"Hi let me introduce myself - I'm a mysterious old man!" Goddammit mate its too early for this.
So I freaking adore this demo, and it would take me way too long to go into exactly what about it I like, so I'm just going to ramble on about a few things I noticed or some silly stuff I did. One of the most eye catching changes is how big the place feels. Normally in Pokemon games the towns you visit feel tiny, even areas that were meant to belong to huge cities didn't feel that big, but here it so does. Luckily you get the ability to ride around on a Tauros to traverse the distances faster (and to avoid looking at that very stiff and awkward looking walk cycle - I have concluded that the protagonist's mother is actually a member of the military and has been drilling the protagonist since they were a child). Also, that Tauros is easily my favourite thing here - I was tearing around town manically laughing aloud the whole time as I imagined the carnage I was wrecking as I charged around on this massive freaking bull. Only to be disappointed when it turns out that the NPCs in this game are made of freaking titanium - seriously, I can shatter boulders in a second with this, but I can't even make the NPC's flinch? Then I drove the bull into the police station, and nobody cared. I then raided said police station, and still nobody cared. Good to see the spirit of RPGs is alive and well.
Another thing that stood out to me instantly was the music, or a few tracks anyway. The route music is one of the most calming tracks I've heard in Pokemon since Unwavering Emotions. But best of all was the Team Skull encounter theme - it is freaking perfect! Sadly the actual battle theme isn't as good, but that encounter theme honestly makes up for it. The grunts are also so derpy, I freaking love them so damn much already ♥ Although it really does make them seem like pushovers (more than usual for grunts anyway). Plumeria I especially love, although I do tend to be pretty biased towards liking people sporting slasher smiles. Its a weakness I guess. There's a lot more I could talk about - lots of little details that I really appreciated, like if you're in the special suit for riding Pokemon and get into a battle, your trainer in the battle is still in those clothes, or that you can hear Pokemon's cries as you get closer to the tall grass, but I'd be here all day. So instead I'll just say I'll probably be jumping into the game for a little bit each day until Sun and Moon is released - based on the dialogue from a lot of the NPCs there's going to be quite a few events going on that only happen on certain days, and I don't want to miss them.
Oh, I should probably mention Ash-Greninja... yeah I don't care. If it only increases the power of Water Shuriken like it claims to then that's kind of lame actually. I mean it could be situationally useful but... come on, Protean. I'm also still not quite sure what makes it activate - I think it tied to how much damage you do, not take.
