angelgotch - Today at 12:48 PM
but yeah! the protags are older (15 iirc? typically the protag is 10), and gen 5 introduced more complex mechanics and a darker, heavier plot, with anti war undertones stitched in!

by contrast SUMO i think is actually designed to be more accessible to kids (since pokemon got more complicated) bc they made IV breeding and EV training easier (and obvious— in the past ppl had to figure it out, now it’s a game feature players are informed of), made shinies more common, gameplay is simpler, and there’s tutorials and stuff
MariaElizabeth - Today at 12:50 PM
aw damn, that's nice
angelgotch - Today at 12:50 PM
which i rlly liked tbh bc i was kinda feeling like pokemon was getting taken away from kids by adult fans
MariaElizabeth - Today at 12:51 PM
honestly yeah
seems to be happenin gto a lot of kids media tbh
angelgotch - Today at 12:53 PM
the worst of it was in the competitive battling scene: see, EV training got more popular at around the same time the games developed wireless communications so u could like, battle ppl who arent literally sitting across from u
and EV training if u dont know is this thing where u battle specific pokemon to boost specific stats to maxed-out levels, resulting in super-powered pokemon. IVs also influence stats but they are inherent to the pokemon and have to be bred-in (and were initially invisible to players altogether)
as u can guess, this resulted in a lot of adults who EV trained their entire teams totally decimating any kid who entered a wifi battle and was just, yknow, using the pokemon they liked and trained normally, because its p much impossible to win a battle against EV trained pokemon with regular ones.
this is discouraging as heck.
i know its discouraging to kids bc it happened 2 me, as a child
lol
MariaElizabeth - Today at 12:54 PM
yeah :frowning:
angelgotch - Today at 12:54 PM
i remember being 14 and excited about wifi battles being a thing only to get rlly upset and discouraged bc i kept not only losing but having some asshole in their 20s wipe my whole team with one pokemon and zero effort
MariaElizabeth - Today at 12:54 PM
yeah honestly people who tryhard at a kids' game really confuse me
angelgotch - Today at 12:55 PM
also, EV training used to be fucking TEDIOUS. do u wanna know how it used to go down?
MariaElizabeth - Today at 12:55 PM
mm?
angelgotch - Today at 12:59 PM
u used to have to
-freshly breed and hatch a pokemon, OR give a pokemon like 200 extremely rare berry items to reset their EVs to zero
-optionally, breed 10 billion of those pokemon to get a specific nature that would inherently increase the stat u want, because EV training is actually useless if u accidentally did it on a stat that pokemon has a reduced affinity with (ie, if their natures worst stat is speed, speed training wont do u much good, so congrats u wasted hours if not days for nothing! and originally natures being relevant wasnt known in-game, ppl figured it out)
-look up the pokemon that gives u the specific stat u want
-go find that pokemon in the wild and battle it. 52 times. sometimes more! 52 was the minimum. there are health drink items in the game that help make the number lower, but they are the most expensive item in the game and u can only use 10 of them on any given pokemon.
-u must do this twice bc u can max out 2 stats.
-if the pokemon u need is rare, eat shit
-THEN u gotta actually level up the pokemon to 100 lol.
MariaElizabeth - Today at 1:00 PM
lmao holy shit
angelgotch - Today at 1:00 PM
so this isnt me whining bc i was lazy, this was genuinely an extremely tedious, boring, un-fun process, ntm completely inaccessible to children and ppl with short attention spans
MariaElizabeth - Today at 1:00 PM
lmao yeah it sounds horribly boring
and stupid
angelgotch - Today at 1:01 PM
also u couldnt check the evs so u had to keep track of all 52 battles manually. tally up. be good at counting. etc. also if u accidentally battle a different pokemon lol there goes all ur hard work!
i did it. twice. as a kid. and hated it bc i felt like it took all the fun out of raising the pokemon.
MariaElizabeth - Today at 1:01 PM
yeah
i mean yeah
angelgotch - Today at 1:01 PM
i just wanted to battle using my favs that i collected during my journey?
MariaElizabeth - Today at 1:02 PM
it's not growing with ur friends it's basically just like
training an army
angelgotch - Today at 1:03 PM
it literally goes against the plot narrative too-- in game quotes:
"strong pokemon, weak pokemon... good trainers should try to win with their favourites!"
"i dont care if my pokemon are strong, i like cute ones!"
"pokemon are friends, not tools"
and a narrative of like
people who treat their pokemon as tools or weapons are LITERALLY decried as being BAD PEOPLE and VILLAINS and ANIMAL ABUSERS in game like this behaviour is LITERALLY discouraged and theres even an episode of the original anime that references it.
the antagonist of gold/silver/crystals ENTIRE SUBPLOT was about learning to treat his pokemon as friends and not as tools that can be weak or strong (in later games a mechanic was introduced where pokemon who like you more are actually better in battle! and ones that dislike u will be obtuse in battle)
and in the original red/blue/green games team rocket was bad bc they treat pokemon as tools and abuse them. the joke of pokemon anime and pokemon yellow was that a 'weak' pokemon like pikachu was so fucking strong, and there was another episode where pikachu defeats a raichu because its owner forced it to evolve too early to become stronger

BUT THE GOOD NEWS IS
MariaElizabeth - Today at 1:07 PM
hm, i imagine that mechanic was there also to discourage the EV trainers as well right?
the pokemon liking you
angelgotch - Today at 1:09 PM
probably, bc pokemon like u more when u interact with it in positive ways like giving it treats, keeping its health good, giving it massages or haircuts, and in later games using pokemon amie
pokemon will start hating u if it loses a lot, consistently has poor health stats, is never played with, or is fed food it doesnt like. i believe some of the EV training items in the original games also made ur pokemon dislike u.
MariaElizabeth - Today at 1:10 PM
and yeah wow imagine being so nasty u abuse ur electronic pets in order to pwn 12-year-olds online
like
buddy losing is ok
angelgotch - Today at 1:11 PM
"Prior to Generation VI, there is no way to directly view effort values; from Generation VI onward, it is possible to view graphs that show effort values without giving specific numbers. Shigeru Ohmori has stated that the reason EVs and IVs are hidden is because he prefers to think of Pokémon as "real, living creatures".[1]"

shigeru ohmori is one of the main game designers and directors for the pokemon series
MariaElizabeth - Today at 1:11 PM
yeah, that makes sense
angelgotch - Today at 1:12 PM
and apparently the only reason EVs existed AT ALL is bc in pokemon lore pokemon that are trained are stronger than wild pokemon
it wasnt for comp play purposes.
MariaElizabeth - Today at 1:12 PM
well, yeah
id imagine, also u probably dont want someone fighting a wild pokemon of the same level to have a 50% chance of losing(edited)
angelgotch - Today at 1:32 PM
NOW THE WAY IT WORKS IS /WAY/ MORE ACCESSIBLE
-best and worst stats are colour coded in the summary and there are npcs who will tell u ur EV status and best stats if u manage to miss that
-there is now a characteristic listed that represents IV values
-stat-specific EV training items exist, such as wings, and holdable items that shorten the amount of training needed
-in one game EV training was made into a minigame called super training, and since then there have been shops u could purchase it using money in both the main game and bonus zones (festival plaza, that one road in BW2, etc), and in SUMO u can purchase it with an item called 'bottlecaps', OR do it passively for free on the island minigames (the island one takes time, but the time can be shortened using beans, which r pokemon treats. u can EV train up to 6 pokemon at once this way, as opposed to one at a time)
-there are now mechanics that make getting specific natures through breeding much easier
-pokemon at lv 100 can now gain EV points-- previously they couldnt and u were just SOL
-in the most recent game the item that made ur pokemon hate u was removed entirely and the boost from stat-specific holdable items was doubled
-traditional ev training was made easier too in SUMO-- because pokemon can now call for help, you can chain like 5 or more battles at once.
-u are now rewarded EVs for catching pokemon AS WELL as defeating them
-EV stats were visible in super training and still are visible in the summary. maxed stats have a star next to them and a pokemon with maxed EVs overall (two maxed stats or 510 EV points total) will have a cyan stat chart instead of white
-several NPCs will comment if a pokemon is maxed out and in most games ur pokemon gets a ribbon for it
-theres now a reset item that resets all EVs to zero, and the berry items are way easier to get as well.
MariaElizabeth - Today at 1:34 PM
hehe
those seem like a really good way to deal with it tbh
just level the playing field :)
angelgotch - Today at 1:40 PM
oh also i lied its not 52 (i thought it was 52 bc after using the maximum amt of vitamins, its 51 LOL), it was 84 battles without items if u battle 3-point pokemon, which are mostly strong or rare. most pokemon are 1 or 2 points. u could get it down to 42 if you used an EXP share or a macho brace and 21 if ur pokemon had pokerus, which was literally so rare it was almost unheard of outside of hacked pokemon and could not be attained through any intentional means, just pure luck. it also wasnt a permanent condition, either.
so it was wORSE THAN IS AID
also pokemon summed through the call for help system give double EVs when defeated
MariaElizabeth - Today at 1:44 PM
oho
hm, that's really interesting
god honestly imagine if all that effort gone toward training pokemon to obliterate any competition went toward like
political campaigning
angelgotch - Today at 1:51 PM
the new items that replaced the macho brace give u 8 extra EVs in addition to the evs u normally get, so instead of 3 (6 with a brace, 12 with a brace and pokerus, though prior to gen 4 the pokerus bonus did not stack on top of the brace bonus so it was just 6 iirc. maybe 9?) u can get 11 by holding the item, 22 with if u hold it with pokerus, and 44 if its an SOS pokemon bc the bonuses stack

bc of this stacking, you would only need to defeat 7 1-point pokemon if u had pokerus, the item, and they were SOS pokemon. theres an item that makes SOS pokemon more common btw, and if u do it right the pokemon will summon SOS allies indefinitely. ive chained 14 before lol. even without pokerus thats only 14 battles, MUCH easier than eighty fucking  four.
MariaElizabeth - Today at 1:51 PM
yeah
especially when, lik eu said
the battles all happen one after another LOL
angelgotch - Today at 1:53 PM
also global trading made pokerus easier to get a hold of, since u could now ask the internet to give u a pokemon with it, or find one on the trade centre.
heres how rare pokerus originally was btw, also the game doesnt tell u what it does either lol.
"Pokérus has a 3 in 65,536 or approximately a 1 in 21,845 chance of being generated on one of the player's Pokémon after a battle, making it rarer than encountering or hatching a Shiny Pokémon. If any of the player's Pokémon are infected, the Pokérus may spread among Pokémon in the player's party after any battle."
MariaElizabeth - Today at 1:53 PM
hmm
so basically if u know someone who has it they trade it to u and then it spreads to all yours
angelgotch - Today at 1:56 PM
ive never actually gotten it naturally in a game-- only thru traded or hacked pokemon.
and yup! tho getting it to spread is a bit tricky-- ur whole party doesnt automatically get it, just the pokemon directly adjacent to it in ur party lineup. also it only lasts 1-4 days, so u gotta spread it to everyone who needs it in that time, but u can extend that time by keeping the infected pokemon in a box, bc itll only recover in ur party.

these mechanics are never stated in game, either.
in gen 3 the box trick didnt always work tho.
MariaElizabeth - Today at 1:57 PM
hm
angelgotch - Today at 1:58 PM
LOL ACCORDING TO THIS GUIDE IN THE GENERATION POKERUS WAS INTRODUCED THE PROFESSOR TELLS U IT DOESNT DO ANYTHING AT ALL
MariaElizabeth - Today at 1:58 PM
well i mean
as far as he knows it doesn't
makes sense :p
angelgotch - Today at 1:58 PM
LOL
in the remake of that game he still says it, but will correct himself if u call him back.
he claims they 'level up better' tho which would imply an EXP boost rather than a stat one
angelgotch - Today at 2:00 PM
either way, u get my point that there is literally no way a 10 year old would figure this out esp if they didnt have access to internet forums that gave guides on it
ah, right
angelgotch - Today at 2:04 PM
basically, im emphasising that the ppl the game was made for would have no way of figuring out EVs even exist (since, again, originally they were never mentioned at all in game), let alone how they work or which pokemon give which points and how many, nor would they have any idea how to utilise the bonuses

now its mentioned in game, players have easy-access to bonuses and non-battle methods of boosting it, bonuses are increased enough to drastically shorten the time and effort needed, methods were made FUN and/or CUTE (the minigames were fun, and the purchased EV points are in the form of giving ur pokemon fancy meals, or ur pokemon playing in a bouncy castle, or ur pokemon 'having fun at the gym'. the island minigame has ur pokemon playing on playground equipment while being fed fancy smoothies and optionally given pokebean treats. u know. cute stuff.)
and most importantly its EASY and doesnt require an absurd amount of math or internet guides to do
MariaElizabeth - Today at 2:05 PM
:smile:
beautiful
angelgotch - Today at 2:05 PM
so now u CAN win with ur favs! and not feel bad doing it! bc tbh i felt guilty ev training bc it felt mean even tho theyre just pixels lol
now its like
yay im making my pokemon stronger by spoiling them!
MariaElizabeth - Today at 2:06 PM
yeah, I see what u mean hehe
they're getting stronger cause of all ur love
angelgotch - Today at 2:06 PM
and bc of the berries, the lv 100 ev limit being removed, and reset bag u cant fuck up, bc if u fuck up u can undo ur mistake, and its never too late to train a pokemon, so u can even retroactively train ur starter
MariaElizabeth - Today at 2:06 PM
oho
yeah that too
im pretty attached to my starter tbh
the absolute boy
angelgotch - Today at 2:08 PM
same!!! i never wanna remove them from my party lol
MariaElizabeth - Today at 2:08 PM
hes my friend
angelgotch - Today at 2:08 PM
so ofc itd be sad in old gens to have an effectively useless pokemon taking up a slot
MariaElizabeth - Today at 2:08 PM
why would i leave him behind
aw
angelgotch - Today at 2:08 PM
now u can be ride or die
MariaElizabeth - Today at 2:08 PM
me tbh
angelgotch - Today at 2:09 PM
also correction: the bottle cap thing changes IVs, not EVs-- which is COOL bc IVs in the past were completely unchangeable u just had to live w what u got.
angelgotch - Today at 2:11 PM
theres a rare kind of bottle cap that maxes ALL of ur IVs too instead of just one. so thats cool as heck since in the past getting perfect IVs involved generations of breeding for each stat.
MariaElizabeth - Today at 2:11 PM
good lord
which sounds
angelgotch - Today at 2:11 PM
also: the way they made stat specialties visible is rlly cute
MariaElizabeth - Today at 2:11 PM
even more tedious than ev trainign
hmm?
angelgotch - Today at 2:16 PM
the nature system which determines which stats ur pokemon will be good at and suck at is presented as ur pokemons personality! adamant, jolly, bold, etc. it also changed what flavour of treats they liked or disliked.
the IV version was characteristic, which was stuff like "loves to eat" "proud of its power" "nods off a lot" etc.
basically, it made ur pokemon more individualistic in a way kids could appeal to, like, i think it made it easier to see ur pokemon as pets!
MariaElizabeth - Today at 2:16 PM
aha
rather than strength = 0.5
yeah honestly from what ur saying theres so many layers of good design
angelgotch - Today at 2:18 PM
the pokemon creators are aggressively trying their best to make the games accessible to kids which i fucking love bc it farts in the face if git gud type gamerbros