The Pokemon Company tackles ‘quantity over quality’ complaints
If there's one thing The Pokemon Company does well, it's keeping us invested in the long-running series. Like Activision does with Call of Duty, Pokemon games are churned out on an almost yearly basis and quickly soar to the top of the charts.
Much like its shooter series counterpart, there are accusations that Pokemon is opting for quantity over quality - insisting on hitting deadlines instead of prioritising the quality of a new and innovative release. We saw these critiques with Pokemon Legends: Arceus, and then, we saw it with Pokemon Scarlet & Violet.
The Pokemon Company responds to game complaints
Click to enlargeThese rumbles of discontent in the usually happy ranks of Pokefans haven't gone unnoticed by those up top. With us having had Arceus, Scarlet & Violet, and the release of Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl in a 12-month window, it's sometimes felt like we've been herded like Tauros into spending our money.
Speaking to ComicBook.com, The Pokemon Company COO Takato Utsunomiya admitted the team is having "more conversations" about how it handles releases. It comes after a slew of technical issues led to Nintendo apologising for Scarlet & Violet but The Pokemon Company largely dodged the issue.
"If you look at the past, the path we've taken up until now has been this constant release, always regularly releasing products on a fairly fixed kind of a cadence, you might say," said Utsonomiya. "Always having these products able to be introduced and new experiences for our customers, and that's how we've operated up until now."
He continued, "I think we're still operating in that way, but there's more and more conversations, as the development environments change, about how we can continue to do this, while making sure that we're ensuring really quality products are also being introduced."
Should The Pokemon Company slow down?
Click to enlargeSimilar to the CoDverse, it does feel like the Pokeverse is moving at a breakneck speed. Arceus remains an underrated title that feels like it never quite hit its potential. Hisui was one of the most ambitious regions in years, although it skipped out on multiplayer and we never got that mythical DLC we dreamed of.
It's true that the big draw is a new generation of Pokemon, and with Scarlet & Violet introducing our 1000th Pokemon, there were more complaints than usual that the designers were running out of ideas. We had fan favourites like Fuecoco and Lechonk, but for the franchise's first truly open-world outing, things were a bit sparse.
Still, most of us are looking ahead at the inevitable Gen X and a milestone for the series. Before that, we've got the Scarlet & Violet DLCs, but we also covered how The Pokemon Company is trying to hype The Indigo Disc over the imminent release of The Teal Mask. We know you like to plan ahead, but come on, give us a break.