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Post by adzpower on Mar 18, 2017 5:29:25 GMT -5
Yeah dragon has definitely lost its wow factor over the years, though I do like some of the more recent designs like Hydreigon and Druddigon.
I actually quite like Cynthia, the only champion I can think of that actually had a diverse, fairly balanced team.
It is strange that they keep omitting Lance, like you say he hasn't made many appearances but he's the first, and most memorable champion bar the original rival I think.
I've always envisioned in one of the future games they would make a huge tournament where all past leaders and elite four's and champions would come back and you'd be against all of them, it would be so cool.
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Post by BettyNewbie on Mar 18, 2017 12:32:20 GMT -5
I actually quite like Cynthia, the only champion I can think of that actually had a diverse, fairly balanced team. "Diverse and fairly balanced team"? Right there, in the original RBY.  Unlike much of the fandom, I've never liked Cynthia one bit. Everything about her always felt so calculated and pandering. GF clearly wants her to be a perfect Strong Female Role Model TM, so they give her this amazingly perfect team with perfect stats full of popular, overpowered Pokémon, while also giving her no visible flaws as a character and constantly pushing her as the most special/strongest/idolized trainer in the land. Furthermore, she's also incredibly beautiful and has perfect supermodel looks (long, shiny blonde hair, tall and thin, yet large-chested), so she hooks the horny teenage boy demo, too. She has no personality, nor any other real character trait besides "Strong Female Character," yet she gets shoved at us like she's the greatest thing ever. Gen 6 was the only gen since her introduction to not include her in any form, and half of Gen 6 was a remake of an earlier gen (ORAS). I also feel that there are many characters who don't get the recognition and attention they deserve because of how the spotlight is constantly being given to Cynthia over and over again.  Yeah dragon has definitely lost its wow factor over the years, though I do like some of the more recent designs like Hydreigon and Druddigon. It feels like, starting in Gen 4, GF decided that Dragon should be slapped onto every aggressive dinosaur-like Pokémon they come up with (especially Legendaries and Pseudo-Legendaries). It took 11 years for us to see non-remake games without Dragon mascots (XY were the first since RS), and we still have yet to see a non-Dragon Pseudo-Legendary since Gen 3 (Metagross being the last one). I realize that Dragon is meant to be a rare and powerful late game type, but it just feels like they were a lot more creative and less "pandering" with the type in Gens 1-3. Instead of stereotypical angry brutes, we got things like elegant snakes, friendly dragons, seahorses, dragonflies, and fluffy birds:      Furthermore, the more "stereotypical" brutes tended to NOT be Dragon type:     Alas, though, Charizard and Gyarados turned out to be far more popular than Dragonite and Kingdra (enough to where countless fans wished that the former two had the Dragon typings that the latter two had), so the Dragon typing started to take a turn towards angry/hardcore/badass Pokémon. Gen 3 started to edge into it with Salamence (aka. a flying Dragon for people who didn't think Dragonite was "cool" enough), and then Gen 4+ went all-out with Pokémon like Garchomp, Haxorus, Hydreigon, Tyrantrum, and Kommo-o. The ultimate kick in the face was probably when Mega Evolutions were doled out to all of Gen 1/2's faux dragons (Charizard, Gyarados, Aerodactyl, Tyranitar), yet neither of the gens' REAL Dragons (Dragonite, Kingdra) got one. Special mention goes to Charizard, who got an unnecessary bonus Mega sporting the long-coveted Fire/Dragon typing. Talk about fan-pandering.  It is strange that they keep omitting Lance, like you say he hasn't made many appearances but he's the first, and most memorable champion bar the original rival I think. Just within Gens 1 and 2, he's very overshadowed by Red and Blue, IMO. The former is particularly annoying, as he's nothing more than a silent player avatar with no personality or backstory beyond what you do while playing as him. Even Ash is more of a character than Red. People will simultaneously complain that Lance "sucks" because he's a type specialist, yet also because he doesn't entirely use Pokémon of his specialized type. Yet, somehow, this hasn't stopped fans from loving Steven (Steel specialist, yet half his team is Claydol/Cradily/Armaldo). I've always envisioned in one of the future games they would make a huge tournament where all past leaders and elite four's and champions would come back and you'd be against all of them, it would be so cool. They actually did that in B2W2 with the Pokémon World Tournament. However, they excluded E4 members, and for the dumbest reason ever. |
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Post by adzpower on Mar 18, 2017 16:14:41 GMT -5
OOh don't even get me started on Charizard and Gyarados, they SHOULD be dragon types, but for some strange reason aren't, Gyarados can't even learn fly! Why is he part flying?! IT MAKES NO SENSE.
I hated mega evolution, it felt like such a gimmick to me, a lazy way to not introduce as many new Pokemon by giving older ones digivolutions, eurgh.
I remember the Pokemon World Tournament but didn't have much fun there because as you say not everyone was included, speaking of things that aren't included, I think ORAS are my least favorite Pokemon games of all time BECAUSE they did not include the battle frontier, when I was a kid, I spent months and months in the battle frontier in Emerald, they included all the good stuff from Crystal in HG/SS, so why leave out the BF from ORAS? After doing some research it seems Game Freak left it out because they didn't think players wanted anything challenging to be included, I mean, WHAT?!
Not to mention the complete bastardization of the contests, loved doing those when I was younger as a fun side mini game when I was bored of battling, it was great earning a ribbon per rank and actually having something challenging to do, but the despair I felt when I entered the ORAS contests was just massive, such a disappointing set of games.
They better not screw up the Diamond/Pearl remakes when they come, just remake PLatinum. And for the love of God don't omit things because you underestimate your fans. Though personally I'm hoping they give us a Kanto sequel, they kind of hinted at it in Sun/Moon with Lillie going off to Kanto at the end, twenty years later in Kanto would be fun to see, would Oak still be alive? Would Red be champion? Could Lillie be your rival? Any new cities? The potential the series has is limitless, they don't have to do a brand spanking new region every single new game.
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Post by BettyNewbie on Mar 18, 2017 19:11:39 GMT -5
OOh don't even get me started on Charizard and Gyarados, they SHOULD be dragon types, but for some strange reason aren't, Gyarados can't even learn fly! Why is he part flying?! IT MAKES NO SENSE. Type balance. Charizard was a starter, and making it part-Dragon would've caused it to lose its weakness to Blastoise's Water type. Gyarados would've been even worse, as the Water/Dragon type combo only had one weakness before Gen 6 (Dragon), and it was a type that didn't have a true attacking move in Gen 1 (only Dragon Rage, which always dealt a set damage of 40HP). Of course, we're also talking about the same gen that also made Psychic nearly invincible thanks to type matchups, movepools, and sloppy programming. Balance wasn't exactly RBY's strong point.  I hated mega evolution, it felt like such a gimmick to me, a lazy way to not introduce as many new Pokemon by giving older ones digivolutions, eurgh. The idea had decent intentions. There are several fully-evolved Pokémon who struggle in competitive play (which has become more and more prominent over the years, for better or worse), yet can't realistically be improved outside of drastically overhauling their stats, typing, and ability. Mega Evolution provided a means to buff those Pokémon and make them more viable in battle. (See Pidgeot and Beedrill, for example.) However, GF screwed it up by playing favorites and mostly giving it to popular/powerful Pokémon like Charizard, Mewtwo, Tyranitar, and Garchomp. Mega distribution was also heavily biased towards Gens 1 and 3, with only a smattering for Gens 2 and 4 and only two combined for Gens 5 and 6 (Audino and Diancie). GF also screwed up by making such a big deal about it in Gen 6 (even going so far as to partially rewrite Hoenn's plot to revolve around it), only to completely drop it in favor of a new gimmick (Z Moves) in Gen 7. With that track record, it's now impossible to even take any future gimmicks seriously because you know that they're just going to get dumped after a single generation. speaking of things that aren't included, I think ORAS are my least favorite Pokemon games of all time BECAUSE they did not include the battle frontier, when I was a kid, I spent months and months in the battle frontier in Emerald, they included all the good stuff from Crystal in HG/SS, so why leave out the BF from ORAS? After doing some research it seems Game Freak left it out because they didn't think players wanted anything challenging to be included, I mean, WHAT?! Not to mention the complete bastardization of the contests, loved doing those when I was younger as a fun side mini game when I was bored of battling, it was great earning a ribbon per rank and actually having something challenging to do, but the despair I felt when I entered the ORAS contests was just massive, such a disappointing set of games. They better not screw up the Diamond/Pearl remakes when they come, just remake PLatinum. And for the love of God don't omit things because you underestimate your fans. Though personally I'm hoping they give us a Kanto sequel, they kind of hinted at it in Sun/Moon with Lillie going off to Kanto at the end, twenty years later in Kanto would be fun to see, would Oak still be alive? Would Red be champion? Could Lillie be your rival? Any new cities? The potential the series has is limitless, they don't have to do a brand spanking new region every single new game. Remakes have not had a good track record with the third versions. FRLG included nothing from Yellow, as well. Obviously, the Pikachu starter wasn't happening, but why not still have following Pokémon? Or, Jessie and James as a double battle? Or, the surfing Pikachu game? I also would've rather had Blaine and Giovanni's Yellow teams over weaker versions of their already weaker RB teams. (Seriously, why did FRLG need to dumb down the levels of the late gyms and E4?) Even HGSS didn't do as well as they could've. The Suicune plot was a lot more watered-down compared to Crystal, and it also would've been REALLY nice to play as Gen 2's female protagonist instead of some ditzy Mario cosplayer. This is all why I'm strongly against Sinnoh remakes. GF has now had three tries, and they have yet to get it 100% right with any of the remakes. ORAS even took a step backwards from HGSS. Past history says that we get the watered-down DP Sinnoh (including its horrible unbalanced Pokédex) with a shoehorned plot revolving around whatever that gen's battle gimmick is. I think fans would ultimately be happier with re-releases of the original Sinnoh games. I strongly agree with you on this: "The potential the series has is limitless, they don't have to do a brand spanking new region every single new game." I'd love to see past regions be revisited in ways besides remakes, and I think it would do GF a lot of good to break out of their box and do something different. A lot of things in SM point towards Kanto (such as Lillie going there at the end or the protagonist being from there), and it would be a lot more original and unexpected to follow the games up with sequels set in Kanto rather than a Stars third version or DP remakes. GF has been all about unpredictability lately, hence the reason why we got Gen 7 instead of a Z or X2Y2. |
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Post by adzpower on Mar 19, 2017 4:34:59 GMT -5
I do think if they played their cards right, Sinnoh sequels would be the way to go along with Kanto ones.
My reasoning for this is the distortion world we see in Platinum, its clearly an alternate dimension just like the wormholes we see in Sun/Moon, and I think if they made the story good they could link the two together somehow.
I do worry about remakes, I think we all know they're coming, if there's one thing Game Freak are fairly predictable at, its those, but I don't want a remake, I want a sequel, it would be so much cooler than jsut an exact copy of what came efore but with better graphics and a shoe-horned in ultra wormhole plot that wasn't present in the originals.
Something else I'm a little confused on, last year they uploaded Red, Blue and Yellow to the e-shop, I thought perhaps this was a sign of things to come and they would upload ALL the games to the e-shop, it makes total sense, if they can add wifi to those relics they can certainly do it to the more recent games. I would kill to play Fire Red or Silver again, they would make a ton of money off it. Sadly my game boy and cartridges stopped working a while ago and I don't really want to shell out for them all over again.
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Post by BettyNewbie on Mar 19, 2017 12:35:56 GMT -5
I do think if they played their cards right, Sinnoh sequels would be the way to go along with Kanto ones. My reasoning for this is the distortion world we see in Platinum, its clearly an alternate dimension just like the wormholes we see in Sun/Moon, and I think if they made the story good they could link the two together somehow. I do worry about remakes, I think we all know they're coming, if there's one thing Game Freak are fairly predictable at, its those, but I don't want a remake, I want a sequel, it would be so much cooler than jsut an exact copy of what came efore but with better graphics and a shoe-horned in ultra wormhole plot that wasn't present in the originals. Something else I'm a little confused on, last year they uploaded Red, Blue and Yellow to the e-shop, I thought perhaps this was a sign of things to come and they would upload ALL the games to the e-shop, it makes total sense, if they can add wifi to those relics they can certainly do it to the more recent games. I would kill to play Fire Red or Silver again, they would make a ton of money off it. Sadly my game boy and cartridges stopped working a while ago and I don't really want to shell out for them all over again. The 3DS struggles with GBA/DS emulation, so VC releases of Gen 3+ won't be doable until Pokémon moves to the Switch. Although Nintendo's saying no to a Switch VC right now, that will likely change in the future. However, the lack of a GSC re-release is very disappointing.  It would take little effort to do, and lots of people would love it. Plus, GSC cartridges were infamous for battery issues rendering the games unplayable after only a few years, so it's very difficult to play the games outside of less-than-legal ROMs and emulators. And, while many would argue that GSC are still "playable" on the 3DS via HGSS, remakes aren't the same as originals. Plus, HGSS are several years out of print and cost a pretty penny nowadays. And, being Gen 4 games, their wi-fi features no longer work, nor can they transfer directly to Pokémon Bank, something that the VC RBY is capable of doing. Plus, if GF wants to do sequels set in Kanto, it would be nice to have BOTH RBY and GSC available, as GSC was RBY's first sequel. Sadly, it seems like GF has mostly ignored the existence of Gen 2 and Johto outside of HGSS (which themselves got severely overshadowed by BW, which were announced before HGSS were released outside of Japan). |
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Post by adzpower on Mar 19, 2017 13:37:19 GMT -5
Yeah you make a good point Betty, I always felt that GF treated gen 2 with some kind of contempt, its my favorite region I think, I love all the Japanese architecture, like in Ecruteak City, gorgeous.
And whilst HG/SS are still playable its just not the same, they're good remakes, but imo they failed to capture the spark of the originals, bad graphics and all.
If they did do Kanto sequels, I'd love the story to carry over into Johto as well. The longer they leave it until the switch change the better imo, I do not want to be shelling out for that anytime soon.
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Post by BettyNewbie on Mar 19, 2017 18:42:05 GMT -5
Yeah you make a good point Betty, I always felt that GF treated gen 2 with some kind of contempt, its my favorite region I think, I love all the Japanese architecture, like in Ecruteak City, gorgeous. And whilst HG/SS are still playable its just not the same, they're good remakes, but imo they failed to capture the spark of the originals, bad graphics and all. If they did do Kanto sequels, I'd love the story to carry over into Johto as well. The longer they leave it until the switch change the better imo, I do not want to be shelling out for that anytime soon. This is 100% speculation, but I've always felt that Junichi Masuda disliked Gen 2 and how GSC turned out. Notice how the very first games he directed, Ruby and Sapphire, seemed to go out of their way to be the "anti-GSC." Instead of another sequel, we got a hard reboot set in a distant, isolated region. We went back to RBY's "8 badges + E4" structure and lost the Day/Night system. New Pokémon were put out front and center and treated more as replacements for the older ones. GSC's Berry system was also completely scrapped and given an overhaul. Furthermore, Johto seemed to completely cease to exist in Gen 3, in general. Even FRLG contained very few references/hints towards GSC, and Johto was never mentioned by name. In fact, the lone direct reference to Johto in the entire gen -- the mention of the protagonist having moved to Hoenn from there in RS -- was removed in Emerald. On top of that, most of the Gen 2 Pokémon themselves were severely marginalized and notoriously hard to get. Only a handful of Gen 2 Pokémon were available before the postgame in RSE (none in FRLG), and many couldn't be obtained outside of the GameCube games. Further generations followed RSE's lead and continued to be mini-reboots in brand new regions. HGSS were shoved into the tail end of Gen 4 and got quickly overshadowed by BW and Gen 5. The lone sequels released since GSC, B2W2, were only made on Nintendo's demand. GF was originally planning a third Grey version, but Nintendo felt that sequels would sell better since the games were on the aging DS at the tail end of its lifespan. And, out of all the references to past regions that are in SM, Johto has the fewest. It's the only region with no Battle Tree cameo, most of the Gen 2 Pokémon are ignored and few in number, and there are no real callbacks to the games at all besides the Apricorn Balls and Malie City. Talk about getting the cold shoulder. As to why Masuda would hate Gen 2, who knows? Based on how he handled Gens 3 and later, it's possible that he felt that GSC were too much of a retread of RBY, and that not enough spotlight was put on the new region, characters, and Pokémon. He may have also felt that the two region gameplay messed up the game's pacing and level curve, which is a criticism many fans themselves have of GSC. |
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Post by Deleted on Mar 20, 2017 0:58:50 GMT -5
Were the adventures manga really that bad? I've seen nothing but positive reviews for them and the few chapters I read seemed ok if nothing special. Didn't see any with Lance though, did they really do a number on him? I personally like the "concept" of Adventures with each protagonist specializing in one aspect of Pokémon training but I've never read it before so I can't comment on its quality. I think Adventures is far more to the Japanese taste than the anime adaptation, really, especially the Western adaptation of the anime with all the censorship, which is why not everyone will like it. I was probably subconsciously a huge fan of Gary Oak since my RBY team was pretty much his team when you pick Squirtle except for Pidgeot (which lacked Drill Peck and thus usefulness) and Alakazam (which was hard to obtain because it required physical trade). As to why Masuda would hate Gen 2, who knows? Based on how he handled Gens 3 and later, it's possible that he felt that GSC were too much of a retread of RBY, and that not enough spotlight was put on the new region, characters, and Pokémon. He may have also felt that the two region gameplay messed up the game's pacing and level curve, which is a criticism many fans themselves have of GSC. Gold and Silver suffered from storage issues. I remember reading a post at Skeetendo claiming that the larger carts with RTC feature were too expensive to manufacture, and Pokémon was a high volume series already. Also Betty, the 3DS cannot emulate the GBA/DS period, it runs those games natively on the smaller ARM processor.  The Old 3DS even has a hard time with SNES games. |
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Post by BettyNewbie on Mar 20, 2017 1:23:40 GMT -5
I think Adventures is far more to the Japanese taste than the anime adaptation, really, especially the Western adaptation of the anime with all the censorship, which is why not everyone will like it. I think that's the case with most of the manga, which rarely get released outside of Japan. Adventures has a very vocal Western fanbase, but they're still very much a niche minority. I was probably subconsciously a huge fan of Gary Oak since my RBY team was pretty much his team when you pick Squirtle except for Pidgeot (which lacked Drill Peck and thus usefulness) and Alakazam (which was hard to obtain because it required physical trade). Heh, I always called myself "Gary" in my Blue and Yellow saves.  I never copied his team, though. I just liked the idea of playing as him more than I did Ash/Red. Gold and Silver suffered from storage issues. I remember reading a post at Skeetendo claiming that the larger carts with RTC feature were too expensive to manufacture, and Pokémon was a high volume series already. Hence, the watered-down Kanto. I wonder if GSC's battery issues were why the Day/Night feature got whittled down so much in the Gen 3 games? Even though GBA carts no longer needed batteries to save, they still needed them to run a RTC. Knowing the problems that plagued GSC's carts, I can see GF dropping Day/Night from FRLG altogether and only giving RSE the most minimalist, barebones Day/Night system. The technology had just not caught up with the feature yet. Also Betty, the 3DS cannot emulate the GBA/DS period, it runs those games natively on the smaller ARM processor. The Old 3DS even has a hard time with SNES games. The 3DS is a horribly underpowered console, period. If Sun and Moon are anything to go by, it struggles to run many 3DS games as well. |
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Post by adzpower on Mar 20, 2017 5:36:49 GMT -5
Oh lord don't mention the storage issues on G/S/C, it reminds me of a very sad moment when I ran into a wild shiny Hoothoot and caught it, really excited, only for it to get released because my party and current box were full, I was FURIOUS. I always preferred Gary to Ash, maybe its because he seemed to have more brains, or maybe I just like him because he's more sarcastic like me  The gen 2 cull is really frustrating, its what introduced me to Pokemon and it saddens me that its underused, if GF think the Pokemon aren't good enough well I have some news for them! You control how good they are! Increase their stats and be done with it. |
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Post by Melinda Halliwell on Mar 20, 2017 7:22:57 GMT -5
Ah yes the rivalry between Ash and Gary Oak was quite amusing really the way he put Ash down mostly and all the women please don't get me started. Although I do have to agree he was smart though actually.
I also liked Ash's rivalry with Paul from Diamond and Pearl.
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Post by BettyNewbie on Mar 20, 2017 15:58:28 GMT -5
Any theories on what the next Gen 7 games will be, Adam and Cerberus? There's been a lot of talk about a "Stars" third version being made for the Switch. Pokémon has a history of being slow to move on to new handhelds, and many think that Nintendo is pushing GF to move development to the Switch earlier to help promote the system better. Since the Wii U flopped, Nintendo really needs the Switch to be a huge success, and Pokémon has always been one of Nintendo's biggest, most reliable franchises. At the same time, though, it's hard to argue for third versions even still being a thing when the last one came out nearly a decade ago. BW got sequels (B2W2), while XY got no follow-up and we instead got remakes of old games (ORAS). Why suddenly revert back to a "standard" third version with Gen 7, especially when you're trying to promote a new handheld? The idea of "Stars" possibly not being a third version at all and instead being sequels set in Kanto interests me. Outside of GSC/HGSS, no generation has ever included sequels to past regions, nor has tried to directly tie a new region back to an old one, so it would be something fresh and unexpected. Lots of things in SM point towards Kanto, and not just in the shallow referency way that XY did it. Lillie goes off to Kanto at the end of the game, and we also see an aged up Red and Blue. The SM protagonist is also stated to have moved to Alola from Kanto. Plus, since "Stars" would mark the first time a main series game has ever been released on a home console, why not do it with the region that started it all? Kanto would certainly bring a ton of hype to a Switch Pokémon game, that's for sure. |
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Post by adzpower on Mar 21, 2017 6:39:12 GMT -5
I saw today that Game Freak have registered a trademark for a new RPG for the Switch due out May 2018, I don't think they would be waiting that long to release something new.
So I'll reckon it'll be for the 3DS. My gut tells me its either a Alolan Sequel/Third game or a sinnoh remake. I would love a Kanto sequel but I don't think it'll happen.
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Post by BettyNewbie on Mar 21, 2017 12:36:36 GMT -5
Very little points towards Sinnoh remakes, IMO. There aren't any strong, blatant hints in SM, and the original games themselves can still be played on the 3DS (even if they're getting harder to find). Plus, GF just released ORAS not too long ago, and GF has never made two sets of remakes for the same handheld.
There also just isn't that strong of a demand outside of niche online fan communities. And, Gen 7 is meant to be the 20th Anniversary gen, so Alola and to a lesser extent, Kanto take priority over other regions right now. Sinnoh just isn't relevant right now, as much as younger fans who grew up with those games don't like to admit it.
(Yes, I have seriously seen people argue that 2016 should've been all about DP's 10th Anniversary instead of the 20th Anniversary of Gen 1 and the franchise itself. Talk about not getting it.)
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It would take little effort to do, and lots of people would love it. Plus, GSC cartridges were infamous for battery issues rendering the games unplayable after only a few years, so it's very difficult to play the games outside of less-than-legal ROMs and emulators.
The Old 3DS even has a hard time with SNES games.
