 |
| My tatty, sweaty, sticky original cartridge. |
All the current talk about
Pokemon Let's go made me curious about their source material, i.e.
Pokemon Yellow. My gaming instinct was ever-so-slightly stirred, and I reasoned that the time was ripe to play that game. (More like a 'now-or-never' situation, really: given my dislike for Gen I and my recent purchase of
FireRed and
LeafGreen, there is virtually no guarantee that I'll ever want to play
Yellow once the fuss about
Let's go dies.) I went with lil' Pikachu as my One and Only
— because indeed, what's the point of even playing
Yellow at all if you're not gonna run with the sparkly mouse?
So off we went, Wonderful Electric and I (I actually wanted to name him just like that
— but alas, there were not enough slots available); and we soon found ourselves facing that most formidable obstacle, the one that's supposed to stop dead in their tracks any
Yellow player who made the fatal mistake of relying on Pika-cute only: the Pewter Gym, lair of Brock and his Rock 'Mons. Now obviously, my little
Etincelle — that's the name I settled for, and it means
spark in french
— only wielded three pathetic Moves at that time, namely Thundershock, Quick Attack and Tail Whip. Thundershock being virtually useless, I had to conquer that Gym with Quick Attack and Tail Whip only
— talk about a tall order. The only strategy I could think of
— and probably the only one that existed, for that matter
— was to weaken Brock's 'Mons as much as possible by spamming Tail Whip, before wearing them down with Quick Attack. And blimey, it worked! And it was not even
that much of an ordeal: sure, it was long and tedious, but Etincelle endured hits quite bravely and was never in real danger of fainting.
Once that most infamous roadblock was behind us, cruising Kanto was easy-peasy. My electric ranger proved to be surprisingly resistant as well as quite strong, which surprised me after Alolan Raichu's poor performance on both defensive and offensive fronts. Gen I being, well,
Gen I, I had to make do with the measliest of Move pool, made of Thunderbolt, Quick Attack, Swift and Mega Punch. Not that this Move diet stopped us from progressing, mind you: one-shooting was our bread and butter and we blazed through Kanto, leaving only fainted 'Mons and crying Trainers in our wake. Well, take that back: we didn't blaze through Kanto as much as we plodded through it.
Yellow's pacing is every bit as horrible as
Blue's one, and I had to backtrack and take detours so often that my run ended up bloated beyond belief, clocking at 15 bloody hours. Before we parted ways though, the game had one more nasty surprise in store for me: a final Gym and a Pokemon League bristling with Ground and Rock 'Mons. Why, thank you, game! You really don't want me to rely on Pikachu, now do you? Anyway,
a whole lot of grinding and
metric tons of Battle Items did the trick and I finally beat all those punks fair and square.
 |
| Ooh, I feel love, I feel love, I feel love. |
After playing
Yellow, my verdict on Gen I remains the same: I still don't like those games
— although not for the exact same reasons as
when I played Blue, ironically. I took the inventory limitation, the terrible pacing and the general clunkiness and glitchiness in my stride this time around, only to be thoroughly bothered and troubled by yet another limitation: somehow, the Gen I entries don't feel like true-blue
Pokemon games to me. This may sound like a ironic and even wildly ignorant statement, given that those games
are the original
Pokemon instalments; and yet, the opacity and abstruseness of the whole Move business in those games, the horrible HM management, the limited fauna and the constant herding of the player feel weirdly at odds with the spirit of the series. How are you supposed to manage your Moves, exploit the Type chart and fight efficiently when you cannot even check the nature and effects of Moves before your 'Mons learn them? How are you supposed to build up a well-oiled team when so few 'Mons can learn HMs and when you constantly encounter the same tired Rattatas and Pidgeys? How are you supposed to enjoy exploring and cruising around when you're constantly blocked by the most random obstacles and have to take a million detours in order to progress? In many ways, the Gen I games feel like a pre-evolution to the
Pokemon series as we know and love it nowadays: everything is there, only half-baked and still in an embryonic state. It's certainly fascinating from a purely historical point of view; but when it comes to gameplay, latter
Pokemon entries are undoubtedly more refined and fulfilling.
As for
Yellow in particular, I'll be blunt: it's a complete rip-off. What we have here is basically
Red&Blue all over again, only with Pikachu at the helm and a couple of Jessie and James cameos. I guess that setup delighted many a fan of the anime who rejoiced in pretending they were Ash Ketchum fighting the evil Team Rocket, but that doesn't make
Yellow less of a shameless cash grab.
Ultra Sun&Moon took a lot of flak for not bringing enough novelties to the table, and yet they still bring ten times more than
Yellow did. I'd be curious to know if
Yellow was mauled by reviewers and branded as daylight robbery back in the days, or if the
Pokemon honeymoon was still going full force and blinding Pokefans to the series' flaws.
At any rate, that's one more
Pokemon entry and one more solo run under my belt, and both managed to redeem the series' mascot after the
Alolan Raichu semi-fiasco. But do you know what's most ironic, dear fellow gamers? Technically, I'm not even done with Pikachu
yet. I still have to see how he performs as normal Raichu; and that means yet another Pikachu solo run, this time with a perfectly regular specimen recruited in tall grass. A solo runner's work is never done, indeed! Thanks for reading, and be my guest anytime!
