Welcome to Retro Gamers Talk, a series of articles where we discuss all of the rumours, speculations, and expectations floating through the internet about upcoming titles from our favourite franchises. Today, I’m going to be looking at all of the new Pokemon game rumours surrounding the next Gen 10 title, listing everything that the Retro Dodo team would like to see from the new game, as well as touching on Pokemon: Legends ZA and what I know about it so far!
There’s a lot of underlying hype about the new Pokémon game; even with the DLC dropping for Scarlet and Violet, the people are ready for a brand new Pokémon title to sink their teeth into. I’ve got my own wishes for the new Pokémon game (which is yet untitled) that mirror a lot of fan opinions on the web, and I’m going to use my professional opinion to guide you through some of the leaks, guesswork, and wishes of both myself and the wider gaming community. Let’s get into it!
Table of Contents
30th Anniversary Release Rumours
Pokémon games in the main series have released every three years since the Gen 1 games dropped (apart from the four-year gap between Ruby/Sapphire and Diamond/Pearl). By this reckoning, the new Pokémon Gen 10 title should drop in 2025, but leakers say different.
Pokémon Red and Green dropped in 1996, which means that we’re coming up on the 30th Anniversary of the series (sorry for making you feel old).
According to Centro LEAKS, it looks like we’re about to break the three-year cycle one more time just like back in 2002-2006 when the series had its 10-year anniversary. Centro also goes on to say that the game is going to drop on the Nintendo Switch 2, something that I can fully get behind. A new main-series Pokémon title is something that would wholeheartedly make me want to buy a new Nintendo Switch console (not that I would need much persuading anyway). We already know that the console is being announced before the end of this Fiscal Year, so that could give Nintendo enough time to get this game out for the new system.
What Can We Expect From a New Game?
Pokémon Scarlet & Violet came out in November 2022 and are currently the third best-selling Pokémon titles in the main series so far, with Sword and Shield taking the second spot. That means that The Pokémon Company is clearly going in the right direction with the ‘traditional formula’, and it allows us to make educated guesses about what we might see in the new title.
An Improved Open World With A More Utilised Map
One of my main qualms about Pokémon Scarlet/Violet and Legends: Arceus is that they tried to do open-world exploration but didn’t fully nail it. I really didn’t rate Arceus at all; the way that it tried to promote open-world gameplay like Zelda but had characters that moved into position as if carved from wood just really annoyed me.
Scarlet & Violet continued this feel and improved on it slightly; I always felt that Arceus was a bit of a precursor to try and get the idea right before Gen 9 came out, but the region of Paldea itself is a little lacklustre. Not enough of the map is utilised; there are a lot of massive empty spaces with not a lot to explore, and if Gen 10 can correct this with more areas to explore and secrets to uncover, then it will have my vote straight away.
I’m not suggesting that we get a massive ‘Pokemon Depths’ to travel through or anything, but let’s fill that map a little more!
Better Graphics
When you look at the likes of Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom, you can see just what the Switch can do. Yes, it’s not as powerful as the PS5 or the Xbox Series X, but those games look insanely stunning and incredibly detailed. Arceus, on the other hand, had elements of the environment that would load as you approached them, a little like an internet page on a Windows PC hooked up to Dial-Up Internet.
There’s a lot of glitching going on in Scarlet & Violet; Pokémon randomly appearing and looking a little too jagged for my liking, as well as more scenery slowly crawling into being and characters just dipping through the ground. I’m hoping that, with Nintendo having a little longer to make this title (if the 30th anniversary rumours are true), they will make these necessary changes and give us a game that doesn’t feel like it’s been thrown together.
Continued Need To Intertwine Games
A lot of people will say ‘I’ve only ever played one of the Pokémon games, there’s no need to buy both’, and to some extent, that used to be true. The games were virtually the same with a couple of different Pokemon to catch and different legendaries appearing at different times, and finding another player with the opposite title and trading with them to complete your Pokédex was a fun extra that promoted Nintendo’s love of multiplayer gaming.
Scarlet & Violet, however, had more reasons to play both games, with different Professors, variations in lore, different Pokémon, different legendaries to catch specific to each game (just like Sword and Shield), and different universities to explore. This is a definite improvement on Sword and Shield, and I’m hoping that there will be even more reason to buy both games when Gen 10 drops, perhaps with stories that can only be fully concluded by owning both titles like Oracle of Ages/Seasons in the Zelda canon.
I wouldn’t be angry if there was a way that we had to have both save files on one Switch in order to fully experience the story, or perhaps collecting items in one game that needed to be used in another that couldn’t be traded, just like that Banjo-Kazooie Ice Key that made me so mad as a kid!
Paradox & Tera Type Pokémon As Well As A New Theme
I think it’s pretty safe to say that we’ll see the return of Paradox and Tera Type Pokémon, but what about a new theme of Pokémon for the new title? I mean, if the 30th Anniversary rumour is correct, then this title needs to knock everything out of the park. Obviously, I would be here all day if I tried to surmise what that new theme could be (let’s just go with ‘Black Hole Ultra Mega Max Pokémon’ because it sounds cool), but I think we’ll be in for another unique type to add extra interest to the series as a whole.
How about this too… every Pokemon that’s ever been, all 1,025 of them, available to capture in the new game, a full 30th Birthday Party that everyone is invited to… now that would be epic!
New Modes Of Transport
Sword and Shield brought the bicycle back for traversing around the world, Arceus brought steeds to ride around on, and Scarlet and Violet introduced the idea of riding around on Pokémon that looked like motorbikes.
I’ve already said that I want an even more in-depth open-world experience, and I think after the flying element of exploration introduced in the Indigo Disk DLC, the idea of flying will come back in full force and be available from the very beginning of the Gen 10 titles. Think about it; Hogwarts Legacy is so fun because you can fly insanely quickly from one area to another, and now that we’ve been introduced to flying in the Pokémon universe, going back to a bike just isn’t going to cut it anymore.
Perhaps there will be a Pokémon that can fly, swim, and ride across the land, covering all of the modes of exploration (and maybe digging down into those Pokémon Depths that I mentioned above that I’m now starting to wish were real).
The New Region Setting
Pokémon games usually have a little easter egg inside of them that alludes to a detail of the next title in the series, little hints for players to find by chatting with NPCs or looking at decorative pieces. Remember the Totem from Alola that featured in Pokémon X & Y? The clues are there when you look for them, and a Pokémon Scarlet & Violet user has found a clue that could lead to the next Pokemon region.
Take a look at the picture above found by Highland_the_kitsune; it definitely is a ‘beautiful town in a different region’, but a lot of people on the internet have been discussing whether this could be set in Italy or Greece. It certainly looks like the Italian town of Ostuni or Santorini in Greece, but there’s a huge problem with this train of thought – none of the Pokémon games have been set in a ‘real world’ region yet.
So, it got me thinking, what other regions or cities had a European vibe to them? Sottopolios City in the Hoenn Region (Generation 3) suddenly came to mind, a place that according to Pokémon Wiki is based on Yakushima but has a similar architectural feel to the two European suntraps I mentioned above.
Take a look at the image above. The shape and colour of the houses, the red flowers on the roof of the house on the right of the image – they both match the street in the picture found inside the house in Scarlet/Violet. Does that mean we’re about to head back to the Hoenn Region in the new game, revisiting the epic locations from Pokémon Ruby, Sapphire, & Emerald?
This isn’t the only time that a picture has been used to give a sneak peek as to what’s coming up in upcoming games. Remember the trailer for Scarlet and Violet where the new starter Pokémon were revealed in a picture found by a Security Guard bumbling around in the dark with a torch? It would only make sense that they used the same trick in the game!
My Thoughts On Pokémon: Legends ZA
Legends ZA remains an enigma to all of us at Retro Dodo right now; the debate is ongoing as to whether this is some sort of Sim City style Pokémon world builder or whether it’s a new adventure like Pokémon Legends: Arceus but this time set in the modern day rather than going all the way back to the beginning of Poké-history.
Here’s what we do know:
- The game is based in Lumiose City and will involve an ‘Urban Development’ plan.
- Mega Evolution is set to make a comeback.
- The game will be released in 2025.
- The Z in ‘ZA’ has some fans thinking that ‘Zygarde’ could play a big part in the game.
Am I looking forward to Legends: ZA? Put it this way; I’m intrigued. The fact that we haven’t been given any real information about it other than a pretty vague trailer has my interest well and truly piqued. This ‘urban development’ plan does make me think of a Mario Maker-style game rather than an actual game like Arceus was, but I don’t really know how the battles would come into play – would it end up being a game where we build the world and then battle through it? That could be a cool new mechanic for The Pokémon Company to test out and more of a reason to buy rather than just creating a ‘similar vibe’ to the main series titles.
That’s all we have for now folks, but I’ll be updating this article as and when new Pokemon game rumours drop to keep you all apprised of what’s happening at Nintendo HQ!
