Review: THE TEAL MASK is a Fun Expansion for POKEMON SCARLET and VIOLET

Last month, Nintendo and The Pokémon Company launched the first half of the DLC pack, The Hidden Treasure of Area Zero titled The Teal Mask. The DLC adds a new storyline, new locations, new Pokémon, and more to Pokémon Scarlet and Pokémon Violet. In The Teal Mask, Pokémon trainers will find themselves on Kitakami on a field trip with a select few other students. It’s been interesting to play through and Nintendo was kind enough to provide me with a code so that I could review it. All thoughts below are my own personal opinion though. You can purchase The Hidden Treasure of Area Zero which includes The Teal Mask as well as the yet to be released The Indigo Disk from the Nintendo eShop or select retailers including GameStop (affiliate link).

Adventure beyond the Paldea region in The Hidden Treasure of Area Zero DLC for the Pokemon Scarlet or Pokemon Violet game. Even more Pokemon, places, and stories await in this 2-part DLC* for the Pokemon Scarlet or Pokemon Violet game! In Part 1: The Teal Mask, join a special school trip to the land of Kitakami. In Part 2: The Indigo Disk, study abroad at Blueberry Academy! Encounter the newly discovered Legendary Pokemon Ogerpon and Terapagos as you broaden your horizons beyond Uva Academy and explore even more of the Pokemon world.

Before I dive into reviewing the story for The Teal Mask, let’s talk about more technical aspects. While I played through the DLC, I didn’t have any problems with my game crashing like some did when Scarlet and Violet launched so it seems a bit more stable at launch. That said, there are still performance problems including drops in frame-rates and general sluggishness. I even found that the controls didn’t feel very responsive in menus. Of course, this isn’t really anything new to the DLC as the base games are also plagued with these issues.

There are a good number of new and returning Pokémon thanks to The Teal Mask. There are 109 returning Pokémon including personal favorites like both versions of Sandshrew and Sandslash (you have to transfer from Pokémon HOME to get the Alolan forms), the Kommo-o line, the Vikavolt line, and even the Diamond and Pearl starters. In addition, there are 8 new Pokémon: Dipplin (a new evolution for Applin), Poltchageist and its evolution Sinistcha, Bloodmoon Ursaluna, a new Legendary Trio (Okidogi, Munkidori, and Fezandipiti), and the main Legendary Pokémon: Ogerpon. Ogerpon even has four different forms depending on which mask it’s wearing! Out of the new Pokémon, I think Ogerpon is my favorite design although I’m sad that it and the other legendaries are shiny-locked.

One other area I want to discuss is the frustrating nature of adding a new area almost a year after launch. Due to the Terra Raid events, many players will have level 100 Pokémon. This is something that these events require and I do not begrudge anyone for having level 100 Pokémon, I have several myself. However, this means that unless you self-impose limits the DLC will be a walk in the park as the strongest Pokémon you’ll encounter are somewhere between level 70-80. My frustration extends also to the wild Pokémon who start in the high 50s but are for very basic Pokémon like Spinarak and Pichu. I don’t have a solution that feels right and I’m sure that the developers struggled too and that’s why we got what we did. You want to keep things challenging, but don’t want to isolate people who maybe haven’t been playing since launch or aren’t participating in Terra Raid events who may not have level 100 Pokémon. Then, for the wild Pokémon, you don’t want them to feel too puny, you need them to be high enough to help level up your team to be competitive, etc.

My solution to the above conundrum was to slowly replace my team (except my starter) with new Pokémon to use for the expansion. This let me have lots of fun with the new/returning Pokémon and feeling like there was some challenge. That being said, I did struggle because I didn’t want to spend a ton of time grinding and so several of my team members were still underleveled by the time I finished the story and I relied a lot on my level 100 starter.

Okay, now it’s time to talk about the story a bit. If you’re worried about spoilers, I’ll do my best to keep them to a minimum but just know that it’s an okay story in my opinion. It’s not great, but it’s not bad and it’s hard to judge because this is only about half of the story as it will be continued in The Indigo Disk.

For the story, you’re sent with three random other students to Kitakami on an exchange-type program where you’ll meet some students from Blueberry Academy. I found it a little weird that Nemona wasn’t included, but my guess is that it has to do with them wanting to put more focus on the two Blueberry Academy students you meet, Kieran and Carmine. You also meet Briar, a teacher at Blueberry Academy who appears very interested in Area Zero and turns out she’s a descendant of the author of the Scarlet/Violet Book (you find this out very early so it’s not really a spoiler). In all honesty, she does next to nothing although I’m guessing she might have more of a role in The Indigo Disk.

Once you’re on Kitakami, you’ll have to do some simple quests of going to specific locations with some battles thrown in. Then, you get to go to a festival where you are put into special clothes and your hair is changed for the occasion. I personally really didn’t like the hair change aspect as I then had to go to a barber and pay for it to go back to normal after the festival. Yes, I had the money, but it was still annoying. You’ll eventually meet Ogerpon and the new Legendary Trio and have to resolve the storyline which I won’t spoil. Throughout the story, one problem I had was that I didn’t agree with some choices that I had no say in. For instance, you’re told to keep a secret from a character and are given two dialogue options that are just varying levels of agreeing when I personally would have disagreed. This is an issue that stems from games like Cyberpunk 2077, Mass Effect, Fable, etc. that let you make choices to impact the game. In The Teal Mask though these are necessary events to get to the story that they’ve designed and written.

There’s one character’s arc that I don’t want to spoil too much, but I am interested to see how it’s continued in The Indigo Disk. It feels like it will either be well done or completely dropped and it makes me a little worried.

I have a few select points from the ending that I do want to lightly touch on. First, was Carmine going to profess her love to me at the end? Did I read that right? Was there something else? Second, I found it very worrying that at the end, Briar just announces that she has to leave and is just going to leave you and the other exchange students on Kitakami with the caretaker. Maybe it’s because I’m an American, but in what world is it okay for a teacher to take students in their care, go to a new place that the teacher has never been to, and then peace out? Nevermind the fact that you were never informed of being entered to go on this trip and you are given no opportunity to speak with your parents in the first place about it! I get that the world of Pokémon is very loosey-goosey. They treat 10-year-olds as full-blown adults for crying out loud. But this is still weird to me.

Overall, The Teal Mask brings fun with new and returning Pokémon and an okay story. The story will be continued in The Indigo Disk so I don’t feel like I can fully pass judgment on it. If you don’t impose your own rules addressing the levels of Pokémon on your team and use your level 100 team from Terra Raid events, you’ll blow right through this story. All things considered, I’m excited for The Indigo Disk and the challenge of completing my Kitakami dex.