My absolute favourite small touch about Gen 5 is just that the traded Pokémon that you trade to the ingame trainers actually can later be battled in the post-game (including the one who gives you two different trades), where it's really nice to see that these Pokémon aren't just boxed and actually do things even if they're not with you.

Honestly its ironic, Black and White (and to a lesser extent Sun and Moon but that's another discussion) are basically everything people today want from the Pokemon franchise, but people just went so berserk at the time GameFreak has played it hyper safe ever since.

Finally someone that understands that open world pokémon doesn't mean entertainment.

The original BW's postgame is a bit underrated due to the massive postgame u get in the sequels, but it also deserves more credit.

scarlet and violet giving you the option to do the gyms/titans/bases in any order is also pretty useless since there's no level scaling, so the harder ones are impossible early on and the easier ones are completely trivial if you save them for later

You go radio silent for over a month and then suddenly drop a half hour video? I love it

I’m not gonna cap I’m glad we had these protagonists older than the ones we had during those 4 generations

Never considered that people who are way younger than me could be completely lost because they didn't spend their whole childhood getting "gotta catch em all" screamed at them. As a child I never would have for a single second thought that I shouldn't have 6 mons in my team.

I've replayed Pokémon White like half a dozen times and was confident I knew the game in and out pretty well, but the fact that Route 3 has a bonus fisherman you can fight is something that actually blows my mind; I've never been to that particular spot and that speaks to your point about how strong the route design is.

I also love some of the games' small touches like the hiker guy in BW that got a Boldore from trading with you comes back in BW2 with his Boldore now evolved into a Gigalith. It's not much but I think it really adds alot to the world.

Honestly I'm always shocked to hear how many people just relied on overlevelling their starters because even when I was a little kid playing Gen 3 and 4 games I would always catch a bunch of pokemon, I think I was one of the few who actually picked up on the idea of getting a full team early on

gen 5 is a work of art. no more no less.

I still remember recently rediscovering the cave near Chargestone, even finding a TM I didn't collect until then, not to mention rediscoveriny the cave connected to the sewers, both in B2W2.

White version was my very first Pokemon game and I wouldn’t have it any other way. That lesson they teach you at the very beginning of the game is so important to the game experience and I’m glad it was one of the first things I learned

The pokemon cycle made this game it's main victim: new game is released, fans complain, a decade later they love it and say the new game is bad, repeat.

A fun little factoid about that lack of Badge requirement for HM usage... For folks who still have the hardware and interest to try it, you can trade an pokemon you intend to use as a pre-loaded HM aide to a fresh save file and shortcut to what should've been a late-game content beat like getting the Larvesta almost immediately in the first game.

Yeah, I honestly didn’t get the complaints about B&W being aggressively linear back in the day. All the little nooks and crannies and side dungeons helped break up the monotony of going gym to gym and tackling the (frankly very interesting) main story. I’ve always had an appreciation for side content like Contests In Pokemon because it can offer a nice diversion from the linear progression of the games. The side dungeons in B&W do an amazing job of feeling well integrated with the core gameplay loop, while still being engaging for those who want to stray from the main path from time to time.

Dude, you couldn’t have said it any better! White was my first Pokémon game, the first I had ever played, it was like my red and blue back in the day, and now I have overwhelming nostalgia for it. BRO I LOVE SERPERIOR!! Snivy was my first starter pokemon! So seeing you beat the whole game with it is something I’m ecstatic for! Thank you for this video! Long live Unova!

i honestly wish that pokemon would make another sequel game in a region we've been to before but in a different time period. seeing characters and locations change between bw and b2w2 was such an amazing experience. i love a good remake, but it'd be great if we could just revisit a region after time has passed too :) great video!

From the music to the gameplay to the characters to the story to the mons themselves, they absolutely knocked Gen 5 out of the park. Truly some of my favorite games in the series period and because of that I'm terrified about what a potential remake would look like.. Another thing I think worth mentioning is the interactive music of the routes and cities. Hearing the soundtrack change after talking to the musicians was such a nice reward for my exploration efforts - it's such a small thing, but it makes each area so unique and makes the entire region feel alive. Like you said, the best part of Unova is that it feels like a place that can and will move on with or without the protagonist there - it's a huge world that, while linear at first glance, is full of so many secrets to discover that I still find new things with every playthrough. Great video!! So glad to see a half hour video full of Unova appreciation!

I don’t want to do the whole “oh wow the quality of this editing is so underrated” so instead I’ll sound like a cocky rude bastard and say that I’ll see you when you have 50k subs

If I remember correctly The protagonists were supposed to be 16 at some point And honestly I prefer that Them being 16 is my personal headcanon because it means that the philosophical questions being asked of the main character can actually be... questioned If they're 16, then N isn't spouting nonsense at a child, he's waxing poetic at a teenager who's probably already asking themselves those kinds of questions

I LOVED Gen 5 growing up, I never understood why it was so hated. I actually loved Gen 5 so much I recently bought Pokémon White and Pokémon White 2. (Kyurem White is my favorite legendary) I still LOVE playing it. There is so much post game content and I can legitimately fight competitively with the NPCs and do EV training and still have it be ridiculously hard, it's so awesome!

In b/w, the grasses are always the answer to the gym if you are getting walled. I do kinda miss playing this game since I never beat the elite 4 but maybe someday. I still am not into pokemon mood right now.

The thing about the region having characters exist outside of the players input is half right. Other regions had things like the chairman from Kanto's fan club vacationing in Hoenn, That one Hoenn psychic getting lost in Kanto, or Hordel steeling Togepie from Cipher. The thing that makes the difference is that Gen V didn't just have the characters stand there and talk about it. When you walk in on the breakup the guy is actively taking his stuff and dipping out of there. When you walk in on the argument at the Abundant Shrine the children are chasing each other and hiding behind you. Gen V put the effort in to create presentation around their events. Events in older games, as well as modern games, don't typically do this. The best and worst examples of presentation in a modern games side events come from that one hotel in Sword and Sheild. There's an event where a bunch of npc's are investigating stolen apples but they just stand around and head talk. Nobody moves around the room and and when stuff does happen it cuts to black. Most events are like this because for some reason they still treat the model's as though they're sprites and think a player's imagination will fill the gaps when that doesn't work in practice. The good example is the one room with the Bellossom that shoves the player out the door. The camera changes to your first-person perspective as the Pokemon charges at you to shove you out of the room. This one is way more impactful than the other despite being so much shorter because they presented it well like they did with side events in Gen 5 but also played to the strengths of the medium.

Watching videos like this makes me feel that Gamefreak have really just stuck out the middle finger with these last few installments. We had it SO GOOD with this generation; and literally everybody hated it when it came out. They made so many small and major improvements and then said, you know what? Let's make SEQUELS, and inarguably created the best pokemon experience in the franchise with B2/W2. If the Pokemon franchise were to ever have a last generation, this felt like it was it and people just hated that notion. All the slop that's come out since is sort of what the fans deserve after how we treated what is unquestionably Gamefreak's most beloved creation (the passion that went into developing this game oozes out in like every corner).

NOT ONLY ARE YOU HITTING THE NAIL ON THE HEAD ABOUT WHAT MAKES THIS GAME PERFECT, YOU ALSO APPRECIATE SERPERIOR SUPERIORITY AJFHSKDGUSLGHLSK

Great video! Black and White is my favorite generation as well, and I really like the way you make your point about Unova having more player freedom and exploration in practice, even if Kanto and Johto have a surface-level idea of player freedom. I also love your editing, it's snappy and fun. This made me want to replay B&W to see all the little places I missed when exploring the region, and check back up on my Serperior.

BW constantly incentivizes you to use more pokemon im your teams because there was always a pokemon that would be strong against the early gym leaders nearby (monkey for gym 1, sawk/throh for Lenora, Darumaka for Burgh, etc.) So im case your were that stubborn/stupid of a child and didn't get the lesson the first time, you had a fee more chances for it to really sink in.

its funny how game freak made the best Pokemon game and ITS SEQUEL (Which is even better) yet decided to throw that away forever and never look back for the next generations

I love the Unova region's vibe.

I actually haven’t played BW1 before (I recently acquired it but I haven’t gotten to it yet) but BW2 were the first games in the series I played, and I’ve sunk a ton of time into it. I always loved how, despite seemingly fairly linear, the game hides so many cool secrets within a lot of the routes (hidden grottos for one, a lot of the things you mentioned in this video). The whole game just radiates this sense that the world is actually alive. It’s part of what makes those games so memorable

A fellow Serperior enjoyer! I started the games with Yellow way back in the day (beat it with my Pikachu and a Mr. Mime) and grew increasingly more disinterested with each game because they are incredibly repetitive in many ways. Black and White, though, had me drawn back in. They refined the traditional pokémon formula and achieved all of the things listed above. On top of that, the developers brought back something that made the original game fun in the first place: an entirely new generation of pokémon unique to Unova. The near-complete exclusion of previous generations made everything from exploration to forming a team to developing strategy more engaging because each pokemon was unfamiliar, even if the same basic concepts applied. Most generations generally add to or build upon previous ones, but never add enough to be able to truly exclude older pokémon. This means that with each game you might find yourself sticking to the familiar rather than seeking new pokémon, or being frustrated with rehashed content in search for more. Besides, we got older pokemon in post-game. On top of that was their inclusion in the sequels, which felt more like incentive to explore the same region all over again to see what changed and seek the unfamiliar within a now familiar context than fan service. The sequels also did this as games in their own right, rather than remakes rehashing the same plot. I know this gen v exclusivity decision wasn’t popular though, and perhaps made for a better single-player experience more than anything else. The pokémon are at the core to the pokémon games, so it’s important that aspect is engaging because plots are never the strong suit (B&W were interesting in that respect too though). I mean, I loved my Charizard in X, but the way they gave it as some sort of soft secondary starter that could potentially overshadow the actual starters was kind of ridiculous.

oh mate, i've just revived the fire of pokemon in my soul

This adds a whole new perspective in regards to the linear map design and the «ugly» pokemon the haters «argumented» with. I was 11-13 when I played the originals and later the sequels and I didn’t agree with the negative opinions. Gen 5 is probably the most vibrant pokemon games to date. I objectively believe, nostalgia aside, everything went downhill after gen 6 came out, gen 7 being a bit better but far from gen 5 quality.

I don’t know how watching one new video from Pikasprey has caused the KZfaq algorithm to flood my recommended with Pokémon content but hey, it’s introduced me to multiple channels that I had no idea existed and have content I really enjoy. You got my sub, The Hayze

This is probably the best video I’ve seen about Gen 5 Been my favorite gen since it came out !!

You are so right! My first pokemon was White, when I played other entries, like fire red, X, Sun, they felt... empty, a souless road. I don't know if it's the music, the details in that beautiful pixel art, like leaves falling or flowers moving, the events, but i can remember every single location. I can't do that in Sun and Moon, the memorable ones for sure, but every town in B/W has "something", story, lore, secrets, I mean it wasn't much but ti was a big step forward for pokemon. Once I realised that in fire red (I discovered it then because it is also pixel art and it was still so much uglier and uninteresting) I couldn't bring myself to finish it, hell I didn't know you could get a larvesta egg because I had a full team probably and when I encountered it in the desert ruins I thought it was a legendary PD: Unpopular opinion White Opelucid city theme is better than Driftveil's

Ah yes, a circle, best for exploration.

While i do like Pokemon black and white quite a lot, i honestly think there is a huge flaw with the exploration in Black and White, the problem is that the game is not designed in a way to encurage exploration. The unova region is just way too linearly layed out, there are very few looping paths, shortcuts, or easy way to get back to a previous place before you get fly. Hell, in the original Black and White the path you take trough the region is basically a straight line. This causes some huge problems related to its exploration. Fistly, before you get fly, backtracking in this game is a huge pain. For example when you get the Strength HM in Nimbasa, and want to use it on the Boulder on Route 2, you have to run trough almost the entire game including the way too long run over the Skyarrow Bridge, it just takes too long without really any way to make it faster. This is also a huge problem with the Fossil pokemon, where most of the time i don't really want to use them because resurecting them is just too much of a backtrack for it to be worth it. Secondly, since the game never really forces you to revisit previously explored areas, you have to just remember all the new places you can explore and then go out of your way to explore them. which is something most people will not do. Even when you get access to fly, why would you ever to back to something like Wellspring Cave? Compare this to Pokemon Emerald, which i personally think is the best game at handeling exploration. The Hoenn region, especially the first half is really dense, with lots of looping paths and shortcuts. Route 115, Mirage Tower, the Desert Area, New Mauvile, Abandoned Ship, and every single early game water route are all completly optional areas in Hoenn. Hell, even route 117 and Verdanturf Town are never really mandetory that you visit. But Emerald is very good at making you backtrack and giving you new things to find. Even just after beating Roxanne, getting access to cut, and having to go back to Briney's house, there is a cut tree on route 104 with an item and a whole new section of Petalburg woods that you can explore. Probably the best exploration moment of this in the entire series is when you get access to Surf after beating Norman. So much of the game upens up from this, and it basically forces you to find something new. In Petalburg itself there is like 3 items you can get from surfing. Then your next destination is to get to Mauvile City and go East to progress, but there are now 4 paths that go from Petalburg to Mauvile. nr. 1 Which is the quickest one is to go trough route 102 and surf over route 103. On this path you might find the Rare Candy and New Mauvile on route 110. Path nr. 2 is to go up to Rustborrow and trough Rusturf Tunnel. Here you will find some new items on both Route 104 and 117. Nr. 3 is to surf down trough the water routes, this is a way longer route but almost everything here is entirely new. If you stop by dewferd you can grab the Sludge Bomb tm, if you have the Mach Bike you can explore the extra section of Granite Cave, you can go into the Abandoned Ship, and you can do the same stuff on route 110 as path nr. 1. The 4. path is to go up and surf trough route 115, which has a whole new section with some new pokemon and items, and a new item on Route 111. There is a ton here, and whichever path you take you are bound to find at least something new. Compare this to getting surf in Pokemon Black and White, which also opens up a ton of new areas. Here you get surf right infront of Twist Mountain. Twist Mountain, Route 7 and Charge Stone Cave, which is the 3 closest areas you have access to right now doesn't have any bodies of water. The closest area where you can get something new from using surf is on route 8 or Dragon Spiral Tower. Of course you can just fly away right after getting Surf, but that is going quite a lot out of your way, and it also somewhat punishes you because you will have to run trough route 7 again to continue forward afterwards. Comparing this it feels like night and day, Emerald gives you so much to find on the way to the place you are already going, while BW you have to go so much out of your way to find anything new.

fantastic video, you put everything i've ever thought about gen 5 + more, into one video. thank you, and keep up the great work

Man this vid takes me back. Pokémon White was my first game of the series and I played like 400 hours on my old DS. You nailed the exploration part. I would literally spend hours running around and keep finding hidden secrets, like the larvesta egg, which I didn't even know existed even after months after beating the elite 4. I remember being so excited whenever I found a new area, feeling rewarded especially when encountering the secret area where a legendary/mythical would be since I didn't follow any guides. I didn't play another Pokémon game until Ultra Sun came out, but dang, comparing my experiences with the two, I didn't realize how much of a gem the Gen 5 games were in comparison with the newer games that they have been releasing.

To those asking WHY B&W was so badly received. It's because it was the first generation that removed a lot of previous games content. Before that, GF would only remove things that extremely didn't worked. For all the rest, they would either enhance, or at least keep, the liked content and try to correct the content that didn't worked. Contests were gone. SearchVS that was there for 4 main games? Gone, back to farming the elite4 and limited by day fights. Safari zone, here since the very first game? Gone. Secret bases ? Gone. Minigame to find evolution stones and fossils ? Gone. Growing berries ? What for? just go farming pokemon that maybe hold them instead. B&W had the best story, one of the best OST, the idea to only have new gens pkm available for most of the game was genius and the rebalancing of the whole gameplay, from moves to abilities, made the fights incredibly fun to play. But outside of the basic loop of explore - fight - capture, the game was bare-boned with lack of content not seen since the very first game (which got a better map and the safari still).

Bro, excellent video! I'm glad I watched the whole video because it seems that many in the comment section didn't lmao. Anyways, thanks for highlighting what the most underrated Pokémon generation did correctly! :D

another element of exploration i love in bw/b2w2 is the hidden grottos, finding my first one felt so magical and special

great video man! way over 2000 likes :) hope to see that run real soon

Thank you for your video! I used this for notes on advancing my own JRPG game I’m making. Made about 2 pages of note and inspiration as to what makes a good jrpg. Thanks!

I don't know if Black 1 and White 1 have these features, but I love Black 2 and White 2 because you can call the professor to find out how to evolve your pokemon and your pokedex can tell you if you've seen or caught every pokemon in whatever area you happen to be in. I hate having to look that sh*t up. I wish gamefreak would bring back these quality of life features.

I really enjoyed this video, and funnily enough Black and White are my favorite games AFTER Emerald. I appreciate the effort and points raised too, so you've definitely earned youself a like and subscription, and i'll share this with friends too. That being said, I feel like you don't give the older games enough credit. For example, I won't say I don't believe you about only using your overleveled starter, but I think that is an experience most people don't run into with emerald. Between your rival, Flannery, Winona (in the case of treecko ofc), team magma etc. there are definitely plenty of reasons way earlier to get more pokemon in your team, and honestly most people never needed a reason to use more pokemon other than 'I like this pokemon too and want to use it.' I also think blaming the game for you going through it 'the hard way' is kind of iffy. If somebody wanted to stick through BW with just overleveling their starter to go through the first gym (which is a lot easier than overleveling them later) they absolutely could, and then they'd have to 'learn that lesson' way later depending on their starter (AT LEAST gym 3, and probably later) which at that point is comparable to learning it later in older gens (although if you picked a torchic you would have to learn it gym 1 in emerald too). I do agree that the dynamic/scaling xp gains in BW make it a lot harder to grind and then sweep with overleveled pokemon and it is great that they do, but that's it. one other thing that bugged me was just that the 'lightyears doesn't measure time... its distance!' is a fucking phenomenal line and a horrible example of something 'weird'; the whole point is that you just started your journey and the trainer right before the intimidating first gym leader tells you 'you're lightyears away from beating brock, kid!' implying that youre weak and will never improve and progress enough to catch up, but then once you beat him reassures you that hey, it's DISTANCE we're talking about, it's all about how much of that distance you can cover rather than an insurmountable time limitation. I think it's one of the more iconic and memorable lines in pokemon games as a whole, so I really think you screwed it up with that one. I also think you don't give the other games credit in terms of exploration and the map/route structure. The nonlinear map structure in older games is very much worth acknowledging as something the older games do well that helps them compete with B&W in the exploration aspect. Being able to travel to all sorts of places out of order just because you went in this direction instead of that direction (as opposed to the map being linear), get a taste of future areas and then go back, or unique ways some areas are connected to eachother are all very fun things, and finding places like pacifidlog town are very memorable experiences, not to mention the regi cave or the flavor encountering Kyogre underwater adds (so what if I'm forced to use an HM? It makes sense and builds atmosphere). As for gyms; my last gen 1 run was like, idk how long ago so maybe there really wasn't a point, but I do remember doing at least one or two of the gyms out of order, and while I don't really remember why I think that does say something about 'freedom' or choice. The fact that going back for Surge or Erika makes them 'not fun anymore' is like arguing any way of completing the game that isn't streamlined/as intended 'wont be fun anymore.' if you can have fun clearing emerald with only your starter you can have fun steamrolling gym leaders you skipped and making that your story. Still, I agree that gyms not scaling better is a big issue for making doing the gyms out of order fun or interesting and agree that it's probably a bit overrated. At least, I'd much rather have interesting routes than this free order with that kind of execution. But a nonlinear map structure is separate from just the gyms. In Emerald for example, the gyms are spread across the map all over and while you are going to the GYMS in order, the locations they're in don't connect linearly at all and you're encouraged to explore the map and move around the region in a lot of different, interesting ways. In addition, while I really like the Unova routes in design, I like routes from the gen 3-4 games just as much. There's plenty of big routes that are fun to explore and aren't particularly linear or just feel more interesting and have a lot of personality even when contained to themselves, like Sinnoh 214 (three different ways to go through it between the grass, trainer ridge or maniac tunnel) or 219, the Kecleon blocking your path in Emerald or the amazing route 119 complete with so many different elements, locations and ways to traverse it (water, bike bridge, two different paths, you can mix and match these for shortcuts) not to mention secrets like the Feebas tiles or the buildup to the route and how it ties into the nearby areas. There is SO MUCH personality in a lot of memorable routes (and caves!) from the older games and pretending B&W simply 'did it better' is plain wrong imho. Routes that can lead to multiple completely different areas tie into the first point about nonlinear exploration/map structure and are great too and very common in those games. I do prefer having unlimited TMs, but I think it's worth mentioning that it does make the game easier, and ALSO that that 'fear of regret' and being freed from it is exactly an example of something that customizes your own adventure. Your decisions matter, and saving a TM or using it early is a significant one that shapes your adventure. I disagree with the argument that 'this gives the players choice back,' there is no choice because there's no consequence. The quality of life is nice and I prefer it overall, though an ideal middle ground would probably be having access to limited or just more additional copies of TMs later or for very high prices only a while after obtaining the first one. In conclusion: I love gen 5 for a lot of reasons, but I think trying to tear down older gens to praise it is misguided and a bit misleading. or at least that your criticism of older gens in comparison to it is kind of lacking. I agree with you about the conclusion though, the 'lived in feeling' of the world does exist in other games but I feel like gen 5 does it best. For me it just has a lot of colorful characters; I love Alder, I love Cheren and Bianca, I LOVE the gym leaders like Elesa and Clay, N is very endearing even if ultimately the themes of B&W were underexplored (because gamefreak/nintendo are cowards). I adore the soundtrack, I adore a lot of the pokemon and the areas you find them in and how you encounter them as well as how relevant they can all be and how colorful runs can feel because of it, and a lot of the random NPCs too (im a heartbreaker... my name... charles), not to mention the absolutely exceptional sound and visual design that both beautifully integrate the narrative's themes. Games are great. But so were Emerald, Platinum and HGSS. 3-5 is definitely the golden age of pokemon for me. and serperior is easily the best gen 5 starter

Dude I love Pokemon Black and White! Also Great video glad you are popping off you deserve more subs and views!!!

Ngl when you put Ns Farewell at the end of the video I got a little emotional. Black and White 1 and 2 are truly the peak of Pokemon. It never got back to that level.

That whole bit of conditioning you to use other pokemon instead of using just your starter speaks so much to me. The first game was Fire Red. I couldn't get through it. Second was coliseum and taught me not a lot. Third was diamond. Used emporeian and dialga with a tanky absnow and staravia (both were HM slaves)and spent everything thing on items and saved scumed to just barely beat Cynthia and get nightmares for life. Gen 5 actually captured evolved and built teams

Hello fellow algorithm riders, let’s see how high we can pump this guy’s sub numbers and then sound like hipsters who were here before it was cool.

Great video, I really enjoyed watching the entire thing! From an artist pov there’s also the aspect of being able to create the most fun Nuzlocke comics because the story is just so amazing with yet enough space for interpretation and artistic freedom. Back in the DeviantArt times there were a ton of great Nuzlocke comics and the best imo were always BW&B2W2.

Idk man I love the confusingly weird dialogue of the old games. Oddly charming in a way lol

Great video! The jiggling frames though were hard for my eyes

I appreciate these games so much Thank you for deepening that thru these great points Currently playing bw2 with a friend from elementary school 10 years since our last pokemon adventure while we're unemployed and we're having such a good time It's his first experience with it

"black and white don't have any stupid roadblocks" this is dancing-for-no-reason guys erasure

Bro this video made me want to boot up my old Black and White 2 saves just to see all the locations you mentioned.

Any-order gyms COULD be something made to have story implications and contribute more to the ending. Its still an idea with value!

I love gen 5. A lot of it is due to nostalgia, was the last generation of pokemon I was super into, have a lot of great memories playing with a friend, but it's such a wonderful experience and the generation as a whole has become my most replayed gen. Over the past 5 years I've even been slowly filling the national dex in my white 2. The thing I honestly miss the most is seasons. I really wish they would return. It was such a simple little thing, but the atmosphere and changes it provided to the game can make even subsequent playthroughs something special, being in areas during seasons you hadn't payed much mind to before.

17:38 i was really enjoying that bass line...

I have to disagree. I mean I agree with your points, but there are a lot of moments in Black and White where they block you from progressing if you don't finish a certain event. Like, you can't progress past Castelia as long as you don't help Iris and finish the gym, blocked from progressing through the map as long as you don't do very specific actions by a very obvious road block. You're not truly free. I tried a lot to go out of the game's intended path but I felt trapped in its linearity. I mean big open worlds aren't really my thing, but there are limits to how linear I like my games. It's not really about wanting to go through the gyms out of order. It's about the fact that if I want to, I can. It's about the freedom. Instead, the game prevents me from progressing if I don't do everything in a certain order. It breaks my suspension of disbelief because it doesn't feel like an actual world, but like a video game which traps me with very obvious road blocks.

One of my fave parts about this game was the seasonal exploration. I just happened to do my playthrough during a winter month, so I casually strolled through that twisting mine in seconds with the snow in the central area with little thought, and I went through the bogs as an ice puzzle Color me surprised when spring comes and the bogs have wild pokemon in the water and the mine became a dungeon now thst the snow is gone So cool

Oh my heart broke when you told the story of your Emerald playthrough. My first game was Pokémon Red on the Gameboy, and for months before I started playing it, I was watching the animé that taught me all that, and the animé aired for free on public airwaves. I had no idea how good I had it in 1998-99

I also love that the Pokémon are so much more versatile in gen 5 and in bw2 you can use so many different lineups with Pokémon with different types of moves. I wish they would go back to making the battling and stories and maps like these but with a twist of the future graphics

About the play conditioning thing, when I played Pokemon pearl, I’d try to catch numerous Pokemon, but I would only train my starter chimchar. I never beat the game as a kid because I would either hit a wall because there’s something my starter can’t deal with so I’d reset the save to try again or just set the game down for a long time and reset the save when I’d pick it up again.

Pretty good video, do make more

The DS Pokemon games were arguably the peak of Pokemon gaming as whole. Sure it started out very terribly with Diamond/Pearl, but then Platinum & HGSS rose the DS era to a legendary status. By the time the Gen V games came along, I could tell Game Freak mastered the DS hardware by then, and it especially shows with the details in B2W2.

Great video, you would be surprised at how absurdly young some truly prodigal chess masters are

When I was a kid I played the hell out of Pokemon blue. I probably beat it 5 times. I played a bit of Pokemon silver but I didn't own a copy so I never got very far. I didn't play gen 3 or gen 4, just wasn't interested really, so my experience with Pokemon by the time gen 5 came out was basically gen 1, and the console spin offs. And I didn't even pick up gen 5 at first. I bought Pokemon Black 2 on the day the 3DS XL came out as my first 3DS game (and in my mind it is a 3DS game) I was absolutely blown away by how good it was. I was a bit confused because I didn't realize it was a sequel but I got over that and went out and bough Black 1. Pokemon Blue made me a lifelong RPG fan, and Pokemon Black and Black 2 made me a lifelong Pokemon fan (who will always criticize the games that came after)

Watching this video made me realize just how much of the content in Black 2 I missed all those years ago. I still loved the game, but I missed SOOO much

I still play gen 5 a lot to this day. I’m totally addicted to bw 2 as well. I played gen 1 when I was young back in 2000 and raised a Charizard to lv 75 before the elite 4 and the rest of my team was garbage. Never played gens 7 or 8 but gen 5 is a masterpiece

Ive never thought about this but it's so true!! When people complain about the unova games being "too linear" I've never felt like it was an issue to me, and I guess thats because there really is so much to explore!

In gen 1, while the story path might be a little linear, the path you go through the cities is not. It makes it feel like a living world not just an IKEA route you have to pass through from start to finish

I’ve always loved gen 5 and never understood the hate it got. Great video!

I actually think the stupid npcs and silly roadblocks are charming and hilarious

I low key almost cried when you said that you were 7 when you got emerald . I was 13 , almost 14 .

I grew up with Pokemon from gen 1, and to this day I still believe Black/White are the best Pokemon games.

Actually there was a competitive scene during gen 1 and gen 2. It just wasn’t Pokémon regionals and it wasn’t easy to find out

this is a great video! also the snivy line is my favourite too lol

I'm reminded of my first pokemon game and starter, Bark, the Feraligatr from Crystal who was level 100 with scratch, cut, surf, and whirlpool.

If you didn’t have Internet back in the days of Black & White, you felt awful, because Pokémon incentivized those who had Internet. And it wasn’t just the one-off Mystery Gifts of the generation prior. The ENTIRE REGION is designed around the Entralink / Entree Forest, being built as a gigantic donut around the fact that you either did or didn’t have Wi-Fi. Oh, but don’t worry. You’re a plebeian without Wi-Fi? It’s not like we’d break the game by introducing something like Contrary Serperior in a Dream Ball, or legendary forms such as the Therian Formes that are accessible only to those who had Dream Radar… Except that’s EXACTLY what happened. Pokémon Black and White’s more expansive region design, its lore, the timeskip, the season system, the music, all of it simply couldn’t shake the fact that I wasn’t able to get to the forest in the smack dab center of the region. A forest which has some connection to dreams, and would inexplicably be the difference between winning or losing the majority of your battles in Black and White / B2W2. Now, yes, there were the Dens introduced that might help some people in B2W2 find certain Pokémon with Hidden Abilities, but by that point, it didn’t matter. It might seem like some small thing, but I went from feeling at the top of my competitive class within my high school in HGSS to being the laughing stock of Gen 5 competitive play due to ALL OF UNOVA being built wrapping around a Wi-Fi exclusive magical forest, which your hexagon-smattered watch and people at school would constantly remind you of. Generation 5 was the first game, by design, that made me feel that because I lived out in the countryside with no Wi-Fi, I’d be missing out somehow. That I’d only ever be on-par with NPC’s. I hated that, and only with the introduction of ways to get Hidden Abilities more easily in following generations did I get back into the series. It still bothers me, the fact that Unova is built around that stupid magical forest, and that you’re literally barred from entry ( no pun intended ) without having Wi-Fi. It could’ve served some role without Internet access, but nope. It felt like being stuck outside of some fancy nightclub, where only the top tier Trainers whose parents could successfully hook up a Wi-Fi router in 2012 got to partake in.

Another thing that black and white does that doesn't get enough appreciation is that it's almost totally removed from the other games. gen 2 is a direct sequel to get 1 and you can even go back to kanto (honestly I wish they did that going to other regions thing more). And then Hoenn and Sinnoh are both locations also based on Japan. But Unova is based on New York, on the other side of the planet. And there are zero Japanese Pokemon around until the post game. Instead you get an entirely new catalogue of Pokemon, the most added in any generation. It's a complete fresh start, each Pokemon a new discovery of something you've never seen before.

Black and White had amazing exploration, but as it would turn out the greatest strength of the exploration is also it's greatest weakness. Maze-like routes that are pretty out of the way that usually has an overworld gimmick THAT ARE OPTIONAL.

Can't wait for the remakes

I think this video really explains why nowadays BW/BW2 are the only pokemon games I can go back to and actually have fun with. I don't consider myself a pokemon fan anymore since I sort of fell out of love with the series, but I can always come back to gen 5 and have a great time.

Absolutely love BW and this video-essay does an excellent job of explaining the good points of the game to those who aren't particularly in the known. They singlehandedly changed my form of viewing the entire series ever since I played them, for the better. However, the post-game is something I'll never quite approve of. After repeated playthroughs I've come to understand that these games' main story is shorter than average on account on you only needing to visit locations necessary for progress, unlike previous and future games where everything is accessible during the main story. Because of that, about one third of the map is inaccessible just to give the post-game a feeling that it's larger than it actually is. Like, no shit, if I fenced up the upper half of Sinnoh plus and then unlocked it until I beat the league, of course I'd think that the post-game massive. That structure also has the side-effect of making your journey feel a bit like an on-rails adventure, as every single area you come across is related to the plot. There's barely any small town you visit completely on your own during the main story, unlike other main games. I'm not particularly a fan of this, and I'm glad it hasn't been done again in the series.

Even after years of playing pokemon black I never realized and tried to go to route 17 and 18 cause I thought it was post game but no the level are proportional to the levels that your pokemon is at when you obtain surf

This was so touching, God I love Unova!

Dope vid, do more

Gen 5 does have a lot of exploration to a degree...but usually when you go through a lot of areas for the first time it is either linear like route 1 or may have some side off exploration in some routes but nothing when you backtrack later one, there is only a couple times where you will be rewarded for backtracking with new stuff later on and then there is routes like route 10 which is entirely very linear. I mean....that goofiness in the writing is still there in the original black and white. Also like....there is a power outage in XY, that seemed pretty obvious to me. Like I played BW1 But I don`t see what maturarity is present in how the characters are written compared to ALL the other games in the series. Like Gym leaders have always had personalities from Surge to Flannery, we see them chat with each other and reference each other in past gens too like how Wallace dated Winona or the battle area the Sinnoh gym leaders hang out at in Pokemon Platinum. The human roadblocks make sense but so do most of them tbh. Even the drunk old man one because yeah....humans can cause road blocks too believe it or not. Now you would be right that the protagonist of BW are the oldest....but BW2 exist too and then there is XY where they are AT LEAST as old as they were in BW1 if not even older and there was originally even plans for the male protagonist to have some facial hair as a option so they could have even been 17 or something I`m not sure. I will say it has great writing for sure but I dunno if it`s the best in the series, Gen 7 has a great story and I hear SV has a great one too. Also like yeah Cynthia on a vacation was pretty humanizting to see for one of the strongest champion but we did see that kinda stuff before like again in gen 4. Also speaking of game balance and exploration....I rememember playing Yellow and honestly one of the areas I really got stuck at was Koga`s gym where Koga himself had Pokemon that range from the upper 40s to a Venomoth that was a wopping level 50 which may I remind you in comparison Erika`s highest level Pokemon was in the lower 30s. Now I never played the original 3 so did you have to grind to beat Tate and Liza? I mean they would be tough but Koga level tough? Also don`t you need hms for victory road? Like multiple times like with strength for example? Like HMS weren`t all bad in the older games, in gen 2 you didn`t have to use many and you don`t have to put them on your main team either. Also I dunno, being able to use more HMs as you get more gym badges is a good way of doing progression.

there is a reason why I had over 3000 hours clocked in to my playtime in this game..

I hope someday we get a game with BW's route complexity, but with Emerald's nonlinear map layout. Hoenn almost feels like a metroidvania or Dark Souls 1 with its map complexity, but BW has amazing routes. Also, sometimes I miss single use TM's. I think reusable ones are better overall, but when doing challenge runs, I kind of enjoy the limitations the single use provides. Especially for nuzlockes. I really like the newer game's solution of having both kinds of TM's, despite all my problems with the new games.

8:55 i love how early in their development they wanted to bring the orchestra to radio hall in nyc to play but it turned out to be too expensive so it never happened

I legitimately didn't know how to put into words why gen 5 was my favorite. You pretty much summed up a majority of my reasons but I guess the short version is quality of life. HMs especially taking up a third of your entire teams move slots was always annoying (even if surf is a good move either way) but the game just flowed right. I never really was able to word how the way you tackle routes just felt different and made the game feel better. The freedom and heavy guidance to realizing you can't solo the game with your starter was great. I honestly kinda think it's one of the weakest gens for starters, but that's actually a good thing since you can really make a full team of interesting and different mons. I'll probably get some flak for saying they have underwhelming starters but I just kinda think it's good in a weird way. Making them something that can't solo the game did wonders for making a generation see how a full team makes things feel so much better.

So glad to have found a based Serpy lover out here in the YT wilderness, wonderful video btw! This entire essay is based and I can’t wait for that Serperior Solo video!

I love the All Star reference, rip Steve Harwell. That aside, great video! EDIT: You're at over 4k likes now, so...

My issue with BW is that I despised the regional dex. It cut out favorites and familiar faces and didnt really replace them satisfactorily for me. So no matter how cool the game itself was, I always felt like I was forced to speedrun through the game until I could trade in. I wish XY and BW had been combined. Great dex, great atmosphere, heart, great exploration, great story... instead XY had the dex and the atmosphere and heart and BW got the exploration and story.

Gen 5 is cool, but the exp system is sometimes a problem and the rant about roadblocks being dumb like the desert construction worker saying you cant pass yet isn't any different then the lumious city worker saying basically the same. You prefer once excuse over the other