XY - Your thoughts

[Celever]

Disclaimer: No pc++. Don't say "lol X sucks" talk about why you think it is a lackluster game. No flame wars, everybody is entitled to their own opinion.

The new generation has been here for over 4 months now, but hype and discussion about it has certainly not died down yet. There has been enough time for you to have played through the game a couple of times and have some fixed views on the games themselves, though. So what did you think of it? Did you wish you saved your money or did you go out and buy another version?

Some things to think about:
How linear was the story?
How was the variety of Pokémon?
How was the level curve?
Do you enjoy the character designs?
Do you enjoy the new Pokémon?

 

[MikeAU]

Overall, I quite enjoyed X/Y -- of greatest contribution to this was obviously the new design and aesthetics and it was overall, quite enjoyable.

How was the variety of Pokémon?

Personally, after a full walkthrough on X and partial on Y, I was quite impressed with the variety that could be encountered. There was a good balance of nostalgia (the likes of Pikachu in the first forest took me back a little). Whilst I found the new additions were not all that great, I did appreciate a number of them -- Honedge, Inkay, Heliptile and Froakie I quite enjoyed. Having said that, the availability of prior generations was also quite good (considering I've been out of the Pokéverse since G/S -- played platinum and white 2, but nonetheless a big absence from the franchise).

It did feel like there was just more to be found everywhere (from my recollection of prior games, also the points at which they can be found) such as the Pan's in the first forest, fletchling, etc. I did find about mid story and around the fairy gym that I kinda didn't want to battle randoms and catch them, rather get a little deeper in the story line.

How was the level curve?

I would have liked to see it a little more challenging, playing my first run-through with a fairly ad-hoc team didn't seem a challenge until around gym 6 then I really started to feel that curve kick in. Perhaps a difficulty setting in the coming generations would be interesting?

Do you enjoy the character designs?

Character designs were, decent. It was interesting to have a group that follows your story a long which was refreshing. Still a few eye-rolling moments when the bleedingly obvious was stated (see below). However, overall I think it covered a decent balance of keeping the story flowing and 'helping' people new to the franchise.

Overall, wasn't blown away by it, but also I respect how it was done. Perhaps while finishing my current run through I will spare a little more attention to the characters and reserve judgment until then.

Do you enjoy the new Pokémon?

For the most, yes -- have I used them all? Nope. As I mentioned above, this was my first serious play through of a game since Gold/Silver and to a lesser extent Platinum. To me, there were a LOT of new encounters, however gen 6 specifically, there were a few mentioned above that were quite cool. Also, the evolution requirements for some were not as conventional but still surprising.

Something I would like to draw attention to, is breeding in X/Y -- what an improvement! I had some some egg-move breeding in W2 however, never invested the time in getting IV's and nature due to the complexity.

X/Y was great in this aspect, the mechanics were good (destiny knot, in particular) and aesthetically, watching the bicycle light turn on at 8PM after many cycles back and worth kind of became a novelty after a lot of breeding.

A little off-topic but a HUGE shoutout to TheMantyke for the guide that he wrote -- was a great starting point and really helped me go from no breeding experience to now, quite confident and certain on how to get a particular outcome.

I am interested to see some other reviews (particularly those who have played through existing generations as they were released) overall I thoroughly enjoyed it. A few gripes and I would have liked to see the story become a little more complex, less linear and a bit more unique to previous generations. Such as the 'baddies' trying take over the world/destroy it is a little old -- but at the same time I enjoy the nostalgia in it. Would be great if Jessie/James got a cameo as well as team rocket!

 

[Raikaria]

It's average.

The variety of Pokemon in the game is alright.
The additions to the game are great.
It's nice to have random trainers actually be dangerous quite often, and the trainers AND team actually evolve their pokemon instead of using Lv 36 Poochyena.
Mega Evolutions is a good concept [Although unfairly done]

It's.. a soild Pokemon game.

What needs more explanation is it's failings:

The game feels like a massive pandering to Genwunners
Gen 6 has 69 new pokemon in the game. 68 of them are available during the main game.
Gen 1 has 106 pokemon available within the main game, and this is discounting the 4 postgame legends [110 total]

There is more of Generation 1 in this game than any other geneation. In fact, Generation 1 is 110/454 of the Kalos Dex, almost 1/4.

But wait, there's more:

Lapras is gifted to you. Oh, and Lapras gets a special surf icon
You are forced to pick a Kanto starter, and it WILL eclipse your Kalos starter because you are also given a Mega Stone. The REGIONAL PROFESSOR dosen't use the Kalos starters, he uses the KANTO ONES.
Snorlax is in the road. The entire reason for it being there? Aside from making the pace issues even worse? To be a throwback to Gen 1
There are 12 Kanto Mega Evolutions. 5 Jhoto, 8 [10 counting Lati@s, which is probobly a R/S/E remake thing.] Hoenn, 3 Sinnoh, and 0 Unoca and Kalos. Kanto provides 12/38 Mega Evolutions that are available within the game, and 12/40 total. Oh, and some Kanto mons have 2 mega evolutions, none of the others have this.

The game constantly shoves Generation 1 down your throat. There's more of it in this game than there is IT'S OWN GENERATION, or any other. This leaves a very bad taste in my mouth. I want a new adventure, I don't want Generation 1 again. At the very least don't shove it into the main path of the game so much that it eclipses the new stuff!

The game has serious pacing issues

The gap between Gyms 1 and 2 is larger in terms of areas [Discounting Parfume Palace and Towns] than the entire gap between the 2nd and 5th Gyms in terms of new areas. You can literally go from Gym 5 to 6 without fighting a single trainer except your rival. Gym 1~2 gives you this expectation that the game is massive. Then Gym 3 is an acceptable time away. Then Gym 4, 5 and 6 are like WHAM WHAM WHAM, and Gym 7 isn't isn't far behind. This leads to Ramos, Clemont and even the gym for the new type, Valerie, being rather forgettable, because the build-up is so non-existent!

It sets you up for a huge game, but in reality, beating Grant is almost the halfway point.

It dosen't help that they decide to shove most of the rival battles in this short period as well, so you fight your rival three times in a row with literally no change in their team, except the last time their starter evolved. Seriously the fight in front of Ramos' gym is the same fight but 2~3 levels higher. Also it's kinda silly Olympia's main is a Meowstic when you had to beat your rival WHO HAS A MEOWSTIC to get in. Couldn't they have made her main, I don't know, Malamar so she didn't overlap with the boss immediately before her?

There are some serious difficulty/sensibility issues
EXP.Share is completely broken, and the game is not difficult to even try and compensate. The free Lucario and two Mega Evolutions shoved into your face make the game too easy as well.

If you choose to ignore the blatantly broken stuff thrust in your face that makes the main game a cakewalk, there are still serious issues with the difficulty. Ramos is a COMPLETE joke. Weepingbel? Seriously? At least use Victreebel. The Team Flare Scientists are pretty pathetic. The Elite 4 using 4 pokemon and not 5 is depressing, especially when they use things like Probopass. The BIGGEST offender however is Dransa. In a region with Salamence, Dragonite, Hydregion, Kingdra and Haxorus available... they give her Druggidon and Altaria. And your rival, who you beat not long ago, has an Altaria too [It's Olympia all over again].

However, there are also some random spikes. After you defeat a boss [Korrina] you walk onto the route leading to Reflection Cave... and suddenly the random trainers spike THREE LEVELS above Korrina, and since this is where Fighters star showing up, suddenly use TM's.

Seibold stands out from the rest of the Elite 4 and is by far the most difficult, suddenly throwing a Dragon Dance Gyarados and a Starmie that could have come from this site at you. [Also his Gen 1 mons overshadow his Gen 6.]

Also Dianthina and Lysandre's inability to send out their Mega-Capable mons until it is their last stand is easily exploitable. Especially Dianthina. Gardevoir could stop something? Nah, I'll run my entire team into it first. [Particularly notable with physical Dragons such as Garchomp]

Postgame...
There basically is none. Looker sidequest is nice but not enough. Basic French-version of the battle tower is not enough when we've had Frontiers. THERE ISN'T EVEN AN ELITE 4 REMATCH.

 

[Dododoggy]

Some parts I LOVED and some parts I HATED.

First off I thought the graphics,pokemon sprites, and animations we're awesome. However your friends (Shauna,Dancing Kid, and Ron Weasley) I wasn't very fond of. I found Shauna super annoying and she was like an annoying rash that wouldn't go away. The dancing kid I thought was just a waste of space and he didn't really do much. Ron Weasly (my nickname for Trevor) I thought was just like the dancing kid, a wasted character that didn't do anything and could've been a lot better. Furthermore I found team flare under whelming and not like other the other amazing protagonist groups such as Team Plasma,Team Rocket ect. they seemed rather silly and we're super easy to defeat.

With the pokemon it's just like every new generation, some you like some you don't. My favorites we're definitely Goodra,Gogoat, and pancham. However Barbacle and Hawlucha rubbed me the wrong way. The starters we're so-so. The Fenniken and Chespin lines were "meh" while the froakie line was one of my favorite starter lines yet!

The towns and city's were really beautiful and I had fun seeing each one. Lumiose was awesome with the cafe's,salons, ect. It made me feel like I was in Paris.

The story line was pretty bland. Diantha was one of the worst, if not THE worst champion yet. Her music was good but she was super under whelming and can be easily defeated. Like I said Team flare was rather odd and Lysandre was not as "badass" as Cyrus or Giovanni were.

Overall X&Y was really enjoyable despite the many downfalls and under whelming moments it had.

 

[MikeAU]

It's average.

The variety of Pokemon in the game is alright.
The additions to the game are great.
It's nice to have random trainers actually be dangerous quite often, and the trainers AND team actually evolve their pokemon instead of using Lv 36 Poochyena.
Mega Evolutions is a good concept [Although unfairly done]

It's.. a soild Pokemon game.

What needs more explanation is it's failings:

The game feels like a massive pandering to Genwunners

The game has serious pacing issues

There are some serious difficulty/sensibility issues

I really enjoyed reading this -- I removed th content so the quote/reply wasn't too long. Had I played through HG/SS, R/S/E, D/P/Pt, B/W, B2/W2 I reckon I would have a much more critical view of the game and what it offered. I think mostly I enjoyed it because it was a good balance of new and old, having said that there could have been a lot more new mons, or some increase to viability of some older monsters.

Totally agree with you on E4 -- cruised through most with a misdreavus/charizard but then got to Siebold and it was a NIGHTMARE to beat that Garados.

Also, some of the type changes and combos I.e Azumarill Fairy/Water was interesting, a few more Normal/X types were tricky at first where traditional means that were highly effective become moderately so, or in some instances even more.

I assume from your post that you've played all (or most) of the previous games, how did you find the slope/curve that this improved at from the previous gen, and also say, from Gen 4?

 

[Gokuzbu]

This game might be my favorite of the series. It's the next step that Pokemon needed to take.

The graphics are so nice. They are very colorful and bring the Pokemon to life. The 3D models make battling more fun. The region looks absolutely beautiful. It's tied with Hoenn as my favorite. Graphics have always been a big complaint for me in
Pokemon such as the trainers overworld sprites looking nothing like them in battle. Or everything pixelated. It's all fixed here.

The variety of Pokemon is amazing. The amount of unique encounters in a route far eclipses the amount in past games. In Pokemon Black for example each route had 2 or 3 Pokemon you could catch. Route 1 had Patrat and Lillipup. In X and Y on the first patch of grass you can get Fletchling, Caterpie, Weedle, Pidgey, Zigzagoon, Bunnelby and Scatterbug. This makes nuzlockes better and also means people can use their favorite Pokemon more easily.

I didn't mind the gen 1 nostalgia. You can see it in the anime too how they brought back the original theme song and brought back the gotta catch em all slogan. It's good for fans of Kanto while not hurting anyone else as you can just use the large variety of other Pokemon.

The story is the weakest part of the game. Team Flare are uninteresting. I don't know what the point of the giant AZ was. Diantha is a terrible champion. As for the rivals they should of just had Serena and removed the rest. Holy shit are they annoying. The lack of a post game sucks, but I expect it all to be in Z or X2 and Y2 or whatever you want to call it.

In short

+Pokemon
+Graphics
+Region

-Story
-Characters
-Lack of post game

 

[Ausgirl]

How linear was the story?

The story was very linear, which I don't mind. I'm not usually someone who cares too much about the storyline either way which is why I tend to rush through my games because I'm more interested in catching the box legendary and breeding cool pokes. I think it was supposed to be linear though, cos as the creators said XY is supposed to be one of those games that new fans and older fans could appreciate. RBY was also linear if I remember correctly and I think that the new games were supposed to reflect that. Just like how XY was supposed have that new feeling like the original games did cos for once we were able to play the games at the same time as people in Japan. The lack of information leading up to games release date made the game more exciting, including the storyline.

How was the variety of Pokémon?

In some ways I was impressed with the variety of pokes available in-game, in particular the variety of pokes available from previous games was HUGE. However I was disapointed with the lack of new pokes.

How was the level curve?

The game was probably one of the more easiest ones in the Pokemon series, which again I don't mind.

Do you enjoy the character designs?

To be honest I couldn't stand the characters that were supposed to be my friends. In particular I found Shauna annoying, the whole time I was playing and she was talking I was like "Shut up, just shut up." Everything about her annoyed me from her girlishness, her general lack of knowledge when it comes to pokemon, her obsession with famous people and cute pokemon and the long discussions about friendship. Bloody hell. The other characters weren't particularly interesting either but at least their appearances were bearable. Team Flare was just stupid, enough said. If there was a competition for the worst bad guy outfits they would win. The Champion was also annoying...

Do you enjoy the new Pokémon?

In every generation there are pokemon that I like and pokemon that I hate. Although this gen only introduced about 70 new pokes, for the most part they had good designs. I wish that there were better fairy types though.

Overall I thought the game was 'above average.' It was engaging enough, the graphics were cool but I think they could have been better. I was hoping that every scene in the game would be as up to date with the graphics like the Team Flare and cave scenes. Though I think that the creators are going in the right direction in regards to the graphics.

 

[DHR-107]

Some things to think about:
How linear was the story?
How was the variety of Pokémon?
How was the level curve?
Do you enjoy the character designs?
Do you enjoy the new Pokémon?

Overall the games are pretty average for Pokemon games imo. There are several flaws but some good things too. I'll try and be succint but don't be surprised if this comes out as being a fairly long winded post.

The story is incredibly linear for the most part, there is almost no movement in how you can go about moving around the map and its very hand holdy for the first huge section of the game (Probably at least until Lumiose City 2). The only real time you can even get remotely lost is if you havent played for a few days and get to some stupid men standing in the way of a route. Because of A) Power Outages, B) Durants C) Other random reasons [At least in BW2 they admitted they were "literally dancing for no reason in the way"]. Why should a power outage stop me from exploring the biggest city Pokemon has ever seen exactly? I was honestly surprised when the Monorail WASN'T broken in Courmarine!

As many other people have said, (Especially MikeAU with the image of Shauna), there were some awful clangers of conversation which really broke the interaction between characters and the player. That single instance above put me in a bad frame of mind heading up that route. We'd just battled, we'd just seen those mons go into the ball... Where else were they supposed to go? :|

There were almost too many Pokemon to chose a decent team from. Having 6/7/8 species per route is kinda overkill, especially when most are older Pokemon which hardcore fans already know and have probably used 47893577849798379 times. I definitely agree with Raikaria about the pandering to Genwunners. The Pidgey on the first route is scripted (its always Pidgey as the first encounter in every game) and on that same route we have Caterpie/Weedle competing for a slot along side Scatterbug. My first game actually managed to be all Gen 6 mons (though not without some extra planning/waiting for them to be available). Overall I think there are too few new Pokemon introduced, and a whole host of them you don't get to see until 75% of the way through the game.

Looking at just the new Pokemon, I think there was a good amount of variety. The only problem I have is they did not introduce any (or very few) Pokemon of certain types. Electric and Ground got shafted the hardest here with just 2 new families for each (and one of them is a Legendary and another is stand alone and a Pikachu clone). I liked how they went down the same vein as Jellicent with Pyroar and took it even further with Meowstic (With having two totally seperate evolutions depending on sex). Several designs absolutely stick out as being great though. For me Avalugg and Clawitzer stand out for being a little different to the norm this gen.

The level curve. This is sort of an odd one really. I am currently on my 4th play through and so far I havent had any real difficulties with the level curve. On my third game I turned it off (and I had to turn it back on just past Olympia) and I ended up falling short on XP towards the end (I am not much of a grinder) and ended up being horribly outgunned by Mega Gardevoir in the final battle. So badly infact I had to "Potion Stall" it out of all of its PP in order for it to be left with only Shadow Balls so Dodrio could come in and defeat it. However, with XP share it is pretty easy to stay on track and even end up over the top on most gym leaders by gym 4 or 5 (By Gym 8 you could have a 6/7 level gap). Strangely, there is a big jump between Grant and Korrina (the two Black Belts in Reflection cave being the most prominently hard trainers).

I quite like the more European slant on the overal designs of trainers/characters. The Gym leaders especially have their own aesthetic. I am sort of underwhelmed by how little they developed some of those characters. Like, in Gen 1/2 you sort of had even a little backstory to each Gym Leader, in Gen 6, especially like Olympia and Valerie have 0 backstory just sort of rumours about where they are form and the like.

Uhh... Wow that was more than I expected. I might post again here though, good topic Celever :)

 

[MikeAU]

The level curve. This is sort of an odd one really. I am currently on my 4th play through and so far I havent had any real difficulties with the level curve. On my third game I turned it off (and I had to turn it back on just past Olympia) and I ended up falling short on XP towards the end (I am not much of a grinder) and ended up being horribly outgunned by Mega Gardevoir in the final battle. So badly infact I had to "Potion Stall" it out of all of its PP in order for it to be left with only Shadow Balls so Dodrio could come in and defeat it. However, with XP share it is pretty easy to stay on track and even end up over the top on most gym leaders by gym 4 or 5 (By Gym 8 you could have a 6/7 level gap). Strangely, there is a big jump between Grant and Korrina (the two Black Belts in Reflection cave being the most prominently hard trainers).

I believe both the level curve and story difficulty is something that a lot of people would be happy to see improved or in my personal belief, overhauled. Whilst the whole "you shall not pass!" gig is getting quite troublesome, with such an open map (certainly not as open as say, Skyrim) it would be easy for the games younger users to get lost and probably give up if you have free access to roam. Rather than skirt the issue due to power failures, bridge repairs, etc. why not simply have a badge verification thing similar to E4? Whilst it wouldn't make a material difference to game play, from a storyline perspective it would be more... mature.

As far as difficulty goes, surely we must be near a point where you can up the difficulty? Even it it triggered a level difference (i.e normal=0, moderate=+5, hard=+8 or something. Actually forcing a level curve, and perhaps even the monsters people use? If a random trainer has say 4 as a standard they have 5 or 6 depending on the difficulty. The 1-2 pokemon trainers are quite annoying, most time its just switch out your best and end it ASAP. As opposed to battles that require strategy to help instill some good battling skills with players.

One thing I didn't cover off, however agree with you completely DHR is the European feel to the game. It was refreshing and something that was quite pleasant.

It would be great to see a jump in overall game play from say R/B/Y to Platinum. Also, perhaps re-start the pokedex? X and Y had a great variety of old and newer generations. Start building up a new wave of pokemon, now that bank is out it will be extremely easy to jump them up to newer versions so by placing an emphasis on building a new pokedex and a larger number of new (and hopefully ALL useful) there will still be a big challenge in catchin' them all.

Overall, they played it safe but were able to deliver a shiny new toy for everyone to play with. Certainly worth the time and monetary investment however, I hope its best aspects sets a baseline for future games.

 

[chaostothemax]

I feel like X and Y was above average. However, to me, the pros and cons are ridiculously exaggerated.

I'll start with the characters. All four of the "rivals" felt like pathetic excuses for characters. Tierno was the worst offender by far, offering literally nothing gameplay-wise, story-wise, and personality-wise. Even in postgame, his daily event is far more inefficient than simply farming the Heart Scales off of Luvdiscs. Trevor was bad, but at least I can relate to him; as a person who (in the games at least) was always more about collecting the Pokemon than battling with them, I feel that he's somebody people can relate to, unlike Tierno. Serena/Calem just felt bland to me. Every time I saw Calem in my second playthrough, I thought I was looking at Cheren; the least they could do is give him a different hairstyle, or even a different color of hair. Both of them feel like a blank slate, which irritates me to no end. Shauna I actually found the most tolerable, unlike what others thought; she was still terrible, but she had a couple moments where I actually felt like liking her.
Other characters are a mixed bag. I HATE Diantha. Like, with a passion. She's passive, doesn't do anything to help in the storyline, her team is easy, her aesthetic feels off to me, I just can't stand her. The Elite 4 and Gym Leaders are all kind of forgettable; granted, after this long it's hard to come up with unique personalities that are apparent from the short time we see them, but they could at least put a little effort into it. Sycamore was okay, but I didn't feel like we really got a decent evaluation of his personality. I actually really, really like Lysandre. Sure, it was obvious he was the bad guy, but how was Game Freak supposed to hide that? He was the first really sympathetic villain Game Freak made (aside from N, but that's more pity than sympathy to me), and I feel like that makes him unique. If only the rest of Team Flare was like that, the story might have been decent.

That brings me to my next point - the story. I feel like the story was hastily cobbled together, honestly. It had some potential - AZ was interesting and added some mystery to the whole ordeal, Lysandre pulled the whole 'sympathetic villain' thing, and the legendaries as a wild card. When it came together, though, it felt like they just smashed everything together and called it a day. The legendaries were atrociously underplayed; unlike D/P/P or B/W, the entire story could have unfolded with little to no reference to them. It felt like they were shoehorned in. The worst offenders, however, were Team Flare. Lysandre was cool, but his team undermined every single thing Game Freak had tried to make him do. It was horribly hard to resist punching my 3DS repeatedly whenever they showed up; they were pompous, sociopathic, and their outfits just piss me off. If they had made them sympathetic like Lysandre, GF might have made the story decent; as it is, however, it feels terrible and an excuse to throw the player around the region.

Speaking of the region, the pacing was kind of screwed up as well. The EXP Share has an awful catch-22 attached to it: If you use it, you overlevel everything, but if you don't everything outlevels you. To stay even with enemy trainers, you have to turn it on and off repeatedly, which is really obnoxious. Like some people said above, the pacing had some bizarre spikes to it as well; Reflection Cave and the Fighters outside and within it were ridiculously hard to beat. The spacing between Gyms is off, too; the space between the first three gyms is about the same as the space between the next five, which just shouldn't happen. If you don't care about difficulty, though, none of that matters; the EXP Share will breeze you through everything if kept on the whole time and using even a half-decent team.

The variety of Pokemon is both a blessing and a curse. On one hand, you have insane amounts of 'Mons to choose from; on the other hand, you have insane amounts of 'Mons to choose from. It's almost too much variety; 7-8 Pokemon a route is a little overkill, as much as I appreciate it as a Pokemon collector. Everything Raikaria and DHR said about pandering to Genwunners is absolutely true; I was actually really surprised when I found out Rattata wasn't available on the first routes, or even in the entire game. The Mega-evolution issue is, I think, just a matter of popularity; most of the Pokemon people know are from the first generation, so of course they'd get picked to raise publicity about Pokemon. I feel like most of the problems could be resolved by not giving you the Kanto starters' Mega Stones until postgame; that would keep the Kanto starters from taking over one's team, and free up some space for other Pokemon if somebody wants.

X and Y's saving grace comes in two forms: The graphics and the new Pokemon. The game is simply GORGEOUS. Everything is beautiful: The overworld, the battle scenes, the trainers, literally everything. Some Pokemon's models are amazing and make me praise GF's artistic skills (seriously, Bisharp looks so badass), while others made me laugh out loud (Stunfisk). The trainers actually look similar between battle and the overworld, which is fantastic. The cutscenes are beautiful; being able to actually see emotion on a person's face makes everything so much better. The new Pokemon also impressed me. Every single one of them, even if they aren't OU viable, at least has a niche (Except Dedenne. Fuck that thing). Even things like Aurorus can be useful; Glaciate Hyper Beam will wreck most things. The Fairy typing, although helping out previous generation Pokemon more than it does the new ones, is amazing as far as the gameplay goes; my brother loves his Slurpuff, and I've grown rather attached to Sylveon.

Overall, X and Y comes out ahead. I know I wrote more bad things than good things, but that's mostly due to my ability to complain endlessly about things I dislike :P Overall, I really do think X and Y are good games for the series, and I can't wait to see where it will go next.

 

[colours]

X/Y for me, was...really quite interesting. I suppose, like Dododoggy has stated, there are some parts that I loved, and yet there are some parts that I really disliked. I mean, I was disappointed with the fact that Pokemon can't follow you around like in HG/SS (I was really hoping for that to make a comeback, but alas!), but not overly too bothered since at least Pokemon-Aime is there to give your 'mons at least some life, and to show that they're more than just ~*sprites*~, I suppose.

The storyline for me was...bland. Okay, not gonna lie, some parts of it were exciting (honestly like, facing the leaders of Team Flare was probably the most exciting for me), but otherwise, it was just...really nothing special, I guess? I suppose things took an interesting turn towards the end, but I wanted to be immersed into the action, I wanted to actually get the feeling of becoming a part of whatever conflict was going on, and I feel that these games didn't really deliver on that. Like, back in Gen III, I suppose one could imagine themselves being in the middle of the whole Team Magma/Team Aqua scuffle, and I wanted to have that kind of experience.

I also feel that X/Y failed to deliver as far as post-game content was concerned. Yes, I'll definitely give it something: The addition of the Battle Maison is definitely interesting, but it's only a mere step-up from your usual Battle Tower. I expected different Battle Facilities (and don't tell me Battle Institute counts because I fail to see how it does), with different conditions and things like that. I mean, knowing the kind of game that X/Y is, I expected there to be a more open post-game, if that makes sense. Like, why not get to know the Champion Diantha better, since she's rarely around for the majority of the game? Like, having a little friendly match outside of the E4? There are just so many questions to ask because I feel that so many things could be improved upon!

What I did like was the change in graphics, of course! I'm a huge aesthetics person and yes, while I'm not a fan of the game getting laggy whenever you turn 3D on, it does look more enticing when you do. @_@;; That, and the Pokemon move animations were also quite amazing to look at (though, some are disappointing, like Sacred Sword, wtf is that??? I kinda expected something more fancier than just a bit of swirly wind or w/e).

What I also liked was the amount of customization available for your character! I feel really happy that this is the first main series Pokemon game to offer such an option ranging from customizing your own hairstyle to even choosing your own clothes and even going so far as to change your eye color! This was definitely something I was pleased with, though honestly I wish you could discard the hat. ~_~ Sometimes, certain hairstyles just look better without the hat and I've been looking for a way to do so for a while before I realized it's pretty much just stuck there.

Ultimately, this is a game that showed a lot of potential, but didn't really deliver on a lot of it. The game, for me, I feel focused more on the customization aspect more than anything else--which isn't a bad thing!--but there's still lots of areas to improve upon, y'know? I also wished that there could've been more Pokemon available. Like, I would appreciate it if maayybe there would've been around 100 Pokemon at the very highest. Heck, I probably would've been happy with around 90 or so, but what we have now is kinda really low for my tastes. u___u

This is not to say that I dislike the game overall, I do like it (I honestly find it really hard to put down because Battle Maison's replay value as well as the Battle Chateau's is incredible), but a lot of it is rather disappointing to me, and it's aspects that I hope would be fixed in the next game....

 

[TGL-00]

Overall, I have mixed feelings about the game in general. For me, the biggest downfall to XY was the plot and the actual gameplay. Graphics, new mechanics supporting competitive play and the new pokemon were all pretty spot on, but Gen5 set the bar high when it came to plotline and characters and XY did very little to come close to that (except making the roadblocks something you actively did something about like fighting Team Flare to restore power to the city).

As has been discussed already, the pacing was certainly flawed, yet there seemed to me no legitimate reasoning behind it: the Snorlax roadblocks in RBY were there to force you to go through Rock Tunnel and fight Team Rocket in Celadon City and Lavender Town, in this game, it's just to force you to go to a palace and have an awkward cutscene with Shauna; the town with the fossil lab forces you to detour down another dead-end for the reward of a fossil while the gym leader using the fossil pokemon is in the next city (where there is nothing else to do at all).

Then gyms 4-7 are all very close together and despite all the encounters with Team Flare in between them, there isn't really anything going on to draw you through the story -- RSE is the perfect comparison here as you have to chase Aqua/Magma from pretty much from Mauville to Meteor Falls to Mt Chimney, then chase the submarine to underwater bit, and then again to Sootopolis which creates lots of drama to pull you through all those hideous water routes. This made the storyline feel so much weaker in XY because there wasn't a lot of continuity between Team Flare encounters, and you basically were defeating them purely because the game made you and not because you knew they were intent on global destruction -- again, it seemed like a throwback to the disparate Team Rocket events in RBY, but because they had no overarching motives besides general criminality. Beating Team Flare in each location didn't really bring them closer to their goals, or you closer to stopping them, it just happened seemingly in isolation creating no intrigue or tension. I admit it's all explained at the denouement in Lysandre Labs/Geosenge Town, but really it seems too little too late: they were tedious to fight imo because you knew so little about what they actually were doing. The other issue with the Team Flare plot was the way Xerneas/Yveltal was just there. Team Flare's main theme was beauty, and yet they don't draw on the powers of the Beauty/Ugliness pokemon? I think this was more apparent as I played X, wherein a pokemon that gives life being used to wipe out the population seemed to make very little sense to me. Then it's all over, the dodgy pacing kicks back in and there's two routes a town and lots of forced battles with rivals to work through before the last badge and the E4.

The whole plot of the game to me felt rushed with lots of gaps (presumably to be filled in by a Z) and as someone that enjoys playing through the main story, I didn't feel satisfied by it and I think despite the huge variety of pokemon, replayability is quite stunted by that fact. A cynic would call it planned obsolescence, ensuring players aren't still enjoying their experience in 1-2 years time to get them to fork out the cash for a new installment. Despite the visuals of the game and the detail put into it (having your friends/those people you literally just met and are now best friends with pass you on routes I thought was a really nice touch), it seemed to be a bit lazy and a step back in terms of storyline, especially when compared to what went before in Gens 4 and 5 (and even RSE really).

Team Flare's battle pose cracked me up the first time though.

 

[Gokuzbu]

Lately I'm seeing a lot of hate for X and Y. The Reddit community gave it a 6.7 which seems pretty low. I also hear a lot of people saying it's the worst Pokemon game. The main complaints are low number of new Pokemon, bad story and lack of post game. I think people hyped themselves up a bit much, the same thing happened with GTA V.

 

[chaostothemax]

Lately I'm seeing a lot of hate for X and Y. The Reddit community gave it a 6.7 which seems pretty low. I also hear a lot of people saying it's the worst Pokemon game. The main complaints are low number of new Pokemon, bad story and lack of post game. I think people hyped themselves up a bit much, the same thing happened with GTA V.

GTA V was overhyped? I'd never have guessed the way my friends talk about it :P

Anyway, I think there is some merit to the complaints, but not enough to make it the worst game. There were a low number of new Pokemon, but in return, we got a generation where every new Pokemon is usable in some form or another. There's no 'fluff' in this Pokedex, unlike previous generations with things like Vespiquen and Lumineon. There was a lack of postgame, but that will be likely be fixed with the 3rd game; Ruby and Sapphire had a similar problem, IIRC, and Emerald gave us more postgame than most people could ever finish. I have to give them the story complaint; as I said above, I felt like the story was lackluster as well.

 

[Celever]

I hated XY during the hype (ask like anyone on smogon) because I hated all of the announcements, but I still bought the game at release date and it was pretty much my expectations. Complete appeal to genwunners & worst game in series. By far. I would give it like a 1/10 on any rating site -- it feels more like a cash in to me on a successful series just by the quality of the game alone, and some of the things introduced. Kanto starters, New typing, Lots of old Pokémon, Lots of references. All of this is just to boost popularity of the game, and in regards to the last couple of options the series as a whole. I had no expectations at all and I was still disappointed.

 

[chaostothemax]

I hated XY during the hype (ask like anyone on smogon) because I hated all of the announcements, but I still bought the game at release date and it was pretty much my expectations. Complete appeal to genwunners & worst game in series. By far. I would give it like a 1/10 on any rating site -- it feels more like a cash in to me on a successful series just by the quality of the game alone, and some of the things introduced. Kanto starters, New typing, Lots of old Pokémon, Lots of references. All of this is just to boost popularity of the game, and in regards to the last couple of options the series as a whole. I had no expectations at all and I was still disappointed.

Lots of Pokemon and references isn't necessarily a bad thing. Lots of Pokemon basically ensures that no two runs will be the same, and lots of references, to me at least, means that Nintendo has acknowledged their older audience; while both have their downsides, they have upsides too. I'm unsure how a new typing means cashing in on the series; if you could elaborate on that, please, I'd be glad to discuss it. Kanto starters were the only thing that felt like a cash in to me; even then, it wouldn't be nearly as bad if they had just waited to give you the mega stone until after you beat the E4.

The other thing. I feel is missing in your post is the fact that there are positives as well. The graphics took a huge leap forward, and things like Pokemon-Amie make the game feel more immersive than ever before. Breeding is much easier; before, I never would have considered doing competitive Pokemon outside of simulators, but now I have a full competitive team. I would give Pokemon X and Y a 4/10 at the very least; it's probably more like a 6 or 7/10 overall.

 

[Celever]

Lots of Pokemon and references isn't necessarily a bad thing. Lots of Pokemon basically ensures that no two runs will be the same, and lots of references, to me at least, means that Nintendo has acknowledged their older audience; while both have their downsides, they have upsides too. I'm unsure how a new typing means cashing in on the series; if you could elaborate on that, please, I'd be glad to discuss it. Kanto starters were the only thing that felt like a cash in to me; even then, it wouldn't be nearly as bad if they had just waited to give you the mega stone until after you beat the E4.

The other thing. I feel is missing in your post is the fact that there are positives as well. The graphics took a huge leap forward, and things like Pokemon-Amie make the game feel more immersive than ever before. Breeding is much easier; before, I never would have considered doing competitive Pokemon outside of simulators, but now I have a full competitive team. I would give Pokemon X and Y a 4/10 at the very least; it's probably more like a 6 or 7/10 overall.

I disagree with that entire post lol. If you have favourite Pokémon and are more selective about the Pokémon you like to use, then two runs may very well share Pokémon, especially as people generally just use things like Scizor and Garchomp anyway. Some of the references were good, but there were too many. There was the odd reference about other games, but it was like 90% were Pokémon and they were plentiful at that. A new type is basically saying "hey, this series is fresh/balanced, if you didn't like it before buy it now!" and that's all there is to it. Very few Fairy-Type Pokémon exist and very few viable moves exist on top of that. Having a Fairy gym when Dark still hasn't got one was a real nail in the coffin as well. I also didn't know about the mega stones pre-game but I face palmed the second I heard the news.

The graphics are laggy. I'm sorry, but in a double battle it lags pretty badly. This happens in computer games, but in video games it should be better. While most of the time it is smooth the edges are extremely blocky, and the shadows can get somewhat annoying. Also most of the Pokémon models were rip-offs from Colosseum updated slightly (Roselia, Spheal) so that doesn't really work either. Amie was kind of annoying, since while puzzle and head it were fun (the berry game was awful) feeding the snacks to your Pokémon got stale extremely quickly, as did petting them. Sometimes you felt like you had to do it though. Breeding? Meh, it improved, but it was made easier. The whole point of getting competitively-viable teams in-game is to actually be committed and to train up your Pokémon from an egg, as well as to make the egg as good as can be. The new mechanics ruined this for me so I hate them for that reason as well.

 

[Hulavuta]

I disagree with that entire post lol. If you have favourite Pokémon and are more selective about the Pokémon you like to use, then two runs may very well share Pokémon, especially as people generally just use things like Scizor and Garchomp anyway.

People using whatever Pokemon they want to is their choice, and if they use the same Pokemon over and over again it doesn't change the fact that they have the option not to. Remember that all players have the same options, so making them more inclusive is a good thing.

A new type is basically saying "hey, this series is fresh/balanced, if you didn't like it before buy it now!" and that's all there is to it. Very few Fairy-Type Pokémon exist and very few viable moves exist on top of that.

I'm pretty sure the (officially stated) reason for Fairy-types was to balance out Dragon-types while also being a chance to buff some other types (Poison anyone?). As for not many Fairy-type Pokemon existing...I actually agree with you there for once, although there are still more Fairies than ghosts. As for moves...there aren't really many but they get the job done...Play Rough, Dazzling Gleam, Moonblast, even Hyper Voice on Mega Gardevoir and Sylveon. I don't know how you can complain about Fairy moves when Rock and Ghost are pretty much as limited as they are too, lol.

You say you dislike the type because it was obvious cash-in or something...pretty much everything Pokemon does is a cash-in. Assuming that it wasn't just for balance reasons and they did do it to appeal to more people and make more money...so what? Games change mechanics between sequels all the time, just because Pokemon has not introduced a new type for three generations doesn't mean it is inherently bad for them to change it now, especially if it is something that will improve the game. And trust me, I didn't want Fairies to be real either, but after I got used to it and got over my bias to tradition it was completely fine with me.

Having a Fairy gym when Dark still hasn't got one was a real nail in the coffin as well.

Explain to me why we need a Dark gym? Complaining about what types the gyms are seems like an extremely arbitrary and nitpicky thing to be upset about. It's true that Dark has never had a gym...this is just my guess but maybe Game Freak likes that and did it as part of a running joke. But either way it's not even worth mentioning, positive or negative.

I also didn't know about the mega stones pre-game but I face palmed the second I heard the news.

I hated Mega Stones in principle as well, I thought Pokemon should not have these kinds of transformations during battle and I did not think the Pokemon should be chosen arbitrarily like they were. But I'm kind of on the fence on this one, because some of the designs were great while some were absolutely awful (most of them were awful but stuff like Mega Aggron and Mega Gardevoir kind of make up for that to me). Again though, just because they changed something after a long time does not really make it inherently bad...although I did have a problem with the terrible designs.

The graphics are laggy.

I had this problem too, only when I played on 3D though. That's really a big issue I have with the game too, the 3D was so underutilized.

Also most of the Pokémon models were rip-offs from Colosseum updated slightly (Roselia, Spheal) so that doesn't really work either.

Most of the Pokemon sprites of the Pokemon games were just updates of sprites of the previous versions ?_? I don't understand what you are trying to say here. The issue should not be if they re-used their own previous resources and assets, it should be if they look good. Which they do.

Amie was kind of annoying, since while puzzle and head it were fun (the berry game was awful) feeding the snacks to your Pokémon got stale extremely quickly, as did petting them. Sometimes you felt like you had to do it though

Personally, I got bored of Amie quickly too (the actual petting thing). I assumed that was just my own personal preference though. Looks like I wasn't the only one who thought this. I still think it was objectively (from a marketing standpoint) a good feature to add considering we seem to be in the minority here.

Breeding? Meh, it improved, but it was made easier. The whole point of getting competitively-viable teams in-game is to actually be committed and to train up your Pokémon from an egg, as well as to make the egg as good as can be. The new mechanics ruined this for me so I hate them for that reason as well.

You are the first person I have come across with this opinion. It is true that the breeding was made easier, but that doesn't mean it was made instant or easy at all, just easier. I have not heard anyone say that breeding competitive Pokemon now has less value or anything just because it is somewhat easier. I never bred at all during previous games, but if I understand it correctly there was a ton of luck involved, to the point where people would rather RNG their Pokemon than try to breed them the normal way. There is still a bit of luck involved (hoping Destiny Knot throws down the IVs you want) but it's much more accessible and more fun.

I understand most of these are your own personal opinions, which is why I tried to use (what I believe is) the general opinion as much as possible. It is difficult to objectively decide what was a "good" or "bad" decision but I think the majority opinion of the target market is as close as we can get.

 

[Tortoise]

I'll start off by admitting I played every gen so far, starting from Gen 1, so I might come across as a Genwunner/whatever-you-wanna-call-it in my opinions.

How linear was the story?
Same old Pokémon story, i.e. linear. Which isn't THAT bad, I feel, given that many players (i.e. more casual ones) play the games to experience and see what new Pokémon are there (not everyone visits Smogon/Showdown/PO/whatever after all). So the linear story allows them to breeze through the game while having fun experiencing what the new generation games have to offer. Having said that, I was quite disappointed when it became extremely apparent early on that Lysandre is related to Team Flare and yet nobody apprehended him about it. -.-" The sequels should really beef up the story (come on, too many Team Flare encounters seem forced and are so obvious that a 5 year old kid can see it coming a mile away!) A much longer and better post game is also desperately needed (Looker quest ends way too fast... Can we bring him back for a longer stint in the next game, please? And bring back the old Gym Leaders/E4/Champions while we are at it :p).

How was the variety of Pokémon?
What variety? We have < 70 new Pokémon, which is just... Poor. I was genuinely excited when I started the game and saw the huge amount of Pokémon on each route. The tribute to Gen 1 by having a zillion Gen 1 Pokémon in the wild probably helped as well. :p But then I realised as I progressed in the game that there seems to be VERY few new Pokémon, which kinda killed the mood/excitement a bit. And I really hated the design of many of the Gen 6 Pokémon like Goodra (like what? that's the worst ever pseudo-legendary design I've ever seen). Hated the new Dragon types also (I like/love most of the Dragons from the past games), as Goodra is just ewww, Noivern is rubbish compared to other Dragons, Dragalge/Tyrantrum are useless without their Hidden Ability and Zygarde just screams of needing a power boost a la Kyurem. Thanks to that, I settled on my end-game team very early on, especially once I found out the Gym Leader types (at a very early city/town, I believe) and ended up using only Delphox + Talonflame as the Kalos representatives. Every other member was a powerhouse from previous generations, e.g. Tyranitar, Garchomp and Lucario (as if anyone needed to validate how powerful they are :p).

How was the level curve?
Hilariously easy with Exp Share turned on, but that's a fact that we all know already, so yeah. I was quite disappointed at the low levels of the Elite 4 (way overlevelled thanks to Exp Share and some EV training for my Hydreigon) and even more disappointed that there are no Gym Leaders/Elite 4 rematches (Battle Chateau does NOT count!). Only had a tiny bit of difficulty with Siebold (surprised to see another Mega), but that is more due to my team's extremely apparent weakness towards Water than his team being any good. Again, desperately needs a post game and rematches to increase the difficulty. A Challenge mode from the start and Pokémon World Tournament v2 would help greatly as well. :)

Do you enjoy the character designs?
Team Flare is hilarious whenever they do their pre and post-battle actions, so I gotta give credit there. The companion characters are, frankly, just useless losers (I call them that the ENTIRE game) considering how weak they are and how little they contribute to the story. Diantha has a spot in the Hall of Fame of worst Champion, considering how detached she is from the main story and how laughably weak her team is (Gary/Blue and Cynthia really spoiled me, I guess). I love the new concept of being able to customise your own character, and really had a lot of fun buying new clothes for my character. Too bad I cannot get rid of the hat as many of my preferred styles work better without the hat. -.-"

Do you enjoy the new Pokémon?
Usage-wise, I already covered the Dragon types above. Don't really like the new Fairies introduced in XY as I feel that most of the designs suck; the Fairies that I like are all retyped, e.g. Azumarill and Togekiss. Hated the concept of Mega evolutions at first, since they literally just scream "Digimon!!!" at me, but I guess I sorta warmed up to them by now (M-Lucario, M-Kanga and M-Garchomp are among my favourites; quite certain watching M-Lucario spamming repeated Close Combats helped a lot with that).

Design-wise, URGH, I really didn't think that Pokémon can get worse in designs after the farce that was Trubbish/Garbador, but I was proven so wrong! Chesnaught, Diggersby and Barbaracle rank very high up on my disliked designs list. I like Delphox though, pity it is so useless competitive-wise.

---
Oh wow, this is the longest post I've ever made anywhere on this forum. o.0

 

[Hootie]

This game is pretty lacking in content especially when you compare to B2W2. Like that fact that they only added 68 pokemon is pretty crappy to me and Mega Evolutions while cool do not really cut it for me. From a competitive stand point they are awesome, but as far as its concept, I really think they are ablittle silly. I feel as if they were made to cater to bringing back in new players. The game doesn't explain mich about them either which was very disappointing. However the WiFi is fantastic and communicating with other players has never been easier, though I do wish they had text chat as opposed to using a mediocre mic for voice chat. That and the breeding mechanics has made the game much more enjoyable for me.