Overrated/Underrated Gens?

[Classic Adamas]

This has probably been discussed here (hell, I've probably brought it up before) but I don't remember and cbf checking.

Pretty self explanatory. Wot gen(s) do you think is overrated or underrated?

For me:

Overrated: Gen 1 and/or 2.

Gen 1 gets wanked so hard by some, despite the fact that it's worse than literally every Gen to follow. This is to be expected, but c'mon people.

I haven't played much of the original Gen 2, and it's not necessarily bad, but people give it so much praise, I'm starting to wonder if it's deserved?

Underrated: Gen 5.

I'm not sure why people hate this gen. I've only played B/W1, but they were gr9. Unova is a kewl region, the graphics are arguably the best in the franchise, very compelling story, everything was so gr10. The battle against N (the last one I think) had a big fight feel, when it was my Reshiram against his Zekrom. Amazing!

Like I've said, haven't played B/W2, but I've heard good things. Sure, this gen has shitty pokemon, but every gen has it's fair share of retards. Gen 6 is even worse, I'd say.

 

[Six Trails]

I really hate Gen 5 because the graphics are so bad. Like the worst out of any games besides RBY in my opinion. I still think Gen 5 has a good story though.

I think Gen 2 praise is justified. I may just being biased because of nostalgia, but no other games have 16 badges and I don't really like Gen 4 (HGSS)


Overrated: Gen 1

Pretty bad. Boring story, nothing to do after the game ends, bad graphics, a plethora of bad glitches, and unsorted (and small) bag and PC which drives me crazy. I find little incentive to play these games.


Underrated: Gen 6

Probably the best generation in my opinion. The graphics are great, the story for XY is pretty decent I think, and there's a lot more to do post-games in XY/ORAS. I also actually like some of the new Kalos Pokémon, and I really like the concept of Mega Evolution.

 

[Yoshi]

Generation 1 is the most overrated generation. It has a ton of glitches, some that are game breaking. There just wasn't that much effort put into the games even for an original Gameboy game.

Generation 2 actually isn't overrated unless you're a nostalgia fag. There are a lot of people who recognize its faults, the majority of which are basically due to the game aging. Even with that in consideration, it still holds up relatively well even today and are solid RPGs.

Generation 3 isn't overrated either, but people who got into these games first and end up criticizing Generation 2 which are better games in comparison are prevalent... They're basically reverse elitists. I can really actually appreciate Generation 3 for it being a revolution when it comes to game mechanics. If you notice, later generations haven't improved on the game mechanics near as much as Generation 3 and I've been too hard on it in the past considering this.

Generation 4 I think is the most underrated Generation. It seems to actually have the smallest fanbase in spite of it having no glaring flaws. That's not to say it's a great generation, but it's still very much playable and enjoyable.

Generation 5 is overrated, although not as much as Generation 1. Even considering how forgettable some people consider it, there are some Pokemon fans saying it's revolutionary when it comes to story telling in Pokemon, which is absurd, especially considering the amount of other flaws it has. It also got 4 games as opposed to Kalos which got 2.

Generation 6 isn't underrated since X and Y are excellent games and are well received, but it's underrated in comparison to ORAS, which are the laziest and cheapest games in the series except maybe Black 2 and White 2. It's probably because Game Freak didn't patch up the two so Pokemon tards would play ORAS instead.

 

[Papasmurf]

Gen 3 gets wanked hard by RSEtards because the people who are in their late teens/very early 20s usually grew up with them as those games are about 13 years old, and this group tends to undermine the much greater replay and entertainment value of the earlier gen, Generation 2. It still gets balanced out by the slightly overblown hate that the cutting out of 200 old Pokemon got though.

Gen 2 I wouldn't say is that overrated, although in retrospect not having a significant villain other than the Rocket Executives was kind of bland and the level balance is waaaay off, like the wild Pokemon in Mt. Silver being roughly half the level of Red's party Pokemon.

Gen 1 is overwanked to high hell for reasons stated above. The shit isn't even playable anymore unless you play the GBA remakes, which is pretty sad when Gold and Silver also run on a GB engine that gains additional features such as color on the GBC. No real opinion on the overratedness or underratedness of the other generations.

 

[Yoshi]

I've actually grown to hate Generation 1 more than Generation 3. I can excuse most of the flaws that Generation 1 has due to how old it is, except maybe the small bag and PC, but the abundance of glitches alone are extremely frustrating and really hurt its playability if you're not looking at the games with rose tinted glasses.

 

[Papasmurf]

Yeah, Gen 3 is the more playable of the two. Only FRLG are better than RS, and still inferior to Emerald imo. I tend to give RS more flak though because it was a missed opportunity to improve upon the already good games that were GSC instead of reverting to RGB-like basics in terms of replay value etc.

 

[Classic Adamas]

I quite like Gen 3, and would rather play them over Gen 2, but that's mainly due to the terribly aged graphics of Gen 2. HG/SS are my favourite Pokemon games ever, so I'm not exactly sure where I stand on that debate.

I honestly don't see how Gen 5 is overrated. I barely see anyone praise it. I guess it's all about perspective.

You call ORAS lazy, and I do think that's probably true, but to me, X/Y is fucking lazy as hell. The plot is shit compared to Gen 3, 5 and even 4 (imo of course) and it seems that they went out of their way to make everything as easy as possible.

But since we're discussing quality now, I think my chain would be:

Gen 3 > Gen 5 > Gen 4 ~ Gen 2 > Gen 6 > Gen 1 , but again, I'm not entirely sure.

 

[Papasmurf]

X and Y seems to have focused for the most part on gameplay improvements since Pokemon's storytelling has always been pretty weak (and EXP share makes the main quest a cakewalk regardless of storytelling), but it's not unacceptably bad as a story goes imo, I liked the little sidequests like befriending that Mega Lucario and such and such. The story mode is still kind of weak, but not really much worse than DPPt's or something. The actual post-game sidequest is actually the most well-done of them all, as Emma/Essentia's story with Looker is pretty emotional. I found those games far more enjoyable than the three generations before them but that's just me.

ORAS is pretty much the laziest games of them all because barring improved camera angles, all it offered was a beaten horse copy/paste of Ruby and Sapphire's story mode with Megas and only minute references to Emerald, none of which were meaningful. Hell, they literally admitted they had the option of patching up X and Y to be fully compatible with those games instead of that gayass "gotta delete the new moves if you wanna trade to X/Y" crap they ended up pulling to improve sales. They even failed to recreate the Battle Frontier which made it to fucking Platinum and HG/SS of all things. It was a waste of money and the worst remakes of all since FRLG/HGSS added tons more to the paired versions they remade.

 

[Kyo]

Gen 1 is the most overrated probably, but I think more people realize how primitive they are these days. There is no real reason to play them unless you're a completionist as those games were remade in Gen 3.

Gen 2 is also overrated, despite being far more playable than Gen 1 the mechanics still needed polishing (e.g. SpA/SpD was still not fully split, and aside from the concepts of the new PokeBalls sucking balls on their own, around half of them didn't even work as intended). However it was one of the most ambitious games, if not the most ambitious, and the combination of two gens, in spite of the criticism that Kanto was not very fleshed out, was no small feat at the time. The main flaw here is that the level progression was not very well done. Also, while it is a direct sequel to Gen 1, the storyline was still rather derivative.

Gen 3 is overrated though there's a balance between those who grew up with the game (older teens/young adults of today) and those who hated the changes (Gen 2/Genwunners). RS were significantly more flawed than E, mostly due to the level progression and easiness of most bosses (which we got again ORAS) and they had a pretty barren post-game. RS in general had a lot of missed opportunities. That said, I don't think Gen 3 gets enough credit for its part in revolutionizing competitive play as we know it today, since most will look to Gen 4 for the physical/special split (albeit rightfully so). As far as remakes go, FRLG are appreciated mostly for the better mechanics over Gen 1 and some extra post-game content, but otherwise they are largely the same as RBY, only more catered to children (more so than RSE).

Gen 4 I find underrated, I think most take issue with the slow pace. Though I suppose there is a large number of people who are teens today who grew up on those games and love it (we are now in a time where teenagers will say "I remember when I was a kid playing Diamond, I remember playing Pearl in elementary school," etc.). But anyway it is the first game that finally had legitimately decent battle mechanics. The main issue is that DP has an atrocious pokedex and some of the worst pacing in the series, though this was mostly rectified by Pt which I find to be the best 3rd version they've done. Gameplay-wise, considering that it was the first 3D Pokemon game, the integration of the 3D perspectives were pretty well done.

Gen 5 is also underrated - the mons sucked but it had a legitimately good story, which is often needed for an engaging RPG but most give Pokemon a pass on this, though yes the graphics are ugly. However I think most Pokemon fans today do appreciate the games for what they did. Also, B2W2 had a very good post-game compared to many, and the difficulty system was appreciated.

Gen 6's new mechanics are simultaneously great and atrocious. Outside of the competitive scene, these are games for babies. I think recency bias and appreciation for the competitive scene is strong with this one. The characters I find very grating. Considering the positives, not under- or overrated as it gets due praise for that, but it doesn't get enough flak imo. Not un-enjoyable though. XY had some competency in the story department imo (despite still being one of the worse games for story) and ORAS fleshed out its story better than RSE did. I also don't think the graphics are that great - the animations are a lot better but there's still a lot of annoying pixelation.

 

[Kyo]

Oh yeah. Forgot to mention remakes in Gen 4, HGSS. Good games. The only legitimately great remakes they've done, bogged down slightly by the negatives of Gen 4's gameplay mechanics. Appropriately rated, I guess.

 

[Classic Adamas]

Unrelated I guess, but there is this old guy in X/Y, and you can loan him a pokemon. He'll eventually die, but not before leaving a letter and the pokemon you gave him.

It made me

 

[Captain Cadaver]

Gen 1 is without a doubt the most overrated. Along with poor gameplay mechanics compared to the other gens, even in it's remakes, the plot was one of the most bland, with the only reasonable twists being Giovanni's role as a Gym Leader and your rival beating you to the Champion race. Aesthetically, the designs of this Gen also get a lot of overration, as those that constantly bash the designs in later gens often overlook such glaring lazy designs as Magneton and Muk.

Most underrated likely goes towards either Gen 4 or 5. Gen 4 may have had an average plot, but it had without a doubt the best lore, as well as having some fair level of difficulty in some parts, mainly Cynthia. Gen 5 was amongst the better half of the franchise in terms of story and characters, and a lot of the designs get a lot of hate, despite containing some of the best designs imo such as Scolipede, Hydreigon, Braviary and Excadrill, along with a lot of competitive Pokemon that are great to use. B2 & W2 decreased the value of this Gen by going back to the more traditional route, though BW are without a doubt my favourite games of the franchise in terms of story due to many of the plot twists and more unconventional characters, with the only one I'd say comes close are X&Y. It also had one of my favourite soundtracks overall as well, with the instruments having a lot more variety than most other Pokemon games.