Pokemonis a franchise that famously prefers to stick to tradition, rather than drastically reinventing itself with every entry. That’s one reason thatPokemon Legends: Arceuslooks so compelling. Game Freak’s newPokemontitle takes a vastly different approach toPokemonmechanics than most games.Pokemon Legends: Arceusseems to give players much more freedom to explore its partially open world. Choices between Strong Style and Agile Style to modify attacks shake upPokemoncombat, while encounters with Noble Pokemon that put players in the middle of the action offer a thrilling new way to engage with formidable wild Pokemon.
However, some fans have been asking questions about whetherPokemon Legends: Arceusis too different from the core franchise. For instance,a recentPokemon Legends: Arceusleakclaimed that the game will omit some keyPokemonfeatures that fans have grown to depend on. According to the leaker, the game won’t have held items, Pokemon Abilities, or breeding.Pokemon Legends: Arceuslooks like a breath of fresh air for a lot of reasons, but dropping these features would be a major loss for fans. They all serve crucial functions that’ll be hard to replace, even in an innovative title like this one.
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The Utility of Held Items In Pokemon
If held items don’t appear inPokemon Legends: Arceus,then there’s a lot of Pokemon evolutions that’ll need reworking. There’s a long list of Pokemon,from Onix to Swirlix, that only evolve when traded while holding a specific item. If those items are inaccessible, thenPokemon Legends: Arceushas to come up with new ways to let fans evolve those Pokemon, which could make them lose a trait that made them unique. Dropping held items inPokemon Legends: Arceuscould be a sign thatPokemonis moving away from trade evolutions, and while that would be convenient, it’d also mean Game Freak has a lot of evolution reworks to do.
Held items aren’t just significant due to evolution, of course. They’re alsoa core part ofPokemonstrategy. Held items can do everything from buff a Pokemon’s moves, to provide healing over time, and competitive players pay close attention to each Pokemon’s equipment. Losing held items would mean losing a core component ofPokemonthat’s even harder to replace than evolution items. Even ifPokemon Legends: Arceusplayers have the benefit of Strong and Agile Styles, those functions don’t fill the gap that would be left by the absence of held items.
Abilities Make Pokemon Unique
The loss of Pokemon Abilities would be a big deal too, partially for the same reason as held items.Abilities act as variables inPokemoncombatthat really shake things up. Some have simple functions, like Oblivious preventing the niche status effect of infatuation, while others are game changing, like Thick Fat’s huge reduction of Ice-type and Fire-type damage. Without Abilities,Pokemonplayers have far less power to construct unique builds for their Pokemon and have to put much less thought into each Pokemon matchup, which would be a major loss forPokemon’s combat, which is already relatively simple.
What’s more, without Abilties, certain Pokemon would lose the functions that define them. For instance, Unova’s Zorua and Zoroark are most well known for the Ability Illusion, which lets them temporarily disguise themselves as another Pokemon. Without Illusion, there’s not much to set Zoroark apart mechanically, which is very relevant toPokemon Legends: ArceussinceZorua and Zoroark have Hisuian variantswho presumably have similar illusionary capabilities. If Pokemon like Zoroark don’t have Abilities inPokemon Legends: Arceus,then they’ll lack a defining characteristic that justified their creation in the first place.
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The Impact of Pokemon Breeding
On top of that, breeding may be missing fromPokemon Legends: Arceus, which would make players lose out on some very important functions. Breeding not only allows players to replicate valuable Pokemon and get baby evolutions of Pokemon that might be hard to find otherwise, but it can let players pass on Egg Moves to the baby Pokemon, which can result in powerful Pokemon that couldn’t be found in the wild.The loss of breeding inPokemonwould mean players lose a vital way to create unique Pokemon teams.
Historically, breeding has had value in the hunt for Shiny Pokemon too. Although the numbers have changed a lot over the years, as a general rule, it’s a little easier to hatch Shiny Pokemon from Eggs when players make use of the Masuda method, where players breed Pokemon from games with different languages. Although players will certainly still haveways to look for Shiny PokemoninPokemon Legends: Arceus,the loss of the Masuda method would be a major inconvenience for Pokemon fans who favor that technique for IVs and Egg Moves. Breeding is a mainstay mechanic ofPokemonby now, so it’d be a shame to seePokemon Legends: Arceusdrop it.
Pokemon Legends: Arceus' Pros and Cons
Game Freak hasn’t confirmed that these features will be missing fromPokemon Legends: Arceus,but if they are, then the game has a lot of work to do to make up for it. Abilities, held items, and breeding aren’t justsupplementary parts ofPokemonthat come and go regularly; they’re fundamental building blocks of the franchise that players make use of constantly. APokemongame without these distinctive features would need to offer a lot of new concepts that play similar roles or fill the niches in order to justify the absence of such basicPokemoncontent.
It’s at least good to know thatPokemonfans won’t have to wait long to see if thesePokemon Legends: Arceusleaks are true. The game’s release is right around the corner, meaning soon players will get to see for themselves just how drastically Game Freak has changed things.Pokemon Legends: Arceuswas always going to be different from the core franchise by a wide margin, and that’s a good thing, but it does mean it’ll have a harder time appealing to somePokemonplayersthan mostPokemonspin-offs. Whatever featuresPokemon Legends: Arceussacrifices, hopefully its new content adds up to a positive experience in the end.
