Nintendo and The Pokemon Company hosted the August 2021 Pokemon Presents yesterday and showcased quite a few new details concerningPokemon Brilliant Diamond,Shining Pearl, andPokemon Legends: Arceus. While the event revealed plenty to look forward to regarding all three games, the most interesting tidbits belong toLegends: Arceus. UnlikeArceus' announcement trailer, theAugust 2021 Pokemon Presentsgave players a very good idea of what to expect from the game, including new lore regarding the Sinnoh — or “Hisui” — region.
This is important becausePokemon Brilliant DiamondandShining Pearluse Sinnoh as their setting, andPokemon Legends: Arceustakes place long before the events of both games, so any changes and additions that the title decides to make to Sinnoh should affect the two remakes. After all, nothing suggests thatPokemon Legends: Arceusisn’t canon toPokemonlore. In fact, the degree of some of the additions that the Pokemon Presents showcase revealed aboutLegends: Arceusaffect thePokemonfranchise as a whole, not just Sinnoh.
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Sinnoh Region Pokemon Variants
The August 2021 Pokemon Presents announced thatArceuswould introduce new Pokemon evolutions and variationsonly native to the Sinnoh region — or at least native to the Hisui region, which is just Sinnoh before it became civilized. This reveal basically told fans why they should be excited forPokemon Legends: Arceus: they’ll get to experience new additions to thePokemonfranchise that are on the same level as core-series games. The only problem with this is that the showcase didn’t say whether these same Pokemon would appear inBrilliant DiamondandShining Pearl.
It seems like common sense that they would, since all three games take place in the same region and play around with canon content. However,Pokemon Brilliant DiamondandShining Pearlcome outbeforePokemon Legends: Arceus. If the remakes featured all of the new Pokemon thatLegendsplans to introduce, the game would lose a lot of its luster. Thus, it’s unclear ifBrilliant DiamondandShining Pearlwill contain any of the new Pokemon — even though each game should for the sake of continuity. It would be a wasted opportunity for them not to, considering again, all the games take place in the same region.
Of course, there are excuses the games could use as to why certain Pokemon don’t appear inBrilliant DiamondandShining Pearl, but to do this for every new Pokemon would be wasteful. For example, Stantler apparently only evolved into Wrydeer due to the harsh living conditions of the Hisui region, harsh conditions Sinnoh probably can’t replicate due to being domesticated. This would be a good explanation for why Wrydeer don’t appear inBrilliant DiamondandShining Pearlif the games neglect to useLegends: ArceusPokemon, but to use this excuse for every other new Pokemon, likeBasculegion— who can come about outside of Hisui — just seems forced.
Outside of DLC, there is one way Nintendo can avoid spoilingPokemon Legends: Arceuswhile allowingBrilliant DiamondandShining Pearlto use the game’s Pokemon. The publisher could make it so thatBrilliant DiamondandShining Pearlonly featurePokemon that it plans to reveal beforeArceuslaunches. In other words, Pokemon like Wrydeer, Basculegion, and Hisui Growlithe would appear inBrilliant DiamondandShining Pearl, but Hisui Growlithe’s evolution, Hisui Arcanine, wouldn’t appear unless Nintendo plans to reveal its design beforeArceuslaunches.
These Pokemon can appear in an updated version ofBrilliant DiamondandShining Pearl’s Safari Zone, in an area that preserved a piece of Hisui before it became Sinnoh. If not that, then thenew and improved Grand Undergroundwould make a good place for them. Players could obtain special statues that open areas where they appear. Either of these areas works if making the Pokemon findable in the wild makes them seem too common. The point is to simply make it so thatBrilliant Diamond, andShining Pearlacknowledge their existence in an interactive way.
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Galaxy Expedition Team
The Galaxy Expedition Team is a collective of people from different regions who aim to map out the unexplored areas of the Pokemon world. When compared tobrand new Sinnoh Pokemon, the team is a much more subtle addition toPokemonlore, but an important one nonetheless, especially when it comes toPokemon Brilliant DiamondandShining Pearl. The organization shares way too many things in common with the remakes' villainous group, Team Galactic, for it to be a coincidence. The details concerning the organization’s connections aren’t subtle.
Beyond the fact that the pair uses the same naming scheme as well as the same letter fonts and colors for their logo, they also have leaders who share distinctive features. Galaxy Expedition Survey Core Leader Cyllene and Team Galactic Leader Cyrus both have blue hair and no eyebrows; they even share the same scowl. How the two are related remains a mystery, but it wouldn’t be hard to believe that Cyllene is Cyrus' ancestor. They even share the “Cy” in their name if it weren’t obvious enough.
With this in mind, it’s almost a guarantee that the Galaxy Expedition Team has something to do with team Galactic’s creation, and if so,Pokemon Brilliant DiamondandShining Pearlshould capitalize on that. It would be interesting to see the two remakes play around a bit with the new lore, andNintendocan even use the connection to set up twists and red-herrings inLegends: Arceus. The game should revolve around some kind of central conflict, so usingBrilliant Diamondand Shining Pearl to set up the story should be possible.
Nintendo hasn’t touched onArceus' plot too much, but it’s hard to imagine that it went out of its way to develop anew battle system and an open-world solelyto have players run around and complete a Pokedex that doesn’t even scratch the surface of the Pokemon roster. And if the game does have a grand story to tell, the Galaxy Expedition Team is the only place a villainous power can spawn from, at least according to public information currently available at the time of this writing.
Pokemon Brilliant DiamondandShining Pearlrelease on November 19 for the Nintendo Switch.
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