6th Gen Masuda on why the Battle Frontier didn't return

In an interview with Masuda before the games were released, Masuda explains why the development team chose not to include the Battle Frontier in Omega Ruby and Alpha Sapphire:

Q:Why wasn't the Battle Frontier in the remakes?
A:This question is connected with my previous answer. We didn't put the BF in ORAS for this very reason. Interviewer's note: In short he means that they didn't include the BF because only a very small part of the players would have fully appreciated and made use of this feature; nowadays players get bored and frustrated more easily and they aren't interested in things that are so demanding/challenging.

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https://www.reddit.com/r/Games/comme...y_there_is_no/

So, what are your thoughts on Masuda's reasoning here? Do you think that the Frontier wouldn't have been appreciated as much for the reasons Masuda states? Would you count yourself among the players who wouldn't have cared much for the Battle Frontier, or were you disappointed that it didn't return? Share your thoughts!
https://www.reddit.com/r/Games/comments/2olmtb/interview_with_masuda_on_oras_and_why_there_is_no/

I read this article shortly after it was posted a while back. It's really infuriating how, based on Masuda's reasoning, it seems that they didn't consider the veteran players when making this move. They just went and assumed that people nowadays are so busy that nobody would have appreciated a Battle Frontier anyway. It was even pointed out that today's players get "bored and frustrated more easily", yet they copy-and-paste the Battle Maison from X and Y (which, by the way is more fodder for both boredom and frustration than anything else). I was severely disappointed that it didn't return because it really made Emerald stand out among Gen 3 games, and even more so after reading about why.

flight said:

I mean, does anyone remember back in Emerald's Battle Frontier in one of the facilities whereas you couldn't even give your Pokemon orders and their actions were dictated based on nature or something? That's more or less what I'm looking for and I imagine others would appreciate the same.

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Yup, the Battle Palace! You're right, their actions are dependent on their natures; each nature reacts differently to a variety of situations like critical health and status conditions(?). The page at Bulbapedia explains it better :P Other than the Battle Tower format that's been seen in newer games, every other facility at the Battle Frontier had something unique that hasn't been seen anywhere else in the series.

I enjoyed the SSHG Battle Frontier most. Battle Palace was frustration and Battle Piramid was way too difficult for me to care. The Battle Factory was always my favorite as you never know what you're gonna get.
I was very disappointed when there was no Battle Frontier at all. Nothing for me to really do post-game...

This is frustrating since I couldn't really do the Battle Frontier back in Gen 3 since I like to grind my pokémon up to Level 50 before the E4 which means I'll either have to get an entirely new set of pokémon or grind them all the way up to Level 100 for them to stand a chance. Just omitting a big part of Emerald like that is kind of a really stupid idea, especially since we can't even re-fight gym leaders like we could in Emerald which was really cool.

To a certain degree, based on what Masuda is saying, I do recognize why it didn't end up in the game. I don't think he's saying they intentionally left it out because not that many players would be interested, but rather, it ended up at the bottom of the list of development priorities, so it just didn't happen :(

Still though, I think GameFreak is underestimating the degree to which people enjoyed the Battle Frontier. It was easily my favorite aspect of both Emerald and HeartGold/SoulSilver, and the fact that it was challenging didn't turn me off or make me give up and move on to something else--it actually kept me coming back to the games for years because to this day I've never beaten it o.o

So yea, I entirely disagree with what Masuda's saying. There's plenty of potential in the Battle Frontier, even in today's gaming environment.

flight said:

I mean, does anyone remember back in Emerald's Battle Frontier in one of the facilities whereas you couldn't even give your Pokemon orders and their actions were dictated based on nature or something? That's more or less what I'm looking for and I imagine others would appreciate the same.

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DraconianWing said:

Yup, the Battle Palace! You're right, their actions are dependent on their natures; each nature reacts differently to a variety of situations like critical health and status conditions(?). The page at Bulbapedia explains it better :P Other than the Battle Tower format that's been seen in newer games, every other facility at the Battle Frontier had something unique that hasn't been seen anywhere else in the series.

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I remember that! This is one of the Battle Frontier facilities that I never beat haha. This would have actually worked quite well in OR/AS, considering how much easier breeding is now in 6th gen.

Their reasoning is so piss poor, honestly. Part of the reason that the Battle Frontier wasn't totally approached back in the day was because it was before the fully competitive scene for Pokémon had surfaced. With the impressive size of the competitive Pokémon community, I do really believe that a lot of people would have appreciated it and played it, much more than in RSE, even.

I still believe the reason behind for the lack of Battle Frontier is related to programming and coding stuff. Just look at the Safari Zone in ORAS (as well as the Friend Safari from XY), they don't even function like the Safari Zones from the previous generations!

Even if the fans are the real reason for the lack of Battle Frontier, saying that publicly just felt terrible you know? It felt like a slap to the loyal fans. It's not like we're all the same, there are those who truly appreciate the facilities. :'/ I wouldn't even mind a rehash of PWT, in fact I would love to see it.

If this was really the reason to leave the Battle Frontier out, then the Battle Maison would've been left out too. So I refuse to believe his reason.

I see where Masuda is going at, though even if it would have frustrated the audience doesn't the Battle Maison do the exact same thing? I mean seriously, I have only beaten the Battle Maison one time and have yet to clear a super battle run which even with my IV bred and EV trained Pokemon is a very hard challenge. So the fact that Masuda gave that reason and put something in that does the exact same thing is kinda contradictory to me.


But eh, Masuda delivered in every other aspect of the game so I don't care at least he gave me a giant nostalgia trip :3

Masuda's reasoning here is very intriguing, because it was pretty much him saying what the fans want, and in this case most of the fans were frustrated by the challenge of the Battle Frontier, whereas few of us actually loved it (which seems to be most of this forum) and sadly he decided in the majority's favour.

I do find the statement ironic when you consider the Battle Maison is just as annoying, full of cheating AI. But the target audience for Pokemon is mainly kids and I could have pictured many kids getting annoyed by the Battle Frontier, to the point that they would have never won a symbol ever.

I'm actually really curious to see if Masuda based any of this on consumer data or some other quantitative measurement. My guess is that those who enjoyed the Battle Frontier really are the minority, but I'm quite interested in how big this difference is.
As to why they included the Battle Maison? Probably it was way easier to make than the Battle Frontier while also serving the same function of providing BP and getting players access to competitive items. The Battle Frontier would require art assets/space for multiple buildings as well as needing to program in different battle formats like rental, whereas the Battle Maison only requires resources for one building, and the battle types are all already in the game. Not to mention that they already programmed the Maison for X/Y, so they could copy over a lot of work from their to save time.

There are always, always more casual players than ones that do care about game mechanics, achievements, etc. For simplicity's sake, let's call the minority players the elitists, the vets, the pros, whatever.

Likewise, if you put something in the game that's challenging, even the most "unskilled" or "ignorant" players will want to get a piece of that content. Because many are unable to meet the requirements of said content, they get frustrated and—for the lack of better terms—pissed off.

If you play a lot of online games, the results are more obvious because everything's more in the open. Human nature guides us this way: if someone has something you want, you want it, too. And when you can't get it, you might get upset.

Now in terms of the game development side, some of the devs may love the Battle Frontier. They might love the vision. However, Nintendo, Game Freak, et al. are corporations. Devs don't call all the shots. Whatever saves them the most money and brings in the most money at the end of the quarter, at the end of the year... that's what gets done.

Cut the development time and costs by removing the Battle Frontier, save the doom/gloom, frustration and grief from the casual players who want to be completionists, but can't. These casual players (and I don't mean this as a negative term at all) are the money-makers. Please them first, cater to them first.

The 1% vocal minority who want the extra challenge? Please, any corporation looking to increase revenue would gladly sacrifice 1% of their player base to please the remaining 99%. Obviously the numbers aren't exactly in that ratio, but again, there are always, always more casual players than ones that do care. Every game.

I don't agree with Masuda's reasoning on the Battle Frontier's exclusion. A good percentage of Pokemon players are in their teens/adolescents. More experienced players like them would have enjoyed a good challenge from the Frontier's battle formats.

The BF was interesting concept but considering it was even more of haxland than the N64 Stadium games it was rather pointless and more reliant on luck rather than skill.

How disappointing... I'm not sure how many new players the games picked up, but it seems to me that there are enough long time players that bought the games to more than justify a Battle Frontier addition, especially because it's those long time players that would want it most in the first place.

Besides, Masuda underestimates Pokemon fans I think. Like VisualJae said, even the newest players to the games would love a shot at a feature considered difficult.

I wonder if ya guys have wondered about the irony of easy EV training?
I mean EV training is easier in Gen VI games, yet they shut the doors tight for Battle Frontier, which is ironic in my opinion.

Sun said:

I wonder if ya guys have wondered about the irony of easy EV training?
I mean EV training is easier in Gen VI games, yet they shut the doors tight for Battle Frontier, which is ironic in my opinion.

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There's a whole community of real people battling online. I don't think easy EV training loses its usefulness in this scenario.

I could never get into the BF the way I got into the Stadium games. The latter were somehow more immersive IMO. :(

Cerberus87 said:

There's a whole community of real people battling online. I don't think easy EV training loses its usefulness in this scenario.

I could never get into the BF the way I got into the Stadium games. The latter were somehow more immersive IMO. :(

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I didn't say easy EV training lost its usefulness. Lmao Didn't know where did that come from. X'D

What I meant to say is easy EV training complements Battle Frontier. :) Hope that clears thing up.

Sun said:

I didn't say easy EV training lost its usefulness. Lmao Didn't know where did that come from. X'D

What I meant to say is easy EV training complements Battle Frontier. :) Hope that clears thing up.

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You'll probably have to excuse me since, despite knowing what you meant, I couldn't come up with a proper answer. The one I had written earlier was even worse. :( I knew you'd reply this if I wrote it wrong but I was still incapable of giving you an answer with the correct meaning.

What I wanted to say was that I saw no irony in it because the existence of a huge online battling community means the impact of no BF is much less significant.