Pokemon Legends: Z-A Announced for Switch, Launches in 2025 - News
by William D'Angelo , posted on 27 February 2024 / 3,366 Views
The Pokemon Company and developer Game Freak have announced Pokemon Legends: Z-A for the Nintendo Switch. It will launch in 2025.
"A new adventure awaits within Lumiose City, where an urban redevelopment plan is underway to shape the city into a place that belongs to both people and Pokemon," reads the description to the teaser video. "Please look forward to seeing it for yourself."
The game will take place in the Kalos Region, the same setting as Pokémon X/Y. The Z in the title is likely referring to the Legendary Pokémon Zygarde.
View the teaser video below:
A life-long and avid gamer, William D'Angelo was first introduced to VGChartz in 2007. After years of supporting the site, he was brought on in 2010 as a junior analyst, working his way up to lead analyst in 2012 and taking over the hardware estimates in 2017. He has expanded his involvement in the gaming community by producing content on his own YouTube channel and Twitch channel. You can contact the author on Twitter @TrunksWD.
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I wonder if this will also launch for the Switch 2. If it does I'd likely get the Switch 2 as the game should run far better on it. Legends Arceus and Scarlet/Violet run terribly on the Switch.
If Wii U is any clue, they could keep the same Switch font/size/color and just add a letter or number after.
Kind of like Sony announcing a game is coming to Playstation or MS announcing a game is coming to Xbox. Switch may be their main name for another generation like Wii/Wii U or NIntendo/Super Nintendo or Gameboy/Gameboy Color or DS/3ds.
They have a long history of adding a letter/number/another word to the beginning or end of the previous system.
Well, Nintendo fans accept poor performance. Gamefreak will always get away it unless Pokemon fans stop buying their games.
Please, make It a good game. Game Freak, don't come up with a shit show like Arceus, Sword/shield, scarlet/violet. We need some good pokémon games.
To be fair...Legends Arceus and ScVi are fun games which truly do evolve upon the standard Pokemon gameplay loop. The big problem -- and this really goes for all Pokemon games on Switch -- is there complete negligence in ensuring decent graphics. Yes, the Switch hardware is not the most powerful, but that doesn't serve as an excuse for the lack in detail they put into ScVi. Just look at Metroid Prime Remaster, Mario v Donkey Kong, Mario Wonder, even Zelda Tears of the Kingdom. All incredibly polished experiences (visually as well as in their gameplay) despite running on a glorified smartphone.
I’m not sure all Pokemon games on the Switch look terrible.
Sure PLA and SV have obvious issue and whilst SwSh has its own problems it is more serviceable, at least by comparison.
BDSP, whilst I appreciate most people didn’t like its art direction, certainly doesn’t have anywhere near the same level of graphical flaws. Lets Go is strongest Switch entry graphically.
The spin-offs New Pokemon Snap and Mystery Dungeon DX also are perfectly fine. Not sure about Pokken DX as I’ve not played it.
Let's Go is by far the strongest on the system, but there has yet to be a Pokemon game to release on Switch and not recieve an overwhelming wave of backlash for its graphics.
--Let's Go Pikachu & Eevee: People complained that the Pokemon models were literally just upscaled ports from 3DS titles.
--Sword & Shield: The famous "N64 tree". A myriad of other complaints would stem (no pun intended) out of this.
--BD & SP: People attacked it's Chibi art style, as well its lacking changes compared to the base experience.
--Scarlet & Violet: This was a complete and total embarrassment by GameFreak. We both know the graphic weakness of this title.
What is awkward when you look at the timeline is that they seem to be getting worse. lets Go is the strongest and the first title on the Switch. sV the worse and most recent.
Hopefully if Z-A is a Switch title it bucks the trend.
Arceus is an enjoyable title., visually looks like a dogs breakfast, but you can see what Gamefreak tried to achieve.
Scarlett and Violett were a technical mess, not just on launch but even a year and a half later... The games are still full of bugs and issues and suffer from some extremely erratic performance and should never have been released in it's state.
This is literally the only game in the last several years I have ever returned for a refund.
I have hopes for this game, it's releasing towards the end of the Switch's life, so Gamefreak should have a pretty solid understanding of the hardware capabilities at this point, plus learned lessons from previous games.
Will I pre-order it or buy it day one? Not a chance, I'll wait for reviews.
Gamefreak has been pumping out titles like clockwork, so less care is going into each game and quality suffered as a result.
We have had:
2018: Let's Go Pikachu+Let's Go Eevee!
2019: Sword and Shield.
2022: Arceus.
2022: Violet and Scarlett.
So a 2025 release window hopefully gives them some breathing room to develop a solid title.
I agree.I truly hope you are right.
Edits: Also, i hope they can finally give us a second save slot! My most requested feature by Miles! It's fu@#$ 2024 Game Freak, 1 saveslot is bullshit.
It's not a "glorified smartphone' seeing as it's entering its 8th year. It was and still is a superb system and will prove it by becoming the best selling videogame system ever.
", an ambitious new entry to the Pokémon video game series, will launch on Nintendo Switch system(s) in 2025"
Have Nintendo ever worded the Switch platform as multiple systems before?
If Switch 2 is called Switch 2, or something with "Switch" in it, then it doesn't seem unlikely. Just as Xbox switched branding to just imply Xbox consoles broadly. Especially if there is a decent cross gen period, I can see this happening. But again, has Nintendo ever referred to a game coming to "Switch System(s)"
What an extremely weird name. Good to hear it's not 2024 though.
It is odd, but makes some sense with a bit of context. Its set in Kalos, so is the Z entry to X & Y. XY also feature a character called Az who was involved in a historical event in the region, so the Z-A title seems to be a reference to him.
Let's gooo
This will end up being cross gen game between Switch and Switch 2.
The best thing about the trailer is that most of the Youtube recommendations are Palworld videos.
2025? Seems this game is being given some more time to cook. Good!
Now my question is will there be a switch 2 port?
It would be dumb not to port to Switch 2.
Mega Zygarde coming?
the graphics in the trailer lead me to believe this is certain a next gen title. Comparing this trailer to ScVi, no shot these are two games in the same system. Plus “Nintendo Switch systems”.
Glad to see Legends get another instalment. Legends Arceus was a technical mess but was still a fun game. The title seems to be a reference to Az, a character from XY, so looks like the plot will cover the first activation of the weapon Team Flare are trying to use in XY.
