Pokémon Games Story Discussion

[Celever]

With the release of Pokémon Sword and Shield I've been thinking a lot about what exactly makes a "good" story in the Pokémon franchise. Sword and Shield has presented a more immediately noticeable departure from the storytelling of recent games: the plot is almost casual, with a primarily laid back, carefree tone until the end game, which is at first jarring compared with the constant world-is-about-to-end stories we've become accustomed to. However, I found myself more invested in the characters of Sword and Shield as a result because the focus of the happenings of the game was on them, rather than on the higher stakes of ecoterrorists, invasive murderous aliens, or an ancient cannon prepared to wipe out all life in the region. This is just one perspective, however.

What I'm trying to get at is there has been quite a lot of variance in how Pokémon has delivered its stories, with one of the largest departures being in the most recent games. So I can't help but wondering: what exactly do we as a community value in the plots of our series? Story and worldbuilding are often seen as key aspects of other JRPG series, but I feel the topic can be somewhat neglected in ours.

Discussion Points (suggestions)

• Stakes - Most games in the franchise have some sort of world-ending threat, particularly in the core series (since Gen III), but this doesn't necessarily mean this is the best route. Kanto, Johto and Orre centred their stories around collapsing organised criminal gangs, while Alola and Galar focussed their stories around containing the threat of thugs or deviants for the majority of the game. Most other games, however, have used legendary Pokémon to threaten the world, and it seems to be a tried and tested formula that usually utilises a variety or nuances to make each plot seem distinct. Is it better to have world-ending stakes, stakes based more so on the human or Pokémon cost (criminality), or less intimidating, deviant threats?
• People vs Pokémon - There's variance in how heavily games character-build humans compared with Pokémon. A great example of the focus being on humans in Unova: N and Ghetsis are undoubtedly the stars of that plot, introduced in the very second town and being pervasive throughout the adventure, resulting in arguably the most emotional crux of the series. These games also explored how people use Pokémon and their relationship with them, but the focus is always on whether people are symbiotic or parasitic towards Pokémon rather than the other way around. Inversely, Galar's focus is on uncovering the legend of Zacian and Zamazenta: they are also introduced very early in the game, and most key plot points involve them, such as the uncovering of their statues in Stow-on-Side. A slightly left-of-field pick is the Pokémon Mystery Dungeon series: the only person in the entire world is the player character, who has morphed into a Pokémon and must learn to live by the ways of our favourite creatures. It provides insight and anthropomorphism of Pokémon unlike other games in the franchise. Inversely, Orre and the Pokémon Ranger series are centred almost entirely around people with Pokémon playing at most a supporting or subordinate role. Though it's called Pokémon, are stories best served deep diving into the lore of Pokémon themselves, or are people more enticing as storytelling vessels?
• Main Characters vs Side Characters - Though the obvious answer may be "why not both?", the vast majority of games in this series cleanly prioritise either main or side characters, particularly in the main series. Johto only develops Silver and Lance to a significant degree, but does both excellently, with highlights from the supporting cast often being tied to these main characters, such as Claire and Giovanni (in HGSS). Similarly, Unova is all about Cheren, Bianca, N, and Ghetsis, with supporting cast highlights again being tied to these characters such as Elesa's interaction with Bianca's Dad and the Shadow Triad's servitude to Ghetsis. On the other hand, Hoenn's worldbuilding is arguably focussed most on the wider Hoenn region: Maxie and Archie are unconvincing primary antagonists, but the story is kept interesting by features from characters like Mr. Briney, the Devon Corp guy you save all the time, the glassblower, Rydel, Steven (Emerald), and Wally, among others. Kanto follows a similar philosophy where, though Gary and Giovanni are great, the main cast is lacking besides and side character highlights aren't connected to those two directly. Despite this, it's a memorable region with figures like the Silph Co. President, the Old Man looking into Celadon City Gym, and even the ghost/Marowak of Lavender Tower. Pokémon Mystery Dungeon is most successful in having well developed main and side characters, but their rosters usually have the benefit of having longer campaigns to properly develop in and a more episodic structure that can give different side characters definitive spotlights. If you had to choose one or the other, would you rather have really well-developed main characters to grow greater attachment to individually, or side characters to grow greater attachment to the region as a whole?
• Tone - Similar to stakes but distinct, games have the ability to set their tone through use of language choices and regional visuals. Orre, despite having relatively low stakes for the franchise, does away with boyish adventure to craft a more rugged, mature tone both visually and through the language people use. For instance in Orre, Pokémon battles aren't the primary way of settling disputes: Cipher is corrupting Pokémon so that they will attack people directly, adding an element of violence that is a departure from franchise norms. Sinnoh also has a more muted colour palette which is perhaps intentional considering the attempted maturity of characters like Cyrus, who exhibits clear psychopathic tendencies that may be lost on a child but adds a dimension of depth for adults. Alternatively, most characters in Galar use British slang which constantly lightens the tone, and the story is essentially one huge celebration of the trainers of the region with no real stakes until right at the end, and it has an intensely vibrant colour palette. Similarly, Kalos goes hard on a child-like outlook until the climax of Lysandre's character arc, with focus on Serena, Shauna, Tierno, and Trevor as they try to find their own aims and motivations in life, as well as ridiculous Team Flare grunts. Perhaps one of the easiest comparisons is between Kanto and Johto: Team Rocket is intimidating in the former but pathetic in the second, going from controlling the entire region through the criminal underworld to trying so desperately to return to their former glory that they stage a coup in the region's Radio Tower in order to plead for Giovanni's return live on air. As a community, do we think it's better to have a maturer tone to games which may be lost on kids but appeal to older audiences, or to cater more so to kids in a way that the casual adult player can still enjoy?

These are just suggestions of potential discussions we could have. Hopefully we can really inspect what has worked and what hasn't about stories in the franchise so far to see how we would like the franchise to move into the future in this regard!

 

[VagueKatti]

I’m personally of the opinion that the stakes need to be dramatically lowered, and that evil teams just need to go entirely. The formula was perfected in Generation 5 - the stakes weren’t a matter of a literal existential crisis, but still had serious ramifications for you and the entire world and thus generated urgency greater than some cataclysmic event. In addition, the initial endgoal of liberating Pokemon ties in nicely with the ehtical questions that Black and White asks about the nature of Pokemon battling, and N himself is easily the best-written character in the series. Need I go on? I think we all know why the story of Gen 5 is so damn good.

Black and White is perfect for being a simple but meaningful kid’s story - and saying it’s a kid’s story isn’t a bad thing at all! Children need stories that are told simply but challenge them to think a bit deeper, subconsciously or no, and I think Black and White does this marvelously; it reminds me of a good Pixar movie in that sense. It challenges kids to think beyond the traditional black-and-white of morality that they are often presented with and consider the grey, and it does so through the ever-charming, timeless nature of the series. Kids don’t necessarily miss more mature themes - in fact, I’d say they’re very perceptive to true maturity, just not what we often consider ‘mature’ (i.e. edginess).

It is for precisely that reason that I don’t think the games benefit from forcing in an evil team anymore. Why repeat what’s been done so well already? X and Y forgot what made Team Plasma so effective and entered in Team Flare, where we’re back to ludicrous doomsday shenanigans and threw out all the characterization that went with Plasma - I’ve played X and Y five times, and I still can’t tell you a single one of the Scientists’ names aside from Xerosic! The Emma sideplot post-game, which tends to be overlooked and very obscure, is a much stronger and well put-together story, and it’s because it doesn’t really try to be much more than a simple story of Looker and Emma’s bond with the player serving as the proxy for it to happen, so it’s not like GF forgot good writing entirely. Sword and Shield came so close to forsaking evil teams entirely, given that Team Yell is a mere nuisance and there is only whispers of the Darkest Day, but then of course we have... everything to do with Chairman Rose that I’d rather save the energy of talking about.

It’s possible to tell a compelling story merely through the characters going on an adventure. I’d say Hop did a pretty good job of this, and Leon’s arc makes sense... even if the whole “undefeated Champion” shtick is somewhat obnoxious. I don’t think there’s necessarily a need for urgency the evil team provides in a Pokemon game - after all, you still have a goal to work towards, and isn’t that a major part of what the obligatory evil team offers to the game? You don’t lose much, and thus in the simplicity that results from the lack of an evil team you’re able to tell a more concise and contained story that can have much more impact. It’s either that, or do what Black and White did and tie in the evil team in such a way that it doesn’t feel detached from the League.

Kids ain’t stupid, and Black and White realized that. By getting rid of evil teams, it’s easier to write a story that can have such mature themes for kids while still taking them on the familiar Pokemon journey of conquering the League, and all you lose in exchange is some Zubat fights I guess.

 

[Felis Licht]

A good story is one that manages to capture your emotions and never let you go imo BW/2 and Explorers of Sky did that and that's why they're so well loved. We're dictated by our emotions a lot and the more we're heavily invested in something emotionally, the more we'll love it I think.

I agree with VagueKatti that evil teams and by extension "awaken/forced to catch the legendary" plot lines should be retired due to their overuse (and that's mainly because I feel like legendaries are becoming seriously devalued because of it), but the question remains of what should replace it exactly. Should it even be replaced with something else? I mean, you could just leave it and just make the main goal to become champion only, but even that has been reused and will eventually wear out. Should it also be retired in favor of something else? What is something else to do?

This something else is one of the hardest things to think about since the mainline games have held on to the same plot elements and goal for so long as its norm. It makes games like Mystery Dungeon that don't follow that plot element great, but then you got unofficial games like Uranium that follow a different, much more jarring beat that to some feels too different from the norm, if that makes sense.

 

[greentyphlosion]

At the risk of sounding a bit arty, I think it's all about how on-message the declared themes of the games are.

What really stands out for me about the Unova games was how they were able to create the sensation of a richer, wider world. Put simply, it felt like things actually happened in it. Every person you met had an ideology and questions about the world; this was almost meme-like with even Preschoolers asking you deep philosophical questions ("Am I chasing you? Or are you changing me? Change your perspective - and the world will change!") but the fact that this was consistent meant that the themes of the story resonated. The Gym Leaders being involved in the story made them feel like people, instead of props there solely to battle. The region's mythology was well-explained - there are some gaps, but the context allows you to fill them in yourself with clues or headcanon - and the recurring design motifs like the bridges tie in beautifully to the themes of connection and differences.

The Johto games are quality for the same reason. The mythology explored is extremely well-crafted but not overdone. It's enigmatic enough that part of the excitement is guessing at the parts we don't know. The story of the games is removed from this mythology (at least in Gold and Silver; Crystal interweaved it slightly) but the games work in this mystery and wonder through clues and contextual hints. HGSS could have followed suit from RSE and DPP by having world-ending stakes, but it's refreshing that it didn't; the story is simply you proving yourself worthy to befriend Ho-Oh or Lugia.

Contrast that to Sword and Shield. What do we really learn about Professor Magnolia? Or Eternatus? Why was becoming the Champion Leon's dream? What is his ideology; what helped him become strong? I couldn't tell you. I get that the Galar region is ancient and grand-looking because it's Britain, but what do Zacian and Zamazenta have to do with that? The various towns and cities are distinctive, but the people in them don't stand out. One or two of the Gym Leaders are interesting, but there's not much to say about Milo or Nessa or Alister save for a bit of flavour text on their trainer cards (which is telling rather than showing). There are very few memorable side characters in the vein of Rydel or Captain Briney. Sure, there's world-ending stakes, but why? It's cheap and rushed and unconvincing and really not that dramatic at all. The final battle with Eternatus should have been epic, but it just felt by-the-numbers. Worse, the whole cartoonish nonsense with Swordward and Shielbert deflates any sense of gravitas the game had.

I found Sword and Shield quite reminiscent of X and Y. Both were visually reasonably impressive, but entirely underwhelming in terms of the story and worldbuilding. The sole interesting part of X and Y for me was Lysandre's conversation with Diantha; it seemed like the game was trying to raise an interesting conundrum about population growth and the depletion of the world's natural resources. But this was rapidly tossed aside and compressed into a formulaic legendary-nearly-destroys-the-planet story. What relevance did that really have to Lysandre's concerns about beauty and overpopulation? It could have been Dialga and Palkia or Groudon and Kyogre in place of Xerneas and Yveltal and not much would have changed. What relevance to Xerneas and Yveltal have to Kalos specifically? The Pokedex tells us that Xerneas slept in the form of a tree for years. Cool. I can't even remember most of the names of the cities and towns in Kalos. The Gym Leaders are pretty much all ornaments.

USUM's story is a bit of a mess, but I think Sun and Moon are second-placed to BW in terms of plot because the central theme - the relationship between Lusamine and her children - is central (which is why USUM wrecking it was so frustrating). On top of that, the theme of the Alola region - humans and Pokemon working closely in tandem - is played up everywhere you go, from Ride Pokemon to various sidequests. They're frustrating games to replay because of the constant cutscenes, but the characters and plot are ultimately strong. The stakes aren't world-ending, but are built gradually and interestingly.

As you'll no doubt have guessed, I didn't think much of Sword/Shield's plot. But I think it's fairly apparent how and why some games succeeded where others failed. I'm not sure if a sequel/revamped version of SwSh could make things better, but I'll be interested to find out.

 

[Yung Dramps]

I think there are two key ingredients for good Pokemon stories.

The first is something that I can't really summarize in a single phrase, but will do my best to explain. I believe the best plots in the series use whatever the legendaries are up to as a backdrop to convey the themes nestled within. Just look at the two most critically acclaimed plots in he series: Gen 5 at a superficial level is a story about a crazy old guy trying to tame Reshiram and/or Zekrom and manipulate trainer Pokemon to take over Unova, but anybody who has played and enjoyed these titles or even those who are vaguely aware of their synopses will tell you it's not about that at all, but rather the philosophy of human-Pokemon bonding and themes of pressure from elders and abuse conveyed through characters like N and Bianca. Likewise, Gen 7 at a superficial level is an alien invasion story, but like the Unova games those region-endangering stakes are ultimately a conduit to tell the story about Lusamine's family and Lillie and Gladion's quests to flee their overbearing parent and grow up. In fact, now that I think about it, these two highly praised stories both involve broken families. Guess Game Freak's just good at that kind of stuff.

The second? Good characters. It's something that sounds so basic and obvious at first, and Game Freak if nothing else can usually create some very memorable characters. But on the occasion where they do mess it up, oh boy do they create some bland husks. And no other game in the series exemplifies what can happen when the developers don't put the appropriate level of care into their protagonists and antagonists than Gen 6, more specifically X and Y. There are many reasons why these games are considered painfully average, but the killing blow for me is how flaccid the cast is. The gym leaders have mostly regressed to the earliest games in the franchise's model of being generic boss fights with no purpose in the world outside their gym battles with some rare exceptions like Korrina and Wulfric, Team Flare is a complete joke (I challenge you to name any of their admins without using Google), the rivals may as well not exist and even the champion Diantha feels unremarkable and bland, she doesn't even get a pokeball throwing model for crying out loud! The characters with the most effort put into their plot role and presentation are AZ whose backstory is infamously exposition dumped at the 11th hour, and Lysandre who's basically a poor man's Cyrus. Thankfully, this is a fluke that hasn't really repeated at a similar scale. Hell, the very next generation we got the incredibly vibrant and lovable Kahunas and Trial Captains, the bombastic and hilarious Team Skull, the sinister Lusamine and her well-developed children. this section exists solely to rant about how hard Gen 6's plot sucks and to jerk off Gen 7 some more lel

 

[King Feraligatr]

I'm not really sure where I stand with Pokemon and story. On one hand, I don't want something so insufferable, lifeless, poorly written, badly themed, badly plotted, raw, etc. as XY (who's gosh awful plot in combination with its countless other flaws has it as my least favorite main series game I've played). And hell, some parts of my ROM hacks might fix some awful lines of dialogue or the like. But on the other hand, story doesn't mean that much to me it seems. I easily prefer BW2 to BW1, finding the latter meh. I evidently don't care too much about how USUM butchers SM's story, speaking that I'm hacking UM over M (and only changing some really bad or questionable dialogue in it when it comes to "fixing" the story). My favorite main games in the franchise are HGSS, Platinum, and BW2, none of which are known for their stories. So evidently, I care more about gameplay over story in this franchise --- I just don't want something as bad as XY. Something passable I guess seems to suit me.

Continuing on my views though, I've yet to see an official story in any Pokemon game I can actually consider good when compared to other video game stories (even PMD), or even stories in general. Part of me doesn't think this series is cut out to do stories terribly well, which I don't consider a bad thing necessarily. It just has to go more in with its gameplay, features, etc. (which Gamefreak has really been lacking in since Gen 6...). Pokemon is also kind of an inherently illogical series that has done stuff in the past just to do things or to sell things, none of which lends itself to good stories...But perhaps to add to this, maybe I try too hard at times with my own Pokemon stories, knowing they'll never actually be good outside the standards of the franchise.

And on villainous teams, I usually like them from certain standpoints. They usually have good music and they give me an excuse to made harder than normal opponents with ROM hacking...but this is a gameplay perspective (one of which the common user doesn't involve themselves in: i.e. ROM hacking)...not a story one...Add to the fact that many of my Pokemon stories involve my custom villain group in the background...I may be biased. And not every team can be as executed well (from a series perspective) as Plasma, be as charming as Skull, be as delightfully evil as Cipher, or be as simple and to the point as Rocket...

 

[Yung Dramps]

I'm not really sure where I stand with Pokemon and story. On one hand, I don't want something so insufferable, lifeless, poorly written, badly themed, badly plotted, raw, etc. as XY (who's gosh awful plot in combination with its countless other flaws has it as my least favorite main series game I've played). And hell, some parts of my ROM hacks might fix some awful lines of dialogue or the like. But on the other hand, story doesn't mean that much to me it seems. I easily prefer BW2 to BW1, finding the latter meh. I evidently don't care too much about how USUM butchers SM's story, speaking that I'm hacking UM over M (and only changing some really bad or questionable dialogue in it when it comes to "fixing" the story). My favorite main games in the franchise are HGSS, Platinum, and BW2, none of which are known for their stories. So evidently, I care more about gameplay over story in this franchise --- I just don't want something as bad as XY. Something passable I guess seems to suit me.

Continuing on my views though, I've yet to see an official story in any Pokemon game I can actually consider good when compared to other video game stories (even PMD), or even stories in general. Part of me doesn't think this series is cut out to do stories terribly well, which I don't consider a bad thing necessarily. It just has to go more in with its gameplay, features, etc. (which Gamefreak has really been lacking in since Gen 6...). Pokemon is also kind of an inherently illogical series that has done stuff in the past just to do things or to sell things, none of which lends itself to good stories...But perhaps to add to this, maybe I try too hard at times with my own Pokemon stories, knowing they'll never actually be good outside the standards of the franchise.

And on villainous teams, I usually like them from certain standpoints. They usually have good music and they give me an excuse to made harder than normal opponents with ROM hacking...but this is a gameplay perspective (one of which the common user doesn't involve themselves in: i.e. ROM hacking)...not a story one...Add to the fact that many of my Pokemon stories involve my custom villain group in the background...I may be biased. And not every team can be as executed well (from a series perspective) as Plasma, be as charming as Skull, be as delightfully evil as Cipher, or be as simple and to the point as Rocket...

I overall agree with this sentiment, Pokemon stories aren't War and Peace and I tend to appreciate gameplay more in my videogames in general. At the same time, I also think the storylines are an incredibly important part of the identity of certain Pokemon games, and that ultimately spills over into the gameplay. BW1's plot for instance gives the whole game a different overall mood and some different important fights compared to BW2. Whereas you can ignore the plot butchering, I still refuse to play either Ultra game because despite not even being that much of a Lillie fanboy or anything I still think that her family's storyline is such a defining part of the Gen 7 experience that impacted so many other people that no gameplay additions or neat regional Pokedex expansions can ever make up for it, and it does end up leading to the loss of some cool moments like the final Lusamine fight as well as sapping the emotion from Gladion's later fights. Maybe if the Ultra Recon Squad were super dangerous opponents with powerful teams I wouldn't be so harsh, but...

The Lillie arc died for this

 

[DrumstickGaming]

While Sword and Shield’s story may be underwhelming, I’ll give it this, they perfected the “friendly rival” in Hop.

Hop, at first glance, is a poor man’s Hau, they look vaguely similar (probably because they use the same animations from Gen 7) he battles you a lot earlygame similar to Hau, and that’s all he appears to be...at first.

If you look closely, he greatly looks up to his brother. When Bede (a character I honestly can’t stand because it’s just “jerk” with a rushed redemption I didn’t buy, it made me glad they retired this Gen 1 character type) insults Hop later on (can’t remember what EXACTLY he said, so I apologize), Hop gets devastated.

Not only does Hop say it ruffled his feathers essentially, but you see this through him inexplicably changing his team in a desperate effort to seem relevant. This caught me off guard when I first played because rivals almost never do that sort of thing barring Blue in Yellow who changed what he evolved his Eevee into based on whether you won or lost to him before I think. I didn’t notice it was inherently related to the insult until much later. Not only this, but he clearly mimics Leon later on during a championship (he pats his face similarly to Leon). He even catches the BOX LEGEND in the postgame, which has never been done. I think Hop is one of the best rivals we’ve had ever.

On the rest of SWSH, it’s a MESS. Why even HAVE an evil team like Yell if they aren’t gonna DO anything? In that case it needs to indeed be retired. Yell was like a rehash of Skull with none of the charm, similar to how Spikemuth was a literal hallway (even if it was a shout out to Streets of Rage I think it’s lame). Marnie is okay but the only development she really gets is...learning to smile (and you have to go out of your way for that postgame at Budew Drop Inn). The Piers moment was cool but that’s all it was. A moment in a sea of mediocrity.

Macro Cosmos was also a garbage attempt to copy the “surprise“ villain from Aether (which was telegraphed but at least it got SOME foreshadowing there). When I got to the final battle with Eternatus, I was like “I can’t get invested because there was almost no buildup.” I DID like the O’leans battle, mostly for the music, at least. But Chairman Not-Lysandre was completely rushed with almost zero buildup, because when the story teased buildup it was like “not now kiddo” with the explosions.

In the next game they need to retire the evil team or make them part of the main plot again. The main issue is they are trying to have their excuse plot cake and eat it too.

Gen V’s plot is indeed memorable, not much to say that hasn’t been said. Same with SM.

Without looking at Google, I think the Team Flare Admin names are Celosia, Mable, Xerosic, and Byrony (last one I’m not sure on but I know I’m in the ballpark).

 

[Bull Of Heaven]

*Bryony, and you missed Aliana

Agreed on Hop, but I’m tired of always having a friendly rival in recent gens, so it’s a little harder to appreciate him.

I think evil teams are still good if you do enough to keep them fresh. I agree with the general consensus that Team Plasma’s story was the best, but I then also loved Team Flare’s silliness in the very next gen. In fact, it was only when Lysander (autocorrect WILL NOT let me spell his name correctly) tried to be serious that Team Flare didn’t work for me.

I think each evil team was different enough to be interesting, until Team Yell, which is just too similar to Team Skull. As long as they have new ideas, I’m happy to see more.

Edit: Oh, but the part where Piers and Marnie rally Team Yell to help you is good stuff, even if it’s part of bizarre chase sequence in a storyline where nothing has much impact.