Pokemon Gold & Silver Review

 (Originally published to Glitchwave on 12/23/23)

[Image from glitchwave.com]

Pokemon Gold & Silver

Developer: Game Freak

Publisher: Nintendo

Genre(s): JRPG

Platforms: GB Color

Release Date: November 21, 1999

The whole “gen-wuner” sentiment across the cultural zeitgeist of Pokemon has never ceased to spark some personal contention within me. I completely understand that a large margin of people were children during the height of “Pokemania'' and aged out of the franchise's young demographic as it still managed to march on with subsequent releases past its commercial peak in its first generation. For many, Pokemon is strictly a substantial centerpiece of popular media at the turn of the millennium in their respective nostalgia capsules, and that is perfectly acceptable. I was one of these people throughout my adolescence until a social shift occurred in my college years, reeling me back into Pokemon out of curiosity about what I missed during the time when I was “too cool” for Pikachu. Still, my enclosed area of sentimentality beforehand was not restricted to Pokemon’s first generation. I suppose I could call myself a “gen-twoer,” as the era of Pokemon Gold and Silver is where I set my arbitrary boundaries. Pokemon’s second generation was also my introduction point to Pokemon as my older cousin gave me his Gameboy Color with a copy of Pokemon Silver when I was seven and unknowingly created a crippling addiction for me that was difficult to mandate. Given this information, it's no surprise that I’ve encompassed both the first and second generations in my personal sphere of wonderment for Pokemon’s past. Still, I question why my situation isn’t as common with those who grew up with the franchise and how the Gold/Silver generation eludes them. Pokemon’s sophomore outing was released two years after Red/Blue when the franchise's fire was still roaring hot, so its sales still benefited from the ongoing Pokemania craze. It’s not as if Gold/Silver wasn’t a heavily anticipated entry because the Pokemon fad was waning. Are the Kanto enthusiasts that dense to think that the franchise peaked with the first entry, even with the coarse, black-and-white Gameboy pixels and unsightly depictions of the Pokemon to contend with? If this is the case, they must stop smoking the nostalgia crack pipe and come to their senses. Pokemon Gold/Silver should ideally be the primary source of warm recollections of when Nintendo’s franchise was a cultural phenomenon, for it’s essentially an extension of the first generation with so many clear improvements that it’s hard to deny its objective superiority.

Pokemon Gold/Silver begins with the same sense of excitement as Red/Blue did. The player is taking control of another bright-eyed rookie trainer with ambitious dreams of besting everyone in the profession of Pokemon training. This time, the trainer wakes up in his hometown of New Bark Town in the land of Johto neighboring Kanto directly to the west. The deviation in setting here establishes that every Pokemon adventure is going to be across the entire jurisdiction of an uncharted land from here on out. The player’s mom will wish him good luck, and he’ll walk next door to the Pokemon laboratory where Professor Elm will gift him a starter Pokemon that the player will cherish and grow with throughout the game. So far, the starting process to this Pokemon adventure should ring familiar, except for the starter Pokemon displayed for the player to select. Every new entry to the Pokemon franchise adds at least one hundred new additions to the accumulative roster, with the region-specific Pokedex altering itself to give the fresh faces higher precedence. Listed at the top of Johto’s national Pokedex are the three starter Pokemon replacing those from Red/Blue: the leafy little Chikorita who highlights the herbivore diet of the long-necked dinosaurs it's modeled after, the anteater Cyndaquil that spurts flames from its backside, and the blue, fun-sized crocodile Totodile. As one could probably guess from their designs, the starters cement that the contrasting grass, fire, and water types will be the selection at the start from here on out. While copying the elemental types of the beginning batch of starters seems like the transition was slick and smooth, Johto’s first Pokemon friends are admittedly underwhelming. Their initial forms are cute, but Chikorita forgets to shed that baby face when it fully evolves into Meganium. Despite its bulky body, no one is going to be intimidated by anything that looks this goofy. Typhlosion’s deficient array of fire moves it learns hardly makes it a barn burner pick, as much as it pains me to admit it because of my sentimental attachment to Cyndaquil as my very first Pokemon. Totodile’s final form Feraligatr is probably the most formidable choice but is ultimately bogged down by a single typing like the rest of its starter mates. None of the fully evolved starters even represent their respective games on the box art, opting for the legendary pair of Lugia and Ho-oh instead. The threesome here lacks the charisma and capabilities that made the previous starters Pokemon icons.

Fortunately, Pokemon’s initiative is to build that eclectic sextet, covering most if not all of the bases to compensate for your starter Pokemon’s elemental blind spots. In my overall summation of the second generation’s Pokemon contributions, we have a divisive mix of fantastic additions alongside some laughably pitiful duds. On the respectable side of the coin, every player should consider putting Hoothoot and Mareep in their Pokemon arsenal, for they evolve into majestic beasts (Noctowl and Ampharos) and can be encountered early on to assuage the growing pains of a paltry pokemon team. The player is guaranteed more confidence during their amateur era as opposed to when Red/Blue expected them to blaze through the first few gym leaders with a bushel of frail bug pokemon. For those who still give the weakest pokemon type in the series a fighting chance, Gold/Silver introduces Heracross and Forretress to firmly instill that sense of entomophobia in other trainers. Gold/Silver also starts the trend of pokemon with contradictory elemental typings, a hybrid the developers probably took into stressful consideration and decided that it wasn’t oxymoronic or made these pokemon impervious. Lanturn’s anglerfish design (a non-hideous one) is a biologically sound influence to craft a water and electric pokemon, as the detached dandelion cotton spore Jumpluff is for a grass and flying pokemon. Wooper and Quagsire are the first evolutionary line to have both water and ground types properties, an elite fusion as long as the trainer keeps them off the grass as stern as a neighborhood sign. The rugged rock tree Sudowoodo is Johto’s Snorlax, a waypoint impediment that requires an item to reanimate and fight for the taking. Ursaring, Donphan, Xatu, Skarmory, Sneasel, and Houndoom are all alluring in their designs alone. Unfortunately, all of Gold/Silver’s striking and sturdy new pokemon are counteracted on the whole by just as many unexceptional ones. For some reason, Johto unloads an abundance of single-evolution pokemon that feel included just to round out the Pokedex. Who seriously shares any attachment towards Aipom, Qwilfish, Yanma, or Stantler? Dunsparce, the oversized sweat bee that resides in a remote, dark cave, is so pitiful that I find it endearing. Delibird, Smeargle, and the alphabetized Unown are practically novelty pokemon. Girafarig is the only substantial one of the unevolved bunch because its normal and psychic typing gives it immunity to ghost, and battling Shuckle is akin to attempting to break open a diamond. Still, I glance at the entire roster and am disappointed that Farfetch’d was multiplied in triplets.

Fortunately, if one is unsatisfied or is feeling obdurately reverent, Kanto’s pokemon are scattered about Johto as extensively as its native species. However, a sizable portion of Gold/Silver’s roster is dedicated to adding variations on the original lineup. Evidently, there is something in Johto’s water supply that allows previously established pokemon to extend their evolutionary capacities. Before we discuss the old pokemon’s addendums, we should probably make note of their more infantile forms that have just been discovered. The Johto daycare’s services not only increase the level of a pokemon without needing to battle: if the player leaves two pokemon of the opposite gender alone in the yard, there is a strong possibility that there will be three pokemon in the pen by the time the player returns to retrieve them if you catch my drift. If the concept of evolution was enough for the conservative, Christian parents of America to put Pokemon on their shit list, imagine their reactions when the sequel introduces a mechanic revolving around sexual reproduction. Little Timmy will have so many questions left unanswered! Anyways, for a small percentage of pokemon, passing down their genetic material by making whoopee with another of a similar typing and relative size (or the amorphous pile of sex putty that is Ditto), an egg will naturally slide out of the female, and will hatch into a “baby pokemon” after walking about with it for a brief period. Pichu is the infant version of Pikachu, Magby is for Magmar, Elekid is for Electabuzz, etc. The only baby pokemon totally removed from Kanto lineage is Togepi, a freebie given to the player by Professor Elm to test the new mechanic. These adorable little tykes are so underdeveloped that using them in battle would be unspeakably cruel, but at least they can learn new moves once they evolve that their non-bred equivalents in the wild cannot. Regarding the evolution end of the spectrum, the swift Crobat is evolved from the gaping-mouthed Golbat via “friendship” where increasing the bond between a man and his pokemon actually provides some tangible benefits. The same process evolves the additional “Eeveelutions” Espeon and Umbreon, two pokemon that intentionally display a contrast between night and day. Some old pokemon simply needed a material incentive to evolve, such as Slowpoke transforming into the hyper-intelligent Slowking upon acquiring a king’s rock, or Scyther and Onix into Scizor and Steelix when traded with a Metal Coat attached. I don’t know how someone could stick their noses up at how Gold/Silver augments the classics from Kanto, for the examples I’ve given are among the coolest and most competent pokemon that the second generation has to offer.

The last two pokemon I mentioned, along with the coal-black Eevee evolved form Umbreon, are also examples of two typings unheard of in Red/Blue: Steel and Dark. The series didn’t introduce any elemental types until several generations down the line, so two whole new categorizations after the first entry is an exciting prospect. Shuffling steel and dark into the deck of pokemon battle attributes is sure to confuse those who had memorized each strength and weakness. Actually, what their inclusion really does is give the once god-like psychic types something to be afraid of, as dark’s super effectiveness against them sensibly stems from the common fear of a lack of luminescence. Now, psychics tremble to what they cannot see, and we all take delight in their quaking vulnerability. With a slight in logic, dark’s primary weakness is fighting, somehow suggesting that martial arts are more potent and accurate when one is blind like a mystical samurai. Steel, on the other hand, is a solid defensive type strong against ice and rock while crumbling to fighting, ground, and fire. They are also totally immune to poison, so no antidotes are necessary. Unfortunately, pokemon of either type are a scarce breed. Scyther and Onix only evolve through the trading process, so that is a no-go for most players unless they have a link cable and a fellow man-child friend ready to initiate the process. Forretress and the retroactively changed Magneton will have to suffice. In an unfortunate twist of fate, Umbreon is THE only dark type pokemon available before the post-game epilogue, so the player will have to rely on dark-type moves like “Bite” and “Faint Attack” to defend themselves against mind-bending maneuvers. Game Freak is a group of sadists.

Adding an elemental type that triumphs over the cocky psychics is what I’d consider a quality-of-life improvement. For more traditional instances of the term, Gold/Silver is filled to the brim with stark enhancements. It goes without saying that the added color flair of the Gameboy Color obviously makes Gold/Silver more visually appealing than the murky gray that presented Red/Blue. Seeing the Pokemon world’s bright sunlight, brick buildings, grassy fields, and sparkling waters after Red/Blue muted all of them is what I imagine taking the bandages off after Lasik's surgery is like. Suddenly, everything is wonderfully vibrant and that feeling of excitement for a grand, country-spanning adventure is reinvigorated. That added color extends to the pokemon’s health bars during battle as well, using stoplight shades to signify their level of health. A blue color bar is introduced to give the player an indication of how close their pokemon are to the next level, so the eventual grind will be more manageable with a visual reference. Inventory items are organized by general categorizations. It’s far more manageable than the one page in Red/Blue but plenty of miscellaneous items that aren’t pokeballs or TMs/HMs are still jumbled up in a single menu and they still overflow as a result. Berry trees are scattered all over Johto, and their juicy fruit can heal a small percentage of health or cure an ailment. Some trees are conversely draped in apricorns, which can be molded into pokeballs with specific properties when brought to a man in Azalea Town named Kurt. Pokemon encounters now depend on three general times of the day, which coincides with a clock that the player sets before they wake up to start their adventure. I’d still argue the colorization is the most significant improvement because of how the black and white of Red/Blue inadvertently made the game a vexing challenge at times. However, every last addition to Gold/Silver ultimately does its part to make the game a smoother and more engaging experience than Red/Blue.

For as involved Johto is in improving the mold of Pokemon, the entire country is surprisingly much more subdued than its neighbor to the east. The region of Johto is directly inspired by the real-life Kansai region of Japan, which is situated on the same island as its capital Tokyo where Kanto took inspiration from. Unlike the bustling industrialized marvel of the modern age that Kanto strived to emulate, Johto’s landscape has a comparatively placid atmosphere. Johto achieves this laidback sensation through its rural iconography. The towering buildings that shadow the notable districts are ancient architectures crafted from wood and bronze, with the triangular roof as the cherry on top to signify its worn and torn history. Unlike places of Buddhist worship in Japan, Johto’s spiritual houses were erected to practice pokemon devotion. This strange phenomenon can be witnessed as early as Violet City where bald monks kneel at the visage of golden Bellsprouts in the Sprout Tower. The Ruins of Alph feature an exhibit dedicated to uncovering the primeval mystery behind the Unown and translating the supposed language behind their cuneiform bodies. South of the ruins, the people of Azalea Town rely on their rampant Slowpoke population to predict the weather (boy, are they betting on the wrong horse). Mahogany Town is a perfectly quaint place to stay by the picturesque Lake of Rage, and the island of Cianwood City is so off the grid that it's a wonder how they communicate with the rest of Johto. All of the region’s urbanity is congested to Goldenrod City, whose glimmering roads and buildings arguably dwarf any of the metropolises of Kanto. After exploring Johto again, I now realize why fans of Kanto look down on them: they are a bunch of backward rubes stuck in the wrong century. Ironically enough, for how advanced Kanto claims to be, navigating through Johto’s unaffected landscape is a far breezier excursion. Misremembering the Union Cave made me anticipate another grueling Mt. Moon escapade, but the exit is merely down the path from the entrance. The Ilex Forest is intentionally designed like a maze, and I had an easier time walking through it than any of Kanto’s commercial sites that were made to be accessible to its citizens. However, one aspect of traversing through Johto that turns me off is the inclusion of two new water-type HMs on top of "Surf" needed to power past whirlpools and trek upwards on waterfalls. I don’t like the idea of my chosen water-type pokemon having three redundant water moves in its selective range of skills, especially since it was Quagsire whose ground nature was heavily undermined by this requisite.

Because Johto is relatively nonchalant, the overall pokemon adventure here is overall fairly languid. Sure, becoming a Pokemon master by collecting all eight gym badges and defeating the Elite Four is still an admirable goal to strive for, but there is not as much content in between completing the primary quest. Team Rocket is still retaining their presence as a nefarious organization but without Giovanni as their menacing leader, the group is rudderless. The player will stop their black market Slowpoke tail scheme along with halting their radio wave mind control operation, with Elite Four member Lance disappointingly volunteering to do most of the leg work. A mission to procure medicine for a sick Ampharos being hospitalized by gym leader Jasmine in the Olivine Lighthouse facilitates a non-linear sequence of collecting three nearby gym badges similar to the middle of Red/Blue. Still, Cianwood’s distant location away from the Johto inland will probably result in the player completing these gyms in the intended order anyway. Also, the player’s rival this time around will never be up to snuff with their pokemon training prowess. Yes, the red-haired thief is just as much of an asshole as Oak’s grandson from Red/Blue, but he falls under the spectrum of a hostile, emotionally distraught asshole who desperately needs therapy. The brutal treatment of his pokemon never leads him to victory, something that infuriates him to no end due to his pure strength prerogative. Eventually, we learn he’s Giovanni’s son, which explains his fiery disposition and why he’s so hellbent on winning. Learning this makes his motives interesting, but we know he’ll never skid past the Elite Four before you in a million years. Having a competent rival greatly raised the stakes for that climb to victory.

Gold/Silver will keep the player busy anyway because the player will be busy grinding to adequately match the gym leaders. Matching the correct weaknesses of the opposing pokemon is no longer a surefire guarantee for smooth success as it was in Red/Blue. The combat greatly considers other aspects like level and base stats, which unfortunately fosters the need to train one’s pokemon outside the series of consistent trainer battles. Also, the assemblage of pokemon gym leaders in Johto specialize in the other half of typings that weren’t featured in Kanto, and these types are the more unorthodox ones. The one available Machop to trade in Goldenrod is the ace up everyone’s sleeves for the deceivingly strong Whitney unless they want to be pulverized again by her Miltank, and catching Swinub in the Ice Cave is the only pokemon that will even dent Clair’s dragon pokemon in Blackthorn. Speaking of dragon pokemon, establishing a grinding regimen is essential this time around not only because the Elite Four members have high-leveled pokemon in their arsenal, but because newly appointed champion Lance has THREE fucking Dragonites this time around. Tell us you have a tiny penis without explicitly telling us you have a tiny penis, Lance. Because Lance’s six beasts are massive and vicious unlike his shriveled manhood, it’s recommended to leave a trail of dead Golbat, Onix, Rhyhorn, and Graveler in their wake from the Victory Road exit, even though the process will truly grate on every player’s patience.

As climactic as it feels, mastering Johto’s Pokemon League is not the finishing moment that rounds out the Gold/Silver journey. After returning home to New Bark Town to rest momentarily, Professor Elm gives the player a ticket to the familiar SS Anne cruise ship docked in Olivine. As expected, the fanciful ship arrives at its home in the southern port city of Vermillion, and Lt. Surge is now the first of eight gym leaders to conquer in another tour around Kanto. If featuring almost all of Kanto’s pokemon in Johto didn’t tie a connective rope between Red/Blue and Gold/Silver, then the trek around the franchise’s first nation once again is practically what makes Gold/Silver a direct sequel. However, it’s a truncated tour that will only take the player a few hours to accomplish. While on this short lark, the player can marvel at the little things that have changed in the three years since Red put himself on the pedestal of the pokemon Hall of Fame. Regarding the gym leaders the player will face, Koga’s daughter Janine is running the poison-type gym leader in Fuchsia and ex-champion Blue has got himself a full-time gig as Giovanni’s replacement in Viridian. Blaine’s island of Cinnabar has washed away to the point where he is its only resident, and the Safari Zone is closed indefinitely. Instances like these snap the revisiting Red/Blue players back to the reality of time upon expecting a Gold/Silver Kanto to pave a road of untainted nostalgic bliss. Then again, why would anyone want to see Kanto again the way it was when the colorful graphics that are now rendering it are so pleasant? Arriving at the old hub of Pallet Town before the final Kanto gym badge sees a distraught Red’s mom wondering where her son is, as he’s become an instance of someone who evidently couldn’t handle the pressure of fame and literally hid from the overwhelming limelight. Finding Kanto’s finest at the peak of the perilous Mt. Silver across the Johto border to battle him is the true final challenge that Gold/Silver provides. Because Red’s reputation as a champion is surely documented, his pokemon are leveled far higher than any other team of pokemon in the game, so be prepared for a ruthless duel that will have you sweating bullets. Another tedious grinding session aside, having the final opponent of Gold/Silver as what is essentially the player from a past life as the ultimate test of trainer aptitude blows the Elite Four out of the water. Red’s stoic silence isn’t awkward at all, for the scope of this fight leaves me speechless as well.

Gold/Silver’s final fight is also a genius way to illustrate how the new guard of Pokemon has vanquished the old, which is exactly its modus operandi that it never shies away from flaunting. Gold/Silver is unmistakenly familiar to its predecessor because it attempts to succeed the Pokemon formula with pinpoint specificity to improve Red/Blue. It shares the same pokemon, the same pace of progression, and the same troublesome terrorist organization of Team Rocket and streamlines all of these, erasing the jaggedness that came with Red/Blue’s presence on the original Gameboy. Red/Blue’s pokemon championship narrative was admittedly already rounded to perfection, which is why the same arc executed in Gold/Silver is a tad less gratifying. Then, returning to Kanto to face the true champion of the series offered an unprecedented final battle that could make the player faint with its tension. Gold/Silver’s superiority to Red/Blue isn’t simply due to the shift into color on the advanced Gameboy Color model, even if it does improve the graphics significantly. With its positive streamlining, additional content, comparatively deeper battle mechanics, and glowing visual flair, Pokemon Gold/Silver eats Red/Blue for breakfast. I can’t believe there is still a large portion of Pokemon fans who refuse to admit it with all the evidence at hand.

(Originally published to Glitchwave on 12/31/2023)

[Image from glitchwave.com]

Pokemon Crystal

Category: Expanded Game

Release Date: December 14, 2000

Pokemon Yellow debuted the concept of re-releasing the latest addition of a Pokemon game with a slew of extra content to justify its existence. However, I wouldn’t consider it to be the definitive version of the original Kanto journey. The bells and whistles attached to Pokemon Yellow deviated far too much from the core narrative and progression of pokemon catching than what was displayed in the Red/Blue entries. For the fans of the Pokemon anime that Yellow was catered towards, it set an inaccurate precedent for every Pokemon generation that followed where they’d have to manually type in Ash’s name for their character and Pikachu would not act as their little staticky shadow step by step. Pokemon Crystal, the subsequent release acting as a sister version of Gold/Silver, is the first instance of what I’d consider a definitive edition for a Pokemon generation.

I can’t believe no one at Game Freak thought to include the option to play as a female protagonist before Crystal. I understand that Pokemon’s target demographic (and video games as a whole) is young boys, but is it outside the realm of possibilities that girls would be interested in a game revolving around collecting cute, fictional animals and bonding with them like pets? Is it the battle system and conquest arc that inherently cements Pokemon as a male-centric series? Hardly. The ability to swap the protagonist’s gender is a brilliant tactic from a marketing standpoint, garnering a crucial audience whose newfound interest in the franchise is because of this new feature giving them a chance to be a contender as a Pokemon master. For the boys who already experienced Johto in either Gold or Silver and are confident in their masculinity, the female protagonist should also mix up the familiar backdrop adequately.

Really, a definitive version of any game should remedy the mistakes made by the rougher iteration it’s sprucing up. One new feature introduced in Gold/Silver is the ability to save the phone numbers of a select few trainers after defeating them in battle, and I didn’t care to humor this feature. Every time one of these people called me to give me an unsolicited rundown of their day, I immediately deleted their contact information. In Crystal, these trainers will notify you of when swarms of rare pokemon are occurring, plus give you various gifts they scrounge up. Socializing finally pays off. The select pokemon found in seasonal packs are also much easier to obtain than the less than 1% chance given in Gold/Silver, which should honestly only be entertained for Remoraid and Snubbull anyway. Gold version exclusive Growlithe is catchable around Violet City to use against Bugsy if your character didn’t choose Cyndaquil as a starter, and dark-ice type Sneasel can be found in the Ice Cave. It’s a far more sensible spot to put a new pokemon with a beneficial typing for both the dragon and psychic challenges the player will face before shipping off to Kanto. Also, if Gold/Silver’s onus was to give the ugly Red/Blue a makeover, surely the moving pokemon sprites that introduce a battle are a pleasant little touch that gives these creatures a boosted speck of personality.

Crystal’s slight narrative deviation seems to revolve around the Suicune, one of three legendary dogs that succeed the legendary bird trio from Kanto. Like in the base game, the elemental dogs will scurry from their resting place in the basement of Ecruteak’s Burned Tower and run frantically around Johto. I did not mention the side quest involving capturing them because stumbling upon them is a rarer occurrence than catching a pokemon only found during swarms, and the exciting moment of finally finding them just to have them roar your pokemon away from battle adds too much insult to injury. At least encountering Suicune periodically finally culminates to potentially catching it in Kanto, unlike the tortuous hunt for Entei and Raikou.

Pokemon Crystal isn’t merely Gold/Silver for girls, even though the addition of playing as one would naturally entice the other half of the gender demographic. Like Pokemon Yellow, its quality-of-life enhancements from the base game are relatively minor, but it doesn’t inject any outside influences from other Pokemon media to discern it for a different player base. Crystal is Gold/Silver plus one, which inherently makes it the definitive version by clear definition.