Well since I keep seeing these kinds of videos pop up on YouTube, I might as well share my opinion on a platform that I know the people won't burn me alive for saying that I don't think the games will be trash just because it doesn't have every Pokémon in it.
Do I think this is sad? Yeah it's a little disappointing. But is it any reason to not buy the game? No. Does that mean that we have to boycott the games? No. I think people have over-exaggerated online about this issue, which is why people have gone mad. I'm honestly surprised 2 weeks later that people are still talking about this. (Well I'm talking about it right now, so...) The games are just including the Pokémon found in the regional Pokédex. So let's compare some other regional Pokédexes.
Kanto has 151 in RBY, and 153 in Let's Go.
Johto has 251 in GSC, and 256 in HGSS.
Hoenn has 202 in RSE, and 211 in ORAS.
Sinnoh has 151 in DP, and 210 in Pt. Now that's a lot of Pokémon added in between games.
Unova has 155 in BW, and 300 in B2W2. Wow, the Pokédex doubled in size!
Kalos has 457, combining the 3 parts it is divided into.
Alola has 302 in SM, and 403 in USUM.
Now why did I distract you from the main point? This is actually part of my point. Look at the size of these regional Pokédexes. And notice how much bigger they got in newer generations. (Except for Let's Go, because they only included gen 1 Pokémon, and Meltan and Melmetal.) And who's to say that Galar's Pokédex won't do the same and be bigger than the 403 in USUM? That's still over half of all Pokémon, not even counting the new gen 8 Pokémon!
We don't even know how many Pokémon will even be introduced into this generation. This will definitely affect how large the We only know 10 Pokémon as of now, not including the inevitable: starters' evolutions, the 3-stage regional bird (assuming it's not Corviknight, which it probably isn't), the 2-stage "rodent", Pikachu clone (assuming it's not Yamper, which it probably isn't), and 3-stage pseudo-legendary. So with just these alone, that's a guaranteed 27 new Pokémon right off the bat. And I think we can all safely assume that there will be more Pokémon introduced than there were in Kalos or even Alola. I hope they can push the amount of new Pokémon back into the hundreds (like they did in previous generations), while still keeping at least half of existing Pokémon to have a Galar Dex in the 500s.
So let's say there aren't many Pokémon in the games. So there's this thing called patches, where they can update the games over time. They could simply add in more Pokémon through patches, and slowly build up the Galar Pokédex.
Now let's say they don't make any patches. Well that's nothing a future game couldn't fix. Now look back to the regional Pokédexes I mentioned earlier. Look at the difference of Pokémon between DP and Pt, BW and B2W2, SM and USUM. They all have something in common: the original games didn't have too many Pokémon, but the new versions added Pokémon that weren't originally in the region. Now who's to say that this couldn't happen between SwSh and the next Pokémon game?
Now let's say that there are no patches, and no future games add any more existing Pokémon. Does that make Sword and Shield bad games? No. This is only one aspect of the games. You also have to consider the facts that the games are not just about the Pokédex. There's also the story, battling, finding shiny Pokémon, breeding, music, the region, the list goes on. Allow me to give some examples.
Gen 5 gets a lot of hate for its Pokémon, and that it's more quantity over quality. "Wow, a pile of trash? An ice cream cone?" "So many gen 5 Pokémon are just ripoffs of gen 1 Pokémon! Conkeldurr and Machamp, Sawk/Throh and Hitmonlee/Hitmonchan, Gigalith and Golem!" But what's the main reason why people why people love gen 5? The story. People love the uniqueness of the story, and the more serious tone it had. In the competitive scene, hidden abilities gave many Pokémon a new chance to shine in battle, such as Ninetales and Politoed, with Drought and Drizzle, respectively. Speaking of weather abilities, weather effects lasted all battle long, which allowed for more creativity with weather-based teams. And with the introduction of the Eviolite, many not-fully-evolved Pokémon rose in popularity, such as Porygon2 and most notably, Chansey.
As much as I love Diamond and Pearl, it has 2 main glaring flaws: the type imbalance of Pokémon featured, and the overall slowness of these games. Literally the Fire type Elite 4 member had 2 Fire types on his team. Obviously that's a problem. However, are Diamond and Pearl bad games? Not necessarily. Just because these flaws exist, it doesn't mean I hate these games. I can love these games because of the music, the story, the geography of the Sinnoh region, the physical and special moves split, or maybe even the glitches, like the infamous tweaking. (As nostalgic as these games are to me, I don't consider nostalgia a strong reason to say that something is good. So I'm trying my best to consider the games themselves, and not the nostalgia they have given me for nearly 10 years.)
Now to bring this rant to a close, just because there's one glaring flaw doesn't mean that the games will be trash. So many people have been extremely pessimistic about this situation, so that's why I want to stay positive about this situation. Now, could I be wrong in my speculations? Maybe. Maybe not. But either way, I think it's important to remember that one flaw does not define the quality a game. That's my philosophy on this whole situation. One flaw does not define the quality of something.
Now, I honestly don't care how much you try to sway me against my ideals. I don't even care if there's absolutely no hope for these games. No matter what, I want to stay positive about these games. I guess this is mostly personal: a lot of times I feel like I get swayed easily. And I feel like there's no better opportunity to practice staying firm to an opinion than right now! And besides, doesn't the internet have enough negativity already?
(This came out much, much longer than I anticipated. Sorry if this is incoherent or I jump to random points.)
