"It's a series geared towards kids."

This is something that I've really wanted to get off my chest, considering that Let's Go is pretty much just around the corner. Concerning pretty much the whole series, it's the whole "it's a series geared towards kids" argument that's been popping up fairly recently.

What I find particularly annoying about it is that it's used to justify the steps the main games are taking in regards to the gameplay, plot and other overall aspects. Most commonly, it is used to fight back at people who complain about the overall "dumbing down" of Let's Go and how the games are being made much easier just to bring in the smartphone audience/GO players. Examples of this include move effectiveness being displayed in battle, the option to be whisked to your destination as opposed to having to trudge all the way back, and the fact that they pretty much hold your hand at the start of the first act. Let's be honest though, this series has always been geared towards kids, and I started with Pokemon Ruby back when I was, like, 5, so why is it that the new games are being attacked by this complaint, yet it's always been like this despite the fact that older games didn't hold your hand as much? This just doesn't feel right, because it imprints the impression that kids are idiots and they need help with everything, when the older players who grew up with the first few generations could get through it without much outside intervention (we were on a dial-up connection and an old machine running Windows 95, so the internet wasn't a thing).

What are your thoughts on this? Is the line justified, or are people just using it to stop others complaining?

I would ultimately agree and say it's not justified.

because it imprints the impression that kids are idiots and they need help with everything, when the older players who grew up with the first few generations could get through it without much outside intervention

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There is a counter-argument for this which of course that children these days don't have as much of an attention span compared to those of us that were children back in the time of Gen 1 because of the amount of instant gratification stimuli available to us today. That is a debate in itself which I'm not going to get into, but just for arguments sake say it's true; then in regards to main series Pokémon games I'd say it doesn't hold up as a decent counter-argument for justifiably making the games easier. Children with an attention span suited to mobile games like Candy Crush and Pokémon Go are going to... play Candy Crush and Pokémon Go rather than invest in something like a DS/3DS so it's not an audience they should be targeting for main series games.

Basically, I agree with you. But can see why the Pokémon Company might be going down this road...but ultimately feel it isn't a good decision on their part if indeed lower attention spans of the children today compared to children of the past is a key reason for them making this noticeable change towards the difficulty level of main series games.

...Okay, this thread just upsets me.....

.........I sure hope gen 8 isn't going to be like this o_O;;;

Game Freak sure are singing a different tune when it comes to kids in recent years than they have back when R/B/Y and G/S/C were a thing, for some odd reason.

But then again, I blame most of that line of thinking on Masuda anyway considering he's mainly the one that perpetuates that kind of thinking. :s