Current Events > I've played Pokemon Brilliant Diamond for around 30 hours. My thoughts:

(+) Yeah! (+)

First of all, the Grand Underground is great. Love the Grand Underground. I'm really enjoying the process of catching and breeding Pokemon. The music is fine, not great but fine.

But it's still gen 4, in all the worst ways. I think this has been my least favourite generation historically, and these remakes do nothing to really assuage any of that. There's something inherent to this generation that I just don't like very much, and while I was hoping my taste would have changed to really enjoy gen 4 after so much time, it just hasn't.

The Exp. Share has legitimately fucked up team building. I have to deposit all of my main team and train up any new Pokemon so that the levels are roughly the same without overtraining my entire team. I don't think I'm gonna catch a fifth or sixth Pokemon for my main party because it's too much of a pain in the ass.

The fog effect is literally just making the screen extremely white with a lot of bloom. Fog always sucked in these games, but it's just outright painful in this game. It's legitimately like the opposite of those dark caves you need Flash for.

The union rooms are busted, I keep trying to connect with them and there's always one asshole looking to trade. I go to trade them an Elekid, and they're trying to offload their Infernape or a shiny Milotic and shit, and the trade goes on with them offering the same shit until they get upset and disconnect. Like Christ you're trying to offload something massive that I have no frame of reference for, and I'm still offering you something nice - Elekids are hard to come by. I can't compete with a shiny fucking Milotic.

And the thing is, it's only one other person in these global rooms. You see the screenshot of these union rooms and there's like 20 people. Every time I've connected to a union room, it's been one asshole trying to trade their awesome Pokemon. No battling, no trade variety. The exact same process, over a dozen times.

Like is the game broken, or did enough people have the sense not to buy these games that there just aren't enough people to fill these union rooms? Or are more people hanging out in the Grand Underground? I just don't understand.

Pokemon SwSh was better at the multiplayer stuff, hands down. The gen 4 remakes honestly feel like they have the exact same limitations as the DS games, with borked wireless communication and repugnant weather effects like fog making the game next to unplayable in some parts.

I still like the game for the most part, but I'm incredibly frustrated.

MrMallard posted...

The union rooms are busted, I keep trying to connect with them and there's always one a****** looking to trade. I go to trade them an Elekid, and they're trying to offload their Infernape or a shiny Milotic and s***, and the trade goes on with them offering the same s*** until they get upset and disconnect. Like Christ you're trying to offload something massive that I have no frame of reference for, and I'm still offering you something nice - Elekids are hard to come by. I can't compete with a shiny f***ing Milotic.

This was an issue when they allowed random trades in Gen 5 too. People don't want to trade, they want to show off their cool pokemon. If you brought something they'd actually be willing to trade for, the trade would probably break because it those are also usually poorly hacked shinies.

Union Room is I think only 2 at a time right now, and a "future update" is supposed to allow more people at once.

You could always just add the new pokemon to your party and keep playing with it a bit underleveled. It's probably good enough to do something, and it'll catch up fairly quickly with the way exp is weighted. It is stupid that you can't turn it off though.

And yes, the fog is exactly the opposite of the dark caves. Why don't you use defog?

What blows my mind is that Pokmon had online figured out with Gen 6. All they had to do is keep it. Instead they keep fucking up perfectly functioning features for shiggles.

Proto_Spark posted...

This was an issue when they allowed random trades in Gen 5 too. People don't want to trade, they want to show off their cool pokemon. If you brought something they'd actually be willing to trade for, the trade would probably break because it those are also usually poorly hacked shinies.

Union Room is I think only 2 at a time right now, and a "future update" is supposed to allow more people at once.

Are you fucking kidding me?

The thing is, you press Y to access the global rooms, and they have screenshots of fully packed union rooms full of players. You're telling me they're presenting that aspect of the game in that light, despite being out for something like a month and having throttled those rooms to 2 players per room the entire time? What a load of horseshit.

DarkChozoGhost posted...

You could always just add the new pokemon to your party and keep playing with it a bit underleveled. It's probably good enough to do something, and it'll catch up fairly quickly with the way exp is weighted. It is stupid that you can't turn it off though.

And yes, the fog is exactly the opposite of the dark caves. Why don't you use defog?

I guess, but I like to start from level 1/5 and work my way up to the same level as everyone else. Something about EVs and IVs or something, I feel like getting a new Pokemon at level 26 is gonna leave it lacking compared to the core starters. I could certainly be wrong though, I barely know anything about EV/IV values.

[LFAQs-redacted-quote]

Yeah, gen 4 is okay. Like let's face it, even the worst mainline Pokemon games are fairly playable. And I have been liking the gym leaders and stuff tbh.

Compsognathus posted...

What blows my mind is that Pokmon had online figured out with Gen 6. All they had to do is keep it. Instead they keep fucking up perfectly functioning features for shiggles.

I mean Pokemon had online figured out for the most part in gen 8. Probably wasn't perfect, but I remember Wonder Trading and doing raid bosses and shit and it was perfectly fine. Right now the Global Wireless thing isn't ready - though I think it's locked behind story progression - and stuff like the union rooms are outright broken.

Considering all the shit the games launched without, to still have aspects of this game that are as incomplete as they are is borderline criminal. This shit sucks.

Someone @ me when the Wonder Trade update comes in. Such a huge step down from Sw/Sh.

DarkChozoGhost posted...

And yes, the fog is exactly the opposite of the dark caves. Why don't you use defog?

First of all, it's garbage to have a second dehabilitating screen effect that makes it impossible to see where you're going. Requiring the use of Flash was already the worst part of the old games, so to do it again is a whole other load of horseshit.

Secondly, this is what that shit looks like:

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/user_image/0/1/3/AAbh80AACuUd.jpg
Like are you fucking kidding me, I know it was bad in the old games too but I feel like this is a lot worse.

And third, this is a necessary route to get to Celestic Town, at which point I can obtain Defog and pass through safely - after I get the next gym badge, of course. So I can't use Defog until I'm past this fog-ridden route.

Edit: it appears I missed it somewhere earlier, I'll go get it now.

smh at all the people who knew it was a shit game but bought it anyway

Compsognathus posted...

What blows my mind is that Pokmon had online figured out with Gen 6. All they had to do is keep it. Instead they keep fucking up perfectly functioning features for shiggles.

Even then, the GTS in both Gen 6 and 7 is not exactly stable - bordering on a pain in the ass, with people - or the same name offering a dozen different Pokmon - either wanting to trade high level common Pokmon or shinies for literally impossible mons (like, say, a Male Ditto or Female Tauros) so they can advertise their website in Gen 6, or hackers finding new and inventive ways to cause the game to actively crash when you scroll over their Pokmon in Gen 7 in addition to the advertising, although at least the Impossible Pokmon issue has been solved, so... yay? At least Wonder Trade still worked last I checked, but I dunno how long that'll last.

MrMallard posted...

I guess, but I like to start from level 1/5 and work my way up to the same level as everyone else. Something about EVs and IVs or something, I feel like getting a new Pokemon at level 26 is gonna leave it lacking compared to the core starters. I could certainly be wrong though, I barely know anything about EV/IV values.

That's mostly a waste of time. Anything you have before like, the 6th gym will have maxed EVs by the E4