Author Topic: Pokepal plays through a bunch of Pokemon games. Nobody knows why.  (Read 5530 times)

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Offline pokepal148

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What made completing the pokedex a few years back so much fun was how it was a fun excuse to play through a bunch of older games. So I decided to do it again. I want to do a playthrough of the pokemon series, generally playing through one game to represent each region while also trying to get multiple games for each system from the GBA onwards. This also means I don't have to play the pokemon games that don't have running shoes which is nice. Those gameboy games have kind of not aged the greatest. I'll also be doing those weird Gamecube games because why not. There are a few regions that have more than one game representing them, namely Kanto and Unova, and a handful of games that I have never actually played to completion.

The games I'll be playing are as follows:

Pokemon Firered (GBA)
Pokemon Heartgold (DS)
Pokemon Emerald (GBA)
Pokemon Colosseum* (GCN)
Pokemon Platinum (DS)
Pokemon White (DS)
Pokemon Y (3DS)
Pokemon Ultra Sun (3DS)
Pokemon White 2* (DS)
Pokemon Sword (Switch)
Pokemon Legends Arceus (Switch)
Pokemon Scarlet (Switch)
Pokemon XD: Gale of Darkness* (GCN)
Pokemon Let's Go Eevee* (Switch)

Games marked with an asterisk are games I haven't actually played to completion before.
 
I'll also be ranking the games when I finish and sharing what teams I used to finish them. I've found I have a hard time ranking the pokemon games relative to eachother so maybe this will help.

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Pokemon FireRed and LeafGreen are an interesting beast. These 2003 remakes of the original Red and Blue offer the first standalone revisit of the Kanto region for a new generation of players nearly a decade after the originals came out. There is also the Let's Go games which are a 2018 reimagining of sorts of yellow but I wanted to start with something more traditional for this game.

These games are faithful to the original Red and Blue to a degree we won't see again for pokemon remakes for a long time. It is to the point where the game actively prevents you from evolving certain pokemon like Chansey and Golbat even if you meet the criteria to do so until the postgame. To be clear, Blissey and Crobat exist in the game. The games just refuse to let you have them until it arbitrarily decides you can.

Espeon and Umbreon are a special kind of hell to get in this game because you kind of just can't. You actually have to trade Eevee to Ruby, Sapphire, and Emerald if you want Espeon and Umbreon. This is because FireRed and LeafGreen cartridges don't have any kind of internal clock system, probably because that would have made the cartridge more expensive to produce, and Eevee evolves into Espeon and Umbreon by getting friendship. If you do it during the day you get an Espeon while at night you get an Umbreon. Eevee isn't even available in Ruby and Sapphire and it wasn't added in Emerald either so you can only get eevee in FireRed and LeafGreen but you can only evolve it into Espeon and Umbreon by trading it to the games you can't get Eevee in. However you can't even trade between FRLG and Ruby, Sapphire, and Emerald unless the FireRed or LeafGreen player has finished the postgame for that game. But also, just to rub salt into the wound, in order to access the postgame, you have to have caught at least 60 pokemon in the Kanto pokedex.

Getting back to the core game. They added alot of trainers that weren't in the original games so if you're like me and you like to fight every trainer the routes can become a bit of a slog but this does help alleviate some of the concerns with the game's level curve. However those concerns are still there and while the new VS Seeker item can help

I just don't find the new Sevii Islands that interesting. They feel like they lack identity and they blatantly only exist to give players access to some Gen 2 pokemon that weren't already available in Ruby and Sapphire. I honestly didn't even feel like fully exploring them. They look so similar to the already samey version of Kanto in this game and I'm honestly just sick of looking at this game with how samey the environments look.

The game just feels bland. A big part of it is that Pokemon has gotten better at creating interesting and varied locations for you to explore since Red and Blue but especially coming off of Ruby and Sapphire which offers a lot of variety in its locations it feels like more could have been done to bring this version of Kanto to life.

Anyways, since nobody asked what my team was, here it is:


Charizard is generally regarded as the worst of the 3 fully evolved starters. It certainly has the worst time at the beginning of the game. However my Charizard, which I nicknamed Blaze, made itself useful with a high special attack and speed stat and access to Flamethrower. This combination gave Charizard enough power to put a dent in almost anything in the game. This combined with the utility that comes with learning Fly, is legitimately all Charizard needed to justify a spot on my team.

Sadly Charizard's only non-fire special move is Dragon Claw. It comes in at victory road and gives Charizard an edge against Lance's Dragonair and Dragonite. It's worth the wait though. Between that and Flamethrower Charizard is capable of hitting anything in the game for at least neutral damage, which allows me to slap some HMs on instead of additional coverage which resulted in an ending moveset of Flamethrower, Dragon Claw, Cut, and Fly.


Spooner the Alakazam is a Psychic type in Kanto. Psychic was infamously overpowered in the original Red and Blue. Later games took measures to bring it down with things like the introduction of Dark and Steel types and changes to the ways types were balanced against eachother.

However alot of what made psychic so powerful for an ingame playthrough in the original Pokemon games was just the kinds of pokemon you face. Poison is by far one of the most common types of pokemon in Kanto and Alakazam can make mincemeat out of them. Meanwhile the only steel types are Magnemite and Magneton, Dark types don't exist until the postgame. Alakazam's main issue is its limited moveset but when you're a psychic type that hardly matters.

As a nice bonus, Abra comes with Teleport which is a nice fast travel option for the earlygame before you get Fly. I gave it Psychic, Shockwave, Flash, and Recover. It did well against Koga and most of Team Rocket's fodder and was generally just helpful to have throughout the game. All things considered, Alakazam is by far the best pokemon in the game for an ingame playthrough. It isn't even a contest. Alakazam was the MVP for this playthrough.


Spike the Nidoking suffered from not having moves that take advantage of it's poison and ground types. For those who don't know, using a move of the same type as the Pokemon using it gives that move a Same Type Attack Bonus or STAB. The Sludge Bomb TM which gives him his best poison move is postgame only and Earthquake isn't obtained until the last gym.

But what makes up for it is how early you can get Nidoking. Just grab one of the like 7 moon stones you can pick up in Mt. Moon, slap it on a Nidorino, and you have a fully evolved powerhouse before the secoond gym. They even have a tutor for Mega Punch outside of the cave so you can give it a decently powerful move to get you by until you get other options down the line.

It ended up with a moveset of Earthquake, Sludgebomb, Rock Slide, and Megahorn when I finished the game and did the postgame which is a powerful moveset, but I would have really liked Sludge Bomb to be a bit earlier in the game. There are only like 40 different kinds of poison types in Kanto. Let's maybe give them a move.


Kicks the Hitmonlee just hits hard. Alot of people argue that fighting types in this game aren't very good because they don't have good matchups against alot of major fights in FRLG. Its only real standout fight is against more than half of Lorelei's team and a small handful of other mons throughout the game that you probably have other options to deal with. I don't disagree with that assesment but Hitmonlee's high attack stat and decent speed more than compensates for it's shortcomings. I'm really happy I used it.

Hitmonlee's main issue is its lack of coverage moves. It only gets 3 notable TM and tutor moves in the form of Rock Slide, Earthquake, and Rock Tomb. Eagle eyed viewers may note that I already used the first 2 moves on that list on Nidoking which just leaves Rock Tomb. I did give it Bulk Up which is a decent move for it to build up its stats a bit with. This resulted in a final moveset of Bulk Up, Brick Break, Strength, and Rock Tomb.


Snorlax comes into the Kanto games ready to blast through the rest of the game with its high attack stat and Chunky was no exception. While it is slow, its special defense gives you an answer to Sabrina's psychic attacks and spending way too much time in the Game Corner gave it Shadow Ball, which allows it to hit psychic and ghost types for Super Effective damage. I ended up with a moveset of Return, Brick Break, Shadow Ball, and Rock Smash.


Shelly the Lapras came in pretty late. However it's monsterous stats along with the fact that it learns a wide variety of moves makes it the best water type available in the game. Water itself is an incredibly useful type but I also just rarely use the water starter because of how many other great water types are available. A moveset of Surf, Ice Beam, Thunderbolt (another Game Corner TM) and Psychic gives Lapras incredible coverage and versatility. It's just a matter of getting it caught up in terms of levels.

---

Overall, If I was asked to put this game on a tier list I'd put it in D. It is definitely one of the weakest games in the series imo, only really beating out the games it is meant to be a remake of and maybe X and Y.

Also, I am already sick of the game corner. I have 3 more games of that stupid place before it is excised from the series forever.
« Last Edit: January 30, 2023, 11:25:15 PM by pokepal148 »

Offline nickmitch

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Re: Pokepal plays through a bunch of Pokemon games. Nobody knows why.
« Reply #1 on: January 31, 2023, 05:11:20 PM »
Quote
These games (Fire Red and Leaf Green) are faithful to the original Red and Blue to a degree we won't see again for pokemon remakes for a long time. It is to the point where the game actively prevents you from evolving certain pokemon like Chansey and Golbat even if you meet the criteria to do so until the postgame. To be clear, Blissey and Crobat exist in the game. The games just refuse to let you have them until it arbitrarily decides you can.

It's funny you mention that because the Let's Go games are very similar in that regard. Any new evolution simply doesn't exist (Rhyperior, Tangrowth, Umbreon, etc.) in those games, which feels very weird. I would've hoped FRLG would've been the last games to be overly faithful, though, at the time, I don't think I minded too much. BDSP's dedication to faithfulness to the original was criminal.
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Offline pokepal148

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Re: Pokepal plays through a bunch of Pokemon games. Nobody knows why.
« Reply #2 on: February 12, 2023, 08:29:58 PM »
Quote
These games (Fire Red and Leaf Green) are faithful to the original Red and Blue to a degree we won't see again for pokemon remakes for a long time. It is to the point where the game actively prevents you from evolving certain pokemon like Chansey and Golbat even if you meet the criteria to do so until the postgame. To be clear, Blissey and Crobat exist in the game. The games just refuse to let you have them until it arbitrarily decides you can.

It's funny you mention that because the Let's Go games are very similar in that regard. Any new evolution simply doesn't exist (Rhyperior, Tangrowth, Umbreon, etc.) in those games, which feels very weird. I would've hoped FRLG would've been the last games to be overly faithful, though, at the time, I don't think I minded too much. BDSP's dedication to faithfulness to the original was criminal.
It sucked that BDSP weren't willing to do more, but IMO BDSP benefited from being a remake of a significantly better set of games.

But FRLG has the better Nidoking sprite/model and that's what really matters in the end. Just look at what they did to my boy.

« Last Edit: February 13, 2023, 06:20:14 PM by pokepal148 »

Offline nickmitch

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Re: Pokepal plays through a bunch of Pokemon games. Nobody knows why.
« Reply #3 on: February 13, 2023, 02:29:04 PM »
Quote
These games (Fire Red and Leaf Green) are faithful to the original Red and Blue to a degree we won't see again for pokemon remakes for a long time. It is to the point where the game actively prevents you from evolving certain pokemon like Chansey and Golbat even if you meet the criteria to do so until the postgame. To be clear, Blissey and Crobat exist in the game. The games just refuse to let you have them until it arbitrarily decides you can.

It's funny you mention that because the Let's Go games are very similar in that regard. Any new evolution simply doesn't exist (Rhyperior, Tangrowth, Umbreon, etc.) in those games, which feels very weird. I would've hoped FRLG would've been the last games to be overly faithful, though, at the time, I don't think I minded too much. BDSP's dedication to faithfulness to the original was criminal.
It sucked that BDSP weren't willing to do more, but IMO BDSP benefited from being a remake of a significantly better set of games.

True. But even though Gen IV was my favorite, I wasn't super inspired to finish everything in BDSP because of the lack of ambition.

Then Arceus came out and took all my attention away. Though that game suffered a tiny bit because I had just adventured around with these Pokémon. But the game felt so fresh and different regardless.
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Offline BeautifulShy

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Re: Pokepal plays through a bunch of Pokemon games. Nobody knows why.
« Reply #4 on: February 24, 2023, 02:29:30 AM »
Good post pokepal.

I do like how you talked about the game themes and some of the history of the series and for your team it is pretty varied and I like you used some pokemon that one doesn't normally play in a typical in game play through.

I look forward to reading about the next game you will play in Heart Gold.
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I'm happy with thinking pokepal148 is just eating a stick of butter. It seems about right for him. I don't need no stinking facts.