Pokemon Direct - Pokemon Sword and Shield Expansion Pass and Rescue Team DX announced



Welcome to the Pokemon Direct. Are you excited to see what Nintendo and Game Freak have in store for the future of Pokemon? Let's find out what's planned for announcement in this new Nintendo Direct.

The first announcement is a remake of the original Pokemon Mystery Dungeon games from the GBA and DS, now in 3D. It's called Rescue Team DX. It'll release on March 6, 2020, and will come with a demo available after the Direct.

An expansion pass has been revealed for Pokemon Sword and Shield. This will allow for new adventures, at a cost, in the latest Pokemon games. Instead of saving this content for an updated re-release, the expansion pass will feature the re-addition of many older Pokemon, new costumes, brand new Pokemon, areas, and Gigantamax forms. This content will be split into two pieces: The Isle of Armor, due June 2020, and The Crown Tundra, due Fall 2020. There will be new places within these content packs, and they'll have unique differences between the Sword and Shield versions of the expansion, which are sold separately.

The Isle of Armor focuses on growth, where you'll allowed to challenge a new Pokemon Dojo. Kubfu is a new Pokemon, with its evolution, Urshifu. It has two different styles; it's either fighting/dark or fighting/water. The final evolutions of the starters will get Gigantamax forms, too.

Meanwhile, The Crown Tundra is about exploration. Calyrex is a new legendary Pokemon. There's new Pokemon Dens and older legendaries you can catch underground. There's also new unrevealed battle challenges to take on. More wild areas will be added.

Over 200 older Pokemon will be added back to the game in these expansion updates. Those who don't wish to buy the expansion pass will still be able to get the newly announced Pokemon via link trades, in a free update that'll be coming.

Pokemon Home is launching next month, but no other news is scheduled for it right now.

Galarian Slowpoke and certain Gigantamax forms will be more common, such as Lapras, in an update later today.

Pokemon Sword and Shield's Expansion Pass will each cost $29.99 per game for the Isle of Armor and The Crown Tundra separately. You can pre-order them now.

If you own both games, you'll need to buy the Expansion Pass for both Sword and Shield seperately. Each game's DLC is $29.99, meaning if you play Sword, and buy its respective Expansion, it'll cost $29.99 to play the Isle of Armor and The Crown Tundra.
 
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@Chary I read that as each area is $30 each, but I've been corrected on discord that it's $30 for both per game. Could you update the article for better clarity?
 

Arras

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I like the art style of the Mystery Dungeon remake, tbh. It's not really what I expected at all, but it's an interesting look.
 

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I was entirely okay with the removal of Pokemon, because the way the dens reward you made it easy to find and train tons of different Pokemon you would never normally use. I'm also entirely fine with the re-addition of said Pokemon, now that I've beaten the game and can play around in the post-game with them. The dex-cuts never once bothered me.

It is a little jarring to see those new Pokemon kept behind a paywall of the DLC, but at the same time, they're going to be tradeable to people who don't have the DLC. So if you truly want those Pokemon to raise yourself, you just have to find a friend or random only with the DLC pokemon you want.

I'm entirely tired with the Pokemon formula as it is, and as I have been since X/Y. Nothing new has changed. I enjoyed the social aspect of SwSh with my friends, but I found it to be a mediocre game overall.

What I really care about is the PMD remake. Ugly and weird looking as it is, it's pretty much the same old game, on the Switch, and looking a little more modern. I don't like seeing sprites replaced by 3D models, but any excuse to replay them or to see actually good PMD games released is fine by me.
 

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The wording was a bit confusing but as I understood the "Pokemon Sword Expansion Pass" and the "Pokemon Shield Expansion Pass" are $30 each. You're effectively paying $15 per area.
 
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deinonychus71

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Isn't $30 per area? Still I just read that there is a season pass for $30 so I'll drop that argument even though a single upgraded game would still be cheaper ($60+$30 vs only $60).

You say that trading is free but we don't really know if you'll be able to really use the added pokemon or not, they only said that there will be an update to add them to the game but that might be only so you can fight against someone that has the dlc.
Well, we can wait and hope that you can indeed use the added pokemon.

The wording is very confusing i agree. But its $30 per version. $60 if you want the pass for both games.
I feel like they should offer discounts if you buy both but eh... the whole point of having two versions was to get people to trade back in the day. It no longer makes sense with online but thats another topic.

And i believe they said they could be traded. Which means you can own them. If that ends up not being true i totally get the disappointment.

--------------------- MERGED ---------------------------

I was entirely okay with the removal of Pokemon, because the way the dens reward you made it easy to find and train tons of different Pokemon you would never normally use. I'm also entirely fine with the re-addition of said Pokemon, now that I've beaten the game and can play around in the post-game with them. The dex-cuts never once bothered me.

It is a little jarring to see those new Pokemon kept behind a paywall of the DLC, but at the same time, they're going to be tradeable to people who don't have the DLC. So if you truly want those Pokemon to raise yourself, you just have to find a friend or random only with the DLC pokemon you want.

I'm entirely tired with the Pokemon formula as it is, and as I have been since X/Y. Nothing new has changed. I enjoyed the social aspect of SwSh with my friends, but I found it to be a mediocre game overall.

What I really care about is the PMD remake. Ugly and weird looking as it is, it's pretty much the same old game, on the Switch, and looking a little more modern. I don't like seeing sprites replaced by 3D models, but any excuse to replay them or to see actually good PMD games released is fine by me.

I get being tired of the formula. That is my main complain about these games (that and too easy) but DLC might actually improve and innovate.
They dont have to waste dev time reinventing the wheel. They can jump straight into adding new stuff and endgame content. We'll see when it gets out but im more hype about this than I was for main game.
 

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Some people may complain about the fact that it's a dlc, but personally, i'll take a half priced dlc with new locations and new pokemon over an ultra sm situation where its the exact same game with a slightly different ending. It does suck that there isn't a full on cartridge release tho.
 
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It's official: GF just went down the Ubisoft/EA route.
Next they'll add pokeball lootboxes I guess, ah.
Yeah, fuck you GF, and your shitty pokecrap game.
I'd want to say their next games will sell like crap... but seeing what happened with this one...
I'mma just declare the franchise dead and move on with life.
That TemTem game that's coming out soon on steam seems pretty promising...

As for the PMD remake, meh, dunno, dun care too much, but since we talking 'bout it, might as well ask:
Anybody knows of a hack/mod for any of the games in the series that lets you, like, be able to evolve whenever you wanna or bring you any partner you want, no story restrictions or some other bullcrap like that?
I'd like to replay one of them games, but I'd also like to be able to evolve my pokes or bring the ones I want to whenever I wanna, eh.
 

deinonychus71

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I've never pld a proper pokemon game only pld pokemon let's go and tht was ridiculousy silly easy I gave up on it as no challenge - why the fk ain't everyone telling the Pokemon Company to put a hard mode in
I know right? I dont get why people complain about textures or animation or dex when the game itself is so boring due to being way too easy in the first place. Kinda feels like it should be a priority...

I was a kid when i beat red and blue. Red and blue wasnt necessarily "hard" but you kinda had to pay attention still.
Kids arent dumb. Bring a normal & difficult mode damnit.
 
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Mythical

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It just keeps getting worse. I'm definitely done buying the main series pokemon games.
Rom hacks/fan games are more interesting at this point for me.
Adding in older content (from earlier titles) as new dlc is just ridiculous.
I understand expansions to the current game that aren't just an fixing a lack of content that should have been there originally, but come on
 
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pedro702

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I was entirely okay with the removal of Pokemon, because the way the dens reward you made it easy to find and train tons of different Pokemon you would never normally use. I'm also entirely fine with the re-addition of said Pokemon, now that I've beaten the game and can play around in the post-game with them. The dex-cuts never once bothered me.

what you said made no sence lol every game even original gold and silver you can only bring old pokemon from older games once you beat the main game... it was never allowed before betaing the main pokemon league, so you were always forced to beat the entire main game with pokemons only found in said reagion and can only play with out of region pokemons post game until then, so it never bothered anyone lol because it was never possible to transfer past gens pokemons before bating the game with the available ones first...

while season pass is nice and all i would apreciate they did a full physical release like pokemons sword/shield deluxe or complete or whatever in the end, i like my complete editions, still waiting for botw one ... maybe when its turned into a nintendo select...
 
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chartube12

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I like the art style of the Mystery Dungeon remake, tbh. It's not really what I expected at all, but it's an interesting look.

it’s using the water brush style of the valkyria chronicles. The original aimed for something similar but fell short due to the technical limitations of the gba and ds. Both red and blue rescue also had some problems back than. Red had frame rate drops causing annoying slows while exploring. While blue had long initial load times to and from dungeons and cutscenes. These problems seem entirely gone in DX. In terms of story the original has my favorite story, while super had my favorite village expanding mechanics. See how well these hold up in the demo. Demo supposedly is 5-10 hours long depending on how your pace. Probably could be finished sooner.
 

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The fact people're defending this is sad;

SwSh had less content than the usual Pokemon game, for more money.
Now they want you to buy the content back, for yet money still.
Further down the line, I bet there'll be either a third version or more DLC still for even more money and the missing last few Pokemon.

The utter disregard for the fans hurts me physically and I don't even play these games.
 

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The fact people're defending this is sad;

SwSh had less content than the usual Pokemon game, for more money.
Now they want you to buy the content back, for yet money still.
Further down the line, I bet there'll be either a third version or more DLC still for even more money and the missing last few Pokemon.

The utter disregard for the fans hurts me physically and I don't even play these games.
You don't play the games but kno swsh had less content lol far as I kno every pokemon game has lots of hours to it so anyone complaining re the cost need to start moaning about something else
 

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you can only bring old pokemon from older games once you beat the main game...
What? The difference with this game was that it had a large mix of Pokemon from every region from the get-go. HG/SS, R/S/E, and Pt all did this on a small scale; G/S/C had some Gen 1 Pokemon (Pidgey, Geodude, Zubat, etc) because Pokemon still had a small dex size back then. R/S/E was mostly "new" Pokemon, but still had some (Machop, Magnemite, Skarmory, etc). What you're arguing makes no sense. What I'm saying is that shrinking the overall dex in SwSh was fun for me, personally, because I didn't wind up using all the old Pokemon I use normally. (Pidgey was out, no Crobat, etc, these Pokemon that tend to be in every game) There were some really weird inclusions that I felt tempted to use for the first time ever, because the XP dumps from raids/dens make it easy to catch a new Pokemon up to speed, level-wise.

You could trade backwards with R/B/Y and G/S/C without beating the league, R/S/E could trade with Colosseum (considering the fact that G/S/C had no compatibility at all, to say the least) before the post-game.

Like I said before, it's no loss to me either way, dex cuts or adding them back post-launch. I had my fun with what I was given. Even if they didn't add the Pokemon back, I was okay with it, because there were 400 different Pokemon to mess around with. Now that they are adding Pokemon back, cool, it'll be like seeing Johto Pokemon in the Sevii Islands in FR/LG.
 

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- Oh, JPY 2,980 for pass

- Checking... it turns out that JPY 2,980 is for each game.

- Moltress alter and Articuno alter are cool

- Zapdos alter is weird

- We might actually have all 18 gyms for each element
 

skawo

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You don't play the games but kno swsh had less content lol far as I kno every pokemon game has lots of hours to it so anyone complaining re the cost need to start moaning about something else

I know it has less content, because people have said it has less content, not to mention the obvious fact they just removed half of the Pokemon from it outright.
 

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