>>26781254The game has almost NO Emerald content. No Frontier, no Gym Leader rematches, no areas like Mirage Tower, etc.
The game has much more handholding than RSE, including several parts of the game where you get teleported to the current plot-related area. You can say no usually, but there's a place where it happens against your will even if you weren't done with the place you were at before the teleport.
Actual locations from RSE are cut down in size and/or features. New Mauville is two rooms, Granite Cave is two rooms (with an optional extra area, but you can't go there unless you backtrack later), Mt. Pyre has less floors, the mach bike puzzle is gone from Sky Pillar, etc. Also, this is the fault of the engine, but there are a lot more route gates than in RSE, which breaks the flow of the game. They also removed side activities like the berry blender, Game Corner, and Safari Zone.
The Gen VI Exp. Share ruins the game if you keep it on. It can be turned off but by default it's on, and if you're playing blind you may not realize how much it overlevels you until you're already overleveled enough to trivialize parts of the game.
MANDATORY GIFT LEGENDARIES. You're forced to take Lati@s and you're forced to catch Rayquaza then use it in one of the only battles with a strong, challenging team, trivializing it.
There's more but I've complained about ORAS so much that I don't feel like detailing every single flaw. ORAS does have some good things to it, like improved characterization for your rivals and the villainous leader, and Dexnav is the best version of Pokéradar in the franchise. The flaws outweight the positives though. If you have CFW then there's no harm in playing it for free but it's not worth $40, especially if you like Emerald a lot.
Also, if anyone calls any criticisms against the game a "meme" they're shills. If they put up an actual argument then they might be sincere, but don't listen to anyone just calling a criticsm a meme.