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[Jubenhimer]

Game Freak, developers of the popular Pokemon series is one of the most famous and talented developers in the industry. They're also one of the most frustrating developers in the industry. Not because they're greedy or evil, but because they seem hell bent on living in the past. For a while, Game Freak was one of the very few developers that hadn't yet fully moved on to modern resolutions, as most of their titles this generation were predomedently on the 3DS, including its flagship. Even there, they struggled. When they moved to full 3D with the Pokemon series, the 3DS entries were plagued with performance issues, including massive frame-rate drops even when there isn't a lot happening. Considering how many other 3DS games with more going on didn't suffer those issues, that says more about Game Freak than the system. I won't get into the heavy handed tutorialization of those games since I always viewed Pokemon as primarily a multiplayer series, but I can understand the complaints if you were looking for a single player experience.

Now we get to the Nintendo Switch. Game Freak is now, whether they like it or not, forced to adopt modern resolutions, including 1080p support thanks to the Switch being both a handheld AND a home console. Their first strike was Pokemon Let's Go! Pikachu and Evee. A solid new side series in the main pantheon, but with a development team of 100 people, 2 year development time, with graphics that aren't much better than the 3DS games that's STILL plagued with performance drops. You get the sense that something is wrong with the Pokemon team there. I get moving to HD resolutions is hard at first, and 100 man teams wouldn't be unusually for a graphically intense AAA project, but for a Pokemon game with graphics that look THAT simple, that's a massive red flag in my eyes. And then there's Sword and Shield, which is already plagued with controversies. First off, only Pokemon that appear in Sword and Shield can be transfered from previous games, meaning that hundreds of Pokemon from previous entries can't be transferred. Game Freak's reasoning was due to hardware limitations and time constraints. I don't know how true that is, but nevertheless, it shows just how inefficient Game Freak is as a developer. 100+ people, toiling away at a game that still looks like an upresed 3DS title (Seriously, I've seen low budget indie games look better than this). There's something wrong here.

What's strange is that, None of these problems plague Game Freak's non-Pokemon titles. Those games have solid performance, good visuals, and are made with smaller teams, even on systems with HD resolutions. So either the Pokemon team is that incompetent, or Game Freak doesn't care. Game Freak is very talented studio, and even at their worst, they still make decent games. But the Pokemon team really needs to get its shit together if it wants to survive in the Switch era. That starts with retiring the aging 3DS engine. No wonder these games are taking this long to make, they're still using an engine designed for a platform rendering things at 240p, no shit it's going to be harder. Either make a new engine designed with the Switch in mind, or just license Unreal or Unity. Seriously, it'd save you a lot of time and money in the future.

 

[MiyazakiHatesKojima]

I really hope they're not trying to bank/double down on the nostalgia factor of Pokemon. Could this be why they're hell bent on 'living in the past', perhaps?

 

[EightBit Man]

I've been question that ever since the release of Mega Drive's Pulseman. Game Freak A.K.A. Pokémon Factory.

 

[Durmos]

Game Freak, developers of the popular Pokemon series is one of the most famous and talented developers in the industry.

I Honestly do not think they are that good tbh.
I think they have always been slightly trash in terms of development
good games no doubt for many years
but like look at red/blue. It has quite a bit of bugs. Like its so easy to do memory manipulation.

But for many years they have just re-used assets over and over. Pokemon sprites in your box have not changed since Gen 3.
So many low resolution objects in the trailers for sword and shield.
They are lazy and i have been saying it for years. That or they have lost their passion for making pokemon games

 

[Ryu Kaiba]

What's strange is that, None of these problems plague Game Freak's non-Pokemon titles. Those games have solid performance, good visuals, and are made with smaller teams, even on systems with HD resolutions. So either the Pokemon team is that incompetent, or Game Freak doesn't care. Game Freak is very talented studio, and even at their worst, they still make decent games. But the Pokemon team really needs to get its shit together if it wants to survive in the Switch era. That starts with retiring the aging 3DS engine. No wonder these games are taking this long to make, they're still using an engine designed for a platform rendering things at 240p, no shit it's going to be harder. Either make a new engine designed with the Switch in mind, or just license Unreal or Unity. Seriously, it'd save you a lot of time and money in the future.

My new theory is that they think if they make a new Pokemon game with modern visuals then the game that comes after that will struggle, because everyone will finally be satisfied or something. or they don't want to increase the workload it would take to produce the games because they sell anyway and its basically call of duty at this point. Hell maybe they're right. I'm pretty sure the next game could look worse and it will still sell like crazy. My only hope at his point is nintendo wanted a Pokemon game on Switch so were rushing and this is what they could get done in two years on the side while another team is working on a proper Switch entry.

 

[Jubenhimer]

I Honestly do not think they are that good tbh.
I think they have always been slightly trash in terms of development
good games no doubt for many years
but like look at red/blue. It has quite a bit of bugs. Like its so easy to do memory manipulation.

They're talented in the sense that they have good creativity and a sense of good game design. But regarding programing and visual fidelity, that's always been their biggest weak point.

 

[Mista]

Seems to me GameFreak concentrated on other aspects and one of those aspects isn’t graphics. If they’re using the same engine then definitely that’s the issue

 

[Jubenhimer]

My only hope at his point is nintendo wanted a Pokemon game on Switch so were rushing and this is what they could get done in two years on the side while another team is working on a proper Switch entry.

Let's Go! was actually created because Game Freak wanted an simpler, introductory series for newcomers, or those coming from Pokemon Go!. It was a success in that sense, and no doubt there'll be another entry down the line.

 

[Dr. Claus]

Graphics are not important, if they were games like Celeste, Shovel Knight, and Atelier wouldn't be popular or beloved. GameFreak could literally go back to using 8bit graphics and I wouldn't care in the least. The most important thing about a game is if it is fun, something that GameFreak does well. People continue to make mountains out of molehills with Sword/Shield.

 

[Durmos]

They're talented in the sense that they have good creativity and a sense of good game design. But regarding programing and visual fidelity, that's always been their biggest weak point.

I do think they are creative in a lot of things but in the Pokemon games i think they are super weak in this regard.
I mean how many generations did they do
Get all gym badges
BUT WAIT this random team is doing something bad you gotta stop around badge 4-6
and some later pokemon designs i see the work put into it but they just seem rather generic.
Maybe its because they just stand there in battle.


They have just gone by for many years based on the brand alone i feel

 

[Danjin44]

Seems to me GameFreak concentrated on other aspects and one of those aspects isn’t graphics. If they’re using the same engine then definitely that’s the issue

I said many times, to me the graphic itself is not the issue but the dull art direction. If they not going for high tech graphics then they should have strong aesthetics like Atlus does for their games.

 

[Whitesnake]

Graphics are not important, if they were games like Celeste, Shovel Knight, and Atelier wouldn't be popular or beloved. GameFreak could literally go back to using 8bit graphics and I wouldn't care in the least. The most important thing about a game is if it is fun, something that GameFreak does well. People continue to make mountains out of molehills with Sword/Shield.

The issue isn’t graphics alone. These graphics were fine when they were on the 3DS.

They are charging $60+ for a game on a $200+ system, but the graphics haven’t improved mucn at all from the 3DS games and they’re still removing features and now they’re removing pokemon. The only new feature is the new all-flash-no-substance gimmick of this generation, dynamaxing.

One has to wonder what exactly they are putting effort into, if it’s not graphics or mechanics or story.

 

[DonF]

I believe they don't see the benefit. Every pokemon game sales like hot cakes, why invest lots of resource improving the technology behind pokemon if the game will see just a marginal gain in earnings. I know that sounds mediocre, but that how I see gamefreak.

Other devs are very passionate about presentation and tech, but Gamefreak and the pokemon company don't care. Look at the animations in the latest trailer, its some frame interpolation garbage, the most generic and flash era crap, its hilarious.

 

[Dr. Claus]

The issue isn’t graphics alone. These graphics were fine when they were on the 3DS.

They are charging $60+ for a game on a $200+ system, but the graphics haven’t improved mucn at all from the 3DS games and they’re still removing features and now they’re removing pokemon. The only new feature is the new all-flash-no-substance gimmick of this generation, dynamaxing.

One has to wonder what exactly they are putting effort into, if it’s not graphics or mechanics or story.

Atelier games have looked like late ps2/early ps3 games for nearly a decade now, yet they still sell for a full 60 dollars. This isn't an issue outside a handful of people who think graphics are everything. Pokemon never strived for high end graphics. Not on the Gameboy, Colour, Advance, DS, 3DS, Gamecube, Wii, or Switch. A loss of a handful of pokemon isn't a major loss either. We lost out on numerous pokemon in the switch to GameBoy Advance to the point where they had to make another game entirely so we could get them back.

You are acting like this is not normal for Gamefreak, but they have done it for literal decades and it was never *really* an issue until now.

 

[Fbh]

For them not much has changed IMO.
Gamefreak isn't particularly great or talented IMO and alongside The Pokemon Company they have always enjoyed of massive success and crazy sales with rather low investments and production values.

For some reason though, it seems like fans are finally starting to expect more of them. Maybe it's because of the jump to an HD system with decent hardware, maybe it's because for the first time the mainline series is coming to a home console (sort of), maybe it's because it has gone for the full $60 pricetag, I don't know.
So it seems to me that Gamefreak/the Pokemon company just went into this as they usually do and treated Sword/Shield as little more than an HD 3DS game. And, for a change, fans have started feeling like maybe this 15+ million selling (per main entry) franchise could be doing more.


And honestly, unless the there's a big drop in sales I doubt anything will change. I see a lot of complaining online about this but I fully expect it will go the same way as the famous "MW2 boycott"

 

[Jubenhimer]

I believe they don't see the benefit. Every pokemon game sales like hot cakes, why invest lots of resource improving the technology behind pokemon if the game will see just a marginal gain in earnings. I know that sounds mediocre, but that how I see gamefreak.

Other devs are very passionate about presentation and tech, but Gamefreak and the pokemon company don't care. Look at the animations in the latest trailer, its some frame interpolation garbage, the most generic and flash era crap, its hilarious.

I still think its more that Game Freak insits on living in the past. It's like they know they have to move to more powerful hardware each generation, but at the same time they really don't want to. So they don't hire people or get tools that can make a Pokemon game who can look modern, instead using the talent and tools they have to make a Pokemon game. Like I said, it's not that they're lazy, but rather stubborn and inefficient just because they don't want to move on from old technology. They're a they kind of studio who insists on making things harder for themselves than it should be because of an inability to let go of the past.

 

[Whitesnake]

Atelier games have looked like late ps2/early ps3 games for nearly a decade now, yet they still sell for a full 60 dollars. This isn't an issue outside a handful of people who think graphics are everything. Pokemon never strived for high end graphics. Not on the Gameboy, Colour, Advance, DS, 3DS, Gamecube, Wii, or Switch. A loss of a handful of pokemon isn't a major loss either. We lost out on numerous pokemon in the switch to GameBoy Advance to the point where they had to make another game entirely so we could get them back.

You are acting like this is not normal for Gamefreak, but they have done it for literal decades and it was never *really* an issue until now.

You’re not listening. Nobody said graphics is all that matters.

They are charging more for a game that has no notable improvements from the 3DS games in ANY aspect. Graphics is just the most notable one because you can literally see it. Every pokemon was in the GBA games, you just couldn’t transfer them from Gen2 to Gen3 because the GB and GBA couldn’t be connected. This time they are removing pokemon from the game entirely for no benefit whatsoever.

They have grown utterly lazy. Gen 6 had no soul, Gen 7 was a just not good, and Gen 8 is looking like it’s not gonna be good either.

 

[Ascend]

This seems relevant.

 

[Hinedorf]

Doritos and Coke don't change much and they keep selling too. Until the current model stops producing riches with minimal effort there will be little change.

 

[Dr. Claus]

You’re not listening. Nobody said graphics is all that matters.

They are charging more for a game that has no notable improvements from the 3DS games in ANY aspect. Graphics is just the most notable one because you can literally see it. Every pokemon was in the GBA games, you just couldn’t transfer them from Gen2 to Gen3 because the GB and GBA couldn’t be connected. This time they are removing pokemon from the game entirely for no benefit whatsoever.

They have grown utterly lazy. Gen 6 had no soul, Gen 7 was a just not good, and Gen 8 is looking like it’s not gonna be good either.

That is incredibly subjective, not objective. Some would see the open areas, raid style pokemon battles, new story, world, and pokemon as improvements over the 3DS versions.

Gen 3 had pokemon you literally could not obtain until the remakes released unless you used a cheat device. Those pokemon, for all intents and purposes were not available for players to use until then.

 

[Jubenhimer]

Graphics are not important, if they were games like Celeste, Shovel Knight, and Atelier wouldn't be popular or beloved. GameFreak could literally go back to using 8bit graphics and I wouldn't care in the least. The most important thing about a game is if it is fun, something that GameFreak does well. People continue to make mountains out of molehills with Sword/Shield.

The problem isn't that these games look too simple visually, the problem is that they have 100+ team sizes on a game that doesn't look that much better than the 3DS entries. When you have over 100 people working on a project, you'd expect it to look better than what we have currently. That's the real crux of the issue. Games like Celeste and Shovel Knight are made by tiny teams of around a dozen people or less in a 1.5 year time-frame. Game Freak meanwhile spent nearly 4 years and 100+ people on a game that, let's be honest, looks like a glorified HD remaster. It'd not that people are complaining about graphics, People are complaining about Game Freak being an inefficient developer. 100 people and 4 years wouldn't be a problem if the visuals reflected that. But given what we've seen of Sword and Shield, it gives the impression of "This is what you've been doing this whole time?".

 

[Mista]

I said many times, to me the graphic itself is not the issue but the dull art direction. If they not going for high tech graphics then they should have strong aesthetics like Atlus does for their games.

True that. I’d take this over better graphics

 

[Ryu Kaiba]

True that. I’d take this over better graphics

Same thing, when people are saying better graphics they mean better visuals in general, and when it does come to literal "Graphics" this is still nowhere near an Atlus game.

 

[Werewolf Jones]

Low effort for maximum profit. Works every time.