Pokemon for Teenagers

[KetsuekiR]

Here's another topic I'd like to hear thoughts on;

Are the games made too suited for children? What if there were games made for teenagers, how would they differ?

I suppose they are, slightly. If there were games for teenagers, the villains would be more psychotic and would have greater depth and they'd just be more evil xD There would also be references to/acts of actual crimes and the police would actually do something. All in all, the region would be much darker than it would be in the normal games.
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[Laguna]

Nah, it's okay that they're marketed towards kids. I don't have a problem with it and there are some more mature themes that only older players would pick up on anyway so it's fine.

 

[Aquacorde]

I think they're catering pretty well to all audiences while staying true to and appropriate for their marketed demographic tbh. We've had some pretty fucked up storylines and characters let's be real here. But none of it was done in a way that was like "dark and edgy". I'm actually against the gritty realism thing in general because like. What's the point? What's the point of telling stories where everything sucks and people are terrible? I like the innocence of Pokémon- you're here to play with ya buddies and wreck some objectively bad gang members. Sure, some morality points are interesting to incorporate, but at the end of it- you, the player, are the hero in every sense of the word. It's an entertaining, lighthearted adventure with a world open to a ton of possibilities and interpretations~

 

[Junier]

But Pokemon is dark. Every game just gets worse and worse. There are so many scary aspects to the universe, like those legendary Pokemon with the power to destroy continents and space itself if they ever get pissed enough, and the fact that every region supports little kids cockfighting and even has an official League based around it!

Shit's scary, yo.

Though nothing excuses the villains being the same Team Rocket grunts with a new coat of paint. If the story isn't going to be optional then I want some original antagonists for once.

 

[Aquacorde]

I mean, it's only scary in analysis. Play-wise? Not at all! A little creepy sometimes, and some of the 'dex entries are a little off-kilter, but it's a very bright and optimistic world.

 

[Bounsweet]

I think that their demographic range is pretty solidly "meant for everyone." I mean obviously it's made for kids, but the amount of depth into the gameplay makes it highly enjoyable for teenagers, and adults, too.

 

[Mega NOBODY]

I liked the team rocket plot in FRLG and Heart Gold, in FRLG they addressed the issue of pokemon being poached like the Marowak that died protecting it's Cubone cub and the hostage situation with Silph Co. In generation 2 same with the Slowpoke tail salesman and the situation in the radio tower. I feel team rocket excelled as an organized crime syndicate I mean in the anime they even created Mewtwo a pokemon that can go toe to toe against pokemon like Arceus.


I did not like team Aqua and Magma very much cause to be honest expansion of the land and sea made no sense to me evil or good, that was basically pointless. Maybe it was Gamefreak's attempt to address the issue of global warming to kids. Anyway the game itself was pretty good and I liked watching two teams fight it out in Emerald, that was kinda cool.


In gen 4 team Galactic felt a bit like comic book superillain which is okay cause it turns out most comic book readers are grown ups. I felt like their plot to control space and time to create an alternate world was inspired by Marvel's Dr. Doom. A lot of people liked the games however and I found team Galactic to be the most bad ass team in the anime.


In gen 5 Team Plasma was fantastic in both B/W and B/W2 the whole pokemon liberation concept is something to really think about. I loved that game freak actually added that concept in their game.


Gen 6 villains can be described in one word as Meh.. it's just a bad guy trying to kill everyone, the plot was underwhelming. I guess with all the new features and graphics they didn't have much time come up with anything.


Sorry if the post is too big.

 

[AkameTheBulbasaur]

Pokemon is a good example of something sweet and innocent on the outside that is appropriate for the whole family, but when you look deeper and speculate about certain things it can get pretty creepy.

I mean, Lavender Town. I really don't have to say any more than that, really. But when we look at Lavander Town, we have to ask why do we remember it so much?

The first time I reached Lavander Town (in FireRed when I was eleven), I was instantly struck by the music. I didn't come across the original Lavander Town music because I never owned that game (I was barely a year old when it came out, so I was a bit too young to have grown up with it back then), but in the remake I remember thinking that the theme was really sad compared to every other song I'd heard in the game thus far. The whole plot with Team Rocket actually killing Pokemon threw me off a bit too.

None of the towns before that were even remotely dark or creepy, and none of the towns past that were either. Lavender Town stood out to us because it was so much different from the rest of the game. Also they never really go into all of the details about the Rocket Invasion. You don't really get a motive besides "Evil Team Wants Power" and you never learn about what the town was like before the invasion. That's left to the fans to speculate on in their own time.

I think that's part of what makes things in the first Pokemon Game that came out nearly two decades ago still an interesting topic today. They don't go all out with the dark/scary stuff, but they put just enough in for it to stand out but also still be mysterious.

I think if the ratings for the games were higher, there's a chance they might overcompensate with the new limits and go crazy with having dark stuff. The manga was definitely a lot darker than the games, and it has zombie Pokemon, corpses being possessed and dissolved by acid and Pokemon getting cut in half! :P It might turn off some people, and it might also lessen the intrigue of having the creepy things hidden in the games, since they would become more commonplace and more mundane.

TL;DR: Pokemon is a series that is outwardly innocent, with a few darker elements mixed in that stand out because they are either rare or hidden. If the ratings increased, and the amount of dark stuff increased too, it might lessen its value.

 

[DraconianWing]

In terms of balance between "kiddie" elements and "maturity" in the story, I think Black and White (and the sequels of course) hit the sweet spot. It was simple enough to understand, but was also complex enough for interpretation. If the games were made primarily for teenagers, I can see their plots involving more blood and violence, in addition to a bit of romance; a lot like some of the games over at the ROM hacking section. A good example of this is Snakewood (a hack of Ruby), where playing through the story feels like reading a huge interactive novel.

 

[Evening]

It's pretty much made for everyone. If there were games targeted towards teenagers, people would pick them up for the plot.