Nature of gyms and E4 in S&M

[CriticallyPann]

Hi all. Joined and made this thread to share a little thought that popped into my head while watching the E3 Treehouse event today.

In short: the setting of gyms and the E4/Victory Road as we know it has been completely flipped for Sun and Moon.

Elaboration:
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Preservation of the natural environment seems to a central focus for Sun and Moon, what with the absence of a metropolis and sparser towns, and sprawling routes and landscapes. Even the battles focus on the environment and making it immersive: the addition of trainer sprites, removal of the battle circles, a more dynamic camera, shadows varying due to light... There's a lot of detail packed in there.

Continuing on with the natural theme in the Alola games, and the vibrant outdoor environments the 3DS is capable of producing, it would seem a bit strange to have major parts of the story occur indoors, as what is the usual when it comes to gyms. So, what if the gyms are no longer indoors?

I propose that gyms in the Alola region are open air, and not necessarily confined to towns and cities.

During the stream, the MC made sure to bring attention the platform you battle Hau on, christened a Battle Arena by Masuda. Timestamped/Transcript below.



2:11 "I think it's going to be really interesting for fans of this series to see this battle and the space. The way that Pokemon and Pokemon battles are integrated into the culture in these islands is really interesting, and you get these amazing battles spaces, where other folks are gathering around and watching you guys fight."

Notice that it's implied these platforms will be used in multiple battles. That would explain the flat platforms peppered throughout the Alola region. The removal of gyms from cities also explains the seemingly random Pokemon Centers scattered throughout the region: they're actually quite near to "gyms". It also explains why people have been struggling to clearly identify 8 buildings that could serve as gyms.

The new style of gyms would also serve some practical purposes as:

• Open air gyms further highlight the Alola region environment
• Natural atmosphere best showcases GameFreak's improvement on the battle environment
• Putting the gyms in the wild further pushes exploration of nature
• Furthers the theme of untouched nature the game seems to be following. Doubles as in in-game justification as well: why disrupt the environment to build these gyms when you have perfectly good space outside?

If gyms are indeed outside, this leads me to my next thought: Where is the Elite 4 and Victory Road?

All the previous games follow a template. You battle humans in civilization when challenging the gyms, but your final gauntlet is always traversing a natural system, mainly facing multiple strong wild Pokemon, rather than just trainers. Analyzed with a literary mindset, this serves as a great contrast, whether players realize it outright or not: humans have been your obstacle up until now, but once you reach Victory Road, nature becomes your opponent. Without a Victory Road, the path from Gym 1 to Champion is extremely same-y. So if GameFreak puts gyms outside, what do they have to do to prevent environmental fatigue?

Put Victory Road inside. I'm thinking that Victory Road is in a building this time.

Specifically the manmade-island in the center of the map. Up until then you've been battling in nature all along. Now you traverse a visually different environment by battling through a building. It's the same contrast the game always follows, just in inverse this time. Victory Road is basically like a gym puzzle full of trainers, simply up-scaled into a multi-level complex. Whether the Elite Four and Champion would be outside as well, I'm unsure of. A manmade building serving as the home of Victory Road and Elite Four also further serves the games thematically, for the opposite reasons stated above:

• Makes final challenge distinct by making it visually distinct from all battles thus far
• The building is isolated in the ocean to further mantain focus on Alola's natural environment. On land, it would draw all attention off the surrounding spaces.
• Isolation also serves in-game purpose to lessen impact on nature.

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Anyways, that's just the fleshed-out version of the thought that popped in my head after viewing all these possible hints. Could be all wrong, but that's the fun of it! What does everyone else think, I'm curious to know!

 

[Hikamaru]

I always take the possibility of super significant change from the usual with a grain of salt until proven otherwise. Meaning, it'd be a pretty stark change for each and every single gym to occur in an outside setting. Though it's a very interesting thought nonetheless, but...I dunno. What about gym puzzles? They've been a huge thing ever since...well, forever, and have gyms outside instead of in buildings seems like an odd thing. To me, at least. :x

We actually had a Gym match that took place outside in the past, in B2/W2 Cheren was battled in the Aspertia Gym/Trainer School playground and there was no puzzle of any sort so they must be taking inspiration from that if it appears all the Alola Gym matches will be outside.

 

[Hikamaru]

I'm aware we've had them before, but every single one (if I'm interpreting the OP's post correctly) seems like a bit of a stretch.

Also, don't first gyms typically not have a puzzle?

I don't think so, or at least most of the first Gyms. The Striaton Trio's one was mainly learning the Grass/Water/Fire type matchups, and Viola had you traversing across a web which still didn't feel like a puzzle to me. The three starting Rock Gyms (Brock, Roxanne, Roark) had the ability to avoid the other trainers, and Falkner sorta went down that route as well.

 

[OmegaRuby and AlphaSapphire]

I like the idea, it would give us incentive to try them all out if we the platforms where we fight gym leaders aren't obivious, well if they use the idea that is.

 

[illumine]

Usually, they might prefer to keep Gym battles slightly distanced from the ordinary terrain. If the game were mostly indoors, then outdoor battles could work to create an atmosphere something like Ico, but that's unlikely. As such, having all of the Gyms outdoors might not be optimal. People watching battles will generally be fairly directionless renders, so having them there or not for Gyms might be optional - they might want this for one or two, it might otherwise be avoidable. Generally,the E4 is fairly reliant on closed spaces to keep the various stages distinct, etc., a bit like a 'dungeon' atmosphere, so they might not want to make that appear too casual.

 

[deathpool]

I actually had this idea about the building a while ago. I called it the Battle Hotel or something like that, and said that the tiny house floating behind it would be the E4.

 

[Malamarvellous]

I agree with some of the posters here and wonder, what about the gym puzzles? I think they're a pretty big part of the game.

I definitely wouldn't mind a few gym battles out in the open, but not every single one. If you do that, then every gym will pretty much be the same and it will become predictable.

It's possible that these arenas are going to be used for something else entirely. There could be battle tournaments that take place at these open arenas that are different from gym battles, and are like the "contests" of the region.

 

[Mister Coffee]

For everyone who is mentioning "What about the puzzles?", why are all the puzzles assumed to be confined to a building? There have been various overworld puzzles that are either assumed naturally occurring or created by in game NPC's to hinder the player's progress. So why couldn't we assume that a Gym Leader may be hidden somewhere in the landscape and the process of finding him and challenging him to fight you back in the main ring, what if that process might be the puzzle?
I think this thread is a nod in the right direction, but I'm not jumping to any conclusions until I see more game play.