I've alluded to this across several posts in this subforum, but I genuinely think Diamond and Pearl are pretty crappy titles that have held up about as well as a paper mache castle in a tsunami. And don't get me wrong, Pearl in particular will always hold a special place in my heart for starting my Pokemon journey, and I sometimes desperately wish I could say these games were good... but they really aren't, and that tiny sliver of sentimental value is literally the only thing keeping me from deeming them the worst Pokemon games I've played.
If there's one word I could use to describe the OG DP experience, it's "frustrating". Everything about them frustrates me: The regional pokedex and its stupid, arbitrary decision to cut out so many of the brilliant new evolutions and their families ranks up with Gen 2 locking off Johto mons to Kanto as one of the most baffling design choices in a Pokemon game, and while it's not too awful at the beginning, I'd say the turning point is around Byron when the game design really begins to break down, where you see gym leaders and even the bloody Elite Four resort to horseshit like Flint having 3/5 of his team not even being Fire type with Lopunny being among his ranks just to stay afloat. Regular trainers and routes seem to be designed to artificially raise playtime via strategies like Double Team/Sand-Attack spam and terrains that slow the player to a crawl. The game speed in general is so fucking slow, surfing and battle speed is just a slog to get through after a certain point, to the point where on my last attempted playthrough when I lost to the Galactic Admins at Spear Pillar I just rage quit because I didn't want to make myself suffer through the horrendously tedious climb to the top of Mt. Coronet again. That's right, despite being my first Pokemon game I have never actually fully completed the main story of Pearl, and frankly I have 0 desire to go back and do so. I laugh my head off when people put these games above the likes of Sun and Moon and Sword and Shield, because at least those games have actual variety in the Pokemon you can raise and battle through the game with, at least those games aren't committed to wasting your time in completely banal ways that do absolutely nothing but reduce player agency.
Now, it's not all bad for DP. As a region, Sinnoh is actually really cool and well-designed (aside from the speed traps mentioned earlier) with plenty of nooks and crannies, interesting lore and a nice variety of locations which all tie into the rustic, historic theme of the region. Mt. Coronet's also a really cool midway point through the corners of Sinnoh, it's awesome to traverse this massive mountain with so many sub-areas that constantly opens up as you progress further through the game. I also absolutely adore the soundfont and route/town music. But there's a problem with all that: Pokemon Platinum.
I've been playing through that game recently. And y'know what? It's still not perfect. Some of that speed jank like terrains are still there, although other optimizations like battle speed and surfing still help out. But WOW it's overall so much better, ESPECIALLY with the improved Pokedex that adds actual variety to encounters. And while I'm just before Candice, people I've spoken to say that the bulk of the improvements don't come until a bit after, so I have yet to see the best this game can do. And that's the thing: Ruby and Sapphire have a perfectly functioning main story with more catchable Pokemon even if you don't have Emerald. BW1 and BW2 are different enough to be considered unique experiences. Sun and Moon have the better plot hands-down over the Ultra titles. But if you have Platinum, there is absolutely no reason to go back to Diamond or Pearl.
If there's one word I could use to describe the OG DP experience, it's "frustrating". Everything about them frustrates me: The regional pokedex and its stupid, arbitrary decision to cut out so many of the brilliant new evolutions and their families ranks up with Gen 2 locking off Johto mons to Kanto as one of the most baffling design choices in a Pokemon game, and while it's not too awful at the beginning, I'd say the turning point is around Byron when the game design really begins to break down, where you see gym leaders and even the bloody Elite Four resort to horseshit like Flint having 3/5 of his team not even being Fire type with Lopunny being among his ranks just to stay afloat. Regular trainers and routes seem to be designed to artificially raise playtime via strategies like Double Team/Sand-Attack spam and terrains that slow the player to a crawl. The game speed in general is so fucking slow, surfing and battle speed is just a slog to get through after a certain point, to the point where on my last attempted playthrough when I lost to the Galactic Admins at Spear Pillar I just rage quit because I didn't want to make myself suffer through the horrendously tedious climb to the top of Mt. Coronet again. That's right, despite being my first Pokemon game I have never actually fully completed the main story of Pearl, and frankly I have 0 desire to go back and do so. I laugh my head off when people put these games above the likes of Sun and Moon and Sword and Shield, because at least those games have actual variety in the Pokemon you can raise and battle through the game with, at least those games aren't committed to wasting your time in completely banal ways that do absolutely nothing but reduce player agency.
Now, it's not all bad for DP. As a region, Sinnoh is actually really cool and well-designed (aside from the speed traps mentioned earlier) with plenty of nooks and crannies, interesting lore and a nice variety of locations which all tie into the rustic, historic theme of the region. Mt. Coronet's also a really cool midway point through the corners of Sinnoh, it's awesome to traverse this massive mountain with so many sub-areas that constantly opens up as you progress further through the game. I also absolutely adore the soundfont and route/town music. But there's a problem with all that: Pokemon Platinum.
I've been playing through that game recently. And y'know what? It's still not perfect. Some of that speed jank like terrains are still there, although other optimizations like battle speed and surfing still help out. But WOW it's overall so much better, ESPECIALLY with the improved Pokedex that adds actual variety to encounters. And while I'm just before Candice, people I've spoken to say that the bulk of the improvements don't come until a bit after, so I have yet to see the best this game can do. And that's the thing: Ruby and Sapphire have a perfectly functioning main story with more catchable Pokemon even if you don't have Emerald. BW1 and BW2 are different enough to be considered unique experiences. Sun and Moon have the better plot hands-down over the Ultra titles. But if you have Platinum, there is absolutely no reason to go back to Diamond or Pearl.
) than any other gen.
