Pokemon Scarlet and Violet reshaped the mainline series by dropping the traditional linear route structure in favor of a fully open Paldea region, and the two-part Hidden Treasure of Area Zero DLC expanded that world even further with two entirely new locations. Whether you are still exploring the base game or planning your route through the expansions, here is how Paldea’s open-world structure and DLC content fit together.
Three story paths, one open map
Rather than forcing players through gyms in a fixed order, Scarlet and Violet lay out three separate storylines that can be tackled in almost any sequence. Victory Road sends you around Paldea challenging the region’s Gym Leaders to build toward Champion Rank, following a more traditional badge-collecting structure. Path of Legends has you tracking down and battling gigantic Titan Pokemon guarding rare ingredients scattered across the map, which doubles as one of the best ways to level up a team quickly. Starfall Street puts you up against Team Star, a group of student delinquents holed up at bases around Paldea, using an Auto Battle feature where your own Pokemon team fights alongside you against waves of Team Star grunts before you face each base’s boss. Because the world is genuinely open, you can freely mix progress across all three paths, tackling whichever gym, Titan, or Team Star base is nearest or best suited to your team’s current level.
Terastallizing and how it shapes exploration
The signature new mechanic of this generation is Terastallizing, which temporarily changes a Pokemon into a single-type form covered in a crystalline shell matching its Tera Type. A Terastallized Pokemon takes on the strengths and weaknesses of its new type for the rest of that battle, and any move that matches the Tera Type gets a boosted same-type attack bonus. Out in the open world, Tera Pokemon appear as large crystal-covered wild encounters, and defeating them in a Tera Raid Battle is one of the main ways to recruit powerful, uniquely-typed Pokemon into your team. Raid difficulty scales up through the game and post-game, with higher-star raids requiring stronger, well-built teams to clear consistently.
What’s in The Hidden Treasure of Area Zero
The Hidden Treasure of Area Zero is the paid DLC expansion for Scarlet and Violet, split into two parts released separately, plus a short epilogue. Part 1, The Teal Mask, released September 13, 2023, and Part 2, The Indigo Disk, released December 14, 2023, with an epilogue called Mochi Mayhem following on January 11, 2024. Together, the two parts add more than 230 Pokemon that were not available in the Scarlet and Violet base game, including every prior generation’s first partner Pokemon, making the DLC essential for anyone chasing a complete Paldea Pokedex.
The Teal Mask: Kitakami and the Loyal Three
The Teal Mask sends your character on a school trip to Kitakami, a new location styled after Japanese folklore and countryside, visited jointly with students from another academy. The story centers on old local legends involving Ogerpon, a Legendary Pokemon tied to a set of ceremonial masks, and a trio of Legendary Pokemon known as the Loyal Three: Okidogi, a Poison and Fighting type; Munkidori, a Poison and Psychic type; and Fezandipiti, a Poison and Fairy type. Village folklore claims the Loyal Three sacrificed themselves to drive Ogerpon away, though the story passed down through the local maskmaker’s family tells a very different version of events. The Teal Mask also introduces Dipplin, a new evolution of the Applin line, and the Poltchageist evolutionary line, both exclusive additions to this expansion.
The Indigo Disk: Blueberry Academy
Part 2 takes your character to Blueberry Academy, a sister school to Naranja or Uva Academy located largely underwater, where the curriculum is built specifically around Pokemon battling. As an exchange student, you work through a series of battle-focused courses and biomes recreated inside the academy that mimic different regions’ terrain, giving you access to Pokemon and habitats not otherwise found in Paldea. The Indigo Disk leans much harder into competitive-style battling than the base game or Teal Mask, making it the DLC content most relevant to players focused on team building and Ranked Battle preparation, alongside continuing the Area Zero storyline that ties both DLC parts back to the mysteries introduced in the base game.
Area Zero and the Zero Lab
Area Zero itself, the massive crater at the heart of Paldea explored during the base game’s ending, ties both DLC story threads together, and returning to it after finishing The Indigo Disk unlocks additional story content and access to Zero Lab facilities used for late-game research and breeding activities. Because the DLC narrative threads connect back to Area Zero’s mysteries, it is worth completing the Scarlet and Violet base game’s main story before diving into either Teal Mask or Indigo Disk, since story context and certain unlocks carry over.
Getting the most out of the DLC
Because the DLC adds so many previously unavailable Pokemon, it is worth playing through both parts even if you are not particularly invested in the new storylines, purely for team-building options and Pokedex completion. Kitakami and Blueberry Academy also each introduce their own version-exclusive Pokemon and location-specific items, so trading with a friend who owns the opposite version of Scarlet or Violet remains relevant even in the post-game DLC content. For a full walkthrough of the base game’s main story and systems, see our complete Pokemon guide, which covers the broader Paldea campaign alongside this DLC’s open-world additions.