Pokémon Sword and Shield will have co-op raids and will launch in November

During a special Nintendo Direct event, The Pokémon Company announced an array of details for the much-anticipated upcoming Pokémon games Sword and Shield. One of the most important pieces of information that everybody wanted to know was the release date, which we now know is November 15th worldwide.

Some of the features shown during the 15 minute event for Sword and Shield are as follows:

• A new battle mechanic which sees Pokémon grow considerably in size similar to mega evolution, but instead of turning into another Pokémon, the same Pokémon just grows in size (and power)
• The Wild Area which is a place where trainers can explore, battle wild Pokémon, and meet with real life friends to take on raid bosses in real time co-op battles (similar to the group battles in Pokémon Go)
• Various new Pokémon including Wooloo (a sheep), Gossifleur (a flower) which evolves into Eldegoss, Drenaw (Rhyhorn type Pokémon/Rhino), and Corviknight, which is a really cool-looking Raven that will fly you around the map to towns you have previously visited
• As well as the new Pokémon above, the two ‘Legendary’ Pokémon have also been announced. These are Zacian, which is a sword-wielding mythical wolf-like creature, and Zamazenta, which looks very similar but instead of wielding a sword it bares a shield; we’re assuming that the version of the game that you buy (Sword or Shield) will decide which of these legendary Pokémon you can get.
• We saw gameplay of a trainer riding various bikes around the Galar Region, and these bikes looked like so much fun to ride
• Fishing was also shown in the gameplay trailer

That’s about it for the announced features, but we did also get another look at the map and camera angle as well as some more gameplay, and it all looks absolutely stunning.

You can re-watch the whole Pokémon event below:

Coming from someone who hasn’t played a Pokémon game since the originals on the Game Boy when there were only 150/151 Pokémon, it’s strange seeing all of these random Pokémon that I don’t know the names of. It makes me sad but at the same time it’s quite exciting to have new Pokémon to discover. However, during the video The Pokémon Company did say that old Pokémon will be making an appearance, before showing us a shot of Arcanine. The old ones are the best.