In recent years, there have been many complaints about the products in the PkMn franchise:
video game quality
gameplay/meta freshness
monster concepts
others ?
You might think the pokemon company and nintendo are checking out on creativity, but are they? We are getting amazing full art cards, BUT, is that pokemon’s doing, or because of the amazing talent that the illustrators bring?
There is a trend in popular media today where many of the “new and updated versions” and long-beloved IP (Intellectual Property) is feeling tired, overused, bland, and unimaginative. Music is mathematically (objectively measurable) less diverse than it was say, 30 years ago. AI merely uses previously created works, without any attempt to add fresh concepts. (It adds new content, but not truly novel ideas, and it can’t, if you understand modelled learning.) Is all media heading this way?
Even worse, some of it is downright carelessness like the new Star Wars sequel trilogy - Disney did not have a clear concept of the trilogy from the beginning, with each episode directed by a new team’s vision, and with later episodes trying to retcon or change story elements from the previous films. I mean, with a property like STAR Freakin’ WARS, Who does that?! It feels like a lot of established franchises today are either too big to fail, and don’t get the effort they deserve, or studios are too afraid to take risks, so we get uninspired creations.
So my question here is: Is pokemon starting to head in this direction? What are the signs? What are opposite signs?
I think a major sign of collapse would be mass exodus of existing interest and lack of new interest. Pokemon hasnt had either imo, not since the early 2000s anyways.
I think the new things get a lot more noise (especially due to how easy it is to post online), but i think across its many parts and at its core, Pokemon is stronger than ever. I know we as hyper focused Pokemon fans love to nitpick and focus on the very specific examples of good/bad, but from a broader collective, everything is more than fine.
It sounds cliche, but we need to worry more about how children are interacting with Pokemon. It is that continued generational nostalgia thats kept Pokemon afoat all these years. That ebb and flow of interest.
ah, fair enough. Honestly, its a wonder how they were able to keep things going this long. 9 generations, 1000+ unique pokemon, new games almost yearly, the tcg becoming the behemoth that it is, the list goes on. Its tough to know what its like internally at Pokemon. My guess is that they (who even is “they” really) at Pokemon are trying to maintain the steady increase in popularity and growth over the last 5 years. Things seem to be ramping up more than slowing down, and time will tell if thats a good thing.
I try not to take any of this too seriously. I think Pokemon, Star Wars, music, etc. is doing just fine. Pick out what you like and leave the rest. Sometimes people lose the forest for the trees when getting wrapped up in their hobbies.
I think the creativity is there. But I think the direction and management of that creativity is what many (including myself) take issue with. I love what is being done with the TCG but the TCG doesn’t have much weight compared to the video games, which are really what draw people in. As I’ve grown, the games (in my eyes) have taken more and more steps backwards. I recognize it’s not for me anymore, and that’s fine. I can still enjoy the old games, the TCG, and Pokémon GO. Right now, the franchise is multi-generational but that won’t happen forever. Eventually it’ll shift. So as mentioned above, I’d only be worried if the newest generation of kids stop showing interest in the video games. Until then, the franchise will keep growing and I wouldn’t be too concerned.
Licensed merchandise — $64.1 billion . Video games — $17.138 billion . Card game — $10.853 billion . Box office — $1.756 billion .
Everything that comes out of the Pokemon IP is made to serve the sale of merchandise. The Pokemon games make good money for the franchise as well, obviously. But they are only created as a way to push the sale of merchandise and keep the IP active for that purpose.
Having said that, it doesn’t mean they have to be bad. The actually creativity isn’t lacking in terms of creating new Pokemon, it’s just that their design philosophy has moved away from the normal Pokemon ‘style’ where things felt familiar enough to look like they belonged even when they were new. They are arguably making some of the best human characters in franchise history the last few years.
The games have suffered because of the shoddyness that has crept into the development time. People would look upon the last couple gens more favourably if they looked better than they do.
Every second parent at my work’s kids collect pokemon cards.
The sheer amount of children i see that are into it, in my regional town of Australia suggests it’s got a lot going for it.
Don’t know about other stuff but Sword Shield era of TCG was second time when i felt so into Pokemon. We honestly were spoiled by all those quality card-products. All that great artwork all those cool things.
Sets became so huge i couldn’t even fit the Lost Origin master set in a Vault X binder haha.
This was the first time i didnt get into pokemon videogame because i was too distracted by cards.
Now after sw/sh era is finished and S/V card sets are…kinda…eh. (just like any other starting set of the new era-don’t get me wrong) i can finally chill and continue finishing last 3 Sword-Shield sets and sealed products and get that new game finally.
Yeah pokemon is BIG. But i think that pokemon is quite healthy as well. We eathing really good and there is a thing for everybody.
I think the games lack polish, modern quality expectations for a studio as huge and financially successful as Gamefreak.
My issue is not that they’re bad as such but that they should be better and people excuse things they wouldn’t from other developers.
Anime recently I’ve heard positive things though I don’t personally watch it. It doesn’t have the terrible reputation now that it had during 4kids.
The latest set of obsidian flames is kinda meh but very much enjoyed sv1 and sv2, we’ve got 151 coming and the next paradox rift set could be an improvement though my really issue is I hate the design of the tera hats.
The tera hats tbf are designed to be easily recognisable at a glance when playing sv in PvP.
And popularity wise, Pokémon is absolutely massive.
I don’t even agree with your premise. Scarlet and Violet have generally been considered very good games conceptually. And people like the open world.
The issue has been the performance problems
largely due to the spawning system and outdated hardware. It’s sold over 22 million copies and is set to become the best selling non Gen 1 Pokémon game ever.
They’re open world that even in normal order is too easy… Out of order you end up with a terribly lopsided experience.
It was a good game and the dlc could add a lot, but there’s still no excuse for many of the shortcomings from a company the size and statute of Gamefreak.
Pokemon is a 25 year old franchise. We’ve been enjoying this franchise a long time. However, it gets harder to enjoy as we get older, as Pokemon become less familiar. In 1999, everyone loved the same Pokemon. In 2009, most people loved the same Pokemon. In 2019, we are pretty divided up into which generations we are familiar with and which ones we are not familiar with. Young folks can enjoy today’s games because they are basically the same game we played in 1999, except for us the formula has gone stale and its become exteremely difficult to follow all the 1000+ Pokemon. Once you skip a generation, its very difficult to get back on the wagon. 10 years from now, the people who grew up with current generations will likely get bored of new releases and the cycle will continue.
What made the golden era of Pokémon so special was that Pokémon was new and all those who were around then had the same experience with the same Pokemon.
