Hello, everyone. First of all, please relax and be nice; I know some of you feel strongly (and negatively) about this subject, and I'm not trying to refute your opinions. My intention is that we consider some positive implications of this new practice that I haven't seen talked about much. Hear me out in this brief summation of what I think, which can hopefully bring some more positivity into our discourse on the subject.
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So, the current situation with available Pokémon in main series games, which we can assume remains in place going forward, is limiting available Pokémon to the regional dex plus change at the beginning, and adding more with each DLC.
I have come up with 2 points as to why this can be a good thing.
1) It Gradually Introduces the Younger Fans to 20 Years of Material
As we can see from our profiles, much of us are old Pokémon fans - naturally, kids don't go to forums. (Or do they nowadays? I'm feeling old already. 😂) It is completely understandable to be used to the old ways, and to reject the bad, new-fangled ways (though with how long Pokémon have been going, I've seen people here denounce my good old ways as sacrilige against their old ways ). We get it, most of us are elders here (some more and some less grumpy 😁).
And that might be what makes us a little blind. See, I started with Ruby in generation 3, and for several years later I would come upon a less-known generation 2 Pokémon and be all "Hey, I don't know this one!" - Yanma or Stantler come to mind.
And that was only 2 generations of backlog.
Imagine you were born in 2010 (which seems to me to have been last year, honestly). You're 10 and you got your first Pokémon game and are generally delighted with and interested in Pokémon. But there's almost 900 of them! How are you supposed to know them all right away?
By dividing the whole huge amount into managable portions, the kids are eased into the depths of Pokémon built over the last 20 years. To them the returning Pokémon are exciting and new, and they get to meet them in person as opposed to, say, just seeing a team full of them in an online battle.
Remember that joy of discovery and exploration you had as kids? I think this regimen really helps with that for our younger fellow Pokémon fans, preventing them from being kinda locked out of the loop with hundreds of Pokémon they never had the chance to see yet.
2) It Gives More Pokémon a Place in the Spotlight, Competitively Speaking
What I mean is, by limiting our toolbox, they give us opportuniteis to think of fun new things, unburdened by a bunch of overused Ultra Beasts. Think of it like the way it was at the start of gen 5: you only had the new Pokémon to play with, and you found interesting ways to use them.
This is just like that! I'm sure you've had a Pokémon you haven't used much before surprise you with how neat it is to use now - Seismitoad of all things is now super popular and gets to shine.
Sure, there's overused things now too, but I don't know, it feels kind of less oppressive.
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In conclusion, those are my ideas as to how our current situation can be positive too. Any others you can think of? And remember: all in good will and just for fun!
---
So, the current situation with available Pokémon in main series games, which we can assume remains in place going forward, is limiting available Pokémon to the regional dex plus change at the beginning, and adding more with each DLC.
I have come up with 2 points as to why this can be a good thing.
1) It Gradually Introduces the Younger Fans to 20 Years of Material
As we can see from our profiles, much of us are old Pokémon fans - naturally, kids don't go to forums. (Or do they nowadays? I'm feeling old already. 😂) It is completely understandable to be used to the old ways, and to reject the bad, new-fangled ways (though with how long Pokémon have been going, I've seen people here denounce my good old ways as sacrilige against their old ways ). We get it, most of us are elders here (some more and some less grumpy 😁).
And that might be what makes us a little blind. See, I started with Ruby in generation 3, and for several years later I would come upon a less-known generation 2 Pokémon and be all "Hey, I don't know this one!" - Yanma or Stantler come to mind.
And that was only 2 generations of backlog.
Imagine you were born in 2010 (which seems to me to have been last year, honestly). You're 10 and you got your first Pokémon game and are generally delighted with and interested in Pokémon. But there's almost 900 of them! How are you supposed to know them all right away?
By dividing the whole huge amount into managable portions, the kids are eased into the depths of Pokémon built over the last 20 years. To them the returning Pokémon are exciting and new, and they get to meet them in person as opposed to, say, just seeing a team full of them in an online battle.
Remember that joy of discovery and exploration you had as kids? I think this regimen really helps with that for our younger fellow Pokémon fans, preventing them from being kinda locked out of the loop with hundreds of Pokémon they never had the chance to see yet.
2) It Gives More Pokémon a Place in the Spotlight, Competitively Speaking
What I mean is, by limiting our toolbox, they give us opportuniteis to think of fun new things, unburdened by a bunch of overused Ultra Beasts. Think of it like the way it was at the start of gen 5: you only had the new Pokémon to play with, and you found interesting ways to use them.
This is just like that! I'm sure you've had a Pokémon you haven't used much before surprise you with how neat it is to use now - Seismitoad of all things is now super popular and gets to shine.
Sure, there's overused things now too, but I don't know, it feels kind of less oppressive.
---
In conclusion, those are my ideas as to how our current situation can be positive too. Any others you can think of? And remember: all in good will and just for fun!