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It's really obvious that the fences being wet is just an excuse to force you through the cutscenes, because they are conveniently dry all of the sudden after you beat Ilima.
I believe the term there is "helicopter parenting": basically, hand-holding – a thing that seems to be appearing more prominently in modern generations where the story has also become more prominent. With the return of Rotom possessing appliances in Sword&Shield, I sincerely believe this will remain to be the case.
I do concur with perceiving the designs that went into similar transitions as being relatively lazy, such as the opening of the captain's barricade and the cutscenes that show when you take a boat to another island: Both are simply Before and After images, especially considering the latter doesn't demonstrate the boats pulling away from the dock (they're literally shown to just be sitting there for ~5 seconds before fading to black, playing a sound, and transitioning to the next island). The same can be applied to the Exeggutor Express.
I actually forgot they existed untill you brought them up. Which creates another point: they have no relevance to the story and as a result, they are able to be considered forgetable. Someone could play that game and not even notice that the fence gates exist...
The fact that the fences are not story relevant isn't what is so annoying about them. They are just some fences, they SHOULD be a seamless and forgettable mechanic for the player.
Now that you mention it though, I can totally see GF making a cutscene where Hau remarks about the fences being wet in attempt to make them 'story relevent'.
After some thinking about which thread this belongs to, I've finally settled for this thread. I don't think it's an unpopular opinion, nor is it relevant to the "favourite place in Pokémon" thread, although it touches on both and it even has a few traces of Little Things I like in it. Anyway, here goes:
The visual quality of the game world took a nosedive between Gen III and Gen IV. More specifically, Sinnoh looks completely bland and barren next to Hoenn. Looking over some area maps on Bulbapedia makes it clear that RSE runs circles around DPPt when it comes to aesthetics. This post is going to contain a bunch of pictures, so please forgive the overuse of hide tags. It'd be about a kilometer long otherwise, and a nightmare to scroll through. I'm also going to use examples from RS to DP if possible, seeing as both were the first games of their generation and so reflect the base aesthetics the designers were going for when moving onto a new system.
For a start, let's look at the colour pallette of the overworld. RSE were great at using contrasting colours. Both on the level of individual tiles/sprites, but also within the areas.
In particular, look at the trees and the grass. This picture is almost entirely filled with green colours, but the trees are lime green bordering on yellow, the ground a kind of neutral, mossy colour, and the grass is a deeper, darker green. You can also see how the dark brown of the ledges make them visible even if you squint a lot, breaking up the green with clear, contrasting lines. Notice also the areas where a lighter green colour break up the monotone of large, open areas.
Even within each sprite of grass and trees, there is some contrast. The blades of grass are almost the same colour as the ground, but there are darker shadows where the blades meet in a stem. Likewise, the tops of the trees are the brightest colour, and the trunk is very dark, but note how dark lines intersect in the bright colours and form patterns almost all the way to the very tip. This prevents the trees from looking like they were just painted with a gradient colour...
Oh hi, trees of Sinnoh, which made this exact mistake. The trees clearly are dark at the bottom, bright at the top, some middle colour in the middle, with little intersection. The end result is that each tree looks like a big clump of green with one bright dot in the middle (Note that Platinum made improvements on the look of trees, putting some dark in the light areas and light in the dark, and so it looks a lot better).
Back to the overall colour of the scene, notice how every green colour in this picture has so much yellow in it? The paths are yellow-brown, the ground a striking aquamarine, and both the trees and the grass are lime green. None of the colours contrast very well, and the overall lime green "feel" of the picture is much harsher on the eye than the soothing cyan of RSE. There actually two ground colours here too (see below the sign in the middle of the picture), but the colour of the secondary texture has no contrast at all and so is difficult to tell apart from the colours of both the ground and the dirt path.
Note that DP has a day/night cycle while RSE doesn't, so at first I thought the colour filter for this particular time of day could be to blame for this overwhelming yellowness. But every picture I've seen of the Sinnoh routes have the same problem, and I doubt they were all taken at the same time. Every vegetated location seems to have a very harsh tint of lime green. If a filter is to blame for this, it seems to be used everywhere.
Next, let's look at variation within an area. More specifically, how maps are designed when we leave the grassy lowlands and enter the mountains. In short, the tilesets used for mountains in RSE look a lot better than those in D/P, which is a bit of a problem seeing how much of Sinnoh is mountainous.
The games both have a lot of mountainous areas, which naturally means a lot of cliffs, and those tend to be brown. But Sinnoh does brown a little different from Hoenn, and not in a good way:
Notice the pattern of dark brown stripes on top of the cliffs, while the vertical faces are very dark with some lighter spots. The same play of contrasts again (likewise, the trees, with just enough dark green to break up their otherwise intense lime). Also take a moment to appreciate how trees grow on the cliffs of Hoenn, because in Sinnoh...
...where the cliffs begin, vegetation ends. Abruptly and mercilessly. Walking in the mountains in Sinnoh is like walking into a quarry, where all vegetation is scrubbed away. Everything is brown. The ground colour is brown with only a hint of texture variation. The brown colour of cliff sides is almost identical to that of walkable areas. Only inaccessible clifftops have contrasting textures (to be fair, this distinction between textures makes it easier to determine which areas you are supposed to be able to access - but it could have looked a lot better). Also notice how horribly monochromatic Sinnoh's grass appears when placed against a darker background. To be fair to Sinnoh, the southern half of Hoenn's Route 114 isn't very easy on the eye either, but that was the only example I found from those games. Sinnoh's mountains have this dull, samey brownness to them everywhere they are, and unfortunately, Sinnoh is practically covered in mountains. You're going to see environments like the above throughout the entire game.
Let us also quickly put in two examples of routes featuring both cliffs and vegetation next to each other. This is all in a spoiler tag, so I can splurge a little with pictures. Hoenn Route 119:
Sinnoh Route 214:
It's amazing how the GBA game managed to integrate the tilesets so seamlessly into the same route, while the DS game has such a notable seam between the cliff tileset and grass tileset you can trace it with your finger.
There is one more thing to note about the aesthetics of these images, but I'll come back to that later. Have a look and see if you can see it. You're probably noticing it subconsciously, if nothing else.
Where I believe Sinnoh fails the most is inside the mountains, however. Caves tend not to be the most exciting of environments, but both Hoenn and Sinnoh have a lot of them, and only the former even attempts some type of variety. Let's have a look in-depth, shall we?
Below, we see Fiery Path, Meteor Falls, Shoal Cave and Cave of Origin in Hoenn:
As you can see, each of the locations has its own tileset, adhering to the principles of contrast seen above. Granted, Fiery Path and Cave of Origin are very samey and seem very monocoloured (but at least each cave has its own colour), but the floors of Shoal Cave and Meteor Falls both use contrasting textures to break up the monotony. Now, let's have a look at the multiple caves of Sinnoh: Ravaged Path, Mt. Coronet, Iron Island, and Stark Mountain:
Notice that all the Sinnohan caves look fundamentally identical. Granted, Platinum did a decent clean-up job in this regard, but again, we're comparing base games here. The cliff textures are all the same, the rocks are all the same, and while the floor texture in Mt. Coronet actually is different from the other three, you had to look twice to notice it. The non-walkable areas have a different texture from the walkable ones, but this lighter brown manages the difficult feat of standing out as jarring and bright while also being too much like the ground texture at the same time.
Another thing might have crossed your mind subconsciously while you looked at those maps, it's the same thing as above, but again, we'll come back to that later. Very soon, actually.
So, now we've been in the calm grasslands, we've been both outside and inside the mountains, then what's next? Why, the high seas, of course! This one should be in Sinnoh's favour, after all, Hoenn is infamous for having too much water, while Sinnoh has only a single water route:
For one, I know where I would like to go swimming. Notice how the walkable shallows blend into the surf tiles (or not, in Sinnoh's case - apparently, sharp-edged rectangles were all the rage for a while), and how Hoenn's little islets have narrow beaches. Notice the little splotch of vegetation to the right (for some reason, there's another forest in the route in Emerald). Note how the Hoennese sea is broken up with areas of deep water, or how there are several types of rocks. And lastly, look at the cliffs.
Yeah, them cliffs in Hoenn look a whole lot better than in Sinnoh, don't they? In fact, let's have a closer look:
Mt. Pyre vs. Mt. Coronet:
Mt. Chimney vs. Stark Mountain:
Ever Grande City vs. Sinnoh Pokémon League:
Just look at the geometry here. Sinnoh is a very, very rectangular region. The peak of Mt. Coronet is a pyramid. So is the entrance to Stark Mountain. The coastline of Pokémon League is drawn with a straightedge. But whoever drew Hoenn were allowed to be intricate. Just look at the complexity of Ever Grande City or Mt. Chimney. See how the vertical cliff faces of Mt. Pyre look a lot better than those at the Sinnoh Pokémon League. Scroll up and notice the geometries of all the other pictures I've posted. Hoenn is complex and beautiful, Sinnoh is blocky and dull. It has a lot less variation in textures, a lot less variation in landscapes, a lot fewer decoration assets. You see the same trees, the same rocks, and the same flowers all over the Sinnoh region. Hoenn seemed to have something unique in every location.
I think some of this comes down to the decision to make DP have a semi-3D perspective. It meant that a lot of stuff had to be rendered as objects and not just sprites, and so quality suffered. Big time. As a result, Sinnoh can't hold a candle to the vibrancy of Hoenn. It is a dull region. And I think that's why I was so disappointed with it when it first came out. Of course, DP's infamously bad gameplay didn't help much, but aesthetics is much more important for a first impression. I wasn't old enough to notice the relative lack of Fire-types or how so few of the cool new evolutions were available in the game (after all, RSE isn't very good gameplay-wise either, but I love those games). But at some level, I'm sure I noticed how bland the environments looked.
After some thinking about which thread this belongs to, I've finally settled for this thread. I don't think it's an unpopular opinion, nor is it relevant to the "favourite place in Pokémon" thread, although it touches on both and it even has a few traces of Little Things I like in it. Anyway, here goes:
The visual quality of the game world took a nosedive between Gen III and Gen IV. More specifically, Sinnoh looks completely bland and barren next to Hoenn. Looking over some area maps on Bulbapedia makes it clear that RSE runs circles around DPPt when it comes to aesthetics. This post is going to contain a bunch of pictures, so please forgive the overuse of hide tags. It'd be about a kilometer long otherwise, and a nightmare to scroll through. I'm also going to use examples from RS to DP if possible, seeing as both were the first games of their generation and so reflect the base aesthetics the designers were going for when moving onto a new system.
For a start, let's look at the colour pallette of the overworld. RSE were great at using contrasting colours. Both on the level of individual tiles/sprites, but also within the areas.
In particular, look at the trees and the grass. This picture is almost entirely filled with green colours, but the trees are lime green bordering on yellow, the ground a kind of neutral, mossy colour, and the grass is a deeper, darker green. You can also see how the dark brown of the ledges make them visible even if you squint a lot, breaking up the green with clear, contrasting lines. Notice also the areas where a lighter green colour break up the monotone of large, open areas.
Even within each sprite of grass and trees, there is some contrast. The blades of grass are almost the same colour as the ground, but there are darker shadows where the blades meet in a stem. Likewise, the tops of the trees are the brightest colour, and the trunk is very dark, but note how dark lines intersect in the bright colours and form patterns almost all the way to the very tip. This prevents the trees from looking like they were just painted with a gradient colour...
Oh hi, trees of Sinnoh, which made this exact mistake. The trees clearly are dark at the bottom, bright at the top, some middle colour in the middle, with little intersection. The end result is that each tree looks like a big clump of green with one bright dot in the middle (Note that Platinum made improvements on the look of trees, putting some dark in the light areas and light in the dark, and so it looks a lot better).
Back to the overall colour of the scene, notice how every green colour in this picture has so much yellow in it? The paths are yellow-brown, the ground a striking aquamarine, and both the trees and the grass are lime green. None of the colours contrast very well, and the overall lime green "feel" of the picture is much harsher on the eye than the soothing cyan of RSE. There actually two ground colours here too (see below the sign in the middle of the picture), but the colour of the secondary texture has no contrast at all and so is difficult to tell apart from the colours of both the ground and the dirt path.
Note that DP has a day/night cycle while RSE doesn't, so at first I thought the colour filter for this particular time of day could be to blame for this overwhelming yellowness. But every picture I've seen of the Sinnoh routes have the same problem, and I doubt they were all taken at the same time. Every vegetated location seems to have a very harsh tint of lime green. If a filter is to blame for this, it seems to be used everywhere.
Next, let's look at variation within an area. More specifically, how maps are designed when we leave the grassy lowlands and enter the mountains. In short, the tilesets used for mountains in RSE look a lot better than those in D/P, which is a bit of a problem seeing how much of Sinnoh is mountainous.
The games both have a lot of mountainous areas, which naturally means a lot of cliffs, and those tend to be brown. But Sinnoh does brown a little different from Hoenn, and not in a good way:
Notice the pattern of dark brown stripes on top of the cliffs, while the vertical faces are very dark with some lighter spots. The same play of contrasts again (likewise, the trees, with just enough dark green to break up their otherwise intense lime). Also take a moment to appreciate how trees grow on the cliffs of Hoenn, because in Sinnoh...
...where the cliffs begin, vegetation ends. Abruptly and mercilessly. Walking in the mountains in Sinnoh is like walking into a quarry, where all vegetation is scrubbed away. Everything is brown. The ground colour is brown with only a hint of texture variation. The brown colour of cliff sides is almost identical to that of walkable areas. Only inaccessible clifftops have contrasting textures (to be fair, this distinction between textures makes it easier to determine which areas you are supposed to be able to access - but it could have looked a lot better). Also notice how horribly monochromatic Sinnoh's grass appears when placed against a darker background. To be fair to Sinnoh, the southern half of Hoenn's Route 114 isn't very easy on the eye either, but that was the only example I found from those games. Sinnoh's mountains have this dull, samey brownness to them everywhere they are, and unfortunately, Sinnoh is practically covered in mountains. You're going to see environments like the above throughout the entire game.
Let us also quickly put in two examples of routes featuring both cliffs and vegetation next to each other. This is all in a spoiler tag, so I can splurge a little with pictures. Hoenn Route 119:
Sinnoh Route 214:
It's amazing how the GBA game managed to integrate the tilesets so seamlessly into the same route, while the DS game has such a notable seam between the cliff tileset and grass tileset you can trace it with your finger.
There is one more thing to note about the aesthetics of these images, but I'll come back to that later. Have a look and see if you can see it. You're probably noticing it subconsciously, if nothing else.
Where I believe Sinnoh fails the most is inside the mountains, however. Caves tend not to be the most exciting of environments, but both Hoenn and Sinnoh have a lot of them, and only the former even attempts some type of variety. Let's have a look in-depth, shall we?
Below, we see Fiery Path, Meteor Falls, Shoal Cave and Cave of Origin in Hoenn:
As you can see, each of the locations has its own tileset, adhering to the principles of contrast seen above. Granted, Fiery Path and Cave of Origin are very samey and seem very monocoloured (but at least each cave has its own colour), but the floors of Shoal Cave and Meteor Falls both use contrasting textures to break up the monotony. Now, let's have a look at the multiple caves of Sinnoh: Ravaged Path, Mt. Coronet, Iron Island, and Stark Mountain:
Notice that all the Sinnohan caves look fundamentally identical. Granted, Platinum did a decent clean-up job in this regard, but again, we're comparing base games here. The cliff textures are all the same, the rocks are all the same, and while the floor texture in Mt. Coronet actually is different from the other three, you had to look twice to notice it. The non-walkable areas have a different texture from the walkable ones, but this lighter brown manages the difficult feat of standing out as jarring and bright while also being too much like the ground texture at the same time.
Another thing might have crossed your mind subconsciously while you looked at those maps, it's the same thing as above, but again, we'll come back to that later. Very soon, actually.
So, now we've been in the calm grasslands, we've been both outside and inside the mountains, then what's next? Why, the high seas, of course! This one should be in Sinnoh's favour, after all, Hoenn is infamous for having too much water, while Sinnoh has only a single water route:
For one, I know where I would like to go swimming. Notice how the walkable shallows blend into the surf tiles (or not, in Sinnoh's case - apparently, sharp-edged rectangles were all the rage for a while), and how Hoenn's little islets have narrow beaches. Notice the little splotch of vegetation to the right (for some reason, there's another forest in the route in Emerald). Note how the Hoennese sea is broken up with areas of deep water, or how there are several types of rocks. And lastly, look at the cliffs.
Yeah, them cliffs in Hoenn look a whole lot better than in Sinnoh, don't they? In fact, let's have a closer look:
Mt. Pyre vs. Mt. Coronet:
Mt. Chimney vs. Stark Mountain:
Ever Grande City vs. Sinnoh Pokémon League:
Just look at the geometry here. Sinnoh is a very, very rectangular region. The peak of Mt. Coronet is a pyramid. So is the entrance to Stark Mountain. The coastline of Pokémon League is drawn with a straightedge. But whoever drew Hoenn were allowed to be intricate. Just look at the complexity of Ever Grande City or Mt. Chimney. See how the vertical cliff faces of Mt. Pyre look a lot better than those at the Sinnoh Pokémon League. Scroll up and notice the geometries of all the other pictures I've posted. Hoenn is complex and beautiful, Sinnoh is blocky and dull. It has a lot less variation in textures, a lot less variation in landscapes, a lot fewer decoration assets. You see the same trees, the same rocks, and the same flowers all over the Sinnoh region. Hoenn seemed to have something unique in every location.
I think some of this comes down to the decision to make DP have a semi-3D perspective. It meant that a lot of stuff had to be rendered as objects and not just sprites, and so quality suffered. Big time. As a result, Sinnoh can't hold a candle to the vibrancy of Hoenn. It is a dull region. And I think that's why I was so disappointed with it when it first came out. Of course, DP's infamously bad gameplay didn't help much, but aesthetics is much more important for a first impression. I wasn't old enough to notice the relative lack of Fire-types or how so few of the cool new evolutions were available in the game (after all, RSE isn't very good gameplay-wise either, but I love those games). But at some level, I'm sure I noticed how bland the environments looked.
Wow! When put side by side the difference is extremely noticeable. While I still do like the Sinnoh region, I never realized how blocky and inorganic it all looked esp compared to Hoenn. One thing that jumped out to me was that Sinnoh appeared to only have one model/sprite for trees, while Hoenn has a bunch. That allowed Hoenn to scatter one-tile trees on cliffs and such, while still having larger trees to sprinkle in too. Sinnoh just has the large 4 tile tree and incorporating that into a cliff side might’ve made it look worse. That being said, they should’ve just made another tree model or two for Sinnoh, some variety is definitely good. I want to go look at HGSS now to see if they made any noticeable changes from DPP in that department!
After some thinking about which thread this belongs to, I've finally settled for this thread. I don't think it's an unpopular opinion, nor is it relevant to the "favourite place in Pokémon" thread, although it touches on both and it even has a few traces of Little Things I like in it. Anyway, here goes:
The visual quality of the game world took a nosedive between Gen III and Gen IV. More specifically, Sinnoh looks completely bland and barren next to Hoenn. Looking over some area maps on Bulbapedia makes it clear that RSE runs circles around DPPt when it comes to aesthetics. This post is going to contain a bunch of pictures, so please forgive the overuse of hide tags. It'd be about a kilometer long otherwise, and a nightmare to scroll through. I'm also going to use examples from RS to DP if possible, seeing as both were the first games of their generation and so reflect the base aesthetics the designers were going for when moving onto a new system.
I think some of this comes down to the decision to make DP have a semi-3D perspective. It meant that a lot of stuff had to be rendered as objects and not just sprites, and so quality suffered. Big time. As a result, Sinnoh can't hold a candle to the vibrancy of Hoenn. It is a dull region. And I think that's why I was so disappointed with it when it first came out. Of course, DP's infamously bad gameplay didn't help much, but aesthetics is much more important for a first impression. I wasn't old enough to notice the relative lack of Fire-types or how so few of the cool new evolutions were available in the game (after all, RSE isn't very good gameplay-wise either, but I love those games). But at some level, I'm sure I noticed how bland the environments looked.
I think a lot of this can be explained away by the devs wanting to remain faithful to the real life counterparts of these locations, and that the Hoenn region is simply set in a more interesting visual region irl than Sinnoh is. Particularly as far as colour pallets are concerned.
First, let's look at three of the mountains you pointed out, but in the real world:
You can see that Mt. Chimney's real life counterpart really has red soil and rock, Meteor Falls has some tan-coloured rock (as well as some light grey), and that Mt. Coronet's real life counterpart is, well.... just brown, and that unfortunate shade of brown which is often used as a generic colour palette in RPGs for cave areas. I think unfortunately for the Sinnoh devs, this has led some people to quite reasonably think they cheaped out or used an uninspired colour palette, but in fact of the entire mountain chain Mt. Coronet is based off, they actually chose the most vibrant colour available to them (the first image).
And this actually extends even to the grasslands in the games. I think it's well-known enough that Hoenn is based off the Kyushu region of Japan and Sinnoh off the Hokkaido, so I just typed "Kyushu landscape" and "Hokkaido landscape" into google to find the most iconic areas of both regions:
You can see that the Kyushu region has similar colour palettes to those seen in Hoenn, the colour of the grass in the third Kyushu image matching with the game's palette particularly well. There's more variance in the Kyushu region compared with Hokkaido from my research, and the devs for Gen III still certainly chose the mutest colour palette as opposed to the slightly more golden or light green seen in the other Kyushu regions, but I think that ties into the feeling of nature they wanted to push in the Gen III games. The entire plot is essentially nature vs humans, so they wanted the region itself to look a little overgrown and maintain the presence of nature. That's why there's such a large portion of the region in water, why part of Wally's whole plot line is that living in the city is making him unhealthy and he needs to return to nature etc..
Hokkaido on the other hand is, irl, overwhelmingly minty/aquamarine/lime in colour, almost to the point of looking unnatural in the third image (to me, at least). It seems the devs didn't have much choice but to use the slightly garish lime colours in Sinnoh for the grasslands, since Hokkaido itself is made of slightly garish lime or mint colours. However, importantly, all Hokkaidan grass appears to be roughly the same colour, at least when grown out properly (if freshly cut it looks the same as any other grass), which generally makes for a less visually dynamic region. Since all the mountains in Hokkaido are also visually similar, particularly in the mountain chain that inspires Mt. Coronet, they didn't have much room to play around with dynamic cave sections either.
However, I agree with most of your other points. Certainly I think more care could have been taken with little details like trees growing on cliff faces, and refining textures in water. But I'd say Gen III is actually the outlier here and than Gen IV is more in line with the rest of the series. Pokémon has always had an intense minimalism when it comes to its landscapes. Need to block a path with a 1-tile Sudowoodo? Flood the rest of the screen with the same tree copy/pasted over and over again. Need to make a bedroom for the player? Bed, PC, desk, TV, maybe a clock if you're lucky, and that's it. Every office block or house has similar interior design and the same colour palette, especially if it's not plot-relevant. Gen III put more effort into being dynamic visually than even Gen VII or VIII do.
I'd also like to counterpoint, however, the singling out of Gen IV as being the end of dynamic visuals for the series. A few examples I can think of:
Eterna Forest having the effect of the light peeking through the trees makes a huge difference to the atmosphere of the location and overall how interesting it is to play, and it makes sense why it's a graphical quirk that's persisted to modern day. Before Gen IV played with lighting in its forest areas, they essentially looked no different to a regular route. You didn't get the sense of loneliness and isolation that a real forest gives a wanderer, but rather were just looking for trainers and items on the ground while trying to avoid the tall grass, and Petalburg Woods does this to the same extent as Viridian Forest in the first game. My criticism with the area from a visual standpoint would be having the path surrounded in rockface and not just trees as is the case in Petalburg Woods (better than the logs in RBY though), but again this can be chalked up to real world inspiration, as Eterna Forest is based on a forest found on a mountain in Hokkaido.
The shadow itself also helps maintain Sinnoh's Hokkaido-based colour palette of the lime grass, but mutes the colour so that it's no longer garish, and actually looks really nice. It makes me wish that there was a way to play the entire game only with the night-time colour palette, but if they'd made that standard I'm sure people would have complained at the lack of vibrancy.
(Ignore the arrow, only image I can find showing the long grass that works)
The flowers in Floaroma Town are simply delightful to look at, there's no other word for it. Nature vs humans is a fairly consistently represented trope in the series, even if not the main focus of the plot like in Hoenn. However, Floaroma Town frankly should be in Hoenn, since it's the best feeling of "overgrown" the series has ever had. The variety in colours and carefully-placed blocks of colours to make the area dynamic and ostensibly random while not overwhelming the player is almost spritework architecture, and is something no other game in the series rivalled. The flowers on Hoenn Route 117 look paltry in comparison, being in specific gardened blocks and only having 2 varieties of flower. On the other hand, the overgrown nature of Hoenn Route 119 is simply less interesting. It's all just the same tall grass sprite copy/pasted over again, and while the river is a nice touch to remind you of both sides of the nature quarrel in the game, and the blue cuts through the otherwise homogeneous green, having two (three counting the brown but the brown looks somewhat out of place) colours compared with an entire field of different coloured flowers simply less effectively portrays "overgrown".
Finally, to look at the polar opposite area type: where humans dominate nature. All of these locations are intended to spark the same reaction in the player, which is a landscape of a harsh/savage environment that players have adapted to meet their own needs. Sunyshore City and Snowpoint City accomplish this better than any location in Hoenn. Sunyshore is a network of bridges connecting an archipelago together, which immediately faces the player with the savageness of the ocean and its blockading of normal development for the city. It manages to convey a verticality to the area beyond what it actually has -- it's actually only on two levels, but being able to see the cliff-faces of the Eastern islands makes them feel much higher up compared with the western island, and they even manage to put the gym on the same plane that's only accessible via bridge on the western island so that it's not just one flat island and then two raised ones. The whole area is interesting in concept and fun to walk around in, but the ocean is an omnipresence: it stops the player from quickly going where they want to, having to instead use the bridge network, and the potential that the ocean has to tear the whole city down at any moment is conveyed by the heavily eroded Snorlax rock situated so that that land was likely part of the south-east island at some point. The inclusion of a lighthouse completes this imagery, as lighthouses are a crucial symbol of human dominion of the sea: think the Colossus of Rhodes, which served the same function as a lighthouse, and how revered that structure still is today.
Snowpoint City achieves similar ends except with water being the only relief to the area. The inclusion of a shipping port, complete with shipping containers to be in your face about it, is entirely esoteric (the boat is used later on but they could have used Canalave City for the same thing as you take other boats from there) but provides a wealth of worldbuilding to the area. That's how they get food since there will be a limited supply in an area eternally covered in snow, and is how they maintain services like a PokéMart, as well as providing an economy to an otherwise isolated area. The snow itself is a clear omnipresence, the entire ground being white, with the only variance in colour being the water, the scarce nature that manages to survive there, and human-made inventions, though even those are coated in snow on top. There's even ice in the water and a drill on the ship to show how far humans have had to adapt to make it inhabitable, as well as the staircases in the rockface! You could even argue that the NPCs help the theming of the area, with a trade requesting a Pokémon found a few tiles west of the city, showing that even locals can't venture far (though trades asking for nearby Pokémon have happened at other points in the series so it's a weak point). The shining example of this is Maylene, who appears near the city for the sole purpose of demonstrating how perilous the area is.
Hoenn doesn't come close to beating either of these cities, despite the theming of the game being focussed on man vs nature even more. Fallarbor Town is set in an area where all vegetation is covered in ash and promptly dies aside from a few sturdy trees, yet there's none of this ash-covered vegetation in the town itself and instead there's just... nothing there, looking barren, and making the player forget that it's meant to be a difficult place to live in at all. Contrast this with Snowpoint City, where there's a shipping port for worldbuilding and snow is an ever-present part of the area wherever you go. Lavaridge Town is a tiny settlement carved into the rockface with its tourist attraction being hot springs. However, everything is too close to each other and verticality isn't played with at all. Imagine how much more effective it would be to having a large staircase out the back of the Pokémon Centre instead of the small one we currently have that only goes one tile off the ground. Perhaps the hot spring itself could be its own area with sheer drops outside of the water and only one staircase leading into and away from the area. This would make it feel more uninhabitable and set the human accomplishment higher. Compare this with Sunyshore City, where the rockfaces are much more striking and there's the added element of water. And though Fortree City probably comes closest, the stakes involved is simply a forest that could be cut down. It represents a human desire to live with nature as opposed to dominating it, with the houses even carved into trees, and is overall a really cool location. However, they also committed a large amount of deforestation right in the middle of the forest where the highest amount of biodiversity would have been for no reason more than to construct a gym. Imagine if Fortree City didn't have the gym inside the city and instead it was located on one of the routes nearby because there wasn't room for it in the original settlement because of the forest. That would complete the symbolism much more. Compare that with Snowpoint City, where the gym is found in a lower snowfall area so that it's more accessible, while other parts of the city and route have such deep snow that the player gets buried in it. And to Sunyshore City, where the gym is located in a mountain and is only accessible by bridge, because all of the available development space on the small available land they have has already been used by a lighthouse, a marketplace, and a small residential base.
Overall, I think that though the graphics may have decreased in quality and refinement in Sinnoh, the visuals far surpass Hoenn, and the overall effect of a game's visuals is more important to the overall player experience. Then consider that the palette choices, which I think are possibly the biggest issue with the game's graphics, are based on real life where the Hokkaido region of Japan is generally composed of similar colours anyway, and I think Sinnoh can still be considered a big step up from Hoenn. Hoenn has some really cool locations, but Sinnoh has more memorable ones (and arguably equally cool) where greater imagination was used and then executed excellently. I'd wager that Fortree City, if made by the Gen IV devs, would be a fan-favourite location rather than a forgotten one.
The response I can see to this is "but why did the devs have to stick to real life colour palettes? Couldn't they have decided to take that bullet for the sake of the game's overall visuals?" and my response is they actually couldn't. The devs used much more imagination for each location in Gen IV than in Gen III, and really the only thing that makes all of the areas of the region feel similar is the colour palette. People familiar with Hokkaido also wouldn't necessarily realise Sinnoh is based on Hokkaido just from location concepts. For example, the real life counterpart of Floaroma Town is just a town known for sunflowers and it's nowhere near as colourful as Floaroma, Snowpoint City's counterpart doesn't have a port but rather a lake, and Sunyshore City isn't a set of islands irl. I think the devs realised Hokkaido has a fairly distinct overall look of lime vegetation in snowy and brown mountainous regions and thought that maintaining that level of inspiration from the source material let them play with other areas in the game and be imaginative while keeping everything looking like it's from the same region, and the overall effect of this choice was pretty effective. Every location in Sinnoh certainly feels like it's from Sinnoh, and after seeing pictures of real life Hokkaido, from Hokkaido too.
Edit: Apparently the images of the games aren't appearing (on my monitor at least) now that it's posted, but they're only screenshots of the respective areas. I'll keep playing around with it and see if I can get pictures of each location there.
Edit 2: It seems gameplay screenshots appear but area overviews don't.
Fun little mechanical decision: Apparently, if your mon faints during a Totem Battle, you send out a Ditto, and the support mon is fainted, Imposter just doesn’t activate. Transform still works fine, but clearly something is weird since both you and the Totem are on the right. I’m expecting that if the support mon is alive, you’ll Imposter that instead of the stat-boosted giant in front of you. Clearly that’s how everyone wants the ability to work, right?
This is going to make my all-Ditto run more tense than I expected.
Overall, I think that though the graphics may have decreased in quality and refinement in Sinnoh, the visuals far surpass Hoenn, and the overall effect of a game's visuals is more important to the overall player experience. Then consider that the palette choices, which I think are possibly the biggest issue with the game's graphics, are based on real life where the Hokkaido region of Japan is generally composed of similar colours anyway, and I think Sinnoh can still be considered a big step up from Hoenn. Hoenn has some really cool locations, but Sinnoh has more memorable ones (and arguably equally cool) where greater imagination was used and then executed excellently. I'd wager that Fortree City, if made by the Gen IV devs, would be a fan-favourite location rather than a forgotten one.
It's a long post and I can't respond to all of its points, but I can try to summarize some of them.
First of all, I don't think that everything Sinnoh did was bad. In many regards, Platinum made massive improvements (such as Eterna Forest - in DP it was bland as a bedsheet). The problem is that the developers failed to commit to the same level of visual quality in the base Gen IV games as they did in the base Gen III games, despite having a much more powerful system at their disposal. There is less variation in the pieces of decoration in the overworld, the terrain is vastly less varied and the amount of reuse of textures makes every location in the game feel samey. For a region as committed to its wilderness as Sinnoh, it feels like that wilderness should have been crafted more carefully. The awful colour palettes might be realistic, but that should not have precedence over making a good-looking game.
With Platinum, it's easy to see that many of the choices made for DP were just plain bad, as many locations had their palette sprited up and new assets were added. Mt. Coronet's dull brown was turned into a darker-tinted grey, bordering on purple. Stark Mountain got a lava pit. Eterna Forest got that impressive shadow overlay. All of the Battle Zone was reworked to become much more tropical and volcanic. The sprite work of the entire region got an overhaul, which wouldn't have been necessary if DP had done it right in the first place. Granted, this was the case in some places in Emerald vs. RS too, for instance does Meteor Falls look loads better in Emerald than in RS.
Regarding cities, I find it strange that you didn't mention Sootopolis City or Pacifidlog Town, which both are better examples of "man conquering nature" than Fallarbor or Lavaridge. A city in a volcanic crater or a floating town on a coral reef, what's not to love? Or Mossdeep, perched on the cliffs of a small island far out at sea? What about the small but tightly knit community at Dewford? Hoenn has great examples of cities too.
So no, I don't agree that Sinnoh has more memorable locations than Hoenn. Some areas in Sinnoh are better than their Hoenn counterparts, but the other way round is much more common. I remember the labyrinth of Mt. Coronet with agony, the Great Marsh was the most frustrating place ever committed to cartridge, and the trek up to Snowpoint was pretty tiresome too, if at least quite epic. But it doesn't compare to Hoenn's expanse of desert, the perpetual rain of the northeast peninsula, the low valley with the constantly falling ash, the lip of the giant volcanic crater (and the descent down Jagged Path to Lavaridge), the vast beach of Slateport, the icy depths of Shoal Cave, the ocean trenches and subterranean caves, the shipwreck deserted in the southern seas, the graveyard on Mt. Pyre, the fast-running currents west of Pacifidlog, or Sky Pillar stretching to the skies on its tiny island. It was a much better created region than Sinnoh, which relied overly much on its poorly executed Mt. Coronet blocking the way between two pretty samey halves of the region, and Routes that were so labyrinthine and complicated to pass through that you'd rather resort to Flying everywhere instead of travelling by land.
The talk of copying Pokemon in the SwSd discussion thread reminded me of something that, to my knowledge, isn't an option in Pokemon, and really should be. Why isn't there an option to just send a Pokemon from one game to another within the same generation? Why do you need to trade?
The talk of copying Pokemon in the SwSd discussion thread reminded me of something that, to my knowledge, isn't an option in Pokemon, and really should be. Why isn't there an option to just send a Pokemon from one game to another within the same generation? Why do you need to trade?
The talk of copying Pokemon in the SwSd discussion thread reminded me of something that, to my knowledge, isn't an option in Pokemon, and really should be. Why isn't there an option to just send a Pokemon from one game to another within the same generation? Why do you need to trade?
If that's really the reason, then their reasoning is super faulty. You'd still be interacting with other people (or just yourself with a second cart). It's just that one person is giving a Pokemon to the other without getting anything in return.
If that's really the reason, then their reasoning is super faulty. You'd still be interacting with other people (or just yourself with a second cart). It's just that one person is giving a Pokemon to the other without getting anything in return.
One recurring thing that annoys me is bosses like Gym Leaders and Totem Pokémon with only a couple of very shaky counters.
Let’s start out with Kanto, where you don’t exactly have a reliable counter to Sabrina in Gen 1 besides...Jolteon’s Pin Missle? And Psychics were infamously broken back then. Gen 3 got a bit better with random mons with Bite but still no hard counters because Bug type still sucked then aside from mons from regions other than Kanto. Misty has elements of this, but you do have the version exclusive Grass types.
Gen 2/4 had Clair. The only Dragon mons you can get you have to go way out of your way for-Game Corner for Dratini, or Whirl Islands for Horsea which doesn’t matter unless you Thief a 5% Dragon Scale (normally Scale is found in Mt. Mortar with Waterfall...only after Clair). Even if you DO get a Kingdra pre-Clair...have fun with level 57 Dragon Pulse when she has it at level 41! Whitney exists too, but so does trade Machop, Fire Blast Quilava, and (while you still go out of your way) Dragon Rage Dratini. You could also get Alakazam by this point, which will dent the cow but you’ll get hit back hard.
Gen 3 has Winona (DD EQ Altaria and no easy Ice type access aside from lolCastform?) and arguably Emerald Juan for Double Team. Wattson also only has TWO ground types before him, one of which is a starter! I mean, yeah you have Makuhita but paralysis isn’t ideal even if you have Guts. A lot of the other bosses are hard too, but for the sake of conciseness I’ll move on.
Next we come to the one I despise the most: Platinum Fantina with her Mismagius. 105 Special Attack Shadow Ball should not exist a third of the way into the game. Sure, you have mons like Crunch Floatzel, but that’s kinda kill or be killed thanks to Magical Leaf. Other niche options for her include Toxic Vespiquen (lol). Most Bite users (Grotle, Crobat) get reamed by coverage or Will-O-Wisp from Duskull/Confuse Ray from Mismagius.
Then in Gen 5 we have Elesa (BW1) and Cheren (BW2). Anybody who has played the Unova games likely knows how hard Elesa is, and while you do have some counters (Rock Slide Drilbur, Gigalith, Krokorok) it isn’t easy unless you heal a couple times or get lucky-
Rock Tomb also sucks for most other physical attackers. Cheren...um, Thunder Wave Growl Mareep I guess, or a few of the X items you get beforehand...yeah they don’t give you much. Riolu doesn’t really work when you have to get to Level 15 for Force Palm off Unova’s EXP system.
Gen 6 is kinda different due to the general easiness and huge mon variety, and shouldn’t give any trouble as long as you prepare.
Gen 7 USUM has a good chunk of the Totems (in contrast, not so much that they are uncounterable, but rather they cover their weaknesses extremely well) to the point where even as a franchise veteran I’ve only been able to go one playthrough (my mono-Psychic run) without losing at least once a run. I honestly hope this becomes the difficulty standard, it felt challenging but not overly cheap (aside from that one fight late in the game without specific cheese strats or knowledge of the moves you’d be up against).
The boss that did the “hard to counter” aspect right imo was Johto Blue, diverse, good mons which is a nice change of pace boss-wise, but you can still win through type matchups.
Personally I don't think this is something worth complaining about. I don't think any of those battles are particularly cheap or ridiculously difficult. The most interesting and tough parts of pretty much every Pokemon game has usually been the first quarter, when the battles feel more high stakes. Limited tools and resources (money & items, powerful Pokemon, SE moves, powerful STAB, etc) frequently puts you at a disadvantage that forces you to think outside the box-- and rely on an ounce of luck too, of course.
I recently played through B2 on Challenge mode and had so much fun with the first few gyms. Going in with half a strategy based on typing and then getting schooled, so I retool and try again. I ended up putting the game down and never finishing it at the gates of the E4 because the game became boring. Beneficial type match + STAB = win, win, win, *yawn* win, win... I wish GF were better at maintaining (or building!) that sense of urgency and high stakes up until the end. There's a reason folks still talk about Whitney & Miltank while so many other leaders have vanished into obscurity.
Sort of like how the two Nidorans are still two seperate evolutionary lines, 5 generations after genders became a baseline thing, despite them explicitly being the same species in-universe (and treated as such mechanically, as far as breeding goes). Also Nidorina and Nidoqueen still can't breed, as far as I know, for... reasons?
Honestly, the Pokedex order needs a serious going-over, to at the very least put all the evolutionary families together.
Movepools are another big one. There's a lot of Pokemon whose movepools need a serious going over, so they have actual non-STAB options worth using (*coughLilligantcough*). There's also a lot of moves that are way more common than they should be given how good they are (Earthquake, being a 100 power move with no drawbacks other than type-related ones, which damn near everything learns, is a huge offender here), and a lot of rarer moves that should be more widespread.
They should have retconned Nidoran into one Pokemon back in Gen 2. Its too late now though, too much merchandise and "151" stuff to shift dex numbers around. Its such a dumb, ugly, pointless artifact. At least Nidoking eggs can hatch into either gender...
And re: movepools, yes some Pokemon could benefit with getting at least a few non-STAB level options but mostly I think they've done pretty well lately. In some cases though, say with Sneasel/Weavile, they could do with more STAB options. Weavile gets Icy Wind via level up, and all other Ice STAB is via TM (all special) or tutors/breeding. I think Sneasel gets Ice Shard now? They could at least toss it Ice Punch or Icicle Crash.
Not being able to put items in Bank is super annoying when you own more than one game in a generation. Especially if, like me, you bought digital so you can't even use another DS to trade with yourself.
I recently played through B2 on Challenge mode and had so much fun with the first few gyms. Going in with half a strategy based on typing and then getting schooled, so I retool and try again. I ended up putting the game down and never finishing it at the gates of the E4 because the game became boring. Beneficial type match + STAB = win, win, win, *yawn* win, win... I wish GF were better at maintaining (or building!) that sense of urgency and high stakes up until the end. There's a reason folks still talk about Whitney & Miltank while so many other leaders have vanished into obscurity.
The problem with Challenge Mode as it's pretty much "Normal Mode with a more grinding required", with no real difficulty difference. Just a few more levels and that difference is gone.
To think the last time you could transfer items were Gen 3 to 4. Now you have to regrind for your items like Everstones, Mega Stones, or competitive hold items.
It sure is fun to grind on the battle maison or battle tree... If only there was something like the battle frontier with various battle facilities to have more viarity for the latter which is why I'm annoyed after hearing that Masuda purposely didn't include the Battle Frontier in ORAS instead of technical reasons or something.
To think the last time you could transfer items were Gen 3 to 4. Now you have to regrind for your items like Everstones, Mega Stones, or competitive hold items.
It sure is fun to grind on the battle maison or battle tree... If only there was something like the battle frontier with various battle facilities to have more viarity for the latter which is why I'm annoyed after hearing that Masuda purposely didn't include the Battle Frontier in ORAS instead of technical reasons or something.
Oh, I wasn't even meaning that (though that's an additional frustration that I'll have to agree with you on). I'm talking more like, why can't I transfer all my items from Sun to Ultra Sun without having to have a billion Pokémon hold them and trade them one at a time?
(For anyone who doesn't know, essentially Masuda didn't include the Battle Frontier because they found only a small percent of the player base used it)
While I can understand them not including it for that reason (letting them then focus on having something all players would participate in which I think was the Delta Episode), at the same time it's annoying they didn't even try to find a way to implement the Battle Frontier in some way and just recycled the Battle Maison and even having the same Chatlaines (so, did they change ORAS position in the timeline? Does it no longer take place at the same time as Gen I but at the same time as Gen VI? If not, how do you explain the Chatlaines unless they are different group of woman and their names are just codenames or something like that?).
Honestly the only Battling styles they couldn't just combine into the Battle Tower as alternate modes was Pyramid and Pike, all the others would only need slight adjustments and you could still have their Frontier Brain be in charge of that mode. Actually, while Pike would need a bit more work format wise, they could also combine it with the Battle Tower. So that just leave Battle Pyramid out... which I say then make it it's own thing not connected to the Battle Facilities. Make it like the White Treehollow/Black Tower in B2W2.
"But what about the Brave Symbol?"
Just because the Pyramid is no longer part of the Battle Tower doesn't mean Brandon can't. Have Anabel be in charge or the Single Battle mode and Brandon in charge of the Double Battle mode.
This is less of an "annoy" thing and more like "I can't believe this is a thing", but...
In Pokémon Shuffle, almost all base forms of the starter lines have a special "winking" version. That means one of the Pokémon with a winking version is... Cyndaquil.
Yup. The starter known for never showing its eyes open has a winking version.
Why?
(I could also make a case about Treecko having a winking sprite, as real-life geckos can't both have eyelids and stick to walls)
Personally I don't think this is something worth complaining about. I don't think any of those battles are particularly cheap or ridiculously difficult. The most interesting and tough parts of pretty much every Pokemon game has usually been the first quarter, when the battles feel more high stakes. Limited tools and resources (money & items, powerful Pokemon, SE moves, powerful STAB, etc) frequently puts you at a disadvantage that forces you to think outside the box-- and rely on an ounce of luck too, of course.
I recently played through B2 on Challenge mode and had so much fun with the first few gyms. Going in with half a strategy based on typing and then getting schooled, so I retool and try again. I ended up putting the game down and never finishing it at the gates of the E4 because the game became boring. Beneficial type match + STAB = win, win, win, *yawn* win, win... I wish GF were better at maintaining (or building!) that sense of urgency and high stakes up until the end. There's a reason folks still talk about Whitney & Miltank while so many other leaders have vanished into obscurity.
Regarding the tough battles: I never realized that it may have been cooler to have Giovanni be a Psychic type trainer since Psychic was so overpowered and Giovanni was supposed to be menacing. And maybe he could have had Mewtwo, and after you defeat Mewtwo it runs off to Cerulean Cave to wait for Red's arrival.
Regarding even Challenge mode becoming boring in the end: I've avoided this in recent playthroughs to a degree by using more than 6 Pokemon and cycling them out at my leisure, trying to keep their levels fairly balanced until right before the Elite Four. (Credit to Codraroll for his Team-A-Team-B Let's Play and all others who have suggested playing with more mons.) In USUM, I used around 11 pokemon, and I had route trainers leveled a little higher or about the same as me and I was forced to think of new strategies and use a few items to get past some of the battles that are supposed to be tough (E4, Post game story boss, the infamous tough battle in USUM that goes without saying, and maybe a few others). As a result I think I'll play SwSh with around 9 pokemon and hopefully I won't need as many healing items late game.
Regarding the tough battles: I never realized that it may have been cooler to have Giovanni be a Psychic type trainer since Psychic was so overpowered and Giovanni was supposed to be menacing. And maybe he could have had Mewtwo, and after you defeat Mewtwo it runs off to Cerulean Cave to wait for Red's arrival.
Well I think in the beginning Team Rocket and Mewtwo were two different things. It was the anime and manga that linked Team Rocket with Mewtwo, the games just said it was made by a scientist (Mr. Fuji) trying to clone Mew for whatever reason. Because you're right it does seem a bit odd that Giovanni would want the most powerful Pokemon created to not be the Type he specializes in, admitting not only he isn't training the strongest Type but another Gym Leader is.
As for would it have been cooler if Giovanni was a Psychic-type trainer, eh, I honestly don't think it would have made a difference. Actually I think it's kind of cooler he's not using the Type that is considered the most powerful. Him specializing in Ground-types I also feel thematically makes sense: since a lot of Team Rocket members uses Poison-types he has an advantage over them. Also it gives him a looming presence, he commands the Pokemon who control the element that everyone, towns & cities, and non-aquatic nature is built upon; with a snap of a finger he could have the ground swallow someone up or cause destructive earthquakes. Finally it also creates a sort of book end as his Type share most of the weaknesses & super effectiveness that the first Gym Leader specializes, Brock & Rock-types. After all the trials and other battles you've had after getting your first Badge, you're probably now using similar strategies and maybe even Pokemon you did when you faced Brock, but now you're no longer a rookie trainer and your Pokemon are much more powerful (especially notable if you started with Charmander who could barely do anything against Brock's Pokemon but it's now a Charizard who is immune to Giovanni's Pokemon STAB).
Regarding even Challenge mode becoming boring in the end: I've avoided this in recent playthroughs to a degree by using more than 6 Pokemon and cycling them out at my leisure, trying to keep their levels fairly balanced until right before the Elite Four. (Credit to Codraroll for his Team-A-Team-B Let's Play and all others who have suggested playing with more mons.) In USUM, I used around 11 pokemon, and I had route trainers leveled a little higher or about the same as me and I was forced to think of new strategies and use a few items to get past some of the battles that are supposed to be tough (E4, Post game story boss, the infamous tough battle in USUM that goes without saying, and maybe a few others). As a result I think I'll play SwSh with around 9 pokemon and hopefully I won't need as many healing items late game.
Him specializing in Ground-types I also feel thematically makes sense: since a lot of Team Rocket members uses Poison-types he has an advantage over them.
Well I think in the beginning Team Rocket and Mewtwo were two different things. It was the anime and manga that linked Team Rocket with Mewtwo, the games just said it was made by a scientist (Mr. Fuji) trying to clone Mew for whatever reason. Because you're right it does seem a bit odd that Giovanni would want the most powerful Pokemon created to not be the Type he specializes in, admitting not only he isn't training the strongest Type but another Gym Leader is.
As for would it have been cooler if Giovanni was a Psychic-type trainer, eh, I honestly don't think it would have made a difference. Actually I think it's kind of cooler he's not using the Type that is considered the most powerful. Him specializing in Ground-types I also feel thematically makes sense: since a lot of Team Rocket members uses Poison-types he has an advantage over them. Also it gives him a looming presence, he commands the Pokemon who control the element that everyone, towns & cities, and non-aquatic nature is built upon; with a snap of a finger he could have the ground swallow someone up or cause destructive earthquakes. Finally it also creates a sort of book end as his Type share most of the weaknesses & super effectiveness that the first Gym Leader specializes, Brock & Rock-types. After all the trials and other battles you've had after getting your first Badge, you're probably now using similar strategies and maybe even Pokemon you did when you faced Brock, but now you're no longer a rookie trainer and your Pokemon are much more powerful (especially notable if you started with Charmander who could barely do anything against Brock's Pokemon but it's now a Charizard who is immune to Giovanni's Pokemon STAB).
Hmm, training two teams instead of one and swapping between the two after each Gym/major event, that's not a bad idea. Maybe I'll try that in Shield.
It’s only implied in Gen 1 and 3 that Dr. Fuji created Mewtwo. The reason it’s accepted is because of the anime and Pokémon Origins, where Fuji is explicitly stated to do so. Speaking of Gen 1, one thing I really don’t like about Meltan and Melmetal is the lore around them: The lore states that they taught metal making in ancient times. That’s my problem: The one thing that separates Kanto from other regions is the facts that there are no legends or Lore whatsoever. Think about it. There are no ancient ruins of any kind, nor there are any legends; the Legendary birds are just very rare creatures, while Mewtwo created from Mew, who has the genetic code of every Pokémon. So in other words, Kanto is 100% Modern with a focus on science. The Pokémon themselves are designed to fit in this theme as well: Porygon was the first artificial Pokémon, Eevee has an unstable genetic code which enables evolution of 3 different types, Ditto can rearrange its molecules to change its shape, clefairy is even theorized to come from outer space, to name a few. Even the mascots aren’t Legendary Pokémon, first and only for the series. This also brings contrast to Johto which values tradition and old fashioned cultures; this 100% modern design is what really makes Kanto enjoyable for the series, so by giving Meltan and Melmetal ancient history as well as a legend, it really ruins the theme of Kanto.
So I recently found a copy of LeafGreen at a thrift store. Maybe I'll get used to it, but the fact that the music cuts out halfway through saving keeps making me think something is about to go horribly wrong.
