It took me until mid-2018 to beat a game (not even catch all the legendaries and complete the National Pokedex because I still haven't) that came out in late 2016, that I bought as it came out. Considering I usually powered through Pokemon games pretty constantly as they came out, that should kind of give you a clue as to my level of engagement by that point in the franchise. Don't get me wrong, I enjoyed a lot of this game. But it didn't grab me as much as other Pokemon games did in the past, forcing me to want to stick with them as much as possible. I'd say one contributing factor is where I was at life by that point, even Pokemon X came out when I was just entering college and very new to being an adult, and of course the others came out when I was younger and had more capacity to spend free time enraptured in a game for hours and hours like that. But that's not all of it because I had beaten some other games around the same time and played a lot of multiplayer games with my friends. It's also that from a single-player perspective, Pokemon Moon does some things right but is not as engaging as it should be. In fact, I had started getting a little more pumped about the game after I had already beaten it (or at least at the time, before I got busy with other things), with the potential of checking out post-game stuff, catching them all, battling others with my built-up team, etc.

Pokemon is a hard franchise for me to judge, because I haven't played it like I've played other games. Pokemon for me has been this game that doesn't ever really end, only when I happen to get side-tracked by something else or lose interest for a time. You have a set amount of powerful trainers you're supposed to beat, but past that point it turns into what is basically a massively-multiplayer single-player game. Pokemon Go was the perfect storm to bring its unique form of augmented reality game to life, because Pokemon as a franchise was always about doing your own thing on your own, and meeting up with other people in the real world by happenstance and interacting with them. You literally were all on your own separate Pokemon journeys and would intersect with each others', just like how the world of Pokemon is portrayed in the show. And Pokemon has this aspect of transference that no other game has come close to matching, I mean Mass Effect's continuing story concept looks cool, but in Pokemon you can literally have Pokemon you trained and raised 15 years ago and transferred over 4 games (at least) still fighting with you. There are always new trainers to meet, and you can breed Pokemon for even better and better attributes, and the progress you made in previous games can carry over into current ones if you choose to do so. This is why I played Pokemon differently, I didn't just play it as its own game where I make progress and complete it in its own self-contained story (at least not past Gen III), I played each one as the new and continued adventures of Pokemon, a new installment in this ongoing saga that I would complete and then have it become integrated into all the other games I had completed, bringing up my favorite older Pokemon to the most recent version and continuing to catch Pokemon and battle with them. It's made it a bit harder for me to evaluate them individually when I was younger, and I'm honestly considering at some point attempting to beat all of the older ones in an individual sense, ignoring the existence of the others and just beating them as if they weren't interconnected, to evaluate how they stand up on their own a little better. It could be useful because then I could go back and also try out the third versions that they would always release (the only one of those I ever beat was Black 2).

That being said, and I acknowledge I haven't spent enough time with Gen I and II as I should have to have proper experience with all of them, I think Gen VI and Gen VII have been my least favorite Pokemon gens personally. A lot of the Gen VI changes were really cool like putting the games in 3D (though part of me wishes we could still see some cool full sprites) and how they revamped some of the online stuff, and a lot of what I remember liking about Gen IV a lot also had to do with how I felt it expanded the potential of the series, but I think starting with Gen VI there were some core issues introduced into the Pokemon experience, and while I think Gen VII improves on some, some remain, and some new ones occur there. I wouldn't say any Pokemon game is definitively the ultimate one, because always I come up with something that is present in another game that one lacks, and they aren't perfect, but I think VI and VII create fundamental issues that bring down the core appeal in a way that the others didn't.

I want to start with the negatives so I can finish on the positives. The first is one of the most crucial issues, that carries over from Gen VI. This game becomes way too easy if you let it. A big culprit is the change to EXP Share, but the real issue is that both gens don't ramp up the difficulty properly to account for this mechanic. I was younger, but with earlier games I remember you had to prove you could match certain checkpoints before you could just move on to the next bit in the story. I don't think in Pokemon X I ever really suffered because of EXP Share. In Pokemon Moon, I started using it, wised up to just how easy it was making the game, and just turned it off until I beat the game. It was only at the very end of the game that there was beginning to be real challenge again because how much EXP Share boosted me, and keep in mind I wasn't grinding for battling, only occasionally giving some extra effort to catch some Pokemon (I think the way catching them also gives EXP is a cool idea but further breaks the difficulty progression). This is even further compounded by some of the other mechanics introduced in both Gen VI and VII. Amie/Refresh is a concept I like though I wish you could do more with it. Small little things like getting rid of statuses and holding on and avoiding attacks is a cool idea (but unfortunately continues to make the game too forgiving). Super Training and Pelago I think both should have been something mostly reserved for beating the game. I did Super Training just to do it in Pokemon X which made the game way too easy. I started using some of the Pelago stuff like growing berries and leveling up some of my PC Pokemon before avoiding it until I beat the game. Granted my pace became almost glacial at times during some of my hiatuses so that issue was compounded for me, but I honestly think that before you beat the game you should start with pretty much just the beans, maybe getting a few Pokemon every now and then, maybe berries. I could see it being like you're supposed to beat the game quick enough that this stuff doesn't really accumulate, but the game's already too easy. A theme I'd say with a lot of these mechanics is I didn't have to use them, but their presence before beating the game means the developers meant me to try to use them, and they break what should be a nice difficulty flow. But Sun and Moon have a unique problem when it comes to that difficulty flow that Gen VI didn't have.

I was intrigued by the concept of getting rid of gyms. They were a pretty formulaic part of the franchise, so getting rid of them could open fresh new opportunities. However, with how they ended up, I feel like keeping gyms and just maybe getting more creative with their layout would have been the best option, unless they really fleshed this concept out more. The gyms were like checkpoints of strength to indicate that you had progressed enough in fighting steadily more complex and difficult trainers, increasing your capacity to do things, and often had fun theming and nice little puzzles and stuff, almost like micro-Zelda dungeons. Theoretically, that's sort of what the trials are but they mostly fell flat for me. They sort of focus on doing certain themed activities and then fighting a singularly higher-leveled Pokemon that could call in lackeys. The activities themselves usually aren't very long and often not as interesting as some of the puzzles gyms used to have, and often feel not as well connected to the concept of building up your team. And fighting a gym leader with multiple Pokemon of their own is a lot more compelling of a checkpoint for me than most Totem Pokemon. I ended up never taking trials seriously, and I don't think it's just because of what level I was at.

Part of the issues with Gen VI were they had this cool flashy new 3D look and more intuitive online capabilities (I actually prefer its system to Gen VII's I don't understand the point of the plaza), but the navigation felt more relatively restricted, I didn't find the region terribly interesting (maybe I'm too harsh on it, not a lot of it stuck with me, I hated how the main city was set up though), story was bizarre and not fleshed out in the right ways, team and villain was pretty unimpactful, introduced the idea of Mega Pokemon I wasn't too fond of and started introducing a power creep issue, the amount of new Pokemon was a lot less than it used to be (especially with legendaries though I do understand the challenge of making so many models all at once) and characters mainly felt weak. Let's go through how some of these issues may have carried on to Gen VII.

The navigation is definitely improved upon, especially getting rid of the roller-blading ugh I just remembered the existence of that and how annoying it was. But a big issue with the game is the progression of the maps themselves. This is probably one of the most linear and least explorative Pokemon games yet IMO. A lot of older Pokemon games would have you return to old areas but have you take new routes that are opened to you, or would have you progress through them in an interesting path shape. Alola's islands seem to mainly be going from one end of the island and eventually making your way back in a very circular feeling and linear way. Maybe they're bigger than I think but the islands themselves feel very small, I don't know how they compare to the size of the other regions but Alola feels very small to me. It could just be how much they lack in explorative feel. I especially feel like traversing the water is not really fun, especially with the limits put on fishing, and I think personally that taking from Hoenn's water routes and making these islands feel like a connected chain (instead of separate hubs) with interesting and expansive water paths in between them would help the atmosphere and provide cool new opportunities. People mocked the abundance of water in Hoenn, but I loved the opportunities they provide. You can have currents, mini islands, little places to stop and explore along the way, diving areas, currents, etc. Alola has some cool theming and some interesting areas, but I don't think they're as fun to explore as they should be. Kalos' theming wasn't as strong, but it was more fun to explore in the weird way it branched out from that main central city. I don't know how fun Alola will be to go back and traverse now that the game's done.

When it comes to story and Sun and Moon, things get a bit interesting because there's parts I really love and parts that really bother me. I'll get to the parts that I love later. This game feels really short. On Howlongtobeat, it seems to be about the same length as the others, but too much of it is cutscene padding. Cutscenes can be good and I'll get to it later, but there is way too much dialogue padding in some parts, and too many little things that pad up scenes and make them go on for too long, and just too many scenes in general. Something that bothered me about this game was that mentally it was hard for me to figure out when the tutorial really ended, and that's both because of the story and the difficulty. The story has an extremely handholding approach, even to the point that now Rotom tells you where to go like this is a big open-world game. Potentially useful if I hadn't played in a while? Yes, but the structure shouldn't be so easy to follow in general. I was like "when is this game not going to have everyone guiding me on where I need to be going and what I need to be doing" and I'm not sure that point ever went away until the ending, and I don't remember it being quite like this in the older games, or at least tonally it being so handhold-y.

What the story itself is about is considerably better than the story of X and Y IMO, and I'll explain later. But I feel like the way it ends is very anti-climactic. Some of the development of the villains ends up undercooked, better than Team Flare and Lysandre, but it feels like it doesn't pay off as well as it should. The reveal of Lusamine and the Aether Foundation as the villain instead of Team Skull is a nice subversion for Pokemon if predictable. I loved Team Skull being a bunch of goofballs, but I kind of wish they had a little more respect for Guzma. He seems to really not matter as much as you'd think, and he seems like he'd have been a really compelling second villain if they could've done something different. What really disappointed me was the showdown with the final boss and with the game's version legendary. Usually in Pokemon there'll be a lot of buildup to the final pre-Elite Four narrative climax and it'll feel like a really big thing. In Ruby and Sapphire, the entire region is terraformed. In Diamond and Pearl, Team Galactic threatens to create a new universe. In Black and White, a castle pops out of nowhere. In X and Y, baffling as it is, the threat of the cannon is more tangible. In these games, it feels like they go to a weird dimension for a bit while Nihilego take up too much screentime, Lillie confronts Lusamine, there's an anticlimactic battle and resolution, and it's basically done. The Ultra Beasts themselves are such a vague thing that worked better earlier on in the story, I really wish they could've better expanded the whole concept of this dimension and what's happened to Lusamine, maybe even have Guzma be like a proper mini-boss. And unlike other games where you take on the version legendary as a conflict to basically save the world, this one it's like a polite little thing to give the legendary a chance to battle, which taking place after the resolution of Lusamine, makes it feel exceptionally weak. Then you just sort of find out the Pokemon League is ready, I guess which is standard, wish they could've made it take a little longer and harder to get there. Also Hau may be somewhat amusing but I wish he was somewhat of a challenge.

Now we talk about the power creep issue, and the amount of new Pokemon. I was a bit uneasy with what Mega Evolutions offered to the world of Pokemon, and the Z-Moves also make me a bit uneasy. First off, the animations tend to be way too long. In theory, special moves and temporary higher states can be cool but I think they throw off the balance of Pokemon. I don't hate the ideas, but they're not my favorite. If I had to pick one of the two, I'd probably go with signature moves. Once again, I like when they can add a ton of new Pokemon. I understand there exist so many already but they always do too many rehashes of concepts they've done before, I've come up with so many and seen so many Fakemon ideas in the past, there's all kinds of potential for new kinds of Pokemon to exist. More of a personal gripe thing, but still I think sometimes they could be a little wiser in coming up with new territory to cover with Pokemon designs. Also I really wish they just had a National Pokedex in the game.

Now that it seems like I have so much against this game, I want to cover what I felt are the positives.

One of the biggest strengths of this game I feel is in the improvement in presentation and in some of the characters and storytelling. This game embraces the potential of cutscenes in a bold way. Sometimes a little too much and a little too long, but characters are so expressive with their faces, and some of their dialogue is solid. These are some of my favorite characters in Pokemon games. I love Lillie, Lusamine, Guzma, Hau, Gladion, Kukui, Acerola, Olivia, and especially Nanu. These characters have a personality in their cutscenes they just couldn't have had in the previous games, especially with their model quality (makes me wish these models were on a system with a better resolution). The story works better than that of X and Y because I didn't feel much for a lot of the characters in that game. There are a lot of vibrant yet distinct and memorable characters in this game, and that's part of what shines to me the most about it. Up until the ending, I enjoy how the story gets moved by these characters, how Lillie adapts and how Lusamine exposes her true self. These are characters I enjoy getting to know and being with, which helped make up a little for the game being too easy and too linear. I also like how the Tapu legendaries are treated in such a unique way in the story, an interesting approach for legendary Pokemon. It felt like in terms of storytelling, Game Freak upped what they were capable of beyond some of the stuff they had done before, which was appreciated and I look forward to what they might be able to do with more visual and character based storytelling going forward.

The world of Alola has a pretty visual style to it, really embracing the tropical theming in a way that capitalizes more strongly than I think Kalos did for its setting. It may be linear but it's very comfortable to traverse and look at, there's some diverse types of places to visit, and everything has been designed to give a pleasant atmosphere. While it can't compete with the incredible tunes of Gen III for me, the soundtrack is very nice and also capitalizes on the theming well. There's some solid tunes there. The Pokemon designs themselves take really strongly from the tropical theming, more so than I felt the Pokemon of Kalos took from a European theme. They chose some great new inclusions (I LOVE Lurantis), made good choices in what older Pokemon they brought back to the region, and I really liked the concept of Alolan variants, how these Pokemon we're familiar with could have alternative forms based in different habitats. And it looks like unlike X and Y there are a healthy amount of their own form of legendary Pokemon to capture.

One major change they did that I did appreciate was getting rid of HM's, and using ride Pokemon instead. You still got the progression but didn't need HM slaves or giving HM's to your main team like I always did. I didn't love that it was there so early, but I think Pelago is useful once you beat the game, helping speed up the process of getting the right items and hatching eggs and leveling up PC Pokemon in the background, sort of like taking phone game mechanics but without the actual paying aspect.

While it seems like I spent so much more time on the negative stuff, I do want to make clear that I did like this game and had fun with it, and continue to enjoy it when I come back to it (maybe I'll make an addendum when I complete the post-game). I just wanted to properly articulate some of the issues I had with this game, I haven't talked to too many people about their opinions on this game but I felt I had to explain what I felt are some of its shortcomings. It can be nebulous to try to explain the appeal of the characters and the atmosphere and the core Pokemon formula. Just know I think it's a mostly good game with some unfortunate shortcomings. For Pokemon fans, I think it's worth it. For people who aren't, I'd say there may be some better Pokemon games to try out for a more compelling gameplay experience. For newcomers, I think it's a good entry way to the concept of Pokemon.