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(Little) Things that annoy you in Pokémon
- Thread starter BriarRose
- Start date
Couldnt tangrowth be related to the general trend of megafauna? Rather than one specific animal.
Also I do like evolving the with a specific move gimmick, especially when its not a move they naturally learn. I think its neat
I wish we got hints on how some pokemon evolve through their dex. I know some games have npcs but the amount of pokemon with newer and wilder gimmicks need a more consistent explanation imo. It doesnt have to be super detailed, just vague enough for you to piece down if its stone/friendship/move/location
Also I do like evolving the with a specific move gimmick, especially when its not a move they naturally learn. I think its neat
I wish we got hints on how some pokemon evolve through their dex. I know some games have npcs but the amount of pokemon with newer and wilder gimmicks need a more consistent explanation imo. It doesnt have to be super detailed, just vague enough for you to piece down if its stone/friendship/move/location
BW2's ability to just call Cheren about a Pokemon was such a good idea and should have stuck around.
If they don't want to be blunt again ( I mean at this point they just should but you know how developers are sometimes) they could even ~gamify~ it more by just like "This pokemon seems to evolve...maybe by x?", and if you see the evolution the hint evolves a bit, and then once you get the evolution it can just be freely available to look up
Like you catch an Inkay "Seems like it can evolve after a certain level, but need something else..." and if you see Malamar it goes to "Seems like it evolves after turning around" and once you finally evolve it "Evolves at level 30 while holding the system upsidedown" just so you can immediately reference it later.
You see Eevee it goes "Can evolve into a lot of things through various methods" great thanks. See Vaporeon "Evolves from Eevee with a certain stone..."; see ESpeon "Evolve from a happy eevee?", see Sylveon "Evolve from a happy charming eevee?"
etc etc
Unfortunately Pokémon was and still is awful at bringing information to the player.
And while you can say "they can look for it on the internet", that should not be the solution. In fact, that's part of the problem. That I can come here to Smogon to see that Scald has a 30% chance of burning the target does not mean the game is not supposed to tell me that.
And while you can say "they can look for it on the internet", that should not be the solution. In fact, that's part of the problem. That I can come here to Smogon to see that Scald has a 30% chance of burning the target does not mean the game is not supposed to tell me that.
Not giving hard percentages is not a pokemon exclusive problem, incidentally. I feel like most RPGs do not get so granular in its information like that and honestly don't necessarily need to.
Contrast with: They should really update the Water Bubble description to mention that it increases water type attacks
I disagree in that regard. Unless it's a glitch or an oversight (which means they simply failed to notice what was happening), every mechanic should have an in-game explanation.
You don't even need an NPC. Just... give some sort of in-game encyclopaedia that one can check anytime.
If I had to guess, the lack of information on evolution methods (and anything else, really) is probably to encourage players to work together. Not like in a "go look it up on the internet" way, but more like "cross reference with friends to figure out what happened when one of your Pokemon spontaneously evolved".
For better or for worse, player-to-player cooperation is the central pillar that the franchise is built atop. "Catch 'em all" and "be the very best" may be the ones with taglines, but collection and competition/conquest are only supporting pillars.
Yes but no
Not giving exact informations on a move's effect or chance is often a deliberate choice in JRPGs.
From what I recall hearing from some interviews, basically the concept is that giving numerical informations would push the player into metathinking "Will i benefit more with 30% extra attack rather than pushing the same move twice? Will I get better result risking a 30% burn chance instead of pushing a different move" instead of just going with the flow of "I want to buff up / I want to attack".
Lot of game designers think that this metathinking is bad game design and the games shouldn't encourage it.
Obviously that is just a school of thought, and there's also who thinks the exact opposite and that the game should be very clear on their numbers.
I don't think either views is wrong, just different schools of thought. I am quite indifferent to either, as long as the game is clear on when a button has a effect, a chance of a effect, or nothing.
What I feel Pokemon needs to do is give items & Abilities (maybe even Moves) two info boxes. One for flavor text, one for what their effects are in any.
Still wouldn't hurt to have somewhere in the game you can go or access to just look up something that is stumping you. Like calling Cheren in B2W2 and being told just a way to evolve a Pokemon.
Hm, maybe for an action RPG where the character can dodge and counter, but when it's a turn-based thus every turn counts I think that is information that is needed. I mean, even if we don't know the effects percentage, we still are told plenty about a move to choose it over another: Category, Power, Accuracy, and description usually includes what the effect is but may not go into detail. It's enough for me to, before battle, choose to teach Flamethrower over Fire Blast because Flamethrower has 100% Accuracy while Fire Blast, despite being more powerful, has a good chance to miss.
Only way I can see a turn-based game having this if both the powerful and weak options were both available you it turns to a spur of the moment thing during the battle. Like (older) Final Fantasy games usually kept the weaker Magic Spells even if you learned the stronger ones, then during battle you got the option to use a weaker spell for less MP usage (saving the MP for healing) or risking more MP on a stronger move to see if you can end a battle quicker. Pokemon thought doesn't have that with its four moves restriction; and no, I'm not suggesting getting rid of the restriction as it's vital to Pokemon's competitive design (that said I don't think that means the Moveset system can't be played with, I've come up with quite a few ideas how it could be expanded upon, notably one which allows you to "stack" a few related moves into one slot that share a Type but are various Power & PP hence sort of recreating that Final Fantasy magic tier system.
Well as I said... it's schools of thoughts, and they arent necessarly exclusive to each other either, there's degrees of informations.
I've played a large amount of turn based JRPGs by now, and there's often cases where all the game tells you is the accuracy and power of a move and if it has side effects, without going on the numbers of said effect.
Sometimes, the power isnt even specified, rather it just says "high" or "low" or similar values (see final fantasy having the classic Fire > Fira > Firaga but most games don't actually tell you the power), or just "can paralyze the opponent" like for example SMT does for Zio attacks. Often they also leave specific interactions purposely not explained and for the player to find out (es, the fact all attacks against a shocked target are crits in early SMT)
Complete numeric information is in fact pretty rare, not many games do it.
Usually both to avoid metathinking.
There is such thing as "too much information" after all, and this kind of information is usually not relevant as far as gameplay goes as long as you have a clear explanation of why you should click Firaga and not Fire against a level 90 boss.
That said, I 100% agree that if a game actually has a competitive environment (like Pokemon), full information should be given out.
Regular gameplay ultimately lets you save, load and experiment.
Player vs Player combat on other hand should allow fullly informed decisions as it's way past the point where you're being bothered by "immersion" and stuff like that.
Well I did go into that and what the difference between that and Pokemon is.
Pokemon you plan the moves you want to have (since you can only have four) BEFORE battles thus you're encourages to weigh the pros and cons of certain moves against each other (Flamethrower's 90 Power & perfect accuracy against Fire Blast's 120 Power but lower accuracy; you can end battles quicker with Fire Blast but is it worth the 30 Power for a father good chance to miss and thus do no damage?). Meanwhile Final Fantasy has all spells available during the battle so it's a much more split second decisions where you may be tempted to use the more powerful move to end the battle earlier with the risk if it doesn't you'll have less MP to use for healing or other utility of elemental spells if needed.
I agree BW1 missed a post game reward system coming off the heels of Emerald, Platinum and HGSS with their Battle Frontiers and respective symbols.
However, BW2 made up for this in my opinion. I like that your trainer card gets upgraded by beating the Champions Tournament at the PWT. That's a very viable goal worth striving for, even with an in-game team.
And Black Tower/White Treehollow handled this pretty well too, with the token shiny Dragon you get.
I get your point, but I didn't really feel like I missed out on a post game achievement system in BW2 with the way they handled things.
I felt the medals were a good commemorative "thing" to get honestly. In both BW1 & 2 you also get trophies for your room for beating the Subway
And while there wasn't trainer stars, the card itself still "upgraded" with colors just like the older cards did when yo ugot a star, for basically the same things that got the star
And while there wasn't trainer stars, the card itself still "upgraded" with colors just like the older cards did when yo ugot a star, for basically the same things that got the star
QuentinQuonce
formerly green_typhlosion
Funny you say that, because I'm just now trying to (finally) fully level up my Entree on Black 2 (it's a grind-y nightmare if anyone has any tips). This is mainly because I'm never going to do all the Pokestar Studio movies so want to get my trainer card as high as I possibly can.
Though I don't think Gen V deserves all the criticism for this when you consider that Gen VI significantly downgraded the concept of the trainer card level. Sure there aren't stars on your trainer card in BW/B2W2 but it still levels up and changes colour like the others do.
Both Gen V titles have five requirements to level up the dex, a couple of which are legitimately difficult. Whereas XY has... enter the Hall of Fame (standard), see all the Pokemon in the Kalos Dex (not terribly difficult if you fight every trainer and explore a good amount, plus you don't even need to see Mewtwo or the bird trio which feels unnecessarily lenient - they're not hard to find), and defeat one of the Chatelaines (a bit strenuous, but you only have to beat one of them). ORAS isn't much harder - it just swaps seeing 450 Pokemon for catching 200 (which with the GTS being a thing now is far easier than it ever was in RSE).
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Biggest sin Gen 6 delivered was not giving the original dragon as a Kyurem Mega Evolution.
How would that... have made any sense whatsoever. "You can get halfway to the original dragon by recombining half of the original dragon, but to get the full original dragon you just need to hand it an unrelated rock."
Original dragon should only be added if the narrative around it makes up for the fact that you're removing a really cool mystery and probably replacing it with a mediocre design that no one will really like because they put their expectations of the original dragon through the fucking roof.
Well, there's the unused God Stone from BW1 (why not say it's actually a Mega Stone?), and Mega Aerodactyl being stated to be Aerodactyl's true appearance sets some sort of precedent.
QuentinQuonce
formerly green_typhlosion
Honestly I don't ever want to see the original dragon. If Nintendo ever made a canon Kyurem Original Form design this thread would be full of people bitching about how bad it looks.
It is far better left to the imagination now that it's been built up for so long, because it's never going to please the people that want it.
It is far better left to the imagination now that it's been built up for so long, because it's never going to please the people that want it.
Its a good thing Pokemon never left a Trio Master's true form for the next generation after hyping it up for 2 years, leaving its original generation unfinished without a definite version or story. Definitely never happen at all.
If we get a Legends game based in ancient Unova, that is the only chance the original dragon has of showing up as a proper Pokemon.
In fact, if we ever do see the original Dragon, it'll be in such a game. If it takes place in the ancient past, before it split into Reshiram, Zekrom, and Kyurem, in a time built around the formation of Unova.
In fact, if we ever do see the original Dragon, it'll be in such a game. If it takes place in the ancient past, before it split into Reshiram, Zekrom, and Kyurem, in a time built around the formation of Unova.
Aerodactyl didn't lose that true appearance from losing 2/3rds of itself
Nah, biggest sin was absolutely having the chance to do Arbok variances, but then just doing Vivillion variances instead
Same with Alcremie Gen 8