With Gen 7 having been over and fairly dead for a couple months or so, and Gen 8 coming, I was asked and inspired to write a review of sorts concerning the very.... interesting... games of Sun and Moon and the Ultra versions. I hate when people say: "Oh this game/movie/show/etc was very splitting so you either hated it or loved it. Uh... yeah.... pretty much everything is a hate or love thing, and rarely are in the middle. And it's an overused phrase more and more and at this point, EVERYTHING is "Oh you hated it or loved it, no in between." Anyone else feeling that vibe these days??? Moving on, I wanted to, as we prepare for a new gen, compare this Alola region and see if this was... any good at all. So I'll try to briefly bring about what I loved and hated about this region, no particular order. Just going by what I can remember.
1. Let's start with one of my favorite features in SM. Rotom! I thought he was funny, cute, and said silly things. Best of all, he didn't talk so damn much! Unlike in Ultra, where he is flat out, doggone annoying!! And if you ignore him he has the attention seeking sad face! Wtf!
2. Let's move on to the star of not only the games, but the anime, Lillie! And let's throw in the entire family. Lillie was a lovely girl in SM, a little too much obvious focus on her, but not bad. And the whole thing about not saving the world, but instead saving a broken family, was fresh, moving, and led to moment with Lillie telling you her history in a cave while it rained, Lusamine losing her mind over her husband Mohn being kidnapped by Ultra Beasts to the point where she was willing to kill her own children to be in the wormhole, and resolving the issue had us knocking lusamine unconscious and having her finally acknowledge the "beauty" of her daughter, not in looks, but as a person, and a growing young lady, before having to go to Kanto to save her life. Well, SCREW THAT in Ultra. Instead we get some human looking aliens and their weak, useless Poipole, the cave scene with Lillie in the rain replaced by a rain scene in a cave with a creepy man, and the Lusamine threat is no longer a threat. She doesn't wanna abandon her family and live in a wormhole with alien Pokemon. Not for long at least, because she gets spit out of the wormhole seconds after you arrive to try and rescue her, and when you enter instead to fight Necrozma, she decides: "Hey Lillie, let's just forget all this happened and move on in life. THere's some evil crap going on in the wormhole so let's just mind out own business." The freaking end. And let's not forget we finally get to have her husband and herself reunite. But despite Mohn obviously interested in Lusamine, Lusamine is like: "Oh, hey. Yeah maybe one day we can work together on our separate projects or something. See ya!" And why didn't she tell the man he has a wife, and TWO CHILDREN??? Oh, cuz he's finally smiling again. Did they have a bad relationship perhaps? Was she glad to see him happy again? Maybe. I dunno! But the fact she didn't have the decency to let this man know he is closer to her work in Aether than he knows, and is part of a fortune! And has CHILDREN! It makes NO SENSE!!! And gladion shoulda just slapped her and told his father the truth imo.
3. I don't wanna make this too long, so let's move on to the story. Listen, I hated when ppl were complaining about how it's the same game as SM for the most part. The way I feel is that, we haven't had a "third" game since Platinum. We got B2W2 and then ORAS. Yellow, Crystal, Emerald, Platinum, were all repeats of the same previous game, ok? So ranting on the similarity of Ultra SM to SM is hypocritical if you ask me. You can't praise "third" games but hate on Ultra version. However, my complaint is not only was it so similar, but it REMOVED the best, emotional parts of SM that gave the game any kind of separation from the same save the world story of the entire franchise, and replaced them all with trash! Example are above. That's what got me so bothered. So I'm just traveling through a WORSE version of Alola. SM was a good game, and it's even better BECAUSE of how bad Ultra version is! And Ultra, it's ok... but it's even WORSE because of the fact it's some new version of something that already exists, but is a horrible version of it! These four games help two of the games, and destroy the other two. It's insane.
4. Any positives? YES! I LOVED the Necrozma battles, especially the one at the Victory Road. The entire scene in the ice surroundings and with Colress appearing. It was aesthetic and just beautiful. And the connection of Necrozma with the Z stones was a solid explanation when compared to the still unresolved explanation for Mega Stones.
Final notes: Will Z Stones stay in Alola? Were they welcome to begin with? I think they added a brilliant new touch to battle, but I don't think they were appreciated like they deserved. I also feel like they should stay in Alola, but I don't see that happening. They never just get rid of a feature, right? Is the Alola series the worst in the series to date? XY initially was loved in early reviews but now, from what I've seen, is Still the most hated game. I've felt like Nintendo has rushed games too much and hope they don't feel the need to put out a Pokemon game EVERY year. With this rushed feeling to their games recently, not only from me but numerous people online, I'm thinking their biggest flaw is the desire to put out games yearly. Some believe stories belong in books and don't need to be in games, which is outright wrong by even the most novice of any reviewers. Stories in game are enriching and while many of my favorite games need no story at all, a detail and engaging one is one of the greatest aspects of some games, and with SM, I think that for the most part, they nailed that decently enough.
One concern I will end on are "poketubers." Growing up, all I had were commercials to tell me about the new Pokemon games, and I had to depend on that to keep my interest in the series. Now, we have youtubers who make Pokemon videos and theories and overhype games with leaks and rumors to the point where when the game comes out, we think we're going to choose Arceus, Mewtwo and Mega Kanga as our starters, and have to stab a stake through the vampire leader of the villainous team leader or the planet will be infected with cancer, and we end up with a normal Pokemon game we then hate because we expected too much... All in all, I think it's harder for GF/Nintendo to produce a new Pokemon game that will be appreciated these days compared to the simpler times without overpromotion and all the insanity of making money off of views covering another person's video game. So, *sips* here's to well wishes for Gen 8!
This is just my opinion, so feel free to speak on yours too.