Looks like there may be a couple small audio glitches and editing blips throughout which I can only apologise for, we had the death of a pet yesterday which meant I wasn't really in the right frame of mind when finishing this up Anyway, Palette Swap are also on Bluesky: bsky.app/profile/paletteswapmag.bsky.social And sorry to any confusion caused with the Patreon. Again, as I say, things will be explained in a post soon. For now, here's where you can support me: www.patreon.com/nocturnalfudj
Imo the worst part is that Eternutis can't even eternamax. It's ENTIRE BOSS FIGHT MECHANIC is useles besides showing up in ONE MOVE, and that move loses it's animation and use opon moving on to scarlet and violet😤😤😤😤
Turning Hop into a sports journalist/announcer is such an economical change to the story, it’s really brilliant. It doesn’t even really need a whole lot of recontextualizing, it just slots nicely into his character. Hop is infamous for providing commentary throughout your fights with him. His incessant chattering in the middle of battle makes a lot more sense with the rewrite you proposed. This change turns an otherwise annoying character trait into something that contributes to the conclusion of his character arc. The rival trainer to Pokemon professor/assistant pipeline works, but it’s something that’s been done before in the series: Gary Oak from the anime, Cheren/Bianca in BW. Providing a little bit of originality and expanding the world is always a good thing.
Also, Hop’s whole story is how he is interested in battling but is horrible at battling. (Although in postgame it is shown he can be decent but will never reach the heights of Champion or people that could be champion.). People like that who are otherwise interested in the scene would turn to reporting. Heck, he could still be a reporter and scientist, with him using his time as a reporter to have anecdotal evidence for Pokémon battling against each other, and both could be concurrent - that is, like Professor Kukui, he would be a battle Professor, but in Hop’s case it would be in the context of Pokémon battling for sport, akin to researchers on overall human health and researchers on fitness and sports fitness and training.
I mean roses intentions were good but trying to solve an energy problem that’s 1,000 years away is just bad writing. I probably would change the writing to where the energy crisis would be months away instead of a 1,000 years
@alexbaldwin1182 This was covered in the video though. If the energy crisis was made to be something happening sooner, then people would be freaking out about it and there would already be work to fix it.
I remember I saw some fanfic on AO3 that made it so Rose was hiding a terminal illness, and due to die in months. He feels like *he alone* can fix it, and so he has to act *now.* It in no way fixes the story, but it does make Rose's motivations make a little more sense.
The rigged matches part actually lines up with base game. Mustard in the DLC used to be Champion but resigned after learning he would be fighting in fixed matches so it’s really not out of the question
@@jdelacruz14791 True. Peony also resigned because his relationship with Rose was already rather rocky even before Rose became the Chairman of the Pokemon League.
@@malgai The full description of the Card you mention is: "This photo was taken about 50 years ago, when Mustard defeated the Fairy-type Gym Leader and went on to become Champion. He reigned undefeated until he lost his partner Pokémon. After this, his losses started to mount. He remained popular even after losing the mantle of Champion, but decided to retire after the league chairman at that time asked him to win in a rigged match. Mustard developed an obsession with video games after his retirement. Apparently he held off while he was still active in order to maintain his image to his fans." So yes losing his partner was part of it but he was also asked to win in a rigged match and so decided that was the final straw and retired.
Here's how I'd add some time sensitivity to Chairman Rose's scheme: Eternatus didn't crash into the Galar region but instead is still inside a comet that flies close to the planet every few hundred years. Last time it passed by it triggered the darkest day. Now in the present the comet is approaching again and this time Rose wants to drag it down and have Leon capture the Pokémon inside and use it as a living nuclear reactor. Rose tower is in fact a tractor beam kind of thingy designed to yank the comet out of the sky when it gets close enough, and the Eternatus comet will be at its closest to the planet on the day of the title fight and it'll be outside the tower's range by the time Leon is done with the championship. THAT'S why Rose can't wait for even a single day for Leon to help him out.
@@mechashadowunova(New York), Orre (Arizona) , and aloha(Hawaii) are all really based off of parts of the USA and predate sword and shield, also how would an aristocrat villlan fit the usa?
1:20:10 Oh, that's such a great line. It makes Garbador being her ace a double entente At first you assume it's because she's secretly a terrible, vile person underneath her beautiful, elegant exterior. But not only is the original lore about her coming from lowly beginnings preserved, it recontextualizes Garbador's significance.
Say what you will about alola (i liked it) but at least when something happened in the story, you SAW it. Imagine if you got held up talking to wicke at the aether foundation, and then when you went up, Hau said "woah dude, you just missed it, a weird looking Pokémon came out of an ultra wormhole, and I had to beat it up!
people without uk bias almost unilaterally prefer alola to any other 3d era game as well as believe sword and shield are by far the worst 3d era game. the only competing is between sv and xy for the number 2-3 slots.
@@BeIlG I mean, I did like Sun/Moon best out of those four, but I also did enjoy Sword/Shield more than I did Scarlet/Violet Though from what I've seen, that seems to be a pretty unpopular opinion, true
I think the worst part about the Sw/Sh story is that the very existence of Regileki makes a plothole. " Its entire body is made up of a single organ that generates electrical energy. Regieleki is capable of creating all Galar’s electricity." 😐
Quite a few Electric-type Pokémon have been said to have the potential to power cities. Then (in retrospect) there’s Levincia. The city powered by :)-faced light-bulb tadpoles.
Maybe it could be argued that Chairman Rose was so focused on Eternatus that it never crossed his mind that a better solution to this problem was right under his nose. One could argue Silveroy could also generate his own energy and that it was safer and cleaner and that he too was ignored.
@@bubalackgaming8892Perhaps there's a difference in ethics between partnering with a Pokemon in a way that allows it to carry on its natural behaviors and habitats, and shutting it into a box for eternity to generate power.
gunna be honest my only regret with watching this video is the vast gulf of discontent and disappointment i now feel about the ACTUAL swsh storyline LOL i couldnt have told you then or now what the plot was supposed to actually be. it was so muddy i finished the game and was like well.. i guess im done? what? but this. man. this rewrite is so well worked and balanced that i cant imagine a world where this WASNT the actual story now. the twist with the scripted loss against nessa especially- could you IMAGINE that happening ingame??? FANTASTIC work. please make like 50 roms i swear to god
I'd make Leon the champion for 6 years instead of 4 for 2 reasons. 1. It is implied that multiple gym leaders took the gym challenge the same year as Leon or more recently. Raihan is a rival to Leon, who was traveling along side Sonia, who was really good friends with Nessa, who sees herself having a rivalry with Milo. Gordie is described as an upcomer who people believe might become champion one day, which leads me to think he's younger than the others. You could not convince me Allister isn't a new gym leader with how young he looks and how shy he is. Bea kind of just seems younger than the first group, I'd put her around Gordie but that's just a vibe. Piers, filling a similar role to Leon as an older brother to one of your rivals, I just lumped him in with Leon's group, but I could see him being a few years older. Maybe he was a gym leader for a year before Leon became champion. All that is to say I don't think everyone should have become a gym leader immediatly after their own run. Maybe Raihan became one the following year, followed by Nessa 2 years later, and Milo the year after that, with 2 years to go before your run, just to feel more stretched out. 4 just feels more compressed. 2. If Leon has been champion for 6 years then that means Leon defended his title 4 times between him winning and you taking his sponsership. (Spoiler for the video) that's 4 champion level trainers that got cheated. I could see Leon reching out to each of them wanting to set things right. Once you win against the gym leaders again you fight this makeshift Elite 4 before you fight Leon. Edit: Just came up with this idea. Have one of these trainers be Volkner from Sinnoh. Gen 8 would later have the Diamond and Pearl remakes so you could get some synergy going. There also is no electric specialist in Galar. For story reasons his whole deal is wanting a challenge and talks about taking on the Sinnoh Elite 4, he hears the Galar league is exceptionally strong and takes it on. When Volkner faces Raihan before Leon, Rose rigs the match so the Galar 8th gym leader gets a decisive victory over the Sinnoh 8th gym leader.
@@BabyGirlTiny I think the implication is that they get invited back and not all the gym leaders partake. You end up fighting them as 4 new to you trainers who all are 'champion level' to be a sort of elite 4.
Mustard and Peony should be two of them, and if I were to pick two more known characters as a sort of "elite 4", it would be Raihan and Piers, and we could retcon it so that Piers is the one who couldn't Dynamax his pokemon
Yeah, I guess I could’ve been more clear on that. We don’t even know who they specifically lost to because we lost to Nessa. Maybe one lost to Raihan, or Piers, or some gym leader who has since retired/moved. It’s easy to recreate our tournament bracket because it’s only been maybe a few weeks, but the other 4, not so much. I think it could go either way when it comes to the other trainers. Leon faces the first trainer and the winner battles the second and then the third etc… or you fight the guy from the year before you, and then the next, until you fight Leon. Either Leon is the strongest of 5 and fights you at the end where he now knows that he would still have been champion this whole time… or you’re the strongest of 5 and battle Leon who still isn’t sure about his title. I think the second option make’s enough sense to justify itself for the benefit of more boss battles.
@@jdelacruz14791 I really like this post-game elite 4 lineup although I think I'd change 1 thing. The stuff with Piers makes perfect sense and he'd easily be able to move on to the elite 4 since he's got Marnie to succeed him as gym leader. But I feel like taking both the 7th and 8th gym leaders is kinda boring so I'd say Raihan stays as the 8th gym leader because he wants the title of champion for himself, not to be part of his old rivals new possee. I'd say instead that it's Oleana that takes the position. Seeking redemption for her participation in Rose's crimes she wants to take a new path and better herself as a trainer. She was already a really good trainer in the first place being a late game boss. Plus it means she gets a new job.
I kind of forgot this rewrite was for the purpose of making roses theme fit, so by God, when I got to the new fight you wrote the music really blew me away. Such a better implementation. Bravo on the rewrite
"How do I make rose's battle theme feel more potent? I know, he's on the verge of losing everything and is desperate to blow everyone up for it mwahahahahaha!"
59:00 I want people to understand this is actually even more fitting than it seems! The Circester baths are clearly inspired by the Roman baths in the City of Bath here in the UK. One thing I didn't know until visiting recently is that the second level and the statues of emperors found there are actually a Victorian addition, centuries after the Roman-built bathhouse had already fallen into ruin and been buried. There's even supposition that the statues of emperors have striking resemblance to the town council members of Bath at the time these statues were commissioned. The idea of Sordward and Shielbert making an excuse about a more recent mayor's interference not only works for the story, it's also a genius reflection of the real-world history involved. Plus considering Brits don't have a great history with artifacts (that's what the jumbled fossils are based on), I think it's also a fun way to keep that motif going!
1:39:19 ok but for real though. Imagining an entire army of trainers holding off a monster like Eternatus while you run for help is such a cool scene to imagine. Why cant we have awesome moments in Pokemon?
I'd program it so that there's a "time limit" to getting to the Legendaries - if you take too long beating the Gigantamaxed rampage, Eternamax manages to win - but of course, your ally in the raid battle might have a move or two to help guarantee a victory if you need it, so you can't get soft-locked out
They used their entire awesome moments budget on the bit in Black and White where all the gym leaders storm Castle Plasma and the consequent Generations short depicting it.
We did, in the anime, they had 14 trainers working to stop or slow down Lysanders massive stone Zygarde thing, I can't remember what's it name was, but it was simply awesome seeing them make up a last stand to keep it from getting to Anistar.
Phenomenal rewrite. When Leon was first shown on social media, many people felt he might be a fraud, so I like how you felt your story naturally gravitated towards this direction. And when I made the connection, that Leon’s whole position as the “ruler/victor/what have you” was actually a fraud, and thus called back to the concept of historical revisionism and your quote about victors getting to write history, I really was just “😮” for a moment, lol. Great job. Just some meta stuff right there. In the end, it wasn’t even Leon’s choice, the instrumentalization of his by Rose (the actual “ruling class”) just hurt him in the end. I also liked how Piers, Marnie and Team Yell were enhanced by adding the anti-capitalist, English punk aspect to them, and how the fellow Gym Leaders were portrayed perhaps not as perpetrators, but definitely as beneficiaries of the system Rose hat put into place, and they were not keen on giving up their position until shown undeniable evidence of Rose’s deceit. We truly live in a society.
I also love how it adds way more depth to Leon after he is finally beaten by the player. In the original, he appears to be super depressed by the player beating him. While this is understandable since he’s undefeated before this, it’s not very relatable. In the rewrite, this depression fits a lot better as he struggles with self-doubt. Since he’s based his personality on being undefeated, he probably is wondering who he is if that was all a lie. It also makes a lot of sense to take over the Rose/battle tower, as helps him strive to get stronger and prove himself.
@@CyberDrewanthere is no depth added though lol. And how is in not relatable to lose at something you’ve never lost ate In the rewrite he should have that depression before the battle, not after it. In the rewrite he would be doubting himself the entire time and the entire battle since everything he’s known about himself is a lie. It doesn’t make sense that he’s depressed after the loss. It makes more sense that he’s depressed before the loss and that affects him in the actual battle It also doesn’t make sense for him to take over rose tower as his entire career has been a lie. He would challenge it, not fake it over as taking it over makes no sense with his entire career being fake. Hell it makes more sense for him to start all over from scratch
"Just because its written for children, doesn't mean it should be written worse, it just means it should be written differently. Everyone deserves to be exposed to stories written by people who care." Fucking go off! Absolutely despise the attitude that childrens media is/should be inherently inferior/made with less thought. No! If anything, it deserves more thought- because your story might be the first time that kid ever encounters a story about that theme, and it has so much more potential to shape the way they see that issue going forward. Great attitude to have ❤
I have been saying this for Years, and it's so nice to see people saying the same things. Children's media is deeply important, it can educate in ways that parents and teachers may well not be able to reach kids.
Motherfucking facts. I'm glad that I grew up in the generation that produced such gems as _Batman: The Animated Series_ and _Gargoyles,_ and they helped shape my views more than a fair bit. I'm glad that time period paved the way for future children's media to be made with some actual substance to them, and not all be mindless drivel and toy commercials.
You've got a real knack for character dialogue and motivation! If you're up for it (and the bank account gets low enough), I'd love to see your take on designing a Pokemon storyline from the ground up. What would you do if you had all the tools, instead of rebuilding a foundation from something else? You've mentioned before how you don't really enjoy returning to the Pokemon well again and again, but I hope an exercise like this is creatively stimulating enough that you can wring some joy out of it! Thank you for sharing!
You mentioned in the Raihan section about teams saying things about character when moving Duraludon off of his team. A cool idea to replace it would be Blastoise IMO. Since it's his old team it represents his rivalry with Leon and shows that Leon was at a disadvantage when it came to starters (like classic pokemon games) it's subtle but reinforces their rivalry and Leon's skill
The “theme” of Galar was descendants/ history / but mostly legacy You beat the unbeatable champion and it’s legacy Hop was trying to reach Leon legacy Marine and Bede continued the legacy of their respective gym leaders Rose was trying to make a legacy last forever Sonia continued the previous professor legacy But even so SWSH doesn’t use this theme very well
yet you catched the theme, how Galar and its people have this inherited will from its past, Hop and Gloria became the new Sword and Shield wielders, the old energy is replaced by a new one, the tradition itself is a passing of the torch the pokemon league is a big celebration, I get that he wanted a more dark approach, but I would loved if he keep the original theme from Sword and Shield
hell its biggest use of this theme was in the post game villains who were descendants of the legendary heroes but were rich layabouts who were more ridiculous rather than compelling or interesting and whose evil scheme just ends with everyone just getitng forgiven carte blanche (yes this last bit is msotly about Sonia's random ass assistant who betrayed her and then just sorta turns good for no reason when really she should've been fired because she betrayed her boss' trust to suck up to some rich snobs)
Regarding the DLC, this rewrite definitely fits given what info we have on Peony-he was a former Gym Leader and the Champion of Galar once, but left the League not long after Rose became the Chairman. As his brother, I have no doubt that Peony would know Rose’s nature best and either chose to or was forced to leave due to corruption. Perhaps if he spoke out he would have been regarded as a bitter brother jealous of Rose, mirroring the player here in their darkest hour, or maybe he just felt the whole thing would be toxic and jumped ship to focus on his family? Come to think of it, Master Mustard in the Isle of Armour was a former champion too and contemporary to early Opal, held his title for 18 years before he left for similar reasons, the then-chairman trying to get a match rigged in his favour. Seems the League has a long history of corruption but given Leon was a pupil of Mustard’s once and is a good guy, maybe the cycle can finally be broken.
I think the part about dynamax not working is a cool idea, but way too obvious of a rig. Maybe it could be a plot point that refusing to dynamax is seen as a power play meant to inflate the fighters ego. So when someone doesn't dynamax, it's seen as a taunt rather than a stupid decision. Then when the fighter inevitably loses, and claims that dynamax wasn't working, people will just assume he's lying to cover his embarrassing loss. That way it wouldn't be as suspicious as it is now
It could make sense. As it is something that some pokémon trainer who is just so confident to their and their pokémons ability to win the match could do just to show everyone how awesome trainer they are and how strong pokémon team they got.
Wow, I actually did this in my second plaaythrough XD. I played a bug monotype team and refused to dynamax (mostly so the game was actually challenging) which kinda came together to form a strong underdog narrative. The small, underestimated bugs can be the strongest with enough effort etc.
I was thinking either this or add some established simple way to feasibly fumble a daynamax in lore. something that would be easy enough to slip up and do on an off game, but something a skilled battler should usually be able to avoid without a second thought. maybe you have to throw the ball a very specific way or do something to the band/with the arm the band is on, otherwise it doesn't work
That, or just remove the part about being made unable to Dynamax altogether? I feel like after the first couple times challengers claimed they didn’t do it on purpose, people would start getting suspicious of the legitimacy of the matches pretty quick. Maybe rather than handicapping one contestant, Rose could actually be empowering the favored winner. So in the scripted battle with Nessa, her GMax Drednaw just has absurdly high HP, and a damage boost. Still accomplishes the same goal
I really wish the games did a better job at hinting toward Sonias backstory. Both the anime and the manga have the implication the Sonia was actually a better trainer than Leon when they were kids, but because she was the professors granddaughter audiences thought that there might be some kind of conflict of interest and the only reason she was winning all of her battles was because the leaders were going easy on her. Eventually the stress and baseless allegations got to her and she withdrew from the competition after Ballonlea. None of this is conveyed in the games except for the fact that Sonia was at the Ballonlea gym one time and didn't have much confidence, which you can learn by reading the report on the table after completing the gym challenge but before fighting Opal.
Cool rewrite, I especially like that you gave Marnie and Piers' story more teeth. I like the characters and always wished they didn't feel so pointless to the game. I also appreciate that you understand the realities of game dev and that the story is the way that it is because the devs had to meet an unfair deadline.
Fun fact: There actually is a small plot involving rigged championship matches in Sword and Shield! Mustard, the master of the dojo in The Isle of Armor DLC pack, is actually a former champion who stepped down after the league chairman at the time asked him to win a rigged match. However this is only revealed in his second league card and the game doesn't bother exploring this plot point further.
Excellent video! As one of those weirdos that like reading fanfiction and thinks way too deep about video game stories to find the smallest crumbs in-canon and real life equivalents to pull from, this was right up my alley. A couple of fun-facts you might not be aware about, there are some secret Trainer Cards you can get in-game that reveal some backstory to the characters. For example, Oleana grew up dirty poor before getting a job in Macro Cosmos and being noticed by Rose, so her Garbodor as a Trubbish was her first Mon, and probably the only one she could afford to keep because it ate garbage, which made it cheap. Also Rose's brother is absurdly funny, and really did not like his brother. How much he disliked him? He was the Champion before Leon, and he resigned the micro-instant Rose became chairman. That's how much he didn't want to have nothing to do with Rose. Also, and I'm not joking, he's basically confirmed to be the father of Penny from SV, the small girl with red and blue hair. And the founder of Paldea's own evil team. Domestic terrorism runs in the family.
I vaguely remember that they partially fixed roses character in the anime by having his reasoning be that his father died working in a coal mine, wanting to stop any other child from experiencing that pain, his impatience coming from his reasoning that if you wait even a day too many people will die
@@WhiteRaven696Ehh not the anime as much honestly, when they didn't keep the villains the exact same, dumb ideology and all, they even made some worse like Lusamine
You gotta love Sword and Shield for having the exact opposite plot as the UK - Chairman Rose actually wants to make renewable energy! The UK government could never
That was one of my big frustrations with the games-that you could read it as mocking climate "alarmists" the same way Black & White villainized Animal Rights activism.
@@GSBarlevI wouldn’t give them enough credit to think of it as mocking. It feels like all the effort went into the excellent league challenge and then they threw a story together. Eternarus? Fuck it energy crisis Pokémon get big. Yeah but how is the fella sorting that a villain? Errr, it’s in a thousand years and it’s basically a disaster. But we’ve not got time to animate all of the Pokémon rampaging? Make the champion sort it all out off screen. Everyone liked the gym leaders helping in BW, they’ll love that.
@@GSBarlev BW2 did have the thing with the team splitting into two, with the good ones following N. Honestly it’s a reach but the whole plot kinda reminded me of stalin taking over the communism craze, however well intentioned it may have started, like animal farm. (iirc, it’s been awhile since I learned about it)
@@GSBarlev Except PETA, the organisation that Plasma (og) was based on, are genuinely evil. With SwSh, it really does seem like a silly caricature, but the "evil" Plasma Grunts are pretty accurate depictions of those PETA nutjobs that would take animal companions from homeless people.
This is now cannon for me. I will accept no arguments or alternatives. This is so much better than what we got. I want to see someone make a comic or write a story or something that follows this version of the game. It would be so cool. This was an amazing video, and I think you should be in charge of writing the story of the next Pokemon game.
I love this rewrite! My only addition would be with Oleanna's character. On her trainer card it reveals that Garbodor was her first pokemon that she befriended while in poverty. I liked this bit of story because when you first fight her it seems like Garbodor represents her toxic attitude beneath her elegant facade, but it's actually her showing loyalty to her roots and best friend despite how much her life has changed. I think this bit of lore could be wedged nicely into your Potswick scene, and it would strengthen her reasoning for helping you in the latter half of the game.
I guess if there's something there could be done with Peony is for him to meet Oleana and make her feel like she, for once, belongs somewhere. And for some fun contrast to Rose, it could be implied that he was a really competent player, close to champion levels even, that decided to focus on his family first and foremost instead of becoming the best
I’m glad you went into explaining the theme of your story. On Bulbapedia, the pages for each generation lists thematic motifs for each region (Hoenn is relationships in nature, Sinnoh is myths and legends, Kalos is beauty and harmony, etc.). Meanwhile, the Gen 8 page doesn’t have a section like that. With a story like this to help contextualize how we should think about Galar, it could.
For all that X and Y has the next most stupidest story after Sword/Shield, at least the bluntness of all plot points means that their resolution of beauty as a theme means beauty is about enjoying life, like how you and your five friends enjoy time together and Pokémon in different ways, as opposed to Lysander who either wants eternal unchanging beauty or death to ugly things, which are anti-life.
TV Tropes seems to approach the idea that the theme of Galar is the pursuit of fame and the cost one takes to achieve it. Granted, there are only a few items in SwSh that justify that theme proposition, including: * Leon * Mustard * Rose * Peony * Swordward and Shielbert * The Spikemuth gang
Literally a few seconds before the Dark gym rewrite I asked how a British game with punks and a bunch of powerfull people didn't even tried to touch the anarchy and skinhead culture.
I just realized that Hop is vague about Zacian/Zamazenta's appearance in the originals because they didn't want to imply the existence of non-Pokémon animals
i'll never understand how they decide when to not reference non pokemon animals sometimes (like with hop) and when to just straight up name drop real animals like with iron moth in scarlet and violet or with the subspecies names for a ton of pokemon in the pokedex (like meowth being the scratch cat pokemon)
What’s interesting is that Boltund is referred to as the “Dog Pokémon” as its category in its Pokédex description, so they clearly know what a dog is. It could be that dog just refers to Pokémon with canine features even if no normal dogs exist. Edit: Boltund was the first Pokémon with that category, it has since been joined by Dachsbun. Before that the only category that explicitly mentioned dogs was Herdier the “Loyal Dog Pokémon”.
The DLC could work with this with just about zero changes, save for the fact that you can head to the DLC areas whenever you want, and there's certain times in this storyline where it'd be pretty weird to just wander off to an island and fight giant bees for a while. Peonea's relationship with Rose is briefly half-touched on in one line of dialogue, and in general the DLCs are a lot better put together than the main game, and are in need of a lot less fixing.
The section on themes and finding them for your rewrite was seriously helpful as someone who is studying creative writing. I have never heard themes described like that and it makes so much sense. This is the first video of yours I have seen but I would gladly listen to you talk about writing for hours.
I personally felt like Bede was missing something. I, too, liked him (I typically do like snarky assholes like him), but it felt like he was left in only a slightly better position from the beginning. he was constantly looking for approval from rose, and then he gets rejected and picked up by opal, who then reforms him to be... himself but without the coat? it didn't feel much like he changed at all, even though he was supposed to have. he learned nothing really, and hasn't really changed. I felt like we didn't get enough time with him to observe the transformation, had it even happened. i know he was a bit of a bitch, but i really never felt that he was doing it just to be an ass. it felt like some unidentified rage at something. therefore: I think bede could work perfectly for a coming out story. all that needs to change is that rose wants him to wear that giant coat, and that he's actually his adopted dad (if he isn't. i actually cannot remember). bede insults the player a lot, so I propose he just focuses on their clothing for insults. make opal's infatuation with pink stem from appreciation AND the sense of freedom she gets from it, and then add a couple encounters after he meets opal. one where his coat is still on, and one where it's unbuttoned, but still on. then, his final battle, without even saying anything, describes his ability to be himself outwardly.
The main problem with Bede for me is how Sword & Shield has him written in the story. Before the final battle against him in the main story begins, he tells announces to everyone that he will retire from being a Pokemon Trainer upon defeat. But just when they do such a good job on his overall character growth, his individuality gets half-assed at the last second by having the *audience* tell Bede not to give up Pokemon Training but to start from scratch. That's not good writing, in my opinion.
You actually really changed my opinion on writing for a younger audience, I used to believe it was an inherit limitation and have had a pretty serious distain for it, but your points in the beginning and the rewrite in general really changed my mind, it's not a limitation, it's just never taken seriously. Super awesome video, I think if this was the actual story Rose would be one of the most memorable villains up there with giovanni because of how down to earth the motivation is while still having relations to a legendary (and using their power for financial gain, but in different ways). Great work!
There are areas where it’s a limitation (sometimes just because of corporate limitations. See plenty of shows that get cancelled in the name of pulling off gay shit like Steven Universe and The Owl House), but there are also areas where it’s a strength (dirty jokes are so, so much funnier in kid’s shows. Like dear lord, the expectation of beating around the bush makes the blunt quips so much more satisfying).
Absolutely fantastic video. Well-thought-out rewrites like this are solid gold to me, and I hope to match your level of competence. I tried my hand with a total re-write of X and Y a few years back, and it went well at first, but once I was past the halfway point the lack of direction left it with nowhere to go. You handled Team Yell and Macro Cosmos both immaculately, as well as Leon and Sonia. Especially if I've successfully bought in to Leon being lovable and having a heart of gold, the final battle against him would be genuinely emotional, knowing how much the loss I'm trying to inflict on him would hurt him. And then the wrap-up where his brother supports him and reminds him of how he held back eternatus...mwah. I might have cried. I do worry for Hop a little. To me, he's one of the best written Pokémon rivals - top 5 for sure, and I understand that a lot of people don't think highly of him. He's fighting an uphill battle against the bad first impression he makes dragging you through the mandatory tutorial and reusing animations from Hau. His biggest strength is how his team conveys his arc extremely well - once Bede crushes his confidence, Hop repeatedly re-shuffles his team to try and find something that beats you - even trying out Cramorant and Pincurchin, while benching his partner Wooloo for a time. I feel like the decisions he makes in the final act of your re-write detract from Hop's story by both shifting the focus away from him and making him feel even more like a loser. Then again, there's only so much space in a narrative to flesh out characters in a satisfying way - if Hop had to make small sacrifices so that Rose and Team Yell could shine, so be it. The other point of concern is the scripted loss in the Champion's Cup. Forced losses are always volatile things to handle, given how awful they make the player feel. Done well, that awfulness can be harnessed for catharsis later - but I feel like the key to a forced loss is if the player can reasonably believe their character would lose. In basically every successful example I can think of, the player character is weaker than their opponent at that point in the story, whether because they're strictly outmatched or the playing field is somehow uneven, like in this case. You don't mind the mechanical violation that is your starter being too scared of the Houndoom at the beginning of S/V, even if you were a psychopath who grinded up a team that could reasonably defeat it, because at that point in the story you're still just a new trainer at the very start of their journey. It's different here, because Dynamax isn't a be-all end-all. There are plenty of strategies a player could use to defeat a Dynamaxed opponent without using the mechanic themselves by the lategame - and if they're highly competent and/or a little overleveled and/or stocked up on items, you could beat Nessa's Drednaw without breaking a sweat. More importantly, by this point in the narrative, you've gone on a long journey and conquered everything in your path so far - so the player character is expected to be strong, able to overcome even the adversity of being unable to Dynamax in a tough fight. Imagine sweeping Nessa with, I don't know, Sleep Powder Quiver Dance Tanga Berry Lilligant, or something. You don't plan on Dynamaxing, knowing that you'll eviscerate Drednaw with Giga Drain anyways - but the game suddenly forces you to, just to show you that you can't. Then, for six consecutive turns, you're locked out of performing any actions as your healthy team is OHKOd by moves they're obviously capable of living. Of course, not every player would put on such a dominant display, but this is a Pokémon game - a lot of players will have to sit there and watch fainting animations for minutes. I don't think the reaction here would be gut-wrenching indignation at the unfairness of the rigged match - because the player can see exactly how the match was rigged, and knew that by all accounts they should have won anyways based on both their mechanical knowledge and the considerable power the narrative insists that the player character has. And that could be an interesting story in its own right, perhaps. Instead, players who have that experience will just be a little bewildered and frustrated by the obvious railroading. "What?" All of that being said. The forced loss against Nessa is an important plot point for your superior retelling of SWSH. Unlike the Hop characterization thing, I'm more inclined to call this one a flaw, but I also don't see how the story you built could exist without it. And I really enjoyed your story. -And maybe the fact that I never finish any of my amateur writing projects is because I detect flaws in them and deny them their existence rather than let something good be told in spite of its flaws.- And really, the whole deal is a limitation of the game this story necessarily exists in, not the story itself. I wonder if, ideally, it would work better as a cutscene than a playable event? Anyways, thank you for the incredible video.
I have thought on what could replace the force loss against NASA, it could still have the dynamac thing but if you beat her without it something could like happen to your Dynamics band at the end of the battle right before you go to shake hands with her causing it to break and need to get repaired which would force you to back out. And then it be revealed that Rose tried to stop you from dying to Maxine but since I didn't marry he got pissed and used to turn just to break your band or something since it's tied to eternimax energy and then the story goes on from there but with only Anna explaining that he broke her bands instead of blocked to your dynamax.
could be fun to cut the railroaded loss and have alternate cutscenes and dialogue for if you win against nessa anyway or lose to her. like if you win against nessa with no dynamax rose has to overload your dynaband to break it when rigging dynamax against you doesnt work
I would make it like the beginning of the Eternamax fight in the actual game, where you can’t use moves at all. Since it’s a power Eternatus has proven to be able to use, it stands to reason that Rose, harnessing its power, could do the same. It makes the railroading make more sense from a story perspective.
I think SV was actually such a good example of storytelling. Arven's dog plotline actually made me cry and Nemona is the best rival pokemon has ever given us.
One of my hypothetical Pokémon projects includes a full remake of SwSh, so I'll keep this video in mind if I ever decide to actually sit down and make it. Great job!
1:23:24 A scene popped into my head. You walk into the gym and it pulls you into dialogue with Piers. He would say something along the lines of- "Well well well... The chairmans prize pony graces us with their presence once again. I would ask if you've come to brag about your win, but it almost seems like someone rigged the race. After all... a one trick pony ain't very impressive when it trips up, eh?". I just think it would be fun to have him softly mocking you, almost like he knew you'd come crawling back eventually.
Love the new motivation for Rose, and the Spikemuth storyline is amazing! Few questions/notes: 1. You mention the game opens back up after failing to convince your mom and Hop to help you challenge Rose, but then what sort of narrative prompting will lead the player to revisit all of the gym leaders to ask them for help and eventually find Piers? I think the easiest path here would just be for members of Team Yell or Piers himself to come to you. Maybe Oleana was originally from Spikemuth when she was that down-on-her-luck League admin, and goes to Piers hanging her head in shame first, then they both show up at your house. B. Eternatus should still be catchable at the end of the Eternamax battle, having it turn back into the egg is too unsatisfying as a player! Even if it’s not the final story boss anymore, leaving a single slot of the Pokédex unfillable would be maddening. Triangle: Why do none of the 10+ people in the room try to stop or restrain Rose when he is clearly building a bomb in front of them? I’d just have him already rig everything to explode before he comes up to the roof, but you still have to block him from getting to the button of doom. I know it’s a relatively small detail, but the mental image of him actively fiddling with wires while expositing, surrounded by people who are all in agreement that he’s bad news, irks me. Episode IV: A New Hope: Gameplay wise, I think you should still be fighting Hop in the true championship tournament. I generally see where you’re going with the reporter/sports commentator angle, and that can still come up here, but having your final battle be comparatively ages ago at Victory Road won’t leave him as a particularly memorable rival compared to others, especially after how late he comes in for the Eternatus fight in this version. I expect corrections on my desk in the morning! /lh
1. I think that was what he was going for with the "You'll need people who hate Rose as much as you do" hint from Oleana. Presumably that line would be written in blue, like many important lines of dialogue in modern Pokemon games. Having Team Yell approach you wouldn't work, since they don't yet know you've turned on Rose. B. Eternatus should be catchable, but in the postgame. It's weird for you to randomly have this world-ending Pokemon before the game ends. Triangle: I think it would be better if he had two of his Pokemon do that instead of doing it himself. He'd be distracting everyone with his dialogue while his mons fiddle with the wires behind the egg. Episode IV: I see your point, but I think we deserve a Leon fight at the end. And he deserves to go out with a bang.
@@Seronimo93I think they meant that Hop would've been one of your final battles before Leon in the tournament. For the point about Eternatus, I agree, that's why the player should've caught one of the dogs right before they fight Eternatus, because it's weird the Legendary that's caught by the player before the ending is some random Legendary that technically has nothing to do with the duo.
What if instead of catching Eternatus, when it turns into an egg you be the one to claim it since everyone’s like “Yeah MC, you’re a pretty capable trainer, the Legendary Pokemon fuck with you, you beat Rose, you saved Galar from being nukes, you seem pretty trustworthy with raising Eternatus and making sure it won’t cause the apocalypse again”
@jayjayag2774 Eternatus should've been something you got in the post-game, you fight and catch it and get its data but Leon and the League hold onto it until they've made it safe. You could've caught one of the dogs instead.
About the DLC: Peony being Rose’s brother in the original DLC was neat, but I feel like they didn’t go far enough with it. There’s actually some lore that Peony used to be the league champion; however, once Rose became chairman, Peony resigned as champion, presumably due to issues with Rose. This lore could slide in perfectly with your rewrite: once Rose becomes chair, have him approach Peony with their plan to rig matches, thinking he’s doing Peony, his brother, a favor. However, Peony is appalled and disgusted by the plan, and storms off, resigning from being champion. Peony could never turn in his own brother, but he removed himself from Galar’s League and stayed as far away from Wyndon as he could get. Peony could express some regret on not helping take Rose down sooner, but could still be happy that it meant he had the time to spend with his daughter. Anyway, Excellent rewrite! I could tell you put a lot of effort into the writing and the result was just fantastic!
This has got to be the best rewrite of this games story I've seen. I absolutely adore this and I'm so very upset that this ISN'T the story we got for this game. I always felt like Sword and Shield had some untapped potential for what it could've been and you literally brought that potential to life with your rewrite! And for the record, I loved listening to your thought process at the beginning of the video where you point out the issues you had and why you want to change certain things, it made it super easy to follow along and understand why you made the changes you did. Fantastic video!
A Japanese game can’t talk about warping and hiding their past follies in history because they’re still actively denying the atrocities they committed in Asia during WWII. Would be rich as hell coming from them if they tackled that theme.
In defence of Piers wanting to "cause a ruckus" at Rose Tower, i think he does have a reason to want to do that. Rose basically started punishing him for not conforming to what Rose wanted him to do, so he isnt too fond of the guy (same, dude) and might just want to cause trouble for Rose the same way that Rose has caused problems for Piers. If someone caused my hometown to go to ruin, then id want to cause as many problems for them as possible too
In regards to theme, I've always read sword/sheild as being about "Passing on the torch" and the various reactions people have about it. Hop/Marnie/Sonia are worried about not being able to fill the shoes of their older brothers with different choices being made, either gaining confidence in their ability and acceptibg the torch with Marnie/Sonia or Hop realising that succeding his brother just isn't for him and taking his own path. Bede has a torch forced upon him. And Rose is worried that the torch he has isn't in a stable enough state to pass on, granted yeah still kot a great justification for his actions. Granted though your idea of revisionism could play really well together with that! Exploring the responsibilities people have to the upcoming generations to be honest with their history and avoid history repeating and being less susceptible to propaganda.
21:34 Yikes, fundamental misunderstanding of part of B&W's core plot. Edit: This video DEFINITELY picks up the slack later, though, holy SHIT. That endgame was GREAT, and DEFINITELY earns Rose his theme!! There's a few weird choices here and there that I disagree with, but the broad strokes- and honestly, most of this in general- are INCREDIBLE! Great work on this!
Hi! Game Design major here, I’d like to say first of all that as a story, this version is a drastic improvement in my opinion, but I do have one major point of issue from a design perspective. While it’s certainly an improvement from a story progression standpoint, the forced loss against Nessa is probably a step too far. There’s a concept in game design called metrics, which basically covers the logic of internal consistency and interactions within a system, and you need to be careful if you plan on messing with them. Preventing the player from dynamaxing is all well and good, and something you could probably get away with, but forcing the opponents dreadnaw to stay up on one hp regardless of the players actions could create serious issues. Part of the reason people play games is to have agency over story progression, and players tend to get very frustrated when they lose that. Additionally, this change would make nuzlocking the game impossible due to the scripted loss. If you want to keep this version of the story, then I would suggest figuring out a way to create a branching narrative based on whether or not you lose during the tournament. I’m not a narrative designer though, so I’ll have to leave that up to you.
I want to propose a potential alternative to the new nessa scripted fight based on what you’re saying. first, I agree with what you’re saying. I think a “scripted loss” is an excellent cinematic moment, but it works a lot less in video games since the player isn’t supposed to lose. however, I also get that the point is to showcase eternatus (rose) actively rigging matches. since I think that this is important to the cohesion of the new story (giving the player character personal stake and hinting at the bigger mystery), I think it could still work by making the scripted loss even more scripted (weirdly enough) by breaking out of the traditional battle mechanics. say, by making it so nessa’s gigantamax is so huge or strong or whatever (something that’s because of eternatus’s meddling) that your pokemon are too scared or can’t get close or are otherwise unable to fight ie. something that doesn’t occur in normal battles. it’d still need to be obvious to the player (and nessa) that this was due to some kind of rigging and not just your pokemon being wimps, but it doesn’t need to be a real battle - more of an interactive cutscene (not unlike the original encounter with the hero pokemon iirc). that way, you still “lose,” but none of your pokemon are required to faint, maintaining the ability to nuzlocke and not making players feel quite so out of control. maybe the player character remarks at the start of the nessa fight or something to prompt the gamer into the idea that this fight won’t be normal to make sure they don’t feel helpless.
I respectfully completely disagree. The idea of the forced loss being frustrating and unfair is reflected by the player character. It's a forced loss because it was rigged. Maybe the Dreadnaw could have It's stats put at the highest possible value so that it would basically be impossible to get it down to 1hp without incredible planning, cheats, or item spam. As for the point for Nuzlockes. Don't consider self-imposed challenges when designing a game, PLEASE. Nuzlockes have never been, and likely never will be an official facet of these games. Regardless of how fun they are. If people would nuzlocke these games, then they would just not count any deaths that occur fron Nessa's Dreadnaw during this fight, as the forced loss is the only possible way of moving the plot forward, and getting to the illustrious game clear and chairman fight. The beginning of this video also clearly states that this was being done within a reasonable estimate of the actual development time this game took. Adding a branching storyline, even a small one, would take so much more time and resources that it would not be worth it in the long term. And likely just make the overall (proposed) plot worse.
@@ObbyFeathersnootall playstyles should be included, a forced loss would alienate a huge section of the playerbase. another way could be the annoucer of the match call the match in favor of nessa, right after her drednaw hangs on by 1 hp. that would keep the “forced loss” aspect while still allowing counterplay due to your pokemon not feinting
@@Pearl7spI think that’s overestimating how dramatic a forced loss really is for the player. Plenty of games, even ones catered to children, have moments where the main character has no choice but to lose in the moment only to come back stronger afterwards.
I thought of something else to give Oleana's character some more depth through enviromental storytelling: Every other time she fights you, her Ace Pokémon is a Lopunny with a max power Frustration (I think that this would work better because of what we know from her base game's ace being a Garbodor; maybe Chariman Rose *forced her* to use that Lopunny to maintain that "Beauty" archetype she has). And after you lose the championship fight against Nessa, Oleana goes to see you at your house and she challenges you again for one last combat so she can make up her mind. *But this time* she does have her Ace Garbodor in her team.
you said you wanted to make rose a character worth having an epic battle theme, and brother, when you started playing his song at the climax i lost my shit. so damn cool! i feel like your rewrite fleshes out galar soooo much and would probably make the game longer than it was. P.S, if you ever find the time, the DLC is actually quite fun! especially the crown tundra. if nothing else, you should play it so you can go hang out with penny's dad and brag about it when you go back to paldea X3
i kept going :O and gasping whenever you revealed the big story beats you came up with- i would KILL to play swsh with your story, it was super engaging and honestly would probably be one of the best games in the series if this is the direction they took
rose seems so much more EVIL and more of a threat in your take on the story- honestly its great to have a villain who's just evil and greedy for the sake of it! he's just a rich asshole here and thats AWESOME! keep up the good work, i definitely want to see more of your writing
Leon now has tons of potential for dealing with his actually legitimate imposter syndrome in the post game and proving to himself that he's still a badass outside of rigged matches. I like that idea.
GODDDDD your rewrites inspire the writer in me so easily, I want to write this whole thing as a fanfic because your stories are SO GODDAMN GOOD. GAHHH 10/10
I have a neat alternate idea for salvaging Rose's Energy Crisis motivation and inability to wait even a single day! Have it hinge on an event that has a narrow time window that can't wait, specifically a comet passing by like Hailey's comet. Eternatus fell to earth from a meteor in the distant past, but in this slightly modified version that meteor passes back around once every hundred years or so. And you can tell when its about to pass by because it gives off Wishing Stars and insane amounts of Galar Particles. This comet's approach is what causes the rogue dynamax phenomenon in the story. Thus Rose's plan is to collect as many Wishing Stars as he can in order to wake Eternatus up in time for the comet to pass by because he knows from studying it while dormant that it can siphon Galar Particles from the atmosphere to fuel itself. He theorizes then that if they can wake Eternatus up before the comet comes and subdue it, they can use its power to siphon a massive amount of Galar Particles from the comet on its swing by, which is what it did in the original Darkest Day, and then siphon that energy back out of Eternatus over time like a battery, staving off Galar's looming Energy Crisis in 10 years. However the time of arrival happens to coincide with the day of the championship match this swing by. Late enough in the night that Leon, partially from confidence in his own skill as the "Unbeatable Champion", believes that they can have the match and still have time to subdue Eternatus after and catch the window they need.. But Rose isn't willing to chance any possibility that they might miss their only opportunity because they weren't fully prepared ahead of time. When Leon refuses to postpone his match to go subdue Eternatus well ahead of time Rose decides to force Leon's hand by awakening Eternatus anyway and letting it rampage, counting on Leon's character to abandon the match and go capture it whether he likes it or not. Things proceed as normal from there, going to the Weald, fighting Rose, and fighting Eternatus except this time the Eternamax form isn't just a random Stage 2 but rather the result of the Comet swinging by just as the Player is fighting base Eternatus due to the time that passed running around. Eternatus absorbs energy from the Comet just like Rose theorized it would and enters its Eternamax form. Then things proceed as normal from there. This means that Rose's plan ultimately succeeded, but ONLY because of the players actions essentially salvaging it from the brink of failure, realizing that his plan and judgement almost doomed Galar right then and there he quietly accepts judgement for his crimes and allows himself to be arrested without contest. (this also explains why Eternatus can't Eternamax after you catch it, it no longer has the Comet to draw the required power from as it already passed out of range.)
To be fair to Rose not being able to wait, I don’t think he awakened Eternatus intentionally. It’s clear that it broke out of its containment, all Rose did was feed it wishing stones. He probably knew that Eternatus was going to wake up soon and wanted people to think he was in control of it instead of it escaping without him being in control, which is why he told Leon about it, it’s pretty much what happened in the manga, it rampaged randomly and they had to deal with it.
i'm still actually really mad they made a region based off the uk, but reduced wales to a single city struggling with poverty, and turned scotland into this empty snowy desert. literally what was going through their heads.
I loved this! I’m no writer but I want to write a few little things between characters that could give them a few more fun interactions. I want Leon and Ryhan’s rivalry to be mentioned a little more. Maybe a scene where Ryhan and Leon come face to face and start smack talking each other like crazy, giving underhanded compliments and intense remarks before pausing for a second and then bursting out laughing. They high five, saying it’s good to see the other and explain to the player that they used to be each others rivals back when they were still Pokémon trainers. I love rivals on good terms so something like that could be fun! I’d love an interaction between Ryhan and Leon in general.
Very enjoyable concept, 100% vast improvement on the story. The only complaint I have is that you didn't suggest an alternative Gigantamax Pokemon for Raihan to use. There's only one other dragon type that can Gigantamax, being Flapple/Appletun, which is used by Milo during rematches. I imagine it'd involve promoting Sandaconda to the ace and Gigantamaxing it, since he already has one and as far as I can recall nobody ever actually used Gigantamax Sandaconda. Guess I solved my own complaint, so no notes, great stuff.
G-Max Sandaconda might be a good pick since I like his team being a Sandstorm Specialist Team, having Pokemon that do well or set-up in Sandstorm, basically looking like a strategic team that is competitive in Pokemon Story standards with a difficulty for the regular Pokemon NPC trainer, stating that he is Leon's Rival.
You can just change Sandaconda's type, there's no reason it shouldn't be Ground/Dragon. Edit: And since it's Double Battle, you can keep the Sandstorm theme since he'll likely have another mon next to the Sandaconda. Make his team Flygon (which has a Smooth Rock and knows Sandstorm), Dracozolt, Dracovish, and Sandaconda. Dracozolt and Dracovish both have Sand Rush, so they'll be terrifying to face on Raihan's team.
This was such a sick listen on my way to work and it was actually really inspiring. I have a bit of nostalgia for SwSh since it came out during COVID time and it acted like a nice distraction from everything - that said though, this video made me realise what we COULD have had instead of what we did, I feel almost spoiled. There’s so much quality to it all and thought put into it too As someone who also studied in the creative field for a degree and hasn’t had the chance to put that time much use, I can say really hope you find your footing soon ❤️
19:20 „Rose spends the entire game being this relatively normal guy who just decides to be completely insane one day“ Wait a minute. A weird ass kind of energy-concerned CEO who does relatively normal CEO shit until he decides to go entirely bonkers one day? Where did I hear this before? HMMMMMMM. Did Rose recently purchase a social media network too by any chance?
The thing is, we already had a way more Musk-like villain in 2013. Unlike Rose, Lysandre's motivated by genocidal ideology. You can also compare Lysandre to other Silicon Valley billionaires like Peter Thiel and Sam Altman who've also suddenly gone fascistic. And like Lysandre, these guys are especially scary because they have world-ending resources at their disposal. Say what you will about XY's storyline, but it definitely predicted the future.
Oh wow, I haven't watched a full plot rewrite video through before, but this one absolutely drew my full attention in the whole time! It was a phenomenal story and I really love the way you structured it. Thank you so much for making this video!
@20:38 - Actually I _DID_ just have two pretty solid ideas for why Rose would suddenly be so anxious about the whole Eternatus thing: First is going with the anime alteration that it's only 10 years away, and second is the idea that he's actually screwed up and given it too many wishing stars too quickly and it's going to awaken a _lot_ sooner than anticipated. Thus, he is trying (and failing) to save face while also getting Leon to put off the championship so Leon and his pokemon, ostensibly still fresh and ready, can face off against Eternatus in prime condition and not only save the company but also his reputation. But when he realizes how much he's just screwed up, he's REALLY hoping to get Leon to just do the thing, hence why he decides to play the villain when Eternatus starts waking up during the tournament and pretends it's all part of his plan. It's likely so the blame can fall squarely on him as a person and not on his company. He likely challenges you because he's hoping to test whether or not you're good enough to join Leon in facing Eternatus. As for the red light scenes, they were likely intended to exist and you were likely meant to take part in them, but that was likely changed when they decided on the dynamax battles in the wild areas.
@@ZA-pv3lyI don't understand why they would do that, if the point of an abridged is a parody there's a lot of humor in mocking how dumb his motivation was in canon
i got sooooo invested in the plot you wrote its actually unbelievable its fan made. it flows so much more naturally and brings much more satisfying character arcs, while still being reasonable pokemon stories. AUGHHH I WISH THE ACTUAL GAMES HAD THIS
@@DrMinaDeZoneAcerola They had plenty of time to write a better story. Fudj just wrote a way better one with a fraction of the time and as one person with no salary. But Game Freak, being a large company, would never make the villain a pure evil corporate boss.
31:20 - 31:35 This. Is. *Eyeopening.* I've been doing this for the longest time, the biggest way I show through my own writing is that I listen to songs and fit the continuation of the story to them, in a way its less about themes in the song, but more about what they feel like... less as a "theme" in conventional sense, and more of a "dimension" that I just "jump off" from to thinking how it could unravel from there... I feel funny now... but thanks for putting it into words.
I think energy can be the focus of the story in two ways - either Rose wants to seize the means of production himself and has made everyone a pawn in his scheme to get Eternatus OR the energy crisis is 10 years away, and Rose realizes that Galar Particles are finite and dynamaxing eats into this finite resource. So every dynamax battle eats more and more into this resource (giving urgency to halt the tournament)
Also so many people have commented throughout the series on how it seems like world-ending phenomena and massive criminal enterprises are tackled by you, a random character. This is why, because suspending disbelief a bit in this fantasy world is preferable to “and a qualified person fixed it offscreen”
That was AMAZING!!!!!!!! I REALLY loved how you interpreted the story and meticulously rewired all the cool content of the Eternatus part, IT'S AMAZING AAAAAAAA
I think Orbeetle would be the best fit for Rose. Orbeetle regularly uses manipulation to make others do its bidding, especially its GMAX form. Additionally Orbeetle starts out as a weak, Inconspicuous, caterpillar, kinda like how Rose started, and pretends to be.
ive watched this whole video three times. I hope to draw fan art of the rose tower constrained eternatus that is such a cool visual, great work im very normal about your story
This was *so good.* As impressive as the parts you invented were your choices of original elements to keep, accentuate and recontextualize. You told me yesterday that, as a fan of the Sordward + Shieldbert storyline, I would be happy with this, and *you were right.*
As I've not finished the video yet, I'm excited to see how the information on the cards gets implemented! As I've finished the video, I'm sad the info on the cards seems to be forgotten, but I really love the story overall!
Honestly, I love these changes, from spikemuth’s history and piers and Marnie, all the way to being rigged out of the league, to Sonia being able to figure out the whole truth, only slightly too late as to not take away from the player’s get back. I really wish that was the real game’s story
I thank you for explaining theme. It has honestly never been explained well enough for me to understand on how to write using it until now. World building and character development are my favorite things to write, yet I didn't understand how to link a story together. I am so excited to do more writings!
I might be a bit late but first of all I want to say, amazing video and amazing rewrite. It was always such a meme how dramatic Rose's theme was, but now it makes complete sense with how much there's on the line in your story. Honestly, if sword and shield had your story it would probably be one of my favorite games, since I enjoyed the gameplay of the game quite a lot! Maybe a cool tweak you could've implemented is that the game ends after your fight with Rose and that the champions tournament is actually part of the post game, like how in Black and White you fight Ghetsis in the main story and defeat the real and champion in the post game. I think this would make the post game a lot more exciting than just dynamax battles. Amazing video :)
I just watched all of this video and was thoroughly immersed throughout, amazing. I’ve always struggled with themes in the little story writing I’ve done, and I just love how appropriate the theme of history turned out to be, as a fellow Brit. I loved how it improved Rose’s character, and adding Swordward and Shielbert into the main story was surprising to me at first, but it seems so obvious now with the way it was integrated. Also, making Oleana more sympathetic was a good idea, and I actually felt bad for her when she was explaining that Rose fired her and now she was back to the poverty she’d been in before he’d taken her under his manipulative wing. Speaking of feeling bad for characters, I felt actually terrible for Leon. I’ve seen plenty of fan interpretations of Rose controlling his life, whether he’s aware of it or not, but I think I prefer this interpretation where he’s so blind that he only realises his legacy was a lie when its said right to him so carelessly. I was also thinking his reaction to losing to you could represent his illusion of himself shattering, but like, in a good way? Like, it’s a reminder for him that he’s just a pokemon trainer like everyone else. I LOVE IT. I also love what you did with Team Yell. I wasn’t so sure at first about making Marnie and Piers colder towards you, but I love how you build up their trust, and the residents of the shunned town Rose wants everyone to forget about become your closest allies towards the climax (speaking of the climax, I even felt bad for Eternatus, because I wondered if it was suffering being chained up like that, with Rose essentially torturing it to siphon its energy). Also, the way you fleshed out Spikemuth was really interesting, and I just LOVE how the Gym is integrated into the main storyline, with Piers being made a more sympathetic character, so you trust him over Rose - leading up to the ironic decision to work with the “evil team” to take him down. This should be so much more well-known in general, enough to become considered an AU so that more content could potentially be made based on it. I’m just imagining a novelised version of this, with all of Sw/Sh retold exactly like this… I need it. I’d read every page.
I mean, considering his entire career is a lie, no he’s not a trainer like everyone else. He’s a phony who isn’t as good as he thinks he is. He’s a fake who thought he was a. Good trainer, but it turns out he’s not really that good at all and he’s only where he is due to a fluke
When I tell you ive watched this video like 3 times and each time I am just bLOWN AWAY from your rewite and am absolutely invested for the entirety of the video!!! An incredible rewrite that I oh so wish was canon 😩🙏
You could potentially wrap up Oleana's story by having her eventually assist or flat-out replace Leon as the new Chairwoman, seeing as she likely already has a lot of second-hand experience and she was simply misguided and manipulated in this retelling. Maybe she could be the proper rags to riches story that Rose stomped on. ... Yes, she likely assisted in far too much shady business to not be locked up, but this is Pokemon. That, and your ending to her involvement already implied she was either pardoned or able to hide her prior actions.
people have mentioned oleana's backstory, so i'll instead say that leaving that stuff as backstory is completely fine. having a beautiful woman with a bunch of beautiful pokemon and an 'ugly' ace serving as the lieutenant to the main villain is good storytelling in and of itself. it doesn't need explaining or examination.
I really like the story that you came up with. I've not played sword and shield, nor do i plan to, but I've always heard there was a bad story. You pointed out a lot of parts that could have been better and you improved so much. I'm a writer myself but I'm still learning and I love the way that you've put this together and the plot is amazing. You also confirmed my suspicious about theme. I've had trouble knowing exactly what it was but hearing other people say that it is derived from what you write (usually after) is very nice. Thank you for your video, it was very good and I am looking forward to your next videos!
Looks like there may be a couple small audio glitches and editing blips throughout which I can only apologise for, we had the death of a pet yesterday which meant I wasn't really in the right frame of mind when finishing this up
Anyway, Palette Swap are also on Bluesky:
bsky.app/profile/paletteswapmag.bsky.social
And sorry to any confusion caused with the Patreon. Again, as I say, things will be explained in a post soon. For now, here's where you can support me:
www.patreon.com/nocturnalfudj
sorry for your loss dude :(
I'm so sorry for your loss.
I'm so sorry about your pet, please take time for yourself ❤
So sorry for your loss
Imo the worst part is that Eternutis can't even eternamax. It's ENTIRE BOSS FIGHT MECHANIC is useles besides showing up in ONE MOVE, and that move loses it's animation and use opon moving on to scarlet and violet😤😤😤😤
Turning Hop into a sports journalist/announcer is such an economical change to the story, it’s really brilliant. It doesn’t even really need a whole lot of recontextualizing, it just slots nicely into his character.
Hop is infamous for providing commentary throughout your fights with him. His incessant chattering in the middle of battle makes a lot more sense with the rewrite you proposed. This change turns an otherwise annoying character trait into something that contributes to the conclusion of his character arc.
The rival trainer to Pokemon professor/assistant pipeline works, but it’s something that’s been done before in the series: Gary Oak from the anime, Cheren/Bianca in BW. Providing a little bit of originality and expanding the world is always a good thing.
Also, Hop’s whole story is how he is interested in battling but is horrible at battling. (Although in postgame it is shown he can be decent but will never reach the heights of Champion or people that could be champion.). People like that who are otherwise interested in the scene would turn to reporting. Heck, he could still be a reporter and scientist, with him using his time as a reporter to have anecdotal evidence for Pokémon battling against each other, and both could be concurrent - that is, like Professor Kukui, he would be a battle Professor, but in Hop’s case it would be in the context of Pokémon battling for sport, akin to researchers on overall human health and researchers on fitness and sports fitness and training.
He’s so deku-coded haha
@@iantaakalla8180 He could even become a trainer coach, helping young trainer hopefuls get better at battling
Plus, he just dresses like a freelance reporter already.
As soon as Fudj said Mr. Reporter Hop it clicked super hard.
Rose kinda acts like a kid finding out the sun is going to explode…….. in a billion years.
More like in 4,5 billion years.
(i was that kid and I didn't see word "billion" first time)
I mean roses intentions were good but trying to solve an energy problem that’s 1,000 years away is just bad writing. I probably would change the writing to where the energy crisis would be months away instead of a 1,000 years
@alexbaldwin1182 This was covered in the video though. If the energy crisis was made to be something happening sooner, then people would be freaking out about it and there would already be work to fix it.
I remember I saw some fanfic on AO3 that made it so Rose was hiding a terminal illness, and due to die in months. He feels like *he alone* can fix it, and so he has to act *now.* It in no way fixes the story, but it does make Rose's motivations make a little more sense.
Would definitely explain why’s he’s in so much a rush and why he would act so rashly when there was no reason for it.
The rigged matches part actually lines up with base game. Mustard in the DLC used to be Champion but resigned after learning he would be fighting in fixed matches so it’s really not out of the question
The previous champion from Leon is actually Peony, and it makes sense that he would find out about Rose's plans since they're brothers
@@jdelacruz14791 True. Peony also resigned because his relationship with Rose was already rather rocky even before Rose became the Chairman of the Pokemon League.
Oh my goodness gracious, it is Marisa Fire Emblem!
Didnt Mustard's league card say that he lost a partner Pokemon and resigned due to that and the fact that he went on a losing streak right afterwards?
@@malgai The full description of the Card you mention is: "This photo was taken about 50 years ago, when Mustard defeated the Fairy-type Gym Leader and went on to become Champion. He reigned undefeated until he lost his partner Pokémon. After this, his losses started to mount. He remained popular even after losing the mantle of Champion, but decided to retire after the league chairman at that time asked him to win in a rigged match. Mustard developed an obsession with video games after his retirement. Apparently he held off while he was still active in order to maintain his image to his fans." So yes losing his partner was part of it but he was also asked to win in a rigged match and so decided that was the final straw and retired.
Here's how I'd add some time sensitivity to Chairman Rose's scheme:
Eternatus didn't crash into the Galar region but instead is still inside a comet that flies close to the planet every few hundred years. Last time it passed by it triggered the darkest day. Now in the present the comet is approaching again and this time Rose wants to drag it down and have Leon capture the Pokémon inside and use it as a living nuclear reactor. Rose tower is in fact a tractor beam kind of thingy designed to yank the comet out of the sky when it gets close enough, and the Eternatus comet will be at its closest to the planet on the day of the title fight and it'll be outside the tower's range by the time Leon is done with the championship.
THAT'S why Rose can't wait for even a single day for Leon to help him out.
Oh this is such a cool idea
And it ties into the concept of wishing stars
I love this idea! It just proves even further there are HUNDREDS of ways the story could have been reworked for the better.
Yeah, no way to reschedule the cosmos, am I right?
@@greenstarlover1Don’t worry, I know a couple of guys
Imagine setting a game in Britain and not making the villain an aristocrat.
I mean, a corporate chairman is a modern day version of an aristocrat
Imagine that they saved the Aristocrat villain for AMERICA
Especially when they did for Kalos
@casteddu6740 there is no difference really unless what's he's asking is a stereotype of one being top hatted Tumblr sexy men esc villain
@@mechashadowunova(New York), Orre (Arizona) , and aloha(Hawaii) are all really based off of parts of the USA and predate sword and shield, also how would an aristocrat villlan fit the usa?
1:20:10 Oh, that's such a great line. It makes Garbador being her ace a double entente
At first you assume it's because she's secretly a terrible, vile person underneath her beautiful, elegant exterior. But not only is the original lore about her coming from lowly beginnings preserved, it recontextualizes Garbador's significance.
isn't it double entendre?
@sealiosoI believe you are right, I think he mistook the term for the Triple Entente in World War 1.
Say what you will about alola (i liked it) but at least when something happened in the story, you SAW it. Imagine if you got held up talking to wicke at the aether foundation, and then when you went up, Hau said "woah dude, you just missed it, a weird looking Pokémon came out of an ultra wormhole, and I had to beat it up!
Oh my god I would combust
people without uk bias almost unilaterally prefer alola to any other 3d era game as well as believe sword and shield are by far the worst 3d era game. the only competing is between sv and xy for the number 2-3 slots.
@@BeIlGTRUE, gen 7 stays winning
@@BeIlG nah xy is PEAK. Number 2 is probably johto
@@BeIlG I mean, I did like Sun/Moon best out of those four, but I also did enjoy Sword/Shield more than I did Scarlet/Violet
Though from what I've seen, that seems to be a pretty unpopular opinion, true
I think the worst part about the Sw/Sh story is that the very existence of Regileki makes a plothole.
" Its entire body is made up of a single organ that generates electrical energy. Regieleki is capable of creating all Galar’s electricity."
😐
well they wouldn't be able to contain it, even if they know it exists. not in an ethical manner, anyway.
Quite a few Electric-type Pokémon have been said to have the potential to power cities. Then (in retrospect) there’s Levincia. The city powered by :)-faced light-bulb tadpoles.
@@Myggins Contain it? My guy, the *whole premise of the franchise* is containing Monsters like Regileki.
Maybe it could be argued that Chairman Rose was so focused on Eternatus that it never crossed his mind that a better solution to this problem was right under his nose. One could argue Silveroy could also generate his own energy and that it was safer and cleaner and that he too was ignored.
@@bubalackgaming8892Perhaps there's a difference in ethics between partnering with a Pokemon in a way that allows it to carry on its natural behaviors and habitats, and shutting it into a box for eternity to generate power.
gunna be honest my only regret with watching this video is the vast gulf of discontent and disappointment i now feel about the ACTUAL swsh storyline LOL i couldnt have told you then or now what the plot was supposed to actually be. it was so muddy i finished the game and was like well.. i guess im done? what? but this. man. this rewrite is so well worked and balanced that i cant imagine a world where this WASNT the actual story now. the twist with the scripted loss against nessa especially- could you IMAGINE that happening ingame??? FANTASTIC work. please make like 50 roms i swear to god
It's like someone took pokemon suns plot, shuffled a couple of things around, and didn't bother checking if things worked coherently
@@mcnierstenen9017the rewrite or original?
I have never resonated with a comment as much as this one. I hope a rom with this story comes to fruition some day 😭
Closest we get is a animatic with said rewrite in mind
I'd make Leon the champion for 6 years instead of 4 for 2 reasons.
1. It is implied that multiple gym leaders took the gym challenge the same year as Leon or more recently. Raihan is a rival to Leon, who was traveling along side Sonia, who was really good friends with Nessa, who sees herself having a rivalry with Milo. Gordie is described as an upcomer who people believe might become champion one day, which leads me to think he's younger than the others. You could not convince me Allister isn't a new gym leader with how young he looks and how shy he is. Bea kind of just seems younger than the first group, I'd put her around Gordie but that's just a vibe. Piers, filling a similar role to Leon as an older brother to one of your rivals, I just lumped him in with Leon's group, but I could see him being a few years older. Maybe he was a gym leader for a year before Leon became champion. All that is to say I don't think everyone should have become a gym leader immediatly after their own run. Maybe Raihan became one the following year, followed by Nessa 2 years later, and Milo the year after that, with 2 years to go before your run, just to feel more stretched out. 4 just feels more compressed.
2. If Leon has been champion for 6 years then that means Leon defended his title 4 times between him winning and you taking his sponsership. (Spoiler for the video) that's 4 champion level trainers that got cheated. I could see Leon reching out to each of them wanting to set things right. Once you win against the gym leaders again you fight this makeshift Elite 4 before you fight Leon.
Edit: Just came up with this idea. Have one of these trainers be Volkner from Sinnoh. Gen 8 would later have the Diamond and Pearl remakes so you could get some synergy going. There also is no electric specialist in Galar. For story reasons his whole deal is wanting a challenge and talks about taking on the Sinnoh Elite 4, he hears the Galar league is exceptionally strong and takes it on. When Volkner faces Raihan before Leon, Rose rigs the match so the Galar 8th gym leader gets a decisive victory over the Sinnoh 8th gym leader.
It wouldn’t make sense to fight them as they were cheated by Leon, not you. They would have to fight Leon again, as they lost to Leon.
@@BabyGirlTiny I think the implication is that they get invited back and not all the gym leaders partake. You end up fighting them as 4 new to you trainers who all are 'champion level' to be a sort of elite 4.
Mustard and Peony should be two of them, and if I were to pick two more known characters as a sort of "elite 4", it would be Raihan and Piers, and we could retcon it so that Piers is the one who couldn't Dynamax his pokemon
Yeah, I guess I could’ve been more clear on that. We don’t even know who they specifically lost to because we lost to Nessa. Maybe one lost to Raihan, or Piers, or some gym leader who has since retired/moved. It’s easy to recreate our tournament bracket because it’s only been maybe a few weeks, but the other 4, not so much.
I think it could go either way when it comes to the other trainers. Leon faces the first trainer and the winner battles the second and then the third etc… or you fight the guy from the year before you, and then the next, until you fight Leon. Either Leon is the strongest of 5 and fights you at the end where he now knows that he would still have been champion this whole time… or you’re the strongest of 5 and battle Leon who still isn’t sure about his title. I think the second option make’s enough sense to justify itself for the benefit of more boss battles.
@@jdelacruz14791 I really like this post-game elite 4 lineup although I think I'd change 1 thing. The stuff with Piers makes perfect sense and he'd easily be able to move on to the elite 4 since he's got Marnie to succeed him as gym leader. But I feel like taking both the 7th and 8th gym leaders is kinda boring so I'd say Raihan stays as the 8th gym leader because he wants the title of champion for himself, not to be part of his old rivals new possee. I'd say instead that it's Oleana that takes the position. Seeking redemption for her participation in Rose's crimes she wants to take a new path and better herself as a trainer. She was already a really good trainer in the first place being a late game boss. Plus it means she gets a new job.
I kind of forgot this rewrite was for the purpose of making roses theme fit, so by God, when I got to the new fight you wrote the music really blew me away. Such a better implementation. Bravo on the rewrite
"How do I make rose's battle theme feel more potent? I know, he's on the verge of losing everything and is desperate to blow everyone up for it mwahahahahaha!"
59:00 I want people to understand this is actually even more fitting than it seems!
The Circester baths are clearly inspired by the Roman baths in the City of Bath here in the UK. One thing I didn't know until visiting recently is that the second level and the statues of emperors found there are actually a Victorian addition, centuries after the Roman-built bathhouse had already fallen into ruin and been buried. There's even supposition that the statues of emperors have striking resemblance to the town council members of Bath at the time these statues were commissioned.
The idea of Sordward and Shielbert making an excuse about a more recent mayor's interference not only works for the story, it's also a genius reflection of the real-world history involved. Plus considering Brits don't have a great history with artifacts (that's what the jumbled fossils are based on), I think it's also a fun way to keep that motif going!
"unfortunately i am still a pokemon fan." too real...
I find myself hating pokemon but still playing the older games
Luckily, we're in a true golden age of fan games. =)
@@mokarokas-1727 which mean the golden age of Nintendo lawyers
@@Chadfill8348 How so? They're stopping nothing.
@@mokarokas-1727 but they still get the paycheck
1:39:19 ok but for real though. Imagining an entire army of trainers holding off a monster like Eternatus while you run for help is such a cool scene to imagine. Why cant we have awesome moments in Pokemon?
time constraints and programming issues, video game companies kinda put themselves on daggers with time constraints
I'd program it so that there's a "time limit" to getting to the Legendaries - if you take too long beating the Gigantamaxed rampage, Eternamax manages to win - but of course, your ally in the raid battle might have a move or two to help guarantee a victory if you need it, so you can't get soft-locked out
The problem is time constraints I’m glad they seem to be taking more time with Pokémon legends Z-A
They used their entire awesome moments budget on the bit in Black and White where all the gym leaders storm Castle Plasma and the consequent Generations short depicting it.
We did, in the anime, they had 14 trainers working to stop or slow down Lysanders massive stone Zygarde thing, I can't remember what's it name was, but it was simply awesome seeing them make up a last stand to keep it from getting to Anistar.
Phenomenal rewrite. When Leon was first shown on social media, many people felt he might be a fraud, so I like how you felt your story naturally gravitated towards this direction. And when I made the connection, that Leon’s whole position as the “ruler/victor/what have you” was actually a fraud, and thus called back to the concept of historical revisionism and your quote about victors getting to write history, I really was just “😮” for a moment, lol. Great job. Just some meta stuff right there. In the end, it wasn’t even Leon’s choice, the instrumentalization of his by Rose (the actual “ruling class”) just hurt him in the end.
I also liked how Piers, Marnie and Team Yell were enhanced by adding the anti-capitalist, English punk aspect to them, and how the fellow Gym Leaders were portrayed perhaps not as perpetrators, but definitely as beneficiaries of the system Rose hat put into place, and they were not keen on giving up their position until shown undeniable evidence of Rose’s deceit. We truly live in a society.
We really do
I also love how it adds way more depth to Leon after he is finally beaten by the player. In the original, he appears to be super depressed by the player beating him. While this is understandable since he’s undefeated before this, it’s not very relatable.
In the rewrite, this depression fits a lot better as he struggles with self-doubt. Since he’s based his personality on being undefeated, he probably is wondering who he is if that was all a lie. It also makes a lot of sense to take over the Rose/battle tower, as helps him strive to get stronger and prove himself.
There was no natural gravitation as it added absolutely nothing to the story lol.
@@CyberDrewanthere is no depth added though lol. And how is in not relatable to lose at something you’ve never lost ate
In the rewrite he should have that depression before the battle, not after it. In the rewrite he would be doubting himself the entire time and the entire battle since everything he’s known about himself is a lie. It doesn’t make sense that he’s depressed after the loss. It makes more sense that he’s depressed before the loss and that affects him in the actual battle
It also doesn’t make sense for him to take over rose tower as his entire career has been a lie. He would challenge it, not fake it over as taking it over makes no sense with his entire career being fake. Hell it makes more sense for him to start all over from scratch
Honestly, this sounds way more anti-corporation than anti-capitalist to me... Yes, there is a difference, believe it or not...
"Just because its written for children, doesn't mean it should be written worse, it just means it should be written differently. Everyone deserves to be exposed to stories written by people who care." Fucking go off! Absolutely despise the attitude that childrens media is/should be inherently inferior/made with less thought. No! If anything, it deserves more thought- because your story might be the first time that kid ever encounters a story about that theme, and it has so much more potential to shape the way they see that issue going forward. Great attitude to have ❤
I have been saying this for Years, and it's so nice to see people saying the same things.
Children's media is deeply important, it can educate in ways that parents and teachers may well not be able to reach kids.
Motherfucking facts. I'm glad that I grew up in the generation that produced such gems as _Batman: The Animated Series_ and _Gargoyles,_ and they helped shape my views more than a fair bit. I'm glad that time period paved the way for future children's media to be made with some actual substance to them, and not all be mindless drivel and toy commercials.
You've got a real knack for character dialogue and motivation! If you're up for it (and the bank account gets low enough), I'd love to see your take on designing a Pokemon storyline from the ground up. What would you do if you had all the tools, instead of rebuilding a foundation from something else? You've mentioned before how you don't really enjoy returning to the Pokemon well again and again, but I hope an exercise like this is creatively stimulating enough that you can wring some joy out of it! Thank you for sharing!
Seconded! Criminal that you got no replies-here's my contribution to boosting ya comment!
Oohh yeah! Honestly, those videos/video series where youtubers make their own pokemon game/story are always really entertaining
Oooo I’d love that
I'd love a video (or broken into a series) on that!!
I will literally donate… some amount of money to the Patreon if this is promised. 10 bucks maybe?
You mentioned in the Raihan section about teams saying things about character when moving Duraludon off of his team. A cool idea to replace it would be Blastoise IMO. Since it's his old team it represents his rivalry with Leon and shows that Leon was at a disadvantage when it came to starters (like classic pokemon games) it's subtle but reinforces their rivalry and Leon's skill
Would be a fun change if his team becomes a Rain Team due to Blastoise being his Ace. So then... Would that mean... Sonia gets Venusaur?
@@ViRo02CasTbh it looks like it would match her, and it would make the perfect Red, Blue, Green parallel.
The “theme” of Galar was descendants/ history / but mostly legacy
You beat the unbeatable champion and it’s legacy
Hop was trying to reach Leon legacy
Marine and Bede continued the legacy of their respective gym leaders
Rose was trying to make a legacy last forever
Sonia continued the previous professor legacy
But even so SWSH doesn’t use this theme very well
yet you catched the theme, how Galar and its people have this inherited will from its past, Hop and Gloria became the new Sword and Shield wielders, the old energy is replaced by a new one, the tradition itself is a passing of the torch the pokemon league is a big celebration, I get that he wanted a more dark approach, but I would loved if he keep the original theme from Sword and Shield
hell its biggest use of this theme was in the post game villains who were descendants of the legendary heroes but were rich layabouts who were more ridiculous rather than compelling or interesting and whose evil scheme just ends with everyone just getitng forgiven carte blanche (yes this last bit is msotly about Sonia's random ass assistant who betrayed her and then just sorta turns good for no reason when really she should've been fired because she betrayed her boss' trust to suck up to some rich snobs)
Regarding the DLC, this rewrite definitely fits given what info we have on Peony-he was a former Gym Leader and the Champion of Galar once, but left the League not long after Rose became the Chairman. As his brother, I have no doubt that Peony would know Rose’s nature best and either chose to or was forced to leave due to corruption. Perhaps if he spoke out he would have been regarded as a bitter brother jealous of Rose, mirroring the player here in their darkest hour, or maybe he just felt the whole thing would be toxic and jumped ship to focus on his family?
Come to think of it, Master Mustard in the Isle of Armour was a former champion too and contemporary to early Opal, held his title for 18 years before he left for similar reasons, the then-chairman trying to get a match rigged in his favour. Seems the League has a long history of corruption but given Leon was a pupil of Mustard’s once and is a good guy, maybe the cycle can finally be broken.
I think the part about dynamax not working is a cool idea, but way too obvious of a rig. Maybe it could be a plot point that refusing to dynamax is seen as a power play meant to inflate the fighters ego. So when someone doesn't dynamax, it's seen as a taunt rather than a stupid decision. Then when the fighter inevitably loses, and claims that dynamax wasn't working, people will just assume he's lying to cover his embarrassing loss. That way it wouldn't be as suspicious as it is now
It could make sense. As it is something that some pokémon trainer who is just so confident to their and their pokémons ability to win the match could do just to show everyone how awesome trainer they are and how strong pokémon team they got.
Wow, I actually did this in my second plaaythrough XD. I played a bug monotype team and refused to dynamax (mostly so the game was actually challenging) which kinda came together to form a strong underdog narrative. The small, underestimated bugs can be the strongest with enough effort etc.
I was thinking either this or add some established simple way to feasibly fumble a daynamax in lore. something that would be easy enough to slip up and do on an off game, but something a skilled battler should usually be able to avoid without a second thought. maybe you have to throw the ball a very specific way or do something to the band/with the arm the band is on, otherwise it doesn't work
This was my one complaint with the vid, but this makes it make sense
That, or just remove the part about being made unable to Dynamax altogether? I feel like after the first couple times challengers claimed they didn’t do it on purpose, people would start getting suspicious of the legitimacy of the matches pretty quick. Maybe rather than handicapping one contestant, Rose could actually be empowering the favored winner. So in the scripted battle with Nessa, her GMax Drednaw just has absurdly high HP, and a damage boost. Still accomplishes the same goal
I really wish the games did a better job at hinting toward Sonias backstory. Both the anime and the manga have the implication the Sonia was actually a better trainer than Leon when they were kids, but because she was the professors granddaughter audiences thought that there might be some kind of conflict of interest and the only reason she was winning all of her battles was because the leaders were going easy on her. Eventually the stress and baseless allegations got to her and she withdrew from the competition after Ballonlea. None of this is conveyed in the games except for the fact that Sonia was at the Ballonlea gym one time and didn't have much confidence, which you can learn by reading the report on the table after completing the gym challenge but before fighting Opal.
Cool rewrite, I especially like that you gave Marnie and Piers' story more teeth. I like the characters and always wished they didn't feel so pointless to the game.
I also appreciate that you understand the realities of game dev and that the story is the way that it is because the devs had to meet an unfair deadline.
Fun fact: There actually is a small plot involving rigged championship matches in Sword and Shield! Mustard, the master of the dojo in The Isle of Armor DLC pack, is actually a former champion who stepped down after the league chairman at the time asked him to win a rigged match. However this is only revealed in his second league card and the game doesn't bother exploring this plot point further.
Excellent video! As one of those weirdos that like reading fanfiction and thinks way too deep about video game stories to find the smallest crumbs in-canon and real life equivalents to pull from, this was right up my alley.
A couple of fun-facts you might not be aware about, there are some secret Trainer Cards you can get in-game that reveal some backstory to the characters. For example, Oleana grew up dirty poor before getting a job in Macro Cosmos and being noticed by Rose, so her Garbodor as a Trubbish was her first Mon, and probably the only one she could afford to keep because it ate garbage, which made it cheap.
Also Rose's brother is absurdly funny, and really did not like his brother. How much he disliked him? He was the Champion before Leon, and he resigned the micro-instant Rose became chairman. That's how much he didn't want to have nothing to do with Rose.
Also, and I'm not joking, he's basically confirmed to be the father of Penny from SV, the small girl with red and blue hair. And the founder of Paldea's own evil team.
Domestic terrorism runs in the family.
Penny's father is HEAAAVILY implied to be Peony
I vaguely remember that they partially fixed roses character in the anime by having his reasoning be that his father died working in a coal mine, wanting to stop any other child from experiencing that pain, his impatience coming from his reasoning that if you wait even a day too many people will die
That is so much more interesting
The anime, the manga and even Masters do a lot to fix the issues with not just Rose, but pretty much every contentious character, period.
@@WhiteRaven696Ehh not the anime as much honestly, when they didn't keep the villains the exact same, dumb ideology and all, they even made some worse like Lusamine
You gotta love Sword and Shield for having the exact opposite plot as the UK - Chairman Rose actually wants to make renewable energy! The UK government could never
That was one of my big frustrations with the games-that you could read it as mocking climate "alarmists" the same way Black & White villainized Animal Rights activism.
@@GSBarlevI wouldn’t give them enough credit to think of it as mocking. It feels like all the effort went into the excellent league challenge and then they threw a story together. Eternarus? Fuck it energy crisis Pokémon get big. Yeah but how is the fella sorting that a villain? Errr, it’s in a thousand years and it’s basically a disaster. But we’ve not got time to animate all of the Pokémon rampaging? Make the champion sort it all out off screen. Everyone liked the gym leaders helping in BW, they’ll love that.
@@GSBarlev BW2 did have the thing with the team splitting into two, with the good ones following N. Honestly it’s a reach but the whole plot kinda reminded me of stalin taking over the communism craze, however well intentioned it may have started, like animal farm. (iirc, it’s been awhile since I learned about it)
@@GSBarlev Except PETA, the organisation that Plasma (og) was based on, are genuinely evil.
With SwSh, it really does seem like a silly caricature, but the "evil" Plasma Grunts are pretty accurate depictions of those PETA nutjobs that would take animal companions from homeless people.
🤣 🤣
Historical revision/erasure would make a fascinating theme, but it's very hard to imagine a Japanese company poking that particular hornet's nest
That's the first thought I had in my mind lol
*grins wildly in One Piece*
41:52 "Home of J.K. Rowling" Ok that got a chuckle out of me
Solid joke. 10/10 would clip to watch again.
I laughed for a full 10 minutes ngl
I did not hear it correctly at first so I didn't get the joke, but I was to invested in the rewrite go back. Looking at it again, that is hilarious.
yeah i was caught off gaurd by it and it was so funny
For those who don’t understand the joke, JK Rowling is considered a TERF and TERField sounds like Turffield
This is now cannon for me. I will accept no arguments or alternatives. This is so much better than what we got. I want to see someone make a comic or write a story or something that follows this version of the game. It would be so cool. This was an amazing video, and I think you should be in charge of writing the story of the next Pokemon game.
I love this rewrite! My only addition would be with Oleanna's character. On her trainer card it reveals that Garbodor was her first pokemon that she befriended while in poverty. I liked this bit of story because when you first fight her it seems like Garbodor represents her toxic attitude beneath her elegant facade, but it's actually her showing loyalty to her roots and best friend despite how much her life has changed. I think this bit of lore could be wedged nicely into your Potswick scene, and it would strengthen her reasoning for helping you in the latter half of the game.
I guess if there's something there could be done with Peony is for him to meet Oleana and make her feel like she, for once, belongs somewhere.
And for some fun contrast to Rose, it could be implied that he was a really competent player, close to champion levels even, that decided to focus on his family first and foremost instead of becoming the best
He was actually the champion but left after Rose became chairman! It would be interesting to see Peony talk with Leon!!!
I’m glad you went into explaining the theme of your story. On Bulbapedia, the pages for each generation lists thematic motifs for each region (Hoenn is relationships in nature, Sinnoh is myths and legends, Kalos is beauty and harmony, etc.). Meanwhile, the Gen 8 page doesn’t have a section like that. With a story like this to help contextualize how we should think about Galar, it could.
For all that X and Y has the next most stupidest story after Sword/Shield, at least the bluntness of all plot points means that their resolution of beauty as a theme means beauty is about enjoying life, like how you and your five friends enjoy time together and Pokémon in different ways, as opposed to Lysander who either wants eternal unchanging beauty or death to ugly things, which are anti-life.
TV Tropes seems to approach the idea that the theme of Galar is the pursuit of fame and the cost one takes to achieve it. Granted, there are only a few items in SwSh that justify that theme proposition, including:
* Leon
* Mustard
* Rose
* Peony
* Swordward and Shielbert
* The Spikemuth gang
Literally a few seconds before the Dark gym rewrite I asked how a British game with punks and a bunch of powerfull people didn't even tried to touch the anarchy and skinhead culture.
Kinda fitting that the region for one of the worst pokemon games is called galar which is the Irish word for disease
That’s actually hilarious given their history 💀💀💀💀
I knew it, Sword and Shield is actually IRA propaganda! That's why it's so bad! To make England seem bad!
WHAT 💀
@@Ludraman_ THATS WILDDDD
1 thing I'll give SWSH is that it has my favourite art style of any 3D Pokémon game
I actually think the game looks *good,* and it's just how jank the Wild Area looks that gives the whole game the bad reputation of looking ugly
i like how the villain is tory austerity
The problem is always capitalism
@@RybackToTheFuturenot capitalism. Corporatism.
@@grandarkfang_1482 Corporatism is the inevitable end result of capitalism.
@@grandarkfang_1482 Imagine defending capitalism🤣🤣
true, but the whole 'mining family' backstory gives the same vibes as 'my father was a toolmaker'
I just realized that Hop is vague about Zacian/Zamazenta's appearance in the originals because they didn't want to imply the existence of non-Pokémon animals
i'll never understand how they decide when to not reference non pokemon animals sometimes (like with hop) and when to just straight up name drop real animals like with iron moth in scarlet and violet or with the subspecies names for a ton of pokemon in the pokedex (like meowth being the scratch cat pokemon)
Probably couldve just compared it to another dog-like pokemon like Boltund.
What’s interesting is that Boltund is referred to as the “Dog Pokémon” as its category in its Pokédex description, so they clearly know what a dog is. It could be that dog just refers to Pokémon with canine features even if no normal dogs exist.
Edit: Boltund was the first Pokémon with that category, it has since been joined by Dachsbun. Before that the only category that explicitly mentioned dogs was Herdier the “Loyal Dog Pokémon”.
The DLC could work with this with just about zero changes, save for the fact that you can head to the DLC areas whenever you want, and there's certain times in this storyline where it'd be pretty weird to just wander off to an island and fight giant bees for a while. Peonea's relationship with Rose is briefly half-touched on in one line of dialogue, and in general the DLCs are a lot better put together than the main game, and are in need of a lot less fixing.
The section on themes and finding them for your rewrite was seriously helpful as someone who is studying creative writing. I have never heard themes described like that and it makes so much sense. This is the first video of yours I have seen but I would gladly listen to you talk about writing for hours.
I personally felt like Bede was missing something. I, too, liked him (I typically do like snarky assholes like him), but it felt like he was left in only a slightly better position from the beginning. he was constantly looking for approval from rose, and then he gets rejected and picked up by opal, who then reforms him to be... himself but without the coat? it didn't feel much like he changed at all, even though he was supposed to have. he learned nothing really, and hasn't really changed. I felt like we didn't get enough time with him to observe the transformation, had it even happened. i know he was a bit of a bitch, but i really never felt that he was doing it just to be an ass. it felt like some unidentified rage at something. therefore: I think bede could work perfectly for a coming out story. all that needs to change is that rose wants him to wear that giant coat, and that he's actually his adopted dad (if he isn't. i actually cannot remember). bede insults the player a lot, so I propose he just focuses on their clothing for insults. make opal's infatuation with pink stem from appreciation AND the sense of freedom she gets from it, and then add a couple encounters after he meets opal. one where his coat is still on, and one where it's unbuttoned, but still on. then, his final battle, without even saying anything, describes his ability to be himself outwardly.
bede got estrogen
The main problem with Bede for me is how Sword & Shield has him written in the story. Before the final battle against him in the main story begins, he tells announces to everyone that he will retire from being a Pokemon Trainer upon defeat. But just when they do such a good job on his overall character growth, his individuality gets half-assed at the last second by having the *audience* tell Bede not to give up Pokemon Training but to start from scratch. That's not good writing, in my opinion.
the fairy uniform looks a lot like a trans flag, so i'd really like this actually!
Insert Blackbeard writing meme here.
You actually really changed my opinion on writing for a younger audience, I used to believe it was an inherit limitation and have had a pretty serious distain for it, but your points in the beginning and the rewrite in general really changed my mind, it's not a limitation, it's just never taken seriously. Super awesome video, I think if this was the actual story Rose would be one of the most memorable villains up there with giovanni because of how down to earth the motivation is while still having relations to a legendary (and using their power for financial gain, but in different ways). Great work!
There are areas where it’s a limitation (sometimes just because of corporate limitations. See plenty of shows that get cancelled in the name of pulling off gay shit like Steven Universe and The Owl House), but there are also areas where it’s a strength (dirty jokes are so, so much funnier in kid’s shows. Like dear lord, the expectation of beating around the bush makes the blunt quips so much more satisfying).
Absolutely fantastic video. Well-thought-out rewrites like this are solid gold to me, and I hope to match your level of competence.
I tried my hand with a total re-write of X and Y a few years back, and it went well at first, but once I was past the halfway point the lack of direction left it with nowhere to go.
You handled Team Yell and Macro Cosmos both immaculately, as well as Leon and Sonia. Especially if I've successfully bought in to Leon being lovable and having a heart of gold, the final battle against him would be genuinely emotional, knowing how much the loss I'm trying to inflict on him would hurt him. And then the wrap-up where his brother supports him and reminds him of how he held back eternatus...mwah. I might have cried.
I do worry for Hop a little. To me, he's one of the best written Pokémon rivals - top 5 for sure, and I understand that a lot of people don't think highly of him. He's fighting an uphill battle against the bad first impression he makes dragging you through the mandatory tutorial and reusing animations from Hau. His biggest strength is how his team conveys his arc extremely well - once Bede crushes his confidence, Hop repeatedly re-shuffles his team to try and find something that beats you - even trying out Cramorant and Pincurchin, while benching his partner Wooloo for a time.
I feel like the decisions he makes in the final act of your re-write detract from Hop's story by both shifting the focus away from him and making him feel even more like a loser. Then again, there's only so much space in a narrative to flesh out characters in a satisfying way - if Hop had to make small sacrifices so that Rose and Team Yell could shine, so be it.
The other point of concern is the scripted loss in the Champion's Cup. Forced losses are always volatile things to handle, given how awful they make the player feel. Done well, that awfulness can be harnessed for catharsis later - but I feel like the key to a forced loss is if the player can reasonably believe their character would lose.
In basically every successful example I can think of, the player character is weaker than their opponent at that point in the story, whether because they're strictly outmatched or the playing field is somehow uneven, like in this case. You don't mind the mechanical violation that is your starter being too scared of the Houndoom at the beginning of S/V, even if you were a psychopath who grinded up a team that could reasonably defeat it, because at that point in the story you're still just a new trainer at the very start of their journey.
It's different here, because Dynamax isn't a be-all end-all. There are plenty of strategies a player could use to defeat a Dynamaxed opponent without using the mechanic themselves by the lategame - and if they're highly competent and/or a little overleveled and/or stocked up on items, you could beat Nessa's Drednaw without breaking a sweat. More importantly, by this point in the narrative, you've gone on a long journey and conquered everything in your path so far - so the player character is expected to be strong, able to overcome even the adversity of being unable to Dynamax in a tough fight.
Imagine sweeping Nessa with, I don't know, Sleep Powder Quiver Dance Tanga Berry Lilligant, or something. You don't plan on Dynamaxing, knowing that you'll eviscerate Drednaw with Giga Drain anyways - but the game suddenly forces you to, just to show you that you can't. Then, for six consecutive turns, you're locked out of performing any actions as your healthy team is OHKOd by moves they're obviously capable of living. Of course, not every player would put on such a dominant display, but this is a Pokémon game - a lot of players will have to sit there and watch fainting animations for minutes.
I don't think the reaction here would be gut-wrenching indignation at the unfairness of the rigged match - because the player can see exactly how the match was rigged, and knew that by all accounts they should have won anyways based on both their mechanical knowledge and the considerable power the narrative insists that the player character has. And that could be an interesting story in its own right, perhaps.
Instead, players who have that experience will just be a little bewildered and frustrated by the obvious railroading.
"What?"
All of that being said. The forced loss against Nessa is an important plot point for your superior retelling of SWSH. Unlike the Hop characterization thing, I'm more inclined to call this one a flaw, but I also don't see how the story you built could exist without it. And I really enjoyed your story. -And maybe the fact that I never finish any of my amateur writing projects is because I detect flaws in them and deny them their existence rather than let something good be told in spite of its flaws.-
And really, the whole deal is a limitation of the game this story necessarily exists in, not the story itself. I wonder if, ideally, it would work better as a cutscene than a playable event?
Anyways, thank you for the incredible video.
Hop's character arc was the only good thing in SWSH...
Big agree, the forced loss isn't handled well enough in this video
I have thought on what could replace the force loss against NASA, it could still have the dynamac thing but if you beat her without it something could like happen to your Dynamics band at the end of the battle right before you go to shake hands with her causing it to break and need to get repaired which would force you to back out. And then it be revealed that Rose tried to stop you from dying to Maxine but since I didn't marry he got pissed and used to turn just to break your band or something since it's tied to eternimax energy and then the story goes on from there but with only Anna explaining that he broke her bands instead of blocked to your dynamax.
could be fun to cut the railroaded loss and have alternate cutscenes and dialogue for if you win against nessa anyway or lose to her. like if you win against nessa with no dynamax rose has to overload your dynaband to break it when rigging dynamax against you doesnt work
I would make it like the beginning of the Eternamax fight in the actual game, where you can’t use moves at all. Since it’s a power Eternatus has proven to be able to use, it stands to reason that Rose, harnessing its power, could do the same. It makes the railroading make more sense from a story perspective.
I think SV was actually such a good example of storytelling. Arven's dog plotline actually made me cry and Nemona is the best rival pokemon has ever given us.
One of my hypothetical Pokémon projects includes a full remake of SwSh, so I'll keep this video in mind if I ever decide to actually sit down and make it. Great job!
Nintendo will take it down
1:23:24 A scene popped into my head. You walk into the gym and it pulls you into dialogue with Piers. He would say something along the lines of- "Well well well... The chairmans prize pony graces us with their presence once again. I would ask if you've come to brag about your win, but it almost seems like someone rigged the race. After all... a one trick pony ain't very impressive when it trips up, eh?". I just think it would be fun to have him softly mocking you, almost like he knew you'd come crawling back eventually.
LOVE this channel, LOVE this rewrite!
Love the new motivation for Rose, and the Spikemuth storyline is amazing! Few questions/notes:
1. You mention the game opens back up after failing to convince your mom and Hop to help you challenge Rose, but then what sort of narrative prompting will lead the player to revisit all of the gym leaders to ask them for help and eventually find Piers? I think the easiest path here would just be for members of Team Yell or Piers himself to come to you. Maybe Oleana was originally from Spikemuth when she was that down-on-her-luck League admin, and goes to Piers hanging her head in shame first, then they both show up at your house.
B. Eternatus should still be catchable at the end of the Eternamax battle, having it turn back into the egg is too unsatisfying as a player! Even if it’s not the final story boss anymore, leaving a single slot of the Pokédex unfillable would be maddening.
Triangle: Why do none of the 10+ people in the room try to stop or restrain Rose when he is clearly building a bomb in front of them? I’d just have him already rig everything to explode before he comes up to the roof, but you still have to block him from getting to the button of doom. I know it’s a relatively small detail, but the mental image of him actively fiddling with wires while expositing, surrounded by people who are all in agreement that he’s bad news, irks me.
Episode IV: A New Hope: Gameplay wise, I think you should still be fighting Hop in the true championship tournament. I generally see where you’re going with the reporter/sports commentator angle, and that can still come up here, but having your final battle be comparatively ages ago at Victory Road won’t leave him as a particularly memorable rival compared to others, especially after how late he comes in for the Eternatus fight in this version.
I expect corrections on my desk in the morning! /lh
1. I think that was what he was going for with the "You'll need people who hate Rose as much as you do" hint from Oleana. Presumably that line would be written in blue, like many important lines of dialogue in modern Pokemon games. Having Team Yell approach you wouldn't work, since they don't yet know you've turned on Rose.
B. Eternatus should be catchable, but in the postgame. It's weird for you to randomly have this world-ending Pokemon before the game ends.
Triangle: I think it would be better if he had two of his Pokemon do that instead of doing it himself. He'd be distracting everyone with his dialogue while his mons fiddle with the wires behind the egg.
Episode IV: I see your point, but I think we deserve a Leon fight at the end. And he deserves to go out with a bang.
@@Seronimo93I think they meant that Hop would've been one of your final battles before Leon in the tournament. For the point about Eternatus, I agree, that's why the player should've caught one of the dogs right before they fight Eternatus, because it's weird the Legendary that's caught by the player before the ending is some random Legendary that technically has nothing to do with the duo.
What if instead of catching Eternatus, when it turns into an egg you be the one to claim it since everyone’s like “Yeah MC, you’re a pretty capable trainer, the Legendary Pokemon fuck with you, you beat Rose, you saved Galar from being nukes, you seem pretty trustworthy with raising Eternatus and making sure it won’t cause the apocalypse again”
@jayjayag2774 Eternatus should've been something you got in the post-game, you fight and catch it and get its data but Leon and the League hold onto it until they've made it safe. You could've caught one of the dogs instead.
About the DLC: Peony being Rose’s brother in the original DLC was neat, but I feel like they didn’t go far enough with it. There’s actually some lore that Peony used to be the league champion; however, once Rose became chairman, Peony resigned as champion, presumably due to issues with Rose.
This lore could slide in perfectly with your rewrite: once Rose becomes chair, have him approach Peony with their plan to rig matches, thinking he’s doing Peony, his brother, a favor. However, Peony is appalled and disgusted by the plan, and storms off, resigning from being champion. Peony could never turn in his own brother, but he removed himself from Galar’s League and stayed as far away from Wyndon as he could get. Peony could express some regret on not helping take Rose down sooner, but could still be happy that it meant he had the time to spend with his daughter.
Anyway, Excellent rewrite! I could tell you put a lot of effort into the writing and the result was just fantastic!
This has got to be the best rewrite of this games story I've seen. I absolutely adore this and I'm so very upset that this ISN'T the story we got for this game. I always felt like Sword and Shield had some untapped potential for what it could've been and you literally brought that potential to life with your rewrite! And for the record, I loved listening to your thought process at the beginning of the video where you point out the issues you had and why you want to change certain things, it made it super easy to follow along and understand why you made the changes you did. Fantastic video!
A Japanese game can’t talk about warping and hiding their past follies in history because they’re still actively denying the atrocities they committed in Asia during WWII. Would be rich as hell coming from them if they tackled that theme.
In defence of Piers wanting to "cause a ruckus" at Rose Tower, i think he does have a reason to want to do that. Rose basically started punishing him for not conforming to what Rose wanted him to do, so he isnt too fond of the guy (same, dude) and might just want to cause trouble for Rose the same way that Rose has caused problems for Piers. If someone caused my hometown to go to ruin, then id want to cause as many problems for them as possible too
In regards to theme, I've always read sword/sheild as being about "Passing on the torch" and the various reactions people have about it.
Hop/Marnie/Sonia are worried about not being able to fill the shoes of their older brothers with different choices being made, either gaining confidence in their ability and acceptibg the torch with Marnie/Sonia or Hop realising that succeding his brother just isn't for him and taking his own path.
Bede has a torch forced upon him.
And Rose is worried that the torch he has isn't in a stable enough state to pass on, granted yeah still kot a great justification for his actions.
Granted though your idea of revisionism could play really well together with that! Exploring the responsibilities people have to the upcoming generations to be honest with their history and avoid history repeating and being less susceptible to propaganda.
21:34
Yikes, fundamental misunderstanding of part of B&W's core plot.
Edit: This video DEFINITELY picks up the slack later, though, holy SHIT. That endgame was GREAT, and DEFINITELY earns Rose his theme!! There's a few weird choices here and there that I disagree with, but the broad strokes- and honestly, most of this in general- are INCREDIBLE! Great work on this!
I was thinking that too.
Not really, BW has weird reactionary undertones to its story
Hi! Game Design major here, I’d like to say first of all that as a story, this version is a drastic improvement in my opinion, but I do have one major point of issue from a design perspective. While it’s certainly an improvement from a story progression standpoint, the forced loss against Nessa is probably a step too far. There’s a concept in game design called metrics, which basically covers the logic of internal consistency and interactions within a system, and you need to be careful if you plan on messing with them. Preventing the player from dynamaxing is all well and good, and something you could probably get away with, but forcing the opponents dreadnaw to stay up on one hp regardless of the players actions could create serious issues. Part of the reason people play games is to have agency over story progression, and players tend to get very frustrated when they lose that. Additionally, this change would make nuzlocking the game impossible due to the scripted loss. If you want to keep this version of the story, then I would suggest figuring out a way to create a branching narrative based on whether or not you lose during the tournament. I’m not a narrative designer though, so I’ll have to leave that up to you.
I want to propose a potential alternative to the new nessa scripted fight based on what you’re saying. first, I agree with what you’re saying. I think a “scripted loss” is an excellent cinematic moment, but it works a lot less in video games since the player isn’t supposed to lose. however, I also get that the point is to showcase eternatus (rose) actively rigging matches. since I think that this is important to the cohesion of the new story (giving the player character personal stake and hinting at the bigger mystery), I think it could still work by making the scripted loss even more scripted (weirdly enough) by breaking out of the traditional battle mechanics. say, by making it so nessa’s gigantamax is so huge or strong or whatever (something that’s because of eternatus’s meddling) that your pokemon are too scared or can’t get close or are otherwise unable to fight ie. something that doesn’t occur in normal battles. it’d still need to be obvious to the player (and nessa) that this was due to some kind of rigging and not just your pokemon being wimps, but it doesn’t need to be a real battle - more of an interactive cutscene (not unlike the original encounter with the hero pokemon iirc). that way, you still “lose,” but none of your pokemon are required to faint, maintaining the ability to nuzlocke and not making players feel quite so out of control. maybe the player character remarks at the start of the nessa fight or something to prompt the gamer into the idea that this fight won’t be normal to make sure they don’t feel helpless.
Or the other option would be to make that "battle" a cutscene instead. Don't know how that'd work, though.
I respectfully completely disagree. The idea of the forced loss being frustrating and unfair is reflected by the player character. It's a forced loss because it was rigged.
Maybe the Dreadnaw could have It's stats put at the highest possible value so that it would basically be impossible to get it down to 1hp without incredible planning, cheats, or item spam.
As for the point for Nuzlockes. Don't consider self-imposed challenges when designing a game, PLEASE. Nuzlockes have never been, and likely never will be an official facet of these games. Regardless of how fun they are.
If people would nuzlocke these games, then they would just not count any deaths that occur fron Nessa's Dreadnaw during this fight, as the forced loss is the only possible way of moving the plot forward, and getting to the illustrious game clear and chairman fight.
The beginning of this video also clearly states that this was being done within a reasonable estimate of the actual development time this game took. Adding a branching storyline, even a small one, would take so much more time and resources that it would not be worth it in the long term. And likely just make the overall (proposed) plot worse.
@@ObbyFeathersnootall playstyles should be included, a forced loss would alienate a huge section of the playerbase. another way could be the annoucer of the match call the match in favor of nessa, right after her drednaw hangs on by 1 hp. that would keep the “forced loss” aspect while still allowing counterplay due to your pokemon not feinting
@@Pearl7spI think that’s overestimating how dramatic a forced loss really is for the player. Plenty of games, even ones catered to children, have moments where the main character has no choice but to lose in the moment only to come back stronger afterwards.
I thought of something else to give Oleana's character some more depth through enviromental storytelling:
Every other time she fights you, her Ace Pokémon is a Lopunny with a max power Frustration (I think that this would work better because of what we know from her base game's ace being a Garbodor; maybe Chariman Rose *forced her* to use that Lopunny to maintain that "Beauty" archetype she has).
And after you lose the championship fight against Nessa, Oleana goes to see you at your house and she challenges you again for one last combat so she can make up her mind. *But this time* she does have her Ace Garbodor in her team.
you said you wanted to make rose a character worth having an epic battle theme, and brother, when you started playing his song at the climax i lost my shit. so damn cool! i feel like your rewrite fleshes out galar soooo much and would probably make the game longer than it was. P.S, if you ever find the time, the DLC is actually quite fun! especially the crown tundra. if nothing else, you should play it so you can go hang out with penny's dad and brag about it when you go back to paldea X3
i kept going :O and gasping whenever you revealed the big story beats you came up with- i would KILL to play swsh with your story, it was super engaging and honestly would probably be one of the best games in the series if this is the direction they took
rose seems so much more EVIL and more of a threat in your take on the story- honestly its great to have a villain who's just evil and greedy for the sake of it! he's just a rich asshole here and thats AWESOME! keep up the good work, i definitely want to see more of your writing
Leon now has tons of potential for dealing with his actually legitimate imposter syndrome in the post game and proving to himself that he's still a badass outside of rigged matches. I like that idea.
GODDDDD your rewrites inspire the writer in me so easily, I want to write this whole thing as a fanfic because your stories are SO GODDAMN GOOD. GAHHH 10/10
I have a neat alternate idea for salvaging Rose's Energy Crisis motivation and inability to wait even a single day! Have it hinge on an event that has a narrow time window that can't wait, specifically a comet passing by like Hailey's comet. Eternatus fell to earth from a meteor in the distant past, but in this slightly modified version that meteor passes back around once every hundred years or so. And you can tell when its about to pass by because it gives off Wishing Stars and insane amounts of Galar Particles. This comet's approach is what causes the rogue dynamax phenomenon in the story.
Thus Rose's plan is to collect as many Wishing Stars as he can in order to wake Eternatus up in time for the comet to pass by because he knows from studying it while dormant that it can siphon Galar Particles from the atmosphere to fuel itself. He theorizes then that if they can wake Eternatus up before the comet comes and subdue it, they can use its power to siphon a massive amount of Galar Particles from the comet on its swing by, which is what it did in the original Darkest Day, and then siphon that energy back out of Eternatus over time like a battery, staving off Galar's looming Energy Crisis in 10 years.
However the time of arrival happens to coincide with the day of the championship match this swing by. Late enough in the night that Leon, partially from confidence in his own skill as the "Unbeatable Champion", believes that they can have the match and still have time to subdue Eternatus after and catch the window they need.. But Rose isn't willing to chance any possibility that they might miss their only opportunity because they weren't fully prepared ahead of time. When Leon refuses to postpone his match to go subdue Eternatus well ahead of time Rose decides to force Leon's hand by awakening Eternatus anyway and letting it rampage, counting on Leon's character to abandon the match and go capture it whether he likes it or not.
Things proceed as normal from there, going to the Weald, fighting Rose, and fighting Eternatus except this time the Eternamax form isn't just a random Stage 2 but rather the result of the Comet swinging by just as the Player is fighting base Eternatus due to the time that passed running around. Eternatus absorbs energy from the Comet just like Rose theorized it would and enters its Eternamax form. Then things proceed as normal from there.
This means that Rose's plan ultimately succeeded, but ONLY because of the players actions essentially salvaging it from the brink of failure, realizing that his plan and judgement almost doomed Galar right then and there he quietly accepts judgement for his crimes and allows himself to be arrested without contest. (this also explains why Eternatus can't Eternamax after you catch it, it no longer has the Comet to draw the required power from as it already passed out of range.)
To be fair to Rose not being able to wait, I don’t think he awakened Eternatus intentionally. It’s clear that it broke out of its containment, all Rose did was feed it wishing stones. He probably knew that Eternatus was going to wake up soon and wanted people to think he was in control of it instead of it escaping without him being in control, which is why he told Leon about it, it’s pretty much what happened in the manga, it rampaged randomly and they had to deal with it.
This video has changed my life by getting me back into pokémon and has me writing my own entire fanmade pokémon region.
This is amazing i cant believe a fanfic pokemon plot had me on the edge of my seat
i'm still actually really mad they made a region based off the uk, but reduced wales to a single city struggling with poverty, and turned scotland into this empty snowy desert. literally what was going through their heads.
I loved this! I’m no writer but I want to write a few little things between characters that could give them a few more fun interactions.
I want Leon and Ryhan’s rivalry to be mentioned a little more. Maybe a scene where Ryhan and Leon come face to face and start smack talking each other like crazy, giving underhanded compliments and intense remarks before pausing for a second and then bursting out laughing. They high five, saying it’s good to see the other and explain to the player that they used to be each others rivals back when they were still Pokémon trainers. I love rivals on good terms so something like that could be fun! I’d love an interaction between Ryhan and Leon in general.
Very enjoyable concept, 100% vast improvement on the story. The only complaint I have is that you didn't suggest an alternative Gigantamax Pokemon for Raihan to use. There's only one other dragon type that can Gigantamax, being Flapple/Appletun, which is used by Milo during rematches. I imagine it'd involve promoting Sandaconda to the ace and Gigantamaxing it, since he already has one and as far as I can recall nobody ever actually used Gigantamax Sandaconda.
Guess I solved my own complaint, so no notes, great stuff.
ok but GMax Dragapult would be awesome! I'm imagining it like a bomber jet or aircraft carrier
G-Max Sandaconda might be a good pick since I like his team being a Sandstorm Specialist Team, having Pokemon that do well or set-up in Sandstorm, basically looking like a strategic team that is competitive in Pokemon Story standards with a difficulty for the regular Pokemon NPC trainer, stating that he is Leon's Rival.
You can just change Sandaconda's type, there's no reason it shouldn't be Ground/Dragon.
Edit: And since it's Double Battle, you can keep the Sandstorm theme since he'll likely have another mon next to the Sandaconda. Make his team Flygon (which has a Smooth Rock and knows Sandstorm), Dracozolt, Dracovish, and Sandaconda. Dracozolt and Dracovish both have Sand Rush, so they'll be terrifying to face on Raihan's team.
This was such a sick listen on my way to work and it was actually really inspiring. I have a bit of nostalgia for SwSh since it came out during COVID time and it acted like a nice distraction from everything - that said though, this video made me realise what we COULD have had instead of what we did, I feel almost spoiled. There’s so much quality to it all and thought put into it too
As someone who also studied in the creative field for a degree and hasn’t had the chance to put that time much use, I can say really hope you find your footing soon ❤️
19:20
„Rose spends the entire game being this relatively normal guy who just decides to be completely insane one day“
Wait a minute. A weird ass kind of energy-concerned CEO who does relatively normal CEO shit until he decides to go entirely bonkers one day? Where did I hear this before? HMMMMMMM.
Did Rose recently purchase a social media network too by any chance?
The thing is, we already had a way more Musk-like villain in 2013. Unlike Rose, Lysandre's motivated by genocidal ideology. You can also compare Lysandre to other Silicon Valley billionaires like Peter Thiel and Sam Altman who've also suddenly gone fascistic. And like Lysandre, these guys are especially scary because they have world-ending resources at their disposal. Say what you will about XY's storyline, but it definitely predicted the future.
@@Seronimo93Lysandre should be more like those weirdos that want to live forever, Ray Kurzweil with deep pockets
@@ChangedMyNameFinally69 Isn't Peter Thiel one of those weirdos?
Oh wow, I haven't watched a full plot rewrite video through before, but this one absolutely drew my full attention in the whole time! It was a phenomenal story and I really love the way you structured it. Thank you so much for making this video!
1:53:29 my favorite part of Pokemon B&W was how your rivals ended up choosing other paths in life that wasn’t strictly Pokemon battles.
I re-played shield after I watched this and then I got mad because I forgot this wasn't the real story
They robbed us of a good story!!!
@20:38 - Actually I _DID_ just have two pretty solid ideas for why Rose would suddenly be so anxious about the whole Eternatus thing: First is going with the anime alteration that it's only 10 years away, and second is the idea that he's actually screwed up and given it too many wishing stars too quickly and it's going to awaken a _lot_ sooner than anticipated. Thus, he is trying (and failing) to save face while also getting Leon to put off the championship so Leon and his pokemon, ostensibly still fresh and ready, can face off against Eternatus in prime condition and not only save the company but also his reputation.
But when he realizes how much he's just screwed up, he's REALLY hoping to get Leon to just do the thing, hence why he decides to play the villain when Eternatus starts waking up during the tournament and pretends it's all part of his plan. It's likely so the blame can fall squarely on him as a person and not on his company.
He likely challenges you because he's hoping to test whether or not you're good enough to join Leon in facing Eternatus.
As for the red light scenes, they were likely intended to exist and you were likely meant to take part in them, but that was likely changed when they decided on the dynamax battles in the wild areas.
Remains me of how SAO Abridged changed Kihiba motive.
@@ZA-pv3lyI don't understand why they would do that, if the point of an abridged is a parody there's a lot of humor in mocking how dumb his motivation was in canon
i got sooooo invested in the plot you wrote its actually unbelievable its fan made. it flows so much more naturally and brings much more satisfying character arcs, while still being reasonable pokemon stories. AUGHHH I WISH THE ACTUAL GAMES HAD THIS
the fans care more than the actual creators; that is legitimately very sad
@@OGfellowfriendno they just don’t have enough time tbh
@@DrMinaDeZoneAcerola They had plenty of time to write a better story. Fudj just wrote a way better one with a fraction of the time and as one person with no salary. But Game Freak, being a large company, would never make the villain a pure evil corporate boss.
@@Seronimo93 Yeah but he didn’t also have to make a dex of new Pokémon and a whole ass video game
31:20 - 31:35 This. Is. *Eyeopening.* I've been doing this for the longest time, the biggest way I show through my own writing is that I listen to songs and fit the continuation of the story to them, in a way its less about themes in the song, but more about what they feel like... less as a "theme" in conventional sense, and more of a "dimension" that I just "jump off" from to thinking how it could unravel from there... I feel funny now... but thanks for putting it into words.
I think energy can be the focus of the story in two ways - either Rose wants to seize the means of production himself and has made everyone a pawn in his scheme to get Eternatus
OR
the energy crisis is 10 years away, and Rose realizes that Galar Particles are finite and dynamaxing eats into this finite resource. So every dynamax battle eats more and more into this resource (giving urgency to halt the tournament)
Also so many people have commented throughout the series on how it seems like world-ending phenomena and massive criminal enterprises are tackled by you, a random character. This is why, because suspending disbelief a bit in this fantasy world is preferable to “and a qualified person fixed it offscreen”
That was AMAZING!!!!!!!! I REALLY loved how you interpreted the story and meticulously rewired all the cool content of the Eternatus part, IT'S AMAZING AAAAAAAA
This was such a breath of fresh air; being able to imagine this story as opposed to what we got was a really invigorating experience
Damn. I would love to play that version of the game. Brilliant rewrite. Love the direction you went with it
Ultra Sun and Moon were such great games packed with content, it's a shame that the series spontaneously combusted and no sequels were ever made -_-
Your such a wonderful story teller. I would absolutely love to see you re write or even just create a new story!
I think Orbeetle would be the best fit for Rose. Orbeetle regularly uses manipulation to make others do its bidding, especially its GMAX form. Additionally Orbeetle starts out as a weak, Inconspicuous, caterpillar, kinda like how Rose started, and pretends to be.
Can I just say? I got chills listening to your rewrite. I felt like I was on the edge of my seat, waiting to see what would happen next!
Holy shit.
I LOVE your re-imagining of the final Rose encounter! The music fits perfectly! This actually gave me shivers.
ive watched this whole video three times. I hope to draw fan art of the rose tower constrained eternatus that is such a cool visual, great work im very normal about your story
This was *so good.* As impressive as the parts you invented were your choices of original elements to keep, accentuate and recontextualize.
You told me yesterday that, as a fan of the Sordward + Shieldbert storyline, I would be happy with this, and *you were right.*
As I've not finished the video yet, I'm excited to see how the information on the cards gets implemented!
As I've finished the video, I'm sad the info on the cards seems to be forgotten, but I really love the story overall!
Honestly, I love these changes, from spikemuth’s history and piers and Marnie, all the way to being rigged out of the league, to Sonia being able to figure out the whole truth, only slightly too late as to not take away from the player’s get back. I really wish that was the real game’s story
I thank you for explaining theme. It has honestly never been explained well enough for me to understand on how to write using it until now. World building and character development are my favorite things to write, yet I didn't understand how to link a story together. I am so excited to do more writings!
I like your version more. Character motivations that make some sense can go such a long way.
I might be a bit late but first of all I want to say, amazing video and amazing rewrite. It was always such a meme how dramatic Rose's theme was, but now it makes complete sense with how much there's on the line in your story. Honestly, if sword and shield had your story it would probably be one of my favorite games, since I enjoyed the gameplay of the game quite a lot!
Maybe a cool tweak you could've implemented is that the game ends after your fight with Rose and that the champions tournament is actually part of the post game, like how in Black and White you fight Ghetsis in the main story and defeat the real and champion in the post game. I think this would make the post game a lot more exciting than just dynamax battles.
Amazing video :)
I just watched all of this video and was thoroughly immersed throughout, amazing. I’ve always struggled with themes in the little story writing I’ve done, and I just love how appropriate the theme of history turned out to be, as a fellow Brit. I loved how it improved Rose’s character, and adding Swordward and Shielbert into the main story was surprising to me at first, but it seems so obvious now with the way it was integrated. Also, making Oleana more sympathetic was a good idea, and I actually felt bad for her when she was explaining that Rose fired her and now she was back to the poverty she’d been in before he’d taken her under his manipulative wing.
Speaking of feeling bad for characters, I felt actually terrible for Leon. I’ve seen plenty of fan interpretations of Rose controlling his life, whether he’s aware of it or not, but I think I prefer this interpretation where he’s so blind that he only realises his legacy was a lie when its said right to him so carelessly. I was also thinking his reaction to losing to you could represent his illusion of himself shattering, but like, in a good way? Like, it’s a reminder for him that he’s just a pokemon trainer like everyone else. I LOVE IT.
I also love what you did with Team Yell. I wasn’t so sure at first about making Marnie and Piers colder towards you, but I love how you build up their trust, and the residents of the shunned town Rose wants everyone to forget about become your closest allies towards the climax (speaking of the climax, I even felt bad for Eternatus, because I wondered if it was suffering being chained up like that, with Rose essentially torturing it to siphon its energy). Also, the way you fleshed out Spikemuth was really interesting, and I just LOVE how the Gym is integrated into the main storyline, with Piers being made a more sympathetic character, so you trust him over Rose - leading up to the ironic decision to work with the “evil team” to take him down.
This should be so much more well-known in general, enough to become considered an AU so that more content could potentially be made based on it. I’m just imagining a novelised version of this, with all of Sw/Sh retold exactly like this… I need it. I’d read every page.
I mean, considering his entire career is a lie, no he’s not a trainer like everyone else. He’s a phony who isn’t as good as he thinks he is. He’s a fake who thought he was a. Good trainer, but it turns out he’s not really that good at all and he’s only where he is due to a fluke
When I tell you ive watched this video like 3 times and each time I am just bLOWN AWAY from your rewite and am absolutely invested for the entirety of the video!!!
An incredible rewrite that I oh so wish was canon 😩🙏
You could potentially wrap up Oleana's story by having her eventually assist or flat-out replace Leon as the new Chairwoman, seeing as she likely already has a lot of second-hand experience and she was simply misguided and manipulated in this retelling. Maybe she could be the proper rags to riches story that Rose stomped on.
... Yes, she likely assisted in far too much shady business to not be locked up, but this is Pokemon. That, and your ending to her involvement already implied she was either pardoned or able to hide her prior actions.
I was with you until 1:21:10, when you suggested Hop would _not_ be an infinitely credulous rube about any far-fetched or specious conspiracy. :V
people have mentioned oleana's backstory, so i'll instead say that leaving that stuff as backstory is completely fine. having a beautiful woman with a bunch of beautiful pokemon and an 'ugly' ace serving as the lieutenant to the main villain is good storytelling in and of itself. it doesn't need explaining or examination.
I mean the games already did with Garbador being her childhood Pokemon that she found while rummaging through garbage because she's dirt poor
I really like the story that you came up with. I've not played sword and shield, nor do i plan to, but I've always heard there was a bad story. You pointed out a lot of parts that could have been better and you improved so much. I'm a writer myself but I'm still learning and I love the way that you've put this together and the plot is amazing.
You also confirmed my suspicious about theme. I've had trouble knowing exactly what it was but hearing other people say that it is derived from what you write (usually after) is very nice.
Thank you for your video, it was very good and I am looking forward to your next videos!
If scarlet and violet has taught me anything, A good and compelling story can redeem a game, no matter how bad everything else is
Now this story actually gave me goosebumps and had me on the edge of my seat!