>>25205441The thing that makes XY's rivals so bad to me is that none of them feel like they have passion, despite their entire personalities being "I am passionate about this one thing." Like Serena, you already pointed out she almost never battles you despite supposedly being the "I love battling and want to be the very best!" type. Contrast with Barry, who's friendly but passionate about battling, and he shows it by CONSTANTLY battling you throughout the game. There aren't too many portions where he just shows up to waste your time with pointless chit-chat, outside the start of the game at least. I feel similar about the Qwilfish in BW2, he's friendly, and he doesn't battle you that much compared to Barry, but even though his only personality is "muh Purrloin," he's incredibly active about it, he doesn't just follow you around, if anything when you go through Plasma bases and shit you're the one following his leadership. That part where he boards the airship with you and you can feel the effects of him taking out half the guards instead of XY's "oh, we caught up to you, let's face Lysandre together but not really do much of note!" is the best example, he's making a notable difference as a character by being there.
I want Z to be a sequel instead of a standard third version so we don't have to deal with those fucks anymore, outside maybe their role as a professor's assistant or some shit (I can see Coconut Head doing so since he's the Pokédex guy).
