I mean don’t forget eternatus, who was going to ...
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make kaiju world while warping space time in a state of power overload or whatever crackpot shit happened in the climax of Swsh
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Unpopular opinions
- Thread starter antemortem
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make kaiju world while warping space time in a state of power overload or whatever crackpot shit happened in the climax of Swsh
This isn't @ you in specific, but we really need to stop saying "change the models" and start saying "change/add animations". The models are completely fine, good even, the main problem is the lack of animations, or how some animations are made.
Also, the colors of the 3ds models aren't washed out, rather, the sprites are too bright. You may prefer the sprite look, and that's completely fine, but it is not the canon look for the pokémon, and was one of the main inconsistencies of the sprites
The anime has distorted a looooot of Gen 1/2 designs in dev, and that ended up becoming the norm after Gen 3 too (cough, Chikorita not being yellow, cough)
That said, not a fan of Sugimori suddenly making things stiffer and washed out after 3. I still wonder why he did it. Though attacking the models for color when...it's entirely his fault is pretty sad
Oh on that point, I totally agree. Perhaps I didn't express myself well enough, but I think the model textures are fine and all and they look good to the eye.
The issue is that in every game, they are always allocated to the exact same "default, idle boring pose" in each and every game in the midst of battle. XY did a good job setting up the models and they looked great! A little boring, but that's fine given they had to model 721 Pokemon and they still gave them some damn good animations, some for Battle, some for Amie, and vice versa. But then come ORAS, and they have the same boring default pose. Sun and Moon? Same boring default pose. USUM? Same pose. Let's Go? Same pose! Sword and Shield? Same default pose (I will say the textures and colors look a lot cleaner and nicer so I'll give them credit for that). It's starting to get tiring at that point, except with the new Gen 8 mons. Not to mention every mon in Sword and Shield only has *two* attack animations, whereas mons in X and Y had around 4-5 attack animations, which was great. Goodra for example had around four, one flipping its horns, another swinging its tail, another for tackling, and vice versa. And Camp reuses a lot of Amie animations too. At this point, there really ought to be more than that.
With the sprites, even before Gen 5, they showed off the personality and expression, and each game had the sprite show off a different aspect of each Pokemon. Like in GSC, a Pokemon would have a different sprite in Gold, another one in Silver, and another one in Crystal (in this case animated even), and each one showed off a different side of the personality of the Pokemon. Same with DPP and HGSS. Every Pokemon had a different sprite in DP, then another one in HGSS, and in some cases even another new sprite for Platinum to show off the personality of the Pokemon in different aspects. Same goes in some extent to RS and FRLG.
You're right, they should "change/add animations" for every Pokemon, and perhaps in every game. Like imagine if a Pokemon in one game in a gen had their model in one battle-ready pose, and in another, in battle they show off in another kind of pose. And then there were new animations added to Camp or Amie or whatever interactive feature they have (which frankly is one of my favorite parts of the newer games, ngl), that showed off the Pokemon's personality even more. The models are fine, but it would be ideal to experiment more with them to make their animations more dynamic. Put them in different poses throughout each game in the battles. Show off personality! That's where it really matters: there needs to be expression and personality. Like the boring default pose is fine for looking at them in the PC/party or in the Pokedex, but when it comes to personality and expression, give them better poses or something too. In that sense the personality of each Pokemon can shine more. Perhaps that gets my point across better.
They do get some things right though, like with the signature Z-moves where Decidueye, Incineroar, and Primarina had reallly good animations for their sig Z-moves. Or the G-Max moves of Rillaboom, Cinderace, and Inteleon. Those were good! And those little fidgets they make in X and Y were pretty good too! I think they *can* make incredibly dynamic animations and moves if they put in the work: they just have to show that off and put in that work a good deal more. Hopefully that explains my point with that better.
I totally get what you're saying, and I agree. I think since they already did a dexit, they should just do one again and use it to add some extra animations for pokemon. I think the main changes should be:
1. Engaging idle loop. Nothing too big, because too much exaggerated movement can look pretty bad
2. Add one animation to the idle loop (like a charmander would look around or look at its tail). Maybe switch between them at every idle loop. Make sure to space them out though so it doesnt look too unnatural
3. Maybe something with attacks? Idk how they would make a system of attack animations different from the current one that doesnt also exponentialy increases the workload, so i would mind if the move animations stayed the same
1. Engaging idle loop. Nothing too big, because too much exaggerated movement can look pretty bad
2. Add one animation to the idle loop (like a charmander would look around or look at its tail). Maybe switch between them at every idle loop. Make sure to space them out though so it doesnt look too unnatural
3. Maybe something with attacks? Idk how they would make a system of attack animations different from the current one that doesnt also exponentialy increases the workload, so i would mind if the move animations stayed the same
Obviously they can have more polish wrt the animations and such but sadly, I don’t see things improving too much in the near future. All this boils back down to the release schedule that they seem to be forced to follow (a new main game every 2 years). With Pokemon being the massive juggernaut that it is I can’t see that changing unfortunately but at least now with the outside development for BDSP they are trying to mitigate it somewhat and hopefully it will pay dividends with Arceus and the eventual next generation. But really they’re doing the best they can with what limited time they have.
Yes please. When it comes to Gen 5, I'd much rather see another sequel than a remake.
Regarding the decline of the series after Gen 5 and how Gen 6 doesn't get criticized for it as much as Gen 7/8, I mostly agree with what ScraftyIsTheBest said. Personally, I feel that the Gen 6 games sort of made a promise to us players, which was: "This is just the beginning of the 3D era for Pokémon games, it will get much better in future games!" But that never happened. Instead, I think the games which got released after Gen 6 were worse instead of better. While X/Y and Gen 6 were the games which promised that things would get better later on, I don't think they should get criticised for it because they aren't the games that broke that promise. No, it is the games that were released after them that broke the promise, and because if that, I think they are the ones who deserve more criticism.
Not sure if this is unpopular, and I have said it before, but I really like Gen 6. While it was not as great as Gen 5, I still enjoyed it a lot and it is my second favorite generation. I feel that X/Y and OR/AS were excellent in terms of gameplay. They aren't perfect, but I think their flaws are mostly minor things that I'm willing to look past. In comparison, S/M felt like a bigger step down. They have several really serious gameplay issues, the most notable for me is the lack of good training spots which it feels like they don't get enough criticism for. US/UM were a step up from S/M, but they were not on the same level as the Gen 6 games. I haven't played LGP/E so no opinion there, but it doesn't seem like they are considerably great when it comes to what I consider important in Pokémon. S/S have some obvious issues as everyone knows. That said, I still liked both S/M, US/UM and S/S. While I feel that the series has mostly been going downhill recently (especially after Gen 6), it is not like it has gone from the top to the bottom in an instant. It has been more of a slow decline. Unfortunately, I am worried that this will continue in the future, I guess that's one reason as for why I'm no longer looking forward to new Pokémon games as much as I have done in the past.
I personally considered Kalos to be a bit less intriguing in most regards, like having to complete the National Dex to get the Shiny Charm (Yeah, I only ever care about Shinies). I also felt like the Looker postgame was kind of tedious and annoying to do, and that Kalos felt too small in comparison to the vast islands of Alola and the continent of Galar. Though it was the first 3D game, it wasn't the first game ever. They had experience making 5 generations and multiple remakes.
ORAS, in my opinion, was quite good, though I am biased, as the original Pokemon Ruby was my first game. Don't hate on me though, the only reason we have remakes is because people had fun with it as their first Gen. ORAS fixed the EXP problem I thought was annoying in RSE, and made grinding a bit easier. It also just felt more vast and explorable, like adding the Soaring feature with the Eon Flute.
USUM (Yeah I'm skipping SM I haven't played them) were a BIG step up from Gen 6, both of the pairs. Alola had awesome Pokemon, good Shiny Hunting, and were just in general a lot of fun. Trainer customization was way better than in Gen 6, and the Ultra Beasts were fun to find and catch. The Pokedex was also much easier to complete. I found it to be more fun, and also a bit better in difficulty. It took 50-75 hours to beat Alola, but it only took 20 to beat Kalos (or less) and 30 to beat Hoenn. I also found it great the Legends were more easily obtainable. Also, though I will admit that there weren't many good areas to train at, none of the games really have any easy areas to train in. Kalos doesn't need it anyway, I beat the league with a team multiple levels higher than theirs, and I didn't ever stop to grind.
But hey, I'm biased, so don't hate me.
ORAS, in my opinion, was quite good, though I am biased, as the original Pokemon Ruby was my first game. Don't hate on me though, the only reason we have remakes is because people had fun with it as their first Gen. ORAS fixed the EXP problem I thought was annoying in RSE, and made grinding a bit easier. It also just felt more vast and explorable, like adding the Soaring feature with the Eon Flute.
USUM (Yeah I'm skipping SM I haven't played them) were a BIG step up from Gen 6, both of the pairs. Alola had awesome Pokemon, good Shiny Hunting, and were just in general a lot of fun. Trainer customization was way better than in Gen 6, and the Ultra Beasts were fun to find and catch. The Pokedex was also much easier to complete. I found it to be more fun, and also a bit better in difficulty. It took 50-75 hours to beat Alola, but it only took 20 to beat Kalos (or less) and 30 to beat Hoenn. I also found it great the Legends were more easily obtainable. Also, though I will admit that there weren't many good areas to train at, none of the games really have any easy areas to train in. Kalos doesn't need it anyway, I beat the league with a team multiple levels higher than theirs, and I didn't ever stop to grind.
But hey, I'm biased, so don't hate me.
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I've played M, and it's pretty fun. My tacky 3DS can't run the best, but the cutscenes were at least cool, and it was pretty fun gameplay wise. I still like gen 4 better, but SM is still fun. Isn't the best, but I'd still suggest you play it. Also, the pokemon and all the features were fun. Even Poke-Pelago was still a bit enjoyable. Alola is linear, but it's a bit more story driven, so it's slightly understandable. And anyways...
Happy April Fools, sus man.
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Probably my own personal bias speaking here (definitely) but I really loved Gen 7, in fact I’d rank it 3rd behind 4 and 2. 5 and 6 would be my bottom 2 for sure but in all honesty thats probably because I was kinda disinterested in Pokemon for large parts of those gens. (I’ll be honest, I never actually finished B2/W2, I was really out of Pokemon at that point). I sort of got back into Pokemon in Gen 6, but it was Gen 7 that truly drew me in again with Alola’s amazing designs and the great plot of the games. I liked the change up with the Island Challenges rather than Gyms and PokePelago and UltraSpace were also very enjoyable for me.
fr tho gen 7 is actually baller. the fanbase just pretends it's bad because it's sandwiched between gens 6 and 8 and they gotta keep the "3D bAd" narrative up
It seems like Gens 3, 5, and 7 were unfairly hurt by lack of nostalgia, as well as receding Pokemania each time
3s was the technical dexit, 5 was BW1s semi reboot + dexit, and 7 was the dropping of the gym format and HMs
Granted they all have their flaws, but it seems unfair the next Gen typically is recieved better and regain fans despite...not really actually being better
DP are worse than RS (inversely, FRLG did better in expanding Kanto with the Sevii Islands and Vs seeker, while HGSS kept many of GS's glaring issues). XY's worse than BW1/2, but it took till Gen 7 for fans to realize it. Otherwise, XY was generally decently relieved when it came out.
Gen 8 is the only one legitimately treated worse to 7 compared to the past 2 examples. And even then, people blame 6 and 7 together for 8s faults. Though not untrue, it makes me wonder....will Gen 9 be equally screwed when it comes out? Pokemon isn't going to be much for buzz by then when it happens, given 8s controversy will be a faded memory
3s was the technical dexit, 5 was BW1s semi reboot + dexit, and 7 was the dropping of the gym format and HMs
Granted they all have their flaws, but it seems unfair the next Gen typically is recieved better and regain fans despite...not really actually being better
DP are worse than RS (inversely, FRLG did better in expanding Kanto with the Sevii Islands and Vs seeker, while HGSS kept many of GS's glaring issues). XY's worse than BW1/2, but it took till Gen 7 for fans to realize it. Otherwise, XY was generally decently relieved when it came out.
Gen 8 is the only one legitimately treated worse to 7 compared to the past 2 examples. And even then, people blame 6 and 7 together for 8s faults. Though not untrue, it makes me wonder....will Gen 9 be equally screwed when it comes out? Pokemon isn't going to be much for buzz by then when it happens, given 8s controversy will be a faded memory
It's also partially driven by the Pokemon fandom's "attitude in cycles" situation that Pokemon fandom goes through every time. Every game goes through the initial hype phase, then some time later it gets bashed as "the worst games ever", then in some years it'll be looked at much more fondly. It happened with Ruby and Sapphire, it happened again with Diamond and Pearl, it notably happened again with Black and White, and X and Y are starting to reach their nostalgia phase (I can guarantee you we'll be seeing more people singing high praises about XY in the near future). Sun and Moon is currently undergoing its "WORST GAMES EVER" phase with the fandom, but soon that will end. Even Sword and Shield, for all of its issues, will reach that phase someday.
The other thing is that the kids who got into Pokemon with Gen 7 are not yet at the age where they are more wired and online and have yet to reach that point where they will frequent Pokemon communities online yet. The kids who grew up with X and Y are starting to get there, and we're seeing more praise from BW these past few years because the kids who grew up with Gen 5 are now more wired and online. It's an inevitable cycle that we're seeing every generation go through, and it will continue ad infinitum with every Pokemon game that comes in the future.
Well they were hurt more in terms of fan reception and not actual quality. Games like BW and SM are more story-oriented in such a way that they definitely appeal more to the more serious crowd, while games like DP and XY have broader appeal and stick well with even casual audiences. I personally really enjoyed Gen 7 despite the issues with replayability (my only real personal qualm with it), and Gen 5 is my personal favorite generation, but the story-oriented approach they take, while very good (and I loved it), has a less broad appeal in terms of what kinds of audiences will like it.
Gens 4 and 6 were likely mainly more well known because they were graphical "jumps" and brought new features and changed up old Pokemon, while having a lot of features that appeal to casual audiences, while Gens 5 and 7 focused on taking what their predecessors did and polishing it without focusing too much on adding cool new "features". The odd numbered generations also have a bit more of a serious appeal than the even numbered generations, and they were definitely meant for more serious Pokemon fans to enjoy.
Gen 9 is hard to say when it happens since it's still at least two years away from now, but I imagine quality wise, it will definitely be better than Gen 8, and I imagine that like SM and BW, it will be the best the Switch has delivered in terms of Pokemon, but it might end up being a bit more divisive in fan reception like BW and SM were.
Really Masters (EX), did you really have to pair one of the underage girls with (Mega) Lopunny and put her in a bunny outfit?
Note her Sync Move is "Heart-Thumping Normal Impact".
Also it took seeing her EX clothes to realize she's wearing tights.
If you wanted to pair a girl with Lopunny to put them in a bunny outfit I would have gone with Whitney... assuming they wanted to stick with the Gym Leader's Type specialty.
Cause at the same time we're getting a rather dandy-looking Easter Burgh... partnered with Togepi. Huh. While I like how Burgh looks, at the same time if they're going to throw Togepi randomly on someone I think it would be one of the player characters (or, you know, Misty). Maybe instead of Togepi have the other Pokemon being Exeggcute. Lopunny Whitney for the fanservice, Exeggcute Elio so that it can later evolve into Alolan Exeggutor for the lols.
Note her Sync Move is "Heart-Thumping Normal Impact".
Also it took seeing her EX clothes to realize she's wearing tights.
If you wanted to pair a girl with Lopunny to put them in a bunny outfit I would have gone with Whitney... assuming they wanted to stick with the Gym Leader's Type specialty.
Cause at the same time we're getting a rather dandy-looking Easter Burgh... partnered with Togepi. Huh. While I like how Burgh looks, at the same time if they're going to throw Togepi randomly on someone I think it would be one of the player characters (or, you know, Misty). Maybe instead of Togepi have the other Pokemon being Exeggcute. Lopunny Whitney for the fanservice, Exeggcute Elio so that it can later evolve into Alolan Exeggutor for the lols.
Unpopular opinion: I really, really like ORAS. Granted, I'm biased because Sapphire was the first game I played, but Alpha Sapphire felt so... right. It felt like they took the region I loved, and added in flavour and personality to all of the nooks and crannies. Things like Flannery's and Norman's gyms, the oceanic museum, and most of all the Aqua Hideout were areas that I found straight up fun to explore. I've got some issues with the games (battle frontier...) but overall I think that they get too much hate.
This is not true. In fact, most modern Pokémon games have pretty good places to train. However, it should be noted that when I talk about training spots, I am mainly referring to the post-game and not the main game (when I play Pokémon, I usually spend 80-90% of my playtime in the post-game). If we look at what the modern games have, there’s the Pokénav and Secret Bases in the Hoenn games, the VS. Seeker in FR/LG and D/P/P, the Nimbasa Stadiums in B/W as well as Black Tower/White Treehollow in B2/W2, and the Battle Chateau and the restaurants in X/Y. In comparison, S/M has nothing like this. The best they have is Morimoto, who can only be battled once a day. Other than that, they have the Battle Buffet which you are forced to exploit in order to battle an infinite number of trainers there every day (this was “fixed” in US/UM). The only other games which are as bad as S/M would be HG/SS. While you can rebattle trainers through the phone system, I find it to be so badly executed to the point that it frustrated me to no end when I tried to train Pokémon in these games. US/UM were a little better than S/M thanks to the Gym and being able to battle wild Chansey and Audino, while S/S gets a pass thanks to the DLC which added more trainers to battle on a daily basis. Not sure about LGP/E since I haven’t played them, but from what I have understood, they have Gym Leader rematches. So that’s at least something.
To me, it feels like they purposely made it as hard as possible to train Pokémon in S/M (at least past level 60), which is one of the biggest reasons as for why they are my least favorite Pokémon games from the 3D era (so far). They are also the games that introduced Hyper Training, which requires a Pokémon to be at level 100 in order to be able to make use of it… bad game design or what?
Regarding shiny hunting, I’m surprised you didn’t like X/Y more because I remember that they were pretty popular among shiny hunters. There was the Friend Safari which was good for easy shiny hunting, as well as the Poké Radar (though the DexNav in OR/AS is more efficient). Regarding the Shiny Charm, I feel that it is the kind of item which shouldn’t be given to you for free. I think it is something that really should require some serious effort before you get it, so I like how it is given as a reward for completing the Pokédex.
No worries, I think we are all very biased towards the games we like. I know I am at least.
I can understand Gen 3 and 5, but Gen 7? It had so much focus on Gen 1 that I just don’t see how it could be hurt by a "lack" of it (in terms of sales and marketing at least - in terms of fan reception, then I definitely see how having too much nostalgia could hurt it). While it didn’t have Gyms or HMs, it had so many other Gen 1 references throughout the entire generation. If anything, I think Gen 7 definitely benefitted in terms of sales and marketing by having a lot of nostalgia focus… which is actually a bit sad to see. I don’t like how it seems like Pokémon must have a heavy nostalgia focus in order to sell well. Fortunately, it seems like it might not necessarily always be the case as S/S has been selling very well, much better than S/M, even if they have a much lower nostalgia focus. So that’s good, in a way.
Such as? On top of my head, I can’t really think of many things that Gen 7 improved upon from Gen 6. The only ones that really stand out are the improvements to traditional breeding (which has been improved in pretty much every generation) and the Battle Tree (even though it came at the cost of removing Triple and Rotation battles, but that’s actually okay with me). I feel that Gen 7 removed a lot of good features from Gen 6 without really having a proper replacement for many of them. Or making some of them just plain worse, like the training spots as I have talked about before, the Pokémon distribution, having even more fan pandering to Gen 1, the removal of the National Dex (which unfortunately became a new standard for the series), worse use of the touch screen outside of battles, or how we went from the DexNav to the SOS mechanics, quite possibly one of the biggest steps down in the history of the series.
Since it seems like few people agree with me on this, I guess I should just make it into an actual unpopular opinion at this point: I really liked X/Y. They are my third favorite games in the series (or second favorites, depending on how you count), beaten only by B/W and B2/W2. I also like OR/AS a whole lot (I’d rank then directly below X/Y), and as said, Gen 6 is my second favorite. In comparison, I don’t have any strong positive feelings for S/M, at least not anymore. I was honestly quite disappointed with them when they were released, they did not live up to my sky-high expectations and they have some really big gameplay issues. Apart from the lack of training spots, there’s also the SOS mechanics, the Pokémon distribution, the unbalanced level/difficulty curve and the massive fan pandering to Kanto/Gen 1, to name a few. This is not mindless hating on them, nor does it have anything to do with the 3D era of Pokémon being bad (which I don’t fully agree with, it is a step down from Gen 5 for sure but still fairly good). Instead, I’m giving some (constructive, I hope) criticism towards S/M since they have a lot of issues when it comes to several things I consider fundamentally important in Pokémon games.
I honestly feel that S/M are overrated nowadays because of how much appreciation they seem to get while their flaws mostly go unnoticed. Which is ironic, because in the past (when they were the newest games), I almost felt like they got too harshly criticized. In comparison, Gen 6 seems like it can’t be talked about without fans criticizing it for every little thing it does wrong. That said, Gen 7 is still my third favorite, but that is mainly because of US/UM and not because of S/M. I also feel like US/UM are underrated and underappreciated compared to S/M, it seems like fans of Gen 7 generally prefer S/M while I personally find US/UM to be the superior Alola games.
I also have another unpopular opinion which I don’t think I have ever posted here before even if I have had this opinion since 2006. I might as well get it done now, better late than never. Either way, it is this: Gardevoir is my least favorite Pokémon. This has nothing to do with its design (even if I no longer like its design after it became my least favorite), but rather due to the fact that I had some very bad experiences with it back in Gen 3. I used Gardevoir on two of my in-game teams in Ruby and XD, and while I don’t remember exactly how it performed, I recall that I was a bit let down by it at times. Then I decided to use a Gardevoir at my team for the Battle Arena in Emerald. On that team, it performed very badly, and I lost 5 times with it on my way to Gold Greta. After that, I decided to swap it out for a Starmie, and that proved to be a very good decision. With Starmie, I made it all the way to Gold Greta on my first try! And along the way, Starmie only fainted once, which was in Battle #55. After that, I became so disappointed by Gardevoir that it became my least favorite Pokémon. I have never used it for anything serious afterwards, unless I am in a format where you have to get rid of all bias in order to be successful (like in the Battle Factory/Agency). I don’t care much for Mega Gardevoir either, it is my least favorite Mega by default and I’ll never use it for anything serious. Gardevoir getting a Fairy-type in Gen 6 did nothing for me either despite Fairy becoming/being my favorite type.
Onto something else. I decided to post my deeper(?) thoughts about remakes which I mentioned in another post here a few days ago, just so I can finally get this over and done with. I have said before that I don’t like Pokémon remakes all that much and that they are my least favorite type of Pokémon games. I have thought about this a bit more now with the announcement of BD/SP and I think I might have figured out another reason why.
I think one very big issue is regarding the fandom and how the fandom is always on heavy demand for remakes. I have thought about why the Pokémon fandom is always so demanding for new remakes all the time, and I think I have found the answer. The fandom in general doesn’t seem to like the newest/current generation all that much. Every Generation since Gen 3 has received a lot of hate within the online fandom. Most notably Gen 5 and 8, but Gen 3, 4, 6 and 7 got their share of it as well. The complaints often vary depending on the generation, but they will always be there in some shape or form.
However, while the fandom doesn’t like the current generation, it seems to be very fond of a certain previous generation. Or sometimes more than one. During Gen 3-4, those generations were hated while the fandom demanded remakes of G/S until they finally happened, which was at the end of Gen 4. During Gen 5-6, those generations were hated while the fandom demanded remakes of R/S until they happened, this time at the end of Gen 6. During Gen 7-8, the fandom demanded remakes of D/P… and now, they are about to happen. Previously, there was also a fair bit of demand for a Kanto/Gen 1 re-remake which did happen with LGP/E. If this continues, it means that the fandom will start demanding B/W remakes as soon as the upcoming remakes have been released. If we even have to wait for that long, it feels like the demand for a B/W remake has already started a while ago, before the announcement of BD/SP.
My possibly unpopular opinion is that I disagree with the fandom here. I don’t want any more Pokémon remakes, I don’t like them and I don’t want them to happen. While the fandom in general tends to look towards the past (which Game Freak seems obliged to follow, sadly), I want to look towards the future instead. If the current generation isn’t the best, I feel there’s more room for improvement with a new generation (or something like a third/alternate version, sequel or DLC). Granted, moving on to the next generation is not necessarily always a step forward, but I do personally feel that new generations and follow-up games are more enjoyable than remakes.
I feel that from Gen 1-5, the games were mostly getting better with each release (the only exceptions were Yellow and HG/SS). But the fandom at large seems to feel the opposite way, the current games are always the worst ever while a certain past generation is viewed as the utter perfection of what a Pokémon game should be, uphold by nostalgia and completely immune to all forms of criticism. Meanwhile, the current games get heavy criticism for every little thing they do wrong, and everything they do right is ignored. It feels like the fandom wants Pokémon to go backwards and go back to the past, while I want the series to move forward instead.
I don’t really like the way the fandom views the current generation and our extreme demand for remakes. I guess the fault of all of this is, sadly, FR/LG. Because they were made, the fandom wanted more remakes. I don’t know if there was any super huge fan demand for Kanto remakes back in the day as I wasn’t active in the online fandom back then, but I honestly doubt it. If there’s anyone reading this who was in the fandom back then, please tell me about the situation back then because I would love to hear about it.
I know I have generalized a lot here when I say “the fandom” since the Pokémon fandom is not a hivemind. I am fully aware that reality is very different from this, things aren’t really this black and white. I simplified things a bit here since I’m not sure how this should have been written otherwise (and I am too lazy to try to re-write it in a more proper way, sorry).
So that’s one reason as for why I don’t like remakes. Another reason is because I think they fail to fix all the problems with the originals. FR/LG fixed some issues with R/B/Y but not everything, HG/SS did little to nothing to improve upon G/S/C, and OR/AS improved upon R/S/E a bit but could still have done even more improvements. Not sure about LGP/E as I haven’t played them, but I get the impression that they weren’t even as good as FR/LG.
Another reason is the fact that I have only liked half of the remakes released so far. I liked FR/LG and OR/AS, but HG/SS are my least favorite Pokémon games, and I have no desire to ever play LGP/E since they just don’t appeal to me. In comparison, I have liked every first pair and third version. As well as every sequel, alternate version and expansion pass, though there has only been one of each for those so far. So my appreciation rate for remakes is only at 50%, while it is at 100% for all other types of Pokémon games.
Because of all this, I don’t want B/W remakes to happen. Gen 5 is my favorite and B/W are my favorite Pokémon games (along with B2/W2), but I don’t want them remade. Why? Because I love B/W but I don’t Pokémon remakes, and I have a feeling that if they were to be remade, they wouldn’t live up to the greatness of the originals. The fact that the series has been declining in recent generations is also a factor which has made me very worried about a future B/W remake. There is of course the chance that the B/W remakes could turn out to be successful and amazing games… but I sort of doubt it. I’d much rather see something like BW3 or a BW0 (especially if L:A turns out to be a success).
Its been a while since I replied here, so I'm going to talk about a few things:
On the topic of mini games: I actually really liked the Sinnoh contests. I love customization, and dress up was one of my favorite things to do in video games. The dancing was one one was fine as well, though I admit I always messed it up when I was a kid because I was a complete noob who had no idea that you were supposed to time the beats based off the host.
The worst mini game was Musicals no doubt. If there's anything in Gen 5 that deserves criticism, no exception, its Musicals. They are literally the Sinnoh Contest but worse. For starters, while the dressing mini game returns, the actual performance is replaced by a very shallow mini game who's only function is to wait for the opposing Pokemon to perform an action and then press yours to steal the spotlight. That's literally it. What's worse only Pokemon with arms could use the props, so if your Pokemon did not have any hands, they would just sit there, unable to steal the spotlight.
I don't know what happened with Musicals. I had feeling they wanted to put contests in BW but decided against it last minute because they wanted to keep it unique and contests were already in the last two gens, but I guess there wasn't enough time to create a new mini game from scratch , so they just took some parts of the contest feature and called it a day.
When I talk about the decline of Pokemon, I usually don't compare it to games in the other series, but rather other games. Other games usually have things like multiple save files, difficulty settings, skip cutscenes, good graphics, and large, giant areas to explore. Whenever I play other games I always note that these games have the massive QOL improvements that Pokemon doesn't have. It makes the games feel slower and behind other games in the series.
On the topic of XY in particular, I've played through Y at least 4 times, and I agree that its giant Pokedex is its saving grace. The options are amazing: You can get a Dragon type by the 2nd Gym, which is the only time in the series that has happened not counting the raid resets in SwSh. Even with its easiness, the variety of Pokemon obtainable makes it fun to replay. B-tier for me.
USM are an odd spot for me. While I agree that they came too soon, and a lot of content should have been in SM, and them and SwSh are the reasons why I'm burnt on the franchise, I will admit I'd rather play them over SM over their gameplay improvements, and recommend them over SM for anyone who prefers gameplay over story, and vanilla SM for players who prefer the latter.
On the topic of mini games: I actually really liked the Sinnoh contests. I love customization, and dress up was one of my favorite things to do in video games. The dancing was one one was fine as well, though I admit I always messed it up when I was a kid because I was a complete noob who had no idea that you were supposed to time the beats based off the host.
The worst mini game was Musicals no doubt. If there's anything in Gen 5 that deserves criticism, no exception, its Musicals. They are literally the Sinnoh Contest but worse. For starters, while the dressing mini game returns, the actual performance is replaced by a very shallow mini game who's only function is to wait for the opposing Pokemon to perform an action and then press yours to steal the spotlight. That's literally it. What's worse only Pokemon with arms could use the props, so if your Pokemon did not have any hands, they would just sit there, unable to steal the spotlight.
I don't know what happened with Musicals. I had feeling they wanted to put contests in BW but decided against it last minute because they wanted to keep it unique and contests were already in the last two gens, but I guess there wasn't enough time to create a new mini game from scratch , so they just took some parts of the contest feature and called it a day.
When I talk about the decline of Pokemon, I usually don't compare it to games in the other series, but rather other games. Other games usually have things like multiple save files, difficulty settings, skip cutscenes, good graphics, and large, giant areas to explore. Whenever I play other games I always note that these games have the massive QOL improvements that Pokemon doesn't have. It makes the games feel slower and behind other games in the series.
On the topic of XY in particular, I've played through Y at least 4 times, and I agree that its giant Pokedex is its saving grace. The options are amazing: You can get a Dragon type by the 2nd Gym, which is the only time in the series that has happened not counting the raid resets in SwSh. Even with its easiness, the variety of Pokemon obtainable makes it fun to replay. B-tier for me.
That's sadly the result of being a merchandise driven franchise- they are always going to put a lot of Gen 1 references because they want adults who played RB to buy the game for their children because they recognize the brand. Its a pretty common marketing technique, and Pokemon isn't the only victim. But I agree that I'm not really a fan of how nostalgia has taken over the games from Gen 6. Personally, I think Gen 4 did the " fan service " for old Pokemon the best it was evenly split relatively well among 3,2, and 1, and these were all new Pokemon given to Pokemon who needed an evolution, not because they were popular in terms of merchandise, specifically Togetic, Yanma, and Dusknoir to name a few. Sadly, due to the negative reception, they discontinued it until Gen 8, where I think it was handled poorly because Galarian Variants get the evolution, while the base forms of Farfetch'd and Corolla still suck.
I'm guessing they do remakes is because they are an easy way to create a new game to fill the annual release, since they can save time on things like region and character design.
I agree, I feel like Gardevoir gets too much hype because it was that rare encounter that Wally used. I've always found Espeon and Alakazam much better in terms of pure Psychic types that are special attackers; in addition, I always found to have more success with Gallade over Gardevoir, and I like Gallade more personally. I find it a lot more useful as Dark Type check thanks to STAB Close Combat which can threaten Steel types as well, not to mention a much higher speed tier when Gallade mega evolves. Gardevoir was popular VGC 14 and 15 though, and was very good on those meta games.
I like SM too, but agree it had some pretty bad flaws, like how Kanto had too much presence in the Alola Dex, more than Alola in fact. For returning generations, the newer it was, the less Pokemon there was, with Kalos, being worst offender, with only Talonflame, Goodra, Klefki, and Zygarde in the SM Dex as fully evolved Kalos Pokemon, And that's before all the Kanto references, with notably the Alolan forms being Kanto Pokemon only.
USM are an odd spot for me. While I agree that they came too soon, and a lot of content should have been in SM, and them and SwSh are the reasons why I'm burnt on the franchise, I will admit I'd rather play them over SM over their gameplay improvements, and recommend them over SM for anyone who prefers gameplay over story, and vanilla SM for players who prefer the latter.
I have to say, when I played Platinum recently, contests were pretty fun too. Every pokemon game above gen 3 always have had one or two minigames to distract you try to become the champion. Pokemon contests can be fun when you're 8, and still be fun once you're older. I didn't actually play platinum before 2020, but it still had the same effect on me. It's so simple, yet so fun to play again and again. Dressing up my dumb fish is funny.
I will admit that XY were pretty good Shiny Hunting games. However, the Poke Radar is very hard to use, and yes, the DexNav is better, but I have more Shinies from random Poke Radar fast music than my zero DexNav Shinies
Friend Safari is cool too, but it isn't quite as efficient for finding Shinies as Gen 7's (USUM's) SOS Battles, but Friend Safari is great as well. The difference to me is just that the Friend Safari gets boring when it's all you're doing, but really any Shiny method gets boring fast except for Poke radar and DexNav, because they require you to be so active. However, once I get a Timid or Modest Synchronizer, I'll probably like hunting Charmeleon more in the Safari than Masuda Breeding, because if anything gets boring quick, it's hatching hundreds of Pokemon and keeping five, plus the Shiny. The advantage to the safari is that you can do it easily in the background and still be able to notice a sparkle, like dual shiny hunting in both friend safari and SwSh. I don't have Sword yet though, so I'm just SOS Battling to my heart's content.
The National Dex was just something I always felt was too big of a challenge; 400 Pokemon in the USUM dex was enough for me. Transferring from older Gens would be helpful too, but I don't have anything from Gens 4 or 5. The SwSh expansion dexes are also easier for me, since I can atcually transfer good mons from the games I do have. But that's really just me being lazy, so...
I agree that USUM was better than SM, which I feel should be more popular of an opinion. SM seemed to be a worse game in general, SOS counter resetting after 255, the menus being worse from a design perspective, harder to get rare Z-Moves like Snorlium Z and all that. The Ultra Wormhole was a very fun minigame, and though it is disliked because Shinies are too easy, I argue that these aren't really the greatest Shinies anyway. Most Gen 7 Shiny Hunters would be Masuda Hatching Charmander or something, not Swablu. It also allows you to get decent IVs on Pokemon, so does SOS Battling. The Ultra Wormhole minigame is also super fun. USUM also added more Pokemon to the region's dex, which I (at first) thought totally sucked because I wanted the Shiny Charm ASAP, but eventually I came to like the general distribution of Pokemon. SM also doesn't have the epic Karate Gi or the Nurse Joy outfit, which I think is a cool secondary reward for completing the dex. USUM made it easier to get FC in festival plaza with the Battle Agency. And USUM...has Poipole. I mean, no contest, am I right?
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I actually prefer SOS over the DexNav. While you can't get Pokémon with egg moves that way, I find it to be way easier to control.
It is the other way around for me. I liked the Musicals but I was never super fond of the Sinnoh Contests, and I guess I should go a bit more into detail as for why. Don't know if this is unpopular though.On the topic of mini games: I actually really liked the Sinnoh contests. I love customization, and dress up was one of my favorite things to do in video games. The dancing was one one was fine as well, though I admit I always messed it up when I was a kid because I was a complete noob who had no idea that you were supposed to time the beats based off the host.
The worst mini game was Musicals no doubt. If there's anything in Gen 5 that deserves criticism, no exception, its Musicals. They are literally the Sinnoh Contest but worse. For starters, while the dressing mini game returns, the actual performance is replaced by a very shallow mini game who's only function is to wait for the opposing Pokemon to perform an action and then press yours to steal the spotlight. That's literally it. What's worse only Pokemon with arms could use the props, so if your Pokemon did not have any hands, they would just sit there, unable to steal the spotlight.
I don't know what happened with Musicals. I had feeling they wanted to put contests in BW but decided against it last minute because they wanted to keep it unique and contests were already in the last two gens, but I guess there wasn't enough time to create a new mini game from scratch , so they just took some parts of the contest feature and called it a day.
First, the dress-up part. Being able to dress up your Pokémon with various things was fun, and this one would have been completely okay... if it wasn't for the time limit. That more or less ruined it for me. I guess they added it because they didn't want people to "cheat" by looking up which accessories were the best for each category, but I think they took it too far. Having only one minute to dress up always felt very stressful to me.
Second, the dancing part. I'll admit that I was never very good at it, though I never practiced that much regarding (which in turn was because of how I wasn't very fond of the Contests to start with). Still, this one was probably the most acceptable part of the Sinnoh Contests. I think it should be possible to master it if you just practice a bit.
Third and last, the actual contest part. I disliked how they changed many things from R/S/E. Many moves had their effect changed, the most notable being how there were now few to no moves which jammed the opponents (don't remember exactly), which I thought was among the more fun parts of the Hoenn Contests. Having three judges was also annoying because you got a lower score if you appealed for the same judge as another participant, making the whole thing more luck-based, which was extremely annoying.
In general, I disliked how they changed the Contests for the worse in the Sinnoh games. Fortunately, you only had to beat one Master Contest in order to get the TC upgrade, so that's what I did in my Sinnoh games. I am pretty sure I used an Ambipom which got to participate in the Coolness category At one point, I had planned to make an entire "Contest team" on D/P, with one member for each category. But I scrapped it because once again, I didn't like the Contests.
I didn't really like the Poffin baking minigame either. I'll admit that I never played it that much, so I never got very good at it. But when I played it, it felt like the touch screen didn't react properly to my commands, which was very annoying. Thanksfully, Platinum sort of fixed this by allowing you to buy Poffins instead of making them, which was neat (though I don't think I ever used them for anything else than to evolve some Feebas into Milotic).
On a positive note, there is a lot of potential to make the Contests and the Poffin baking more enjoyable in BD/SP, which I really hope they will do!
And I really liked the Pokémon Musicals. They are one of my favorite minigames in the series. I think they did everything just right. They were short, simple and fun, and I definitely prefer them over the Sinnoh Contests or the Pokéathlon as I'm not particularly fond of either of them. Not having a time limit for the dress-up part of the Musicals was also great. That said, I can totally understand why other players don't like them. They have gotten some very heavily criticism over the years though, so I would't go as far as to say that they deserve more criticism.
Yeah, that's probably one big reason. I agree that Gen 4 actually did it pretty well, but I disagree about Gen 8. I like the Galarian forms and the Galarian evolutions, I thought they were really good. And I'm not surprised that the original forms got nothing because of the negative reception the new evolutions in Gen 4 got from the fandom back then.
Same here, I like Alakazam, Espeon and Gallade way better than Gardevoir. I have used those three to great success on various teams, including Mega Alakazam and Mega Gallade as well (the latter is one of my favorite Megas).
Same here. I think S/M and US/UM are the reasons for my current burnout on Pokémon (not so much S/S though), I played the Alola games so much during 2016-19 that I practically overplayed them and I am still tired of them even if I haven't played US/UM seriously since before the release of S/S. Currently, I have zero current desire to go back to them because I still feel so "done" with them. And while I personally don't think story is that important in Pokémon, I would recommend S/M over US/UM to anyone who considers story to be one of the most important parts of the games.
This is interesting. It is pretty much the exact opposite for me, I find the DexNav extremely convenient and fun to use. It requires a bit of skill but I found it fairly easy to master. It isn't perfect, but I think it is really good and among the closest the series has gotten to what I think can become the ultimate encounter system in Pokémon. In comparison, the SOS mechanics are one of my least favorite features in the entire series, I dislike basically everything about them. The only thing I actively used them for was to get the wild Pokémon that were exclusive to them, then I never purposely used them again (and I would have turned them off for all eternity if that had been possible, but sadly, it isn't).
I think one issue I have with SOS chaining is that it just felt too mindless for me... and not in a good way. It still required a bit of concentration, but for me, I found it too easy to lose focus when doing them. I am also terrible at multitasking, not to mention that when I play Pokémon, I want to do something that requires my full attention. I could never bother with SOS chains for anything more than to find the Pokémon that were SOS-exclusive. Hunting for things like HAs, perfect IVs or shinies through SOS chains would have been a nightmare for me. Regarding those things, I prefer other methods, such as Dream World/Hidden Grottoes/Friend Safari/Hordes/DexNav/Raids for HAs, just plain breeding for IVs (or Hyper Training in some cases), as well as RNG or TSV hatching for shinies (I am not a shiny hunter, so if I want a shiny, I'll make sure the odds of getting one are 100%).
Since I don't feel like making another long post with everything I dislike about the SOS mechanics, I decided to include some old posts where I went into deeper thoughts about why I don't like them. Find those posts below:
Regarding what I said in the last post, I am extremely happy that they got rid of the SOS mechanics in Gen 8! Quite possibly one of the best things S/S did for the series if you ask me.
I should also say that I am quite surprised to see that there are players who prefer the SOS mechanics over the DexNav. I never thought there was anyone who felt that way, probably because I am of the complete opposite opinion and sometimes I have a hard time seeing something from the opposite point of view when I have strong feelings about a certain feature in a game. But hey, to each their own. Sometimes it is better to just accept than to try to understand.