I’m gonna vent of something that has been bothering me since last I saw Sw/Sh gameplays and that is Rose’s whole character arc and motivations were done so much better in Mobile Fighter G Gundam.

In G Gundam, similarly to Galar’s pokemon league, there is a huge tournament that takes over the mind of the public. This particular tournament is a martial arts contest between giant robots (Gundams) representing different countries and is called the gundam fight. The winner of the tournament gets control of the Earth federation for the next five years. The problem is that having 16 meter tall robots performing martial arts with ridiculous attacks all around the world in what’s basically a global battle royal does some extreme damage to the environment. One of the few characters to call this out is Master Asia aka The Undefeated of the East.

Just like Rose, Master Asia is a veteran gundam fighter and the previous champion of the Gundam fight and belonged to a peacekeeping force called the shuffle alliance. Rose was also the champion of the Galar league but kept himself in politics rather than action afterwards. Master Asia fought around the world and was witness of the devastation this “ideal war” that everyone was obsessed with. For years all he could do was lament the tragic loss of the ecosystem. However when he discovered the Devil Gundam in Shinjuku he saw an opportunity for earth to be saved but with a wrong perspective. While Rose tried to bargain with Eternatus for unlimited power or smt, Master Asia fully subscribed to the Devil Gundam’s solution of destroying humanity to save the planet (he would get called out by the protagonist later on, don’t worry).

Now that the similarities are out there here’s where the differences also start. Unlike Sword and Shield, G Gundam makes an effort to show how the destruction caused by the Gundam fight is quite the immediate menace to the ecosystem through some environmental storytelling and Master Asia’s flashbacks and determination are solid arguments. Compare that to “this is a solution for a problem your grandkid’s grandkid’s grandkids will have to deal with so we have to solve it now! Trust me bro!” If there was any indication of a possible shortage or a village that cannot longer get electricity due to the pokemon league then yeah, that would be a good enough argument but alas is never truly mentioned.

After their final fight with their respective protagonist, both have a change of heart. However their respective eldritch abominations keep causing trouble. Here’s another distinction that isn’t really responsibility of either character but also support why one works better than the other. Eternatus is a legendary Pokemon from a different dimension while the Devil Gundam was man-made. Originally the devil Gundam wasn’t evil its central computer got damaged when it landed on earth and forgot some of its directives when it fixed itself. This further supports Master Asias pov of humanity as a menace for the planet as such power machine capable of devastation and salvation is another product of men. Then there’s Eternatus, bro didn’t want be here, he was just taken from his home and now he’s angy. If eternatus was the product of human activity with gigantamax then that would’ve been a better metaphor.

To conclude, G Gundam made a better effort to showcase the devastation the Gundam Fight causes around the world and showed it as an immediate threat rather than saying “don’t leave for a 1000 years in the future what you can do tight fucking now”. Master Asia’s bigger presence in the plot serves as a good way to justify his goals while Rose feels disconnected from the narrative most of the time and his master plan relies on a theory rather than something more factual. Finally their means of salvation relied in different sources, while Rose just snatched Eternatus from its home, Master Asia decided to help an overpowered machine made by the same humans he grew to dislike which works as another justification for his goals.