It’s been quite a few years now that everyone was introduced to the cloud, storing all your media and information at a data center for easy access. It’s taken until now for a mainstream game like Pokémon to take full advantage of the system, now allowing players to store all their Pokémon in a similar way.
Accessible on both the game system and mobile devices players have a near unlimited amount of access to everything the community has to offer. Though it’s just standing on its own two feet, the premium services are up and running, giving users significant boosts and allowances that will help serious players. But is it worth it? Let’s dive in and check out the pros and cons of getting into it.
10 WORTH IT: Connection Between Titles
If they have been around the Pokémon titles long enough, players will know the chore that is getting a Pokémon from one game to the other. Most titles weren’t compatible with each other and the ones that could had little variation.
Now with Pokémon Home, you can transfer Pokémon between titles with ease, even between generations. The main benefit is the connection of Pokémon Go and the more mainstream titles, players can finally put the more exclusive Pokémon they catch to use in the actual games.
9 NOT WORTH IT: The Average Player’s Use
Though the premium version does allow a massive upgrade in storage space, unless you’re a serious player that is trading large amounts of Pokémon at once, there will be little use. You can do almost everything that the premium option does, just in smaller quantities.
The upgrade is large and the online scene for Pokémon battles is growing, so if a player is active in all aspects of catching and trading then it might come in handy. But at the end of the day, for the biggest slice of the player base, it will rarely come into use and will be idly sucking up the small fee from their wallets for little benefit.
8 WORTH IT: Mobile Compatibility
As much as Nintendo has tried to move the switch into a mobile console when it comes to trading Pokémon on a global marketplace, the phone will be king. Players will need to be able to search and post trades anytime they like, especially if they’re looking for a specific Pokémon.
When this will come in most handy is during the search for a rare Pokémon or a great deal. Pokémon Go is exclusively mobile so the trading community needs to be accessible too. Now with the whole system at your fingertips, it’s completely the player’s choice on how much work to put in, and more convenient than ever to access it. That’s a definite win.
7 NOT WORTH IT: Beginners Only Features
The ease of the function makes it convenient to check exactly how strong your Pokémon is, attributes and all. Though when looking at what it actually does it’s nothing more than a shortcut, it doesn’t give us any new information that we couldn’t find in previous years.
The judge function is more of a summary than anything else, wrapping up all of the stats into a single rating. This might be initially useful for the more green players that have some cash to splash on the premium plan – but most seasoned trainers have a good sense of the statistics anyway, and it’s going to stop providing benefit once the new players have developed as much, so it’s really not much of a boon in the end.
6 WORTH IT: Massive Jump In Storage Capacity
This is probably the biggest difference between basic and premium homes. With a whopping 5,970 Pokémon difference in storage space, players aren’t likely to run out of space anytime soon. Players could catch every Pokémon from all versions of the game and still have plenty of room left.
Justifying the need for such a large amount of space is hard unless talking about avid traders and serious collectors, but the argument for more than 30 is an easy one. Unless you really only care about the storyline and completely ignore the classic tagline, every trainer should have more than 30 Pokémon at their disposal – this one’s beneficial across the board, and absolutely worth the hype.
5 NOT WORTH IT: Hosting Trade Rooms
Trade rooms will let you gather with a bunch of other trainers from around the world and get to swapping, either through the GTS which will give you a more specific experience or a wonder trade that will let you trade multiple at once. Room trade is one of the best ways to add some adventure and variety to the experience.
Being able to host a trade room allows the player to get a large variety of randomly traded Pokémon at their disposal. All it really takes is some searching around and few tries to get yourself in as a free member, and since you have the same experience as the rest of the premium members, this feature definitely isn’t worth buying in for.
4 WORTH IT: Trade Marketplace
The large landscape of the global Pokémon market is a huge advantage compared to some of the options the community has had in the past. Being able to access players has been an option in recent generations but Pokémon Home, especially the premium option, gives us almost full access to every trainer on the planet.
Spanning multiple titles and giving the varied options of specific trades, players can fill up their Pokédex with all generations of Pokémon at any time, which is very convenient and totally worth the price of admission. While it’s still relatively new, the option of large scale trades only available to premium users lets players empty their excess Pokémon quickly.
3 NOT WORTH IT: Minor Conveniences
With the exception of the jump in storage space and the judging system, the differences in the premium and free packages are a matter of convenience. Though some players might be willing to pay for the shortcuts, that’s all that they are. When it comes down to it, the premium package gives you more room to move without anything substantially different.
The ability to do more in a short period of time is definitely something to consider if the players going to spend a lot of time in the marketplace. The online community is a strong one that players can invest in. But if it’s the Pokédex you’re looking to fill up then the premium isn’t going to make a big enough difference to actually be worth it.
2 WORTH IT: Price Point
A huge jump in storage space and the easier overall ride doesn’t come at a big jump in price. In fact, you can get a year’s subscription for just over 15 dollars. Now for a single game that would seem to play on the high side but the Pokémon franchise spans over so many games and characters the price isn’t a hit to the wallet.
The all-access pass being available on multiple devices that players need is another advantage that few subscription options offer. For what equals $1.30 a month players can keep every Pokémon they’ve gathered and trade them between games, not bad for a single series.
1 NOT WORTH IT: Nintendo Switch Online Doesn’t Connect
Even though the most prominent system in the Pokémon world today is the Switch, the 2 online systems don’t connect in any way. Keeping a strict line between the online Pokémon community and the rest of the Nintendo games on the system.
Though achievements aren’t a thing for the Nintendo Switch as of yet, a record of activity and general communication between the two systems would be a given. This is a problem for both the free and premium services, swaying all the additional play/activity that players will spend their time on in Pokémon Home.
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