It has been a long time coming, but Pokemon Legends: Arceus is set to be the very first fully open-world game in the series. Pokemon Legends: Arceus is very different from most other installments, mostly because it is set in the past when PCs and the digitalization players know from other Pokemon games don't exist yet. On the one hand, this is a very interesting premise that will allow players to explore the world differently, more like pioneers than fully realized Pokemon trainers. On the other hand, this can also be problematic because many things that players grew accustomed to over the years won't be possible in Pokemon Legends: Arceus.
A good example is asking what will happens if players catch more than six Pokemon, considering technology isn't there to automatically transfer them to PC boxes. In this same vein, it's easy to see how the first-ever Pokedex of Sinnoh can suddenly become an issue because it would be hard to catalog critters and gather information on their habits with pen and paper. There is no official information about what the Pokedex in Pokemon Legends: Arceus will look like, but a trailer for the game does show a Poke Ball near a notebook illustrated with daily life in Sinnoh.
The First Pokedex of Sinnoh in Pokemon Legends: Arceus
It seems very likely that Pokemon Legends: Arceus will have its players collect data by filling a journal with drawings and annotations, which could be the plausible explanation for another Pokedex-related issue in the series. Some Pokemon games have bizarre entries in their Pokedex for a few specific critters, like Malamar's entry in Pokemon Shield being about how its hypnotic powers were part of events that changed history. This sort of description can seem false or exaggerated, maybe coming from hearsay or word of mouth, and this may be caused by the lack of technology to verify data across the various regions and Professors.
This is not so different from the real world, where the Internet made information more accessible, but also able to be confirmed factual by plenty of people worldwide. Pokemon Legends: Arceus' Pokedex may be inaccurate, but being the first of its kind (at least in the region of Sinnoh) can justify that, and probably that's the point in the first place; to create a basic collection of data that will grow in time. There are several more mysteries for Pokemon Legends: Arceus to explain, including why some Pokemon species found in the region in the past are not living there in the present Generation 4 remakes.
It's peculiar, to say the least, that Pokemon Legends: Arceus comes so soon after these remakes do, with Pokemon Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl releasing this November and Legends: Arceus in January 2022. With these games being both based in Sinnoh, it's plausible that the series' lore is about to get something new to chew on. Considering how little is known about Pokemon Legends: Arceus, players will probably have to wait a few months to learn more about the basics of the story and what the game tries to achieve.
Pokemon Legends: Arceus' National Pokedex and Pokemon Home
There is another potential issue linked to the lack of advanced technology in the era of Pokemon Legends: Arceus, and that is the fact that the Pokemon captured in the game are likely not going to be available in Pokemon Home. This can be an issue because the game will potentially be a standalone title with little to no actual connection to the main series, if not for its available critters and lore. What this means is that, for Pokemon Legends: Arceus to be successful, the game should have quite a varied Pokedex for players to catch and train their favorite species, even if it means not being able to transfer them to other games via Pokemon Home.
Both Pokemon Home and the National Pokedex are very important topics for modern Pokemon games. As a matter of fact, they became the newest way to have a massive critter collection. Pokemon Home came not too long after Pokemon Sword and Shield, the most recent mainline installments in the series, and it offers the opportunity to transfer Pokemon from different games all on the same server. This also applies to those critters that are not present in the Pokedex of the Galar region, where Pokemon Sword and Shield and their DLCs take place, which helps bring them all in one place.
However, with Pokemon Legends: Arceus being an atypical Pokemon game, this may result in the experience feel incomplete. It is more plausible for Pokemon Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl to grant access to Pokemon Home for all the critters caught in these games, both because some are in the National Dex of Pokemon Sword and Shield, and because they use the same technology as the originals. With Pokemon Legends: Arceus having a mixed Pokedex, including Pokemon from several different regions, things get more complicated.
It should be noted that among the main reasons for criticism at Pokemon Sword and Shield's release there was the fact that the National Pokedex was not available compared to previous games. Pokemon Legends: Arceus faces a similar issue because it is the first fully open-world Pokemon title, and as such, its Dex should reflect this by featuring more Pokemon. Still, here's to hoping that the Pokemon Company has bigger and better plans for this prequel, and that it learned its lessons from Sword and Shield.
Pokemon Legends: Arceus releases for Nintendo Switch on January 28, 2022.