Even in case you’ve by no means performed a Pokémon sport earlier than, you possibly can most likely determine how the kind chart works. Fireplace varieties are weak to water varieties, water is weak to grass, and grass is weak to fireside. Sort matchups are foundational to Pokémon battles, far earlier than you get into the weeds of stats and strats. I’ve had the Pokémon kind chart memorized for round 25 years.
That also didn’t cease me from making a rookie error in Pokémon Legends: Z-A. I panicked and despatched out my Weedle in opposition to an NPC’s Pidgeotto, which it is extremely a lot weak to. It obtained one-shot, clearly.
It’s not that I forgot how kind matchups labored. However the battle system in Legends: Z-A may be very, very totally different from what I’m used to, at the least with Pokémon. It’s the second entry within the Legends spinoff sequence, which started with 2022’s Pokémon Legends: Arceus, and whereas the Legends video games are nonetheless RPGs like the primary Pokémon video games, they mechanically and structurally diverge a bit from the everyday Pokémon system. And Z-A takes it additional than Arceus did: it’s the primary Pokémon RPG to function real-time battles as a substitute of turn-based ones.
In the primary sequence, you select your actions flip by flip, taking time to suppose by way of the choices — the precise assault to make use of, whether or not to modify out for an additional pokémon, what the opponent could be planning — earlier than locking one thing in and seeing the way it performs out. In Legends: Z-A, however, you’re going through your opponent extra immediately. There’s no ready for each opponents to lock of their actions for the flip; you simply decide your pokémon’s transfer utilizing one of many face buttons, and the transfer goes out.
It’s a giant departure from almost 30 years of Pokémon video games. I’m used to excited about Pokémon like a chess match, slowly and several other steps forward; in Z-A, I had to consider the identical kind matchups and stats and all the pieces else, however shortly and on my ft. It took me a while to regulate.
The demo, which I performed forward of the 2025 Pokémon World Championships in Anaheim, California, was break up into two components lasting round 10 minutes every, each seemingly early within the sport and closely targeted on the brand new battle system. Within the first half, I attempted my hand on the Z-A Royale, which had me battling NPC trainers round Lumiose Metropolis at evening. Within the second, I battled a Rogue Mega Absol, which felt just like the Pokémon model of a basic 3D Zelda boss. Within the second a part of the demo, I began to get the hold of this fashion of battling, and what was at first somewhat overwhelming shortly grew to become an alluring form of problem: rewiring the Pokémon a part of my mind.
The primary massive change I needed to cope with: since battle in Z-A is in actual time, strikes are on cooldown timers. You possibly can’t simply spam the one super-effective transfer you may have time and again; you need to determine what else you are able to do when you wait to make use of that assault once more. Even in opposition to very low-level opponents, I discovered myself counting on standing strikes like Growl, which lowers the opposing pokémon’s assault stat, as a buffer whereas my different strikes had been on cooldown. This had the added bonus of permitting my pokémon to take extra hits, shopping for me a while each for the cooldown and to suppose.
Utilizing standing strikes like this isn’t uncommon when enjoying the core Pokémon video games at a excessive degree, however it’s very uncommon in opposition to a run-of-the-mill Bellsprout early within the sport. I didn’t have sufficient time within the demo to actually mess around with it, however I can see myself rigorously deciding on every pokémon’s strikes to account for the cooldown, like making certain I’ve Shield on extra of my pokémon to dam incoming assaults. In different Pokémon video games, I’d completely train my pokémon Shield if I used to be constructing a aggressive crew, however I’d nearly by no means do it simply to play the primary story.
Picture: The Pokémon Firm
It’s not that battles in Legends: Z-A are unforgiving. (I did get smoked by the Pidgeotto, however in my protection, it was additionally at the least 10 ranges greater than the pokémon on my crew.) However after years and years of approaching each mainline Pokémon sport the identical means, working at the least somewhat bit on autopilot and muscle reminiscence within the early sport, it’s form of an thrilling problem to have to have a look at Pokémon in another way.
The battle in opposition to Rogue Mega Absol — a wild, rampaging Absol that may Mega Evolve by itself — was much like the NPC battles in that means, however way more hands-on. In contrast to in battles in opposition to different trainers, wild pokémon can injury each your pokémon and your character, so you need to bodily dodge and transfer across the area whereas deciding on your pokémon’s strikes, maintaining a tally of everybody’s well being, and juggling cooldowns. (Utilizing gadgets like Potions can also be on a cooldown.) Touchdown hits on the Rogue Mega causes it to drop orbs of “Mega Power,” which you need to run and decide up with the intention to cost up a gauge to Mega Evolve your individual pokémon and deal extra injury.
It’s much more to stability, however I didn’t discover it overwhelming, in some way. On this case, I had a Lucario at my disposal, and it had super-effective strikes whereas additionally resisting Absol’s assaults, which helped. Lucario already knew Shield, too, so I obtained to benefit from the technique I had simply developed within the Z-A Royale. And it’s additionally a well-known fashion of boss battle in video games extra typically, even when it’s totally different for Pokémon. It was extra concerned and felt extra harmful than the coach battles, however I felt competent at it comparatively shortly (particularly in comparison with the Pidgeotto incident).
Perhaps it’s only a typical studying curve, and I’ll in a short time develop an up to date form of autopilot for the simpler components of Z-A. However I actually did like having to suppose actively about Pokémon in a means that I normally save for aggressive play. I hope the sport can maintain that for longer than a demo, and that I’ll get to construct on the Pokémon information I’ve been amassing for years, relatively than simply passively flexing it.
Pokémon Legends: Z-A can be launched for Nintendo Change and Change 2 on October sixteenth.