>>55878204Honestly, USUM.
Yeah, i know the story was complete ass, peak Ohmori slop, it's incredible how he ruined SM's plot, that was pretty concise before btw, and made it even worse. But stuff like the PokéPelago, early Ditto encounters with that one sidequest, accessible breeding, Island scan, and many other side shit made it cool and comfortable to customize your playthrough. You felt like an actual trainer micromanaging your mons, and the Title Defense mechanic made the game even more peak chuuni.
I feel like if SV hadn't borrowed or based most of its online from SWSH, and had something like the PokéPelago on the side, plus a crossover post-game tournament like with the Battle Tree and PWT, it would be the closest game to peak pokemon we would have currently.
Of course, story would still be shit, but the time travel debacle showed that they didn't really think that shit through, so it gets a pass if you just ignore it overall.
