3rd Gen Opinion on Gen 3

[Squirtkipfan01]

Generation 3

The mainline games include Ruby, Sapphire, and Emerald. While notable for the addition of Contests, Double battles, and 136 new pokemon, i think this is the generation i hear the least about ever. Everyone seems to have something to say about other gens, be they the bugged gen 1 or the popular gen 5. Nothing on 3 though. Whats your thoughts on gen 3?

Most of my experience comes from Alpha sapphire and its one of my favorite pokemon games. I put tons of time into that remake with new megas and latios/latias flying, but thats clearly stuff added for the remake so idk how much that counts as far as the OGs. I did play the OG sapphire afterward though just to say i did. And i personally fine them to be the most ok pokemon game. Nothing expectedly bad, but nothing noteworthy either. Especially when i think how much of an improvement gen 2 was from 1, 3 just doesnt feel like THAT much of a jump. Im sure theres some specific things that really went along way, like im pretty sure this is the gen when ghost types moves stopped being weird(shadow ball, the go to ghost move was physical in the past 2 gens im pretty sure)

What do you think about generation 3?

 

[MVs.C Fan]

Oki doki, here goes my not very professional opinion.

For what i can say about Gen 3, it's very special to me because they were my beginning throught this franchise. They offer me a lot of fun playthroughts and memories that are record in my head. Even thought i only cared about battles, i never fell bored played the same game.

Thinking more about it, the changes presented in this gen weren't that big like the others two previous gens, but throught my perspective they were significant. Introducing double battles was air fresh, because now there are variation and not only stay with the classic 1vs1.

 

[CoolKid575]

I think of it as the last "classic" generation before all the big changes from Gen 4 onward. It's the last with purely 2D graphics, no physical/special split, no online and the last on the Gameboy line of consoles. The OG Gen 3 games are still fun but IMO they're definitely starting to show their age.

 

[ReKoil]

I started with RBY, but prior to gen 6 RSE were my most played Pokemon games. Even restarted Ruby and Sapphire several times to play them anew. Emerald I never restarted because I caught a shiny Makuhita/Hariyama there. In gen 6 I obviously played ORAS multiple times 😁
Personally I always liked Hoenn's contests the most and the secret base stuff was fun, but needed something more as my ability to go online and play with others on the GBA was basically just not there. In my Emerald game I made it my quest to win all Master Rank contests just so I could fill the Museum with paintings =P and I succeeded.
My access to internet was limited so figuring out the Regi puzzles was very rewarding. The Trick House was okay, always felt like they could've done more with it tbh.

Imo RSE were the best Pokemon games till gen 6. They were fun, the region is nice and has good new Pokemon. They also actually had side stuff to do.

As for the other gen 3 games, FRLG. It's a better Kanto than RBY pretty much. The Sevii Islands were a nice addition, but they sadly never returned in the next Kanto games after.

 

[PageEmp]

Honestly my personal least good generation, but it's not bad at all. My main gripes is the lack of a physical/special split when most of the new mons would have greatly benefitted from such, RS having a bad plot (I do not like how the bad guys have plan that defies basic science and when they fail they are like "oh noes") and the awful, horrendous victory road.

As for good parts, I enjoyed the great variety of areas in the region, like there being a volcano, rainforests, and so on, the music was pretty good, and it was a great generation for new designs. Swampert, Aggron, Sharpedo, and Salamence are all some of my favourites in the seriesas a whole, and most of my least favourites in gen3 are such because of stats and not design.

Ironically, I think the gen3 arc might be my favourite generation for Pokemon Adventures. (And also ironically my favourite generation of the games is possibly my least favourite arc for that comic series but that's irrelevant)

 

[Squirtkipfan01]

Oki doki, here goes my not very professional opinion.

For what i can say about Gen 3, it's very special to me because they were my beginning throught this franchise. They offer me a lot of fun playthroughts and memories that are record in my head. Even thought i only cared about battles, i never fell bored played the same game.

Thinking more about it, the changes presented in this gen weren't that big like the others two previous gens, but throught my perspective they were significant. Introducing double battles was air fresh, because now there are variation and not only stay with the classic 1vs1.

Your first game is always special

 

[CoolKid575]

I've been binging One Piece over the past week; I had heard that the series was supposed to end in 2024 and I figured now was as good a time as any to start; I've been loving it so far. It's such an engaging story and while I wish there were more "slice of life" fun episodes between the big arcs; it's been a wonderful experience. I'm currently up to EP55.

EDIT: Shoot, looks like I posted in the wrong thread lol

 

[Corveone]

Maybe people don't talk as much about gen 3 because among the old generations it's basically the only one without some notorious gameplay flaw to criticize. That's not to say they were remarkably wonderful games either. Not much (if anything) to hate, but not much to fall in love with that other games might have handled better.

Well, at least that's my personal feeling. My main gripe with the Hoenn games was the Water obsession, not only because of how much of the map is just tons of water, but also the Pokédex itself being bloated with Water types, while certain other types were severely underrepresented.

Sinnoh gets typically meme'd for the lack of Fire types, but Hoenn also only had one starter line, Torkoal, and Camerupt (which... 4x weak to Water in Hoenn, so yeah, no thanks). And for Electric types, you basically only had Manectric, which was just a poor man's Jolteon until it got Flamethrower gens later. In my early Pokémon days, I really liked Electric and Fire types, so Hoenn was pretty disappointing for me in that regard.

I personally didn't care about Contests, Pokéblocks and some other Gen 3 additions in the slightest, although of course Abilities is one of the most important additions that happened to Pokémon gameplay, and we have these games to thank for that. I'd also say that Hoenn had a better pace than the rest of the games, or at least the 2D ones, but I can't say for sure because it's been ages since the last time I played vanilla RSE, I've only returned to Gen 3 in the recent years in rom hacks.

Im sure theres some specific things that really went along way, like im pretty sure this is the gen when ghost types moves stopped being weird(shadow ball, the go to ghost move was physical in the past 2 gens im pretty sure)

It was still physical in Gen 3. But at least it worked better because Hoenn replaced Gengar and Misdreavus with two physically-oriented Ghost types.

 

[Squirtkipfan01]

Maybe people don't talk as much about gen 3 because among the old generations it's basically the only one without some notorious gameplay flaw to criticize. That's not to say they were remarkably wonderful games either. Not much (if anything) to hate, but not much to fall in love with that other games might have handled better

yeah basically what ive thought for years on it

 

[Curt_09]

Gen 3 walked so that every subsequent generation could run (or stumble, depending on your opinion). There were so many improvements with the jump from GBC to GBA, like the graphics and music. Having a little circle of terrain under the Pokemons' feet during battle felt like such a huge deal at the time. Other things like the Running Shoes, free cursor movement on the Town Map, berry planting, improved menu sprites, secret bases, Pokemon Contests, pressing 'A' on an object to use an HM move, the little animations that play with the HM moves, the item descriptions in the bag, the move descriptions on the Pokemon summary, and so many more little things that I'm forgetting right now really made this feel like a whole new series rather than a sequel to previous generations. There were also the major additions of abilities and natures, which added to the depth of the experience. The graphics were pretty, the music was banging, and the movement felt crisp in comparison to the previous titles. These games got so much right that they're hard to criticize, and they normalized the notion that each generation of games will come with the addition of new features and the removal of old ones. They made it safe to experiment with each future installment, for better or for worse.

 

[VaatiRulesets]

Gen 3 had the most hard to find legendaries without a guide: the Regis. And I love Gen 3 solely for that. Legendaries should be extremely hard to find.

 

[Squirtkipfan01]

Gen 3 had the most hard to find legendaries without a guide: the Regis. And I love Gen 3 solely for that. Legendaries should be extremely hard to find.

Idk i think draw the line at needing to know brail and needing two very specific pokemon in specific party slots, one of which is fairly rare to find lol

 

[VaatiRulesets]

Idk i think draw the line at needing to know brail and needing two very specific pokemon in specific party slots, one of which is fairly rare to find lol

In the Regi cave there was the braille alphabet so you had the tools to do it (somewhat) . Of course I totally understand that the majority of the fanbase doesn't agree with me lol

 

[Reginald Cosmic]

I have come to sing the praises of Gen III because there's too much negativity in this thread. Before I begin, though: Gen III refers to Ruby, Sapphire, Fire Red, Leaf Green, and Emerald only! . ORAS is Gen VI. Otherwise, you'd just call them the Hoenn games.

It's really cool choosing between two criminal organizations to beat into submission, or just beating them both in Emerald. (I didn't grow up with Emerald, and when I returned to the games in high school onward, I stuck with Sapphire out of blind loyalty. There's probably a metric ton of QoL improvements, but I have no nostalgia for the cutscene where Rayquaza tells Groudon and Kyogre to shut up. I guess Groudon and Kyogre can both be caught that way, but I don't use legendary Pokemon.)

The writing in this game is so quirky and charming. It taught me to love talking to every single townsperson in every turn-based RPG.

The superior Kanto experience? Sign me the heck up! Gen I is freaking weird, but there's so much cool stuff in Kanto! There's fewer glitches from Gen I since they had a whole team of developers this time around, and the sprites are really top-notch in Gen III.

Physical/Special split? Yeah, Gyarados would be really cool if HM move Waterfall was physical, but I love its Kaiju Moveset of Surf, Thunderbolt, Ice Beam, and Flamethrower. Of course, in Kanto, the TMs for Thunderbolt, Ice Beam, and Flamethrower are sold at exorbitant prices by Team Rocket, so it's probably a better idea to use Return and Earthquake instead of Flamethrower and one other move. Still though, it's not too difficult to overcome the disadvantages with the pre-Physical/Special split games. Crobat's actually really good with Sludge Bomb in Gen III.

The Trick House I will admit is a disappointment. The concept's really cool and feel like a proper episodic series on the Game Boy Advance, but the puzzles aren't very good (especially the earlier ones).

Mudkipz, I heard you liek them! Squirtle Squad's cool too!

There's so many banger Pokemon like Flygon, Gardevoir, Breloom, Ludicolo, Sharpedo, Aggron, Salamance, Altaria, and Metagross as well as underappreciated mon like Grumpig, Shiftry, Claydol, Tropius, Absol, Cacturne, Torkoal, Whiscash, and Crawdaunt (though to be fair, some of these are subpar in battle), not to mention returning classics like Alakazam, Gengar, Dodrio, Pikachu (and my buddy Raichu), Gyarados, Ninetales, Slowbro, Xatu, Donphan, Nidoking, Dugtrio (guilty pleasure of mine, I will admit), Crobat, Jolteon, Arcanine, Skarmory, Poliwrath and Politoed, Victreebel, Marowak, Girafarig, and Snorlax! (I'm aware Pokémon like Victreebel, Girafarig, and Absol aren't the best choices for in-game teams or competitive play, but I really like these designs.) Slaking gets an honorable mention because I find the joke that spawned the evolution line very humorous.

There's some weird stuff like the fossil mon in Gen III Kanto being level 5 (at the tail end of the game) and Acro Bike and Mach Bike switching in Hoenn (and those dang HM roadblocks and one-use TMs). Also, they 100% got carried away with the trio of Regice, Regirock, and Registeel. Still, I adore this generation.

I hope I brought some positivity here (and that I won't get a ton of messages about why these games are trash in response to some of my statements).

 

[Rock_Salazar]

Generation 3 of pokemon has to be the one I spent the most time on, and is personally one of, if not, my favorite gen. I began with Yellow and Diamond, both of which I enjoyed frequently, but when I got my hands on Emerald I could not put it down. I think it had to do with the music and how the overworld felt. Gameplay wise it felt faster than gen 4, and far better than gen 1. Going back to it is quite difficult because there is no physical/special split, there are 3 water HMs, 1-use TMs, and Battle Tower/Frontier scales with your levels if above 50.

The game is lacking in fire type variety though. Camerupt and Torkoal aren't bad but they're too slow. Electric type variety isn't lacking, but this is the same generation that gave us gen 1 remakes. Without Manectric your only options are Kanto-mons Magneton, Raichu, and Electrode (which you probably have used in Fire Red or Leaf Green), or the terrible Plusle and Minun.

However, I owe it to gen 3 for some of my favorite pokemon: Aggron, Swampert, Sceptile, Blaziken, Flygon, Salamance, Manectric, Seviper, Shiftry, Ludicolo, Cactrune, Absol, Metagross, Gardevoir, Claydol, Breloom, Walrein, and all the legendaries (especially Rayquaza for being one of my favorite designs to this day). Emerald especially gave me the itch to find post-game secrets like finding Groudon and Kyogre, the regis, Mirage Island, and Johto-mons at the Safari Zone. Also, using HM Dive for the first time was an experience I wish I could relive again.

 

[GhostColossus]

I think Gen3 brought a lot of new unique Pokémon

 

[Sheep]

Love it. RSE are one of my most-replayed games ever, super fun for challenge runs. -love- Honestly I think it's the funnest to replay out of all the gens. ORAS were also good!

 

[GameBunnyAdvance]

Gen 3 is one of my least favourite generations. Nostalgia works in reverse a bit here I think: when Ruby and Sapphire were released I was in Secondary School, and admitting you liked Pokemon was basically painting a giant target on your back and inviting people to bully you. The anime stopped airing on local television as well, so I couldn't watch it any more, and everything felt significantly less exciting and more scaled back than Gen 2, which gave you two regions and significantly more Pokemon to play with. At the time in gaming there was a more prominent leap to 3D graphics as well, so the GBA was quite a bit less impressive, particularly in my circle of friends, who were all very enamoured with the likes of Final Fantasy X and Super Smash Bros Melee.

The "too much water" complaint is one that I feel has some validity too, even if it's expressed in a way that doesn't really do it much justice. As a region Hoenn doesn't feel particularly exciting to explore, and I can't help but feel that this is a wasted opportunity, especially with rare glimpses of brilliance with the underwater caves and Regi puzzles. They should have capitalised on that more, and made the surface of the water routes more interesting to traverse. It didn't help that Wind Waker did a much better job of it, with islands scattered everywhere on its ocean to break up the tedium of travel. Emerald fixed this issue too, but with Ruby and Sapphire it felt like you were getting half a story, because whichever one you picked, the other team was basically ignored. Emerald also gave us the Battle Frontier which I did enjoy, but I was never overly fond of contests as a concept.

The new Pokemon...well, there are good and bad ones with each generation I think, and I like enough Gen 3 Pokemon that I wouldn't count it as the worst one. But this is where the first dexit happened - at least before FRLG - and I didn't like that some of my favourites had been cut out and replaced by...well, things I would never want to use. It fed into that scaled-back feeling I felt that Ruby and Sapphire had, and left me a bit jaded with it.

I will never like the soundfont in the GBA titles either; that is by far the worst thing about Gen 3 in my opinion. I place a lot of emphasis on a good soundtrack when I'm playing video games. ORAS kinda highlighted how good some of the melodies are, but at the time the GBA wasn't capable of doing them justice at all. Those awkward trumpets actually give me a migraine. Or it might just be the way they're used, because I have heard some phenomenal remixes of done in the Gen 3 soundfont. So it's either the GBA, the audio compression, or just the person responsible having no idea what they're doing.

 

[Setsuna]

RSE are great games that feel just barely short of really getting it perfect to me. Inclusions like contests, abilities, an actual proper system of berries, and some expanded movesets make it way more comfortable to play. I'd probably argue the jump from Gens 2 to 3 was the biggest mechanical jump the series has ever made. It makes me wish the moniker of "Pokemon Advanced" was more popular, it's basically that. Although, things like the physical/special split not having introduced yet makes a decent chunk of Pokemon either way better or way worse than they really should be, it (understandably!) didn't have things like wi-fi connection or IR functionality, that just wasn't really possible, and things like double battles weren't used to their full potential and could really just be forgettable. Gen 3 is a fantastic leap forward for the series but I think it happened right before the full potential of the series could really be realized. That's not the fault of the games, the series is just naturally going to advance forward.

 

[Megan]

I still like Sapphire the best among the gen 3 games. Emerald is alright but what really annoys me is how they changed one minor detail about the phone feature: now they constantly tell you that a number was added. In general, Emerald feels like they just increased the time wasted due to more textboxes being used throughout. It's a silly complaint, but definitely a complaint I have. ^^"

FRLG are fine. I still prefer the originals, tbh. They're just simpler to me and nostalgia also plays a part.