Did they go a little overboard with legendaries each gen?

[Sydian]

My take on it is that in the real world, areas have their urban legends, mythical creatures, and there are many different religions, some with more than one god. And each region obviously has a different set of the things I've listed, some more than others because that region is rich in myths and perhaps religions. So to me, it makes sense to have a lot of legendaries in each region these days.

 

[Aurielle]

The amount of legendaries there are is just silly. I don't even like them, I just catch them for the sake of my Pokedex and they just sit in a box for the rest of eternity, collecting dust.

 

[tokyodrift]

My take on it is that in the real world, areas have their urban legends, mythical creatures, and there are many different religions, some with more than one god. And each region obviously has a different set of the things I've listed, some more than others because that region is rich in myths and perhaps religions. So to me, it makes sense to have a lot of legendaries in each region these days.

This is exactly what I was going to say. But then again, I do think that they could have included a little, emphasis on little, less amount of legendaries they decided to include. The more there are the less I tend to care if I actually even catch them since there are so many.

 

[Pikachukid]

People say there are only five in Gen I (Articuno, Zapdos, Moltres, Mew, and Mewtwo) but that's not true!

 

[OmegaRuby and AlphaSapphire]

I'm personally okay with the amount, for me the legends tend to have better designs than the rest (they look cooler or cuter). Though I wish they kept some of them hidden like the Regi's in Hoenn where you had to do a whole puzzle to get them that added some more enjoyment in getting them.

 

[PokePandemic]

I honestly couldn't care less if there was 1 or 100 in the game. As long as they were hard to get. Its the challenge I enjoy. And once I have earned that Pokemon then I should feel like it is legendary and worth the effort.

 

[8bitSilence]

I was fine with the amount of legendaries in Gen I.
I was amused by the story behind the legendaries in Gen II.
I was a little dissatisfied with the amount of legendaries in Gen III.
Gen IV introduced a ridiculous amount of legendaries. I didn't really like any besides Darkrai.
I'm actually pretty happy with the legendaries in Gen V, though.

I just don't like all the semi-unimportant trios (Birds, Beasts, Golems, Musketeers, Kami)

 

[Joshawott]

The way I see it the abundance of legendaries and our attention directed toward them came when the Hoenn games did, and from that point on they've had somewhat of a role in the plot of each respective game. Personally, I wish it was like old times in which the legendaries were almost never discussed by people and the only details regarding them were hidden in journals inside of burned down mansions and such places.

 

[Mentalii]

I agree with the fact that there are too many legendaries in the last generations. There are so many legendaries, that they loose their mythicalness. Before, each legendary was precious for gamers, now there are so numerous that they aren't as important as before. Moreover, the fact is that they aren't really interesting... I mean, we totally could have done without Thundurus, Tornadus and Landorus for example. They were already not very appreciated, but adding them a new form made them going down even more in my estimation, and I guess I'm not the only person. There are too many legendaries, and too many forms.

 

[MiTjA]

The way I see it the abundance of legendaries and our attention directed toward them came when the Hoenn games did, and from that point on they've had somewhat of a role in the plot of each respective game. Personally, I wish it was like old times in which the legendaries were almost never discussed by people and the only details regarding them were hidden in journals inside of burned down mansions and such places.

The only real difference between genII and genIII is that there was a third uber for the third game
and the Latis.
Besides that its as similar as it gets.
When you play G or S, you meet 1 trio

and 2 true legends

.
When you play R or S, you can find 1 trio

, 2 true legends

, and 1 roaming extra

.

You know, 10 is more than 6 of course, but in Hoenn they were still distributed as evenly as genII, and for example Jirachi never even appeared as an ingame event, while

was actually introduced in FRLG, not RS, and was never specifically pointed to as a Hoenn pokemon if you get my point.

It didnt come with Hoenn, Johto had the first real legendaries. Its when they started being on covers instead of starters, so essentially right after a successful beginnng for the franchise............

Same with their lore. Gen I was the first, so it wasn't yet standing on firm ground. It was like Mewtwo, an experiment if you want.
Sure the amount of NPCs referencing legendaries has increased, but you cant deny that this was present from GS on, with people talking about the two mystical birds and the huge towers built just for them.
Not to mention genII brought us Eusine, the first person seriously obsessed with a legendary in the franchise.

DPt is the generation that actually really had a distinguishing increase in the number of "extra legends", and doing like double of everything thats usually covered once. The reason for this is that the fourth generation was intentionally full of awesome stuff, it was meant to be the ultimate generation.

Because of that, I was expecting that the number of legends would have went back down to 6-10 with generation V. But it stayed at 13!

So when you play B or W, you encounter 1 trio

, 1 true legend

, 1 roaming extra

.
lol.
Notice something?
Of course you find an enigmatic weak Kyurem

and can figure out how to get the extra Kami

, but besides that, the rest is not available.

Why is that? Because they stretched this generation into 2 sets of games. That's where the other new legends are introduced. Kyurem being the omfg true legend suddenly, Keldeo and Meloetta being revealed, and the roaming extras dont simply remain roaming extras, they gain completely new formes, EACH.
Genesect will probably come into play in BW2 sometime later too.

So my point in the last few paragraphs is that the 13!!! legendaries in gen V are justified by the fact that BW focus on the first half and 2 years later BW2 can introduce the rest.

But of course since we're all obsessed and check the new pokemon the moment someone rips and uploads them on the net, we see 13 legendaries and find it too much.

I agree with the fact that there are too many legendaries in the last generations. There are so many legendaries, that they loose their mythicalness. Before, each legendary was precious for gamers, now there are so numerous that they aren't as important as before. Moreover, the fact is that they aren't really interesting... I mean, we totally could have done without Thundurus, Tornadus and Landorus for example. They were already not very appreciated, but adding them a new form made them going down even more in my estimation, and I guess I'm not the only person. There are too many legendaries, and too many forms.

You have to distinguish between the REAL legends and the extras and events.
The true legends have been A FEW in every generation since GS. And all of them had the same kind of exposre and mythicalness. They been on the covers.

The extras, yes you can argue that they're too many, but do so for the DPt ones. Because Thundurus/Tornados in particular have a very specific basis, unlike say Cresselia or Heatran, who just represent interesting attributes (dreams and the moon, magma in general, in those cases).

What Im trying to say is, its not like they're just pushing endless amounts of legends into the franchise for the sake of it. Each of them has something unique and interesting about them, whether their origin, or representation.

 

[Atomic Pirate]

T
DPt is the generation that actually really had a distinguishing increase in the number of "extra legends", and doing like double of everything thats usually covered once. The reason for this is that the fourth generation was intentionally full of awesome stuff, it was meant to be the ultimate generation.

Awesome stuff? Seriously?

Pointless legendaries are awesome? Sure, I can get behind a "main legend" trio and a side trio, and an event legend or two, but are all these pointless ingame and event legendaries necessary? And all the Formes? Seriously?

And you said "double of everything thats usually covered once", what about Fire-types. How many completely new (sorry, Magmortar) non-starter, non-legendary Fire types were there? ZERO! They could have used all the space taken up by unwanted pre-evolutions (Chingling and Munchlax, anyone) and evolutions (Lickilicky and Tangrowth, anyone?) to add in some Fire-type Pokemon.

"The Ultimate Generation?" It's the ultimate generation for furries (Lucario and Lopunny), little kids (all the legendaries), and unenlightened, unwashed heathens who have never experienced the glory of the first 3 generations. Sinnoh was also really boring, with a very dreary, gloomy, and boring feeling.

But it wasn't all bad. Gliscor was cool, as were Weavile and Honchkrow. But that's about it.

As for the legendaries:

Dialga: Okay
Palkia: Okay
Giratina: Okay, but the Origin Forme was pointless
Uxie/Mesprit/Azelf: All okay
Shaymin: Okay, except for the Sky Forme, which was pointless
Arceus: As much as I hate it, it was okay as an event legend/prize. The Formes were pointless.
Regigigas: Pointless
Darkrai/Cresselia: Both pointless
Heatran: Completely Pointless
Manaphy: Even more pointless than Heatran
Phione: The most pointless of them all.

 

[MiTjA]

Awesome stuff? Seriously?

Pointless legendaries are awesome? Sure, I can get behind a "main legend" trio and a side trio, and an event legend or two, but are all these pointless ingame and event legendaries necessary? And all the Formes? Seriously?

And you said "double of everything thats usually covered once", what about Fire-types.

"The Ultimate Generation?"

"doing like double of everything thats usually covered once. The reason for this is that the fourth generation was intentionally full of awesome stuff, it was meant to be the ultimate generation."

Sorry for the poor choice of words.
Let me rephrase it for you. Every generation they pick a theme. The theme for gen IV was "the ultimate generation". Meaning not an average generation with common pokemon, but a big focus on things that are usually few. Whether they succeeded, we can disagree about, thats not the point.

I did not mean literally everything, "like double of everything", 2 cute event legends, 2 trios of legends for the plot, were my particular thoughts, but in general I was referring not just to legends but the unusual number of evolutions and babies.

I know there was "no" Fire types, I know all that why thank you.


As for the rest of your post, for the sake of it
"insert gen I-III legendary" - pointless

or rather, let me ask you this:
What does a legendary need so it doesn't classify as pointless?

 

[Azureth]

Remember in the first games when Mewtwo was just the most awesome thing ever? Then Lugia and Celebi and a whole bunch of other legendary Pokemon came along and made all the rare ones less special.

Drawing analogies to the car industry, there's a reason why Ferrari limit the number of cars they produce each year - to keep them exclusive and special.

 

[pokemonranger109]

Well not really the only 1 i am trying to find in my firered is the entie since i chose bulbasaur and it is a little over bored of the odds finding it

 

[Maruno]

What I object to is the overuse of the legendaries. Mewtwo and the birds were purely optional sidequests. In Gen 2 you saw the beasts but could still ignore them. In Gen 3 two become part of the plot, and it's only gotten worse in Gens 4 and 5 (the latter of which I believe forces you to capture the game's mascot).

There's also the compulsion to put older legendaries into newer games. Doing so just crowds the game, and cheapens the current Gen's legendaries, which is probably (partly) why they're forced into bigger roles.

 

[The Grubby Pup]

eh, I never actually cared that much for legendaries, but I did thought they were beginning to go abit overboard with each gen.

And now the three genie/jinni...whatever the hell, now got beast formes and Keldeo an adult...apparently.

But whatever, like I said, I really don't care much for them. :\

 

[Rivvon]

I don't think the number makes them any less legendary. At least now they have more of a plot (or sub-plot) associated with them, so they're just as legendary. And they're not rehashes of previous legendaries, so I see no issue with their number. Also, there are a good number of event-only legendaries, too, so it's not like they're all there swamping up your game until you catch them.
Less than 10% of all the total Pokemon are legendary; out of 649 it's really not a lot.

Remember in the first games when Mewtwo was just the most awesome thing ever? Then Lugia and Celebi and a whole bunch of other legendary Pokemon came along and made all the rare ones less special.

Drawing analogies to the car industry, there's a reason why Ferrari limit the number of cars they produce each year - to keep them exclusive and special.

But remember in the first games that you could catch any Pokemon before beating the Elite Four...except for Mewtwo? Anyone who played gen 1 games had a Mewtwo, basically.
But now, not everyone may have a Victini, or Dialga, or Darkrai...the fact that there are more means they're actually more difficult to get, and therefore may even be more rare.

 

[Olli]

This is one of my greatest dislikes with every new game actually. I mean, I love legendaries and all, but when there are so many of them, they become less legendary than they were before, and more like regular Pokémon, I feel. It began building up in the third generation games, but the point where it became an issue was in the fourth generation, where there were legendaries everywhere. That's why I mainly like the older generation legendaries, because they managed to retain their legendary status for me, since there weren't Pokémon like them everywhere.

So yeah, I feel like they went majorly overboard with all the legendaries.

 

[MiTjA]

This is one of my greatest dislikes with every new game actually. I mean, I love legendaries and all, but when there are so many of them, they become less legendary than they were before, and more like regular Pokémon, I feel. It began building up in the third generation games, but the point where it became an issue was in the fourth generation, where there were legendaries everywhere. That's why I mainly like the older generation legendaries, because they managed to retain their legendary status for me, since there weren't Pokémon like them everywhere.

So yeah, I feel like they went majorly overboard with all the legendaries.

The only things that changed are
-that some of them are put on the box and have an actual plot.
-gen 4 added plenty of standalone ones, because of being the "ultimate" generation.

Of course they make new ones each generation, I dont see how that makes them less legendary.

IMO, there were no "legendary" pokemon until the mascot ones were introduced.

80% of them have always been just strong rare non-evolving pokemon.
Yet I see no one complaining that they make too many useful three stage pokemon etc.

 

[Laurenellis]

I liked the earlier legendaries - they seemed realistic. But eventually then you could end up catching and controlling time, space, and "god." Did anyone else find that a little weird?

I love how Arcanine is a legendary though. It is so random! And makes Arcanine that much cooler! :P