what was his name again?

do you think nicknaming rivals will ever make a comeback? why or why not? we've been without this feature for 2 generations straight now, and BW2 had it but BW did not.

also, what's your opinion on it being removed? have you missed it?

I'm not that bothered about it tbh, I personally prefer the names the games give the rivals, Blue, Silver etc and find them to be more immersive in the world. Although naming my rival a funny name or the name of one of my friends was fun when I was younger, I never do it anymore so don't really have a need for this feature.

i've only just realized that we haven't been able to name our rivals for 2 gens now, i think that says a lot about how much it bothers me lmao. i always call the rival by the names they're given anyways so it's really not an issue to me tbh.

I think personally think renaming rivals will come back one day! But just not currently because I think they still to figure out/test the censorship stuff still because they probably don't want our rivals to be called ____

I am no good with coming up with names, so it definitely doesn't bother me that I haven't been able to rename them. Just means I don't have to stop and potentially sit there for a bit while I think one up.

Also, I totally didn't realize at all that it was removed.

I actually liked the feature and I do hope it'll make a comeback.

It's funny that we've been missing it for over two generations but so many of us didn't even realize it was gona, ahah. I had to go double check as well before making this thread.

Rainbow said:

It's funny that we've been missing it for over two generations but so many of us didn't even realize it was gona, ahah. I had to go double check as well before making this thread.

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I think the thing is, in Generation 6 there was just loads of rivals, and naming all of them would have been a pain. In Sun and Moon, Hau's (who I consider the main rivals) name was a part of the culture of Alola so I think it was important he had a set name. I dunno, maybe that's part of the reason, but still I'm sure rival naming will return someday.

It may be due to how the focus of the games has shifted. Naming your rival goes back to when you would set up the story of the game yourself. You'd put your own name as the player and someone you saw as a rival as your ingame rival and play your own little game of beating that person.

As the games shifted more and more towards story driven experiences with not as much rivals as friends who beg you to beat them, it just turned out unnecessary to give them a name. It would even be counterproductive to rename them, since they now are part of the story the game tells and not your own.

Marth has probably nailed the reason why nameable rivals have become a thing of the past. Pokemon games as of late have shifted more towards these rivals becoming a part of the story and choosing their name would not fit with that.

And even when it comes to rivals who can be named, I still often only know them by their canon names, such as Barry, Silver and Hugh.