"Kieran will never go hard."

SPITS CEREAL

*This review will contain spoilers, but I think the story is predictable enough that no one will care, and I will also warn before I get to them

This update genuinely shocked me with how much content was added. Seven new Pokemon, over a hundred returning Pokemon that weren't already in the game, a new Pokemon League, the story (although, barely one at all), a brand new location, quests that give you new customization options and cosmetics, the ability to invite major characters to a club and interact and battle them, three new sidequests for the base game friends, including a subplot for Team Star, way more new clothing items, a new ability for Koraidon/Miraidon, an update to the school's tournament, and probably even more things I'm forgetting. I might not be selling it well here, but there really is so much added here that I didn't want to stop playing; it's safe to say that the majority of the money you're spending for this game's DLC is for The Indigo Disk.

I definitely have complaints, though. The new quests, BBQs, are a good addition on paper, but with how grindy and minimal they are, it's extremely unfun. The points gained through quests can be used to complete sidequests and inviting special characters from Paldea to talk, battle, and trade. That's fine and dandy, but to get everything that requires BP, you need roughly 28K of the stuff (I calculated), and that is just so, so rough considering how few points you get for each quest. Take a picture of a Pokemon swimming, 20 points; defeat a wild Pokemon by Terastalizing, another 20 points; catch a wild Pokemon 20 points. Does this sound fun? No? Well, sorry, you're gonna be doing that for hours and hours and hours if you want to do everything. After doing ten quests, you'll get a bigger one that'll reward you with 200 points. That might sound good, but it's still so much grinding it out, and it's hard to keep track of ongoing quests without just looking at the menu for it every two minutes. The most efficient way to grind up points, and how I'm sure they intended it, is to do multiplayer. Every quest counts for all players involved, has increased points, and there are another set of even bigger quests that give a lot more points. It does go way faster, but it really sucks that you really have to play with other people in order to not spend your pre-retirement life grinding out points. There is potential with the quest system, but it needs fine-tuning to be good.

Secondly is kind of a "me" issue. While there are over 100 returning Pokemon, the selection is actually rather shallow in practice. Of these returning Pokemon, 72 of them are the starter Pokemon. Just personally speaking, I've used almost all of the starter Pokemon so much that I have no interest in using them in the games anymore, so that takes the available Pokemon to under 100 Pokemon, and by a decent margin. Then, eight of the remaining ones are version exclusive, so might as well cross off four of whatever version you're playing if you can't trade with people (not to mention the trade evolutions, but those can still mostly be caught). This left very little Pokemon to choose from, especially if you also don't like to repeat types. I still managed alright - I decided to use a gift Pokemon from Teal Mask, and a Dipplin so I could use the new evolution, and I had already planned on using Milcery, so I only needed three other spots filled. I know this won't be an issue for most people though, a lot of people love reusing their favorites, even if that means using Cyndaquil for the 47th time in their life, but it is somewhat annoying for me.

(Spoilers moving forward, but it's nothing you wouldn't expect)

The story is, in true Scarlet and Violet fashion, non-existent until the end. Well, ok, that's not entirely true. This expansion continues the events from The Teal Mask where Kieran wants to take revenge on the player character by beating them in a League Champion battle, and to get to that point you must defeat the Elite Four members of Blueberry Academy. So... basically just the bog standard story of Pokemon in general. But wait, after you beat the Champion, you now go on a sudden adventure to Area Zero to discover its secrets with your friends. So... basically just a copy of Scarlet and Violet's base game. But here it's even more out of nowhere as, up until the end, there was barely any reference to Area Zero, nor the idea that you'd be going back there, nor does it really feel like it fits with the rest of the adventure. This is just fundamentally the same story of the base game, but with a new location and characters; which to be fair, the characters were what you cared about from the main game, not really the story. But still, seems like a weird way to wrap it up.

The final issue is one that permeates all of Scarlet and Violet: the performance issues. The game ran poorly to begin with, and then with Teal Mask the game would turn into a slide show if you jumped in water, and now with this expansion there are some circumstances in which the game will freeze entirely for up to ten seconds (or so it felt when I had it happen). Scarlet and Violet's performance seem to just get even worse as time went on. To be completely honest, though, the bad performance is something that never bothered me too much. Perhaps I'm too forgiving, but if I find a game fun, I can put up with slowdown, and I find this game fun. I also sincerely hope nobody actually thought the performance would be any better with this update.

Soooo that was a lot of complaining, which might make the rating of 4/5 stars seem weird. But in all honesty, those flaws are all things I either expected or didn't mar my enjoyment of the DLC too much; the first issue is really only for completionists, and the rest I more or less expected would be a factor. In the end, The Indigo Disk did what I wanted it to and way more: (mostly) end the stories of the characters I loved, brought in new amazing characters, and added a ton of new content. More content than I expected at all. The Hidden Treasure of Area Zero ended up kind of being a mini Scarlet/Violet 2 and... I can't say that isn't what I wanted, because I find this game so incredibly charming and fun and I'm very excited to see what's next.

I guess you could say that the true Hidden Treasure of Area Zero were the friends we made along the way...