Pokémon Sword & Shield Direct Information

While short, the fifteen minute Direct on Pokémon Sword & Shield had a decent amount of information. So…here it is, along with additional news released on the official Pokémon website alongside the Direct. Let’s go, giant wolf pals!

Main information, Pokémon Sword & Pokémon Shield:

Release date: November 15, 2019.
Art Director: James Turner, the first westerner to officially design Pokémon and the creator of Shadow Lugia, Buzzwole, Guzzlord, and the Vanilluxe, Golurk, Mandibuzz, Trevenant, and Naganadel families.
Game appears to have a partially voiced theme song, a first for the mainline series.

Pokémon:

Wooloo: the Normal-type “Wool Pokémon,” particularly popular in a Galar town that makes textiles from its wool. Abilities are Fluffy and Run Away.
Gossifleur: the “Flowering Pokémon,” whose pollen is said to have healing properties. Evolves into Eldegoss, the “Cotton Bloom Pokémon.” Both are Grass-type; Abilities are Cotton Down and Regenerator. Cotton Down lowers the speed of an opponent who hits it.
Drednaw: the Water / Rock-type “Bite Pokémon,” described as a high level Pokémon. Abilities are Strong Jaw and Shell Armor.
Corviknight: the Flying / Steel-type “Raven Pokémon” and a flying taxi. Abilities are Pressure and Unnerve.
Zacian & Zamazenta: two legendary Pokemon, and presumably the mascots of Sword and Shield. Zacian holds a sword in its mouth, while Zamazenta’s mane is a shield. Distinct from many other legendaries, they’re unknown even within Galar itself.
Confirmed returning Pokémon: Sawk, Wobuffet, Bewear, Hippopotas, Snover, Rhydon, Golurk, Duskull, Gyrados, Frillish, Butterfree, Bounsweet, Mudsdale, Seismitoad, Tyranitar, Avalugg, Hawlucha, Milotic, Mantyke, Mantine, Stufful, Raichu, Meowstic, Flygon, Charizard, Budew, Wynaut, Pancham, Grubbin, Arcanine, Inkay, Fraxure, Snorlax, Wingull, Steelix, Braviary, Weavile, Clefable, Dugtrio, Quagsire, Pangoro, Steenee, Pikachu, Lanturn, Espurr.

Dynamaxing: A new mechanic which follows on Mega Evolution and Z-Moves; it allows Pokemon to grow exponentially in size and boost their power. Each move turns into a “max move,” though a few special Max Moves are available (presumably based on the Pokémon knowing certain moves?) Dynamaxing can only be used once per battle, and regardless of whether the Pokémon faints, the condition will reverse after three turns. Requires the trainer to have a Dynamax Band.

New characters:

Leon: the Champion and a celebrity trainer. Has a Charizard.
Hop: the rival character, and Leon’s younger brother.
Professor Magnolia: the region’s professor, focusing on Dynamaxing.
Sonia: Magnolia’s granddaughter and assistant.
Milo: The Grass-type specialist Gym Leader. Has an Eldegoss.

Mechanics and Features

Wild Area: a massive sandbox between cities, filled with a plethora of Pokémon which changes depending on the day and weather. Allows free camera control for the first time in the series. It contains Max Raid Battles; not dissimilar to games like Pokémon GO and Destiny, up to four trainers can team up to fight a permanently giant and powered up Pokemon. Like the rest of the area, which giant Pokémon you can find is dependent on which part of the area, the day, and the weather. For instance, Lanturn only appears during rainstorms. In addition, some Pokémon will only become available in the wild after being defeated in a Max Raid Battle.
- If there are not enough players, CPU players will join in their stead.
Gyms are public sports stadiums built to exploit Dynamaxing and have seats for audiences to cheer during the battles.
A number of Corviknight work for the Galar Taxi service, which acts as the next replacement for Fly
Players can shake berries out of trees as in earlier games.
Game seems to be drawing from Sun & Moon and Detective Pikachu, trying to emphasize human and Pokémon interaction.
The Rotom Pokédex returns, now part of the player character’s smartphone. It allows Rotom to infiltrate other electronics, such as speeding up your bike or explore previously cordoned off areas.

Cool.

I like that they’re taking some interesting directions with stuff like that open Hyrule Field-ish area and the raid battles. The latter especially, since I never got the chance to play those in Pokémon GO. Nothing else is really eye popping for me, but the legendary doggo duo is neat. I’ll go with Sword since that legendary is pretty much Dark Souls’ Sif.

Instead of talking about the new Pokémon or anything (beyond, as Liquid mentioned, that they put Sif the Great Grey Wolf in a Pokémon game, which is just Rad), I just want to talk about the battle menus. Because they look really crisp. It’s such a huge jump, but I really love how the buttons and options look.

This is so nice to see. After four whole generations on dual screened Nintendo handhelds, we’re now going back to a style in which the menus have to be on the battle screens. It looks absolutely gorgeous, and in a very distinct way from the way other Pokémon menu’ing has looked. It’s “professional,” which feels weird coming from a series like this one. But…it ain’t bad, not at all (outside of the kinda too big Dynamax button, though I’m suspecting that’s only that big because the cursor’s on it). And here’s another image that shows a classic Poké Ball sprite for when you’re facing a wild Pokemon, alongside the rest of the slick menu. Just in general, the game looks excellent, but the UI is especially lovely to me. The buildings, the landscapes all look great to me, but these menus are capturing my heart.

In one word: “Cute”. The new Pokémon look really appealing, specially Corviknight. and the design of the new characters makes a good first impression.

And speaking of Corviknight, the mention that there will be a “taxi service” to fly you to other cities and the Bike now being able to float on water kinda soft confirms the return of PokéRides, which is nice. I hope we see a combination of old and new Pokémon able to help us in our adventure.

But for me the most relevant part for me is how the “Wild Areas” could enrich the experience, at the cost of grinding, as it could be harder to battle Pokémon quickly. However the landscape views, the likely chance to get a photo mode and running like crazy at the sight of a Shiny certainly worth the hassle… if only we could get our Pokémon to go alongside us.