Pokémon Sword and Shield: The Isle of Armor


is the first downloadable content expansion pack for the 2019 role-playing video games Pokémon Sword and Shield on Nintendo Switch and a part of the Expansion Pass. It was developed by Game Freak and published by The Pokémon Company and Nintendo and released on June 17, 2020, for Nintendo Switch. The addition of Expansion Pass was used to replace the need for a third version or sequel of Sword and Shield. It is set on the coastal island, the Isle of Armor, based on the Isle of Man, which is off the coast of Sword and Shields fictional region of Galar. The player controls the protagonist during their journey through the island, home to the former champion of the Galar region and his family. The Isle of Armors main gameplay consists of training the newly introduced Pokémon named Kubfu. Completing the training will result in Kubfu evolving into one of two forms of the Pokémon named Urshifu.

Gameplay

The island the expansion pack is set on is one inter-connected "Wild Area", a free roaming open world with a free moving camera and dynamic weather, which has implications on which Pokémon species appear at a given time. Additionally, "Raid Dens" appear which are small arena for battling and catching 'Dynamaxed' and 'Gigantamaxed' Pokémon. New to the game are the trials. These trials are iniciated by the island's dojo master and former Galar Champion, Mustard, and are need to be completed in order to forward the story. The trials involving battling Pokémon and collecting items for "Max Soup", used for "Gigantamaxing" Pokémon. These trials grant the players access to Kubfu, a Pokémon that can be trained to be evolved into either a dark type or water type version of Urishfu. There is also the "Cram-o-matic", a machine that resembles the Pokémon Cramorant. This machine combines items into creating newer, and sometimes rare, items. A returning feature from the games is the player's leading Pokémon can follow them in the overworld. A new form of battling was introduced name "Restrictive Sparring", which limits the types of Pokémon the player can bring to a battle. The expansion offers a big side quest involving the hunting of 151 Alolan Digletts, which the player would be different Alolan Forms for certain milestones.

Pokémon

The expansion introduces the legendary Pokémon Kubfu and its evolution Urshifu. These Pokémon are central to expansion's plot and its themes of growth. Additionally, a regional form of Slowpoke and one of its evolutions, Slowbro have been added. The expansion also adds new Gigantamaxed forms for Venusaur, Blastoise, the region's starter Pokémon, and both forms of Urshifu. The expansion pass includes the Mythical Pokémon Zarude, which is a pivotal character in . The island contains 108 returning Pokémon that were not seen in the base game, despite previous statements for not wanting to add Pokémon past the release of the base game.

Synopsis

The player arrives at the island via train from their home town. Once at the island, the player meets up with a new rival, exclusive to the version of the game. They meet Avery if playing Pokémon Shield and Klara if playing Pokémon Sword. Due to a mix up, a man at the island dojo thinks the player is a new student and engages in a Pokémon Battle. The player is prompted to visit the "Master Dojo", where they meet Mustard, the dojo's master and former region champion, who challenges the player to a battle. Once the player has won the battle, Mustard declares that the dojo is at max capacity and initiates the "three trials", the winner of which will be given the "secret armor" of the Master Dojo.
The first trial is revealed to be chasing after and defeating three fast Slowpoke after they steal the rival's Dojo Uniform. After the player defeats all three Slowpoke alone, Mustard lets everyone who at least managed to catch up to the Slowpoke a pass to the second trial. The second trial involves finding "Max Mushrooms" for the dojo's secret recipe, the Max Soup, which allows certain Pokémon to Gigantamax. Upon finding Max Mushrooms, with which the rival challenges the player to a battle for the mushrooms. After beating the rival, the player is able to collect the mushrooms and return to the dojo, where they and their rival are revealed to be the only ones who were able to pass the trial. The last trial is a Dynamax battle between the player and the rival at the dojo's Battle Court. The player emerges victorious, granting the player the "secret armor" of the Master Dojo: the Legendary Pokémon Kubfu.
After the player has obtained Kubfu, Mustard tasks the player with raising its friendship. While the player can use standard friendship methods, Mustard recommends that the player take Kubfu to visit various spots around the island. During this time only, Master Dojo Students will be present at these different points across the island allowing the player and Kubfu a place to view and battle. Once the player and Kubfu become the best of friends, Mustard tells the player to choose one of the "Towers of Two Fists", the "Tower of Waters" or the "Tower of Darkness", and challenge it with Kubfu. Regardless of which tower the player chooses, Mustard will be waiting at the top floor, ready to challenge them with his own Kubfu. After defeating Mustard, the player can let Kubfu examine a special scroll that allows it to evolve into Urshifu. Depending which tower the player chooses, the types and moves Urishfu obtains will be different.

Development

The expansion pass was announced in the January 9 Pokémon Direct and again shown briefly in the March 26 Nintendo Direct Mini. Following this, the pass was shown off in great detail in the June 17 Pokémon Presents, hours before The Isle of Armor was released.
Development for The Isle of Armor began shortly before Pokémon Sword and Shield were released. During interviews, it was mentioned that depending how far into the game the expansion pack would be entered, the levels of the Pokémon would be scaled accordingly. However, in game, no such feature appears.

Reception

The Isle of Armor received generally favourable reviews according to review aggregator Metacritic. GameSpot considered it to be an extension on the best part of the base game being the Wild Area. The length of the expansion, specifically the story, was seen as too short; Álvaro Alonso of Hobby Consolas and Travis Northup of IGN wrote that the expansion's story only lasts a couple of hours and a lack of post game does not help improve this problem.
One of the highlights according to critics was the giant Wild Area that is spread across the isle, with critics from TouchArcade calling it "the star of the show". Kallie Plagge of GameSpot noted that the expansion doubled down on the idea and made it "bigger and better" than the base game's version, making praises on the diverse scenery and better suited game elements such as the dynamic weather system. In Alex Olney of Nintendo Life's review, he felt that the Wild Area was well thought out and carefully planned, but did mark down the game due to "muddied graphics". He also praised the pokémon scaling that was originally missing in the base game, such as with the up-scaling the size of Wailord.
Despite the fairly positive reception, the expansion was mainly criticised for not doing much with its gameplay or story. Chris Carter of Destructoid mentioned while the game was solid and worth the price, the expansion did not fix the base game's problems nor shake up the "Pokémon formula". Other critics felt the game was not offering to much. Sam Loveridge of GamesRadar+ concluded her review by stating she felt the story and characters may not be enough to excite fans of the series and that the Wild Area felt repetitive.