3/5 ★ – Royvlution's review of Pokémon Sword.

This game is very fun to play. That doesn’t mean however that it is good. Let’s start off with what I like about this game. First off it’s Pokémon and you really can’t go wrong with Pokémon. The new designs overall are really nice, some of my favorites include Nickit and Carkol. Some downsides to the game are how easy and handholdy it can be. Hop the main rival is a joke and you fight him almost 5 times in the first 2 hours. The game also can’t go 10 minutes in the beginning without panning the camera to show you something you could have easily figured out. Another HUGE problem is the linearity of the games routes. What used to be a huge maze like cave is now basically a hallway that you just get to run through without much trouble. It really is sad cause this makes the game feel more like a slog than a journey. This however leads into the Wild Area. A huge open world portion of the map that your free to explore at your own pace... kind of. To balance things out higher level Pokémon are abundant and your not allowed to catch them without the proper amount of gym badges. This can be very annoying to have to deal with when you just wanna explore, but isn’t that big of a deal because by the end of the game all Pokémon in these areas are set to level 60. Gyms have a very different feel this gen, making a much bigger deal out of them and making it more of an event. Although the battles are neat and the music is amazing the puzzles leading up to them are a big let down. One gym in particular has a puzzle where you just go through a pinball machine like mini game 3 times and battle 3 trainers and that’s it. If there was more depth or strategy then these would be amazing sections of the game, but as is they’re a bit of a let down. Dynamax is this gens new gimmick. In certain areas in the game you have the option to Dynamax your Pokémon which makes them much larger and powers them up. Some pekemon have special forms called gigantimax which is basically Dynamax just with a different design. I’m a big fan of changes in old designs but sadly only 1 Pokémon not from gen 8 or 1 has a Gigantimax form and that’s Garbodor. It’s a really cool concept but I prefer mega evolution if I’m being honest. Regional variants make a return this gen with Galarian Pokémon. There was a very healthy amount from each generation, even if gen 1 got the most. My favorite Galarian form is Corsola because it plays with the idea of coral very well. Finally we have the legendary dogs. Zacian and Zamazenta are both locked to their respective games and aren’t available to catch till post game. I like their designs, and their special moves are cool. I’m also a fan of how they locked them until the end rather than making them catchable during the game, reminds me of mewtwo a little bit in that aspect. Now despite Dexit and the shitty graphics, overall I’d say Sword and Shield are decent games, and they are fun to play. However I do hope to see the many flaws fixed in upcoming generations. I would say if you want a fun Pokémon experience you would be better off going to older games, but these games can suffice for the time being.