The eternal battle of the Pokémon series is one to leave the past behind. Ever since Generation 1, the games have iterated upon themselves without cease, leading to experience after experience without any particular interest in standing out on their own. Sure, each generation has their own peculairities, but those are often underdeveloped and superficial. Black and White are the closest these games have gotten to carving out a unique identity amongst the sea of prequels and sequels to me, hence why they are my favorites of the bunch, but even they are beholden to the past.

Scarlet and Violet is also within this constant. The endless capitalist machine of iteration upon iteration, of endless franchising. To pretend otherwise would be silly - Pokémon IS the machine. It's the world's biggest franchise of all time. Sure, there might be an open world now, and sure, the quality of the writing might have surprised me, but it's still Pokémon. You still have the same structure of battles and exploration, the plot still doesn't tread particularly provocative ground, and the presentation is still kind of a nightmare. What do you expect?

There's a part toward the end of the game, where in order to stop the ecology of the surrounding region from being destroyed, you have to shut down a time machine which is pumping out prehistoric Pokémon. In doing so, no more prehistoric Pokémon will be able to come to the present ever again. The past will become sealed off, with no way of accessing it again. Perhaps if Pokémon ever wants to become something truly special again, then it needs its own past to become inaccessible. Pokémon needs to be reborn, even though it never will be.