Gen 5 fans like to constantly praise Unova for the games giving Gen 5 Pokemon more attention by making them the only Pokemon in the game, and not relying on previous gen Pokemon.

But does anyone else feel like it actually had the opposite effect? Because the game spoonfeeds you only new Pokemon, and lazily shoves 3-4 new ones in each new area in a linear fashion, it waters down the engagement of seeking out new Pokemon and sort of just homogenizes them and makes them more forgettable. There's nothing interesting like headbutting trees to find Heracross and Pineco in Johto or finally finding that rare Feebas after seeing nothing but Magikarp or Tentacool for hours, finding that one secret room with Bagon despite the rest of the area being filled with Zubat, or discovering that Mareanie you only found after encountering a Corsola. As a result the Gen 5 games feel kind of shallow in terms of Pokemon and nothing really leaves an impact. You can see this in how Gen 5 had the lowest number of votes on the Pokemon of the Year poll, the least amount of merch, and the fewest characters in Pokken and Pokemon Unite despite being the generation with the highest number of Pokemon.

I think GF themselves realized this and made future gens focus more on fewer Pokemon that leave a more memorable impact during the story by making them rarer or as totem/titan fights.