What Pokémon side content do you miss

[Queen Of Space]

I don’t see a thread for this so i’m gonna make one!

What side content like contests, league cards, PR videos, the photo rating in Sub and Moon, etc.

Personally I miss content like PR videos where you can make so many fun things with them, i also used to grind the battle buffet in sun and moon so something like that would be fun back. I also would love League cards back.

 

[Yung Dramps]

I don't tend to agree with the "Game Freak keeps cutting good ideas for no reason one step forward two steps back" meme but customizable player housing (Secret Bases) and side-activities for your boxed Pokemon (Poke Pelago) are 100% ideas that should've become series staples

 

[colours]

this is... perhaps the "pokeboomer" in me talking, but i dearly miss the mini-games of old. i mean things like what you would play in pokemon stadium 2 (that isn't a main series game, but you get my point), or even hgss' pokeathlon. i think there should be more little fun pokemon mini-games where the player can turn their brains off from the main story or battling or grinding or whatever else they're doing and have fun for the sake of having fun.

i think festival plaza had sort of the right idea with this but didn't go far enough with it, not to speak of the other issues fp had which far overshadowed the interactive aspect of it.

(maybe this made some sort of return in sv sort of? but i havent played in ages so i wouldn't know).

 

[carpology]

i really enjoyed the pokéathlon in hgss, the poké pelago in sm, and amie in xy. i didn't do the athlon much but when i did i enjoyed it and i did find it to be a really fun concept worldbuilding-wise. as for the pelago, it sounds ridiculous since it's just a game but i've always found myself feeling guilty when i just leave my pokémon in the boxes, so them being able to do something and live their lives in the pelago was nice for me and made me less reluctant to catch pokémon. (i don't know if it could count as a side feature, but this same thing extends to legends arceus, where they all live in the pasture instead.) amie, i really just loved everything about it. i really miss the little minigames that were there (i spent a looot of time playing head it), and i always enjoyed being able to unlock more furniture and decorate the little bottom-screen amie, as well as seeing the pokémon hang out with other random people's pokémon. and i love being able to pet your pokémon!!! back when i played xy it was my favorite part of the whole game.

 

[Pasio]

Not sure if I "miss" them since I've been glued to the 3DS over Switch games but

The secret bases from Hoenn was fantastic and would remain fantastic in modern ages, Pelago was great, various minigames like the Head It in Poke Amie, or the games in Pokeathalon would be nice. I don't expect these to return, but Pokemon games with extrataneous features you can really go back to whenever is always great. Not everything has to just be about catching and battling.

In the battle aspect however, Vs. Recorder - Bulbapedia, the community-driven Pokémon encyclopedia - was absolutely perfected in the 3DS games and should have never left to begin with. The single most unappreciated feature in the series. It wasn't just a device that let you rewatch your old favorite matches you've recorded; This was a sandbox that allowed players to create whatever type of match they wanted granted they had the right assets (which many fans either do or do have the ability have them)

Speaking of this, going back to Secret Bases, ORAS allowed you to scan QR codes of other people's bases, or get them online through PSS, and this allowed players to battle anything in the series from Bulbasaur to Diancie. I find this sort of freedom so overlooked to such an extreme it baffles me. How was this reduced to just "they're mostly just used to grind in Blissey bases"?? This sort of stuff wholly outclasses anything like Gym Leader matches, because you don't get battles from them where you can face off against all sorts of stuff like Level 100 Mega Diancie, Level 100 Arceus, Level 50 Primal Groudon, etc. RSE allowed players to fight a full team of six in Secret Bases but it was a lot less efficient due to the lack of QR scanning or online at the time, and I assume the reason they shortened it to 3 in ORAS was to give the Vs. Recorder, and by extension, player interaction, more value.

Standardized battle facilities were perfected with the Battle Tree in Ultra Sun and Ultra Moon. A friendly streak system to give some type of incentive of completing, a large variety of battle themes in the game to pick from, boss fights every 10th streak, and trainers using all the generational mechanics applicable to the game. Ultra Sun and Ultra Moon even allowed you to bring any Pokemon with no restrictions in the normal modes for each format, while applying fair restrictions in the super mode, allowing players to quickly blow through the normal mode and test out crazy stuff, even create their own matches, then play seriously in the Super Mode. A facility like this should return in every future Pokemon game. If we want other battle facilities come around, we should also have something like the Battle Agency (a less frustrating, more rewarding Battle Factory), but not online reliant, then facilities with other gimmicks. It can all just be the same trainers across every battle facility it's fine. This would essentially be like bringing the Battle Frontier back.

These older games used to have so much more freedom in letting you battle however you like but it was suddenly all stripped away.

 

[Kallyle]

Super Contests; the original version instead of the watered-down version BDSP has. ORAS Contests are welcome too!

 

[RTLfan]

The Pokeathlon game although I'm not sure if that counts as side-content per se.

 

[SekihaTenkyo]

I kind of miss the aspect of random trades available in Black/White. One of my earlier joys is someone giving me a Zorua they bred, which was just really nice. It was kind of cool, even if Wonder Trade effectively just replaced it and is essentially better.

It was just neat, y'know? Especially with the icons. Felt like a fun form of communciation between players, especially when it'd go well. Or just indicating "No yeah, you can just have this!" is always fun.