r/pokemon
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u/Joelius_Caesar
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Nov 25 '22
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The Pokemon Fandom & Rewriting History Discussion / Venting
A lot of people forget how much hate Black and White got back in the day around its release. I was a fan way back then and I can remember getting lambasted on smogon forums for liking the games. Sure, I was young and didn’t make good points, but people were vicious if you said anything nice about them.
Now, everyone is acting like they’ve been on board since day one. There’s no one who I can say “I told you so” to, so I just wanna give a general “I told you so” to everyone.
When everyone starts saying X&Y are the best games in the series in three years refer back to this post.
Edit: Lotta people are talking about Gen IX. This post isn’t about Gen IX. They right tho. Broken game.
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Nov 25 '22
To be honest, I don’t think people “forget” that generation 5 was hated. It’s mentioned every time the games are brought up.
I think that 1, people came around.
2, the kids who played these games (such as myself) are now young adults and are able to voice their opinions on the games.
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u/Nambot Get blue Spheals Nov 25 '22
I think what also helped is that Black2/White2 really saved the reputation of Unova and Gen V as a whole, by fixing many of the major issues people had with Black & White.
People had two real issues with Black & White, the lack of variety (and the related issues that Pokémon were extremely restricted in what areas they could be found in making many choices not viable simply for how late they turn up), and the fact that the map is very linear with little to offer in the post-game.
But equally, it's two biggest issues actively got worse in subsequent games. Linearity only increased in both Alola and Galar, and Alola removed the national 'dex entirely, before Galar made it impossible to obtain a good chunk of the Pokédex at all. Black & White don't look as terrible next to those titles, so of course it's reputation has improved by contrast.
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u/Blayro You might as well call me PUN-ichan Nov 25 '22
People had two real issues with Black & White, the lack of variety (and the related issues that Pokémon were extremely restricted in what areas they could be found in making many choices not viable simply for how late they turn up)
Ironically, this was one of the reasons I disliked B2W2. I just prefer the feeling of having a new selection of pokemon than using the old ones. Is only through the main story too. Also I disliked the story in B2W2 but I guess I was just too attached to the old protagonists
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u/the-dandy-man Nov 25 '22
Yeah B2W2 felt like a return to formula as opposed to the fun new changes BW made that I really enjoyed. The story didn’t hit nearly as hard. But I did really like the addition of the PWT.
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u/Nambot Get blue Spheals Nov 26 '22
The idea is good in theory, but it's execution is what killed it. In theory it should work, they had 150 new Pokémon, same as they had in Gen I. But whereas Gen I provided lots of Pokémon in routes, with their evolutions appearing in later routes, Gen V pretty much kept things to one area. For instance, compare and contrast Pidgey and Pidove. Both are there respective generations generic bird Pokémon, based on the common pigeon, but while Pidgey can be found in Kanto on 14 of Kanto's 25 routes (with Pidgeotto available in three of those), Pidove is available in precisely two places (with Tranquil available in two different places, and Unfezant in those same two places).
Unova basically locks a lot of Pokémon to the late game by this simple design decision, which makes it feel more artificial. Gen I's method makes the world feel more realised, there are common Pokémon you can find anywhere, uncommon Pokémon that appear in certain habitats, and places where rare Pokémon can be found due to their unique needs as creatures being met there (Pidgey are everywhere you can find grass, Geodude are in most caves, Koffing are only in places with high levels of human waste). Gen V feels much more artificial, on this side of the river there are birds, but the birds never fly across the river, even though the environment is identical, because that's a different game zone.
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u/i_will_let_you_know Nov 26 '22
I absolutely hate seeing the same Pokemon show up everywhere so we have a major difference in opinion.
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u/Morganelefay Nov 25 '22 edited Nov 25 '22
The one thing Alola and Galar have vs B/W is that you at least have some choices even early on. What could you catch before gym 1? The dog, Pidove, the absolutely useless Purrloin, the Elemonkeys (Who are in the race for worst designs in the game) and that's about it?
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u/Polderjoch Nov 25 '22
You actually couldn't get pidove, but you could get Patrat. In BW you could literally not field a full team of 6 because you would only get your Starter, Patrat and Lillipup on Route 1, Purrloin on Route 2, and the Monkey in the Dreamyard, since the actual grass in the dreamyard was locked behind Cut so you couldn't get Munna, shaking grass doesn't spawn until you have one badge so no Audino, and Pidove, Blitzle, etc are all on Route 3 which is blocked until you go through the dreamyard.
BW has some real issues with Pokémon distribution, and the pre-Gym 1 chunk is definitely a big issue. The other main outliers I'd say is the area around Gym 7, where you have three whole areas that literally only contain Palpitoad, Stunfisk, and Shelmet, and the desert which has the opposite problem of being the only area in the game to house like 4 exclusive Pokémon alongside a bunch of others that are otherwise also only on Route 4.
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u/Supersnow845 Nov 26 '22 edited Nov 26 '22
BW starved you of Pokémon till you hit nacrene then stuffed half it’s dex between nacrene and nimbasa then decided beyond nimbasa that having 4 routes/areas in a row with the same distribution of Pokémon was a good idea
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u/i_will_let_you_know Nov 26 '22
Gym 1 is never designed for you to have 6 Pokemon before you beat it. That's why the gym leader usually only has two Pokemon.
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u/Polderjoch Nov 26 '22
Sure but that's not the point, every other first gym before BW has a wide variety of mons for you to use to the point of having more than enough to fill your party and then some, the ability to have a curated but still decent variety of options to choose from is it; compare and contrast it to Violet Gym which has an identical amount of towns before hitting a Gym but a significantly larger amount of mons and areas to visit before it despite being lower levelled
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u/Link1112 Nov 25 '22
Goddamn I hate those monkeys.
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u/thebiggestleaf Nov 25 '22
It also didn't help that they were a staple for several NPC battles so you saw them goddamn everywhere.
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u/m1dnightlycanroc Professional Shorts Wearer Nov 26 '22
Life is hard for a gen 5 monkey fan :pensive:
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u/greenPotate Gen 8 was good Nov 25 '22
Galar is actually the only region where I did a second playthrough almost immediately after I finished the first because of the diversity of choices(+enjoying the theatrics of the gym leader battles) that made me want give it another go and actually have a team that feels different. I adored Gen 4 but that early game...
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u/Teradonn Nov 25 '22
The thing about BW’s linearity is that it really is more of a feature than an issue; they went for a story-driven narrative, which kind of needs linearity to function. But people at the time didn’t really consider this, because Pokémon games before then never had a good plot. The games built a fanbase that was there for the exploring, catching, training, and battling, and not for actual RPG aspects. People saw the linearity as nothing but a flaw, because they didn’t care for the plot at all
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u/jacksonjkeller Nov 26 '22
This is an excellent point I hadn’t thought of before, speaking as someone who both enjoyed Gen V’s story and as someone whose favorite game is RBY in no small part because of the map design.
Still… I do think they could’ve made the linearity of B/W feel more natural. Unova is an ugly loop and they don’t even try to hide it. Like I have a pretty strong image of all the maps in my head and Unova’s always sticks out as being dull.
It’s a nitpick for sure: the pacing of that game is pretty good, I have a strong image of most of the towns, and that’s what really matters. Still, for such a richly realized setting… it is slightly disappointing that they didn’t put much thought in the macro beyond making it a big loop. Given how every other map is, I’m sure that was intentional, but I don’t like it all the same. Just an aesthetic touch.
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u/bennitori Nov 26 '22
I remember gen 5 being controversial. One of the big problems I saw was that in BW you could not catch any non-gen5 pokemon until post game. And that alienated older players, who were concerned that all of their favorite pokemon were going to be removed from story mode or made transfer exclusive going forward. B2W2 fixed that. I remember thinking that was an odd choice, since the story was clearly aimed at slightly older and more mature players. The fact that you couldn't use older gens until post game very much delayed me in playing. But after the story and post game was lauded so much, I came around and had a blast with it.
I find it funny that Gen 5 had controversy around limiting what pokemon you could use, and then gen 7-9 didn't look back and realize repeating that mistake on steroids was a bad idea.
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u/Hannig4n Nov 26 '22
Part of the problem with the B/W dex is that they literally just remade all the old Pokémon and called them new mons.
Like every generation has the rodent and the bird, but B/W gave us a new geodude line, a new machop line, a new zubat/golbat duo, new magnemite line, etc. and they were all so clearly designed just to replace existing lines of Pokémon and at that point like why not just do what Gen 3 did and have a mixed dex. It also didn’t help that many of the cooler Gen 5 designs weren’t accessible until way later in the game and the starter trio designs were (imo) pretty weak.
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u/namohysip The first non-Dragon dragon Nov 25 '22
This is more likely. I was hyped for BW and Triple Battles and was not disappointed when the games released. But I was also still in high school and didn't go on forums very much. Internet was a very different place. But my feelings about Gen V haven't changed since then. So many little things about Gen V were like the capstone of the sprite era. That has only become more and more true as time went on.
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u/ssmike27 Nov 25 '22
Yeah I was 11 when Black and White came out, and I loved it. While I like every generation, gen 3, 4, and 5 are the ones I played most as a kid and have the most nostalgia for. I remember being blown away by how good White looked when I first played it, and I think it still has my some of my favorite UI and aesthetics of any Pokémon game.
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u/StevGuy90 Nov 25 '22
Im old enough to remember the gen 3 hate. It had the OG dexit and double battles, which many claimed would kill pokemon.
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u/ghostly_esper Nov 26 '22
I've been around since the first generation, and I have always thought that generation three was overly hated. It and generations four and five are probably the most nostalgic for me, even compared to the first two.
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u/weakestlink33 Nov 25 '22
I hated black and white. I actually quit playing until right before sun and moon came out because of how much I hated black and white.
I was wrong. They were great games. I just wasn't comfortable having NO familiar pokemon available. Now that those pokemon are nostalgic too, I love the faraway land / soft reset idea.
You can say it to me. I wish I loved black and white at the time. And I wish everyone else did too. The series would have been on a better track now if we didn't force them to dumb down the series and focus on the gen 1 mons (which was exactly what I had wrongly wished they had done at the time)
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u/SonicFlash01 Zipzapflap Nov 25 '22
I would kill for a new gen that only had new pokemon in it now... I'm so fucking sick of the same things showing up again and again.
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u/Flipp_Flopps Nov 25 '22
Most of the remaining Pokémon in my Pokédex are old mons because I just run past them in game thinking they’re boring to catch
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u/SonicFlash01 Zipzapflap Nov 25 '22
Does pokedex progression still increase the chances of a critical/quick/"one wiggle" capture?
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u/Godddy Nov 25 '22
Don't know for new mons you didn't catched but if you have it registered in the dex, next time you try to catch it and succeed will always be a crit.
Ex.
You catch a Pawmi, does the three ball moves, and you register it.
Next time you try to catch a Pawmi, if the ball succeeded it would always be a crit cap.
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u/SonicFlash01 Zipzapflap Nov 25 '22
Interesting? I generally don't bothering trying to capture duplicates of a pokemon unless it's a shiny or I'm trading it away.
Bulbapedia doesn't mention that anything changed, though3
u/Godddy Nov 25 '22
Because it's not critical capture per se nor it's more effective, but a way to not repeat the three jiggle animation (tho if you fail the capture it does the jiggle animation till it opens, so you'll know if you get it or not)
And about dupes I usually don't bother since breeding it's more fun, but since in the game there are mons you can't breed, but catch many it's nice to have the option.
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u/Pearadox_ Nov 25 '22 edited Nov 26 '22
I still like older pokemon receiving evolutions. I wish we could lean towards new pokemon with a few old ones receiving love. Unfortunately a balance like that doesn’t seem likely. I miss the huge additions of new pokemon we saw in gens 3 and 5, it made the world feel huge.
I think Gen 10s new mons being larger than the past few gens feels refreshing. Too bad the games are optimized like shit
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u/Doctor-Grimm Nov 25 '22
Tbf the number of new Pokémon in Gen 9 is the highest since Gen 5, so hopefully that’s a good sign?
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u/AngelAnatomy Nov 26 '22
And for all of the unplayable nonsense that is Gen 9, I fucking love the new pokemon. So many leaps and bounds better than the new sword and shield mons
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u/rcoelho14 Nov 26 '22
So many leaps and bounds better than the new sword and shield mons
I feel that Sw/Sh Pokémons were amazing. Except the starters and legendaries (base game, didn't play the DLC). Loved all the designs.
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u/gibbie420 Nov 25 '22
I think all the games should just be new Mons until the post game.
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u/Neirchill Nov 26 '22
That's exactly what people hated about black and white. They were, in my opinion, one of the best games with some of the best new Pokemon ever introduced but people really hated that they couldn't get their favorite Pokemon until after finishing the game.
BW2 remedied that situation, but that is exactly why in x and y it had so few new Pokemon and relied heavily on past favorites, especially gen 1.
While I do love black and white, I'd like for all Pokemon to be available before post game just so I have maximum options on team building for replayability. In my current run of scarlet and violet I pretty strictly stuck to new Pokemon because they're the most interesting part but I do plan on doing at least one more run at some point where I get whoever I feel like playing with. If that's Gyarados for the hundredth time then so be it.
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u/Gorgii98 Nov 25 '22
Idk maybe a handful of returning mons could be thrown into each game, as long as it's not too many.
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u/LeoRex286 Nov 25 '22
My dream is to have a region that’s all new Pokémon and regional variants, which I think is a great addition and a fun way to have old Pokémon but with a twist. But I’ve accepted that’s not likely to ever happen.
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u/TheBlueSuperNova Nov 25 '22
Idk, I felt like that for the first couple generations after 5 but now there are so many Pokémon idk how much more they should keep expanding it. It’s nice to me to have access to older generations. Maybe they could work on having all Pokémon accessible at some point but not sure how that would look
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u/SonicFlash01 Zipzapflap Nov 25 '22
It's not exactly randomized which come back, though. Some popular ones return all the time, making me get sick of them, where I might appreciate some deep cuts making an appearance.
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u/kingjoe64 Nov 25 '22 edited Nov 26 '22
I love old species, I just wish they would've came up with regionals back in Gen 5 so the games would've had better reception via familiar faces (e.g. "Alolan" Rattata or Grimer could've fit really well in an NYC themed region) and maybe GF would've had more fun designing Pokémon the last 15 years
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u/Annonymous_97 Nov 25 '22
That's honestly one of the things I loved about Gen 5, only having access to new mons. One of my favorite parts about a new generation is getting to see the new creatures that they came up with, so I personally couldn't relate to that outrage. And while I don't mind having old ones around, I've tended to lean on them too much. I've raised waaay too many Garedvoirs and Eeveelutions across too many gens haha
My personal challenge in my Gen 9 playthrough is to only use new mons
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u/SGKurisu Nov 25 '22
Vast majority of people wouldn't and I think they learned their lesson since Black 2 immediately pivoted back towards having way more older mons, plus every Gen since then being quite heavy in having them or new forms.
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u/Gears_Of_None Silverware Nov 25 '22
Why gen 1 specifically?
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u/Zevyu Nov 25 '22
Nostalgia.
Because gen 1 is the gen a lot of people started with.
It's the gen with Mewtwo, Charizard and Pikachu, you know, the 3 pokemon that GF likes to pander too. I'm honestly surprised Mewtwo didn't get a G-max form in Sw/Sh.
Also during the gen 5 time, the genwunners were going HAM on the gen 5 hate.
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u/Mijumaru1 Nov 25 '22
God I remember that. People constantly acted like the entirety of gen 5 was awful because Trubbish and Vanillite existed (both are good designs and I will die on that hill)
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u/Zevyu Nov 25 '22
I mean, by that logic, gen 1 is awful because grimer and voltorb existed.
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u/yuhanz Nov 25 '22
In gen 1 imo, voltorb was a great design as a pseudo mimic. Electrode tho…
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u/OuchPotato64 Nov 26 '22
Pokemon was a game before it became anything else. Voltorb was intended to be a mimic, which were in a lot of Japanese games in the 90s
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u/BrilliantTreacle9996 Nov 26 '22
The only things I can say against them is that the Vanillite line probably should have only been two stages. It doesn't feel like Icecream->More icecream->morer icecream deserves that many dex slots.
Klang's line also feels a bit underwhelming. Tho that was them not pushing the gimmick hard enough. It should have gotten a mega in gen 6 that made it like, into a legit warmachine, that still incorporated the basic gears as part of an increasingly arcane machine.
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u/smokinnic_suckindic Nov 25 '22
I enjoyed B&W as a kid but I remember being frustrated for the lack of familiarity like you. A few years ago I got my copy of B2 and had SOOOOOO much fun… I played it in all of my free time for a month straight to complete it, then sent my full team up through the bank from my 3DS and into Shield. The game was an absolute blast
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u/AutumnLiteratist Nov 25 '22
This was me too. Hated Black. Thought it was barebones on content (lmao) and didn't like the restrictiveness of only getting Unova pokemon until postgame. Completley skipped B2W2 until after...OR/AS?
I would kick past-me if I could. Gen 5 is my absolute standout favourite now; both the first two and the sequels.
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u/Leidaans Nov 25 '22
Tbh, despite being in gen 5’s corner from day 1, I can’t fault people for falling off at that point. The games just came at a bad time. They were DS games releasing after the 3ds was out, and dropped at the peak of pokefatigue.
I’m just happy that people have gone back and given them another go, and mostly had a good time.
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u/TheFacca Nov 25 '22
Yeah, everyone who changed their mind usually was because of their nostalgia on gen 1 ~ 4 not being present there.
Thinking the same thing would happen to Gen 6 to 9 is such a hard copium, people's issues with these games aren't as simple as "why isn't charizard in my pokeman game?"
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u/another_bug Nov 25 '22 edited Nov 25 '22
They were great games. I just wasn't comfortable having NO familiar pokemon available.
I think that is what did it for BW1. It threw a lot of people off, and IMO even in retrospect the designs were a bit different in their style. But once you get over that, they were great. Or at the very least, BW2 were good enough to make up for BW1.
I think this, partially anyway, explains the difference between their reception on release vs now.
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u/javierm885778 Nov 25 '22
Completely annecdotical, but as a kid, BW broke the connection with the franchise for many people I knew, so BW2 was mostly ignored, even mocked as a cashgrab by my friends, even when it was the least cashgrabby "third version" we'd seen to this day even.
So while BW2 "fixed" a lot of what made BW hated, I think a lot of people didn't play it on release due to the BW connection.
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u/Link1112 Nov 25 '22
Same here. I really hated the mons. The world was really cool but the Pokémon were so bad to me.
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u/Tabbygail Nov 25 '22
I think the reason we don't see so much B/W hate anymore is that the kids who were 10-12 (pokemon's target demographic) when black and white came out have grown up and are now 18-25, which is the demographic that dominates social media. The people who were 18-25 in 2011 (who likely started with RBY or GSC) are older now, have full time jobs and families, and aren't playing/talking about games online as much. The B/W kids have displaced the RBY kids on social media, just as one day the S/V kids will displace us.
I think we're seeing the Gen 7 games go through this process now- popular opinion on sun and moon is much more positive than it was on release, but there are still a lot of detractors who haven't burned themselves out
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u/schachspanner Nov 25 '22
As a Gen 1 kid, the two main issues I had with Gen 5 is: 1) I had probably the least disposable income I will ever have in my life. I was paying for my own food for the first time in my life, and a gen with FOUR games was a huge cost. I admit, I pirated 3/4 games. 2) it felt like a soft reboot. No familiar pokemon. A huge regional dex, a lot of which felt like filler. And two rivals whose introduction consists of them trashing your room. As a first year at uni, it was too real. I wonder if part of the gen 9 hate is gen 5 kids hitting the same stage.
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u/Daphrey Nov 26 '22
I dunno, the games on a technical level are just worse though.
The only games I am really nostalgia blind for are all of gen 4, at the time I only minimally played B/W and only recently played B/W2. The games are so, so much better than gen 8/9. In so many ways the games are just better. I was definitely dissapointed by hype for sw/sh, and as such my opinion may soften over time, but I already had low expectations for s/v, and the game seemed to treat those low expectations as a challenge.
I really don't get this whole thing with people acting as if these games will be heralded in a few years. They will have a reneisance at some point, the games aren't that irredeemable, but they just aren't very good. Arceus is and will be highly considered because it is a fundamentally good game. Despite all the issues its got stuff going for it. Sw/sh and s/v just have too many problems.
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u/Spacemn5piff Nov 25 '22
Black and white was hated for deliberate choices in:
Pokemon availability
art style
Pokemon design
Just to name a few.
S/V are not generally hated for any of those reasons other than availability which is more of a series issue now than a specific title issue what with dexit sticking around.
The main reasons s/v are getting hated would be their performance and heavy removal of fluff not integral to the main story and post game activities.
To be more specific, s/v are mostly hated for:
low and unstable framerates
low quality animations for NPCs and Mons in the over world
major technical flaws including but not limited to the game actually slowing down when frames drop
misleading promotion of the open world model
Black and white was hated for things that were in most cases up to taste. And while you can somewhat say the same for s/v nobody will take you seriously if you say you prefer the sub 20fps versus the Arceus experience. It's just a dumb claim.
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u/Shiny_Kelp
Nov 25 '22
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People really do be thinking that every game has been unanimously hated on release since BW when that couldn't be further from the truth.
XY were massively praised as far as I remember. Only complaints I remember were some megas looking like digimon ripoffs or a disdain for the new fairy type, but even those weren't all that common.
ORAS did get some backlash due to the battle frontier cut and the infamous "kids are too busy playing mobile games" Masuda interview. Other than that, also praised.
SM had the entire community hyped as shit all the way to release, and even after release the complaints were a minority. I would know because I myself was part of that minority. Any criticism other than the hand-holdiness was met by "well at least they're trying something different".
USUM is what really started itching people's nerves. The game was 90% base SM even though they were marketed as "sequels with a brand new story" so more peopel than usual were disappointed in them.
Really it was around the late SM -> USUM-LGPE era where the gen 5 praise picked up steam and the community started calling out Game Freak's decaying quality.
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u/-Mez- Nov 25 '22
Agreed.
Especially in USUM's case marketing hurt it the most imo. They pitched it as way more than it was and tried to justify doing another 2 version release instead of just having a singular 3rd version that rounded everything out. When in reality the game was good but it was nowhere near a brand new story since you had to play through a lot of the same content to get to the new stuff near the end of the game. And playing through those tutorials takes so long.
The games going to the switch really changed the general sentiment of things though. Stuff like the price increases due to being switch games instead of 3DS games and dexit have compounded to make people question if what was promised is actually being fulfilled with every new release. Skepticism like that didn't really come up as often previously.
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u/nick2473got Nov 25 '22
The game was 90% base SM even though they were marketed as "sequels with a brand new story" so more peopel than usual were disappointed in them.
Tbf they marketed it as an alternate / expanded version, they even called it a director's cut. I never once heard them say it was a sequel, literally any pre-release footage of the game showed that it wasn't.
USUM was just a 3rd version split in two.
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u/Blayro You might as well call me PUN-ichan Nov 25 '22
USUM is what really started itching people's nerves. The game was 90% base SM even though they were marketed as "sequels with a brand new story" so more peopel than usual were disappointed in them.
Honestly USUM are, in my opinion, completely superior to SM. The issue is that the games are too similar, unnecessarily so.
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u/justinhanks Nov 26 '22
I agree with you, but I recall XY receiving a lot of criticism for the Exp Share and generally being too easy.
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u/DrSavitski Nov 25 '22
I never hated Gen 5.. tbh, after I was disapointed in Gen 4, it’s actually Black and White that got me back into Pokémon. I remember walking by them on the shelf at Walmart (before I worked there) and thinking “oh, there’s a new Pokémon game? Guess I’ll ask my mom for it”
Then Black and White 2 got my best friend back into the series as well
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u/AznOmega Nov 25 '22
At college, I noticed someone playing Black and White. When I got a 3DS, I got Pokemon Black and it got me back into Pokemon.
It is still my favorite generation, I would say X/Y suffered from unused potential.
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u/DrSavitski Nov 25 '22
When X/Y came out I pulled an all nighter and absolutely loved the game! It was in my top 5. At that point it was my 2nd favorite behind R/S/E. I’ve come to realize B/W is better lol
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u/RaysFTW Nov 25 '22
I wasn’t a fan of D/P back then and I’m still not today. My biggest issue is that with all the Pokémon at it’s disposal, D/P somehow had worse Pokémon variety than R/B, pre-postgame. Imo, it was one of the worst directions GF ever made.
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u/Someguy0328 Nov 25 '22
I didn’t get to the point of falling off of Pokémon , but Gen 4 was the least fun that younger me had playing a Pokémon game (mainly due to the slowness). I’ll add the major caveat that I never played Platinum. In comparison, I enjoyed Gen 5 quite a bit, and was absolutely fine with the new Pokémon in it (though I never got to play B2W2). It wasn’t my favorite gen, but it definitely helped refresh the enjoyment of playing a Pokémon game.
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u/enseminator Nov 26 '22
Seeing someone refer to Black and White as "way back when"... holy smokes. Am I really that old now?
I remember when the first English version of Red and Blue came out, for the original Gameboy 🤣
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u/RaysFTW Nov 25 '22
What’s with this sub and thinking that everyone from B/W days are the same people today? There’s a very good chance that the active people in this sub were not around on Reddit or other forums when B/W were released.
OP and comments are pointing out the injustice of Person B changing their opinions from Person A when they are different people altogether.
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u/dekgear Nov 25 '22
The only hate I remember from those days was from the Pokemon designs themselves, and maybe the decision to not include most of the old Pokemon, not really about anything about the gameplay or bugs.
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u/Narananas Nov 26 '22 edited Nov 26 '22
Absolutely, online I only remember it being icecream this, garbage that. Then people would say genwunners and point out bad Gen 1 pokemon.
These comments give an idea of changing attitudes since then, but I wonder if people look more fondly on the Unova pokemon now.
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u/I_Love_Ampharos Nov 25 '22
X and Y are very ok games but a Z could have been the best in the franchise pretty handily.
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u/Link1112 Nov 25 '22
I remember the rumours about the train leading to Kalos neighbour region and Z having a post-game like GSC.
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u/NotRed9282 Nov 25 '22
Well we know that Paldea is based in Spain, so we can only assume the top right portion would be Kalos geographically if it was accurate to the real world. If the DLC for SV opens up this area, it could help flesh out Kalos more if that is the case
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u/Supersnow845 Nov 26 '22
That’s just the same argument people used to say the train went south in the original map of SWSH so we’d go on the “Eurostar” to a kalos DLC
Sure the train south actually did go to the DLC area but I don’t think using the geographical locations of the real world inspirations of regions is going to tell us anything about DLC
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u/RaysFTW Nov 25 '22
Lol that’s a pretty big assumption, tbf. Everything we think would’ve made Z great is purely speculation and fan theories. Historically, all that stuff just makes fans disappointed when games don’t live up to preconceived hype.
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u/DrogoOmega Nov 25 '22
Considering the improvements Emerald and Platinum had made, it’s a no brainer to think Z would have been better and a great addition. I was annoyed we never got one. Still am.
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u/ApophisRises Nov 25 '22
100% agree with this. This has always been the case for the games in some form or another. Same with the Anime.
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u/Savthatsit Nov 25 '22
Same! I remember when the Sun and Moon anime came out! People were pissed!
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u/Deadtaor33 Nov 25 '22
That Litten story was heartbreaking and one of the best stories in the Anime!
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u/Tsukuyomi56 Embrace Darkness Nov 25 '22
The segment where Litten mourns for Stoutland’s passing never fails to make me tear up when I see it.
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u/Silly_Snails Nov 25 '22
On rewatch it's definitely Stoutland teaching Litten to use Fire Fang.
The episode shows a tree losing its leaves to represents Soutland's life coming to an end. But methinks the symbolism goes deeper : when Soutland shows Fire Fang to Litten, they knock a leaf out of the tree, symbolizing Stoutland using their last bit of strength for Litten.
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u/Deadtaor33 Nov 25 '22
Was watching it with my Partner and i knew what was coming as soon as it showed the leaves on the tree leading into the Fire Fang training. My Partner did not see it coming lol
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u/Neos472 dragon type fan Nov 25 '22
for real that story came to me right when I was dealing with the passing of my father so it hit home on so many levels I just resonated a lot with Litten then.
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Nov 25 '22
Have people been praising the Gen 5 anime recently? From what I’ve seen it’s still considered one of the show’s weaker periods.
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u/AbbyWasThere Nov 25 '22
The anime where Ash loses the league to a guy who only brought 5 Pokémon to a 6v6 battle because his Riolu deus ex evolved will never not be mid.
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u/bongowasd Nov 26 '22
I personally enjoyed every mainline game until the dex cut. They had their issues, but almost all of those issues were not present during the post game where you spent 99% of your playtime.
To me these games are half as good as Sun/Moon because of it. There is outright less for me to do here than in Sun/Moon.
Just give me a Pokémon Colosseum game that has literally every form of battling and uses my Pokémon home for my teams. That's literally it, I'd actually accept the dex cuts if that existed. Alpha megas and Z-move Palafin? FUCK YES!!!!
Add whatever bullshit restrictions you want for ranked, just let me enjoy the variety this game once had with friends again.
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u/ReFluff Nov 25 '22 edited Nov 25 '22
I wish this line of thinking would fade away tbh.
Pretty silly to assume that the positive opinions you see nowadays are from people only “pretending” to have always liked it. The opinions you see comes from literally millions of people. Maybe those toxic people from BW just moved on from Pokemon, or mellowed out. Maybe your social media habits have changed and you avoid more toxic forums and interactions.
Black and White released 12 years ago, is the only possibility really that the fandom consists of hypocrites?
Or maybe those people actually did always like the game, and using people’s positive opinions to paint a fandom as hypocrites is really disrespectful?
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u/yanderekittie Nov 25 '22
The kids who grew up on Gen 5 are adults now too. They’re probably 50% of the people showing love for Unova
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u/IWasTooSlowSteam Nov 25 '22
I'm one of them. I was 8 years old when BW came out in NA, now I'm in college.
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u/Aonswitch Nov 25 '22
People only didn’t like gen 5 because they made you use new Pokémon. Whenever I play a new gen I ONLY use new Pokémon so it was perfect for me. I remember my mom taking me to GameStop after school and getting roasted on forums for liking it.
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u/Morganelefay Nov 25 '22
Nah, there are some other reasons to dislike gen 5. To me the big one was the utter lack of choice before the third gym, with some of the early 'mons being so crap that even for in-game they were just no fun to use (looking at you Purrloin). On top of that, for a gen that tried to be "Everything is NEW" it had a few too many obvious expies of gen 1 'mons.
I also personally thought scrapping follower pokemon right after Heartgold/Soulsilver was a bit of a stupid move.
It did have a lot of good stuff though, but there are more reasons other than "there's no old stuff".
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u/TSPhoenix Nov 26 '22
If BW were your first Pokémon games growing up there is no reason not to love them, they were solid games, probably the most refined take on the Pokémon formula to date. But as someone who was getting tired of how formulaic things had become a game that was pure formula and essentially a soft reboot, it left me feeling like I was unlikely to be interested in the franchise's future. It's biggest strength as a game was for me it's biggest weakness as a longtime fan.
I went spoiler free on Gen 5 and I'm glad I did, I did enjoy it but my enthusiasm for the fully "new" roster was heavily dampened by how many of them were blatant 1:1 stand-ins for Gen 1 evolution lines. Also the reusable TM system I think ended up undermining the new roster. Natural learnsets and type coverage are important considerations when adding a Pokémon to your roster in previous generations, but in Gen 5 Pokémon it makes more sense to choose Pokémon based on TM compatibility causing the new roster to end up having blatant winners and losers in terms of usability.
People talk about the story as something that makes BW stand above previous games, but they softballed the themes they raised so hard they may as well not have bothered raising them at all. The series about catching and battling monsters was never going to conclude that catching and battling monsters is bad actually.
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u/TheJakeanator272 Nov 25 '22
Well if it makes you feel better, I played black and white for the first time about a year ago and it’s my least favorite game by far.
I wasn’t able to play them because I never had a DS growing up. I started on red as my first game.
I am always a person that will use the new Pokémon in a game no matter what. But I could not get past the regional dex in the game. The beginning of the game was so grueling to get through because everyone just had the same 7 or 8 Pokémon on rotation. Not having previous gen Pokémon really narrowed down the variety and made it uninteresting. Also, as a grass starter guy, I didn’t know there would be literally one fire type to choose from besides the starter. And those monkeys suck.
I don’t think Scarlet and Violet are bad games as far as gameplay goes. I’m enjoying them a good bit. The performance is inexcusable though. The frame rates and textures are pretty terrible.
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u/TheMannWithThePan honorary poképal Nov 26 '22
I don't these are mostly the same people. Like, from my perspective, I didn't really like gen 5 then, and I don't now. People who liked it at the time are now just the people who dominate the discourse now, and the same was true for people like me back then.
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u/Earthbnd Puff!!! Nov 25 '22
I have a soft spot for x and y. I know the single player campaign is probably the worst of all mainline games, but the online features they added at the time took the series to a whole other level. X and Y was the generation where I was playing with all my classmates in high school at once for the first time, it was soooo sick. The lack of online community to interact with really makes x and y feel even more content-less, despite it being the game I spent the most time playing with friends.
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u/whippedalcremie Nov 25 '22
Gen5 came out at a really awkward time in the franchise where the original fans were in college, before Pokemon Go brought the franchise roaring back into public consciousness and before original fans started having kids of their own. It was seen as cool on the internet to hate big franchise properties, anything indie was king. Then came the 3D games that had objective performance lag that made the 2D games much more appealing in retrospect.
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u/HolypenguinHere Nov 25 '22
Now, everyone is acting like they’ve been on board since day one.
No they're not. Different people, different times. Posts like these are silly. People really encounter 100 angry fans online and assume that they represent the millions of fans of the games who don't rage online because they enjoy the games.
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u/SpaceTaco27 I ❤️ Unova Nov 26 '22
👆this is correct. I didn’t become a Pokémon fan until Gen 6, I think X was the first one I played if memory serves. So I obviously wasn’t aware of any of the BW debate when it was actually happening. But later, I went back and played every mainline game in the series. And when I got around to playing Gen 5 they were my favorite, in my personal opinion. It has nothing to do with me trying to manipulate history or saying “I told you so”. I just really enjoyed those games, man.
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u/Serapius Nov 25 '22
I was starting college when BW hit shelves. While I loved the games, you’re right that a huge portion of the online community lambasted them upon release from what I saw.
It really just seems like sometime within the last four or five years that people have started to speak more fondly of gen 5 as a whole.
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u/Darbs504 Nov 25 '22
I remember hating Black and White when they realeased. So much so that Black and White 2 are the only mainline games I haven't played
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u/Calophon Nov 25 '22
No. I have not seen people say B+W were incredible em mass, other than people who always liked them from the beginning. I did not like them when they came out and I still do not like them. I dislike most Unova Pokémon, but some have grown on me.
People aren’t trying to rewrite history. I think it’s more likely that the people who liked the bad games stuck around because the quality hasn’t really gone up since, and the people who trash talked the games have since left. The echo chamber favors those who praise the echo chamber.
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u/Kae04 Nov 25 '22 edited Nov 25 '22
It's almost like the fandom is a large and fluid collective of people and not one big hivemind... Of course the general opinion of games waxes and wanes over time.
BW and BW2 are the only Pokemon games (until recently) I've not bought. Sun and Moon are the only Pokemon games I've owned that I haven't bothered to finish. My opinion hasn't changed but the general opinion of the fandom has because the people that stuck around are generally the ones with fonder memories of the more recent releases.
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u/Thadrea Nov 25 '22
Gen 5 introduced a lot of new ideas. Unfortunately, a lot of those ideas like triple battles and the Dream World were either clunky or just not fun.
The fact that there were also no non-Unova Pokémon until the post-game was also sort of a bummer for long time players. Player knowledge about types and abilities was largely thrown out the window since all of the Pokémon you encountered were new.
Gen 5 has aged well, though-- B2/W2 were better received, triple battles were not continued in the main series and have gone from being an annoyance to something of a novelty. The Dream World has also been shut down, so the need to participate in that to get OP hidden abilities is no longer a factor.
In a sense, for Gen 5, the community's collective memory has shifted over time as the biggest pain points have gone away or at least ceased to be the center of attention.
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u/Golden-Owl Top-u Kek-o Nov 25 '22
I’ve stood firmly on the side of disliking XY since day 1, and still do to this day
That game started out so amazingly cool but then went goddamn nowhere after Korrina’s gym. The difficulty was utterly nonexistent. I can’t recall a single enjoyable battle in that.
Another 5 years will pass and I’ll still dislike it. Though I do adore Megas and was disappointed to see them gone
Same for BW and BW2. I sunk over a hundred hours into each because I just loved the story and exploring Unova. It felt like it was truly a huge step forward towards a traditional JRPG. Which made me hate XY so much more afterward
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u/primalmaximus Nov 25 '22
Imagine if we didn't get access to Mega evolution until after we fought Korrina's Mega Lucario with just the base Lucario we received. Sort of like a "Let's show you how powerful Mega Evolution is by completely curb stomping you."
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u/3163560 Nov 25 '22
Didn't later gym leaders in XY have Pokemon that only knew 2-3 moves as well?
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u/notwiththeflames Nov 26 '22
Yeah, X and Y were the games that started the incomplete movepools trend.
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u/Sunsurg_e Nov 25 '22
Nobody has forgotten Black and White hate, that’s just a plain lie. Has Black and White had a total second coming in terms of fandom popularity? 100%.
But I see plenty of people who admit they didn’t like it upon release and have changed their tune or people who didn’t like the OG games but enjoyed BW2 a lot more.
And quite personally Black and White are still my least favorite of the games (Sun and Moon being a close second), soooo I personally disagree with the second coming, but I don’t see people acting as if they were on board day one.
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u/YourIntIsOne Nov 25 '22
This is the case for every new game that comes out.
Though to be fair, Gen 5 remains my least favorite Gen. But I enjoyed Kalos and Alola despite everyone else seemingly hating them.
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u/Golden-Owl Top-u Kek-o Nov 25 '22 edited Nov 26 '22
I’m kinda bummed people disliked Alola. I personally really loved it. Though I do feel SM is way better than Ultra (It felt rather unneeded)
I don’t think I’ll ever not dislike Kalos. That region was a snoozefest. But Megas were mad hype, so I’ll give it that
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u/Ivy_lane_Denizen Nov 25 '22
X/Y (interchangably with ORAS, I suppose) are my favorite pokemon games. (Ive played all but gen 5 and gen 4 remakes)
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u/Gears_Of_None Silverware Nov 25 '22
I like Alola, but the constant stopping and starting is annoying.
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u/linus140 Nov 25 '22
I could be wrong, but I think a lot of the Gen 7 hate comes from the fact USUM were the second set of games and basically remakes of SM with some different content but basically the same game.
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u/notwiththeflames Nov 26 '22
Things probably would have been better if they were a single game and had some Emerald-esque choices - ergo choosing between Solgaleo and Lunala like you could with Latios and Latias.
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u/nerfzacian Nov 25 '22
I really loved Alola but I don’t think I could ever replay it. I don’t have the same patience now as I did when I was 14
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u/Wrinkled_giga_brain Nov 25 '22
I love alola, it just hurts to replay with the constant interruptions. But when someone uses issues like that to hold against a game i don't think it is really fair to say a game is bad because it is difficult to replay.
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u/greenPotate Gen 8 was good Nov 25 '22
Yeah I loved Alola a ton and SuMo definitely one of my favorites with a fun cast and story. Kalos I'd struggle to recall anybody that isn't Lysandre and I can't recall much of the region location wise besides Eiffel tower.
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u/GoldenVoltZ Nov 25 '22
It’s insane watching individual people fall for this because my opinions on each Gen literally have not changed from when I first played them. None of you mfs are ever going to convince me SwSh were good and the people claiming XY are the new best in the series are insane.
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u/Agent010203 Nov 25 '22
I never played Black and White 1, but I did play both Black and White 2 on release. The only other pokemon game I’d beaten up to that point was Soul Silver (got stuck in Diamond) so I really loved them. But then X and Y came out and I instantly fell in love with Y. It has been my all time favorite pokemon game since the release.
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u/Gears_Of_None Silverware Nov 25 '22
I was still a kid when BW/BW2 came out, they are very nostalgic games for me and I've loved them since day one. They do have their flaws though, I don't like the limited roster or the gen 1 clones personally.
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u/JallerHCIM Nov 25 '22
black and white was super alienating to me as I'd just had my copy of heartgold stolen, where my entire ruby, leafgreen, and pearl collection had been compiled, only to find that none of them were even present in the new game.
I dropped white for a couple years until the X and Y hype train began and I replayed all the previous games. at this point, white and especially white 2 absolutely rocked my world and I couldn't believe how reviled they were. been chasing the high of that white 2 run ever since, the series has never quite topped it, but I adore Alpha Sapphire and Moon
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u/ZombearXD Nov 25 '22
Don’t think I’ve ever actually hated a Pokémon game 🤷🏻♂️ just happy when I get to play a new adventure 😊
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u/MayanMan2012 Nov 26 '22
If it helps, I still don’t like Black & White
Weirdly, the one thing I did love from the start was that it only contained new pokémon!
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u/raypkm Nov 25 '22
I could write a whole dissertation about how the reception to BW changed the course of the franchise forever. It felt like being a Pokémon fan at the time was the hardest it ever was. I cannot tell you how much I appreciated and loved Gen V as a whole. I guess it depended a lot on how old you were; I was around 14 so the more mature story telling and fresh take really resonated with me. For “Genwunners” it did not
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u/Narrow-Gas9493 Nov 25 '22
I like to compare BW to the Star Wars prequel movies. Everyone hated them when they came out but here we are, years later we have people who grew up on them now defending them on the internet and those who lambasted them are trying to use rose colored glasses to act like they were not the same ones who hated them.
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u/sertroll Nov 25 '22
I think X and Y are past the relative time from BW where they started getting praise
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u/DTVMAN_01 Nov 25 '22
I also find that people misremember the reception to x and y everyone loved those games for the first like year or two and then people decided they didn’t like it anymore.