To those of you who fell for my April Fools joke… you got pranked! Ha! To those of you who didn’t fall for it, it seems as though you have a discerning eye that managed to be able to see through to the truth of the matter by looking at a calendar and making an educated guess. It is possible you managed to see my masterfully hidden message as well, but I find that very unlikely. However, it is true that I am feeling pressed for time this month in part thanks to Monster Hunter Rise and also in part thanks to Edmund McMillen or as I like to call him: evil incarnate. Not only does this man add on yet another DLC to The Binding of Isaac: Rebirth which he knows I have to get, but he adds two hundred more achievements for me to get so now I have to fully complete this game for the fourth time. Or is it the fifth time? I don’t know anymore. Anyway, that is where my gaming life is at right now. So I decided to fall back on Pokémon and even do a whole month of it this time. I figure I can just go through each generation one at a time and give my general thoughts on each generation since mechanically the games have barely differed from each other since the original Pokémon Red and Pokémon Green first came out in 1996 (Pokémon Blue if you aren’t Japanese). So with all that being said let’s get into it.
Now I just have to say that I forgot how absolutely broken the first generation was to play. It isn’t broken so much in the unplayable sense though. It is more like one of those games where you try to see just how much you can break it. Usually that lasts until after one too many encounters with MissingNo. It really makes you appreciate how far we’ve come. Like can we take a second to thank the developers for adding an experience bar in later games, because man is that something you really need in an RPG based solely around leveling up. And let’s not forget the psychic types essentially breaking the game because back then they did not have a difference between special attack or special defense and so all specials were so broken that psychics basically won you the game. I’m assuming the broken special stat is why people picked Charmander as their starter. I will admit that I rarely pick Charmander because he starts out at a disadvantage and then becomes essentially busted by the end of the game. He’s fun to use if you want to break the game which is really the best way to enjoy the first games and yet I have never really felt the need to have a Charizard to do it. Maybe it’s because I am too lazy to catch a water Pokémon that I need to teach the move Surf to so I can make progress. Sometimes I choose Bulbasaur too since he makes catching Pokémon at least a bit easier, not that it makes much of a difference. After all, you can just wait until later to clone a bunch of master balls instead.
Being honest here, I don’t have a lot of attachment to the first generation. I started with Generation II since the first generation came out the year I was born. I do appreciate how it started the series, but the game still has some issues that won’t be resolved until later games and so there isn’t much reason to go back to it. That is unless you actually want to try and catch them all since this was back when it was actually realistic enough for you to do that. And if I’m being really honest with myself, despite the fact that the game balance is terrible I still have more fun playing it than I do some of the newer generations. You know why? It’s because this game has teeth. It can be unforgiving and cheap with its RNG and some Pokémon are way stronger than others, but that adds to the challenge of it. Many recent game have had to rely on specific gimmicks to feel more challenging so its nice to go back and have an adventure that makes you feel like you’re going to be the very best etc. etc. you know how the song goes. So I take back what I said earlier. It is fine to go back to Generation I to have a bit of a challenge. Sure, there are most balanced games to play, but where’s your sense of adventure. And hey if you are really looking for some other fun challenges you should play some of the spinoffs like Pokémon Snap and Pokémon Stadium. Catching them all with a camera is a fun challenge and the battle tournaments are quite lively and entertaining. It is weird how it took years for one of these games to get any sort of sequel treatment though. Just saying. That about sums up my thoughts on Gen I. Again I don’t have a ton of experience with this generation, so I can only talk about so much. However, that will most certain change next time. Tune in to see if I pick the fire starter next time or settle for the water starter out of laziness once again.
That Casual Gamer Guy 