The franchise has always been low effort. It's babby's first JRPG. Every single entry is just derivative of the last with minimal innovation and is mostly adding a fresh coat of paint to the environment and throwing in a few new critters. Which is exactly why I've never been into the franchise. The games themselves are hypersimplistic, boring, and derivative. The only thing that's changed this time around is that all the stans started to take notice of some of these issues. If you wanted them to try harder, you'd have to go back in time and stop people from buying gen 2, 3, & 4 if you're all suddenly concerned with graphics and pokemon count.
