What Pokémon Let’s Go did right

[Alolan_Apples]

Although I enjoyed these games more than Pokémon Sun and Moon (and Ultra Sun and Ultra Moon) since it’s taking place in Kanto, but even more modernized, these games are not too popular among traditional Pokémon fans. And I can understand that. The world doesn’t need another Kanto remake, and making it like Pokémon GO rather than a traditional Pokémon game isn’t a good idea after all. Add to that, they removed many features that were added after the first gen that played a major role in the series (such as Pokémon breeding, abilities, and items) while doing some other bizarre changes (Game Corner was changed because of political correctness, bike riding was removed because of the ability to ride a Pokémon, gym requirements were added etc). Lastly, a Pokémon game like this wouldn’t be too bad, but as your first main series Pokémon game for a home console? That’s like if Pixar stole ideas from other people to make a movie and it became the first animated film to win “Best Picture” at the Academy Awards. In fact, it even got review bombed by people who aren’t true fans about Pokémon, giving illegitimate ratings. Is this game that bad, or are these fans just angry and ungrateful?

Regardless, there are a few parts of the game they did right.

• Candies - even though this is an upside of the game, it is not flawless. The idea of replacing EV builds and minerals with candies is a little bit iffy, and Pokémon given candies can level up stats by one at any level, not build up their base stats that remain low at lower levels, but expand as the Pokémon levels up. I’m not going to lie to you. I restarted Let’s Go Eevee, and I traded my Oddish from Let’s Go Pikachu to the newly started Eevee game. I gave it 200 Oddish candies before making the trade, and it had all base stats of 200 or more as a Level 4 Pokémon. I even beaten Brock with this Oddish before it reached Level 10. That’s how broken it is. But here’s the bright side. You can max out all six stats. In games past, Pokémon can have only 252 EV max per stat (which is worth 63 points at Level 100), but only 510 EV max. That means you can only max out just two stats and give little to another. That’s not enough. It should be 252 EV max per stat, and 1,512 EV max. That’s what candies are like. They should make each EV worth 1 point at Level 100, have 100 EV max per stat, and 600 EV max, but they cannot level up stats at lower levels. Therefore, a Level 4 Oddish can’t have 200 base stats, but a Level 100 Vileplume can have 100 additional points on all six stats.
• Nature Fortune Teller - want a good-natured Pokémon? In games past, you have to keep catching good Pokémon, and if they aren’t good enough, you had to breed them for good natures. Since Pokémon Let’s Go doesn’t have Pokémon breeding, this would be a lot harder. But at least we don’t have to battle wild Pokémon for this part. What they did right is that you can choose the nature of all wild Pokémon for the rest of the day by talking to the channeler in Celadon City’s Pokémon Center. This way, if you’re looking for a specific Pokémon with a good nature, they will all have this nature, until midnight that is.
• Regional Variants - while they cut out many features to make it very much like a Gen 1 game, and scaled back to just the first gen Pokémon (except for Meltan and Melmetal), having regional variants on 18 of this species is a good idea. As you see, there’s only one family of Ghost Pokémon, only one family of Dragon Pokémon, only one family of Steel Pokémon, no Dark Pokémon, and very few Ice Pokémon in the first generation. By having the regional variants, they would’ve improved the gameplay and added diversity.
• HMs - although I wouldn’t mind them from the first generation, getting rid of HMs was a great step forward. That’s what Pokémon Sun and Moon did right. And if you want to get past obstacles or get to another city more quickly, you can use your partner Pokémon to do that.
• Obtaining Mew - remember that Mew glitch? I think it was absent in the game, but fortunately, you can obtain a legitimate Mew even earlier, if you have the Pokéball Plus. Spending $50 on a single Pokémon sounds like a ripoff, but I like the Pokéball Plus as a controller. Granted, it will become useless when I play Pokémon Sword and Shield, but for Pokémon Let’s Go, it’s a really good controller, as I don’t see a point of playing it without the Pokéball Plus.

What are some other things they got right? Well, we have unlimited use of TMs, hyper training, gym requirements (though some call it handholding), mega stones, and Pokémon masters all over the world.

Despite newer games scaling back difficulty, giving you tutorials every time you encounter a new feature, giving extra help (like putting in objective waypoints on the map), and removing popular features, they at least do something right every new game. Thought Gen V was terrible for having “fakemons”? They had unlimited use of TMs. Thought Gen VI was terrible for having uncreative legendary and mythical Pokémon? They added the Fairy Type. Thought Gen VII was terrible for having no gyms or National Dex? They replaced HMs with Poké Pager. Of course, there’s always going to be problems.

Now if you want to know what I personally didn’t like about Pokémon Let’s Go, it would have to be their character customization, lack of Pokémon breeding, Game Corner was ruined, almost no postgame, and no use Pokémon use of items. On the subject of character customization, the GameCube Version of Animal Crossing is better than that. On the subject of Pokémon breeding, how can I get an Alolan Vulpix with me as the original trainer? On the subject of the Game Corner, if you can’t have gambling, can you at least have arcade mini-games? On the subject of the postgame, it would be nice to have a postgame plot. On the subject of items, I actually liked the Z-crystals.

Right now, I’m still playing Pokémon Let’s Go, and while there are both advantages and disadvantages, I have to enjoy what’s in the game. But that’s all for this entry. Feel free to leave a comment.