Many of these outlets stated that they played the first 30 minutes of the expansion, but in that time they were able to experience some of what’s to come in the Galar region.

Here’s what we learned from the Pokémon Sword and Shield Isle of Armor demo impressions:

LEVEL SCALING

IGN reports that the Pokémon found in the Isle of Armor will scale to your party in some way. Trainers in the first battle had Pokémon around Level 60, which was the same as their highest level Pokémon.

It was unclear to the outlet whether the entire DLC will scale to your team, but this is promising for those who have played Sword and Shield for months now and have a team of Level 100 Pokémon.

Speaking of which, IGN also learned that the Isle of Armor DLC can be accessed as soon as you reach the Wild Area in the core Sword and Shield, which is only a few hours into the main story. This allows for trainers who are new to experience the DLC as soon as they’d like. However, it should be noted that it’s unclear whether certain parts of the Isle of Armor will be closed off due to level restraints.

ISLE OF ARMOR IS ONE BIG WILD AREA

The Isle of Armor is seemingly one massive Wild Area with Pokémon appearing in the overworld. IGN reports that unlike the Wild Area in the main game, The Isle of Armor has a lot more diverse environments to explore with the Pokémon interacting in various ways. According to IGN, one Pokémon in particular can be seen on a tree branch that doesn’t come down. The outlet speculates that you can likely call for that Pokémon by whistling, but it wasn’t shown.

SIDE MISSIONS/NEW ITEMS

The main story of The Isle of Armor has been revealed already, but what the IGN demo confirms are side missions for players to complete.

Players will need to complete three trials to obtain Mustard’s dojo’s sacred armor. One of these trials is to collect Max Mushrooms, which are used to create Max Soup. Max Soup is a new item that can be fed to Pokémon that are capable of Gigantamaxing. Feed your Pokémon Max Soup and they’ll gain the ability to Gigantamax when they couldn’t before.

Another side mission is finding 150 Alolan Diglett. The Kanto region Diglett is already in Pokémon Sword and Shield, but there’s no way to catch Alolan form Pokémon in the Gen 8 titles. The only way to get Alolan form Pokémon is via Pokémon Home transfer.

GamesRadar reports that a new item called the EXP Charm allows trainers to focus the experience gained in battles to one specific Pokémon.

The Isle of Armor DLC for Pokémon Sword and Shield will release Wednesday, June 17.

So what do you think of this latest Sword and Shield news? What in the DLC are you excited about the most? Let us know in the comments section.