Needless to say, it’s official. Pokemon has crossed the barriers and fully entered its open world era. No more invisible walls and no more annoying HM roadblocks. No more linear cave-to-gym traversals.
Pokemon Legends: Arceus paved the way with mid-open zones, and Pokemon Scarlet and Violet broke through the ceiling entirely. You can now sprint across the Paldean wilderness on your legendary moto-dragon from the jump.
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+ 11You can challenge Gym Leaders in any order. You can come across chilling mountains or desert tundras filled with buried towers at your leisure. And yet, something doesn’t feel quite right. The world may be open, but the experience isn't.
The culprit? No level scaling.
What is Level Scaling?
Level scaling is a mechanic where enemy levels adjust based on your current level or progress, making every battle just right no matter where you go or when you get there.
click to enlarge+ 11Before this new open world ambition, Pokemon’s charm lived in being perfectly simple. You went from Route 1 to Route 2, take down a Gym Leader, then moved to the next town.
Sure, there were cute little detours like the Safari Zone or some side caves filled with strong trainers, but the path to becoming a Pokemon Champion was mostly a straight shot. It worked because everything was level-scaled appropriately.
The wild Pokemon, the Gym Leaders, the rival battles, each was placed with precision to match your expected level at that part in the journey. That consistency gave players a good sense of progression. Your Pokemon felt stronger not just because they leveled up but because the game was balanced around it.
click to enlarge+ 11But now, that same fixed level system feels like a heavy jail ball tied to the legs of your Pokemon’s open world dream. You can technically go wherever you want, but is that really how it feels like?
Walk a few steps and get bodied by overpowered Pokemon. Wander south and easily topple underleveled trainers. The illusion of freedom crumbles the moment you realize there's still an optimal route or a “correct” order.
There's still a secret hand guiding your journey based on arbitrary level design. The wild world loses its wildness when it still operates on a rigid power curve.
click to enlarge+ 11Imagine this, you're deep in exploration, trying to enjoy the flawed scenery of Pokemon Scarlet and Violet, and you enter a trainer battle. You toss out your Level 14 Sprigatito with your head up high, only for the opposing trainer to throw out a Level 55 Cetitan. Your jaw drops. You blink. You black out.
On the flip side, imagine rolling up to Art Class master himself, Brassius, with your team of Level 50 Pokemon, only to watch his ace, a Terastallized Sudowoodo, crumble at Level 17.
click to enlarge+ 11It’s either pure rage-quit or pure disappointment. Pokemon thrives on the intense drama of a good fight and fixed levels in an open world will remove the immersion.
This mismatch of levels doesn’t just mess with difficulty but also with the fun. Yes, you can technically go anywhere, but that doesn’t mean you’ll enjoy being anywhere. It becomes less about curiosity and more about caution.
You're not exploring. You're navigating a minefield of potential overleveling or brutal underleveling. That's not open world. That's open risk or open boredom.
click to enlarge+ 11Eventually, Pokemon players realize the sad truth. The open world is just a facade. You’ll hit a wall, either because the enemies are too tough or because they’re laughably weak. Then you’re forced to backtrack and find the “correct” next area that matches your current power level.
It becomes a game of matching numbers instead of embracing adventure. Exploration stops being rewarding and starts being a strategic calculation.
What Games Have Properly Implemented Level Scaling?
click to enlarge+ 11Meanwhile, other RPGs have cracked this code. The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim lets you roam its massive world without worrying about walking into certain doom (well, unless you're hunting dragons in your undergarments). The foes scale with you, meaning even early zones remain welcoming later on.
The Witcher 3 combines static and dynamic scaling where some monsters stay tough, others grow with you, but the world adjusts enough to keep things challenging and immersive.
These systems make exploration fun and truly fair.
click to enlarge+ 11Should Pokemon Have Level Scaling?
Yes, because it would finally make its open worlds feel open. If your Pokemon team felt appropriately matched no matter where you went, the possibilities would truly be endless.
Want to take on the Psychic Gym first? Go for it. Want to head straight for the Ice Titan? Why not? There's no need to second-guess every direction on the map. You’d just go and trust the game to make the experience worthwhile. That’s the magic of level scaling. It doesn’t just level enemies. It levels the promised experience.
There are plenty of ways to implement this. The simplest? Scale all wild Pokemon and trainer battles dynamically based on the average level of your team.
click to enlarge+ 11Alternatively, take a page from Tears of the Kingdom and gradually increase enemy strength the more objectives you complete. Want a more feasible solution? Lock scaling only to major story beats like Gym Battles and Titan fights.
Each Gym could pull from a pool of levels and Pokemon that adjust based on the order you challenge them. For example, Brassius could still lead with a Sudowoodo, but it might be Level 15 if he’s your first Gym or Level 50 if he’s your last. That way, the path remains flexible and the challenge stays real.
click to enlarge+ 11Looking forward, it feels like this is a no-brainer. Pokemon Legends: ZA is on the horizon, and Generation 10 isn’t far off either. It’s time for Game Freak to stop pretending their open world games are truly open and start building mechanics that make them so.
Level scaling isn’t just a tweak a philosophy shift. That every trainer’s journey is equally epic, no matter the path they choose. It’s about time we stopped being railroaded through routes and finally let our adventure unfold on our own terms and timelines.
click to enlarge+ 11We’ve seen the potential and the flaws. Now it’s time for Pokemon video games to evolve. Not into something new, but into what it always could have been which is a true open world RPG where freedom isn’t just a promise, but a guarantee.
Let us battle how we want, explore how we want, and grow how we want. Level scaling could be the missing piece and if done right, it could make the next generation of Pokemon not just better, but legendary.