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1st Gen Your starter?

12,284
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11
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  • Seen Oct 22, 2023
As we all know, there were three Pokémon to choose from as your starter in R/B/G—Charmander, Bulbasaur, and Squirtle. So, the question is, which did you pick and why? d: I ended choosing Squirtle, as I find out to be the cutest. Plus, it was also the mascot of my game—Blue version. In my second run, I picked Bulbasaur.
 

Pikelodeon

Woo, pokemans!
20
Posts
10
Years
I only did one run (I was borrowing it from a cousin), and my favorite pokemon was Squirtle/Blastoise. With his amazing bulk and the devastating move Hydro Pump, he can be a killer!
 

Dreg

Done after the GT.
1,496
Posts
12
Years
  • Seen Jul 11, 2016
I always chose Bulbasaur - I had a real liking for Grass types back then. Also, it was to me "which one would have the advantage over Brock?" which narrowed it down to Bulbasaur and Squirtle, so then I decided to stick with Bulbasaur.
 
1,633
Posts
10
Years
  • Age 34
  • Seen Feb 22, 2024
In Blue I chose Squirtle and Red Charmander, unfortunately both games corrupted, at the time Blue broke I was trading with myself in Crystal and the game froze as I was trading Squirtle back and it ended up in the vast abyss never to be seen again. Never got to play through either.

In Yellow I traded over a Seel and Kadabra and those became my starters since Pikachu was kind of weak.
 

inzain786

Learning Before I Post
12
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16
Years
  • Seen Feb 17, 2014
Usually I would go with water, because that always seemed like a safe bet. One time I went with grass, but it was incredibly difficult and I ended up reseting and going with fire.
 

Dragon

lover of milotics
11,151
Posts
10
Years
Ah, for my first run-through of pokemon Blue, I've picked Squirtle. it was because it was a really simple, yet pretty cool pokemon! It was very handy as a water type and it fit well with the team that I was planning at the time - Vileplume, Clefable, Alakazam, etc. I dunno, it's simple design appealed to me, which, while Charmander and Bulbasaur was also really cool, Squirtle just held something pretty dear to me!

Another partial the reason was when I was playing pokemon Yellow, I used to haaaate fighting rock type pokemon, especially the first gym. That's because there wasn't much opportunities to get moves that were super effective against Brock's Rock-type pokemon, so, I had to spend a lot of time training my Nidoran♀ to learn double kick. Training a Butterfree didn't really help me at all because of those Rock-type moves, and using Pikachu to beat them just took too long. Plus, Nidoran♀ wasn't exactly a foolproof plan to beat Brock since his Onix had Bide and there was a chance that Nidoran♀ couldn't OHKO is pokemon, so, yeah.

There was also that dang Rock Tunnel, you know, with all the Hikers and their Ground and Rock pokemon.. ugh, I regretted not training my Bulbasaur or Squirtle that I've gotten on Pokémon Yellow, and those Rock Pokémon were really tough to beat, especially the ones with Self-Destruct that OHKO'd my Pikachu. So there fore, Squirtle was just my way of saying 'REVENGE' to all those ground pokemon, and so that I could breeze through the game much easier!
 
3,518
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19
Years
  • Age 31
  • Seen Nov 9, 2021
First time through I picked Squirtle, naturally because that was the Pokémon on the box. Thereafter I always, always chose Charmander.

Never picked Bulbasaur until I started playing it on-and-off on my Android when I needed time to kill. Never realized it took so long for the *saurs to learn razor leaf <_<
 
55
Posts
10
Years
First time I ever played Red, I picked Charmander. My sister and I had a fight for about half an hour before it, though. She wanted me to pick Squirtle. The fact that she had no interest in Pokemon made me want Charmander even more ^^
 

Urugamosu

Happy, and Searching.
588
Posts
15
Years
I chose Charmer, just because of how it looked. I mean who wouldn't? Then I noticed how hard it would be later on for the first few gyms. I chose Squirtle every time after.
 
5
Posts
10
Years
  • Age 29
  • Seen Mar 3, 2014
My first run was with charmander just cause I really liked the way it looked. I just overtrained it before I did the first gym which made it pretty easy.

I played through the games with every starter (including pikachu), but charmander is still my favourite one. I still remember my epic fight against this bug guy in the veridian forest. I only had 40pp on growl left and he just went on hardening all the time. It took an eternity to take that thing down.
 
122
Posts
10
Years
  • Seen Jan 15, 2017
I remember the very first time I played my Red version. I think I got it the Christmas it was released in the UK. At that point, I was so young I didn't even bother to read anything and just kept clicking AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA haha. I didn't even know how to save. The very first Pokémon I chose was a Bulbasaur, which is probably why he is still one of my favourites to this day.
 

Heather

1,076
Posts
16
Years
  • Seen Jul 17, 2021
I first chose Charmander. Nooby reason why I picked him: He was one of the Pokemon that I saw on TV. Of course playing R/B/G the first gym being a rock type gym made it take a while for me to figure out how to beat it. In the end I found out that I could use a Mankey and use Low Kick.
 
2
Posts
10
Years
  • Age 30
  • Seen May 6, 2015
Well my first ever Pokemon game was yellow, so Pikachu. But when I finally played red, call me a rebel, but I picked Squirtle. Since then I have always Favorited Squirtle and I have to convince myself to use the other two every once in awhile.
 

Olli

I am still bathing in a summer's afterglow
2,583
Posts
13
Years
Jeez, you're asking me to remember 15 years back :O If I know myself well enough though, I probably picked Charmander because it looked the coolest. I mean pretty much everyone did that, and I don't think I thought any different :p But yeah, I don't really remember how much I liked it or how far I got with it, but I doubt it was very far, considering I had just about no skill at all, it was most likely the first game I ever played, and I couldn't read English, let alone Danish :p So yeah, I most likely started a new game because I couldn't beat Brock.

The first one I do remember, though, was also with Charmander, though I was just a biit more experienced that time, and I remember getting surprised by how much damage Charmander actually did to Brock's Pokémon, despite being a Fire type. I mean, I didn't think it would damage it at all. I remember getting through quite a bit of the game though, and ending up with a much loved Charizard :D Don't remember if I beat the E4 though.

Nowadays, you'll usually see me pick Bulbasaur. I used to always pick Squirtle because I knew Water was strong against Rock, and it meant getting through Brock was a lot easier. I'd always thought Grass was weak to Rock though, hence why I never chose Bulbasaur. I knew it'd be good against Misty, but I thought I was gonna have a hard time beating Brock with it. Imagine my surprise when I finally use a Bulbasaur and his moves turn out to be super effective against Brock's stupid Onix. Since then, I've used Bulbasaur in most of my first gen playthroughs, since I usually settle for the easy route, but if I want a challenge, I'll usually go for Charizard instead :p I never really use Squirtle, because he's more like the inbetween one. He isn't too hard to get through the game with, but he isn't too easy either. And I just always preferred the two others more haha
 

Elincia

Arisa Gracia: Protagonist
31
Posts
10
Years
  • Age 28
  • Seen Apr 23, 2016
I also chose Squirtle.
I basically stopped with Charmander against Brock.
And Bulbasaur. You learn Leech Seed.
 
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