Is Pokemon Legends ZA Good For New Players?
Is Pokemon Legends ZA good for beginners and how could I possibly know the answer? Because the most Pokemon I have played is Pokemon GO for a few weeks during its initial craze back in 2016. Outside of that, no pun intended, I missed out on series since it first released on the Game Boy thirty years ago in 1996. After the initial release because there never seemed like a perfect time to jump in. The series has always seemed daunting with most releases having multiple versions, and established canon, but with new hardware and a new standalone Pokemon release, now seems better than ever.
If you happen to be in a similar situation being curious about Pokemon and have wanted to give the series a try, but never knew when, then this review is for you. It should go without saying that if you are wondering how Pokemon Legends ZA is compared to the rest of the series, recent releases and how it evolves tradition, then this definitely isn’t the right place for that.
If you’re a new player, Pokemon Legends ZA might be the best opportunity to get into the franchise that there has been in a while. There is only a single version on release, combat has moved to real time, and the gameplay loop of catching, evolving and competing with your Pokemon in the ZA Royale tournament is accessible and addicting.
It’s not perfect and the truth is that Pokemon Legends ZA should be a vastly better experience as there are a myriad of reasons that make it feel like the antithesis of a next generation experience, but the likely culprit is that it’s anchored to the past with a simultaneous release on hardware that released nearly a decade ago. When you get past the faults, there is a fun experience underneath it all.
Pokemon Legends ZA REVIEW
You arrive by train in Lumiose, which is clearly a city inspired by a slightly futuristic, alternate universe Paris and you are hoping to see the sights. After too much handholding, too much dialogue, and being robbed Pokemon Legends ZA offers a pretty unique loop with collecting Pokemon in the day and battling them during the night.
During the day you explore Lumiose, that is small, and laid out simply, which makes it easy to understand. The city is in the middle of an infrastructure redevelopment, due to some larger Pokemon event, but for the most part have managed contain all of the wild Pokemon in the “wild zones”. Early on, there will only be a handful of wild zones to explore and capture Pokemon, but as you level up and progress the game, new and more challenging wild zones will appear. The large majority of Pokemon in the wild zones are easy to sneak up on and catch without battle or can be quickly defeated. However, there are the occasional evil Pokemon who are not only stronger than the average zone encounter, but also can call over other Pokemon to fight you. These were fun and challenging encounters.
The other part of your adventure happens in the evening when you will need to compete in the ZA Royale tournament, which is where the best trainers in Lumiose compete. When you first arrived at Lumiose, you were immediately asked to join a team that competes in the ZA Royale with their end goal being to protect the city of Lumiose. Similar to the wild zones, it will only take place during certain zones. Once again, this is laid out extremely straight forward and is easy to understand for even the most novice Pokemon player. Whether day or night, Pokemon features a great soundtrack that was likely inspired by Paris with a jazz forward approach.
You start the ZA Royale Tournament at Rank Z and will need to climb your way up the ladder to get the Rank A, become the best trainer, and save the city. To move up in rank, you will first need to earn enough points to complete in a promotion match, which is done through beating anyone within the Battle Zone. As you rise in ranks the point requirements will also rise, but with the use of tickets that you can find in the Battle Zones, you will be able to earn bonus points. Once enough points have been acquired, you will need to win the promotion match, which is located somewhere else in the city and is slightly more difficult than anyone else you faced at that rank, but they don’t pose too much of a challenge.
You build your team of six different Pokemon and just through normal combat, as well as completing certain goals for the research scientist, you will unlock plenty of new moves for your Pokemon as well as be able to evolve them. Much later in the game, you will also be able to find and equip stones that allow your Pokemon to Mega Evolve, which will be required against some of the harder Pokemon that you will battle. As expected these battles against the Rogue Mega Evolved Pokemon not only pose the biggest challenge, but feel the most rewarding.
To find success in these Mega Battles, you will first need to make sure you have a Pokemon and the proper stone to do the Mega Evolution. Once in battle, you will need to damage the Rogue Mega Pokemon, which will drop energy balls that you will need to grab in real time to fill your Mega Evolution meter, which will allow you to evolve your Pokemon using the Mega Stone.
CRITICISMS
As great as Pokemon Legends ZA is for newcomers and the step in the right direction it appears to be taking based on what I've seen from the most recent releases, there is still no denying that this is not a next generation experience, but one that is anchored down by previous Nintendo hardware and this is where most of the issues can be traced back to. Almost everything about Pokemon Legends ZA feels at least a generation or two removed from the current gaming environment.
The visuals are extremely dated from the city that lacked personality and memorability. Many areas felt too similar with repeated textures or more performance related problems like invisible walls or constant clipping. Even something that you will see often is the evolution screen, which looks like a 90’s wallpaper or screensaver and not in a good retro way. Evolving your Pokemon is one of the highlights of the core Pokemon experience and having an amazing evolution cutscene should be a priority.
Looking at previous entries like Pokemon Arceus, which was set in the fantastical wild or Pokemon Sword and Shield that featured a more decisive art direction. Both of these examples not only suit the series better and focus on strengths, but also aligns with the blue ocean strategy of Nintendo that focuses on art direction and style over envelope pushing technology.
The problems went beyond how the city looked as traversing it also felt dated and clunky. It seems very odd that Game Freak added in a real time combat system that is more forward thinking in its approach, but didn’t put in jump for exploration. You eventually unlock an ability about fifteen hours in to glide across rooftops, but it feels too late and is imprecise. Items are littered all over the city in plain sight, which eliminated the reward of finding most items. There are rare items and rare Pokemon hidden around the city, which would were the more rewarding to find, but the lack of a jump button and the imprecise nature of the traversal system would usually end in frustration rather than satisfaction.
It’s hard to believe that in 2025, Pokemon doesn’t feature voice acting, which isn’t good enough anymore, especially when Nintendo’s other major tentpole franchises have embraced dialogue to some degree with The Legend of Zelda: Tears of The Kingdom, and even more recently Donkey Kong Bananza. The issue goes deeper than just voice acting as the characters felt stiff, emotionless and NPC’s around the city felt lifeless. Dialogue choices are just an illusion as they are just differently worded versions of the same option. All of this adds up to a less immersive experience.
IS POKEMON LEGENDS ZA WORTH IT FOR NEW PLAYERS?
Does Pokemon Legends ZA get extra scrutiny or extra forgiveness because it’s a Pokemon game. It’s hard to say, but as someone who isn’t a lifelong fan, it’s safe to say that nostalgia doesn’t factor in and that means a lot of these shortcomings feel unacceptable.
For the first Pokemon on Switch 2, let alone just an RPG in 2025, you would hope for a more well rounded experience. Sadly, most of the issues are likely due to the fact that it was anchored down by a simultaneous release on the Nintendo Switch, which is hardware from 2017.
The experience is accessible, the gameplay loop is addictive, and it emphasizes how satisfying catching and evolving Pokemon can be. It’s definitely not the best foot forward, but if you’ve always wanted to get into the franchise, Pokemon Legends ZA is a great place to start as the monster taming is still great and at times showcases what makes the series a worldwide phenomenon.
As a new player, I'm very interested to see where the series goes from here.
