Publisher: Nintendo
Platform(s): Nintendo Switch, Nintendo Switch 2
Release Date: October 16, 2025
I was lucky enough to get to go hands-on with Pokémon Legends: Z-A at 2025 Pokémon Worlds Championships in sunny Anaheim, California over the past weekend. During both halves of the two-part demo, the only thing I could think was that if Pokémon Legends: Z-A is what the future of the Pokémon franchise looks like, then there are very exciting adventures ahead. I would go so far as to say that Pokémon Legends: Z-A is as much of a monumental change to Pokémon as Pokémon Moon and Pokémon Sun tried to be in 2016 with changing up the storytelling format.
In the first half of the demo, I had to collect items off the ground and use them from my inventory, talk to NPCs, and use my set of four Pokémon (Chikorita, Mareep, Fletching, and Weedle) to take down three NPCS in my first night in the Z-A Royale and collect 1,000 tickets. As to be expected, the demo battle zone was very much on-rails in order to get you to go from fight to fight while also learning the gameplay mechanics. In the second half of the demo, the game skips ahead and you start by following a certain Pokémon around Lumiose City until you find yourself in a Mega Evolution battle with a Rogue Mega Absol! It is then I had to put all the mechanics (plus a new trick or two I figured out along the way) to work to take that Pokémon down. While I personally prefer using Joy-Con to play my Nintendo Switch 2 at home, I only had the Nintendo Switch 2 Pro Controller available to me at the Pokémon Legends: Z-A demo station.
Pokémon Legends: Z-A’s combat is everything I’ve wanted in Pokémon for years now, and I could not stop gushing about it to my friends. You are actively moving your character around on the battlefield while also throwing, attacking, and returning Pokémon back to you in real time. You use the left and right on the D-Pad to select what Pokémon you want to use, and you hit up to send it out and down to call it back. If you want to run faster, you hold B to dash and you roll with Y. You can focus in on a target with ZL, and you then use ABXY to move around while focusing on that enemy Pokémon. Finally, if you want to Mega Evolve a Pokémon, you press down on the right joystick. This control scheme was surprisingly intuitive, and I was just itching to remap the call and return D-pad buttons to GL and GR on the Nintendo Switch 2 Pro Controller’s backside.
The gameplay battle mechanics were incredibly fun. Pokémon Legends: Z-A brings back the mechanic of a fight starting when both trainers’ eyes meet…but you can now sneak up on an enemy Pokémon and get an extra bit of damage in if you’re lucky enough and clever enough to do so. Conversely, your opponent can absolutely do the same to you! Battling itself felt incredibly natural. Each of the Pokémon’s moves work on a cooldown timer, and I found myself constantly switching out between Pokémon on my team to get in extra attacks while I was waiting for another Pokémon to be ready to attack again. When I was fighting a Bellsprout in the first half of the Pokémon Legends: Z-A demo, for example, I ended up pulling out Fletchling to do super effective attacks against the grass-type Pokémon.
It is hard to tell whether or not STAB (single-type attack bonus) makes a return in this game as I simply did not have a big enough pool of Pokémon to fight against to figure it out. What I ended up doing was starting off a battle with Weedle to get off String Shot and Poison Sting on my opponent and then switching it out for a heavy-hitter Pokémon to try to get the win. Real-time battling really turns Pokémon Legends: Z-A from a slower paced game like you would see in Pokémon Violet or Pokémon Scarlet into quite the action-packed adventure that was just so much fun to play.
“Pokémon Legends: Z-A is the biggest, and riskiest shakeup to the Pokémon franchise in a decade and I found myself wanting MORE.”
Taking on the Rogue Mega Absol with my own Mega Lucario in the second half of the Pokémon Legends: Z-A demo really felt like the training wheels were coming off. It was here that it was revealed that I have my own HP, and if I get hit too many times by the opposing Pokémon, then I can faint too! What this meant in practice was that there were times when I was having to dodge area-of-effect or direction ranged attacks that were aimed deliberately at me while also still trying to have Lucario whittle down Rogue Mega Absol’s health at the time. When Lucario would successfully land a hit on Rogue Mega Absol, that Pokémon would release Mega Energy that I had to go around and collect while still not getting hit myself. Once I filled out my Mega Meter in the lower righthand corner, I could Mega Evolve Lucario and just WAILORD on Rogue Mega Absol while I lost that Mega Energy and reverted back.
This was a hectic, crazy, and fun experience, and it worked. There were times when I would have to stop trying to order Lucario to do moves since I was more in danger of getting hit by the opponent Pokémon than anything else and I had to watch out for myself. This had the fully intended effect of making every Mega Evolution I did feel genuinely satisfying and well-earned and not just a rehashed gameplay gimmick from 2013. When I saw that Lucario was in danger of getting hit by an area-of-effect move, I ended up actually recalling it back to its Poké Ball, dodging the attack myself with the dash and roll commands, and then throwing it back onto the field again to fight some more. All of this combat in Pokémon Legends: Z-A felt natural, fun, and just chaotic enough that you could lose yourself in the gameplay but without it feeling overwhelming. In short: Real-time attack gameplay is such a natural fit for Pokémon that it is going to be hard to go back to anything else.
So far, I’ve spent over 750 words talking about the combat, and for good reason: a Pokémon game without good combat simply isn’t a good Pokémon game. But Pokémon Legends: Z-A is an absolutely beautiful title as well because Lumiose City has never looked more stunning. This game absolutely takes full advantage of the Nintendo Switch 2’s power to create a detailed, color-drenched experience that becomes what the Nintendo 3DS only could imagine Lumiose City to be. While both demos took place at night, you could just see the city light up and there is detail on the plants, in the moving river, and on the pavement that makes Lumiose City feel like its own vital character to the world of Pokémon Legends: Z-A. It is also worth noting that I didn’t accidentally get hung up on any geometry while running around, but I wasn’t intentionally trying to break the game during both of my 10-minute segments.
Overall, I loved Pokémon Legends: Z-A in a way that I haven’t loved Pokémon since 2012’s Pokémon White Version 2. Pokémon Legends: Z-A is the biggest, and riskiest shakeup to the Pokémon franchise in a decade and I found myself wanting MORE. While I could not try out the brand-new multiplayer aspect, I am really looking forward to it as well. Pokémon Legends: Z-A comes out on October 16, 2025, and it is already a Day One buy for me and I cannot wait for my return to Lumiose City.
Now, if only poor, adorable Shuckle would finally get an evolution…
You can preorder Pokémon Legends: Z-A now for Nintendo Switch and Nintendo Switch 2!
Are you excited for a return to Lumiose City?
What Pokemon do you want to see get a Mega Evolution in Pokemon Legends: Z-A?
Let us know in the comments below!
