>>32466877First, the puny cast. Ash, malefriend, girlfriend, and maybe fourthfriend will never have as dynamic of interactions of 7/8 children and an equal number of sentient communicating monsters. The best characterization we get out of a non-meowth Pokemon is probably Ash's Charizard, who almost feels like an actual sapient being with motivations and personality beyond a quirk.
Second, the status quo. Pokemon is primarilly a commercial, so nothing big can shake up the formula. Digimon? Fuck it, fight world ending balls of hands at the first season, switch over the cast, do whatever.
Third, scale. The most impressive moment of Pokemon outside of movies is either a champion battle, or maybe a single encounter with a legendary. In Digimon, the kids are fighting demigods back-to-back that shoot nuclear missiles by halfway through the season.
Fourth, relateability. In Digimon, a given character is more or less a human as we know them, maybe from a slightly more technologically advanced world, thrust into a bizarre world. In Pokemon, the world operates under an assumption that at 10 everyone backpacks around the country for a few years, fighting animals and nobody thinks this is strange in the slightest.
Fifth, care. In Pokemon, characters of the day are the shopkeep, or traveling scientist, or whatever the fuck. They do their thing, then you never see them again. In Digimon, far more characters wind up doing something. Just from the original series, Ogremon stands out here. A disposable, no-name generic villain not only came back, but followed the gang around and we got to see his story. There are rivals who have been fleshed out less than this guy that the animators didn't even bother to make his mouth close when he talked.
I think it has to do with quality of characters, honestly, coupled with the ungodly amount of filler Pokemon has.
