Concept: Open World Pokémon Games (Badge Level Scaling and HM Items)

What is your opinion on "open world" Pokémon games like Crystal Clear and R.O.W.E.? I think they make for a unique playthrough, despite the simple concept. Usually these games have levels that depend on badge count and things like HM items.

I liked the many different options with R.O.W.E like the different modes and, of course, just the open-world feel. The QoL changes were also nice. I have no experience with rom hacking, so I have no idea how hard this would be, but I was wondering how difficult would it be to have multiple regions in your hack. I know they have hoenn on the same console so a multi region game might be a cool idea. Good luck with your hack!

On the whole, I like Crystal Clear. I like that I could pick Pikachu for a starter, that you can go wherever you want and beat the gyms in any order. I also like that you can rebattle the gym leaders as well at different levels on demand unlike ROWE where you have to wait until the next day. I also like that you can buy every TM and have Move Tutors to teach moves that Pokemon can't actually learn in the vanilla games. However, I would have liked the original Elite 4 to be retained at the Indigo Plateau, and perhaps the New Elite 4 could've been retained as post-Elite 4 bosses.

I haven't played ROWE yet, but I don't like you can only rebattle the gym leaders once a day. But I think I'll play it some day because it has a randomizer mode (including having random starters).

im going to focus more on rowe since i played it the most, and being honest, im really a fan of how they did it.
i think they did both of the levle scalling and the pokemon selection in a great way, im guessing they use the amount of gym badges you have in order to scale the lvels and they did a really good job at it! you can start at any town just like you would start at littleroot1 and i think they did the modes very well too, be it the hard mode or randomizer, and the implementation of newer gen pokemons or even the wonder trade.
while i dont mind pokemon games not being open world, i think the rowe team did an wonderful job at it.
i dint play crystal clear yet, but i dont doubt they made a good job too.