Never have I ever played a 3D platformer that gave me such a visceral reaction as this game did. I thought I just didn't like 3D platformers anymore because of it. Everything in this game is the epitome of obnoxious, between absolute garbage level design, camera and controls functioning as well as trying to run on a treadmill on ice while being sprayed with water in the face, to the entire game having the sound design of slapstick kids commercial for the newest Slime Toy TM. If you give this game anything above 3 stars I genuinely feel bad for you of how you lie to yourself. Just go play Mario 64 if you want a good platformer from that era.

I used to think that these older Pokemon games were cool novelties that did not stand the test of time at all. Hell, for years gen 2 was my least favorite out of any of them. I shiny hunted Celebi on the VC version of this game and stopped playing immediately after. I never really "got" Crystal or the hype around it. After SV pushed me away from the series, I came back with a real Gameboy Color (custom of course) and an official Crystal cartridge. Now that I've beaten Red, I can easily say that I was so wrong.

I forgot what it was like for these games to actually feel like an RPG with an end goal to reach for. I forgot how much smaller details got put into the world to make it feel more alive. Legendaries actually feeling like legends that you can find and catch for yourself, rather than the game just handing them to you. So many other components that make these games so special are highlighted in Crystal, and it made me love this series again.

This game definitely isn't perfect, and it's not going to suddenly be my favorite Pokemon game. But after the Switch's output of mostly okay-at-best pokemon games this was such a nice refresher, and a reminder as to why I still love this series after 15 years.