Pokémon Winds And Waves Look Like The Open-World Dream We’ve Been Waiting For

Pokémon Presents has come around again for the franchise’s 30th anniversary, dropping the huge news that many were expecting: Our first look at Pokémon Winds and Pokémon Waves:

Straight up, the game looks absolutely stunning. A common pain point for more recent Pokémon titles has been the ongoing struggle with fidelity, but that looks to have been entirely sorted out for the first proper Switch 2 entries. Lapping waves, grassy fields and all manner of forest greenery showcase a world that I am desperately hungry to explore.

We are also introduced to our new starter Pokémon, furthering the generational winning-streak that is the fire-type starter ‘mons:

• Browt, a grass-type chocobo thing
• Gecqua, a water-type gecko friend
• Pombon, a goddamn FIRE-TYPE POMERANIAN PUPPY

I have known Pombon for all of 10 minutes, and I am already on board with pledging my eternal servitude to them.

There is also a focus on two Pikachu friends who will serve as part of the story – Mr. Windychu and Ms. Wavychu. The website mentions they will be involved in your adventure, but there are no details as to how.

The one thing missing from the announcement is whatever gimmick/macguffin will serve as the central doohicky to the game. It’s a tale as old as time at this point that modern Pokémon games have some kind of flagship feature to define that generation – your Dynamax form, or Terastal, or whatever the heck – and I have no doubt that Wind and Waves will do yet another odd twist. Perhaps something to do with Wind or Water? Super Splash forms? Blistering Breeze attacks?

We will all know in due time. For now though, we can at least cross our fingers and hope the genuinely looks and runs as well as this announcement trailer suggests.

I wanna surf those waves baby.

What are your thoughts on the next generation of Pokémon? Are you a Gecqua gal or a Pombon pal? Perhaps you like Browt? Tell us all about it in the comments or on our social media.