>>20686567I agree with you that XY were bland, but that's not saying much. It's not like any of the Pokemon games have engaging storylines. And honestly, I don't remember a single gym leader after GenIII, they all just seem to be boring clones of old gym leaders with a pun in their name based on the type of gym it is.
That being said, I disagree with RB being dated--other than the Graphics, obviously, but who cares. If you strip off the "story" of the game, RB and all the other games are essentially the same, and I personally love them all equally more or less. I might like II and V the least. II because of shit level scaling and V because it wasn't different enough from IV, and I liked IV a lot and was just expecting a little more from V. But those are very minor complaints and I'll still probably be playing the shit out of all Pokemon games--besides Diamond and Pearl because Platinum exists--til the day I die.
But what you were saying about lazy cop-outs like Pokemon riding, yeah that's shit, I never cared about any of those gimmicks in-game unless it had something directly to do with raising Pokemon. Like underground in GenIV, farming for infinite Shards, Stones, Heart Scales, Fossils, etc. was fucking amazing.
And GenVI brought breeding to a whole new level. That alone
and Megas made me really love XY even though it's just more of the same shit.
I like Megas because they have the potential to make shitmon good. I think any negative aspects of them are overshadowed by that fact alone. 
