Honestly, I want level scaling for the gyms and nothing else. I like taking on trainers and things above my level, but it's jarring to get to a gym leader who is using level 14 Pokémon against my level 30s. Then you go back in post game and all the gym leaders had level 60 Pokémon all along. Like they clearly had better Pokémon the whole time. Taking on the gyms in different orders and seeing different teams would be great for replayability and unique player experience.
Try a hack rom called Crystal Clear. It's an open world Pokémon Crystal that lets you start at any city in Johto or Kanto, has a very cool way to ease you into the world no matter where you start and makes it so every Gym has a different team depending on your number of badges, plus you can rematch them at any time to see what the other teams would look like. It's pretty much what I wanted Scarlet/Violet to do.
I think an optional level capping system like what Xenoblade had is far more realistic to expect. Level scaling systems are complex and a greater game dev could do it, sure, but, come on... this is Game Freak. It's saying something when this is one of the best games we've gotten out of them and it's this level of unpolished.
They could make levels scale *up* but not *down*. So you can go out of order and hit difficulty walls, but if you go too far ahead you don't have to sit through battles where you just OHKO every mon on the opponent's team with one move when you come back.
Fighting the earth titan early in scarlet was one of the most fun moments i've ever experienced in a pokemon game, almost getting wiped out twice vs that behemoth was so memorable, it's a shame that the performace is so atrocious because this is probably my favorite pokemon main campaign in the series, and hell even the story was actually good for the first time in the series and got me very very excited for what they're leading to in the DLC unlike sword and shield.
Hard drive makes an interesting point about level scaling. Yes. You could fight the more later gyms too early into your playthrough. Yes, it could make for a good challenge, that's not the point of level scaling though. I'd rather levels scale up than levels scaling down, I prefer instead of going back to gym 1 with your level 40 team, the gym brings a buffed up team in response to you beating gym number 7.
something(probably a stable wage) about the move to hard drive seems to have reinvigorated you and made your videos so so much better than the last few videos on the fudj channel.
Probably my favorite moment in the game so far was taking on the psychic gym when I was under leveled and beating the gym by leading palafin then switching it out to meowscadra or whatever the cat is to be immune to psychic attacks and negate as much damage as possible
5:15 "this video is actually about me" i loved this, it says so much in so few words. people pretend to go on youtube to watch videos about their interests but for the most part it's really just a friend simulator.
1:14 pokemon legends arceus while being short and not that much to do the game is awesome and the graphics look way better than that trailer, the game was in a wayyy worse stage when the video's for the trailers got captured
I’m glad you addressed the elephant in the room (Copperajah) Nintendo has to make their money printer games to keep their small indie company alive, hoping that we’ll get a Pokémon game this fun AND polished at some point, but we may be dead by then
12:43 > likes the unintentional optional challenge of tougher battles that actually force you to think and make use of the game's mechanics > demeans anyone who would want that to be more than a personal challenge that only works for 10% of the game before completely trivializing the rest ??????????
With no difficulty scaling, it almost discourages you from exploring, because you can't control/catch pokemon past a point based on how many badges you have, you have no hope against later challenges. I feel like instead of maybe scaling with your level, "story" battles should scale with how many badges you have. Get one badge, every other gym goes up a rank. With BotW, you could beat anything, anytime if you were skilled enough because the battle system let you. In pokemon, if you want to fight a level 60 with a level 5, it NEEDS to be a specific mon with a specific build. And that could be fun for some but it's much less accessible than BotW. Anyway, good vid.
This game is fun, but released in an absolutely appalling state. Legitimately, everyone involved should be embarrassed. Sword and Shield and Legends Arceus were both obviously rushed, but that is nothing compared to the absolute broken state of these games. I literally laughed out loud the first time I saw lower frame rate NPCs in the background of a cutscene in the classroom. On that note, this video unexpectedly made me laugh out loud several times, absolutely hilarious and i subscribed.
Standards are so insanely low for a Pokémon game people think this game would actually be great without poor performance. It would still be below par. But it would be “okay for a Pokémon game I guess”
I agree, I'm getting sick of how complacent people still seem to be with this series. If it didn't have Pokemon in it's name people would be a lot faster to trash the poor performance and wonky level curves. I seen better functioning games get trashed for a lot less then what Pokemon gets away with.
Legends Arceus kinda solved Pokémon and then they just ignored most of it in this game. If you haven’t played it yet, there’s no rush but you should give it a shot. It kind shows you Pokémon’s immense potential.
I agree with most of this but level scaling is not a monolith. There is a way to dynamically scale leveling that isn't just "everything is the same difficulty forever". Just because Bethesda does something shitty doesn't mean that the entire concept scaling levels is shitty. See: like a hundred mods that fix Bethesda's shitty level scaling.
Its not so much that level scaling can't work (soft scaling of some sort). The AI and team size could also scale with how prepared you are, and not have like, the last bosses in the game spam completely ineffective moves against you. BOTW shrines were often awful because of this too, 100 hours into the game finding a combat shrine that you can beat with your eyes closed. Scale everything up, never down.
I was genuinely shocked at how much I am enjoying these games. I’m grateful that the technical issues weren’t too bad for me, as well that I have a particularly high tolerance to them. After Sword and Shield my expectations were extremely low and they’ve gone and made one of the best Pokémon games I’ve played. (Imo)
I felt like the difficulty curve aspect was very fun. It required me to have a Pokémon at the necessary level, since I had not found false swipe yet. It was very cool to stumble upon a high or low level mon and being forced to adapt on the fly
ugh you're so right, this SHOULD and EASILY COULD have been the best entry in the series but noOoOo, the highest grossing franchise in the world WANT MORE MUNNYY AND WANT IT NOWWW
@8:16 Saying this travesty of a video game is "going into a new direction" is absurd to me (probably because I've gone from fanboy-ism to complete and utter disdain for what it currently represents). Advancing "one step forward" in almost 15 years (since Platinum came out) is completely insulting!! Specially when they lie and take a few steps back every time they put something out. It's a shame, is what it is.
Open World Level Scaling: Not necessary, though it could be a Witcher 3 style menu toggle. Gym Leader Level Scaling: Definitely necessary, and super easy to implement by just having it so that the professional Pokémon Trainers you are challenging send out different teams and play harder depending on how skilled they think you are. Hell, I think that the series has done something similar before.
I don't think level scaling necessarily has to be as all-encompassing as this video argues. There are options. One option would be to limit the degree of level scaling, i.e. a lvl50 Pokémon could scale up or down by 10 levels to match your friendly monster, but go no further up or down than that. Another option would be upscaling-only, so that harder gyms are hard from the beginning but easier gyms can only become harder as you progress. Yet another could be step-wise scaling, so that you can challenge gyms with their Pokémon at lvl50 while yours are anywhere between lvl40-60 but any higher or lower than that would trigger level scaling.
Yeaaaah Let's get this video to a lot of views in the first hour so that it gets love from youtube Algorithm bless this video which i liked even before watching it because it's that good Seriously, sometimes i end up pissed off because i can't like it again after watching it, fix that youtube Lots of words lots of engagement, yadda yadda
Yeaaaah Let's get this video to a lot of views in the first hour so that it gets love from youtube Algorithm bless this video which i liked even before watching it because it's that good Seriously, sometimes i end up pissed off because i can't like it again after watching it, fix that youtube Lots of words lots of engagement, yadda yadda
I can see where you’re coming from against level-scaling, but these games give you SO much EXP that you’ll end up being overpowered by the time you get to the next gym you’re “supposed” to go to. It’s like they expect you to take on gyms consecutively and never explore, fighting wild Pokémon or trainers. I had to use two different teams just so one wouldn’t be even more overpowered. Personally, I don’t really find it funny travel and then find something where the levels are so high I have zero chance of actually beating it. It just means I wasted time going there and have to find the “proper” path to progress. Which usually just means searching online because there’s really no hint in-game, if you _wanted_ to go on the pre-planned path.
I played the games with my older brother. We played it blind but swept everything with a lucario, even if we were under levelled. It was still more fun than sun and moon.
If this game gets a pass for its level curve. I don't ever want to hear anyone talk about Johto's level spikes again. They are just challenges that you need to use your brain for. Otherwise nice review and glad to see the unfinished product being called out. This game had the potential it just needed more development time. Like baking a cake, all the ingredients were there, they put it in the oven but took it out way too early. It then collapsed into a gooey mess when they tried to take it out of the pan.
Why is terrastilising just taking a pokemon and drowning it in gloss varnish still better then giving your pokemon growth hormone energy with a wristband
Scarlet is probably my favorite game from the 3D era. If it wasn't for the performance issues and bugs it would legit be the best Pokemon game I've played since Gen 5 imo. I certainly think this game points to the fact GM is going the right direction when it comes to design but the bugs and all that also show they either don't have enough staff, not enough time, etc. Like you said, it's unpolished as fuck sadly.
I instead think that for a game like pokemon power scaling is perfect ,and this structure instead makes so that you are not really free to explore and do things in your own order because if you do, you'll just not win the gym battle until you grind. "Oh you though you could actually start from anywhere and do the Ghost gym first? Ah! Better think again, cause it is going to be lvl 40 and body you". Power scaling in pokemon means that gym leaders are dynamic, they have different teams to use depending on the challenger ,and can be more or less tactical in their way of battling to provide for a better challenge. I understand that power scaling works very poorly on a Zelda game, but Pokemon has a completely different style of gameplay and that demands for a different structure and approach to stuffs.
#PlayTouhouPDPSoDExtended Seriously, though, great review as ever. I audibly laughed several times throughout, particularly at the Gordon Ramsay analogy, that was powerful. And it is a genuine shame to see Game Freak so almost able to realize their ambition but so obviously hamstrung by TPC's greed to put out a rushed title like this.
Level scaling is a tricky one. I see where it might feel stagnant, but I'd really like a way for every gym leader to feel like a formidable challenge. I didn't even dick around that much before facing Brassius as my first gym leader, and he was already a pushover. Maybe part of it is Pokemon's inherent design, type matchups leading to a "Press A to win" playstyle as I effortlessly sweep an entire gym leader's team with one pokemon that hits all of theirs super effectively. They might throw out a wildcard meant to counter it and I might suffer a KO, but then I just send in the second best option to finish the job with 4 more mons in reserve. That said, I had to fight Eri of Team Star 4 times. My levels were about the same as hers, but I had not trained anything with a good Psychic or Flying move to attempt to sweep her with. My best fighters would get picked off as they blow their wad on her regular pokemon, then get crushed by her Starmobile as it kept building defense with Stamina and running over everything. It was thrilling.
did you pick fuecoco? because otherwise i don’t think you can find a pokemon that resists grass before that gym if you take the logical route there edit: assuming you do it first, i know you can go anywhere
