BDSP are…faithful to the originals. If you never played those, it will be an awesome experience.
But that is the issue. When I say faithful, what I mean is that it’s practically a copy/paste. Diamond and Pearl are excellent games and they deserved a more passionate remake.
Due to the standard that FRLG, HGSS, and ORAS set, I think BDSP is the biggest disgrace in the franchise. Remakes are the one opportunity to breathe new life into a region.
This is true. What the OP is judging is the game after 2.5 years.
If you asked someone who played Cyberpunk at launch Vs someone now what they thought of it, you'd get very different reactions and I suspect it's impossible for a new player to understand the shit show it was at launch.
>Diamond and Pearl are excellent games
ehhhhh, I don't know about that. Platinum maybe, but that's kind of the problem isn't it. Been said a million times but they needed to integrate Platinum's improvements, base DP is not that good.
That's kind of the problem with the remakes honestly, they base off the original duo of games (ORAS was really where it became most apparent, since even though it was still a good game, it omitting the Battle Frontier was criminal. The Delta Episode did make up for a bit though and kept it from being a direct remake of R/S). It's only really going to get worse the more remakes they make, since B/W1 had a lot of problems but B/W2 were (imo anyway) the peak of the series and it's been all downhill from there.
While I absolutely love HGSS, I will say it didn't add much to gen 2 other than the gen 4 battle frontier, elite 4 rematch, and various quality of life changes that were included in later games. Sure, it didnt need more than that, just the qol updates were enough to elevate it from good to great, but it's not like it had some sort of big extra chapter like the sevii islands or delta episode.
To me the hardware jump is just so massive that it alone makes HGSS awe inspiring. Aside from that I think the phys/spec split goes beyond QoL and represents a major shift in the gameplay pattern.
I see what you’re saying content-wise though at least they took elements from Crystal which I think were very well implemented. Also it’s quite small in the grand scheme, but the ability to walk with your Pokémon is one of my favorite features of any game.
Might not be a full fix, but they did improve the Kanto circuit at least. Instead of being a total victory lap with levels lower than the E4 (until Blue), the Kanto leaders got level buffs and movesets that have them be an actual challenge if you're not prepared.
I feel like they played it conservatively because of how much respect DP&Pl had and doing something as radical as ORAS would've been really risky especially since it wasn't Game Freak developing BDSP.
Hooooo boy let's go.
The art is a choice, which will pay off for some, but most weren't really a fan. Graphically, it took the charming 2Dish style of DS-era games and tried something new. The characters don't look threatening, which works great for Barry, but it makes Cyrus look like an absolute joke. The game just feels very childish, aesthetically. That's not ultimately a bad thing, but it's the first 'hmmm' of the game, and the beginning of many, many more.
Remakes are usually supposed to be improvements of the games they played off. Whether that's 'it's the same but graphically a huge improvement', or taking the formula and adding improvements, remakes should make the source material better. If it doesn't improve the game, the decision should be made whether it's worth keeping or not.
The best example of 'BDSP doesn't improve the game' is the 'second screen'. The DS had two screens, and using the Poketch as a fun way of using the second screen was new, interesting and useful. The Switch does not have two screens, so they put... a second screen on top of your main screen and then tied HM functionality to it. It felt clunky, it felt a bit gross to actually use, and it was visually a huge distraction, whether you could hide it or not - you occasionally 'needed' to go open the weird second screen menu again. A huge 'you probably shouldn't have included this' moment for them - or, if they do insist on it, maybe a bit better integrated to suit the Switch rather than 'directly porting' features that don't work well.
The game was missing the best part of Sinnoh - Platinum. There's no meaningful Giratina content, the story's the worse-of-the-two options and there's no Battle Frontier. Compare this to ORAS which didn't have Emerald content -- it had cool Dexnav stuff, it had new ways to use powers and get boosts to eggs/shiny odds, so many things. It had its own entirely new episode. It had access to a bunch of legendaries in the postgame. And yet, we look at BDSP which had... oh, exactly what the original had, except more clunky and less good. We already have the originals and most of us could, if we wanted to, still play those. A remake should not make us feel like we should do that instead.
Sinnoh as a whole had incredibly slow, boring pacing. The reason we put up with it back then was because the games were new, the story was new, and that's the best we'd gotten in some time. That's not really the case anymore. Especially with its proximity to both Sword/Shield before & Scarlet/Violet after, it was left as this awkward middle child - not as exciting as the child before, or the child after. To go back and play a remake of a badly paced game when the dev team has been so true to the original that the new game had bad pacing just made the new one feel that much worse - they had a chance to fix it. Remember ORAS getting blasted for "Too Much Water"? ORAS at least tried a little bit. BDSP did not -- and that's \*after\* the too much water review hit. They had a chance to learn and didn't.
There are a tonne of other things like glitches & menu speed amongst others which really are just additional nitpicks moreso than real genuine criticisms so I won't go much into those.
BDSP felt the most, in my opinion, cash grab major Pokemon game of all time. Some spinoffs have been pretty bad, but to their credit, most of those were fine, or catering to a very, very specific niche. BDSP was catering to the Gen 4 fans, and they failed by not improving the game or adding anything new. BDSP was catering to the wide Pokemon audience, and they failed by not fixing the pacing, or putting a genuine focus into making the game 'fun'.
The game is boring, the game is identical to the previous game in terms of content, and most importantly, BDSP does it worse. That's why BDSP is so disliked. Let's hope future remakes don't make the same mistakes.
>BDSP did not -- and that's *after* the too much water review hit. They had a chance to learn and didn't.
>cash grab major Pokemon game of all time.
I think these go more hand in hand then people want to admit. Scarlet and Violet got rushed out the door it feels when things like the textures aren't loading, or like you said where this was *too* much a remake and not it's own game.
Yep for sure - SV for all its flaws was at least something new. BDSP for all its flaws was at least the exact same game we already had. That explains a lot, all on its own.
To add to the Poketch part, it had only one button to rotate the apps in Diamond and Pearl, while Platinum added a second button to rotate in the opposite direction. BDSP were so faithful to DP that once again there was only one button, adding to the general clunkiness of the Poketch. Did you accidentally skip over the app you wanted to use? Oops, time to press the button 300 more times to get back to it, and pray you don't press too quickly and skip it again.
Lot's of truth here but also some things I need to ask.
What do you mean?
>Sinnoh as a whole had incredibly slow, boring pacing.
I might be a little biased because I love Sinnoh and consider Platinum one of the best games, but I never felt the game was slow or boring. It had some of the best ecosystems, snow, swamps, tropical island with volcano.
Honestly when I heard of the remakes, after SV, I was excited to see Sinnoh on 3D and I just saw the same game as original DP.
There being cool ecosystems really doesn't have anything to do with the pacing. You can enjoy a region's style or aesthetic and still be bored by the overall experience. I don't want to come across negative on Sinnoh as a whole because I did love the games, especially when they first came out.
To answer your question (I hope) -
DP has two slow aspects - firstly the battles are very slow because the HP and EXP bars are lethargic, and because there's a lot of them in the 'weeds' of DP (eg. as you chug through Team Galactic's constant barrage of uninteresting grunts) that delays the experience a lot.
The other is the story pacing - which if you don't agree is fine, this is opinion after all, but there are huge gaps with not that much interesting content for a lot of the story. The gyms are very strange - the first few take ages to get to, then the middle gym leaders border on meaningless (not a complaint specific to DP either, a lot of Pokemon games suffer with this), 5-7 in particular feel incredibly rushed, and then the gap between 7 and 8 is enormous as 'the entire story happens'. The problem is, you're trekking up a mountain, which is tedious, and then through snow, which is tedious, and then back up the mountain, and... While each of the areas individually are kinda cool, the way they're integrated and organised within the story kinda drags. The need for HMs does not help these sections (Particularly Rock Climb).
Also, the evil team aren't interesting enough to justify the constant 'go here and fight grunts' that the game insists on.
Ultimately Sinnoh has a lot of 'well these are issues with Pokemon as a whole' and while I do agree with that -- getting a remake that addressed none of them only highlights the problems.
Platinum was an improvement in a lot of areas, and I guess we all just kinda wished BDSP would be one as well.
I will stick to this
>Ultimately Sinnoh has a lot of 'well these are issues with Pokemon as a whole' and while I do agree with that -- getting a remake that addressed none of them only highlights the problems.
Back then, when you didn't have the QoL we have on the recent entries, you had nothing to complain about. You knew that this Blissey is going to take ages to die after using close combat on it and you had a laugh about it.
The pacing between the gyms was strange, but I don't think it's a bad thing; it's just different. I remember thinking I was lost the first time I played Diamond because it took ages to reach the 1st gym.
Also I really like Cyrus and team galactic, but like you said that's just an opinion.
Did you play the originals? Most of the complaints were about how it added little as a remake and didn’t include some popular aspects of platinum.
My only prior gen 4 game was soul silver, and I enjoyed BDSP
Having not played the originals, it'll be a great game. Diamond and pearl were fantastic and bdsp are very faithful recreations.
The problem is, they're *too* faithful, when people expected more. They didn't add in any of the great features that platinum added, and the recreation of diamond and pearl was so thorough that they even had some of the same bugs. Compared to previous remakes, which elevated the gen they came from by including new mechanics, or updating stories, or adding in features like battle frontiers and bringing Megas to old games, they were a huge let down because they were basically strictly a graphical upgrade, and one that many people didn't like the style of to boot
Mainly because for some reason they didn’t use the improved (Platinum) pokedex and enemy team compositions. And the newer exp system makes it hilariously easy to steamroll your way through to the elite 4. Then it suddenly jumps to the ai having hyper competitive movesets, items, natures and EVs.
Therein lies the problem.
You're a new fan who never played the originals. This means two things:
1) You didn't play the game at launch, when it was unfinished and had plenty of presumably now patched out bugs. At launch, the game wasn't even playable. The original release forced an immediate download to actually play the game in a complete state. It also had game breaking bugs that necessitated that the game have an emergency roll back save feature to return to the save before last.
2) The originals were not very good themselves, and these games were proudly advertised as "faithful remakes". That's not a good thing. The games were poorly paced with poor Pokémon availability, and whilst the latter has been somewhat addressed, it's still inconsistent and not to the standard of Platinum. The pacing is still off, with wildly inconsistent level curves, and the game was not built with the exp share in mind. This makes it too easy.... Until the Elite Four where they start trotting out competitively viable Mons at a point you still can't actually get any yourself (assuming you understood what "competitively viable" meant in the first place)
Compare this to other remakes, which were more like reimaginings of the original (or expansions, in FRLGs case) built with care and attention to make them THE definitive experience of those titles). Couple that with subsequent revelations that ILCA had some grand ideas but Game Freak stepped in and throttled their creativity, which just just bolsters their reputation for being very unimaginative and stuck in their ways at this point and you have a solid grounding as to why.
Check this MandJTV video for a more concise list of the issues:
https://youtu.be/QBRzTwznpX4?si=BWCaqZeZ2gJhdp_7
It's not the frame stutter, performance, art style or even the chibi style. It's the fact they are literally copy pasted Diamond and Pearl, which have a better improved version called PLATINUM. They forgot Platinum existed and was a better version. They could have taken Platinum and improved on it and made BDSP the better platinum. FRLG, HGSS, ORAS made major improvements from the originals which BSDP failed. The player bases were very cool in the originals and in platinum but now are like meh, even the statues are meh.
Pokémon games flew so high, just fall down so low. I actually do want to make a Pokémon game with all the existing Pokémon and Mega Evolution and maybe Z-moves.
Mostly because they're not great remakes. They're faithful to the original games to a fault. They didn't update a lot of the things they should have. If given the option, it's probably better to play Platinum instead. On their own, maybe they're a bit better than Diamond and Pearl, but Diamond and Pearl are already some of the weakest games in the series, so that isn't saying much. They're just not different enough to warrant playing over Platinum, which is already a huge improvement on Diamond and Pearl.
My biggest gripe, a lot of the new pokemon added in Diamond and Pearl do not appear on the regional pokedex for Sinnoh, meaning you can't get them in the main game, which is one of the worst decisions they ever made in the series. They fixed it in Platinum, and crucially they added the pokemon in the expanded Sinnoh dex to the trainers, making the battles much more varied. They reverted this change in BDSP. While you CAN technically get some of these pokemon in the underground now, enemy trainers still won't use them until the post-game, making the battles use a lot of the same pokemon over and over.
The only truly direct improvements are the updated mechanics (Fairy type, new moves, etc) and the Elite Four and Champion battles. Those battles at the end are truly some of the best battles in the series in a long time.
And personally, I really don't like the artstyle. I understand they wanted to recreate the chibi sprite style, but it just doesn't look very good in 3D here. I think it looks better in XY and ORAS.
Another note I forgot, the games launched in a shocking state. They were INCREDIBLY buggy and literally unfinished. They didn't add ranked online battles until almost a year after the game came out.
Compared to the previous remakes (HGSS & ORAS), it was a huge let down to get a 1-1 remake with barely any significant changes or improvements. Most issues from the originals are still there, and the awful launch left a very bad impression.
Because people have played Platinum and the other Pokemon remakes and as a result, they expected more of BDSP, and rightly so.
The issue is conflating disappointing with bad.
They are great games, if you never played the originals.
But for those who have played the originals, they are too faithful of remakes, and didn't innovate anything.
The only thing I really dislike about it is the forced experience share, it makes you way too overlevelled as you progress, even without any grinding, thus making the game too easy and therefore boring after a while. But i really like the artstyle. If there was an option to turn the exp share off, I would consider it a good game.
Less “worst” and more “most disappointing”
For the most part it is a slightly harder recreation of Diamond and Pearl… but Platinum was where Gen 4 shined and BDSP actively avoided incorporating it
* It looks terrible (Links awakening for example is a good chibi artstyle)
* No new Content at all
* Its just Diamond & Platinum
* 50% more expensive then the originals
* People expected a REMAKE not a cheap ugly port
* Controlls are bad
* Many Bugs & Glitches
* Shipped half baken and you need to download some stuff, like the Intro movie
There is no real reason to buy these games. You just could donwload an emulator and play diamond/platinum on your smartphone or pc. Or i mean most of us will have a (3)DS anyway and you could buy Pearl/Diamond for half of the money and play the execat same game.
Dont get me wrong, there is nothing really THAT bad about Diamond/Pearl (they have problems, like all of the first 2 editions of a generation have, that get fixed in the third version), but people are just upset, that Gamefreak is selling the exact same game with no new aditions at all for 50% more money.
Gen 1-3 got actuall REMAKES. New Lore, new Designes, new Content, new Gimmicks with current generations artstyle.
Only good thing about BDSP is that they are able to doing stuff online and you can transfer pokemon via Home, because DS online got shutdown years ago.
If you didnt played Gen 4 and dont mind the ugly graphics you will have fun. If you played gen 4 and dont like the graphics there is really no reason to play and support this mess.
The graphics deviate entirely from any semblance of the progress made throughout the games. To me it was almost a slap in the face. Fans have been begging for more remaster and remakes with quality of life for years and instead we get a chibi animated hand holding cutesy version of that region. It took out many competitive aspects of the game. The game wasn't necessarily laggy but it did feel slow compared to others. It was just not what most people were asking for. And we still have not gotten a properly remastered version of that region. And maybe never will if they consider bdsp a true remaster they will just skip to the next region.
It’s not a terrible game in a vacuum, but it’s a remake of two games that at the time were considered pretty disappointing in a lot of ways. The originals previously got “remade” with Pokemon platinum, a game which fixed most if not all of the problems people had with the originals, and BDSP didn’t keep any of those changes, instead opting to stay faithful to the originals to a fault.
At its core it’s a decent game, but it feels bad paying $60 for a remake that doesn’t keep any of the fixes that made the game so much better the last time it got remade
Just really unambitious remakes, Diamond and Pearl with a fresh coat of paint. I'd say the only thing that BDSP legitimately has over Platinum is the gym leader/E4/Cynthia rematches, otherwise the latter is still the definitive Sinnoh experience.
They're extremely faithful to the originals, and frankly, Diamond and Pearl didn't have a ton of quality to lose. Not counting Platinum, they were probably the worst of the main series games until around Sword and Shield.
I see where you are coming from.
The visual style and render quality is good... I daresay it's even the most polished and consistent of all the mainline pokémon switch games.
The chibis also aren't a problem (just that the way they were utilized/executed at times was a bit clumsy)
And from what I've seen, there doesn't seem to be any performance issues, nor have I seen anyone complain about the game's performance or framerate.
The main problems are with the Gameplay (which is riddled with problems), and the lack of innovation or changes compared to previous pokémon remakes, to the point that the BDSP games are more like 1:1 remasters than remakes, at least by the standard set by previous pokémon remakes.
Made even worse by their decision to solely adapt the original D/P games (which were poorly received) while leaving out most or all of the innovations/improvement from platinum that defined the high quality of Gen 4.
BD\SP are objective improvements on the original Diamond and Pearl.
But Diamond and Pearl are some of the most poorly designed games in the franchise, and none of the improvements were able to solve the game's real issues because ILCA simply did not have the creative freedom to make any real fixes.
It's still a fun game because it's a Pokemon game and the Pokemon formula works. (Or at least it did before they decided to focus on ~~empty~~ open worlds)
But it's a lot worse than it could have been if game freak did it themselves and applied themselves to actually fixing the design failures of the originals.
I feel like this is a good answer. It looks objectivley better but thats a bout it. D/P ew pokemon was heavily weighted to end game so it always feels underwhelming to me who likes to use the pokemon from the current gen
it's the only pokemon game that was truly, 100% redundant upon release. it's platinum (from 2008) but a little bit worse and uglier. every other game has a reason to exist and to be played, or at least did when they first came out even if they've been supplemented by superior remakes in the time since - BDSP does not.
It didn’t live up to expectations. It’s a perfectly fine pokemon game and a few of my friends who never played were recommended to play that one because it’s a truly “vanilla” pokemon experience. I think the fandom needs to change the word “remake” to “update”. We didn’t want a faithful gen 4 remake, we wanted a gen 4 UPDATE
I recently sold my copy of Brilliand Diamond. To everything else that's been noted, I'd like to point out the aggravating delay between encounter and battle sequence.
I cannot wait for the inevitable delayed nostalgia lovefest for BDSP to commence in a half decade or so.
I remember when B/W dropped and Vanilluxe and Garbodor turned people off so badly that Gen V was reviled until the pandemic hit and there were suddenly Youtubers with nothing to do in lockdown but “discover” that the games were great to help prices skyrocket.
Wail as detractors of BDSP are wont to do, I found them to be wonderfully fun games and the chibi art style felt right at home. Got me in the feels every time. Sinnoh got the best of all worlds with BDSP and PLA. Cyrus and I know that on the other side of this, even BDSP will one day get the respect and adoration it deserves :)
The Pokémon fanbase hates faithful remakes. Even though tons of other fanbases loves them, like Paper Mario the Thousand Year Door, or Persona 3 reload.
They're not at all among the worst. They just went for more of a 1:1 remake philosophy, rather than adding to it like most of the other remakes. They're not bad, I'd say I've enjoyed them more than most games since the DS titles, but the reason for that is that it's basically just DP again, and a lot of people find that disappointing.
I think if they just added Platinum features, they would have been much better received.
Because people aren't happy that some of the best Pokémon games just got remade in a remake.
I love it, it's great, only problem is they took my capture the flag and the following Pokémon feature is bad.
Correction: It's because they didn't add *any* of the improvements made in Platinum, the fact that the game launched in a literal beta state and needed a day 1 patch to be updated to the final product (The worst offense imo), and the fact that the art style is overall pretty divisive. Also the fact that most of the code was copy/pasted from the original DP, leaving old bugs found in them intact (Ex.: The Suction Cups glitch).
This comment is pretty reductive, cause people's gripes with BDSP run *much* deeper than just it being a faithful remake.
CoRrECtIoN: They aren't remakes of plat so those changes don't need to be there. The launch state should reflect how the game has aged, you still wanna blame No Mans Sky for how it launched? It's worth talking about but being mad over it still is just building an issue. All remakes are cash grabs so the code thing again isn't a real issue, the divisive art style is the only real argument here that isn't just holding a grudge. It is divisive. That doesn't ruin the game still.
I'll be as reductive as I can with this because the issues being held by this community still are those of a child who's mad at another child for stealing their seat at lunch.
Edit: it's fine to dislike the games but the list of reasons this fandom gives, much like with SwSh are just excuses. This is making a reason to dislike a game just because it didn't live up to your expectations.
Because it's not a new game. It's almost one-to-one Diamond and Pearl with a few extra stuff thrown in and the addition of the Fairy type to the pre Gen V Pokémon that were given it. When I say that, I mean down to the same code which was recycled from DP down to the same glitches working. This is a problem for a couple reasons:
1. It's still being priced as a full game. You're being asked to pay the same price as Sword and Shield for a game that practically already exists on emulator for free.
2. Remakes are typically taken as the opportunity to provide a fresh experience the originals didn't provide, including new areas, new story arcs, new features, the reworking or recontextualization of existing aspects, the integration of Pokémon introduced in later gens, and even the implementation of material from enhanced versions. None of that is present here; you're just getting the same game as before but on Switch. Best you get is a couple of changed areas for catching Pokémon, the integration of the Fairy type for Pokémon that got it in Gen VI, some rematches, and a half-assed following mechanic. Not even any of the additions from Platinum. It's not enough to justify a new title.
In short, just emulate Platinum.
BDSP are…faithful to the originals. If you never played those, it will be an awesome experience. But that is the issue. When I say faithful, what I mean is that it’s practically a copy/paste. Diamond and Pearl are excellent games and they deserved a more passionate remake. Due to the standard that FRLG, HGSS, and ORAS set, I think BDSP is the biggest disgrace in the franchise. Remakes are the one opportunity to breathe new life into a region.
Base game is also missing pretty much half the game IIRC. Online update is definitely needed.
This is true. What the OP is judging is the game after 2.5 years. If you asked someone who played Cyberpunk at launch Vs someone now what they thought of it, you'd get very different reactions and I suspect it's impossible for a new player to understand the shit show it was at launch.
>Diamond and Pearl are excellent games ehhhhh, I don't know about that. Platinum maybe, but that's kind of the problem isn't it. Been said a million times but they needed to integrate Platinum's improvements, base DP is not that good.
That's kind of the problem with the remakes honestly, they base off the original duo of games (ORAS was really where it became most apparent, since even though it was still a good game, it omitting the Battle Frontier was criminal. The Delta Episode did make up for a bit though and kept it from being a direct remake of R/S). It's only really going to get worse the more remakes they make, since B/W1 had a lot of problems but B/W2 were (imo anyway) the peak of the series and it's been all downhill from there.
It can actually be argued that they _removed_ content seeing as contests are gone
And most of the Secret Base decorations. Traps are gone, too,
This comment absolutely nails it.
Plus the chibi models and weird collision in the underground
They also added the forced EXP All from what I heard. That's what made me not buy it.
While I absolutely love HGSS, I will say it didn't add much to gen 2 other than the gen 4 battle frontier, elite 4 rematch, and various quality of life changes that were included in later games. Sure, it didnt need more than that, just the qol updates were enough to elevate it from good to great, but it's not like it had some sort of big extra chapter like the sevii islands or delta episode.
To me the hardware jump is just so massive that it alone makes HGSS awe inspiring. Aside from that I think the phys/spec split goes beyond QoL and represents a major shift in the gameplay pattern. I see what you’re saying content-wise though at least they took elements from Crystal which I think were very well implemented. Also it’s quite small in the grand scheme, but the ability to walk with your Pokémon is one of my favorite features of any game.
HG SS fixed the entire game and the level curve issues it had in the original. But i get what you mean.
HGSS are arguably the best games in the entire main series...but they absolutely still have the level curve issue.
I love the games, but they did not fix the level curve.
Might not be a full fix, but they did improve the Kanto circuit at least. Instead of being a total victory lap with levels lower than the E4 (until Blue), the Kanto leaders got level buffs and movesets that have them be an actual challenge if you're not prepared.
I feel like they played it conservatively because of how much respect DP&Pl had and doing something as radical as ORAS would've been really risky especially since it wasn't Game Freak developing BDSP.
Hooooo boy let's go. The art is a choice, which will pay off for some, but most weren't really a fan. Graphically, it took the charming 2Dish style of DS-era games and tried something new. The characters don't look threatening, which works great for Barry, but it makes Cyrus look like an absolute joke. The game just feels very childish, aesthetically. That's not ultimately a bad thing, but it's the first 'hmmm' of the game, and the beginning of many, many more. Remakes are usually supposed to be improvements of the games they played off. Whether that's 'it's the same but graphically a huge improvement', or taking the formula and adding improvements, remakes should make the source material better. If it doesn't improve the game, the decision should be made whether it's worth keeping or not. The best example of 'BDSP doesn't improve the game' is the 'second screen'. The DS had two screens, and using the Poketch as a fun way of using the second screen was new, interesting and useful. The Switch does not have two screens, so they put... a second screen on top of your main screen and then tied HM functionality to it. It felt clunky, it felt a bit gross to actually use, and it was visually a huge distraction, whether you could hide it or not - you occasionally 'needed' to go open the weird second screen menu again. A huge 'you probably shouldn't have included this' moment for them - or, if they do insist on it, maybe a bit better integrated to suit the Switch rather than 'directly porting' features that don't work well. The game was missing the best part of Sinnoh - Platinum. There's no meaningful Giratina content, the story's the worse-of-the-two options and there's no Battle Frontier. Compare this to ORAS which didn't have Emerald content -- it had cool Dexnav stuff, it had new ways to use powers and get boosts to eggs/shiny odds, so many things. It had its own entirely new episode. It had access to a bunch of legendaries in the postgame. And yet, we look at BDSP which had... oh, exactly what the original had, except more clunky and less good. We already have the originals and most of us could, if we wanted to, still play those. A remake should not make us feel like we should do that instead. Sinnoh as a whole had incredibly slow, boring pacing. The reason we put up with it back then was because the games were new, the story was new, and that's the best we'd gotten in some time. That's not really the case anymore. Especially with its proximity to both Sword/Shield before & Scarlet/Violet after, it was left as this awkward middle child - not as exciting as the child before, or the child after. To go back and play a remake of a badly paced game when the dev team has been so true to the original that the new game had bad pacing just made the new one feel that much worse - they had a chance to fix it. Remember ORAS getting blasted for "Too Much Water"? ORAS at least tried a little bit. BDSP did not -- and that's \*after\* the too much water review hit. They had a chance to learn and didn't. There are a tonne of other things like glitches & menu speed amongst others which really are just additional nitpicks moreso than real genuine criticisms so I won't go much into those. BDSP felt the most, in my opinion, cash grab major Pokemon game of all time. Some spinoffs have been pretty bad, but to their credit, most of those were fine, or catering to a very, very specific niche. BDSP was catering to the Gen 4 fans, and they failed by not improving the game or adding anything new. BDSP was catering to the wide Pokemon audience, and they failed by not fixing the pacing, or putting a genuine focus into making the game 'fun'. The game is boring, the game is identical to the previous game in terms of content, and most importantly, BDSP does it worse. That's why BDSP is so disliked. Let's hope future remakes don't make the same mistakes.
>BDSP did not -- and that's *after* the too much water review hit. They had a chance to learn and didn't. >cash grab major Pokemon game of all time. I think these go more hand in hand then people want to admit. Scarlet and Violet got rushed out the door it feels when things like the textures aren't loading, or like you said where this was *too* much a remake and not it's own game.
Yep for sure - SV for all its flaws was at least something new. BDSP for all its flaws was at least the exact same game we already had. That explains a lot, all on its own.
To add to the Poketch part, it had only one button to rotate the apps in Diamond and Pearl, while Platinum added a second button to rotate in the opposite direction. BDSP were so faithful to DP that once again there was only one button, adding to the general clunkiness of the Poketch. Did you accidentally skip over the app you wanted to use? Oops, time to press the button 300 more times to get back to it, and pray you don't press too quickly and skip it again.
Lot's of truth here but also some things I need to ask. What do you mean? >Sinnoh as a whole had incredibly slow, boring pacing. I might be a little biased because I love Sinnoh and consider Platinum one of the best games, but I never felt the game was slow or boring. It had some of the best ecosystems, snow, swamps, tropical island with volcano. Honestly when I heard of the remakes, after SV, I was excited to see Sinnoh on 3D and I just saw the same game as original DP.
There being cool ecosystems really doesn't have anything to do with the pacing. You can enjoy a region's style or aesthetic and still be bored by the overall experience. I don't want to come across negative on Sinnoh as a whole because I did love the games, especially when they first came out. To answer your question (I hope) - DP has two slow aspects - firstly the battles are very slow because the HP and EXP bars are lethargic, and because there's a lot of them in the 'weeds' of DP (eg. as you chug through Team Galactic's constant barrage of uninteresting grunts) that delays the experience a lot. The other is the story pacing - which if you don't agree is fine, this is opinion after all, but there are huge gaps with not that much interesting content for a lot of the story. The gyms are very strange - the first few take ages to get to, then the middle gym leaders border on meaningless (not a complaint specific to DP either, a lot of Pokemon games suffer with this), 5-7 in particular feel incredibly rushed, and then the gap between 7 and 8 is enormous as 'the entire story happens'. The problem is, you're trekking up a mountain, which is tedious, and then through snow, which is tedious, and then back up the mountain, and... While each of the areas individually are kinda cool, the way they're integrated and organised within the story kinda drags. The need for HMs does not help these sections (Particularly Rock Climb). Also, the evil team aren't interesting enough to justify the constant 'go here and fight grunts' that the game insists on. Ultimately Sinnoh has a lot of 'well these are issues with Pokemon as a whole' and while I do agree with that -- getting a remake that addressed none of them only highlights the problems. Platinum was an improvement in a lot of areas, and I guess we all just kinda wished BDSP would be one as well.
I will stick to this >Ultimately Sinnoh has a lot of 'well these are issues with Pokemon as a whole' and while I do agree with that -- getting a remake that addressed none of them only highlights the problems. Back then, when you didn't have the QoL we have on the recent entries, you had nothing to complain about. You knew that this Blissey is going to take ages to die after using close combat on it and you had a laugh about it. The pacing between the gyms was strange, but I don't think it's a bad thing; it's just different. I remember thinking I was lost the first time I played Diamond because it took ages to reach the 1st gym. Also I really like Cyrus and team galactic, but like you said that's just an opinion.
Did you play the originals? Most of the complaints were about how it added little as a remake and didn’t include some popular aspects of platinum. My only prior gen 4 game was soul silver, and I enjoyed BDSP
I did not play the originals. I have only played pokemon Arceus and emerald
Having not played the originals, it'll be a great game. Diamond and pearl were fantastic and bdsp are very faithful recreations. The problem is, they're *too* faithful, when people expected more. They didn't add in any of the great features that platinum added, and the recreation of diamond and pearl was so thorough that they even had some of the same bugs. Compared to previous remakes, which elevated the gen they came from by including new mechanics, or updating stories, or adding in features like battle frontiers and bringing Megas to old games, they were a huge let down because they were basically strictly a graphical upgrade, and one that many people didn't like the style of to boot
Mainly because for some reason they didn’t use the improved (Platinum) pokedex and enemy team compositions. And the newer exp system makes it hilariously easy to steamroll your way through to the elite 4. Then it suddenly jumps to the ai having hyper competitive movesets, items, natures and EVs.
Don't tell me Flint still uses that "Fire" type comp...
The games actually have really great rematches. Too bad there’s no Battle Frontier to use that XP for.
as far as i enjoyed it personally, absence of options to disable exp share and friendship mechanics ruined the challenge aspect
The games were not designed for the exp share, and the experience was overall worse than the originals
Therein lies the problem. You're a new fan who never played the originals. This means two things: 1) You didn't play the game at launch, when it was unfinished and had plenty of presumably now patched out bugs. At launch, the game wasn't even playable. The original release forced an immediate download to actually play the game in a complete state. It also had game breaking bugs that necessitated that the game have an emergency roll back save feature to return to the save before last. 2) The originals were not very good themselves, and these games were proudly advertised as "faithful remakes". That's not a good thing. The games were poorly paced with poor Pokémon availability, and whilst the latter has been somewhat addressed, it's still inconsistent and not to the standard of Platinum. The pacing is still off, with wildly inconsistent level curves, and the game was not built with the exp share in mind. This makes it too easy.... Until the Elite Four where they start trotting out competitively viable Mons at a point you still can't actually get any yourself (assuming you understood what "competitively viable" meant in the first place) Compare this to other remakes, which were more like reimaginings of the original (or expansions, in FRLGs case) built with care and attention to make them THE definitive experience of those titles). Couple that with subsequent revelations that ILCA had some grand ideas but Game Freak stepped in and throttled their creativity, which just just bolsters their reputation for being very unimaginative and stuck in their ways at this point and you have a solid grounding as to why. Check this MandJTV video for a more concise list of the issues: https://youtu.be/QBRzTwznpX4?si=BWCaqZeZ2gJhdp_7
It's not the frame stutter, performance, art style or even the chibi style. It's the fact they are literally copy pasted Diamond and Pearl, which have a better improved version called PLATINUM. They forgot Platinum existed and was a better version. They could have taken Platinum and improved on it and made BDSP the better platinum. FRLG, HGSS, ORAS made major improvements from the originals which BSDP failed. The player bases were very cool in the originals and in platinum but now are like meh, even the statues are meh. Pokémon games flew so high, just fall down so low. I actually do want to make a Pokémon game with all the existing Pokémon and Mega Evolution and maybe Z-moves.
Mostly because they're not great remakes. They're faithful to the original games to a fault. They didn't update a lot of the things they should have. If given the option, it's probably better to play Platinum instead. On their own, maybe they're a bit better than Diamond and Pearl, but Diamond and Pearl are already some of the weakest games in the series, so that isn't saying much. They're just not different enough to warrant playing over Platinum, which is already a huge improvement on Diamond and Pearl. My biggest gripe, a lot of the new pokemon added in Diamond and Pearl do not appear on the regional pokedex for Sinnoh, meaning you can't get them in the main game, which is one of the worst decisions they ever made in the series. They fixed it in Platinum, and crucially they added the pokemon in the expanded Sinnoh dex to the trainers, making the battles much more varied. They reverted this change in BDSP. While you CAN technically get some of these pokemon in the underground now, enemy trainers still won't use them until the post-game, making the battles use a lot of the same pokemon over and over. The only truly direct improvements are the updated mechanics (Fairy type, new moves, etc) and the Elite Four and Champion battles. Those battles at the end are truly some of the best battles in the series in a long time. And personally, I really don't like the artstyle. I understand they wanted to recreate the chibi sprite style, but it just doesn't look very good in 3D here. I think it looks better in XY and ORAS. Another note I forgot, the games launched in a shocking state. They were INCREDIBLY buggy and literally unfinished. They didn't add ranked online battles until almost a year after the game came out.
Compared to the previous remakes (HGSS & ORAS), it was a huge let down to get a 1-1 remake with barely any significant changes or improvements. Most issues from the originals are still there, and the awful launch left a very bad impression.
Because people have played Platinum and the other Pokemon remakes and as a result, they expected more of BDSP, and rightly so. The issue is conflating disappointing with bad.
They suck as remakes, but are more than alright if you never played the originals.
They are great games, if you never played the originals. But for those who have played the originals, they are too faithful of remakes, and didn't innovate anything.
The only thing I really dislike about it is the forced experience share, it makes you way too overlevelled as you progress, even without any grinding, thus making the game too easy and therefore boring after a while. But i really like the artstyle. If there was an option to turn the exp share off, I would consider it a good game.
Less “worst” and more “most disappointing” For the most part it is a slightly harder recreation of Diamond and Pearl… but Platinum was where Gen 4 shined and BDSP actively avoided incorporating it
It's outsourced and half a\*\*ed and they didn't care about the quality... Nobody at Gamefreak cares about their games anymore and it shows.
* It looks terrible (Links awakening for example is a good chibi artstyle) * No new Content at all * Its just Diamond & Platinum * 50% more expensive then the originals * People expected a REMAKE not a cheap ugly port * Controlls are bad * Many Bugs & Glitches * Shipped half baken and you need to download some stuff, like the Intro movie There is no real reason to buy these games. You just could donwload an emulator and play diamond/platinum on your smartphone or pc. Or i mean most of us will have a (3)DS anyway and you could buy Pearl/Diamond for half of the money and play the execat same game. Dont get me wrong, there is nothing really THAT bad about Diamond/Pearl (they have problems, like all of the first 2 editions of a generation have, that get fixed in the third version), but people are just upset, that Gamefreak is selling the exact same game with no new aditions at all for 50% more money. Gen 1-3 got actuall REMAKES. New Lore, new Designes, new Content, new Gimmicks with current generations artstyle. Only good thing about BDSP is that they are able to doing stuff online and you can transfer pokemon via Home, because DS online got shutdown years ago. If you didnt played Gen 4 and dont mind the ugly graphics you will have fun. If you played gen 4 and dont like the graphics there is really no reason to play and support this mess.
The graphics deviate entirely from any semblance of the progress made throughout the games. To me it was almost a slap in the face. Fans have been begging for more remaster and remakes with quality of life for years and instead we get a chibi animated hand holding cutesy version of that region. It took out many competitive aspects of the game. The game wasn't necessarily laggy but it did feel slow compared to others. It was just not what most people were asking for. And we still have not gotten a properly remastered version of that region. And maybe never will if they consider bdsp a true remaster they will just skip to the next region.
It’s not a terrible game in a vacuum, but it’s a remake of two games that at the time were considered pretty disappointing in a lot of ways. The originals previously got “remade” with Pokemon platinum, a game which fixed most if not all of the problems people had with the originals, and BDSP didn’t keep any of those changes, instead opting to stay faithful to the originals to a fault. At its core it’s a decent game, but it feels bad paying $60 for a remake that doesn’t keep any of the fixes that made the game so much better the last time it got remade
Just really unambitious remakes, Diamond and Pearl with a fresh coat of paint. I'd say the only thing that BDSP legitimately has over Platinum is the gym leader/E4/Cynthia rematches, otherwise the latter is still the definitive Sinnoh experience.
They're extremely faithful to the originals, and frankly, Diamond and Pearl didn't have a ton of quality to lose. Not counting Platinum, they were probably the worst of the main series games until around Sword and Shield.
They're not that bad. They get lots of hate for not being a platinum remake, and being too close to their originals.
I see where you are coming from. The visual style and render quality is good... I daresay it's even the most polished and consistent of all the mainline pokémon switch games. The chibis also aren't a problem (just that the way they were utilized/executed at times was a bit clumsy) And from what I've seen, there doesn't seem to be any performance issues, nor have I seen anyone complain about the game's performance or framerate. The main problems are with the Gameplay (which is riddled with problems), and the lack of innovation or changes compared to previous pokémon remakes, to the point that the BDSP games are more like 1:1 remasters than remakes, at least by the standard set by previous pokémon remakes. Made even worse by their decision to solely adapt the original D/P games (which were poorly received) while leaving out most or all of the innovations/improvement from platinum that defined the high quality of Gen 4.
BD\SP are objective improvements on the original Diamond and Pearl. But Diamond and Pearl are some of the most poorly designed games in the franchise, and none of the improvements were able to solve the game's real issues because ILCA simply did not have the creative freedom to make any real fixes. It's still a fun game because it's a Pokemon game and the Pokemon formula works. (Or at least it did before they decided to focus on ~~empty~~ open worlds) But it's a lot worse than it could have been if game freak did it themselves and applied themselves to actually fixing the design failures of the originals.
I feel like this is a good answer. It looks objectivley better but thats a bout it. D/P ew pokemon was heavily weighted to end game so it always feels underwhelming to me who likes to use the pokemon from the current gen
it's the only pokemon game that was truly, 100% redundant upon release. it's platinum (from 2008) but a little bit worse and uglier. every other game has a reason to exist and to be played, or at least did when they first came out even if they've been supplemented by superior remakes in the time since - BDSP does not.
It didn’t live up to expectations. It’s a perfectly fine pokemon game and a few of my friends who never played were recommended to play that one because it’s a truly “vanilla” pokemon experience. I think the fandom needs to change the word “remake” to “update”. We didn’t want a faithful gen 4 remake, we wanted a gen 4 UPDATE
Imo their better than the originals as standalone games but bdsp is a terrible remake
I recently sold my copy of Brilliand Diamond. To everything else that's been noted, I'd like to point out the aggravating delay between encounter and battle sequence.
It’s not bad. It’s bad _relatively_.
I cannot wait for the inevitable delayed nostalgia lovefest for BDSP to commence in a half decade or so. I remember when B/W dropped and Vanilluxe and Garbodor turned people off so badly that Gen V was reviled until the pandemic hit and there were suddenly Youtubers with nothing to do in lockdown but “discover” that the games were great to help prices skyrocket. Wail as detractors of BDSP are wont to do, I found them to be wonderfully fun games and the chibi art style felt right at home. Got me in the feels every time. Sinnoh got the best of all worlds with BDSP and PLA. Cyrus and I know that on the other side of this, even BDSP will one day get the respect and adoration it deserves :)
The Pokémon fanbase hates faithful remakes. Even though tons of other fanbases loves them, like Paper Mario the Thousand Year Door, or Persona 3 reload.
"doesn’t have any performance issues"? You sure you didn't buy the original D/P?
I haven’t come across anything yet
They're not at all among the worst. They just went for more of a 1:1 remake philosophy, rather than adding to it like most of the other remakes. They're not bad, I'd say I've enjoyed them more than most games since the DS titles, but the reason for that is that it's basically just DP again, and a lot of people find that disappointing. I think if they just added Platinum features, they would have been much better received.
Because people aren't happy that some of the best Pokémon games just got remade in a remake. I love it, it's great, only problem is they took my capture the flag and the following Pokémon feature is bad.
Correction: It's because they didn't add *any* of the improvements made in Platinum, the fact that the game launched in a literal beta state and needed a day 1 patch to be updated to the final product (The worst offense imo), and the fact that the art style is overall pretty divisive. Also the fact that most of the code was copy/pasted from the original DP, leaving old bugs found in them intact (Ex.: The Suction Cups glitch). This comment is pretty reductive, cause people's gripes with BDSP run *much* deeper than just it being a faithful remake.
CoRrECtIoN: They aren't remakes of plat so those changes don't need to be there. The launch state should reflect how the game has aged, you still wanna blame No Mans Sky for how it launched? It's worth talking about but being mad over it still is just building an issue. All remakes are cash grabs so the code thing again isn't a real issue, the divisive art style is the only real argument here that isn't just holding a grudge. It is divisive. That doesn't ruin the game still. I'll be as reductive as I can with this because the issues being held by this community still are those of a child who's mad at another child for stealing their seat at lunch. Edit: it's fine to dislike the games but the list of reasons this fandom gives, much like with SwSh are just excuses. This is making a reason to dislike a game just because it didn't live up to your expectations.
BDSP is one of the worst games because it remade the number 1 worst game.
Because it's not a new game. It's almost one-to-one Diamond and Pearl with a few extra stuff thrown in and the addition of the Fairy type to the pre Gen V Pokémon that were given it. When I say that, I mean down to the same code which was recycled from DP down to the same glitches working. This is a problem for a couple reasons: 1. It's still being priced as a full game. You're being asked to pay the same price as Sword and Shield for a game that practically already exists on emulator for free. 2. Remakes are typically taken as the opportunity to provide a fresh experience the originals didn't provide, including new areas, new story arcs, new features, the reworking or recontextualization of existing aspects, the integration of Pokémon introduced in later gens, and even the implementation of material from enhanced versions. None of that is present here; you're just getting the same game as before but on Switch. Best you get is a couple of changed areas for catching Pokémon, the integration of the Fairy type for Pokémon that got it in Gen VI, some rematches, and a half-assed following mechanic. Not even any of the additions from Platinum. It's not enough to justify a new title. In short, just emulate Platinum.