Pokémon Sword and Shield Get New Items, Features

by Zack Webster · Published November 6, 2019 · Updated November 7, 2019

The Pokémon Company and Game Freak have begun showing off more elements that will be making their way to Pokémon Sword and Shield. These new items include many ways to manipulate a Pokémon’s stats, add experience, and means to adjust a Pokémon’s nature. New features include changes to how players access boxes, autosaves, and nicknaming Pokémon after trades.

For starters, players will now be able to influence how a Pokémon’s nature determines stat growth. Players can give Pokémon mints that alter how the nature doles out stats, though the nature itself cannot be changed. Returning supplements, like Protein and Iron, can still be used to raise a Pokémon’s base stats, but their limit has been removed so that players may entirely fill a Pokémon’s base stats using these items. A new type of candy, Exp. Candy, has also been introduced. Rather than adding a flat level like a Rare Candy, Exp. Candy offers a set amount of experience points, allowing lower-level Pokémon to quickly catch up in levels.

The first new feature highlighted is that Pokémon boxes can now be accessed at nearly any time in the game, with a few exceptions such as gyms. Sword and Shield will also be the first games in the series to have an autosave feature, generally whenever entering a new area. Manual saves will still be present and autosaving can be turned off. Players will now also have the ability to nickname traded Pokémon so long as they haven’t already been nicknamed. This feature will only work once, however.

Finally, Game Freak announced some limited-time events following the game’s release. From the game’s release to early January 2020, players will have an increased opportunity of encountering Gigantamax Butterfree in Max Raid Battles. The first online competition for the game, Galar Beginnings, will also be hosted in December 2019. Sign-ups for the tournament will begin on November 15, 2019, at midnight GMT and end on December 5, 2019, at 23:59 GMT. Galar Beginnings will run from December 6, 2019, to December 8, 2019. The competition will feature solo battles using only Pokémon obtained in Sword and Shield.

Pokémon Sword and Shield will release exclusively on the Nintendo Switch on November 15, 2019.