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What would be the ideal game?
Gen 1 had the best pokemon designs, the best names for npc's/cities, the best gym/elite 4 types and layout, the best music, the best rival, the best use of an evil team; just generally the best. Gen 2 added day/night and rematches, which I like, and steel/dark which are good ideas with imperfect implementation. Gen 3 had the best look/sounds/snappiness. Gen 4 had the best sprites and move density (and supposedly routes, though I have yet to play all the way through sinnoh). Gen 5 added some nice detail to the game (regular grass looks better, for instance, and you see shit blowing in the wind, and many of the towns were unique and flavorful if useless) and seasons, and had the best non gen-1 pokemon in my opinion (though plenty were bad).
The forced crappy stories/dialogues of post gen-1 games are bad. Most of the distractions in later games are crap, but I guess kids and females like them. Linearity is bad. Gen 1 had bad routes. Handholding is bad, baby-fied shit is bad. Bloat is bad.
GBA Gen 3, gen 1 overall design quality/simplicity, but with gen 4 sprite/route quality, with gen 5 details, later gen pokemon redesigned with gen 1 aesthetics (like pic related), + day/night cycle, + rematches, + seasons.