(Little) Things that annoy you in Pokémon

[KalosianPorygon]

Igglybuff's eyes are red and black when Jigglypuff and Wigglytuff both have blue eyes.

I remember a friend of mine calling Igglybuff "creepy" because of the red eyes. Said friend is a Dark-type fan who likes grotesque stuff.

Speaking of, it bugs me that Sneasler doesn't have a gender difference but Sneasel-H does.
None of the other regional forms have gender differences, even if their original does, except for Sneasel so if 3/4ths of the "line" has them...the only reason I can think of is because they wanted the Noble Sneasler to be a girl and the extra long ear piece was meant to look feminine by design where as it'd be short if they retained the difference, but at that point why bother giving Sneasel-H the difference? Or maybe it could have been cute to flip the gender length?

I didn't even know Hisuian Sneasel has a gender difference.
Really if it weren't for female Partner Eevee, I would have thought the 3D models are why Game Freak discontinued subtle dimorphism.

It's more like how they handle gender differences after they experimenting with minor sexual dimorphism in gen IV and threw it out of the window after Gen IV to only major sexual dimorphism with only select Pokemon.
Sometimes they designed that the male and female Pokemon will play different role. Unfortunately, Pyroar are just Lions and Lionesses, nothing more.

By the way, as much as I like the Espurr line, can someone explain to me whyMeowstichas gender differences? Nothing about its inspiration suggests it should.
And speaking of gender, the Dawn Stone.Unlike any other evolution stone, it gained no members after its introduction in Generation IV. 17 years later, it still only affects male Kirlia and female Snorunt.

 

[Axiemeister]

what annoys me about gender differences is that they dropped the concept after one (01) generation, but still carry on all the minor differences from the first four gens of mons. dudes, either work them into every generation or just drop them from the old mons too.

 

[QuentinQuonce]

what annoys me about gender differences is that they dropped the concept after one (01) generation, but still carry on all the minor differences from the first four gens of mons. dudes, either work them into every generation or just drop them from the old mons too.

For several gens after 4 I almost got the impression that the design team were like "oh, right! Gender differences! Make a couple of species have a really obvious difference" almost as if to compensate for the fact that it's only those ones instead of a bunch of species. Hence all the Pokemon that have extremely obvious visual/mechanical differences like Jellicent, Meowstic, Indeedee, and Pyroar (that one's pretty justified though) instead of a minor sprite difference.

 

[Kaltau]

The rigid adherence to National Dex limitations, specifically in gen 4.

for HGSS, there’s a decent amount of criticism for Gen 2 for the minutiae of Pokémon collection (waiting for swarms, specific event days, etc…). HGSS also introduces this badass idea of regional sounds, to bring in even more variety. Who wouldn’t love the opportunity to bring in another steel and dark type (Bronzor and Absol), Gen 2’s new additions that are still exceedingly rare? Tossing an iconic bird Chatot (sorry Hoothoot) in Sprout Tower to finally give Violet City, steeped in tradition, a tradition of bird Pokémon? Adding in some cool fighting types, which Gen 2 was definitely lacking in providing? Shinx in the National Park for anyone wanting to do an Officer Jenny run? For what little they were, radio sounds offered a ton of depth and it was already soft locked behind two gym badges in having to get the Radio Card. Buuuut no, you can only unlock this after the National Dex, after you’ve beaten the Elite Four and are taking on Kanto (which only exacerbates the issue of catching low level Pokemon and fighting strong battles).

Same story again for Platinum and the GBA cartridge offerings. The chance to start with a Solrock from the very first lake sounds awesome. However, this opportunity, which already requires the separate purchase of another game, is locked behind a National Dex.

There are just several opportunities in which GF/Nintendo can loosen regional restrictions to the tune of 10-15 Pokémon in the face of 493 or whatever that would add just so much depth, but they won’t.

 

[Ironmage]

The rigid adherence to National Dex limitations, specifically in gen 4.

for HGSS, there’s a decent amount of criticism for Gen 2 for the minutiae of Pokémon collection (waiting for swarms, specific event days, etc…). HGSS also introduces this badass idea of regional sounds, to bring in even more variety. Who wouldn’t love the opportunity to bring in another steel and dark type (Bronzor and Absol), Gen 2’s new additions that are still exceedingly rare? Tossing an iconic bird Chatot (sorry Hoothoot) in Sprout Tower to finally give Violet City, steeped in tradition, a tradition of bird Pokémon? Adding in some cool fighting types, which Gen 2 was definitely lacking in providing? Shinx in the National Park for anyone wanting to do an Officer Jenny run? For what little they were, radio sounds offered a ton of depth and it was already soft locked behind two gym badges in having to get the Radio Card. Buuuut no, you can only unlock this after the National Dex, after you’ve beaten the Elite Four and are taking on Kanto (which only exacerbates the issue of catching low level Pokemon and fighting strong battles).

Same story again for Platinum and the GBA cartridge offerings. The chance to start with a Solrock from the very first lake sounds awesome. However, this opportunity, which already requires the separate purchase of another game, is locked behind a National Dex.

There are just several opportunities in which GF/Nintendo can loosen regional restrictions to the tune of 10-15 Pokémon in the face of 493 or whatever that would add just so much depth, but they won’t.

And yet the accessibility of non-regional dex mons has gone down since. At least using a spheal in HGSS was possible.

 

[Axiemeister]

gamefreak not changing old regional dexes as the regions appear in newer games incenses me. there is never any good reason to not retcon them and at least add the evolutions/pre-evolutions of lines that started out in that region, such as the happiness evos in FRLG. and, as mentioned above, including newer pokémon in the dex for balance reasons. any lore/flavour explanations falls to the fact in gen 2 there were then newly introduced pokémon that you can only obtain in kanto, instead of them all being in johto and kanto only having kanto pokémon.

with that said, imo regional dexes with too many pokémon (so all of them post XY except the remakes and maybe original SM) are also annoying to complete and also area/route composition becomes too crowded, and i am fine with some mons being locked to postgame. in dexit era, i'd like to see a game start with a "core" dex of 250-300 mons, so the main story can actually have cohesive areas instead of 15+ new mons in an area, and then post-game unlock an expansion of 100-150 more mons via radar, swarm, etc - basically how gen 4 and 5 worked, but with a better "core" selection of mons.

 

[Kaltau]

And yet the accessibility of non-regional dex mons has gone down since. At least using a spheal in HGSS was possible.

I hypocritically don’t mind that, in a way. I was actually all in favor of Gen 3’s approach of mostly hardlocking Gen 3 ONLY for the playthrough (shoutout to Marill for making the cut). It was fun and fresh kept things feeling different.

It’s just that, for me, in remakes and games with multiple regions of Pokémon available, I’d like to see a better mix than the same old geodudes and zubats (or roggenrolas and woobats) everywhere to represent the extra. Instead of just Tangela outside of the National Park, let’s throw in Tangela and Carnivine. Instead of throwing more Pidgeys and Hoothoots, let’s get some Swellows and Chatots involved as well. With the Sprout/Burned/Tin Towers, there’s way more spooky motifs for Meditite and Bronzors fit in perfectly than in their original introductions, and the Burned Tower is a way more thematic locale for Absol than outside of Fortree City. Let’s get a few more bugs in the Contest and a few more smashing rocks and headbutting trees.

Idk, that’s just how I see it. Either hardlock regions or actually pull in Pokémon to build an environment instead of spamming in the same usual suspects (not that the usual suspects are bad, they’re just hard to get excited about).

 

[Kaltau]

gamefreak not changing old regional dexes as the regions appear in newer games incenses me. there is never any good reason to not retcon them and at least add the evolutions/pre-evolutions of lines that started out in that region, such as the happiness evos in FRLG. and, as mentioned above, including newer pokémon in the dex for balance reasons. any lore/flavour explanations falls to the fact in gen 2 there were then newly introduced pokémon that you can only obtain in kanto, instead of them all bring in johto and kanto only having kanto pokémon.

with that said, imo regional dexes with too many pokémon (so all of them post XY except the remakes and maybe original SM) are also annoying to complete and also area/route composition becomes too crowded, and i am fine with some mons being locked to postgame. in dexit era, i'd like to see a game start with a "core" dex of 250-300 mons, so the main story can actually have cohesive areas instead of 15+ new mons in an area, and then post-game unlock an expansion of 100-150 more mons via radar, swarm, etc - basically how gen 4 and 5 worked, but with a better "core" selection of moms.

I’m definitely in agreement here. I’m not advocating for full on unlocking of everything. I just think adding in 10-20 newer Pokémon and allowing for evo lines (also Leafeon could totally have been an Ilex Forest level up and Glaceon an Icy Path level up, instead of having the trade to Platinum) would go a long way to keeping remade iterations feeling dynamic and a part of the larger world.

There should definitely be some locks in place (radio Pokemon requiring reaching Goldenrod and opting into using the radio signal, National Dex after Elite Four, etc…) to keep the clutter down, like you’re talking about.

 

[Ransei]

Pokémon Bank does not reward you for completing its National Dex at all, meaning there is no real reward you get for filling in the National Dex all the way up to Gen 7.

The closest thing to an award would be the ability to speedrun for an indefinite amount of Magearna-O in Pokémon HOME (by linking Bank with HOME then pumping Pokémon in the GTS for all the Galar Dex Pokémon, then deleting your HOME account after getting Magearna-O to do it all over again), but as someone who enjoys Gen 7 and have no real desire to get Sword or Shield, it sucks how you cannot transfer Magearna-O back to the Gen 7 games or even get Magearna-O off Bank for Natdex Completion.

What I did for this case was complete the HOME National Dex, all the way up to 905 (only 1-890 is required for Mag-O), then when I got Magearna-O, there very coincidentally became an update that allowed anyone to delete their HOME save file the day after. I decided I was going to delete my HOME save file and use an external device to create a Magearna-O in Pokémon Ultra Moon, then consider it as "transferring the Pokémon HOME Magearna-O backwards".

Am I crazy? Yes. I do not care however. I'm just playing Pokémon how I feel I'd enjoy it most .

I then created a new HOME account, linked it with Pokémon Bank, instantly got 1-807 registered, filled the HOME dex up to 890 again for another Magearna-O, and gave that one away via Wi-Fi room giveaway last Christmas.

Note, I decided to sacrifice a lot of valuable Pokémon I had in the Gen 6 (and to some extent, 7) games in order to get the Galarian Pokémon from the GTS, so anyone doing the same would need to have the resources (legendaries, fully evolved Pokémon, etc) to offer up for trades.

 

[Hugin]

with that said, imo regional dexes with too many pokémon (so all of them post XY except the remakes and maybe original SM) are also annoying to complete and also area/route composition becomes too crowded, and i am fine with some mons being locked to postgame.

This IMO is a breakdown between the "Catch 'em All" players and the "multiple playthroughs" players. If someone wants to 100% the regional dex, an opening route with Bellsprout, Hoothoot, both Zigzagoon, Shinx, Scatterbug, and Nickit is a nightmare with 5 balls. If I'm on Nuzlocke #2, Pidgey, Sentret, and Mareep repeating for everything pre-2nd town is going to guarantee I don't play a third. And while those are extreme examples, I don't really think there's a medium that makes everyone happy.

Personally, I'm a big fan of them just throwing a bunch of mons into the game, making them available early, and staying out of our way. Something like Hoenn Spheal being locked to an optional area just before the 7th gym is just sad for a new mon that should get a spotlight, and things like the Sinnoh's lack of fire shouldn't happen. Yes, it makes the routes fairly busy, but I'd rather take that than get bored.

 

[R_N]

I find busy routes really fun, an I'm definitely more catch 'em all than multiple playthrough.
It's just nice to see a bunch of variety route to route and new things to get, and circling back to pick up what I missed isn't a downside to me.

My only issue is one found in a lot of the games: continuing to put new stuff (not even literally New Pokemon for that gen i mean different encoutners in general) i nthe final areas of the game. I'd like to see those earlier, actually, game...I can make a concession for rare or very strong Pokemon (pseudos, example) but when it's stuff like Lickitung in Victory Road or the Cerulean Cave its like

my dudes

are you for real right now

 

[Axiemeister]

This IMO is a breakdown between the "Catch 'em All" players and the "multiple playthroughs" players. If someone wants to 100% the regional dex, an opening route with Bellsprout, Hoothoot, both Zigzagoon, Shinx, Scatterbug, and Nickit is a nightmare with 5 balls. If I'm on Nuzlocke #2, Pidgey, Sentret, and Mareep repeating for everything pre-2nd town is going to guarantee I don't play a third. And while those are extreme examples, I don't really think there's a medium that makes everyone happy.

the one thing that could be a happy medium would be a new game+ feature in which you get this expanded pokédex i mentioned available from the get-go without needing to unlock features for it. of course, this would never happen since gamefreak would rather burn to the ground than actually introduce explicit replayablity features again, but...

 

[Cobalt Empoleon]

I'm generally in Team Constrained Pokedex, but mostly I just want finding Pokemon to be more fun and gamified, rather than a tedious slog where you run back and forth on every route to joylessly tick off each Pokedex entry. It's much less relevant now that we're in the open world era (and they do an okayish job of this in SV), but I wish they'd subdivided areas more often in previous gens so that different Pokemon appear in different parts of a route/dungeon/area, in a similar vein to stuff like the Meteor Falls Bagon room or the secret entrance to Wayward Cave.

It doesn't have to be anything too fancy, nor do the 'bonus' Pokemon need to be pseudo-legendaries haha, but having slightly rare or quirky Pokemon gatekept behind exploration rather than low encounter probability is always more fun. Put a secret grotto at the centre of one of the hedge mazes on Kalos Route 4 and make Ralts a 60% encounter in the grass there! Carve out a hidden cave on Alola Route 1 that links to some Electric-themed offshoot of Tapu Koko's lair, or maybe some surfing-related shrine to reference Alolan Raichu, and make that the spot to find Pichu!

These are just two examples I came up off the top of my head, but with a bit of thought you could tie so many fun worldbuilding details into the process of filling out the Pokedex (provided it's not overdone).

 

[QuentinQuonce]

I'm generally in Team Constrained Pokedex, but mostly I just want finding Pokemon to be more fun and gamified, rather than a tedious slog where you run back and forth on every route to joylessly tick off each Pokedex entry. It's much less relevant now that we're in the open world era (and they do an okayish job of this in SV), but I wish they'd subdivided areas more often in previous gens so that different Pokemon appear in different parts of a route/dungeon/area, in a similar vein to stuff like the Meteor Falls Bagon room or the secret entrance to Wayward Cave.

It doesn't have to be anything too fancy, nor do the 'bonus' Pokemon need to be pseudo-legendaries haha, but having slightly rare or quirky Pokemon gatekept behind exploration rather than low encounter probability is always more fun. Put a secret grotto at the centre of one of the hedge mazes on Kalos Route 4 and make Ralts a 60% encounter in the grass there! Carve out a hidden cave on Alola Route 1 that links to some Electric-themed offshoot of Tapu Koko's lair, or maybe some surfing-related shrine to reference Alolan Raichu, and make that the spot to find Pichu!

These are just two examples I came up off the top of my head, but with a bit of thought you could tie so many fun worldbuilding details into the process of filling out the Pokedex (provided it's not overdone).

I've argued this a lot with X and Y specifically, since there's so many Pokemon to find in Kalos. Like yes it's good that Kalos has 450 Pokemon in its initial Pokedex, but it's not enjoyable or interesting to have each route have 10 Pokemon all solely found in the grass. It means that if you're ever specifically looking for something you're in for a long slog before it emerges.

Alola had significantly fewer Pokemon in its first game, but had almost the same numbers as XY did in USUM and IMO it did Pokemon distribution really well. There were still a lot of routes that were simply crammed with different species, but the addition of ambush encounters and the odd one or two that had to be chased in the overworld like Wimpod, and the fact that certain Pokemon that could only be found via SOS battles (which I really enjoyed, it added a great element of strategy since you often had to specifically go in with a Pokemon that could survive a long chain of encounters) made the spread of Pokemon much more enjoyable than the prior games. And of course there was Island Scan, even though those aren't native Pokemon.

But yes, I'd like to see areas like the Bagon room in Meteor Falls more commonly used too.

 

[R_N]

I don't know how you look at Xy's encounter tables as "a slog" and then turn around and go "SOS encounters were great"

Absolutely nothing is more of a slog than getting something to low HP and then just twiddling your thumbs, waiting for it to make a call (because even at low HP & with the Adreneline orb it isn't guaranteed nor is it always a successful call), then killing the called pokemon until the proper one is called. I'll take a brisk run around some grass over that any day, legitimately.

Meanwhile with the XY routes may as well mention that some routes differed their encounter rates based on patches of flowers, horde encounter exclusives, several routes & caves had 5-styled "phenomenon" (Rustling grass, trash cans, swooping encounters, etc)...

 

[Worldie]

And while reading all the issues above about the difficulty to get certain pokemon to spawn I still wonder how some people can still defend "random encounters" as a good mechanic and better than overworld encounters.

(hint, they never were, they were just a product of the limited processing power of old consoles)

 

[Red violet blue]

The ability of the swords of justice is not good enough, and is completely useless on Keldeo.
I think sharpness would be better, and it's still really in their mood: SWORDS of justice.
Off course, the dev should add Secret Sword to the list of moves which have an increased power with sharpness.
(Sharpness increases the power of sacred sword, leaf blade for Virizion and the rare x-scisors I can't even write)

 

[pika pal]

As a main-game player, I think Sharpness sounds awesome. As a Comp-poisoned player, I debate if I want to go that hard on them.

Sharpness would be really useful for the Swords and Flavorful but I also expect most of them would end up in some BL-Hell given 108 Speed is a really strong speed tier for anything before Gen 9 OU and besides Boosted Sacred Sword > Close Combat, most of them probably find use for at least one Coverage move if needed (Virizion likes Leaf Blade boost, Keldeo could use Air Slash for bulky Grass even if Secret Sword isn't added, and maybe someone likes X-Scissor as coverage for something like Slowking/Bro). Going from no ability to basically a free Choice item on most of their moves would be a massive benefit to them but I also imagine some ending up in a weird limbo due to being too linear for a tier above but too strong for the one below.

All that rambling aside, I do find it a bit strange the Swords never got a Hidden Ability, whether universal like the Beasts (as Gen 9 parallels them to) or individual like the Kanto Birds. It feels like they started adding those for Gen 1-3 alongside the Forces of Nature, then forgot/dropped the idea for "Sub-Legendary Set" Pokemon until we got to Gen 9 with the Loyal Three despite giving them to several Box-Art and One-Off Legendaries. I don't mind whether they do or don't give them out but it feels odd to me that they just kind of did a few and then stopped.

 

[R_N]

All that rambling aside, I do find it a bit strange the Swords never got a Hidden Ability, whether universal like the Beasts (as Gen 9 parallels them to) or individual like the Kanto Birds. It feels like they started adding those for Gen 1-3 alongside the Forces of Nature, then forgot/dropped the idea for "Sub-Legendary Set" Pokemon until we got to Gen 9 with the Loyal Three despite giving them to several Box-Art and One-Off Legendaries. I don't mind whether they do or don't give them out but it feels odd to me that they just kind of did a few and then stopped.

It wouldn't surprise me if the Forces of Nature got HAs because they had future plans for them. Maybe not even a specific plan, just "we want to do something" and the Hidden Abilities were a good way of having that as a marker. At minimum you could just have that be their shtick; Dream Radar or something like it could have always been in the cards and even if the Therians werent it'd be a reason to pay attention to them.

The Swords didn't have that consideration, so they didn't get HAs.

 

[Axiemeister]

posting this just for the possibility of being convinced to drop it:

it annoys me that dialga is time and palkia is space because i feel their typings and designs match the opposite.

 

[R_N]

posting this just for the possibility of being convinced to drop it:

it annoys me that dialga is time and palkia is space because i feel their typings and designs match the opposite.

Dialga's spikes are probably meant to invoke a clock with things like gears, ahnds, and so on (more obvious on the much later designed Origin form), so I think that design aspect fits. Palkia less so, admittedly, but I don't think it really fits "time" any more than it does "space"; feels like the smooth design is more to represent being Pearl mascot (smooth, with curves)

I guess Steel doesn't necessarily link up with Time (to be fair most of them would have issues here) but it does link up with Diamonds being hard, while Palkia's water type probably to represent how spacious the seas are & also because its a Pearl.

 

[pika pal]

Dialga's spikes are probably meant to invoke a clock with things like gears, ahnds, and so on (more obvious on the much later designed Origin form), so I think that design aspect fits. Palkia less so, admittedly, but I don't think it really fits "time" any more than it does "space"; feels like the smooth design is more to represent being Pearl mascot (smooth, with curves)

I guess Steel doesn't necessarily link up with Time (to be fair most of them would have issues here) but it does link up with Diamonds being hard, while Palkia's water type probably to represent how spacious the seas are & also because its a Pearl.

The prevailing theory I hear for Palkia's Water typing is because Water is one of the few forms of Matter that can exist in all 3 regular states at reasonably observable temperatures, with "Matter" being an approximation for Space based on Giratina's "Anti-Matter" moniker and 3 Dimensions vs Dialga's 4th for Time.

 

[KalosianPorygon]

The ability of the swords of justice is not good enough, and is completely useless on Keldeo.

I remember Justified being really good on Terrakion, but I do agree with pika pal: they deserve Hidden Abilities. Partially because I like them, partially because Justified is bad on Keldeo, but also because even before Sharpness became a thing, there are a couple possible alternate Abilities for the four.
Sharpness fits all four, but how about more specific picks like, say, Intimidate or Swift Swim?

 

[Red violet blue]

I remember Justified being really good on Terrakion, but I do agree with pika pal: they deserve Hidden Abilities. Partially because I like them, partially because Justified is bad on Keldeo, but also because even before Sharpness became a thing, there are a couple possible alternate Abilities for the four.
Sharpness fits all four, but how about more specific picks like, say, Intimidate or Swift Swim?

Swift Swim Keldeo, Sand rush Terrakion and Chlorophyll Virizion?
Or intimidate on Cobalion Terrakion Virizion, but competitive on Keldeo?
(Or even intimidate Keldeo but it's kind of weird because Keldeo is "the young one")

 

[Axiemeister]

Dialga's spikes are probably meant to invoke a clock with things like gears, ahnds, and so on (more obvious on the much later designed Origin form), so I think that design aspect fits. Palkia less so, admittedly, but I don't think it really fits "time" any more than it does "space"; feels like the smooth design is more to represent being Pearl mascot (smooth, with curves)

I guess Steel doesn't necessarily link up with Time (to be fair most of them would have issues here) but it does link up with Diamonds being hard, while Palkia's water type probably to represent how spacious the seas are & also because its a Pearl.

The prevailing theory I hear for Palkia's Water typing is because Water is one of the few forms of Matter that can exist in all 3 regular states at reasonably observable temperatures, with "Matter" being an approximation for Space based on Giratina's "Anti-Matter" moniker and 3 Dimensions vs Dialga's 4th for Time.

the thing is, while i get these points, their typings particularly would fit better reversed (water as the flow of time, steel as space and stars - meteor mash is a steel move!), and even their designs superficially feel switched to me (dialga looks... spaceship-y?, palkia's shoulder things look like clocks) even if there's obviously more thought in what you two said than in my perception.

on justified and keldeo: if the ability just raised rhe higher stat between attack and sp.attack it would fit all four swords of justice