How do you rank Sun & Moon?

[Envoy]

As a generation, where does Gen VII sit for you when ranked with all the previous generations?

You can go general (ex. Gen II, Gen VII, Gen III, etc.)

Or you can go specific (in terms of Pokémon, Gen VII ranks behind..., but in terms of region...etc.)

 

[Snowy]

Gen 7 ranks at the top for me... It had a poor evil team, but I loved the rest of Sun and Moon.

Gen 7
5
6 (ORAS)
4
3
2
1
6 (XY)

 

[PurplePopplio]

Gen 3 (Emerald)
Gen 5 (B2W2)
Gen 4 (DP)
Gen 5 (BW)
Gen 4 (HGSS)
Gen 3 (LGFR)
Gen 4 (Platinum)
Gen 7 (SM)
Gen 6 (XY)
Gen 6 (ORAS)

Never played Generations 1 or 2.

 

[dragon_nataku]

#1. HG/SS
#2. Plat
#3. (everything else except:... )
Almost last: B/W
Dead last: B2/W2 (couldn't even be arsed to get much further than the first gym, IIRC)

 

[Esserise]

Gameplay: 6 > 7 > 5 > 4 > 3 > 2 > 1

Spoiler: Reasons

This is sad. The first actual, hard step backward in terms of playability and game function. It's not even that SM are bad games, it's just, wow, where'd all the good stuff from Gen 6 go? I understand ditching things like the Black Tower/White Treehollow or the Underground after a generation. Those are gimmicks, and brilliant as they are, they don't really improve the game on a fundamental level. But here, we've seen the dual-screen utility of Gen 6 be completely erased in favor of a permanent Town Map/invisible Pokédex shortcut/"make Rotom dance" button. The crazy thing is, ORAS also had a permanent Town Map on the bottom screen and were still able to fit so much more there! And of course we have the Festival Plaza debacle...and SOS Battles, which are vile, and grinding for post-game experience is much harder than it was previously. While I do love some of SM's improvements (mainly to the Battle UI, PC Storage System, and HMs/Poké Ride), there's enough that either went too far back or disappeared entirely for me to say that I still definitely prefer how the Gen 6 games handle as games.

We can't even sit down anymore!

Region: Unova > Kalos > Johto > Alola + Sinnoh (tie) > Hoenn > Kanto

Spoiler: Reasons

I bloody love Unova. I'm never not going to, so let's just get that out of the way now.

I like Kalos for the culture, and for the rustic feel. I'm very fond of Johto for similar reasons - it's historic, and that matters to the people living there, but the lack of detail does hurt it somewhat.

Alola is lovely, and again, they did fantastic work on the culture of the region. However, it feels at many times like I'm only seeing 10% of it because the areas are so gutted. I've mentioned before about the Hano Grand Resort and how it looks big and luxurious on the outside, but is just a boring lobby on the inside, and well, you can pretty much extend that to the whole region. The cities and towns have like, two or three buildings you can even enter. Tapu Village is pathetic. We're literally back to Saffron City levels of façade and shallowness here, except it's for the whole region!

Sinnoh is nice and labyrinthine, but dear lord the caves get boring. So it's the inverse of Alola - there's a lot of depth and interior complexity; nooks and crannies and such, but it's so identical and uninteresting to look at.

As for Hoenn, Sinnoh at least gives me a reason to explore those caves and to backtrack through them. Once you've gone underwater in Hoenn, there's little reason to do it again, and I just don't love the rest of the region very much to begin with.

And then Kanto is just dull. Bring on the sequels, please.

New Pokémon: 6 > 7 > 3 > 5 > 2 > [Qualitative gap to emphasize that the five I just listed all share an overall tier of adoration] > 1 > 4

Spoiler: Reasons

Gen 6's roster is still the most consistent and more interesting-looking, in my opinion. Gen 7's comes close. The box mascots are about tied, although I prefer Zygarde's design over Necrozma's by far (and none of them come close to the Gen 5 mascots). I prefer the concept of Alola Forms over Mega Evolution, but the latter gave us a lot more to work with even just within XY. The Starters... well, I love all of the Gen 6 Starters. In Gen 7, I love the Rowlet and Litten lines, but I'm less hot on Popplio. And as for everything else, I still obviously really like Gen 7 since it got my second-place spot (the UBs contributed to this a lot; Xurkitree is probably my new favorite Pokémon), but I look at the Gen 6 Pokémon, and I don't know. They all have this really artful flair to them. The Gen 7 Pokémon seem in general more cartoonish to me, which isn't a bad thing, but I prefer the feel that the Gen 6 'mons had going.

Gen 3's Pokémon are all so interestingly unique/original, and were colorful and diverse. The biggest weakness in Gen 3 for me is the Starter lines, where the only design I particularly like is Grovyle's.

Gen 5's are pretty great and produced some of my all-time favorites. They're more on the cartoonish side, but that works for Unova (whereas in Alola I would expect more naturalistic designs - oddly, the Alola Forms accomplished that much more than the new Pokémon, but then again, Gen 1 Pokémon tend to be inherently more naturalistic to start with). However, I feel like having to make so many new Pokémon stretched them a bit thin. And again, the Starters leave something to be desired.

Gen 2 is wonderful with designs, but quite a few of them are just extensions of Gen 1 Pokémon that I wasn't as much of a fan of.

Gens 1 and 4 are fine, but don't work for me as much. Gen 1 (understandably) has a tendency toward "too plain," while Gen 4 is the opposite and tends toward overdoing it.

Storyline: BW/B2W2 > ORAS > SM > RBY/Crystal > RBY/GS > XY > Platinum > HGSS > FRLG > RS > Emerald > DP

Spoiler: Reasons

Okay so this probably looks a bit messy. I sort of have my own logic for ranking the stories of the games, so allow me to break it down first.

I pair sequels with their originals and count them as one story. So BW/B2W2 go together. Similarly, GSC get paired with RBY because GSC were intended as sequels, but I differentiate between GS and Crystal because the plot differences are significant. So you may be asking why don't I pair FRLG with HGSS. Well, that's because to my mind, HGSS aren't sequels to FRLG. They are in fact separated by three whole releases, none of which have anything to do with Kanto or Johto. That's a significant disconnect, and the way that I see it, HGSS don't really "continue the story" of FRLG. They're just remaking a story that was a sequel to RBY, and so include the same references because they have to, by their very nature. So I think of FRLG as more of an independent retelling of the Kanto story, and I think of HGSS as another iteration of GS, comparable to what Crystal is, but in DS graphics.

I don't think of ORAS along those lines because the differences in plot from RS and Emerald are much more significant.

So with that explained, let's look at these.

Again, you just can't compete with Gen 5 as far as I'm concerned. They have never before had, and probably never again will have a story as thoroughly considered and careful as Gen 5's. I could go into this much more, but that's a long post for another day, and everyone's already familiar with my profuse adoration for the gen.

ORAS surprised me quite a lot by taking what I felt was one of the worst stories in the series and fixing basically all of my problems with it. They fleshed out the characters a bit, gave the important ones more screentime and personality, and went deeper into the mythology of the story. You can say what you will about retcons (not that they matter in the grand scheme of things), but I also think the way that they worked Mega Evolution into things was quite savvy and resourceful, at least for the purposes of revising Hoenn's storyline.

SM were a good, enjoyable story and I liked so many of the characters. The downside is, they are frustratingly vague at several points, which obscures what the story is trying to say. I had no such problems with the BW games or ORAS.

... which is why the next ones on my list are the ones that many people would probably expect to come last. Because the (obvious) truth is, Pokémon games suck as a storytelling medium. We see this frequently with the villains as of late (I like both Lusamine and Lysandre, but it's absolutely fair to say that their characters don't quite work), but even in general, one must wonder what the point of these games even having a storyline is if it's only going to be used to continually reiterate the "People and Pokémon are great together!" message. Gen 5 went deconstructionist with that, which I admired, but I am convinced that those games were basically a huge fluke. Granted, ORAS did manage to deliver a nice aesop about compromise, and Lillie has a satisfying character arc in SM. But if anything, what those things suggest to me is that they should focus less on big, ambitious plot structures and maybe do something more intimate and character-based.

With that in mind, I quite like the simplicity of the Gen 1 and 2 plots. They're not too complicated, not too caught up in themselves, and are largely just about exploring the world. Team Rocket are a believable nuisance without being too overblown, and unlike every other team aside from Plasma (and I guess Skull, who are just a rap-themed regional variant of Team Rocket) have an ideology that is inherently related to the society of the Pokémon world. Gold & Silver add mythical intrigue with Ho-Oh and Lugia, but it's on a more reasonable scale than Gens 3, 4, and 6, and then Crystal go the extra step to make it more interesting and more focused, via the Suicune plot and the Unown, which is why I prefer that take on the story. Additionally, I kinda like how, back in those days, they were still sort of writing as though the Pokémon world was our world "but with Pokémon." I don't think they were wrong to move away from that as time went on, but it created a relatable atmosphere.

After that comes XY, which I think is a good idea for a story that's brought down by its flaws. I've said before that I don't hate the rivals like everyone else does (I am fond of both Serena/Calem and Trevor), nor do I dislike Diantha or Lysandre. So that does probably help me like the story more than usual. But nevertheless, I'll readily admit that it does have some very significant problems. Most notably for me is AZ, who is a pretty wicked concept, and his design is great, but they completely and utterly waste him in the writing department, with that atrocity that is the epilogue. Similarly, I don't mind them changing the focus of the story toward something like the weapon instead of a Legendary, nor do I mind them downplaying Legendary Pokémon for a bit, but in practice, they go about this all wrong, and end up shoehorning the box mascot into the plot almost out of nowhere. They needed to pick one approach or the other - focus on the Legendary, or do something else. It really just feels like they got a bit lazy. I also still think Mewtwo could have been involved in the plot in some way, but instead it's just thrown in a cave with a Mega Stone that shouldn't exist.

But I dislike Platinum's story more, because I can't stand Cyrus and Team Galactic. Barry and Cynthia are fine, but not any more noteworthy to me personally than the Kalos quintet or Diantha, so it's not like it wins points over XY in those areas, at least in my book. Plus, XY were at least trying to express some thoughts about class divide, regret, and the fact that superficial ideals like beauty and eternal life aren't all they're cracked up to be, and can be corrupted. They certainly don't manage these themes in a fully-formed or satisfying way, but I can at least give them some small credit, whereas the Sinnoh games' storyline is just incoherent claptrap. And the Charon/Heatran subplot is stupid, whereas the Looker Bureau in XY is quite lovely.

We then come to HGSS and FRLG's stories, one ranked after the other. It's fair to ask why I don't bother lumping them together anyway since they're ranked beside each other and my criticism of both is largely the same (that they're low-key stories trying to pass as modern ones without changing anything of substance about themselves, and so all that really happens is that without the retro graphics, they're left as bland retellings that are devoid of their original charm). Well, my answer is simply that I felt it was an important distinction to make. For what it's worth, FRLG's story adds the Sevii Islands which are fun, but inconsequential, and HGSS expands on Silver's character (which is something I do like about the HGSS story) while reworking the Unown's to feature Arceus (an understandable move, but not one I'm tremendously fond of) and shrinking Suicune's significance (something I'm not happy about - the Suicune stuff was cool and mystical).

Ruby & Sapphire's story is hot garbage, Emerald's story is someone welding two bags of hot garbage together with the result looking about as good as you'd expect, and Diamond & Pearl's is even worse because it's derivative hot garbage that's trying to be even bigger than the previous mess.

 

[CynthiaLover]

Generation wise: 5, 7, 4, 3, 6, 2, 1

Individual game wise: BW, SM, Pt, ORAS, B2W2, RSE/DP, XY, GSC/HGSS, RBY

Story wise: BW, SM, B2W2, ORAS, Pt, RSE/DP, XY, GSC/HGSS, RBY

Region wise: Unova, Alola, Hoenn, Sinnoh, Kalos, Johto, Kanto

So, overall, Gen 7/SM ranks as second in every field. It rivals BW in terms of a deep story (well, deep for Pokemon) and well-developed characters, but it lacks new Mon diversity, once again favoring Kanto Pokemon, which is something BW clearly does not, which is what makes Gen 7/SM lose points on. If it had introduced at least 100 new Pokemon (UB are iffy to me, and Alolan forms further ignite my ire toward Kanto), then it might have bested BW. But overall it has been one of GF's best gens/games to date.

 

[dragon_nataku]

I do have to admit that I loved Unova as a region. The seasons were my favourite thing and I really liked the scenery, and the fact that some areas were only accessible in certain seasons cause snow gets in the way was cool, I think. In terms of everything else though, uuuuggggghhhhh B/W/B2/W2.

 

[smalllady]

1. Gen II
2. Gen V (B/W only)
3. Gen IV
4. Gen VII
5. Gen VI
6. Gen III
7. Gen I

S/M was an improvement over X/Y for me, so it ended up in the middle.

 

[Boss1708]

In general, my favourite games are: BW2, Emerald, ORAS and HGSS. They form my "Fantastic Four" of the main series, and I consider them superior to all the rest of the main series games. It´s a complete tie between the four of them, but if I had to give a winner, I think BW2 wins- just barely. It´s just the most complete game ever.

SM is somwhere in the middle for me: BW2 > Emerald = ORAS = HGSS > Platinum > XY, BW, Crystal > SM > FRLG > ...

Region wise: Johto, Hoenn Unova > Alola > Kanto > Sinnoh, Kalos

Pokemon roster wse: Hoenn > Kanto > Johto > Unova > Sinnoh > Alola >Kalos

Music wise: Unova > Alola > Hoenn & Johto > Kanto > Sinnoh > Kalos

Story/Plot wise: BW1 > ORAS > BW2 > SM > etc

 

[Steel_Justice]

Story and Characters
BW/BW2>SM>DPPT>RSE>XY>GSC>RBY

Region and Atmosphere (includes music)
Unova>Hoenn>Alola>Johto>Kanto>Kalos>Sinnoh

Gameplay and Features (gimmicks and postgame)
BW/BW2>XY>GSC>SM>RSE>DDPT>RBY

Pokemon (New and Megas)
XY>BW>GSC>RBY>RSE>DPPT>SM

I do like the story and how (surprisingly) well the characters are developed since XY was pretty weak in that regard. The region being 4 islands is pretty cool and unique and I appreciate how much that was done with those kinds of limitations. Gameplay is alright in my opinion but there were some holes. In particular the stripping down of overworld features like the PSS and Dexnav make things feel like it took a big step back from what gen 6 offered. Sure a minimap helps stop you from getting lost and keeps you on track of what needs to be done to advance the story but I feel like it was never really a problem to begin with so it wasn't a fair trade. The sheer difficulty of obtaining a lot of the new pokemon is a bit silly to me as it kind of takes the wind out of using a lot of the new pokemon especially since many of them suffer from poor move selection and stat distribution. As for the pokemon themselves aside from the starters and some pokes like Silvally I don't find many of them very exciting or memorable compared to XY having pokes like Aegislash, Greninja and Sylveon. Z moves are pretty cool and greatly help certain types (rock) a lot by providing a strong and accurate attack when you need it but it feels less exciting than Mega Evolution. Though if Z-moves came out before Megas I feel like I would appreciate both of them more. Not a bad game in the slightest but I do wish Gamefreak would have thought out a few more things first.

 

[godiego]

region-wise:
Kalos > Unova > Sinnoh > Alola > Kanto > Johto > Hoenn

main pair-wise (ie., no remakes):
6 > 4 > 7 > 5 > 2 > 1 > 3
[honestly i felt including one and two was a bit inappropriate since GameFreak and the franchise were so young at the time, but then again i still manage to like them more than 3 anyways so something went right regardless]

i didn't dislike SM and i definitely don't think it's bad, but there's an element of it that just feels....off, but i can't put my finger on it so. whelp.

 

[Lanstar]

Top to bottom:
1: Gen IV
2: Gen VI
3: Gen VII
4: Gen III
5: Gen II
6: Gen I

Unknown: Gen V - I haven't played it yet.

Overall, Gen. IV was the first 'modern' Pokemon game for me, as it got the Attack/Sp. Attack dynamics nailed down like it should have. In that way, it is so hard for me to go back to the older games. Plus, the postgame gave them lots of reasons to replay them, compared to any of the other generations.

Gen VI gave the great graphics and communication features - which inspired me to give a taste of how competitive battling works. But the postgame made it lose some staying power in my books compared to gen IV.

Gen VII extended the graphics to a point that I don't see how they could get any better, other than from upgrading to better hardware, and maybe a few tweaks here and there - like sitting down. And yet, the communication features were weakened too much compared to gen. VI. Worse was the nearly nonexistent postgame, the lack of Exp. grinding spots, and the motivation to even try to complete the national dex. Too much was removed from Gen VI for me to think Gen VII was better.

Gen III: I loved Emerald's battle frontier, and the region of Hoenn... But still it is hard to go back to the older battle Dynamics.

Gen II: A great sequel to Generation I, with Kanto as a postgame even.

Gen I: The starting foundation... Very Primitive, experimental and glitchy, but also great for nostalgic value.

Either way... None of the generations I have played are truly ideal to me. I wish Game Freak could just mesh the best things about all the Generations of Pokemon Games, and finally achieve perfection in their next set.

 

[DoctorWhy]

Top=best, Bottom=worst (but I love em all).

Top tier:
B2W2
HGSS
SM

Middle tier:
GSC
ORAS
RSE
BW
Platinum
XY
FRLG

Lower tier:
RBGY
DP

No specific order within tiers. Remakes and originals separated for obvious reasons. BW and B2W2 separated also for obvious reasons. They're pretty different. At least as much as remakes.

DP and Plat are separated for less obvious reasons. In my opinion, DP fucked up a lot. From bland or awkward story points to the horribly small and unbalanced Dex (only 2 fire types in DP?! Seriously? Even with a "fire type" elite 4 member, Flint? Infernape and Rapidash is it until post game!)...contrasted to Platinum which was so much better they might as well be different games entirely. The Pokedex was mostly fixed (thank God for more fire types, as well as other rad additions), the story was *greatly* improved from start to finish, and was overall a much more enjoyable experience every time.

Again, I love and have played them all haha

 

[Kisu]

I'd rank it second to last only because I never played gen 4 so it's automatically ranked last for me personally.

1.gen 3
2. Gen 1
3.gen 2
4.gen 5
5.gen 6
6.SM
7.gen 4( never played)

 

[Soki]

1. Gen IV (DPPt and HGSS)
2. Gen V (BW(2))
3. Gen VII (SM)
4. Gen VI (XY and ORAS)

Never played the other gens (except Emerald, but don't remember it well enough to rate it).

Gen IV is definitely on top, love the region, the Pokémon, the characters, the music, and just everything about DPPt and HGSS, and still like to replay those games. Gen V with BW(2) is second, mostly because I love a lot of Pokémon from that gen and that you could only use new Pokémon in BW.

SM gets third place. I did enjoy the culture and the music and Team Skull, but looking back on it there's just so much I don't like about the game:

• The region feels pretty empty imo, the Routes all pretty much look the same and there wasn't a single area or town in which I went 'whoa this looks cool!'
• Lot of repeating music. Could be that other gens have this problem too, but this is the first time I really noticed it at least. I was especially annoyed at Verdant Cavern and Lush Jungle sharing the same music, making both areas seem a lot less unique. And almost the whole of Poni Island has the same music too, again making different areas not very unique.
  
• The UB storyline didn't interest me, Lusamine's motivations were too vague, and I really dislike that the Aether Foundation is revealed as (sort of) the bad guys right at the beginning. I guess it was kinda obvious as soon as they were revealed, but we weren't sure, so it would've still been nice to keep it as a surprise.
• The handholding. I miss the days where you would just get a Pokémon and off you go to do whatever you want, instead of not even being able to explore Malie City before visiting Kukui in the gardens :/ You already have the Rotom Dex continually telling you what to do, not giving us more than one path to travel at all times really wasn't necessary.
• Huge majority of the Trainers only have 1 to 2 Pokémon.
• Way too little new Pokémon and way too many Kanto ones.
• Encounter rates of a lot of new Pokémon being very low, except Yungoos/Gumshoos and Rattata/Ratica, which can be found pretty much everywhere :/

Gen VI ends up even lower though, both XY and ORAS just didn't interest me. XY at least had an interesting region with various unique areas, but the characters, the story and the music was all meh to me. And ORAS just disappointed me a lot, I disliked a lot of the redesigns of the characters and Mauville, the music, and was hoping for that Battle Frontier we never got. I did like the Dexnav, but only for postgame purposes. I just have zero interest in replaying both of these games. Though I can say the same of SM, as just the thought of having to go through hours of handholding again at the start makes me shudder.

 

[Almonds]

Personal ranks.

1. Gen5
2. RSE/ORAS
3. DPPt
4. Gen7
I enjoyed the colorful, bright region, and some of the new pokemon introduced are my favorites already. I really appreciate that Raichu finally got some love with a new form. The Island Trials were unique, and I liked being the first champion of the region. The Aether Foundation's story was also interesting. However, it isn't strong enough to compare with the Sinnoh games, where Pt definitely offered a lot of content (like it or not, having a Battle Frontier is certainly a huge addition). I'm just too biased with the Hoenn games, and Gen5 wins all in my opinion.
I ranked the Johto games lower than Gen7 because I'm so used to those games that it doesn't feel exciting to me anymore.

5. XY/Gen2/HGSS
6. Gen1/FRLG

 

[Foxwarrior]

Top 5
1) BW
2) GSC/HGSS
3) SM
4) RSE/ORAS
5) DPP

The order of the list may change depending on the hype and mood. If it was a month ago, I would put SM at first, for example.

 

[RoselikyuNL]

I have only played moon, blue and AS for now.

But this is my rank for now.
1: AS
2: Moon
3: Blue

 

[Karamazov]

Not gonna talk about why I chose each and every single rank, so I just talked about what I felt needed to be mentioned. And for the record, I do like Gen VI despite my many gripes with it.

Region: V, VII, II, III I, IV, VI

Spoiler

Gen V is the perfect blend of urban cities and fantastic landscapes, in addition to great wild areas. It's always fun to explore the region, and my only gripe is how we're forced to follow a set path that limits and controls what we can see and do in the region, during the main games.

Gen VII has a great starting region. Unique locations, beautiful scenery, a great selection of Pokemon, and so much interesting history make this one of the most fun and immersive regions. On paper, at least. Alola's flaws are almost entirely from a technical standpoint, such the removal of field moves, the inability to access a lot of locations, being unable to sit down and enjoy the peace, and how small the region feels. If the region wasn't limited by the technical problems of a video game, it'd tie with Unova, and possibly even beat it.

Lore: V, IV, VII, II, III, I, VI

Characters: V, VII, II, III, IV, I, VI

Spoiler

Gen V is the gen of perfection. I could go on for hours, singing the virtues of nearly all these characters. And my favorite character in the franchise (Marlon) is also part of the Gen. Really, it's no contest.

Gen VII had great characters, like Gladion, Guzma and Lusamine. The story is driven by the characters and their relations, and it works really well because the characters and their stories are compelling. I don't like Lillie all that much, but the worst I can say about her is that she's generic and boring - she's not horribly annoying or rage-inducing, which is a lot more than I could say about Barry, Tierno, Trevor, Calem/Serena, Zinnia at times, and others. The cast bounce off each other well (barring Lillie's chemistry with most people.)

Silver largely props up Gen II. He's my favorite rival because he feels like a rival, he has a lot of growth as a character, his backstory is awesome, and you can see how each interaction you have with him helps shape him into the person he becomes. Eusine is also a fun treat, though somewhat underexplored. His interest in mythology really help to flesh out the region, the legends, and its history. All the new Gym Leaders are really neat too, though their teams leave a lot to be desired.

I kind of feel bad for always picking on Gen VI. It's like you're a bully, and you're making fun of an ugly kid whose parents are in the middle of a rough divorce. Like you want to pick on him, but he's dealing with bigger problems and he doesn't need this right now. But the only characters I loved were Sycamore and Emma. I liked Clemont and Xerosic. I'm ambivalent to nearly everyone else, and I outright hate most of your friends.

Story: V, VII, IV, III, II, I, VI

Spoiler

Gen V's spot on the top is a no-brainer. And while people tend not to care about BW2's story as much, I really liked it. It was held up by a strong cast, fleshed out the world in a believable way, and continued the stories of characters I've grown to care for in the past game. Sequels are great for a series that's often so barebones about worldbuilding and lore.

Lillie strangled us with cutscenes, but her story really was compelling. The story was so good largely because the characters were so good. The idea of Ultra Space, alternate worlds and Pokemon from other dimensions is such a great concept, and I'm glad they're building off of what Gen VI started. I look forward to them exploring this a bit more in future games, before watching it be unceremoniously dropped to focus on a future gimmick.

Gen I didn't even have that much of a story and it was better than Gen VI. I'm sorry, but Kalos and Team Flare were an incoherent mess. There's room to grow there, but they just put in no effort at all to connect their ideas and flesh things out. And a lot of Team Flare's plots were directly lifted from Gen I's, so.

Gameplay: V, IV, III, VII, VI, II, I,

Spoiler

Rounding up side content, difficulty, and features all in here for simplicity.

It's been over three years now. I still think about PokeStar Studios, Black City/White Treehollow, Musicals, the sports domes, the fun Gym puzzles, the difficulty. Just everything. I miss Gen V so much, holy shit.

Platinum is one of the best Pokemon games ever, period. Full of content, extremely difficult, great Pokemon, bam. It still suffers from a weak Pokemon selection, being slow as heck, horrible use of HMs and and taking forever to grind, but it was great otherwise. DP were probably some of the worst games in the main series in terms of gameplay, but Platinum turned that around.

Gen VII was a huge step back in terms of stuff. IV training, breeding, trading, and basically everything XY excelled at was taken out or made worse. I can at least give I some slack because they were still starting out, but Gen VII just regressed a notable chunk of the game. Trials were also fun, but a big step down from Gyms. The Pokemon Snap thing gets very tedious and there's no worthwhile rewards for forcing yourself to gain a ridiculous amount of points. The world feels entirely dead after you complete the UB storyline.

But on the other hand, Gen VII also brought in Pokemon Ride, had a higher difficulty than XY, and revolutionized the Champion system into something a lot more fun. We also had some really cool strategies from the characters, like Olivia's Thunder Wave Nosepass. Bringing back Gen V's experience system really helped balance the EXP.Share. With a bit of spit and polish, some side content, and improved difficulty though, the games would easily be near the top of the list here.

I think I said all I need to about XY in my blog reviews. I think you all know what I'm going to say about XY. But I WILL praise it on its great PSS system, making the metagame more accessible, and Pokemon Amie being better than Pokemon Refresh.

Gen VI is held back by a lack of side content, abysmal difficulty, weak team planning, a horribly bloated Pokedex that overshadows the new Pokemon, and the EXP.Share. However, customization was much better than it was in Gen VII, the PSS was a godsend for trading and communicating with friends, and it made IV breeding, EV training and preparing for the metagame so much easier. Gen VI was flawed, but it had quite a few things that deserved to be carried on to the next generation.

Music: V, VII, III, VI/IV, I/II

Spoiler

FIVE. FOUR. THREE. TWO. ONE.

Pokemon: V, IV, VI, III I, II, VII

Spoiler

This is going to be unpopular, but what did you expect? I'm a huge Gen V shill. Frankly, I love the designs as a whole. We have so many cool, cartoony, cute, and even bizarre designs, and so many of the Pokemon are strong and fun to use. And while objectmons get a lot of flack, I felt that Gen V did them so well Litwick's line, Trubbish's line, and the Vanillite line feel like living, organic and adorable creatures that fit in well with the world. Plus it has my favorite group of starters.

Sinnoh had a low number of Pokemon, and distribution of them were pretty bad in DP. Some of the Pokemon they introduced were a bit forgettable or weak. But it had so many amazing cross-gen evolutions, and they made me love older Pokemon even more. A lot of the new Pokemon lines were also memorable, fun, and very fun to play with. Helping this gen shine even more is the legendaries, which have great designs and interesting lore.

Kalos had a lot of good designs. Mega Evolution was a great addition to the franchise, though the execution was flawed. I feel that very few designs are amazing, but they're overall acceptable or good. On the other hand, it introduced my least favorite Pokemon ever, Doublade.

III had some great designs, but I feel the first three generations I mentioned overshadowed them. Same with Gen I, though it also had more stinkers than V/IV/VI/III. Some of the Alolan Variations are great improvements though. Can't really forget about Gen I because they'll keep bringing it up any chance they get.

Gen II has some great Pokemon, but overall it's kind of forgettable? Like the best ones are amazing, and the worst ones are just unmemorable. There's nothing particularly bad here, and the starters are great. But weak Pokemon and forgettable looks plague the gen. Maybe it's because I grew up with them, so I kind of see them as the quintessential Pokemon. I'm so used to them that I take them for granted.

Gen VII's Pokemon were very weak overall. We had solid designs for base stages that ended up having lamer evolutions (Cutiefly, Crabrawler, Alolan Meowth, Pikipek, Morelull, Salandit, Steenee, Sandygast), too many meme Pokemon for the sake of being funny (Dugtrio, Persian), Pokemon with horrible speed that make them really boring to play with outside of Trick Room, one of the worst starters yet, and a lot of boring designs. I'm hoping later Gen VII games will bring us a new Lycanroc form and some Alolan Variations (which are a cool concept, btw) to try and save this sinking ship for me. There are a lot of Pokemon I like in this Gen, but a lot more that I dislike. Mimikyu's by favorite of this gen, but it's miles ahead of everything else of Alola.

Overall: V, IV, III, VII, II, VI, I

Spoiler

Are you surprised? Are you really surprised in my rankings? Like I'm sorry, but Gen V collectively makes up nearly everything I've ever wanted in Pokemon games. I can understand why people would disagree with me, but Gen V was practically made for me.

Gen VII is merely good now, but it definitely has the potential to be something amazing if Game Freak puts in some more effort. It has a strong story, region and lore, and a lot of work was put into making the world feel immersive. I'm begging you GF, please don't rest on your rotten laurels and call it a day here. You're so close to making something grand.

 

[Cookies and Creme]

I thought all the games were great, though that doesn't stop me from ranking them
Might as wel rank top 5, cuz if I rank all of them this would become a rant

1. Emerald and Moon
My first game was Emerald, and I still remember destroying gyms with my op Blaziken. Also, this game also debut the Battle Frontier, which was by far one of the best post-game content that Pokemon ever had. Collecting symbols were kinda like collecting gym badges, but, in a sense harder and in a much larger quantity.
The games, while not much different than Ruby and Sapphire, is a pretty nice way for both games to be "integrated", I mean, catching both Legendaries in one game, which only the "third game" (and Gen II) have done, a lot more Pokemon to be easily caught w/o trading, and rematching Gym Leaders were some of the few things that made it good, in my opinion

Now it was my definite favorite 'til Gen VII came along. Heck these games blew my mind how much they changed the formula, yet still stuck with it. They made practically everything better (except fishing and SOS battles, wtf), and had probably one of the greatest storylines Pokemon ever had. The character development was insane, it was, my opinion, pretty dark in some cases, and while the post-game lacks content that Emerald had, its 20+ hour storyline definitely makes up for it.

3. Black 2 (and obviously its counterpart, but I played Black 2)
I liked Gen V as a whole. Black/White were already pretty strong, despite being released late in the DS's lifespan. N was set up really well, and Ghestis being the true final boss was just not expected. I felt like their sequels took it a step farther, with better characters (and thus development) as well as integrating more older Pokemon, which is really nice. Also, The Post-game content was abundant, with Pokestar studeos, PWT, and the god-awful musical... The experience was pretty good

4. SoulSilver (and counterpart)
By far my favorite remake. I loved the buddy feature, and it also gave me a chance to experience Kanto and Johto without 8-bit, which kinda bugged me after playing Gen III. Also, it was nice that they buffed Red's team, and the post-game was, once again, really amazing, with the Pokeathlon, National Park Bug Catching Contest, and rematching Gym Leaders from both regions. Not to mention the abundance of Pokemon from all gens in it.

5. Y (and counterpart)
Gen VI may seem kinda hollow in a way, but I loved it nevertheless. I felt like Pokemon's transition to 3D (ignoring side-games) was a really smooth one. The gameplay (minus Exp. Share, which was pretty broken) was pretty fun and interesting, and its arguably the darkest entry yet, yet it's also really complex and fun. Also, the shiny hunting tools are insanely abundant, with PokeRadar, Horde, FS, Masuda Method, Chain Fishing. I prefer shiny hunting here over ORAS, which have the same tools except DexNav for PokeRadar. The only downside is the lack of post-game content, which is why it's so low on the list.

Edit (months later): Wow I really did tie Emerald with Moon, did I?
After a few months and the hype died down, I would put Moon below Emerald, mainly due to lack of good Post-game. Still a good game imo