Rant: Why Rapidash is about to become the most overused Pokémon
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DISCLAIMER: I do not include legendaries in my analysis, as I do not use them.
Diamond and Pearl are looking to be the greatest games in the series so far. The graphics are phenomenal, the new moves appear to be wonderful and backwards compatibility looks to be amazing.
In fact, the only thing I don't like about this generation compared to the past is its Pokémon.
Why on Earth does the final Shin'ō Dex have just five Fire types in the whole game and only four Ice types in a place with a snow-covered region?
I don't understand their logic. Why did they cap it at 151 Pokémon again, instead of going to 200 like they did in Ruby and Sapphire? They could have stuck 50 more Pokemon in it, including a decent number of Fire and Ice Pokémon, and it would have been just fine. Even if they were old ones, at least they'd be there.
Statistically speaking, one third of people will have the Fire starter. What are the other two thirds to do? I see one other Fire-type: Ponyta. Essentially, if you don't pick the Fire starter, and plan to get a Fire type so you don't have to use a TM on something else, you will get Ponyta, end of story.
I'm just as unhappy about the lack of Ice-types, but at least there are enough Water types (1/5 of the Dex!?) that can handle Ice-type moves.
I really don't understand why they were so stingy on Fire and Ice this time around. I'm glad they gave the Electrics some much-needed expansion, but this is depressing. In essence, they gave us one new Fire-type, the starter, and one new Ice-type, that Ice/Grass thing (which does look rather interesting). Weavile doesn't count since it's an evolution of Sneasel.
I remember when Ruby and Sapphire came out. I was very impressed at how well they brought Dragon and Ghost and Steel up to being more regular types. I felt that Fire and Electric got neglected, as did Ice (though I was so tickled about pure-Ice Snorunt that I didn't think as much about it), but it was the price to pay for this balancing move.
Now we get to Diamond and Pearl and we see tons of new Ghosts and Bugs, a lot of oldies, and a bit of help to Electricity. Fire and Ice got left in the cold, once again (Pun intended.).
Don't get me wrong- I understand what they did this time. They turned a lot of Pokémon that were single-staged in Gold and Silver, or were the only ones of their type in the game (Mr. Mime, Sudowoodo) and turned them into primary Pokémon that would be more typical to the game. But if they wanted to do that, couldn't they have done it along with making a whole bunch of new Pokémon? They can't possibly be so short on ideas that they could not introduce one single new Fire type that is not a starter, or more than one single Ice type that is not an evolution to a previous Pokémon.
I hope DS game chips are writable. Really. Because I'm really hoping that in the next installment of the Pokémon series, be it SolidGold/SterlingSilver, or Gem, or whatever the name is, I hope they introduce more, and allow them to be sent to Diamond and Pearl. Or, even better, allow them to be downloaded via Wi-Fi. Especially if they are Fire and/or Ice.
I'm not trashing the game, as many of the new Pokémon we got do look very fascinating and original. But come on. They might have taken a lot of time on this game. Heck, this game may have caused delay in its release. But for all the time they had, was it so restricted that they couldn't have put any more Fire-types in?