Pokemon Friends Is A Reskin Of 2016's Think!Think! Games For Kids
"Pokemon Has Officially Proven You Can Just Slap Pikachu On Anything And People Will Buy It"
It's not too surprising when you consider that the reviewers calling it 'boring' are adults who can easily do their times tables, when Think!Think! Games for Kids was clearly intended to be an educational game for, well, kids. However, as CandyEvie notes, Nintendo didn't market Pokemon Friends that way, stirring up even more comments like, 'This is boring, I can do it with my eyes closed'.
lol
Like it literally proves what I've been saying for ages -- Pokemon sells on brand more than anything else.
The fact that Friends doesn't only exist but was highlighted in a Pokemon Day presentation (and advertised to ALL AGES when it was clearly not ever designed as such) proves that Pokemon Company literally does not give a shit lol
Like there is NO WAY Pokemon Company did not know this game was a total reskin of an older game. If they did not know, it means they did not give a shit to look into the developer's previous works. If they DID know, it means they did not give a shit about slapping Pokemon PNGs on and calling it a day.
This game was ALREADY scummy in my eyes once we found out about the pricing model and content. And it seemed pretty apparent it was a reskin from the get-go. Having that confirmed just further solidifies my doubts in the TPC management, and the Star Wars like obsessive toxic positivity that goes into defending their practices.
I'm not telling you to not like Pokemon - I love Pokemon, and have ever since Day 1 when it was introduced to Americans.
I am telling you that it has become a brand so obsessed with oiling its grinding gears of profit, while simultaneously not growing up with its audience, that it can and will and will continue to churn out half-baked crap on a cheap budget and rake in mass profits.
They have no incentive not to.
Pokemon is not Nintendo. Nintendo, for all of their faults (and there are many, as with any corporation), prioritizes quality and polish and even originality to an extent. Pokemon absolutely does not and has not for a long time. And that will not change at this rate.
Pokemon SV proved that even a mainline Pokemon can be unfinished and undercooked and underdesigned as HELL and it will still sell millions and millions. There is no floor too low for them to crash through, no budget cheap enough to make them feel embarrassed. Not one we've yet seen, anyway.
We can cross our fingers for "Gen 10 to save us" but mark my words, Legends ZA will be a middling game with 10+ points added to its metacritic average purely because of its notable brand name and that reviewers only have access to the Switch 2 edition, we'll call it "a step in the right direction" (for like the fourth or fifth time in a row), and Gen 10 will probably be the same. Each new Pokemon game tosses in a throwaway gimmick that mainly just lasts that one game, because they don't care about steady progress and building on top of what came before -- just whatever they can rush out the door with a 'hook' to attach to The Brand in order to get the masses coming back.
I would LOVE to se be wrong, to be crystal clear. But this is what The Pokemon Company has trained me to expect. To expect any different is to ignore the evidence in a cloud of copium vapors.
To toss in a positive note, I DO think the combat system in Legends ZA looks like a nice change of pace. The performance on Switch 2 looks smooth.
But. Man, everything else about what I have seen looks like a game from 15 years ago and I just don't get the hype for it, it's literally The Brand selling it, and our desperate HOPE to see that IP with its insane wealth of resources do literally ANYTHING to make us feel something new. They clearly care more about investing in the MARKETING behind these games than the quality of the games themselves. Gotta crank it out now while all of the Mega Evolution merch and tie-ins are going on, right?
Never seen a franchise so up its own ass in cranking content out to appeal to an audience primarily made of adults while continuing to feign ignorance that adults are the people spending the majority of their money on their products.
The people who MAKE Pokemon games deserve better.
The people who BUY and PLAY Pokemon games deserve better.
The franchise itself, as a fictional world and playground, deserves better.
