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Emerald wasn't my first pokemon game. It was my second after Fire Red, but it was my favorite since it had better pokemon designs and more early pokemon available. I even speedran it before as a kid before I knew that speedrunning was a thing.
Because of this, I wanted to play ORAS. For what it's worth, I did enjoy it, if only because of nostalgia, but the removal of the battle frontier was upsetting. For me, that was when the games started going downhill. They demonstratedly had less effort put into them. I kept using the post-game as a litmus test for the games. Gen 7 rolled around and it took place in Hawaii where I live. I wasn't going to miss a region where I could literally visit my house, and the people around me sure as hell weren't either. It was great. I found two very rare shinies in the middle of my first playthrough, (Toxapex and Mimikyu) but then USUM rolled around, advertising itself more or less like a sequel (as B2W2 were) but having very few changes to the original story. Honestly felt like a rip off. Also, the battle tree is boring as shit. It just wasn't enough for me.
Sword and Shield rolled around, and I just didn't bother. I loved stupid gimmicks, and while several of my favorites got in, losing so many pokemon I really liked and having so many gimmick strategies made impossible by the completely arbitrary limits, combined with the bullshit excuses just put me off of the game. The reviews didn't exactly change my mind, and the post-game was yet another step down from the battle tree, now having battles exclusively against Leon. The battle tree was repetitive, but at least you could unlock trainers as partners in multi-battles as you beat them.
Frankly, the inclusion of the battle frontier is going to make or break BDSP for me. That and the potential pokemon exclusions will determine whether I give a shit about it or not. Again, this is a really low fucking bar, but I'm sure they'll find a way to flop onto it face first.
