Pokémon Scarlet & Violet Reviews
As good as it is bad, Pokemon Violet & Scarlet doesn't do anything lightly. For the first time in the series, we experience a pure freedom. Paldea is very huge, Pokemon are numerous and it has never been so exciting to complete your Pokédex. However, the technical aspects are a pure disaster. Instead of being a Nintendo Switch must-have, this 9G starts is just a hyper addictive okay game.
Review in French | Read full review
It’s astonishing how a game as clearly unpolished as this could be allowed onto the market, especially once you consider that it’s representing a media franchise that’s made approximately 92 billion dollars to date. (The easy answer is that this is yet another example of a major release being rushed out to meet an approaching holiday deadline, where quality greatly suffers in the name of convenience, but that’s a story for another time.) If players choose to squint their eyes and push on through—and, hopefully, don’t clip into the ground or encounter any game-breaking glitches that will force them to restart their save file—then that old Pokémon charm might still be an adequate reason to give Pokémon Violet a pass. But before the franchise can ever truly hope to redefine itself in the future, Game Freak desperately needs to iron out the issues that are currently holding Pokémon back by at least two console generations.
Ultimately, these games were the result of Game Freak and Nintendo taking a risk and giving the fans something they've been begging for over a long while. It tries to mix Legends: Arceus with the main series, and it half-succeeds. Some things brought innovative and fun changes, while we learned others were better off they way they were before. If Pokémon fans can look past the obvious flaws and limitations, there's so much to appreciate here.
Summing up the new Pokémon game always means triggering a conflict between heart and head.
Review in Italian | Read full review
The open world sparks a sense of adventure and the typical Poké collecting fever, but also has playful but hardly any exciting ideas.
Review in German | Read full review
One thing Game Freak does have working for it is that people want to play this game. People want open-world Pokémon. Game Freak may be struggling to get there, but it’s been really cool to be able to see it getting closer with each new generation.
Pokémon Scarlet & Violet are very worth it. This is a fantastic end to a great year on the Nintendo Switch, and I can't wait to see how Game Freak and The Pokémon Company take what worked here and expand on it in the future.
Review in Spanish | Read full review
It's a smaller step than many may have hoped for, especially considering what Pokémon Legends: Arceus did, but it's definitely one in the right direction.
Pokémon Scarlet & Violet is engrossing at its best but clunky at its worst, offering an uneven but ultimately exceptional experience on Switch.
Pokémon Scarlet and Violet's open-world pivot is exactly what the series needed, though poor tech holds back its true potential.
From visual shortcomings to a smattering of bugs, these games shouldn't be as good as they are. Whether I was on the road or at a family gathering over a holiday weekend, I couldn't put them down once I started playing thanks to Scarlet and Violet's charming storylines, incredible monster designs, sonically rich soundtrack and enthralling battles. I haven't had as much fun with a new Pokémon game in years, possibly even a decade, even if its launch sets a concerning precedent for the series going forward.
Pokémon Scarlet & Violet's high points are among the series's best, but its lows, spanning across both bugs and design choices, are too egregious to ignore.
In terms of gameplay and variety, Pokemon Scarlet/Violet is something this series has needed for years. I had lots of fun, despite some of its glaring technical issues.
Review in Polish | Read full review
Pokemon Scarlet and Violet are hardly perfect games, far from it, in fact. But when you look past the visual setbacks and glitches, you'll find an expansive experience that begs to be explored in full. It doesn't do everything right, but it further sets up a future that fans will be excited for once they refine it more.
Beneath all the jank and technical disaster, there's a Pokemon game that deserved better.
Pokémon Scarlet & Violet represents the power struggle between innovation and execution. There's so much promise in the idea of a fully integrated, cooperative Pokémon game, yet the final product I experienced with Pokémon Violet falls short of those aspirations. There's still a lovable structure found within the game, driven by a more immersive world design and a new generation of adorable mons. Though the polish is lacking, failing to completely realise the ideas put in place and falling short of expectations.
Whilst there's still stumbling missteps as Game Freak try to find their footing in the future of Pokémon, Scarlet and Violet is an endearing, and enjoyable attempt at a fundamentally different Pokémon experience. New ideas, some quality of life improvements, and some excellent new Pokémon designs make the trip to Paldea worthwhile.
Moving to an open-world concept is a brilliant step forward for the Pokémon series, but currently, this release lacks the Nintendo quality that we expect from their published titles.
Pokémon Scarlet is just a ton of fun. The gameplay is engaging, the battling is satisfying, and catching the 'Mons scattered throughout a vast open world is addicting. It's a shame the presentation doesn't hold up it's end of the bargain, BUT, if you can get past that like I did, I think Scarlet is a real gem.
Pokemon Scarlet and Violet is an imaginative reinvention of the iconic Pokemon adventure, with a heart wrenching story and a real sense of soul, which is let down by sloppy mechanics, half-fulfilled ideas and disappointingly common cut corners.