>>32930047Not being able to trade between Gen 2 and 3 is what killed it for a lot of people, even without considering the "You still play Pokemon, you fuckin' baby?" Phase. Sure, they gave us FRLG, but no one cared about that. They wanted their ORIGINAL Pokemon, not replacements.
Then Sinnoh came and re-vitalized the series for late high-school and college people, especially due to all the newfangled features, significant increase in Pokemon due to skipping Gen 3, wireless play and notable competitive aspect compared to the "SIX MEWTWOS" of yesteryear back when that's all children could really think of.
Finally, before diving into the "Pokemon's alright again I guess!" point of Gen 6 and 7, we have Unova.
Despite having a nice surplus of optional areas to explore to combat complaints of railroading, the fast-paced nature of battles and putting a few spins on the usual shit, it was almost immediately shit on for having a linear (which is true, I won't try to pretend it isn't) layout and lack of older Pokemon until postgame.
Even if Unova would see a significant improvement to its fauna in B2W2, the damage was already done. Anyone who wasn't spirited away into the franchise again with Sinnoh basically said fuck it and wouldn't pay the series any mind until Gen 6 or 7, where GameFreak "apologized" with Kanto Pandering and vast varieties of Pokemon.
And now we're where we are today.
