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It's been pretty clear that it's the case. I even started getting that vibe back in Gen VII when they removed the actual National Pokédex in the technical sense of the word from the main games, but still had it complete with entries for Bank. Unlike Bank, you won't be able to just drop your Pokémon into a game after you're done transferring. You are being locked into a SaaS because it means that you either pay up or lose access to all of your Pokémon forever. For people with living dexes, this is absolutely a requirement. For someone who wants to transfer anything over from a previous game to Gen VIII, this is a requirement. For someone who wants to transfer Pokémon from Gen I/II on the 3DS Virtual Console to Gen VII, or from Gen V to Gen VI > VII, well... you're going to become irrelevant in a couple years whether you want to or not. Transferring between Gen I and II, or from III to IV to V will always be free as long as the games are there. It's Bank's offerings as a transferring service and storage that are being retired because it's not aggressive enough with its monetization. Even if they said Bank was the future, they've gone back on it.
