"Game Freak's mentality with game development is "release now, finish later", and that's really biting them in the ass now that we're not getting third versions anymore."

I don't think it's any coincidence that the most widely-beloved Pokemon games are either third versions (Emerald, Platinum), remakes (FR/LG, HG/SS), or in the case of Unova, a sequel that borrows heavily from the first games. Likewise, when you look at a game like X/Y, or Sword/Shield, they don't really compare when it comes to polished gameplay or the sheer breadth of content. But when you ignore all the re-releases and focus only on the brand new, original releases Game Freak's made, it really puts into perspective how incomplete these games feel without the content introduced in their definitive editions.Gold and Silver didn't have a female protagonist, the Suicune subplot, or animated Pokemon sprites. Ruby and Sapphire didn't have have the Rayquaza storyline, Gym Leader rematches, double battles as a regular occurrence, or the Battle Frontier. Diamond and Pearl had it the worst. The Distortion World, battle facilities, Elite 4 rematches, and almost 20% of the regional Dex were exclusive to Platinum. Black and White were the first games in a long time that truly felt like complete, definitive products with a lot of content. But even these games lacked the PWT, secret grottos, animated trainer sprites, and difficulty modes that so many people love about their sequels.I feel like Game Freak got used to releasing what were essentially a pair of betas onto the market, and then releasing a definitive version/remake to finish what they started. X and Y, on the surface, looked like another repeat of this trend. I remember thinking "the story's dumb, Zygarde doesn't do anything, there's not as much content as the older games, but we'll get Pokemon Z to fix this." But to everyone's shock, they skipped a third version entirely and made Sun and Moon instead, which were just as rushed. We got a half-hearted attempt to fix these issues with US/UM, but not only were they a pair of games instead of a singular title, they completely ruined the storyline of a game that is very reliant on its storyline to hook players in. Sword and Shield I don't even need to comment on, the DLC expansions were nice but fixed none of the core underlying issues with the main campaign.None of these games are necessarily worse than say, Diamond and Pearl or Gold and Silver. But games like Emerald and Platinum have shown us how good the series could be with enough development time and resources. Don't get me wrong, the fact that we even needed third versions in the first place for these games to feel complete is a problem. But it's frustrating to me that Game Freak's still operating on the same mentality they had back in the year 2000. On the bright side, the fact that they're taking their time on the next mainline games, and are releasing Legends Arceus as a single product is all promising news. Maybe they'll eventually break this habit and start releasing finished products on day 1 like Nintendo's other studios. via /r/pokemon https://ift.tt/3uX7XsE