The plot was to basically catch stolen "dark" pokemon, there is no pokemon league, there is barely any wild pokemon, I could go on and on...
The two parts there - it's due to the region of Orre being in torubled times, drought, and what not. Would be odd if there were routes despite there being no Pokemon... would have liked wild Pokemon myself (and more than in XD, the sequel), but I still liked the game. Can't really see what's wrong with the first point you made (the plot) - a new idea, and with a character that wasn't a small 10 year old kid as well. Plot was elaborated a tad further than that as well, with developed characters and all.
they should have just made a 3-D version of kanto, johto, or hoenn!
...I doubt that. Kanto - stupid, as FR and LG came out on GBA anyway shortly after, so NMintendo would have lost sales, Johto - GSC wasn't all that long ago, and Hoenn... see Kanto.
Those regions IMO will stay in the handheld format anyway, unless they deside to remake GSC on the Wii, which seems unlikely, and would probably have the same happen to it as did RBY - into FR and LG.
Orre and Shadow Pokemon was a new concept, something different rather than the same old same old.
I wasted my money on these games!
Matter of opinion... although I got the game for free of a friend who had two copies (
), I might have bought it anyway if I know about it...
Leastways, now you backed up your opinion to a degree...