As of now, there are still 60 Pokemon absent from Gen 8, with Pokemon Legends: Arceus including three that were previously unavailable on modern consoles - the entire Oshawott evolution line. Among the missing pocket monsters, some that may be more painful than others to reintroduce are Deerling and Sawsbuck given their unique seasonal forms. Unlike other missing Pokemon such as Vivillon and Minior, Deerling and Sawsbuck have forms that strictly depend on seasons, and there are more technical reasons why this wouldn’t work as well going forward.
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How Deerling and Sawsbuck’s Unique Forms Could Find a Way Into Gen 9
The problem is that Gen 5 had a season-based mechanic that allowed players to get all four forms of these Deerling forms: winter, spring, summer, and autumn. However, it may be trickier to achieve on the Switch because of how easily players can change the date and time on their consoles to affect their games, which is something that Gen 8 saw often due to changing monster availabilities in the Wild Areas and Max Raid battles.
The impact of changing the date and time on Pokemon Sword and Shield was significant enough that it was used to specifically hunt the best Pokemon, or complete some time-gated encounters. This was especially abused with Max Raid battles, in which players could change the critters available to guarantee special Gigantamax encounters despite these being meant as a rare occurrence. The games after Sword and Shield ended up having some form of protection for this feature, which is likely that Pokemon Scarlet and Violet will inherit to avoid further issues.
For example, Pokemon Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl had a feature that imposed a penalty on changing the time and date, which confused players who were trying to get Drifloon before the post-game portion of the remakes. With Gen 9 being fully open-world, it could be even trickier to get the forms to appear on a seasonal cycle, as the impact of this system could be massive when there are no loading screens in between areas. Instead, it’s more likely that Pokemon Scarlet and Violet will have a specially-tailored climate in various areas.
A great way to allow for the return of Deerling and Sawsbuck’s seasonal forms would be to include a couple of them in the base game and others in expansions, placing each form in an adequate climate for its associated season. This would make sure that the base game still includes a way to get at least one, with the others being available for collectors further down the line. That, or Game Freak could simply add them all to the base game if appropriate. Overall, this would be a good solution for Pokemon Scarlet and Violet to not be overly complicated, while still allowing players to catch these unique critters and their seasonal forms.
Pokemon Scarlet and Violet release for Nintendo Switch on November 18, 2022.
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