What do I mean by "dark themed"? Permadeath for your pokemon and gory, realistic outcomes from the attacks. But to go with that, make it so that you have to personally train and bond with your pokemon in some way, so that each is a significant time investment and it hurts if they die. Perhaps learning a move involves some sort of minigame where you have to participate, and practice raises accuracy/damage.
Combine that with a survival element. If you go into the wild you need to gather food, find shelter to sleep, perhaps kill stuff for food if needed.
Mechanically though I'd like to add more flexibility. Do away with the 4 move limit and allow a creature that logically has some ability always have it. Eg, anything that's big enough and has wings can be used for transport, but perhaps you need some sort of practice minigame for it to let you ride.
Think a bit like Skyrim with lots of summoning.
What do I mean by "dark themed"? Permadeath for your pokemon and gory, realistic outcomes from the attacks. But to go with that, make it so that you have to personally train and bond with your pokemon in some way, so that each is a significant time investment and it hurts if they die. Perhaps learning a move involves some sort of minigame where you have to participate, and practice raises accuracy/damage.
Combine that with a survival element. If you go into the wild you need to gather food, find shelter to sleep, perhaps kill stuff for food if needed.
Mechanically though I'd like to add more flexibility. Do away with the 4 move limit and allow a creature that logically has some ability always have it. Eg, anything that's big enough and has wings can be used for transport, but perhaps you need some sort of practice minigame for it to let you ride.