It doesn't matter if people prefer the story of SM to USUM, it is still an enhanced version of the base game with a bunch of extras and changes here and there. It's "third version" to a T regardless of what warts people may not care for.
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(Little) Things that annoy you in Pokémon
- Thread starter BriarRose
- Start date
Frankly, Yellow's status as an adaptation of an adaptation, as well as the existence of Japanese Blue, makes it much more of an odd one out than USUM.
Could you imagine if they went through with the "Pink" version, too? Making the other generations blush.
JP blue is a standard enhanced third edition, with no anime tie-ins. It doesn't have a direct equivalent among the western releases. I don't think a Pink version ever fully existed, so I'm guessing it's a proposed counterpart to Yellow that focused on clefairy (since it was in the running for being mascot at one point)
When Pokemon got localized, they basically took Japanese Blue, split in two, and gave those two parts the encounter tables of Red and Green (and probably made some other changes, but Blue was the base, not Red and Green. The most obvious product of using Blue instead of RG is the updated battle sprites.
Japanese Blue was an "enhanced" version of Red & Green. It was originally a CoroCoro contest exclusive and then sold separately later on. It had bug fixes, some tweaked encounter tables and different front sprites. This version was the "base" for the localization of Pokemon; it's why our copy is less buggy than the original Red & Green and why Blue has different sprites (red & green had the same sprites for both). Though, we didn't get the tweaked encounter tables Blue had, English Blue uses Green's.
Pink version was something found in leaked documentation for Yellow from the big gigaleak that also got us all those "capumon" assets and SpaceWorld build and so on. It was only mentioned in some headers, however, so we don't know much of anything about it; just that it was at some point planned. Likely it didn't get very far into production, if at all.
Considering the timing of everything, I strongly suspect that if they had gone through with Pink it would have been Jigglypuff, who was a recurring character in the anime and popular in its own right.
Wouldn't surprise me if Pink was shelved shortly after cocneption because it made some sense to have one that "emulated" the anime vai Pikachu starter than it did Jigglypuff, the pokemon no one catches and keeps interrupting the gang.
If there were a Pokémon Bow (or, as Pikachu315111 suggested, Pokémon Arrow), I’d imagine that that wolf would have a big ballista on its back in its Crowned form that it somehow fires (probs with the same mechanism that Zamazenta uses to fold its shield), so something similar would work with a gun (or cannon, if we want to keep this antiquated). But then again, Eternatus kinda already took the whole gun motif (since its signature move is Dynamax Cannon).
it took me this long to realize that something that i liked about pokemon....ended up in the thread regarding things that annoy you
I can understand what you mean, but this would also likely mean giving up Neo Team Plasma and the semi-civil war between them and the ex-Team Plasma members loyal to N. And while having Ghetsis as the big bad again felt repetitive, just having another new villain team would have also so that's why I feel the Neo Team Plasma gives it an interesting niche to work off on.
Yeah, that's always been an annoying thing they ignore. It would be something to make Rivals, Gym Leaders, Pokemon League, and villain team admins more than just more powerful NPC like the ones you face on any route. And with so many items they could try showing off how those items can be used (or you'll be told they were using certain items and hopefully noticed how much stronger they made their Pokemon).
This is what they exactly say:
If I had to guess, him losing yet one more time to a "random kid" left his mind in shambles. All he probably does now is lie in his bed, the Shadow Triad having to force him to eat and clean him. What he's thinking who knows, maybe trapped in his own mind palace either trying to come up with some sort of new plan, living an alternate delusion where he won and has taken over the world, or had just given up on life. Eitherway, it's left his body in a vegetative state. If he ever gets back up I would be afraid he would come back as a maniac only wanting to destroy everything, a "if I can't have my world than no one can" mentality. So, might be best for Ghetsis to never be able to do anything again (of course this is just "on his own", they could have another character pull him out of his funk, say like a dimension hopping yakuza/mafia boss...).
And that's another thing, reason Ghetsis is setup as he is is because he's no longer the end game boss (of the main story). The final boss is once again the Champion who this time its Iris that earned her title as Champion (albeit by defeating Alder instead of the BW player cause they're MIA). While the reason Ghetsis needed N was because he wanted N to control one of the Legendary dragons to convince people they should obey him, Ghetsis also likely probably couldn't defeat the Champion on his own (not to mention the Elite Four that proceeds the Champion); he needed that special trainer. So if "sane" Ghetsis wasn't as powerful as Alder, there's no way insane Ghetsis is more powerful than Iris. Thus, relegated to penultimate boss.
And you're acting as if Ghetsis is the only "showing" that Team Plasma has to offer after that. Post game you can have battles with Colress (daily), N (monthly), and the Shadow Triad (monthly), so though Ghetsis is gone Team Plasma lives on in three strong post game battles.
Lack of resources? While I don't know if he was a businessman like he is in the anime, I did get the sense Giovanni was the one with the money or knew how to make money, and now with him gone a lot of that money is inaccessible and/or they're not making a lot & it dried up. The first thing we see Team Rocket doing in Gen II was cutting off Slowpoke tails to scrap together some money. While there was instances in Gen I where there was a Rocket grunt trying to make a quick buck like stealing Cubone skulls, there also was always a deeper motive (they kidnapped Mr. Fuji because he knew about Mewtwo, the invaded Silph Co. because Giovanni wanted the Master Ball likely for personal use, aka catching Mewtwo).
Misunderstood sense of loyalty? Many of the remainder of Team Rocket are Giovanni loyalists/fanatics and possibly consider the Pokemon they were given as part of Team Rocket as a "gift" from Giovanni. You know, instead of just Pokemon they caught en masse so they could hand them out to Grunts to do their job yet in no way pose a threat to Giovanni. No, no, Giovanni TOTALLY caught that Zubat and Ratatta just for you so you better treat those two like the only Pokemon you'll ever have... sure.
If I had to guess a lot of the evil decisions were likely handed down by Ghetsis for Colress to enact. Doesn't excuse Colress of these actions of course, but a character who is "True Neutral" and sees some benefit from following the evil orders will do them with little question. It's probably why Ghetsis picked a TN person, anyone as evil as him would want to take full control over Team Plasma and do what they want to do/betray Ghetsis. Obviously a good person would be against him. And Chaotic Neutral are too random to be trusted. His only choice if he wished to remain the chessmaster was a TN.
Sort of the point. Cyrus was gone at this point, Saturn too decided not to follow Charon and instead try reinventing Team Galactic to be what they actually promised the public they were (a group researching a new form of energy); and many members probably followed Saturn. Mars and Jupiter stuck around Charon because they wanted to know what happened to Cyrus, Mars immediately quitting (once she was defeated) after learning Cyrus was in the Distortion World and Jupiter following suit though her dialogue more hints her going on her own journey instead of following Mars or going back to Saturn. And what's Charon plan now? Stealing the Magma Stone to sell for money. Yeah, that's it. After chastising Cyrus for being immature, overthinking, and wasting what he built with Team Galactic, he then reveals all he wants to do with the team is make money. It's supposed to be pretty pathetic, but if anything shows that the player did indeed dismantle Team Galactic and the admins aren't anyone to worry about.
That was probably Giovanni's plan for it. Gen II Team Rocket was so desperate to get Giovanni back they repurposed the plan to try and get in contact with him.
Giovanni: My loyal servants, I am back! I've heard your call and came rushing back to lead you once again.
Admins: GIOVANNI SENPAI! <3
Giovanni: I'm surprised you were able to contact me, it's how I knew you were serious for my return. How did you find me?
Archer: Oh, we didn't. We just repurposed Project Rage Signal to transmit our message all across Johto and Kanto.
Giovanni: Rage Signal... wasn't that the project meant to cause Pokemon to suddenly evolve with radio waves and make them go berserk?
Archer: Yup!
Giovanni: The project I spent millions on? The project that took a decade of research to do? The project that would have assured our dominance over the entire regions?
Archer: Yes...
Giovanni: So it's finished? Good. How long will it take to switch back and we can start using it?
Archer: Switch... back...
Giovanni: ... You can make it so we can control the radio signal to force Pokemon to evolve whenever we want, yes? Do not tell me you tore it down along with years of research and money just to send out a radio signal.
Archer: ...
Giovanni: ...
Archer: ...
Giovanni: ... When we get back to the HQ you all are going into the pain box.
Admins: D'aw, not the pain box! TT n TT
Yeah, the Admins should have been stronger no doubt. Archer has a better team in Let's Go Pikachu & Eevee than he does in Gen HGSS!
I imagine the majority of the villain teams are probably made up of ordinary people who likely weren't trainers before joining. They either had weak Pokemon as companions or HQ gave them a few Pokemon to do their tasks. They probably have special teams to go out and catch Pokemon for use by other team members, probably told a specific amount, and the only way they're going to reach those numbers is by going after the easily catchable they can encounter in the dozens/hundreds.
It brings to mind how special the Aether Foundation felt when you fought their members and all the employees had Pokemon of varied Types some that were evolved, the total opposite of Team Skull which used basic stage Pokemon that were mostly Dark- & Poison-type (and odd amount of Drowzee users). Granted they still only used one or two Pokemon, but it was at least some fresh change-up from the usual grunt Pokemon.
It's always implied they're experimenting on the Shadow Pokemon creating process even after turning a few Legendaries into Shadow Pokemon (likely the latest Pokemon to be turned into Shadow Pokemon). My guess some Pokemon were just able to fight off the process used on them, possibly making them immune to further experimenting. Just chalk it up as a failure, give it back to the grunt, and figure out what went wrong to fine tune it for the next experiment. And this causes some grunts to not have a single Shadow Pokemon because all their Pokemon were able to reject the Shadow-fication. "But wouldn't the Pokemon do it if their trainer tells them to?". I would say no, because the Pokemon would know this would close its heart making it unattached to its trainer, so in a case of anti-Stockholm Syndrome they refuse their trainer's demands in order to keep connected with their trainer; much to the annoyance of the grunt trainer.
And unlike Charon who maybe may not have any Pokemon (unlikely as that is), we know all the other Sages aside from Ghetsis have Pokemon since they battle the Gym Leaders. Being the other six sages are named after colors it would have been pretty easy to assign them teams:
- Rood: Simisage, Throh, Scolipede, Krookodile, Darmanitan, Crustle, Scrafty, Accelgor, Druddigon, Bisharp, Braviary, Heatmor.
- Zinzolin: Liepard, Gothitelle, Mienshao
- Ryoku: Simisage, Whimsicott, Lilligant, Basculin, Maractus, Garbodor, Reuniclus, Golurk
- Giallo: Leavanny, Scrafty, Cofagrigus, Archeops, Galvantula, Haxorus
- Bronius: Watchog, Conkeldurr, Sawsbuck, Beheeyem, Stunfisk, Bouffalant, Mandibuzz
- Gorm: Simipour, Gigalith, Swoobat, Seismitoad, Sawk, Carracosta, Eelektross, Cryogonal
These but more yellow (and looking like Zazian & Zamazenta) since it would be Zazellow:
Which is confirmed with the recent Evolutions episode which story events & character designs are based off USUM. *Sigh*
"Pokemon Staff" would just confuse people, unless it was a game in which you play as the Game Freak designers and editors trying desperately to churn out new title before the deadline.
...actually that does sound quite fun
Reading through green_typhlosion’s PYSSBTCCCCC challenge reminded me of one thing I don’t like, which I also mentioned in one of my posts in that thread. I said that I might make a longer post about it in this thread… and here we are.
I am not a fan of most of the changes to the Gym Leader rosters in Yellow. I know they were generally changed to match the Gym Leader’s teams in anime since Yellow was based on the anime, but I don’t approve of the changes since I think many of them ended up worse than in R/B.
Let’s take a look at them and compare them to R/B (as well as FR/LG and LGP/E to lesser extents):
Brock: Same team as in R/B, but his Pokémon are at lower levels. I wonder why? Maybe this was done in order to trick people into thinking it would be possible to beat him with only Pikachu. I remember that I tried to beat him with only Pikachu on my first playthrough of Yellow, but I did not succeed. I guess it can be possible if you try really hard, but it feels like you need to overlevel a lot in order to make it. Beating Brock in Yellow more or less forces you to catch another Pokémon in order to win, and I don’t really approve of that. I’m not sure if it can be considered good game design either.
Misty: Exactly the same team as in R/B. LGP/E gave her a Psyduck which would otherwise have been a good choice in Yellow as well since she used a Psyduck in the anime.
Lt. Surge: Goes from having a team of Voltorb/Pikachu/Raichu to just one Raichu, but at a higher level. Yes, that’s what he had in the anime, but it feels like a step down compared to his team in R/B. They could at least have given him one or two Pikachu to go along with his Raichu. Or maybe not since the anime focused on the difference between Pikachu and Raichu? Don’t remember if I ever watched that episode. Though, one change that was for the better in Yellow is that his Raichu has Mega Punch/Kick, which means that you can’t just walk all over it with Ground-type. This was possible in R/B where it only has Electric-type moves and Growl. That said, it still feels rather lacklustre. I think Lt. Surge in Yellow is the only Gym Leader in the whole series with just one Pokémon, correct me if I’m wrong.
Erika: Her team is at higher levels than in R/B, but two of her Pokémon are no longer fully evolved. She has Gloom and Weepinbell instead of Vileplume and Victreebel. Which is because those two and Tangela was her team in the anime. But when I look at Bulbapedia, it seems like Erika has a Vileplume and Victreebel in the anime as well, though she doesn’t use them in the Gym Battle. Even with the higher levels, this feels like a step down since her Pokémon are no longer fully evolved.
Koga: In Yellow, he has three Venonat and one Venomoth. They are also at very high levels compared to Erika. Koga’s team is just plain bad. There are 13 Poison-type Pokémon lines in Gen 1, and Koga restricts himself to using just one of those lines. While he used a Venonat/Venomoth in the anime as his ace Pokémon, he also had a Golbat there. As well as a Scyther (flashback only) and Voltorb, though it is understandable that he didn’t use those in the games. Either way, restricting him to just the Venonat line in Yellow doesn’t really make sense. That said, his teams in R/B and FR/LG weren’t that much better since he just used Muk, Weezing and 2 Koffing, but they were at least better than his team in Yellow. I think his team in LGP/E might actually be his best (as a Gym Leader) since he uses four different fully evolved* Poison-type Pokémon there.
*discounting Crobat since it doesn’t exist in LGP/E.
Sabrina: She uses the three members of the Abra line and nothing else. This was another step down because of anime influence. Kadabra was the only Pokémon she used in the anime, but there are many more Psychic-types from Gen 1. Her team in R/B and FR/LG is better, although it is a bit weird how she uses a Venomoth. Interestingly, Sabrina uses a Venomoth on her team in all the games in which Koga does not use one on his team, and vice versa. Thanks Bulbapedia for that piece of random trivia! Like with Koga, Sabrina’s team in LGP/E team looks like it is the best out of her teams in the Kanto games.
Blaine: He goes from using the four members of the Ponyta and Growlithe lines to using Arcanine, Ninetales and Rapidash. While he has one Pokémon less than in R/B, it feels like a step up since he uses three fully evolved Pokémon from three different lines in Yellow. At first, I was wondering why in the name of pharaoh Yellow didn’t give him a Magmar. It was his ace Pokémon in the anime. Leaving out Rhydon is more understandable since it is not a Fire-type. But I looked a bit deeper into it and I think the reason he did not use Magmar in Yellow was because from what I can find, the anime episode where Blaine debuted aired just a month before Yellow was released in Japan. At that point, Yellow must have been in the final stages of development, so that feels like a reasonable explanation. LGP/E did give him Magmar in addition to his original Yellow team, so that’s cool.
Giovanni: Exchanges his Rhyhorn for a Persian, which is an obvious anime reference. While Persian isn’t a Ground-type, I’d still say this is a step up compared to R/B since it makes his team more diverse. LGP/E completely removes his Persian, leaving him with just four Pokémon. I also find his team in FR/LG a bit disappointing since he uses a second Rhyhorn instead of a Rhydon here. When I first played FR/LG, I thought this was a hint towards how you would face Giovanni again during the post-game, now with a Rhydon instead. But said fight never happened. Nowadays, I can think of three possible alternatives as for why he has a second Rhyhorn in FR/LG:
- They were planning for Giovanni to appear again during the post-game, now with a Rhydon, but said fight was scrapped and not included in the games for unknown reasons.
- They meant to give him a Rhydon instead of a second Rhyhorn, but they made a mistake which ended up with him having a second Rhyhorn instead.
- They wanted to foreshadow his appearance in HG/SS where he has a Rhyperior in the battle against him… which was event-exclusive as it required a Celebi. But this feels unlikely, I doubt they were planning his appearance in HG/SS as far back as in FR/LG.
In the end, why Giovanni has two Rhyhorn in FR/LG is a mystery.
Anyway, here’s my overall opinion on the Gym Leader rosters in Yellow:
- Giovanni was better than in R/B
- Brock, Misty, and Blaine were just as good as they were in R/B
- Lt. Surge, Erika, Koga, and Sabrina were worse than in R/B
Overall, I think their rosters were a step down from how they were in R/B. That said, I kind of approve of how Yellow did at least change the Gym Leader rosters, something most other third versions did as well. The only exception is Crystal, which did no changes to G/S from what I can remember (or find). But despite Crystal is still the best Johto game despite that.
Continuing on the topic of Yellow, I guess I should say that I’m not overly fond of Yellow in general. It is my second least favorite Pokémon game. Yes, it does some things better than R/B, notably the better front sprites and the ability to get all starters. It also made some interesting changes regarding the Pokémon distribution. But there are many negatives and I think that in general, it was a step down compared to R/B.
I think many of the anime references in the game just didn’t work. They either made the gameplay worse, or they were minor to the point that I didn’t notice them. First of all, I disliked being forced to start with Pikachu. I like having the ability to choose my starter, and I think that being forced to go with the one the game chooses isn’t quite as fun. At least not in Yellow. I have less of an issue with it if the game has a more interesting starter (or starters), such as Espeon & Umbreon in Colosseum, or Eevee in XD. Those are fine starters which I don’t mind being forced to start with. However, I do not feel this way about Pikachu. Especially not about a Pikachu which I can’t evolve. Another bad anime reference.
As for other anime references, I feel that they were mostly either for the worse (half of the Gym Leader rosters, as explained above) or minor to the point that I missed them. I think Yellow was trying to do something that the technology of the time just wasn’t good enough to accomplish, which left it feeling lacklustre. I believe LGP/E did this whole thing better, but they were 20 years too late… and they have many other issues instead. That said, I think Pikachu being out of its Poké Ball and walking behind the player was one thing that Yellow did okay. It wasn’t perfect, but it worked. I think the execution was quite good and I prefer it over the walking Pokémon features in HG/SS and the S/S DLC.
Regarding anime references and influences, I think the anime gets too much importance in Pokémon. At least if we compare the influence it gets to its quality and how it works as an advertisement for the games. At least that’s how I feel, though I haven’t seen the anime since I was a kid so real fans of the Pokémon anime might disagree with me here.
I guess Yellow just didn’t feel like a very meaningful adaption of the anime. It also adds very little new and notable to R/B, especially compared to the other third versions which added a lot more and were basically direct upgrades over their first pairs. In comparison, Yellow is a step down from its first pair, which I can’t say for any other third version. I should also mention that one of the many reasons I skipped LGP/E was because they were based on Yellow. If I want the best Kanto games, I’ll just stick with FR/LG.
In the end, Yellow is a game, based on an anime, which in turn is based on the games Yellow itself is also based on… it doesn’t really work. I think Yellow was still fun for its time, but when it comes to Kanto games, I prefer FR/LG. Or even R/B, I always liked them better than Yellow. I had fun with Yellow back in the day and I liked it… but nowadays, I think most other Pokémon games are better.
Enough about Yellow. I want to talk about something else too. After following green_typhlosion’s PYSSBTCCCCC challenge from the beginning to the end, I thought a bit more about challenges. I remembered one of green_typhlosion’s previous challenges in which he completed the National Dex on Home without paying anything at all. This got me interested in trying to do the same thing myself. Though I own a Switch as well as Sword + DLC, so it isn’t completely without payment for me. The reason that I want to do it is that I love Magearna and I really want the OC version. If I should manage to obtain it, I can send it to Sword and use it for some kind of team there, which would be cool.
Anyway, I started on it a few days ago… and it reminded me of why I never used Home that much in the past, as well as why I never tried to complete the National Dex on it. I immediately remembered how much I dislike the fact that the National Dex (and some other features) are nowadays locked to side-apps which you have to pay for to get the most use of (or in order to them use at all, in the case of Bank), instead of being in the main games. I have talked about this before, but I wanted to say something about it again.
First, we have the issue with the National Dex being on Home (and Bank) as opposed to being in the main games. I usually liked completing the National Dex in the past, when it was still in the main games. Especially in Gen 5 and 6, the combination of great Pokémon availability and great training spots in those games made it a lot of fun! More than in any previous generation. In comparison, I have never liked how it was excluded from the main series games in Gen 7 and 8, being limited to side-apps instead. I think both of them executed it terribly.
In Bank, there’s nothing you really need to do outside of completing the Pokédex on your games. A complete National Dex on Gen 6 and having registered all Alola Pokémon in US/UM gives you a complete National Dex in Bank as soon as you connect to it. There’s no reward either, making it completely pointless. For Home, it is badly executed overall, I find it more frustrating and irritating than fun. It is also very limited because of dexit. Looking back now, I really miss the good old days of Gen 1-6 where the National Dex was in the main games and not limited to just side-apps. Sometimes, you don’t know how much you appreciate something until you no longer have it…
Next, let’s talk about the features in Home. First, there’s the GTS. Unlike in the previous generations, the GTS now only exists in Home and not in the main games. I really think it should have been kept in the main games (alongside existing in Home, that would have been the best solution). Now, if you want to trade a Pokémon on the GTS which you have in your game but not in Home, you need to close the mobile app, open the Switch app, deposit the Pokémon you want to trade in Home, save and close the Switch app, open the mobile app, and now you can finally trade it. This is just unnecessarily overcomplicated and requires a lot of extra work. If the GTS had been in the actual games like in the past, this wouldn’t have been an issue.
There is also the issue with unreasonable offers and trades on the GTS, just like always. It seems like a vast majority of all offers are unreasonable, people are asking for legendaries or other “rare” Pokémon. Right now, one of the most requested Pokémon seems to be Furfrou. Specific trims of it, at least. Which must be because the trims can only be obtained from Go and Furfrou is currently dexited. If it hadn’t been dexited, I’m convinced that nobody would give a flying Fletchling about it or any of its different trims. One other issue is that mythicals can’t be traded over the GTS, and since you need them to complete the National Dex on Home, it means I have pretty much already lost unless I pay for the Premium version of Home (or find some other way to get them, but I don’t think so).
Fortunately, the unreasonable offers on the GTS can be abused to great success. Shinies seem to be highly valued as always, so I can just transfer some shinies from Go and use them as trade fodder, asking for whatever I want and be guaranteed to get it. Like when I offered a shiny Haunter and asked for a Giratina, I got it almost immediately. That was cool. I have more shinies on Go, so I can just transfer some more if I should see the need for it. And some reasonable trades still exist, like trading one legendary for another, or one UB for another. Trading one dexited Pokémon for another seems to work too, like offering a Minior and asking for a Komala. And even trading one regular Pokémon for another. At least as long as you are one making the offer.
Still, the GTS has issues. Ever since it first got introduced in Gen 4, I have felt that they really need to make it better in some way. But I’m not really sure how. Perhaps it is a lost cause. At least the Home version has some things that weren’t possible in the past generations, such as the feature where you can search for Pokémon others are looking for instead of just ones you are looking for. It is really cool.
Then we have the Wonder Box. It is a successor to the Wonder Trades of Gen 6/7, so that’s cool. Or it could have been. Like the GTS, the Wonder Box has issues. It takes hours for the trades to get completed, which is annoying. In comparison, I remember that Wonder Trading in Gen 6/7 went very quickly for the most part. This just feels very slow. I guess they just couldn’t make it super-fast because it would overload the servers or something? I have no idea how it works, but that’s my guess. That said, I really like how you can trade 3 Pokémon at once through the Wonder Box. It can also give some unexpected surprises, like when I got a shiny Lugia at level 100, EV-trained and seemingly ready for battle. I don’t trust it to be legit though, so I’m probably going to trade it away at some later point.
I have some issues with Home in general as well. I won’t deny that there are some positives with it, but I think there are far too many issues. Chances are there are even more positives that are exclusive to the Premium version. But the free version has several issues. First of all, I guess I am the only person in the world who finds this annoying, but I really dislike how the Switch version of Home sorts the deposited Pokémon in National Dex order. While this is no problem when it comes to random stuff I just have in my boxes, I found it very annoying when depositing my teams since I have them in specific orders, which Home then messed up. Thankfully I had all of the team orders written down so I could just rearrange them once I had them back in Sword. I also found it annoying how Home removed items, without telling me first. This was not an issue for my mid-game and Battle Tower teams since I had their items written down, but it ended up messing up the hold items for my in-game teams to the point that they just won’t be holding any items from now on (though it’s not like I am planning to use them anymore, so it doesn’t really matter).
One other issue with Home is how there are some features that are exclusive to one version of it. For instance, the GTS and Wonder Box are exclusive to the mobile version, while you can only see your exact number of Pokémon obtained for the National Dex in the Switch version (unless it is possible to see it at some place in the mobile version that I am missing). Another issue with Home is that you can’t release Pokémon directly in the app. This means that if you only use the free version, your space is very limited. Though you can just shift them to S/S and release them there, so that’s okay… if it wasn’t for dexit. Now, because of dexit, several Pokémon can’t be transferred from Home to S/S, which means they will be held in prison there for all eternity forward unless they should get un-dexited in the future.
There are different versions of Home. I have the free version, but I know about the premium version as well. If I wanted to do this the easy way, I could just pay for Home and renew my Bank accounts as well, and things would pretty much be solved. According to what I was told once here on the forums, having a complete National Dex on Bank will automatically add the data to the National Dex on Home, which means I only have to deposit the remaining Galar Pokémon I am missing and the beautiful Magearna will be mine! But if that should turn out to be false, that will make things a bit more annoying. Though even in that case, having access to Bank and the paid version of Home will make things a lot easier. So that’s an alternative.
On one hand, I am sort of interested in giving it a try since it would make things easier. On the other hand, it feels like a waste of money to pay for something if I am not going to use it. The reason I paid for Bank in the past was because I used it. I did a lot of traditional breeding on both Gen 6 & 7 to the point that I filled up all 100 boxes on both of my Bank accounts. But now, I am not that interested in Pokémon anymore. I have barely played Sword at all since June, I lost interest in Pokémon Go, and In Wonder is still on hold until later. Right now, it is unlikely that I am going to go back and play Sword seriously in the near future, so I don’t feel like paying for Home.
Back to my own challenge (or what it should be called). After connecting Sword to Home and depositing all the Pokémon I had on Sword, my National Dex on Home is at over 500 Pokémon obtained. I have also used the GTS and Wonder Boxes a bit, so I might be close to 600 at this point. I have obtained all of the legendaries and UBs, just regular Pokémon and mythicals left. The latter will of course be a big problem, which is annoying. Since I can’t get mythicals without transferring from Go (where I only have a handful), transferring through Bank (which would require me to pay for both Bank and Home), from Sword (where I only have a handful as well, and I have already added them) or by trading with somebody else through Home outside of the GTS and Wonder Box (which is unlikely to happen), I might as well just give up and quit at this point. Continuing feels pointless. My respect to green_typhlosion for completing this challenge. I don’t think I am going to do it myself at this point.
So far, doing this has been more frustrating and annoying rather than fun. It feels like a big waste of time more than anything. The National Dex being limited to Bank was pointless, but in Home it is downright irritating. If I should choose to pay for Home and Bank, chances are it would feel like a waste of money instead. Though I really want that Magearna… had it been a mythical I’m not such a big fan of (like Mew), I wouldn’t have been as interested in it.
In the end, this will probably be the first National Dex I’ll never complete. Unfortunately, I have a feeling it won’t be last one either… The endless frustrations of going through it all, or being forced to pay for both Bank and Home to get it done… neither of these alternatives feel worth it right now.
Overall, locking the National Dex to side-apps feels like a very idiotic decision to me. It is either pointless and requires you to pay for it (Bank, though I’m guessing the reason anyone would pay for Bank is for the storage and not for the National Dex) or frustrating and irritating unless you pay (Home). Having the National Dex in the actual games like in the past was much better. There, you always had it with you without having to use a side-app or pay extra for it. I really dislike the recent developments regarding how the National Dex has been handled and I guess it will only continue in the future, maybe it will get even worse from here on. It is one of the many reasons as for why I am thinking of quitting Pokémon.
…
Sorry for these long rants today, I just wanted to get all of this said. To compensate for it somewhat, I am going to make a more positive post in the likes thread later today. Not sure if it will be enough, but it will hopefully spread some positivity at least!
I am not a fan of most of the changes to the Gym Leader rosters in Yellow. I know they were generally changed to match the Gym Leader’s teams in anime since Yellow was based on the anime, but I don’t approve of the changes since I think many of them ended up worse than in R/B.
Let’s take a look at them and compare them to R/B (as well as FR/LG and LGP/E to lesser extents):
Brock: Same team as in R/B, but his Pokémon are at lower levels. I wonder why? Maybe this was done in order to trick people into thinking it would be possible to beat him with only Pikachu. I remember that I tried to beat him with only Pikachu on my first playthrough of Yellow, but I did not succeed. I guess it can be possible if you try really hard, but it feels like you need to overlevel a lot in order to make it. Beating Brock in Yellow more or less forces you to catch another Pokémon in order to win, and I don’t really approve of that. I’m not sure if it can be considered good game design either.
Misty: Exactly the same team as in R/B. LGP/E gave her a Psyduck which would otherwise have been a good choice in Yellow as well since she used a Psyduck in the anime.
Lt. Surge: Goes from having a team of Voltorb/Pikachu/Raichu to just one Raichu, but at a higher level. Yes, that’s what he had in the anime, but it feels like a step down compared to his team in R/B. They could at least have given him one or two Pikachu to go along with his Raichu. Or maybe not since the anime focused on the difference between Pikachu and Raichu? Don’t remember if I ever watched that episode. Though, one change that was for the better in Yellow is that his Raichu has Mega Punch/Kick, which means that you can’t just walk all over it with Ground-type. This was possible in R/B where it only has Electric-type moves and Growl. That said, it still feels rather lacklustre. I think Lt. Surge in Yellow is the only Gym Leader in the whole series with just one Pokémon, correct me if I’m wrong.
Erika: Her team is at higher levels than in R/B, but two of her Pokémon are no longer fully evolved. She has Gloom and Weepinbell instead of Vileplume and Victreebel. Which is because those two and Tangela was her team in the anime. But when I look at Bulbapedia, it seems like Erika has a Vileplume and Victreebel in the anime as well, though she doesn’t use them in the Gym Battle. Even with the higher levels, this feels like a step down since her Pokémon are no longer fully evolved.
Koga: In Yellow, he has three Venonat and one Venomoth. They are also at very high levels compared to Erika. Koga’s team is just plain bad. There are 13 Poison-type Pokémon lines in Gen 1, and Koga restricts himself to using just one of those lines. While he used a Venonat/Venomoth in the anime as his ace Pokémon, he also had a Golbat there. As well as a Scyther (flashback only) and Voltorb, though it is understandable that he didn’t use those in the games. Either way, restricting him to just the Venonat line in Yellow doesn’t really make sense. That said, his teams in R/B and FR/LG weren’t that much better since he just used Muk, Weezing and 2 Koffing, but they were at least better than his team in Yellow. I think his team in LGP/E might actually be his best (as a Gym Leader) since he uses four different fully evolved* Poison-type Pokémon there.
*discounting Crobat since it doesn’t exist in LGP/E.
Sabrina: She uses the three members of the Abra line and nothing else. This was another step down because of anime influence. Kadabra was the only Pokémon she used in the anime, but there are many more Psychic-types from Gen 1. Her team in R/B and FR/LG is better, although it is a bit weird how she uses a Venomoth. Interestingly, Sabrina uses a Venomoth on her team in all the games in which Koga does not use one on his team, and vice versa. Thanks Bulbapedia for that piece of random trivia! Like with Koga, Sabrina’s team in LGP/E team looks like it is the best out of her teams in the Kanto games.
Blaine: He goes from using the four members of the Ponyta and Growlithe lines to using Arcanine, Ninetales and Rapidash. While he has one Pokémon less than in R/B, it feels like a step up since he uses three fully evolved Pokémon from three different lines in Yellow. At first, I was wondering why in the name of pharaoh Yellow didn’t give him a Magmar. It was his ace Pokémon in the anime. Leaving out Rhydon is more understandable since it is not a Fire-type. But I looked a bit deeper into it and I think the reason he did not use Magmar in Yellow was because from what I can find, the anime episode where Blaine debuted aired just a month before Yellow was released in Japan. At that point, Yellow must have been in the final stages of development, so that feels like a reasonable explanation. LGP/E did give him Magmar in addition to his original Yellow team, so that’s cool.
Giovanni: Exchanges his Rhyhorn for a Persian, which is an obvious anime reference. While Persian isn’t a Ground-type, I’d still say this is a step up compared to R/B since it makes his team more diverse. LGP/E completely removes his Persian, leaving him with just four Pokémon. I also find his team in FR/LG a bit disappointing since he uses a second Rhyhorn instead of a Rhydon here. When I first played FR/LG, I thought this was a hint towards how you would face Giovanni again during the post-game, now with a Rhydon instead. But said fight never happened. Nowadays, I can think of three possible alternatives as for why he has a second Rhyhorn in FR/LG:
- They were planning for Giovanni to appear again during the post-game, now with a Rhydon, but said fight was scrapped and not included in the games for unknown reasons.
- They meant to give him a Rhydon instead of a second Rhyhorn, but they made a mistake which ended up with him having a second Rhyhorn instead.
- They wanted to foreshadow his appearance in HG/SS where he has a Rhyperior in the battle against him… which was event-exclusive as it required a Celebi. But this feels unlikely, I doubt they were planning his appearance in HG/SS as far back as in FR/LG.
In the end, why Giovanni has two Rhyhorn in FR/LG is a mystery.
Anyway, here’s my overall opinion on the Gym Leader rosters in Yellow:
- Giovanni was better than in R/B
- Brock, Misty, and Blaine were just as good as they were in R/B
- Lt. Surge, Erika, Koga, and Sabrina were worse than in R/B
Overall, I think their rosters were a step down from how they were in R/B. That said, I kind of approve of how Yellow did at least change the Gym Leader rosters, something most other third versions did as well. The only exception is Crystal, which did no changes to G/S from what I can remember (or find). But despite Crystal is still the best Johto game despite that.
Continuing on the topic of Yellow, I guess I should say that I’m not overly fond of Yellow in general. It is my second least favorite Pokémon game. Yes, it does some things better than R/B, notably the better front sprites and the ability to get all starters. It also made some interesting changes regarding the Pokémon distribution. But there are many negatives and I think that in general, it was a step down compared to R/B.
I think many of the anime references in the game just didn’t work. They either made the gameplay worse, or they were minor to the point that I didn’t notice them. First of all, I disliked being forced to start with Pikachu. I like having the ability to choose my starter, and I think that being forced to go with the one the game chooses isn’t quite as fun. At least not in Yellow. I have less of an issue with it if the game has a more interesting starter (or starters), such as Espeon & Umbreon in Colosseum, or Eevee in XD. Those are fine starters which I don’t mind being forced to start with. However, I do not feel this way about Pikachu. Especially not about a Pikachu which I can’t evolve. Another bad anime reference.
As for other anime references, I feel that they were mostly either for the worse (half of the Gym Leader rosters, as explained above) or minor to the point that I missed them. I think Yellow was trying to do something that the technology of the time just wasn’t good enough to accomplish, which left it feeling lacklustre. I believe LGP/E did this whole thing better, but they were 20 years too late… and they have many other issues instead. That said, I think Pikachu being out of its Poké Ball and walking behind the player was one thing that Yellow did okay. It wasn’t perfect, but it worked. I think the execution was quite good and I prefer it over the walking Pokémon features in HG/SS and the S/S DLC.
Regarding anime references and influences, I think the anime gets too much importance in Pokémon. At least if we compare the influence it gets to its quality and how it works as an advertisement for the games. At least that’s how I feel, though I haven’t seen the anime since I was a kid so real fans of the Pokémon anime might disagree with me here.
I guess Yellow just didn’t feel like a very meaningful adaption of the anime. It also adds very little new and notable to R/B, especially compared to the other third versions which added a lot more and were basically direct upgrades over their first pairs. In comparison, Yellow is a step down from its first pair, which I can’t say for any other third version. I should also mention that one of the many reasons I skipped LGP/E was because they were based on Yellow. If I want the best Kanto games, I’ll just stick with FR/LG.
In the end, Yellow is a game, based on an anime, which in turn is based on the games Yellow itself is also based on… it doesn’t really work. I think Yellow was still fun for its time, but when it comes to Kanto games, I prefer FR/LG. Or even R/B, I always liked them better than Yellow. I had fun with Yellow back in the day and I liked it… but nowadays, I think most other Pokémon games are better.
Enough about Yellow. I want to talk about something else too. After following green_typhlosion’s PYSSBTCCCCC challenge from the beginning to the end, I thought a bit more about challenges. I remembered one of green_typhlosion’s previous challenges in which he completed the National Dex on Home without paying anything at all. This got me interested in trying to do the same thing myself. Though I own a Switch as well as Sword + DLC, so it isn’t completely without payment for me. The reason that I want to do it is that I love Magearna and I really want the OC version. If I should manage to obtain it, I can send it to Sword and use it for some kind of team there, which would be cool.
Anyway, I started on it a few days ago… and it reminded me of why I never used Home that much in the past, as well as why I never tried to complete the National Dex on it. I immediately remembered how much I dislike the fact that the National Dex (and some other features) are nowadays locked to side-apps which you have to pay for to get the most use of (or in order to them use at all, in the case of Bank), instead of being in the main games. I have talked about this before, but I wanted to say something about it again.
First, we have the issue with the National Dex being on Home (and Bank) as opposed to being in the main games. I usually liked completing the National Dex in the past, when it was still in the main games. Especially in Gen 5 and 6, the combination of great Pokémon availability and great training spots in those games made it a lot of fun! More than in any previous generation. In comparison, I have never liked how it was excluded from the main series games in Gen 7 and 8, being limited to side-apps instead. I think both of them executed it terribly.
In Bank, there’s nothing you really need to do outside of completing the Pokédex on your games. A complete National Dex on Gen 6 and having registered all Alola Pokémon in US/UM gives you a complete National Dex in Bank as soon as you connect to it. There’s no reward either, making it completely pointless. For Home, it is badly executed overall, I find it more frustrating and irritating than fun. It is also very limited because of dexit. Looking back now, I really miss the good old days of Gen 1-6 where the National Dex was in the main games and not limited to just side-apps. Sometimes, you don’t know how much you appreciate something until you no longer have it…
Next, let’s talk about the features in Home. First, there’s the GTS. Unlike in the previous generations, the GTS now only exists in Home and not in the main games. I really think it should have been kept in the main games (alongside existing in Home, that would have been the best solution). Now, if you want to trade a Pokémon on the GTS which you have in your game but not in Home, you need to close the mobile app, open the Switch app, deposit the Pokémon you want to trade in Home, save and close the Switch app, open the mobile app, and now you can finally trade it. This is just unnecessarily overcomplicated and requires a lot of extra work. If the GTS had been in the actual games like in the past, this wouldn’t have been an issue.
There is also the issue with unreasonable offers and trades on the GTS, just like always. It seems like a vast majority of all offers are unreasonable, people are asking for legendaries or other “rare” Pokémon. Right now, one of the most requested Pokémon seems to be Furfrou. Specific trims of it, at least. Which must be because the trims can only be obtained from Go and Furfrou is currently dexited. If it hadn’t been dexited, I’m convinced that nobody would give a flying Fletchling about it or any of its different trims. One other issue is that mythicals can’t be traded over the GTS, and since you need them to complete the National Dex on Home, it means I have pretty much already lost unless I pay for the Premium version of Home (or find some other way to get them, but I don’t think so).
Fortunately, the unreasonable offers on the GTS can be abused to great success. Shinies seem to be highly valued as always, so I can just transfer some shinies from Go and use them as trade fodder, asking for whatever I want and be guaranteed to get it. Like when I offered a shiny Haunter and asked for a Giratina, I got it almost immediately. That was cool. I have more shinies on Go, so I can just transfer some more if I should see the need for it. And some reasonable trades still exist, like trading one legendary for another, or one UB for another. Trading one dexited Pokémon for another seems to work too, like offering a Minior and asking for a Komala. And even trading one regular Pokémon for another. At least as long as you are one making the offer.
Still, the GTS has issues. Ever since it first got introduced in Gen 4, I have felt that they really need to make it better in some way. But I’m not really sure how. Perhaps it is a lost cause. At least the Home version has some things that weren’t possible in the past generations, such as the feature where you can search for Pokémon others are looking for instead of just ones you are looking for. It is really cool.
Then we have the Wonder Box. It is a successor to the Wonder Trades of Gen 6/7, so that’s cool. Or it could have been. Like the GTS, the Wonder Box has issues. It takes hours for the trades to get completed, which is annoying. In comparison, I remember that Wonder Trading in Gen 6/7 went very quickly for the most part. This just feels very slow. I guess they just couldn’t make it super-fast because it would overload the servers or something? I have no idea how it works, but that’s my guess. That said, I really like how you can trade 3 Pokémon at once through the Wonder Box. It can also give some unexpected surprises, like when I got a shiny Lugia at level 100, EV-trained and seemingly ready for battle. I don’t trust it to be legit though, so I’m probably going to trade it away at some later point.
I have some issues with Home in general as well. I won’t deny that there are some positives with it, but I think there are far too many issues. Chances are there are even more positives that are exclusive to the Premium version. But the free version has several issues. First of all, I guess I am the only person in the world who finds this annoying, but I really dislike how the Switch version of Home sorts the deposited Pokémon in National Dex order. While this is no problem when it comes to random stuff I just have in my boxes, I found it very annoying when depositing my teams since I have them in specific orders, which Home then messed up. Thankfully I had all of the team orders written down so I could just rearrange them once I had them back in Sword. I also found it annoying how Home removed items, without telling me first. This was not an issue for my mid-game and Battle Tower teams since I had their items written down, but it ended up messing up the hold items for my in-game teams to the point that they just won’t be holding any items from now on (though it’s not like I am planning to use them anymore, so it doesn’t really matter).
One other issue with Home is how there are some features that are exclusive to one version of it. For instance, the GTS and Wonder Box are exclusive to the mobile version, while you can only see your exact number of Pokémon obtained for the National Dex in the Switch version (unless it is possible to see it at some place in the mobile version that I am missing). Another issue with Home is that you can’t release Pokémon directly in the app. This means that if you only use the free version, your space is very limited. Though you can just shift them to S/S and release them there, so that’s okay… if it wasn’t for dexit. Now, because of dexit, several Pokémon can’t be transferred from Home to S/S, which means they will be held in prison there for all eternity forward unless they should get un-dexited in the future.
There are different versions of Home. I have the free version, but I know about the premium version as well. If I wanted to do this the easy way, I could just pay for Home and renew my Bank accounts as well, and things would pretty much be solved. According to what I was told once here on the forums, having a complete National Dex on Bank will automatically add the data to the National Dex on Home, which means I only have to deposit the remaining Galar Pokémon I am missing and the beautiful Magearna will be mine! But if that should turn out to be false, that will make things a bit more annoying. Though even in that case, having access to Bank and the paid version of Home will make things a lot easier. So that’s an alternative.
On one hand, I am sort of interested in giving it a try since it would make things easier. On the other hand, it feels like a waste of money to pay for something if I am not going to use it. The reason I paid for Bank in the past was because I used it. I did a lot of traditional breeding on both Gen 6 & 7 to the point that I filled up all 100 boxes on both of my Bank accounts. But now, I am not that interested in Pokémon anymore. I have barely played Sword at all since June, I lost interest in Pokémon Go, and In Wonder is still on hold until later. Right now, it is unlikely that I am going to go back and play Sword seriously in the near future, so I don’t feel like paying for Home.
Back to my own challenge (or what it should be called). After connecting Sword to Home and depositing all the Pokémon I had on Sword, my National Dex on Home is at over 500 Pokémon obtained. I have also used the GTS and Wonder Boxes a bit, so I might be close to 600 at this point. I have obtained all of the legendaries and UBs, just regular Pokémon and mythicals left. The latter will of course be a big problem, which is annoying. Since I can’t get mythicals without transferring from Go (where I only have a handful), transferring through Bank (which would require me to pay for both Bank and Home), from Sword (where I only have a handful as well, and I have already added them) or by trading with somebody else through Home outside of the GTS and Wonder Box (which is unlikely to happen), I might as well just give up and quit at this point. Continuing feels pointless. My respect to green_typhlosion for completing this challenge. I don’t think I am going to do it myself at this point.
So far, doing this has been more frustrating and annoying rather than fun. It feels like a big waste of time more than anything. The National Dex being limited to Bank was pointless, but in Home it is downright irritating. If I should choose to pay for Home and Bank, chances are it would feel like a waste of money instead. Though I really want that Magearna… had it been a mythical I’m not such a big fan of (like Mew), I wouldn’t have been as interested in it.
In the end, this will probably be the first National Dex I’ll never complete. Unfortunately, I have a feeling it won’t be last one either… The endless frustrations of going through it all, or being forced to pay for both Bank and Home to get it done… neither of these alternatives feel worth it right now.
Overall, locking the National Dex to side-apps feels like a very idiotic decision to me. It is either pointless and requires you to pay for it (Bank, though I’m guessing the reason anyone would pay for Bank is for the storage and not for the National Dex) or frustrating and irritating unless you pay (Home). Having the National Dex in the actual games like in the past was much better. There, you always had it with you without having to use a side-app or pay extra for it. I really dislike the recent developments regarding how the National Dex has been handled and I guess it will only continue in the future, maybe it will get even worse from here on. It is one of the many reasons as for why I am thinking of quitting Pokémon.
…
Sorry for these long rants today, I just wanted to get all of this said. To compensate for it somewhat, I am going to make a more positive post in the likes thread later today. Not sure if it will be enough, but it will hopefully spread some positivity at least!
I hate breeding in Platinum. It took me a while to realize, but Power Items don't transfer your ivs like in Gen 5. You need HGSS. You also need HGSS to transfer as much as you want from Gen 3 per day. You also need HGSS to get competitive standard moves on your Pokemon like:
- Brave Bird on Honchcrow
- Dragon Dance on Wishcash, Crawdaunt and pretty sure some others
- Nasty Plot on Chatot
- Agility on Mareep
- Weather Ball on Belsprout and Cherrim
- Power Whip on Bulbasaur (guess I can use my perfect one I have to breed a Scrappy Kangaskhan in Gen 4)
I think I mentioned this before but the more I breed, the more I see the issue.
It took forever to get 3 ivs on my Adamant Dragon Dance Lapras. And I want to breed a decent iv Careful Wespequeen and you know how much of a pain that will be.
- Brave Bird on Honchcrow
- Dragon Dance on Wishcash, Crawdaunt and pretty sure some others
- Nasty Plot on Chatot
- Agility on Mareep
- Weather Ball on Belsprout and Cherrim
- Power Whip on Bulbasaur (guess I can use my perfect one I have to breed a Scrappy Kangaskhan in Gen 4)
I think I mentioned this before but the more I breed, the more I see the issue.
It took forever to get 3 ivs on my Adamant Dragon Dance Lapras. And I want to breed a decent iv Careful Wespequeen and you know how much of a pain that will be.
Well they can't exactly replicate the anime without breaking the game's rules or adding in new scripts just for the Gym Battles. The only solution I could see is maybe giving Pikachu Counter (or I guess Double Kick if they wanted a more proactive move).
The episode did sort of focus on the difference between Pikachu & Raichu, but more in the sense that since Raichu was Pikachu's evolution it was just much stronger and had more options for moves (though later Ash won because Brock realized that since Lt. Surge evolved his Raichu so early it didn't learn the speed and evasion increasing moves). But yeah, giving Lt. Surge a Pikachu wouldn't work as one thing about Surge in the anime is that he evolved his Pikachu as early as soon as possible.
Anyway I think him having one Pokemon is fine for Yellow. It was done to reference the anime, and honestly giving him like another Voltorb or Magnemite wouldn't really change that much.
This was probably for balance reasons. Remember, the focus is on Pikachu who will likely be in most player's party and Electric-type moves are resisted by Grass. While Vileplume and Victreebel wouldn't be difficult, it might have been a bit more tedious so went with their prevos + higher levels that was less so. Plus anime reference bonus.
Yeah don't know why his team wasn't high level Venonant, Golbat, and Venomoth.
Though in Gen I that was enough to still make her "that one boss" since Psychic-types were OP and she used one of the most OP of them: Alakazam. Heck, even Kadabra hits hard. And you can't use the anime's logic because a glitch in Gen I made Psychic-types immune to Ghost (and since the Gastly family were part Poison they received super effective damage from Psychic!).
That would explain it! Good sleuthing!
Very likely this, his FRLG team is exactly like his original RB team except for the second Rhyhorn instead of Rhydon.
*Scratches head* Look, I both understand... but don't understand. Yeah, I can see in many ways why Yellow would be looked as a downgrade to the original games... but that was on purpose (or rather the result of a purposed decision). It was advertised to be the Gen I games but remodeled to reflect the anime. Players went in knowing Pikachu would be their only Starter and they can get all the other Kanto Starters along the way. The Gym Leaders were, for the most part, made to reflect their anime counterparts with their team selection while also trying to balance the game with having a Starter that had low base stats that didn't evolve you'd likely keep with you through the entire game. It's not made to be a better RB, it was made
Not really, at this point the games and anime are pretty much separate entities. Pokemon has become so huge it's that the anime, while still an advertisement, is an advertisement for the entire franchise then just the games. Remember, Pokemon makes most of its money through selling merch, the games make a tidy sum but that money mostly goes to GameFreak so they can just keep making the games and any other game project they feel like doing. There's of course little crossover, but the anime no longer feels like it needs to follow the game's storylines and feature all the characters in the games while the games rarely reference anything from the anime unless its for an event and even then it's not a major thing but a small "hey, this is something the anime did, a grass monkey you were given a few months ago but now its wearing a pink shirt as a scarf/cape. No, there's nothing else different about it, it's just this small cosmetic addition".
Well if what GF said is true, HOME for now is going to be THE out-of-game hub. Of course, they said that about Bank, but since you can't trade Pokemon with Bank and they're now doing the limited dex thing they probably felt it was better to just make this new app than try upgrading Bank (though hopefully they made sure to make HOME easy to upgrade and to add things...). So if you don't finish it now because you're missing some older Pokemon not in SwSh, those Pokemon may be made available in the next gen (infact if BDSP & Legends still don't let you finish the dex within only Gen VIII I'd imagine Gen IX will make sure to add in the missing Pokemon... aside from the mythicals which I'm shocked they didn't do a year-long release for for the 25th anniversary).
I myself am missing 4 Pokemon: Cosmoem (which I can easily get but want to see if maybe I could get another one so I have both a Cosmog and Cosmoem for future dex completion), Meltan, Melmetal, & Regieleki.
Eh, I kind of get it. Thing is, I don't think the National Dex is really needed anymore anyway, at least for "dex completion". Gen VII didn't have one and it was better off for it. National Dex should only exist as a background lore thing... and personally I think they should redo it because with their being Baby Pokemon, Cross Gen Evos, & Regional Variants (with their own exclusive evos!), and different Forms it needs a redo. I've came up with my own system I think orders things pretty nicely, it's almost like the dewey decimal system they have for books (hard to really explain why I did, would need to show a few examples to give the clear picture; then again maybe I could make it into a Google Doc).
But anyway, National Dex isn't something the average player needs to worry about anymore. Because of that, I can understand them pushing it to a side app so it still exists in the public eye but not in a way many players would feel compelled to complete it. The extra award is just a unique Magearna form which is just a palette swap, nice but not something you feel is unfairly being kept from you like say the Shiny Charm.
And now you know why they introduced Hyper Training, Nature Mints, and Pokemon able to pass on moves in the Daycare if both are the same species... too bad it took them 20 years for Hyper Training and another few for the other two...
I'm not sure what they could have done to make Brock beatable without forcing the player to catch something else tbh. Geodude and Onix are pretty much synonymous with him. The games harp on about "you can't win with just one strong Pokemon" but in the main the game design goes against that; FRLG even gives Charmander Metal Claw so that the player isn't forced to catch something else. Yellow is really the only game where that does hold true, at least initially. (And XD because you need at least two Pokemon to be able to take on most of the trainers.) What could they have given Pikachu? Maybe Double Kick or Low Kick, but it's moot now. I just wish it could learn Surf without an event, especially in the VC.
I feel like in keeping with Yellow's general difficulty spike Surge's Raichu should have been at least level 30 or maybe even as high as 32/33. It's still a good challenge either way but Surge is portrayed in the anime as fearsomely powerful and you're right, in-game he is lacklustre. It is a style over substance chance and I'm generally quite forgiving of that so it doesn't bug me too much but I've never had difficulty with Surge. By contrast, when I first played Yellow many decades ago I found Koga and Sabrina horrifically difficult, and it'd be cool if all eight of the Gym Leaders actually were.
If you're not counting Tate and Liza in RS as one each then yeah I think so! It's kinda cool really, I wish there were more.
Interestingly, I've got the Prima Games strategy guide for FRLG and it lists him as having Rhyhorn, Nidoqueen, Nidoking, Dugtrio, and Rhydon. It's riddled with errors (still a pretty good guide overall, though) so this might just be another one, but it makes me suspect the original plan was for Rhydon to be included and someone in development changed it.
Big agree on this. Most of the cameos from anime trainers are so underwhelming and obscure that they aren't memorable at all, and the lack of names for trainers means the only context is a brief pre-battle text. Since they're anime characters, why not actually make them part of the plot? But that would interfere with the story of RGB so they couldn't be bothered. So all in all it's just a reskin. It's the sort of thing where I'll be reading the Bulbapedia article for a route and the trivia section will say "the Lass on this route is a shoutout to the anime" and I'll go "oh yeah, there was a girl with a Cubone in that one episode".
They also made my PYSSBTCCCCC challenge more irritating as I was largely working from a list of RBY rosters when it came to the LRTG and every so often I'd battle someone and go "...huh? Why don't they have the Pokemon they're supposed to?"
Interestingly later games have a few shoutouts like this, like Ace Trainer Jamie on Route 224 and the duo outside the Resort Area who are meant to be Butler and Diane. In fact most of the movie cameos in DPP are so minor that the translation teams missed them and gave them random names instead of their actual names from the anime. But DPP aren't direct homages to the anime so their cameos shouldn't be meaningful. Yellow's should have been.
The "Home economy", as I like to think of it, is truly fucked up. For a long while (and possibly still now, I haven't looked) Aromatisse and Slurpuff were two of the most-requested mons on the GTS. Which seems bizarre until you remember they evolve by trade with an item and they're version-exclusive in SwSh. So it makes a kind of sense, but they're still two such relatively commonplace species. I wonder if Go introducing them has made them less sought-after.
Don't get me started on the legendary begging, though. Just as long as you remember to check "exclude legendaries" you're good. But every single Pokemon I searched for had dozens of people wanting a Glastrier or a Regieleki in return. Fuck off, I'm not giving you a Glastrier for a Corvisquire. Even if I do want very badly to complete my dex challenge...
Dexit really does make a joke out of the GTS, though, to the point I wish I could connect my Bank to it. I could stick, say, a Scatterbug up on the GTS and get something comparatively far better like a Rillaboom because, hey, Scatterbug is Dexited and therefore rare and coveted.
*>salutes<*
Long rants are the BEST kind of rants!
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I agree overall. Though I think Blaine was also better in Yellow despite still lacking Magmar; Ninetales was a welcome addition. Yellow also messed up the progression of number of Pokémon on Gym rosters which RB had. There was a clear and good progression of 2>3>4>5 in terms of number of Pokémon on RB's Gym rosters at appropriate intervals, which Yellow unfortunately abandoned.
I do want to say though that the Yellow Giovanni fight is one of the best Gym Leader battles in the series in my opinion. Five fully evolved Pokémon: a SlideQuake user off behemoth Attack in Rhydon, a fast Earthquaker in Dugtrio, the Nido's with Thunder to dispel any Water types getting too frisky, and a Persian for some variety. I don't think this battle was topped as a Gym battle until Emerald Tate and Liza. Pretty stellar work for a Gen 1 game.
See I've never been into this idea that each game's set of Gym Leaders must or should increase the party size as they go. People complain about this a lot (particularly in Johto) but the number of Pokemon a given leader tends to have relative to their position is incredibly inconsistent. When you look at the number of Pokemon Gym Leaders have in each game, it becomes apparent that there really isn't much of a pattern, and that it's more dependent on that particular game's development team's whims rather than any hard or fast rules.
Johto: 2>3>2>4>2>3>3>4
Hoenn: 2>2>3>3>3>4>2>5
Sinnoh 3>3>3>3>3>3>4>4
Unova: 2>2>3>3>3>3>3>3
Unova2: 2>2>3>3>3>3>3>3
Kalos: 2>2>3>3>3>3>3>3
Galar: 2>3>3>3>4>4>4>4
This only accounts for original versions and disregards challenge mode, upper versions, and remakes, which often add additional Pokemon. Roxanne and Brawly have two Pokemon in RS and three in Emerald for example.
I'm not saying that they shouldn't increase as they go, and it obviously makes sense for leader #8 to have more Pokemon than leader #1. But one leader having fewer Pokemon than the preceding leader doesn't automatically make things bad. People complain a lot about Chuck only having two Pokemon, for instance, and I don't really think it's warranted. Blaine's team in Yellow is better than his team in RGB despite being smaller. Whitney is notoriously tough (well, for some people - I've never personally found her that difficult). Pryce has three and his team sucks; Juan and Wallace have five, and their teams are by and large abysmal. Quality over quantity, is what I'm saying.
True. But quality and quantity don't have to be mutually exclusive. Had Blaine's RB team been something like Magmar, Arcanine, Rapidash and Ninetales it would have been better than has Yellow rendition. And Chuck from the Johto games isn't just bad due to him having only two Pokémon. It's the fact that neither is a Johto Pokémon even though Heracross and/or Hitmontop were readily available from him to use. Juan as well randomly uses a Johto Pokémon as his ace for no apparent reason. They both score poorly on the quality side of things as well.
A good Gym Leader like Yellow Giovanni has high quantity and high quality mons, making him stand out. If a region's Gym battles were all properly designed, I think a progression of number of Pokémon would be important, in addition to the Leaders using quality mons.
Not at all, and I never meant to imply the contrary.
To give another example, I've often found Tate & Liza in Emerald a very difficult fight. It's optimised to benefit from the FlyQuake combo, the whole team benefits from sunny weather, and it's generally quite defensively tough.
On the other hand, there are so many Gym Leaders for whom having four Pokemon isn't any more threatening than three, because they're thrown together with little regard for synergy or wider strategy. Winona is a pushover in RS; she gets some extra type diversity and is beefed up to five team members in Emerald, but if anything she's even easier. Candice's team is laughable in DP and only marginally better in Plat.
XY were criticised for having all the Elite Four only have four Pokemon apiece, but imagine if the signature mon had been a Mega. To go by the anime, Siebold could have had Blastoise, Wikstrom Scizor, Drasna Garchomp or Ampharos, and Malva either Charizard or Blaziken. As it is it's so underwhelming.
Actually I think it would be Houndoom.
Anyway I think the ideal Gym Leader team part increase should be 3>3>3>4>4>4>4>5, followed by the Elite Fur having 5 Pokemon, and then the Champion a full 6.
Emerald came pretty close, though it was less than stellar from a quality perspective with a lot of redundant families and the aforementioned Juan's Kingdra. I think Emerald's progression + Platinum's quality of mons would've made for the optimal Gym, Elite Four and Champion layout.
I agree with a lot of this. While I'm not a big fan of HG/SS, they definitely have the edge over D/P/P when it comes to breeding. Both regarding traditional breeding and RNG breeding. The only real disadvantage is that there are no good places to hatch eggs quickly in HG/SS, at least I never found such a place.
Reading your post also made me remember all the traditional breeding I did in Emerald and D/P (and a little in Platinum). Looking back at it now, it feels like I just wasted a lot of time. Especially since many of the Pokémon I ended up obtaining weren't even that good. And I never ended up using many of them for anything serious either.
Anyway, I can strongly recommend you to learn RNG breeding in HG/SS. It might be hard at first, but it is very worth it once you master it. You can save a lot of time with it compared to traditional breeding.
If they want to replicate the anime but can't do so because of the game mechanics, then I think that is an issue. I like your idea of giving Pikachu a new move to deal with Brock's team, Double Kick would have been great. You could still get screwed up by Bide, but Double Kick would at least make it a lot easier (or downright possible) compared to having just Quick Attack, or maybe Slam if you overgrind like crazy.
I think the main issue I have with it is that he has just one Pokémon, which is less than the previous Gym Leaders. While it is at a quite high level, that does not really compensate for it feeling lacklustre IMO. The fact that he has less Pokémon than the leaders before him makes it feel like a step down. Especially since he only has one Pokémon.
Maybe, but I have a feeling that 90% (or even more) of all Yellow players had a Charmeleon at that point, so it shouldn't be too hard. I believe many players had a Pidgeotto or maybe a Fearow as well. Regarding "balance reasons", I highly doubt it since Yellow has the bizarre level jump from Erika's highest being at level 32 to Koga's lowest at level 44. So I don't think that really is the case here, it feels more like a direct anime reference than anything else.
I guess this is a good point. I remember that the anime had made me super scared when I first battled Sabrina in Blue, I thought I would auto-lose against her... but my Blastoise one-shotted all of her Pokémon with Hydro Pump, making it rather anti-climatic. Still, I think her team in Yellow could have been more diverse.
I think that is an issue. They made a worse version of R/B on purpose. They included a lot of anime references which mostly made the gameplay worse (IMO) or was minor to the point that some players like me didn't even notice them. R/B started a phenomenon, Yellow was a worse version made to grab some quick cash while the games after it would be the ones to actually make the series move forward. I know I'm being cynical here but this is honestly how I feel about Yellow, I'm less harsh towards the other third versions since they at least improved upon their first pairs.
Fair enough. I guess I just find it annoying that the anime gets a lot of attention that other (and IMO, better) Pokémon media doesn't get. Notably Pokémon Adventures, but also the TCG (though I admit I'm not into it so I might be wrong there). I don't mind anime references in the games if they are minor, but major ones like the majority of Yellow or the existance of Ash-Greninja are a bit annoying.
Yeah. I hope that one day in the future, all Pokémon will be obtainable either in S/S alone, or in S/S combined with other future games. But it feels like it is going to take a while before we get there.
That's interesting, because I have obtained all of these. I got Cosmoem through a GTS trade (can't remember what I offered for it, probably something rare or "valuable" like another legendary), Regieleki from Sword as it was the one I chose in the CT, Meltan from Go (completed the special research to get it, but it wasn't very fun and it took ages) as well as Melmetal from the Event from a while ago. Apart from Meltan and Melmetal, the only other mythicals I have registered on Home are Keldeo, Zeraora and Zarude, all of which I got through Sword and Events.
I hope you will be able to get the four you are missing in some way. Maybe I can help you by letting you borrow them through Home if you want to, and if we can get it to work. And if you feel that you really need them.
I think the National Dex has some really valuable uses in the games. First of all, the Pokédex is the only place in the games where you can see the full 3D models for Pokémon. You can zoom in and out, rotate them and have them do their attack animations. While you can see them on their summary screen as well, you can't do all the things that you can do with them in the Pokédex. Another notable thing is that as of now, Pokémon that are outside of the National Dex doesn't get an index number at all (at least in Gen 7, unsure about Gen 8). Which means that they essentially don't "count" at all. I think it looks very off if you look in a box and switch from a Pokémon with an index number to one without a number.
I can't disagree more. I think Gen 7 was worse than Gen 6 because it didn't have a National Dex. Or at least that's one of the reasons I found it worse. The lack of a National Dex has always been one of my biggest issues with Gen 7.
I definitely agree with this though. The order of the National Dex needs to be redone in some kind of way.
Maybe, but for former hardcore players like myself, the removal of it feels annoying. In the past, I never cared much for the rewards, just working on the Dex and completing it was the more fun part of it. The journey was more enjoyable than the destination, so to say. And there's no reason they can have it both in the main games and in the side app.
Yeah. Things would have been a lot easier in the earlier generations if these things had existed back then. Which is why I hope that if they ever decide to make Pokémon Anthology, they will add these things to all older generations as well.
Though, after learning RNG abuse in Gen 4 & 5, I skipped out on a lot of the annoyances with getting perfect Pokémon in those generations, so that's cool. Aside from hitting the wrong delay 20 times in a row or being trolled hard by my Timer0, but those are things I can live with. It was so worth it when I finally got the Pokémon I was after.
I think giving Pikachu a Fighting-move like both you and Pika suggested would be the best solution, but that would at the same time mean the events in the anime would not be completely replicated... but it would at least give you a functional way to beat Brock with only Pikachu.
Interestingly, I think the opposite. I think Surge's Raichu should have been at a lower level, for better balance. But I guess they wanted to make it a bit more challenging and I think they also succeeded, but it came at the cost of the game being unbalanced.
I had forgotten about them, but I'm not really counting them. And I disagree, I'm glad that most/all other Gym Leaders have more than one Pokémon.
That's interesting. Because of this, and because of what Pika said, I guess that theory is the most likely one. Though I still want to believe that they had planned another battle against Giovanni in the post-game which got scrapped for unknown reasons...
Yeah. They just failed in every way. This also reminded me of how they added Jessie and James to Yellow, which I found horribly executed. Especially Meowth. In the anime, it doesn't fight, yet the only thing it does in the games is to fight as a part of their team. I also thought that Jessie & James didn't appear often enough in Yellow, while in the anime, they appear in pretty much every single episode and in almost every area.
I'd say that this is one of the changes I liked with Yellow, the fact that it changed the rosters of many regular trainers. I understand that you found it annoying for your challenge though.
I definitely agree. Other anime references, like those in D/P/P, are just minor and that's okay for me. As you say, Yellow's anime references aren't meaningful, despite the game in itself being highly influenced by the anime. That feels like a big failure on the whole.
I agree. I don't think I saw anyone asking for Aromatisse or Slurpuff during the few days I used the GTS before giving up yesterday, so I guess the fact that they can be transferred from Go has made them less valuable. Aside from legendaries, Furfrou in specific trims seems to be the most valuable Pokémon right now.
I saw this too. It is very annoying. It was even worse when I checked "exclude legendaries", but ended up getting no results because of that. But obtaining legendaries was rather easy for the most part, I could either transfer some shiny from Go and offer it, or offer one legendary while asking for another. It always worked.
I also noticed that dexited Pokémon seems to be more valuable than non-dexited ones. Interesting but understandable in a tragic way.
I guess that if you have a lot to say, it can be good to say all of it. But at the same time, it takes a lot of time. I spent a large chunk of the weekend writing on my previous post here (as well as my most recent post in the likes thread). And I still have another somewhat long post in the works, which I have been meaning to make for a while, but I have been delaying it for a long time. I wanted to get it done rather soon, but it doesn't look like it is going to happen. Oh well. It should get done eventually.
Fair enough. The reason I see his team as equal to R/B is that while his team in Yellow is more diverse, he has one less Pokémon. So that drags it down a bit for me. Still better than many of the others though.
Regarding progression for how many Pokémon the Gym Leaders should have, I definitely prefer the situations when they have an increasing progression like 2 > 3 > 4 > 5. But at the same time, I agree that having more Pokémon does not automatically make a Gym Leader better. Some of them have been good and/or difficult even if they only have 2 or 3 Pokémon, and some have been bad and/or easy even if they have 4 or 5 Pokémon.
It's a fair criticism. Funny thing is, though to us Yellow is the third version, to the Japanese audience it's the fourth. Not sure how much more tougher Japanese Blue is to the original Japanese Red & Green, but it did provide a lot of improvements to them so it is a more proper third version by definition.
All else I can say about Yellow is that, at least nowadays, you ain't playing it for the challenge. You're playing it strictly for the novelty. If you want to experience the best version of the Kanto games you got either FireRed & LeafGreen for a more traditional experience or you now have Let's Go Pikachu & Eevee for ones with improved battles against trainers. Remoraid to head choice, you know what, I would say go for Let's Go just because of the improved teams; if you want a traditional Pokemon experience any of the main series titles still does that so you aren't lacking of it.
Honestly, at this point, the only way to further improve Kanto is just doing another story within it; over 20 years have passed, surely a lot has changed about it. And as a bonus they could include the Sevii Islands and Johto, make it the complete Indigo League experience.
Yeah, Ash-Greninja shouldn't be a thing (especially since we're not Ash so how is Greninja taking on a form that resembles him in our possession?). To this day I still debate whether it was something the anime wanted to do so Ash could be special and not have to use Mega Evolution or if it was something GF was planning to do with all the Starters, a super form where they take on the players customization options, but scrapped it with the advertising of Ash-Greninja being the only remainder of it.
Wouldn't mind that, I'll drop you a PM. I don't need to keep them, just put them in HOME to register them.
And that right there is going to be a problem moving forward. You're right that there's no reason not to have a National Dex, even one that's just for reference, if all the models are in the game. However GF had announced they're sticking to the Limited Dex idea so not all Pokemon models are going to be in the games.
Can't They Still Have A National Dex?: Technically. You don't need the Pokemon's model just to have its name written down on the list. If it's purely for reference material to know a Pokemon's NatDex#, they could just have the National Dex be a list of names where all Pokemon names that aren't programmed in are just left blank (or maybe include stock art or a neat drawing; maybe make it a collectible to make the NatDex look less empty). But without the models I don't think GF would feel like including it, just shuffling you over to HOME for any National Dex needs.
Can't They Decide Not To Do A Limited Dex?: Very likely. Despite what they said, with how much more space games are holding they can very likely have all Pokemon in a single game. To put it in perspective, Sword & Shield is 10.3 GB while HOME is 921 MB; yeah, the app made to hold all species of Pokemon have have 5k slots isn't even a Gigabyte. We truly don't know what happened with SwSh's development that made them decide to do the Limited Dex, even they seemed unsure they should do it which I can only take meaning it was possible to add in all Pokemon. Was it because they rushed and wouldn't have had time to update all the Pokemon's Movesets and textures? Was it because they were hitting the file size cap because GF aren't great programmers and each Pokemon (plus their Shiny forms) were given another bigger model for when they Dynamax? A combination of both? Eitherway, I guess next game we'll see if they continue with the Limited Dex or they'll try to get bide player's good graces by revealing next game can have all Pokemon in it... though you'll still need HOME to trade with the GTS (gotta knick a few more dollars from our pockets some how).
(As a bonus you also get to see a second project I'm working on: giving Pokemon better/more descriptive Species Category names)
- 1.1: Bulbasaur (Bulb Hybrid) - 1.2: Ivysaur (Bud Hybrid) - 1.3 Venusaur (Flower Hybrid) - 1.3M: Mega Venusaur - 1.3G: Gigantamax Venusaur
- 2.1: Charmander (Fire Lizard) - 2.2: Charmeleon (Fire Theropod) - 2.3 Charizard (Fire Dragon) - 2.3MX: Mega Charizard X - 2.3MY: Mega Charizard Y - 2.3G: Gigantamax Charizard
- 3.1: Squirtle (Water Turtle) - 3.2: Wartortle (Furry Turtle) - 3.3: Blastoise (Cannon Turtle) - 3.3M: Mega Blastoise - 3.3G: Gigantamax Blastoise
- 4.1: Caterpie (Green Larvae) - 4.2: Metapod (Hard Cocoon) - 4.3: Butterfree (Powder Butterfly) - 4.3G: Gigantamax Butterfree
- 5.1: Weedle (Hairy Larvae) - 5.2: Kakuna - (Poison Cocoon) 5.3: Beedrill (Needle Bee) - 5.3M: Mega Beedrill
- 6.1: Pidgey (Plain Bird) - 6.2: Pidgeotto (Crest Bird) - 6.3: Pidgeot (Elegant Bird) - 6.3M: Mega Pidgeot
- 7.1n: Rattata (Tooth Rat) - 7.1a: Alolan Rattata (Minion Rat) - 7.2n: Raticate (Fang Rat) - 7.2a: Alolan Raticate (Boss Rat)
- 8.1: Spearow (Nasty Bird) - 8.2: Fearow (Pierce Bird)
- 9.1: Ekans (Rattle Snake) - 9.2: Arbok (Hooded Snake)
- 10.1: Pichu (Static Mouse) - 10.2: Pikachu (Electric Mouse) - 10.2G: Gigantamax Pikachu - 10.3n: Raichu (Lightning Mouse) - 10.3a: Alolan Raichu (Surge Mouse)
- 11.1n: Sandshrew (Scale Armor) - 11.1a: Alolan Sandshrew (Block Armor) - 11.2n: Sandslash (Spike Armor) - 11.2a: Alolan Sandslash (Icicle Armor)
- 12.1: Nidoran (f) (Poison Quill) - 12.2: Nidorina (Poison Spike) - 12.3: Nidoqueen (Poison Queen)
- 13.1: Nidoran (m) (Poison Pin) - 13.2: Nidorino (Poison Horn) - 12.3: Nidoking (Poison King)
- 14.1: Cleffa (Star Fairy) - 14.2: Clefairy (Moon Fairy) - 14.3: Clefable (Night Fairy)
- 15.1n: Vulpix (Six-tail Fox) - 15.1a: Alolan Vulpix (Snow-tail Fox) - 15.2n: Ninetales (Nine-tail Fox) - 15.2a: Alolan Ninetales (Mist-tail Fox)
- 16.1: Igglybuff (Soft Balloon) - 16.2: Jigglypuff (Lullaby Balloon) - 16.3: Wigglytuff (Lullaby Pillow)
- 17.1: Zubat (Echo Bat) - 17.2: Golbat (Drain Bat) - 17.3: Crobat (Silent Bat)
- 18.1: Oddish (Walking Weed) - 18.2: Gloom (Foul Bud) - 18.3.1: Vileplume (Large Petal) - 18.3.2: Bellossom (Dancing Flower)
- 19.1: Paras (Host Bug) - 19.2: Parasect (Parasite Husk)
- 20.1: Venonat (Radar Bug) - 20.2: Venomoth (Powder Moth)
- 21.1n: Diglett (Hidden Mole) - 21.1a: Alolan Diglett (Ash Mole) - 21.2n: Dugtrio (Mole Team) - 21.2a: Alolan Dugtrio (Mole Band)
- 22.1n: Meowth (Coin Cat) - 22.1nG. Gigantamax Meowth - 22.1a: Alolan Meowth (Spoiled Cat) - 22.1g: Galarian Meowth (Hardy Cat) - 22.2.1n: Persian (Classy Cat) - 22.2.1a: Alolan Persian (Prideful Cat) - 22.2.2g: Perrserker (Viking Cat)
- 23.1: Psyduck (Headache Duck) - 23.2: Golduck (Focused Duck)
- 24.1: Mankey (Ill-temper Monkey) - 24.2: Primeape (Berserker Monkey)
- 25.1: Growlithe (Fire Puppy) - 25.2: Arcanine (Guardian Dog)
- 26.1: Poliwag (Swirl Tadpole) - 26.2: Poliwhirl (Meta Frog) - 26.3.1: Poliwrath (Muscle Frog) - 26.3.2: Politoed (Singing Frog)
- 27.1: Abra (Sleepy Esper) - 27.2: Kadabra (Zener Esper) - 27.3: Alakazam (Spoon Esper) - 27.3M: Mega Alakazam
- 28.1: Machop (Extra Muscle) - 28.2: Machoke (Super Muscle) - 28.3: Machamp (Quad Muscle) - 28.3G: Gigantamax Machamp
- 29.1: Bellsprout (Pitfall Plant) - 29.2: Weepinbell (Flycatcher Plant) - 29.3: Victreebel (Pitcher Plant)
- 30.1: Tentacool (Drifting Jelly) - 30.2: Tentacruel (Squid Jelly)
- 31.1n: Geodude (Rock Arms) - 31.1a: Alolan Geodude (Magnet Arms) - 31.2n: Graveler (Limbed Rock) - 31.2a: Alolan Graveler (Limbed Magnet) - 31.3n: Golem (Boulder Shell) - 31.3a: Alolan Golem (Magnet Launcher)
- 32.1n: Ponyta (Fire Pony) - 32.1g: Galarian Ponyta (Magic Pony) - 32.2n: Rapidash (Fire Unicorn) - 32.2g: Galarian Rapidash (Magic Unicorn)
- 33.1n: Slowpoke (Dopey Synapsid) - 33.1g: Slowpoke (Galarian)(Zoned Synapsid) - 33.2.1n: Slowbro (Hermit Synapsid) - 33.2.1nM: Mega Slowbro - 33.2.1g: Slowbro (Galarian)(Sidearm Synapsid) - 33.2.2n: Slowking (Genius Synapsid) - 33.2.2g: Slowking (Galarian)(Sorcerer Synapsid)
- 34.1: Magnemite (Magnet Ball) - 34.2: Magneton (Magnet Batch) - 34.3: Magnezone (Magnet Saucer)
- 35n: Farfetch'd (Leek Duck) - 35.1g: Galarian Farfetch'd (Errant Duck) - 35.2g: Sirfetch'd (Chivalrous Duck)
- 36.1: Doduo (Twin Bird) - 36.2: Dodrio (Triplet Bird)
- 37.1: Seel (Sea Pup) - 37.2: Dewgong (Arctic Seal)
- 38.1n: Grimer (Sludge Pile) - 38.1a: Alolan Grimer (Sludge Cleaner) - 38.2n: Muk (Sludge Pool) - 38.2a: Alolan Muk (Sludge Crystal)
- 39.1: Shellder (Tongue Clam) - 39.2: Cloyster (Horn Clam)
- 40.1: Gastly (Gas Wisp) - 40.2: Haunter (Gas Creep) - 40.3: Gengar (Gas Shadow) - 40.3M: Mega Gengar - 40.3G: Gigantamax Gengar
- 41.1: Onix (Rock Snake) - 41.2: Steelix (Iron Snake) - 41.2M: Mega Steelix
- 42.1: Drowzee (Dream-eating Tapir) - 42.2: Hypno (Hypnotizing Tapir)
- 43.1: Krabby (River Crab) - 43.2: Kingler (Pincer Crab) - 43.2G: Gigantamax Kingler
- 44.1: Voltorb (Shock Ball) - 44.2: Electrode (Bomb Ball)
- 45.1: Exeggcute (Egg Seed) - 45.2n: Exeggutor (Linked Coconut) - 45.2a: Alolan Exeggutor (Dragon Coconut)
- 46.1: Cubone (Bone Orphan) - 46.2n: Marowak (Bone Guard) - 46.2a: Alolan Marowak (Bone Dancer)
- 47.1: Tyrogue (Scrapper) - 47.2.1: Hitmonlee (Taekwondo) - 47.2.2: Hitmonchan (Boxing) - 47.2.3: Hitmontop (Capoeira)
- 48.1: Lickitung (Stretch Tongue) - 48.2: Lickilicky (Rolled Tongue)
- 49.1: Koffing (Smog) - 49.2n: Weezing (Miasma) - 49.2g: Galarian Weezing (Air Purifier)
- 50.1: Rhyhorn (Spike Rhino) - 50.2: Rhydon (Drill Rhino) - 50.3: Rhyperior (Demolition Rhino)
- 51.1: Happiny (Happy Egg) - 51.2: Chansey (Lucky Egg) - 51.3: Blissey (Healthy Egg)
- 52.1: Tangela (Vine Ball) - 52.2: Tangrowth (Vine Man)
- 53: Kangaskhan (Mother-and-child) - 53M: Mega Kangaskhan
- 54.1: Horsea (Sea Fry) - 54.2: Seadra (Sea Horse) - 54.3: Kingdra (Sea Dragon)
- 55.1: Goldeen (Goldfish) - 55.2: Seaking (Pond Fish)
- 56.1: Staryu (Blinking Sea Star) - 56.2: Starmie (Glowing Sea Star)
- 57.1: Mime Jr. (Mimic Mime) - 57.2n: Mr. Mime (Barrier Mime) - 57.2g: Galarian Mr. Mime (Dancing Mime) - 57.3g: Mr. Rime (Comedian Mime)
- 58.1: Scyther (Blade Mantis) - 58.2: Scizor (Claw Mantis) - 58.2M: Mega Scizor
- 59.1: Smoochum (Kissy Doll) - 59.2: Jynx (Kissy Woman)
- 60.1: Elekid (Electric Troll) - 60.2: Electabuzz (Electric Oni) - 60.3: Electivire (Electric Yeti)
- 61.1: Magby (Magma Chick) - 61.2: Magmar (Magma Duck) - 61.3: Magmortar (Magma Mallard)
- 62: Pinsir (Stag Beetle) - 62M: Mega Pinsir
- 63: Tauros (Whip Bull)
- 64.1: Magikarp (Weak Carp) - 64.2: Gyarados (Fury Serpent) - 64.2M: Mega Gyarados
- 65: Lapras (Shelled Plesiosaur) - 65G: Gigantamax Lapras
- 66: Ditto (Transform)
- 67.1: Eevee (Evolution Fox) - 67.1G: Gigantamax Eevee - 67.2.1: Vaporeon (Aquatic Fox) - 67.2.2: Jolteon (Lightning Fox) - 67.2.3: Flareon (Flame Fox) - 67.2.4: Espeon (Sunrise Fox) - 67.2.5: Umbreon (Moonlight Fox) - 67.2.6: Leafeon (Mossy Fox) - 67.2.7: Glaceon (Icy Fox) - 67.2.8: Sylveon (Emotion Fox)
- 68.1: Porygon (Virtual Program) - 68.2: Porygon2 (Upgraded Program) - 68.3: Porygon-Z (Corrupted Program)
- 69.1: Omanyte (Helix Squid) - 69.2: Omastar (Spiral Squid)
- 70.1: Kabuto (Dome Shellfish) - 70.2: Kabutops (Blade Shellfish)
- 71: Aerodactyl (Fanged Pterosaur) - 70M: Mega Aerodactyl
- 72.1: Munchlax (Big Eater) - 72.2: Snorlax (Deep Sleeper) - 72.2G: Gigantamax Snorlax
- 73n: Articuno (Blizzard Bird) - 73g: Galarian Articuno (Glaring Bird)
- 74n: Zapdos (Lightning Bird) - 74g: Galarian Zapdos (Stampede Bird)
- 75n: Moltres (Heat Bird) - 75g: Galarian Moltres (Fury Bird)
- 76.1: Dratini (Molting Wyrm) - 76.2: Dragonair (Weather Wyrm) - 76.3: Dragonite (Guardian Dragon)
- 77: Mewtwo (Genetic Mutant) - 77MX: Mega Mewtwo X - 77MY: Mega Mewtwo Y
- 78: Mew (Ancester-of-all)
- 179n: Castform (Normal Form) (Weather Cloud) - 179su: Castform (Sunny Form) - 179r: Castform (Rainy Form) - 179sn: Castform (Snowy Form)
- 211.1p: Burmy (Plant Cloak) (Cloaked Bagworm) - 211.1s: Burmy (Sandy Cloak) - 211.1t: Burmy (Trash Cloak) - 211.2.1p: Wormadam (Plant Cloak) (Nested Bagworm) - 211.2.1s: Wormadam (Sandy Cloak) - 211.2.1t: Wormadam (Trash Cloak) - 211.2.2: Mothim (Bagworm Moth)
How would that work? (Assuming all Gym Leaders to have 5)
2>2>3>3>3>4>4>5
2>3>3>4>4>4>4>5
2>2>3>3>4>4>5>5
2>3>3>4>4>5>5>5
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