Sαpphire
Johto Champion
I do sometimes think that LGPE are somewhat underrated, but it's important to recognize that it's not a black and white situation (no pun intended).
I think that LGPE are enjoyable and feel like classic Pokémon games. I didn't have an issue with them being restricted to 151 (really 152/3?) species, I didn't have an issue with them limiting wild battles, and I love the look and feel of the game - visually, it's still my favorite. I like the Master Trainers, and the standard QoL improvements that bring the Yellow concept closer to other more recent titles are nice. Overall, I like the games.
The issues come in when we start to talk about what the games meant in a broader perspective. There are a lot of fans who did not enjoy the games, and who were vocally opposed to them from the announcement and through the release. I, personally, dismissed a lot of their concerns - that limiting the dex could set a bad precedent for the series, that removing wild battles was removing something too inherent to the series' identity, that not including the Sevii Islands was tantamount to removing content from Kanto, that the games being targeted at a slightly younger audience could make them difficult for older players to enjoy.
The way I engaged in that discourse, even on this site, is one of my biggest regrets as a fan of this franchise, and the callous attitude that I and many others took in dismissing critics of these games was embarrassingly misplaced. I remember clearly dismissing concerns from members like @Bolt the Cat as unfounded - and now in 2022, I look back and I was wrong on almost every single count. I actively regret that every time I have a discussion about the state of the franchise and the negativity in the community, because defending LGPE was where I directly contributed to where things are now.
Just to go over what some of those things were: In the time since release, we've seen that the dex restriction and move restriction probably did start to set a precedent for the rest of the main series, and those are two things that I think are honestly shameful. No game released in this franchise has had all the Pokémon or their moves since USUM, and even Legends: Arceus probably won't. We've also seen that the removal of enhanced version content is still and probably always going to be par for the course for remakes when BDSP didn't have virtually any of the things that Platinum brought to Sinnoh, and worse, that remakes may now remain restricted to species that were available in their original counterparts - instead of incorporating everything and being treated as truly legitimate new entries in the series, as HGSS and ORAS were. Further, they removed abilities, held items, breeding, and eggs, some of the things I'm personally going to miss from Legends (which also, allegedly, removes those things), all of which feel like important pieces of what the series had become by 2018 and what it's been since twenty years ago with Ruby and Sapphire. I get now what people were worried about because it arguably did come to pass.
Further, I think the way they're considered to be core series titles by Game Freak also means that there's a standard that they should be held against, and as much as I enjoy them, I don't feel like I can say they met that standard. I get that it's hard to bring both younger and more casual players into the fold and still appease us long-term fans, but LGPE don't feel like they made any effort to appeal to more dedicated existing players for anyone outside of a very specific Gen 1 niche. There are no post-game battle facilities to provide a satisfying and engaging gameplay loop after rolling the credits; there are no new or extra areas to explore beyond a single dungeon, so you've seen it all if you've beaten the game and caught Mewtwo; they don't make much of an effort to flesh out many Kanto characters, with the only notable example I can remember being a scene with Lorelai in a spot she hadn't appeared before; they don't add to or change the Kanto story almost at all. HGSS improved on the Johto experience, adjusting levels and adding the Battle Frontier and adding a Safari Zone and incorporating elements from Crystal. ORAS expanded the Hoenn story with the Delta Episode and added brand new Mega Evolutions, then allowed us to catch old legendaries in all kinds of new places. LGPE... just didn't do anything like that. It's just Kanto again, same story (less story than FRLG actually), same features more or less, but with a few extra battles and the Master Trainer thing.
They're less remakes and more remasters with wild battles swapped out for Go-style encounters - and that's fine in general, but is it really fine for a $60 core series Pokémon game that's the series' first on a home console? I don't know.
With all that said, I think that LGPE have probably earned their reputations, so I can't in good faith say they're all that underrated in the end. I get why people don't enjoy them, and a few years later I now get why some fans who haven't felt right about the series lately might point to them as where things started going wrong. Because I now see those same concerns from a few years ago impacting my own ability to enjoy more recent titles, I can't really argue against the perspective that the success of LGPE justified to Game Freak and Nintendo a path that I don't like from the series.
I think that LGPE are enjoyable and feel like classic Pokémon games. I didn't have an issue with them being restricted to 151 (really 152/3?) species, I didn't have an issue with them limiting wild battles, and I love the look and feel of the game - visually, it's still my favorite. I like the Master Trainers, and the standard QoL improvements that bring the Yellow concept closer to other more recent titles are nice. Overall, I like the games.
The issues come in when we start to talk about what the games meant in a broader perspective. There are a lot of fans who did not enjoy the games, and who were vocally opposed to them from the announcement and through the release. I, personally, dismissed a lot of their concerns - that limiting the dex could set a bad precedent for the series, that removing wild battles was removing something too inherent to the series' identity, that not including the Sevii Islands was tantamount to removing content from Kanto, that the games being targeted at a slightly younger audience could make them difficult for older players to enjoy.
The way I engaged in that discourse, even on this site, is one of my biggest regrets as a fan of this franchise, and the callous attitude that I and many others took in dismissing critics of these games was embarrassingly misplaced. I remember clearly dismissing concerns from members like @Bolt the Cat as unfounded - and now in 2022, I look back and I was wrong on almost every single count. I actively regret that every time I have a discussion about the state of the franchise and the negativity in the community, because defending LGPE was where I directly contributed to where things are now.
Just to go over what some of those things were: In the time since release, we've seen that the dex restriction and move restriction probably did start to set a precedent for the rest of the main series, and those are two things that I think are honestly shameful. No game released in this franchise has had all the Pokémon or their moves since USUM, and even Legends: Arceus probably won't. We've also seen that the removal of enhanced version content is still and probably always going to be par for the course for remakes when BDSP didn't have virtually any of the things that Platinum brought to Sinnoh, and worse, that remakes may now remain restricted to species that were available in their original counterparts - instead of incorporating everything and being treated as truly legitimate new entries in the series, as HGSS and ORAS were. Further, they removed abilities, held items, breeding, and eggs, some of the things I'm personally going to miss from Legends (which also, allegedly, removes those things), all of which feel like important pieces of what the series had become by 2018 and what it's been since twenty years ago with Ruby and Sapphire. I get now what people were worried about because it arguably did come to pass.
Further, I think the way they're considered to be core series titles by Game Freak also means that there's a standard that they should be held against, and as much as I enjoy them, I don't feel like I can say they met that standard. I get that it's hard to bring both younger and more casual players into the fold and still appease us long-term fans, but LGPE don't feel like they made any effort to appeal to more dedicated existing players for anyone outside of a very specific Gen 1 niche. There are no post-game battle facilities to provide a satisfying and engaging gameplay loop after rolling the credits; there are no new or extra areas to explore beyond a single dungeon, so you've seen it all if you've beaten the game and caught Mewtwo; they don't make much of an effort to flesh out many Kanto characters, with the only notable example I can remember being a scene with Lorelai in a spot she hadn't appeared before; they don't add to or change the Kanto story almost at all. HGSS improved on the Johto experience, adjusting levels and adding the Battle Frontier and adding a Safari Zone and incorporating elements from Crystal. ORAS expanded the Hoenn story with the Delta Episode and added brand new Mega Evolutions, then allowed us to catch old legendaries in all kinds of new places. LGPE... just didn't do anything like that. It's just Kanto again, same story (less story than FRLG actually), same features more or less, but with a few extra battles and the Master Trainer thing.
They're less remakes and more remasters with wild battles swapped out for Go-style encounters - and that's fine in general, but is it really fine for a $60 core series Pokémon game that's the series' first on a home console? I don't know.
With all that said, I think that LGPE have probably earned their reputations, so I can't in good faith say they're all that underrated in the end. I get why people don't enjoy them, and a few years later I now get why some fans who haven't felt right about the series lately might point to them as where things started going wrong. Because I now see those same concerns from a few years ago impacting my own ability to enjoy more recent titles, I can't really argue against the perspective that the success of LGPE justified to Game Freak and Nintendo a path that I don't like from the series.