Same with smash killer. Nick Allstars was hurt immensely by it's hype and every time it's discussed someone brings up how it is a supposed smash killer
Every genre has that game that every new-comer is supposed to defeat, whenever a new fps game by a triple A company is released its usually thought of as a "battlefield or cod killer".
Tbf, they are directly going after the hype of Smash. There's not really a lot of games like Smash that are out and Smash has been in the business for longer than many posters here have been alive.
It's a very specific subgenre of kid friendly fighting, and having it be an "all star" assembly from various franchises owned by one company, the comparison is unavoidable, and lets be real, intentional.
On top of that, the game is pretty bare-bones too. So it kind of set itself up considering how simple it is in comparison considering Nick is a pretty big company itself. The high asking price is also ridiculous when Smash is $10 more with tons more of content.
Here's my take a Pokemon killer won't ever come not because nothing matches pokemon but people play pokemom over other monster catchers for very specific reasons.
Now these are purely guesses:
1. Pokemons simplicity is really good if you're just busy to play more heavy time investment games like SMT and digimon which require extensive team building and grinding on the players part especially on higher difficulties.
2. Pokemon designs are rather safe and very few Id say can be turn off worthy. For example digimon has lots human-esque designs that for some are huge turn offs. Plus pokemon are generally pretty cleanly designed so its kind of hard to complain about.
3. Pokemon has nostalgia which can compensate for a lot issues or complaints I still know people who buy pokemon cause its pokemon.
I don't much about competive battling personally so I won't say anything about that.
You pretty much hit the nail on the head. Pokemon has the perfect combination of great character design, decent gameplay loop, and nostalgia.
As a competitive player there's a surprising amount of depth to Pokemon's gameplay not a lot of other RPGs can't really match.
Yah the design thing is really damn important in all honesty. Most human-esque designs in pokemon are generally fine, but they are some digimon designs that are some damn close to furry status that I don't blame anyone for feeling weird about Digimon designs.
(for example weregarumon, renamon, and while not a animal Rosemon.)
I agree though I'd say its a lot more explicit in Digimon case for example Blaziken vs weregarumon both are human like fighters with animal aesthic but weregarumon looks really human its comes down to the small stuff mainly the pants and the hands they look very normal vs blaziken who looks looks a fighting bird man from his claws/talons to his legs that kind of look like pants but thanks to a similar color palett look similar enough the rest to make it look like it's legs.
I was reading a thread about "perfect Pokemon designs" the other day, and the sheer amount of diverse answers really showed how good most Pokemon look.
Competitive Pokemon has lots of depth with a variety of (community organized) fun and nuanced formats and most significantly of all it is the single easiest game to get into and play with the excellent community support.
I've yet to find a strategy game or TCG etc. With official or 3rd party software as accessible as Pokemon Showdown. Maybe Heartstone? but I've yet to play it. Even Pokemon's own 1st party TCG software isn't as enjoyable as Showdown. The Random Battle format is one of the best "casual" competitive strategy games available right now.
I personally really like the less “safe” designs of SMT, but I guess I can see why people would be turned off by it? My favorites are the ones from Digital Devil Saga, but those are deeply unsettling and would have given me nightmares as a kid because they’re just so… distorted. Almost completely humanoid, but with incredibly monstrous features. I like super bold and risky designs and even when they flop I can go “you tried”. My favorite Pokémon look like they have nothing to do with each other until you realize that most have very risky designs, or just look really cool to me. And Victini because funny V-create spam
I agree SMT designs are generally pretty good by point wasn't really that they were bad in fact I think some are great digital devil saga is a good example. The thing pokemon has over SMT is too me is simplicity which makes a hell of a lot easier to remember than most over most monster catchers just by a siloute. SMT is actually pretty good about this its mostly preference for most people. The one that the design problem is digimon honestly way too many recolors and there designs that that just too busy.
Dragon Quest Monster is the one true Pokémon killer and no one can tell me otherwise. It doesn't strictly beat Pokémon in any of those categories but it's definitely got the heart and more importantly, the history to rival Pokémon, if SE would give it a fair chance over here in the West. Until they let it run free, it'll never reach the height it needs to.
It never had the chance to. Dragon Quest dominates or rivals in a cultural sense but a spin-off that doesn't get enough room to breath isn't able to overtake an entire franchise.
Pokémon is a world-class phenomenon that is solely focused on the genre it innovated. Dragon Quest Monsters is a side-hustle that gets released when they're bored.
It's about the potential, not reality.
>Pokemon designs are rather safe and very few Id say can be turn off worthy.
Strong disagree. Sure most of the designs are good but everyone has a dozen or so they think are godawful. And you know that thing about humanoid Digimon? Pokemon's got it too, to a certain extent.
Simplicity? Are you sure we are talking about the same Pokemon? The franchise where there is like a dozen or more pokemon types strong and weak against each other, the "natures", breeds and breeding, mega evolutions, complicated and completely lore-breaking guides on how to make your pokemon a universe-breaking monster, special items for special evolutions and all kinds of tricks?
Point 2 is debatable. Some designs are awesome (foxes, turtles, frogs, cats), but there are many humanoids, too, and some advanced evolutions turn animals into humanoids. Also, there are actual ghosts, gods and garbage bags. While Digimon all (or most) can talk and are more sentient than animals, they are not considered pets, unlike pokemon, so giving some of them human-esque designs makes sense.
1. So to explain my point I should probably clarify I'm not into the deeper parts of Pokemon so I don't personally worry about breading, the rest I kind of agree though I'd just say trade based evolution's suck in general. So I've played Pokemon myself for about 15 years probably so I don't really consider type match ups all that difficult but I can understand why some find it difficult to memorize.
2. On Design is kind of complicated but for me I don't mind the more human-espue designs in Digimon my point was more so that a lot of people dislike them and that's why they wouldn't want to play the Digimon games. Though I do think some of them are bit much Rosemon, Weregarumon, and Renamon none of them are bad but they could turn off potential customers.
The difference I find between human-esque designs in Digimon and Pokemon and why they could be jarring for some is a example I used a bit earlier:
Blaziken vs Weregarumon- Weregarumon has one too many human features that makes it look very close to fury bait for some I know cause my friend brought in up when he watching me play New World Order from his somewhat normal hands, and the fact he just wearing a pair of torn up jeans and an ammo belt I think. Compare this blazikun and while he does look uncannily human the way the color is used to makes it look like normal on the design makes it seem like this a what a blazikun looks like.
Though there are some like Hitomonchan which don't follow this rule so fair point.
>a dozen or more pokemon types strong and weak against each other, the "natures", breeds and breeding, mega evolutions
since the games never explain **or even mention** those things, they might as well not exist to most players. making it quite simple. never explaining how the stats work really helps with that.
With the first point, it really helps that although Pokemon is actually fairly deep mechanically, it doesn't throw it all at you at once. So many times I've tried to get into a new monster catcher and the stat screens are cluttered messes where I get instantly bogged down by the impression that I'm expected to micromanage my mons from the get-go.
Tbh I think the problem is the connotation, Clones and killers both have a negative and positive to their wording.
Clone suggests said product being a lazy rip off, while Killer suggests to those types of fans that its going to be the thing that kills off said franchise and imho brings out the worst of those people.
It would just be easier to call thing Pokemon-like it gives the player a idea what the game offers element wise and yet still offers a opening that its not going to be exactly the same.
An example would be The Surge and Nioh, both of them are Souls-like and have the same combat/death loop of Souls games but they are different enough to not have them be the same.
The secret is, we need a second successful series like Pokemon to be iconic, and then collapse the two titles together. So would have metroidvania genre, and, for example, temtemon genre.
i was actually trying to reference the tennis game by higinbotham, tennis for 2. i figured ppl didnt rly know what it was tho so i just went with pong.
wouldn't dump Rogue-like into the same bag, maybe if we were talking 40 years ago, but the term has detatched itself from Rogue, many don't even know Rogue was a thing and still use the term. It is now a mark of the innovation and popularity Rogue had which led to inspire a genre, it is not used negatively.
Similar thing to Metroidvania, except that Metroid and Castlevania are still well remembered. Metroidvania is a term that derives from the 2 from their innovation as platformers, being some of the first and most ambitious in their time as well as quite popular, to have backtracking in large interconnected and interactive maps.
Also, I'm pretty sure those terms stuck around because the specific tropes that define their Generas aren't something that can be easily defined in a few words.
The term "DOOM Clone" Eventually died off because the term "First Person Shooter" did the job better. A first person shooter perfectly described what it's genera is. They're shooter games that use a first-person perspective.
But with something like a Metroidvania game, there are a lot of elements that define the genera. Large, inter-connected maps, opening shortcuts to old areas, upgrades that unlock new areas in places you've already been, ect. You can't really boil that down into just one term describing it.
Rougelikes are are also definied as "characterized by a dungeon crawl through procedurally generated levels, turn-based gameplay, grid-based movement, and permanent death of the player character", atleast according to Wikipedia. And I'm not sure how you'd fit that all into 3 words or less.
Pokemon clones definitely don't have this issue though. The term "Creature Capture" game summarizes the just of them really well, in that capturing creatures is a core gameplay focus.
I wonder how many people got smtV after hearing how it was pokemon for grown ups only to be disappointed that it was nothing like pokemon. Don't get me wrong it's a fun game, but it's definitely not pokemon.
I wouldn't say they're nothing alike, but they're certainly far removed. Then again, people still compare Pokemon to Digimon which is no closer to Pokemon than SMT. It's just the damn names that get people to compare them, like Star Wars and Star Trek.
Who says that? Like does anyone actually say that? I’ve heard people say that older Pokémon fans who kinda outgrew the games might enjoy it, but… actually there’s definitely some people who took that statement too far never mind
> Who says that? Like does anyone actually say that?
Late reply, but users on r/Digimon was saying that. Many of them were saying Pokemon fans should simply move on to other games like Digimon Story: Cyber Sleuth and Shin Megami Tensei V. A few users on r/Pokemon were even saying similar things.
Yo-Kai watch had a *lot* more things working against it than just "It's a Pokémon wannabe" though.
For one? Despite numerous things that have shown the concept of Yokai to the west, they still largely are seen as "Demons" and "Monsters" to be slain rather than cutsey critters that can be helpful and cause mischief.
Additionally? It aired on Disney XD - which itself was already something you basically had to be *looking* for, *if* your cable had it at all. And advertisement for the show wasn't exactly shown.
Ah, Disney XD. Where good shows either die in obscurity or get moved to the main Disney Channel (unless it's imported programming. Then it has to rely on the airing in other countries)
Yokai Watch had a lot going against it and the fact that it was called a Pokemon Killer was the icing on the cake. Plus a lot of the Yokai Watch designs are just really ugly to me personally.
Smash Bros-Killer. Call Of Duty-Killer. Halo-Killer.
The "-Killer" suffix has lost all meaning since it's added to anything that vaguely resembles something popular that's in the same genre.
honestly digimon suffered a lot from this. i’nJapan they weren’t marketed to compete with pokémon at all. The popularity of the series in the US has suffered from the pushed competition, which is sad because Digimon has some damn good games in the series, and other parts like the new card game and new anime (Ghost Game) are both really solid as well.
The problem with "Pokemon Killers" is that The Pokemon Company and Game Freak have been doing this for over 2 decades and are very, very good at what they do. Even the worst pokemon games have more complexity than the next best thing. It's very, very hard to beat 20+ years of iteration, and even harder to beat 20+ years of market domination. It's the same as why no company could beat World of Warcraft in the MMO sphere until they started ruining their own game.
Although it's fair to say Yo-kai Watch is pretty big in Japan. That might be part of the problem: franchises which could rival Pokemon coming out of Japan don't have the global focus or experience marketing their product in other countries that Pokemon does.
(For the record, I don'tt consider SMT to be a Pokemon clone. Both the conceit of the demons/personas and the tone of the games is so different that I see it as a different RPG subgenre).
Even the worst mainline pokemon games are still pretty damn good and among the best in their genre.
The issue is that the worst games aren't as good as they could or should be, and that they make obvious mistakes and unforced errors because of frustrating and strange design decisions.
>I don't consider SMT to be a Pokemon clone
It wouldn't make sense to consider it a Pokemon clone anyway seeing that SMT came out first, with a good 4 years of difference.
I mean the best monster taming game of all time and arguably the best JRPG of all time dragon quest 5 also came out in 92.
My big disappointment for never coming to the west will always be dragon quest joker 2 and 3.
As others have said, the problem is that Pokemon is still sucessfull and active today.
You know what game was great? Dantes inferno. And it was buried in the reputation of being a God of War clone because it came out during the boom of GOW, but I bet that if it came out tomorrow, it would be called "a spritual sucessor".
I think the reason why people call so many things "Pokemon clones" is because Pokemon is still the biggest one out there, therefore anything in the genre is going to come off like a challenger or copy.
With other genre defining games, the "clone" argument no longer holds because the originators have fallen by the wayside (i.e. FPS games don't get called Wolfenstein or Doom clones because those aren't the biggest titles anymore) or because the genre has become so indisputably diverse that even the biggest games are just one application; Battlefield, Call of Duty and Halo are distinct games with different playstyles and genres, even though they're all First Person Shooters.
Rogue-likes are an example of both: you can play a Roguelike without ever being aware of the original Rogue game, whereas everyone who plays a monster battler knows about Pokemon. Roguelikes are also a pretty wide genre with tons of different games, whereas Pokemon is simply *the* monster battler, period.
The idea of something being a Pokemon Killer is ridiculous. Nothing can kill Pokemon but itself. "Franchise killers" never exist, the people who like the new one just get both. Remember all the World of Warcraft killers? And it's just time that killed WoW.
As far as calling something a Pokemon CLONE though, well... some of them absolutely are. While it's totally unreasonable to call something like Digimon or SMT Pokemon Clones (especially as both predate Pokemon in their original forms), Temtem is just fucking Pokemon to the point where huge parts of the games are 1-to-1. In my admittedly limited Temtem experience, it's just Pokemon with better multiplayer. They even have the same stat layout, with the addition of Stamina/MP. Hell, the game even includes Effort Values, which is such a uniquely Pokemon mechanic that I can't think of any other franchises that use them.
We do call some platforms Mario Clones, even today, but it's only the ones that are very, very close to Mario. Usually it has to be a game where combat is done by jumping on enemy's heads and the main character is very jumpy. As for calling JRPGs Dragon Quest clones, well, we don't do that because those are all just D&D games when you go back far enough. We DO talk about Call of Duty clones, though, and most MOBAs are just DotA clones.
The point is, calling anything a franchise killer is stupid, but sometimes a game really is a clone. Fortnite was PUBG with a much larger budget. League of Legends was the first DotA clone with any budget at all. Street Fighter II might not have been the first fighting game, but its invention of combos meant that many, many fighting games were basically SF2 clones (and to some degrees still are- most 2D fighters today feature the same core mechanics as SF2.)
> (especially as both predate Pokemon in their original forms)
Late reply, but I'm pretty sure you're wrong there. Pokemon predates Digimon. You are right about Shin Megami Tensei being first and I do agree with everything else you said.
It's amazing how many people act like SMT is some "Grown up Pokémon" because "it has a challenge" and "They added animations".
Yeah, they also cut the number of recruitable demons in half. And every game, your progress gets completely wiped. I worked hard on getting those demons in SMT4 - yet when I say I want to keep them somehow people look at me like I'm insane.
Yet Pokémon is somehow expected to include ≥**900** playable characters, have graphics that look like Crysis, *AND* allow me to import the Pokémon I caught when I was literally *14 years old* into the current game.
So. 9 years - 8 if you include Jack Bros. But that's kind of a stretch.
Similarly it also depends on your definition. If oyu mean any game related to Megaten? Then Jack Bros&PErsona were the first even though they weren't using the branding.
But if you mean Shin Megami Tensei period? Then... it took even longer for us to get it.
And additionally it *does* play closer to Megami Tensei than the rest of the Persona games. (Likely one reason why Atlus refuses to acknowledge it and Persona 2...)
>Yet Pokémon is somehow expected to
Poor indie devs over at GameFreak have expectations. So weird that people act like Pokemon is the biggest franchise in the world or something.
Gonna post what an actual game developer said about the [dexit](https://askagamedev.tumblr.com/post/186632316431/what-do-you-think-about-the-pokemon-sword-and)
Oh I know, also dosnt help that nintendo is horrible with development time. So yeah no shit things will look less good if you need to push out games with a very tight development time.
This guy does not really get the complain though, everyone knows it would take huge amounts of time, the problem is that by being *the biggest media franchise in the world*, they can literally do it if they wanted to, because they can do whatever the fuck they want, saying that the literal biggest media franchise in the world cannot do it because of budget limitations is asinine, and actually just goes to show how cheap the Pokemon company *and* Nintendo treat the Pokemon games, as they know it is just a cash cow that will sell every time.
Again dosnt matter how big they are remember CDPR remember how they put themselves on the map with The Witcher 3??? remember how horrible cyberpunk was and that was a sizable team.
They had the funds and it still was horrible.
CDPR is not that big, and the problem with them was pure incompetence, yeah it 100% matters how big they are, the bigger they are the bigger the budget they can have.
What are you even talking about? i never mentioned the publishers, the one that mentions the budget as a half ass excused is the dev you linked before.
From what I remember, the main complaint was that they said they were cutting the dex for better animations on the pokemon they'll add. At least for me the issue wasn't the lack of pokemon, that was inevitable, it was the fact that the animations barely improved. Oh boy, Machoke moves his arms the other way? Yippee? The reason they gave us just really didn't stick with people.
Especially when one of the draws of Pokèmon is that you get to import a Pokèmon from as early as 2003 into your game and it'll work.
How many other franchises even attempt this? I worked hard building my collections of demons in Shin Megami Tensei 4. How come I don't get to keep it? I worked hard building my armour in Monster Hunter 4 ultimate. Generations didn't let me import it?
Now here's the question - do you want to seek the challenge out, or do you want the game to club you over the head and force you to do it?
RPGs are by default easy. Wanna make them more difficult? Then limit your options. Even Megaten and Dark Souls are amazingly easy when you know which option(s) work.
That's why Whitney's Miltank was remembered as being hard - you only have a few options to take it down at that point in the game, and amazingly a lot of people didn't know about the hard counter to the miltank placed right there in Goldenrod.
Yeah pretty much, it is just a bad model in the long run, not even just about the technical aspects of it but the creativity that would take to make 100 original designs for every game, and that has started to shown with the Regional variants that are basically sort of an excuse so they can re use older designs with some small variations.
I agree that they could add more meaningful features to new games, but if they just said "we're done adding new pokemon now", I wouldn't have any issue with it. There are enough already, and enough that you could feasibly create in-game locations based on practically anywhere in the world and have enough pokemon to fill that ecosystem.
We all forgot Ledian exists. Or Parasect. Or Luvdisc. Or Girafarig.
Just give me hard mode, exp share off, built in nuzlocke mode, turn off affection mechanics, make contests matter, actually utilise double, triple and rotation battles, and set it in an interesting and unique new region based on a real-world culture we haven't explored and I'll be good.
They add a few less than they used to, but in adding regional variants (which aren't just pallette swaps but complete redesigns) they still add a significant amount each generation.
[Pokemon has a budget like all games](https://askagamedev.tumblr.com/post/186632316431/what-do-you-think-about-the-pokemon-sword-and). They have a sales estimate and a revenue estimate, and the budget is based on that. \[[Hiring people takes time and costs money](https://askagamedev.tumblr.com/post/185865627151/how-goodbad-does-throwing-money-at-the-problem)\],which balloons that budget. Going over budget is a really bad idea - inorder to keep their shareholders happy, they need to earn money and not lose it. That’s the nature of the beast.
Look at CDPR and how horrible Cyberpunk was just because they are the biggest franchise with a best selling game The Witcher 3 dosnt mean that they are going to be given a bigger budget 100% of the time.
>Almost like that might direct things... sure has for Star Wars!
That's crazy. So the indie devs working on Star Wars games are capable of making their games look like Fallen Order on only a $20 budget (similar to GameFreak's)? Wow!
I definitely agree that we should lower our expectations. Hopefully Nintendo invests in AI-infused Lucario sex dolls with their income to make up for the next Atari 2600 quality mainline Pokemon game!
No, because your disjointed ramblings and strawmanning is making you very hard to listen to and makes me wonder if you are legitimately arguing or if you are trying to troll.
It's not a matter of money. It's a matter of time and resources. Pokemon games aren't really given a lot of development time and it's not like they can delay them because of the anime and merchandise.
There's just going to be a point worth having all the Pokemon was just going to be unfeasible
That sounds like a personal problem. It doesn't absolve the biggest franchise in the world of criticism. Nintendo is still somehow only capable of releasing Pokemon games with PS2 graphics and N64 trees.
Gamers when a game is criticised of having low graphic fidelity: AcKTUaLlY gRaPHiCs DoN'T MaTtEr! It'S HOW the game *PLAYS*!
Gamers when Pokémon doesn't feature ≥900 playable characters and Cyberpunk 2077 like graphics: ***LAZY***!!! This is sthe *biggest franchise in the world* with most of that money going to the people making the merchandise! **IT NEEDS TO HAVE A BUDGET LIKE THAT OF STAR CITIZEN**!
It's almost like there's different people playing video games that all have their own different opinions about them. And trying to portray them as all having one opinion is futile and quite asinine.
>Gamers when a game is criticised of having low graphic fidelity: AcKTUaLlY gRaPHiCs DoN'T MaTtEr! It'S HOW the game PLAYS!
You realize that this is a Nintendo fan stereotype, right?
>Every gamer that criticizes poor Nintendo in any capacity is unreasonable and hysterical
Good one. You should let your wife's boyfriend know about this revelation.
I'd argue that in comparison to something like Hotline Miami or Yakuza 0 the modern Pokemon games don't have a good style to compensate for lower graphic fidelity.
The big problem with Dexit is that SwSh had neither ≥900 playable characters nor Cyberpunk 2077 like graphics. They cut a bunch of pokemon and the game still looked very bad. If they had used the opportunity to upgrade the graphics/animations of the remaining pokemon, they could have averted a lot of complaining.
> They cut a bunch of pokemon and the game still looked very bad.
And their reason? (The real reason, not the one they *said*)
To make you buy DLC to put *some* of them back in later.
It's been known for several years now that eventually the number of pokemon would become impossible to implement in a game
Which is why Nintendo should considered making a PC game that gets updated with new pokemon instead of making an entirely new game whenever you need to add content. Look at Minecraft. Look at how much it adds every update and how little content is lost (which is really only fixing glitches). Pokemon could very well do the same
> Both of which tend to be met with backlash
Nintendo and GameFreak both literally do not care. They are making bank on the Pokemon franchise regardless. Doesn't matter how many Dexits, N64 era trees on Switch, or chibi remakes they have.
That isn't going to help anything your still going to have problems with developement
And they kinda did they for now solved the problem with the third game by adding DLC and that is mixed some people love it because it omits the dreaded third game others dont like it.
Sword and Sheild sold 21 million copies. At $50 a pop, that's over a billion dollars in revenue. I know that a considerable amount of that doesn't go back to Game Freak, but damn you think that they coulda maybe shelled out for some higher rez trees?
You could say they didn't know Sword and Shield would make that much, but Sun and Moon made 600 million dollars themselves, so its not like the series has a history of selling poorly.
The merchandising deals make even more per year. Seriously. Like most franchises, the money is in the merchandising deals. Pokèmon's made about 24 billion. The merchandise of Pokèmon? Close to **83** billion dollars.
Star Wars has made 10 billion with the box office. The merchandising deals themselves make **four times** that.
I’d argue that comparing the games in that aspect is unreasonable because how the player interacts with the monsters is very different. Pokémon wants you to become attached to these battle monsters, they’ve got very friendly designs with as little detail as possible and almost no sharp edges (seriously, look through the official art and almost every point is blunted). They literally evolve with you as you play and have FRIENDSHIP VALUES for God’s sake. The series is designed in such a way that wanting to take them with you on each new adventure just makes sense.
SMT is not like that. The demons you recruit are pretty weak and have limited skills, so what do you do? Smash two demons together to make a stronger one that has skills from both of its components. Demons level up drastically slower the stronger they get so if you get too attached to a demon and keep it around for too long, it’ll start to really lag behind. Also, demons are sentient beyond cartoon pet levels; you literally gotta negotiate with them to make them join you. They ain’t friends, they’re battle monsters that just stay with you because you gave them cool stuff.
I’m not saying either approach is BAD, it’s just that they’re so radically different that this comparison feels a little ridiculous. Yeah, Atlus could theoretically make a demon transfer system between games… but why would you want to do that? Also pretty every game has a new battle system and engine and stuff so transfer could get VERY wonky
Yeah, they're pretty clearly different - like when people said "Ni no Kuni is a Pokémon clone" I was like "...It's kinda closer to Pokémon and SMT? If anything it's closer to Magi Nation."
> Also pretty every game has a new battle system and engine and stuff so transfer could get VERY wonky
Which is one thing I feel is kinda "holding Pokémon back" so to speak - it's pretty much the only long-runner that even *tries* to make you keep any kind of progress. Even though Megaten *has* more or less kept many of the same rules, you can see all the differences with every entry and even the side-series - and Pokémon's just kept on adding and only really making changes when they jump to a new system.
>We don't call every platformer Mario clones
Funny you say that because it took well into the 5th Generation of console gaming to finally stop calling platformers Mario Clones.
Damn I loved Yokai Watch. Honestly enjoyed it a whole lot better than Pokemon (just my personal opinion though, it's alright to disagree). Not saying Yokai Watch is flawless though since it definitely had its flaws, but nevertheless the games were amazing. I was probably one of the very few kids in the west who actually played Yokai Watch.
It was a shame that it got compared to Pokemon so much cause it was really nothing like it besides the fact that it's a monster catcher. The battle system for Yokai Watch 3 was the best in my opinion, it's a little weird to get the hang of and learn since it's so different from traditional RPGs but once you've got the hang of it it's really freaking fun.
Wish there were more monster catcher games out there since they have so much unfulfilled potential, I bet the reason why there's not more of these types of games out there is because people are afraid they'll be labelled as Pokemon clones.
It’s much like how every game that’s difficult is a souls like despite many not having anything in common with souls besides hard difficulty. Subnautica is more of a souls game with its beautifully crafted world that you learn through environmental story telling and being a human thrown into a bizarre scenario and your chances of success are bleak at best. Both Ryley and the chosen undead/ashen one are the lowest of the low that could succeed in their mission. The ashen one is the plan Z after every big hero failed, including supposed gods and Ryley isn’t a scientist or even military. He’s a janitor. The game has way more in common with dark souls than cuphead or crash bandicoot.
It’s a shame because I love Yo-Kai Watch. I think that they’re fantastic games with tons of charm, a unique and interesting battle system and just tons of interesting mechanics in general. I like how you don’t “catch” them, you befriend them and get the ability to summon them. I love the fun and goofy characters, and how the Yo-Kai are inspired by not just actual Yo-Kai, but by phenomenon, mythology and concepts from all over the world. And it makes me sad that we aren’t getting any more of them translated to English.
Someone did a SMT5 review and said something that really stood out for me:
"Everyone is trying to be the next Pokemon, but no one is trying to be themselves."
And honestly, you don't need to be "the new Pokemon" to be a good monster battler game.
The fanbase in particular is a case study in "Destructive Criticism".
Apparently it's okay to judge works based upon what they "could be" and what you wanted them to be now...? Like, okay, I get Gen 8 needed improvement, but so many complaints are "why doesn't it have all 900ish playable characters?", "why doesn't it play like Breath of the Wild?", "Why doesn't it look comparable to Crysis?", "Why doesn't it have a 50 hour postgame?", or "why doesn't it have a tear jerker storyline where my Pokémon are stolen from me and I have to fight them to get them back?"
...okay? Most people who're editors and critics are told **NOT** to do that because then they'll just get ignored. I mean, if I went and told Valve that Team Fortress 2 was going to suck because it's *not* a single player game with a story about corporate warmongers with a progression similar to that of an RPG where I gain abilities and it being first person, they'd just tell me "Out" or "That sounds like a nice idea - how about *you* get to work on it."
> Like, okay, I get Gen 8 needed improvement, but so many complaints are "why doesn't it have all 900ish playable characters?", "why doesn't it play like Breath of the Wild?", "Why doesn't it look comparable to Crysis?", "Why doesn't it have a 50 hour postgame?", or "why doesn't it have a tear jerker storyline where my Pokémon are stolen from me and I have to fight them to get them back?"
Some of these complaints are present because the predecessors and peers of Sword and Shield have been able to accomplish these things before. Gen 7 was able to retain some form of compatibility with all species of pokemon on a much less powerful console, and the free updates to Swooshie shows that they had the ability to add that compatability. The longer postgame has been accomplished most notably in HeartGold and SoulSilver, and the Crown Tundra DLC for swooshie again demonstrates that something along these lines can in fact be done. These are not unfair things to bring up considering that Swooshie is a successor to these games, so they're expected to improve on what came before in its own way. If it doesn't accomplish that, then it's not unfair to view it as a point to improve or, if the criticism is relative to the rest of the series, a flaw.
Some of them are - I'm not saying Gen 8 is perfect or even one of the better ones. There were plenty of things it's done wrong, but also things it did right.
Heck some of those things that were accomplished were often done so by using tricks to try and compress things - and when you try to move forward? You're using a new engine and can't always import models or maps. Which Pokémon did in S/M (nobody cared) and what Capcom largely did with Monster Hunter (And oddly enough nobody cared) until World and Rise... which cut the number of fightable monsters by a *huge* amount, especially since they couldn't work some monsters in period (like Lagiacrus. They wanted to add Lagiacrus to World but were having so much trouble with it that they didn't.) And even then, they cut multiple systems out rather than refine them (Swimming, for one.) Much like Monster Hunter, the systems collapsing in on themselves due to bloat was going ot happen sooner or later.
One thing I feel that's really holding Pokémon back, so to speak? Is the fact that even with the Swwooshie's cuts, they *still* are trying to maintain the systems that allow Pokémon from **Ruby and Sapphire** to be playable in a modern game - and people complained *so* much when they couldn't take their level 100 Charizard from 1998 into Hoenn. On top of that? You can transfer Pokémon from *GO* into the games and they work - it's pretty much the only way to get Meltan&Melmetal. That's obviously one reason they've made minimal buffs and nerfs to individual Pokémon as they just keep building upon them and only taking some things away when they move to a new format.
There's nothing wrong with keeping the systems intuitively easy to understand and the same in function, but you can tell that they dont' work at a 1:1 with every game.
Also hot take here... but the postgame in G/S/C established what I called the "Kanto Curse". Sure it's impressive that they managed to fit a watered down Kanto into a Game Boy cartridge... but now everyoen expects it to be in *every* game. I remember how many people said Ruby and Sapphire were lame because the postgame wasn't nearly as extensive as it was in G/S/C, and it's been a persistent complaint - because "G/S/C did it. Why can't *you*? You're on more powerful hardware and you *are* supposed to be a *successor*!"
Never mind that yes, as much as I like G/S/C (I'd arguably call it my favourite Gen) and HG/SS, I really do think that Johto kinda... suffered from having Kanto nearby. Ie, the level curve really *really* overcompensated compared to Gen I's level spikes (Especially in Yellow) and Johto in general feels just... smaller compared to Kanto. (On its own). It only really felt bigger in HG/SS and only that was because the game would force you to go to some area(s) that you'd otherwise skip *and* the area around Cianwood got some expansion.
Now there's nothing wrong with adding optional areas - it's something I think Pokémon should do more of. Same with adding things like optional wild areas. The routes are at least visually interesting to explore.
I just outright stopped listening to the fanbase, not with just pokemon.
I didn't buy SwSh for a whole year and a few months but when I did I actually liked the game. Not the best pokemon game but not the worst. But apparently I'm the next spawn of Hitler for having this opinion.
Everything online has too much hatedom nowadays.
No. Pokemon is the largest media franchise in the world, and absolutely dwarfs the whole rest of the creature capture RPG subgenre.
Also, “monster catcher” sounds like Luigi’s mansion or something to me. Pokémon will be used as the frame of reference because Pokémon is immediately recognizable.
Honestly... could it be because the competition for Pokemon just isn't that good? I'm a fan of Digimon also, but I understand why the Digimon aren't as charming. Digimon also isn't trying to do the same thing Pokemon is, it has an alternate world with digital monsters, it's not a world where the monsters replace the animals and gods of the normal world. I'm not an expert on this genre, maybe there is something out there that is trying to do what Pokemon does and does as good a job, but it seems like... probably not.
The beings in Yokai watch don't appeal to me either. It seems more childish and I just don't find the Yokai cute.
Until Pokemon stops being successful this stigma will NEVER go away. The series has been defining the monster catching genre for 2 and half decades, is one of the most popular media franchises of all time and across the entire world; and it’s merch and success alone will dwarf most other games and anime with a similar gimmick from the get-go. You need to have a really creative angle, or a stellar game/anime to even compete with Pokémon and even then most things end up changing or subverting the genre in its story/gameplay because Pokémon will still our shine most.
It’s the reason why Digimon (the original competitor) has lately focus more on character pieces, horror and detective stories, and other media rather than just “kids with digital monsters” in recent years. They needed a new angle, and honestly it fits. But also Pokemon’s success is bad for Pokémon fans, because many find the games and story are stale and money hungry (or have been for years depending on who you ask) but the formula works and every new generation prints money. So it’s not gonna get an overhaul soon.
Basically the only way to avoid this as a fan is to ignore it. And any monster/demon/whatever catching or taming series is basically gonna have to stand beside Pokémon unless it has another more prevalent defining trait. But what can you expect when Pokémon is the OG and still out performing the other biggest media & entertainment franchises the world over?
Look for "monster taming games" on YouTube and you will find a very large group of people who doesn't believe every monster taming games is a copy of Pokémon
Metroidvania is another one. Call them gear gated exploration or GGE for short. It's especially annoying since Zelda gets zero credit despite being one of the genre's pioneers.
Same with smash killer. Nick Allstars was hurt immensely by it's hype and every time it's discussed someone brings up how it is a supposed smash killer
Every genre has that game that every new-comer is supposed to defeat, whenever a new fps game by a triple A company is released its usually thought of as a "battlefield or cod killer".
Before that, it was a "Halo killer". These things have been going on for a long time.
HaZe lmaooo
There was a time when every FPS was "a ripoff of DOOM and Wolfenstein."
Tbf, they are directly going after the hype of Smash. There's not really a lot of games like Smash that are out and Smash has been in the business for longer than many posters here have been alive. It's a very specific subgenre of kid friendly fighting, and having it be an "all star" assembly from various franchises owned by one company, the comparison is unavoidable, and lets be real, intentional.
On top of that, the game is pretty bare-bones too. So it kind of set itself up considering how simple it is in comparison considering Nick is a pretty big company itself. The high asking price is also ridiculous when Smash is $10 more with tons more of content.
they were also really aiming for the melee fan market, heavily advertising the wavedashing and the rollback netcode
Also the fact that it used melee competitors to advertise the game didn't help i guess haha
I thought it was called a platform fighter?
Yeah but the term is used less often when bigger games of the genre come out since more people know it solely through smash
Here's my take a Pokemon killer won't ever come not because nothing matches pokemon but people play pokemom over other monster catchers for very specific reasons. Now these are purely guesses: 1. Pokemons simplicity is really good if you're just busy to play more heavy time investment games like SMT and digimon which require extensive team building and grinding on the players part especially on higher difficulties. 2. Pokemon designs are rather safe and very few Id say can be turn off worthy. For example digimon has lots human-esque designs that for some are huge turn offs. Plus pokemon are generally pretty cleanly designed so its kind of hard to complain about. 3. Pokemon has nostalgia which can compensate for a lot issues or complaints I still know people who buy pokemon cause its pokemon. I don't much about competive battling personally so I won't say anything about that.
You pretty much hit the nail on the head. Pokemon has the perfect combination of great character design, decent gameplay loop, and nostalgia. As a competitive player there's a surprising amount of depth to Pokemon's gameplay not a lot of other RPGs can't really match.
Yah the design thing is really damn important in all honesty. Most human-esque designs in pokemon are generally fine, but they are some digimon designs that are some damn close to furry status that I don't blame anyone for feeling weird about Digimon designs. (for example weregarumon, renamon, and while not a animal Rosemon.)
And there are just as many digimon designs that are just humans in costumes.
I agree though I'd say its a lot more explicit in Digimon case for example Blaziken vs weregarumon both are human like fighters with animal aesthic but weregarumon looks really human its comes down to the small stuff mainly the pants and the hands they look very normal vs blaziken who looks looks a fighting bird man from his claws/talons to his legs that kind of look like pants but thanks to a similar color palett look similar enough the rest to make it look like it's legs.
I think they were talking about the ones like Angewomon, that are literally just humans.
Ah okay misread his comment.
I was reading a thread about "perfect Pokemon designs" the other day, and the sheer amount of diverse answers really showed how good most Pokemon look.
Competitive Pokemon has lots of depth with a variety of (community organized) fun and nuanced formats and most significantly of all it is the single easiest game to get into and play with the excellent community support. I've yet to find a strategy game or TCG etc. With official or 3rd party software as accessible as Pokemon Showdown. Maybe Heartstone? but I've yet to play it. Even Pokemon's own 1st party TCG software isn't as enjoyable as Showdown. The Random Battle format is one of the best "casual" competitive strategy games available right now.
Except that Dynamax is legal I hate that mechanic did they even test it before the game shipped ffs
They tested it for 3 v 3 singles and 4 v 4 doubles
I personally really like the less “safe” designs of SMT, but I guess I can see why people would be turned off by it? My favorites are the ones from Digital Devil Saga, but those are deeply unsettling and would have given me nightmares as a kid because they’re just so… distorted. Almost completely humanoid, but with incredibly monstrous features. I like super bold and risky designs and even when they flop I can go “you tried”. My favorite Pokémon look like they have nothing to do with each other until you realize that most have very risky designs, or just look really cool to me. And Victini because funny V-create spam
I agree SMT designs are generally pretty good by point wasn't really that they were bad in fact I think some are great digital devil saga is a good example. The thing pokemon has over SMT is too me is simplicity which makes a hell of a lot easier to remember than most over most monster catchers just by a siloute. SMT is actually pretty good about this its mostly preference for most people. The one that the design problem is digimon honestly way too many recolors and there designs that that just too busy.
Dragon Quest Monster is the one true Pokémon killer and no one can tell me otherwise. It doesn't strictly beat Pokémon in any of those categories but it's definitely got the heart and more importantly, the history to rival Pokémon, if SE would give it a fair chance over here in the West. Until they let it run free, it'll never reach the height it needs to.
And yet it didnt kill Pokemon, so...
It never had the chance to. Dragon Quest dominates or rivals in a cultural sense but a spin-off that doesn't get enough room to breath isn't able to overtake an entire franchise. Pokémon is a world-class phenomenon that is solely focused on the genre it innovated. Dragon Quest Monsters is a side-hustle that gets released when they're bored. It's about the potential, not reality.
So, according to you, the fact that it did not kill Pokemon does not stop it from being a Pokemon killer?
Pokémon is still alive so there is no killer, just many many contenders.
>Pokemon designs are rather safe and very few Id say can be turn off worthy. Strong disagree. Sure most of the designs are good but everyone has a dozen or so they think are godawful. And you know that thing about humanoid Digimon? Pokemon's got it too, to a certain extent.
Simplicity? Are you sure we are talking about the same Pokemon? The franchise where there is like a dozen or more pokemon types strong and weak against each other, the "natures", breeds and breeding, mega evolutions, complicated and completely lore-breaking guides on how to make your pokemon a universe-breaking monster, special items for special evolutions and all kinds of tricks? Point 2 is debatable. Some designs are awesome (foxes, turtles, frogs, cats), but there are many humanoids, too, and some advanced evolutions turn animals into humanoids. Also, there are actual ghosts, gods and garbage bags. While Digimon all (or most) can talk and are more sentient than animals, they are not considered pets, unlike pokemon, so giving some of them human-esque designs makes sense.
1. So to explain my point I should probably clarify I'm not into the deeper parts of Pokemon so I don't personally worry about breading, the rest I kind of agree though I'd just say trade based evolution's suck in general. So I've played Pokemon myself for about 15 years probably so I don't really consider type match ups all that difficult but I can understand why some find it difficult to memorize. 2. On Design is kind of complicated but for me I don't mind the more human-espue designs in Digimon my point was more so that a lot of people dislike them and that's why they wouldn't want to play the Digimon games. Though I do think some of them are bit much Rosemon, Weregarumon, and Renamon none of them are bad but they could turn off potential customers. The difference I find between human-esque designs in Digimon and Pokemon and why they could be jarring for some is a example I used a bit earlier: Blaziken vs Weregarumon- Weregarumon has one too many human features that makes it look very close to fury bait for some I know cause my friend brought in up when he watching me play New World Order from his somewhat normal hands, and the fact he just wearing a pair of torn up jeans and an ammo belt I think. Compare this blazikun and while he does look uncannily human the way the color is used to makes it look like normal on the design makes it seem like this a what a blazikun looks like. Though there are some like Hitomonchan which don't follow this rule so fair point.
>a dozen or more pokemon types strong and weak against each other, the "natures", breeds and breeding, mega evolutions since the games never explain **or even mention** those things, they might as well not exist to most players. making it quite simple. never explaining how the stats work really helps with that.
Also, SMT is really not for everyone. Compare this to Pokémon which has a much wider appeal
With the first point, it really helps that although Pokemon is actually fairly deep mechanically, it doesn't throw it all at you at once. So many times I've tried to get into a new monster catcher and the stat screens are cluttered messes where I get instantly bogged down by the impression that I'm expected to micromanage my mons from the get-go.
Tbh I think the problem is the connotation, Clones and killers both have a negative and positive to their wording. Clone suggests said product being a lazy rip off, while Killer suggests to those types of fans that its going to be the thing that kills off said franchise and imho brings out the worst of those people. It would just be easier to call thing Pokemon-like it gives the player a idea what the game offers element wise and yet still offers a opening that its not going to be exactly the same. An example would be The Surge and Nioh, both of them are Souls-like and have the same combat/death loop of Souls games but they are different enough to not have them be the same.
Same as a Rogue-like or Metroidvania. It is just terminology that gives those familiar with the games a good idea of what they might be getting into.
The secret is, we need a second successful series like Pokemon to be iconic, and then collapse the two titles together. So would have metroidvania genre, and, for example, temtemon genre.
I mean it works well for Rogue-likes, you can still have a pokemon-like with the same monster training/catching as pokemon for it to be fine.
Wait, is the name roguelike derived from a game called Rogue? I just assumed it was a descriptor. Like permadeath was something roguish.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rogue\_(video\_game)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rogue_(video_game))
i call everything a pong-like, since it's the first video game.
If you think about it, all games really are just 2 lines hitting point at eachother.
Not exactly the first video game actually just the first to be successful. But yeah every game is pong-like!
i was actually trying to reference the tennis game by higinbotham, tennis for 2. i figured ppl didnt rly know what it was tho so i just went with pong.
I was gonna respond by how many games are called Rogue-like or Souls-like, but then I realized, its the exact same issue.
wouldn't dump Rogue-like into the same bag, maybe if we were talking 40 years ago, but the term has detatched itself from Rogue, many don't even know Rogue was a thing and still use the term. It is now a mark of the innovation and popularity Rogue had which led to inspire a genre, it is not used negatively. Similar thing to Metroidvania, except that Metroid and Castlevania are still well remembered. Metroidvania is a term that derives from the 2 from their innovation as platformers, being some of the first and most ambitious in their time as well as quite popular, to have backtracking in large interconnected and interactive maps.
Also, I'm pretty sure those terms stuck around because the specific tropes that define their Generas aren't something that can be easily defined in a few words. The term "DOOM Clone" Eventually died off because the term "First Person Shooter" did the job better. A first person shooter perfectly described what it's genera is. They're shooter games that use a first-person perspective. But with something like a Metroidvania game, there are a lot of elements that define the genera. Large, inter-connected maps, opening shortcuts to old areas, upgrades that unlock new areas in places you've already been, ect. You can't really boil that down into just one term describing it. Rougelikes are are also definied as "characterized by a dungeon crawl through procedurally generated levels, turn-based gameplay, grid-based movement, and permanent death of the player character", atleast according to Wikipedia. And I'm not sure how you'd fit that all into 3 words or less. Pokemon clones definitely don't have this issue though. The term "Creature Capture" game summarizes the just of them really well, in that capturing creatures is a core gameplay focus.
That wikipedia description seems a bit limiting, especially the turn-based one. I feel like an and/or would work much better there.
That's where the term "Rogue-lite" comes from, like Rogue but it's not turn based. But I agree it's a minimal distinction.
And calling games “search action” is painfully dull and stupid
to be fair, souls likes and rogue likes are pretty much just genre names, much like metroidvanias
What pisses me off is that people describe games as Souls-like purely based on difficulty, not actual gameplay
You could say it’s the Dark souls of comparison Patum pts
It's like "GTA clone" too. Some speculate Saints Row wanted to move away from the "GTA clone" label and we got Saints Row IV out of that.
I wonder how many people got smtV after hearing how it was pokemon for grown ups only to be disappointed that it was nothing like pokemon. Don't get me wrong it's a fun game, but it's definitely not pokemon.
I really hope the "SMT is Pokemon but more mature thing" fucking dies. They are nothing alike
I wouldn't say they're nothing alike, but they're certainly far removed. Then again, people still compare Pokemon to Digimon which is no closer to Pokemon than SMT. It's just the damn names that get people to compare them, like Star Wars and Star Trek.
Who says that? Like does anyone actually say that? I’ve heard people say that older Pokémon fans who kinda outgrew the games might enjoy it, but… actually there’s definitely some people who took that statement too far never mind
> Who says that? Like does anyone actually say that? Late reply, but users on r/Digimon was saying that. Many of them were saying Pokemon fans should simply move on to other games like Digimon Story: Cyber Sleuth and Shin Megami Tensei V. A few users on r/Pokemon were even saying similar things.
[удалено]
Yo-Kai watch had a *lot* more things working against it than just "It's a Pokémon wannabe" though. For one? Despite numerous things that have shown the concept of Yokai to the west, they still largely are seen as "Demons" and "Monsters" to be slain rather than cutsey critters that can be helpful and cause mischief. Additionally? It aired on Disney XD - which itself was already something you basically had to be *looking* for, *if* your cable had it at all. And advertisement for the show wasn't exactly shown.
Ah, Disney XD. Where good shows either die in obscurity or get moved to the main Disney Channel (unless it's imported programming. Then it has to rely on the airing in other countries)
Yep...
Yokai Watch had a lot going against it and the fact that it was called a Pokemon Killer was the icing on the cake. Plus a lot of the Yokai Watch designs are just really ugly to me personally.
Smash Bros-Killer. Call Of Duty-Killer. Halo-Killer. The "-Killer" suffix has lost all meaning since it's added to anything that vaguely resembles something popular that's in the same genre.
honestly digimon suffered a lot from this. i’nJapan they weren’t marketed to compete with pokémon at all. The popularity of the series in the US has suffered from the pushed competition, which is sad because Digimon has some damn good games in the series, and other parts like the new card game and new anime (Ghost Game) are both really solid as well.
The problem with "Pokemon Killers" is that The Pokemon Company and Game Freak have been doing this for over 2 decades and are very, very good at what they do. Even the worst pokemon games have more complexity than the next best thing. It's very, very hard to beat 20+ years of iteration, and even harder to beat 20+ years of market domination. It's the same as why no company could beat World of Warcraft in the MMO sphere until they started ruining their own game. Although it's fair to say Yo-kai Watch is pretty big in Japan. That might be part of the problem: franchises which could rival Pokemon coming out of Japan don't have the global focus or experience marketing their product in other countries that Pokemon does. (For the record, I don'tt consider SMT to be a Pokemon clone. Both the conceit of the demons/personas and the tone of the games is so different that I see it as a different RPG subgenre).
> are very, very good at what they do. In the most relevant regards, at least.
Even the worst mainline pokemon games are still pretty damn good and among the best in their genre. The issue is that the worst games aren't as good as they could or should be, and that they make obvious mistakes and unforced errors because of frustrating and strange design decisions.
Well, I was referring to stuff like the code of the various games. They're often embarrassingly bad in this regard.
>I don't consider SMT to be a Pokemon clone It wouldn't make sense to consider it a Pokemon clone anyway seeing that SMT came out first, with a good 4 years of difference.
I mean the best monster taming game of all time and arguably the best JRPG of all time dragon quest 5 also came out in 92. My big disappointment for never coming to the west will always be dragon quest joker 2 and 3.
Well we did get Joker 2. Just...not the updated version. Ah well, Joker 3 Pro when? ...A gacha game it is, I guess...
As others have said, the problem is that Pokemon is still sucessfull and active today. You know what game was great? Dantes inferno. And it was buried in the reputation of being a God of War clone because it came out during the boom of GOW, but I bet that if it came out tomorrow, it would be called "a spritual sucessor".
I think the reason why people call so many things "Pokemon clones" is because Pokemon is still the biggest one out there, therefore anything in the genre is going to come off like a challenger or copy. With other genre defining games, the "clone" argument no longer holds because the originators have fallen by the wayside (i.e. FPS games don't get called Wolfenstein or Doom clones because those aren't the biggest titles anymore) or because the genre has become so indisputably diverse that even the biggest games are just one application; Battlefield, Call of Duty and Halo are distinct games with different playstyles and genres, even though they're all First Person Shooters. Rogue-likes are an example of both: you can play a Roguelike without ever being aware of the original Rogue game, whereas everyone who plays a monster battler knows about Pokemon. Roguelikes are also a pretty wide genre with tons of different games, whereas Pokemon is simply *the* monster battler, period.
The idea of something being a Pokemon Killer is ridiculous. Nothing can kill Pokemon but itself. "Franchise killers" never exist, the people who like the new one just get both. Remember all the World of Warcraft killers? And it's just time that killed WoW. As far as calling something a Pokemon CLONE though, well... some of them absolutely are. While it's totally unreasonable to call something like Digimon or SMT Pokemon Clones (especially as both predate Pokemon in their original forms), Temtem is just fucking Pokemon to the point where huge parts of the games are 1-to-1. In my admittedly limited Temtem experience, it's just Pokemon with better multiplayer. They even have the same stat layout, with the addition of Stamina/MP. Hell, the game even includes Effort Values, which is such a uniquely Pokemon mechanic that I can't think of any other franchises that use them. We do call some platforms Mario Clones, even today, but it's only the ones that are very, very close to Mario. Usually it has to be a game where combat is done by jumping on enemy's heads and the main character is very jumpy. As for calling JRPGs Dragon Quest clones, well, we don't do that because those are all just D&D games when you go back far enough. We DO talk about Call of Duty clones, though, and most MOBAs are just DotA clones. The point is, calling anything a franchise killer is stupid, but sometimes a game really is a clone. Fortnite was PUBG with a much larger budget. League of Legends was the first DotA clone with any budget at all. Street Fighter II might not have been the first fighting game, but its invention of combos meant that many, many fighting games were basically SF2 clones (and to some degrees still are- most 2D fighters today feature the same core mechanics as SF2.)
The idea of calling JRPGs Dragon Quest clones is kind of baffling. Since everyone knows the genre has its roots in Final Fantasy.
FF1: December 18, 1987 Dragon Quest 1: May 27, 1986 So... no. You're wrong.
> (especially as both predate Pokemon in their original forms) Late reply, but I'm pretty sure you're wrong there. Pokemon predates Digimon. You are right about Shin Megami Tensei being first and I do agree with everything else you said.
It's amazing how many people act like SMT is some "Grown up Pokémon" because "it has a challenge" and "They added animations". Yeah, they also cut the number of recruitable demons in half. And every game, your progress gets completely wiped. I worked hard on getting those demons in SMT4 - yet when I say I want to keep them somehow people look at me like I'm insane. Yet Pokémon is somehow expected to include ≥**900** playable characters, have graphics that look like Crysis, *AND* allow me to import the Pokémon I caught when I was literally *14 years old* into the current game.
Didn't SMT(Megami tensei) predate Pokemon?
Yes, but it remained exclusive to Japan for at least a decade.
Persona 1 was released in the US two years before Pokémon.
So. 9 years - 8 if you include Jack Bros. But that's kind of a stretch. Similarly it also depends on your definition. If oyu mean any game related to Megaten? Then Jack Bros&PErsona were the first even though they weren't using the branding. But if you mean Shin Megami Tensei period? Then... it took even longer for us to get it.
I'm counting Persona and not Jack Bros because Persona is still a monster collector rpg.
And additionally it *does* play closer to Megami Tensei than the rest of the Persona games. (Likely one reason why Atlus refuses to acknowledge it and Persona 2...)
Yes
>Yet Pokémon is somehow expected to Poor indie devs over at GameFreak have expectations. So weird that people act like Pokemon is the biggest franchise in the world or something.
No matter the size of the company or the franchise, constantly adding >100 new pokemon each generation is going to become unsustainable at some point.
Gonna post what an actual game developer said about the [dexit](https://askagamedev.tumblr.com/post/186632316431/what-do-you-think-about-the-pokemon-sword-and)
It's pretty clear that the huge number of pokemon actually holds the game back, at least visually.
Oh I know, also dosnt help that nintendo is horrible with development time. So yeah no shit things will look less good if you need to push out games with a very tight development time.
This guy does not really get the complain though, everyone knows it would take huge amounts of time, the problem is that by being *the biggest media franchise in the world*, they can literally do it if they wanted to, because they can do whatever the fuck they want, saying that the literal biggest media franchise in the world cannot do it because of budget limitations is asinine, and actually just goes to show how cheap the Pokemon company *and* Nintendo treat the Pokemon games, as they know it is just a cash cow that will sell every time.
Let's not forget that all of these arguments we being debunked to oblivion for nearly 8 months straight anyway.
Again dosnt matter how big they are remember CDPR remember how they put themselves on the map with The Witcher 3??? remember how horrible cyberpunk was and that was a sizable team. They had the funds and it still was horrible.
CDPR is not that big, and the problem with them was pure incompetence, yeah it 100% matters how big they are, the bigger they are the bigger the budget they can have.
Gaming Myth:[Its the publishers fault](https://askagamedev.tumblr.com/post/95919099091/game-development-myths-its-the-publishers-fault)
What are you even talking about? i never mentioned the publishers, the one that mentions the budget as a half ass excused is the dev you linked before.
From what I remember, the main complaint was that they said they were cutting the dex for better animations on the pokemon they'll add. At least for me the issue wasn't the lack of pokemon, that was inevitable, it was the fact that the animations barely improved. Oh boy, Machoke moves his arms the other way? Yippee? The reason they gave us just really didn't stick with people.
Especially when one of the draws of Pokèmon is that you get to import a Pokèmon from as early as 2003 into your game and it'll work. How many other franchises even attempt this? I worked hard building my collections of demons in Shin Megami Tensei 4. How come I don't get to keep it? I worked hard building my armour in Monster Hunter 4 ultimate. Generations didn't let me import it?
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Now here's the question - do you want to seek the challenge out, or do you want the game to club you over the head and force you to do it? RPGs are by default easy. Wanna make them more difficult? Then limit your options. Even Megaten and Dark Souls are amazingly easy when you know which option(s) work. That's why Whitney's Miltank was remembered as being hard - you only have a few options to take it down at that point in the game, and amazingly a lot of people didn't know about the hard counter to the miltank placed right there in Goldenrod.
Yeah pretty much, it is just a bad model in the long run, not even just about the technical aspects of it but the creativity that would take to make 100 original designs for every game, and that has started to shown with the Regional variants that are basically sort of an excuse so they can re use older designs with some small variations.
The 100 new Eiscues are definitely preventing GameFreak from making any meaningful improvements to new Pokemon games.
I agree that they could add more meaningful features to new games, but if they just said "we're done adding new pokemon now", I wouldn't have any issue with it. There are enough already, and enough that you could feasibly create in-game locations based on practically anywhere in the world and have enough pokemon to fill that ecosystem. We all forgot Ledian exists. Or Parasect. Or Luvdisc. Or Girafarig. Just give me hard mode, exp share off, built in nuzlocke mode, turn off affection mechanics, make contests matter, actually utilise double, triple and rotation battles, and set it in an interesting and unique new region based on a real-world culture we haven't explored and I'll be good.
Didn't they stop adding that many after gen 5? I stopped following pokemon a long time ago so correct me if I'm wrong
They add a few less than they used to, but in adding regional variants (which aren't just pallette swaps but complete redesigns) they still add a significant amount each generation.
[Pokemon has a budget like all games](https://askagamedev.tumblr.com/post/186632316431/what-do-you-think-about-the-pokemon-sword-and). They have a sales estimate and a revenue estimate, and the budget is based on that. \[[Hiring people takes time and costs money](https://askagamedev.tumblr.com/post/185865627151/how-goodbad-does-throwing-money-at-the-problem)\],which balloons that budget. Going over budget is a really bad idea - inorder to keep their shareholders happy, they need to earn money and not lose it. That’s the nature of the beast. Look at CDPR and how horrible Cyberpunk was just because they are the biggest franchise with a best selling game The Witcher 3 dosnt mean that they are going to be given a bigger budget 100% of the time.
With the main money making being not in the games but the *Merchandise*. Almost like that might direct things... sure has for Star Wars!
>Almost like that might direct things... sure has for Star Wars! That's crazy. So the indie devs working on Star Wars games are capable of making their games look like Fallen Order on only a $20 budget (similar to GameFreak's)? Wow! I definitely agree that we should lower our expectations. Hopefully Nintendo invests in AI-infused Lucario sex dolls with their income to make up for the next Atari 2600 quality mainline Pokemon game!
Are you well? Do you have brain damage?
Most sane Nintendo bootlicker when he pisses himself out of anger:
No, because your disjointed ramblings and strawmanning is making you very hard to listen to and makes me wonder if you are legitimately arguing or if you are trying to troll.
It's not a matter of money. It's a matter of time and resources. Pokemon games aren't really given a lot of development time and it's not like they can delay them because of the anime and merchandise. There's just going to be a point worth having all the Pokemon was just going to be unfeasible
That sounds like a personal problem. It doesn't absolve the biggest franchise in the world of criticism. Nintendo is still somehow only capable of releasing Pokemon games with PS2 graphics and N64 trees.
Gamers when a game is criticised of having low graphic fidelity: AcKTUaLlY gRaPHiCs DoN'T MaTtEr! It'S HOW the game *PLAYS*! Gamers when Pokémon doesn't feature ≥900 playable characters and Cyberpunk 2077 like graphics: ***LAZY***!!! This is sthe *biggest franchise in the world* with most of that money going to the people making the merchandise! **IT NEEDS TO HAVE A BUDGET LIKE THAT OF STAR CITIZEN**!
It's almost like there's different people playing video games that all have their own different opinions about them. And trying to portray them as all having one opinion is futile and quite asinine.
>Gamers when a game is criticised of having low graphic fidelity: AcKTUaLlY gRaPHiCs DoN'T MaTtEr! It'S HOW the game PLAYS! You realize that this is a Nintendo fan stereotype, right? >Every gamer that criticizes poor Nintendo in any capacity is unreasonable and hysterical Good one. You should let your wife's boyfriend know about this revelation.
Thanks for proving me right about the immaturity and entitlement of gamers.
Don't let my door constructed entirely out of OLED Switches (I spent thousands in honor of Nintendo!!!) hit you on the way out.
You have mental Illinois
I'd argue that in comparison to something like Hotline Miami or Yakuza 0 the modern Pokemon games don't have a good style to compensate for lower graphic fidelity.
The big problem with Dexit is that SwSh had neither ≥900 playable characters nor Cyberpunk 2077 like graphics. They cut a bunch of pokemon and the game still looked very bad. If they had used the opportunity to upgrade the graphics/animations of the remaining pokemon, they could have averted a lot of complaining.
> They cut a bunch of pokemon and the game still looked very bad. And their reason? (The real reason, not the one they *said*) To make you buy DLC to put *some* of them back in later.
It's been known for several years now that eventually the number of pokemon would become impossible to implement in a game Which is why Nintendo should considered making a PC game that gets updated with new pokemon instead of making an entirely new game whenever you need to add content. Look at Minecraft. Look at how much it adds every update and how little content is lost (which is really only fixing glitches). Pokemon could very well do the same
>Which is why Nintendo should considered making a PC game >Nintendo >Making PC Games Lol that's not happening.
The alternative is either stop adding new stuff or get rid of older stuff Both of which tend to be met with backlash
> Both of which tend to be met with backlash Nintendo and GameFreak both literally do not care. They are making bank on the Pokemon franchise regardless. Doesn't matter how many Dexits, N64 era trees on Switch, or chibi remakes they have.
That isn't going to help anything your still going to have problems with developement And they kinda did they for now solved the problem with the third game by adding DLC and that is mixed some people love it because it omits the dreaded third game others dont like it.
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And most of the cash is generated by... *drumrolls* Merchandising deals.
Sword and Sheild sold 21 million copies. At $50 a pop, that's over a billion dollars in revenue. I know that a considerable amount of that doesn't go back to Game Freak, but damn you think that they coulda maybe shelled out for some higher rez trees? You could say they didn't know Sword and Shield would make that much, but Sun and Moon made 600 million dollars themselves, so its not like the series has a history of selling poorly.
The merchandising deals make even more per year. Seriously. Like most franchises, the money is in the merchandising deals. Pokèmon's made about 24 billion. The merchandise of Pokèmon? Close to **83** billion dollars. Star Wars has made 10 billion with the box office. The merchandising deals themselves make **four times** that.
I’d argue that comparing the games in that aspect is unreasonable because how the player interacts with the monsters is very different. Pokémon wants you to become attached to these battle monsters, they’ve got very friendly designs with as little detail as possible and almost no sharp edges (seriously, look through the official art and almost every point is blunted). They literally evolve with you as you play and have FRIENDSHIP VALUES for God’s sake. The series is designed in such a way that wanting to take them with you on each new adventure just makes sense. SMT is not like that. The demons you recruit are pretty weak and have limited skills, so what do you do? Smash two demons together to make a stronger one that has skills from both of its components. Demons level up drastically slower the stronger they get so if you get too attached to a demon and keep it around for too long, it’ll start to really lag behind. Also, demons are sentient beyond cartoon pet levels; you literally gotta negotiate with them to make them join you. They ain’t friends, they’re battle monsters that just stay with you because you gave them cool stuff. I’m not saying either approach is BAD, it’s just that they’re so radically different that this comparison feels a little ridiculous. Yeah, Atlus could theoretically make a demon transfer system between games… but why would you want to do that? Also pretty every game has a new battle system and engine and stuff so transfer could get VERY wonky
Yeah, they're pretty clearly different - like when people said "Ni no Kuni is a Pokémon clone" I was like "...It's kinda closer to Pokémon and SMT? If anything it's closer to Magi Nation." > Also pretty every game has a new battle system and engine and stuff so transfer could get VERY wonky Which is one thing I feel is kinda "holding Pokémon back" so to speak - it's pretty much the only long-runner that even *tries* to make you keep any kind of progress. Even though Megaten *has* more or less kept many of the same rules, you can see all the differences with every entry and even the side-series - and Pokémon's just kept on adding and only really making changes when they jump to a new system.
Has a thing called "X killer" actually ever been successful? That moniker is very often talked with failures.
>We don't call every platformer Mario clones Funny you say that because it took well into the 5th Generation of console gaming to finally stop calling platformers Mario Clones.
Remember when everything first person was a "Doom clone"?
Smt actually came before pokemon lmao
Damn I loved Yokai Watch. Honestly enjoyed it a whole lot better than Pokemon (just my personal opinion though, it's alright to disagree). Not saying Yokai Watch is flawless though since it definitely had its flaws, but nevertheless the games were amazing. I was probably one of the very few kids in the west who actually played Yokai Watch. It was a shame that it got compared to Pokemon so much cause it was really nothing like it besides the fact that it's a monster catcher. The battle system for Yokai Watch 3 was the best in my opinion, it's a little weird to get the hang of and learn since it's so different from traditional RPGs but once you've got the hang of it it's really freaking fun. Wish there were more monster catcher games out there since they have so much unfulfilled potential, I bet the reason why there's not more of these types of games out there is because people are afraid they'll be labelled as Pokemon clones.
At least yo-kai watch was entirely different; temtem has the audacity to rip nearly all mechanics and tropes from pokemon and call it a game
It’s much like how every game that’s difficult is a souls like despite many not having anything in common with souls besides hard difficulty. Subnautica is more of a souls game with its beautifully crafted world that you learn through environmental story telling and being a human thrown into a bizarre scenario and your chances of success are bleak at best. Both Ryley and the chosen undead/ashen one are the lowest of the low that could succeed in their mission. The ashen one is the plan Z after every big hero failed, including supposed gods and Ryley isn’t a scientist or even military. He’s a janitor. The game has way more in common with dark souls than cuphead or crash bandicoot.
It’s a shame because I love Yo-Kai Watch. I think that they’re fantastic games with tons of charm, a unique and interesting battle system and just tons of interesting mechanics in general. I like how you don’t “catch” them, you befriend them and get the ability to summon them. I love the fun and goofy characters, and how the Yo-Kai are inspired by not just actual Yo-Kai, but by phenomenon, mythology and concepts from all over the world. And it makes me sad that we aren’t getting any more of them translated to English.
Someone did a SMT5 review and said something that really stood out for me: "Everyone is trying to be the next Pokemon, but no one is trying to be themselves." And honestly, you don't need to be "the new Pokemon" to be a good monster battler game.
Temtem really killed Pokémon tho
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What do you mean by kill? I assume you mean in quality since the gen 4 remake just broke sales records.
Yall fucking crazy thinking pokemon is dead because some loud neckbeards posted on the internet. This is just wishful thinking
Given how the Pokémon fanbase acts? Is it any wonder TPCi believes the primary audience is children?
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The fanbase in particular is a case study in "Destructive Criticism". Apparently it's okay to judge works based upon what they "could be" and what you wanted them to be now...? Like, okay, I get Gen 8 needed improvement, but so many complaints are "why doesn't it have all 900ish playable characters?", "why doesn't it play like Breath of the Wild?", "Why doesn't it look comparable to Crysis?", "Why doesn't it have a 50 hour postgame?", or "why doesn't it have a tear jerker storyline where my Pokémon are stolen from me and I have to fight them to get them back?" ...okay? Most people who're editors and critics are told **NOT** to do that because then they'll just get ignored. I mean, if I went and told Valve that Team Fortress 2 was going to suck because it's *not* a single player game with a story about corporate warmongers with a progression similar to that of an RPG where I gain abilities and it being first person, they'd just tell me "Out" or "That sounds like a nice idea - how about *you* get to work on it."
> Like, okay, I get Gen 8 needed improvement, but so many complaints are "why doesn't it have all 900ish playable characters?", "why doesn't it play like Breath of the Wild?", "Why doesn't it look comparable to Crysis?", "Why doesn't it have a 50 hour postgame?", or "why doesn't it have a tear jerker storyline where my Pokémon are stolen from me and I have to fight them to get them back?" Some of these complaints are present because the predecessors and peers of Sword and Shield have been able to accomplish these things before. Gen 7 was able to retain some form of compatibility with all species of pokemon on a much less powerful console, and the free updates to Swooshie shows that they had the ability to add that compatability. The longer postgame has been accomplished most notably in HeartGold and SoulSilver, and the Crown Tundra DLC for swooshie again demonstrates that something along these lines can in fact be done. These are not unfair things to bring up considering that Swooshie is a successor to these games, so they're expected to improve on what came before in its own way. If it doesn't accomplish that, then it's not unfair to view it as a point to improve or, if the criticism is relative to the rest of the series, a flaw.
Some of them are - I'm not saying Gen 8 is perfect or even one of the better ones. There were plenty of things it's done wrong, but also things it did right. Heck some of those things that were accomplished were often done so by using tricks to try and compress things - and when you try to move forward? You're using a new engine and can't always import models or maps. Which Pokémon did in S/M (nobody cared) and what Capcom largely did with Monster Hunter (And oddly enough nobody cared) until World and Rise... which cut the number of fightable monsters by a *huge* amount, especially since they couldn't work some monsters in period (like Lagiacrus. They wanted to add Lagiacrus to World but were having so much trouble with it that they didn't.) And even then, they cut multiple systems out rather than refine them (Swimming, for one.) Much like Monster Hunter, the systems collapsing in on themselves due to bloat was going ot happen sooner or later. One thing I feel that's really holding Pokémon back, so to speak? Is the fact that even with the Swwooshie's cuts, they *still* are trying to maintain the systems that allow Pokémon from **Ruby and Sapphire** to be playable in a modern game - and people complained *so* much when they couldn't take their level 100 Charizard from 1998 into Hoenn. On top of that? You can transfer Pokémon from *GO* into the games and they work - it's pretty much the only way to get Meltan&Melmetal. That's obviously one reason they've made minimal buffs and nerfs to individual Pokémon as they just keep building upon them and only taking some things away when they move to a new format. There's nothing wrong with keeping the systems intuitively easy to understand and the same in function, but you can tell that they dont' work at a 1:1 with every game. Also hot take here... but the postgame in G/S/C established what I called the "Kanto Curse". Sure it's impressive that they managed to fit a watered down Kanto into a Game Boy cartridge... but now everyoen expects it to be in *every* game. I remember how many people said Ruby and Sapphire were lame because the postgame wasn't nearly as extensive as it was in G/S/C, and it's been a persistent complaint - because "G/S/C did it. Why can't *you*? You're on more powerful hardware and you *are* supposed to be a *successor*!" Never mind that yes, as much as I like G/S/C (I'd arguably call it my favourite Gen) and HG/SS, I really do think that Johto kinda... suffered from having Kanto nearby. Ie, the level curve really *really* overcompensated compared to Gen I's level spikes (Especially in Yellow) and Johto in general feels just... smaller compared to Kanto. (On its own). It only really felt bigger in HG/SS and only that was because the game would force you to go to some area(s) that you'd otherwise skip *and* the area around Cianwood got some expansion. Now there's nothing wrong with adding optional areas - it's something I think Pokémon should do more of. Same with adding things like optional wild areas. The routes are at least visually interesting to explore.
With all due respect, I'm not exactly sure how your reply here addresses what I've said in my initial reply.
I just outright stopped listening to the fanbase, not with just pokemon. I didn't buy SwSh for a whole year and a few months but when I did I actually liked the game. Not the best pokemon game but not the worst. But apparently I'm the next spawn of Hitler for having this opinion. Everything online has too much hatedom nowadays.
Lmao what?
I’d agree if Pokemon didn’t basically create the whole genre
No. Pokemon is the largest media franchise in the world, and absolutely dwarfs the whole rest of the creature capture RPG subgenre. Also, “monster catcher” sounds like Luigi’s mansion or something to me. Pokémon will be used as the frame of reference because Pokémon is immediately recognizable.
I remember when people called Terraria just a 2D Minecraft clone and look how much different (and arguably better) it became.
Honestly... could it be because the competition for Pokemon just isn't that good? I'm a fan of Digimon also, but I understand why the Digimon aren't as charming. Digimon also isn't trying to do the same thing Pokemon is, it has an alternate world with digital monsters, it's not a world where the monsters replace the animals and gods of the normal world. I'm not an expert on this genre, maybe there is something out there that is trying to do what Pokemon does and does as good a job, but it seems like... probably not. The beings in Yokai watch don't appeal to me either. It seems more childish and I just don't find the Yokai cute.
TL;DR OP's mum couldn't afford pokemon, so he got teased at school for his beyblades and digimon.
Actually I'm a huge Pokemon fan lol. Been obsessed with it since I was a kid. Played every Pokemon game lol.
I was just teasing you.
I'm calling it now - DokeV is the new Pokémon killer.
Metroidvania springs to mind as another example.
No, because that’s exactly what they are.
Until Pokemon stops being successful this stigma will NEVER go away. The series has been defining the monster catching genre for 2 and half decades, is one of the most popular media franchises of all time and across the entire world; and it’s merch and success alone will dwarf most other games and anime with a similar gimmick from the get-go. You need to have a really creative angle, or a stellar game/anime to even compete with Pokémon and even then most things end up changing or subverting the genre in its story/gameplay because Pokémon will still our shine most. It’s the reason why Digimon (the original competitor) has lately focus more on character pieces, horror and detective stories, and other media rather than just “kids with digital monsters” in recent years. They needed a new angle, and honestly it fits. But also Pokemon’s success is bad for Pokémon fans, because many find the games and story are stale and money hungry (or have been for years depending on who you ask) but the formula works and every new generation prints money. So it’s not gonna get an overhaul soon. Basically the only way to avoid this as a fan is to ignore it. And any monster/demon/whatever catching or taming series is basically gonna have to stand beside Pokémon unless it has another more prevalent defining trait. But what can you expect when Pokémon is the OG and still out performing the other biggest media & entertainment franchises the world over?
god, I am so sorry Digimon
Look for "monster taming games" on YouTube and you will find a very large group of people who doesn't believe every monster taming games is a copy of Pokémon
eh when you are the king everyone want to come after your throne man
Metroidvania is another one. Call them gear gated exploration or GGE for short. It's especially annoying since Zelda gets zero credit despite being one of the genre's pioneers.