>>58732065OP here, I fully agree about the dex. The repetition of common encounters is a little unfortunate, but it helps make the rarer encounters that you need to go out of your way to find stand out. It really helps a Pokémon feel special to obtain when you have to deliberately hunt for it, or at least have it be a reward for engaging with an optional mechanic, like honey trees and mining. You can really tell how they were trying to follow in the footsteps of Gen 2 in this regard, along with the new evolutions and pre-evos. Really, I like how much DPP try to tie themselves into old gens in this way.
As for features like the Pokeradar and the GTS, I feel like they really added to the post game experience a ton. Beating the game in DP feels like such a huge achievement since they’re such long games (I think it took me months on my first playthrough) and yet there is legitimately so much to do in the post game that it feels more like the game opens up rather than closes out. It’s a bit less tangible nowadays but the global online connectivity of DP was revolutionary in making the games feel rewarding to play well after the campaign. The ability to trade and battle with people at pretty much any time, in tandem with the ability to catch new Pokémon across the region, battle difficult NPCs at the battle tower, and explore new areas around it, made sinking hundreds of hours into the game feel effortless.
