Several hours into Pokémon Legends: Z-A, I'm having a great time. Its innovative approach to real-time battling and design choice to set the whole game in one city are a breath of fresh air for the franchise. It also runs great on Nintendo Switch 2. As someone who thinks Pokémon X and Y are vastly underrated, I'm glad Kalos and Lumiose City are getting the love they deserve.

I just wish Pokémon Legends: Z-A didn't have the same problem that pretty much every Pokémon game over the past decade has had: a really slow start. Likely because of the series' focus on younger players, the games feel the need to spoon-feed information to the player over the first two or so hours of every adventure.

While I have lots of fun with Pokémon games once I get over that initial hump, those slow starts have made recent Pokémon games tough to replay for me. I'd like for Game Freak to find a way to accommodate both experienced and novice players, letting that information stay for those who need it while getting other players past the slow start so they can get right into the action.

Modern Pokémon games take too long to get going

The first couple of hours are typically a slog to get through

Pokémon Legends: Z-A kicks off the way many Pokémon games do. Players arrive in Lumiose City, quickly meet one of the game's main support characters, and then quickly find themselves in a situation where they need to choose a starter Pokémon to fight a battle with. For the first 15 years or so of the series' existence, the game would open up after that point, letting players set off on their own adventure.

Instead of doing that, Pokémon Legends: Z-A railroad players for the next two hours. It takes its time, slowly introducing each character and mechanic that the game has to offer. I understand wanting to tutorialize the real-time battles because that's something new for the series, but the game's incredibly slow pace of doing so made the adventure get boring fast.

While I like some of its characters, none of its dialogue was particularly gripping, and none of the battles I fought were particularly difficult. After those first two hours, I was finally let loose on Lumiose City, but I almost felt burnt out on the game after all that. While it might be easy to forget that as I put 10+ hours into the game, I can't help but remember it's an issue I've had with almost every game in this series over the past decade.

Ever since 2016's Pokémon Sun and Moon on the Nintendo 3DS, I've felt like every Pokémon game has spent way too long getting the adventure started. Players are railroaded on a linear path as the game spoonfeeds information to them before finally freeing them from that monotony and offering the gameplay loop they buy Pokémon games for. It's concerning that I feel this is now a core part of the franchise.

Game Freak should have more confidence in its player base

Players are smart enough to understand what's happening.

To play devil's advocate for Game Freak, I am a man in my late 20s playing a turn-based RPG made for children. The developers' target audience is probably much younger than me, and Game Freak likely feels the need to repeatedly break down everything for young players so they don't get confused and stop playing. That underestimates how smart younger players can be, though.

While I rarely finished a Pokémon game when I was little, I had every Pokémon type's strengths and weaknesses memorized before I knew algebra. Kids also love complex games like Fortnite and Roblox, but don't spend a lot of time on their tutorials. As a player, I'd much prefer those first two hours be spent gaining my bearings in its world myself rather than having everything explained to me bit by bit.

My issue is that this approach hurts the game's replay value. While I play the first six generations of Pokémon games over and over again to this day, I've rarely replayed any of the Pokémon games from the past decade, even after I've had a good time with them. If I could find some way to circumvent that initial tutorial slog in these games, that might not be the case.

As for potential solutions, Game Freak has some options. They could bake in difficulty modes, so the battles players partake in early on are actually more challenging for more experienced players. They could also add options for players to skip over tutorial explanations entirely, offering an option to start the game from right where they end. Both of those could improve the experience, and tutorials could be found within the game's menus for those who really need them.

Pokémon Legends: Z-A would've been better without a slow start

I'd like for future Pokémon games to cut down on hand-holding players early on

Nothing makes me feel older than complaining about a Pokémon game, but the fact that this issue has persisted for a decade is really starting to frustrate me. I understand that Game Freak has so many competing interests and requests from this series' massive player base that it's tough to accommodate everyone. Also, players like me can suck it up and stick through the slow parts so we can get to the good stuff.

Still, I can't help but believe that Pokémon would only benefit and make its players happier if it offered up more difficulty options or gave players a chance to get right into the action (at least on a second playthrough). While I doubt this will change, nothing would make me happier while playing a future Pokémon game than booting it up for the first time and getting right into the stuff I love about these games.