During Pokémon Day 2024, The Pokémon Company announced a brand new Legends game, Pokémon Legends: Z-A. As someone who loved Pokémon Legends: Arceus for subverting and redefining what a modern Pokémon game could be, I was pleasantly surprised and eager to think about how Arceus could be improved.
And then, the Mega Evolution symbol flashed onscreen, and I couldn’t help but let out a long sigh of disappointment.
I’ve long thought that Pokémon is in desperate need of a break, and I’m not alone in that sentiment. I first attributed to this the constant outpouring of content that led to the poor performance issues and underwhelming reception of Pokémon: Scarlet and Violet. Sure, the constant barrage of live-service games didn’t help, but I’ve tried to ignore those parts to focus on the core entries. But the more I thought about it, the more I thought Scarlet and Violet actually took some steps to address some of the problems I had for the past several generations. And those problems started to form from Gen VI with Pokémon X and Y. One of those problems was how gimmicky the gameplay of the series became, and all of that can be traced back to Mega Evolutions.
For those who are unaware, Mega Evolution was a mechanic introduced in Gen VI where certain Pokémon, not all of them, can have an extra evolution in battle. This evolution would require a specific item, known as a Mega Stone, and the Mega Evolution would cause notable changes for the Pokémon for the remainder of the fight. Some of them are obvious, like a visual redesign, but other changes would be more subtle, like respeccing certain stats and even type changes. It helped to make Pokémon from previous generations gain new importance, like Lopunny or Mawille, but its long-lasting effects only served to limit how to play the game.
If you were going to play any of the Gen VI Pokémon games in any serious competitive capacity back then, you needed a Mega Pokémon. Team compositions became incredibly limited as your team, in order to be viable, had to be centered around one of these Pokémon. It robbed the series of one of the things I loved most about it – choosing a team of your favorite Pokémon. Now, if you wanted to have even a chance against some higher-level opponents, you basically had to design your team around one of a set few Pokémon. I personally was happy that Houndoom, one of my favorite Pokémon, received a Mega Evolution, but others weren’t so lucky, making a lot of team compositions boring.
It also came across to me as a blatant attempt to try and make certain Pokémon more marketable and create new merchandise for them. Charizard and Mewtwo are the two best examples of this because they received not one but two different Mega Evolutions. No matter how much I thought about this decision over the years, I can’t think of any reason they would do this other than to make new toys for some of the franchises’ most popular creatures. Now that there are new versions of your favorite Pokémon, you can buy their brand-new figures and plushies to add to your collection! At least, that’s how it came across.
Related: 10 Pokémon Likely To Receive Mega Evolutions in Pokémon Legends: Z-A
And from there, future generations would have one gimmick that would dominate how the game would be played. Z-Moves were the hot new addition for Gen VII (complete with a physical toy), and Dynamaxing and Gigantamaxing would be Gen VIII’s obligatory inclusion. Did they add any meaningful change to how the games are played? Not really. Dynamaxing was a more limited version of Mega Evolution where not only could only select Pokémon completely transform, but it didn’t even last for the entire battle, and it could only happen in certain fights. Z-Moves were, at the very least, tolerable, if only because they offered up a one-time super-powered move that could change a match, but the limited usage and application made them forgettable.
Most of the marketing for these games put a lot of emphasis on these elements as more important issues fell by the wayside. The games were already starting to feel tired and repetitive, so these inclusions felt like they were putting a small band-aid over a gaping wound. Pokémon didn’t need flash-in-the-pan gameplay mechanics that would be abandoned with the next installment. It needed meaningful changes, like varying the core gameplay loop, offering alternative objectives for players to complete, and removing the linear progression that had become a ball and chain for the series. Those changes would eventually be implemented, but it should not have taken as long as they did.
These gimmicks would have been tolerable as well if they bothered to build on each other. If Gigantamaxing ended up being a new version of Mega Evolutions, then it would have been interesting to see how it could have addressed criticisms of Mega Evolutions. Mega Evolutions were present in Gen VII, but nothing was changed about them. They were just included without any real rhyme or reason. It gives off the impression that with each new gen, The Pokémon Company consistently throws the baby out with the bathwater and starts from scratch every time. The latest gimmick is Terastallization, but at the very least, it offers up an interesting wrinkle wherein a Pokémon’s type changes midbattle. That can have significant competitive advantages and presents a meaningful change where any Pokémon can potentially be viable in a competitive match. Granted, the same group of Pokémon will still be thrown out due to their superior stats, IVs, EVs, and team synergies, but that’s just the nature of competitive play and still presents potential. There wasn’t much potential with those prior limiting gimmicks.
Yet I just know that whenever Gen X gets announced, they’ll quickly abandon Terastallization for a new gimmick meant to sell more toys and barely change how the game is played. And for as nice as it is to see Mega Evolution make a return with Pokémon Legends: Z-A, I’m much more interested in seeing the Legends formula make a comeback. That was a meaningful change to how Pokémon was played that deserves to be refined and perfected. Mega Evolutions could have stayed forgotten in Pokémon‘s past, and no one would have batted an eye. The same goes for Z-Moves, Gigantamaxing, and Dynamaxing.
Pokémon Legends: Z-A will release in 2025.
