For the most part, Pokemon Scarlet and Violet introduce great new features or further improve on the foundations laid by others in the past, which makes Gen 9 one of the best mainline games released so far even considering performance issues. There is arguably a much higher level of attention to detail in Gen 9 than other game in the franchise, to the point that Game Freak added specific animations for how some Pokemon disappear from the overworld, for example. Character customization in Pokemon Scarlet and Violet has made significant leaps forward compared to Gen 8 alone, but it's not always a bed of roses.
A great example is that Pokemon Scarlet and Violet players can never take their school uniform off, nor change the way it looks outside of four predetermined outfits - one for every season. As such, players' freedom is quite limited because school uniforms are such an overbearing part of the whole outfit that it's hard to make anything else pop, especially considering that their colors cannot be changed. However, this is far from the worst issue that character customization entails in Gen 9, as Pokemon Scarlet and Violet completely remove the ability to wear skirts in Paldea.
Why Pokemon Scarlet and Violet Removing Skirts Makes No Sense
Often considered a symbol of female empowerment, skirts and dresses have been part of Pokemon games for almost a decade now, as they were introduced with Pokemon X and Y. As such, Pokemon Scarlet and Violet removing both skirts and dresses entirely not only makes no sense, but it breaks a major tradition that had only helped the franchise grow thanks to trainers across the world being able to choose what their in-game avatars looked like. School uniforms always come with shorts and pants regardless of the character gender that players pick at the beginning of the game, which doesn't make much sense.
Pokemon Scarlet and Violet's gendered language is already a big issue within the game when Gen 9 seemingly promotes a more open approach to LGBTQIA+ representation both via its NPCs and the character customization menu, and the lack of clothing options doesn't help. Allowing players to wear skirts and dresses would have continued a 10-year trend that had no reason to be stopped in its tracks, to begin with. This makes even less sense when one considers how Pokemon Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl ended up including more clothing customization than Gen 9 does, accessories aside.
Still, LGBTQIA+ representation in Pokemon Scarlet and Violet is better than it's ever been. For instance, Rika from Pokemon Scarlet and Violet's Elite Four seems to be introduced as a non-binary character, and allowing all characters to wear skirts would have taken this further. While Gen 9 also features some prominent characters wearing a dress, with them being the sisters Ryme and Tyme, as well as Poppy from the Elite Four, and Tulip from the Alfornada Gym, skirts seem to be completely absent from Paldea. Thus, even good representation and character customization features don't shine as much as they would, leaving players wondering why skirts couldn't be included, to begin with.
Furthermore, if four characters in the entire game can wear a dress, making it impossible to do so for players stings even more because it's probably not a matter of character models, then. The reason why dresses were cut could be rooted in the design for school uniforms, but even then, skirts could have been made available to players anyway, which makes this point moot. As such, there is seemingly no answer to why Game Freak decided to remove a longstanding female-empowering feature that's been present since Gen 6, and it's unlikely that Pokemon Scarlet and Violet's DLC will fix this.
Pokemon Scarlet and Violet are available now on Nintendo Switch.