This has probably been discussed already... But why the fuck

I agree there should be difficulty settings but the most famous RPG franchise (final fantasy) usually doesn't have these so it's not really unheard of.

>>29013807
Because that requires effort and adult fans apparently don't exist according to them.

Haha I don't know

>>29013807
>Just noticed you barely made it out of that cave, let's battle
This never happened. Why do people keep acting like this ever happened when it didn't.
You battle Blue in the following locations:

-Professor Oak's laboratory (Tutorial fight, your starter is at full HP)
-Route 22 (optional battle preceded by two grass patches with weak random encounters)
-Nugget Bridge (immediately after Pokemon center, your party is at full HP)\
-S.S. Anne (May have a weakened party due to trainer battles before it, however you may return to the Pokemon center in Vermillion at any time)
-Pokemon Tower (2nd floor, first encounter. Party is likely at full HP)
-Silph Co. (party is fully healed immediately beforehand)
-Route 22 second encounter (Same as the first except the wild pokemon are now completely negligible. Party is at full HP)
-Champion battle (The only encounter where your party will probably not be at full HP, exactly like every other main series game.)

>>29013947
There's even a place to heal ON the S.S. Anne, isn't there?

>>29013947
The problem is that most players who remember Blue as ambushing you at difficult times is because they were kids when they first played, and didn't properly heal or have decently trained mons

>>29013947
nostalgia is a powerful drug, it blurs your memories and makes you mistake childhood stupidity (not healing at every center, for example) for actual difficulty.

>>29013807
bw2 did have that

it required you to beat the game and connect to other game. it also had a EASY mode from the same method

>>29013947

The S.S Anne one and Silph Co ones can fuck you over if you don't see them coming.

>>29013807
I've never seen Gary ask for a fight after a cave, and if your talking about cerulean, you can visit the Pokemon centre before you go to nugget bridge you know?

>>29014106
SS Anne I can see it. But how does one not heal before entering what couldn't be more obviously a dungeon? Unless of course they're a kid with zero experience who never heals but then this applies to all battles, not just these two.

>>29014106
they literally put a nurse joy before fighting him. even if you aren't expecting you rival, not taking advantage of a heal spot in the middle of a dungeon is childhood stupidity, not actual challenge.

>>29014091
>it required you to beat the game
And there's the problem.

>>29014138
>>29013947

You fucks are missing the point. The point of it is that It's either a totally hard battle that hits you when you're down... or just a breeze to play through. And don't give me that "Play with Nuzlocke rules" bullshit. I shouldn't have to finagle a way to make it a challenge for myself, or get some hacky method of doing it.

Final Fantasy can get away with it, and the like cause the games are moderately challenging. Starting off easy and progressing in difficulty. Pokemon games are just all ease all the time. Only in certain random spots can the difficulty be seen as challenging. And when it is, it's like wtf? C'mon I didn't even get a chance to heal or anything. It's like Game Freaks just stuck those instances in at random and rare times.

>>29014177
It could be unlocked before via key system, but that just makes it even more retarded.

>>29013977
only in FRLG

>>29014203
>The point of it is that It's either a totally hard battle that hits you when you're down
But it's not.
It's a reasonably difficult battle that hits you immediately after you heal your party. The only Blue fight that even has the potential to catch you off guard is the S.S. Anne one.

>>29013947
Nugget Bridge might just be what OP's pic refers to, as if you get out of Mt. Moon and decide to explore north instead of going straight to the pokemon center, you will get ambushed with little indication.

A similar thing can happen in the S.S. Anne. Remember, you don't always have a perfect indication of where the rival fights are your first time playing. If you don't know Gary will battle you in some of these spots, you could very well have a weak team and be forced into a difficult fight.

>>29014203
>The point of it is that It's either a totally hard battle that hits you when you're down... or just a breeze to play through
which he literally explained that the "difficulty" was just pure stupidity coming from the young player since most of the gen 1 battles were pretty easy unless you did something really dumb with your party

As for what OP asked, Pokemon is aimed at children who just got into the franchise (same with the anime, thus retarded Ash) so it would be a dumb idea to lock shit behind difficulty settings or push these new players too much and make them ragequit, based on my own experiences with each gen i played i can safely say they keep a standard, was playing Crystal the other day and i got to the fourth gym using only my starter and a slightly weaker mon for support

>>29014301
I'll give you S.S. Anne. But I'm really having a hard time imagining anybody who just made it out of Mt. Moon doing anything but making a fucking beeline for the Pokemon Center, especially if their party's in as bad a shape as OP's pic implies.

>>29014399
What? You can't see someone assuming that they won't be randomly forced into a battle in the middle of town, and walking around to explore a bridge that appears to still be part of the town?

>>29013947
I swear there was one right after you exit Mt. Moon.

>>29014491
Of course I can see someone walking around to explore town. After they top their party off.

>>29013807
Serena makes my dick hard

>>29014524
Best argument in this thread.

>>29014524
amen

>>29014524
Always been more of a May man myself.

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All this said, there was one rival that ambushed you at the end of a long cave.

>>29014706

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>>29014706
this

>tfw I never had a problem with rivals except for one battle
>tfw the only reason that battle was hard was because it happened in the middle of town after a gym and caught my dumbass 12 yr old brain off-guard
>tfw my dumbass adult brain gets confused by everyone reminiscing about the "hard battles"

Why do people think that 'babbies first rpg' would ever be hard?

>>29014712
Yeah a cave with nothing in it that's difficult to not prep for.

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>Pokemon is too easy!!1!11!!
>t. 20-something who has years of experience in the series and/or memory bank of type matchups, movesets, pokemon and character locations, etc.

Wow, it's almost like Pokemon was originally and still is aimed at 8-12 year old boys, eh?

>>29013807
Pokemon here 'suffers' from being one of Nintendo's main franchises. Nintendo wants to make their games enjoyable by everybody, children and grown ups alike, so making difficult or frustrating games is not in their plans. Other games for the 3DS (e.g. Bravely Default) do have difficulty settings and a more mature plot as well, but they are not nearly as important as pokemon is.

Now, I agree that adding difficulty settings could actually attract more players, but probably GF/Nintendo doesn't want to make some players feel alienated because they couldn't beat the game in hard mode, or maybe they don't want little kids getting frustrated because they set the games in hard without noticing.

There's also the issue of how they would actually make the games harder. Buffing up NPC's levels isn't really a solution since nothing stops you to grind until you can breeze through the game anyways. Not even only improving the AI would work since you are still able to defeat them before they can even move if you grind enough. They would have to add some sort of penalty to grinding (like making the pokemon centers not free) or something like that. Those kind of things can make the game frustrating and led people to stop playing them (probably why they require you to beat the game before unlocking hard mode in B2W2), and that's certainly something GF doesn't want (as Masuda has stated before)

Don't get me wrong. I'd love to have difficulty settings, but I don't think that will happen and I can kinda see why.

>>29015264
>I agree that adding difficulty settings could actually attract more players
It'd probably alienate more players than anything simply because of how retarded most "gamers" of the current age are.
It's why Nintendo tends to place the hard stuff as post game or optional content so the main game can just be fun without the frustration.

>>29015264
It's also pretty clear that they've always wanted the emphasis and attention to be geared towards the socio-interactive aspect regarding the main games rather than shift focus towards the single-player campaign.

Trade evolution, Gen III with Secret Bases, Gen IV with the Underground, the various battle modes introduced in recent Gens, it's always been about freshening the ways you play with other people and that experience.

It's a valid complaint that the single player experience, as it is, is a waste of potential; but it should be acknowledged that Pokemon's game philosophy was never really about that to begin with.

>>29015412
>It's a valid complaint that the single player experience
I wouldn't call it a valid complaint by any means seeing as their main goal was to create a world for the player to explore and search out Pokemon. A challenge isn't really a necessary part of that.

>>29014906
I don't know if you can read, but OP would like there to be the option to play a harder mode, they're not expecting Game Freak to make the games harder period.

>>29013947
Proof that casuals create the worst memes

>>29015568
>I wouldn't call it a valid complaint by any means

yes it is. Previous Pokemon games weren't braindead easy like it currently is. And the campaign is still a large chunk of the game.

>>29015674
>Previous Pokemon games weren't braindead easy like it currently is
You'd be surprised how easy gens 1 to 5 are. Especially 1. Personally I would say that's currently the easiest game followed by Gen 2.

>>29015568
From the perspective of the player base, it can be quite necessary to maintaining their attention.

>>29015674
Pokemon games were always brain dead easy.
The people playing them just got smarter while the games didn't.
None of the early games aged well at all mechanically.

>>29015813
>From the perspective of the player base, it can be quite necessary to maintaining their attention.
Thing is, that would be an extremely small portion of the player base. Most either don't care or get their fill from the competitive environment using ranked battle.
So it's not particularly needed.

>>29013807
>Every rpg, or adventure game I can think of has SOME form of difficulty rating

This is certifiable bullshit. Tons of RPGs don't have a difficulty setting. They're just more difficult than Pokemon by default.

>>29014160

not in the originals

>>29015704
Gen 5 can actually fuck you over.

Remember that they actually had to nerf Ghetsis after a lot of complaints in Japan, he can be called the biggest gate in the franchise without the need of a fake level spike like the one in DP.

Pt is also infamous for its ace trainers after the breeding town and their Pokémon being members of 1 stage lines or middle stage lines, then there is Fantina.

The difficulty on B2W2 still existed through challenge mode giving us Whitney on steroids in the form of Roxie often needing the use of magnemite/Arcanine to defeat her easily and Burgh using a pokemon with the use of a fully evolved third stage using high BP moves.

Seriously hard mode BW has some interesting stuff postgame and outside of sheer force flame orb conkeldurr it actually delivers in a good player experience.

>>29013807
Because, at least in Japan, Pokemon now has to compete with Yokai Watch and mobile games for children's attention. They fear that anything that isn't instant success/reward will lose a kid's attention and make them drop their 3DS for their phone.
Not that Pokemon was ever difficult, but the change in the market has lead to a lot more railroading and helping hands.

>>29013807
It's kind of ironic since gary/blue/green for me was one of the easier rivals

>>29013807
Considering the constant comics about people complaing about reading the nurse joy text it would not be uncommon for some of these people to skip healing from time to time

>>29013947
This. Silver always seemed like the one to pop up unexpectedly to me as a kid. Was not happy about that fight in Azalea Town after beating Bugsy.

>hurrr gary ambushes you when you least expect it xD
Silver and Barry were far worse about that.

>>29013947
YOU DON'T KNOW WHEN HE'S GOING TO FUCKING APPEAR THE FIRST TIME YOU PLAY, COCK WIPE.

>>29014399
Because you know exactly where the Pokemon center is the first time you get to a new town, right?

If you start searching the town top to bottom looking for the center, you're getting Gary's girth.

>>29013807
>inb4 underage furries defend the lack of difficulty setting
>"IT'S JUST A KIDS GAME, TIME TO GROW UP"
please end yourselves

>>29013914
Guess you didn't have a Bran Balst today, huh, Jimbles Notronbo?

Hows your mom, Judles, and your dad, Hh?

>>29016173
You don't, but you can save and reset. Even as a kid I fucking knew this. Even then, that anon mentions how many times you can heal BEFORE you encounter your rival.

>>29015875
wat, yes they do. In RBY (or at least in Yellow) you can heal right fucking before your rival pops up.

>>29016341
How the fuck do you think saving before a fight will help when you don't even know there will be one, retard?

>>29016374
save early, save often

don't mistake your retardation for difficulty

>>29015875
Yes, yes they did.
Either your memory is terrible, or you never actually played them.

>>29014521

you dont know where the pokemon centre is the first time you play through it YOU FUCKING BUFOON

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>>29016396
Forgot to attach the image

I will say that the only real difficulty I've found in pokemon was being caught off guard.
>Second battle with Blue, i didn't realize he'd be there and already be much stronger than my level 7 Charmander.
>Erika, I thought my Charmeleon and Beedrill would be able to win faster than bind and wrap
>Whitney, I had never seen Rollout or Attract before and went in blind
>Chuck, I hadn't encountered Dynamic Punch before and it wrecked me hard
>Clair's Kingdra had only 1 weakness that I had no means of exploiting and it gave no shits about anything on my team
>I went in way underlevelled for Wattson and ended up killing a tonne of Roselia to grind for him
>Flannery landed one good hit with Overheat and I had nothing left to deal with her
But gen 4 onwards i had a much better understanding of the game mechanics and usually entered each situation prepared

replaying Yellow right now and it's just as easy if not easier than XY

the AI is so fucking terrible and the movepools are laughable (Giovani using tail whip or using Dig on my Charizard) kek

>>29016200
you have to fucking walk past it on your way to the bridge. There's literally no way to get there without seeing it

>>29016530
LOOK AT THE MAP OF CERULEAN CITY AGAIN YOU STUPID IDIOT

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>>29016562
are you confusing it with the fucking pokemart?

>>29014514
That's team rocket in yellow.
>>29014399
The problem with the cerulean battle is levels. Blue (and Misty) will most likely be high leveled at that point, wild pokemon before you cross the bridge are low leveled, and getting to the nugget bridge is the only way to escape cerulean.

>>29016578

NO! but if i- but if you go up- and then left- uh-

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>>29013807
Single player experiences in Pokemon games are strictly for world building purposes. Expecting difficulty in the main scenario is like expecting story in Mario Kart.

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>>29016578
>walk from the route
>walk forward
>even if you go up the Pokecenter is fucking impossible to miss
You can't complain about getting reamed by Gary with your team in tatters if you see and proceed to ignore the Pokecenter that you literally can't miss.

>>29015895
>Remember that they actually had to nerf Ghetsis after a lot of complaints in Japan
What

>>29015264
>or maybe they don't want little kids getting frustrated because they set the games in hard without noticing

That's why they should

A) Make them interchangeable in-game via options menu.

and

B) Have another setting which sets the game to 1 difficulty lower automatically if you're having a hard time, which you can set it to prompt you or turn off altogether.

>>29016766
They could also word the difficulty options to cater more to kids. Make easy sound like the default, normal the "challenge", hard the "nearly impossible", etc. some autists would still complain but most experienced players would understand the reason.

>>29016766
/thread

>>29016766
OR you could just play another game instead of wanting easily breakable difficulty from babby's first JRPG.

I don't get this. I don't see Kirby people constantly asking to make the game more difficult.

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>>29017199
Of course there's gonna be a GF white knight apologist that's against an option where literally everyone wins.

>breakable difficulty
There are tons of examples that have interchangeable difficulty levels that work. The tales series for one.

Is it so hard to understand that people can play games for different reasons? Especially with a franchise like pokemon, where there's so many different aspects to it. And people with varying skill levels.

Your argument basically sums up to "if you don't like it don't play it". Why is it a problem for you that people are discussing ways to improve the series for everyone? How can you be THIS autistic?

And before you start spouting shit like "pokemon has always been an easy kids game", again, people have fucking varying skill levels. What's wrong with having something like the challenge mode from BW2 again? Or having battle tower-level AI with better teams & movesets? Nothing. There's no reason to complain because it's an OPTION. You might find OHKO-ing everything in your path to be fun, and we don't care because that's how you have fun. We all have fun in different ways, what's so hard to understand about this?

>>29016435
I've only struggled a bit in pokemon
> Clair and her op kingdra (it's impossible to obtain a STAB SE hit on kingra with out hacking or trade)
> Maylene, My staravia was the only way to get an advantage on her (he was horribley underleved,)
>Crasher wake, Diamond was my first game so i didn't think ground was immune to electric and i tried to swep him with my luxray
>Lenora, Retaliate

>>29017491
>it's impossible to obtain a STAB SE hit on kingra with out hacking or trade
what is the game corner's dratini?

>>29017562
Nice STAB Twister there

>>29016404
you literally just keep walking right and you'll see it, why would you go up

>>29014712
you mean Wally?

>>29017605
To scope out the size of the fucking city to guess where the Pokemon Center is, dumbass.

>>29017655
see >>29016530 >>29016578

>>29017463
>How can you be THIS autistic?
>says after making that post

>You might find OHKO-ing everything in your path to be fun
It works that way in every "challenge mode" you might come up with too, you fucking retard.
Pokemon as enemies are too weak compared to other RPG, you even name Tales while conveniently forget the boss HP go into the 40k there.

Your
>What's wrong with having something like the challenge mode from BW2 again? Or having battle tower-level AI with better teams & movesets?
Doesn't work because you still oneshot them just as easily as you would have in the normal game.

Idiot.

>>29016393
You used to need to save often because of the unknown. Now you don't even need to do that unless you want to switch off the console or catch a legendary

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>>29017696
>It works that way in every "challenge mode" you might come up with too, you fucking retard.

Holy shit, do you seriously believe this? Then why the fuck do we even have a level system? HP? Stats? Why not just have a fucking "win" button every time you enter a battle.

This is the last (You) you're getting out of me. Because it's clear nothing in this world can cure your amount of retardation.

>>29013807
>being ambushed out of the blue when your team is weak is considered "difficulty"

>>29016393
>save after every grass patch/dungeon/before leaving any map(note that you didn't know where is the exit, so you would have to save everytime the screen stopped moving along your character) because of fearing a random rival encounter
I-it's not hard! Y-you are the retard for not doing it!

Also, the first encounter wrecked me up, because I only had a low level starter and a half-dead pokemon that I caught. How the hell should I know that he appears there?

ITT: If you make a single step in the wrong direction as a kid, it's your fault, it's not the game that is hard

Oh yeah, I bet you guys finished Ninja Gaiden as a kid in first try too, right? I mean, if you make a single step in the wrong direction it's your fault, and you are a retard.

>>29017881
gameboys ran on actual batteries back then and you couldn't just plug in a charger when they got low so of course you would save every time you reached a milestone like getting to a new city

>>29017975
Are you trying to tell me that Route 22 is a milestone? Or in S.S. Anne, where you had no idea that was the end of it?

Also, Gameboys had a light indicator of batteries in case you didn't know, so you wouldn't be surprise attacked by batteries running out.

>>29017922
they're not hard though, the point is that every one of those rival encounters is near a healing area except the s.s. Anne one and obviously the champion one
there is no "ambushes you as soon as you leave mt. moon" encounter. I highly doubt that many people went up to nugget bridge as soon as they entered cerulean when game freak deliberately puts pokémon centers near the area you'd enter the town from for the first time in earlier cities.

>>29018025
As stated by the other anon, if you tried to search for a pokemon center in a smart way instead of randomly walking, you would go up first, and then, when you saw the pokemon center, you had to not take a step upwards, because if you did, you would be fucked.

The one in Route 22 is also easy to fuck up new players, since unless you leveled and healed your pokemons before going up, all you would have in the best case, is a starter around lvl 8~9 and 2 shitmons.

>>29013887
Have a (You), faggot. The earlier FF's were hard as balls and even the later games included actual fucking challenges for if the main game was not to your liking.

The closest Pokémon ever comes to a fucking challenge is "Hard" Mode for Gen 5, or the obvious fucking cheating in the Frontier.

>>29018111
>fucking cheating
It's your fault for sucking at frontier and similar facilities.

>>29018111
He was referring to how final fantasy doesn't have difficulty settings, no that final fantasy wasn't hard

>>29013887
>Versilify
I guess I was too busy to notice this

>>29017922
Except there's no "single step" you fucking retard, Cerulean City has a clearly divided passage between the city and the bridge and you pass by the fucking center even.

Stop defending retards.

>>29013807
BW2

>>29017826
>Holy shit, do you seriously believe this?
You seriously believe this is not the case?

Tell me how many Dynamicpunch it takes for a lv30 Machop to kill a lv35 Raticate. Come on.

What's that? ONE? Guessed so.

You're the fucking retard that can't differentiate between Pokemon and other games, not me.

>>29014317
They don't need to lock anything behind difficulty settings. Most RPG do not nowadays. They just offer a hard mode for those who want difficulty. There's no reason Pokémon can't be like that.

Stadium series, the collosuiem series, and Battle Revolution are all difficult because of the limited options and the level capped for Stadium and Battle Revolution. That's the only way for pokemon to be hard. Pokemon series give you a plethora of options to beat the game, and unlike most rpg's, the bosses are subjected to the same effects as the player pokemon. The pokemon single player is more like a bot pvp match more so than anything else. So unless you make the A.I. cheat, the only way pokemon becomes hard if you start limiting the pokemon, the items, and TM's.

>>29016173
No, but using a pokémon center after exiting a cave before exploring a new route is fucking common sense.

Mt. Moon is a reasonably challenging cave when it comes to resource management - there's quite a few trainers and you don't have that many funds to buy potions and stuff, so likely you're pretty exhausted when you exit unless you backtrack to the Pokémon center often. If your initial reflex upon exiting it and finding a new city is not to find a Pokémon center and to save, you losing the rival battle has nothing to do with it being difficult or unexpected, but everything with you being a goddamn six-year-old retard.

>>29018255
>he randomly walks through the city to find shit
>calls other retards

>>29017199
Admittedly, making a Kirby game more difficult requires you to redesign entire levels. Making a Pokémon game more difficult requires you to just change a few teams around. They don't even have to be highly balanced or optimized teams like for the Battle Maison or whatever, just give them some better moves (aside from the gym trainers and E4, a whopping twelve trainers in the game, which should have reasonably optimized movesets).

>>29016766
This. There's literally no counter argument against difficulty setting that can be reajusted at any time.

>>29014906
yeah because coding higher levels into the game and a difficulty mode for lifelong fans of the series would be really fucking hard for gamefreak to do, right? yup. so fucking hard.

>>29015264
>kids putting the game in hard mode by accident
easy, just make normal the default and make it so adults have to go into the settings and change it.

>>29015393
>implying that easy is fun
quite the opposite, even for children
it can get very fucking boring
not saying kids are gonna like bloodborne and shit
but there's nothing wrong with a mario level you die at a few times ffs

>>29013908
What with all the nostalgia pandering then? do the maybe see anyone still playing Pokemon as having not grow up?

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>>29017696

>>29018432
People always claim Pokémon will never have difficulty settings again, or challenging moments in an overall easy game because it's a big Nintendo franchise.
Mario is the best example of how that is bullshit, no matter how piss easy a Mario game is overall there's always a handful of challenging levels.

>>29017975
>gameboys ran on actual batteries back then and you couldn't just plug in a charger when they got low
The fuck are you talking about? I had a gameboy charger and played with it plugged in most of the times.

>>29018068
See, I'll give the Route 22 encounter, it really does come out of nowhere, especially if you're trying to level up your mons a bit before heading on, and you leave the first grass.

Cerulean City, if it messed you up, was your own fault. Mt. Moon was a grind that early in the game, and if you see the pokemon center, and you don't to go straight to it after being weakened from the cave, you deserve to lose. The encounter is right before the bridge. Even your paper-thin "exploring" or "finding the Pokémon center" excuse is laughable, because as seen here >>29016578, you have ample opportunity before the start of the bridge to backtrack and heal.

>>29013947
That second battle is rough if you go straight to it

>>29013908
>>29018445
they are actually not just targeting kids but also young adults that grew during the original anime era and want to play pokemon again but dont have the time or the will to go through something hard. gf provides with an easy as balls game that panders nostalgia and doesnt really require commitment unlike, say, bw2. fifth gen is when the fandom was at its lowest and, therefore, purest. the games were made with thought and hours of extra content, which is why i consider this gen as the best one. i think we'll get another gen like this after the eighth gen. with pokemon go, the casuals returned and i wouldnt be surprised that sm turns out to be in the same shit tier as xy

im fine with lower difficulty because it frees me up to pick whichever pokemon i like, and have as few as i like.

yellow fucking trashed me back when i played it.

>Black2
>make challenge mode unlock after beating e4
>try to start new game with the challenge mode
>you have to erase all data to start new game
>it also erases the "challenge mode" key
WHAT THE FUCK GAMEFREAK

>>29019226
And this is why gen v failed.Pure trash.

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>>29013807
>Muh difficulty
>Muh casual gameplay
yes the games have been watered down but lets investigate why.

>Pokemon Red and Blue came out in 96
>It was a new game with new albeit broken mechanics
>a new idea to most gamers
>lots of at the time unknown features and game elements
Of course the game was difficult as balls we had no idea what was going on we only knew the bare minimum of info about the game. Fast forward to the release of Gold and Silver
>Updated game
>Game difficultl upped after elite four
>two new types to mix up the game
>new moves etc
The games were difficult because again not much was known about the games before they came out but the basics we learned from Red and Blue aided inlearning about Gold and silver
>Gen 3 threw in new pokemon and pokemon abilities
>gameplay was shaken up
This time more was known about the game but the introduction of the abilities added a new level to the gameplay.
>Gen 4 gave the physical special split
>battling, training and raising pokemon was now different to a degree
>more new pokemon and moves
More info about the game before hand made the game a bit easier but the new mechanic added difficulty
>Gen 5 new battle types
>really odd level scaling
To me the difficulty in this game felt forced to the the slow pace and forced use on new unknown typed pokemon.
>Gen 6 We knew about 90% of the game before it came out.
>Mega's, stats and new type was revealed in advance
>changes to the IV and EV's of pokemon made it easier to OP your pokemon via special training.
>exp curve seemed to have been reduced
But we knew basically everything about the games before they came out, years of experience allowed us to pre plan and prepare ourself for the game.
And i'm sure gen 7 will feel the same as Gen 6 because we have been spoonfed so much information about the game before hand.

If you go back and play RBYGSCRSEDPP none of them are actually difficult when you know what you're doing.

>>29019940
>difficulty felt forced

I am confused

>>29019965
It's a game for kids. It shouldn't be difficult. Anything that gives kids trouble is forced

So yeah, if anything they should add a button to skip battles if you lose against them the first time. It's all about making the game more accessible, not less

>>29019940
Let me see if I can decode this clusterfuck of a text wall.

Are you saying that the difficulty of each Pokemon game is dependent on how much information was revealed before its release?

>>29013977
Fuck off underage

>>29013807
The people who care about difficulty make up such a small fraction of the total playerbase that you can't possibly expect to be catered to. Sorry, but you've gotta see the writing on the wall. If stuff like challenge mode was successful and well-received it would have been carried over. But most people didn't care.

>>29020002
>Let me see if I can decode this clusterfuck of a text wall

>Are you saying that the difficulty of each Pokemon game is dependent on how much information was revealed before its release?

Thats a part of it if we know all the types and abilities and battle mecanics we can plan teams to cover all bases etc, if we know basically nothing then we need to learn how the new stuff works.

Heres a quick TL:DR

>The less we know about the game the more difficult it is, the more we know the ore prepared we are.

>>29019987
It's not though. It just stops you from being over leveled

>>29020059
I'm not him, but I'm a committed to playing it as much blind as possible.

I knew about megas and fairies existing, that's it

X and Y were the biggest jokes of games Pokemon has ever put out. I was confused where all the new Pokemon where

Knowing shit is pointless

That doesn't change the fact that your final rivals have only petal dance on one of their Pokemon you faggot

>>29019940
This is mostly true, but the real kicker is this: Parents buy games. Kids used to get games more rarely, so long, difficult games were a better investment. Modern games have a lot more competition, and modern kids get a lot more games. Making your game require long-term player investment is considered a hindrance when marketing to kids now. Not because kids have changed, but because the market now offers them so much more. It's much, much more profitable to -reward- long play, rather than -require- it. Which is why all the stuff that takes a long time is stuck on the end.

Tl;Dr - the games are easier because they have to compete with other short games more than other long games.

>>29020173
It's GF's logic but it's fucking shit logic

>>29019264
>get Mankey on Route 22 to fight Brock with Low Kick
>get Caterpie evolve to Butterfree
>duh, Pikachu on Misty
>Diglett's cave for Lt. Surge
>people just give you Bulbasaur, Squirtle and Charmander for free
>Char mander/meleon/izard on Erika
>Butterfree on Koga
>Butterfree on Sabrina
>SquirWartortBlastoise on Blaine
>SquirWartortBlastoise on Giovanni
>if you can't figure out how to beat the Elite 4 by now just put down the game

>>29020261
yeah you're basically forced to used specific pokemon
i never found that fun.

>>29020261
>Pikachu on misty

You'd think it works, but that's how shit Pikachu is

>>29020285
...do you have something against pokemon types?

>>29020261
>get Caterpie evolve to Butterfree
I think that was the hardest part about Brock in RBY. You had to overlevel Butterfree to teach it Psybeam and you had no way of knowing it was going to unless someone told you. The same goes for Nidoran and Double Kick. Yellow was slightly better with Mankey existing.

>>29020291
get an oddish then
or just train your mons like you are supposed to

>>29020303
actually yeah, i never use fire types

>>29020285
>you're forced to use one of the several effective times if you want an easier time
>i hate being restricted!

>>29020261
>Butterfree on Sabrina
Butterfree isn't good against Sabrina. It has shit special defense, it doesn't resist Psychic, and it doesn't get any bug moves (or does it get some shitty move like Leech Life? I forget). You're better off bringing something like Snorlax.

>>29020339
Before some autist corrects me, I'm aware that defense and offense were the same Special stat/

>>29020311
>I think that was the hardest part about Brock in RBY. You had to overlevel Butterfree to teach it Psybeam
why

they had no stab moves back in RBY. even a team of lvl10 rattatas or pidgeys and spearow would be enough if you at least knew about status effects. specially because onyx used bide almost the entire time. just drop a pidgey and sand attack it every time it bides and you can slowly win that shit with any pokemon

getting a butterfree and grinding for psybeam is so retarded i refuse to believe anyone did this

>>29020339
just an example, there's plenty of other bug mon to choose from
and anyway by that point in the game you shouldn't even have to worry about having the type advantage on the leader and just brute force it with anything except fight or ghost

>>29020397
>just an example, there's plenty of other bug mon to choose from
That's the thing about gen 1: there aren't. The game only has like three bug attacks and they're all shit.

>>29017696
Every battle can't be that though. It'd be almost impossible to beat the game, as a stupid kid, if every random trainer battle and wild pokemon was super strong and could easily do 1/3 to a half of a pokemon's hp, while you do the same.

>>29020339
I hate how bug types aren't even allowed to have good stab until gen 4. It is so bad that jolteon is the best bug type of gen 1.

>>29020440
but by then your mons are high level anyway (or should be) and it doesn't matter anyway

>>29020440
The best one is Pin missile, and the best user is Jolteon who gets up to a max of 70 BP

>>29020440
>The game only has like three bug attacks
you dont need the bug attacks
a beedrill with fury attack is enough to trash brock because none of their pokemons have rock throw, and unless you're unlucky/stupid enough to fury attack onyx 5 hits three time and still dont kill it, i dont think it would even oneshot you and you would kill it the next turn

>>29020487
...
oh for fucks sakes please don't tell me you guys skip trainers on R/B/Y

>>29020487
The reason so many people find Sabrina to be so damn hard is because there's no way to exploit Psychic's weaknesses and the Abra line has such a massive Special stat. Since neither the games themselves nor the manual really explain how the special stat works, most people go into the battle using things like fire or water attacks and can't figure out why they're not doing shit. Even most people who wrote the online guides at the time didn't know what the special stat did.

It doesn't help that her Yellow team was overleveled as fuck.

>>29019940
I would say that Gen 2's broken leveling curve contributed a lot to Gold and Silver's difficulty.

>>29020127
What he's saying is you know the mechanics. No one really understood how the game worked in gen 1, and as the fan base got older they got less stupid and learned things, making the later games seem easier.

However XY are ridiculously easy, but that's because of the experience share making you way overleveled.

Except Gen 1 was hard because you were 7 when you played it.

Replaying it this year, none of the Blue or Gym Battles were that difficult till at least Gym 5. Even then, it's just a matter of counter type sweeping.

>>29020592
Not even that, everything is broken let easy. Mechanics didn't make gen 5 any easier/harder

It's just gen 6

>>29013807

When is Pokemon going to implement a NG+

They can easily make it that its its own seperate file that's incompatable with trading so people can't just use it to get easy legends.

The bosses can all have 6 teams, max ivs with EV trained Pokemon and the Gym Leaders can have like 1 or 2 Pokemon thats an offset of the typing they specialize, and it can start, for example with Brock's levels starting at level 65, ending with the champion at level 99.

>>29018111
>The closest Pokémon ever comes to a fucking challenge is

Colosseum, but it has more to do with the fact that the boss AI is actually smart and have competent strategies (and also blatantly cheat at times, but that's another story) and you have to deal with them using a gaggle of shitmons.

>>29020663
every trainer should have 6
and Champion should be all lvl 100

>>29020218
It's not just their logic though.

It's most of the industries logic. Hard games are a niche thing these day. Especially with kids.

>>29020699
I thought it was because every enemy was 10-20 levels higher than you and there was no good way to level.

You guys know what Pokémon really needs to up the difficulty?

Smirk.

>>29020663
>its own seperate file
Mentioning separate files in Game Freak's headquarters is grounds for summary execution.

>>29014203
I never liked the whole Nuzlocke 'difficulty', because it doesn't actually make the game harder per se, it just increases the consequences of failure. And I'm not interested in playing Pokemon with permadeath and artificial scarcity, because to me that isn't even really the same game any more.

Challenge Mode in BW2 is the best difficulty setting we've had so far. In many ways it didn't quite go far enough with the level adjustments, but it stayed a pokemon game while ramping up the difficulty in interesting ways, like giving gym leader pokemon enchanced teams and useful items.

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>people say gen 1 was harder than later gens
>mfw LITERALLY just beat the E4 and Blue in Yellow with Pokemon 15-20 levels underleveled

>>29020703

I'd like the trainers to have 6 pokemon, but only if there are less trainers on the routes as it would get tedious as there are a good amount of routes that have lots of trainers. Flawless Platinum (a ROMhack) did this after a certain point and it was hella tedious especially when they also each have 2-4 full restores.

Also adding on to the fact, Gym Battles should also act like Link Battle rules, in which you choose a Pokemon to send out first and no using items during the battle.

>>29020711

Only before Dakim. After Dakim, you can easily get your entire team to level 60 before you each touch The Under because Mt. Battle increases at such a steady rate. Then theres also the colosseums which have fairly high leveled Pokemon as well as the retread through Pyrite Cave which adds a few trainers as well as them having higher levels from the first encounter.

>>29020801
>but only if there are less trainers on the routes

cmon brah don't you wanna be HARDCORE?

I hate these pictures that imply Blue was anything but shit at battling

>>29016693

I think he means that Ghetis in BW2 had a physicla Hydreigon

but that's a moot point becuase they gave that Hydreigon to Iris as her lead in

I've said this before, but the biggest change they could make to improve the difficulty of the series would be to give opposing trainers held items. Seriously, outside of postgame challenge facilities there's absolutely nothing outside of Sitrus Berries on one pokemon for gym leaders and E4. And there's no reason for it. Give Youngsters and Bug Catchers their Oran or Sitrus Berries, Gym Leaders can throw a Charcoal or Miracle Seed or whatever on their ace, Rangers can have a neat gimmick with stat-boosting berries, and Ace Trainers are going to be packing Life Orbs and Choice Scarves.

>>29020949
give Gamblers Amulet Coin so if you lose they take more of your money

(no fuck you Nintendo of America I'm not calling them "Gamers")

>>29019274
It's almost like they were trying to sabotage it. I can't fathom anybody thinking "oh yeah beating the game to unlock EASY mode and having to trade locally for difficulty options is a good idea"

>>29020949
I'd really like to see nicknames used to trip up what is switching in.

It's something I saw some shitty fangame did and I really liked it. Good thing for late-game trainers.

>>29021036
... set mode?

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57KB, 780x890px

>>29021005
>(no fuck you Nintendo of America I'm not calling them "Gamers")
Call them "game devs", its gonna fit like a glove

>>29021036
i wish for something similar to that, young trainers (or any trainers really) sometimes throwing mons with nicknames they gave them, it makes the world feel more alive and the battles more meaningful because you're not just battling Zigzagoon #23

make the trainers on victory road much harder if they're going to be there at all
cmon game freak you expect me to believe these plebs got all the badges just like I did?

>npc trainers in areas that require HMs for you to go to, yet they don't have pokemon that know those moves or could even learn them

and no I'm not talking about swimmers

How about some trainers actually use TMs on their pokemon? Maybe even have the Pokemon Breeders have pokemon with Egg Moves.

It'd be a lot more challenging expecting to be able to kill a Psychic with a Dark type only to get hit with Focus Blast

>>29020311
Why? Once it evolves it learns Confusion and you can beat all his mons.

>>29013807
They are fucking LAZY

Game Freak are shit tier devs who put the minimum amount of effort possible into their game because they know they can. Their coding has historically always been terrible - see gen 1s infamous bugs, iwata literally fixing gold and silver for them, and the optimisation of the 3ds games if you don't believe me

They are absolute amateurs who luckily have one of the simplest, most enjoyable formulas ever to work with. Don't expect innovation - they won't bother if they can get away with it. Don't expect any gameplay features they couldn't be asked putting in - why do you think features like following pokemon in the overworld never came back despite every pokemon having a 3D model? How many things have game freak made, then tossed aside because they couldn't be asked putting it in the next game?

Fuck game freak

>>29021317
>hyper beams everywhere
I like it

I think the main reason people see the first gen as difficult is because we were all like 5-12 years old. Likely with little to no understanding of either RPGs or even the basic rules of the game.

Personally I don't remember having too severe of a time, I can hazily remember being thoroughly intimidated by caves but never actually losing to anything. But you need to think like a dumbshit 6 year old, it's perfectly feasible to walk right past the Pokecenter and into danger with a retarded team, and that's who GF has to balance the game for.

That said, I do wish GF would make things more difficult. There's a big difference between making sure kids can play it, and making it so easy that it's no longer fun to play. I don't need this to be like SMT or EO, but I'd like to sweat a bit when fighting the gym leader. Difficulty settings seem like the perfect balance, kids can still be dumb and I can play the game with a bite of challenge.

>>29021641
Gen I is harder when you play with no knowledge, regardless of age. I do agree it's part nostalgia, but there's more to it.

Though it leads and teaches you through exploration it's not as in your face as later games like BW and XY. No one lead you straight to the Pokemon Center for example. There's really only three inorganic roadblocks (Safron, Pewter, and Pallet) and the rest are HM-related or item-related, many of which you aren't handed without exploring and talking to NPCs with no hints.

The item count restriction and box changing also created a bit of resource management "difficulty" as well but that's a bit different. There are some other technical limitations that give it a bit artificial difficulty as well but I think the general flow of the world is what makes gen I seem harder.

It's a game that's not so much easier with age, but easier with knowledge of the series as a whole and how it works.

It's not hard mind you. It's easy to grasp and beat, but it just treats it's players with a bit more self-respect and a whole lot less contempt. It's probably gen I's greatest plus.

the only way I can see RBY being hard is if the kid can't read, or doesn't know its important to save often.

Blue was the first videya I ever owned, but I was old enough to be able to read so I didn't have much trouble. obviously the first time you play you don't know about the rival encounters and stuff but other than that its easy. I mean hell the instruction manual basically walks you through to Pewter City and tells you which starter to choose for easy (bulbasaur) medium (squirtle) or hard (charmander)

>>29019940
I never thought I would be turned on by Giraffirags back head

i just wish there were more than 4 move slots
ramp it up to 6 i say

>>29013807
Question how would you make a pokemon game hard? Sure you can increase the level of the enemy pokes but in the end its not much of a problem when you can grin for levels and passe them.

>>29022672
By that logic there are no hard jrpgs, just ones where you have to spend more time grinding.

>>29022771
In pokemon the second you surpass your foe there's nothing the opponent can do even a big attack wont damage you at all. At least in some rpgs low levels can still damage you and cause trouble in some way.

>>29022771
But that's exactly the case, fag. No hard rpgs, only grindy ones.

>>29021063
>See nickname, attempt to counter-pick it
>Send out your Psychic against their Dark
>Swap out
>They use Pursuit

I think it'd be a hilarious gimmick if nothing else.

>>29013887
Fuck off namefag

How about letting players restar the game without losing everything? Do they actually think they are stopping players from accumulating a lot of Master balls or some shit? I just wanna play through the story again with a new team, what is the point in making it this hard?

>>29023078
Gives a bit of challenge to people who do choose shift during regular play. It's not much but it'd be a fun gimmick.

>>29018541
But no mario game (not counting the rpg spinoffs) requires you to grind or strategize in order to get through the difficult parts of the game. You just have to play through the same level a couple of times at most.