Since most critics probably aren't really into Pokémon, it will score pretty high. Somewhere around 85 (unless it's really broken).

81

I'll go with 79.

I think it is quite funny that a few people who did nothing but rag on Pokemon have already started their "it didn't deserve those scores" defense..... when we don't even have a single review yet. Man people get ahead of themselves around these parts.

9.0 from Gamespot. So the world apparently isn't ending.

Judging from the first few reviews, this is going to get a much lower score than sun/moon.

Edit: another review in, 84 ATM so better than first appeared. Not sure where it'll end up.

By the way, I think it will get an 81. Not that many critics care at all for the content cut, so in their eyes all will be well. We will see the first below 50 review for a pokemon game, though. Someone will do it.

80 with 13 reviews.

I guessed 71-79 but it seems it's gonna be higher.
But i'll stick to 78 as my predictction.

In France:
JV.com: 80.
Gameblog: 70
Gamekult: 70

Gen 3 came out at a time where the gaming community that made Pokemon a phenomenon had kinda shunned it a little (in the U.S at least). A lot of those of us who grew up with gen 1/gen 2 were at a phase where we thought we'd outgrown pokemon during gen 3 and that it was more for kids (which was silly since gen 3 introduced even more complex mechanics and competitive scene than ever before). Nostalgia for the franchise didn't start really happening until gen 4, especially around HG/SS release, so that's why you see the uptick in review scores for Pokemon games after that.