General Pokémon Thread

[Pirez]

Oh by the way, remember our discussion about meritocracy the other day?

Well guess who's been a good parasite

[EdgyRabbid]

that’s insane! Good job holy fuck

[Greengoop]

I could barely name 100 nowadays, great work Pirez!

[Hunchman801]

That's impressive. I think I still know all first 151 Pokémon but I would inevitably forget some of them when trying to name them all.

[The Jonster]

If I tried the quiz I'd get a fair amount, probably would need some tries to get all though. Nice job Pirez

[Serza5]

Oh by the way, remember our discussion about meritocracy the other day?

Well guess who's been a good parasite

Capture d'écran 2025-08-14 103954.png

Now this I need to try.

[Master]

So Legends ZA is coming out this month, at one point I was genuinely excited for it after how much I enjoyed Legends Arceus, but as we've learnt more and more I'm actually contemplating whether it's worth even getting at launch. I've lost interest.

Anyone else feeling the same or is there still some excitement for this?

[Rsandee]

I used to have a great memory of pokémon and their names but I've since lost it
I've been playing Pokemon Red and I've been having a blast, completed it with my team consisting of Charizard, Exeggutor, Nidoking, Jolteon, Dragonair (has blizzard) and Gyarados. I should've switched Dragonair with Dodrio, but I wanted it to get the XP to evolve it into Dragonite.
Playing some Pokemon Emerald now

[Pirez]

Aside from the Kalos starter mega-evolution being restricted to online subscriptor I have no issues with this. Still looking forward to try it.

It specifically intreagues me because it implements the battle system I thought Arceus needed to have.

[Master]

I used to have a great memory of pokémon and their names but I've since lost it
I've been playing Pokemon Red and I've been having a blast, completed it with my team consisting of Charizard, Exeggutor, Nidoking, Jolteon, Dragonair (has blizzard) and Gyarados. I should've switched Dragonair with Dodrio, but I wanted it to get the XP to evolve it into Dragonite.
Playing some Pokemon Emerald now

Funnily enough, despite the fact that they love Kanto nostalgia, the closest I've ever played to Gen 1 is probably HGSS, and that's by virtue of Gen 2 including Kanto. I've never played any Gen 1 or remake of it. Are you playing on original hardware or is this through emulation?

Aside from the Kalos starter mega-evolution being restricted to online subscriptor I have no issues with this. Still looking forward to try it.

It specifically intreagues me because it implements the battle system I thought Arceus needed to have.

I think for me the issue is that it feels a bit...bland? I don't know what it is, but it just doesn't draw me in the same way, granted it could be because I enjoyed the catching mechanics of Arceus, and the battles felt more supplementary rather than intrinsic. Whereas ZA seems to be more battle focused rather than catching focused. I'll probably check and see how it fares at launch, but I don't think it's one I'll be getting until I've got an idea of how it feels.

[Rsandee]

Are you playing on original hardware or is this through emulation?

I'll answer this as best I can:



They are definitely worth replying imo, HG/SS was an amazing 10/10 remake but I also like to play the janky old versions if only for them simply being like a time capsule.

[Master]

Truth, I'm left in awe at just expensive old Pokemon carts are whenever I pop into CEX, I don't blame the use of an alternative approach. I have been left burnt out of modern Pokemon lately, perhaps a replay of the older games to see whether or not I'm blinded by nostalgia isn't a bad idea actually...

And yeah, it is impressive just how much refinement the games had over the course of the first few generations.

[EdgyRabbid]

TBH I might be dumb but I have been told to play through pokemon platinum instead of pearl? Personally I haven't encountered any problems but people say its glitchy? What is up with that?

Also its a bit funny looking back and seeing that they had to make a whole new game to fix problems with the older ones. How funny.

[Master]

Pearl's fine, as far as I can remember there wasn't any glitches that affected me back when I played it. It's likely Platinum was recommended because Pokemon games used to do this thing back then known as "Third Versions." Whereby after releasing the initial pair of games (Red/Blue, Gold/Silver, Ruby/Sapphire, Diamond/Pearl), they'd eventually release a "Third Version" that had enhancements and extra features (Yellow, Crystal, Emerald, Platinum). They're less "fixing problems" and more "expansions" if anything. It's probably the reason we don't see third versions in that guise anymore, as DLC has filled that niche.

I'm in two minds of the practice, frankly I think we should really do away with the idea of paired versions in general now, there's so many Pokemon out there that artificially restraining what you can get with paired versions isn't really gonna make things any easier if you want to catch all of them, you're still going to need to trade. But as dated as the practice feels, I do still appreciate the novelty of it, at least.

[Rsandee]

I do agree that the trading mechanic feels outdated and kinda money-grubby by today's standards, but I am still sympathetic to them because they do encourage trading. I guess some third evolutions already encourage that though so you might be right on that.

I also recommend Platinum above Pearl, simply because Diamond and Pearl are considered to be the most annoying Pokemon games to go back to after you've played other Pokemon games as the gameplay is so so so slow in comparison. Platinum greatly sped up most mechanics like battling. In the end it doesn't really matter though, especially if you want to experience the region through multiple versions.

[Pirez]

whenever I pop into CEX

Huhuh, he popped into CEX


Funnily enough, I've never played Platinum, mostly because it is really expensive. I'm not against emulation by any means but I have a copy a diamond which I can play and enjoy whenever I want.

But got damn slashing them Blisseys be long.

[Master]

Ahh CEX jokes, they never get old...

And yeah I didn't really mind it much cause I was a kid, but waiting for those health bars is certainly an experience. I'm glad later gens decided to speed that aspect up.

[Pirez]

The Nintendo DS/PS2 era was a weird one for sure. Accross many games you'd feel like devs suddenly discovered the concept of QoL when it wasn't exactly an issue in former generations.

[Master]

Quite so, I think it's where games really started to become truly mainstream (it's telling that those two consoles currently stand as the best selling consoles in their respective - home/portable - categories, well, until the Switch manages to catch up anyways).

So I wonder if it's the greater audience and reach that drove developers to be more stringent on quality as there'd be more exposure and rival developers to compete with. Or maybe I'm just nostalgic as that's the era I grew up in xD

[Pirez]

Since I was elusive on Dah Yoo Game for comedic purposes, here are my thoughts on Pokémon Z-A, spoiler-free. I've not completed the game by any means anyway.

First of all, I've seen multiple reviews that the game was marred by technical issues (and that anyone who denies it is a Nintendo gobsucker but that's the nature of the discourse nowadays). I suspect they're playing on the Switch 1 version and that this version is poorly optimised, because I've been playing the NS2 version and it's perfectly fine and smooth. It retains its anime style which is bound to never evolve at this point but otherwise Poké-Paris is very beautiful, if a bit samy. I get that Illumis in X/Y was repetitive since the game was rushed out the door but there were ways to incorporate more of Paris' diversity inside the world of Pokémon. There's more to the city than Haussmanian buildings. But that's not a huge complain.

The story is absolutely bare-bones and as complex as Duck Hunt, it's a Pokémon game after all, and it holds your hand way too much which makes it at odds with the Legends style of game design that wants to be more of a Breath of The Wild approach to exploration, which Arceus did very well, so in Z-A it feels like a downgrade. Unless I'm somehow still at the tutorial.

But for me the biggest issue of Arceus was that it broke all codes except combat which almost felt begrudgingly added because otherwise it wouldn't be a Pokémon game. Z-A changes that by shattering turn bu turn, but alas, it still has major paths towards improvement. It wants to dissociate player health and Pokémon health and have certain Pokémon attack the player instead of the Pokémon. Fine in theory but there's no way of giving your Pokémon any sense of direction, and your lovely creature always gravitates towards you when it's idle, which means deadlier attacks always end up hitting the both of you. Since there's no possible strategy in Pokémon placement, combat ends up being the mashing of attack whenever you have a cooldown ready, and on some occasion it seem like button mashing. That's my biggest disappointment with the game.

Still competent on a technical level, but doesn't exactly grip you. Meganium is still the 2nd best Pokémon ever (The first, Quilava, isn't in the game), and Mega-Meganium is ever cuter that that. 7/10.