#but these are the new pokedudes that would be added to it:

[gamebunny-advance]

Random Thought

So, a while back I posted a pic of all the Pokemon dudes that I like despite knowing basically nothing about Pokemon, and it's become a very shocking fact to me that despite their apparent popularity, the train dudes do basically nothing in their home game.

[mrmallard]

So here's my problem with modern Pokemon. Yes, this is my boomer-ass genwunner rant, finally realised and in the flesh.

So ever since gen 6, Pokemon as a franchise has relied a lot on redesigning old Pokemon and adding gimmicks to the gameplay loop. I'm talking about Mega Evolutions and Dynamax, but I'm also talking about regional variants. As much as the team make new Pokemon every gen, they rehash old Pokemon with a new coat of paint.

And that's fine. I don't have beef with any of that. Perfectly neutral, and frankly some of the new forms are badass.

But I think gen 9 has come to a head with that.

Much like prior gens, Paldea has Pokemon like Wiglett that rehash old Pokemon designs. There's a land-walking Tentacool, there's Clodsire etc. etc. Wiglett is explicitly calling back to Diglett in a new context. Clodsire is explicitly Quagsire but Different. You couldn't argue that these new Pokemon aren't specifically calling back to older Pokemon designs - and it's cute and fun and all that. Game Freak does design throwbacks like that. That's not inherently an issue.

But this time, Wiglett and Clodsire and all of the throwback Pokemon are actual, new, registered Pokemon. Like, Alolan Raichu is its own thing, but it's not called like Umichu and given its own Pokedex number - it's understood that there's an evolutionary difference between Pikachu that's native to places like Kanto, Johto, Hoenn etc. and Alola. It's Alolan Raichu.

They took Diglett, made it into a barnacle, gestured wildly at it and went "look it's Diglett as a barnacle!!!" and made it a new Pokemon.

I feel like these new Pokemon go past the point of homage - because I would argue that those other gimmicks like mega evolution and regional variants are a form of homage. It's covering old ground, but it's being cute about it. But with Wiglett and all that, they're actually padding the Paldean Pokedex. "OoOoOoOoOoHhHhH it's a NeW sPeCiEs~~~~~~~~", meanwhile it's indistinguishable from a regional variant of Diglett, or Tentacool, or Quagsire from an older game. It's explicitly a throwback in the style of regional variants, except it's been labelled as a distinct, seperate entity for what feels like a completely arbitrary and creatively bankrupt reason.

That being said? I understand that Game Freak are overworked, and they're churning out crap like Scarlet/Violet on development time-frames that are less than a year. And I know that's a contentious and facetious opinion - it's less that Paldea is Bad, and more that the games were completely unoptimised and underbaked, even with the bold new open-world direction and inspired new gameplay elements that the games introduce. Paldea is fine, but the games themselves are these awful products of corporate greed and crunch, and you can blatantly see the seams.

Game Freak made that game in maybe a year or two, probably beginning pre-production during the development of Legends Arceus to lock down the design and aesthetic of Paldea and then entering full production after Legends came out. I'm not a game dev, I'm just speculating, but if that's true, S/V was in full production for less than a year. And when you're under the crunch like that, with a franchise that's been recycling old designs for years, you're gonna hit a point where you either take more of the critically short dev time to make up some new pokedudes or you do the same song and dance of dressing up mutton as lamb.

So like I can understand why this might have happened. I'm not crossing my arms and throwing a tantrum at the devs; S/V genuinely seem hellish in the way that they were developed.

But I still don't think Pokemon like Wiglett and Clodsire should count as their own Pokemon. I think it's a product of crunch, but I still think it's a bullshit decision. They're so, so clearly regional variants. And like - I think they should exist in any and all facets that they can exist in, it's not that I'm decrying their entire existence. I just don't think they deserve to be a new Pokemon when they're clearly a homage to Pokemon that came before, like with a new mega evolution or a regional variant. And I find the fact that they do qualify as their own distinct new Pokemon to be creatively bankrupt and extremely cynical on behalf of the Pokemon Company.

Detractors have been throwing the idea of "Game Freak running out of ideas" around for years. We've all seen bullshit hater kvetching about the ice cream Pokemon and the car key Pokemon and the trash Pokemon, and we've seen the counter-argument of older Pokemon with bullshit designs etc. etc. I don't go for that, and I never have. I'm not a fuckin Klefki rabble-rouser.

But Diglett and Wiglett being legally, textually distinct Pokemon with their own seperate Pokedex number is bullshit, right? Like it's not controversial to say that these are just elevated regional variants that are bizarrely and cynically considered new Pokemon for the sake of padding and not on their own merits, right? They're fine designs, I'm not saying they shouldn't exist, but having the games go "This is Quagsire, and this is Quagsire's Paldean cousin Clodsire, and they're different :)" after years of toying with the idea of regional variants is just bullshit. It's actual, unabashed bullshit.

That's my boomer-ass genwunner Pokemon rant. The fact that Paldean regional variants are considered entirely new, original and fresh Pokemon for the sake of filling out the Paldean Pokedex is a lazy, cynical decision - and it may have a sympathetic motivation, but it doesn't make the decision any less bullshit. I've always been a flexible Pokemon fan, I haven't been a hater up until now, but this is bullshit.