Rant - In defense of Fire red and Leaf green
By webmistress Butterfree A.K.A. Dragonfree
I recently checked out some reviews at GameFAQs of Fire red and Leaf green. And there were VERY split opinions. Six people gave it ten out of ten. Five people in total with nine, eight or seven. Then, hovering there like ghosts, three fives and one four. Both sevens were by people who loved the game, but were unhappy with what it seems to cost to "Catch 'em all". One eight lowered it on the story, which is after all not what pokémon is about, the other one about the difficulty, which can easily be fixed (see "Fancy a challenge?"). Nine is a great score, only thing that lowered it down in that review was the story again.
Now, I wanted to see why they got such negative reviews from these other four people. And this is very interesting...
What they were complaining about was basically "Been there, done that". They complained about that they already played the old games and they'd have to add much more to the games to make them good.
So, as much as I love to randomly split people into groups, I instantly split them up: On one side, the people like me, who enjoy experiencing the feeling of the old games, hearing the remixed music that reminds them of their idiot days, using Charmander, Bulbasaur and Squirtle again, walking around Cinnabar mansion and remembering when they were absolutely dying to know what happened to Mewtwo and Mew...
On the other side, the people who like the new and don't like remakes in general.
Now, here is my review as a fan of remakes:
Graphics: 9/10. Not the best thing ever, admittedly. Better than R/S, though, and I'm not much of a graphics person.
Gameplay: 10/10. Come on, this is pokémon. We all know how incredibly simple, yet addicting it is.
Controls: 10/10. Being turn-based really feels like a necessity to me when we're dealing with gameboy games. I find it hard to control action games on the GBA, but Pokémon has always been extremely easy to control for me.
Sound: 8/10. Sure, it DOES please my ears immensely to hear the old battling tunes again. But I really don't like how they remixed the town music. It sounds completely different, and Cerulean and Fuchsia have this annoyingly addicting music, meaning I can't stand it but still can't leave the town until I've heard it through at least once.
Replay value: 10/10. You can play it again and again, it isn't about the story or solving the mysteries; you can use a different technique, a different starter, use different pokémon in your team. The possibilities are endless.
Difficulty: 8/10. Sure, it's easy, but COME ON, read this page and THEN tell me it's boring...
Play time: 10/10. I have only ONCE restarted a pokémon game of mine, and that was not out of there not being any more to do, but because I wanted to hear the legendary music from Crystal again. Sure, beating the Elite Four doesn't take long, but the pokémon games are just so FAR from being completed when you beat them. You still have pokémon to catch, islands to discover and the Unknown Dungeon to play around in. And of course, a team to train. You've never completed a pokémon game, meaning you can play it forever if you like.
Story: 7/10. I've said it a hundred times, but - pokémon is NOT about the story! It isn't any more about the story than a game without sounds is about the sound. It's open-ended, and when the story ends, you just go on, nobody tells you to stop there and lose all your pokémon. After you've completed the story, the story is yours to make.
Final score: 9.0/10. Wonderful games, wonderful experience. For a Deja Vu fan at the very least.
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