Why Is Pokemon Legends: Z-A Only In Lumiose?

When you take out all of the unrealistic requests like ‘more expansions for 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:New Pokemon Snap’, ‘Gen 1 games on Switch’, and 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:the apparently foolish wisꦍh for Leꦗt’s Go Johto, a new Legends game was at the top of my list for what I wanted to see revealed at this week’s 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:Pokemon Presents. My wish was granted, but now I’m not quite sure what it even means to be a Legends game anymore.

Pokemon Legends: Arceus takes us to a feudal version of Sinnoh, known then as Hisui. We have a small arable settlement which acts as our hub with some trading posts and crafting stations, then a lot of open world wandering about. Throughout the game we unlock different biomes with str𝔉onger Pokemon, and discover new ways to traverse. It’s a solid if unspectacular blueprint for the future.

Why Was Pokemon Legends: Arceus So Special?

The Pokemon trainer approaching a Spheal in Pokemon Legends Arceus

The reason I vibed so much with Legends is because it 16♔8澳洲幸运5开奖网:built so successfully on the Wild Area of 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:Sword & Shield. Being able to encounter Pokemon in an open world environment like this, with weather changes and in-built variety, was the one area of Pokemon’s arrival on home console that felt like a true evolution. Legends: Arceus built on that concept by making exploration the name of the game (though not literalꦦly, that would be Pokemon Exploration).

It seems as though Pokemon has embraced this part of its future. Though 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:Pokemon Scarlet & Violet were beset by bugs and had a fairly dull and barren open world, it was nevertheless still an open world as the series abandoned linearity for something closer to freedom. But Legends: Z-A c𝕴onfuses things.

The game will not be set in the wider Kalos region (nor in whatever Hisui-like name it is given), but 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:entirely within the wal♚ls of Lumiose City. Pokemon’s Paris is due its flowers, an🍃d an entirely inner city Pokemon game sounds compelling. It’s new, and for a series ꦦso reliant on the ol’ it ain’t broke adage, new is always good.

How Does A Legends Game In A City Work?

Sylveon walking through a neon grid city of Lumiose in Pokemon Legends z-A

So what does this mean for Legends? When I was hoping for a new Legends game, that meant a new open world adventure where I c🔥rept through the grass to catch Pokemon, or throwing my own directly into battle to train them up while I skulked off in search of new discoveries. It meant a blank canvas to explore, something light on narrative and focused on the art of collecting and cataloguing. Does Legends: Z-A have 🐻any of this, and if not, in what sense is it a Legends game?

꧟Legends: Arceus is the only Legends game in existence, so in a sense it has no more right to define what a Legends game is than Z-A does. But the people asking for a new Legends game weren’t asking for a completely different sort of game that just happens to share the same title. They wanted Legends, again. How can Z-A deliver on this if it’s all in one city?

I don’t ask this to dismiss the notion as a possibility, but because I’m curious as to how you keep the idea of a Legends game intact while uprooting the open world. It’s unclear whether we’re in the past, present, or future in Z-A, and if it’s the past then Lumiose may be far less urban and therefore more suited to open world biomes - but t⛎his will only raise the question why confine it to a city at all if said city is not yet built?

It could even mean rebuilding the city as it once was after the Ultimate Weapon was fired (something we spent all of X & Y trying to stop), giving us 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:parts of Lumiose still standing.

I’m interested to seওe more from Z-A, to piece together a little bit more what sort of game it is, and whether the developers’ view of what a Legends game ‘is’ lines up with mine. I’m still glad my wish for a new Legends game was granted, but there’s a sneaking feeling I should have been careful what I wished for.