Pokémon Legends: Arceus is the newest Pokémon game on the block. We don’t know much about it yet, but an early trailer for the game has revealed a gorgeous, open world adventure showing off the Sinnoh region in ways we’ve never seen before.
While games like Sword and Shield gave players their first taste of a semi-open world adventure, Arceus is doubling down on what an open world can be for Pokémon. Taking cues from Breath of the Wild, the game looks like a gorgeous and intriguing journey set to expand on the lore and world of the franchise.
Here’s everything we’d love to see explored in Pokémon Legends: Arceus when it’s released in 2022.
Diverse biomes
The first trailer for Arceus showed off a bunch of beautiful, sunlit fields — and not much beyond them. While we saw grassy terrains, flower-covered fields and mountains, there wasn’t a whole lot of biodiversity on show. Given the trailer was an early preview, this makes sense. But we’d love to see more biomes and locations in the game soon.
Pokémon are found all over the game’s world in rivers and volcanoes, and swampy marshes and valleys. This biodiversity should stand out as you’re travelling around Sinnoh and hunting down every Pokémon native to the region.
Give us red hot lava canyons, coral-filled seas and misty, cloud-filled mountains.
A hearty catching mechanic
The catching mechanic in Arceus was shown off in the first trailer, but few details were given about how it would work.
On the surface, it appears to be a simple aim and fire mechanic where players can catch wild Pokémon with good aim. But we’ve love to see this mechanic explored more fully, with traps and techniques implemented for the ‘perfect’ catch.
Something like Horizon Zero Dawn would be fantastic, where players are required to analyse their target Pokémon, discover what they like or what their weakness is, and exploit them to catch them more easily.
Berries would work great for this functionality, as would items like tripwires or box-type traps. This would add a layer of depth to the game and strengthen the catching mechanic in new and exciting ways.
More ancient Pokémon lore
Pokémon lore is scattered throughout the franchise, and teased in various in-game books, artworks, TV episodes and films — but it’s very rare to see the games explore Pokémon history in depth. The lore behind the story is absolutely fascinating, and we’d love to see more about how the Pokémon world came to be and what part Arceus has to play in the creation of the Pokédex.
Given this is one of the first ‘historical’ Pokémon games (alongside the Pokémon Conquest DS spin-off), it’s likely we’ll get to see more lore and ancient stories than we’ve ever seen before.
Bring it on.
A complete Pokédex to fill out
It’s likely one of the major talking points for Arceus will be the in-game Pokédex.
The National Dex for Sword and Shield, which limited the range of Pokémon available in-game, was a major talking point for Sword and Shield.
Given the plot of Arceus seems to revolve around building out the world’s first Pokédex, it feels safe to assume the game will include a lot more Pokémon than appeared in Sword and Shield. Given it’s a game all about catching Pokémon, hopefully the game’s Pokédex will be absolute ginormous, and keep players collecting for months on end.
We’ll just have to wait and see how hearty the Dex really is.
Multiplayer Pokémon adventures
Comparisons between Breath of the Wild and Arceus have already been made, but one thing the game could improve on that BOTW lacked is multiplayer functionality.
Travelling in the wide open world of Hyrule was often lonely, but if Arceus includes some form of multiplayer like the Sword/Shield ‘Wild Area’ you could have friends to take with you on your adventures in Sinnoh.
Online multiplayer trainer battles would be excellent, as would Pokémon-hunting tourneys where players compete to catch the most Pokémon in a set amount of time.
Multiplayer isn’t strictly necessary for the Arceus experience to succeed (and it does appear to be a single-player game for now) but including multiplayer as an additional bonus could open up the game’s world and let players enjoy deeper adventures.
The addition of more NPCs in the world would also solve this minor issue and create a world that feels less ’empty’.
What do you want to see in Pokémon Legends: Arceus? Tell us about it in the comments below.
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