don’t notice how much you’re eating but the truth is, I watched you like a hawk. I saw the way you shifted uncomfortably in your chair when I got you thirds, I noticed the way your shirt clung to your belly after dessert, how your breathing got heavier and heavier as you got fuller and more turned on. You did so well for me, baby. Now let me take care of that full tummy of yours.

[120daysofsodomm]

[injuredsoullessfrog]

[necroticghost]

why the fuck am I the way I am

[moanlightx]

[3m0g1rlyyy]

the urge to push everyone away.