XYZ effect on fans and writers. How do you feel?

[BlobbiBoi]

Trauma from what? TF?
I personally do believe that Ash might suffer from PTSD with all that he’s witnessed. XYZ could have done something where after the Flare arc, Ash is like “why do I have to save the world again? Why I am the only one doing it? Why do all these terrible things keep happening when I’m around?” if that’s what you mean.

Yeah, that's exactly what I meant. Sorry if I wasn't super clear.

 

[satopi]

Like @SerGoldenhandtheJust said, I like how XY(&Z) made the writers realize how stagnant they made the series and characters which in turn helped break the mold going into SM.

 

[Power Up]

As for my comments on Alain, I was more referencing the fact he's a clear outlier compared to the rest. So is Ash, but he's the main character.

He's not an outlier, neither is Ash. He's part of the Masters 8, the strongest trainers in the world, something that Ash is also part of. Seems relatively simple to me.

 

[Power Up]

I think they mean that Alain is the only non-champion in the masters 8.

No, I don't think that's what they meant since they also mentioned Ash being an outlier when he's the Alola Champion

 

[Xuxuba]

Like @SerGoldenhandtheJust said, I like how XY(&Z) made the writers realize how stagnant they made the series and characters which in turn helped break the mold going into SM.

Nah, it was still formulatic af. Most of the changes were superficial and made by the games, like replacing gym leaders for kahunas (which are essentially the same thing, except in smaller numbers) and adding Totem pokémon (which went mostly underused). The school setting accomplished nothing other than being a background for their discussions. It essentially did what OI did years ago, which was change the gym leader format a bit, provide a tropical setting with small islands to visit and have Ash actually win something.

I'd say the only series that truly went against the formula were BF and JN, with the former having a good execution (besides the fillers) while the other not so much.

 

[BlobbiBoi]

He's not an outlier, neither is Ash. He's part of the Masters 8, the strongest trainers in the world, something that Ash is also part of. I don't understand how this is difficult.

I think they mean that Alain is the only non-champion in the masters 8.

Lemee try and explain (also I forgot Ash was the Alola Champ I'll be real).

I think its fairly commonly accepted that not every Champion is on par with one another even simply because of how they battle (looking at you, Lance) in the Masters 8. Anyone could lose to anyone, but in reality depending on the matchups you could argue that some battles would "realistically" be heavily one sided (even if obviously its all scripted to get Ash the matchups we've been wanting for years now).

Alain, at least going by what we've seen him accomplish, has never really shown he could tangle with a lot of the people in the 8 in a straight-up battle. The fact he's there is very impressive but I could have seen a repeat of the Leon battle if he'd have gotten matched with Cynthia, for example, or even Steven (going back their brief match in the Mega Evo specials).

Hell, Steven almost bodied Ash. He pretty firmly dominated that fight from the getgo.

tl;dr - I don't think Alain was ever going to last long, and I dunno why some people act like its XY hate or a conspiracy to say otherwise.

 

[DatsRight]

Nah, it was still formulatic af. Most of the changes were superficial and made by the games, like replacing gym leaders for kahunas (which are essentially the same thing, except in smaller numbers) and adding Totem pokémon (which went mostly underused). The school setting accomplished nothing other than being a background for their discussions. It essentially did what OI did years ago, which was change the gym leader format a bit, provide a tropical setting with small islands to visit and have Ash actually win something.

I'd say the only series that truly went against the formula were BF and JN, with the former having a good execution (besides the fillers) while the other not so much.

I think BW is kind of unsung for breaking a lot of formula elements, though SM was the start of actually capitalising on them properly.

I think the key one was attempting some basic character driven stories with the protagonists without having an antagonist like Team Rocket inorganically butt in and call it off, something XY regressed on completely compared to BW. Even some of the key arcs suffered from it (how did they manage to be involved in the Wetlands draining again?).

I will admit however that Ash and the other heroes being less of a reactor and more a character that drives the plot is less of new concept and more just a revival of something they tried from the very first episode.

Others like trying to even the companion screentime rather than only prioritise Ash and the Pokegirl, Team Rocket having more dynamic involvement, main characters having a wider accomplishment cap like being allowed to catch mythical/legendary Pokemon or even WIN at their goals, having episodes besides specials that didn't even feature certain main characters. All these started in either BW or SM. XY by comparison doesn't really open a lot more floodgates, just tease them. I think the biggest ideas I'd never seen before were having a big culmination finale arc where all the key characters from the series are involved (something SM continued a variation of), and the more obtuse one of Meowth landing an actual hit on Pikachu in battle.

 

[BlobbiBoi]

I think BW is kind of unsung for breaking a lot of formula elements, though SM was the start of actually capitalising on them properly.

BW could have gone further but the earthquake (iirc) forced them to make a sharp right turn away from the Rocket vs Plasma arc. I think that's a shame, because it really hurt the overall reception of the series when they had to scrabble to fill the gaps.

 

[Power Up]

Alain, at least going by what we've seen him accomplish, has never really shown he could tangle with a lot of the people in the 8 in a straight-up battle. The fact he's there is very impressive but I could have seen a repeat of the Leon battle if he'd have gotten matched with Cynthia, for example, or even Steven (going back their brief match in the Mega Evo specials).

No, there's nothing showing that Alain's somehow incapable of tangling with a lot of the 8 in a straight up battle. He's simply not capable of tangling with Leon in a straight up battle. I don't think there's any sort of evidence to suggest that Cynthia would have even come close to performing a Leon style decimation on Alain.

I've watched the Steven vs Alain battle multiple times. Yes, Steven was stronger than Alain in their encounter but suggesting that it was some sort of blowout is completely contrary to what the battle actually displayed.

In that battle, MCX tanked a

- Mega Boosted Flash Cannon
- Mega Boosted Meteor Mash

And was still completely in the battle, while of course landing direct hits with Dragon Claw and Blast Burn. Not to mention that this was just the second episode of the Mega Evo specials in which they made clear Alain continued to gain in strength.

I have zero clue how one could see this as some sort of demolition on Steven's side, especially comparing it to Leon.

 

[BlobbiBoi]

No, there's nothing showing that Alain's somehow incapable of tangling with a lot of the 8 in a straight up battle. He's simply not capable of tangling with Leon in a straight up battle. I don't think there's any sort of evidence to suggest that Cynthia would have even come close to performing a Leon style decimation on Alain.

I don't mean to that level of decimation persay, but if Cynthia had matched with Alain I'm at least 90% sure people would have gone "lol bye Alain", the same way people did that when Diantha matched with Lance.

Maybe I'm just being a little too critical; we'll never know what would have happened if Leon had viewed Alain as enough of a danger to pull out his ace and G-Max instead of clapping him with a Dragon Pulse to the face and oneshotting him.

My only real point of note is that Leon was clearly threatened enough to meet Mega Gardevoir with his (objectively) full strength, and even then it had enough firepower to land a thunderbolt and throw the Wildfire back at Charizard's face. Alain, by contrast, didn't get that.

 

[Trillion]

Well Ash is technically just the Alola League Champion, not an actual official champion of the region like the others.

lmao are we still on this

 

[Power Up]

I don't mean to that level of decimation persay, but if Cynthia had matched with Alain I'm at least 90% sure people would have gone "lol bye Alain", the same way people did that when Diantha matched with Lance.

No they wouldn't, especially when provided with the information we know now. The anime has literally never characterized as Cynthia being this sort of unbeatable god the way they've done with Leon.

And when did people do that with the Diantha/Lance match? That was literally the match people felt could go either way.

Maybe I'm just being a little too critical; we'll never know what would have happened if Leon had viewed Alain as enough of a danger to pull out his ace and G-Max instead of clapping him with a Dragon Pulse to the face and oneshotting him.

Alain had taken damage from an Air Slash and an Ancient Power. He didn't get one-shot. To be fair, I made the same claim in the match thread when I watched it live, but that's objectively not the case.

My only real point of note is that Leon was clearly threatened enough to meet Mega Gardevoir with his (objectively) full strength, and even then it had enough firepower to land a thunderbolt and throw the Wildfire back at Charizard's face. Alain, by contrast, didn't get that.

It had the fire power to land a basically stationary target? It was impressive that MG was able to make GZard shake, but I don't think landing it was as all impressive.

I don't think G-Max powerlevels map on the same way that Megas do, which is why I hesitate to make the claim that Mega Gardevoir performed considerably better than MCX.

 

[DarkusHeracross]

Thing with XYZ is that they were seemingly going for a high-risk high-reward type of series:

They made Ash more mature.
They upped animation to 11.
Writing felt somewhat more consistent.
Tropes not explored previously done correctly.
Main girl being romantically interested towards Ash.
Ash getting to the finals.
Ash actually having some kind of 1 in 10000000 thing that centered the entire region around him.

So they were going for pretty much the peak of what they could do with the anime up to that point, and it was working well up until the conclusion of several of these things being a complete 180 from what they had buildup for the fans, Ash lost the league in the finals, Serena romance plot obviously went nowhere, Ash-Greninja form was not ever implied to exist ever since, art style changed drastically, etc.

So it's not like it's a bad series or anything like that, because it's one of the best in the anime, but it definitely tried something too extreme when it came to hyping fans up for something that ended up disappointing most of them in the ending, I mean, the cope from "Down To The Fiery Finish!" is still as strong as ever.

Agree with this post completely, just look at what we got after, much more childish. I feel like if they had Ash win the league the divide would not be this bad, but he lost so just about everyone who liked XYZ was upset with it and the people who didn’t like it have more of a reason not to.

When Ash won the Manalo cup I was thinking to myself “it should have been the kalos cup”

 

[Leonhart]

but if you talk about XYZ on any pokefourm it always boils down to these things; ash greninja, serenas kiss and the ending.

If those are really the highlights that most people recall when they think about XY&Z, then that makes me a little bit apprehensive. For me personally, the Flare-dan [Team Flare], Alan, and Zygarde having large roles were the key elements of that part of the saga. Even with Gekkouga [Greninja] receiving so much screen-time, he's not the first thing that I remember during the rare times that I reminisce about the Kalos saga.

 

[Xuxuba]

I think BW is kind of unsung for breaking a lot of formula elements, though SM was the start of actually capitalising on them properly.

I think the key one was attempting some basic character driven stories with the protagonists without having an antagonist like Team Rocket inorganically butt in and call it off, something XY regressed on completely compared to BW. Even some of the key arcs suffered from it (how did they manage to be involved in the Wetlands draining again?).

I will admit however that Ash and the other heroes being less of a reactor and more a character that drives the plot is less of new concept and more just a revival of something they tried from the very episode.

Others like trying to even the companion screentime rather than only prioritise Ash and the Pokegirl, Team Rocket having more dynamic involvement, main characters having a wider accomplishment cap like being allowed to catch mythical/legendary Pokemon or even WIN at their goals, having episodes besides specials that didn't even feature certain main characters. All these started in either BW or SM. XY by comparison doesn't really open a lot more floodgates.

I do agree that BW making TR competent was a breath of fresh air. That was one of the reasons why i kept watching it. But the regression happened within that same series instead of the next one, with TR going back to their old selves midway through. I guess mostly because some people were complaining they were "too serious" for their liking.

Personally, i think TR are fine in the newer series. I do not think they are great/amazing as it is, but they are certainly nowhere near as bad as they were back in Kanto, Johto and Hoenn. I mean, they might not be as competent as their early-BW days, but they do have a good balance between being the comic relief and being an actual threat sometimes. For example, XY had them literally dropping off a toddler to her death while also having them doing silly comical acts like dressing up as the main characters and impersonating them. SM TR had a really strong Pokémon to rival Pikachu in the form of Mimikyu while also giving some comedic moments eith Bewear (even if it got boring real quick). Meanwhile, JN mostly side lined TR so even if they were bad in this series it wouldn't make much of a difference.
Nowadays they are just a tiny speck in a sea of patterns that made up the formula, as oppose to before when they were responsible for most of it. That might also be the result of the newer series having less fillers.

 

[GLTSRY]

XYZ was objectively more mature and serious than any season before it or that has come after it. That maturity is a big part of the appeal for a lot of people. I'm not criticizing the series for being "too dark" to "too edgy" lol, and I don't know why the immediate assumption is "you HATE XY!!!! You're just PARROTING bro!!!" when I've said before the animation is gorgeous and I enjoy it for what it is.

But absolutely no villian in the anime came close to the abject horror of that final arc with Lysandre - the BW Rocket vs Plasma arc could have, but we'll never know.

I'll go one step further; I think XY is the one series that actually had the highest chance to give Ash some legitimate post-arc problems and trauma. They obviously couldn't go that direction in a kids show, so didn't, and we got SM which gave more grounded themes and a more grounded scale while also going back to what the series had been more early on.

Team Galactic and Hunter J exist. Furthermore, I don’t think the TF arc - in terms of events, not the quality of the arc - was more grandiose than the Magma/Aqua showdown

 

[DarkusHeracross]

XYZ, despite your opinion on it, certainly had a MAJOR effect on the fans and writers

So, like literally most people in the Pokémon world.

Why do you keep responding to obvious bait?

 

[DarkusHeracross]

Like @SerGoldenhandtheJust said, I like how XY(&Z) made the writers realize how stagnant they made the series and characters which in turn helped break the mold going into SM.

Im half and half on this. I think that the main reason why they changed it up is because after the HUGE backlash from fans they finally realized that yes, like you said the old format did get stagnant and they had to change it up.

 

[DarkusHeracross]

Why do people throw out bait in the first place?

To get people like you to respond. Just ignore him and move on.

 

[Kuzehiko]

Serena's return was handled perfectly.
She is one of the best characters and that episode proved that right in my opinion.
As for Alain and Diantha, is it coincidence that the writers had Leon battle 2 Kalos trainers and they were curbstompped just to make look Leon good and unbeatable? I don't think it is but I don't think they have a thing against XY either. They took terrible choices just like they have been taking it throughout Journeys.