Pokémon Sword

Like it's recent predecessors, Pokémon Sword aims to keep the series fresh by shaking up previous staples and adding exciting new gameplay features. After the Let's Go games got me excited for new possibilities and directions in the main series, Pokémon Sword worked hard to deliver. However, as a collector, I was very put off by the absence of hundreds of Pokémon - so much so that I almost didn't even play the game. Luckily, I was so distracted by everything that this game does right, that I nearly forgot about it's issues.

In their imitation of the mobile game, Pokémon Go, the Let's Go games did away with the series standard of random encounters in favor of having all of the Pokémon wander the world in plain sight. My number one wish for the series going forward was to adopt that feature permanently. With a little modification, Sword and Shield did exactly that, and it was amazing. Gone are the days of constant interruption of your adventure, and in their place, the freedom to choose your battles and the ease of finding what you're looking for. Among the wide range of changes, I thought a more interesting one was in the story. Most of the previous games in the series designed the late-game plot around your adolescent character putting themselves in extremely dangerous situations, while grown adults encourage your poor decision-making the whole way through. In Sword, the adults actually recognized the danger of certain situations, and wouldn't let me get involved until I proved my talents as a Pokémon trainer. I thought that was a funny change, but I actually liked that I got to focus on the gym challenge before dealing with the title's legendary Pokémon.

Although I was disappointed that a large portion of Pokémon that I connected over the years will never enter the Galar region, I had a fantastic time there. Pokémon Sword showed me that the series is on a good path, and that I can expect to have a lot of fun with whatever GameFreak has for me next. With that in mind, this game is easy to recommend. There are so many new things that I didn't even mention here, so please give it a try!

The game can be purchased for Switch here (as of 1/9/21: https://www.nintendo.com/games/detail/pokemon-sword-switch/

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