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Pokemon games: Who agrees with me?
9 years ago
General
Just my personal opinion about 2 aspects of pokemon games, wondering who else thinks the same or not and why.
First off: The rival{s}.
The new pokemon games 'need' rivals similar to that from the first 2 generations (red/blue/yellow/gold/silver/crystal) because those actually felt accomplishing to defeat. They got in your way, taunted you, always trying to one up you and generally make you WANT to defeat them. All rivals since then have been friendly friends and like "Oh I wanna see how good you've got so lets battle"... to me that doesn't make me want to defeat them and feel happy that I did, they just feel like an obstacle used to give you a little more of a challenging battle. It's boring! Give me a rival I want to defeat, not one that just gets in the way to add time.
Sure rivals can be friends, for example in the anime Ash and Gary were friends however were always trying to be better than the other when pokemon was involved, it seemed like they were enemies and they used that to motivate each other to get better (though not too obvious in the first few seasons). Similar in the first gen of games, ??? is your rival but not a bad guy or anything, he just got in your way always claiming to be better making you want to defeat him and feel good when you do. Second gen was very similar and beating him made you feel accomplished. Everyone since who've just been friends with you and wanting to challenge you to see how good you got or whatever, so boring, especially when they lose and go "Wow you're good" rather than anything that makes you want to even face them in battle again.
Second: Difficulty.
Now I'm not the best pokemon player by any means, not even close. Challenge me online and I'd get my ass kicked. I know nothing about EV's (originally when people said EV training I thought that meant that an Eevee could get very powerful, not kidding), little about building a great team or even how to best use items and such.... however when I play the games I can just blast through them using only my starter pokemon and maybe 1 more, without any grinding really at all, and have no real problems with any battle at all. Few exceptions such as Red from Gen 2, Cynthia, and a few others where I did have to grind or level up some more.
People have to agree with me that the new generations are easy as hell, they even give you strong pokemon for free! So I want pokemon to have a harder mode for experienced players. Sure have a normal mode for people just starting to help them ease into the game and what to do, but once beaten then have a harder mode where rival levels are harder, AI are smarter, stuff like that! Sure at the end of the games you can battle the elite 4 again and they're stronger and such, but that's a very small bonus after beating the game. I want to play the whole game in a harder mode, something that gives it at least a small challenge throughout. Beating Red from gen 2 was a hard thing to do when younger, and when I finally beat him it was the best moment in any pokemon game I've had, it was a challenge and something we've not seen since then. We need more of that!
So TL;DR: Better rival who we want to defeat, and make the games harder or give them a harder mode.
First off: The rival{s}.
The new pokemon games 'need' rivals similar to that from the first 2 generations (red/blue/yellow/gold/silver/crystal) because those actually felt accomplishing to defeat. They got in your way, taunted you, always trying to one up you and generally make you WANT to defeat them. All rivals since then have been friendly friends and like "Oh I wanna see how good you've got so lets battle"... to me that doesn't make me want to defeat them and feel happy that I did, they just feel like an obstacle used to give you a little more of a challenging battle. It's boring! Give me a rival I want to defeat, not one that just gets in the way to add time.
Sure rivals can be friends, for example in the anime Ash and Gary were friends however were always trying to be better than the other when pokemon was involved, it seemed like they were enemies and they used that to motivate each other to get better (though not too obvious in the first few seasons). Similar in the first gen of games, ??? is your rival but not a bad guy or anything, he just got in your way always claiming to be better making you want to defeat him and feel good when you do. Second gen was very similar and beating him made you feel accomplished. Everyone since who've just been friends with you and wanting to challenge you to see how good you got or whatever, so boring, especially when they lose and go "Wow you're good" rather than anything that makes you want to even face them in battle again.
Second: Difficulty.
Now I'm not the best pokemon player by any means, not even close. Challenge me online and I'd get my ass kicked. I know nothing about EV's (originally when people said EV training I thought that meant that an Eevee could get very powerful, not kidding), little about building a great team or even how to best use items and such.... however when I play the games I can just blast through them using only my starter pokemon and maybe 1 more, without any grinding really at all, and have no real problems with any battle at all. Few exceptions such as Red from Gen 2, Cynthia, and a few others where I did have to grind or level up some more.
People have to agree with me that the new generations are easy as hell, they even give you strong pokemon for free! So I want pokemon to have a harder mode for experienced players. Sure have a normal mode for people just starting to help them ease into the game and what to do, but once beaten then have a harder mode where rival levels are harder, AI are smarter, stuff like that! Sure at the end of the games you can battle the elite 4 again and they're stronger and such, but that's a very small bonus after beating the game. I want to play the whole game in a harder mode, something that gives it at least a small challenge throughout. Beating Red from gen 2 was a hard thing to do when younger, and when I finally beat him it was the best moment in any pokemon game I've had, it was a challenge and something we've not seen since then. We need more of that!
So TL;DR: Better rival who we want to defeat, and make the games harder or give them a harder mode.
And to counter giving strong pokemon, they could of at least given a challenge or story arch to get there in the first place. make people earn it.
After the game is over, maybe have an adventure that lets you learn and see more of the region's lore and such. Or have a codex like in Mass Effect about some things like cities or technology.
I hear some people saying that it would be nice if you could lose to rivals at times, and that they may comment on it.
A codex for completion afterwards would be fun for completionists but not me, though going through the world again adding more story and lore can be fun as long as it also has a challenge to it such as in gen 2.
Rival's commenting on if you beat them or not, very undertale but could be fun.
I've actually not played the more recent pokemon games because of these traits, as a matter of fact. I quickly realized that the pokemon games, on their own, just aren't very good or challenging anymore. Gen 2 was probably the best in terms of overall gameplay. A rival you felt compelled to defeat and actually has a change of heart over the course of the game. A difficulty curve that was more challenge and less unfair compared to the first game. Probably the best post-game content in the series thus far and even has a decent story.
I'm actually not even all that hype for pokemon sun and moon. Its gotten to the point that the only thing I enjoy with modern day pokemon is the competitive battling, and, why buy a game that's lackluster just to grind up a team and finally be good enough to battle online when I can just jump on pokemon showdown and simulate it all? I mean sure, they won't be "MY" pokemon that I raised from the ground up, but that's just not enough of an incentive to me. I'd rather just log on and just play what I like from the start. Not to mention the implementation of tournament rules and tiers on showdown make battles FAR more fun and balanced that just "go online and get rekt by a team of 6 legendaries".