-
Welcome to Smogon! Take a moment to read the Introduction to Smogon for a run-down on everything Smogon, and make sure you take some time to read the global rules.
-
Congrats to the winners of the 2023 Smog Awards!
SPOILERS! Mysteries and Conspiracies of Pokemon
- Thread starter stage7_4
- Start date
Interesting on the model front, more interesting that they only partially worked on it.
And sorry to keep harping on this but are you sure they did 2? I glanced through the credits and dont see them listed (might've just glanced by them though?). Bulbapedia (bastion of accuracy, I know) only lists Creatures Inc, just like with Ranger 3
Could just be something as simple as like...
Maybe it was cost reasons
Maybe it was time reasons
Maybe Hal was busy and then once that unhook happened, they just didn't feel the need to keep going back to them
It's also possible hal just stopped approaching gamefreak for games. Maybe they were busy, maybe they just wanted to do something else, maybe they weren't offering the same services, maybe they just didn't have an idea worth putting forward.
QuentinQuonce
formerly green_typhlosion
Tangential and quite probably better suited to a different thread, but I wish they'd made a PBR-style game for Gen V and even Gen VI/VII. I think PBR's poor sales and bad reception (critics disliked it for being too reliant on the DS games, fans disliked it for not having a Story Mode like Colo/XD) may have put Game Freak off the idea of doing console games for future generations. And now the mainline games are the console games that era's well and truly at an end. More spin-offs in general would be nice, albeit preferably spin-offs that connect to the MSG.
How so? Like, if you strip the games down enough you can pretty much describe most of the Pokemon games down to a repeating concept:
A new trainer starts their adventure to help the Professor fill the Pokedex. While doing this they go around the region to collect proofs of their battling prowess from people assigned by a governing body to judge who use Pokemon of a certain type. But the trainer then gets embroiled in a plot by a villainous team, encountering them multiple times and ultimately being the one to stop them. With the villain team defeated the trainer also battles an elite group of trainers and the League's top trainer to claim the title of Champion.
Now, as you can probably guess, I kind of needed to go a bit vague there due to some recent games mixing things up (Alola using Captains & Kahuna instead of Gym Leaders, Alola also have a top trainer instead of a Champion, Galar not having an Elite Four, not all region villains are focused on taking over the world or use a Legendary Pokemon, etc.).
The ones who plot probably match the closest with one another I would say are likely Sinnoh & Kalos. If you disregard there being two villain teams, Hoenn can be added alongside them. If you discard the villain team not wanting to use a Legendary Pokemon, Kanto & Johto can be added too. Unova, especially Alola, and Galar have a bit too much unique things in their details to really be comparable to another gen so basically.
You could actually merge the first three iterations of Smash Bros. in here too if you really felt like it. The late '90s and most of the 2000s were largely based on reused assets in future games; games you featured on your list that reused assets of previous titles include Stadium by virtue of its sequel, Snap by virtue of the anime, the entirety of Generation 2's Game Boy Color run, Pokémon Colloseum by virtue of XD coming out, and all three Ranger games. Reusing assets for sequel games and other media is nothing new, but that's not really what I'm getting at here.
See, in Generation 5, Game Freak had a pretty big design philosophy change in regards to this sort of thing. The end of the 2000s going into most of the 2010s saw Game Freak and The Pokémon Company utilize a lot more of their own work in their games compared to older titles. Series such as Mystery Dungeon and the recently introduced Rumble started going more in their own directions as games like the old battle simulator titles, Ranger, and cult classics like Snap, Puzzle League, Pinball, etc. fell out of the radar completely. If I had to guess, this massive shift across the franchise as a whole doesn't have anything to do with one particular affiliate of Game Freak, but rather the modern mindset that they and Nintendo have with which games they'd like to put out and how they want to go about it. They're so picky nowadays about the games being up to date with their standards as opposed to the standards of the actual developers, and since the pictures rarely match that well, the other companies can't produce their games and make money off of them.
Yung Dramps
awesome gaming
So uhhh... Where's the SWSH Super Music Collection? Did they just give up on those cuz they weren't selling well enough or what?
Covid might've fucked with plans, maybe? They usually like to release physical discs in Japan instead of putting them on itunes like they do internationally.
Maybe we'll see it come out alongside a Legends Arceus soundtrack, or something.
Ah right I meant to mention this yesterday but BDSP datamine discussion made me remember now:
So internally, dialog strings have an associated little tag for who is speaking. So like you speak with a Hiker, its "mount" short for mountaineer the japanese name for the Hiker class. Or gingam if its a galactic grunt or leader if its a gym leader and so on and so forth.
For the stat trainers (which is a fan name, as a reminder) they have the tag of...."seven"
Since BDSP reuses DP so heavily, I expect that those have the same tag back there as well. Which makes me wonder if at some point in development there was meant to be seven of them, not 5.
I'm also guessing that they were concieved more primarily on "sidequest pair up partners" and not "stats!".
Also there's this bit of Mira dialog which is kind of interesting, this one's always been there if you talk to her: I like helpful Pokémon moves, like Growl and Minimize. Those kinds of moves are my favorites.
Which is funny because she doesn't use those moves at all and while she does have various "helping" moves like Flash or Double Team, those aren't unique to her or anything. I don't think it pertained to the initial idea of the "seven" but I could see an original concept for Mira specifically being primarily "status move" based.
Next on the conspiracy train Riley has this line
67-msg_pair_seven3_08 Thanks. You really helped me out. Listen, I have a Pokémon here named Luca. Would you take it with you?
Which seems to be an early version of this line where he gives you the egg
81-msg_d24r0105_seven3_06 Thanks. You really helped me out. Listen, I have a Pokémon Egg here... Would you take it with you?
Seems like he was meant to give you a Riolu instead of an egg. And also, possibly it was named "Luca" before...?
Incidentally, something I find funny
Cheryl = Seven1
Mira = Seven2
Riley = Seven3
Marley = Seven4
Buck = Seven....2, again. He's also referred to as Seven5 later in the dump so bit of an oopsie there.
So internally, dialog strings have an associated little tag for who is speaking. So like you speak with a Hiker, its "mount" short for mountaineer the japanese name for the Hiker class. Or gingam if its a galactic grunt or leader if its a gym leader and so on and so forth.
For the stat trainers (which is a fan name, as a reminder) they have the tag of...."seven"
Since BDSP reuses DP so heavily, I expect that those have the same tag back there as well. Which makes me wonder if at some point in development there was meant to be seven of them, not 5.
I'm also guessing that they were concieved more primarily on "sidequest pair up partners" and not "stats!".
Also there's this bit of Mira dialog which is kind of interesting, this one's always been there if you talk to her: I like helpful Pokémon moves, like Growl and Minimize. Those kinds of moves are my favorites.
Which is funny because she doesn't use those moves at all and while she does have various "helping" moves like Flash or Double Team, those aren't unique to her or anything. I don't think it pertained to the initial idea of the "seven" but I could see an original concept for Mira specifically being primarily "status move" based.
Next on the conspiracy train Riley has this line
67-msg_pair_seven3_08 Thanks. You really helped me out. Listen, I have a Pokémon here named Luca. Would you take it with you?
Which seems to be an early version of this line where he gives you the egg
81-msg_d24r0105_seven3_06 Thanks. You really helped me out. Listen, I have a Pokémon Egg here... Would you take it with you?
Seems like he was meant to give you a Riolu instead of an egg. And also, possibly it was named "Luca" before...?
Incidentally, something I find funny
Cheryl = Seven1
Mira = Seven2
Riley = Seven3
Marley = Seven4
Buck = Seven....2, again. He's also referred to as Seven5 later in the dump so bit of an oopsie there.
Interesting. Well, looking at the Stat Trainers, we already see an oddity with Buck training both Defense & Special Defense. With Mira's dialogue maybe hinting she was a "Status Move" specialist, separating Buck's specialty would give us seven: HP, Attack, Defense, Special Attack, Special Defense, Speed, & Status (though I would have more thought the last would be Evasion/Accuracy, which works in Minimize but Growl lowers Attack; unless Growl was a mistranslation and meant to be something like Flash, Sand Attack or Sweet Scent).
Though, assuming Cheryl, Riley (we'll just ignore Lucario has a higher Special Attack stat...), and Marley are "correct", and Mira apparently was "Status", that means Special Attack, Defense, and Special Defense are unassigned and we have a question mark on what Buck trained. Buck's partner is a Claydol which highest stat is Special Defense, so for now let's say that was his stat. So that means there may have been originally seven, with Special Attack and Defense having unique characters, but likely time constraints or thinking seven was too many shortened it to five. Mira was changed to Special Attack cause they saw "Status" as unneeded and tossed Buck the other defensive stat to just make him the all around "defensive" stat trainer instead of just Special Defense. Also not sure if the number assignment means anything like they were the first five made before pulling the plug on the last two. Maybe the initial mistake with Buck being labelled as 2 meant he was supposed to appear earlier, possibly it was him in Wayward Cave and not Mira but changed their mind.
Actually, that all said, the Stat Trainers are color-coded but their colors don't match the Stat they specialize in. In the gamed generally Attack is Red, Defense is Yellow, Special Attack is Blue, Special Defense is Green, and Speed is Pink. If we're to go by that, Buck would be Attack, Riley would be Special Attack, Cherly would be Special Defense, & Mira would be Speed. We're missing Defense & HP, though HP has no color assignment WHICH could fit with Marley wearing black & white. So we're missing a yellow-colored trainer for Defense. Of course, this does contradict with Mira saying how she liked Status Moves unless they maybe decided to have Speed be represented by a different color like purple or gray.
Not sure what you find odd about the Riley thing, unless you think it being named "Luca" implies he was going to give a Lucario instead of a Riolu. Perfectly possible, Riolu sort of feels like one of those prevos they worked backwards to make (hence why its considered a Baby Pokemon and initially a gift) so I could see three possibilities: (1.) If Riolu did exist they were just gonna cut you hatching the Egg originally but decided to make you work for your Lucario, (2.) Riolu existed but they were going to give you a Lucario anyway and leave it a surprise for those who bred it to learn it had a prevo, (3.) Riolu didn't exist yet so you were just going to be given a Lucario but then they made Riolu and decided it would be hatched from an Egg. All plausible though I don't think anything too revealing.
It's worth noting that there's another set of colour-coding for different stats in addition to the one provided by natures and contest stats. Back in gen 3, stat changes had their animations coloured for different stats. Attack changes were still red and SpD changes were green, but Defense was a different shade of green, SpA was orange, Speed was blue, Accuracy was purple, and Evasion was cyan. Gray was used when a single move boosted multiple stats. The first two MD games also colour-coded stats in a similar way, though it changes up some of the associations, with yellow evasion, purple SpA, gray SpD and pink accuracy.
So now we have three different ways to match colours with stats, and none of them actually match the trainers. That said, I do wonder if Buck was originally the SpA trainer, matching both his colour and potential original index of 2 (where the SpA trainer currently is).
Yung Dramps
awesome gaming
Resurrecting this topic for a few reasons:
1) the aforementioned relevancy is even stronger right now
2) nobody ever continued this convo when I first posted
3) I've since found another oddity that hints at the dex slashing being a relatively late change. In DP, by using Surf in the very first floor of Mt. Coronet, you can obtain a Dawn Stone before the postgame. This item is only useful for evolving Kirlia into Gallade and Snorunt into Froslass. Why was it even included here if it serves no purpose for a DP main story playthrough?
As for the DP Pokédex, I think they wanted 151 Pokémon and just forgot to include more than two Fire-type families. By the time anyone noticed, it was either too late or they didn't want to change it.
As another oddity, Pokémon: Detective Pikachu has the titular character say "serenity now" to calm down Psyduck, which is of course a reference to the hit 90s sitcom Seinfeld. Which makes me wonder... does Seinfeld exist in some version of the Pokémon universe? Does it include regional variants like Serenity Now Primeape and Festivus Delibird?
My other Kyurem theory was that the original dragon's empty husk was left behind in the eventual Giant Chasm when Reshiram and Zekrom were created, and the meteor impact released enough energy to reanimate the dragon as Kyurem. Kyurem was revived without replacing what was lost, so it has no will besides seeking out its missing pieces. Meteors can power Rayquaza's Mega Evolution and Dynamax in the Pokémon universe after all, so many of them appear to have some special power. The presence of Star Pieces, Comet Shards, Solrock, Lunatone, and Clefairy in the Giant Chasm suggest that there was genuine meteor impact at some point, though I don't know if it's indicated when the impact occurred.
As another oddity, Pokémon: Detective Pikachu has the titular character say "serenity now" to calm down Psyduck, which is of course a reference to the hit 90s sitcom Seinfeld. Which makes me wonder... does Seinfeld exist in some version of the Pokémon universe? Does it include regional variants like Serenity Now Primeape and Festivus Delibird?
QuentinQuonce
formerly green_typhlosion
Yes.
Numerous real-world aspects of pop culture have been established to exist in the Pokemon universe, often with a Pokemon twist to them. As well as countless minor shout-outs in the games and anime to pop songs and TV shows, Wizard of Oz and Stand By Me are indirectly referenced in FRLG as being films in-universe, and there have been explicit references in both the games and anime to, among others, Beauty and the Beast (in which the beast either was, or took on the appearance of, a Pokemon), Dr Seuss, Titanic, and Mario Bros. The last of those is obviously also a Nintendo property so is perhaps not that surprising a reference. So it's not at all far-fetched to assume that Seinfeld could exist in Pokemon too.
Now I want Festivus Delibird which will somehow duplicate two of the same ability.
Probably because there's really nothing to say as we don't know what happened. Your theory might as well be the truth, your obviously put a lot of thought and did a lot of sleuthing to come up with it.
Okay, everyone. It's been a week since anyone's posted on this thread, but I may have just stumbled upon something extremely fascinating by complete accident. I just had to post about this here. So what's this big breakthrough, you ask?
To answer that we need to go back to Pokémon Omega Ruby & Alpha Sapphire. These games had that whole sequence where you went after your version's mascot Legendary and then they went primal and then you had to battle them... all that stuff we already knew. In a few other threads I've mentioned how I've recently been playing through Alpha Sapphire, and I just finished that part of the story. Now, ORAS is a bit unique in that you can actually unlock the National PokéDex functionality as soon as this part of the story is completed, in contrast to other games where you have to complete the main story first and in older games see every Pokémon in the regional PokéDex beforehand.
Knowing this, I went to the professor's lab to pick up the new PokéDex upgrade, but... have you ever sat back and thought about his dialogue when you talk to him? Here's an excerpt taken from the Bulbapedia page detailing his character quotes. (Source: https://bulbapedia.bulbagarden.net/wiki/Professor_Birch/Quotes)
"Welcome back, <Player>! You must be tired after all your recent exploits. Brendan/May has been keeping me updated about all of your grand adventures around Hoenn. After hearing all that you've been up to, there is something I'd definitely like to share with you. The fact of the matter is that after you resolved that kerfuffle with the super ancient Pokémon, a number of Pokémon never before recorded in the Hoenn region began to appear all over! Those Pokémon are precisely the subject of my many long years of research… They are Pokémon which are thought to have resided in Hoenn thousands of years ago! We'll finally be able to meet Pokémon never before seen, the very Pokémon I've pursued all these years! I'm so excited I feel like I'm about to burst! So excited that I went right ahead and upgraded the Pokédex to be ready for all of them! Now, let me upgrade your Pokédex while you're here!"
And then he goes on to say this:
"You'll now find the National Pokédex on your Pokédex's menu, so use it well! It is being suggested that Hoenn is now more hospitable to Pokémon after that incident in Sootopolis. However, that does not necessarily mean the environment has become any more hospitable to humanity. People, Pokémon, and nature… The balance between these three great ecosystems has shifted greatly. I can't wait for you to start exploring this new world! Exploration may help us learn how best to coexist with Pokémon from this time forward. I hope you will find your own answers to this great question, as you continue your journey with your Pokédex!"
A region becoming more hospitable to certain Pokémon after the re-release of ancient energy that was lost in the distant past... doesn't this remind you of something all of a sudden? Is it perhaps possible that seven years ago, we received some sort of hint as to how the Hisui Pokémon population changed without actually knowing about Legends: Arceus being a thing?
To answer that we need to go back to Pokémon Omega Ruby & Alpha Sapphire. These games had that whole sequence where you went after your version's mascot Legendary and then they went primal and then you had to battle them... all that stuff we already knew. In a few other threads I've mentioned how I've recently been playing through Alpha Sapphire, and I just finished that part of the story. Now, ORAS is a bit unique in that you can actually unlock the National PokéDex functionality as soon as this part of the story is completed, in contrast to other games where you have to complete the main story first and in older games see every Pokémon in the regional PokéDex beforehand.
Knowing this, I went to the professor's lab to pick up the new PokéDex upgrade, but... have you ever sat back and thought about his dialogue when you talk to him? Here's an excerpt taken from the Bulbapedia page detailing his character quotes. (Source: https://bulbapedia.bulbagarden.net/wiki/Professor_Birch/Quotes)
"Welcome back, <Player>! You must be tired after all your recent exploits. Brendan/May has been keeping me updated about all of your grand adventures around Hoenn. After hearing all that you've been up to, there is something I'd definitely like to share with you. The fact of the matter is that after you resolved that kerfuffle with the super ancient Pokémon, a number of Pokémon never before recorded in the Hoenn region began to appear all over! Those Pokémon are precisely the subject of my many long years of research… They are Pokémon which are thought to have resided in Hoenn thousands of years ago! We'll finally be able to meet Pokémon never before seen, the very Pokémon I've pursued all these years! I'm so excited I feel like I'm about to burst! So excited that I went right ahead and upgraded the Pokédex to be ready for all of them! Now, let me upgrade your Pokédex while you're here!"
And then he goes on to say this:
"You'll now find the National Pokédex on your Pokédex's menu, so use it well! It is being suggested that Hoenn is now more hospitable to Pokémon after that incident in Sootopolis. However, that does not necessarily mean the environment has become any more hospitable to humanity. People, Pokémon, and nature… The balance between these three great ecosystems has shifted greatly. I can't wait for you to start exploring this new world! Exploration may help us learn how best to coexist with Pokémon from this time forward. I hope you will find your own answers to this great question, as you continue your journey with your Pokédex!"
A region becoming more hospitable to certain Pokémon after the re-release of ancient energy that was lost in the distant past... doesn't this remind you of something all of a sudden? Is it perhaps possible that seven years ago, we received some sort of hint as to how the Hisui Pokémon population changed without actually knowing about Legends: Arceus being a thing?
Regions supporting forms of life in the past but not the present has been a feature of the series since day 1 with Omastar, Kabutops, and Aerodactyl, and have been expanded upon a lot with regional forms. There's also nothing to suggest that present-day Sinnoh will suddenly start supporting Basculin due to some ancient energy bullshit.
You have spent 544 words and 3,175 characters suddenly realizing that time passes. Nice breakthrough.
You have spent 544 words and 3,175 characters suddenly realizing that time passes. Nice breakthrough.
I suppose that's true, but think of it this way. Those are, from what we know, from one specific landmass that we know as a region. This also isn't necessarily talking about fossil Pokémon. I get that you may interpret my post as useless or whatever, and that's fine by me. I'm not going to start an argument where there doesn't need to be one. I just thought it would be some nice food for thought, that's all.
From an in-universe point of view, I can imagine it would have took place something like this. We've got Arceus, and we've got all these other Pokémon who lived in Hisui but not in modern-day Sinnoh. Based off of Birch's dialogue here, perhaps something happened involving Arceus that eventually would have done away with all of the Hisuian-era Pokémon. The ones that did survive whatever that might be would go on to be the Pokémon we know and love in the modern day Sinnoh region.
With ORAS and Hoenn on the other hand, this may very well have happened but in the opposite direction. Whereas in Arceus's version of this energy was taken away and took the Pokémon along with it, when the Primal Reversion energy was released back into the world during the events of ORAS, the specific species of Pokémon that lived in whatever Hoenn's equivalent of Hisui was came back along with it. Of course, since thousands of years have passed since then, any sort of regional variants and region-exclusive species would have gone extinct around the time Groudon and/or Kyogre did what Arceus did. Canonically, this would explain why something such as Braviary in ancient Sinnoh would have a visible regional variant in the past, but something like, I dunno, a Lillipup showing up on Route 101 wouldn't have one in the present day.
An oddity I noticed while trying to get a Moon Stone in Brilliant Diamond.
Despite the connections to the moon, in Mount Coronet, wild Cleffa have the lowest chance of appearing at night, while wild Clefairy do not have a higher chance of appearing at night than they do in other times of the day (save for Platinum where they never appear in the afternoon).
Despite the connections to the moon, in Mount Coronet, wild Cleffa have the lowest chance of appearing at night, while wild Clefairy do not have a higher chance of appearing at night than they do in other times of the day (save for Platinum where they never appear in the afternoon).
One good possibility for Cleffa I've thought of is that they don't have the same connection to the night as Clefairy, as all Dex entries that mention the night only mention nights with shooting stars, while the RSE Dex entry also mentions that in the morning for some sweet
The encounter data might back this up. In the main games the only 2 other places that Wild Cleffa appear as normal Pokemon is the Trophy Garden and Mount Hokulani. The former confirms they're artificially placed there, and the latter has Minior. The Wild Miniors are basically living meteors (though they admittedly originate in the Ozone Layer, not deep Space), can only be found in Mount Hokulani, and Cleffa's Moon entry specifies that they love Miniors. It's possible that like Mt. Cornet Cleffa reside in the Mountain and come out at night to dance to the Meteors, and in this case Minior.
As for Clefairy I have no idea. It's possible that maybe after their night playing stragglers can still be found in morning, and by afternoon they're all back inside their hiding places, but that's the best guess I've got.
Last edited:
QuentinQuonce
formerly green_typhlosion
Anyone else find the early placement of box legendaries in the Pokedex intriguing? In the early gens the ordering of the legendaries in the Pokedex was reversed in regards to how they're ordered by the games.
So for instance, in GSC Ho-Oh is the "A" legendary, Lugia is the "B" legendary. It's Gold and Silver, not Silver and Gold. But in the Pokedex Lugia comes first at #249, while Ho-Oh comes second at #250.
Similarly, in RSE Groudon is the "A" legendary while Kyogre is the "B" legendary. But in the Pokedex Kyogre comes first at #382 while Groudon comes second at #383. Interestingly, the same is true of the version-exclusive Lati species - Latias comes first despite being nominally exclusive to Sapphire, Latios comes second despite being nominally exclusive to Ruby.
But in Gen IV onwards, this changes. Dialga is the "A" legendary, Palkia is the "B" legendary. Finally the Pokedex reflects this, with Dialga coming first and Palkia coming second in both the Sinnoh and National listings. This has continued with every box legendary pairing up to Zacian and Zamazenta. And the same is true of version-exclusive minor legendaries, too - Tornadus comes first in the dex because it's exclusive to Black.
This has to have been a deliberate change, right?
So for instance, in GSC Ho-Oh is the "A" legendary, Lugia is the "B" legendary. It's Gold and Silver, not Silver and Gold. But in the Pokedex Lugia comes first at #249, while Ho-Oh comes second at #250.
Similarly, in RSE Groudon is the "A" legendary while Kyogre is the "B" legendary. But in the Pokedex Kyogre comes first at #382 while Groudon comes second at #383. Interestingly, the same is true of the version-exclusive Lati species - Latias comes first despite being nominally exclusive to Sapphire, Latios comes second despite being nominally exclusive to Ruby.
But in Gen IV onwards, this changes. Dialga is the "A" legendary, Palkia is the "B" legendary. Finally the Pokedex reflects this, with Dialga coming first and Palkia coming second in both the Sinnoh and National listings. This has continued with every box legendary pairing up to Zacian and Zamazenta. And the same is true of version-exclusive minor legendaries, too - Tornadus comes first in the dex because it's exclusive to Black.
This has to have been a deliberate change, right?
It's probably deliberate yeah.
Ho-oh was flying solo for a long, long time and definitely meant to be the mewtwo during that time period, so it comes last in GS as a remainder of that.
Kyogre & Groudon, who knows. Maybe it was just luck of the draw, maybe they thought water before land made sense, maybe they thought "Kyogre, Groudon" had better "mouth feel" (dont know how to better explain this one), maybe kyogre finished design first, etc.
Then gen 4-on they went with what the "A" & "B" version mascots go, probably just because it "makes sense", for lack of a better phrase.
Ho-oh was flying solo for a long, long time and definitely meant to be the mewtwo during that time period, so it comes last in GS as a remainder of that.
Kyogre & Groudon, who knows. Maybe it was just luck of the draw, maybe they thought water before land made sense, maybe they thought "Kyogre, Groudon" had better "mouth feel" (dont know how to better explain this one), maybe kyogre finished design first, etc.
Then gen 4-on they went with what the "A" & "B" version mascots go, probably just because it "makes sense", for lack of a better phrase.
Biologically speaking, I could see this being for a number of reasons. As a baby Pokémon form of Clefairy, it only seems natural that the source material would come first, "chicken or the egg" style. Why is this relevant? It's because Cleffa would very likely have only been discovered after Clefairy itself was, following its outer-space origins or whatever's going on there. I'm not caught up on my Clefairy lore at the moment, but personally, I believe that wherever Clefairy came from, it did not have the means necessary to reproduce Cleffa offspring. That's a more complex way of saying Clefairy lived alongside some sort of lifeforms that could not be classified as Pokémon.
Therefore, since wild Cleffa would have only come along after Clefairy's departure to Earth, Cleffa itself would not have a lot of these factors going for it while the average Clefairy still would. Hopefully this post made some sort of sense.
I can think three possible explanations as for why this change happened, some of which are more reasonable than the others. Technically there's a fourth option as well, but I'm excluding that since it really only applies to the Hoenn legendaries, and only in the 3DS remakes at that.
1. In Generations 2 through 4, they may have wanted the PokéDex order of the mascot legendaries to have the "blue" member of each duo (Lugia, Kyogre, Dialga) come before the "red" member of each duo (Ho-Oh, Groudon, Palkia). If this theory is to be believed, than starting in the franchise reboot of Generation 5, the "blue & red" pattern would be swapped around in each future installment.
2. While Generation 4 was not one of those "reboot generations" so to speak, it did signal the shift from Pokémon games on "Game Boy" family systems to "DS" family systems. Since Generation 1 did not use mascot legendaries, it's hard to say if this is true, but the shift from Game Boy/GBA era to DS/3DS era may have something to do with this.
3. The order of mascot Legendaries in the PokéDex relative to if they represent the A version or the B version may not have any set criteria at all, instead being based on factors varying from game to game. I've compiled a list of possible explanations for this option here.
Gen 2: Gold is typically valued as a higher honor than silver, but people still use the phrase "silver and gold" more than "gold and silver"
Gen 3: The switch of Groudon to the A version of the game may possibly be a reference to Pokémon Red back in Gen 1
Gen 4: This is honestly the only one I'm really stuck on... isn't it referred to as "space-time" and not "time-space"?
Gen 5: The phrase "black and white" is pretty obvious, but the order also properly represents Yin and Yang, part of their inspirations
Gen 6: This one's pretty easy to figure out; coordinate pairs on a graph are listed as (X,Y) as opposed to (Y,X)
Gen 7: How much more often do you hear "day and night" as opposed to "night and day"?
Gen 8: If the pattern we seem to be following is to be continued, then perhaps "offense and defense" is the next common phrase