Official Pokémon Discussion Thread

[Kong Wen]

Also neat that the eShop versions of R/B/Y will be Bank compatible. I'm not sure I'll be buying any of those, but it's still a nice feature.

I am halfway tempted to buy one just to see what all the fuss is about, although I'm 90% certain than 90% of the fuss is a "you had to be there at the time" kind of thing.

Have you never played any Pokémon game? If you want to start playing Pokémon, there's very little reason to start with RBY. It's significantly worse than its successors in most ways. Still a fine game, but not great. I'm tempted to buy Pokémon Blue, since it was the first video game I ever owned (and I have since lost it), but its value beyond nostalgia is minimal. If you want a good entry point to the series, I'd say Black or White is not a bad place to start. Or even the new ones. There's no need to know much about the preceding games to jump into any of the new ones.

On the other hand, I suppose if you've never played a Pokémon game, it would be better to play RBY first since they only get better and playing any of the others would make it hard to go back to.

And really, at just ten bucks, it's not breaking the bank to give a, if nothing else, significant game series and honest try.

I've played Pearl, Platinum, and SoulSilver. The former two were agonizingly slow, but that was a technical issue. The latter game was rather enjoyable up until the postgame, when it just became tedious.

But I like retro portable games, and I don't think it being old and clunky would be a huge obstacle since I was already playing games long before this one even came out.

[Claytone]

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I've played Pearl, Platinum, and SoulSilver. The former two were agonizingly slow, but that was a technical issue. The latter game was rather enjoyable up until the postgame, when it just became tedious.

But I like retro portable games, and I don't think it being old and clunky would be a huge obstacle since I was already playing games long before this one even came out.

I'd probably call SoulSilver my 2nd favorite Pokémon game. Very fun.

And in that case, definitely look into it! And by the way, I didn't mean that it was old and clunky in terms of playability (as you know, I'm not easily deterred by retro games either), just that it's got incredibly dated Pokémon mechanics. It has 3 fewer types than the later games, some of the type matchups are different, and it doesn't have abilities (my poor Gengar can get hit by Earthquake ), natures, EVs, TMs aren't infinite use, etc. It's not something that will be noticed terribly much on a casual playthrough, though, which is why I plan to probably play through it armed with, almost by definition, the most nostalgia I could possibly have for a game.

[Kong Wen]

It has 3 fewer types than the later games, some of the type matchups are different, and it doesn't have abilities (my poor Gengar can get hit by Earthquake ), natures, EVs, TMs aren't infinite use, etc. It's not something that will be noticed terribly much on a casual playthrough, though, which is why I plan to probably play through it armed with, almost by definition, the most nostalgia I could possibly have for a game.

Those changes sound good, neutral, bad, good, great, fine, and etc. respectively. I might like the old ones more than the new ones! As long as combat isn't super-slow and bogged down by waiting for animations.

[Claytone]

It has 3 fewer types than the later games, some of the type matchups are different, and it doesn't have abilities (my poor Gengar can get hit by Earthquake ), natures, EVs, TMs aren't infinite use, etc. It's not something that will be noticed terribly much on a casual playthrough, though, which is why I plan to probably play through it armed with, almost by definition, the most nostalgia I could possibly have for a game.

Those changes sound good, neutral, bad, good, great, fine, and etc. respectively. I might like the old ones more than the new ones! As long as combat isn't super-slow and bogged down by waiting for animations.

IIRC, you can turn off animations, if you want.

[The Shoemaker]

This should liven up the 3DS's holiday this year. I know some people were hoping for Pokémon Z, but a new generation (if this is what it is) sounds way better to me.

I won't be grabbing the VC releases, I suspect they will be a bit too old school for me, especially considering how much I like the features added in the last two games. Glad to see them there though, first time a main line Pokémon game has ever been on the VC.

[SkyPikachu]

I hated the new pokemon it does to much and there's to much wow look how pretty and graphics that it just feels weird.

I've only ever played a emulated copy of yellow and had a speed button to make training easier.

The GBA ones are good and being able to run makes life easier.

[Claytone]

So I did end up downloading Blue, and I am surprised to find that I can't put it down! I thought I'd be bothered by the old, objectively worse stats system, but it's really not that big of a deal. I've still been able to form a party of Pokémon I like (Gengar, Gyarados, Golem, Pidgeot, Snorlax, Dragonite, once I fully evolve everything), which is really all it takes for me to have a good time with the game. Pre-physical/special-split Pokémon is still absurd to me, and the lack of any decent Ghost moves sucks (not to mention the mind-bogglingly obvious bug that Ghost does 0x against Psychic when it should do 2x), and single-use TMs is just stupid (especially in a game where Pokémon learn so few moves by leveling up), but in spite of all of that, I'm having fun. I think I may even try to finish the Pokédex this time, which is something I've never done. It would be nice to finally be able to say I've finished my very first childhood video game 100%.

In any case, definitely enjoying it. If anyone else is playing, I'd love to hear how your team is coming along!

Edit: Also, I've been playing in Spanish. I have really enjoyed doing so in the past two Pokémon games (X/Y, OR/AS), so I'm glad they also re-released R/B/Y in multiple languages. The vocabulary of the games is rudimentary enough that I'm never lost, but also advanced enough that I come away having learned quite a bevy of new words every time I play one. Not to mention it keeps me sharp on the language despite not having had a class in it since 2011. If nothing else, it's a fun way to add a new element to a game I know better than just about any other.

[Kong Wen]

So GO got me re-interested in playing Red Blue Yellow, and I visited the eShop, and looooooooooooooooooooool the game costs $12.49!!!??? WTF? I was expecting it to be $5 like any normal VC game of that quality. I have a copy of the cart with a sketchy battery so even then I was only really going to toss them a fiver for convenience. Instead I ended up downloading Severed, a stylish brand new game for a couple bucks more. Someone please send me a reminder when these ROMs get a deep discount.

[Kiwi the Tortoise]

So GO got me re-interested in playing Red Blue Yellow, and I visited the eShop, and looooooooooooooooooooool the game costs $12.49!!!??? WTF? I was expecting it to be $5 like any normal VC game of that quality. I have a copy of the cart with a sketchy battery so even then I was only really going to toss them a fiver for convenience. Instead I ended up downloading Severed, a stylish brand new game for a couple bucks more. Someone please send me a reminder when these ROMs get a deep discount.

They are on sale once in a while
The reason for the price is that it's not just an emulation, they got them to work with the 3DS infrastructure to trade (most notably the Pokebank).
So there is some extra effort.

[MerlinDrazziw]

They're on sale here with 30% off the normal € 9.99. Red and blue are the older ones, but I think I would choose yellow first. Don't think I'm ready for a game like that though.