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3rd Gen What? Golbat stopped evolving!

Sydian

fake your death.
33,379
Posts
16
Years
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As we know, FRLG are remakes of the original games Red and Green. Games that were released after the originals added in new evolutions for some original Pokemon, such as Crobat evolving from Golbat. However in FRLG, the need for the National Dex was very enforced, unlike in Ruby and Sapphire, the first games of the third generation. When trying to evolve a Pokemon like Golbat or Chansey, the game will not let them evolve into Crobat and Blissey respectively if the player does not have the National Dex.

Do you think this was fair, and a good way to stay true to the originals? Do you think it shouldn't have been included? Was there a better way to go around this, but still include the need for the National Dex?

Clearly they learned their lesson, as seen with evolving Pokemon in HGSS...
 

vaporeon7

My life would suck without you
5,143
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This was more frustrating than having people's brat children knock over the itunes card stand at work and not even yell at them for it. I really hated it. I hated geting told my Chansey was going to evolve every level, and stop. THey should've just kept with what they did in HGSS, they did it right then.
 
10,173
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17
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  • Age 37
  • Seen today
It actually kept me from using a Golbat in FR/LG, since I didn't want to deal with every level having Golbat enter the evolution screen and being unable to evolve. Very annoying. I can understand why they did so, since the games were remakes of versions that were around before these evolutions, but still. It limits the choices of Pokemon that can be used if one doesn't want to deal with the constant interruptions every level.
 
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I hated this little feature. I did a nuzlocke on firered (my first one ever) and I worked so hard to train up my zubat who i go tin mount moon. Zubats are impossible to train in gen III at that level, since they only know leech life or something. And then. once my golbat was happy enough, she started to evolve... and they made it look like she was going to... AND THEN SHE DIDN'T.

So basically I hate this feature even if it makes sense I still I just omg that ruined everything and I hate it. I think they should have done it like it was done in HGSS where you could evolve mons to their "new" evolutions.
 

Elaitenstile

I am legend
1,908
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11
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  • Age 24
  • Seen Feb 27, 2015
I coveted this little feature, since I would have found a bug but... hey, really these guys are awesome! Like the experience GolurkIsDaBomb narrated, it also broke people's hearts, but fortunately I was patient when I trained Chansey, so I didn't get surprised when it didn't evolve after four levels of good training and legit happiness.
 
8,571
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14
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This really bothered me, since I'd never really gotten the chance to use a Crobat in Gold, I made a point to try to get one in FireRed. I honestly didn't think evolving my Golbat would work until I beat the Elite Four, but lo and behold, it started trying to evolve much earlier, only to leave me disappointed.

I understand that they didn't want to tamper with the original 151 in the Pokedex (and I don't blame them), but I would've much rather have had Golbat not even try to evolve than getting teased like that.
 

Kikaito plush

Angeline plushxKikaito plush
5,557
Posts
14
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I thought it strange when my Golbat stopped evolving when it was going to evolve.
I looked up why it stopped on Gamefaqs and still was upset by this. It did ruin some of the game though.
 

Satoshi Ookami

Memento Mori
14,254
Posts
15
Years
I was amused by this when lot of people were asking what's going on in ROM hacking section =D
So as a hacker, I would say, they should just omit this...
As a player, I would want to enjoy the remake as close as possible so I would leave this feature there.
 
35
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12
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I was SO frustrated when my shiny Golbat couldn't evolve into a Crobat. When I found out that you had to get the National Dex, I just transferred him to Diamond and from Diamond to White 2. It was such a pain to get that green Golbat to evolve.
 
27
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11
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This should not have happened because you could train a Chansey to high happiness and have to keep it in your E4 party when it might not be much good
 

Pinkie-Dawn

Vampire Waifu
9,528
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11
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I never experienced this issue since I never used a Golbat nor a Chansey on my LG team. This sounds like another issue with the Gen 1 remake in general.
 

Guy

just a guy
7,128
Posts
15
Years
This was probably one of my bigger complaints about FRLG was how they treated Pokémon from later generations like they never existed. I understood GameFreak's effort to keep FireRed and LeafGreen as close as possible to the originals, but to prevent certain Pokémon from evolving to their next generation stages was a silly thing to do especially with how they went about doing it.

It's not like no one knew about these Pokémon at the time, so why try and stop it? I don't know, I never really got why they did it. Thankfully, they learned from their mistakes when developing HG/SS.
 
50,218
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13
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Yeah I was never fond of the fact they made Chansey and Golbat not able to evolve was almost like how you couldn't evolve Eevee into Espeon or Umbreon without trading to R/S/E first. I sorta guess Game Freak was trying to be close to the original Red/Green/Blue but preventing evolution to the new stages was like a slap in the face to those who were expecting them to evolve.

I'm glad HeartGold and SoulSilver allowing evolution of the Pokemon that evolve by learning a certain move showed Game Freak learned their lesson.
 
788
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17
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  • Age 29
  • Seen today
Unlike most people in this thread, I really liked this feature, and I didn't like the fact that they didn't include it in HGSS. As much as I loved my Ambipom in HG, and I know I would've never used Aipom if I had to wait until after the E4 to evolve it, it just always felt sort of off to have Gen IV Pokemon running around in the main story of Johto.
 
131
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11
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  • Seen Jan 28, 2015
i really didn't notice. the whole reason i played Firered was ONLY because the graphics were better than the original red. I wasn't interested in the new generation pokemon when i played it. I played with the Original Pokemon and made sure to play with the same glory as i would have had i been born five years younger
 
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11
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  • Seen Jul 17, 2016
It never really bothered me that much but I always questioned how hard it could have been to code it so they only show evolution after the National Dex is obtained, as in it becomes activated.
 
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17
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I think it was a good thing as it made it a 100% honest remake, though I have personally not encountered the problem.

I suppose if the evolution didn't show up at all it would be better.

This really annoyed my friend the other week when he didn't realise that Kingdra was introduced in Gen II which halted his in-game strategy to complete the game a large amount.
 

Bounsweet

Fruit Pokémon
2,103
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16
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  • Seen Sep 17, 2018
I understand that they were trying to be true to the originals but I think that was a silly thing to do, imo. You could easily trade National Dex Pokemon to FRLG from RSE or something and it would just come up unregistered, I don't get why they had to take out the evolutions :\
 

Olli

I am still bathing in a summer's afterglow
2,583
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13
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I never actually experienced this myself, as I'd never trained neither Chansey or Golbat to evolve in my Leaf Green, although I learned about the "feature" a while back. I see what Gamefreak were trying to do with it, however, the idea of remaking is to get them up to date after all, and that means including what the other games provided us with, ie new types, new Pokemon, etc. If they went solely for a graphical update, then sure, it'd be acceptable, but the addition of the whole Ruby and Sapphire thing makes it clear that they weren't, and that kinda contradicts the whole thing about staying true to the originals.

I mean, of course they're added through the National Dex later on, but it wouldn't harm anything to include a few extra Pokemon because they were evolutions added in a later gen. And if they really wanted the part before beating the league to be an exact copy of the first games, just with the updated graphics and mechanics, they really should've waited with the whole Sevii Isles thing till after as well, not right after the 7th gym. And don't freaking move Moltres! :[
 
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