>>56095579Other RPGs are balanced around it. Pokémon is the kind of game where you mash A to Champion, the optimal playstyle is literally sticking to your starter and spamming powerful moves the whole game. That's how speedruns and TASes do it. Going out of your way to catch multiple diverse Pokémon and juggle between them is more or less a self-imposed challenge. Pokémon has always been babby's first RPG, and they've made a ton of changes to make it easier.
>Added midroute healers>Took away poison overworld fainting, eventually took away overworld damage>Introduced affection which gives you boosted experience, free endures, free crits, and free status heals>Critical captures almost being like Master Balls (at least they make you have to earn the right to get them)>Free once per battle nuke button that most other NPCs won't use>Always on party-wide Exp. Share>PC access anywhereIf you put all this into an earlier game as a difficulty option, it would almost certainly be called Easy Mode.
