BW vs. B2W2

[Torchic W. Pip]

Both are amazing. Both combined make great games.

B3W3.

 

[ShieldFan]

B2W2. B2W2 has the better post game (PWT, Pokestars studio's, the medals, ETC) a wider array of Pokemon to catch and in my opinion a better UI (the battle interface looks better). Also team building is way more fun than in BW since you had more options.

 

[Torchic W. Pip]

I will say that it's interesting (and pretty neat) that BW only allowed new Pokémon. When I play Pokémon games, I sometimes worry about balancing old favorites with new ones, and BW forces you to use new Pokémon. Luckily, Unova has its fair share of (in my opinion) cool Pokémon: The Gothita line, the Litwick line, the starters, etc.

 

[Mr. MoonStone]

I will say that it's interesting (and pretty neat) that BW only allowed new Pokémon. When I play Pokémon games, I sometimes worry about balancing old favorites with new ones, and BW forces you to use new Pokémon. Luckily, Unova has its fair share of (in my opinion) cool Pokémon: The Gothita line, the Litwick line, the starters, etc.

Yeah, I'll jump in and agree. I never really had trouble building a team in BW because the Pokemon available in Gen 5 were so diverse. I didn't find myself repeating team members or relying on specific types.

 

[Camille]

Black 2/White 2, no contest. Black/White do have better storyline, but pretty much everything was disappointing. The sequels have a ton of content, are slightly less linear, and I love the addition of Move Tutors, since most are available before becoming the Champion. I also like Iris better as a Champion than Alder, and I don't mind the large gap between the 6th and 7th Gyms at all.

 

[Hidden Mew]

It's a tough call since I really like both games, but I think I prefer B/W. The storyline was engaging, N and Bianca are some of my favorite characters in the franchise, Team Plasma was pretty unique among the evil teams and I still remember being emotional over N's farewell. I guess I prefer Alder over Iris as the Champion too, but she was fine and I liked the flashback explaining why Iris' Champion outfit is a dress. I never really had a problem with being stuck with just the new Pokemon. I thought it was a fun way to encourage fans to experiment with new Pokemon and there are plenty of Unova Pokemon that I really like too. Although, I always felt that the marketing for every new main series title, or at least new generation, emphasized that older Pokemon are available in part because of the backlash to keeping older Pokemon locked away until the post game of B/W.

B2/W2 is really solid though. Having a proper sequel really made it stand out. While it basically took the place of a third version game for that generation, it was still a brand new game with a different storyline. The different factions of Team Plasma was interesting. I really like Hugh and his storyline. While I still think that Bianca is the best of the fifth generation rivals, Hugh feels so underrated since his storyline was engaging and well handled. It was really nice to see how Cheren, Bianca and N turned out after the time skip. I really wish that they could have shown N reuniting with the playable character from the previous game, but there was still a good amount of closure for the other characters from B/W. There was definitely more content with the tournament and the Black Tower/White Treehallow. The former was a really fun and difficult way to level up my Pokemon, especially when I think it took me at least a couple of days to complete both of them. The Unova region itself felt more complete in B2/W2 than it did in B/W. After all of the marketing emphasizing how far away the Unova region was from the first four, it just felt a bit too small for me, but the additions in B2/W2 made it feel bigger.

It's probably closer to a tie, but I think the B/W's storyline and characters edges it out for me.

 

[Bolt Strike]

BW2 is night and day better in every way except story (and even then, the plot twist at the end of the game is the main reason BW is better). The region design is better, with more areas being added, less linearity due to more backtracking and the gyms not being one freaking city after the next (although the gap in between the 6th and 7th gym is way too long, they should've put a new gym in Lacunosa Town or something). The Pokemon selection is vastly superior due to actually having some old Pokemon instead of being forced to use the "new" ones (totally new, not-at-all ripoffs of 1st gen Pokemon). And there was much, much more to do in BW2 than BW. The only other thing I like about BW over BW2 is that there's a few features in BW2 that are locked to post game (such as breeding and fossil restoration), but that's only because they just locked some of the areas from BW to post game and were too lazy to move them to areas that would be main game areas in BW2. But in general? BW2 was far better and redeemed a generation that was otherwise one step forwards and two step backwards for the series.

 

[Silktree]

B2W2 are the better games from a gameplay perspective, but playing BW for the first time felt a lot more special even though I was only fond of a few Pokemon. Game Freak pretended to challenge themselves with the morality angle in BW, but they couldn't deliver on that in B2W2 at all.

 

[colours]

i made a much longer post on my issues with BW elsewhere, but i wasn't particularly impressed with it compared to the longevity that B2W2 had for me. for that reason i'm going with the latter.

 

[Isaac the Investigator]

BW2 is a straight upgrade in most respects, better Dex, more areas, more postgame content, etc., and we really haven't had any Pokémon game that was truly comparable in the amount of stuff you could do there since.