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Modern video games can be so perceptibly realistic – grass rippling in a gentle breeze, non-player characters going about their daily routines, faces and gestures that look so close to those of real humans – that they’ve started to call to mind Plato’s old chin-stroker about the cave (reimagined in 1999’s trench coat-flapping classic The Matrix.) What if we are all trapped inside a shockingly realistic illusion? Would we really know if we were inside a video game? If you’re looking for reassurance that we haven’t yet reached the singularity, boot up the ropey Pokémon Scarlet and Violet.
In this second Pokémon outing of the year, developer Game Freak abandons February’s Legends: Arceus’s intriguing feudal-era setting, but otherwise picks up where it left off. It aims to take the series’ expansive-yet-enclosed-environments to the next logical level: a seamless open world, where you can go where you want, catching and battling creatures as you travel. But Scarlet and Violet buckles violently under the weight of that ambition.
Initially, it all feels promising. We are thrown immediately into a shiny-looking character creator, and the slick presentation is a world away from the Pokémon of yore. After selecting a fresh haircut and slowly tweaking my avatar’s bulbous anime eyes, the screen shifts to reveal a filled-out school application form. This refreshingly modern prologue segues into a cut-scene, sweeping across the Paldea region’s sprawling plains and introducing the Uva Academy – a Hogwarts-esque boarding school for budding Pokémon trainers.
But on setting foot outside your house – the classic first step on all Pokémon adventures – the wheels fall off. Much like Arceus, Scarlet and Violet are games that dream big, but are beaten down by reality. It’s not hyperbole to say that Scarlet/Violet is one of the worst-looking – and running – games I’ve ever played.
