(Image by The West News)
November 19th marks the date where we finally return to the Sinnoh region after speculation for the better part of a decade of when Diamond, Pearl and Platinum would get the much deserved and often wonderful remastering’s that we saw with Fire Red and Leaf Green, Heart Gold and Soul Silver (my favourite), and Omega Ruby and Alpha Sapphire. These games took the much beloved games they are based on and amplified them with new features and quality-of-life upgrades whilst keeping faithful to their original source material such as adding more post game content, a new and updated Pokedex with Pokémon that were previously unavailable in the original games, or even new story elements that expand upon the lore of their respective regions. When the initial trailer for Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl was revealed in February for the ‘Pokémon 25th Anniversary Event’, the response was… interesting to say the least, with many people concerned about the graphics in particular that looked straight out of an iPhone game, as well as a change in developers, with Game Freak taking a backseat in this project after developing every main line Pokémon game in the series thus far, with ILCA taking the reins on this project. Slowly but surely more information and footage has been unearthed before the game’s release next week, but I thought we could look at some of the big talking points surrounding the game’s launch and see how we feel about them and how they could possibly affect our return (or for some people, their first outing), into the Sinnoh region.
The Graphics/Art style
Upon the initial reveal of Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl, a lot of criticism went towards the graphics and the ‘chibi’ art style as it somehow looked worse than the original games that came out 15 years earlier on significantly weaker hardware. We weren’t expecting 4K graphics with unreal attention to detail, but the initial trailer looked very rough and like it was made like I said before for a free to play mobile game. Upon the release of the second trailer, the graphics seem to have improved drastically, with the backgrounds looking a lot more vibrant in their colour pallets such as the backgrounds of wild encounters and battles. Personally, I didn’t like the graphics in the initial trailer, but they have definitely been improved to a point where I am more than happy with them and how beautifully some of Sinnoh’s imagery has been recreated.
The Underground
One of the coolest but most underutilised areas in the original Diamond, Pearl and Platinum, The Underground appears to have been completely revamped in the remakes, with overworld wild encounters being seen in the trailers for this area, with opportunities to catch rare Pokémon perhaps that you wouldn’t expect to see in the originals. This area in the original games allowed players to make their own secret bases and go into their friend’s bases as well, you could collect fossils from a little minigame with a pickaxe and then there was the usage of The Underground’s facilities in the requirements to encounter the illusive Spiritomb. The official Pokémon website describes these new areas in The Underground by saying, ‘Pokémon Hideaways come with a variety of different terrains ranging from still-water caverns to volcanic landscapes, with different Pokémon living in each type of environment. Among the Pokémon that inhabit the Sinnoh region, there are some Pokémon that can only be found in these Pokémon Hideaways.’ This will allow for more team diversity in your playthrough, and it will be interesting to see what new Pokémon are in these areas.
National Dex
One of the original problems of Diamond and Pearl when they were released was that with their own original Pokedex, there were a severe lack of diversity when it came to different Pokémon of a certain type, such as Fire type especially, which was fixed with the release of Platinum version. My wonder revolves around whether the expanded ‘Dex’ will return in the remakes, or whether it will be even more expanded with Pokémon that were previously unobtainable. The expansion of The Underground makes me think that the expanded Pokedex is here to stay, but possibly more expanded which will give us a chance to finally use some different Pokémon as opposed to the typical Staraptor, Luxray and Togekiss. Recently, news was revealed about the previously named Pal Park and what it has been replaced with, a zone called ‘Ramanas Park’ where the player is able to encounter Legendary Pokemon such as Rayquaza, the three Kanto legendary birds and the three Johto legendary beasts just to name a few. Whether or not this means a full National Dex of every Pokémon from generations 1 through to 4 is still unclear, but I imagine this will be the case after the outrage that followed Sword and Shield’s release where the National Dex was removed altogether instead for a much smaller Galar Pokedex, with some Pokémon not being able to be used in the games that people desperately wanted to use. I don’t imagine any Pokémon from generations 5 and onwards will be in the game but you never know.
Event Pokémon (DLC?)
The mythical Pokémon of Sinnoh remain some of the most elusive in the history of the franchise, with limited opportunities to obtain them legitimately through limited time events (not with an Action Replay, you dirty cheaters), and with in-game events being hidden in the coding of the original games such as the Azure Flute that was supposed to be taken to Spear Pillar to encounter Arceus in an event that was never actually released. A pre-order bonus of Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl from some distributers allows the player to obtain a Manaphy egg, a mythical Pokémon otherwise unobtainable in the core game. (Quick side note, does anyone remember one of the only ways to legitimately obtain one of these into your generation 4 games? You had to have a copy of Pokémon Ranger for the Nintendo DS and complete it, unlocking the Manaphy post game mission and upon completing that you could send a Manaphy egg to one of your gen 4 games, but there was only 1 egg per cartridge. I recently played through this game again and to my surprise I had never redeemed the Manaphy egg from my copy, meaning that I could send it to my game and help complete my Pokedex. No real correlation to these new games but thought it was an interesting story to share nonetheless.) The mythical Pokémon of generation 4 include Arceus, Darkrai, Shaymin and Manaphy, and it would be interesting to see whether there are going to be post game episodes such as in ORAS with the Delta saga that allowed players to obtain Deoxys in the core game, a Pokémon like these little guys that were pretty much unobtainable apart from special timed events or convoluted manners. Would these mythical Pokémon be included in the post-game? Or maybe they will go down the most recently explored avenue in Sword and Shield with DLC housing new story elements, game modes such as the Max Lair Dungeons and new/returning Pokémon. I personally liked the DLC experience in Sword and Shield, but I can understand the hesitancy from some regarding paying for extra content that really should have been included in the base game. Either way, I imagine (or at least hope) there will be at least some way to officially obtain some, if not all, of the previously mentioned Pokémon in these games. Whether it is an in-game event, a DLC, or a simple mystery gift distribution, it will be cool to see some of these previously unobtainable Pokémon in action.
Following Pokémon and Overworld Pokémon
One inclusion in Pokémon Sword and Shield that I personally loved was the inclusion of wild Pokémon in the overworld. That whilst you could still aimlessly wander in the grass for an encounter to appear, you could just avoid them completely and only search for the specific Pokémon that you want to encounter. In the latest trailers, it seems that this feature has been removed for Sinnoh’s remake, which isn’t too surprising for me as this feature didn’t exist in generation 4 anyway, but it is certainly a quality-of-life upgrade from the newer generations that I feel would have been more than welcome in these games. It may have looked peculiar with the ‘chibi’ art style that the game has and the fact that the game is from a top-down perspective in homage to the original games rather than the third person view of the wild area in Sword and Shield. Following Pokémon make their return, being included in the Sword and Shield Isle of Armour and Crown Tundra DLC after their initial debut in Heart Gold and Soul Silver and they look wonderful. The trailer showcases them following the protagonist in Amity Square, an area where ‘cute’ Pokémon could follow the trainer, with this now being upgraded to six Pokémon following the trainer in this area. What always threw me when I was younger was which Pokémon they deemed as cute, are you going to tell my literal God of the Distortion World that he isn’t cute enough to come for a pleasant stroll with me? I’d like to see how that one turns out.
Is Platinum cannon?
The expansion of the cannon and lore of the Sinnoh region in Diamond and Pearl’s expanded version, Platinum, made the story a lot more interesting. With the inclusion of Giratina, the ruler of the Distortion World, into the main story rather than being a post-game legendary to simply capture as was the case in the original games. This added such a darker tone into the otherwise seemingly harmless adventure you embark on at the start of the game, with an evil team leader being sick of the imperfections of the current world, wishing to terminate this world and make a whole new one. With these games being remakes of Diamond and Pearl, question marks have arisen over the role that Giratina will have in these games, will it be relegated to simply a check mark on your quest to complete the Pokedex? Or will it have a more prominent role like it did in Platinum.
Online Play
Nintendo were very quick to say to us that the main form of competitive battling in the Pokémon series will remain in Sword and Shield as opposed to Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl. With this revelation it must surely mean that online play and battling isn’t going to be really expanded on in any way monumental. However, one thing from the trailer that made me quite curious was the return of the Union Room, a place located in the Pokémon Centres in each town that was a hub of local and online trainer communication, battling and trading. I am not really sure why this was a feature that needed to come back, with the online system that Sword and Shield used being more than adequate and simple enough to use. You could put in codes to match with specific players and organise trades and battles with little to no fuss. Nevertheless, this feature makes a return in these games, and it will be interesting I suppose to see if any new features are added to this place, or if anyone will really care.
The Music
Oh man. The music. Pokémon Diamond, Pearl and Platinum has one of the most incredible soundtracks of any game I have had the pleasure of hearing, being up there with Black and White and Pokémon Mystery Dungeon: Explorers of Time, Darkness and Sky in terms of my favourite soundtrack in the Pokémon series. Hearing these tracks in the trailer sent me back to my childhood, hiding my DS under my pillow when my mum would come and check on me, waiting for her to leave before returning to my journey to get my Infernape to level 100. The tracks that I heard from the trailer do an incredible job of modernising these tracks without taking anything away from the source material. Some of my favourite tracks include the lake themes (which is absolutely gorgeous), the Eterna Forest theme (which is absolutely gorgeous), and Cynthia’s theme (which is absolutely terrifying as her IV and EV trained Garchomp swiftly disposes of me and my team).
Post-Game
After the disappointment that Omega Ruby and Alpha Sapphire caused by not including the fan favourite Battle Frontier in the post-game that was included in Pokémon Emerald (only a model sculpture that teased a Battle Frontier that never arrived), it remains a wonder as to what post game content will be available upon our return to Sinnoh. Since the Battle Frontier was included in Pokémon Platinum’s post game and not Diamond and Pearl, I have a feeling they are going to recreate the disappointment of ORAS and not include it, I hope I am very much in the wrong on this though as the Battle Frontier is home to some of the most interesting and challenging battles in the series. It is split up into different sections with different rules such as only being allowed to battle with rented Pokémon or having random consequences before the battle starts such as having a poisoned Pokémon. I would be disappointed but not surprised if this area isn’t included in the final game. The Battle Zone and the other neighbouring zones such as the Survival Zone were post-game areas in the original games, with access to new Pokémon, much stronger trainers and move tutors and IV boosting items. I imagine this will make a return in the remakes, but I wonder if they will add any new Pokémon or story elements to this area, with a particular focus on capturing Heatran in the original games in Stark Mountain. Along with this, I wonder if they will expand on the stories of Heatran and Cresselia, two Sinnoh legendary Pokémon that have their own little sections dedicated to them in the post-game, with Cresselia being one of particular interest to me as it links to the point earlier surrounding the event Pokémon Darkrai and whether its inclusion will have any impact on Cresselia’s story if it is in the game.
Quality-Of-Life Inclusions and Removals
The ‘Poketch’ makes its triumphant return in the remakes, a feature that utilised the bottom screen of the DS, the console which the original games released on, and could help with step tracking, shiny hunting, and checking the status of your Pokémon amongst many other cool features! This feature appears to have been updated as well in these reimaginations of Sinnoh, with trailer footage showing the usage of HM moves through the ‘Poketch’, surely signalling the burden of having to assign one of these often-useless HM moves (apart from you Surf, we love you) and allowing roadblocks to be overcome such as bodies of water to surf on, rocks to climb, or trees to cut without sacrificing move slots on your Pokémon. Maybe Bibarel will finally be of some use to our main teams now it isn’t the designated HM slave! This seems to have been a feature that has been phased out for the past few generations, with Sword and Shield moving away from HM moves all together, with bodies of water simply being rode over with the help of the Rotom Bike, as well as Cut and Strength being obsolete. On the other hand, I have heard some leaks telling of the reversion back in terms of TM’s from being multi use to single use. This absolutely baffles me. From generation 5 onwards, TM’s became multi use and allowed multiple Pokémon to learn the same moves over and over again, allowing for exploration with your team and their move sets, trialling new tactics and combos with no penalty to your team. This seems to have gone completely out of the window in favour of being completely faithful to the mechanics that were evident in generation 4, to resounding disappointment from the fanbase. This was one of the quality-of-life mechanics from the later games that I thought for certain would have been in these remakes, but I stand very much corrected it seems.
Overall, despite some concern around these games, I am very much excited to return to the Sinnoh region next week. These games when they first came out made a big impact on my childhood and made me fall in love with the franchise even more than I already did. Whilst it may not be the most polished game and also the fact that Game Freak taking a backseat on this project is a little concerning, I am sure that whether it is your return to Sinnoh or your first time exploring the region, this game is going to be a lot of fun and let us relive or experience some incredible moments that will last a lifetime.
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