Leading up to its release it was almost like
you couldn’t go a single day without hearing some new reason on why Pokémon Sword and
Shield were going to be disappointing. The initial backlash it received after it
was revealed that were would be no national dex grew like a wildfire. I hadn’t really been into the series for
the last several years, I didn’t even finish Sun and Moon, but the controversy surrounding
the next entry made me morbidly curious in a weird way. So when it was released, I bought the game
to see if it was going to be as bad as people thought. However, as I played it, out of all the shortcomings
the game had, the one that oddly stood out to me the most was its story. It’s odd because I never cared about the
narrative in any Pokémon game, even the ones that people put in high praises like Black
and White. But with Sword and Shield, I couldn’t help
but be interested in the ideas and concepts presented in the game, and how baffling it
was to see them handled so poorly. I feel like it could have been one of the
best stories Pokémon ever told, unfortunately it ended up becoming one of the most poorly
written in the series. As I completed Sword and Shield, I couldn’t
help but think of the wasted potential the game had, and as I did, I began to think of
ways it should have been done instead. So, um… yeah that’s why I’m here… I feel that with just enough tweaking and
working with what the game already has, we can make it into something that could have
been great. I don’t claim to be a great storyteller
myself and I’ve certainly never published anything, but I at least know what I like
in a good story. I know what kind of things get me invested
and make me care about a fictional world. The idea here is not to try and change things
drastically, but to improve the ideas and concepts that are already present in the game. We’ll build upon and change them slightly
to improve the general writing, but the plot will still be the same and hit the same beats. Perhaps you felt that some of the ideas presented
in the game were silly, but I believe you can make any idea into a good story. Before we can go about what we can do to improve
it though, we have to go through it to know what it did well and what it didn’t do so
well, it’s strengths and weaknesses. You’ll find that a lot of small changes
to the game’s weaknesses can make the strengths really shine. If you feel like you already have a good idea
on what that is, then skip to this part of the video, but I encourage you to watch the
whole thing. The majority of the story is crammed into
the ending of the game and is incredibly convoluted and confusing to the point where you might
not remember important details. There are essentially two plotlines in the
game. The first one is the usual Pokémon storyline
you’re used to at this point: you, the player, set off on a journey to become the best trainer
in the region. Your rival and also best friend this time
around is named Hop and he has the same goal as you. The champion of the region is Hop’s brother
Leon, who’s introduced very early in the game. He endorses the player and Hop to take part
of the Gym Challenge… yeah, we’ve been through this multiple times before, we don’t
need to go over it in detail. It’s done well in this entry in the series
and is generally effective for a video game to motivate the player to play the game at
least in the beginning. There are important characters you meet during
the gym challenge that are worth discussing, but we’ll get to them when they actually
show up in the game. No, the plotline that this video will mainly
focus on is the B-plot, which is about the history of Galar and an event called The Darkest
Day. The reason I’ll be going into this storyline
more thoroughly is because while the A-plot is decent, the storyline about the Darkest
Day is… well, trash. The concepts I mentioned at the beginning
of the video come primarily from this plotline, but we’ll still be discussing the A-plot
when it’s important or to move along to the next point. There are a few things to know about the Darkest
Day before we get started: In Galar, there’s a phenomenon known as dynamaxing that makes
Pokémon grow to gigantic sizes. This is possible thanks to the energy that
emits from items called Wishing Stars. Magnolia, the professor of the region, sends
her granddaughter Sonia off to find out more about dynamixing and the Darkest Day. The last important thing to note is that the
player and Hop briefly encounter one of the legendary Pokémon at the beginning of the
game. After getting your endorsement from Leon,
you travel to Motostoke to register for the gym challenge and then check into a hotel
to prepare for the opening ceremony the next day. At the hotel, you see Sonia and get your first
taste of the history of Galar, which was mentioned before as one of the main storylines in the
game. This is the first time you hear about the
Darkest Day, which is an event in Galar’s history about a black storm that covered the
sky a long time ago and how the region was assaulted by gigantic Pokémon. She also mentions the hero of Galar who stopped
it, which is represented by the statue at the hotel. We are also introduced to Team Yell and then
Marnie at the hotel. Marnie is another one of the gym challengers
wanting to become champion, and Team Yell is basically her rabid fanbase. And while Team Yell is honestly just filler
to extend the game’s length, Marnie is a cute and endearing character that most people
end up having an attachment to. Something you’ll come to find out about
Marnie throughout the game is that she… isn’t a particularly deep character. Now, before going any further with this, let
me just say that I don’t think having a character who’s just cute and endearing
is a bad thing. Not every single character needs to be super
deep or have a ton of backstory, and with how popular Marnie is, it seems like she fits
her role fine. Having a personality can be good enough as
it is. With that said though, besides being an obstacle
to the main character, she doesn’t really serve a purpose to the story; Like, at all. When it comes to stuff like the Darkest Day,
the Legendary Hero, or the history of Galar in general, she is not involved in any way. She is either not in these scenes at all or
is unimportant while in them. Which is a shame because I’d love to see
her reaction to some of the things that happen during the course of the game, but we don’t
get any of that. She’s like Hop, she wants to become champion,
but that’s pretty much it. She’s popular because she’s a loveable
character with positive traits, but she never really goes through anything. She doesn’t grow or learn during the course
of the game, she’s kind of just there to battle you and to give you another rival to
fight during the story. Her only real purpose story-wise is to highlight
how cool her brother Piers is, showing how caring he is of Marnie by forming Team Yell
himself to cheer her on during the gym challenge. I don’t want to get too ahead of myself
though… but at the end of the game when you finally defeat Marnie at the Champion
Cup, she doesn’t really give you a reaction besides her usual animation when losing a
regular battle throughout the game. She never really shows any passion for wanting
to become champion and it shows when she finally loses. “OK, so I lost… But I got to see a lot of good points about
you and your Pokémon!” Compare that to Hop’s losing animation in
the semi-finals, he’s devastated! After staying at the hotel, everyone goes
to the opening ceremony where Chairman Rose, who all we know at this point is just a public
figure and has a design that screams “I’m the villain of the game,” introduces the
gym leaders and the challengers and, uh… that’s it… I was kind of expecting a lot more from the
opening ceremony but it kind of just starts and then abruptly ends. After the ceremony the player character is
introduced to Rose and has some interaction with him. Unfortunately, the interaction isn’t very
meaningful as we don’t learn anything about Rose, and he doesn’t say anything we don’t
already know or of substance. He mentions Dynamaxing and how the gym challenge
will be a blast before leaving for important business. But don’t worry I’m sure we’ll get a
lot more opportunities to see him and the buildup he has for being the main antagonist! “I’m so excited, I bet he has a GREAT
arc!” *Stands in silence for a few seconds…*
As you make your way to Turffield to fight the first gym leader, you meet up with Sonia
in route 3, who tells you about how Rose is responsible for Galar’s energy supply, which
is really important for how short and unimportant this scene feels, and then you go through
Galar Mines. Near the end of the mines, you meet the last
of the main rival characters, Bede. He has a cocky and confident personally and
thinks he’s better than the rest of the gym challengers because he was chosen by Chairman
Rose himself, who Bede says is more important than the champion. The chairman also told Bede to look for Wishing
Stars to give to him, and Bede takes this responsibility very seriously. He’s a self-important jerk and a great rival
character. The reason why people still remember Blue
from Red/Blue/Yellow so fondly, besides nostalgia, is because he was one of the main driving
forces to push the player along and give them motivation to keep playing. We don’t like him and want to beat him to
the ground, one of the so-called “characters you love to hate.” Silver did this as well, but to a lesser extent,
as he was kind of just there to be mean and only showed up every once in a while, not
really competing against the player. In fact, the series hasn’t really seen a
rival character that fulfills that role quite like Blue did since the first generation. Until Bede that is! I guess you could make that argument for Gladion
from Sun and Moon, but he seemed more of an entitled brat to me. But, again, I didn’t finish Sun and Moon
so I can’t really speak for him, maybe he becomes a great rival later on. Bede actually goes through development in
this game. He starts off as an arrogant jerk and throughout
the course of game shows hints of becoming more humble, or ‘mellows out’ as his league
card puts it, especially after Rose disqualifies him from the gym challenge and is taken in
by Opal. He still has a ways to go by the end of the
game, but he goes from conceited to someone who has an air of confidence, like the other
gym leaders. Speaking of which, his scene with Opal is
also great. The way she decides to choose him to replace
her for being the fairy gym leader is humorous. It’s a simple arc, but it works. Unfortunately, Bede isn’t without his own
problems. Just like with Marnie, he isn’t involved
at all in the Darkest Day plot, which is a lot more odd for Bede considering his relationship
with the chairman. I never got the vibe that Rose was like an
adoptive father to Bede like some people suggest, but the fact that he’s gathering Wishing
Stars for Rose, which is an important plot point later on, and yet has no role at all
in the B-plot seems out of place. It also kind of sucks that after the Opal
scene, he doesn’t have much to do with the story anymore, as he disappears until near
the end of the game. It would have been great if we saw more of
him during the game before the moment with Opal happens. I do think his character arc is effective,
but it would have been better if we saw more of this change with our own eyes instead of
seeing the results of it at the end of the game. Despite these things, when it comes to the
Gym Challenger storyline, Bede is a great addition. He isn’t the deepest character Pokémon
has had, but he fulfills his role much better than Hop or Marnie does. He’s definitely a highlight of the game. So you arrive at Turffield and meet up with
Sonia so you can talk about the lore. “A long time ago, a great black storm covered
the Galar region.” Uh… “Giant Pokémon ran rampant… But what was that black storm they called
‘the Darkest Day?’” Didn’t we go over this exact thing back
at the hotel? She’s definitely already said this. This time, it specifically emphasizes dynamaxing
and connects that with what she said about “gigantic Pokémon” back at the hotel,
but that’s all the new information we get. Maybe it’s because I played the game twice,
but I kinda figured that we already made that connection. After you talk with Sonia, you fight Milo
and get the grass badge and head to Hulbury, where you fight Nessa. There’s a short cutscene here with Rose
and his secretary Oleana, and here you’ll start to notice a pattern with the cutscenes. After fighting Nessa, Rose wants to talk to
you in the café, but just like the previous scene with Sonia, you realize that you already
know all the information that’s presented in this scene. Wishing Stars, Dynamaxing, we’ve heard all
of this before. And this isn’t the only scene that does
this! A lot of the cutscenes about the Darkest Day
usually covers like 60 to 80% of things you already know and then gives you a tidbit or
two of new information before you’re back on your adventure, making the cutscenes feel
mostly useless and padded. The information itself isn’t expanded upon,
it’s usually just a sentence or two. A lot of these scenes don’t further anything
else either. So, you eventually have to ask yourself: what
do these scenes with the chairman or Sonia do for their character or the Darkest Day
storyline? I can’t think of a reason for this particular
scene at all. You could argue that it’s more of an introduction
to Rose, but this scene lasts for maybe a minute! The conversation didn’t really do much of
anything except for telling Sonia about how to find out more about the history of Galar
or something. Like, when a cutscene is happening, you expect
something important to happen, right? Especially when the game stops you over and
over again in succession. But a lot of these scenes just amount to nothing. This isn’t exclusive to the Darkest Day
storyline either, the scenes that revolve around the gym challenge also don’t amount
to much. So many of these cutscenes amount to having
some chit chat with a certain character, them asking for a battle, and then after the battle,
something along the lines of, “I’ll improve and beat you next time,” is said. There are exceptions to this obviously; the
majority of Bede’s scenes are great, and Hop shows lot of potential with his character
in some of his scenes, like when he loses to Bede, but most of the cutscenes honestly
just feel like a waste of time. Because of this, I will only be covering the
new information we learn so I don’t repeat myself. But guess what!? Because I won’t be repeating myself, I’m
basically going to skip to the end of the game! We’ve already talked about important scenes
with Marnie and Bede, and we’ll get to Hop, but the game’s story is structured in such
a way that it honestly feels like nothing is happening. During the scenes from Hammerlocke, Stow-On-Side,
and Circhester, over the course of 4 and a half hours, Sonia theorizes that the legendary
hero is actually two Pokémon instead of human and that’s pretty much it. Keep in mind that in my playthrough of the
game for this video, that I avoided catching any Pokémon and didn’t fight Pokémon Trainers
when I could, so for anyone playing the game for the first time, it could easily be double
that length depending on how many Pokémon they want to catch and battle with the trainers
you fight along the way. The game starts feeling like you’re just
going from town to town and getting gym badges with the actual story of the game being very
lightly sprinkled throughout. We have routes and other similar places in
between the story but they mostly serve and just catching and battling Pokémon, which
is fine, it’s giving us time to play the actual game, but we need some kind of motivation
to keep going. I mean, granted, most Pokémon games have
been this way in the past, but that doesn’t make it okay! And even if you do compare it to previous
games, it seems like there is a lot less going on in this game anyway. Pokémon is also 25 years old and has done
good stories before. We have an entire B-plot to work with, let’s
use it! But hey, maybe I missed something, so let
me look up a summary of the game real quick. “Professor Magnolia's granddaughter and
assistant Sonia tells them about Galar's history and a mysterious event known as the Darkest
Day. The player ends up uncovering pieces of the
Darkest Day's history during their journey, much to Sonia's pleasure. Eventually, the player manages to successfully
collect the eight Badges and travels to Wyndon, where the Champion Cup is held!?” What!? I’m freakin’ serious, the story has such
little significance during the course of the game that Bulbapedia summarizes 15-20 hours
into one sentence. This entire summary does not mention Bede,
Marnie, Piers, none of that. The story is so unimportant during the majority
of the game that it doesn’t need to be summarized at all! But then after this point, when the game only
has a few hours left, suddenly it deserves 2 paragraphs. I wasn’t missing anything at all, it’s
just that… nothing happens! You really do just go from town to town and
collect gym badges with very little important scenes happening to build up the story. Well, okay, not nothing happens, there are
a few things to go over. Sure, the Darkest Day storyline barely progresses
but there are a few important things that happen with the characters. Even though the cutscenes are very sporadic,
Hop shows up an annoying amount of times to battle you, giving him more screen time than
any of the other characters. The only reason I haven’t talked about him
in detail yet is because he’s arguably the most important rival you have in the game,
so let’s talk about him! Okay, so like, unpopular opinion time, Hop
is a decent character, he’s just not presented very well and often comes off as annoying
because of how often he halts the progression of the game, but I don’t think that makes
him a bad character. In fact, he probably goes through more growth
and has more depth than Bede does. I like the arc he goes through at least: trying
his hardest to be the champion and never being able to achieve it despite the hard work he
put into it. If anything, he’s more like us than our
insert character over here. We played the actual game and it was a cakewalk,
from what we see of Hop it looks like he goes through a lot more hardship and puts in more
effort than we do. It’s depressing to think about actually. How many of us are actually going to get our
way throughout life? Will we be able to get the careers we want? Will we ever be the best at anything? Are we even good at the things we do? Honestly, even with how annoying he can be,
he’s a more relatable character than anyone else in the game. Throughout the story you can see him switching
up Pokémon and trying out different strategies when you’re battling him. It would have been better if this were more
subtle, since he does outright say this in the game, but it’s a nice touch. He really looks up to his brother and wants
to be just like him, which isn’t that uncommon for a ten-year-old. These characters are ten, right? He even goes through a bit of a depressive
episode when he loses his battle with Bede and is told by him that he’s dragging his
brother’s name down. This is cool, even if it would have been cooler
if he didn’t get over it so quickly. He goes through a lot in order to become champion
only to realize in the post-game that he likes helping Pokémon, which unfortunately comes
out of nowhere. These things are present with Hop’s character,
but it isn’t presented or conveyed very well and can often be overshadowed by how
annoying he can be at times. He has potential to be a great character and
we can easily work with what the game gives us when it’s comes time to talk about what
we can do to improve his character. Alright, with Hop out of the way, let’s
go over the few other important things that happen during the game. The scenes we’ve talked about with Bede
happen, where he’s disqualified and then later taken in by Opal to fill in her role
as the fairy-type gym leader. We meet Marnie’s older brother Piers, who’s
also gym leader. We learn that he set up Team Yell to cheer
Marnie on in the gym challenge and he’s actually pretty cool. Chairman Rose also has some buildup to being
the villain, but it’s mentioned in like one or two lines before being easily forgotten
instead of basing a whole scene off of it so it stays in the players mind. There are a few scenes that almost hint that
they were supposed to have greater significance, but then just tells the player to keep going
with the gym challenge. Like the scene where there’s a large explosion
at Hammerlocke, instead of having the player investigate it, Leon says he’ll handle it
and that you shouldn’t worry about it. Especially since after this scene is just
the next gym leader, literally 10 minutes after fighting Piers. Alright, that’s basically everything. Now, you might be thinking, “since we’re
practically at the end of the game, we don’t have a lot more to go over, right?” Not quite. Game Freak, for some strange reason, sprinkled
the Darkest Day storyline very lightly throughout the game… and then just crammed every single
idea they had at the very end. Even with not much happening during the course
of the game, the last hour has so many concepts that summarizing it is surprisingly difficult. So, since we’ve already mentioned all the
important parts of the gym challenger storyline, let’s just skip aaallllll the way to the
Champion Cup. After defeating Marnie and Hop, the first
section of the Champion Cup is done, and Leon invites you to dinner. They wait for a few hours and Leon is still
nowhere to be found, which, I’d like to mention, is very in character for him. The running joke for Leon is that he’s terrible
with directions and always gets lost! But anyway, Piers shows up to tell us he’s
at Rose Tower and that he’ll be late. They sense that something is amiss and decide
it’s a good idea to go to Rose Tower to get Leon. Piers suggest he bring Team Yell along to
have some fun, almost like they’re going off to some grand battle. The characters are treating this situation
almost like Leon was kidnapped or something, they’re really overreacting right now. Hop: “Let’s go make a ruckus!” Like… why though? What suddenly made this a situation where
you need to go to Rose Tower yourselves to get Leon? And just for dinner too? Is there any indication that Leon being late
to dinner will make it so that Finals will be delayed? As they head out the restaurant, Oleana stops
the cast almost as if she’s suddenly a grand villain stopping the heroes in their tracks
to save Leon. But like… she’s being completely reasonable. “He’s in an important meeting that I can’t
let you interfere with.” In this situation I feel like an important
meeting with the chairman of all people would justify him being late for dinner, or if their
fears are really to be taken seriously, delaying the finals if needed. There also has been no indication at all throughout
the game that Rose is some kind of antagonist with an evil plan, certainly not to the characters
at least. Oleana even says that only authorized personnel
are allowed in Rose Tower. They’re literally going to break the law
so they can have dinner and/or not delay the tournament. Like, “Oh, really now, an important meeting? I see, if it’s so important, I suppose we’ll
have to wait.” This would be the appropriate response to
this situation. But then Oleana just gives them a reason to
go anyway. “I gave this guy a key because chairman
likes games, so see if you can get it lol.” Not to get too ahead of myself, but if Rose
is really actually serious about saving the future, he wouldn’t let anyone get in his
way, like Oleana says. “Don’t come and disturb Rose, but also
see if you can get the key to rose tower from this guy so you can go anyway.” Long story short, you corner the guy, he mixes
himself with the other guards because their models are all the same, and Piers does a
live concert to have fans stampede over the guards to where he’s at, which gives them
the chance to bypass them to Rose Tower. Marnie: “He’s got the champion holed up
in there. I wonder what he’s plotting.” I’d like to remind you that there have been
no signs whatsoever that Rose has any inclination of doing anything bad at this point! You reach the top and fight Oleana, who gets
in your way, saying that she won’t allow you to disturb Rose. She suddenly goes insane and says she’s
going to defeat you so Leon has no one to battle and will thus have no other choice
but to help Rose, as if they couldn’t just go to the Pokémon center right afterwards. The battle itself has a theme of a bunch of
feminine looking Pokémon and then garbage, implying that her character has always been
this way. And then after the battle, Oleana says that
all the Wishing Stars have been collected so it doesn’t matter if they interrupt Rose’s
discussion with Leon. Why—why did we fight you then? Why did you get in our way in the first place? You’ve literally been saying for the past
15 minutes that you will not let Rose be disturbed! “Just kidding! We have all the wishing stars anyway! You guys should have seen the look on your
faces!” We then see the infamous scene with Rose and
Leon. Rose saying that they need to act now to avoid
an energy crisis in 1000 years and Leon being surprisingly logical about the situation and
saying that they have plenty of time to avert it since it’s in 1000 years. With what little we’ve seen of Rose up until
this point, it feels very out of character for him to act this way. The first few times we see him outside the
opening cutscene, he looks and acts like some conceited famous person. The scenes that come after don’t really
give off that vibe at all, instead being levelheaded like with his scene with Bede at the ancient
wall. We had a lot of dialogue telling us about
the Darkest Day but Rose himself barely mentions it. This all seems to be coming out of nowhere. Rose is making such a big deal out of this
and is honestly being completely irrational about it. It didn’t make me feel that Rose was being
drastic, it just felt like the whole thing is badly written. Even with Leon being the sane one out of the
two, Rose has such little build up for believing this that it comes off as unsatisfying, especially
when he just sends everything into disarray by bringing back the Darkest Day the next
day just before the championship battle. Also that’s, um, what happens next. In the finals you fight and defeat Bede, who
crashed the party, and a few of the previous gym leaders. Just before the fight with the Champion, Rose
interrupts the show and tells everyone that he’s bringing the Darkest Day right now
to save Galar’s future. He also says he can’t control the energy
and that’s he’s in a pickle, and then blames Leon for not listening to him. And then, literally, right after the announcement,
Hop and the player character go to the forest from the beginning of the game because who
knows why, Hop says it might be a good idea for some reason, I forget. I guess he remembers what Sonia has said about
the Darkest Day and thinks they might find the Sword and Shield Pokémon there, since
they stopped the Darkest Day last time... They take the rusted sword and shield from
the forest and then immediately head for Rose. There isn’t any tension to this part of
the game when there’s probably supposed to be. “It’s a real shame the way things have
turned out.” I have a feeling that the post-game was actually
supposed to be in this part, but the team thought to move it to after the game so they
could have some post-game stuff, or at least that’s what I think. You run into Oleana and she asks you to save
Rose. She says that her Pokémon have been dynamaxed
at the Hammerlocke stadium, and if anymore Pokémon in there dynamax the stadium might
collapse into the underground plant where Rose is. She says that If we don’t do something now
that all Pokémon in the region will Dynamax. She then mentions the name Eternatus, who
is, apparently, very important to the plot of the game even though it’s first time
we hear about it. Hop: “What is all of this! We have to help Lee!” I mean… I agree. Rose at this point isn’t important anymore. He’s the one that set this all off but battling
him now would be worthless to stop it. Hop is sitting there in defeat from Rose like
he can’t do anything anymore. He needs to get the crap out of there and
help Leon fight Eternatus! And with all the information the game is dumping
on us all at once, it’s honestly difficult to understand what’s actually going on. Why is Rose bringing back the Darkest Day
now going to solve the energy crisis in 1000 years? I played the game twice and then rewatched
all the cutscenes and I’m still having a hard time understanding his motives and his
line of thinking. Rose says that energy will cease to exist
in 1000 years and so they must act as quickly as possible, but why is bringing the Darkest
Day a solution to that? I guess releasing Eternatus will just give
the region all the energy it needs, if I’m understanding it correctly. If this is the case though, then we have learned
NOTHING about this until this point. Eternatus was never mentioned in any of the
cutscenes regarding the Darkest Day at all, how are we supposed to draw any sort of conclusion
with the information we have? Even with Oleana telling you that Eternatus
gives off energy to dynamax, it is one line. Unless you hit the audience with an explanation
or demonstration that will stick out in their minds, it is SO easy to forget. I eventually had to check Bulbapedia again
to make sure I was getting everything right and I swear their article about the Darkest
Day has information that is nowhere to be found in the actual game! I couldn’t find anything about its exact
date (3000 years ago) or whether or not Eternatus was involved in it. There is barely a mention of Eternatus being
the one that produced Wishing Stars to begin with. Not only did I play the game twice and rewatch
all the cutscenes, but I copied down every line of dialogue from the scenes that talk
about the Darkest Day, I swear this information isn’t in the game. I guess the game just wanted us to make the
connections ourselves? I suppose we’ll just go with what Bulbapedia
says. Eternatus’ very existence was never mentioned
before this point in the story. All we were told about the Darkest Day is
that a black storm covered the sky, dynamaxed Pokémon almost destroying the region, and
the legendary hero with a sword and shield who stopped it, I am not kidding. I mean, obviously the Darkest Day had something
to do with energy since dynamaxing is mentioned almost every time it’s brought up, but the
very first time Eternatus is mentioned in any way, shape, or form, including by name
or not, is Oleana just as your about to go down to fight Rose. It is not hinted towards at all. And why are we fighting Rose to begin with? The music makes it seem like this is the battle
that will decide everything, but everything already been decided! Rose woke up Eternatus and now has the energy
he needs to save Galar’s future energy crisis! He even says so right before you fight him,
there is nothing to stop now, he has woken up Eternatus! In order to stop dynamaxed Pokémon from rampaging
all throughout Galar, we need to stop Eternatus right now! Rose is just sitting around, not doing anything,
he is unimportant! Stopping Eternatus now will save potentially
hundreds of lives, I think that’s a better trade off than Rose potentially getting away. Was his purpose to slow us down getting to
Eternatus? Even if it is, Rose says right after the fight
that it doesn’t even matter because Leon has probably already caught Eternatus by now! So not only do we not have a motive to fight
Rose but now he doesn’t have a reason to fight us either if he actually believes this! He woke up Eternatus, but couldn’t control
it, and so Leon comes in to fight Eternatus himself, which Rose is apparently okay with
basing off what he says after you fight him. He even says that Leon came in for Rose to
save him “like a princess from a dragon” by fighting Eternatus…. WHAT!? Why are we here? Why are we challenging him to a fight? Why is he challenging us to a fight if Leon
is supposedly already fixing the problem!? Rose apparently tells Leon to help control
Eternatus by catching it, but when we come along, suddenly we can’t get in his way
and stop his plans, even though Leon already is, by Rose’s request! *Sigh*… I just don’t understand Rose’s logic and
his line of thinking. This part of the game is so terribly written
that it’s hard to keep up with everything that’s going on. Raihan “I can’t follow how all of this
is exactly supposed to work.” Okay, so, after you fight Rose, you immediately
go up to Leon and see that he’s struggling with Eternatus, and its reveal is so disappointing
that it’s hard to fathom. *Clip of Eternatus being shown for the first
time with “actual game audio” caption on screen*. Eternatus is way too cool looking for this
reveal to be so underwhelming. I mean, granted, because it didn’t have
any build up to begin with it wasn’t going to leave that much of an impact anyway, but
like, Leon and Eternatus are just standing there looking at each other. You see this massive cool looking Pokémon
and there’s no dramatic build up or intense music or anything. It just like… Here he is… yep… The cutscene where Leon throws a pokeball
plays and THEN the dramatic music kicks in. The scene should have started right here and
then included some dialogue before Leon threw his pokeball. The actual fight with Eternatus doesn’t
really amount to much. It looks pretty cool for sure but things kind
of just happen. Hop thinks holding up the sword and shield
will work somehow and then it does when the dog Pokémon show up. It’s then just one big raid battle with
Hop and the dogs. So you catch Eternatus, the dogs howl and
jump into the sky and… Th-three days later? We just did some huge accomplishment, why
are we suddenly at three days later. Yeah, so as it turns out, immediately after
the Eternatus fight, the very next scene jumps forward a few days, just before the championship
battle. There is no fanfare at all for beating Eternatus. No one says how amazing the player is, no
one thanks him, nothing! The next scene plays, you learn that Rose
turned himself in, Hop tells us exactly what happened literally right after we just accomplished
it, and then you’re off to fight Leon in the final battle. Holy crap dude, give the player some kind
of reward for doing this! In the span of 35 minutes, from the time Rose
interrupts your fight to catching Eternatus, you fight what seems to be the two most important
battles in the game back to back with no fanfare at all, and now the game is telling us it’s
time to fight Leon literally actually immediately after all of this happens. There’s such little pay off for anything
you just did that it ultimately feels like you wasted your time. We’re playing a video game, let us feel
some sense of accomplishment for what we did. And to top it all off, Leon says: “They
know you’re the one who caught Eternatus and saved the future of the Galar region.” Wait… so catching Eternatus does save the
future of Galar? As in a thousand years from now? So like… Rose gets no credit for this? The player wouldn’t have saved the future
of the Galar region if Rose didn’t summon Eternatus. Unless they’re not talking about 1000 years
in the future and talking about just saving everyone’s life. I don’t know man Rose seems like he accomplished
what he set out to do. Turning himself in just makes him seem like
he regretted what he did. It would probably be better if he was on the
run or something. There’s also a post-game, but it’s just
some stupid BS happening with some weird dudes with annoying hair and I kind of just want
to forget about them. They make Pokémon dynamax and you go and
stop them and that’s pretty much it. 90% of the game’s story is crammed into
the last hour, and it’s a mess. It’s confusing trying to follow along with
it coherently, not a lot of things are explained well and reasons and motivations for some
of the characters actions later on are really bizarre. Not a lot of things add up and it’s hard
to connect one thing with another. Nothing that happens in the narrative has
any lasting impact and because everything is shoved into the ending, the plot points
and concepts did not have proper buildup. The pacing of the game is all over the place
with the characters constantly stopping you, repeating information you already know, and
having very little progression or new information about the story at all from the 3rd gym onward. But we did pick up on a few highlights and
strengths of the game’s narrative. The Gym Challenge story line, even with how
simple it is, is effective for a video game, which is why Game Freak has never changed
it at all (Except for Sun and Moon). The cast of characters have a lot of potential
and there are some that are actually great. Hop, even with how annoying he can be, has
depth to uncover and actually goes through growth throughout the story. Marnie, despite not having much depth, is
a fun and loveable character with an endearing personality. Bede is the best rival character Pokémon
has had in a long time. The gym leaders are memorable and pretty likable
even with them only have one or two overblown character traits. We need to keep these things in mind as we
go onto the next section of the video. There is a lot that needs to be done when
it comes to the story, but there’s also a lot that the game gives us to work with. Some ideas could be seen as silly or bad,
like Rose’s motivations and plans to save the future in 1000 years, but these are ideas
we can work with. I think you can make any idea into a good
story, as I said at the beginning of the video; it just has to be presented well. So, with the summary and critique of the story
out of the way, let’s go about what the game could have done differently and what
changes to the story we can make to have it truly shine without changing any of its core
concepts. If there is one thing that needs improving
in Pokémon Sword and Shield’s story, it’s buildup. A lot of these scenes at the end of the game
could actually be impactful if we hint towards them throughout. Doing a lot of small changes over the course
of the game can make a big difference, as we can spread out the ideas crammed into the
ending of the game throughout its entirety. As we do that, we can also change and emphasize
certain characters so they are more important and revolve around the story, as well as making
the characters who are already important to the story have more significance. We are doing all of this so these ideas and
concepts can have the lasting impact they deserve. The basic narrative for the gym challenger
storyline is fine. The only way I can think to improve it is
to talk about the characters, so let’s start there. We don’t really need to go over the player
character, Pokemon has always left the protagonist a blank slate so that we can insert ourselves
into the game. Perhaps we could do a few things to them,
but it wouldn’t have that much of an impact in the story, so let’s keep them as they
are. With that out of the way, let’s go over
the other characters: Marnie, Bede, and Hop… and by that, I mean mainly Hop. So, what do we know about Hop? Right off the bat, we know that he’s a good
friend that has a positive attitude. He looks up to his older brother a lot and
wants to become champion just like him. He’s a hard worker, as we can see him throughout
the game switching up his Pokémon to try different things out. He stays this way throughout the game, only
going through a few things that could be considered development. The two main examples being the following:
one, after he’s beaten by Bede, he goes through a rough patch and beats himself up
for not being good enough and not wanting to disgrace his brother’s reputation. He overcomes this pretty easily though; it
seems like it would bug him for a while but he suddenly gets over it. Two, in the post-game, he says he realizes
that he wants to help Pokémon rather than battle with them. Let’s keep these core concepts and build
upon them. Leon, when you first meet him, mentions that
Hop is his number one fan. Let’s take this and make it more apparent
that Hop really looks up to his brother and wants to follow in his footsteps, but slowly
realizes through his journey that even though he looks up to his brother, being the champion
isn’t necessarily what he wants. There are a few moments in the game that we
can use to hint more towards this. There’s a part where Team Yell won’t let
gym challengers through because there’s a snake Pokémon trying to sleep or something. We can use this scene to our advantage. After the Team Yell battle Hop laments from
Bede’s comment that he’s dragging Leon’s good name down, we can make it so that after
this scene Hop checks to see if snake Pokémon is doing okay and asks it if it needs any
help or a possible trip to the Pokémon center. We would need scenes like this spread out
sporadically throughout the game to have the audience get the impression that Hop is really
fond of Pokémon and is more concerned about helping them out rather than battling with
them. We also need to hint that Hop is only following
in Leon’s footsteps because he looks up to him rather than actually wanting to become
champion. This is a better outcome then what we get
in the post-game where Hop wanting to help Pokémon comes too quickly with very little
buildup. We’ll make Hop’s journey a soul-searching
one where his real purpose, unbeknownst to him, is finding out what he truly loves to
do. Then finally during the semi-finals when you
defeat him, it hits him that this isn’t his true passion. He can still be crushed upon defeat because
of how hard he worked to get there (because this animation of Hop being defeated is great). So when the final scene with Hop happens in
post-game, you don’t really need to change much since the buildup was enough for this
scene to have an impact. Okay, next up: Marnie, as fine as she is by
herself already, could benefit from having more scenes where we get to know her better. Her league card details some things about
her life that makes her more endearing. How about, instead of learning these things
about her in this roundabout way that some players might not even read, we learn these
things about her during the actual game. Her card implies that she was a bit antisocial
and didn’t really have a positive attitude but becomes “more cheerful as she played
with the Pokémon she received from her brother.” “Piers caught Morpeko and gave it to her
when she was five. She still finds herself at the mercy of Morpeko's
mood swings even now.” Her relationships with both her brother and
Morpeko can add more to her character, and we get to know more about her in the process. Plus, hinting towards a character before they’re
actually shown is always a good thing. The last thing I’d change is to have her
actually visibly upset when you defeat her at the champion cup. Give her a unique animation like they did
with Hop, have her actually show some emotion since we don’t really see any from her in
the game, and suddenly you have a very impactful moment. Give us more of a reason to love her. As for Bede, he’s almost perfect. We’re going to have Bede appear more often
by moving the scenes where he’s disqualified from the gym challenge and his scene with
Opal to later in the game. We battle Bede more often, he stays a jerk
for longer, and instead of him disappearing from the 5th gym onward, we’ll have the
Opal scene after you fight Raihan. Besides that, nothing else needs to be changed. He fills his role wonderfully, he’s the
jerk character I’ve been wanting in Pokémon since 1st gen, he grows as a character, has
great scenes, he’s honestly the best character in the game. There are more characters to discuss, but
the ones that are left have a direct impact on the plot of the game. So, for now, let’s talk about that plot;
specifically, the Darkest Day. We’re going to keep it so that no one really
knows the history of the Darkest Day besides the very basic stuff: A black storm covering
the sky, and the hero who saved the day, but we are going to expand upon this lore a little. We’ll include more of a story this time
around as the characters discover more about it instead of just the facts of what happened. We’re going to mention Eternatus and his
relevance for the Darkest Day early on instead of right at the very end of the game. Eternatus looks way too cool for him to have
no build up at all and then suddenly be a big threat. They also need to be mentioned consistently
throughout the game, probably alongside the legendary hero. We also need to have Wishing Stars mentioned
in the story of the darkest day far more often, as Eternatus is the one that made Wishing
Stars to begin with and it would be a good way to help players understand the plot better
as we get to the end of the game. We can also have a few things about the story
ambiguous so more can be revealed about it. Because it’s a Pokémon game, the story
of the Darkest Day doesn’t need to be super complex or deep, just a simple story telling
the events is fine. In this new version, at the beginning of the
game, people know about how a black storm covered the sky, that Galar was almost destroyed,
and that a legendary Hero saved the day, but that’s it. We don’t know that Galar was almost destroyed
by gigantic Pokémon. Because of this, even though it is part of
Galar’s history, people don’t pay much attention to it because no one really knows
a whole lot about it. Professor Magnolia, at the start of the game,
says that she’s been researching about the Darkest Day and found out something about
it. She says that apparently the hero used Wishing
Stars in order to save the day. Now, we know that this isn’t true in the
actual story, but it’s enough to raise a lot of questions about the Darkest Day. In our version, the story does not mention
Pokémon at all, yet Wishing Stars, which give Pokémon the ability to dynamax, were
in the hero’s possession. Does that mean the Hero used Pokémon to stop
the Darkest Day instead of a sword and shield? This is enough for Magnolia to send Sonia
off to do more research since Magnolia is too old to do that or something. Then over the course the game, the player
character, Hop, and Sonia discover that Pokémon were involved in the Darkest Day and that
those Pokémon dynamaxing is what almost caused the destruction of Galar. They also learn about a legendary dragon Pokémon
that emits a massive amount of energy and that this Pokémon is what produced the Wishing
Stars to begin with. The Hero, who they come to find out it actually
two legendary Pokémon, engage in battle with the mysterious dragon Pokémon and defeat
it, causing its massive energy to finally disappear and return the dynamaxed Pokémon
back to normal. The legendary dogs are declared heroes but
are never seen again. The defeated dragon Pokémon left a ton of
Wishing Stars behind, which are used in the present day for Galar’s energy supply as
well as dynamaxing Pokémon in battle. There, we didn’t change the story that much
and we are giving it a lot more clarity then it’s presented in the actual game. We need Eternatus, the mysterious dragon Pokémon,
to be revealed early on so it can have the proper buildup it needs to have an impact
for when you actually face off against it at the end of the game. The question then comes up with how they learn
about these things in the first place. In the actual game, Sonia just kind of theorizes
things and everyone assumes she’s right. We can still work with this with scenes like
Bede breaking down the wall on Stow-On-Side and Sonia looking at the images in Turffield,
but we can add more information and tidbits in these scene as well as replace scenes that
don’t matter with the characters exploring unknown parts of Galar or just Sonia doing
it offscreen and then calling you out to those places. We could discover caves that have ancient
drawings on them, that sort of thing. We could even use that specific example to
tease how cool Eternatus is, seeing an ancient drawing of something that looks like a dragon
skeleton, or something that resembles Eternatus, just not as cool looking as the actual thing
but cool enough that it makes you curious. We’ll also make it so the legendary dogs
have more relevance too. Perhaps they can be guiding the player and
Sonia to these artifacts, which wouldn’t be that out of place since we see one of them
at the beginning of the game. We just need to add a few more scenes where
things like this happen. They reside at the Slumbering Weald, but since
it’s Pokémon and pretty much anything is possible, we can just make it so the dogs
can project images of themselves in front of the player and lead them to more locations
that have to do with Galar’s history. This also makes the reveal that they were
the legendary hero all along have more impact. But that’s really it when it comes to changes
to the Darkest Day specifically. Like I said, I don’t want to change the
core concepts of the ideas they have. So all we have to do with the Darkest Day
is add Eternatus and add a little story to it rather than just facts or events. We’ve changed a little about how the cast
learns about it, and that’s a small change but a needed one. We need small changes like this in order for
the ending of the game to actually work and not be such a mess, we also want to avoid
repeating information like the original game. So we’re going to add scenarios that build
upon the information we already know as well as add depth to the characters and have buildup
for important moments down the line. And if there’s one part that needs proper
buildup it’s the end of the game, and in order to talk about that, we need to talk
about Rose. Rose is pivotal to the story of Pokémon Sword
and Shield. One of the reasons why the story fails, at
least in my eyes, is because the game made a pivotal character not important at all,
not until the last hour of the game that is. So we are going to make heavy changes to Rose,
not necessarily to his character or personality, but his role in the story. We are going to make Rose much more relevant
and show up far more often than he does in the actual game. Rose’s concerns about Galar’s future in
1000 year, his plans to wake up Eternatus, and motivations came out of nowhere near the
end of the game. But with the changes we’re going to make,
instead of it coming out of nowhere, we will see the gradual change in him as the story
goes along. Rose is a genuinely friendly and loving guy
and shares his hopes for the future generation of Galar and the Pokémon that reside there,
and how his dream is to make the world a better place for them; he has a deep passion for
this. Unlike in the actual game, Rose now knows
just as much as everyone else does about the Darkest Day and will follow the developments
that are made by Sonia and the player character. As Sonia learns more about the Darkest Day,
she theorizes that things are going to get messy for people far into the future. Eternatus produced a lot of Wishing Stars
back then but not an infinite amount, and they will eventually run out. When that happens, Galar will have no source
of energy left. Since Rose is responsible for the energy of
Galar, he shares his concern over the matter, as he just assumed that Wishing Stars were
naturally produced (or something). But Sonia assures everyone that it’s so
far off into the future that they shouldn’t worry about it. The player and Hop agree and continue with
the gym challenge. Rose on the other hand has a different reaction
from everyone and is still bothered by it. And this doesn’t need to be much either,
showing small signs of concern can go a long way. Something like the scene ending with the cast
walking offscreen, leaving Rose behind, only to show his head slightly lowered and a dialogue
box showing an ellipsis. This small thing shows the audience that Sonia’s
answer didn’t satisfy him. Also, yes, the hypothetical situations that
are coming up are going to be like this. I wish I was good enough at art or had a more
appealing way of doing this, but this is the best I could come up with. A little later in the game, around the time
you get the 4th or 5th gym badge, Sonia calls you and says she’s found strange drawings
in a cave around… uh… Turrfield, sure, why not. She tells us to come, but also says that Rose
is coming as he had contacted her and wants to be more involved about finding out about
the Darkest Day. You explore the cave Pokémon-style and reach
where Sonia is at. You briefly discuss the drawings on the wall
and what it means to the plot before Rose shows up as well. Before you can discuss Sonia’s findings
with him, he brings up that he looked into how much energy Galar uses and how many Wishing
Stars it consumes. He says that based on the energy consumption
alongside how many Wishing Stars that are assumed to be left (based on… science or
something I don’t know), that Galar’s energy will run out in 1000 years. Sonia and Hop express that that’s great
news and that it won’t run out until long after they’re gone. Rose stands in silence at their reaction before
saying something like “I do find it quite concerning though. This is Galar’s future we are talking about.” Sonia says that’s true, but they have 1000
years to figure out how to solve it, so they’re in no rush. Rose hesitantly agrees but we can tell that
it still bothers him. Throughout the game, Rose will continue to
voice his concerns about the future of Galar but is always brushed off by the other characters. “It’s in 1000 years bro, we just want
to catch Pokémon!” Remember, in our version Rose is very passionate
about the future generations that come after him, and him being constantly brushed off
and not being taken seriously by the characters even after voicing it multiple times will
slowly get to him. His demeanor slowly goes from the typical
friendly Rose to someone more stern as he continues to say they need to act as fast
as possible in order to save the future generation. Leon in one of these scenes later on could
finally snap at him and say that they just want to focus on the gym challenge for now,
and they can wait until the end of it to worry about “the silly energy crisis.” Rose, little by little, starts to go crazy. People are inconsiderate of his concerns and
feelings, and his constant worrying about the future makes him start to think that everyone
else is the villain, that they are unreliable and that he’s the only one that can do anything
about this. He sees them as the people who will be responsible
for the failing of the future generation. Leon starts to notice Rose’s shift in character
and confronts him about it, which the player runs into the middle of as they enter the
next town. It’s a heated argument, with Rose saying
that they don’t care about Galar’s future and Leon being reasonable and saying that
it’s so far off into the future that there’s no need to worry about it. The player interrupts the argument and they
both regain their composure. Neither of them apologizes to each other and
Rose walks off quietly with Oleana. Eventually Sonia discovers Eternatus’ fossil,
which wows and amazes everyone. Even though Sonia wants to send it to her
grandma for research, Rose insists that it be taken to his company so they can study
it and perhaps find a solution to the energy problem since Eternatus is the one that produced
the wishing stars to begin with. Sonia doesn’t like the idea but says they
can discuss it with Professor Magnolia. The game continues and sometime later, Sonia
calls you and says that the fossil is missing and that someone had to have stolen it. Rose claims he knows nothing about this, but
of course as the audience we have strong suspicion that Rose actually did take it. This leads us to the scene in the game where
you hear a huge explosion and see a large surge of red light after you fight Piers,
but instead of Leon saying that he'll handle it, he just doesn’t show up at all and you
and Hop go investigate it yourself. You guys see a few dynamaxed Pokémon in front
of Hammerlocke stadium (where the red surging light is coming from) and take care of them. Since this scene is supposed to hint that
Rose is up to no good and is also starting to feed wishing stars to Eternatus, we have
to have Rose show up. As the player and Hop are at the Hammerlocke
stadium finishing up calming down the Pokémon, Rose shows up from out of the elevator and
tells everyone that one of the machines he owns that handle wishing stars malfunctioned
and apologizes. Then finally we get to before the finals,
where Leon invites you and Hop to dinner. Right after the invitation, Rose calls Leon
and says to come to Rose Tower. Leon says he’ll be quick about it because
Rose said something like “I want to briefly apologize for my behavior back in whatever
town, come to Rose Tower so I can apologize in person,” and says he won’t be late
for dinner. However, after several hours, they start to
assume the worst, especially since Rose has been acting crazy lately, and they go to Rose
Tower to get Leon. On their way to Rose Tower they run into Marnie
and Piers, Oleana stops them and says not to disturb Rose before walking off, and the
cast ignores this and goes to Rose Tower anyway. The game will have Rose Tower more like a
building now that the player has to explore and find their way to the top instead of just
a giant elevator, and just before we can get to Rose, Oleana stops us and we fight her. And this is a good place to talk about Oleana
and her role in the story. In the actual game, she barely has one. You could quite literally remove her from
the game, and nothing would be different. The one thing we have to work with when it
comes to her is just before her fight when she goes insane, and that’s it. We don’t learn anything about her, she doesn’t
even have her own league card. This is why I’ve barely mentioned her until
right now, there was nothing to talk about. Let’s use this to our advantage and make
Oleana a good side character that not only we have at least some attachment to, but someone
who can build Rose up. With her fight in the game being the only
thing we have to work with, we’ll need to find inspiration to help us with her character
and backstory. Uhhh *browsing through league cards. Stops and reads Bede’s card* … that’ll
work. As we have spoken about before, Rose is a
great and caring guy at the beginning of the game. We’ll create a scenario for Oleana that
involves Rose saving her life in a figurative way. Rose helped her out in some way to the point
where she appreciates Rose and really, REALLY looks up to him. We don’t need to know all the details of
someone’s backstory, especially a side character, but having a vague but meaningful background
to her character could go a long way. Oleana was in a bad place in her life, didn’t
know what to do or where to go, and that’s when Rose came in and saved her from her troubled
life. If we wanted to be specific, we could say
she was homeless or something, Rose felt bad for her, and took her in and she eventually
became his secretary. The first time we really get a chance to talk
to her is in Hulbury where we see her and Rose talking to Bede. She doesn’t do anything in this scene though
besides telling the Chairman to hurry and telling the player character to meet with
Rose at the restaurant after they get the water badge. She doesn’t really do anything of significance
in the scene at the restaurant either… or like… ever. So instead, when you first see her with the
Chairman, he introduces her as a great assistant and that we shouldn’t be intimidated by
her despite the stern look on her face. We’ll work with what little we have for
her and keep her mannerisms stoic and blunt. At first, she just seems like she’s doing
her job, but you eventually come to find that she actually really cares for the Chairman
and wants to do everything she can to show him she’s grateful for him. At that part of the game, we wouldn’t know
why yet, but as we continue to see both her and Rose, we can learn a little about her
at a time since these scenes are mostly centered around Rose and the Darkest Day and we don’t
want to detract from them too much. Just a little something here and there is
fine for a side character while still being enough for us to care. We could even see her away from the Chairman
doing an errand for him as we’re exploring a route or a cave. A small dialogue exchange is fine, and during
these exchanges she could talk about how much she admires Rose and that he’s done a lot
for her, etc. As Rose gets crazier as the story progresses
and the other characters start to worry about him, Oleana takes us aside and tells us to
not worry and that chairman is just passionate about the future generation. Down the line she can mention that he saved
her life without going into much detail about it and say he would never do anything bad. When we can see that he’s actually insane,
you can see her gradually starting to support Rose and his views, and how she “owes everything
to him, so it’s the least I can do,” but also tells us not to worry, he wants to change
the world for the future generation, but he’s not going to do anything drastic. When it’s apparent that he is going to do
something drastic and the cast storms Rose Tower to confront him, Oleana stands in your
way, and you see that she not only admires Rose, but is actually kind of crazy and obsessive
of him for saving her life, so she will do anything for him. Rose is pretty much the only thing that matters
to Oleana. “Chairman rose deserves for his dream to
come reality! He’s put so much hard work into this! I won’t allow you to thwart his efforts
to build a better future!” ~Oleana before your fight with her in our
version of Pokémon. It’s all about Rose rather than his plan,
because she’s obsessed with Rose. After the battle, she finally reveals what
Rose did for her when she was going through so much hardship in her life, giving the cast
sympathy for Rose before confronting him. Perhaps people can point out that changing
the character like this would ruin the cool little Easter egg when you fight Oleana, how
all her Pokémon are graceful, beautiful, and feminine, but then her last Pokémon is
literal garbage, reflecting her character. Okay, let ask you something… is Oleana actually
like this? Sure, in the battle itself and like 10 seconds
before the battle begins, we see Oleana go insane and now has scary facial expressions…
but do we actually know anything about her… like I’m honestly asking here, because I
can’t think of anything. After defeating Oleana, we see Rose and Leon
arguing again, but Leon seems to be more reasonable and tells him that after the gym challenge,
which should end by tomorrow, he will dedicate all of his time to helping Rose out. Leon is the straight man in this scene when
it comes to Rose. He’s saying what we are thinking, but in
our version, we at least know what Rose has been going through and that he’s kind of
insane and can’t be reasoned with. We can sympathize with Rose at least a little
bit since we know he can be a great guy with what he’s done for both Bede and Oleana,
plus we’ve seen him be blown off by everyone throughout the game. The scene can play largely the same as it
did in the original with a few more lines added in, with Leon leaving and saying that
he’ll help after the Champion Cup. This leaves Rose unsatisfied; he doesn’t
respond back before Leon walks away with the player and Hop. And then just before the champion battle,
you can see that the Chairman has snapped and the scene plays exactly like it does in
the game, announcing that he has brought back the Darkest Day in order to save the future
of Galar. With the changes we made to Rose’s role
in the story and the buildup he now has, this scene no longer feels like it comes out of
nowhere and it doesn’t feel out of place. After the announcement, instead of immediately
going to Slumbering Weald and then right to the Rose fight, we’re going to take the
post-game content and put it here at the end of Rose’s announcement. The Darkest Day needs to seem like a big deal
and really threatening, and the post-game, with dynamaxed Pokemon running rampant and
the player character and Hop desperately trying to stop it, is a perfect fit for this situation,
but we’ll need to make some modifications. For starters, Sordbert and Sheldguy don’t
exist anymore. Period. They were either never born or were murdered
before the game started. We never hear anything about them. Ever. Sonia does not have a new assistant who is
secretly working for the weird hair guys either. The overall tone in this part of the game
will be different from what it is in the actual game, which means a serious tone since everything
is going to crap. Leon and others, like Sonia, are trying to
locate Rose and Oleana while the player, Hop, Marnie, Bede, and the gym leaders are trying
to stop Pokémon that have dynamaxed and trying to lead people to safety. The player and Hop return to their hometown
to stop the dynamaxed Pokémon there to save their families, and in the middle that, instead
of Hop just suggesting to go to Slumbering Weald out of nowhere (especially since it
doesn’t fit the situation they’re now in), dog Pokémon projects himself in front
of them again, and gestures them to follow him to Slumbering Weald, where they find the
Rusted sword and shield. Eventually you find out where Rose is and
head to Hammerlocke stadium. Hop calls Leon and tells him to come to the
stadium, but since Hop and the player are already there and can’t afford to wait for
help, they’ll have to deal with Rose as Leon is on his way. Rose is in the same room as he is in the actual
game, but we see the fossil of Eternatus behind him. Turns out he actually did steal it! Rose explains that Eternatus has been reacting
to and absorbing Wishing Stars that he feeds it, to the point where Eternatus is on the
verge of reviving. Rose continually feeding it Wishing Stars
is also what caused the explosion and surge of red light from earlier. Eternatus is already producing enough energy
for the Darkest Day to be happening and for Pokémon to be dynamaxing. You can still stop it in time if you act now,
but Rose is in your way of doing so. The battle between the player and Rose then
commences. And with everything we’ve talked about so
far, changing parts of the narrative and especially Rose’s role in the story, we now have all
the buildup necessary to have this battle be awesome. The tension in this battle can be felt as
you can really see Rose and his determination to “fix” the future. Throughout the journey, you’ve seen Rose
struggle with his ideals and be brushed aside by the other characters, so now not only do
you realize the gravity of the situation, but you actually know where Rose is coming
from with all this. The awesome “One Winged Dad-Bod” theme
plays, and the player feels the impact and weight that this battle has. “Ooooh man this is serious; I need to save
the world from this maniac!” You end up beating Rose, but the fight is
enough to delay the player, and Eternatus finally awakens. A cool cutscene plays with cool dramatic music
and a red-light envelopes Eternatus’ fossil before it emerges from the light and shows
itself to the player. By the way, Eternatus is supposedly 65 feet
long, which is bigger than Wailord, so we can make this guy freaking huge and terrifying. He breaks out of the room just as Leon shows
up and the cast follows it to the top floor of Hammerlocke Stadium to battle it. Since Eternatus is so big, we can make the
fight begin as a raid battle with the player, Hop, and Leon. They defeat Eternatus, but then it absorbs
all the energy in the Galar region, like in the original game, but now it’s Eternamax
form is way bigger, much too big of a threat to deal with, even with the three of them. Leon tells the player and Hop to run away
and that he’ll try and handle it by himself. Before they can get away though, Eternatus
makes quick work of Leon’s Charizard, leaving just the player and Hop. Desperate and out of options, Hop remembers
the sword and shield they were guided to by the dog Pokémon and suggests that perhaps
they can summon them somehow. “The dog Pokémon stopped the Darkest Day
all that time ago, and Zacian has been guiding us throughout our journey, they might be able
to come and help us stop Eternatus!” The rest of the battle plays out as it does
in the original, with dog Pokémon helping Hop and the player defeat Eternatus and the
player catching it in the end, saving the day. It cuts to the next day with the player waking
up at they’re house, where their mom congratulates them for saving Galar and tells them that
she’s very proud. You walk out of the house to see Hop there
where he tells us that everyone is talking about them and the people they met on their
journey would love to speak with them. The player now has the option to go to any
or every town they’ve been to and talk with whoever they want. Marnie, Bede, the gym leaders, random NPCs,
they’ll each have something to say to you and tell you how amazing you are for what
you did. The player sets the pace here, as they can
go to Wyndon at any time to fight Leon in the finals to the Champion Cup. We’ll put a little bit of moral ambiguity
in there, where it’s implied that the future of Galar is saved because they have Eternatus
in their possession, which will allow them to produce energy for Galar indefinitely…
which wouldn’t have happened without Rose’s actions. Rose and Oleana end up getting away in the
confusion surrounding Eternatus and are on the run somewhere. Rose, even though he put everyone’s lives
in danger, accomplished what he wanted to do, and if we have him turn himself in, it
shows us he regrets his decision. Leon, as he mentions how everyone knows how
the player saved Galar from destruction, also says something like “I suppose we don’t
need to worry about the energy crisis anymore either!” With that said, the championship battle commences,
and the player finally beats the game. Pokémon Sword and Shield had a lot of potential
when it came to the narrative. It could have been the first Pokémon game
in a while that had an impactful, grand, well told story, but it ultimately became one of
the most poorly written in the series. The suggestions I’ve listed are what I would
have liked to see in the game and are things that I know I would have personally enjoyed. I’m sure you can find problems with what
I’ve laid out, maybe even find some holes in it, but it’s at least more interesting
and engaging now than it was in the actual game. What kind of changes would you make to the
story? I mean, maybe you wouldn’t make any changes
and genuinely like the story, I don’t know. More power to you if that’s the case. Perhaps this is an odd way to end the video,
but I’d like to end on at least a somewhat positive note: Pokémon Sword is the most
fun I’ve had with a Pokémon game in a long time. The series had become stale for me as each
new game released, and while the typical formula the game is known for and the lack of innovation
when it came to gameplay did contribute to that, I just became tired of the new designs
of the Pokémon themselves. From generation 4 onward the designs became
less appealing to me, but generation eight surprised me with its new Pokémon, as it
holds some of my favorites now. Hatterene, Alcremie, Eldegoss, Sirfetch’d,
Galarian Corsola, I think these Pokémon are great. There’s certainly a lot to hate about these
games, but for me, it was the first time since Ruby and Sapphire that I felt like a kid again,
excited to explore new routes to see what kind of new Pokémon there were, and with
Sword and Shield I was rarely disappointed in that aspect. It was definitely more difficult to play it
a second time for this video because I can only get that sense of wonder from discovering
new Pokémon the first time around. It made the flaws of the game a lot more apparent,
especially with the story since that’s what I was paying extra close attention to. Even with all the problems it has, I find
it hard to hate this game.
