Pokémon Sun And Moon Review: 6 Ups And 3 Downs

Downs

3. Z-Moves

I got a bit of flack for saying in my preview article this year that they needed to dump Mega Evolutions. Essentially a cheap gimmick designed to make battles needlessly easy and give the promotion team a cool feature to hang the marketing on. Thankfully, there's been no sign of these in my experience of Sun and Moon (although I'm sure it'll crop up eventually), but it's been replaced by something even worse.

Z-Moves, which are type specific, once-per-battle super-attacks that require a crystal to power up, come complete with ridiculous OTT animations, and do nothing but guarantee a cheap KO. They add nothing from an attacking perspective, and when your opponent has one it merely means you have to factor in losing one of your team straight out of the gate.

I can't quite find the words to describe to you just how stupid the names and animations of these attacks are. Each have a name that wouldn't look out of place as a copyright-free wrestling finisher, and an animation that should signal the end of the world. Supersonic Skystrike, Continental Crush, Black Hole Eclipse; if I rolled my eyes any harder at these I'd faint.

Just watch this. From the name, to the animation, to the dance the trainer does, to the fact that it's NOT A MOONSAULT this is one of the most jarring things to be seen in a Pokemon game...