I feel like my equivalent to overall aura when it comes to connecting with a game's story is enjoyable gameplay. It doesn't matter how intense the cutscene is if I'm skipping it/not paying it any attention because I'm desperate for better action, while on the other hand I'll openly accept something contrived if I'm excited about the next level that event leads to. This also means I take a very dim view of boss fights that are heavily scripted with little player agency, just be honest about there being a cutscene there.
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Unpopular opinions
- Thread starter antemortem
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View attachment D Rose Lost Loss for words.webp
How many fukkin meds y'all taking to learn a whole-ass writing system out of medicine boxes!?
Each their own, but that would just be boring to me. Like, I could go play Solitaire or Tetris if I just wanted a ruthlessly efficient, plotless game, and sometimes I do. But I don’t ever connect with those games in the same way that I do with Pokémon, because Pokémon has lovable creatures and characters and an adventure with obstacles to overcome. Doesn’t need to be high art (and it never is), but these are adventure RPGs, and I like being immersed in a story that can create situations beyond “catch monster, grind through cave, beat nondescript League-sanctioned boss, repeat.” And I think narrative is important for differentiating those things.
Since we’re here, I also just don’t really have rules for analyzing media. The media is what it is, I take it on those terms, and draw what I can from it. There’s so much media out there in the world; more than any individual could conceivably experience even with a thousand lifetimes. Every single increment of the spectrum of quality has been covered. If a game tries at something and fails, well, it’s got company. But even in those failures, I can usually find something interesting.
Since we're on this topic, we really might as well call it for what it is.
GOOD.
I know I'm not in the minority here when I say that a lot of the formulaic fluff getting cut or at least adjusted was good. By that, I'm explicitly talking about Gyms and Evil Teams.
I'm not a fan of how "Evil" teams are just poor social misfits three times in a row. Yeah, I get it, it worked for Alola, but...
As for the gyms... let's talk about the worst kayfabe storytelling this side of AEW.
XY's "mystery" of Mega Evolution. Sycamore does a good job of sending the kids on a wild goose chase so they can discover the mystery of Mega Evolution and bring back a can of blinker fluid while they're on the way.
You know what doesn't come up in the story until you find out Korrina is somehow the leader of Shalour's gym? Yep, the gyms.
In most games, gyms are just roadblocks you gotta do for one reason or another. It's telling that you can outright skip so many of them until there's a badge check, especially in Gen 1.
So, MAJOR props to Galar for putting respect on Gyms' names. They're this franchise's meat and potatoes gameplay-wise and should have a BIG impact on the journey.
To be fair, there were a bunch of children who would get sick often and my parents had an attitude to stock on medicine "just in case", so we had a lot of medicine in the house. But 3 common medicines are half of the alphabet's letters: tylenol, advil, dorflex. You don't need much, you just need variety.View attachment 716266
How many fukkin meds y'all taking to learn a whole-ass writing system out of medicine boxes!?
And besides that the words have to make sense. I doubt that I ever discovered the letter "w" in braille, it's not really used in portuguese so I had "_ailord", but I knew there is a pokémon named Wailord, it was easy to deduce that first unknown letter.
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Gen 7 and 8 were PEAK for gyms after the weaksauce Kalos ones, and I don't think that's a coincidence. Someone recognized that people were disappointed in Korrina etc and decided to fix that.
"But Alola didn't have gyms," I hear you say. EXACTLY. Alola said "What if we replace the gyms with actual puzzles, that are designed around not leaving in the middle, and end them with a reasonably challenging fight?" And it worked.
Galar then brought back the gyms(I wonder if people complained about the lack of formal enemies etc or if it was always the plan), but Galar said "Well, we're bringing back the big formal fights, people clearly care about those, let's give them something to care about." And everything from the soundtrack to the location to the super-form delivered on that. Yes, they're cheeseable with your own DMax, but they are impressive enough that I don't think most people noticed. And if you ban DMax, good luck. You're going to need it.
There's also the fact that Braille is algorithmic. Sign language or a foreign language, you have to learn everything on it's own. Braille is a pattern.
It's an amusing irony to me that even as post-classic era Pokemon other than Galar has gone out of its way to de-emphasize the Pokemon League relative to other gameplay/story bits they've simultaneously put more effort into contextualizing it on a region-by-region basis. Alola's Island Challenge is a traditional ceremony commemorating an old hero's journey with the League being a new thing, Galar is a big sports league and Paldea's League is an academic certification (note how 3/4 of the E4 and Geeta wear very simple, clean, "professional" outfits).
What does the Pokemon League mean to the people of [region]? How does [region]'s cultural identity permeate into it? These questions and more have only been getting answered consistently since Alola outside of the vague handwavey "it's part of your pokemon trainer coming-of-age ritual" thing. Makes me wonder what Gen 10 will do
What does the Pokemon League mean to the people of [region]? How does [region]'s cultural identity permeate into it? These questions and more have only been getting answered consistently since Alola outside of the vague handwavey "it's part of your pokemon trainer coming-of-age ritual" thing. Makes me wonder what Gen 10 will do
Since you mentioned the Zero series, one example I wanted to bring up last time about how wasted LA's "humans vs Pokemon" angle feels is from that series. I didn't mention it before bc I didn't know if you were familiar with them. So here I present, the Caravaners from Zero 4.
View attachment Caravan.webp
The Caravaners are people from Neo Arcadia, once a paradise for humans, escaping from Weil's tyrannical regime and settling in the life resurging Area Zero. After all the wars in which the humans got caught in the crossfire, they've grown to dislike all reploids, including Zero and the Resistance. Some of them (the younger ones) act timid were Zero meets them, others (the grown ups) are more hostile. Their leader Neige is less prejudiced because she was saved once by a reploid, Craft, and became
At the halfway point of the game, the Caravan is invaded by Weil's forces and Zero goes to the rescue. Craft, now serving Weil, kidnaps Neige after she reveals they used to know each other; and the caravaners are willing to abandon her because of this, despite all the help Neige provided them and that their camp was just saved by the resistance. This was Zero's last straw, he calls them out for their cowardice and goes to rescue Neige himself. The caravaners realize their mistakes and act more open towards Zero from then on, they even start believing again in a world where humans and reploids can live together like they used to in the Classic and X series, which is doubly heartwarming considering that's what happens in the ZX games.
The caravaners are like the Jubilife villagers, both groups are afraid of what the other faction (Reploids and Pokemon) did to them in the past, and feel threatened around them, except it's more clear in Zero 4 that you are not welcome at the start. In Legends Arceus it's kinda hard to believe ppl are feeling threatened about Pokemon no matter how much they say it at the start, when Jubilife Village still behaves like the usual Pokemon world, with professors passionate for investigating Pokemon, clan leaders and wardens respected figures like gym leaders will be in the future, and just how quickly you're given quests to introduce Pokemon to the village.
Now wait a minute...
Well, now I'm getting read like a children's book out here.
Right now, the only thing I'm really missing in Gyms now is some creativity. I need gyms to be at least on par with Emerald Liza and Tate.
Too many gyms are like 2-3 shitmons with the Leader's TM, (It probably isn't good) then an Ace that's as threatening as a Magikarp in Sun.
Gamefreak may think they're cooking, but they got a British recipe book out there. Paldea's highest-level leader had an ALTARIA as an Ace. Not any Altaria btw, TERA ICE ALTARIA, because we can't even have it try to leverage its good typing.
I'm curious now, what recipe book did this come from?
(for context, I'm not saying it's a weak set, in fact it did its job well by stopping cold plenty of people's runs, but I dunno, playing with Double Team feels...dirty)
This is nothing to me after Justy's Sand Veil-Storm + Double Team spamming Ground/Grass mons (in games with limited access to Shock Wave or Aerial Ace) coupled with things like Ingrain and the mentioned Sandstorm to win/recover by Chip
i actually think that in concept, the ai reading your moves isnt that bad. i dont think it should be on at all times but itd be a more effective way to code "prediction". i think something funny they should do is that if someone tries to pp stall the trainer with switching pokemon back and forth it should activate a mode where the ai knows exactly what youre doing for 5 turns. i want nuzlockers to lose their mons for it
For reasons unknown to man or God, GF loves evasion strategies, especially around Gens 3-4. They couldn't get enough of it. For reference, the Bright Powder appears no less than 80 times in the list of Pokemon in Emerald's Frontier, which to my knowledge is tied with the Lum Berry and the Focus Band for the most common item in the Frontier - and many of these Bright Powder mons are paired with Double Team.
Someone rated this post of mine from a while back, which reminded me
that the Teraleak outright confirmed this theory of mine, with clarification that the anti-Xereneas form was planned to be a predatory animal like a wolf or big cat, and the anti-Yveltal form was planned to be a hunter with some sort of anti-air weapon(likely a bow due to the nature of Thousand Arrows). Sounds like both were heavily retooled into 10% and Complete Zygarde
Gens 3 and 4 don’t just love evasion-boosting moves, they also love status spam. In regular trainer battles, this is because they aren’t meant to be challenging on a consistent basis, but 1-2 fights will be tough because you get paralyzed 5 times or hit yourself in confusion for an accidental KO.
And there is counter play to all this. There are moves and abilities that prevent evasion-decreases and buff accuracy, there are X-accuracy items. I think part of this is semantics where certain status conditions feel more legitimate than others, ie evasion and sleep can take away 4-5 turns in a row, but the former feels cheaper. (Obv that’s not a perfect comparison but stuff like evasion and confusion feels cheap).
I do think in-game these days, due to power creep, the AI suffers more because the human player is going to choose 3-4 strong attacking moves, while the AI learnset will be worse, not able to take advantage of support moves well, and not able to switch around the attacks. These things have always been issues but now that the human players have more tools available to them through Power Creep it’s worse.
And GameFreak compensates by making you fight more overpowered bosses like in Tera Raids
On this note tho from what little I’ve gleaned from skimming Wolfey videos, evasion spam and OHKO moves are becoming popular in VGC which seems like a really bad thing, and I got mad about it last night in some sort of connection with how GameFreak doesn’t let old gen Pokemon keep their moves when transferred up.
And there is counter play to all this. There are moves and abilities that prevent evasion-decreases and buff accuracy, there are X-accuracy items. I think part of this is semantics where certain status conditions feel more legitimate than others, ie evasion and sleep can take away 4-5 turns in a row, but the former feels cheaper. (Obv that’s not a perfect comparison but stuff like evasion and confusion feels cheap).
I do think in-game these days, due to power creep, the AI suffers more because the human player is going to choose 3-4 strong attacking moves, while the AI learnset will be worse, not able to take advantage of support moves well, and not able to switch around the attacks. These things have always been issues but now that the human players have more tools available to them through Power Creep it’s worse.
And GameFreak compensates by making you fight more overpowered bosses like in Tera Raids
On this note tho from what little I’ve gleaned from skimming Wolfey videos, evasion spam and OHKO moves are becoming popular in VGC which seems like a really bad thing, and I got mad about it last night in some sort of connection with how GameFreak doesn’t let old gen Pokemon keep their moves when transferred up.
Good point! Adding on to this, the typical casual player would often be underlevelled in earlier games, but from Gen 5 onwards mechanics were introduced to make sure you'd keep up. Evasiveness strats and status spam might have been a little more common in Gens 3-4, but I think what makes them stick out in those games is that battles take longer, so you have to land more hits to get through them.
Incidentally, I reckon this is also why those 'I was juuust about to win but then they used a Full Restore' memes basically died out after Gen 4: the Champion healing their ace back up to 100% used to represent like 5 turns of chip damage, erased in the blink of an eye, but now it's 1-2 turns at most.
I think what makes Evasion feel so much cheaper than Sleep or Paralyze is two factors: you are much less likely to have an explicit countermeasure to Evasion (status healing items or berries are common loot to find vs X Accuracy relative to how often you use them); you have more direct control over putting up with a Status (switching out or at least knowing you're taking a turn on Sleep if you don't heal it) vs Evasion just being something the opponent whips out and forces you to coin flip.
Additionally on Sleep specifically, there's at least some upper limit to how long you can stay out on one use, whereas Evasion rolls independently whether you've missed 1 time or 10 times.
Additionally on Sleep specifically, there's at least some upper limit to how long you can stay out on one use, whereas Evasion rolls independently whether you've missed 1 time or 10 times.
I'm pretty sure that it's because Evasion can never wall a player. It sucks and is annoying, but an enemy who clicks Double Team 6 times in a row isn't attacking you, so with enough save-and-resets, eventually the player will win. If you're building for children, that probably feels more reasonable than Rain Dance Kingdra etc.
(Note, I do not agree with this design philosophy. Major battles should either teach or test the player, Evasion spam generally does neither.)
you're probably right but uuuuugh. UUUGH. can we make 10 year olds smarter so they stop doing this shit already. put some brainchips on those kids
double posting but its for a different topic
people always talk about doubles, and implementing doubles in the main campaign of pokemon. Now, personally I enjoy singles battles too and i would prefer a more hybrid type of game, but lets ignore that and talk about just doubles
So my preference for this is very much only doubles in main fights (rivals, gyms etc) > doubles for all fights. I think the main problem with doubles is that for any fight that isnt important, it gets reaaaaally annoying to constantly do double fights with the common fodder trainers. theyre fun once or twice but i think the "doubles is faster" stuff stops being true the lower the quality of a trainer is. when the answer is just to spam a move, youd rather have a simple click move > action than click move > choose target > click move > choose target loop.
but the best part of doubles is that i think monotype gyms really benefits from being a doubles battle. for single monotype to not get destroyed by a counter, you need to be able to stack on immunities/resistances/find ways to counter. Fine on paper, that's just teambuilding! but we have to remember most gyms will not be high leveled or 6 mons, and not all types have ways to do that without being extremely overwhelming for its placement. its very easy to fall into romhacky "counters everything" teams, or to just not do enough and end up being bodied either way.
If you have a doubles team though, you force the player to either teambuild with multiple counters (already more interesting than using a single mon tbh) or for the other pokemon of the team to pick up the slack and be there to help the counter. meanwhile you can create a foe with pokemon that are actually supports and defensive without being blown exploded by the players starter or something. it also makes very small counters to types the team is weak to much more effective: you can have a water/ground type that protects the other water types from electric types, while another pokemon uses flying moves to chip grass types (doesnt have to be stab). its beatable, but engaging
people always talk about doubles, and implementing doubles in the main campaign of pokemon. Now, personally I enjoy singles battles too and i would prefer a more hybrid type of game, but lets ignore that and talk about just doubles
So my preference for this is very much only doubles in main fights (rivals, gyms etc) > doubles for all fights. I think the main problem with doubles is that for any fight that isnt important, it gets reaaaaally annoying to constantly do double fights with the common fodder trainers. theyre fun once or twice but i think the "doubles is faster" stuff stops being true the lower the quality of a trainer is. when the answer is just to spam a move, youd rather have a simple click move > action than click move > choose target > click move > choose target loop.
but the best part of doubles is that i think monotype gyms really benefits from being a doubles battle. for single monotype to not get destroyed by a counter, you need to be able to stack on immunities/resistances/find ways to counter. Fine on paper, that's just teambuilding! but we have to remember most gyms will not be high leveled or 6 mons, and not all types have ways to do that without being extremely overwhelming for its placement. its very easy to fall into romhacky "counters everything" teams, or to just not do enough and end up being bodied either way.
If you have a doubles team though, you force the player to either teambuild with multiple counters (already more interesting than using a single mon tbh) or for the other pokemon of the team to pick up the slack and be there to help the counter. meanwhile you can create a foe with pokemon that are actually supports and defensive without being blown exploded by the players starter or something. it also makes very small counters to types the team is weak to much more effective: you can have a water/ground type that protects the other water types from electric types, while another pokemon uses flying moves to chip grass types (doesnt have to be stab). its beatable, but engaging