Pokemon Scarlet/Violet Review

For many years, I have been a big Pokemon fan. That said, there have been good Pokemon games, bad Pokemon games, and some okay Pokemon games. On Friday, November 18, 2022, I purchased my copy of Pokemon Scarlet, the newest generation of Pocket Monsters awaiting me. Having spent some time with it, I feel confident in my ability to say: Pokemon Scarlet and Violet is/are one of the most entertaining Pokemon games I have ever played. (For the sake of brevity, I will refer to them as one game for the rest of this review.)

The game adds a few quality-of-life fixes that I personally feel outweigh both the negatives of the game and the features that I feel are missing. When I started my journey that faithful evening, I was hesitant. I had been excited for the game fresh off the heels of Pokemon Legends Arceus, which was a much-needed overhaul of the Pokemon formula. Pokemon ScarletViolet was advertised in a way that made it obvious that some cues were taken from the Legends game to give us our first truly open world mainline Pokemon game, and I was nervous. Nevertheless, I optimistically dove in.

My Adventure

WARNING: The following section contains some spoilers.

Pokemon Scoilet starts you off with a relatively smooth 1-2 hour long introductory sequence. During this sequence you get quite a bit of area to explore already. In fact, I was able to fully form my first draft of a pokemon team before reaching Mesagoza, the almost-hub town of the game. Once reaching Mesagoza, you start your first day of school at Naranja Academy, which, alone, gives you a few activities to do. The school’s director, Director Clavell, informs your class that your main assignment is to set out into the wilds of Paldea and go on a journey to find your “Treasure”.

After this point, two friends that you’ve met by now, Nemona and Arven, fight over what you might decide to do first, at which point you are finally given full control to explore the region at your leisure. Now, it is imperative to point out that while you CAN go anywhere in no particular order, the game does still function with certain areas and characters set at certain specific levels. So, if you’re planning on going into areas with higher level pokemon and trainers, ensure that you’re diligently training your team.

The game gives you 3 different storylines to follow: The Victory Road story that we’re all used to, the Team Star storyline, which subverts your expectations of what teams usually are, and the Titan Pokemon storyline, which mimics totem pokemon from SunMoon, or noble pokemon in Legends Arceus. While, at first, some of these story bits didn’t interest me, I very quickly got pulled in by the content and writing of each (more on this in a bit).

Leaving Mezagosa, my sights were set on Iono, the electric-type gym leader. I had a specific idea in my head of how I wanted to play the game. I made a b-line toward Levincia, fighting pokemon and trainer alike on my way, and finally approaching the electric gym. You should know that gym leaders during Victory Road have standard gym battles but require a mini game to be finished before being allowed to face each gym leader. All these gym challenges are hit or miss, with some being fun and some seeming to be shoehorned in. Iono’s mini game was enjoyable, but her battle gave me a challenge I should’ve expected. I blacked out, ran to a Pokemon Center, and was immediately greeted with this game’s pull.

If I was to play this game MY way, I would have to treat it differently from the type of Pokemon game I was used to. Being the stubborn ~gamer~ I am, I trained my pokemon a few more levels before going to destroy Iono’s team. After claiming victory over my digital frenemy, I reworked my plan for the game, deciding I would leave the most interesting part of each story line for the end of the game, and work through each other challenge depending on whatever I felt at what time. This made certain parts of the game harder, and certain parts easier. Once I had this plan figured out, I started working on the storylines outside of Victory Road.

The Titan Pokemon were the easiest to get through. Here’s how it works: you find a pokemon that is larger than it should be, fight it, and then it ingests an herb known as Herba Mystica, prompting a second, harder fight. Next, Team Star requires the most interaction to beat. Each Team Star base has a guardian character to beat in battle, then you go through the team’s base battling 30 pokemon with the new “Let’s Go!” Feature, then FINALLY you fight the Boss for the base. You even get to fight the car that they drive. It’s pretty cool.

I was able to blow my way through most of the Titan pokemon (albeit fumbling the Steel type battle), but the Team Star bases required a bit more thought and care. I would intersperse Team Star bosses and Gym leaders, attempting to use each to level up at one just enough to move on to the other. Despite my best efforts, NOTHING could prepare me for Eri, the fighting-type Team Star boss. She kicked my ass. A lot.

The Titan storyline gives you the story of Arven. On the reveal of Arven’s motivation for fighting the titans, I felt obligated to help my new friend. Arven’s odd relationship with the Professor lead me to want more. The Team Star storyline was a bit heavier. When you’re introduced to Team Star, two grunts are harassing Penny, another student. Over the course of the boss battles, you slowly unravel a story that can really hit home if you’ve ever had a hard time with school. With a predictable but happy ending, the Team Star storyline really gave me a new appreciation for the not-incredibly-significant amount of worldbuilding in the game.

After Victory Road is the Elite Four. Nothing special to say about this, as it’s standard, aside from a quiz the game throws at you right before going through. The elite four can be pretty tough depending on how you curate your team. The champion, however, is not and can be blown through like nothing. Victory Road, complete. At the end each storyline, you are brought into a battle with your newfound friends. These battles all feel good and help make you feel like youv’e grown during the game. The battle with Penny feels like you’ve helped her open up to others. Arven’s battle is fun and a bit more challenging, and seeing his team in action makes the events of his storyline feel like they matter. Nemona’s battle was cathartic for me, the moment the entire game built up. Honestly, she gave me a bit of a challenge, and it felt good to see the battle through.

After going through the three stories, I finally got to go to Area Zero, a large crater in the middle of Paldea. The Area introduces paradox pokemon which are both interesting and, by virtue of being introduced late game, powerful. Discovering Sada’s secret filled me with a mix of emotions, and really cemented what was missing from Arven’s storyline.

Upon defeating Professor Sada, I could now finally have Koraidon as part of my party. The game ends, the credits roll, and I’ve made three new friends.

Spoilers end HERE.

Positives and Negatives

While there have been many evident reports of Pokemon Varlet being a broken, glitchy mess, this was not present during my playthrough of the game. There were a few graphical glitches during cutscenes leading into battles, but nothing game breaking and not often. I didn’t start to actually experience problems until attempting to activate the multiplayer aspect of the game with friends. I attempted this twice, both resulting in the game crashing after mere minutes. This was a big disappointment given that the game’s big selling point is the First Multiplayer Pokemon Game.

Aside from that, I feel that the game’s open world and abundance of pokemon makes the world feel populated and a blast to explore. Finding hidden items or places, or randomly placed challenge NPC’s always feels good and makes the game actually feel like an adventure. I found a black stake on accident while wandering around and it made me excited. I had no clue what was going on and had to figure it out.

While it does suck that the game takes away the catching mechanic from Pokemon Legends Arceus, the new mechanics that are introduced add a quality of life to the game that improves the experience. Sending or retrieving pokemon from your PC Boxes can now happen remotely through the Rotom phone, ensuring that you don’t need to take the time to fly or run to the nearest Pokemon Center.

Certain pokemon in each game can have some frustrating catching requirements, which can easily lead to burnout for players who enjoy filling their Pokedex, however the newly integrated sandwich creator -and extension of the camping system – can help with not only catching but also spawning different pokemon types. This, along with the “Let’s Go!” feature help take away some of the more tedious parts of the game, such as pokemon hunting and battle grinding.

While gimmicky, Terastallization is one of the more fun battle mechanics added to recent Pokemon games. It can make your pokemon even stronger, or help you strategize even further and run a (possibly) triple-type pokemon. I had a lot of fun with it.

Pokemon Scailet does suffer from being somewhat devoid of quest content outside of the main storylines. There are some side quests you can do at the academy in the form of taking classes, but while I find the teacher storylines to be interesting to experience, unless proper discoverable side quests are integrated into the open world itself, I do not see future games incorporating this aspect being all too successful. Show up to your classes though. They’re useful.

Other minor changes in the game leave me feeling somewhat mixed. Not being able to enter houses freely definitely feels a little more realistic but given the lack of side quests it makes the game feel that much more restrictive, even if only miniscule. As mentioned by other outlets, the lack of voice acting makes certain cutscenes feel awkward, but it feels like this could be remedied by having keytones during text dialogue moments.

In Conclusion

As a pokemon fan, Pokemon Scarlet and Violet feel like a breath of fresh air and a much-needed change to the mainline Pokemon RPG formula. The open world feels natural for the Pokemon world, but without the integration of side quests it feels lacking. I believe that optional multiplayer in pokemon is a much-needed feature, seeing as how the series has a focus on friendship and teamwork, but if this feature is to be implemented it has to be fine-tuned. And while I didn’t much care at first, the separate storylines ended up reeling me in and keeping my attention. Overall, Pokemon Scarlet (and Violet) was a fun experience for me, but while I thought it was a really well put together game, it isn’t hard to see why others might not enjoy the game. I do believe the game is worth a playthrough, and if you’ve been debating the game yourself, I say that it’s worth a try.

Mediocre Gaming gives Pokemon Scarlet and Violet a 6.5/10