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crystalelemental · 2 months

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When I was a child, there was something that really bugged me in Pokemon games. Why was it that some Pokemon showed up so late? I really like Misdreavus, but it's all the way in Mt Silver! Even smaller issues like Seel in FRLG felt annoying. I have to beat five whole gyms without this thing? Why even pick it up? This led, inevitably, to my first hacking device: a GameShark for Gen 3. I have a vivid memory of replaying FRLG, excited to hack in my own personalized and very normal starter, Articuno. Articuno was so great when you caught it! Surely it would be even better if I could use it all game!

Now...I did not have the internet at the time. And by Gen 3, I was perhaps overconfident about not needing a strategy guide. So while you may know what happened already, I did not know what was coming. Articuno sucked. Like, really bad. If you look at it, it turns out the answer is obvious: it only knows Gust and Powder Snow as attacks until Ice Beam at level 49. Which...hey, wait a second. That's only one level below what you catch it at to begin with! And it turns out, this was similar all over. Seel didn't learn anything but Headbutt until level 17, it was useless against Brock despite its typing. What is going on? Why do all these Pokemon I like when I catch them at the intended time suck so badly when I get them early?

At the time, I blamed it on the Pokemon being bad and just hacked rare candies. But over time, you begin to suspect that maybe, just maybe, the game was designed on purpose? That maybe there was a structure to the game at large that kept things in balance. With age, it stops being "this was badly designed because I didn't get what I wanted out of it," and starts to become its own thing. To quote a famous Nuzleaf, I believe all of this is happening for a reason.

Friends...let's talk Sword and Shield.

My team was Rillaboom, Thievul, Butterfree, Mr. Rime, Alcremie, and Dragapult kinda sorta, with additional showcasings for Carkoal and Perrserker. I say sorta kinda on Dragapult because I intended to use it, but it didn't fully evolve until after I beat Leon. Oops!

If the intro wasn't a giveaway, I want to talk gameplay first. While we'll get to the story issues, I think gameplay matters more to Pokemon, and is the bigger problem that keeps Galar low on my list. To get some small housekeeping out of the way first:

I will not be harping on graphics, I don't care. Yes I know performance isn't good, but it's mildly annoying at worst.

I will not be harping on designs, they're largely fine. The starters are one of the weakest sets, and the box legends might be my least favorite, but there are plenty of good ones to the region as well.

I will not say "game too easy," but I will be discussing factors that led people to that assertion.

I will not be talking about Dexit. While I hated it at first, having calmed from it, I think it's for the best. I liked when Gen 5 forced you to use the new stuff to generate new favorites, and if anything Dexit should go harder by removing Home so they can more severely tweak stats and movesets between generations.

My problem with Gen 8 gameplay my very well be my own preferred means of playing, but I'm going to attempt making my case with three examples.

First: Growth via TM progression. In my Crystal run, I ran a Togetic, and have a pretty rough time of it. Togetic was never particularly strong, but it had an arc, picking up Mud Slap for Morty, Sunny Day/Solarbeam/Flamethrower for several Kanto gyms, and then falling back on Psychic/Zap Cannon when the earlier set wasn't working out. Togetic had an arc of struggle, in which it had to find tools that made it work for each phase of the game, that came down to recently acquired TMs the game provided naturally. Barring Flamethrower, all of these were free acquisitions.

Compare this to Thievul is Galar. It also is pretty bad, despite access to Nasty Plot, because its best attacking move is Snarl. It needs TMs to learn anything else. But in Galar, TMs are no longer infinite, as TRs now cover the really good moves. And the only way to get them is random den drops, and random shop items around the Wild Area for thousands of Watts, when a full den gives only 300. Acquiring the specific TM it wants is next to impossible. Dens aren't guaranteed to be Dark type, and even if they are, you could get other dark moves like Crunch. The shops aren't guaranteed to sell Dark Pulse, and even if they are, how long will it take to farm 5000 Watts? There is no control over what the Wild Area produces, and thus no arc to be had for anything specific.

Second: growth via learnset progression. In Emerald, I ran a Mawile. Caught at level 37 in Victory Road, we needed several levels before it could learn the move that would give it relevance, and the EXP options were scarce. I had to use an EXP All, cutting the entire team's EXP gains just for Mawile to catch up, while trying to find optional areas with trainers left, and at times trying to keep Mawile in to win the fight herself. There's a struggle and a cost to the growth unit perspective.

Compare that to my Butterfree. Until it gained Quiver Dance, Butterfree contributed little beyond the occasional Sleep Powder lockdown. It took off once it learned Quiver Dance, but the means of getting there was just...have it in the team. Even on the back row, it'll be fine and catch up with no real issue. There's not much of a struggle to overcome, or a sense that you're building things. It just kinda happens to you.

Third: Galar's Intent. I do not have a comparison point for this, but Mr. Rime. Probably my MVP! Once it hits Mr. Mime, it has Icy Wind, Psybeam, and Dazzling Gleam. With a Thunderbolt TM I had randomly picked up from an early den, it had excellent coverage that took down a majority of the region past its evolution. This was a fairly fun find.

I think that's the intent of Galar's structure: accidents. Surprises. The Wild Area lacks any sense of control, holding events locked to the day and forcing save commitments that refuse to allow soft resets for different outcomes. If you can roll with the punches, and accept whatever comes at you, this game probably is a lot of fun. That's probably why my wife likes it so much. But if you can't...well, you're like me, and this game is really difficult to appreciate.

I will, however, argue that it's not just me. The Wild Area's structure is awkward, being the sole home of a lot of different Pokemon, who will only show up under specific weather conditions and at very low rates. Look up how to find Dreepy some time. But the dens lack control as well, unless you manipulate the system's clock in the right way. Then, even if you find something you want, you have to hope for the random TM to drop too. I decided to use Rillaboom because I never once ran a starter, and part of Rillaboom was wanting TMs that required time manipulation to find in stock. If you come in wanting literally anything, the Wild Area is very likely to deny you. You have to come in wanting for nothing at all, working only with what's handed to you, to have a good time.

Which feels crazy disingenuous to me? Pokemon is all about the little critters you can find, and growing an attachment to things you want to catch. Not everything even comes from what's randomly found, sometimes you see something in an enemy team and get really excited for that thing. Like, imagine seeing something like Cursola in Allister's team, and going man, that looks cool! Regional Corsola and it gets an evolution, sign me up! So you go out into the world hoping to get it, only to find that it shows up exactly 5% of the time under one (1) specific weather condition in one (1) region of the Wild Area. Better hope that one area has the right weather condition or there is no way in hell you're getting that Corsola!

I just...I get that replaying Pokemon games is a thing, and that each experience can be different, and that having some random outcomes is beneficial. But Galar takes it way too far. I think their intent was to give players technical access to what they want right away, without making it actually available. See, this is something I heard and agree with: Pokemon is most engaging while you're building the team. Postgames have felt difficult for me to appreciate because my team is done, my moveset is done, I don't want to do the volcano in Platinum I just want to finish. You need to have a ladder to climb and a goal to reach for the game to remain engaging. But players are also impatient, and have gotten worse with this series over time. Learned movesets went from situations where Gyarados learns very little of value naturally, to learning its best Water move at like level 21. Players will tell you they want the feeling of being done early, but that provably kills the experience.

Another thing I'd do with hacking as a kid was bring in all TMs. Yeah, let's start HGSS with a Swinub that has Ice Beam, Rock Slide, and Earthquake, what could go wrong? It turns out everything at once, as you just clobber the entire early game with no resistance. There was no real challenge to approaching the game in this way, and the run turns stale fast because oops, Swinub had its best moveset right out the gate. I started a lot of runs in those days but rarely finished, and it's why nowadays I do have some compulsion about the purity of a run. It can actually take away part of the joy. And more than likely, the devs know this too. So if players demand the ability to kill that joy, but you want to sustain it, what's the compromise?

Make it all so random that it's borderline impossible to account for anything. Yeah dude, you can get everything right away! But you can't get anything specific at all. Which solves nothing and creates new problems. Because now there's no progression toward the endgame outside of learnset, and some learnsets in Galar are hilariously bad. You ever looked at Coalossal's moveset? Its best Rock move is Rock Blast at 54. Good luck not using TMs and making that thing work to any enjoyment. It feels like they overshot the mark, and for anyone who plays like I do, thinking about what Pokemon you want to run or trying to chart a course for the game, it's naturally going to be miserable. Galar still ranks really low for me, but I at least feel like I understand what Galar may have wanted to do.

Gameplay aside...it's time to talk about the aspect that got my wife laughing at me, and will probably have @alphakuriboh saying some things too. Story.

Much like XY, Galar is generally considered a low point for story. Doesn't make sense, antagonist is stupid, etc, you know the drill. However, I do think they Galar was cooking to some degree.

Rose is the main sticking point regarding story, because...again, the antagonist's actions are the only story we get in Pokemon. And he kinda pingpongs. Worried about a millenium from now, he refuses to wait 24 of god's own hours for Leon to finish his sports tournament, and unleashes hell. He acts sad about the state of affairs but resolved that he must do it, then after you beat him is back to borderline cheerful about how fun battles could be. You solve the problem, and Rose turns himself in, never to be heard from again. That is. An event, my dude.

Thing is, I think his actions make more sense given his character, and the theme of Galar. Galar's big theme is a sort of "passing the torch," best summarized by Opal. The old need to know when to step out of the way, but we're not done yet. Opal's stance and her actions tell the full picture. It's not that the old blood needs to disappear, but rather that at some point, the young need to take ownership of their future. They're the ones most impacted by the conditions going forward, after all, and it's important they be granted the ability to decide for themselves what they want.

Rose, as a character, denies that entirely. He manipulates the younger generations for his own ends, and his motivation is about maintaining his own view of things and his legacy 1000 years in the future. Yes, it's a far off problem that can be solved a bit later, but that's not the point. This is his problem, and it has to be solved his way. And most importantly, solved how he commands it. His lack of patience isn't about truly being so hasty. It's about forcing Leon back into compliance. Even if Leon didn't strictly say no, it wasn't a yes, and that's not how this goes.

Rose acts kind, propping up Leon as the unbeatable champion and giving Bede his position and mission. But his actions aren't altruistic. Leon now holds the same neuroses as Rose, taking everything on as his own responsibility. Accidents at the power plant? He'll talk to Rose, you all go on. Dynamax Pokemon going out of control? He'll take care of it, don't worry. Eternatus is unleashed? He'll catch it and take care of it. That last one is even what Rose wants! Leon falls completely into his expected role that Rose shaped for him. Bede also falls exactly into the role he expects, even if it results in discarding him and banning him from the competition as a result. Rose controls the youth in order to shape his vision of the future.

While I didn't play it, I imagine this is the intent with Shieldbert and Sordward, too. Control over the truth of the past alters what you think to do in the future, and so they are just another iteration on this idea, albeit less fleshed out.

Rose's future also lacks accounting for everyone's future. Spikemuth is in horrible poverty because they lack a power spot to draw energy from, or to Dynamax for spectacle from. Any future Rose builds will continue this inequality. His vision of preserving the future isn't a net positive for others, but that's not important. What's important is that it's his future. Which is why he lets himself be locked up. If the energy crisis was really the main concern, then your character catching Eternatus and beating Leon should result in another attempt. It never comes because at this point, whatever happens next is no longer his future. He can't care if it's not what he wanted.

The flip flop on his general mood state is a little harder to read with certainty, but I imagine the intent is one of cycles. I doubt he crafted this company from nothing, and his family likely had their own expectations of him that led to him perceiving every little thing as his concern and losing connection with the fun of things. It's a bit messy, but I'd be lying if I said the start of his fight with him gripping the Pokemon wasn't a cool individual scene.

Now before I get too positive, I do think Galar's story is also rife with problems. Primarily, its refusal to engage the player in anything. We feel utterly disconnected from anything going on with Rose or the region, because Leon's taking care of it instead of us. It does hinder the feeling that we're doing anything particularly important or special.

I also feel like some of their decisions were rather...poor, regarding passing the torch. Mostly Magnolia, if I'm honest. I think the decision to not even use your first old female professor to play up her 20-something granddaughter is...telling. God forbid female professors be old, they have to be super young and pretty. I just think it would've been more interesting to have Sonia acting as assistant to Magnolia and piecing together what your player character does instead. It gives Magnolia more spotlight, and gives Sonia like...an actual function beyond turning to you all the time to ask what you think, rather than posit ideas of her own.

Lastly and most vitriolically...what is the point of Marnie? No really, why is she here? Spikemuth's situation is understood, but Piers carries all the interesting stuff. Refusing to Dynamax as a statement about the inequality and the value of its residents is fantastic, and Marnie just throws it out the window. She holds no convictions, and at no point in the story does she really do anything. She's around for the ride until Piers shows up and has an actual emotional stake in things. His own passing the gym leader torch to her doesn't even feel valuable because she's so disconnected from his philosophical stance. I think Marnie should've been the one out here making that statement by refusing Dynamaxing while climbing the League's ladder, and Team Yell benefits from this as their interference can be interpreted as concern that their one chance for a Champion is playing risky by not using Dynamax for some political point. She just feels pointless.

The less said about postgame the better. That entire sequence is just tedious and annoying and completely missed its mark dramatically.

Unlike Kalos, Galar remains low on the list. I'll admit, I have been harsher on the game than was strictly called for, but I maintain it's one of my least favorites. Its entire design is just so functional antithetical to what I like in these games.

Next...I'm gonna be real, I have no idea. I'm kind of in stasis right now. I don't feel like replaying Gen 9, that's too fresh. I considered White 2 but didn't love White 1, so I'm hesitant. I considered ORAS, which...might be next. And for my own console time...it's either BDSP or I pick up one of the games in my backlog. We'll see what I feel like doing tomorrow.

#pokemon gen 8 #pokemon sword and shield #pokemon replays

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crystalelemental · 2 months

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As I've mentioned, part of what got me replaying Pokemon games was a stream series I've been following. During the course of one of their other streams, their cohost made the comment "Who cares about the story in a Pokemon game?"

This was a fascinating comment, because generally speaking I think the response would simultaneously be "everyone" and "no one." Story is an often discussed aspect of Pokemon, but at the same time it feels like stories are often skipped. There's a giant rift between those who seem to really engage with the story of Pokemon, and those who are just here to play, and that discrepancy tends to inform preference for the games. As they become more story-centric in modern generations, the more gameplay-aligned grow less and less attached, though the complaint is more often that the story is bad, rather than the gameplay-story ratio is out of balance. It seems like story is often wanted, but to be more "serious" like some nebulous older days when they cared.

With that, let's talk about that nebulous time: Gen 5.

Okay so real talk! Like, super real and earnest, and kinda deviating from what I usually do with the Pokemon write-ups. I don't really care too much about story in games like this as long as it's out of the way.

I think when story is discussed, people often expect "good story" to mean the most complex and thematically potent thing released. But that's not really true. A perfectly serviceable and sensible story can still resonate well, and adds a bit of flavor to the world you explore. This is often what Pokemon aims for, even now. The stories are never that complex, but they can be engaging and fun ways to rope the player in to whatever is going on around them.

Gen 5 is heralded as the strongest story, in large part because of what it discusses. The question of whether Pokemon are being oppressed in our current society is a fair one, riffing on a long-standing joke about Pokemon being slaves and doing whatever players tell them to etc etc. Thing is, the story never really challenges anything. The people advocating for releasing Pokemon are entirely framed as misguided at best and overt lunatics at worst. The decisive answer given is "No no, this is fine, don't think about it." It's a story that pretends at strong themes and exploration of a conflict, but it doesn't really exist.

The same is true of characters. A lot of characters are presented as really deep and complex, but that...also isn't entirely true. Cheren and Bianca have their own things going on, but they're not necessarily more complex than, say, Silver or Wally. They just show up and talk more often, waxing philosophical about their inability to determine what they want for their futures due to being roughly 10-14 years old. I'd be willing to argue that even N is not particularly complex, and offers less depth as a child of abuse than SuMo Lillie and Gladion did.

This isn't to say you can't like these characters. I certainly do. But I think it's odd how much emphasis gets placed on Gen 5's story and cast despite them not really being more complex than anything that came before. There's more time given to the leaders and rivals and such, but they're not more fleshed out, just more present. Which is the point. You don't know more about them. You're around them in the gameplay longer.

What this suggests is that there's a good gameplay-story balance within Gen 5, which is...possible. Gen 6 onward do feel like you're being stopped every route to have people talk at you. But having just played it...Gen 5 does the same thing. And in some ways...Gen 5 is legitimately worse.

I talked about this a few weeks ago, but Gen 5 is the first game I've replayed that I put down for a while, because it was driving me crazy. The game has a lot of trouble in the early acts, due to EXP scaling. Your level is universally below your opponents, and every single fight feels like a shitshow as a result. You're constantly in need of healing, and opponent movesets are expanded and much stronger. Compare Lenora, whose Watchog has access to Crunch, to Gardenia, whose Roserade has almost exclusively Grass moves. Despite Roserade being stronger statistically, Gardenia is easier to beat because they offset the stats with a movepool that can be counterplayed.

This is the crux of Gen 5's...I won't call it issue, but I'm thinking it. Difficulty has been a hot-button topic with Pokemon for a long while, and the Gen 3-5 era is the main draw for those discussions. Gen 3 was challenging because it had a lot of good strategic play from opponents. Gen 4 introduced really strong opponents and restricted movesets. Gen 5 turns this up with scaled EXP and expanded enemy movepools, without giving players the same. For example, my Deerling didn't learn a damage-dealing Grass move until level 32, which was 9 levels above what I caught it at. We did not have a Grass move for Clay as a result, but don't worry, his Excadrill has Steel, Ground, and Rock-type attacks.

Your solution to this is meant to be Audino farming, which is a huge spike in EXP, but you have to run around doing nothing until the grass wiggles, then hope no other encounter intercepts before you get to it. It's a slow, tedious process that really hinders the flow of the game, and this continues until you get the Lucky Egg from Juniper in Chargestone Cave.

On that note: this was the second fastest clear of any game I've played, losing only to Blue. The game feels long, but was one of the shorter experiences.

This game, more than any other, feels hindered by flow in the early game. Past that Lucky Egg, my team was able to actually stay above the level of opponents until the League. But getting to that point feels so wildly tedious because of the EXP scaling. There are tradeoffs. Using a strong Pokemon like Durant late in the game results in rapid levels, getting even two in a single fight. But the problems that arise tend to involve sharp spikes that cannot otherwise be overcome with any reasonable ease.

I got locked in this game. My team could not outspeed Ghetsis' Hydreigon, and it one-shot everything except for Emboar. Yes, even Zekrom, who rolled a -Sp Def nature and must've gotten crap Speed IVs. My solution at this point was to take one of two options: go back and somehow farm levels past 50 using enemies in the mid-30s, or find a way to reroll events until Ghetsis missed Fire Blasts or Quick Claw activated. I opted for the latter. It was Not Fun.

This then blends into the immediate post-game experience of being in the low-50s, and having to immediately face opponents in the mid-60s in every direction. I despise this part of the game. While you get more EXP for them being higher level, trainers tend to be not fully evolved, which sharply reduces the EXP gained. So it takes forever to break through that ceiling as well.

Gen 5 lacks for a clear level curve, instead having awkward spikes that are impossible to keep up with. Lenora's nigh-impossible to keep up with if you have more than your starter in use, and that's a dangerous prospect in itself. Elesa's impossible to keep up with due to lack of Audino in the desert, and the obvious Sandile doesn't evolve until it's at her level and cannot statistically hold up against her team. The post-league hunt is a mess of opponents being much higher level than you for a long while.

These kinds of jumps are not new to the series, but this is also the first game where it feels like there's no actual response to what the opponent brings. When Norman is a huge level spike with no real room for training, you at least have the possibility of Aron or Rock types that largely block his attacks. When you have an opponent like Whitney who is huge, there's a ton of extra routes beyond her that can be used to level. Gen 5 has little to none of this, or at least not enough.

Let's take that example earlier of Clay. Clay has Ground types, weak to Grass, Water, and Ice. Around him, you have options: Deerling, Swadloon, Ducklett, and Vanillite. Great! Except Deerling doesn't learn a Grass move until too late, and can't evolve so it's statistically worse than his entire team. Swadloon evolves via happiness, which you're sure not gonna have, and is weak to Rock, which he has a ton of. Ducklett has similar evolution problems to Deerling, you don't have Surf yet, and it is also weak to Rock. Vanillite also doesn't evolve until late, and is both weak to and does not deal much to Steel. Essentially, there is no solution to Excadrill nearby if you haven't already trained one. And if you do pick them up, you're wildly below his level, and better hope you can handle all the fights nearby enough to clear.

Add to this, the change to reusable TMs was a double edged sword. Unova allows you to put your big moves on everything as needed, but in compensation, all the good moves are postgame locked. This results in tragedies like Seismitoad, who can't learn any Ice moves until post-game and is useless against Iris, and doesn't get a good Ground move until postgame when you find Earthquake. I can't say it even feels like they're restricted for reasons like Gen 4, where boosting was BP locked because the game wasn't balanced to respond to them, leaving only a few options. Like every Psychic learns Calm Mind, it's not a big deal.

At a guess, I think the design intention here was one aiming for difficulty. I was not super attentive to fandom around this era, so I may be offbase, but I wonder if arguments about difficulty in these games escalated around this time. It just feels like the type of game that tried to do things solely to make it hard, that...well, it didn't, it just made it tedious. I can't think of any other reason for movepools to feel so awkward, good TMs to be so scarce, boss fights to be so constantly above your level with tremendous movepool coverage, and even random encounters having serious threat potential while having a million of them. It just feels like something that was designed not to be fully its own adventure experience with your Pokemon, but to be actually challenging. And if I remember critical reception, the game bombed. I kinda wonder if that's not a huge cause of it.

To be honest, it feels like I'm mostly complaining at this point. There were a few points of fun, specifically around getting my new additions leveled up, like facing the League to get Deino to evolve and start contributing. But on the whole, this was...the least fun experience I had with the series thus far, from a gameplay perspective. Maybe I'm just burning out a bit after all this time, but even coming back there were times I felt like progress was just too slow and frustrating. I'm not sure how the next sets will go. I've been a long-standing hater toward the EXP All era, but I'm going to give this an honest try, and see what I feel about the games moving forward.

#pokemon gen 5 #pokemon replays

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