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Hoenn Does Not Have Too Much Water! ...kinda


Ronnie
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Too much water is definitely a meme, but I still think the reviewer in question had some good points, for one major reason: It's too faithful to the original RS with extremely bland Pokemon all over the place. This was a problem with games all the way up to gen 5, but the water represents the terrible repetition present throughout the entire game.

1. A water rich region's wild encounters is overwhelmingly represented by Wingull and Tentacool. Even though wailmer and luvdisc are common with a rod, and could have easily been used to spice up the encounters. As it stands, there's no way you don't just repel over the oceans. Because Wingull can't even be contained by water alone, Wingull's line appears in 31 areas, though some of them are ponds in cities that you generally wouldn't check.

2. On land, you're basically seeing zigzagoon and linoone line in the majority of grass patches. The Zigzagoon line is present on 8 land routes.

3. Gen 1 staples like the Abra line, Geodude line, Machop line, and Zubat line also appear a lot. This is a problem in every game but in a game with a particularly limited pre-National dex Pokedex like ORAS, it pushes a lot of the new guys out of the way.

4. Finding Sootopolis isn't so bad, but the signposting to find the Team Aqua base is rather poor. It's been made better, but in RS this was one of the easiest places to get lost, leaving you sweeping the ocean trenches for a sign of where to go. Cue more wasted repels or excessive amounts of samey encounters.

5. The Elite 4 reuses Pokemon of the same line multiple times. In RS, Glacia still had Sealeos! Now she just has... double glalies and double froslass and a walrein. Yay. Phoebe has two banettes, a dusclops, and a dusknoir. These teams are just yikes.

There's just a lot of design decisions here that the devs consciously chose to not change. Which is a shame because there's a lot of good QOL changes like the Dexnav and additions of mega evolutions and split evos from gen 4, but they didn't even decide to take some of the Emerald changes to spice up the Pokedex even a little bit. The game definitely gets better in its post-game with the addition of Mirage spots and Delta episode, but it isn't the huge upgrade to RSE than FRLG is to gen 1, or HGSS is to gen 2 games either. Something about the changes made is very underwhelming, knowing what resources are available to them now.

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Only played the originals, and it was long ago. And I had game guides.

As has been said, there really isn't that much water, it's only the final stretch of the game. However, water looks samey, water is filled with scatter trainers, an- *A wild level 15 Tentacool appeared!*. Repel is always a great QoL thing in Pokemon, but having to spam it is never not in a small measure annoying (and yet I can't see Pokemon with a totally free Bravely random encounter adjuster, nor visible enemies).

As for optionality- who doesn't explore the whole of a Pokemon world? They're part of what makes Pokemon so wonderful. It might as well have been mandatory to me.

 

7 hours ago, Ronnie said:

Actually time yourself and see how quick it takes. It's not as bad as the land route from Lavender Town to Fuschia City lol.

Lavender to Fuchsia has a semi-varied terrestrial landscape. The route from Fortree to Lilycove is similar, but even more varied a landscape. Open water isn't so distinctive, although I could be saying too nice a thing of Lavender-Fuchsia here, since Kanto's Routes and such on the whole aren't so fabulous.

And there are plenty of walking places where you don't need to spray Repel, with more trainer variety too.

 

7 hours ago, DisobeyedCargo said:

If you wanna complain about surfing, Diamond and Pearl are easily the worst when it comes to surfing  

Just curious, what were the problems there? Not exactly a lot of water, being Hoenn's thematic opposite.

 

7 hours ago, DisobeyedCargo said:

“Too much water” is one of the stupidest complaints I’ve ever heard

*Smacks you with a Deku Leaf*

I think you have to admit it to be true of at least one game. Not to say WW is bad, the Great Sea is great for one who likes to explore (OoT, TP, and SS are all lacking here, perhaps WW even beats out ALttP), but even the developers realized there were problems and added the Swift Sail in the HD version.

 

7 hours ago, Ether said:

Sure, most of the water routes are optional, but if you're dissuaded from exploring a large chunk of the map because it fails to differentiate itself, that's still not good design. And as I said, I don't think the volume of water in Hoenn is a problem, I just wish it was broken up more so that it can be taken in chunks, rather than being all dumped on the player at once with little in-between. If Mossdeep had more content besides a filler town with just a gym and little else, or if Pacifidlog had... well, anything aside from completionism backing it, the game would be much better off for it. Imagine if the sea routes were filled with interesting offshoots like the wrecked ship/sea mauville, and it wasn't a one off area?

And maybe some coral reefs! Corsola but no coral reefs, which are the foundation of so much oceanic biodiversity, and which are bright and colorful and bustling. To use The Blue Planet I & II documentary series for ocean environments, we have: 

  1. The Deep
  2. Big Blue/Open Ocean
  3. Coral Seas/Reefs
  4. Green Seas (Kelp Forests)
  5. Coasts
  6. Tidal Seas
  7. Seasonal Seas
  8. Frozen Seas

Now we can't have Hoenn do Frozen Seas, and Coasts are land and sea, which is bit more complicated, and I'm not sure Hoenn can do Temperate Seas. Hoenn has plenty of The Deep, and Big Blue, with the Tidal Seas represented by the Shoal Cave. But Coral Reefs and Green Seas are nowhere to be found.

 

Now what places we presently have are:

  • Rapid currents (Pacifidlog-Slateport route)
  • The little Regice islands
  • The one shipwreck
  • The Shoal Cove
  • Mossdeep looks nice
  • Sootopolis is very unique
  • Pacifidlog is interesting as an idea too
  • Mirage Island (IF you get lucky enough to see it)
  • The Sky Tower
  • Some underwater caverns

This is decent variety as is, I'm not sure how many more oceanic-themed locations one could come up with, I concede this. Is a request for more too much?

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19 minutes ago, Interdimensional Observer said:

Just curious, what were the problems there? Not exactly a lot of water, being Hoenn's thematic opposite.

The surf speed was PAINFULLY slow. So slow that Platinum had to boost the surf speed.

In fact, Sinnoh in general is extremely slow. Slow battles, slow gameplay. Plenty of areas that slow you down too. Besides the slow surf speed, you have the marshy areas that trap you every 5 steps and you have to wiggle out. Then there's the route to Snowpoint City where you walk ever so slowly across the deep snow.

Edited by Ronnie
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Sinnoh's surf speed is absolutely indefensible. Same with the slowly depleting HP bars and rising exp bars. Gen 4 had a terrible game engine even though the world design is interesting in concept. Other than gen 1 being a cluster of terrible game mechanics and glitches, gen 4 is probably the least playable gen at this point, as much as I love the games.

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8 hours ago, DisobeyedCargo said:

Frickin 7.8/10

the surf speed is fast 

you have repels 

I’m fairly sure the encounter rates were Lowered on sea tiles in ORAS from RSE

the music is gorgeous

If you wanna complain about surfing, Diamond and Pearl are easily the worst when it comes to surfing  

  1. Surf being fast doesn't negate the water routes in Hoenn being nearly universally uninteresting and tedious, and the things you have to do in water, being repetitive. This isn't like the Swift Sail in Wind Waker HD, where you actually WANTED to be in the water a lot of the time and fast speeds helped considerably.
  2. "Just use these items that make you not encounter Pokemon in a Pokemon game for a large chunk of the game because the Pokemon, like the routes, are also incredibly limited and repetitive"
  3. Still doesn't fix the problem.
  4. See: 3

I don't remember Diamond and Pearl being as bad, but saying "Oh, it wasn't as bad as the most generic Pokemon game in the series" isn't a glowing defense.

The 7.8 is accurate. A modern score for a modern Pokemon game that lines up with the original scores of the original Pokemon game. The complaint of too much water is accurate. Even if a lot of it is optional, it makes it so roughly half of the map is just something nobody wants to set foot... flipper in. A Pokemon game with a map that is half nothing is a poor Pokemon game.

Edited by Slumber
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8 hours ago, Anacybele said:

It doesn't matter because it's still super annoying for those players that DO want to complete the Pokedex, visit Pacifidlog Town, etc. And it's still boring because there's not much to see or do in the meantime while you're traveling on the water.

if you're heading for pokedex completion, there's not much that's encountered via surfing in that part that's not availible elsewhere.

 

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25 minutes ago, Interdimensional Observer said:

Just curious, what were the problems there? Not exactly a lot of water, being Hoenn's thematic opposite.

It’s 

so

god

damn

slow

 

27 minutes ago, Interdimensional Observer said:

Smacks you with a Deku Leaf*

I think you have to admit it to be true of at least one game. Not to say WW is bad, the Great Sea is great for one who likes to explore (OoT, TP, and SS are all lacking here, perhaps WW even beats out ALttP), but even the developers realized there were problems and added the Swift Sail in the HD version.

 

You do realize I was talking about Pokémon right?

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11 minutes ago, Slumber said:

Even if a lot of it is optional, it makes it so roughly half of the map is just something nobody wants to set foot... flipper in. A Pokemon game with a map that is half nothing is a poor Pokemon game.

You say that yet millions of people did it anyways. And those same millions did it again in the remakes. Jokes on them??? *shrugs*

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1 minute ago, Ronnie said:

You say that yet millions of people did it anyways. And those same millions did it again in the remakes. Jokes on them??? *shrugs*

It's a Pokemon game.

You could sell a turd with Pokemon trademarks on it and it'd fly off the shelves.

Edited by Slumber
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Just now, Slumber said:

It's a Pokemon game.

You could sell a turd with Pokemon trademarks on it and it'd sell like crazy.

Yeah Pokémon Channel was a huge success.

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For the record, no too much water, is, in fact NOT a meme because of IGN review. It have always been a meme in pokemon fanbase, or at least gamefaqs message boards side that is mercilessly joked about - IGN's review brought it to global meme status essentially because that complaint is so damn obvious that everyone expect it coming and it did come and it just exploded from there

 

The problem with Hoenn route isn't so much the water being too much and more the watery side is backloaded in the very end of the game. Hoenn, lorewise, is formed by Broudon and Brodre fighting each other and their idea of reflecting that is by making a near 50-50 of the area. As everyone knows Groudon is originally the stronger of the two during Primal and the weaker of the two during current form or something so the land is slightly bigger idk. The result is while the land isn't neccesarily smaller in proportion, the entire end game is slapped under Water Route, 24/7 random ecounter. That being where 90% of the endgame also directly translates to post game stuff where it is basically exploring the sea routes 101

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Just now, Ronnie said:

Yeah Pokémon Channel was a huge success.

Nobody knew what the hell Pokemon Channel even was. I'm still not really sure what it is.

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7 minutes ago, Ronnie said:

And you just disproved your point

People know what a turd is. Hey You, Pikachu! sold 2 million copies despite costing way more than your typical N64 game(Which was already expensive), and the N64 in total only selling about 30 million units. Oh, and that game was virtually unplayable and had about 30 minutes of content in it. But it was Pokemon so people bought it.

A small handful of misses in a giant bag of hits doesn't disprove that the Pokemon name is nearly synonymous with massive sales.

Edited by Slumber
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1 minute ago, Slumber said:

People know what a turd is. Hey You, Pikachu! sold 2 million copies despite being way more than your typical N64 game(Which was already expensive), and the N64 in total only selling about 30 million units. Oh, and that game was virtually unplayable and had about 30 minutes of content in it. But it was Pokemon so people bought it.

People bought it because it had a gimmick that the general mass thought would be promising. "Oh boy you can talk to Pikachu and friends with a microphone? So cool!" Then those kids try it out and realize it was bad and never want to touch it again. Not to mention Pokémon was in its prime during the 64 days.

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8 minutes ago, DisobeyedCargo said:

You do realize I was talking about Pokémon right?

I do, I just felt like throwing in mention of Nintendo's other overly watery game. 

 

30 minutes ago, Ronnie said:

In fact, Sinnoh in general is extremely slow. Slow battles, slow gameplay. Plenty of areas that slow you down too. Besides the slow surf speed, you have the marshy areas that trap you every 5 steps and you have to wiggle out. Then there's the route to Snowpoint City where you walk ever so slowly across the deep snow.

I stopped Pokemon at Gen 5, but Gen 4 was the real peak of Pokemon experience, and while I forgot the sluggishness of surfing, I do actually recall the painful slowness of battle and the other things you say. Not to mention perhaps the most HM necessity nastiness, Victory Road there I recall was awful.

 

8 minutes ago, JSND Alter Dragon Boner said:

The problem with Hoenn route isn't so much the water being too much and more the watery side is backloaded in the very end of the game. Hoenn, lorewise, is formed by Broudon and Brodre fighting each other and their idea of reflecting that is by making a near 50-50 of the area. As everyone knows Groudon is originally the stronger of the two during Primal and the weaker of the two during current form or something so the land is slightly bigger idk. The result is while the land isn't neccesarily smaller in proportion, the entire end game is slapped under Water Route, 24/7 random ecounter. That being where 90% of the endgame also directly translates to post game stuff where it is basically exploring the sea routes 101

How could a game have lots of water and land the highlighted problem be avoided? Hmm.... I know! PokEgypt! Start either in the Sandnile River Delta, or at the sources of the Sandniles and move gradually south/north to the other end via the river, crossing the banks back and forth along the way.

 

1 minute ago, Ronnie said:

And you just disproved your point

One real spinoff instance is not the same as a remake of a mainline. 

 

1 minute ago, Slumber said:

Nobody knew what the hell Pokemon Channel even was. I'm still not really sure what it is.

I had it as a kid. Calling it a successor to Hey You Pikachu! sans mic would be the obvious thing. But genre? That I admit is difficult to nail down, it's like they wanted to make a nonviolent/action intimate Pokemon game. It was just really, really, really shallow and underdone. Maybe a nice idea underneath it all? That is the best I can say of it.

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10 minutes ago, Ronnie said:

People bought it because it had a gimmick that the general mass thought would be promising. "Oh boy you can talk to Pikachu and friends with a microphone? So cool!" Then those kids try it out and realize it was bad and never want to touch it again. Not to mention Pokémon was in its prime during the 64 days.

This is true, but Pokemon hasn't declined severely. The most severe decline in sales was from GS to RS, where the series lost about 7 million in sales(From 23 million that GS sold to 16 million), and actually picked up again for DP, and the series continues to hover around 16 million in sales with each gen. Its prime has likely passed, but it's not so extreme that it'd be that significant.

A terrible, unplayable mess like HYP! might have sold just over 1 million as opposed to just under 2 million. Nintendo's not going to be hurting in either scenario, and any publisher would be thrilled to have a game that bad sell that well.

Edited by Slumber
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On 8/20/2018 at 11:09 PM, Samias said:

Other than gen 1 being a cluster of terrible game mechanics and glitches, gen 4 is probably the least playable gen at this point, as much as I love the games.

Yeah, this is why I've been saying gen 4 really needs remakes right now! I still like playing Diamond and Platinum, more so the latter, but remakes would really do Sinnoh more justice right about now.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Gen3 was the first time I hated a Pokemon game. Tentacool might have had a lot to do with that, I don't remember. Nobody but critics seem to know now why they hated it back then. Personally, I was 14 or 15 and pokemon was not cool anymore, so I didn't hesitate to resell it (mellowing out can make pokemon fun again).

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  • 2 weeks later...

I mean, Hoenn's far and away my favorite region and it never hindered me as a player personally. But at the same time I guess if you want to explore the entire region (which most RPG fans like to do (explore I mean)) I can see where the complaint might come in I suppose. But at the same time its not like you DIDNT have a easily accessible map, and once you find a location you can fly back, so backtracking isnt really an issue either. So I can see a mild complaint here and there being reasonably, but not nearly so much of a big deal that it makes it unplayyable or even unnenjoyable.

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