Pokemon has been a huge part of my life since I was a child, and I'm happy to say that I'm still a fan now! I've even got two cats named Pikachu and Dedenne after the main mascot and the "Pika-clone" from Pokemon X and Y.
Pokemon Red, Blue, and Yellow
These were the first games released in the US, and they were the games I cut my teeth on. I learned how to read just so I could go on my own Pokemon journey just like Ash Ketchum, who I saw on TV every Saturday morning on Kids WB. I started with Red, felt like I needed to have Blue as well, and bought Yellow to round out my collection. Sure, it was the same game three times, but I was happy.
Going back to play them as an adult, the level grinding is a huge speedbump, and it takes a while for every battle to play out. Even with a fast forward cheat on my emulator, it felt very slow and a little tedious. The in-game clock shows a completion time of 60 hours, and that's without completing the Pokedex. Still, I'll never forget the first time I got the Missingno glitch to work. That very weird bug started me on the journey to become a computer programmer! I'm still fascinated with game design and programming because of that little rabbit-hole I went down one afternoon.
Pokemon Gold, Silver, and Crystal
They say that the "correct" answer to "What's your favorite Pokemon generation?" is "Whatever one you grew up with." For me, that would be Pokemon Gen 2, with Gold and Silver being the main ones I played. I didn't have Pokemon Crystal as a kid, but I loved Gold and Silver with a passion. Cyndaquil is still my favorte Starter to this day, and when Hisuian Typhlosion happened in Gen 8, I was thrilled. As for Gen 2 itself, I felt immersed in the full color world that the GBC showed me, even if it's quite dated now. The Day / Night Cycle blew my mind away as a kid, and the Pokemon Daycare was a welcome addition that let me trade Starters with my friends. Or... it would have let me do so if I had any friends to trade with in the first place.
Every Pokemon Generation builds upon the last one, and I feel like Pokemon Gold, Silver, and Crystal are where the "feel" of Pokemon started to solidify. The colored sprites, the animations introduced in Crystal, the faster battles, the more present storyline, and the introduction of Dark and Steel Type were all improvements on the ideas that Pokemon Gen 1 had. The split of the Special Stat into Special Attack and Special Defense was a necessary balancing change, and the Dark and Steel Types helped to mitigate the stranglehold that Psychic Type had on Gen 1. Aside from the major overhaul that Stat determination had in Gen 3, this is sort of how Pokemon still works. I have a great deal of nostalgia for these games, and I'm grateful that I was able to play them at such a formative part of my life.
Pokemon Ruby, Sapphire, and Emerald
Excellent games with awesome Legendaries, a fun set of rival evil teams, and a solid trio of Starter Pokemon! Despite what some publications said about the amount of water in the map, this set of games will always hold a dear place in my heart. This Generation is also the one that started the remake trend that continues to this day, for better or worse. I think that Pokemon Ruby and Sapphire having the player character fight against Team Magma and Team Aqua respectively is a fun way to tie in the version-exclusive Legendaries Groudon and Kyogre. Pokemon Emerald has you fight both of them at different times, and I feel like the story is the most effective at making me feel like the protagonist of a shonen anime about friendship and saving the world. That's the premise of every Pokemon game, of course, but I feel like these games captured my imagination in that way the most.
This is also the set of games that solidified the Stat Determination System that we use to this day. There's Individual Values (IVs) that act like the "genes" of a given Pokemon and Effort Values (EVs) that act as growth from training. There was a similar system that existed in Gen 1 and Gen 2 with Determination Values (DVs), but this didn't work out very well, and so the overhaul was needed. This change is also why Gen 3 can't trade with the earlier Generations, and that's why there were remakes of Pokemon Red and Green; you couldn't catch all of the Pokemon in the National Pokedex in just Ruby, Sapphire, and Emerald, and so Pokemon Firered and Leafgreen were introduced. Now we can't go a single year without the Pokemon fandom asking when the next remakes of the next Generation up is... I'm not saying that it's a bad thing; I like that remakes make older Generations more accessible to new players and people who are nostalgic for those games. I'm just not a fan of the pestering asking.
Pokemon Diamond, Pearl, and Platinum
This was the first Generation where my brother and I were able to play together. He got Diamond while I got Pearl. He's four years younger than me, so I had a bit of a head-start on these games. I had a great time teaching him how to play, and even though I'm not sure how far he got, I do remember battling him and trading our exclusives with each other. This started a lovely tradition of one of us getting one version and the other sibling getting the other version. Neither one of us got Platinum when it came out, however. I believe one of our cousins did, though, and now that I know what updates and improvements they added, I look forward to when I get around to playing a copy of it.
The impact that the Physical / Special split on Pokemon cannot be understated. In all previous games, every Grass, Fire, Water, Electric, Psychic, Ice, Dark, and Dragon Move went off of the Pokemon's Special Attack Stat. Normal, Fighting, Flying, Poison, Ground, Rock, Bug, Ghost, and Steel Moves all went off of the Attack Stat. However, starting in Gen 4, the Stat that a Move will use is on a case-by-case basis. This totally changed how Pokemon were designed in the future, and it unintentionally affected all previously designed Pokemon. Even more so than the Special split, this recontexualized a lot of Movesets. For example, many Attack-heavy Normal Type Pokemon such as Snorlax and Tauros had access to Hyper Beam, but now that Move doesn't do any good for them. While this change was frustrating for some high-level competitive Pokemon players who particularly liked Gen 1 Pokemon, I think that this update actually opened up a lot of design space for battles and character creation.
Pokemon Black, White, Black 2, and White 2
To be honest, I didn't really get into this set of games. They released when I was in my edgy teenage "everything that I liked as a kid is actually bad" phase. I feel like many of us get into that mindset around that age, and since these games came out when I was going through that, I didn't take much of an interest in them. Even when I did try them, the grinding was too slow for me, and didn't like the designs of many of the new Pokemon. The fact that there were no returning old Pokemon until the post-game didn't help.
Looking back on it, I do appreciate the darker tone of the game which is more grounded than Gen 3 or 4. Gen 3's rival teams are a lot of fun, but it's very cartoonish. Gen 4's end of the world theming is interesting, but it feels a little too ridiculous for a child to be able to capture the literal incarnations of time, space, and anti-matter that were used to create the universe. Gen 5's approach to a villanous group is a hypocritical cult that claims to be for the liberation of Pokemon but is actually a cover-up for their sinister leader's aspirations. That feels more plausible, even if the MacGuffin that the leader ultimately needs is a genetically modified prehistoric creature with a cannon welded to its back and a dragon that is the embodiment of either truth or ideals. Yes, those Pokemon are just as implausible as Gen 4's Legendaries, but something about the approach that the villanous team takes feels more grounded.
Pokemon X and Y
This was the first Generation that was in full 3D on portable console. There were 3D games as early as Pokemon Stadium on the Nintendo 64, but this was the first mainline series to be in 3D. When it first came out, I remember thinking that every frame of it looked like it had been taken straight out of the anime. Now as an adult, I find the lack of saturation a little disappointing. Still, the games look really good, and the addition of the Fairy Type was a bold move. I don't like the common fanmade types that are added to ROM Hacks, like Light, Cosmic, Sound, or the like. I don't think anyone saw Fairy coming, though, and while it was an odd choice at first, I really welcome the addition!
One weird tidbit that I've been thinking about is that Eevee has been used in previous games to show off new ways for Pokemon to evolve. In Gen 1, they were the only Pokemon with a branching evolution. In Gen 2, they evolved with Friendship and the Day / Night Cycle. In Gen 4, they had location-specific evolutions. In Gen 6, the new evolution for Eevee was showing off the new Fairy Type and the Pokemon-Amie system. I find it odd that it's the only Pokemon that evolves with Affection as opposed to Friendship. In later Generations, they removed this distinction and made it a Friendship evolution while knowing a Fairy Type Move, but it's still an interesting choice. It's also notable that all of Eevees evolutions would have used the Special Attack Stat before the Physical / Special Split in Gen 4. I wonder if that would have been the case for Fairy Type?
Pokemon Sun, Moon, Ultra Sun, and Ultra Moon
Honestly, I don't know how I feel about these games. They happen to be the first Pokemon games that some of my college friends played, and I got to help them with their Pokemon journeys, but I don't revisit them that often. My partner started with my old copy of Pokemon Sun while I was playing Pokemon Ultra Sun, and they preferred to play the Virtual Console release of Pokemon Silver. I didn't really like how often the Rotom Dex chimed in to hold my hand, and I felt like the fun gameplay loop of catching, battling, and challenging Trials was interrupted a little too often by a plotline that wasn't integrated well, even if it was interesting in theory. Mega Evolutions move out of the way for the new Z-Move mechanic, which I sort of prefer from a design perspective. Not all Pokemon can Mega Evolve, so you had to hope that your favorite unpopular Pokemon was chosen to have new life breathed into them. Any Pokemon could use Z-Moves, and some Pokemon had special Z-Crystals to have special Z-Moves.
I liked the Pokemon Pelago feature. Taking care of your Pokemon in the Boxes was cute!
Pokemon Sword and Shield
These are often considered the worst Pokemon games ever, at least on the Switch. That's not really encouraging considering that they were the first games on the Switch, as well. It left a pretty sour taste in the mouths of a lot of long-time fans. In a controversial move, Game Freak explicitly stated that not all Pokemon that existed at the time would be available on the Switch. This decision was labelled "Dexit," as a pun on Brexit, itself a portmanteau of "British Exit." Honestly, I think that it was necessary; as the first games on the new console, they naturally wouldn't have all of the Pokemon available in the wild. Later games would reintroduce old Pokemon alongside their new roster. The fact that not all Pokemon would be available immediately is disapponting, but it makes sense as a limitation of the system and of the game development team. At the same time, I understand the frustration of not being able to play with your favorite Pokemon right away, and I feel like the removal of Mega Evolution and Z-Moves in one fell swoop added to the disappointment.
This Generation introduced Dynamax, which is an interesting new mechanic where your Pokemon grows to gargantuan size for three Turns and has its Moves transmogrified into new, powerful blows. There are Pokemon Dens scattered across certain areas of the Galar region, and Trainers are able to battle a Dynamaxed wild Pokemon with up to three other Trainers. This marks the first time that players are able to all encounter the same Pokemon and battle together. Gen 8 also introduced the idea of DLC instead of a third game or a direct sequel. Somefans prefer the third, definitive game, but I actually like the DLC approach. It allows fans who picked up the game at launch to have all-new content instead of having to replay mostly the same game with some new things added. Overall, despite the controversy about this set of games, I feel like they paved the way to better mechanics later on.
Pokemon Legends: Arceus
A breath of fresh air from the previous showing, and an interesting edge case on labelling Pokemon Generations as a concept! This game came out after Pokemon Sword and Shield, but before Pokemon Scarlet and Violet, which led a lot of fans to classify it as Pokemon Gen 8.5 while others place it squarely in Gen 8. Generally, this is a distinction without a difference, since there is not much of a mechanical or material difference between calling it one or the other. The Pokemon Company tends to favor calling Pokemon: Legends Arceus a Gen 8 game, and that's good enough for me. It's interesting that it's considered a mainline game at all, considering its semi-open world, the way you traverse it, the way you can capture Pokemon without battling them first, and the lack of a Pokemon League Gym Challenge. Even Pokemon Sun and Moon had an Elite 4 battle at the end, and the plot of that game was hinting that Professor Kukui was trying to get the Pokemon League to officially sponsor the Island Trials as part of a Pokemon League Gym Challenge.
But, I digress, Pokemon: Legends Arceus brings a lot of new ideas to the table, several new Pokemon, a twist on a familiar Pokemon region, and a plot unlike anything we have seen before. Even the way the Pokedex is filled out is different; you can't just capture one instance of a Pokemon and know everything about it. Now you need to observe it performing certain Moves, Move Styles, or capture several different kinds to gather data. Personally, this reads as the first scientific writings of these creatures as observed in Hisui, now modern-day Sinnoh, during the Edo period. Extrapolating further, it seems like the modern Pokedex that our protagonist is gifted at the beginning of each game is more of a glorified coin collection book; all of the knowlege of the Pokemon exist in a database, but the player needs to capture an example Pokemon to unlock the information.