(Little) Things that annoy you in Pokémon

[DrumstickGaming]

Here's something I really think Game Freak dropped the ball on from Generation 7 onward: boss room theming. But let's start from the beginning.

Generic rooms! Granted, it was on the Game Boy, so this is forgivable. I love the purple in Lance's room though.

in FRLG they gave em pillars but...yeah still kinda generic. What about Let's Go?

Okay that looks WAY better, to the point I kinda wanna get the game just for how it looks. Beautiful. If they had to stick with the pillars, they did the best they could.

Onto GSC.

Yay MORE generic rooms! However...

If there's one thing I really DO like about HGSS, it's the Elite 4 room design. Excellent color palettes used, and it set the stage for Gen 5 later. Gen 3...

G-g-generic and yes it's on the GBA

Those hallways in ORAS are phenomenal. Love everything about them.

Still generic but it looks fine enough and the hallways make up for it. Champion room itself is pretty good too. Onto DPPT (not showing anything BDSP here if people wanna go in blind and I haven't really seen the stuff for myself):

Yeah you can clearly tell this is where each room stopped becoming "same room but with a few different colors." These are great.

Sidenote but I think I like the Champion's Room more in the original DP than in Platinum. Sure black fits Cynthia but that futuristic platform is so cool man!

Unova time!

10/10. Each has fancy animations before the fight and BW2 made the rooms even better. Absolute perfection, and also ties in nicely with the Badge Check Gates of BW1. While Unova routes may be all shades of generic, they didn't hold back one bit with the endgame stuff. XY time!

I think these might even top Unova's. For all the complaints you can have about X and Y, the League visual design shouldn't be one of them.

And then we get the Champion's room, like holy wow, it's like Lance's on crack.

HOW IS THIS USED TO HOUSE THE MOST FORGETTABLE CHARACTER IN THE UNIVERSE IT LOOKS PHENOMENAL-

And then we get Alola. I'm sorry Yung Dramps, but these are terrible.

Okay, they don't look Gen 1 bad, but they look way too similar to each other now - it's obvious they palette swapped the rooms. Look how the same crystal textures are repeated throughout the room. Generic Poke Ball battlefield we've long since moved past is also back. An exceptionally boring 5 second animation where the only one who looks vaguely impressive is maybe...Olivia?

I love the idea of a League in a hollowed out mountain and crystals are always awesome no matter the context but these are seriously underwhelming. Champion room is a bit better but not by much. If it wasn't for the fact the Title Defense challenger was randomized, you'd have a contender for weakest Pokemon League in the series, both visually and debatably gameplay wise (seriously aside from Sturdy nonsense they really are not that hard compared to the rest of the game). Also it goes without saying but all the above pictures are much more comprehensible in the actual games when you can see the animations and such. Edit: After thinking about it some from an in-story perspective it makes since why the rooms are so basic as it was just constructed but that shouldn't be an excuse for lame visual design.

I can't find many SWSH pics from a quick search but aside from coloration they kinda leaned back toward generic too (the Gym Leaders being better at this than the tournament). The tournament is a complete flop visually speaking (gameplay is fine as it is different enough) since it's all on a grassy field. I love how each boss's room in the previous endgames were personalized, but now it's all boring, lame, sucks, and I don't like it. I do like the battles in the tournament, it's just a shame it came at the cost of some of the atmosphere (a stadium would be cool if every Gym wasn't also a stadium).

I can't believe I'm saying this but more games should follow the X and Y / Let's Go visual template.

 

[Wukong]

Here's something I really think Game Freak dropped the ball on from Generation 7 onward: boss room theming. But let's start from the beginning.

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Generic rooms! Granted, it was on the Game Boy, so this is forgivable. I love the purple in Lance's room though.

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in FRLG they gave em pillars but...yeah still kinda generic. What about Let's Go?

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Okay that looks WAY better, to the point I kinda wanna get the game just for how it looks. Beautiful. If they had to stick with the pillars, they did the best they could.

Onto GSC.

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Yay MORE generic rooms! However...

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If there's one thing I really DO like about HGSS, it's the Elite 4 room design. Excellent color palettes used, and it set the stage for Gen 5 later. Gen 3...

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G-g-generic and yes it's on the GBA

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Those hallways in ORAS are phenomenal. Love everything about them.

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Still generic but it looks fine enough and the hallways make up for it. Champion room itself is pretty good too. Onto DPPT (not showing anything BDSP here if people wanna go in blind and I haven't really seen the stuff for myself):

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Yeah you can clearly tell this is where each room stopped becoming "same room but with a few different colors." These are great.

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Sidenote but I think I like the Champion's Room more in the original DP than in Platinum. Sure black fits Cynthia but that futuristic platform is so cool man!

Unova time!

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10/10. Each has fancy animations before the fight and BW2 made the rooms even better. Absolute perfection, and also ties in nicely with the Badge Check Gates of BW1. While Unova routes may be all shades of generic, they didn't hold back one bit with the endgame stuff. XY time!

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I think these might even top Unova's. For all the complaints you can have about X and Y, the League visual design shouldn't be one of them.

And then we get the Champion's room, like holy wow, it's like Lance's on crack.

View attachment 370670

HOW IS THIS USED TO HOUSE THE MOST FORGETTABLE CHARACTER IN THE UNIVERSE IT LOOKS PHENOMENAL-

And then we get Alola. I'm sorry Yung Dramps, but these are terrible.

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Okay, they don't look Gen 1 bad, but they look way too similar to each other now - it's obvious they palette swapped the rooms. Look how the same crystal textures are repeated throughout the room. Generic Poke Ball battlefield we've long since moved past is also back. An exceptionally boring 5 second animation where the only one who looks vaguely impressive is maybe...Olivia?

I love the idea of a League in a hollowed out mountain and crystals are always awesome no matter the context but these are seriously underwhelming. Champion room is a bit better but not by much. If it wasn't for the fact the Title Defense challenger was randomized, you'd have a contender for weakest Pokemon League in the series, both visually and debatably gameplay wise (seriously aside from Sturdy nonsense they really are not that hard compared to the rest of the game). Also it goes without saying but all the above pictures are much more comprehensible in the actual games when you can see the animations and such. Edit: After thinking about it some from an in-story perspective it makes since why the rooms are so basic as it was just constructed but that shouldn't be an excuse for lame visual design.

I can't find many SWSH pics from a quick search but aside from coloration they kinda leaned back toward generic too (the Gym Leaders being better at this than the tournament). The tournament is a complete flop visually speaking (gameplay is fine as it is different enough) since it's all on a grassy field. I love how each boss's room in the previous endgames were personalized, but now it's all boring, lame, sucks, and I don't like it. I do like the battles in the tournament, it's just a shame it came at the cost of some of the atmosphere (a stadium would be cool if every Gym wasn't also a stadium).

I can't believe I'm saying this but more games should follow the X and Y / Let's Go visual template.

This probably belongs in the "little things I like" thread but as a branch off of this I really like the battle backgrounds of the Elite Four matches in HGSS. I swear just the presentation of those games makes me want to play them. The Pokémon series really peaked visually with HGSS in my opinion, whereas I think Gen 5's mix of 2D and 3D resulted in too much pixelation unfortunately. And the 3D games are a bit too washed out in terms of color in my view.

Will:

Koga:

Bruno:

Karen:

Lance:

These have such beautiful shading and colors to underline the Elite Four members' Pokémon. Plus I like the sense of isolation these give off. It looks like you're battling Lance in a golden void completely detached from everything else. Though the difficulty of that fight coupled with the isolation can be a bit anxiety inducing.

 

[DrumstickGaming]

This probably belongs in the "little things I like" thread but as a branch off of this I really like the battle backgrounds of the Elite Four matches in HGSS. I swear just the presentation of those games makes me want to play them. The Pokémon series really peaked visually with HGSS in my opinion, whereas I think Gen 5's mix of 2D and 3D resulted in too much pixelation unfortunately. And the 3D games are a bit too washed out in terms of color in my view.

Will:
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Koga:
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Bruno:
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Karen:
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Lance:
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These have such beautiful shading and colors to underline the Elite Four members' Pokémon. Plus I like the sense of isolation these give off. It looks like you're battling Lance in a golden void completely detached from everything else. Though the difficulty of that fight coupled with the isolation can be a bit anxiety inducing.

It’s a shame such beautiful aesthetics went into a game that’s not only limiting but sadly…boring. I can’t think of one person in recent memory who said they actually like the Team Rocket stuff in Johto in particular: it feels like total filler to me whereas at least in Kanto, they had a leader in Giovanni that, while a joke gameplay wise, was at least memorable.

Gen 5 is pixelated but I’m fine with that as a trade off for the refined gameplay.

 

[Hugin]

XY's visual designs for the E4 were excellent, agreed. I'd argue the Sun/Moon ones were fine as well. Not the best ever, but they got the point across and were clearly different from every other E4, which is good enough for me.

Then there's SwSh. Like, I really like the gyms there. The gym challenges are at least trying to follow Sun/Moon and be different and interesting, and they let you go from the very visually different gym challenges to the massively impressive stadium battles with the soundtrack etc. And the gym stadiums all looking similar is fine, it provides continuity between them. But the E4. Or rather, the whole endgame mess. You have the tournament where you just happen to face all 3 of your rivals across the 2 required fights. Then you face off against 3 gym leaders that you already beat. THEN it's interrupted so you can do the whole Necrozma thing. And then you face Leon. And with the exception of the Necrozma portion, that's 7 battles in a row, all of which take place on the same stadium turf you've been using this whole game. And Leon is the only new oppt for those 7 battles. Between Dynamax and the soundtrack, it should be incredible, instead it comes across as bland.

 

[mertyville]

Being completely unable to get Celebi in Generation 3. Where I live I don't even recall any Celebi distribution at all. There maybe a glitch to get Celebi, but I can imagine it not being very accessable.
Something I appreciate about how buggy Diamond is. Yeah, I got into Tweaking Glitch recently and the only thing that makes me actually like DP. In my next playthrough, I will softreset for another Shaymin and Darkrai.

 

[QuentinQuonce]

Being completely unable to get Celebi in Generation 3. Where I live I don't even recall any Celebi distribution at all. There maybe a glitch to get Celebi, but I can imagine it not being very accessable.

It's accessible via Pokemon Colosseum via the Bonus Disc, but only on the Japanese version, so as long as you imported a Japanese GameCube and a Japanese copy of one of the five GBA games, and had all the relevant linking devices, you could get one. See? Perfectly accessible.

(There were also a couple of downloadable events but only in the USA, Taiwan, and Japan so if you lived in literally any other country oops, hard luck)

PKMN.net ran an April Fools prank that said you could get it in Emerald, briefly raising my pre-teen hopes. (Even though I'd have never have unlocked this anyway because you needed to have 385 Pokemon, which was equally impossible)

 

[Nokocchi]

Being completely unable to get Celebi in Generation 3. Where I live I don't even recall any Celebi distribution at all. There maybe a glitch to get Celebi, but I can imagine it not being very accessable.
Something I appreciate about how buggy Diamond is. Yeah, I got into Tweaking Glitch recently and the only thing that makes me actually like DP. In my next playthrough, I will softreset for another Shaymin and Darkrai.

For the US at least, the event to get Celebi was a mobile expo going from major city to major city in celebration of the 10th Anniversary of Pokemon. I managed to go to the one closest to where I lived and got the Celebi(and a bunch of other 10th anniversary events that you could choose a select few from a big list, which also had many Legendaries, the Kanto starters, and Pokemon that were hard to get or train, like Tyranitar and Alakazam)

 

[QuentinQuonce]

I've still got the LeafGreen save file with the Deoxys island unlocked. It was the sole event in Gen III that was in my tiny little city in the UK and I still can't believe I persuaded my parents to drive me to the area it was being held in.

(Incidentally, can the MysticTicket and the AuroraTicket be shared in Gen III? I know the Eon Ticket and the Secret Key in Gen IV can be passed to other players, but as I've never heard whether this is possible with the other ones I'm presuming not)

 

[mertyville]

regarding the Japanese Bonus disc for Colosseum... you can only download a limited amount of Celebi on anything. Now matter what you try, you can't get more than the set amount of Celebi from a disc making it pretty much worthless once used completely. And I don't think you can softreset it either.
Well, at least you can get a Pikachu too... right?

I am glad there is no such stupid restriction on the Jirachi discs. Even if its a pain, I can keep replaying Saphire or Ruby and download a new Jirachi from Channel.
Speaking of that, Pokemon Ranger Manaphy distribution is likely one of the stupidest things as well. You can get only 1 per cardridge (not safefile). Not as terrible as the Celebi Bonus disc, but seriously you need to get your hands on several copies of DP to get the one you like since softresetting for good nature is for the weak.

 

[R_N]

I've still got the LeafGreen save file with the Deoxys island unlocked. It was the sole event in Gen III that was in my tiny little city in the UK and I still can't believe I persuaded my parents to drive me to the area it was being held in.

(Incidentally, can the MysticTicket and the AuroraTicket be shared in Gen III? I know the Eon Ticket and the Secret Key in Gen IV can be passed to other players, but as I've never heard whether this is possible with the other ones I'm presuming not)

I don't think any of the Mystic Ticket, Aurora Ticket or Old Map can be shared.
And from experience I am pretty sure RS cannot share the Eon Ticket with Emerald.

It's pretty dumb...

regarding the Japanese Bonus disc for Colosseum... you can only download a limited amount of Celebi on anything. Now matter what you try, you can't get more than the set amount of Celebi from a disc making it pretty much worthless once used completely. And I don't think you can softreset it either.
Well, at least you can get a Pikachu too... right?

I am glad there is no such stupid restriction on the Jirachi discs. Even if its a pain, I can keep replaying Saphire or Ruby and download a new Jirachi from Channel.
Speaking of that, Pokemon Ranger Manaphy distribution is likely one of the stupidest things as well. You can get only 1 per cardridge (not safefile). Not as terrible as the Celebi Bonus disc, but seriously you need to get your hands on several copies of DP to get the one you like since softresetting for good nature is for the weak.

The Japanese Bonus Disc probably makes a save file, I imagine? I can't recall hearing of any gamecube games (or, uh, "Games") that can save to the disc. So you can probably just delete the save file and refresh the Celebis?


The Manaphy situation is explicitly worse, by the way. It is not that it can only send to a single cart, it is that the manaphy is tied to the Ranger cart itself. And without hacking (at which point just hack yourself a manaphy anyway, honestly....) there is no way to ever get another Manaphy on that cart. I believe the same thing applies to the other bonus pokemon from Rangers 2 & 3.

 

[Nokocchi]

regarding the Japanese Bonus disc for Colosseum... you can only download a limited amount of Celebi on anything. Now matter what you try, you can't get more than the set amount of Celebi from a disc making it pretty much worthless once used completely. And I don't think you can softreset it either.
Well, at least you can get a Pikachu too... right?

You can start a new save file on Colosseum by deleting your old one, or just use a completely different Memory card, since data can't be saved onto the Gamecube discs themselves. It's a massive pain having to play through the entirety of Colosseum again just to get 48 more Celebi, but it can be done if you want to try can get good IVs and a good nature(though the former doesn't matter if you plan to move it to Gen VII or VIII, and the latter doesn't matter if you want to move it to Gen VIII. Unless you want an Attack IV of 0 or something). Since the GBA games ALSO have to be completed, and you can't soft-reset for a better Celebi, it is a VERY lengthy process to get one that is usable in Gen III-VI.

The Japanese Bonus Disc probably makes a save file, I imagine? I can't recall hearing of any gamecube games (or, uh, "Games") that can save to the disc. So you can probably just delete the save file and refresh the Celebis?

It's more like you can't use the disc at all without a save file of Colosseum where all of the Shadow Pokemon are Purified is on your memory card, and each save file can only send 49 Celebi each(One for your Colosseum save file, and 48 for GBA save files that entered the Hall of Fame). Also reminder that you can only have one Colosseum save file per memory card, and save files cannot be copied.

 

[R_N]

You can start a new save file on Colosseum by deleting your old one, or just use a completely different Memory card, since data can't be saved onto the Gamecube discs themselves. It's a massive pain having to play through the entirety of Colosseum again just to get 48 more Celebi, but it can be done if you want to try can get good IVs and a good nature(though the former doesn't matter if you plan to move it to Gen VII or VIII, and the latter doesn't matter if you want to move it to Gen VIII. Unless you want an Attack IV of 0 or something)



It's more like you can't use the disc at all without a save file of Colosseum where all of the Shadow Pokemon are Purified is on your memory card, and each save file can only send 48 Celebi each. Also reminder that you can only have one Colosseum save file per memory card, and save files cannot be copied.

Ah so that's how it works? Interesting, and time consuming.

you know when they said a limited amount of Celebi I kind of expected a number far lower than 48....

 

[Nokocchi]

Ah so that's how it works? Interesting, and time consuming.

you know when they said a limited amount of Celebi I kind of expected a number far lower than 48....

I edited the post further to also clarify that there are actually 49, one for the Colosseum save file and 48 for any GBA game save files that have beaten the Champion.

 

[Volt-Ikazuchi]

Gen 5 is pixelated

You're starting to see the light brother.

 

[mertyville]

The Japanese Bonus Disc probably makes a save file, I imagine? I can't recall hearing of any gamecube games (or, uh, "Games") that can save to the disc. So you can probably just delete the save file and refresh the Celebis?


The Manaphy situation is explicitly worse, by the way. It is not that it can only send to a single cart, it is that the manaphy is tied to the Ranger cart itself. And without hacking (at which point just hack yourself a manaphy anyway, honestly....) there is no way to ever get another Manaphy on that cart. I believe the same thing applies to the other bonus pokemon from Rangers 2 & 3.

If that is true what you said, then I take back what I said about the Japanese Bonus disc. Regardless, I can't get that into my Gen 3 games so it doesn't matter anyways.

As for the Manaphy situation. Oh boi... that's really stupid and worse than what I remembered. So you need to get your hands on a specific Ranger game...
As for Ranger 2 and 3, they were only Wifi exclusive distributions making them useless even without that "once per cardridge" restriction.
If there is an exploid with external servers, might as well go with the one for the games and download the Event Pokemon directly to DPPHGSS. No need to buy a seperate game.

 

[Sonikku A]

You're starting to see the light brother.

I think they meant more how the affine animations for mons were really cruddy. It's basically tweened flash
it has the identical issues of gen 1 back sprites where they scaled a small sprite to be bigger for backs. So the jagged edges are shown even worse
And then of course, the issue of things with long tails/parts being animated horribly (Mew and Espeon notably), fat/round things randomly heaving in/out, and using Gen 4s worse shading style along with a lot of Gen 4 bases (Pidgeot probably being the worst one)
Don't get me wrong, it was surprising Pokemon got this. It was just WAY too late, and GF was still pretty behind graphically overall. The battle trainer sprites in BW2 are a lot better animated in comparison ironically to mons

 

[R_N]

I think they meant more how the affine animations for mons were really cruddy. It's basically tweened flash
it has the identical issues of gen 1 back sprites where they scaled a small sprite to be bigger for backs. So the jagged edges are shown even worse
And then of course, the issue of things with long tails/parts being animated horribly (Mew and Espeon notably), fat/round things randomly heaving in/out, and using Gen 4s worse shading style along with a lot of Gen 4 bases (Pidgeot probably being the worst one)
Don't get me wrong, it was surprising Pokemon got this. It was just WAY too late, and GF was still pretty behind graphically overall. The battle trainer sprites in BW2 are a lot better animated in comparison ironically to mons

the trainer sprites only have to worry about one set of sprites and unlike Pokemon sprites aren't meant to loop and instead land on a specific pose and freeze. So they can basically do what they did in the 4th gen games &the BW1 rivals, create 3 key poses that link to one another in one often quick motion, and then manipulate the sprite from there to add a little flourish. They also tend to have more restrained poses to begin with. Trainers also avoid the "problem" of the camera zooming in and moving all over, because after the battle starts they do their animation and move off screen.

Meanwhile, Pokemon must always be in motion and there's a ton of them AND they all need perfectly mirrored backsprites. Since they're meant to be more active they want them to do a lot more motions and the best way to do that is, well, hwo they did it. So you've got a lot of pieces meant to move this way and that around the pivot point and a bunch of modifiers like squash and stretch.

Then it just compouds from there, you've got more complex designs doing more complex (ish) motions so the pixelation is more obvious when combined with the camera.


Fantina (and please bulbapedia just let me hotlink these good lord)'s a nice example of this since all the gen 4 trainers reuse their animations

Platinum's 3 poses

And now thanks to the parts system they can wiggle the dress, and make it look like her arms are actually stretching. But it all flows quickly and only once. There actually is some fair amount of pixelation but since it goes by quick and you only see her at the start of the battle you hardly notice. If she had to stay o nthe field it would probably become very pixelated with how she'd have to move to keep idle with lots of wiggling dresses and arm motions.

meanhile dusknoir

He's meant to keep in motion more, so he keeps moving all his parts in various ways and he's got some squash & stretch to make it look more natural so they dont have to actually create more sprites. But all the factors become way more obvious because you're seeing it all the time it's on screen and the camera's going all over

e: Also probably helps that for as awkward as squash & stretch can be on Pokemon they would look significantly weirder if they did it to the sam extent on trainers.

 

[Bakugames]

that dusknoir bw sprite is making me motion sick

 

[Wukong]

I think they meant more how the affine animations for mons were really cruddy. It's basically tweened flash
it has the identical issues of gen 1 back sprites where they scaled a small sprite to be bigger for backs. So the jagged edges are shown even worse
And then of course, the issue of things with long tails/parts being animated horribly (Mew and Espeon notably), fat/round things randomly heaving in/out, and using Gen 4s worse shading style along with a lot of Gen 4 bases (Pidgeot probably being the worst one)
Don't get me wrong, it was surprising Pokemon got this. It was just WAY too late, and GF was still pretty behind graphically overall. The battle trainer sprites in BW2 are a lot better animated in comparison ironically to mons

A particularly bad example of this was Floatzel for me. Below it has a clean, sleek looking sprite in DP. The random head jerk in the Gen 5 animation adds little of value and comes at the cost of exposing those horrible jagged edges on its arms, head and especially its left eye (what the hell is going on there?):



This is to say nothing of the camera jerking around in the middle of battles which came off a bit too hyperactive for me. Overall I just wasn't a fan of the battle presentation in Gen 5. I will say Infernape's Gen 5 sprite looks sick with its flowing hair despite the jagged edges on its arms. So there's that at least:

 

[QuentinQuonce]

And from experience I am pretty sure RS cannot share the Eon Ticket with Emerald.

No, I'm sure it can, I've seen this done. The file giving the ticket has to have received it from an official event, and not from sharing (therefore I, for instance, can't give a ticket I got from someone else to you; they have to give it directly) and they also have to be in position #1 in the record mixing room - from memory I believe that's the green one. Emerald iirc never got a proper event for the Eon Ticket (at least in the west) so it's the only way for Emerald files to get the Eon Ticket. Allegedly there's a limit to the amount of times a ticket can be shared this way - five, perhaps - but I've never seen that verified.

But yes, as you say, dumb.

 

[R_N]

No, I'm sure it can, I've seen this done. The file giving the ticket has to have received it from an official event, and not from sharing (therefore I, for instance, can't give a ticket I got from someone else to you; they have to give it directly) and they also have to be in position #1 in the record mixing room - from memory I believe that's the green one. Emerald iirc never got a proper event for the Eon Ticket (at least in the west) so it's the only way for Emerald files to get the Eon Ticket. Allegedly there's a limit to the amount of times a ticket can be shared this way - five, perhaps - but I've never seen that verified.

But yes, as you say, dumb.

I just remember trying to share the ticket with Emerald and just completely failing to make it work.
Maybe I was in the wrong position, as you say?

 

[Chadlad50]

Despite a lot of the BW sprites looking odd, I honestly quite like some of them

I could be biased because these two are my top 2 favorite Pokemon currently, but they give them a lot of personality, compared to Dragonite's 3D model (Gengar's is fine, I like his little shimmy). That isn't to say they're without flaw but I quite like them

Despite that I generally find there are a lot more that look really weird compared to these two

Look at that tail...

 

[mertyville]

I just realized that the one Tangela I breed and ev trained for a Sun Sweeper and transfered evolving it has its ability changed to Florashield...
That's so freaking stupid. I thought only Skitty and Delcatty get their abilities changed. So do the Gen 3 Pokemon have 2 ability slots and the game looks at the second ability slot changing it to Flora Power if that ability is used?

I have no choice then breed another Tangela but this time in Platin... so much time wasted for nothing...

 

[QuentinQuonce]

I just realized that the one Tangela I breed and ev trained for a Sun Sweeper and transfered evolving it has its ability changed to Florashield...
That's so freaking stupid. I thought only Skitty and Delcatty get their abilities changed. So do the Gen 3 Pokemon have 2 ability slots and the game looks at the second ability slot changing it to Flora Power if that ability is used?

I have no choice then breed another Tangela but this time in Platin... so much time wasted for nothing...

Yes. All Pokemon have an "A" and "B" option for ability in the game code, even if it's a Pokemon like Slaking which only has one ability. Due to this, for Pokemon which gained a second ability in Gen IV, the ability slot can change upon evolving if an individual Pokemon is a "B" Pokemon. I had this happen recently with a Machop: it has has Guts as its sole ability in Gen III, and gains No Guard as a second ability in Gen IV. So Guts is the "A" ability, and No Guard is the "B" ability. A "B" Machop will obviously still just have Guts in Gen III, but if evolved in Gen IV the ability will change to reflect the correct slot.

This only happens to Pokemon which evolve, however. So Absol (which gains Super Luck as its "B" ability in Gen IV) can never have Super Luck if it originated in Gen III.

The Ability Capsule obviously makes this a lot more simple. Hidden Abilities work independently of this system.

 

[Volt-Ikazuchi]

And now thanks to the parts system they can wiggle the dress, and make it look like her arms are actually stretching. But it all flows quickly and only once. There actually is some fair amount of pixelation but since it goes by quick and you only see her at the start of the battle you hardly notice.

Basically, they plugged in the key frames used in Plat and let a computer generate the middle frames. It's a way to cut some costs because instead of animating say, 13 frames, you only need 4.

On the other hand, it's kinda easy to screw up if you rely too much on it. Dusknoir can attest to that.

A particularly bad example of this was Floatzel for me. Below it has a clean, sleek looking sprite in DP. The random head jerk in the Gen 5 animation adds little of value and comes at the cost of exposing those horrible jagged edges on its arms, head and especially its left eye (what the hell is going on there?):

Been saying all this for years and finally everyone sees the light.

I'm moved to tears.