Is Competitive Pokemon STILL Too Inaccessible?

Another Worlds, another round of drama. Should breeding and training really be a requirement for competitive play?
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[@JPRPokeTrainer98]

Japan was cool but it finally gave me the rona so ya boy is going back to bed 😷

[@sawkchalk6966]

Get well soon!

[@kristopherwillis8075]

🍵 here you go some herbal tea 😁 get well soon.

[@fallendeus5641]

You fucked up with this video a bit... they DID email competitors and tell them that teams would be checked for validity during the tournament.

[@TheIrvman08]

Get well soon!

[@bp1991able]

Feel better! Joe "Serebii" Merrick contracted it in Japan too. At least it's not the near-death sentence it was just three ago.

[@HeroHansel321]

a battle simulation game is probably the best solution, just put all of the resources into making all pokémon available and battles

[@DanteCrowlley]

Smogon?

[@HeroHansel321]

@@DanteCrowlley an official one, that maybe a team like bandai namco could work on

[@Stinkoman87]

Imagine if competitive pokemon got it's own game for the switch. Call it Pokemon Arena or something. You would still have to raise the pokemon in the main game but you could just move it though home.

[@aliameth4386]

@@Stinkoman87there’s no point

[@BladeSerph]

The thing is since its totally proven they can sell a terribly quality game, TWICE, with sword/shield was half meh and scarlet/violet was total dog-shite that scalped as many features you would expect as normal with open world games. In addition to scalping even more main-stay features from previous entries for them to not come back (besides remakes thank Arceus.) or bring back in a much more poor version, whether its a new gimmick system or going one or more games to `nudge it back in`, but again, a much more poorer version of it. Throw in doing `Dex its` and reselling access to mons via the DLC, its likely they rather just repeat the yearly process to drip feed them all back, rebalance the stats and turn it literally into a Splurge to `compete` version of a League of Legends (which of course they already do that with Pokemon Unite), just so even competitive players on top of dealing with subscription for internet costs, they have to start fresh with a new game and buy the previous games that are likely STILL close to full price. Heck throw in the fact that despite the `changes` each version, Each pokemon game is like 80% the same song and dance still, which includes rotating a gimmick and the remaining 20% be whatever fad they wanna clamp onto for that generation, only to not have it present in the previous one. The only way i can see an OFFICIAL revival of the pokemon Stadium/Battle-Revolution games, is either they suddenly get thar entire staff replaced with a group that cares to make good games or it takes the scummiest route where even if its `free to play` they will just make it to where you need to GACHA for the pokemon via time limited packs. Effectively removing the battle simulation part and just ram another mobile gaming addiction title for people to latch onto and waste moneyz on, only to abandon it in a year to throw up another one instead. This is why indie games and `unofficial` means to play Pokemon is thriving because the game went basically uncheck for so long in its portable era that its too beeg to `fall` until they turn into the next Disney and another Company comes around to beat them at what they do as they continue to take more greedier and lazier practices to pump out titles that are likely 50% or more asset re-use and the rest being rushed out un-optimized materials if it actually uses any new assets for a new entry. With rare cases like Legends Arceus being `good` because the previous stuff was so bad that it made the former look better.

[@danielferrieri7434]

I wish Scarlet and Violet would get us the ability to fight Randomly Generated AI Trainers to fight. You can only fight Geeta, Nemona Arven etc so many times before it gets boring.

[@LuigiTheMetal64]

I do wish the past Trainer Classes would come back. They have so much variety. Too bad SV have a school-centered region.

[@AlphaladZXA]

Is there no Vs. Seeker in these games?

[@GravityIsFalling]

Isn’t that just the ranked ladder?

[@videos43334dhdjj774h]

@@AlphaladZXAunfortunately no

[@videos43334dhdjj774h]

Do you mean something like battle tower or battle tree?

[@chugga]

I see the sides that say it breaks immersion to make Pokémon hacking legal, and it really doesn't make you a "Pokémon Trainer" any more. So I think the solution would have to make sense in lore, but they've already streamlined training itself about as much as can be. Here's what I'd consider ideal that suits both sides: There could be a building somewhere in the Pokémon world where you battle using hologram Pokémon. These holograms can have everything about them customized within what is legal in regular gameplay. But of course, when you leave this building, those holograms don't come with you and you're stuck with real Pokémon when exploring the world outside or playing in raids. This way, training up your own Pokémon still has a purpose, competitive isn't inaccessible compared to other eSports, and it all makes sense within the universe.

[@AlexThat200]

Wasn’t expecting to see you around here. Thanks for all the entertainment over the years, Chugga! ❤️🔥

[@noahpokeemon6503]

I've seen patterz on these video before, but seeing you is brand new!

[@williamcox632]

Oh hey chuggaaconroy, did not expect to see u here.

[@JomaXZ]

I'd add that you need to unlock which Pokemon you can use with this mode by catching them or some other method (like some random grandpa giving you a collectible data card of Heatran if you give him a berry he wants or something, I dunno) to tie it a bit more into the main game. Maybe it's what the Regional Pokedex is for storywise? To make a comprehensive battle sim, the professor needs your Pokemon capture data to make it work properly?

[@JonBoyVGC]

Hi, Chugga! And yeah, I agree. Immersion & lore are pretty big parts of the Pokémon experience. And If we had a game *just* dedicated to battling they’d lose sales on the main series. I really like the idea of “holograms.” Kinda like Gale of Darkness CD & similar. But more customization. To encourage people to still breed & catch ‘mons, maybe you’d unlock different things by having them in your PC. Like you wouldn’t be able to have Swampert in a lure ball until it’s registered. Have a “scan” feature for the ‘mons that you did raise & train competitively to show off your ribbons in hologram form. They could do some cool things! We’ll see what the future brings. I’m optimistic.

[@ultrabros3]

Waiting for the bottle cap to lower ivs

[@JPRPokeTrainer98]

funny how this would actually help lol

[@mattbernacki9282]

They really should give you two options when you use one, max or min IVs in the stat. The only realistic time for not having max IVs is Trick Room, so having an option to pick when you use a Bottle Cap just makes sense.

[@mettelindegardnielsen9411]

I heard a interesting take, which was that since modding is illegal in Japan, it is more important for the turnament to check it in Japan than any other places.

[@TreeckoDX64]

But just in the third round? Like JPR said in 8:47 they should done something about It waaaay before the tournament begin 😭

[@MidoriNatsume]

It's probably a sneaky little sinful act of pride. "See foreigners, HERE in Japan WE run tournaments better than anywhere else. 🇯🇵🇯🇵🇯🇵"

[@PokeInspired]

​@TreeckoDX64 a warning email about hacked pokemon was sent out before the tournament began. I'm not sure what else they should have done that didn't involve stopping the tournament to hack check 1000s of people.

[@TreeckoDX64]

@@PokeInspired that's new

[@UltraBall23]

@@PokeInspiredI mean, they didn’t even need an email. It’s been against the rules forever.

[@tbone6032]

The fact that you can’t bottle cap to 0 is freaking insane. It makes stuff like getting a female indeedee with trick room and 0 attack and speed impossible (you can’t breed for it if you want TR you have to raid catch it).

[@enoyna1001]

Are errors like this even allowed by VGC rules?

[@tbone6032]

@@enoyna1001 yup, totally legal set. It’s not a glitch move, they just fucked up on the raid set and forgot that female isn’t supposed to earn it. But it’s freely obtainable in game so it’s totally legal. There’s a lot of weird stuff. For instance, electroweb as an egg move. Egg moves can be transferred from other mons with it. But without trading, electroweb can actually only be obtained from a level 2 magnemite raid. The thing is, you lose level 2 raids when you beat all the gyms, so if you haven’t gotten a magnemite then you literally can’t get that move on any mon in the game unless you can trade for a mon with it or home one in

[@enoyna1001]

@@tbone6032 thanks

[@mushroomdude123]

I would love if we got a new "Battle Revolution" type game. Both the casual and competitive side would benefit GREATLY from not having their space compromised by the other. Part of why Legends Arceus was so well designed was because they probably didn't have to concern themselves with how to balance Strong/Agile Style moves for multiplayer.

[@veeetox]

8:47 they did it, sort of. They sent an email (before worlds) telling people to not use external Pokémon (like Pokémon from other people). And knowing that japan is so against hacking/modding games, you could totally see this coming

[@arachineatzeer7478]

Came here to say this but I see you got here way before me

[@T-man114]

I feel like if they made an official Pokémon showdown with all Pokémon and fully fleshed out animations for all of them it would be easier. Because then they could just copy and paste the high quality animations from their game into future mainline Pokémon games. This would also prevent people from complaining by saying that a “side game” such as an official showdown has Better animations than a mainline Pokémon game. Kinda how people complain about how Pokémon stadium has better animations that sword and shield.

[@GarciaSweet]

A stadium 3 would be lit as long as they don’t forget the minigames

[@redturkeydragon64]

exactly

[@tbone6032]

Love the battle simulator idea. Even for collection stuff, they can make it so you link it to the main series game where you need to have shinies or marks or cool balls in the main game to use in the simulator

[@mathewricafrente5984]

It has gotten much easier to get the items necessary for turn even early game Pokémon into competitive Pokémon since 2013, but there are still issues such as the lack of manipulating IVs to be a specific number or how certain Pokémon aren't obtainable without another game, sometimes needing the DLC to said game. And there's also the fact that competitive players don't want to play Pokémon: the RPG in order to play Pokémon: the Online Battle Simulator.

[@AlphaladZXA]

This makes me hope something like legends arceus sticks around as the future of the series. There's a clear divide between singleplayer and competitive in the game design so why not make a battle simulation game once per nintendo console like pokemon bank where you transfer stuff into and out of freely and go full competitive. Then people like me can get our fun adventure games we still want with a better sense of balance and focus. And competitive can focus on your customization and grinding out online Ws

[@neobahumuth6]

IV should just be removed honestly

[@TheFloodFourm]

At what point do these people realize that they watered down the fantasy to non-existence and admit they never knew what they wanted?

[@AlphaladZXA]

@@TheFloodFourm wait what fantasy?

[@TheFloodFourm]

@@AlphaladZXA the fantasy of raising a pokemon

[@Drby_]

So glad I’m not the only one that thinks about an official battle sim almost EVERY DAY

[@MrLuizilla]

As long as Pokémon Showdown and its functionalities exists, any other approaches to competitive Pokémon will be archaic and neddlessly convoluted by comparison, by default. Also to be fair, they DID warn competitors that the hack checks at Worlds would be stepped up, I think at least one month before tge event. So TPC did that right, at least.

[@Flash33c]

Some things to note about the hack checking: 1. Though there is a rule against using hacked pokemon it's rarely enforced, hence why so many use them. 2. This year a warning email that there would be hack checks was sent out ahead of time. Some of the ones who still used hacked mons anyway got caught. 3. The hacks used are often made to get around the hack checks, so it isn't as simple as "hack check more often". That aside I do think it needs to be made more accessible, especially in regards to mons available in the formats. No one should have to spend $200+ just to get mons from other regions on a competitively viable team. Your idea of a virtual VGC server is something that could maybe work to help resolve that issue. Hopefully TPCI does something about this in the future but I won't hold my breath.

[@thoumodszo1348]

Not only would I love a new battle revolution game for all the reasons you stated since I had to end my dreams of VGC competing this years due to life needs more time from me, but also all those super slick battle animations. I love scarlet but dang the animations are stiff

[@shadowmarauder6033]

I definitively agree that the stadium/battle revolution-type games mixed with some Showdown features to make competitive battles more optimized, organized & accessible. The times we live in are too hectic for many fans to enter such a metagame that involves hours of breeding & hunting, modifying & buying over $100 worth of games & dlc.

[@heinrichkrull2523]

Best comparison to hacked pokemon are proxy cards.

[@nharviala]

I know a lot of Legacy tournaments at local stores for Magic will let you proxy, since getting your hands on a bunch of reserved list cards is usually not an option, considering you could buy a brand new Tesla for the price of some Legacy decks.

[@Raeoku]

you don’t have to buy packs and hunt for specific pokémon spending more and more money, also you can’t decide to buy one to avoid all the process. it would be a pay to win game just as any TCG. bad take man

[@breloommaster12]

@@Raeoku you're right, you don't have to buy packs; you might have to buy ENTIRE GAMES for certain Pokemon instead. If anything this analogy puts the TCG to shame.

[@alohamikan]

Imagine a shoplifter getting upset they finally got caught shoplifting after years of getting away with it through nobody checking their pockets.

[@kendragramley6243]

I think this is a really fair and balanced solution! The gap between competitive and casual players has never been bigger, imo, and the game’s core message is literally antithetical to the competitive game, so I think this would be ideal. But of course that means they’ll never do it, lol. Great video! Rest well.

[@duckymomo7935]

The core message is bonding with Pokémon but the game is inherently unbalanced

[@CyberAngel573]

A dedicated Competitive Pokemon game? Sounds perfect

[@zexalbrony4799]

Separate games is actually a really smart idea. Some only play the games casually for fun, you just catch Pokemon you like(weather they are good or not) and use them, level them up, teach them some decent moves with TMs, maybe give them an item or something, and that is enough for the casuals. I don't think a lot of people would waste time on the first route catching the same Pokemon like 10 times just to find the best one with the best stats. But then you have competitive players who have to play through the entire game's story just to access the stuff they want to start building a competitive team, so it's not very fair forcing them to play through a whole game just to get to the part they really want. And then you could have casuals who want to try and get into competitive but it's kind of daunting having to go through all this stuff and not very fun and can be a little time-consuming, those Pokemon they caught on Route 1 and have grown attached too aren't going to be competitively ready, so they either have to start catching multiple copies to find the best one or start IV and EV training the ones they do have, which is a lot more complicated(but is easier nowadays thanks to all the improvements) then just simply leveling up and teaching them a move or two, and some Pokemon regardless of how much you try to make them competitively viable will never be viable because their only decent and good for playthroughs or they just aren't that good but you got attached to them and found a way to make them work in a playthrough but now you can't use them in competitive. So separate games would be able to solve most if not all of these problems.

[@EdgarDGomez-fx6vh]

I have been out of practice for like 12 years, I had some knowledge of EVs at 4th Gen and used to battle with people I knew online, it was a lot of fun. I'm starting to catch up with all the new stuff, playing Alpha Zaphire, and new generations but I feel I am too relegated 😭with IVs, objects, etc. Game Freak should invest a lot more at generating battle formats for different levels, from begginers, amateurs, intermediate and advanced, and generate an algorythm that calculates this well to match people, I don't know if such a thing exists already. I still think that the breeding proccess is a great part of the experience and having some knowledge on natures, EVs and strategy is part of the fun, but to the point of obssesing to have a perfect pokemon... well we adults have things to do in life.

[@sharblast]

The problem with with "battle simulator" idea is that TPC has no incentive to do it. People having to buy multiple games to get all the relevant Pokémon is good for them since it makes them more money. it honestly wouldn't surprise me if that was at least partially the reason for these increased hack checks.

[@munchrai6396]

I think it's more that they want the entire audience buying a single game rather than them being split between single and multiplayer. While we have always had multiple versions, this new emphasis on foreign Pokemon seems to be the result of the new connectivity format rather than anything else. Definitely still greedy though, it's just got so much worse this gen

[@nerdyfalco408]

For being a relatively "casual" pokemon channel you summed up the situation very well, and made really valid arguments for both sides. I too think that this situation should just be resolved by adding a pokemon builder somewhere in the games, or as you said, as a subscription service. Also I would like to point out that TPC actually sent an email to all worlds participants warning them that hack checks would have been harsher that usual at worlds, but many didn't know at what point they should have been scared, because TPC litterally never enforced this rule before, that's why I think many still went with hacked or partially hacked mons.

[@andrewisgood]

The issue I have with the argument about spending money on games is, most World's Players do have prior games. Brady I think is the posterboy for someone who deserved to be disqualified. He might as well have nicknamed his Urshifu "Im Hackd LOL". I also look at the prize money issue with competitive and potential issues with using Pokemon outside the confines of the game. It does feel like Regulation D was done the way it was on purpose to catch hackers. My hope is it changes the culture and Pokemon works more to improve accessibility.

[@binitbs]

The hardest thing is as a casual player is to grind to buy held items and vitamins. And also the XP candies are only easily available through 7 star tera raids. I wish the prices of these things were like 10 to 20 times lower and more easily available. This would allow the players to better experiment with their teams and would provide more diverse pokemon teams. Don't even get me started on EV reduction berries and tera shard farms.

[@L.Drizzle]

Personally, I think from a team building/training point of view the games are pretty well optimised. As you rightly say, you can build a 6 member team in a couple of days now. The real kicker, to nobody's surprise, is their commitment to not giving us a game with all pokemon in it. It ain't hard Game Freak: just get a few more people in to make some character models. We know you're good for the cash. Oh, and if you could stick to one OP in-battle gimmick to keep it consistent, that'd be nice too (or in my utopia take them out altogether thanks).

[@dodleboper]

btw apprently the comptetors in worlds did get an email saying that hack checks would be more harsh at worlds

[@zacharykhan8556]

Wouldn't the issue be fixed if they didn't allow transfer mons to be used? We normally get a way to obtain legendaries from previous generations through third versions/dlc so they could have just waited until then to allow them. To me it sounds more like they just didn't think their rulesets through when approaching worlds this year.

[@ZakanaHachihaCBC]

The majority of Pokémon that are legacy are found in Pokémon Go.

[@frogthejam2472]

My problem with the sentiment that competitive is easier to get into than ever before is that it still isn’t easy IMO. Someone wanting to get into competitive Pokémon is going to have one hell of a time using only official resources

[@LexClone5]

It's never been easier to make a competitive team in Pokemon. Realistically speaking, you can have a fully ready Ladder Team in as little as a day if you know what you're doing, 2 days if you encounter some issues. The difficulty comes in wanting something that normal people wouldn't care about, such as 0 IVs, but it's not an absolute necessity

[@jeez8939]

@@LexClone5Tera shards are arbitrarily difficult to get 0ivs matter a lot more as stated b4 with trick room for speed and not mentioned was foul play with attk ivs They have pay walled reseting evs twice. And more Pokémon than ever being pay walled. Technically you can get them through trading but good luck getting a legit legendary from someone else in general. Honestly (“the broken bottle cap (lowers all of a Pokémon’s ivs to 0) would be a good addition to the game that would put a major dent in the accessibility issue

[@ZetaNiGHT]

True and correct and you should say it.

[@ZetaNiGHT]

@@LexClone5 it CAN be easier than it has ever been (and I agree, it is) while still being not that easy from the perspective of someone starting at square one. The problem with this mindset is that people who want to get IN to competitive do NOT know what they're doing, and the games themselves do little to help in this respect. Yes, they do more now than they ever have before, but it's still not much.

[@ZetaNiGHT]

@@jeez8939 The other alternative I wish they'd consider (and they won't... s'just how it is, what can you do) is getting rid of the concept of IVs entirely, and just giving Pokemon of the same species a standardized stat spread that is only changed by EVs and natures. Would simplify things a lot on the competitive side (probably to an extent that would piss people off, but not like they'll do this anyway), and more importantly, would drastically lower the barrier to entry for new players wanting to get into competitive.

[@GreyShadowUchiha]

i've been thinking about this a lot recently. theoretically, we just need a way to lower IVs for corner cases and then it really is all doable. that being said, it's doable but still no walk in the park with how much in game money you need. i like your solution with a separate game for battles a lot!

[@whisperingwooper1763]

I totally agree with having a separate battle game! Makes so much more sense because who wants to grind for natures, IVs, EVs, bottle caps or terra types?

[@flashbrad011]

I mean catching/raising the Pokémon is 90% of the game. Also only took me like 4 raids to change a Tera type and I got new additions to my dex.

[@astreagc1187]

Seeing the lack of polishing from Scarlet and Violet, I don’t think making a plataform aside the games and paying a subscription on top of that is the correct way right now. That only would increase the barrier of entry for competitive play and the quality would be something to be worried. Just see for example how PTCG Live is compared to other card games is, very very lackluster. I’m more of the idea that having more development time and making a game that really feels next gen and is sold as a whole package would be the more idea scenario. That includes leaving behind the era of releasing 2 versions of the same game with few differences between them. Having 2 versions on each release made sense back on the day, but as games become more expensive I believe a change on that regard is necessary.

[@JustaGr8GuyHere]

I DO like the idea of massive simulation game. It means there’s more adding to something than remaking/scrambling every generation.

[@benediktwindisch2778]

Luckally I just want to fill the Pokedex and hunt for shinies. I play since 1999 when I received Red and tried competitive Pokemon once on Showdown. And got completely crushed. Huge respect who play competitive succesfully. But they definitely should make it more accesable

[@Unholychaos987]

I like the idea of the battle sim. Have all the pokemon (across all gens or just the current gen) with their entire learnset available, assemble a team, choose the movesets, battle. No EV/IV stuff, everyone is on a level playing field, the one with the best battling and team building skills wins. Simple and accessible

[@aureliamastergoomba1278]

Pain Pokémon refuses to acknowledge you. You covered your editor’s face, I kind of respect that. 1:01 It’s only hard if you don’t know EV distributions, how to get good IVs with a knot, and other things. I’m not a pro at it, heck, the one “competitive” Pokémon I have is a Ceruledge that my FRIEND trained up!

[@juice787]

I got in to competitive Pokémon during lockdown but ever since life has been back to normal I don’t have much time to spend/ nor do I want to spend time catching new Pokémon’s getting Tera crystals and money for IVs just for that team to be trash and redo the process again A separate game like animated showdown with maybe small mini games would be great

[@Jlaps941]

One other thing I think is hard to get into competitive (VGC specifically since double battles are standard there) is that singles and doubles strategies are very different. Casual players are mostly familiar with singles since double battles are pretty rare in almost every game’s story, and don’t know how to do double battles efficiently. There’s a ton of stuff that makes doubles different and harder, like some Pokémon are terrible in singles but great in doubles, and vice versa. Also having to run moves like protect that aren’t as necessary in single battles, worrying about spread moves and shared weaknesses, etc.

[@LuigiTheMetal64]

Since Emerald until BDSP, Synchro is the best Ability to hunt for Pokémon with the Nature you want to save time and money. Mints only change the stat growth, having no affect in encountering wild Pokémon nor breeding Pokémon. Pickup is also great for hunting to level up Pokémon, while getting rare items like Point Ups and Mystery Candies to sell or use on your Pokémon.

[@dariussellers8489]

The problem with a seperate official simulator nowadays is that it undermines the modern Mainline games. Pre-switch era, this worked because of the jump in graphics and it being on a different console, but now with the 1 console system Nintendo has taken. I don't think you'll ever see a stadium-esque game again. Because then the issue becomes that you'll have this player base that solely plays that and isn't buying thier new game or DLC every year. I feel best solution with that in mind would be to make formats more akin to Magic the Gathering. In MTG we have Standard, which is the most recent sets in the last few years and legal cards rotate out after a time, and then we have eternal formats in which cards don't rotate out. In pokemon they could do a Standard(insert newest mainline game here) format and a National Dex(can use pokemon from all games) format.

[@stephvondames6369]

Happy to see your video again JPR.

[@StarsShatteredBeyond]

Wow omg I can’t believe you can’t get perfect endgame pokemon with everything optimised in my fxxking SINGLE PLAYER ADVENTURE RPG. “Omg You need to spend so much money to compete in the TCG, let me just print my own cards” Everytime GameFreak tries to appease the “make Pokemon like Showdown crowd” those people demand more 😅😅

[@christopherokagawa5499]

Jpr, could you please talk about how much money and traveling it takes to qualify for the world championships. I've always wanted to participate, but the amount of money to get to the competitions always deterred me from competing.

[@RagnorokKing]

Pokemon competitive training is about as accessible as it could be. Personally the only real problem left is the fact they just refuse to show ACTUAL numbers on IV's and EV's. Aside from that the last 2 games have made competitive prep so easy that I (someone who has played pokemon since Blue and NEVER touched even IV training) was able to try my hand at competitive. I think the biggest problem is that for a lot of people, hacking is too ingrained and they just don't want to try and adapt. And if we're being real I don't blame them, even a few generations ago competitive training was a nightmare that Pokemon Company just did not give a f@ck about trying to fix.

[@Clawnyan]

first thing but i love ur videos! gotta say tho, the moment i heard the idea of a stadium game that has every pokemon, my mind immediately thought of how shedinja would be broken due to tera-electric + air balloon lol

[@wyattdupre2721]

It feels like the main game and competitive are too seperate because of the hoops you have to go through to make metta team. I really wish they made makeing a team more part of the game, make it more of a minigame to bread better pokemon with the proper ivs and egg moves

[@randomprotag9329]

It be better to separate them since they are too different to properly mix with out each one getting in the way of the other.

[@munchrai6396]

Bringing back something like Super Training in a more efficient form would be great for EV transparency. If it also gave you extra cash to spend on Mints and Bottle Caps that would be incredibly helpful.

[@Sol_Calibre]

Regarding 8:20. Honestly, most if not all competitive players are aware of hacking Pokémon not be advised as you can be disqualified. I've known since gen 5 so i highly doubt anyone is unaware. They just want to ignore the rules until it affects them personally.

[@sla7889]

Aside from Tera share grinding and maybe ability patches I feel it is pretty ok The major problem is the amount of pokemon that you have to pay more to have (such as urshifus because it is in another game and a dlc) Rental teams surely help, but still aren’t enough, it just makes way harder for people (myself included) to build teams as they want

[@ricardofernandes9207]

One BIG aspect, is that without 3rd Party programs like Showdown it would be impossible to test every single possible Pokémon, specially now with Tera Shards you would have to spend 24/7 farming raids just to be able to change Tera Types at will.

[@dekumidoriya2928]

Frankly with how long they took just to update the Home to be compatible with SV, adding a battle simulator that would update to the new game would be impossible, considering GF is having enough struggle to give a home compatibility on the same day the game is out, adding a new plateform specific to the competitive side instead of having it included in the game would be another thing that would make the games less good at shipping, since a wider time for development is apparently out of the question for TPC

[@tktyga77]

I fully agree with the idea of a cross gen battling format, especially a kind able to be connected to Pokémon Home, but I also feel that minigames can also give a different kind of gaming experience that many miss about the 3D battling games such as Stadium (both ones) & Stadium GS. I mean it sounds to be really boring for both the players & the Pokémon in storage to be in such all the time with nothing to do & can't be transferred over to other titles (not even just core ones either, but side ones) for other interaction kinds. These can relate to competitive play since accessibility can be found in other forms as well as having a chance of finding otherwise inaccessible bonuses which can make it more fun

[@typlosionattack8595]

For your sweater analogy, I think pre Gen 7-9 you had to sow it by hand, but now you still have to make it yourself, and instead you have a sowing machine. There's a huge barrier still. I have 100+ hours and have only been able to change three Pokemon tera types. And I've yet to see an ability patch. My Cinderace had hers reset by the Home glitch... New Pokemon showdown would be awesome. And a Pokemon Home spinoff Pokemon Battle could work too. But to be fair, you can rent Pokemon in the newer games.

[@aceofaces0007]

The football comparison is such a bad take. Jerseys are just cosmetic and have zero impact on one's ability to play. To go in the opposite direction, that's like saying trainers need to have shiny Pokemon to compete in tournaments, and thus must put in the arduous effort of getting a full team of shinies to compete. Simply put, there is little excuse for using hacked mons. Labeling anti-cheating as "pay to win" is such a bad take when everyone has to pay for the games to get these Pokemon. What may be a better conversation is how narrow the competitive meta is to the point where trainers feel compelled to use a very short list of Pokemon and essentially build the same teams as everyone else to be competitive. That's where you start getting into the realm of inaccessibility because trainers looking to compete must seek out hard to obtain Pokemon, or Pokemon from past games, in order to not be at some sort of disadvantage. Such is the power creep that exists in Pokemon where trainers feel compelled to revisit old games to bring in Landorus and Urshifu. The true disconnect between how one plays the mainline games vs competitive Pokemon is that the teams we build for the games, while strong against the opponents in the main game, are deemed not viable for competitive formats. The Pokemon that you grew to love over the course of playing the game are immediately shelved as a result of the meta. If you reduce how much the meta dictates competitive battling, that's when you see the format become truly accessible, and trainers competing in tournaments with their true partner Pokemon.

[@Cynsham]

Competitive pokemon has ALWAYS been completely inaccessible to casual players. Even with all of the improvements they’ve made, it all just adds up to a bunch of bandaids slapped on the massive wound that competitive battling has always been. You still need multiple games, often multiple consoles, and obtaining/training the pokes still takes dozens if not hundreds of hours if you’re trying to create more than 1 viable team.

[@kawaiidere1023]

I think it’d be fine to use the current system with a couple changes. If EVs/IVs were easily customizable (think hyper training, but being able to reduce or lower stats) or if there was a “modification simulator option” (still using the same Pokémon species, but being able to change the item, sex, IVs, EVs, moveset, nature, gimmick variable, etc). I’d imagine the modification simulator would be contextualized as a battle simulator to allow Pokémon to fight more optimized, maybe also changing to a special ball (maybe called a Training Ball, Simulation Ball, League Ball, etc), and maybe removing shininess. It would still be “battling with YOUR Pokémon,” but without needing to roll rng. If training effort was needed, using credits (Watts/LP/BP/etc), exp, items, or some other form of resource (steps, time, or various process advance) could fill in for it

[@cyndawu1940]

Getting good ivs and nature on Legendary Pokemon is the biggest waste of time on earth. Its also the most unfun way to grind.

[@rrigo45]

Wow. I’ve never thought about this. Great idea!

[@ItsTheLegendOfZelda]

Vitamins should cost 1,000 pokedollars and IVs should be reworked to be easier to change

[@ccyamato]

I'm definitely on the "anti hack" side but I also assumed that these checks would have been done well before the nationals. Go figure. Honestly I figured it was obvious that you should never bring genn'd pokemon to an event, and I'm just paranoid and would never run a pokemon I didn't catch or breed myself specifically for this reason. I have to throw away enough wonder trade pokemon as it is. That said you and I have the same solution, it's time for another Battle Revolution game, and I like the idea of a subscription service model for it. It actually makes sense in this particular case.

[@LuDogg805]

To me, GameFreak should have a tutor that erases IVs and EV's... like negative hypertraining. This way you always have ways to reset a Pokemon as you carry it on to game to game... but honestly I think the real issue at hand is WHY THE F*** IS DEXIT A THING! We should always have all Pokemon available in every game, even if it's post game. I wan'na catch a new Mewtwo every game...

[@bradensmith8682]

Hyper Training being lowered to Lv. 50, Bottle Caps and Mints being purchasable and relatively cheap, and ev trading being easy, if not as easy as Gen 6, it's never been easier. And I had no Idea that mirror herb could give Pokemon egg moves. So even more accessible.

[@StickMaster500]

I can defintely imagine that with the DLC, they'll be things like Rusted Bottle Caps and Tera Raid Adventures so it becomes more accessible since they'll already be items to increase and reset your stats in the Teal Mask.

[@sawkchalk6966]

It does suck that reset mochi is pay wall blocked

[@TheFloodFourm]

Off course, thats how you sell to that portion of the fan base

[@essessLP]

​@@sawkchalk6966use the berrys instead? Its not like its impossible to reset evs?

[@UltraBall23]

@@essessLPpeople would know this if they actually played the games, lol

[@JuanLeon-oe6xe]

​@@essessLP Berries reduce EVs, what OP meant wants is the stuff to change *I*Vs and the tera type.

[@boxkid759]

The reason the hack checks were more frequent and harsher is because it was in Japan. And the takes they have on that and punishments are way higher and more sever.

[@dood3530]

I'm completely behind the idea of a dedicated battle simulation game. There's always going to be a huge disconnect between the RPG experience and the competitive experience, so they might as well officially acknowledge it and make them into their own separate things.

[@DanielisAwesome52]

Their sheer value as a company blinds too many people (mostly the people in charge) to how chaotic and unorganized all of the Pokemon Company truly is. I think you are totally right in that each Generation should have one Meta Stadium style game. I think the existence of Showdown proves that would be viable. I know to a Company a game like that is scary because they just want profits on top of more profits, but its still the best idea. They'd probably charge by month rather than one small fee for a year as well. With Microtransactions for access to Shinies, Mythicals, etc. A Stadium game would also remove the need to import every Pokemon Model, rebalance every movelist, and all the other work they complain about every game. They'd be free to do more experimental and fun (and quality) games, things like Let's Go and Legends. They'd be able to do smaller more directed games and ideas without having to worry about how to breed/train every Pokemon, how to make every evolution method available or how to give players all the hold items. I'm sure the tedious task of placing TMs and Mega Stones in every corner of a game lead to a lot of the work hours in the mainline games.

[@ubercow6611]

4:01 Why was Urshifu horizontally mirrored for a split second?

[@viperneongaming4314]

4:36 i will never unsee Bombaclot and Bass2mouth

[@patrickmohr6985]

Good suggestions, I hope TPC hears them

[@realagentpenn2376]

I agree with the only being 1 game with all mons available but to add a little flare, why not make it like pokken tournament and just have the 4 moves be attached to a, b, x, and y while moving, jumping, diving and such be the other buttons so the fights could be like the anime. Just my thoughts I did kinda like pokken but loved the main games.

[@tuvyamaeir4684]

Inaccessible is one thing. Fun is another. I had a lot of fun teambuilding in Alola what with Poke Pelago. Isle Aplenny and Isle Aphun helped a ton. In games since then EVs alone are NOT fun to manage, even if IVs and such are easier. And if it's not FUN to build a team, then why bother? Edit: I do really prefer the modern aspects of breeding and such...though not the picnic basket...but after that it's oh, grind for these berries to lower an EV that grew by mistake and grind for these nuggets to buy vitamins. Grinding for something that is customizable but again, not fun to do. And all before we start playing.

[@DataDrain02]

You know. To add to your solution game.... How about it be an addon for Home? So, you can "rent" Pokemon (which you just make like on Showdown). But, it could also let you use Pokemon you caught/bred yourself. It would have both a online mode, and a local multiplayer by connecting to a nearby phone or whatever. Kinda a best of both worlds situation. People who just want to battle... well, battle. And those who have sentimental value for their bred/caught Pokemon can still play.

[@tiredclemont]

I would really love that battle simulator idea, competitive has become even more p2w now and it would properly level the playing field.

[@SnugNap]

Also you CAN just jump into ladder. Its called rental teams every point youve made has an answer

[@nix207]

This might be the first video ive watched with a proposed solution to the disconnect between casual and competitive Pokemon. Id love to see a new battle simulator.

[@Trixie_Lavender]

Speaking as a judge, we only judge a few people each round, usually the first to finish their matches. We prioritize the players doing well for obvious reasons. Everyone who makes top cut will be checked, even if they were already checked. It's impossible to check everyone early on, as much as we'd like to. If you bring a team that won't pass, that's on you. You will not do well and not get checked

[@joaoaugusto7049]

If I had known this would happen, I would have farmed at least 5 kubfu to give to those worlds classified players, from a new save spending 1 hour and 20 minutes i can have a kubfu in my pokemon home, the incarnate forces are easy to catch on dynamax adventuries too but it takes more time.

[@pokeperson1000]

Mentioning his Battle Revolution video just made me think of " _Torched_ by Flare Blitz"

[@ajr_7828]

Not gonna lie your idea about a side Pokémon battle game is super cool

[@AlphaladZXA]

They should just separate the competitive multiplayer from mainline games into an app like pokemon home. Then you can get a more focused, less time constrained, better balanced singleplayer cause multiplayer is offloaded to an app that is a once per console thing that sticks around and is updated with everything and really lets you customize with no restrictions.

[@CaptainObliviousV]

My only issue with a battle sim is that it would likely either kill competitive in the main games or they’d cannibalize each other and both would see low usage due to the divide. Plus, just being able to have every Pokémon immediately available at your finger tips kind of makes catching and raising Pokémon in a competitive sense in the main games redundant unless your doing a nuzlocke or something. Maybe they could have the simulator tied to Home and so long as you have registered that Pokémon in Home’s Dex you can use it in the simulator, with the ability to copy over the data of a particular Pokémon you raised in the main games. The only barrier you’d have to cross at that point would simply be trading Pokémon around on the GTS or Surprise Trade, and while yeah that’d have its own frustrations (*cough* Furfrou stocks *cough*), it’d still be far cheaper than needing to own all the games.

[@michaelryan1767]

You're totally right, there is too much of a barrier to entry to competitive Pokémon. There's also too much of a barrier to entry with competitive swimming, I think I should be allowed to save valuable time working out by taking anabolic steroids.

[@armorbearer9702]

Maybe it is best two have two tournaments. Official Pokémon tournaments can focus on raising a Pokémon team. Unofficial fan made leagues can focus on pure combat.

[@kenw.1520]

My solution has been the same since Generation 6. We need a new Pokemon game that's dedicated to just competitive Pokemon Battling. I.E. Pokemon Stadium 3 that's a legal version of showdown. It would solve the issue of the National Dex and the raising of competitive Pokemon all in once. They could do rule sets, tournament rules, balance patches, banlist and more. Pretty much what you said at the end of the video. But I've been vocally vouching for such a game since Gen 6 and ESPECIALLY since "Dexit". Oh and if GameFreak still wants us to "breed" our Pokemon from the main/past games... just give this hypothetical game Pokemon HOME support. That would allow us to take Pokemon from almost ANY game and turn it into a competitive one.

[@No__direction__]

The whole math part automatically disqualifies me 😅 I have no idea how the h*ll people manage to calculate stats and moves so well. I’ll stick to casual

[@hibikuokudan]

The fact that IVs and EVs are still hidden in the main games is, in my opinion, a real problem for competitive accessibility. Previously, it's been impossible to see the IVs and the check methods requiring items to change stats and count each Time is a hassle, and in SunMoon i think seeing them was a post game reward after hatching a certain number of eggs. Sure, now we can see the stats in Home, but transferring your Pokemon in and out of the game to check IVs and EVs is really annoying, especially after SunMoon showed us that GAMEFREAK CAN SHOW US IVS IN GAME Making IVs and EVs visible would make it easier to get into competitive breeding and training for many casual players

[@shisuiedits]

Would be cool if you didn't have to bring anything and they just genned mons for you. They would give you something like pokemon showdowns team builder. Then you send them the team and they send the mons. Also makes sure no mons are illegal.

[@cannabishornliu6119]

Pokémon Showdown is nowadays the best way to experience Pokémon battles

[@KiLLKiNDLY]

Has been for a long time

[@randomprotag9329]

that shows how badly its been handled. showdown is not hard to create. showdown even handles disconects better as well.

[@Mr777conrad]

Why even make the competitors own the games? Or a switch for that matter! Why even make the competitors know how to battle optimally? If player A knows these strategies its only fair for player B to know them as well. Why even let the competitors know they're competing? Heck!! Why even let the competitors know what Pokémon is? They shouldn't have to know what a man monkey is to know how to fight with it.

[@bennconner1195]

Pokémon is about being a Pokémon trainer. This is clearly what the developers intended and the rules reflect this fact. That said the Pokémon company has created this problem by not enforcing the rules properly most of the time, giving players that weren’t following the rules a sense of entitlement.

[@DJPrimeAmvs]

It's more like a crippling drug addiction than a sense of entitlement.

[@jamonero]

I think we need a "Pokémon battle simulator" like collosseum / stadium that helps to play competitive. Can have a teambuilder OR some kinda source to train EV/IV, reset training easily. But... if you have money to travel, you have money to buy a pokémon game. If not, you can also have friends to help with another version pokémon. You can easy do the team in the flight time or in hotel.

[@munchrai6396]

You mentioned this very briefly in your video, but I think the availability issues we're seeing in gen 9 is a direct result of the connectivity changes introduced between gens 8-9 that caused the loss of transferable moves in exchange for two-transfer between gens. Pokemon is using this new transfer system as justification for allowing foreign Pokemon into the competitive scene without proper reintroduction methods that we've been seeing from the previous system over the past 3 gens. Gens 6-8 all had modes where you could get a plethora of legendary Pokemon with relative ease in order to update them to the current gen's mark, a system that is far more friendly to introductory player. Honestly I'm very against removing grinding from the game in its entirety, I just think the money grind needs to be more engaging and filled with more interesting gameplay like the star tournament we had in SwSh filled with a ton of great dialogue and interesting interactions that you'd never seen anywhere else unless you spent the time grinding with the different partners

[@gooooood3344]

literally if they just explained how competitive worked in-game (that and breeding are the only tutorials actually needed) it would eliminate the knowledge gap

[@IPS-bk2wr]

Yeah, it feels a bit too complicated (but I guess that’s the point). I would love to use my favorite Pokémon that aren’t viable. It’d be cool if there was an official format where all Pokémon had roughly the same stats or something in competitive; much like the anime

[@flashbrad011]

I don't think they have close to the same stats in the anime. Like I love Chimecho and it's my all time favorite but in no universe is it going to stand up to someone like Cynthia even maxed out. The only way she'll survive is to he completely overleveled. There's just no equal footing no matter how you spin it. The thing with the anime is that unlike the games they aren't limited in movements. Example being Ash having Pikachu climb up something like Stone Edge or using the debris to get a higher ground.

[@James58Rams]

I think it makes sense for competitive that you be good at Pokémon as a prerequisite. Having to be good at different aspects of the game is a differentiator between the tcg and vcg. Maybe it’s not the game for you.

[@Jondoe_04]

The problem with that idea is it would take away from people breeding in the game. Which Nintendo wants you to be in. Nintendo wants you to trade your failed pokemon because it gives the core of a competitive pokemon to someone else who can make it work. I think the simplest solution is to allow us to alter the IV's of legendary pokemon and allow us to drop IV with something like a chipped or rusty bottle cap.

[@bongkey2210]

I've been trying to get ability patches for months, but they've either been taken out of the raid den prize pools, or I'm just extremely unlucky. Make fixing mons easier, and people won't have to cheat to win.

[@MEPlaysGames]

Solid video man, it’s nice to see both sides of the argument from someone who actually knows what they’re talking about, unlike half the discourse on Twitter. And yeah I agree with most of the points you make as well, I’m not a fan of the hack checks but Game Freak has every right to enforce their rules. I can’t blame anyone for genning Pokemon one bit, but I do appreciate that Game Freak is taking steps to make that easier. The progress on that front has been pretty slow but hey, it’s progress nonetheless

[@1Henrink]

To get a VGC good team is pay to win. Since you NEED more games to be able to have other pokemon.