As you know, just about everything from Pokemon Scarlet and Violet have leaked online in the last few days or so. These include every Pokemon and form in the game, all the gym leaders, new moves and abilities, and much, much more besides.

So as is the norm here on Gaming Reinvented, we’re gonna cover all of it! As you can guess, there will be major spoilers here, so if you’re a Pokemon fan interested in keeping the game a surprise, you may want to leave this page now.

We’d also like to mention to any company reps reading this that as journalists, we have no obligation to keep your secrets, especially as no one at GR signed any NDAs or other such agreements. All this information comes from the sources linked at the bottom of the article.

Either way, let’s go! Bring on the new Pokemon!

Spoilers Begin Here

This is your last warning.

If you want to avoid any spoilers, turn back now.

New Pokemon

Onto the new Pokemon now! Here’s the full Paldean Pokedex, courtesy of the folks at Centro Leaks:

There’s a lot to unpack here, so we’ll go through them one category at a time.

Starter Evolutions

Starting with the starter evos. These have garned a lot of speculation, with people constantly wondering whether they’re all bipedal and what types they have.

Well now we know. First, we’ve got Sprigagito’s evo, a humanoid grass cat called Meowscarada with the Grass/Dark typing:

It’s a contentious one to say the least, with half the fanbase considering it one of the best designs ever, and the other half wondering why it’s yet another humanoid. Regardless, it stats look good, with a spread of 76/110/70/81/70/123 painting it as a fast sweeper.

Meanwhile, Fuecoco evolves into Skeledirge, a half crocodile, half musical instrument Pokemon with a very unique design:

This one has a stat spread of 104/75/100/110/75/66 and a Fire/Ghost typing, making it a unique take on a crocodilian for sure.

Finally, there’s Quaxly’s final form, Quaquaval. This Pokemon is a water/Fighting type, with a stat spread that priorities attack power over just about everything else (85/120/80/85/75/85). It’s arguably more well balanced than Skeledirge, though the jury’s out on whether it or Meowscarada is most likely to find a role in the competitive scene.

So yeah, those are the starters. They’re an interesting bunch for sure, though their designs definitely look better in motion than in still screenshots, in part due to how complex they are.

Paradox Pokemon

But starters aren’t the only interesting additions that got leaked here. No, the mysterious paradox Pokemon did too.

These are Pokemon based on existing ones, albeit from the distant past or future. As you can tell, Scarlet has the prehistoric theme going here with more naturalistic designs, whereas Violet has mech style versions with robotic designs.

They’re an interesting bunch to say the least. For one thing, they’re all separate species from their original counterparts, with legendary tier stats on top of that. And those stat distributions are insane to the point they rival the Ultra Beasts for craziness too.

For instance, the ancient Misdreavous equivalent has stats of:

55/55/55/135/135/135

Giving it a ridiculous 135 speed, and equally insane special attack and defence, while leaving its hp and physical stats at your typical point. While Iron Bundle, Delibird’s futuristic counterpart has a stat spread of:

56/80/114/124/60/136

Giving it a similar insane boost over its original form too.

They’re also given codenames as their species names in game too. Indeed, while the Ultra Beasts all at least had real names like Nihiligo and Buzzwole, the paradox mons go by things like ‘Slither Wing’ and ‘Scream Tail’ instead, making them seem even more alien by comparison.

It’s a creative choice for sure, albeit one which will definitely stand out next to the more normally named species next to them in the Pokedex.

What’s more, there are also a few Paradox Pokemon who don’t exist in the game yet. These are presumably going to be added via DLC, and solely exist in the Scarlet/Violet book as of the time of writing this article.

Check them out here:

As you can see, they’re basically fusions of existing legendary Pokemon, which turn an entire trio into a single Pokemon. Maybe someone at Game Freak really liked the idea of that Thufizer thing from the manga?

Extra Legendaries

We also have some new legendary Pokemon too, at least outside of the main cover legends. These are a bunch of evil animal spirits based on the 4 Perils from Chinese mythology, and consist of 4 Pokemon sharing the dark type and related ‘ruin’ abilities. Here they are:

Ting-Lu

Stats

165/110/130/50/80/45 (Total: 580)

Type

Dark/Ground

Ability

Vessel of Ruin

A dark/ground type deer like creature, which is a slow yet bulky attacker with the ability to reduce other Pokemon’s special attack stats upon entering a battle…

Chien-Pao

Stats

80/130/80/90/65/135 (Total: 580)

Type

Dark/Ice

Ability

Sword of Ruin

Some sort of ice type sabertooth tiger which can lower the defence stats of other Pokemon in the battle. Which as you can imagine, is pretty damn devastating for something with ridiculously high speed and attack stats.

Wo-Chien

Stats

85/90/100/100/135/70 (Total: 580)

Type

Dark/Grass

Ability

Tablets of Ruin

A bulky grass/dark type snail, with the ability to lower the attack stats of other Pokemon…

Chi-Yu

Stats

55/80/80/145/120/100

Type

Dark/Fire

Ability

Beads of Ruin

Plus a fiery fish that can lower their special defence.

They’re all powerful in their own right, with stat lowering abilities perfectly suited to their designs and a move that automatically takes off half an opponent’s HP when it hits, Super Fang or Guardians of Alola style. It’s pretty cool really, though we’re not sure the storyline justification explains why they’re here in Paldea rather than a region based on China or something.

Other Interesting species

Finally, that brings us to the other interesting species found here. Most of which are related to the Pokemon officially listed on the official website. These include Paldean Wooper’s evolution, Clodsire:

Cetitan’s pre evolution, Cetoddle:

And the unevolved form of Armarouge and Ceruledge, Charcadet. Seems pretty cute to us!

We also have an evo for Lechonk, which has different forms for its male and female variants…

Plus Grafaiai’s unevolved form, which is… a bit different to what you’d expect:

But it’s not just version evolutions and pre evolutions here. No, some older Pokemon get new evolutions in this generation too. These include our favourite underrated fairy worm, Dunsparce:

Primeape, whos evo is a ghost type with the incredible name Annihilape:

Presumably, this is what happens when (as the Pokedex says), Primeape gets too angry and literally drops dead as a result.

And most unexpectedly, Bisharp, which got an insane evolution in Kingambit. This one has a huge 135 attack, at the cost of a massive drop of speed due to its sitting animation.

As for normal new Pokemon, there’s an interesting mix of things there too. Like a three stage party of fairy types with hammers that can apparently blast Corviknights from the sky…

Gholdengo, the silver surfer esque evolution to Gimmighoul, who looks like he stepped right out of a cheese strings commercial…

Plus a very interesting superhero dolphin. Basically, it starts out as a now dolphin, before turning into a superhero with a secret identity. This evolved form is called Palafin, and switches from its zero form to its hero form when you switch it out in battle.

And that’s the tip of the iceberg! If you want to learn more about any others, you can read a full list here and here. It’s a very interesting Pokedex overall, and perhaps one of the more creative ones in the last couple of generations.

Characters

Onto characters now! Starting with the gym leaders, who have been leaked via Smogon. You can see them here (click the link for the full image):

Yes, Larry plays the role of both gym leader and elite 4 member, with a different team and speciality for each. That’s something we never saw coming in the least!

And the other choices are pretty unexpected too. A rapper? A fishmonger? A literal 12 year old elite 4 member?

Yeah, they’ve got some interesting designs this generation. You can find a map of their locations here, if you’re interested in that.

As for Team Star, well we also have their designs too. They’re pretty cool, though their role is very limmited outside of that one particular story path, with their actions having virtually no effect on Paldea except the odd roadblock for students.

So if you want more info on those, a map of their locations (with info on their type specialities) can be found below:

And that brings us to the biggest spoiler in the game. The two characters that are perhaps the centre of the strangest reveal in the history of the series.

Namely, Professor Sada and Professor Turo. Yeah, we all knew there was something weird about the professors. Their designs and personalities came across as very odd for Pokemon Professors, and them being different in each game set off alarm bells too.

But what they’re up to is another thing entirely. It’s something very out of place in a Pokemon game to say the least, and something that almost completely comes out of left field given the series’ genre.

So we’re not gonna spoil it here. It’s an interesting twist and it is one we will have an article about after the game’s release date, but we think it’s something the players themselves should experience first hand rather than through a blog article like this.

Other Interesting Changes/Additions

Which brings us to the last section, where we’ll mention some of the more… interesting mechanical changes and additions these games have brought, such as new moves, abilities and gameplay mechanics.

New Moves

Here are some of the most interesting new moves added in Scarlet and Violet.

Gigaton Hammer

Tinkaton’s signature move. Can’t be used twice in a row, but has a ludicrous base power of 160.

Population Bomb

The mouse family’s signature move, a 20 BP move that can hit up to 10 times in a row.

Revival Blessing

Acts like a free revive mid battle, and can bring back fainted teammates. Only has 1 PP thankfully

If you want any more of them, they’re either on the master spreadsheet in sources, or this pastebin with more info on their effects.

New Abilities

There are also a range of new abilities too. Here are some of the more interesting ones we’ve come across…

Commander

A strange ability that lets Tasugiri go inside of a Dondozo’s mouth, and fight from there.

Good as Gold

Gholdengo’s ability, which offers it full immunity to all status effects

Zero to Hero

Palafin’s ability. Changes between its normal and hero form when it switches out for the first time

Again, you can find a full list of abilities and their effects on Pastebin, or in the master spreadsheet linked in sources.

Other Interesting Mechanics

And that brings us to the last topic of the article. Namely, those random extra mechanics not covered everywhere else. There are a few of these, and we’ve found a few we thought were especially worth covering here…

Like the fact your Pokemon will refuse to auto battle with a shiny Pokemon. So don’t worry folks, auto battle won’t knock out all those shinies you might want to catch, since Game Freak actually planned ahead for that one

From Baidu. This person mentioned that he was using Grafaiai and Let's Go slaughtering wild Igglybuffs.

But when sent out to one of the Igglybuff, the Grafaiai shook its head and refused to attack. Tried many times and didn't change.

He battled that Igglybuff. It was shiny. pic.twitter.com/SA9uoYJn03

— Jan (Not Pokemon Challenges) (@hsinhsung) November 12, 2022

Secondly, you can now tell if an egg has a shiny Pokemon because it will glow, as reported by Centro Leaks.

Thirdly, terra-types can be changed mid game, and boost a Pokemon’s attacks related to that type too. So, if you make Charizard into a water type, water type moves will also do 1.5x the usual damage. Interestingly, terastallizing will actually boost moves of a type even more if it gives the Pokemon one of its existing types again. So this hypothetical Charizard would have its fire or flying moves do 2x damage instead of 1.5x damage if its terra-type matched one of those ones.

Finally, the day 1 patch for this game actually nerfs a few Pokemon and moves only added in this generation. Yeah, it’s a balance patch for a competitive game being released prior to the game in question. We don’t get it either.

Either way, that’s all the leak coverage we’re gonna post for now, and a nice look at some of the Pokemon, characters, moves and other content found in Pokemon Scarlet and Violet. If you want to learn even more about the game (or anything covered here) you can check out Pokemon Leaks on Reddit or the Smogon forums, or one of the numerous Discord servers available for discussing such content online.

Regardless, what do you think? Does any of this stuff make you more excited for gen 9? What are the most intriguing new Pokemon and characters in these games overall?

Leave your thoughts in the comments below, or on our Discord server today!

Sources:

• Centro Leaks (Twitter)
• Centro Leaks Alt (Twitter)
• Pokemon Leaks Subreddit
• Pokemon Scarlet and Violet Leaks Thread on Smogon
• Pokemon Scarlet and Violet Master Data Spreadsheet