Pokemon Scarlet and Violet yesterday got a new trailer after two months since the last one, with The Pokemon Company showcasing many new features of the upcoming Gen 9 games. The Pokemon Presents trailer revealed the pre-order bonus for Pokemon Scarlet and Violet, which is a special, otherwise unobtainable Pikachu that has a unique Tera form. In fact, the battle gimmick for Pokemon Scarlet and Violet was also disclosed, and it is called Terastallization -- a feature that allows every Pokemon in the game to change its type to a new one, or boost its existing type to a whole new level.
Pokemon Scarlet and Violet's Terastallization could be better than Mega Evolutions in the long run, and that's because the Gen 6 gimmick was exclusive to a handful of pocket monsters, whereas the Terastal phenomenon can drastically change any Pokemon's performance. This is because it's a gimmick that can be used both offensively and defensively, as changing a Pokemon's type can help deal STAB damage to opponents or prevent super effective damage from certain critters or moves.
The problem could be how Pokemon end up dealing STAB damage if they don't know moves of that specific type when Terastallized, but a known leaker by the name of Riddler Khu confirmed that this is still going to be possible for all Tera types and for all Pokemon. The way this works, according to Khu, is that every Pokemon can learn a new move that sounds a lot like Hidden Power, a move that changes its type when used. In fact, in Pokemon Scarlet and Violet, this new move will change its type to match the Tera type of the Pokemon using it, causing STAB damage at all times.
Based on Khu's leaks, every Pokemon in Pokemon Scarlet and Violet's Paldea region can have any of the existing 18 types for its Tera type, meaning that a universal STAB move would come in handy when Terastallized, but not so much in regular forms. Still, this allows Pokemon that have 4x weaknesses to Terastallize into a different type and also deal STAB damage with the new move, allowing trainers to employ different strategies in every encounter.
This is far from being the only major change to the series as a whole, as Pokemon Scarlet and Violet get rid of evolution screens and also change the menus to learn moves to work in the overworld, which is very different to what players are used to. These changes are great to see, and Gen 9 could be one of the biggest hits in the series.
Pokemon Scarlet and Violet launch on November 18, exclusively for the Nintendo Switch.
Source: Twitter