Pokémon fans are often extremely nitpicky and hard to satisfy, no matter what the developers do, as they would always find something to complain about. Based upon my experiences with the game, rating this game is complicated. Compared to the other titles, I arguably had the most fun playing this game because of the vast open world and the huge variety of Pokémon to catch in the open, something that I enjoy about the wild areas in Pokémon Sword and Shield, which leaves me playing the games and enjoying myself for long unhealthy hours. I also love the Union Circle, which allows me to connect to the net and set out on adventures with my friends. It's perhaps the best part of the game for me. However, other aspects prevent me from rating this game a perfect 10/10 such as horrible performance issues, weak day/night cycle with no real-time clock, lack of Pokédex variety from a competitive standpoint, and pointless nerfs to Pokémon movesets and their abilities. Beginning with the performance issues, the game crashed on me four times since I've played it, even after the update. The worst part is that it would crash every time I spent hours grinding for TM crafting materials and I had to start over each time because, for some reason, it never autosaved, which was probably another glitch.
Other than the game constantly crashing on me usually when opening the map, I haven't experienced any other major glitches. Next, regarding the lack of a real-time clock, Pokémon in my experiences always had a real-time day/night cycle, but for some reason, they did away with this on the main console. I have no clue why they couldn't include this for Pokémon Scarlet and Violet, but it's really a minor issue. I still enjoy the game regardless. The lack of variety in the Pokédex from a competitive standpoint is alarming, however. For example, practically no Water-type special sweepers exist in the game, as most of the Water-type Pokémon are physical attackers. If they are special attackers, they are typically slow and/or bulky instead of fast special attacking hard hitters. The same applies to a lot of Psychic-types as well. This isn't good if you're trying to build a competitive team. In addition, the developers nerfed a lot of things that they shouldn't have. For example, Protean was nerfed to only work once per switch in, making the ability much weaker now, but still managed to create a bunch of other overpowered things such as Palafin and Paradox Pokémon. Thus, overall, in the game's current state, I would give them a solid 8/10. I rank it slightly better than Pokémon Sword and Shield, much better than Pokémon Legends: Arceus, but thus far, still pales in comparison to Pokémon Black (2) White (2) and Pokémon Ultra Sun/Ultra Moon for me personally.
