Which were the best games AT THE TIME?

Which set of games was the most fun to play for the first time? It's not necessarily the same as which set of games is the best, you see. For example, the innovation of the first games can outweigh the technical superiority of later games.

A close call between RBY and RSE.
But I spent most of my time on RSE, so I'm going with that.

Emerald definately. Because it fun to meddle with 2 different evil teams.Not to mention the battle frontier.

Personally, it was RSE. I don't why, I just have the fondest memories of my old lv.100 Swampert... He will be missed forever.

Story line wise s/g/c had the best.

This one's a toughie for me.

I'd say Red because that was my first pokemon experience. Not to mention that the formula hasn't changed much.

However, I played Ruby at an age that I could understand it much better. Back when I played Red I was the only one who really played it all that much. RSE brought a competitive aspect to the table, my friends and I would have entire tournaments sent up.

So basically RBY and RSE are very much a tie.

I'm stuck between R/S/E and G/S/C. I love both a lot but i ended up voting for G/S/C.

GSC. those games just had it all good pokemon, great storyline, and even great graphics for the time (I actually like them better than the ds ones).

I'll say Pearl; My first game was that....

G/S/C all the way. Original ones are always the best.

Kirbychu said:

Is it me or is the nostalgia slowly inching up to RSE now? A few months ago RSE would have failed in this poll.

As for me, I can't really say a favorite, all I know is that the 4th generation games felt a bit outdated when they were released. DPPt suffers from this more than HGSS.

Click to expand...

well, it is almost 7 years since their release, a long long time.
RSE is my choice. I spent most of my time on them, liked them..

I rermember vividly he ride home from the shop clutching my brand new GBA and copy of ruby a couple of days after the release.

even if no-one else does, i believe that RSE are the vital games to the success of the series.

I played Blue and Yellow, but even though I had'nt played any later times at the time, I found them outdated, and the graphics annoyed me. RSE was my favourite, it's graphics were so much better, and I actually bought all in the series cus I liked them so much. I later lost Emerald, but they still to me are the best games, and were definitly at the time.

Since G/S/C were my first Gen. to play the Pokémon games, those three really mean something to me, specially Crystal. But with the remakes of Gold and Silver, I'm definitely sticking with HG/SS. It brought back some good memories and they have sentimental value to me.

Gold and Silver, I'd say.

I started with Yellow, and moved on to Red/Blue. And they were good, everything was novel, and I learned what a Pokémon game was about.

Then Gold/Silver came out. An entirely new region filled with old favourites and interesting new Pokémon (and some stupid ones, of course - I've never like Unown, for one). It was a different story, but a continuation to the previous generation. There was a bit more to do and see (Headbutt/Whirlpool/Bug Catching Contest/etc.), but not so much that I felt I was being bombarded by it all. And on top of all that, Kanto was in there as well! True, it may have been shrunk a little, but little of value was lost, and much of it was modified so that it was all new again.

For the time, Gold/Silver were the best. Ruby/Sapphire were certainly good too - they improved the story part of the game, introduced new dynamics to raising Pokémon and so forth, and of course had better graphics. They come in at a close second, and I suspect the dislike was mainly (solely?) because of the lack of compatibility with the older gens.

I like the retro feel of the early generations. It was simple and clean, and not cluttered up with contests and ribbons and Undergrounds and Battle Towers and all that nonsense (most of which I never looked at because, I'll admit, I used ROMs). The minimal story was good, because it allowed you to explore a little and it only gave you a vague prod in the right direction. The story nowadays feels far too imposing, and far too much of it paints you as the friend of all living things, the Mary Sue hero in this very nice world that's somehow troubled by those two Team Generic grunts standing at one of the town entrances. When Team Rocket took over Goldenrod, they were all over the place and the townsfolk had gone. It's just not the same.

I'm not considering the second gen remakes in this, partly because I haven't played them (my ROM crashes after 31 events, and it's horrible having to save/reset every two minutes, so I've just given up), partly because remakes never have the same impact as the originals (they may be better - rarely - but they don't have the impact), and because there's loads of fiddly little extras in it that make me feel I'm missing out on half the game for not doing them all.

I don't like "one game for the price of two" things, but at least in the early gens the only downside to having just one of the versions was a few missing entries in the Pokédex (which otherwise would still be mostly full) - nowadays, not only is it nearly impossible to complete the Dex anyway thanks to all the trading and events required and so forth, there's all these other features I'm not interested in but feel I'm missing out on because they're there. I'd like to have a complete game when I buy it, and to be able to experience the entire game at my leisure. I could do that with the early gens.

Anything past the third gen (that includes all remakes) doesn't deserve consideration here. By now, the fanbase has way too make expectations for the series, and it'll never live up to them. The new games just won't be as good as people were hoping, and therefore won't have any impact other than "oh, I see Pokémon has a new generation out now". Way back after the first gen, when there were rumours of a sequel, we didn't know what to expect, which made it all the more fun to find out about gen 2. Nowadays everyone expects backwards compatibility, so Gen 5 will have it, which means it can't deviate too much from the basic format (battling and Pokémon-wise, at least), which means we know what to expect. And that's not as fun.

Gold/Silver/Crystal, and especially Crystal. Just FYI, these weren't the first ones I played (Red/Blue/Yellow ftw), but they were such a quantum leap over the first gen that it's ridiculous. I mean, day and night, good coloring (the coloring in Yellow sucked), fantastic phone/time features, epically challenging but not impossible legendaries, a remotely interesting rival, and in Crystal they animated every single Pokemon in the battle introductions. Getting all 251 of those suckers animated on a GBC ROM was an astounding feat in itself. Oh, and I almost forgot: TWO REGIONS. 16 BADGES. Just so much more to do in that game compared to RBY, and when you consider all the features that they took out when moving on to RSE, I just don't see how you can call it a contest.

Crystal in my mind is the apex of the Pokemon franchise. They'll have to do some really astounding stuff with Black and White to make me change my opinion. Considering that they'll have 500+ monsters this time around, nearly a third of which will undoubtedly look really stupid (they're so running out of ideas, isn't that obvious by now?), I don't think that's likely. 151 was probably the ideal number to begin with, but 251 was still tolerable. I feel sorry for all the kids now who can't possibly feel the satisfaction of knowing each and every Pokemon.