A glance at the Galar region

So, the rumours that Pokémon Day would see the announcement of a new Pokémon game turned out to be true. Pokémon Direct revealed that, later on this year, we will see the release of two new Pokémon games on the Nintendo Switch – Pokémon Sword and Shield. We’ve very little in the way of information at the moment, but here’s a look at what the video promises, and some desires for these two games.

The announcement video offered a sneak peek at the games, before introducing us to the three starter Pokemon for the region. Grass is represented by a mischievous monkey called Grookey, Fire by a bounding rabbit called Scorbunny, and Water by a cowardly sea creature called Sobble. It’s hard to have a favourite at the moment, as all three are incredibly adorable – Twitter seems really divided on which is best, whereas poor Popplio had already been discounted by Sun/Moon players.

The games will take place in the Galar region, which looks to be heavily inspired by England. It looks very similar in style to the Let’s Go games, although the announcement has confirmed that it’ll be in the style of a traditional Pokémon game – good news for core gamers, many of whom were unhappy with the Pokémon Go! form of gameplay in Let’s Go. It’s good that the games are sticking with this graphical style, however, as it looks incredibly beautiful and suits the few areas we’ve seen (the video also promises “idyllic countryside, contemporary cities, thick forests, and craggy, snow-covered mountains”).

So, now it’s time to speculate and dream of what could be

We don’t have much more info than that at the moment, although the video promises much more to come – so, now it’s time to speculate and dream of what could be. It appears that, in one scene, the player character enters an arena – the Pokémon games normally incorporate some elements of the region they adopt (think of Sun/Moon’s Hawaiian styling), so perhaps football (or some Pokémon variant) will rock up in the game. Could there perhaps be some use of the Queen as an incredibly powerful Pokémon trainer?

Something that fans have always asked for is the inclusion of other regions in the post-game, and they have always been told that technological limitations make such a thing impossible. But now, given the power of the Switch, another region is no longer a simple pipe dream (maybe not Kanto, though, or fans will grumble a bit more). Similarly, fans clamour for a massive increase to the Pokédex – it needs to be at least a three-digit number of new Pokémon (and it will be really interesting to see what elements of UK culture the Pokémon team have adapted).

The one thing that must be avoided is the over-simplification of the games. Let’s Go was intended for a casual audience, and so slightly steered away from a core game – the Sun and Moon games (and their updates) were heavily criticised for over-explaining and hand-holding the players to a degree that almost made the game unplayable. If the developers do one thing correctly, it must be making sure that this isn’t the case this time round, or they will lose an awful lot of fan goodwill.

We’ve had a minute’s worth of footage, but excitement is already building for Sword and Shield – there are many Pokémon fans around the world looking forward to seeing what awaits us in the Galar region, and the end of the year can’t come soon enough!