u/ThunderD2Player

For reference, I’m new to the franchise. I’ve played through Gen 1-7, with only one clear per game under my belt. Ive played through the main story and post game of each, and just recently completed soul silver (as of 3 hours ago).

I didn’t play the original variants of red/blue and silver/gold, rather, I played fire red and soul silver. For Gen 3, I played both emerald and alpha sapphire.

Now in my reviews, I’m just sharing my experience. I’m not really accounting for the era the games came out in. I understand that they innovated upon the base provided by games past, but I think that’s more for a tier list, which I don’t really think I’m qualified to do.

I’ll provide these brief reviews in the order of the games I play through.

—————————

Pokemon Emerald: this was my introduction to the series. And yeah, I had a blast. The game felt a bit easy at first, but the fire gym forced me to build a diverse team rather than just only using my starter. Over all, I didnt have any major complaints about the game. In hindsight, there are definitely aspects of the game that I probably wouldn’t enjoy as much now that I have played more modern Pokemon games, but at the time, I really enjoyed just catching Pokemon. I did feel that there wasn’t really any challenging boss fights, but man, the post game really destroyed me. There were these battle camps that were really tough. Over all, solid game, and one that I would consider replaying using different Pokemon. Personally, 7/10.

Pokemon fire red: I felt this game was far worse than emerald, and I couldn’t really shake that feeling for the entire run. The enemy Pokemon weren’t threatening at all, and the Pokemon I caught just felt a tier below what I grew used to in emerald. For example, I went from swellow to pidgeot. It felt horrible. Then all the sudden, I traded for a jinx, where single handedly destroyed 90% of the game. It felt like the game just didn’t have a clear direction. Outside of Alakazam at a couple different points, I literally can’t think of a fight that gave me any enjoyment. Also, there wasnt like a main story? Like I guess it was the original game, and maybe the norm back then was just to “catch em all”, but it kinda made for a lackluster experience. I did personally enjoy team rocket a bit more than the two emerald teams. Personally though, the game was a 4/10. Probably not a game I’d go back to.

Pokemon White: ok so I really have nothing but good things to say about this game (except for like maybe one thing). Having endless Tms, the visuals, and the Pokemon themselves feeling strong was sooooo good. I was starting to get bored of Pokemon, but man did this hook me right back in. Also the story was like 10x better than the other games so far? I’d say the only downside was the difficulty of the game? But this was flipped on its head with a crazy hard final boss fight with the plasma team leader (or I guess the guy that was controlling them behind the scenes) and a post game that was certainly expansive. Loved it. If the game was more consistent in its difficulty, I’d give it a 10/10. I give it a 9/10. Snivy was by far my favorite starter up until this point, and it might still be my favorite.

Pokemon Black 2: ok so I played this game pretty much immediately after White because I enjoyed the first game so much. I think this game was even better? Like there were soooo many Pokemon to catch, to the point where my team was constantly rotating Pokemon in and out between each city. And the difficulty was much better. The story was solid and used the first games foundations greatly. Also merging the two legendary dragons was sick. The post game was initially not enticing, as I saw it mainly took me back to the starting locations of Pokemon White, but that line of thinking was quickly changed when I realized how much stuff there actually was to do. Legendary catching, battling N, battling the weird scientist dude from team plasma, battling the previous champion, the black tower… yeah this game might have been the first perfect experience I’ve had so far with the Pokemon games. I will absolutely replay this at some point. Probably with tepig since I haven’t tried him yet. 10/10 game.

Pokemon Y: so I wanted to play this to try mega evolution out. Yeah it’s super friggin sick. I also like fairy type. The new pokemon in this game were also super cool, but I found it a bit odd that none of them got mega evolutions. I also enjoyed how the game just played. It definitely felt like an upgrade. I liked the game a lot in general. However, this was the first time in any game where I was not just at the level of the elite 4, but half my team was higher than the final boss? The game was ridiculously easy in my opinion. Also, the post game was not really a thing, though I was super surprised to find mewtwo and even get to mega evolve it. Team flare was kindaaaa ehhhhhh. I thought the game also just had too much dialogue, and not enough exploring. I think the biggest problem for me was not being able to play through the story with a larger pool of potential mega evolutions. Like that’s the whole thing that made me want to play it, and I couldn’t use any of em during the main story. Odd choice by the devs. Over all, still enjoyable. Probably a 6.5/10. Probably not going to replay it.

Pokemon alpha sapphire: Amazing game. From start to finish. Best post game maybe? I don’t really know. That bonus story line with the dragon and the alien pokemon was kind of nuts. Also the game had hard fights. The champion in particular had me on knives edge with his mega pokemon. This was just kind of a perfected version of emerald for me. I thought I was gonna be bored, but I was entertained the entire time. Even reusing pokemon from emerald on my team felt new. I literally don’t think I have any complaints about this game. I’m sure there are some specific things that more adept Pokemon players notice that I didn’t, but uhhhh yeah this is a 10/10 for me. 100% will replay it. I don’t think I could go back to emerald after playing this.

Pokemon Platinum: So I played this next because everyone and their mother seems to love this game the most… and I kinda get it? But I don’t? Like the game felt small to me compared to what I previously went through. With that being said, the game was pure quality. The champion destroyed me on my first run, which is something that has never happened in any previous game. The Pokemon themselves were really cool looking (maybe the coolest generation of pokemon?). I did feel that much of the middle parts of the story were kinda boring, and I struggled to really find new Pokemon that seemed interesting or cool enough to use over my current team. Not to mention, but it felt like every Pokemon had to be traded to evolve. I’d say one of the bigger dampers to my experience with this game was experiencing the lower QoL features (TMs were back to being limited, certain moves were less useful, etc.) WITH THAT BEING SAID, the reverse world was super sick, the area design felt on par with White and black 2, the pokemon that I actually committed to using might still be among my favorite pokemon (shout out to frosslass for dealing with garchomp), and the post game was quite good. I’d also say that the game had an air of mystery to it? Like maybe it’s all the space time stuff idk. Over all, 8/10 for me. Would be willing to replay it.

Pokemon Sun: This is a tough one. On one hand, as far as regions go, this might be my favorite. In terms of story, I was sooooo not interested, and at times, annoyed. And it really sucks, because I think literally every new pokemon was cool, the game had some challenge, and i found the removal of gyms in favor of strong boss pokemon kinda neat. The post game though, was ehhhh. Like it existed. I don’t really have much to say, especially because of this next game coming up on the list… 6/10 though, highest I’ll go.

Pokemon ultra Sun: ok so I genuinely thought this was like a sequel, kinda like black 2 for Pokemon white. Man was it not lollll. With that being said, on a second run through, there were tons of notable changes. And man, the legendary might have been the toughest boss fight of my life. It took like 5 attempts to get it done. Just by playing the main story (even though it’s a bit annoying at times with the characters), I already liked it a little bit more than Pokemon Sun, but the post game is what sold me. The whole wormhole thing was crazy cool, and team rocket returning with all the other evil teams? And they have legendaries? Oh and mega mewtwo? Yeah the post game was sick. Over all, 8/10. I could honestly go higher, but I think I got similar enjoyment out of platinum, so I’ll leave it around there.

Pokemon Soul Silver: my god, this may have been least favorite Pokemon experience ever. First, the good stuff. The region was cool? I guess? Not as interesting as the others though. Having the fire red region was a massive shock to me. And fighting the same trainer you played at in the fire red game was bonkers. Like that was crazy. Level 80s when I had just gotten to low 50s was a crazy challenge. The bad is just about everything else. I didn’t find as many new pokemon as I was used to in other games, and the ones that I did find kinda sucked (outside of my starter and like one or two others). I ended up using something comparable to my fire red team? Also man, was there literally no story line at all… and team rocket just became bums. I also thought the gym leaders were some of the easiest thus far, though this may be due to me not being as bad as I used to be at Pokemon. The worst part of the game? Leveling. By far. I had grown used to being able to use more than just 6 pokemon in a playthrough, and being able to float somewhere around the level of opponents generally. Which I enjoyed, because I thought the whole point of these games were to catch pokemon. It felt like soul silver, specifically this game, was the “anti-catch ‘em all” game. Because 90% of the pokemon just kinda are boring to use, and you are already gonna have to grind a little just to have 6 pokemon alone up to level. Id give this game a 5/10, but purely for the final boss fight and the sheer number of legendaries, I’ll give it a 6/10.

Sooooo that’s how I felt about the games I played lmao. I’ll prob get around to the switch games once I buy a switch 2. Hope yall enjoyed my yap. Please flame me in the replies.

Team for red battle?

My review of Pokemon games