Fun detail: the two most "developed" cities in Johto, Goldenrod and Olivine, are also the only two that have direct connections to Kanto (Magnet Train and S.S. Anne).
Not even new bark town has a direct connection despite it being the town you have to go through to get to the élite 4. You'd think there would be a bridge or SOMETHING
That's why you hope to get pichu or elekid in the mystery eggs. I got Elekid, and Electrabuzz might not be as strong as Ampharos but still a decent pokemon. I do miss Ampharos though... Pokemon Silver was my chidlhood.
A quick note on Unown: I think the reason they're modeled on the English language probably comes down to Japanese kids having to learn it in school, so they feel smart if they can decipher what the Unown are representing.
@@gregoryschwing3786 The game was still made by Japanese people and for the Japanese market before anything, especially at that time. The fact that it could do even better overseas was a bonus.
@@batmabelI’ve been rewatching the indigo league series lately and it’s fun to catch all the little Japanese cultural things in the show that, as a kid, meant nothing to me
@gregoryschwing3786 I thought RPGs were considered a dead genre in the west back then. Yeah, Pokemania, but I think gen 3 were the first titles designed with worldwide release in mind from the get-go.
I grew up in a pretty poor home. We often did not have enough money to get out let alone anything else... That said my mother is a freaking beast and would figure something out so I could go to bk on Tuesdays for the Pokemon meetings and meet up with other kids. I think this maybe was one of the key events that made me fall even more in love with Pokemon (and more so my loving mother). There is a whole conversation to be had about how art (pokemon in this case) can help us through hard times. Thank God for art and thank God for loving parents.
Great comment, right in the feels. I'll never forget going to town with mom and all of a sudden she says to me that I can pick any game I want. So I went for Pokémon Gold. It was my gaming introduction to the universe (had watched the animé since it first aired) and still play to this day. Love you mom, one of my most cherished and beloved memories
My abuelita gifted me Pokemon Gold, I even have the picture of me and her besides the christmas tree holding the game box. This was my first Pokemon game. I remember that feeling like it was yesterday! RIP Tita!
While GSC was amazing, I almost feel bad for people that didn't get to experience RBY first. Not because they're missing out on RBY, but because the gen 2 games felt like such a massive improvement over gen 1. The feeling of going from Gen 1, which was still a pretty damn good game, to the fucking masterpiece of gen 2, was bananas. On top of the general improvements, and the additional Pokemon, you even got to RE-VISIT Kanto from Gen 1. That, and the world just felt so much more alive in GSC. The only thing that could really have made the games even better is if NPCs moved around. The idea that everyone just kinda stands in the same place forever, is a bit...eh. But hell, that's still a thing in the current games, so I guess they liked it.
Australian here. I had a Celebi! They did a thing in Aus where you could go the shopping center (Mall or whatever) and put your game cartridge in a machine they had and they would put Celebi into your game. I can't remember if it went directly in your party or box or whatever. I do know it just gave you the Pokemon, there was no event to play through. I must agree that event and DLC Pokemon are shit though. Downloading a Pokemon just feels wrong. There is no attachment or anything with that Pokemon, and it is even worse when they come at a high level. All Pokemon should be in the game to be caught.
I think what gravitates a lot of people to Johto is not just the nostalgia, but also because there's this sense of intimacy and humbleness to it. There also seems to be an underlying message about the passage of time. Johto is a region that showcases how the old ways of the past can co-exist with the new and modern world. Which has a lot of meaning towards it because these games and Crystal were released around the year 2000, which was the start of a brand new millennium. This is further showcased with how much Kanto and the returning characters changed, and your final battle with Red, who's essentially your old self. Gold/Silver/Crystal are the very definition of retro games. You know they're old, but definitely not outdated. It has this mysterious charm to it that draws both me and other fans in, that no other game in the franchise has rivaled since.
Pokemon games are always best when they encourage you to be possessive of your save file. That doesn't happen in titles where the game just sorta ends when the champion loses.
I just started playing a Gen 2 game for the first time since I was a kid. And I gotta say, I'm loving it. It feels way more 'alive' than the other games. Like, the time of day changing with your real life time, along with different Pokemon appearing at different times, and even the nurse mentioning the time. Then there's all the daily things like events, berries re-growing, trainer rematches, etc. And the phone calls where the people on your phone book will call to just chat sometimes and tell you about some interesting thing that happened. No other Pokemon game I've played (which, mind you, I've only played up to gen 5. I haven't finished 5), has felt the same as GSC. Gen 3 and 4 were great, but they felt a lot like Gen 1, just with more of a story. Gen 2 had this OPEN feel to everything. Like, yeah, it was mostly linear where you needed to go aside from a few gyms being able to be played in different orders, but it didn't FEEL linear. It's also one of the few Pokemon games where I actually WANT to talk to the NPCs. They could have some daily thing I don't know about, they could mention something, they could give me an item or have a Pokemon to trade. Who knows? To me, Gen 2 almost feels like a mix between a Mobile game and an MMO. An RPG that you load up for a little bit at a time, do some grinding, do some battling, maybe get a badge, do some Pokemon collecting and maybe some shiny-egg stuff, and you do your various daily things. And then you put the game down and play again later, or tomorrow. It's a game that feels like it was designed to be played in small bursts as opposed to one big chunk.
Gen 2 has a special feeling to it, I feel like it's whole aesthetic is one of my all time favorite things, you pick the game and it has these insane color palettes, you pick a game guide and you see images of the game next to Ken Sugimoris ink and watercolor illustrations, you stroll around the region as you listen to nice rich adventurous music, you search for clues all through the game about the region but all you get is mystery. It's an absolutely endearing experience, I always thought it was weird how Gold and Silver were praised for having Kanto in the game, because Johto alone was so amazing to go through. I actually used to reset my game over and over once I beat the Elite 4, I wasn't playing the game so I could go to Kanto I was completely in it for Johto's appeal and wonder. I also may have just realized that one of the reasons I love Johto so much it's because I grew up in a small town with a lot of wonder to it too, so many areas in the game, especially Ecruteak City's care for tradition, ring to me personally. I grew up in a town bathed in tradition and history, and that place in particular in Johto was covered in historial wonder. I didn't grow up in Japan no, but I can deeply relate to living in a place where there are fables and myths around it. In my town we had a tale that if a child had trouble sleeping, their family should climb the mountain and go within the great boulders until they find the Saint of Sleep, pray to it and light up a candle, and good fortune and good sleep would come to the child. I visited that place every now and then as an adult, and what remains from that is not the clear child like story that you hope becomes a true thing, it's the fact that people went through the trouble of creating a chapel within massive stone boulders in honor of a childs sleep because they cared for their health and well being. That's part of what I feel with Johto, it's a game that it genuinely feels like it cares about that whimsical child like wonder and care.
Glad I wasn’t the only one to recognize Johto’s magic, especially through the allure of Crystal version exploring with the female character whom was one of my favorite designs.
I think it's more like "what's the lore, what's the mythology, why did Lugia choose it over others." But you could also just say that it's the closest to the deepest parts of the ocean and thus Lugia likes calling it its home. But that's where individual theorizing comes in.
Or is it only one island? Is it just a cave system that extends up in to water? Why does lugia need to go through a small door just to access the open ocean? Is lugia being contained there? How do the kimono girls reliably get out there and interact with it? Is lugia really related to ho oh? Or more like the heatran to ho ohs arceus.. so many questions, especially if you only played gold
# lakewood20 pretty sure the implication is there's a way into the caves from underwater. Lugia is found on a body of water deep inside the islands, so that body of water probably extends downwards and exits out into the open ocean farther below. It does mostly live at the deepest depths of the ocean after all
i got a celebi legitimately on my (NTSC-U) silver cartridge by going to the pokemon center store in new york city and downloading it from a kiosk there around 2001 or 2002, so it wasn't entirely impossible consider it region locked to japan, and one small, small section of middle manhattan, which is... not much better if at all
DrunkWario I got Celebi in the Netherlands legitimately in the Gold/Silver era. Don’t know exactly anymore, but I had to sent the game to Nintendo by mail. They traded another pokemon with Celebi and mailed it back. I always thought it was a fairly common event even in other countries.
Germany used to have a Pokémon Day where they would tour the country and would trade the current especially rare event pokemon. Not sure if Celebi was shared like this but definitely other pokemon.
The second generation is by far my favorite. That connection it had to the first with the inclusion of the Kanto region and the final battle with Red, continuing the story with Team Rocket and seeing all the gym leaders in Kanto that have grown, with Blue as the last one. It really felt like it was passing the torch to a new generation like it has never again felt to me. Like you were picking up where Red left and trying to make a story of your own, evenctually exceeding even the greatest trainer ever. The design of the new Pokemon and towns, the color pallette and just the general vibes of the game are outstandingly beatiful and timeless. It's the game that makes me the most nostalgic for my childhood by far.
I think what gravitates a lot of people to Johto is not just the nostalgia, but also because there's this sense of intimacy and humbleness to it. There also seems to be an underlying message about the passage of time. Johto is a region that showcases how the old ways of the past can co-exist with the new and modern world. Which has a lot of meaning towards it because these games and Crystal were released around the year 2000, which was the start of a brand new millennium. This is further showcased with how much Kanto and the returning characters changed, and your final battle with Red, who's essentially your old self. Gold/Silver/Crystal are the very definition of retro games. You know they're old, but definitely not outdated. It has this mysterious charm to it that draws both me and other fans in, that no other game in the franchise has rivaled since.
The second generation used to be my favourite (I thought), but I've realized I just don't find it as fun as I used to. I've only played the remake once, and when I got Gold for the 3DS I quite after the fifth gym. In comparison I've played the shit out of both Yellow and LeafGreen, and when I got Blue for the 3DS I loved every second of it. This video gave me a newfound appreciation for the general vide and design of this game, even though I feel no desire to actually play it.
My favorite thing about GS was the cellphone. I really liked checking back in with trainers that I beat early on who felt like they were going on their own parallel journey without being saddled with the narrative importance of being a proper "rival" and foil to the player character.
Nothing gets me more nostalgic like pokemon GSC.. So many great memories. The graphics, the incredible soundtrack, hearing the weird Celebi myths at my lunch table, even the aesthetic art designs in the instruction booklet are a vivid memory of mine.. Everything about these games just take me back to much simpler time. I had over 999 hours played on my Gold version & used to look forward to seeing my best friend every day so we could play together. I'll never see those warm suburban summers again but I will never forget them either. Thank you for uploading man!
You must've been super excited about the Johto remakes. As someone who grew up on Hoenn, I am immensely jealous over how your remake turned out vs. mine.
To be honest that's my sentiment when the Heartgold Soulsilver games are talked about. They are the games that give me the best nostalgia, even though my first pokemon game was Pearl. Heartgold is just so important to me and my childhood memories. Beating Red is so memorable as well... Such a hard trainer to beat when you are a child!
@@antonioorlando4104 Yes, im glad that the newer Pokemon fans got to enjoy it also! Gold/Sapphire were my first Pokémon games, I wouldn't have it any other way
@@KingKlonoa Well, if Pineco was a sentient Pine cone, it will be Grass type, not Bug type. After all, Exeggute are sentient Coconuts shaped as eggs, Sunkern is a sentient Sunflower seed, Seedot is a sentient Acorn, Cherubi are sentient Cherries. All seeds and fruits seem to be Grass-type. The original design seems to be a mix of three ideas: Bag Worm shaped as a Nut and a Weapon. For Pineco: a bag worm using the Acorns' cupule from japanese oak as home and shaping it like a hand grenade (that is why it explodes when falling). None of the japanese descriptions refer it as a pinecone, but only as a nut. Only the westerner descriptions do. Even if the design seems to point to a pinecone, well this is purely a coincidence: the japanese designer didn't have this in mind. But I guess the translation went from Acorn to Pinecone, because... most Acorn's cupule we know are not "stringy" like the japanese one but smooth/"beaded". Forretress is just a worm is a Chestnut's cupule with turret (again: Nut + Worm + Weapon).
I always saw Red as a final battle challenge, not as a continuation of the story. It made sense to me that he was so much stronger because the idea was that if you could beat him, you beat the game (from a combat perspective).
@@miimiiandcoyeah that’s how I looked at it. Mount silver in general felt like an extra zone just to flex basically. Nobody’s allowed in here without all of the badges so it’s just me and Red? Bet😎
Maori people didn't exactly worship the kakapo. It's culturally significant to them and features in their folklore, as do a lot of other bird species, but they also actively hunted them for food, their feathers and kept them as pets. It's also only Natu that is based on the kakapo. Xatu is said to have been based on a Condor or Resplendant Quetzel with Native American inspired totem designs. The name Xatu comes from the Native American "Xat", which is their name for the totem.
I would argue Natu isn’t even based on the kakapo at all. It seems more likely that Xatu was designed first and designing a chick-like version of it for a pre-evolution made sense. Other than being green and flightless, nothing about Natu resembles the kakapo. Its flightlessness is more easily explained by it being a chick of Xatu.
As somebody pretty informed on Mesoamerican (Aztec, Maya, etc) culture, I don't buy that it was influenced by the Quetzal or Mesoamerican culture, at least not exclusively. It's clearly more influenced by the Native American groups along the Pacific Northwest with Totem Poles and such, though I notice that Japan tends to more freeily mix North Native American and Mesoamerican and South American socities in media; so it could be a mix, wheras here in the US we tend to make a distinction between Latin American native cultures and US/Canadnian ones
MajoraZ I agree, but I don’t even think Natu and Xatu are green to reflect Mesoamerican culture at all. I think they are purely based on making a bird out of a Native American totem pole, but to make it the color of carved wood (brown) would not distinguish it well enough from Hoothoot and Noctowl, which are also brown birds.
Pros of crystal (on virtual console): the Celebi event is easily accessible and unlocked after beating the kanto champion. Cons of crystal: no Mareep line
@@joshuarichard6827 That's the idea, but deleting the _wrong_ Pokémon from the roster for version exclusivity leads to game balance problems for whichever version got, say, _the_ definitive early-route Electric-type deleted.
This whole Houndour problem reminded me that even in Heart Gold and Soul Silver they didn't bother to add him as a night pokémon for Johto. What a kick in the balls, Game Freak.
And for the time, these games felt huge. It used to blow my underdeveloped mind that such a massive world existed on a tiny cartridge. It still kind of does, truthfully.
But at the same time the G/S games Safari Zone was just as bad as the Red Blue Yellow games just WITHOUT the Glitch that allows you to fight Safari Zone Pokemon elsewhere.
@@skyatollah2skyharder276 yeah Kanto GSC was underwhelming, the trainers were weak, the gym leaders being lower level than lance (minus Blaine&Blue) was not good at all
@@vulcanraven9701 As a kid I remember being stoked as that you had Kanto iin the game only to be disappointed at how stripped down it was. I feel like they could have used the remaining space to make the last half of Johto better than what we got and have enough depth to make sure we weren't facing the Pokemon league with level 40 Pokemon.
I had a lvl 10 female Rattata that I taught dig to. I got my shit kicked in by Morty and was facing his last Gengar. I used attract on the Gengar and used dig until It went down. That rat went up 2 levels as a result and I won the battle thanks to it. Needless to say I have a huge respect for Rattata.
Can’t tell if you’re trying to say that Lavender Town is a bad composition. Its dissonance is reflecting that something’s not quite right in that town.
I've recently come to appreciate gen 1's less standard/tonal music. In addition to Lavender Town and Pokémon Mansion, you have Viridian Forest and Mt. Moon as really creepy themes. It's a different style to gen 2's music, but not worse imo
@@LongfellowLP Back then, when pokemon were still treated as scary wild animals a lot of the time, there was still quite a lot of lore saying that you should be wary of wild pokemon. So, being stuck wandering around a mazelike forest or cave full of them would be a disconcerting experience, and the music from those zones are a bit creepy to match.
These were definitely my favorite as a kid, and the later remakes were an excellent upgrade. Having two regions in one -and fighting 16 gyms in total - is a feat that no other entry has achieved. It really felt like there was so much to do, so much to see. Absolutely loved it.
Man that music makes me so emotional. I have a really heavy, dark story about how Pokemon Silver, and Blue before that, helped me cope through a very very VERY difficult time in my life. I won't go into it, but, Silver's Johto region was a second home for me, when I had nowhere else to go, and going back to Kanto at the end felt like coming home even though at the time I knew I'd never go home in real life. I'm forever indebted to these games, and I wish I could share the level of joy I feel just hearing the music with everyone, and I hope that it helped someone else through a dark period of their time, or just reinforced the joy they felt when things were going well for them.
Our experiences probably are different, but the sentiment to this game is the same. Hearing the music in this video awakened something inside me, probably smoll child me and a bunch of emotions. Hard to describe really, but something more then just nostalgia
Don't mind me Im just being needlessly salty on the internet buuut... Either you had to be entirely to young to be having dark times(that you can actually rember) Or, you too old to still be watching pokemon videos on youtube. I Probably shouldn't judge though, im definitely of the later. For some reason still clutching at whatever fond memories i have of a game from 20 years ago.
The way you describe Johto and discovering Kanto is very reminiscent to my experiences to the generation with Pokemon Gold. Even though I moved a crazy amount, and for a year, the Pokemon Crystal Prima Strategy guide was one of 4 books I had access to. Playing and reading it for a year really was one of the few stable, consistent parts of my upbringing. Now that I'm older with my own place, I can really say for sure that it was like you said, "a second home.' I just want to reach out and say that I appreciate you sharing your experience from this generation of games.
@@cernanwinterfox85 kids can have darktimes you know. Just because you didn't doesn't mean others didn't. Child abuse exists you know. That was a really ignorant reply.
@@cernanwinterfox85 lol imagine thinking children cant have dark times, or that adults cant enjoy pokemon. This is coming from a 30 year old child abuse victim. Pokemon helped me through dark times as well. Pokemon crystal in particular helped distract me from an abusive corrupt foster home, too.
Generation 2 was a great time to be alive as a kid. Pokémon the movie 2000, the fast food tie-ins that were mentioned, and the game was just absolutely huge. You finished Johto, and you still have Kanto! All of that packed into a Game boy cartridge. And I've heard that generation 2 was going to be the last generation of Pokémon that they were ever going to do, but because it became so popular, they continued on. So basically they put their entire effort into this series of games which one of the driving forces of why it's so good. When I started with the third generation I just couldn't feel it anymore, and I became a second generation purist ever since. At 34 years old, I still adore Lugia.
The nostalgia thinking about when the second movie came out, playing my silver version, and loving the trading cards, what great times to be alive for. I miss it so bad I could cry. I’ll cherish those memories forever.
@@RolandKoller90 Never let it die. Sit down and re live those memories. Heck I've gotten a customized GPU backplate that's Lugia. And I've even found on Etsy a tasteful Lugia mouse mat. That was my idol Pokemon as a kid and now that I'm an adult in my 30s, I'm gonna feed my inner child. Life is too short to "grow up"
Lance has 3 Dragonites because in the last game he has 2 Dragonaires and they evolved since the previous game. That happens a lot in Gold and Silver when you run into people from the first game. Their Pokemon tend to have evolved since the last game.
Last I checked, the games and anime use some entirely original fake language, probably to avoid having to translate signage during localization. I assume this wasn't a thing yet when gen 2 was released?
@@DarthFennec yeah. Even as far in as Sun and Moon I don't remember the fake language. Might be different in the anime though. I think SWiSH was the intro for that.
@@oswin1234 Makes sense, since I don't remember seeing it in Sun/Moon either. I'm pretty sure it's been that way in the anime since at least Black/White, though.
Gold: These aren’t even dragon types. Lance: Tell that to my three inappropriately leveled Dragonites! and my personal favorite: Lance: You don’t get to be champion of the Pokémon League without knowing how to spam *FULL RESTORES!!!*
14:53 Australian here! There was a special Celebi event at select Westfield shopping centres that gave you Celebi by inserting your Gold and/or Silver cartridge into a Game Boy slot built into a Computer that even showed you transfer of Celebi into your game! I think it you had to have a space in your Pokemon team in order to store the Celebi. I got my Celebi at Westfield Parramatta!
27:22 A recently found Prototype of Gold and Silver actually had Blue and Red at significantly lower levels than in the final game. Red capped at around 70 or so with Pikachu, with the others being mid 60's and Blue was of a similar power level to the other Kanto leaders. The fact that the buffing to Red happened so late makes a ton of sense (at least to me), because of how massive the spike is in the final with effectively no trainers to fight for exp.
The spike is huge because of two critical stagnation points, one being after Morty and the other is the whole Kanto region. If we had a constant progression you would have the pokemon league around lvl 50-60 like in RBY and Kanto going up to mid/late 60, Red's lvls would fit perfectly.
0:47 Pokémon is On Top 2:13 KingK wants to see what these games added to The Pokémon Series 2:57 *Part 1 - Elusive Johto* • Johto is a land based off of rural Japan • What happened here? Why are the legendaries roaming around? - “A bit undercooked” The Unknown are kinda off 7:33 • A land steeped in tradition & nature *Displayed Through Music* 🎼 🎶 And Pokémon based off real world creatures 12:13 _New Evolutions!_ , Celibi Region Locking 🔐 17:49 *Part 2: Kanto’s Backyard* 19:29 Gold Team Rules!....right? 22:33 Traveling through Johto, Battling Gym Leaders 25:51 Red >>>> Lance _Proper Strategy can make weaker Pokémon able to beat Strong Pokémon, but LV 75???_ - You have to grind to beat Master Red 32:30 No Main Antagonist in Johto - Pre-Teen edge boy learns love ❤️ 36:29 Lance is “as interesting as a Plank of wood” 39:42 HM Use 42:00 *Part 3: A Staggering Coat of Rock Polish* Dark Types
I’m pretty sure the 3 Dragonites are the evolved dratinis he had in his Elite 4 fight, as is the rest of his team. He kept his team because he valued the bonds he had with them and believed in their ability to win
Dragonairs... You said Dratinis Come on, I'm French. To me it's Minidraco, Draco and Dracolosse (Sorry for the jealousy, our translators were really good. And btw, Crisacier-metapod. Dracofeu-charsard. Charmelion-Reptincel. Triopiqueur-dugtrio. Alright I'll leave you alone with this.) Anyway, even I know Dratini and Dragonairs names.
@@machina5 What? So I'm saying french pokémon translators did a better job and the names are better? And for the reste it might have been a joke about a mistake.
This reminds me of Easter, over a decade ago. I got soul silver as a gift and that was my first Pokémon game. At first I didn’t even know that you had to save the game. I started over half a dozen times before I learned. I still remember the cities and the aesthetics more than Pokémon black, which I spent the most time in of any Pokémon game. It was just so revolutionary to me
Oh wow. The suggestion of Karen as the champion.... genuinely outstanding and insightful contribution to the discourse on a game where I thought it had all been exhausted. But as you allude to later (thanks edit!), I think it needed some changes to accommodate the pre-physical/special split and availability issues for that to be viable.
Didgeridude yeah I find it weird they gave her a gengar when she could’ve had a full team of dark types (Umbreon, Houndoom, Sneasel, Murkrow, Tyranitar)
Yeah but why a Vileplume? (I know she uses her favorites but still). If Lance can have 3 under leveled Dragonites, then Karen should get an underleveled Tyranitar haha. Ah well.
"Think of the stories you'll tell when teambuilding" My Black playthrough really won out in that regard. My whole team had their own distinct personalities in my head--the one that most amused me was characterizing my Unfezant as a wannabe ladies' man; I was heavily inspired by real pheasants in that regard. Seriously look up their courtship habits sometime. Those birds are the Johnny Bravos of the animal kingdom XD
i liked how red straight up kills your confidence you built after becoming champion, and I like how it teaches you to never feel conplacence and also it makes you think, forcing to use status moves and you can't brute force your way through it. it's merciless and fun for hiding the new pokemon behind him was fun I love lance because it's a common thing for people to want to use the same pokemon but i'd have made different moves for them
I think I know he's the first gym leader but still. An Onix is quite special. He could have had something better. Like a Pigeotto and something special. A Doduo and a Pigeotto. A scyther in the second gym, thats what I mean.
In defense of Gen 1 music: the Lavender Town music was extremely creepy if you were a little kid playing that game and the walking and biking themes are iconic, even if they're a bit simplistic.
Oddly as a kid I never found Lavender town's music creepy, at least not even to actually creep me out. More spooky but cool Surprisingly I found the Tower far more chilling given the gravestones and channelers.
Regarding Snubbul, you could have just gotten a schoolboy's phone number and waited for him to call you. Swarms were another one of the many things that were introduced here.
Silver and Gold, can be bought and sold but Crystal is found in the earth Pleasure is nice, but not the whole and certainly not the arbiter of worth...
I cannot explain why but I love the Gen II Pokémon. Sunflora is up there, mostly because I hardly won the bug catching contest so no one in my group really had one or a sunstone for that matter.
I’m right there with you. I remember spending the night at my cousins and we printed the list of pokemon and how they evolved with the plan that we would evolve and trade a bunch of Pokémon the next day. Getting politoed, porygon 2, scissor, are super memorable.
We used mail all the time. We were 12 and it was the only way for us to talk about things we wanted to keep from our parents without leaving evidence they'd be capable of finding.
@@cooladam2167 If i remember correctly,you take one of the Mails,write through your scene ,give it as a hold item and trade the Pokemon with the other. Then back and forth.
33:03 I certainly wasn't expecting ChuggaaConroy of all people to be named dropped in a KingK video of all places lmao what a blast from the past, I'm glad to see you have good taste
The bad level curve goes hand in hand with the nonlinearity in the second half of Johto (although there's zero excuse for the too low level ranges in Kanto). As a kid I never really noticed and that might just be because I transferred over a lot of my high-level Pokemon from my Red cartridge onto my Silver one. But I definitely felt the grind when revisiting. Still, Johto remains my favorite region for atmosphere alone. I love every single town.
Sun and moon gets a lot of flack, even from me, but I’m super thankful for what they did with the HM’s. And great review, really took me back to my favorite generation
What I like about Johtos Pokemon in particular is that aesthetically, they actually seem to fit in pretty well with the Kanto region Pokemon. They kind of took the art design in a different direction with Gen III onwards. That isn't to say they're bad per se-I like plenty of the newer Pokemon, even the ones that look aesthetically very different. Mind you, some of this could just be some amount of nostalgia bias if you will-I got into Pokemon around Gen II's release, so that might be it. I can't quite put my finger on what details they are, either. I suspect it might be the prevalence of baby Pokemon, to give a thematic sort of follow-through if you will between the old and new ones.
I mean that makes sense. A lot of the Gen II pokemon were reworked designs of rejected Gen I pokemon designs. Its likely a lot of the designs were all made at the same time.. So obviously there's a thematic connection between the two generations that doesn't really exist between later generations (outside specific individual pokemon). I remember watching a youtube video that said that a lot of newer designs also had more of a 2-D (cartoon) feel to their features, while older ones focused more on depth of features (realism) to designs. Obviously all pokemon are stylized versions of real animals/objects, but i think the amount of stylization changes a lot past Gen 2.
@@ddre71194 ddre71194 I think it mostly goes down to simpler, quainter designs, possibly with certain, maybe something about more muted color pallets, too. A good example: Reshiram has a very complex design, and honestly looks quite a bit like a Digimon (in fact, quite a bit like a hybrid between the two). It looks cool, don't get me wrong, but somewhat out of place in Pokemon. Though, the best examples I can think of are the more colorful Pokemon. Deoxys, for example. I imagine some of this is graphical limitations being exceeded and them playing with more complex designs consequently.
@@MatthewCampbell765 This is the video I mentioned. ua-cam.com/video/nmtY5Ebl0wE/v-deo.html Yeah I agree with you, the designs for a lot of the first 2 generations pokemon was a lot simpler to me as well. Especially for legendaries. Ho-oh and Lugia to Groundon and Kyogre is even a huge shift. But I think a large part of that specifically is the shift in the importance of them. The first 2 generations just had legendaries being rare or mythical creatures that were revered but were in the end just random creatures. Later generations had Legendaries be forces of nature or creation, and so the greater elaboration in lore kind of translated into their designs. That's why some of my personal favorite legendary designs (Regi trio and eon duo) are the ones that have the lesser amount of "specialness" and are just really rare creatures. I think they tried to do that with Zacian and Zamazenta (simple design and just rare creatures)but then threw that out of the window with Eternatus.
A lot of the Gen 2 Pokemon were designed in the original generation one batch. What I mean is, they made more Pokemon for Gen 1 than they actually put in the Gen 1 games, and The Leftovers got put into generation 2. That's why the anime had things like Togepi and Ho-Oh well before the Gen 2 games ever came out.
Matthew Campbell I feel the same. I also think Pokemon from X and Y fits well with Kanto Pokemon. Especially if you look at the promotional art style of X and Y
I love how you talk about the fun in team diversity that Pokémon has. I’m playing Platinum now and purposely using a team with only 2 of my staple playthrough Pokémon (Empoleon/Luxray) and keeping the rest of the team fresh
I think I would enjoy "catching them all" in the earlier generations due to the smaller size of the pokedex. I actually did catch them all in XY, which was an absolute PAIN but it was fun at the end.
@@twilit8162 I only got Volcanion because i bought a copy of X for my boyfriend who had somehow never played a Pokemon game before and the save file that was already on it happened to have Volcanion.
Regarding Silver: The key difference between him and Blue is that Blue is unlikable in a mundane way-he's a 'sitcom arch-nemesis' as TV Tropes would call it-but Silver is an actual jerk. I think this could work for a rivalry pretty well, but I think the issue is that the game simply doesn't have an arc to it. You see, with Blue, the rivalry between him and Red is essentially the main arc of the game. They both grew up together, were both given the same mission, and are both competing to see who can do that job better. Silver, by contrast, doesn't feel connected to Gold's story much at all. He's more like an intruder stepping interrupting things. Indeed, when he shows up, my mind would usually go to "Oh no, this asshole again?" Admittedly, at the time I wasn't very good at strategizing, but he always struck me as what amounted to an NPC roadblock. I do like the idea of having a rival who's genuinely evil, though.
I will say that Silver has the same problem as Hop and other rivals in regards to development that it's less development and more "this dialogue shows I'm not the same right?" I think the Gen5 rivals and Lillie/Gladios were one of the better examples of development in the mainstream games
You say Silver being evil is a negative, I say it's a positive. Whether or not you feel a pet-like attachment to your pokemon or not, seeing someone mistreat them and throw them under the bus is so much of an attention grabber than yet another "I'll get stronger then win" type. I always wanted to beat that misanthropic redhead if only because it feels so good to shut him up.
The saddest thing about Gen 2 was it's inability to connect with Gen 3. This brought about what my childhood self dubbed The Dark Age of Johto, from 2002-2009. Essentially, between the release of Ruby and Sapphire and Heartgold and Soulsilver. This was the age when Johto Pokemon were extremely hard to find, and could only be found in games like Pokemon Colosseum, in special locations as in Emerald, or given away in rare special events such as the Navel Rock event.
Nowadays with Gen 2, I can't play it without recommending the romhack Crystal Clear enough. It's a romhack that turns the Gen 2 experience into open world with paths that get everywhere important without HMS, redistributed Pokemon, scaling difficulty for trainers and gyms based on how many badges you acquire, and ways to get every Gen 1 and 2 Pokemon within a single file, making for a unique experience overall. On top of that, the romhack is programmed in such a way that it's compatible with Pokemon Bank and Pokemon Stadium 2, putting it far above other romhacks like it. Excellent review, KingK!
Silver was my main squeeze in this generation. I was 8 years old, my parents had just divorced. The Pokemon hooks were in deep haha. My first playthrough of Silver was the most special of all to me not only because of the obvious fact of everything is new and exciting but my starter in that game was a Celebi (and a Mew technically as well). A buddy of mine had a GameShark at the time and he was wanting to trade starters (I have no idea why since HE had the GameShark). So I was like sure I haven't really started much so I'll trade. He trades me the Celebi and then something random for Mew. I just went with it because of course I did. It was hands down the most rewarding Pokemon playthrough Ive ever had. While Celebi is a "legendary" the stats for him are ehh. Not bad just not on par with a normal legendary of the era. Also Grass/Psychic was unique for the gyms since Dark was introduced and rampant. Mew was a lot of the same thing and honestly became mostly an HM Slave. I did grab a copy of Gold from a friend later on and played normally and loved it. Hands down my favorite Pokemon Gen. Also, love the vids dude keep it up! Was anxiously waiting for this one.
Great job on getting the sponsorship, King! I'm really stoked that you were able to get something going there. I've always been wanting a VPN, but too lazy to actually do anything about it, but once I heard your sponsorship for it, I finally decided "hey why not" and went for it. Keep up the great work, and thanks for this high quality S-Tier content.
Still my all-time favorite Pokemon game I love how you can go back to the Kanto region and fight the old gym bosses and you fight red at the end it was epic 10/10
Gen 2 will always be my favourite simply because I was a kid, and it’s when I first truly got lost in the Pokémon world and got into it. It was a magical time that can never be re created. I hold strong emotional connection to a lot of Gen 2 so while I don’t think it’s the “best” generation it will always be my favourite.
I haven't watched your vids in a while (I love falling asleep with rewatching Zelda retrospectives lmao), and I remembered seeing the thumbnail on Twitter. So glad I caught this video so early! Good watch, everyone
Oh my god FINALLY! I remember going into my stocking on xmas eve, realizing i got silver, playing it all night and putting it back before 3am and pretending i didnt know it was there. I actually didnt expect them to buy it, i didnt ask for any games that yr. But i was so glad! My favorite pokemon game. Dont have my copy any more, and i wish i knew what i did with it.
Better use smokescreen a couple times first or it'll be taking you out with rock throw before you take it out with flame wheel. Especially since your Quilava will most likely be underleveled since you're coming out of the longest water route of the game.
@@Flip-a-dip-dip What's funny to me, about GF giving Sunny day to Jasmine's Steelix, fully knowing that would give an unfair advantage to Typhlosion, while putting Feraligatr at a disadvantage, is that they really had to sit there, and make that decision, of adding that move to Steelix's moveset. That means, they thought Typhlosion really needed all that help, in order to beat a type it naturally has an advantage against, while Feraligatr was viewed as the actual threat that needed to be nerfed. Perhaps it's because they knew Typhlosion doesn't get any super good fire moves by level up (when you reach Jasmine, it'll probably only have flame wheel as stab), that is, if you don't want to get out of your way to get flamethrower from the casino/game corner. While Feraligatr on the other hand, gets access to Surf, the probably strongest water move in the game, relatively early. It can get Surf before Morty, if you beat the Kimono lads first. So in order to offset that, they had to nerf Feraligatr's Surf somehow, or else, Surf has the potential to one-shot Jasmine's entire team. And you really think Feraligatr will struggle against a couple Magnemites? They get swept by Surf, or dig. A tm Croconaw can get before Whitney from National Park, useful to break Miltank's terrifying rollout chains. You Feraligatr haters are so pressed to show how much mighty and superior Typhlosion is, that you'll literally try and convince yourselves and other people, that a well-trained Feraligatr will lose to Jasmine's Magnemites. Wow, just wow.
That moment when someone finally appreciates my favourite Pokemon, from the second generation. Sudowoodo, Lanturn, Xatu and Forretress. Jeez, I loved my team back then, as well as today :'o
38:31- That I can agree with In hindsight, the Champion theme, much as I like it, would probably have more of a lasting impact if we first and ONLY heard it with Red.
What a nice thoughtful retrospective! It's a testament to your script writing (not to mention the pleasant cadence in the way you talked throughout the video) that I was fully engaged for the full hour long run time
I'm ok with Red being so monstrously higher level than anything else. I wish he had straight 100's and Blue capped at 60. Would be such a shock. You would understand that he's been grinding on Mt Silver. I think it would also be cool if the game communicated in some way that he had all 251 in Silver/Gold/Crystal and all 493 in Gen IV.
I played Heart Gold a couple years ago, and I definitely felt that experience problem. I think most Pokémon games lack a good way of leveling between 50-70. Some Pokémon evolve or learn cool moves in that range, but it’s usually not all that fun to grind it out in a single area.
Smash A to defeat the Elite 4 a couple of times until I got a level or two on the Pokémon I wanted. Definitely not the most exciting way to grind your level 50+ pokémon but still the one where you get the most experience in a relatively short time. You can also run through Mount Silver if the Pokémon you are trying to level isn't weak against any of the wild ones there or in the grass before it but definitely takes more effort to run around.
I especially had a problem in this game as a person who doesn't play with a set team of 6. I tried to train pokemon for each of the Kanto gyms, but could find a spot to power level them up to the 40s with shared exp. I would have had to train each the normal way, which would take forever.
This is why Platinum and the Gen 5 games are some of my favorites. The post-game island for Platinum was a godsend and gen 5 was mostly designed around getting Pokemon to higher levels, especially the B2/W2 games, where half the game is the post-game. As someone who wants to at least try out every new Pokemon when I play a new generation, GS really sucked to go through, and HGSS just made it worse with the increased variety and no way to compensate grinding to make it easier to explore different options. Such great games bogged down by suck a poor leveling system
@ItZed That's assuming you know where and when to get their numbers to call for a rematch. Or that rematching them is a feature at all. Luckily the "when can I rematch them" is pretty easy. If it's time, they'll wait for you at the Saffron City dojo. If it isn't, they'll tell you when it is.
I can’t wait for the HeartGold & SoulSilver video❤ I’ve watched this probably 15 times as background noise doing chores around the house or shiny hunting. Pls make the remake video at least an hour 😅
I loved the morning noon and night sequence in this game. I remember waking up as the sun rose as a kid to catch some pokemon you could only catch in the morning on my crystal version. Aww the memories
I'd like to point out, the music doesn't have any more "detail" in either Gen. The music sounds so different because the composer changed between games. Matsuda's style is largely contrapuntal with an ostinato lower line, often employing very simple harmony. Ichinose uses more complex harmony and employs more textures than Matsuda, but as you said yourself, they're using the same sound chip, which can only play a maximum of three notes at a time. I agree it's a large step up in terms of soundtrack (I listen to the ost from gen 2 constantly), but I wouldn't characterize it as "more detailed".
I don't think he was saying it's more detailed than the red blue yellow ost per se, but instead it's more detailed in the sake that we had more variety of "town music", "dungeon music", "bad guy hideout music", "battle music", and so on, each appealing for a special context.
It's funny how you mention it's present popularity thanks to the remakes, but I played the originals more times than I can count, never played the remakes that much and it's weird taking into consideration that I was in the era of the remakes (but that's just me).
Well that's only bc in Gen 1 you were only allowed to play as Red. In Gen 2, the sister version Crystal was the first game to give you a female trainer option but it wasn't really a part of the plot I'm guessing. Also Oak already had known Red according to the gen 1 story. I really love Gen 3s Kanto Remakes for the addition of Leaf, she has such a great design and isn't shoved into as many games as Red. For that alone she feels more special, even if Red is still pretty cool. Gen 3 was the time where female playable protagonists became more relevant as even when you didn't pick May, she was still a part of your journey being your rival. It's a pretty cool evolution tbh
@@isaacleillhikar4566 There was a (now deleted) tweet from Toshinobu Matsumiya which placed the games up until X/Y (I believe) in chronogical order, it placed the Kanto games alongside the Hoenn ones. There is this article on Bulbapedia about it: m.bulbapedia.bulbagarden.net/wiki/History_of_the_Pokémon_world
@@starbo3110 Yeah. The problem i think is the pokémon from chicorita onward are "100 new discoveries" and how come there are some in Hoenn poping up ie Scarmury, Slugma, Marill... and these people know about them even including Gym leaders.
I literally just started a Heartgold nuzlocke an hour ago. Haven’t played it in 2 years and now out of nowhere tou choose to make this video. Amazing. Update: I got to Lance with a Typhlosion, Umbreon, Crobat, Gyarados, Poliwrath and Forretress, all at level 47 or 48. I lost my Umbreon to a destiny bond from Karen’s Gengar. I stacked 6 dragon dances on Gyarados and would have almost certainly sweeped his team with waterfall, avalanche and ice fang. My stats were buffed to high heaven, but I misclicked. I accidentally pressed dragon dance again instead of waterfall and got killed by his Aerodactyl’s thunder fang and proceeded to get sweeped. All that work which would have almost definitely led to me wiping the floor with him, ruined by a misclick. Bullshit. But then I went back to fight Lance from my last save so I could give my team the sendoff it deserved, even if they all died it wouldn’t matter because at least they wouldn’t lose because of a goddamn misclick. *This* was a much more poetic end. Thanks to some crits and a freeze, I was left with my Typhlosion vs Lance’s Charizard. I just barely scraped through the fight and beat the nuzlocke with only my starter left. I’m glad that I actually managed to get some good closure. Bu the way, I never do stuff like this, but this was a special case. I might do Kanto one day in the future, sort of like a reboot for the team.
I will never forget how Lance told one of his dragonites to straight up HYPER BEAM a dude that was blocking his path.
I mean...wouldn't you? I would personally flamethrower them out the way.
I’d just use explosion.
That blew my mind as a wee young'n
I always got annoyed because the dragonite sprite just rams into the guy, there's no hyper beam animations
Lance is a king
Fun detail: the two most "developed" cities in Johto, Goldenrod and Olivine, are also the only two that have direct connections to Kanto (Magnet Train and S.S. Anne).
that's actually pretty good world building. i love it.
Not even new bark town has a direct connection despite it being the town you have to go through to get to the élite 4. You'd think there would be a bridge or SOMETHING
Cool so Kanto is developed and Johto is rural
Crystals biggest flaw is that you can't catch Mareep.
Replaying vc crystal made me think i was crazy not finding one after I’d played heart gold
Good point, one of the strongest electric types!
I've never played Crystal. That would have infuriated me. Ampharos is so good.
Mareep the goat ironically
That's why you hope to get pichu or elekid in the mystery eggs. I got Elekid, and Electrabuzz might not be as strong as Ampharos but still a decent pokemon. I do miss Ampharos though... Pokemon Silver was my chidlhood.
A quick note on Unown: I think the reason they're modeled on the English language probably comes down to Japanese kids having to learn it in school, so they feel smart if they can decipher what the Unown are representing.
usa market bigger than japanese market
@@gregoryschwing3786 japanese game release in japan first
@@gregoryschwing3786 The game was still made by Japanese people and for the Japanese market before anything, especially at that time. The fact that it could do even better overseas was a bonus.
@@batmabelI’ve been rewatching the indigo league series lately and it’s fun to catch all the little Japanese cultural things in the show that, as a kid, meant nothing to me
@gregoryschwing3786 I thought RPGs were considered a dead genre in the west back then. Yeah, Pokemania, but I think gen 3 were the first titles designed with worldwide release in mind from the get-go.
I grew up in a pretty poor home. We often did not have enough money to get out let alone anything else... That said my mother is a freaking beast and would figure something out so I could go to bk on Tuesdays for the Pokemon meetings and meet up with other kids. I think this maybe was one of the key events that made me fall even more in love with Pokemon (and more so my loving mother). There is a whole conversation to be had about how art (pokemon in this case) can help us through hard times. Thank God for art and thank God for loving parents.
Great comment, right in the feels.
I'll never forget going to town with mom and all of a sudden she says to me that I can pick any game I want.
So I went for Pokémon Gold.
It was my gaming introduction to the universe (had watched the animé since it first aired) and still play to this day.
Love you mom, one of my most cherished and beloved memories
Hard to believe parents can be such W's sometimes
Beautiful. Thank you for sharing.
It’s hard to express how much I love my parents for everything they did for me and my sister. They’ll probably never fully know it
My abuelita gifted me Pokemon Gold, I even have the picture of me and her besides the christmas tree holding the game box. This was my first Pokemon game. I remember that feeling like it was yesterday! RIP Tita!
I’m sorry for your loss
Cool abuelita! Mine always got me clothes I never wore lol
You got a very badass granny, my dude. My condolences.
I thought I had a stroke reading that word.
While GSC was amazing, I almost feel bad for people that didn't get to experience RBY first. Not because they're missing out on RBY, but because the gen 2 games felt like such a massive improvement over gen 1. The feeling of going from Gen 1, which was still a pretty damn good game, to the fucking masterpiece of gen 2, was bananas. On top of the general improvements, and the additional Pokemon, you even got to RE-VISIT Kanto from Gen 1. That, and the world just felt so much more alive in GSC.
The only thing that could really have made the games even better is if NPCs moved around. The idea that everyone just kinda stands in the same place forever, is a bit...eh. But hell, that's still a thing in the current games, so I guess they liked it.
The salt in the "I can't have a Celebi" apart was palpable. I approve!
You can if you get the VC version of Crystal
And i miss my spiky eared pichu too
For this specific case I think gameshark is understandable. Just remember not to abuse this power.
Would you say he was **puts on sunglasses** summoning salt?
Australian here. I had a Celebi! They did a thing in Aus where you could go the shopping center (Mall or whatever) and put your game cartridge in a machine they had and they would put Celebi into your game. I can't remember if it went directly in your party or box or whatever. I do know it just gave you the Pokemon, there was no event to play through. I must agree that event and DLC Pokemon are shit though. Downloading a Pokemon just feels wrong. There is no attachment or anything with that Pokemon, and it is even worse when they come at a high level. All Pokemon should be in the game to be caught.
I think what gravitates a lot of people to Johto is not just the nostalgia, but also because there's this sense of intimacy and humbleness to it. There also seems to be an underlying message about the passage of time. Johto is a region that showcases how the old ways of the past can co-exist with the new and modern world. Which has a lot of meaning towards it because these games and Crystal were released around the year 2000, which was the start of a brand new millennium. This is further showcased with how much Kanto and the returning characters changed, and your final battle with Red, who's essentially your old self.
Gold/Silver/Crystal are the very definition of retro games. You know they're old, but definitely not outdated. It has this mysterious charm to it that draws both me and other fans in, that no other game in the franchise has rivaled since.
kristof gergely perfectly said. Gen II still has something that almost feels sacred about it.
Agreed. Johto just feels like home.
Agreed. Whenever I say my favorite region is Johto and people ask why, the video and this comment capture it perfectly.
Pokemon games are always best when they encourage you to be possessive of your save file.
That doesn't happen in titles where the game just sorta ends when the champion loses.
I just started playing a Gen 2 game for the first time since I was a kid. And I gotta say, I'm loving it. It feels way more 'alive' than the other games. Like, the time of day changing with your real life time, along with different Pokemon appearing at different times, and even the nurse mentioning the time. Then there's all the daily things like events, berries re-growing, trainer rematches, etc. And the phone calls where the people on your phone book will call to just chat sometimes and tell you about some interesting thing that happened.
No other Pokemon game I've played (which, mind you, I've only played up to gen 5. I haven't finished 5), has felt the same as GSC. Gen 3 and 4 were great, but they felt a lot like Gen 1, just with more of a story. Gen 2 had this OPEN feel to everything. Like, yeah, it was mostly linear where you needed to go aside from a few gyms being able to be played in different orders, but it didn't FEEL linear. It's also one of the few Pokemon games where I actually WANT to talk to the NPCs. They could have some daily thing I don't know about, they could mention something, they could give me an item or have a Pokemon to trade. Who knows?
To me, Gen 2 almost feels like a mix between a Mobile game and an MMO. An RPG that you load up for a little bit at a time, do some grinding, do some battling, maybe get a badge, do some Pokemon collecting and maybe some shiny-egg stuff, and you do your various daily things. And then you put the game down and play again later, or tomorrow. It's a game that feels like it was designed to be played in small bursts as opposed to one big chunk.
Gen 2 has a special feeling to it, I feel like it's whole aesthetic is one of my all time favorite things, you pick the game and it has these insane color palettes, you pick a game guide and you see images of the game next to Ken Sugimoris ink and watercolor illustrations, you stroll around the region as you listen to nice rich adventurous music, you search for clues all through the game about the region but all you get is mystery. It's an absolutely endearing experience, I always thought it was weird how Gold and Silver were praised for having Kanto in the game, because Johto alone was so amazing to go through. I actually used to reset my game over and over once I beat the Elite 4, I wasn't playing the game so I could go to Kanto I was completely in it for Johto's appeal and wonder.
I also may have just realized that one of the reasons I love Johto so much it's because I grew up in a small town with a lot of wonder to it too, so many areas in the game, especially Ecruteak City's care for tradition, ring to me personally. I grew up in a town bathed in tradition and history, and that place in particular in Johto was covered in historial wonder. I didn't grow up in Japan no, but I can deeply relate to living in a place where there are fables and myths around it. In my town we had a tale that if a child had trouble sleeping, their family should climb the mountain and go within the great boulders until they find the Saint of Sleep, pray to it and light up a candle, and good fortune and good sleep would come to the child. I visited that place every now and then as an adult, and what remains from that is not the clear child like story that you hope becomes a true thing, it's the fact that people went through the trouble of creating a chapel within massive stone boulders in honor of a childs sleep because they cared for their health and well being. That's part of what I feel with Johto, it's a game that it genuinely feels like it cares about that whimsical child like wonder and care.
Glad I wasn’t the only one to recognize Johto’s magic, especially through the allure of Crystal version exploring with the female character whom was one of my favorite designs.
Magical game indeed
Thank you for this it's fair to point it out for having such a unique distinction and starting up of series staples
Going back to it as an adult, Silver is definitely a goofy villain, but he’s just so anime I can’t help but love it
"What ARE the Whirl Islands? These questions don't have clear answers"
The answer is that they're islands.
I think it's more like "what's the lore, what's the mythology, why did Lugia choose it over others." But you could also just say that it's the closest to the deepest parts of the ocean and thus Lugia likes calling it its home. But that's where individual theorizing comes in.
Or is it only one island? Is it just a cave system that extends up in to water? Why does lugia need to go through a small door just to access the open ocean? Is lugia being contained there? How do the kimono girls reliably get out there and interact with it? Is lugia really related to ho oh? Or more like the heatran to ho ohs arceus.. so many questions, especially if you only played gold
Which whirl...
# lakewood20 pretty sure the implication is there's a way into the caves from underwater. Lugia is found on a body of water deep inside the islands, so that body of water probably extends downwards and exits out into the open ocean farther below. It does mostly live at the deepest depths of the ocean after all
haha island go whirrrrr
i got a celebi legitimately on my (NTSC-U) silver cartridge by going to the pokemon center store in new york city and downloading it from a kiosk there around 2001 or 2002, so it wasn't entirely impossible
consider it region locked to japan, and one small, small section of middle manhattan, which is... not much better if at all
DrunkWario I got Celebi in the Netherlands legitimately in the Gold/Silver era. Don’t know exactly anymore, but I had to sent the game to Nintendo by mail. They traded another pokemon with Celebi and mailed it back. I always thought it was a fairly common event even in other countries.
Michiel Peters Same here, in Sweden. I think they were touring around different cities and set up events outside game stores.
Germany used to have a Pokémon Day where they would tour the country and would trade the current especially rare event pokemon. Not sure if Celebi was shared like this but definitely other pokemon.
@@MichielPeters As a fellow Dutchman I can back this up. I also got a Deoxys in Fire Red that way.
God, I miss the NYC Pokémon Center. Nintendo NY just isn't the same.
The second generation is by far my favorite. That connection it had to the first with the inclusion of the Kanto region and the final battle with Red, continuing the story with Team Rocket and seeing all the gym leaders in Kanto that have grown, with Blue as the last one.
It really felt like it was passing the torch to a new generation like it has never again felt to me. Like you were picking up where Red left and trying to make a story of your own, evenctually exceeding even the greatest trainer ever.
The design of the new Pokemon and towns, the color pallette and just the general vibes of the game are outstandingly beatiful and timeless.
It's the game that makes me the most nostalgic for my childhood by far.
I think what gravitates a lot of people to Johto is not just the nostalgia, but also because there's this sense of intimacy and humbleness to it. There also seems to be an underlying message about the passage of time. Johto is a region that showcases how the old ways of the past can co-exist with the new and modern world. Which has a lot of meaning towards it because these games and Crystal were released around the year 2000, which was the start of a brand new millennium. This is further showcased with how much Kanto and the returning characters changed, and your final battle with Red, who's essentially your old self.
Gold/Silver/Crystal are the very definition of retro games. You know they're old, but definitely not outdated. It has this mysterious charm to it that draws both me and other fans in, that no other game in the franchise has rivaled since.
The second generation used to be my favourite (I thought), but I've realized I just don't find it as fun as I used to. I've only played the remake once, and when I got Gold for the 3DS I quite after the fifth gym. In comparison I've played the shit out of both Yellow and LeafGreen, and when I got Blue for the 3DS I loved every second of it.
This video gave me a newfound appreciation for the general vide and design of this game, even though I feel no desire to actually play it.
It was literally my first video game i ever owned. Silver version that is. My favorite as well.
@@Emeraldiouss you got Blue for the 3ds?
@@sebbyh9764 Yes? They released the first two generations on the 3DS.
"Not every Legendary Pokémon needs to be holed up in a cave somewhere."
(laughs evilly in Ultra Sun & Moon)
Need I say dynamax adventures???
*ORAS waving hands furiously in the distance*
My favorite thing about GS was the cellphone. I really liked checking back in with trainers that I beat early on who felt like they were going on their own parallel journey without being saddled with the narrative importance of being a proper "rival" and foil to the player character.
My game was broken I constantly got phone calls.
I surprised he didn't mention that the phone network was how he learned to wait for Snubull to swarm. I guess he decided not to pick up phone numbers.
I thought this was rad too
I thought I could call my friends using the GBC...
Nothing gets me more nostalgic like pokemon GSC.. So many great memories. The graphics, the incredible soundtrack, hearing the weird Celebi myths at my lunch table, even the aesthetic art designs in the instruction booklet are a vivid memory of mine.. Everything about these games just take me back to much simpler time. I had over 999 hours played on my Gold version & used to look forward to seeing my best friend every day so we could play together. I'll never see those warm suburban summers again but I will never forget them either. Thank you for uploading man!
You must've been super excited about the Johto remakes. As someone who grew up on Hoenn, I am immensely jealous over how your remake turned out vs. mine.
To be honest that's my sentiment when the Heartgold Soulsilver games are talked about. They are the games that give me the best nostalgia, even though my first pokemon game was Pearl. Heartgold is just so important to me and my childhood memories. Beating Red is so memorable as well... Such a hard trainer to beat when you are a child!
Are you Jesus Christ?
TheAbsol don’t worry oras doesn’t have wild pokemon so low level that it lessens the experience as a whole
@@antonioorlando4104 Yes, im glad that the newer Pokemon fans got to enjoy it also! Gold/Sapphire were my first Pokémon games, I wouldn't have it any other way
Perfect timing I was just looking for something to watch while eating.
Shhhame
Ain’t that shit the best
Yep this goes on the dinnertime playlist.
I love how we’re all in agreement that KingK’s videos are the best to watch while eating
Ikr
"Pineco is based off of... take a wild guess."
Bagworm, actually. Same as Burmy in Gen 4 oddly enough.
there is no fucking way it wasn't a pinecone, you cannot convince me, at least burmy I can get behind
@@KingKlonoa it's a bagworm in a pinecone haha
@@KingKlonoa bulbapedia.bulbagarden.net/wiki/Pineco_(Pok%C3%A9mon) Pokedex says Bagworm but it could have been the worst translation ever maybe
@Tea slurper If Onix is supposed to be a worm, I want to see the rock snake.
@@KingKlonoa Well, if Pineco was a sentient Pine cone, it will be Grass type, not Bug type. After all, Exeggute are sentient Coconuts shaped as eggs, Sunkern is a sentient Sunflower seed, Seedot is a sentient Acorn, Cherubi are sentient Cherries. All seeds and fruits seem to be Grass-type.
The original design seems to be a mix of three ideas: Bag Worm shaped as a Nut and a Weapon. For Pineco: a bag worm using the Acorns' cupule from japanese oak as home and shaping it like a hand grenade (that is why it explodes when falling). None of the japanese descriptions refer it as a pinecone, but only as a nut. Only the westerner descriptions do. Even if the design seems to point to a pinecone, well this is purely a coincidence: the japanese designer didn't have this in mind. But I guess the translation went from Acorn to Pinecone, because... most Acorn's cupule we know are not "stringy" like the japanese one but smooth/"beaded". Forretress is just a worm is a Chestnut's cupule with turret (again: Nut + Worm + Weapon).
Gotta say man, you are in my top 5 fave channels, love your content and analysis
Yeah. These retrospectives are solid gold.
TacticalNut and silver
Oh shit it’s my L4D man Wow Such Gaming
Get off his 🥜
@@xkaitoukidx stfu
I always saw Red as a final battle challenge, not as a continuation of the story. It made sense to me that he was so much stronger because the idea was that if you could beat him, you beat the game (from a combat perspective).
So more like a Super boss than a Final boss?
@@miimiiandcoyeah that’s how I looked at it. Mount silver in general felt like an extra zone just to flex basically. Nobody’s allowed in here without all of the badges so it’s just me and Red? Bet😎
Maori people didn't exactly worship the kakapo. It's culturally significant to them and features in their folklore, as do a lot of other bird species, but they also actively hunted them for food, their feathers and kept them as pets. It's also only Natu that is based on the kakapo.
Xatu is said to have been based on a Condor or Resplendant Quetzel with Native American inspired totem designs. The name Xatu comes from the Native American "Xat", which is their name for the totem.
I would argue Natu isn’t even based on the kakapo at all. It seems more likely that Xatu was designed first and designing a chick-like version of it for a pre-evolution made sense.
Other than being green and flightless, nothing about Natu resembles the kakapo. Its flightlessness is more easily explained by it being a chick of Xatu.
As somebody pretty informed on Mesoamerican (Aztec, Maya, etc) culture, I don't buy that it was influenced by the Quetzal or Mesoamerican culture, at least not exclusively. It's clearly more influenced by the Native American groups along the Pacific Northwest with Totem Poles and such, though I notice that Japan tends to more freeily mix North Native American and Mesoamerican and South American socities in media; so it could be a mix, wheras here in the US we tend to make a distinction between Latin American native cultures and US/Canadnian ones
MajoraZ I agree, but I don’t even think Natu and Xatu are green to reflect Mesoamerican culture at all. I think they are purely based on making a bird out of a Native American totem pole, but to make it the color of carved wood (brown) would not distinguish it well enough from Hoothoot and Noctowl, which are also brown birds.
Pros of crystal (on virtual console): the Celebi event is easily accessible and unlocked after beating the kanto champion. Cons of crystal: no Mareep line
Just buy the other two and trade you phucking dipshyte
@@joshuarichard6827 Joshua Richard
Joshua Richard trade from my 3DS to my 3DS with two games open at the same time? Absolute moron
@@joshuarichard6827 That's the idea, but deleting the _wrong_ Pokémon from the roster for version exclusivity leads to game balance problems for whichever version got, say, _the_ definitive early-route Electric-type deleted.
This whole Houndour problem reminded me that even in Heart Gold and Soul Silver they didn't bother to add him as a night pokémon for Johto. What a kick in the balls, Game Freak.
They did that to add to the lore of the new Rocket Boss and the new top elite 4 member Karen
They made it catchable in the Johto Safari zone but it takes a bit of tweaking the blocks I think for it to appear.
oh look its another zoomer who doesnt understand world building
@@animejerk05 doesn't mean it had to be an exclusive pokémon. They could've added it in both regions no problem.
@@nolanhartsoe At least Polished Crystal exists to fill that void. Great romhack btw.
I loved Red/Blue but G/S were just perfect, because they got rid of so many annoyances that R/B still had
And for the time, these games felt huge. It used to blow my underdeveloped mind that such a massive world existed on a tiny cartridge. It still kind of does, truthfully.
Yeah, but GSC Kanto absolutely sucked. Empty shell. And I know, cartridge limitations, but still.
At least HGSS gave us most of Kanto back.
But at the same time the G/S games Safari Zone was just as bad as the Red Blue Yellow games just WITHOUT the Glitch that allows you to fight Safari Zone Pokemon elsewhere.
@@skyatollah2skyharder276 yeah Kanto GSC was underwhelming, the trainers were weak, the gym leaders being lower level than lance (minus Blaine&Blue) was not good at all
@@vulcanraven9701 As a kid I remember being stoked as that you had Kanto iin the game only to be disappointed at how stripped down it was. I feel like they could have used the remaining space to make the last half of Johto better than what we got and have enough depth to make sure we weren't facing the Pokemon league with level 40 Pokemon.
I had a lvl 10 female Rattata that I taught dig to. I got my shit kicked in by Morty and was facing his last Gengar. I used attract on the Gengar and used dig until It went down. That rat went up 2 levels as a result and I won the battle thanks to it. Needless to say I have a huge respect for Rattata.
Youngster Joey was onto something....
Can’t tell if you’re trying to say that Lavender Town is a bad composition. Its dissonance is reflecting that something’s not quite right in that town.
Suuumthin ain't raaaght.
I don't wanna be buried in a poke cemetery.
I absolutely love it. Never thought some 8-bit tune could make me feel so uneasy.
I've recently come to appreciate gen 1's less standard/tonal music. In addition to Lavender Town and Pokémon Mansion, you have Viridian Forest and Mt. Moon as really creepy themes. It's a different style to gen 2's music, but not worse imo
@@LongfellowLP Back then, when pokemon were still treated as scary wild animals a lot of the time, there was still quite a lot of lore saying that you should be wary of wild pokemon. So, being stuck wandering around a mazelike forest or cave full of them would be a disconcerting experience, and the music from those zones are a bit creepy to match.
Its one of my favourite tracks in the entire series, something really creepy about i love and hints at the darker side to the series lore.
These were definitely my favorite as a kid, and the later remakes were an excellent upgrade. Having two regions in one -and fighting 16 gyms in total - is a feat that no other entry has achieved. It really felt like there was so much to do, so much to see. Absolutely loved it.
Man that music makes me so emotional. I have a really heavy, dark story about how Pokemon Silver, and Blue before that, helped me cope through a very very VERY difficult time in my life. I won't go into it, but, Silver's Johto region was a second home for me, when I had nowhere else to go, and going back to Kanto at the end felt like coming home even though at the time I knew I'd never go home in real life. I'm forever indebted to these games, and I wish I could share the level of joy I feel just hearing the music with everyone, and I hope that it helped someone else through a dark period of their time, or just reinforced the joy they felt when things were going well for them.
Our experiences probably are different, but the sentiment to this game is the same.
Hearing the music in this video awakened something inside me, probably smoll child me and a bunch of emotions.
Hard to describe really, but something more then just nostalgia
Don't mind me Im just being needlessly salty on the internet buuut...
Either you had to be entirely to young to be having dark times(that you can actually rember)
Or, you too old to still be watching pokemon videos on youtube.
I Probably shouldn't judge though, im definitely of the later. For some reason still clutching at whatever fond memories i have of a game from 20 years ago.
The way you describe Johto and discovering Kanto is very reminiscent to my experiences to the generation with Pokemon Gold. Even though I moved a crazy amount, and for a year, the Pokemon Crystal Prima Strategy guide was one of 4 books I had access to. Playing and reading it for a year really was one of the few stable, consistent parts of my upbringing. Now that I'm older with my own place, I can really say for sure that it was like you said, "a second home.' I just want to reach out and say that I appreciate you sharing your experience from this generation of games.
@@cernanwinterfox85 kids can have darktimes you know. Just because you didn't doesn't mean others didn't. Child abuse exists you know. That was a really ignorant reply.
@@cernanwinterfox85 lol imagine thinking children cant have dark times, or that adults cant enjoy pokemon.
This is coming from a 30 year old child abuse victim. Pokemon helped me through dark times as well. Pokemon crystal in particular helped distract me from an abusive corrupt foster home, too.
Generation 2 was a great time to be alive as a kid. Pokémon the movie 2000, the fast food tie-ins that were mentioned, and the game was just absolutely huge. You finished Johto, and you still have Kanto! All of that packed into a Game boy cartridge. And I've heard that generation 2 was going to be the last generation of Pokémon that they were ever going to do, but because it became so popular, they continued on. So basically they put their entire effort into this series of games which one of the driving forces of why it's so good. When I started with the third generation I just couldn't feel it anymore, and I became a second generation purist ever since. At 34 years old, I still adore Lugia.
The nostalgia thinking about when the second movie came out, playing my silver version, and loving the trading cards, what great times to be alive for. I miss it so bad I could cry. I’ll cherish those memories forever.
@@RolandKoller90 Never let it die. Sit down and re live those memories. Heck I've gotten a customized GPU backplate that's Lugia. And I've even found on Etsy a tasteful Lugia mouse mat. That was my idol Pokemon as a kid and now that I'm an adult in my 30s, I'm gonna feed my inner child. Life is too short to "grow up"
@@TheNiteNinja19 respect
Lance has 3 Dragonites because in the last game he has 2 Dragonaires and they evolved since the previous game. That happens a lot in Gold and Silver when you run into people from the first game. Their Pokemon tend to have evolved since the last game.
and so he caught a third dratini for what reason lol
@@Ammut6 In Red/Blue he has Gyarados, two Dragonaires, Aerodactyl and Dragonite. In Gold/Silver his two Dragonaires evolve and he adds a Charizard.
*IN LORE THE LETTERS ARE BASED ON UNOWN, NOT THE OTHERWAY AROUND.*
Last I checked, the games and anime use some entirely original fake language, probably to avoid having to translate signage during localization. I assume this wasn't a thing yet when gen 2 was released?
@@DarthFennec yeah. Even as far in as Sun and Moon I don't remember the fake language. Might be different in the anime though. I think SWiSH was the intro for that.
Same for ice cream and vanilte line
@@NachoCheeseDorito-Kun The fake language is only really a thing in Sword/Shield where the resolution was good enough that you'd expect to see signage
@@oswin1234 Makes sense, since I don't remember seeing it in Sun/Moon either. I'm pretty sure it's been that way in the anime since at least Black/White, though.
It took me 5 months after beating the elite 4 to realize that you could explore the rest of Kanto. I beat the Elite 4 on loop for a very long time lol
Lol
Well at least you would have been more ready for Red than most.
Edit: Grammar
me too..back when i was a kid, i dont understand english that much..until someone told me on my second playthrough about ss anne
same by the time i got to kanto my team was level 70
@@thelightseeker94 hahahah..to OP for kanto
Gold: These aren’t even dragon types.
Lance: Tell that to my three inappropriately leveled Dragonites!
and my personal favorite:
Lance: You don’t get to be champion of the Pokémon League without knowing how to spam *FULL RESTORES!!!*
Oh. (300 metronomes later...)
ahh. a hamun of culture i see
Aah a mattyburrito reference. These eyes see all my friend.
At least credit the video you got your joke from
Tbh the full restore line is overrated, i think "MOVE YOU FAT BASTARD" is much better
The rival evolving his Golbat because of friendship is a cool touch I never noticed.
14:53
Australian here! There was a special Celebi event at select Westfield shopping centres that gave you Celebi by inserting your Gold and/or Silver cartridge into a Game Boy slot built into a Computer that even showed you transfer of Celebi into your game!
I think it you had to have a space in your Pokemon team in order to store the Celebi.
I got my Celebi at Westfield Parramatta!
27:22 A recently found Prototype of Gold and Silver actually had Blue and Red at significantly lower levels than in the final game. Red capped at around 70 or so with Pikachu, with the others being mid 60's and Blue was of a similar power level to the other Kanto leaders. The fact that the buffing to Red happened so late makes a ton of sense (at least to me), because of how massive the spike is in the final with effectively no trainers to fight for exp.
The spike is huge because of two critical stagnation points, one being after Morty and the other is the whole Kanto region. If we had a constant progression you would have the pokemon league around lvl 50-60 like in RBY and Kanto going up to mid/late 60, Red's lvls would fit perfectly.
Where is a video of that
Video proof or cap
0:47 Pokémon is On Top
2:13 KingK wants to see what these games added to The Pokémon Series
2:57 *Part 1 - Elusive Johto*
• Johto is a land based off of rural Japan
• What happened here? Why are the legendaries roaming around?
- “A bit undercooked” The Unknown are kinda off
7:33 • A land steeped in tradition & nature
*Displayed Through Music* 🎼 🎶
And Pokémon based off real world creatures
12:13 _New Evolutions!_ , Celibi
Region Locking 🔐
17:49 *Part 2: Kanto’s Backyard*
19:29 Gold Team Rules!....right?
22:33 Traveling through Johto, Battling Gym Leaders
25:51 Red >>>> Lance
_Proper Strategy can make weaker Pokémon able to beat Strong Pokémon, but LV 75???_
- You have to grind to beat Master Red
32:30 No Main Antagonist in Johto
- Pre-Teen edge boy learns love ❤️
36:29 Lance is “as interesting as a Plank of wood”
39:42 HM Use
42:00 *Part 3: A Staggering Coat of Rock Polish*
Dark Types
You’re a channel on the come up for sure with this. Remember me when everyone knows who you are
I’m pretty sure the 3 Dragonites are the evolved dratinis he had in his Elite 4 fight, as is the rest of his team. He kept his team because he valued the bonds he had with them and believed in their ability to win
Dragonairs... You said Dratinis
Come on, I'm French. To me it's Minidraco, Draco and Dracolosse (Sorry for the jealousy, our translators were really good. And btw, Crisacier-metapod. Dracofeu-charsard. Charmelion-Reptincel. Triopiqueur-dugtrio. Alright I'll leave you alone with this.) Anyway, even I know Dratini and Dragonairs names.
@@isaacleillhikar4566 This might be the most pompous comment I've seen on UA-cam yet. Wow.
@@machina5 Just a typical french guy. (greetings from Belgium
@@machina5 toxic ass fan base
@@machina5 What? So I'm saying french pokémon translators did a better job and the names are better?
And for the reste it might have been a joke about a mistake.
Hands down my favorite gen. I remember playing this when I was 12 years old. My starter was totodile. Great memories.
This reminds me of Easter, over a decade ago. I got soul silver as a gift and that was my first Pokémon game. At first I didn’t even know that you had to save the game. I started over half a dozen times before I learned. I still remember the cities and the aesthetics more than Pokémon black, which I spent the most time in of any Pokémon game. It was just so revolutionary to me
Hey now! 10 year old me thought "Badass with Dragons" was all the character Lance needed lol
56:00 I'm pretty sure Day and night encounters were a thing in G/S
They were. The phone calls also had all the same features in Gold and Silver.
@@Joker22593 Jap I agree. I don`t know why he says this.
@@Joker22593 Most of them, yes, but not the "i found this object" ones.
I don't think he said that day and night cycles were exclusive to Crystal. He said that capturing certain Pokémon was contingent on the time of day.
@@arvindhmani06 i think the creator of this thread knows that, but that feature is also seen in gold and silver regardless.
Oh wow. The suggestion of Karen as the champion.... genuinely outstanding and insightful contribution to the discourse on a game where I thought it had all been exhausted. But as you allude to later (thanks edit!), I think it needed some changes to accommodate the pre-physical/special split and availability issues for that to be viable.
She could have had Tyranitar too!
Didgeridude yeah I find it weird they gave her a gengar when she could’ve had a full team of dark types (Umbreon, Houndoom, Sneasel, Murkrow, Tyranitar)
@@kylecampbell565 She's using her favourites and just really likes Gengar!
Yeah but why a Vileplume? (I know she uses her favorites but still). If Lance can have 3 under leveled Dragonites, then Karen should get an underleveled Tyranitar haha. Ah well.
Petition to bring back Karen as the gen...9? Champion with a team of six Explouds :P
"Think of the stories you'll tell when teambuilding"
My Black playthrough really won out in that regard. My whole team had their own distinct personalities in my head--the one that most amused me was characterizing my Unfezant as a wannabe ladies' man; I was heavily inspired by real pheasants in that regard. Seriously look up their courtship habits sometime. Those birds are the Johnny Bravos of the animal kingdom XD
What kind of insane MF'ers sees.... Unfezant..... and goes "Damn, that ugly ahh is going straight on my team!"
i liked how red straight up kills your confidence you built after becoming champion, and I like how it teaches you to never feel conplacence and also it makes you think, forcing to use status moves and you can't brute force your way through it. it's merciless and fun for hiding the new pokemon behind him was fun
I love lance because it's a common thing for people to want to use the same pokemon but i'd have made different moves for them
Lance is the flying master not the dragon master, just saying.
But proto!!
And he has a better team than pokemons such as a Pigeotto with mudslap.
I've been saying that forever, he fits much better as a flying type trainer. lol
I think I know he's the first gym leader but still. An Onix is quite special. He could have had something better. Like a Pigeotto and something special. A Doduo and a Pigeotto.
A scyther in the second gym, thats what I mean.
Kingdra would like a word.
In defense of Gen 1 music: the Lavender Town music was extremely creepy if you were a little kid playing that game and the walking and biking themes are iconic, even if they're a bit simplistic.
I actually like lavender town’s song
Oddly as a kid I never found Lavender town's music creepy, at least not even to actually creep me out. More spooky but cool Surprisingly I found the Tower far more chilling given the gravestones and channelers.
I used to turn off the volume when I entered in Lavender Town.
Will there be a test at the end of the lecture Mr.KingK?
>trying to sleep to kingk videos
>pokemon mansion and lavender town themes BLAST through my speakers
I love how you find the old commercials for these vids so awesome and nostalgic. Great content
Regarding Snubbul, you could have just gotten a schoolboy's phone number and waited for him to call you. Swarms were another one of the many things that were introduced here.
I'm not sure how he missed this, there's 5 or 6 pokemon that essentially require a swarm to catch
Silver and gold, silver and gold
Ev'ryone wishes for silver and gold
How do you measure its worth?
Just by the pleasure it gives here on earth…
Silver and gold, silver and gold
Means so much more when I see
Silver and gold decorations
On every Christmas tree!
That is an extremely subtle reference and I'm glad someone made it
Silver and Gold, can be bought and sold
but Crystal is found in the earth
Pleasure is nice, but not the whole
and certainly not the arbiter of worth...
Gen 2 will always be my favorite generation.
It added so much, and the day and night cycle made exploring and catching Pokemon even more immersive!
I cannot explain why but I love the Gen II Pokémon. Sunflora is up there, mostly because I hardly won the bug catching contest so no one in my group really had one or a sunstone for that matter.
I’m right there with you. I remember spending the night at my cousins and we printed the list of pokemon and how they evolved with the plan that we would evolve and trade a bunch of Pokémon the next day. Getting politoed, porygon 2, scissor, are super memorable.
@@NickYoung22 dude right! Such good times
I'll never forget the feeling when I first realized I could go back to the Kanto area in the post game. SO.MUCH.EXCITMENT.
What about the absolutely 100% necessary "Mail" mechanic.
I still don't understand how that was supposed to work. It felt so half-baked, and it was never improved upon in the later games.
We used mail all the time. We were 12 and it was the only way for us to talk about things we wanted to keep from our parents without leaving evidence they'd be capable of finding.
@@Jono1874 how did it work?
@@cooladam2167 If i remember correctly,you take one of the Mails,write through your scene ,give it as a hold item and trade the Pokemon with the other. Then back and forth.
33:03 I certainly wasn't expecting ChuggaaConroy of all people to be named dropped in a KingK video of all places lmao what a blast from the past, I'm glad to see you have good taste
The bad level curve goes hand in hand with the nonlinearity in the second half of Johto (although there's zero excuse for the too low level ranges in Kanto). As a kid I never really noticed and that might just be because I transferred over a lot of my high-level Pokemon from my Red cartridge onto my Silver one. But I definitely felt the grind when revisiting.
Still, Johto remains my favorite region for atmosphere alone. I love every single town.
Sun and moon gets a lot of flack, even from me, but I’m super thankful for what they did with the HM’s. And great review, really took me back to my favorite generation
Gen 2 will always be my favourite. Being able to go to Kanto was amazing. There always seemed to be something to do :D.
What I like about Johtos Pokemon in particular is that aesthetically, they actually seem to fit in pretty well with the Kanto region Pokemon. They kind of took the art design in a different direction with Gen III onwards. That isn't to say they're bad per se-I like plenty of the newer Pokemon, even the ones that look aesthetically very different.
Mind you, some of this could just be some amount of nostalgia bias if you will-I got into Pokemon around Gen II's release, so that might be it. I can't quite put my finger on what details they are, either. I suspect it might be the prevalence of baby Pokemon, to give a thematic sort of follow-through if you will between the old and new ones.
I mean that makes sense. A lot of the Gen II pokemon were reworked designs of rejected Gen I pokemon designs. Its likely a lot of the designs were all made at the same time.. So obviously there's a thematic connection between the two generations that doesn't really exist between later generations (outside specific individual pokemon). I remember watching a youtube video that said that a lot of newer designs also had more of a 2-D (cartoon) feel to their features, while older ones focused more on depth of features (realism) to designs. Obviously all pokemon are stylized versions of real animals/objects, but i think the amount of stylization changes a lot past Gen 2.
@@ddre71194 ddre71194 I think it mostly goes down to simpler, quainter designs, possibly with certain, maybe something about more muted color pallets, too.
A good example: Reshiram has a very complex design, and honestly looks quite a bit like a Digimon (in fact, quite a bit like a hybrid between the two). It looks cool, don't get me wrong, but somewhat out of place in Pokemon.
Though, the best examples I can think of are the more colorful Pokemon. Deoxys, for example. I imagine some of this is graphical limitations being exceeded and them playing with more complex designs consequently.
@@MatthewCampbell765
This is the video I mentioned.
ua-cam.com/video/nmtY5Ebl0wE/v-deo.html
Yeah I agree with you, the designs for a lot of the first 2 generations pokemon was a lot simpler to me as well. Especially for legendaries. Ho-oh and Lugia to Groundon and Kyogre is even a huge shift. But I think a large part of that specifically is the shift in the importance of them. The first 2 generations just had legendaries being rare or mythical creatures that were revered but were in the end just random creatures. Later generations had Legendaries be forces of nature or creation, and so the greater elaboration in lore kind of translated into their designs. That's why some of my personal favorite legendary designs (Regi trio and eon duo) are the ones that have the lesser amount of "specialness" and are just really rare creatures. I think they tried to do that with Zacian and Zamazenta (simple design and just rare creatures)but then threw that out of the window with Eternatus.
A lot of the Gen 2 Pokemon were designed in the original generation one batch. What I mean is, they made more Pokemon for Gen 1 than they actually put in the Gen 1 games, and The Leftovers got put into generation 2. That's why the anime had things like Togepi and Ho-Oh well before the Gen 2 games ever came out.
Matthew Campbell I feel the same. I also think Pokemon from X and Y fits well with Kanto Pokemon. Especially if you look at the promotional art style of X and Y
I love how you talk about the fun in team diversity that Pokémon has. I’m playing Platinum now and purposely using a team with only 2 of my staple playthrough Pokémon (Empoleon/Luxray) and keeping the rest of the team fresh
I think I would enjoy "catching them all" in the earlier generations due to the smaller size of the pokedex. I actually did catch them all in XY, which was an absolute PAIN but it was fun at the end.
yeaa i have a living dex in Y myself and it took so long but its great.
@@violetsparkles5453 same lol. Even the mythicals, which took an eternity to trade for
@@twilit8162 I only got Volcanion because i bought a copy of X for my boyfriend who had somehow never played a Pokemon game before and the save file that was already on it happened to have Volcanion.
@@violetsparkles5453 that was the last one for me. Had to trade some other event-only stuff for it
the BEST part of your pokemon retrospectives is the way you dive into your teams for each game. LOVE IT
Regarding Silver: The key difference between him and Blue is that Blue is unlikable in a mundane way-he's a 'sitcom arch-nemesis' as TV Tropes would call it-but Silver is an actual jerk.
I think this could work for a rivalry pretty well, but I think the issue is that the game simply doesn't have an arc to it. You see, with Blue, the rivalry between him and Red is essentially the main arc of the game. They both grew up together, were both given the same mission, and are both competing to see who can do that job better.
Silver, by contrast, doesn't feel connected to Gold's story much at all. He's more like an intruder stepping interrupting things. Indeed, when he shows up, my mind would usually go to "Oh no, this asshole again?" Admittedly, at the time I wasn't very good at strategizing, but he always struck me as what amounted to an NPC roadblock. I do like the idea of having a rival who's genuinely evil, though.
well, I mean he's not exactly evil, he just wants to prove his mob-boss dad who disowned him wrong.
I will say that Silver has the same problem as Hop and other rivals in regards to development that it's less development and more "this dialogue shows I'm not the same right?" I think the Gen5 rivals and Lillie/Gladios were one of the better examples of development in the mainstream games
@@darknessknows1235 I'll agree silver doesn't hold a candle to blue, but I'll wait and see when I play the newer games.
You say Silver being evil is a negative, I say it's a positive. Whether or not you feel a pet-like attachment to your pokemon or not, seeing someone mistreat them and throw them under the bus is so much of an attention grabber than yet another "I'll get stronger then win" type. I always wanted to beat that misanthropic redhead if only because it feels so good to shut him up.
@@bagelpenguin6499 I think the problem there is the game never told us, they wanted us to read a comic/manga to find that out.
The saddest thing about Gen 2 was it's inability to connect with Gen 3. This brought about what my childhood self dubbed The Dark Age of Johto, from 2002-2009. Essentially, between the release of Ruby and Sapphire and Heartgold and Soulsilver. This was the age when Johto Pokemon were extremely hard to find, and could only be found in games like Pokemon Colosseum, in special locations as in Emerald, or given away in rare special events such as the Navel Rock event.
KingK: *Talks about region locking.*
Me: I see where this is going.
Is it weird that I use this video as ASMR to fall asleep to? I could listen to people talk about Gen2 for literally hours.
I'll never forgive Crystal version for making it impossible to get Mareep.
What I got one so easy lol
Truth😕
Nowadays with Gen 2, I can't play it without recommending the romhack Crystal Clear enough.
It's a romhack that turns the Gen 2 experience into open world with paths that get everywhere important without HMS, redistributed Pokemon, scaling difficulty for trainers and gyms based on how many badges you acquire, and ways to get every Gen 1 and 2 Pokemon within a single file, making for a unique experience overall.
On top of that, the romhack is programmed in such a way that it's compatible with Pokemon Bank and Pokemon Stadium 2, putting it far above other romhacks like it.
Excellent review, KingK!
That's amazing. I played through it and its brilliant.
Where can i find this romhack?
Silver was my main squeeze in this generation. I was 8 years old, my parents had just divorced. The Pokemon hooks were in deep haha. My first playthrough of Silver was the most special of all to me not only because of the obvious fact of everything is new and exciting but my starter in that game was a Celebi (and a Mew technically as well). A buddy of mine had a GameShark at the time and he was wanting to trade starters (I have no idea why since HE had the GameShark). So I was like sure I haven't really started much so I'll trade. He trades me the Celebi and then something random for Mew. I just went with it because of course I did. It was hands down the most rewarding Pokemon playthrough Ive ever had. While Celebi is a "legendary" the stats for him are ehh. Not bad just not on par with a normal legendary of the era. Also Grass/Psychic was unique for the gyms since Dark was introduced and rampant. Mew was a lot of the same thing and honestly became mostly an HM Slave. I did grab a copy of Gold from a friend later on and played normally and loved it. Hands down my favorite Pokemon Gen. Also, love the vids dude keep it up! Was anxiously waiting for this one.
I love how both this and Tama Hero's Gen II retrospective compliment each other well and both make excellent points
My favourite generation. The first one was just so broken, that even the little kid in me could appreciate to have a fixed and a bigger pokemon game.
Great job on getting the sponsorship, King! I'm really stoked that you were able to get something going there. I've always been wanting a VPN, but too lazy to actually do anything about it, but once I heard your sponsorship for it, I finally decided "hey why not" and went for it.
Keep up the great work, and thanks for this high quality S-Tier content.
Not gonna talk about the HM problem here because it’ll be brought up again, huh? *Gen 4 intensifies*
Ride Pokémon in green 7 was one of the best things they ever added to Pokémon. Hms were annoying since I was kid.
That ad transition was so flawless, hot damn.
Still my all-time favorite Pokemon game I love how you can go back to the Kanto region and fight the old gym bosses and you fight red at the end it was epic 10/10
Gen 2 will always be my favourite simply because I was a kid, and it’s when I first truly got lost in the Pokémon world and got into it. It was a magical time that can never be re created. I hold strong emotional connection to a lot of Gen 2 so while I don’t think it’s the “best” generation it will always be my favourite.
I haven't watched your vids in a while (I love falling asleep with rewatching Zelda retrospectives lmao), and I remembered seeing the thumbnail on Twitter. So glad I caught this video so early! Good watch, everyone
I fall asleep to the zelda retrospectives too! 😅
I'm not joking... I do too! His voice is just so calm. Its soothing. Lol
@@feartheoldblood7222 Ngl, before your comment, I thought these were some kind of sarcastic hating comments
Oh my god FINALLY! I remember going into my stocking on xmas eve, realizing i got silver, playing it all night and putting it back before 3am and pretending i didnt know it was there. I actually didnt expect them to buy it, i didnt ask for any games that yr. But i was so glad! My favorite pokemon game. Dont have my copy any more, and i wish i knew what i did with it.
I’m a little shocked you didn’t mention that Jasmine’s Steelix knows Sunny day. A move that helps you beat her if you chose Cyndaquil.
Or make it harder for totodile
It was already a hard battle for Totodile, she has 2 Magnemite.
Better use smokescreen a couple times first or it'll be taking you out with rock throw before you take it out with flame wheel. Especially since your Quilava will most likely be underleveled since you're coming out of the longest water route of the game.
He DID mention it.
@@Flip-a-dip-dip What's funny to me, about GF giving Sunny day to Jasmine's Steelix, fully knowing that would give an unfair advantage to Typhlosion, while putting Feraligatr at a disadvantage, is that they really had to sit there, and make that decision, of adding that move to Steelix's moveset. That means, they thought Typhlosion really needed all that help, in order to beat a type it naturally has an advantage against, while Feraligatr was viewed as the actual threat that needed to be nerfed. Perhaps it's because they knew Typhlosion doesn't get any super good fire moves by level up (when you reach Jasmine, it'll probably only have flame wheel as stab), that is, if you don't want to get out of your way to get flamethrower from the casino/game corner. While Feraligatr on the other hand, gets access to Surf, the probably strongest water move in the game, relatively early. It can get Surf before Morty, if you beat the Kimono lads first. So in order to offset that, they had to nerf Feraligatr's Surf somehow, or else, Surf has the potential to one-shot Jasmine's entire team. And you really think Feraligatr will struggle against a couple Magnemites? They get swept by Surf, or dig. A tm Croconaw can get before Whitney from National Park, useful to break Miltank's terrifying rollout chains. You Feraligatr haters are so pressed to show how much mighty and superior Typhlosion is, that you'll literally try and convince yourselves and other people, that a well-trained Feraligatr will lose to Jasmine's Magnemites. Wow, just wow.
Pokemon Silver is a special game for me
That moment when someone finally appreciates my favourite Pokemon, from the second generation.
Sudowoodo, Lanturn, Xatu and Forretress.
Jeez, I loved my team back then, as well as today :'o
38:31- That I can agree with In hindsight, the Champion theme, much as I like it, would probably have more of a lasting impact if we first and ONLY heard it with Red.
Never imagined myself watching a 1 hour video but I just did. Amazingly well done. Listening to you is fun on its own.
I’m a simple man, I see a kingK retrospective and I click immediately. Especially GSC
The way you explain everything and the amount of detail is really what makes your retrospectives, THE retrospectives.
What a nice thoughtful retrospective! It's a testament to your script writing (not to mention the pleasant cadence in the way you talked throughout the video) that I was fully engaged for the full hour long run time
I'm ok with Red being so monstrously higher level than anything else. I wish he had straight 100's and Blue capped at 60. Would be such a shock. You would understand that he's been grinding on Mt Silver. I think it would also be cool if the game communicated in some way that he had all 251 in Silver/Gold/Crystal and all 493 in Gen IV.
red wouldnt have evry single mon, all jrmals ones sure but not stuff like creation trio and weather trio.
Dude I've been waiting so long for this
Same! Favorite gen by far
Mark Eaton Yup. Simply because of nostalgia and memories for me. Can’t wait to see what King K comes up with for Gen III and IV.
@@SSJFutureGohan62093 gen 4 and 2 are my fave
@Zandeel Remmington yea don't know how many hours I put into that game as a kid I got a Ds and diamond for Christmas in 06 and was so happy
I played Heart Gold a couple years ago, and I definitely felt that experience problem. I think most Pokémon games lack a good way of leveling between 50-70. Some Pokémon evolve or learn cool moves in that range, but it’s usually not all that fun to grind it out in a single area.
Smash A to defeat the Elite 4 a couple of times until I got a level or two on the Pokémon I wanted. Definitely not the most exciting way to grind your level 50+ pokémon but still the one where you get the most experience in a relatively short time. You can also run through Mount Silver if the Pokémon you are trying to level isn't weak against any of the wild ones there or in the grass before it but definitely takes more effort to run around.
I especially had a problem in this game as a person who doesn't play with a set team of 6. I tried to train pokemon for each of the Kanto gyms, but could find a spot to power level them up to the 40s with shared exp. I would have had to train each the normal way, which would take forever.
This is why Platinum and the Gen 5 games are some of my favorites. The post-game island for Platinum was a godsend and gen 5 was mostly designed around getting Pokemon to higher levels, especially the B2/W2 games, where half the game is the post-game. As someone who wants to at least try out every new Pokemon when I play a new generation, GS really sucked to go through, and HGSS just made it worse with the increased variety and no way to compensate grinding to make it easier to explore different options. Such great games bogged down by suck a poor leveling system
@ItZed That's assuming you know where and when to get their numbers to call for a rematch. Or that rematching them is a feature at all.
Luckily the "when can I rematch them" is pretty easy. If it's time, they'll wait for you at the Saffron City dojo. If it isn't, they'll tell you when it is.
yeah...this seems like a noticeable flaw so I wouldn't call heart gold and soulsilver perfect like many others may
I can’t wait for the HeartGold & SoulSilver video❤ I’ve watched this probably 15 times as background noise doing chores around the house or shiny hunting. Pls make the remake video at least an hour 😅
I loved the morning noon and night sequence in this game. I remember waking up as the sun rose as a kid to catch some pokemon you could only catch in the morning on my crystal version. Aww the memories
16:41 Ok, that's probably the best and smoothest sponsor-transition I've ever seen hahaha
I'd like to point out, the music doesn't have any more "detail" in either Gen. The music sounds so different because the composer changed between games. Matsuda's style is largely contrapuntal with an ostinato lower line, often employing very simple harmony. Ichinose uses more complex harmony and employs more textures than Matsuda, but as you said yourself, they're using the same sound chip, which can only play a maximum of three notes at a time. I agree it's a large step up in terms of soundtrack (I listen to the ost from gen 2 constantly), but I wouldn't characterize it as "more detailed".
See also the Video about, 2nd Gen Fighting Music and about 1st gen music remake in second gen, by 8bit music theory
I agree, there was plenty of detail in gen 1, the main battle theme is an excellent example when it reaches its climax.
I could've swore that at least for battle themes Gen 1 used 4 bit audio while Gen 2 used 8 bit.
I have no idea what any of this means. Oh well, lol.
I don't think he was saying it's more detailed than the red blue yellow ost per se, but instead it's more detailed in the sake that we had more variety of "town music", "dungeon music", "bad guy hideout music", "battle music", and so on, each appealing for a special context.
It's funny how you mention it's present popularity thanks to the remakes, but I played the originals more times than I can count, never played the remakes that much and it's weird taking into consideration that I was in the era of the remakes (but that's just me).
Fun fact! Professor Birch was the first professor to ask you your gender. In Crystal, the game itself asks you before Professor Oak wakes up.
Well that's only bc in Gen 1 you were only allowed to play as Red. In Gen 2, the sister version Crystal was the first game to give you a female trainer option but it wasn't really a part of the plot I'm guessing. Also Oak already had known Red according to the gen 1 story. I really love Gen 3s Kanto Remakes for the addition of Leaf, she has such a great design and isn't shoved into as many games as Red. For that alone she feels more special, even if Red is still pretty cool. Gen 3 was the time where female playable protagonists became more relevant as even when you didn't pick May, she was still a part of your journey being your rival. It's a pretty cool evolution tbh
What if Gold was a final trainer Brendan/May had to battle in Ruby Saphire.
Togetic
Red Gyrodos
Sudowoodo
Typhlosion
Fearligator
Meganium.
RSE is placed before GSC chronogically
@@starbo3110 I heard that. How do we know?
@@isaacleillhikar4566 There was a (now deleted) tweet from Toshinobu Matsumiya which placed the games up until X/Y (I believe) in chronogical order, it placed the Kanto games alongside the Hoenn ones. There is this article on Bulbapedia about it: m.bulbapedia.bulbagarden.net/wiki/History_of_the_Pokémon_world
@@starbo3110 Yeah. The problem i think is the pokémon from chicorita onward are "100 new discoveries" and how come there are some in Hoenn poping up ie Scarmury, Slugma, Marill... and these people know about them even including Gym leaders.
Isaac Leillhikar he deleted the tweet for a reason lol
Johto makes me feel warm, the music, the friends.
I literally just started a Heartgold nuzlocke an hour ago. Haven’t played it in 2 years and now out of nowhere tou choose to make this video. Amazing.
Update: I got to Lance with a Typhlosion, Umbreon, Crobat, Gyarados, Poliwrath and Forretress, all at level 47 or 48. I lost my Umbreon to a destiny bond from Karen’s Gengar. I stacked 6 dragon dances on Gyarados and would have almost certainly sweeped his team with waterfall, avalanche and ice fang. My stats were buffed to high heaven, but I misclicked. I accidentally pressed dragon dance again instead of waterfall and got killed by his Aerodactyl’s thunder fang and proceeded to get sweeped. All that work which would have almost definitely led to me wiping the floor with him, ruined by a misclick. Bullshit.
But then I went back to fight Lance from my last save so I could give my team the sendoff it deserved, even if they all died it wouldn’t matter because at least they wouldn’t lose because of a goddamn misclick. *This* was a much more poetic end. Thanks to some crits and a freeze, I was left with my Typhlosion vs Lance’s Charizard. I just barely scraped through the fight and beat the nuzlocke with only my starter left. I’m glad that I actually managed to get some good closure. Bu the way, I never do stuff like this, but this was a special case. I might do Kanto one day in the future, sort of like a reboot for the team.
I started a Heartgold Nuzlocke too this morning lol. Bless your playthrough with good RNG
I hope you don't get any mid-game game deaths. Lord knows the grind for newly caught Pokemon is real in this gen
I'm in the middle of a Soulsilver nuzlocke. Currently debating the best way to beat Jasmine since my Quilava died :s