I was a little suspicious of Pokemon Scarlet and Purple, but after the new trailer, I’ll tell you what gave me my faith back. – Chatborgne

Beyond the memes we already know, there are plenty of new details and features that deserve our attention.

The scarlet and purple Pokémon reappear with a trailer, and it’s time for a new review: how is the ninth generation progressing? Are we satisfied? Well, the truth is that beyond the memes we already know, there are a lot of new details and features that deserve our attention: an open world is coming for four that has every chance of becoming our fall obsession .

All right, guys. We can leave Reddit, 4Chan, Twitter and take a deep breath. More clues, more puzzles, more self-proclaimed leakers prophesying the next batch of Game Freak news. The second trailer for Pokémon Scarlet and Violet (Scarlet/Violet if you prefer) has finally arrived, covering all kinds of new features: the beginner species, the rival, the covers of each edition with their respective legends, or a curious duo of teachers who… it’s hot all of a sudden, isn’t it? It was fun to see how the community came to a series of consensus within minutes of the trailer airing.

Lechonk was love at first sight, a friend we must protect at the risk of our lives and the funniest name in the entire franchise for English-speaking audiences, while mentor Turo became the reincarnation of Gigachad. What is less talked about is that beyond the memes and Españita, we have before us the first game of open world game of the saga. And he also has cooperative for four players.

I think it’s pretty cool to have four colleagues in one game.I don’t know how you’ll see it, but a humble servant interprets it as “hold on, they’re coming for life”: you see, the Japanese studio has been living reasonably well for a few years under the influence of a Pokémon GO that shook the world in 2016 with the overwhelming power of socialization. This factor is so ingrained in the identity of the franchise that it is the reason why its main episodes have been released on handheld consoles: it is to facilitate or encourage camaraderie, the exchange of opinions or knowledge, cooperation and other pleasant things. In my experience, anyway, I have such a good time when I release a new game with my friends that when the excitement of discovering it together wears off, it starts to bore me. So I find it rather cool to bring together four colleagues in the same game, each on their own, but at the same time in permanent company. I think it’s a bit like the the height of the “post-GO era”.if you know what I mean. What I’m not sure anymore is whether or not I like the open world that will be made possible by this feature, because Game Freak has been working on this formula for a few years now, and at this point we’re seeing patterns .

The Sword and Shield Wild Area, other open areas added by DLC, and even the biomes of Pokémon Legends: Arceus have faced a cosmetic issue. They were hideous as hell; and it’s not so much a question of muscles, but of… artistic success -I don’t want to explore flat, rigid places without personality. This intellectual property was reinforced by building a world around its creatures, right? Well, it would make sense to exploit that same trait of identity everywhere. In architecture, in the shape of cities, in the treatment of lighting, in the scale of caves. Like in the original RPGs, come on. It may sound silly, but it’s actually a very serious matter because if we settle for less, we end up with an effect that I could only describe with the English terminology, uncanny. Weird, as if the Arceus personLegends, this point of the visuals ripped me out of the experience. Unfortunately, I don’t think Scarlet and Purple perform much better in terms of resolution or texture filtering, edge smoothing and such, but at least I feel like I’m in the right place. more inspired artistically and I think that’s super important.

On closer inspection, the trailer has a lot of (easy to overlook) little things that I think help to alleviate this lack of naturalness. Watch the animations of Mencia, the rival; much smoother than what had been recycled from Hau. The teachers move their mouths when they talk, and in Albora’s case, you can see his fangs because his design is inspired by a caveman. If you listen carefully, you’ll find that the legendaries have rhythms of their own in musicWith Koraidon, the music uses drums, while Miraidon has a synthetic beat. Their designs are clearly inspired by motorcyclesit is therefore logical that there are gas stations along the roads. There are Hattenna, Drifloon and Applin stickers on the protagonist’s shelf, cobblestone roads on the courses, windmills. Even valleys and grasslands look a bit more like Pokemon thanks to the fact that at almost every moment you can see at least one item in the distance that complements and consistently adds to the fantasy of the game. which you look at it, all these things convey something more than one credibility, dynamism and life at every turn; things that make us forgive or ignore (if only partly) other graphical flaws because we’re just more immersed in that world.

I’m not sure Pokémon Scarlet and Purple look to work well on the Switch screen.I don’t know if the Scarlet and Purple Pokemon will look good when I spin them around on the Switch screen, but I’m at least sure they’ll look more authentic than Legends. The latter, which I commented on in its review, is still an extremely organic game and I think the next installments will benefit from the evolution it has started. I love that Gas Stations are becoming Pokémon Centers or outposts of Arceus Legends, a less linear world, and the return of Gyms. We’ll see how things go over the next few months, but so far there’s a good vibe, don’t you think?