>>48761592For all the shit you can give LGPE about its gameplay, they absolutely nailed it in the art direction and for the most part, the music.
Even if it's not the big, sprawling cities and locales the anime gave us, the style is exactly what it felt like Pokemon should one day be in the games after seeing it on TV so much. Not too gritty and realistic, but not a straight up full cartoon either, and the soundtrack only complimented that sense.
The real shame is that they evidently have zero interest in trying to take that art style forward and instead believe they have to reinvent the wheel with every single game, and everything that's come after is nowhere near as consistently cohesive or just plain looks worse. We have FOUR (4) Core Pokemon Switch Games and none of them look even remotely alike save for the eponymous creatures, but even they don't feel quite right in some cases thanks to how much lighting, shading and outlining matter.
