[Sword & Shield] What do you think of Hop as a rival?

Hop is one of the rivals from the latest main series games, and has seen mixed opinions from players. What do you guys think about him? Was he a strong or weak rival/character? Also why does he have one of the best battle themes?

Liked them from a narrative standpoint. Began with big expectations to meet. Failed to do so. Switched up the team several times. Ultimately improved after letting go of those concerns.

Leans more negatively from a gameplay perspective. Fights against Hop eight times (Postwick, Route 2, post Opening Ceremony battle, breeder bridge, Stow-on-Side, Hammerlocke, Circhster, and the semi-finals). Returns twice more during postgame. Go away. Softened the blow through different teams. Tended to be weak during the main story, though.

Roughly evens out overall. Ranks higher when compared against previous main rivals.

I didn't mind Hop actually, the overly positive personality and body language still irked me but the battles were fun and engaging and the (I think) final battle against him after the swordbert storyline was actually a challenge that I struggled with.
I do also like how they handled you beating him at his own dream, I think it's a good message to show that you can and probably will fail at your childhood dreams, and that it's OK to choose a different path :)

I feel like Hop is a sweet kid, and I love him, but geeze did I feel bad for crushing his dreams at every turn! They made him so emotional and pure.

Though I'll admit I was mildly annoyed with his talk of 'oh good you understand type matchups' every time I'd use a super effective attack against his team. like honey, listen, I'm about twice your age and have raised hundreds of Pokemon, if I didn't know type matchups by now I don't know where I'd even be.

ninestarryskies said:

I feel like Hop is a sweet kid, and I love him, but geeze did I feel bad for crushing his dreams at every turn! They made him so emotional and pure.

Though I'll admit I was mildly annoyed with his talk of 'oh good you understand type matchups' every time I'd use a super effective attack against his team. like honey, listen, I'm about twice your age and have raised hundreds of Pokemon, if I didn't know type matchups by now I don't know where I'd even be.

Click to expand...

This sooooo much! I thought he was endearing, mildly annoying, but overall a fun character... and the it was like boi i'm THIRTY i've been hustling since before you was born

I think they went overboard with him, really didn't need to have him appear as many times he did before the league.

Other than that I liked his character.

He's basically just a Hau reskin, right down to the animations. He's not offensive, but he's not exactly memorable either. He's just...kinda there.

Hop is fine, better than the one in XY (and idr but if SM had one it wasnt good either). Hop at least had a bit of story with him other than just childhood friend, you managed to see his ups and down, and his worst down was when he lost a battle with bede and tried to change his team too much and had no confidence anymore, i think that was pretty neat. while usually rivals end up just being "power checkpoints" to test if your strong enough for the next part of the game. Hop you got to see some story, see him go through something. Just my opinion, but i just enjoyed it

I agree Hop was overbearing with how many times he bumped into you, but I enjoyed seeing his ups and downs. I appreciated seeing him grow after losing to Bede. I liked Hop being the Champion's little brother and that Hop aspired to become Champion. I liked Hop actually being there during the Eternatus crisis. It gave the story a little more substance than if he was just your childhood friend bumping into you 10 times with his Wooloo. Hop only lost to me because I have 20+ years of battling experience lol.

Better than Hau, but he took some time to develop, and his appearence in the Isle of Armour was a bit weird. I could have done without the, uh, slurpping. And inability to actually help. That kinda diminished my thoughts of him.

His finals battle theme though is pretty good though!

I didn't mind Hop all that much. I've been playing since Gen 1, so I am kinda used to the rival being super egotistical, but it is nice to have a few games where the rival was the main character's friend and actually acted like it. However, I did feel like Leon was the 'real' rival because he was actually a relatable champion, for me at least.

I think he's the most realistic rival because I too would get frustrated and change my team if I kept losing to my rival

I have to preface this by saying that I JUST beat Hop in the championship last night and this is my first playthrough!

I honestly think Hop is poorly written. I love the idea of a positive rival, but it feels to me like there may be a pity party in the near future. He takes defeat in stride, but you can tell he's thiiiiiis close to not being okay with it anymore.

That, and for someone who mentions in every. single. battle. that he "should have known (I) would go for type advantages", as if he didn't expect it, he sure did make it REALLY FAR in the Challenge.

I like the idea of his arc culminating in the realization that becoming the champion isn't truly his dream, but I kinda dislike that he became a Pokemon researcher. That's already happened with Bianca, Gary in the anime, Brendan/May sorta (they were researchers from the beginning, but after your last battle in the story they declare their intent to go back to Littleroot to focus more on it)...it's just starting to seem like the writers just default to this when they don't know what to do with a rival character.

If I had to stick with the Pokemon-researcher thing, though, I'd still change it up a bit. One, I'd have him actually show an interest in science and knowledge throughout the story - that would've been such an endearing character trait, omg - and two, instead of having him become full-fledged professor Sonia's apprentice, I'd have Sonia give up Pokemon research for something else, maybe even getting back into the Gym Challenge, and Hop take her position. Seriously, she had so much dialogue where she seemed like she just hated her job - it really seemed like the story was flowing towards her having a similar arc to Hop, realizing that she has a different dream than what she's expected to do because of her family, but then they just never did anything with it.

He's alright. Don't like nor not like him, I like his development through the game. I seriously wish he wasn't constantly whining here and there all through the mid game. Seriously, does he still complain about losing the Ice gym if he picked Fire? Or the Rock gym had he picked Water? Regardless, he's not bad at all.

He's actually one of my favorite characters, and has by far some of the best battle music. Poor Hop wasn't written too well as a rival though, but still not horrible at all to me, and I'll always like him a lot! Can only hope he shows up in the anime soon. :<

He's one of my favourites; I don't really see him as a rival. He feels too friendly and encouraging, I'm wondering if that's influenced by Leon's behaviour. Perhaps, that's why he's like that.

All I know.
I wish he'd stop doing whatever this is.


He vibes with his arms rapidly.

i genuinely like him! at first he was kinda unimpressive to me, just the standard happy-go-lucky/energetic rival archetype or whatever, but the self-reflection that he was forced to go through later on in the game really improved my opinion of him. he really does take being a stronger trainer quite seriously. he may be #2 to the player, but aiming for that #1 spot is really what keeps him interesting to me!