Pokemon players concerned about the future of competitive play
As the competitive Pokemon community assesses the impact of The Pokemon Company’s crackdown on the use of modded and genned Pokemon at Worlds 2023, the competitive scene is facing an uncertain future. With several high-profile players disqualified and facing bans, the competitive community is wondering about the impact of the enforcement of the official rules and whether it will lead to a decline in the competitive scene.
Leading competitive player Brady Smith, better known by his Twitch username Sceptile11, was disqualified from the World Championships after he admitted using modified/genned Pokemon. Two other high-profile players, Omegascope and Anima, were also disqualified after they were found to have used unofficial Pokemon at Worlds.
The Pokemon Company’s recent moves to crack down on cheating are raising questions about its detection methods and the impact on the competitive community. The rules for official tournaments only allow legitimate Pokemon that are caught or hatched in-game. While players are concerned about the impact of the crackdown on the competitive community, others believe that it is important that the rules are enforced and players cannot continue to use unofficial Pokemon.
“It’s cheating,” one Twitter user says. “It’s not fair when people spend hours and hours building a team, and someone else just downloads their team using a hacked save and wins with it.”
Some argue that players who earned their right to compete deserve to keep their spots regardless of the time or effort they invested into building a competitive team. Others say that building a competitive TCG deck or playing Pokemon Unite does not require the same investment and that the use of third-party software to manipulate Pokemon stats is unfair.
“I will say I find it ironic that the world’s best players of a video game have actual real-life sponsors, make money off YouTube videos, Twitch subs, and affiliate links, and yet they still complain about having to put in work to get to the top,” another user replies.
Some people think that the solution to the problem of team building is a battle simulator like Pokemon Showdown, which would level the playing field by eliminating the time investment required to build a competitive team. Others believe that the enforcement at Worlds will lead to a decline in the competitive scene, while others say they will continue competing but will be more cautious about obtaining Pokemon from reliable sources.
Whatever the future holds for competitive Pokemon, the competitive community would benefit from a consistent system for enforcing the rules. If players know that there will be consequences for using unofficial Pokemon, the enforcement of the rules could be part of the reason for the thinning of the competitive scene.
Featured image via The Pokemon Company.
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