Well now with ample time with the game, I feel like writing my little thoughts on it. A psuedo review that will piss some people off since this thread has devolved into a circle jerk since a certain boomer started tweeting about it.
1. Story
Overall it's exceptional. Plain and simple. Some might say something like ">expecting story from a pokemon game", but its like, really sloppy this time. The characters however is a lot more likable overall Bede being the stand out for having the best arc over the story. Hop also has a much more interesting arc compared to his counter part in sun and moon. Marnie is weaker but she shares it with her more interesting family member. Leon is likable if not a little mary sue-ish. Worst off in the "good" group is the professors daughter, that has an arc that expects you to care about, but you dont. The gym leaders have more character then in past gens. Team yell is team skull part 2, the REAL evil team makes Magma and Aqua look like true big brains. Replacing the elite 4 with a tournament with the gym leaders is neat, however they should not heal you between matches, and should have boosted their levels a lot more on rematch. Though having the cover legendary quest post game is actually a good touch and is more interesting then the main game's "conflict"
2. Gameplay
It's a pokemon game, you know what to expect, only thing I can do is shed light on some common questions about certain common questions I see asked around. Exp and overleveling is.... well done i guess, the system leaves its self open to being broken apart as much as you need it to be. While running through the story I spent a lot of time catching most the pokemon on a route, my levels would usually end up LOWER then wild pokemon on the next new route, HIGHER then the trainers of that route, and around par for the gym coming up. Wild area changes this for obvious reasons however and open up to how hard you are willing to over level. Speaking about the wild area, its actually pretty cool if not somewhat small, has a lot of pokemon you can catch opening up team variety. However, its actually more of a post game feature. The raid battles are going to be you main supply for creating competitive pokemon, and the items you get from them make them almost mandatory when taking saved time into account. The actual battle itself is fun enough to not be a total bore. Other post game content is the battle tower, the legendary quest (probably slightly longer then the delta episode), and championship rematches. The wild area will be the playtime hog however. It shapes up to be the best postgame for a FIRST INSTALLMENT in a new generation at this point. Overall the first 2/3rds of the game is nicely polished, falls apart a bit after you hit the rock/ice gym, and gets itself together again for post game.
3. Performance
It looks like a ps3 jrpg and it runs like shit. the gym leaders have neat animations, some pokemon have neat new idle and attack animations. I personally havent experienced any sort of crashes but some people get them bad.
4. Overall
Its alright, is it worth the $60? probably not but you bought it already if you like pokemon and had a decent time with it already. If your just here to shitpost then obviously not.
Here is were I would place it in the meme tier list. quality within the letter grade decreasing from left to right. (debating if frlg deserves to be that high)
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