I want to address two things.
Concept wise I guess they're trying to do two things: 1) breathe life into previously worthless Pokémon like Beedrill; and 2) make it apparent what is the ace Pokémon or center piece of a team. However, I think cross-gen evo's did a much better job of breathing life into older Pokémon, like what Johto and Sinnoh did, without creating balance issues and overly busting Pokémon, which I'll get to in a minute. Second, I don't think the ace status should be handed to a Pokémon in such a blatant way. First, it overshadows the rest of the team members. But also, Metagross didn't need a Mega to prove to be the ace of Steven's team. Nor does Garchomp need a Mega to be the ace of Cynthia's team. Infernape doesn't need a Mega to be the ace of my Sinnoh playthroughs; it earns that status all on its own. Mega's just seem like an over the top way to cater to the "ace" concept.
And in execution, Mega's are spectacularly flawed. Why the fuck do Metagross and Garchomp even need Mega's when, I don't know, something like Butterfree doesn't get one? If Beedrill got one, why not Butterfree? Just using it as an example to make my point. And in playthroughs you have to purposely nerf yourself to not use Mega's against trainers who do not also have a Mega or you end up becoming completely OP. Unlike Set mode, no healing items in battle, and not grinding, it's honestly pretty hard for me to rationalize this kind of handicap. It removes any kind of tension that might exist in the main campaign. Which kind of speaks to the dull difficulty of the Gen 6 games, Exp. Share issues aside.
Mega's just seem like a flawed concept with abysmal execution and I think a lot of people like them because they seem like the best of the three post Gen 5 gimmicks. Which I agree they are. But that doesn't make them good by any stretch.
While I do agree that some of the Megas like Houndoom, Altaria, and Banette could have ( and probably would be better off ) as cross-gens, I want to address two issues:
1. Ace Pokemon getting Megas. Yes, Megas also exist to promote merchandise, which is the reason why Charizard and Mewtwo got two, and Pokemon like Garchomp and Gengar got one. Remember, Pokemon is a merchandise driven franchise, so people who did not play Pokemon for long time will se their favorite Pokemon getting Megas and want to play the game. At least Megas were not soley Gen 1 unlike Alola Forms and Gigantamax.
2. The biggest issue I have is the subjective nature of how a Pokemon's stats correlate to its role. If that was the case, Articuno would be in the same tier as Zapdos, or Typhlosion as Charizard. People say Salamence should not get a Mega Evolution due to being a Psuedo-Legendary, but Goodra is also a Psuedo-Legendary and its in NU. Metagross is also another case of a Pokemon who people argue should not have gotten a Mega, but its in RU as of now. And that’s only looking a Smogon tiers. Dragonite gets significantly less usage than Goodra in VGC, does Dragonite deserve a Mega over Goodra in that case?
And that goes back to another topic I want to discuss: Difficulty. Before I go into this, I want to bring up other observations. I’ve been hanging on Fire Emblem Forums recently, and I have often noticed a huge series of complaints against Fire Emblem: Three Houses, with some people saying it’s the worst series; here are some of the complaints: “ The Monastery is a chore “, “ The Minigames are pointless “, “ Maps are too simple “, and the “ difficulty is too easy “. Don’t those complaints sound familiar? Anyway, I think it’s a shame that people feel that way about the monastery and minigames, because I really do believe that they really fit in the world of Three Houses very well and helps brings out it themes; in other words, Three Houses is a game that rewards you for taking the time to learn about your peers and participating in activities with them. People who just wanna go from battle to battle with little to no break are not going to enjoy the game because that’s not how it was supposed to be played.
But enough about that. I want to talk about the Map Design particular. Fire Emblem has a rough history especially in the west. The first five games were never localized in the west, and when they did start localizing them, they did not sell well. A big factor is how difficult the older games were. Not only did they feature huge maps with multiple objectives as well as being a huge time sink, Fire Emblem was famous for permadeath, or when Charcters die, they are permanently removed from the game. This made the games notoriously difficult, which is probably why when they started localizing the games in the west, they struggled to be super popular: The learning curve being too difficult really made it hard for newcomers to be invested. There wasn’t any option to turn off permadeath until New Mystery of the Emblem, which was the 11th game in the series. Radiant Dawn was widely criticized for being too difficult by western critics, and difficulty settings were mistranslated in English: Hard is Lunatic, Normal is Hard. Ever since Awakening, which saved the franchise form cancellation, the maps become a lot simpler in design with more simple objectives like “Defeat the Boss” instead of “Seize”. The developers noted the complaints and tried to appease both veteran players and casual players with Fates, with the Conquest Campaign being designed to be a challenge with complex map objectives and limited resources, while Birthright features simple maps and allowed grinding making it ideal for beginners. Despite that, they went back to simpler maps and objectives in Three Houses. Why? Simply put, most people or Casual players don’t like, or don’t have the patience to handle super complex maps the older titles. Fire Emblem was almost canceled, and they don’t want that to ever happen again. That’s why the newer games have been designed with a casual approach in mind, they want someone who started with Three Houses to stick until the end of the game- they do not want them to quit just because the game was too difficult.
Newcomers will likely have some difficulties with Three Houses. I know that for a fact because I am a veteran and gave a copy of Three Houses to my brother, and he had some pretty hard times in the game. Even I had found Three Houses difficult at some points, and I am a veteran player.
So what does this have to do with Pokémon? Well, all the logic I’ve used in the paragraphs above applies here. Just because a small minority of people find the game easy, doesn’t mean others will. For someone playing XY as a veteran might find it easy and find Megas overkill, but for a newcomer Megas might just be what makes the game passable after being too difficult. I’ve played XY several times, and in one particular run I actually struggled against Olympia because her Meowstic set up too many Calm Minds and I did not have a dark type. I actually lost, and yes, as a veteran player, I lost in XY. How tragic!
In conclusion, when looking at design choices like difficulty, it’s more important to consider casual or one time players, people who only play game once. Those are the people who vastly outnumber those who do Ironman runs as well as those who play the same games multiple times. While I can echo some people express disappointment that Pokémon games have become streamlined recently, I can understand why they do it from a business perspective and the fact that most hardcore players who do things like nuzlockes are in a minority and do not weigh much in comparison to the casual/newcomers.
