On October 13, 2013, Gamefreak released their first mainline 3D games in the Pokemon series: Pokemon X and Pokemon Y, marking the 6th generation of Pokemon. The games themselves received mixed reviews, with some enjoying what the game had to offer, and others complaining the game was too easy or it held your hand too much. Pokemon X was my first Pokemon game, so I naturally have plenty of nostalgia for it, and I do agree that the game is not balanced at all. In these first versions, your Pokemon gain EXP so quickly that they’re overleveled by the next random trainer battle in the game, and should you choose to fight all of them, you’ll overlevel the next major battle too (probably).
Pokemon X and Y did, however, bring plenty of new things to the table such as heightened shiny odds, 93 new Pokemon to catch, the brand-new fairy type, and the most famous example of all, Mega Evolution, which would temporarily give certain Pokemon a power boost. The gimmick was discontinued in late 2019, when Pokemon Sword and Shield were released.
Alongside Pokemon X and Y, there was also going to be a third version, known as Pokemon Z, but it was cancelled and its core mechanic was instead implemented into Pokemon Sun and Moon, the 7th Generation of Pokemon games. This was followed by the beginning of what I refer to as Gamefreak’s downfall, which refers to the start of Pokemon’s time on the Switch (2018-2021). Let’s Go, Pikachu and Let’s Go, Eevee were just more Kanto remakes designed to bring attention to Pokemon GO, Sword and Shield were heavily controversial for having a lackluster story and bad tree textures (apparently), and Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl were not the Sinnoh (based on the northernmost part of Japan) remakes everyone who grew up with Generation 4 asked for in terms of enjoyment, since they were notoriously glitched, the gameplay was sub-par, and don’t even get me started on the Elite Four.
But on January 28th, 2022, a new game was released, titled Pokemon Legends: Arceus (Arceus is basically Pokemon’s equivalent of God). It was revolutionary. It brought so many new mechanics to Pokemon to make the game genuinely fun. It felt like a game that had had so much effort and love poured into it, whereas Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl were just Sinnoh’s soulless husks. However, there was much debate as to whether or not the game was a mainline game or a side game. Now, two years after Legends: Arceus’ initial release, a new Legends game has been revealed and is scheduled to arrive sometime in 2025.
The only information we have so far on this new game is that the game will be known as Pokemon Legends: Z-A, and it will take place in a past version of Kalos (based in France), and be set “entirely within Lumiose City (based on Paris),” according to The Official Pokemon Twitter/X Account. The phrase “entirely within Lumiose City” does raise a few concerns. Although Lumiose City has the record for the biggest town/city in a Pokemon Game, some doubt the city is actually big enough to have enough content for a whole Pokemon Game. Legends: Arceus let the player explore Hisui (past Sinnoh) in all of its glory, so it would be strange if we were locked into one location for an entire game.
Some other fans have theorized that the game will follow Pokemon X and Y’s lore, taking place 3,000 years before the events of X and Y, and showing us how the Pokemon war played out, how AZ made the ultimate weapon, and the aftermath of it all. Not a lot of fans were expecting Kalos to get any attention, instead expecting Let’s Go, Johto (based on another part of Japan) or Unova (based on New York) remakes, or maybe a Legends game set in past Unova. But needless to say, I am excited, because my childhood region is officially coming to the Switch (at least, I hope it is) and hopefully the game will be more balanced than its 3DS counterparts.
