I loved the choice of Black and White to only feature new Pokemon at first. It was very refreshing. I hope Pokemon does it again. I also loved seeing Pokemon that played the same role as Kanto counterparts.
Came expecting Gen 3 Glaze, left to find an incredibly underrated video essay on something I had never really considered. However I do have to mention the fact that this model was very much likely unintentional. The Hoenn games were intended to be reboots like Unova, only possessing Hoenn Pokémon, likely why some of the Pokemon in the game (Spheal, Aron, Feebas, Electrike, Ralts, so on) feel like retreads of Gen 1 Pokemon, but your points are still fair and interesting. Rarely see Pokédex analysis like this, let alone to such quality as this. Hope more content like this is made, and most certainly I hope you gain more traction for this.
I'm really glad I could share some new points 😊 yea I'm sure this was more of a happy accident than an intentional decision but I think it turned out well regardless. Thanks for watching, and thanks for the kind words 🤘
@ That’s one of the funniest things ever. For like the entire 2010’s anyone who liked Unova was crucified, but now everyone acts like Gen 5 was always loved and peak. Like I like Gen 5, but I think Gen 5 has become the new Gen 1, Ironically enough
@@Chronocrossfangirl2002 First to say this, N would be a far better character if his writing was better and the themes him and the game as a whole are meant to present were not constantly a talking point. Thats what makes Bianca & Cheren work far better than N does In my opinion. But like you say anything bad about N it’s like you just gave someone a death threat. You mention anything about the Pokémon they use the same “But muh Gen1 Sludge and Ball” I’m terrified that this could become Gen 7 in a couple years
Kalos will always have my personal favorite dex, if only for the sheer variety and lack of repeats from one route to the next making it so there's almost always something exciting to find, new or old on every route. However, I will concede that at least insofar as giving the spotlight to what's new goes, Hoenn does indeed do it better.
Yea that's one of my favourite parts of XY, being able to build so many different teams with everything they've included. But I feel like Kalos' mons are so often slept on, in no small part because XY doesn't promote Kalos mons to its players
A good thing about the Hoenn dex is that you can pretty much obtain all the pokemon before the League, with the exception being the Beldum line, Lati@s and Rayquaza in RZ. That's a good design choice, even thought some mons like Salamence can only be obtain late in the adventure, at least you can build your team before the E4.
I actually did an interesting experiment of trying to cut down the Kalos dex by 200 Pokémon with it still feeling like Kalos but making the Kalos Pokémon stand out more! Some Pokémon had to stay for appropriate type diversity but I managed to get it down to 285 and feel like a solid Pokédex. Might look at romhacking that into the game somehow. Could also make for an interesting video idea as a follow up for this and take a look at what you would cut.
That's a great idea for a romhack. I have a suggestion: Make all the removals temporary, so that someone can backtrack to get one of their favorites if it was removed. I feel strongly still, despite this video, that Kalos' large Pokedex is still a strong suit of the games. So for example, remove pidgey from Route 2 and Santalune Forest to highlight Fletchling, but after you beat Viola, if you happen to go back you could still encounter Pidgey for the rest of the game. By the time you beat gym 8, you've already encountered every pokemon as well, so there'd be no need to limit Victory Road's encounters either. Another thing you could add as well is simply most, if not the rest of the natdex pokemon encounters as "backtrack" pokemon, in particular Starter Pokemon and Friend Safari exclusives. Since Kalos is such a linear region, locking encounters on certain routes to gym badges could really work well. Playing the intended way of course, you'd encounter only the "new" kalos pokemon on your first visit to a route, and most people don't really backtrack their routes after each gym, and so your intended effect to get people to try out Kalos Pokemon would remain successful, while still allowing Bidoof to be caught early on.
28:47 Excellent points! Apparently, Junichi Matsuda said Hoenn was planned to only include the new region Pokemon and the older gens were going to be available post game. That is why you can mostly find the new mons at the beginning. They abandoned the idea because of balancing issues in game. Nowadays Gen 5 gets showered in praise as the gold standard by some folks, but I remember there was more backlash than any other game when they were first released. While I didn't mind because I only use new pokemon during the first play thru even as a kid, I did not like any of the starters. For the first time I boxed my starter(Snivy) and basically had Darmanitan as my ace. Also a lot backlash when Megas came out for some reason as well. AAAND there's a lot of hype around the fact that they are coming back.
Out of the newer Pokémon game I would say gen 9 has the best case of Pokémon team wanting you to use new Pokémon, most of the Pokémon you find at the start is all new Pokémon, and around mostly every gym is a new type of Pokémon, it’s not perfect or anything but compared to Kalos it definitely does a better job
Another reason why dexes can’t have a larger percentage of new mons is for competitive. If a game comes out and only 200 mons are available to play with, that would be incredibly hard to balance as there likely wouldn’t be answers to dominate mons and more niche strategies require specific Pokémon to work. Only having around 200-250 mons in a dex would make the meta more over centralized than it can already get.
@@Magic_Ice that's a fair point. There was a Ruby Sapphire competitive format (also known as ADV 200) and while it wasn't awful, it lacked a lot of the tools current ADV players love. I think it could work if they plan to add more Pokémon later through Pokémon Home and DLC, just make the 200 format a temporary one, but having more options definitely helps to prevent overcentralizing
Your criticisms of the Kalos dex pain me, because I know that they're right, as I too love the Kalos Region immensely. I've always also loved how expansive it's pokedex is, without truly realizing how it hides all the new toys behind the old ones, subjecting so many good pokemon designs to obscurity. If they were to change it, so that most of the new pokemon appear earlier (where it makes sense), and then add all the old pokemon to the routes after you obtain the National Dex, then I think we would see a lot more people claiming to like Kalos Pokemon more. Fantastic video.
@@portwise23 oh absolutely, I'm guessing they had so many since they wanted to make the most of all the work they spent upgrading every Pokémon to 3D. But I like your idea in your other comment about having old Pokémon appear after certain milestones, that'd be a great way to both promote new Pokémon and reward the players for progressing the story
I’ve been a long time believer that Hoenn has the best species diversity (however i was a Gen 3 kid so bias), especially because it’s easy to say “this route is the one where you catch these new Mons”. Personally I’ve found the only other region that really ticked this box for me Alola.
This is a really high quality video for such a small channel! I've always liked both rse and oras's hoenn pokedexes as well but i didn't really thought about the game play aspects or realized that the new pokemon were shown off first in hoenn before the old ones. The Hoenn pokdex is probably tied with b2w2's unova pokedex as my favourite in the entire series.
Awesome video, really glad I got recommended this. Im not much of a fan of Pokemon fan (haven't played a new game since diamond/platinum), but this video was so informative it gave me a new application for the game. Keep it up, bud!
I'm glad this video gave you a new outlook on the series! Ik a lot of people fell out of the series as they grew up so it's cool that people like you are still choosing to listen to me blab about it haha
this is a great video !! i’m shocked to see how few views it has, it’s very insightful and discusses something i don’t hear talked about often, though maybe i’m just not in the right corners of the internet. well done!
Good video! You make some good points. Hoping to see more video essays like this one! I noticed a small mistake though, Unova only introduced 156 Pokémon, not 157.
Really solid analysis; Hoenn’s regional dex has always felt special to me, and I think this puts it very eloquently, as while I learned about its fairly unique ratio of new Pokémon to old Pokémon awhile back as a part of an equally nerdy Pokémon data analysis I did awhile back, I didn’t know about some of the finer details like how older mons in the regional dex are often held back in Gen 3 until after newer mons show up. If you were going to do something like this again, I think I’d be most curious to see you go more in-depth on the Alola Pokedex from Sun & Moon. I haven’t played Scarlet & Violet yet so I can’t speak to that game, but I feel like SM came the closest of any later game to having the balance of old & new that the Hoenn games had, even if the ratio was basically flipped on its head like you said in this video. I hope this video continues to get recommended to more Pokémon fans like it was for me so that we see even more discussion on this topic.
@@ReitheOffbeatOtaku I definitely should revisit Gen 7 someday, I only played through SM once before my 3DS stopped working and I never tried USUM. If I find a way to play through them, I'll definitely pay attention to how it distributes its new Pokémon
Really nice video! I haven't played the original Hoenn games, but I have played Alpha Saphire. While this design philosophy wasn't immediately obvious to me, my subconscious was definitely kicking in and saying "hey, try out these Hoenn pokemon" even though, at the time, I had nearly no idea what Pokemon belonged to either Gens 1,2, or 3. While I honestly believe some old options are better (sorry Manetric), they are found just that bit earlier or easier. I'm about to play through Emerald for the first time, and I've been thinking up an all Hoenn team for a "true experience". One thing that I noticed is that, outside of electric types (again, sorry Manetric), it was honestly fairly easy to do, and to figure out how to get them.
@@vanderan yea it's unfortunate but Manectric really struggles to stand out, especially with Electrode's high speed and Magneton's defensive typing. It at least can learn some Fire type moves which is interesting, but you're more likely to use that Overheat TM on an actual Fire type lol
@@rug052 I really ought to sit down and figure out why it's my favourite some time, there's so many flaws I willingly accept with XY yet I still think so highly of them. It's definitely something I want to make a video about, especially with how the fanbase at large typically dislikes Kalos
Really put my thoughts about the hoenn Dex into words! Hoenn is probably my favourite region and I love the variety of Pokémon! I too thought Skarmory was a gen 3 Mon for awhile XD
Really great insight here! You made a good point about fans taking for granted common perceptions about regional dexes (sinnoh bad, all others good, etc). I think the way younger players experience and perceive older games in the franchise is kind of spoiled by overly homogeneous online discourse about the series. It’s great to hear some original thoughts grounded in actual experience for a change 😂
Always loved Hoenns Pokedex with many of its Pokemon being my favorites. My only issue has to be the lack of Ice and Ghosts types. Never liked how both Phoebe and Galacia have to use repeat Pokemon and the inclusion of Gengar and Piloswine couldve really helped with their teams
@@TheRealYeezus2002 yea odd choice to have them as Elite Four members despite their types being really uncommon in the region, guess they needed to call back to Kanto somehow haha. Of course Phoebe could have also used Shedinja, but I'm guessing they didn't want to softlock some teams which weren't prepared for it
I might be wrong but I feel like B2W2 does it relatively similar to Hoenn in the way it mixes in gen 5 pokemon with older ones. I'm still not a fan of BW having no previous pokemon available, it gave me a serious disconnect of gen 5 with the rest of the series and just made me go back to playing gen 4 with the pokemon I knew and loved. Only when B2W2 came out I started to really love the gen 5 pokemon for what they were because I could use them alongside my old faves, and in turn that made me actually want to finish the playthrough of Black that I had previously just given up on
B2W2 is definitely an improvement. I just focused on the original releases from each gen since they're the proper introduction to each region and so have a bigger impact on how people discover new Pokémon (and they sell more than the update versions lol)
I agree, both Gen 3 and Gen 5 do an excellent job in featuring older Pokemon but showcasing its new roster well. I personally dont mind the exclusion of older Pokemon in the first games as I really love Unovas Pokemon but I can see why people have issues with it
Ive always held the belief that the Kalos Pokedex was a way for GameFreak to please fans who were upset with Gen 5. The constant Kanto Pokemon especially with fan favorites given to you the same way you get them in Kanto. And also the inclusion of a free Lucario who is probably the most popular non Kanto Pokemon. Such a shame that GameFreak felt kinda shamed about showcasing new Pokemon since Gen 6 had a lot of cool inclusions
I grew up on Gen 3 and onward but am most nostalgic towards Gen 2. Gen 1 I had blue version but definitely was my least played and Kanto overall is my least enjoyable region. I do like the pokemon but they aren’t as good to me as later Gen pokemon from Gen 3 and on. Plus a lot of the good pokemon are locked behind trades which as someone who didn’t have the luxury to do so until Gen 4, I never used alakazam, golem, or gengar. Some cool pokemon but unable to use them. Gen 5 had BANGERS and I loved that Gen when it first came out even birthed my favorite mythical Victini. I did not know it was hated until honestly recently. Then I see videos of “we were wrong about Gen 5” is like if people hated it so much why do suddenly people like it? I’ve always liked it and I never had the “I need my Gen 1 pokemon or I can’t have fun” because It’s my least played Gen. there’s nothing wrong with Gen 1 and I even like the starters and a lot of the Gen 1s but I just prefer pokemon from every other region. Gen 5 had the best but types introduced, amazing ground types, grass types, a Zebra, the starters were bangers didn’t even care that there was another fire fighting starter, and there wasn’t geodude or zubat in ever game. And the pokemon cries in that game are by far the BEST of any gen don’t @me. They’re animalistic and sound pretty cool with the echo. Now people complain about always having the Gen 1 starters and always seeing the same n 1 pokemon b it Gen 5 literally did what people now and they hated it and now all of a sudden they like it which I find cringe
Yea I was online a bit during the BW days and people HATED those games, it's a whole different story now that the BW generation has grown up. I'm glad Gen 5 has been getting its flowers lately, it was so overhated even into Generation 7. I think it might have circled back around to overhyped, but I can't deny it's far better than many other games in the series
Thank you so much for your video, it puts some words to describe my first impressions and my most powerful feelings I got when I discovered the third generation in my childhood, and it reminds me why I consider this generation as the best until today, or at least my favorite one (despite the fact I started with Pokémon Yellow on my GBC, resulting to giving a special place to the first generation in my heart, but the GBA era seems even closer to perfection in my opinion, especially the Hoenn part). And even if there are many elements to gather in order to appreciate a bunch of games as a whole (such as the region design, in therms of both beauty and utility, the way the graphics make it shine visually, the music linked to each town and route of the games, the gameplay efficiency...), the Pokédex composition is certainly the most important and central element to take in consideration, especially with a franchise as Pokémon (no need to precise what are the games that check all the points I mentioned before in my case ^^). Overall, thanks again for all your good work exposed in this video, and I share the same deception as you concerning the Kalos games, about the Pokédex (the small number of new creatures introduced, the even smaller ratio between new and old ones in the regional dex, and the lack of visibility of the new ones through the way they're under exploited), as well as the fact that Game Freak completely gave up this arc in the middle of the path (no sequel or complementary version as intended from some leaks that were revealed in the last years, no South of Kalos to explore through a deeper story and a more complete adventure, what a shame when we think about the wonderful country that inspired the Kalos region, and I don't say that only because I come from this country lol)
@@alexandreberthault9942 thank you for the kind words 😊 damn it's hard to be a Kalos fan, isn't it? I'm very excited for Legends ZA, I'm hoping it's the fresh air Kalos needs for fans to see how great the region is
Hoenn has the best thematic Pokemon like magcargo, lanturn, tentacruel etc. Sinnoh did this well but it took 2 years to get there. The best in variety is Kalos as there is so many Pokemon. You can have like 3 teams for each type with no overlaps
Great video! I’ve played all games up to Gen 8 and the gens I believe have the best Pokédex are gens 1, 3, and 5 (both bw and their sequels.) I know a lot of people hate on Gen 1 pokemon now but that’s because they’re not looking at them in the context of red and blue. Early in the region you see a lot of “generic” and “bland” pokemon like pidgey, pikachu, ekans, etc. But as you progress you start to notice how more “monster like” they’ve become: doduo, hypno, jynx, muk, magmar, etc. I think you’ve done a great job explaining Gen 3 so I’ll just move on to Gen 5. One of the main themes of Gen 5 is the relationship between trainers and pokemon. Team plasmas whole point was that pokemon aren’t supposed to be with trainers. Now if you look at Gen 5 pokemon you’ll see that almost all of them have something pertaining or relating to trainers and humans in general. Mincinno is known to be a good cleaner, purrloin is a trickster that pulls pranks on trainers. Even the despised trash and ice cream pokemon have something relating to humans. People modeled the Castelia cone after vanillite and trubbish helps clean garbage and if they feel loved by their trainer then their stench goes away. In short, I think these three generations make use of their Pokémon and weave them into their respective region the best.
@@taylormidnights3133 those are very good points! I've never gotten the hate for Gen 1's simple designs, there's talent in taking a real creature and giving it a fantastic spin with just a small change. I really like the idea of Pokémon co-evolving with humans over time in Unova (real evolution, not the Pokémon kind haha), like you said it ties into the story well
This video perfectly encapsulates why I feel Hoenn is probably the region that feels the best to play! The Pokédex feels so vibrant and new, while not forgetting its roots, so it's just a treat to catch them all! I have to admit I'm a staunch gen 6 defender (I've been in the TRENCHES since 2013, let me tell you), and I do think Kalos' dex is probably the second best dex in the entire series, hindered mostly by the ridiculous amount of gift mons you get before the fourth gym and the obvious pandering as a result of gen 5 backlash. Having said that, I do think ORAS is the best Hoenn experience possible: regional dex not just as good as the original but even BETTER with the much-needed inclusion of gen 4 evolutions and such (Froslass, Magnezone, Roserade, Gallade, Dusknoir come to mind)! In fact, ORAS is the only remake to actually include all post-original-gen evolutions in the dex!! It doesn't feel as ridiculously limiting as FRLG or HGSS, and the new additions just improve what was already there! Hoenn's Pokédex is amazing, but ORAS simply elevated it to true perfection. All the gen 6 additions serve Hoenn perfectly, too: Super Training, DexNav, the most useful map the series has ever seen and ever will see... And dare I say the post-story old-gen additions only serve as an incentive for players to revisit areas they otherwise wouldn't!! And mirage islands keep the game fresh with new random areas and quests!! And the battle resort is actually a good addition!! [Quick aside: why people complain about the lack of Battle Frontier is a mystery to me, weren't those the same people who only ever played it once and got bored of it because of how unforgiving it was? Oh well, what do I know] Sorry for the long comment, I just wanted to enthusiastically agree with you and rave about the ORAS dex. Great video !! It's very thought-out and thorough!! Much love and encouragement for future affairs ❤
@@ssgold19shousetsuka46 ORAS is definitely great for all the reasons you listed, I loved playing through it when it released. I haven't revisited it nearly as much as the originals but that's just because I broke my 3DS lol. Thank you for the kind words 😊
I definitely think Gen 5 does a good job promoting its new Pokémon, but limiting itself to only new Pokémon hinders its variety. Several areas in the story mode only add one new mon, and Route 7 and Moor of Icirrus don't add anything new at all, similar to Kanto Route 9. I also think the retreading on Kanto designs hampers Unova's dex; even if you think Unova strictly improves on Kanto's designs, the fact that such a large portion of Unova's Pokémon invite the comparison puts it in Kanto's shadow, despite how many cool and original Pokémon Unova adds as well. Definitely up to personal preference, I don't blame you if neither of those things make you think less of Unova
@kadabraguy9846 no i don't strictly think gen 5's designs are better than gen 1's i think overall i prefer the designs from gen 5 over gen 1 with a few exceptions (machamp) i also think the region design *is* a straight improvement over gen 1 essentially when looking at it from let's go pikachu / eevee I know alot of people harped on the designs of gen 5 mons back in 2011 but for every 'bad' designs someone points to i can point to 2 or 3 stupid ass designs or terrible decisions made in gen 1 that people overlooked because of course they did it's gen 1 -_-
Love the video although I disagree with you about your gen V criticism. I think gen V did an excellent job creating parallel, all the while standing on its own. It's the only Pokémon game that truly engaged me story-wise, had a balanced type distribution, and did a good job catering to old fans wanting something new. Excellent video regardless.
@@StrayTato yea I can accept that I've just got less love for Gen 5 than most fans. I still think they're some of the best games in the series, but I think many other fans say they're the best games, no contest haha. I'm glad you still enjoyed the video despite disagreeing with me there 🤘
there are no ice types in sinnoh because garchomp is 4x weak to ice, gen iv is more of a classic rpg then monstet collecting, this is also why it has many hms, you may not like it but this was the intention all along
@@DorminatorX that's an interesting reason. I can respect the devs went for something different, though even if that was their intent, to me the reaction from the fans to both of these decisions indicates they could have implemented them a bit better
@@kadabraguy9846 in bdsp they gqve garchomp poison jab especielly to counter abomasnow, i know that people hate those remakes but i dont, also same was with gen 3, there bearly any ice types so you couldent just swipe the entire drake team since he has altaria,salamance, and flygon, all 4x weak to ice
I am disliking this video simply for saying that Kanto’s pokemon and game design were done lazily. That’s a disrespect to the devs who spearheaded this entire franchise. You have to take into account that it was back in the early 90s when this game was conceptualized and released. Resources and even the influence of media were still limited. Pokemon Gen 1 was ahead of its time. And you say that they were lazy? Shame on you.
That's fair. In my defense, I was more referring to how the fanbase at large has turned on Gen 1's designs in recent years, especially as the fans who grew up with Gen 5 started applying the criticisms laid against their games to the Gen 1 games. But yea, I didn't really make that explicit in the video, my b
“Shame on you” is so brazen. Make your own video about how good kanto was, even though it IS a strangely designed region considering for example how there are pokemon ONLY obtainable throught trade, so it is in no way near perfect. You are one curious critter!
I loved the choice of Black and White to only feature new Pokemon at first. It was very refreshing. I hope Pokemon does it again. I also loved seeing Pokemon that played the same role as Kanto counterparts.
Hell yea, to each their own 👍
Came expecting Gen 3 Glaze, left to find an incredibly underrated video essay on something I had never really considered. However I do have to mention the fact that this model was very much likely unintentional.
The Hoenn games were intended to be reboots like Unova, only possessing Hoenn Pokémon, likely why some of the Pokemon in the game (Spheal, Aron, Feebas, Electrike, Ralts, so on) feel like retreads of Gen 1 Pokemon, but your points are still fair and interesting. Rarely see Pokédex analysis like this, let alone to such quality as this.
Hope more content like this is made, and most certainly I hope you gain more traction for this.
I'm really glad I could share some new points 😊 yea I'm sure this was more of a happy accident than an intentional decision but I think it turned out well regardless. Thanks for watching, and thanks for the kind words 🤘
Yet everyone hated unova til recent years.
@ That’s one of the funniest things ever. For like the entire 2010’s anyone who liked Unova was crucified, but now everyone acts like Gen 5 was always loved and peak. Like I like Gen 5, but I think Gen 5 has become the new Gen 1, Ironically enough
@Wooper2009 gen 5 is okay like its not bad but people are just afraid to admit the problems it has nowadays or shun people who do
@@Chronocrossfangirl2002 First to say this, N would be a far better character if his writing was better and the themes him and the game as a whole are meant to present were not constantly a talking point. Thats what makes Bianca & Cheren work far better than N does In my opinion. But like you say anything bad about N it’s like you just gave someone a death threat. You mention anything about the Pokémon they use the same “But muh Gen1 Sludge and Ball”
I’m terrified that this could become Gen 7 in a couple years
Kalos will always have my personal favorite dex, if only for the sheer variety and lack of repeats from one route to the next making it so there's almost always something exciting to find, new or old on every route.
However, I will concede that at least insofar as giving the spotlight to what's new goes, Hoenn does indeed do it better.
Yea that's one of my favourite parts of XY, being able to build so many different teams with everything they've included. But I feel like Kalos' mons are so often slept on, in no small part because XY doesn't promote Kalos mons to its players
A good thing about the Hoenn dex is that you can pretty much obtain all the pokemon before the League, with the exception being the Beldum line, Lati@s and Rayquaza in RZ. That's a good design choice, even thought some mons like Salamence can only be obtain late in the adventure, at least you can build your team before the E4.
I actually did an interesting experiment of trying to cut down the Kalos dex by 200 Pokémon with it still feeling like Kalos but making the Kalos Pokémon stand out more! Some Pokémon had to stay for appropriate type diversity but I managed to get it down to 285 and feel like a solid Pokédex. Might look at romhacking that into the game somehow. Could also make for an interesting video idea as a follow up for this and take a look at what you would cut.
@@alexadavis8558 damn Legends ZA is not too far away, this isn't a bad idea 🤔
That's a great idea for a romhack. I have a suggestion: Make all the removals temporary, so that someone can backtrack to get one of their favorites if it was removed. I feel strongly still, despite this video, that Kalos' large Pokedex is still a strong suit of the games. So for example, remove pidgey from Route 2 and Santalune Forest to highlight Fletchling, but after you beat Viola, if you happen to go back you could still encounter Pidgey for the rest of the game. By the time you beat gym 8, you've already encountered every pokemon as well, so there'd be no need to limit Victory Road's encounters either.
Another thing you could add as well is simply most, if not the rest of the natdex pokemon encounters as "backtrack" pokemon, in particular Starter Pokemon and Friend Safari exclusives. Since Kalos is such a linear region, locking encounters on certain routes to gym badges could really work well. Playing the intended way of course, you'd encounter only the "new" kalos pokemon on your first visit to a route, and most people don't really backtrack their routes after each gym, and so your intended effect to get people to try out Kalos Pokemon would remain successful, while still allowing Bidoof to be caught early on.
Surprised he didn't give that Shroomish the nickname of "Luigi." 🤭
He's not Luigi by name, but he is in spirit ;)
@@kadabraguy9846 Waaaah
28:47 Excellent points! Apparently, Junichi Matsuda said Hoenn was planned to only include the new region Pokemon and the older gens were going to be available post game. That is why you can mostly find the new mons at the beginning. They abandoned the idea because of balancing issues in game.
Nowadays Gen 5 gets showered in praise as the gold standard by some folks, but I remember there was more backlash than any other game when they were first released. While I didn't mind because I only use new pokemon during the first play thru even as a kid, I did not like any of the starters. For the first time I boxed my starter(Snivy) and basically had Darmanitan as my ace.
Also a lot backlash when Megas came out for some reason as well. AAAND there's a lot of hype around the fact that they are coming back.
@@camwoz5181 it's a time honoured tradition that Pokémon fans don't know what they want until it's gone haha
One could say that the Hoenn dex slays the house down boots
Kanto really walked the runway so Hoenn could death drop 🤔 what a serve
Out of the newer Pokémon game I would say gen 9 has the best case of Pokémon team wanting you to use new Pokémon, most of the Pokémon you find at the start is all new Pokémon, and around mostly every gym is a new type of Pokémon, it’s not perfect or anything but compared to Kalos it definitely does a better job
Another reason why dexes can’t have a larger percentage of new mons is for competitive. If a game comes out and only 200 mons are available to play with, that would be incredibly hard to balance as there likely wouldn’t be answers to dominate mons and more niche strategies require specific Pokémon to work. Only having around 200-250 mons in a dex would make the meta more over centralized than it can already get.
@@Magic_Ice that's a fair point. There was a Ruby Sapphire competitive format (also known as ADV 200) and while it wasn't awful, it lacked a lot of the tools current ADV players love. I think it could work if they plan to add more Pokémon later through Pokémon Home and DLC, just make the 200 format a temporary one, but having more options definitely helps to prevent overcentralizing
@@kadabraguy9846 yeah or maybe have more mons available in the post game for that.
Geodude am I right?
More like Geodoof if I'm being honest
Your criticisms of the Kalos dex pain me, because I know that they're right, as I too love the Kalos Region immensely. I've always also loved how expansive it's pokedex is, without truly realizing how it hides all the new toys behind the old ones, subjecting so many good pokemon designs to obscurity. If they were to change it, so that most of the new pokemon appear earlier (where it makes sense), and then add all the old pokemon to the routes after you obtain the National Dex, then I think we would see a lot more people claiming to like Kalos Pokemon more. Fantastic video.
@@portwise23 oh absolutely, I'm guessing they had so many since they wanted to make the most of all the work they spent upgrading every Pokémon to 3D. But I like your idea in your other comment about having old Pokémon appear after certain milestones, that'd be a great way to both promote new Pokémon and reward the players for progressing the story
@@kadabraguy9846 I'm hoping PLZA gives these mons a second chance just like how PLA gave Sinnoh pokemon the full focus with some old one sprinkled in
I think you've nailed it. This is the kind of Pokemon game design analysis I've been looking for
Oh, subbed btw.
I'm glad you enjoyed it enough to subscribe! I'm excited to make more analyses like this in the future 🤘
@kadabraguy9846 heck yeah, I'm looking forward to it!
I’ve been a long time believer that Hoenn has the best species diversity (however i was a Gen 3 kid so bias), especially because it’s easy to say “this route is the one where you catch these new Mons”.
Personally I’ve found the only other region that really ticked this box for me Alola.
another gen 3 W
Giant w of a video, algorithm bless you and keep it up!
This is a really high quality video for such a small channel! I've always liked both rse and oras's hoenn pokedexes as well but i didn't really thought about the game play aspects or realized that the new pokemon were shown off first in hoenn before the old ones. The Hoenn pokdex is probably tied with b2w2's unova pokedex as my favourite in the entire series.
@@caterpillarh8490 I'm glad you enjoyed the video 😊 thank you for the kind words
Awesome video, really glad I got recommended this. Im not much of a fan of Pokemon fan (haven't played a new game since diamond/platinum), but this video was so informative it gave me a new application for the game. Keep it up, bud!
I'm glad this video gave you a new outlook on the series! Ik a lot of people fell out of the series as they grew up so it's cool that people like you are still choosing to listen to me blab about it haha
you raised a lot of points I'd never thought of before, awesome vid!
Thank you! :)
this is a great video !! i’m shocked to see how few views it has, it’s very insightful and discusses something i don’t hear talked about often, though maybe i’m just not in the right corners of the internet. well done!
Thank you! I haven't heard many people talk about this either, which inspired me to make this video haha
Good video! You make some good points. Hoping to see more video essays like this one! I noticed a small mistake though, Unova only introduced 156 Pokémon, not 157.
@@venustoise4389 I swear I double checked that number 😅 thanks for the heads up
You captured it perfectly 👌🏿
Really solid analysis; Hoenn’s regional dex has always felt special to me, and I think this puts it very eloquently, as while I learned about its fairly unique ratio of new Pokémon to old Pokémon awhile back as a part of an equally nerdy Pokémon data analysis I did awhile back, I didn’t know about some of the finer details like how older mons in the regional dex are often held back in Gen 3 until after newer mons show up.
If you were going to do something like this again, I think I’d be most curious to see you go more in-depth on the Alola Pokedex from Sun & Moon. I haven’t played Scarlet & Violet yet so I can’t speak to that game, but I feel like SM came the closest of any later game to having the balance of old & new that the Hoenn games had, even if the ratio was basically flipped on its head like you said in this video.
I hope this video continues to get recommended to more Pokémon fans like it was for me so that we see even more discussion on this topic.
@@ReitheOffbeatOtaku I definitely should revisit Gen 7 someday, I only played through SM once before my 3DS stopped working and I never tried USUM. If I find a way to play through them, I'll definitely pay attention to how it distributes its new Pokémon
Really nice video! I haven't played the original Hoenn games, but I have played Alpha Saphire. While this design philosophy wasn't immediately obvious to me, my subconscious was definitely kicking in and saying "hey, try out these Hoenn pokemon" even though, at the time, I had nearly no idea what Pokemon belonged to either Gens 1,2, or 3. While I honestly believe some old options are better (sorry Manetric), they are found just that bit earlier or easier.
I'm about to play through Emerald for the first time, and I've been thinking up an all Hoenn team for a "true experience". One thing that I noticed is that, outside of electric types (again, sorry Manetric), it was honestly fairly easy to do, and to figure out how to get them.
@@vanderan yea it's unfortunate but Manectric really struggles to stand out, especially with Electrode's high speed and Magneton's defensive typing. It at least can learn some Fire type moves which is interesting, but you're more likely to use that Overheat TM on an actual Fire type lol
Would love to hear more of your thoughts on Kalos!
@@rug052 I really ought to sit down and figure out why it's my favourite some time, there's so many flaws I willingly accept with XY yet I still think so highly of them. It's definitely something I want to make a video about, especially with how the fanbase at large typically dislikes Kalos
Really put my thoughts about the hoenn Dex into words! Hoenn is probably my favourite region and I love the variety of Pokémon! I too thought Skarmory was a gen 3 Mon for awhile XD
Really great insight here! You made a good point about fans taking for granted common perceptions about regional dexes (sinnoh bad, all others good, etc). I think the way younger players experience and perceive older games in the franchise is kind of spoiled by overly homogeneous online discourse about the series.
It’s great to hear some original thoughts grounded in actual experience for a change 😂
@@obviobvi thank you! I'm glad you liked the video 😊
I don't like Smash. But watch this type of content so you got recommended 🙂
Always loved Hoenns Pokedex with many of its Pokemon being my favorites. My only issue has to be the lack of Ice and Ghosts types. Never liked how both Phoebe and Galacia have to use repeat Pokemon and the inclusion of Gengar and Piloswine couldve really helped with their teams
@@TheRealYeezus2002 yea odd choice to have them as Elite Four members despite their types being really uncommon in the region, guess they needed to call back to Kanto somehow haha. Of course Phoebe could have also used Shedinja, but I'm guessing they didn't want to softlock some teams which weren't prepared for it
Underrated video for sure
Thank you 😊 I'm still trying to get the hang of making good thumbnails, once I get that down I'm hoping more people will check it out
DUDE WHEN IS THE NEXT VIDEO GOING TO BE RELEASED?!
I think it'll be some time before the end of the year 😳 who can say?
I might be wrong but I feel like B2W2 does it relatively similar to Hoenn in the way it mixes in gen 5 pokemon with older ones. I'm still not a fan of BW having no previous pokemon available, it gave me a serious disconnect of gen 5 with the rest of the series and just made me go back to playing gen 4 with the pokemon I knew and loved. Only when B2W2 came out I started to really love the gen 5 pokemon for what they were because I could use them alongside my old faves, and in turn that made me actually want to finish the playthrough of Black that I had previously just given up on
B2W2 is definitely an improvement. I just focused on the original releases from each gen since they're the proper introduction to each region and so have a bigger impact on how people discover new Pokémon (and they sell more than the update versions lol)
I agree, both Gen 3 and Gen 5 do an excellent job in featuring older Pokemon but showcasing its new roster well. I personally dont mind the exclusion of older Pokemon in the first games as I really love Unovas Pokemon but I can see why people have issues with it
Ive always held the belief that the Kalos Pokedex was a way for GameFreak to please fans who were upset with Gen 5. The constant Kanto Pokemon especially with fan favorites given to you the same way you get them in Kanto. And also the inclusion of a free Lucario who is probably the most popular non Kanto Pokemon. Such a shame that GameFreak felt kinda shamed about showcasing new Pokemon since Gen 6 had a lot of cool inclusions
I grew up on Gen 3 and onward but am most nostalgic towards Gen 2. Gen 1 I had blue version but definitely was my least played and Kanto overall is my least enjoyable region. I do like the pokemon but they aren’t as good to me as later Gen pokemon from Gen 3 and on. Plus a lot of the good pokemon are locked behind trades which as someone who didn’t have the luxury to do so until Gen 4, I never used alakazam, golem, or gengar. Some cool pokemon but unable to use them.
Gen 5 had BANGERS and I loved that Gen when it first came out even birthed my favorite mythical Victini. I did not know it was hated until honestly recently. Then I see videos of “we were wrong about Gen 5” is like if people hated it so much why do suddenly people like it? I’ve always liked it and I never had the “I need my Gen 1 pokemon or I can’t have fun” because It’s my least played Gen. there’s nothing wrong with Gen 1 and I even like the starters and a lot of the Gen 1s but I just prefer pokemon from every other region. Gen 5 had the best but types introduced, amazing ground types, grass types, a Zebra, the starters were bangers didn’t even care that there was another fire fighting starter, and there wasn’t geodude or zubat in ever game. And the pokemon cries in that game are by far the BEST of any gen don’t @me. They’re animalistic and sound pretty cool with the echo. Now people complain about always having the Gen 1 starters and always seeing the same n 1 pokemon b it Gen 5 literally did what people now and they hated it and now all of a sudden they like it which I find cringe
Yea I was online a bit during the BW days and people HATED those games, it's a whole different story now that the BW generation has grown up. I'm glad Gen 5 has been getting its flowers lately, it was so overhated even into Generation 7. I think it might have circled back around to overhyped, but I can't deny it's far better than many other games in the series
@ banger vid and new sub 🫶🏽
2k veiws is a true youtube algorithm moment
Thank you so much for your video, it puts some words to describe my first impressions and my most powerful feelings I got when I discovered the third generation in my childhood, and it reminds me why I consider this generation as the best until today, or at least my favorite one (despite the fact I started with Pokémon Yellow on my GBC, resulting to giving a special place to the first generation in my heart, but the GBA era seems even closer to perfection in my opinion, especially the Hoenn part). And even if there are many elements to gather in order to appreciate a bunch of games as a whole (such as the region design, in therms of both beauty and utility, the way the graphics make it shine visually, the music linked to each town and route of the games, the gameplay efficiency...), the Pokédex composition is certainly the most important and central element to take in consideration, especially with a franchise as Pokémon (no need to precise what are the games that check all the points I mentioned before in my case ^^). Overall, thanks again for all your good work exposed in this video, and I share the same deception as you concerning the Kalos games, about the Pokédex (the small number of new creatures introduced, the even smaller ratio between new and old ones in the regional dex, and the lack of visibility of the new ones through the way they're under exploited), as well as the fact that Game Freak completely gave up this arc in the middle of the path (no sequel or complementary version as intended from some leaks that were revealed in the last years, no South of Kalos to explore through a deeper story and a more complete adventure, what a shame when we think about the wonderful country that inspired the Kalos region, and I don't say that only because I come from this country lol)
@@alexandreberthault9942 thank you for the kind words 😊 damn it's hard to be a Kalos fan, isn't it? I'm very excited for Legends ZA, I'm hoping it's the fresh air Kalos needs for fans to see how great the region is
You can’t bring Steelix into Scarlet and that really grinds my gears!
8:56 Wait a minute... why does geodude...
Why does geodude look like MISTER BEAST?!
Naming the shroomish Vigilante 😭😭
@RedSteall his Bullet Seeds are quite deadly 😳
Hoenn has the best thematic Pokemon like magcargo, lanturn, tentacruel etc. Sinnoh did this well but it took 2 years to get there. The best in variety is Kalos as there is so many Pokemon. You can have like 3 teams for each type with no overlaps
Very interesting video
Great video! I’ve played all games up to Gen 8 and the gens I believe have the best Pokédex are gens 1, 3, and 5 (both bw and their sequels.) I know a lot of people hate on Gen 1 pokemon now but that’s because they’re not looking at them in the context of red and blue. Early in the region you see a lot of “generic” and “bland” pokemon like pidgey, pikachu, ekans, etc. But as you progress you start to notice how more “monster like” they’ve become: doduo, hypno, jynx, muk, magmar, etc. I think you’ve done a great job explaining Gen 3 so I’ll just move on to Gen 5. One of the main themes of Gen 5 is the relationship between trainers and pokemon. Team plasmas whole point was that pokemon aren’t supposed to be with trainers. Now if you look at Gen 5 pokemon you’ll see that almost all of them have something pertaining or relating to trainers and humans in general. Mincinno is known to be a good cleaner, purrloin is a trickster that pulls pranks on trainers. Even the despised trash and ice cream pokemon have something relating to humans. People modeled the Castelia cone after vanillite and trubbish helps clean garbage and if they feel loved by their trainer then their stench goes away. In short, I think these three generations make use of their Pokémon and weave them into their respective region the best.
@@taylormidnights3133 those are very good points! I've never gotten the hate for Gen 1's simple designs, there's talent in taking a real creature and giving it a fantastic spin with just a small change. I really like the idea of Pokémon co-evolving with humans over time in Unova (real evolution, not the Pokémon kind haha), like you said it ties into the story well
i'm a "gen 1-gen9/10 on GBA games" connoisseur
This video perfectly encapsulates why I feel Hoenn is probably the region that feels the best to play! The Pokédex feels so vibrant and new, while not forgetting its roots, so it's just a treat to catch them all!
I have to admit I'm a staunch gen 6 defender (I've been in the TRENCHES since 2013, let me tell you), and I do think Kalos' dex is probably the second best dex in the entire series, hindered mostly by the ridiculous amount of gift mons you get before the fourth gym and the obvious pandering as a result of gen 5 backlash. Having said that, I do think ORAS is the best Hoenn experience possible: regional dex not just as good as the original but even BETTER with the much-needed inclusion of gen 4 evolutions and such (Froslass, Magnezone, Roserade, Gallade, Dusknoir come to mind)! In fact, ORAS is the only remake to actually include all post-original-gen evolutions in the dex!! It doesn't feel as ridiculously limiting as FRLG or HGSS, and the new additions just improve what was already there!
Hoenn's Pokédex is amazing, but ORAS simply elevated it to true perfection. All the gen 6 additions serve Hoenn perfectly, too: Super Training, DexNav, the most useful map the series has ever seen and ever will see... And dare I say the post-story old-gen additions only serve as an incentive for players to revisit areas they otherwise wouldn't!! And mirage islands keep the game fresh with new random areas and quests!! And the battle resort is actually a good addition!!
[Quick aside: why people complain about the lack of Battle Frontier is a mystery to me, weren't those the same people who only ever played it once and got bored of it because of how unforgiving it was? Oh well, what do I know]
Sorry for the long comment, I just wanted to enthusiastically agree with you and rave about the ORAS dex. Great video !! It's very thought-out and thorough!! Much love and encouragement for future affairs ❤
@@ssgold19shousetsuka46 ORAS is definitely great for all the reasons you listed, I loved playing through it when it released. I haven't revisited it nearly as much as the originals but that's just because I broke my 3DS lol. Thank you for the kind words 😊
Sooooo if we're looking for a larger dex that has good variety and prioritises newer pokemon that means...........
gen 5!
I definitely think Gen 5 does a good job promoting its new Pokémon, but limiting itself to only new Pokémon hinders its variety. Several areas in the story mode only add one new mon, and Route 7 and Moor of Icirrus don't add anything new at all, similar to Kanto Route 9. I also think the retreading on Kanto designs hampers Unova's dex; even if you think Unova strictly improves on Kanto's designs, the fact that such a large portion of Unova's Pokémon invite the comparison puts it in Kanto's shadow, despite how many cool and original Pokémon Unova adds as well. Definitely up to personal preference, I don't blame you if neither of those things make you think less of Unova
@kadabraguy9846 no i don't strictly think gen 5's designs are better than gen 1's i think overall i prefer the designs from gen 5 over gen 1 with a few exceptions (machamp)
i also think the region design *is* a straight improvement over gen 1 essentially when looking at it from let's go pikachu / eevee
I know alot of people harped on the designs of gen 5 mons back in 2011 but for every 'bad' designs someone points to i can point to 2 or 3 stupid ass designs or terrible decisions made in gen 1 that people overlooked because of course they did it's gen 1 -_-
Unova slander
I think Unova is great, I just think it'd be better if it was Hoenn ;)
Yeah I miss gen 3. Besides having a good dex it also had the best spin off games.
Love the video although I disagree with you about your gen V criticism. I think gen V did an excellent job creating parallel, all the while standing on its own. It's the only Pokémon game that truly engaged me story-wise, had a balanced type distribution, and did a good job catering to old fans wanting something new. Excellent video regardless.
@@StrayTato yea I can accept that I've just got less love for Gen 5 than most fans. I still think they're some of the best games in the series, but I think many other fans say they're the best games, no contest haha. I'm glad you still enjoyed the video despite disagreeing with me there 🤘
Pokemon
Gotta catch them small, or so I've heard
there are no ice types in sinnoh because garchomp is 4x weak to ice, gen iv is more of a classic rpg then monstet collecting, this is also why it has many hms, you may not like it but this was the intention all along
@@DorminatorX that's an interesting reason. I can respect the devs went for something different, though even if that was their intent, to me the reaction from the fans to both of these decisions indicates they could have implemented them a bit better
@@kadabraguy9846 in bdsp they gqve garchomp poison jab especielly to counter abomasnow, i know that people hate those remakes but i dont, also same was with gen 3, there bearly any ice types so you couldent just swipe the entire drake team since he has altaria,salamance, and flygon, all 4x weak to ice
So you're saying that Hoenn has the best pokedex for selling plushies?
@implying8903 hadn't thought of it like that, but yea that's pretty accurate haha
Hoenn always solos esp oras and emerald
Investing in this video at 437 views
could you have made a more biased video?
Yes
I am disliking this video simply for saying that Kanto’s pokemon and game design were done lazily. That’s a disrespect to the devs who spearheaded this entire franchise. You have to take into account that it was back in the early 90s when this game was conceptualized and released. Resources and even the influence of media were still limited. Pokemon Gen 1 was ahead of its time. And you say that they were lazy? Shame on you.
That's fair. In my defense, I was more referring to how the fanbase at large has turned on Gen 1's designs in recent years, especially as the fans who grew up with Gen 5 started applying the criticisms laid against their games to the Gen 1 games. But yea, I didn't really make that explicit in the video, my b
“Shame on you” is so brazen. Make your own video about how good kanto was, even though it IS a strangely designed region considering for example how there are pokemon ONLY obtainable throught trade, so it is in no way near perfect. You are one curious critter!