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Diamond & Pearl remakes finally confirmed?
Let’s dive in.
That there
would be Pokémon announcements throughout the week didn’t mean that there was
one every single day. The first announcement that could be considered part of
Pokémon’s 25th came on Wednesday with new Pokémon Masters EX content. There was
some Pokémon GO stuff on Monday, but that wasn’t anything special. Nothing out
of the ordinary. With Pokémon Masters EX, on the other hand, it’s clear that it
meant to celebrate Pokémon 25th. Officially, the say that all of the new stuff
is because of the games 1.5 Year Celebration. To that I say: yeah, right. Who
celebrates their 1 and half year existence?
Pokémon Masters EX players are about to have a Champion Time! ... I'll see myself out. |
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Pokémon 25th goodness came the following day in the form of music. The Pokémon
Company had earlier announced that it had entered a partnership with multiple
singers to produce music for the anniversary. Before the digital Post Malone
concert in February, a collection of songs was released on places like YouTube,
Apple Music, Spotify and any music streaming service that you can think of.
These songs are … fine if you ask me. I’m no fan of most of these artists, to
begin with, and I’m not that impressed with these new arrangements even with
the added Pokémon flair.
A day later
there was quite a surprise. The announcement that a Pokémon Present would air
the following day. That there would be a Pokémon presentation was not a
surprise, but that it would be on Friday was. The Presents rolled around the
next day and oh boy, was it a doozy! It was such a doozy in fact that I ended
up writing two separate articles about it already to which I’ll link when it’s
appropriate. Let’s go over everything in the present one by one. ‘
The
presentation started off with a very neat video recapping nearly every Pokémon
product that has come out. From Red & Green in Japan to the Sword &
Shield Expansion Pass. From the anime to the TCG. From the E-reader to the
microphone accessory of Hey You, Pikachu!. If you’ve been a Pokémon fan that video
will a trip down memory lane for you. I very much enjoyed it. It’s well-edited,
fast-paced and has a catchy tune under it. My one problem with it is that it's
rather long. I mean, I get it. Pokémon has been around for 25 years now so
there’s a lot to talk about. But the only thing I and many watchers were
thinking was: ‘this is great, but can it end now? We want to get to the
announcements!’. So yeah. It was fun, but it a bit long.
With the
introduction out of the way, it was time for the first announcement. As I
suspected, the Pokémon Company started with another look at New Pokémon Snap.
It’s due to release next month after all. New Pokémon Snap isn’t a game I have
any real interest in, I never understood the appeal of Pokémon Snap, but I’m
going to try my best and cover it here nonetheless. Just excuse me if I miss
some things here and there. We got some more details on the story of the game:
to observe and research Pokémon in their natural habitats. We’re formally
introduced you to Professor Mirror as well as your two teammates: Rita and
Phill. You know, with how weird Pokémon can get with the names of its
characters (Cheren, Ghetsis etc.) ‘Rita’ and ‘Phil’ are two very tame names. It
kind of sticks out if I’m being honest!
Prof. Mirror and his assistant and your team-mate Rita. |
After New
Pokémon Snap, it was time for the main event for many. It’s also the part that
those two other articles come in. As many had hoped, Diamond & Pearl
remakes were confirmed. They are Brilliant Diamond & Shining Pearl and will
launch later this year. I gave my full thoughts on the Sinnoh remakes in ‘Let’s Talk
About Pokémon Brilliant Diamond & Shining Pearl’, so if you want to know my full thoughts on
them I encourage you to read that article. What you need to know about these
games is that they’re, and I quote the official announcement here, “has been
faithfully reproduced”. The game is outsourced to another company, ILCA, and
uses Chibi style graphics for the overworld. The graphics and the uncertainty
of any improvements and additions to the game have received criticism from fans
but overall, people are looking forward to it.
The other
announcement was a surprise to virtually everyone watching. You remember
people, after Sword & Shield turned out to be a disappointment for many,
asking GameFreak to make a game that’s more like the Legend of Zelda: Breath of
the Wild? Well, turns out they listened! Pokémon Legends: Arceus is the
first-ever truly open-world Pokémon game. Looking at the footage of the early
build of the game, it truly does look like Breath of the Wild, but with
Pokémon. It’s set in Feudal Sinnoh when the region had not yet been full
colonized. It’s your goal to explore Sinnoh, complete the Pokédex while also
dealing with the Mythical Pokémon Arceus in some way. People are looking
forward to Brilliant Diamond & Shining Pearl but can’t wait for Legends:
Arceus. If you want to read more about it then I will, once again, refer you to
the article I wrote on it. Check out 'Let’s Talk About
Pokémon Legends: Arceus' for more info as well as my thoughts on the game.
One thing that I didn’t mention in either of the two articles is what these two games mean for the whole Dexit situation. First off, from what it looks like right now, none of these games will future the National Pokédex. In Pokémon Legends: Arceus its quite clear that not all Pokémon will be in there due to story reasons. In Brilliant Diamond & Shining Pearl, the Chibi style combined with the outsourcing and the ‘faithful’ in the marketing heavily implies that there won’t be a National Pokédex in the game as well. It’s quite a bummer, really. I had hoped that whatever the other Gen 8 mainline game would be, it would bring the missing Pokémon back. With the Sword & Shield Expansion Pass introducing the concept of patching in Pokémon, I was hoping that these Pokémon would become compatible with Sword & Shield as well. A shame that this isn’t about to happen.
That Post Malone model is quite... something, isn't it?That Post Malone model is quite... something, isn't it? |
Lastly,
there was National Pokémon Day 2021 itself. February 27th, 2021. The day that,
25 years ago, a small and severely under-staffed game company launched their
passion project. Pocket Monsters: Red & Pocket Monsters: Green. The day
itself was what as advertised. The lack of any real-world event lessened its
impact if you ask me. Twitter and Social Media were abuzz the entire day with
Pokémon by both official outlets and the fans. It was quite fun. The day ended
(in my time-zone at least) with the virtual Post Malone concert. It was OK. I’m
not familiar with Post Malone nor can I say that I enjoyed the music, but the
animation of the backgrounds was nice.
..........
And with that anti-climax, National Pokémon Day and this post came to an end. Overall, I enjoyed it. I thought that the build-up throughout the week wasn’t much like I expected and that the day itself was lacking but at least we got a very good Pokémon Presents out of it. I mean, I did write two posts on the stuff in that presentation alone. Plus: I’m pretty sure that this isn’t the end of it. We will see more information revealed about Brilliant Diamond, Shining Pearl and Legends: Arceus no doubt. Perhaps we will even get another surprise later in the year? I’m certainly hoping for it!
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