Traveling as a pack

[Fluffyunicornz]

Hello everyone! It is currently 2 am and i have something i really wanna discuss. Ok, here i go. Back in 2003 i was devastated when i found out my precious 1st and 2nd gen Pokemon could not be transferred to my first Pokemon Ruby game. I got over it once i played Ruby and enjoyed it so much however. I played Ruby nonstop(400+ hours on it). When LG/FR came out i got Leafgreen and was so excited to be able to get the first gen Pokemon i never could get on Ruby! Lastly, around 2005 i believe i got Emerald and played that...ALOT(700+ hours). Finally in 2007 I got what i thought was the best thing ever, a somewhat 3D Pokemon game, Pokemon Pearl. Once i finished the game i brought all my Pokemon from Ruby, Leafgreen, and Emerald. I was so excited to see my good old Pokemon on my new game :'). With Platinum and Heartgold, i actually took the time to catch hundreds of hoothoots/starlys to trade my Pokemon over, because i hated the fact knowing my old pals were stuck on a game i didn't play as much anymore. Finally, when Black came out i waited months before i gave in and bought it. I finished it and used the PokeTransfer to once again, bring back my old Pokemon. Lately, i have been thinking, if anything EVER happened to my current save file(Pokemon Black for this instance) i actually wouldn't know what to do. This sounds silly as after all..Pokemon is a game and the actual creatures are pixels on a screen...why am i so attached? I feel as if i would just quit Pokemon forever. I am super careful with my stuff, but you never know.It just makes me scared thinking about it. Anyways, for anyone who actually read this entire post, thank you, i wanted to get this off my chest. So, i want to know if anyone else does this. Do you bring your 7-9 year old Pokemon with you, or leave them in the dust? Do you do anything special to make sure your current file is never corrupted/ruined? Please let me know.
-Sam

[Xeninacra]

It's actually interesting what you do with your Pokemon. I do it in a different way, 'cause I think that the Pokemon I've caught in a certain game must remain in that game. So I've never sent my Pokemon from Diamond to SoulSilver or Black. I keep them where I caught them.

I used to do what you do when I bought Diamond and beat it, though. I mean, I sent all my Pokemon from Ruby, FireRed and Emerald to Diamond via Pal Park. From there, I didn't like the idea of my Pokemon leaving their original game, so I don't do it anymore.

But what I do to keep my Pokemon safe and to make sure I'll never lose them, it's to back up the saved game file, so in case of loss I know I can get them back at any time.

[LightningAlex]

Well, getting attached to a Pokemon is nothing abnormal, most of us are attached to a few of our Pokemon in someway. It's not just the Pokemon themselves, you've worked very hard and very long for your Pokemon, and hard work is always something to be proud of, even if it's just progress in a game. If you somehow lose your Pokemon, all that work will go to waste.... But it's just as you said, they're pixels on a screen, so it's not really worth not playing the game ever again. If it happens, you'd just have to start again...

[Fluffyunicornz]

Yeah, i guess you guys are right. But, what do you mean by backing up a game save file?

[AzaleaLightning]

I leave them in the dust, I have maybe three or four 7-9 year old Pokemon on my Pearl Version that I brought over for Dex completion/nostalgia reasons.

Other than that, they're usually history if I decide to reset a game, unless I have some seriously good Pokemon on it, then I trade them over.

[Patchisou Yutohru]

I didn't do it in Gen IV because I just... I was stupid. I knew about the feature, but I didn't really care all that much about it. In retrospect, I really wish I did.

Right now, though, I'm planning on doing it with my Emerald version but I need to go get a charger for my old DS since I can't find that. I kind of neglected my DS after I got my 3DS, but I can't migrate with a 3DS, so... yeah. Emerald is my only game I have left (bar my Silver version) that I still have with me. I don't know what happened to my Red version, my Blue version, my Gold version, my Crystal version, my Sapphire version, my FireRed version, or my LeafGreen version. But I'm asking around my social group (both offline and online) for a FireRed version I can restart and beat, then migrate them on over to my White or Black version, and then migrate those over to Black 2 and White 2 when they come out and keep them for generations to come.

[MIAU]

That's... wow. I've only ever played White, actually started playing Pokemon this summer, but I'm actually quite moved even though I can't relate, because the only Pokemon I've ever had are in my current White run. I bet your Pokemon bring back a lot of memories from almost 10 years ago, so I can understand why you're so attached to them. Actually it's not the pixels you care about, but those hundreds and hundreds of hours you've spent playing; I hope you never lose your save

[Element0]

I'm exactly like that. I have a dozen or so pokemon that I have been migrating from Leafgreen all the way to White, in particular, the first pokemon I ever had, Venasaur. I even keep a special box just for pokemon that have been migrated from my Leafgreen. Honestly, I don't know what I would do if my save data became corrupt. I do know that I love these pixels very much.

[PlatinumDude]

When I'm done with a previous-generation game, I don't transfer my Pokemon over to the next generation; I leave them in the game so that I could probably have some nostalgia during the off-chance that I look at my old games.