The Pokémon franchise has changed quite significantly since the days of Red and Green. While some changes have occurred more drastically and at a far greater pace, others have been implemented slowly over time, gradually tweaking the core formula to appeal more to a specific audience. These changes are often for the better, but, in the rare instance, they can be for the worst. In fact, there is one change made to Pokémon’s core formula that has robbed it of what made it such a great series in the first place.
Fortunately, there is the opportunity to rectify many of these issues in the upcoming Gen 10 Pokémon game. From fixing Pokémon’s broken battles to introducing more compelling villains, there is a lot that players want to see changed in the next mainline game. However, none of these come close to the biggest issue with the Pokémon games, something that has not just fundamentally changed how many people approach each new entry, but has also affected the one aspect of battles that still felt fresh.
Pokémon Has Lost What Once Made It Great
It No Longer Feels Like An Adventure
One of the core tenets of the Pokémon franchise – both the video games and the anime – is that it’s all about adventure. From the moment players set off from their hometown to the final battle against the Elite Four, every part of the journey should feel like a once-in-a-lifetime adventure. The series’ trademark approach to exploration through its diverse routes often facilitates this, as well as the slow progression of difficulty, and, most importantly, the steady stream of new Pokémon to meet and catch.
However, while the core Pokémon formula hasn’t changed much since the very first titles, the more recent entries – predominantly from X and Y to Scarlet and Violet – have ditched the idea of offering exclusively new Pokémon in order to bolster their rosters with every other Pokémon in existence. Scarlet and Violet, for example, added most of the Pokémon from previous generations, allowing players to encounter pretty much any Pokémon that had been created before that point throughout their adventure.
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Pokémon’s Gen 10 Team Should Complete The Trend Seen In Recent Generations
There is a noticeable pattern in Pokémon games regarding each new Generation’s Team, a trend that Gen 10 should follow to its logical conclusion.
This created a whole new dynamic, as, whereas in previous generations – which just so happen to be some of the best Pokémon games of all time – players would set off from the starting town and immediately encounter new Pokémon, from X and Y onward, there was a very good chance that players wouldn’t encounter a new Pokémon for upwards of an hour. This robbed the series of its focus on adventure, as it’s hard to feel like the latest Pokémon game was offering a new journey to embark upon when the player is surrounded by nothing but familiar Pokémon.
Pokémon Needs To Stop Including The Full Pokédex
It Makes Each Pokémon Feel The Same
If Gen 10 has any hope of being the best Pokémon generation yet, then it needs to reduce the Pokédex significantly, ensuring that it is made up of Pokémon exclusive to that region and not ones players have caught ad nauseam across the past nine mainline games. Not only will this see that feeling of adventure return, as people will have no idea what Pokémon they’ll encounter until they’ve caught them all, but it will also significantly improve the overall challenge of combat.
It’s hard to resist the urge to catch the same team per game, especially when players have grown comfortable with team layouts. This can make combat feel repetitive and lack any strategy as players are just using the same moves over and over again. Even if people resist the temptation to catch the same team per game, they’ll still be facing the same Pokémon that they’d mastered how to beat several generations ago. The benefit of having exclusively new Pokémon is that players are forced to learn new moves and strategies, which naturally increases the level of challenge.

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Pokémon Scarlet & Violet Needed A Real Villain, But There’s A Way For Gen 10 To Be Perfect Without One
The future core Generation 10 games of the Pokémon franchise could make a striking break with tradition and have no main villain character to fight.
Reducing the Pokédex size will also surely remove a significant burden on performance. Pokémon Scarlet and Violet’s performance suffered significantly thanks to the sheer amount of Pokémon it had to cram into its sparse open world. Gen 10 can avoid this problem entirely if it removes all the familiar Pokémon and replaces them with just new ones. Of course, it is great to celebrate Pokémon’s past, but there has to be a point when the series is ready to move on from its ever-burgeoning baggage and try something new.
Pokémon Should Be About The Future, Not The Past
It Is Too Stuck In Its Ways To Move On
From its continued inclusion of previous Gen Pokémon in modern games to its Legends spin-off series, which explores past regions in alternative time periods, it isn’t hard to see how Pokémon is clinging a little too much to the warm nostalgia of its past entries. That’s not to say that those games were bad or shouldn’t be, in some way, celebrated. In fact, Pokémon Scarlet and Violet’s DLC and many events that introduce old Pokémon are a great way to include them without tampering with the main experience.
However, it is time for Pokémon to stop celebrating the past and begin thinking about the future. Of course, each new entry does add new Pokémon, but it dilutes them and makes them feel significantly less important by mixing them in with old ones. Instead, Gen 10 should celebrate its new region and new collection of Pokémon by putting them front and center. Game Freak already has the perfect vehicle from which to deliver the nostalgia boost that fans desire so much: the Legends games.
However, it risks making them a little redundant if players can catch everything they offer in other games. The feeling of revisiting a region and catching its Pokémon feels significantly less special when players have already caught those Pokémon in the past two mainline games. It also goes without saying that completing a Pokédex, something that was at the forefront of the Legends Arceus experience, also feels redundant when people have caught 90% of them dozens of times before in multiple other games.
It feels like a no-brainer to remove the majority of past Pokémon in order to make room for newer ones. However, fans really want each game to include as many Pokémon as possible as if to make them all the definitive Pokémon experience. It isn’t hard to see that point of view, especially as the draw of having access to every Pokémon at once is a compelling one. However, for Pokémon to flourish in the future and stand a chance of retaining its relevancy, it needs to prioritize its future and not its past or risk becoming a relic.
Source: The Official Pokemon YouTube Channel/YouTube
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