POKEMON SCARLET AND VIOLET

Switch

The beloved franchise’s big 25th anniversary may have been last year, but Pokemon shows no sign of stopping its celebrations. As if this year’s open-world spin-off Arceus wasn’t enough, Game Freak is treating us to a new game at the end of 2022 that marks the beginning of a new generation of those adorable critters.

Or should we say ‘new games’? As per tradition, a new generation consists of two titles, in this case Scarlet and Violet, with some creatures being exclusive to one version of the game and vice-versa in order to encourage players to trade with each other in the quest to catch ’em all. Anyway, everyone will have the same starters to choose from, with grass cat Sprigatito, laid-back fire croc Fuecoco and water duckling Quaxly forcing fans to pick a side.

But the biggest news is that this is finally a mainline Pokemon game going fully open-world – a large, living, breathing world in a new region that looks to be inspired by parts of Europe (meaning Italy and Spain, not Dewsbury).

Given some of the criticism of Arceus, we can but hope that the Switch’s power will be enough to realise Game Freak’s ambition here.