Reddit Is Furious About Pokémon Sword & Shield
The total number of Pokémon in Sword and Shield has been revealed, and fans are voicing their discontent on the internet.
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It’s finally out: There will be exactly 400 Pokémon in Pokémon: Sword and Shield, and fans are upset. Not because that’s a small amount for fans to catch, but because the cuts to the National Dex are outrageous. There’s already a Pokérap that removes the missing Pokémon from Gen 1, and it’s… pretty short.
The controversy began when it was revealed that all Pokémon wouldn’t be coming to the new games. For the first time, it wouldn’t be possible to catch ’em all. Granted, no mainstream Pokémon game has included every single Pokémon, but fans could easily trade or import to fill the gaps. Sword and Shield won’t allow this.
Things died down for a while, until the game’s release date neared… where fans found out that several series staples didn’t make it in. That means no Squirtle, no Bulbasaur. No starters except Charmander.
Fans are upset at the Pokémon Company for a number of reasons. Reddit user BrainisSickToday prophesied that the number of people upset will only grow as more purchase the game. First when people realize only around half the Pokémon made it in after purchasing the game, then when Pokémon Home’s subscription service is announced, then when a new round of buyers buy it at Christmas, and so on.
X-Vidar posted that what bugged him the most was the number of Pokémon being exactly 400, meaning that all of the promises that they’re “working hard to bring over as many Pokémon as possible” was a lie– after all, it’s very unlikely the final number would have landed exactly on 400 if it weren’t planned that way. Meanwhile, hantomimp is excited for the release of Sword and Shield for a different reason– he says dataminers will finally be able to prove that models and animations were “copied and pasted from the 3DS games,” giving Game Freak no excuse to cut any Pokémon from the game aside from greed.
Still others have brought up other developers for comparison. Like how Masahiro Sakurai, the creator of Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, talked about adding twenty fully animated characters to the background of a Smash Bros. stage. Meanwhile, Pokémon still hop around on the battlefield like statues. “I don’t mind the missing Pokémon,” GanondorfDownAir wrote, “but don’t lie to me about why.”
It’s important to note, however, that Pokémon doesn’t even need to make money on the games to be successful. The franchise has an estimated revenue of $95 billion and is the highest grossing franchise of all time. $17.138 billion comes from the games. So what does the Pokémon Company make the most money off? Merchandise. And to longtime fans’ dismay, people are buying more plushies of Pikachu, Charizard, and a handful of other classics. So those Pokémon continue to get the spotlight.
When considering the bottom line, the decisions make a lot more sense, but that doesn’t make fans any less bitter– Neoboe called it a “total disconnect between Pokémon and the fans that have stuck around for more than a decade,” and that it didn’t start at Gen 1.
Finally, Reddit user IanMazgelis mentioned that it’s easier than ever to patch in new Pokémon, making it a deliberate decision. And Teakmahogany remarks that the Pokémon Company “Overestimates their children fanbase and underestimates their adult fanbase–” really, new topics are popping up all the time, and it doesn’t seem like they’ll stop any time soon. The Pokémon name is being dragged through the mud, and whether or not it affects the bottom line, it’s good to remember that fans matter too.
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