Pokémon Omega Ruby and Alpha Sapphire Announced for November 2014 Release
Today, we received some surprising news about new games in the Pokémon franchise for release later this year in Pokémon Omega Ruby and Alpha Sapphire. They are widely believed to be remakes of the third generation games which nobody expected at all. We have no information on the titles outside the release date which is planned for November 2014 as a worldwide release, much like Pokémon X and Y. Also like Pokémon X and Y, Nintendo and The Pokémon Company International seem to have dropped the word “Version” from the titles of the games.
Nintendo says that, “Pokémon Omega Ruby and Pokémon Alpha Sapphire are a fresh take on Pokémon Ruby and Pokémon Sapphire, which launched in 2003 and were fan-favorite hits on the Game Boy Advance system. The new titles promise to take players through a dramatic story within a spectacular new world.”
With a November 2014 release, Omega Ruby and Alpha Sapphire will not make it in time for the first Regional Championships of the VGC ’15 season in October. Like the VGC ’13 and VGC ’14 seasons, we expect to play using Pokémon X and Y at the fall regionals before switching to Omega Ruby and Alpha Sapphire after mid-December. Keep in mind that the VGC ’15 season will be the first year we will hopefully have events on a regular basis if the current Premier Challenge pilot program pans out. It remains to be seen how long that Play! Pokémon decides is sufficient before sanctioned events switch to the new games.
About the Author
Firestorm is one of the co-founders of Nugget Bridge and the Community Manager for eSports Tournament Platform Battlefy. He has been playing Pokémon since 1999, competitively since 2007, and attending tournaments since 2010. He lives in Vancouver, Canada with a degree in Interactive Art & Technology + Communications. You can follow him on Twitter at @rushanshekar.
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Lol, how did I forget that XD I think then it won’t be national dex but Kalos + Hoenn most likely.
Aaaand you’re wrong. The Fall Regs will probably mantain VGC’14 ruleset, but Winter Regs will definitely be in a new format. It’s been like this when BW2 was out and XY as well.ninja’d by Scott
I’m soooo hyped! Battle Frontier, FREAKING CONTESTS, <3 HARUKA <3 too many things I’m hyped about now.
Im not expecting too many nerfs or additional megas unless TPC plans on patching XY (to allow compatibility).
*Dies a little inside, and then reduces house to rubble screaming with joy!*
Did anyone realise that groudon and kyogre were different. I.E. Possible forme changes/Mega evolutions for them !!!
#AllAboardTheHypeTrain!
I’m holding out great hope the Gen 3 move tutors come back too, I want my Helping Hand Dusclops and Seismic Toss Chansey in an easy way darn it.
The thing I’m actually more hype for is those remixes, Hoenn has my favorite route themes in the series and to hear they XY-fied would be glorious.
Helping Hand was a Tutor in BW2. Dusclops, however needed XD Purification to learn it
Seismic Toss is now Chansey’s Egg Move.
Chansey actually gained Seismic Toss as an egg move in XY.
Mega castform has to happen!
They don’t specifically say that it will take place in Hoenn. It could very well be a new region.
These are my regional map ideas:
And most likely accurate:
All aboard the hype train!
I seriously can’t wait fo- Actually, I can.
My backlog is enormous. >_>
People keep saying that and it’s never that
Awesome! Looking forward to this
Seismic toss is now an egg move on chansey, and Helping hand dusclops was XD only
Sorry if someone already said this but the trailer stated “explore a new world” which could possibly mean a new region.
Secret bases!! New megas!!
Hoenn was my favourite map to travel around so I’m hyped up on this.
What new mega evolutions do you think/hope they will introduce this season?
Maybe, but most likely, it will be an updated region. I mean, an updated story line would be nice, but a sequel would be brilliant. #HoennHype
Inb4 Mega swampert with sap sipper
Now if they can just remake Colosseum or XD, we’re set.
Pokemon Snap 2
Maybe we can get a pokewalker with these remakes
. Gamestop always gives a little souvenir/toy thingy for remakes.
Emerald is my favorite Pokemon game of all time so I am beyond excited for these remakes. Also, seeing what it could do to the competitive scene is beyond exciting! I hope we can take the star for Mega Kang with these new games. n_n
Mega Sceptile Grass/Dragon would be awesome. All aboard the #HypeTrain
Clearly they’ll be using RS200.
Also the press release we got words it like this so I’m definitely gonna say remake:
Pokémon Omega Ruby and Pokémon Alpha Sapphire are a fresh take on Pokémon Ruby and Pokémon Sapphire, which launched in 2003 and were fan-favorite hits on the Game Boy Advance system. The new titles promise to take players through a dramatic story within a spectacular new world.
Will we only be able to transfer to the new games or back and forth? Also, do you guys know if VGC will take place on XY, new RS, or both? I wasn’t playing during 4th gen with HGSS and DPPt.
I know External, but I am inclined to agree with Rushan here, especially because of how close the release is to XY. I’m sure there was a lot of concurrent development, but it’s hard to imagine a totally new project spit out that quickly. I’m sure there’ll be touch ups like FRLG saw especially, but…
Actually, even considering it’s a remake it’s hard to imagine they’re getting this done so quickly. Really seems like the franchise went back into overdrive recently…
Watching that feels good. Nice to know there will be a completely different metagame we can’t predict next year.
Very very soon release, a year after X/Y. They have done a lot of the hard work in X/Y, so I can understand why this is so recent. with 700 individual sprites or so animated in X/Y, along with the ”same” map assumedly, that’s some production time taken out. Bring on the trumpets!
Its wired we only have to wait for 5-6 months where for XY we had to wait for 10 months or so. Also I won’t make any preditctions until more info comes out. And to be a bit disappointing at least not one film gameplay footage. I can usterstand that they just released that they are making the game.
What I would like to see next season in the VGC metagame
– Hoenn Dex Only
– Several Mega nerfs (mainly for Kangaskhan tbh, possibly Mega Lucario,Mega Mawile and Mega Blaziken too)
– Move tutors
– Cover/Event Legendary ban (I may be in a minority here but I’m not too keen on seeing Kyogre in a metagame again, it’ll completely dominate it)
– Nerfed Gems
With all of these in place I can imagine an even more fun and creative metagame than this years. Mega Kangaskhan’s power creep does ruin the potential of a lot of teams and strategies.
The naming order is odd to me as Omega is akin to end and Alpha first, so shouldn’t it be Alpha Ruby and Omega Sapphire given the Red/Blue naming scheme? Then again that doesn’t roll off the tongue any better…
While I liked Emerald, the original R&S were the weakest ones in the series to me, so hopefully it will keep the best elements of Emerald, like the Battle Frontier > Battle Tower, and redo it so Steven is the Champion again instead of Wallace (who I really hated as Champion, along with his replacement 8th Gym leader Juan). And with wifi available over link cable, they better do secret bases some justice, as they were an unfortunately underused thing since you know, the whole having to live near people thing.
What else…it’ll mess with vgc again, so fall regionals instantly become the “boring” ones like last year going from BW2 to XY assuming the ruleset is the same before switching. It also seems weird this game is being released so fast considering XY will barely be a year old with 2 “unrevealed” event Pokemon still. I personally can live another few years without having to see Latios again…but eh, guess we’ll see.
Oh and finally, Sap Sipper or Drizzle Mega Swampert please!
Getting super hyped for this. Can’t wait for the return of Kyogre/Groudon/Rayquaza/Dialga to the game and hopefully VGC <3.
Also Mega Flygon Gamefreak please
I do hope that Sceptile gets a really good mega evolution to make up for how frail it was. I think that it the two remaining starters will probably receive their mega evos through events such as mega blaziken. Maybe mega sceptile for ruby and mega swampert for saphire?
Also I hope that tutor moves are completely ironed out and don’t return. If they do return, 5 years down the line we’ll just get annoyed that we have to breed through these games to receive them. Unless there is going to be a specific ”hoenn only” mark, that would be interesting for VGC.