The huge open world game, the new protagonists in the games possibly being schoolkids, and possible lack of Gyms doesn't really give the anime a lot to work with. I really can't see the writers confining Ash to one region again especially since there may not be much for him to do. Also remember how the SM anime didn't even adapt most of the totem pokemon battles for Ash, so like those and the ones in Arceus, if there are boss pokemon again we'll probably not see it.

I still don't really understand how being open world would mean that the anime doesn't have a lot to work with. There is still going to be a storyline, objectives for players to do and most likely an evil team or villain for the players to defeat. That still feels like a big conclusion to jump to with little to no information to back it up. We don't know if there are going to be boss Pokemon and despite how they handled the Totem Pokemon in SM, that wouldn't necessarily guarantee that any potential boss Pokemon would be handled the same way in this series.

I'd really like to see Ash go back to Gym battles. That might be hoping for too much, especially when we don't know if Gyms are even in the new games, but I think it would give the anime some much needed structure. It would make it easy for them to feature new characters, new Pokemon and new locations from the games. Considering that we haven't had a proper badge quest since XY, which ended about six years ago, I don't think it would be stale or boring. I remember watching Ash's first battle with Bea and wondered to myself why we were wasting time with the PWC when the third Gym Leader in Galar was so strong that it took Ash multiple attempts to actually defeat her. I really like the Galar Gym Leaders and I think it's a huge shame that Ash most likely isn't going to battle any more of them, aside from maybe Raihan. It is such a waste, especially when some of those battles were tough for me in the games. Giving the amount of time left for Journeys, I really have my doubts that we'll get any more appearances from the Galar Gym Leaders, which is just so disappointing to me.

I honestly don't think that Ash's PWC ranking will affect whatever they do with him in the next series. Not just because I don't think that the tournament is that big of a deal, but it took them about seventy episodes just to bring up Ash's Alola League victory and it wasn't at least an in-universe reason for Ash to take part in the PWC. They may mention it, but I don't think it's going to be a huge factor in determining what he'll do in the future.

At the very least, I really hope that the new series takes place in the new region, focus on the new Pokemon, feature characters from the games and showcase locations. I really love the Galar region, so many of its Pokemon and the Galar characters, but they were in large part ignored by Journeys. Although, as sad as it sounds, Hop being ignored is still better than giving him the SM Hau treatment. I don't want the new region, Pokemon and characters in S/V treated the same way. I just want them to actually promote the newest game and put more spotlight on the new generation instead of mainly focusing on older Pokemon, most of which are already popular.

While I do really like Goh and Chloe, I don't see either of them sticking around. I think giving Goh all of the Galar starters makes him more associated with that generation than anything else. Not to the same level as a character from the games, but I think he would be more associated with Cinderace and maybe Inteleon more so than any of his other captures. Plus, I always kind of figured that Goh would either go on a journey by himself after Journeys wrapped up or continued to work at the lab while Ash goes on a new adventure. Since Chloe's main focus seems to be based around Eeveelutions and they're almost covered all of them, I don't see her getting more attention in a new series. Chloe will probably find out what she'll want to do with Eevee near the end of the series so that she has something to work on off-screen.

Besides all that, I think it would make more sense to give Ash a new cast of characters to interact with. It would help to make the new series distinct and give them something potentially new to work with. We obviously don't know what characters could join the cast, but I really hope that we'll have a proper female lead with a battle active goal. I still maintain that Contests were the best goal they could have given to the female leads and the anime lost something important when they had to get rid of them. The pipe dream for me would be that S/V has Contests just so that the anime could include them again, especially when they still haven't found anything worthwhile as a replacement for Contests after all these years, but I don't see that happening sadly. I just want to get a female main character with a good amount of focus and development again. I really like Chloe. She's honestly a highlight of Journeys, but the lack of a proper main female lead in the series has always been a big issue for me. I just want the anime to have a female lead in the new cast with a good goal and good development.