Amid Fan Complaints, Pokemon Company Is Discussing Game Quality And Release Timing Internally

Pokémon Scarlet And Violet launched in November to mixed reviews, with praise for the game’s scale and world mired by rampant technical issues. Speaking to press at the 2023 Pokemon World Championships, The Pokemon Company COO Takato Utsunomiya confirmed the team is "having conversations" regarding future releases.

According to ComicBook.com, Utsunomiya first addressed the question by looking into the past. "I think in general, if you look at the past, the path we've taken up until now has been this constant release, always regularly releasing products on a fairly fixed kind of a cadence," he said. "Always having these products able to be introduced and new experiences for our customers, and that's how we've operated up until now."

Utsunomiya then confirmed that the team was discussing how they can adhere to the schedule while maintaining the games’ overall quality. "I think we're still operating in that way, but there's more and more conversations, as the development environments change, about how we can continue to do this," he explained, "while making sure that we're ensuring really quality products are also being introduced."

The comments come after Pokémon Scarlet And Violet launched with a myriad of technical problems, which included characters popping in and out of frame, textures on buildings or landscapes not loading properly, and more. The issues were so prevalent, Nintendo issued a statement that it was taking fan feedback "seriously."

Still, GameSpot’s Pokémon Scarlet And Violet review highlighted the game’s quality despite its technical issues, saying, "While undercooked presentation and visual issues hold the games back, Pokemon Scarlet and Violet are still the best mainline Pokemon games in years."