The reveal of Pokemon Legends Arceus has left fans astounded in the newest Pokemon Presents. The news completely overshadows the Pokemon Brilliant Diamond & Shining Pearl Gen. 4 remakes coming out in late 2021 that fans were looking forward to so much. With all the announcements in the direct, let’s focus on the one everyone’s talking about: Pokemon Legends Arceus.
Finally, there will be an open-world Pokemon game developed by Game Freak and I can’t help but compare it to The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild. In this action-RPG adventure, players will choose between Rowlet, Cyndaquil, and Oshawott starter Pokemon and explore an early Sinnoh Region from Gen. 4. Players will set out on a task given by the professor to complete the region’s first Pokedex.
Pokemon Legends Arceus seems to be a single-player story-driven experience, and the trailer beautifully captures the open world the player will explore. I can’t help but be so excited for how incredible this gameplay looks. The scene of the character aiming and throwing a pokeball at a wild roaming Pokemon realizes those childhood fantasies of being a real-life Pokemon Trainer. The battles look incredible as well—the animations looked great and the process of the Pokemon approaching its enemy and using its attack seems much more realistic and flashier than ever before.
I do have some concerns about the game. I acknowledge that it’s still in development, but I can’t help but notice that in its trailer some of these scenes are at a completely awful framerate. Pokemon Sword & Shield was criticized for instances of lazy animations for Pokemon its wild area, and that wild area would often lead to performance issues on the Nintendo Switch. I can’t help but imagine how much worse this game could perform if not released on a next gen console, like the rumored Nintendo Switch Pro. GameFreak was heavily criticized after this post comparing graphics of Sword/Shield to Breath of the Wild, so I’m hoping some measures are taken to ensure this won’t happen again.
I really encourage everyone to watch the whole Pokemon Presents, where you can learn more about Pokemon Legends Arceus and other news including the update on Pokemon Snap, the Gen. 4 remakes Pokemon Brilliant Diamond & Shining Pearl, and Pokemon Day events in a handful of other Pokemon games.
