Backwards Compatibility in Pokémon

[EmpoleonProd]

I never see this topic discussed and I think it warrants discussion, but why has Pokémon gone away from backwards compatibility? For those who might not remember, we had this in Gen 2. You could send Pokémon you actually caught in GSC back to RBY which was probably one of the best things about owning Gen 1 and 2 games at the time. This has not been a feature since, technical limitations probably stopped this from being possible with Gens 3 or 4 (3 couldn’t even communicate with Gen 2 at all), Gen 5 didn’t have it despite being on the same family as Gen 4, Gen 6 didn’t have it even though Pokémon Bank was a thing for the transition from 5 to 6, this isn’t even a thing with Gen 7, despite both 6 and 7 using Bank.

I have identical cloned Dittos from Emerald in Bank, one I transferred to Ultra Sun at one point, one has never entered a Gen 7 game. I can only move the latter to ORAS, despite both Dittos being identical in every other respect. Once a Pokémon even lands on a Gen 7 game, you cannot move it back to Gen 6, even if everything about it could exist on Gen 6, it’s twin clone can, but it can’t. Gen 2 blocked you from transferring Pokémon back that were Gen 2 Pokémon or knew Gen 2 moves, so why weren’t similar restrictions implemented for Pokémon Bank? You also can never transfer a Pokémon back to Let’s Go from Home once it enters SwSh. I’m not even sure if you can put a Pokémon in Home and back in Let’s Go since I’ve never tried it but I think I’ve heard that you can. It just seems like it would be so easy to implement limited backwards compatibility, particularly for Gens 4-5, 6-7, and Let’s Go-8.

Is there a business reason for them not doing this? I envy the people who grew up with Gens 1 and 2 (I started with 3) and could just effortlessly move Pokémon back and forth between the two on a whim. Whenever I make transfers from Gens 6 to 7 or 7 to 8, it pains me a bit to know those transfers are one-way and permanent.

 

[Puddle]

Sending a Pokemon from Gen 2 to Gen 1 was as simple as deleting incompatible moves, but the games have become more complex since then. Each Pokemon has a lot more attributes to keep track of now, like Abilities and ribbons, all of which could cause compatibility issues. Perhaps Game Freak felt that it would be easier for their programmers, and less confusing for players, to make transfers a one-way trip.

Gold and Silver were, at one point in time, intended to be the last Pokemon games. It's understandable that Game Freak would want all six Pokemon games (Red, Green, Blue, Yellow, Gold and Silver) to be compatible with one another, but maybe this didn't seem so important to them once they'd decided to keep making more games, and adopted the "generation" model.

I have to say, I've never really been a fan of the one-way nature of transfers either. There's always something quite sad about booting up an old save file to find that all the Pokemon are gone, apart from a level 3 Pidgey in your party. I used to transfer all my Pokemon up through the generations, but now I prefer to keep them in the generation they were caught in.

Sometimes I think it would have been better if cross-generational transfers had never been re-implemented in Gen 4 onwards. If each generation had become its own separate ecosystem, it would have always been possible to return a Pokemon to the game it originated from. As I mentioned in another thread, the fandom would have come to accept this system as the norm, and so would have been saved all of the emotional turmoil of Dexit further down the line. But I expect no game developer plans that far ahead!

I can't think of any business benefits to removing backwards compatibility in the games themselves, apart from the time and money saved on programming. Preventing Pokemon from being removed from HOME, however, is clearly a ploy to "trap" people into paying their subscription fees until a compatible game is released, which is absolutely scandalous.