3rd Gen Gyarados or Sharpedo?

So both Gyara and Shark are powerful physical attackers that evolve from pretty bad Pokemon, and both can mega evolve and gain the same typing. Which one do you prefer?

I don't use any of the two because they're both physical attackers and water (and dark) are special based types in the third gen.

In Generation III, I guess Gyarados, because even if neither of them have any good STAB to use their attacking stats with, Gyarados can at least take a hit for nuts, even the occasional Electric-type attack it can necessarily avoid getting slammed by thanks to its high Special Defense (if it isn't STAB). Sharpedo really got the short end of the stick and no good defenses.

Sharpedo. I've never really been a fan of Gyarados whereas I really like the designs of both Carvanha and Sharpedo. The only real downfall to Sharpedo is the low Defense & SP. Defense stats, it can easily be taken down within one hit.

Gyarados is much more suitable than Sharpedo, it pretty brutal attackers and stable Sp Def stats. The downfall of Gyarados it's typing despite having a better Sp Def it doesn't mean it could withstand few thunders and thunderbolts due to 4x weakness towards electric and just say you mega evolve it and it have weakness equivalent to Sharpedo, but mega gyara would pack a better punch.

I gotta say Gyarados. I never really used Sharpedo and Gyrados was always one of the water Pokémon that could take a hit and keep going.

I like the design of Sharpedo but Gyarados is better overall imo. Even without a physical Water STAB in Gen 3, it can still spam Strength, HP Flying, and Earthquake pretty easily with Dragon Dance so it can still do some damage.

I always use Gyarados in any Gen III game prefered to other nonstarter Water types.
Aren't I forget, does Gyarados learn Flying moves in Gen III? Haven't used one for a while, but I thought it couldearn Aerial Ace or something.....

Go with Sharpedo, because its SpA stat is higher than Gyarados, so it's able to use both of its STABs.

Not too sure about viability, but I definitely prefer Sharpedo over Gyarados.

Sharpedo feels a lot more fun to use, plus I'm a huge fan of Shark-themed Pokémon, haha.

Definitely Sharpedo. It's a giant shark, and you can give it cool nicknames like Megalo. The truth is, I've never really liked Gyarados and I think it's way too popular. So yeah, Sharpedo :)

For me, it's got to be Gyarados. I've always found Sharpedo to be really low key and honestly I didn't even know that people used it or that there was a mega form for it till now. But other than that Gyarados's base stat total is greatly higher than Sharpedo's and with a Defense/Sp. Defense stat of 40 for Sharpedo, it'd be hard for it to survive for very long in battle even with the high Attack stat.

I like them both but I encounter Magikarp first so I evolve it and keep it o my team most time.

This is in the gen III so I'll disregard the mega evolutions. Competitively, Gyarados outclasses Sharpedo in every way, so there's no real competition there. In game, I find Sharpedo to be a bit better because you can get it pretty early, and it has a few useful and hard hitting STAB moves in the form of Surf, Waterfall, and Crunch. It also learns Ice Beam which is pretty nice coverage wise. Gyarados is okay, but its level up movepool alone isn't the best and it honestly doesn't become good until the postgame.

I'm going with Gyarados.

In comparison, Gyarados is much more easy to utilize when it comes to battling, as it carries a lot of moves in its arsenal which we could find helpful, such as Dragon Dance, Waterfall, Earthquake, and much, much more. Not only that, but its abilities are both also quite valuable.

In terms of design, it would still have to be the same answer. In my opinion, Gyarados is more scary-looking, and I believe that appearance suits this Pokémon pretty well. Sharpedo isn't too bad, either, though; it's kind of unique (we've never had any Pokémon before looking like this).

Gyarados.

Even though Sharpedo has a beast of a design and all, it's slightly harder to find then Gyarados, which can be evolved from Magikarp. Those things can be found everywhere with an Old Rod which you get pretty early in-game. I've never used Sharpedo before though. I've definitely used a Gyarados plenty of times, and it can learn some good moves. It evolves early, which gives you a great Pokémon at the start of the game. Especially if you chose the Grass-Type starter or something like that.

As for design, I'll go for Sharpedo. Taking a glance at Gyarados, it has an interesting expression but not a really unique design, while Sharpedo had a pretty design and looked more ferocious. One thing I never really got is why it didn't have a tail. It seriously looks weird. They messed up there on the design part.

Sharpedo doesn't stand out to me in anyway. I find it kinda fragile. I feel like if I had gyarados on my team I'd feel more comfortable depending on it. Also when it comes to design I prefer the latter. I find the actual torpedo look of Sharpedo's design to be distasteful.

Gyarados is pretty much the go-to Water mon in the 3rd Gen even if this gen didn't favor its type (and Base Stats) that much because unlike Sharpedo who's really vulnerable against the Fighting Types (and its rather squishy defenses overall), which started to get really good in this gen, Gyarados' part flying type provides its resistance to it, along with its awesome ability Intimidate, as well as the all important Ground Immunity from Earthquakes.

And I'm not even talking about this in a competitive battling POV.

I'm much more fond of Sharpedo, both design and movepool-wise. I usually don't like vicious-looking Pokemon but this guy became a favorite early on and was always a beast in-game even without Intimidate. That 4x electric weakness is a killer to me too; enough to put me off from using Gyarados altogether at times.

Go shark!

I choose gyarados.

1.) I like the shiny form of gyarados better than most of the shiny forms of the other Pokemon. It was one of the first shinies I ever had and I like the red coloring of it. It looked especially nice in HG/SS!
2.) Gyarados was a beast in 4th. gen metagame and did well in 5th. gen metagame as well. Give him a life orb with DD+Waterfall and this guy could sweep teams. Give him a leftovers with Taunt+DD+Waterfall and he was actually pretty tanky. I used him quite a bit.

3.) Nostalgia. I've liked Gyarados ever since gen 1.