Quote Originally Posted by deuterio12 View Post
Emphasis mine. New kids joining the franchise don't already have the old games, let alone have beaten them. That just promotes an elitist culture where said elite would only get smaller and smaller if the total number of Pokémon in each game keeps going up.
And that's the real thing about Main Line Pokemon: the division between supporting long term players, and making it easy for brand new people to join. Or more particularly, trying to appease older 20-30 year old fans, while also trying to attract and entertain the new batch of 10 year old kids. The longer Pokemon goes on, the more older fans exist, spread through many ages, with many different start points. A brand new 10 year old fan has very different requirements to entertain then a 15 year old fan who started with gen 6 or gen 5, or a 20 year old fan who started with gen 5 or gen 4, or a 25 year old fan who started in gen 3 or gen 2, or a 30 year old fan who started in gen 1. Every one of those groups of fans like different things about Pokemon, and most also think the golden age with the best games are entirely different from the other group's best game. There is almost no way you can please every single one of those groups.

Its pretty clear overall most of their decisions lean to appealing to the 10 year old, and 25-30 range. The first to make sure the fan base is constantly growing, and the second as they have been with the series the longest, and thus most committed to staying with it. The appeal of the adults is targeting them also has the side effect of drawing their potential kids in, making it a bonding experience for the family. This leaves the 15-25 range under appreciated which can be seen with most media glossing over gens 3-5. Funnily enough, this is also the age most of a mobile game's, especially a nostalgia mobile game, target demographic is. Hence the popularity of GO and Masters, as most people those ages have a phone, have a bit of income, but not that many life costs. Noticeable with Masters showcasing of a lot of Gen 4 and Gen 5 characters, who are the primary ones the age range of 15-25 are most aware of.

A lot of the gen 1 pandering is only pandering to the long term fans who have seen them all before. But to a new kid, they might have had a toy or other thing of them, and expect to see the game version of things they connect with Pokemon. Yes, this is due to TPCI filling the media with a chosen few, but its also a case of being some of the longest standing and most recognizable designs. Its like seeing a Fallout game without a Vault Suit, or a Gundam without a V Fin, or a Dragonball Z game without energy beams. So a Pokemon game has the expectation to contain the things that are most visible in its media. Its also most annoying I notice to people within that 15-25 range mentioned before, as they mostly missed the initial launch so lack most of the nostalgia for said older Pokemon.

Every Pokemon game has this divide of trying to draw back the older fans, yet also draw in new fans. There will always be compromises done for the sake of this, and simplifying the PokeDex for the sake of letting people without access to older games actually be able to complete it was a very understandable step. Especially when said older games are on an entirely different expensive system. In this regard, I feel Gen 7 handled the PokeDex the best, only requiring the Pokemon find able in game to complete it yet also allowing all old Pokemon to exist in said games. Gen 6 was the worst, requiring you find/breed/evolve near 700 Pokemon. And with that number, its not at all surprising that most players would assume that theres no way only 4 games could hold that many. Generation 3 was arguably worse, requiring 6 games, on two systems, one of which being a home console, to complete. It also did not allow transferring from old games, due to massively reworking the entire stat system. And again, you notice most of those put out by the Gen 8 cuts are those in the 15-25 range who were with the series long enough to have played through the large era of transferability, but aren't old enough to remember the first Transfer Cuts, which as noted, were slowly rereleased to the players by way of multiple full price games, over 2 consoles, and several years. Imagine the mess that would happen if said thing was done nowadays. Yes, there is very much the worry that we could be on track to said events with the next round of games, and they will very rightly deserve much of the backlash should they be foolish enough to try said actions, but I doubt it would end up being as ridiculous as the events of Gen 3. Locking Mew behind a pay wall is and will always be dumb though.

Gen 8 combined this need to streamline the Pokedex with the "side" need to support their VGC system, which as a core part of the rules only allows Pokemon from current game to be used in said format. Already most Pokemon mechanics nowadays are being more and more focused on VGC, yet still oddly under represented in story. Which again is a sign of the division in their market. For kids, singles is the most straight forward and understandable system, hence it being used for in game. But VGC being 4v4 Doubles, is clearly tailored to in Pokemon's moves and abilities. Notice how there was a initial rush of doubles moves in Gen 3, when it was introduced, then as time went on, more and more moves and abilities were introduced, being vastly more common in generation 6 and later games, around when VGC really gained momentum. Also notice how many new abilities in Gen 8 focused on negating Attack Drop effects, and how few Intimidate Pokemon got through while ones with ways around Intimidate got in. This was due to Intimidate running rampant over VGC 2018. Incenaroar was used on 90% of all teams in said format. That's totally bonkers, and the new abilities and selected Pokemon are clearly a response to said events.

All in all, Pokemon is being stretched in many directions, trying to appeal to many highly various fan bases, and there will always be cuts on one end to make another end or two work better.