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I was a kid during Pokemania and saw the original anime back in the day, OP.
Onix looked impressive as fuck and everyone went nuts for it since it's first appearance, the fascination around it grew even more with the Bruno episode and the Crystal Onix episode, one of the most memorable of the entire series.
Finding out later (many years later in my case) that it's garbage in the games was very sad. The balance excuse never sat well with me because they could have given it a fixed damage move. I believe they just were in a hurry and didn't think things through.
A pokémon this cool being so atrociously bad is a crime.