#the max level I've played my music on purpose is 4!!

[doubleddenden]

So I beat the main story of Isle of Armor. A bit shorter than I'd like it, about 9 to 10 hours roughly, maybe 11. A lot of was me getting lost, me exploring, and me grinding or doing the (maybe?) Improved max raids.

That being said, it's not the worst. I predicted a terrible 2 hour run. I suppose if you were a speed runner, already knew where everything was, didn't want to explore, and was either high enough level or had better strategy than I did then sure, maybe 5 or 7 hours.

For what I got though, considering this is part 1 of 2 dlc's that are together worth $30... for now, I'd say I was maybe robbed $5 if we're going by a $15 per dlc judging. Better than being robbed $30 by the bland normal game, imo. Still feel a little robbed, but I was expecting a lot worse.

That being said I did hope for a bit more. Maybe more Klara stuff, maybe less Hop, maybe a bigger story or more struggle instead of just WOW YOU'RE SO GREAT :000. Of course I also said it in my first impressions, but I did expect better team balancing and not unevolved level 60 something trainer battles. Maybe more stuff to do besides raids, the dojo and that one tower.

But I'll be real, I'm feeling a bit lenient due to the virus. Even though Isle of Armor WAS IN DEVELOPMENT AT THE SAME TIME AS SWSH AND THUS WAS PURPOSELY LEFT OUT TO SELL DLC (that's a rant by itself), I'm still feeling lenient because we all know Game Freak and Nintendo probably were making Tani and his team work from home or be forced into their office spaces. Not to mention there was a quarantine period where people were told not to leave their homes.

Still, I do feel like this was meant to be played with the main story in increments. I definitely feel some of it should have just been included with the base game.

But. Again. Feeling lenient. What really brought me around was whatever they did to make offline Max Raid battle AI less... well, stupid. And the final fight with Mustard. And Klara who I still hold to be better than Hop.

I've been complaining, but overall for his first directing gig (I believe in general, let alone pokemon), Tani did pretty decent. Tbh he was kind of given a pile of unfinished popsicle sticks and glue and told to have fun while Ohmori and Masuda took a twitter break or another vacation for all we know, and he did better with the materials than Ohmori did. The island is a better wild area than the damn Wild Area itself, it feels populated and alive and not empty or soulless, there's a decent variety of returning pokemon and there's better use of color and texturing, not to mention the free camera everywhere outside the dojo and tower and the ability to let your pokemon stroll with you. The new animations are actually half decent (although there's still some shitty ones), the character designs and characters are appealing, the music is fun enough, and Tani managed to give us the ability to turn our precious pokemon we already owned into Gmax pokemon. Not to mention the extra pokemon brought back after Masuda was like "mmmm lemme think about it. *taps mic* No."

My faith in Masuda waned after he removed Battle Frontier because of smart phones. My faith in Ohmori waned after just the general lack of polish SwSh has. My faith in both fell apart after the needless dex cuts that weren't warranted at all (proven by fans and by the dlc).

But Tani, given what was already there and CONSIDERING there was/still is a pandemic during development time, considering this was his first time directing anything pokemon related, and undoubtedly the mess that Masuda and Ohmori left for him to clean up while they went about their business (hopefully not touching gen 4 remakes or gen 9)...

Tani did good. Not perfect, but good enough. I respect his direction abilities (plus he apparently used to work for CC2 which is really cool and useful for Pokemon) and what he gave us.

I've been pretty harsh on TPC and GF for their shady business practices and the overall lack of care that went into SwSh... but. Dare I say I look forward to Crown Tundra? I think so. If nothing else, I look forward to exploring the new map and hope it's just as big if not bigger than Isle of Armor. Again, I'll probably be lenient due to the virus and whatever other crisis 2020 decides to throw out.

Bring it on, Tani!

So my rating:

Swsh base game: 6.9/10 (as comparison)

Isle of Armor: 7.5/10

Now if we could just get the starters back :) I miss my Typhlosion and Samurott something bad.

#pokemon #Isle of armor #den reviews stuff #swsh #sword and shield