Another gen, another remake. I got Pokémon Omega Ruby and Alpha Sapphire for my birthday in 2014 and, at the time, they were my most enjoyable Pokémon experience since Gold/Silver/Crystal. I never really warmed to the originals, besides falling in love with Kyogre and its brute force. There were a lot of great changes made, while still retaining the feel and general storyline from the originals (except for the inclusion of the Delta Episiode, in lieu of an Emerald remake)
- 3D gameplay
- Move name changes (bye ThunderShock; hello, Thunder Shock!)
- Riding on Pokémon
- Pokémon-Amie
- Super Training
- The Fairy type
- Trainer customisation
And, a new gimmick: Mega Evolution. It’s a mechanic that people have begged to return as it allowed a select few Pokémon to temporarily evolve into much stronger forms with the use of Mega Stones. Maybe one day we’ll see it again but this was the start of things to come with new PEDs (Pokémon Enhancing Devices) being introduced in future games.
Commercial wise, we get some 3D representations of Hoenn and more gameplay to show off the new graphics and mechanics. Standard stuff.
(Header photo: “Ryu” by Nathan Rupert is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)
