Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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51 of 56 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
The best Pokemon game to date, August 25, 2006
Fun:5.0 out of 5 stars
When Pokemon Ruby and Sapphire came out, I was very distraught to learn that some of my favorites from the original Game Boy generation, particularly Nidoking and Persian, were absent from them. Furthermore, since the Advance Generation employs a different system for Pokemon stats and is on vastly different hardware, I could not upload my power Pokemon from Crystal or Blue. And there were some things that annoyed me about Ruby/Sapphire, including the spineless rival and outlandish town concepts (Who builds a town atop trees or inside a crater?).
Enter LeafGreen. This game, along with the companion game FireRed, takes us back to the world where Pokemon got its start, but now with all of the Advance generation upgrades. The graphics are pretty good, and the lead girl character is the cutest I have seen in a Pokemon game. The boy isn't too bad, and they did make him look less like Ash from the anime this time around (compare to Brendan from RSE, who has white hair that makes him look like he belongs in a nursing home).
Most of the dialogue remains unchanged from the original games. You have the shorts-obsessed youngsters, the really sensitive Lasses, and that poor scientist that was shipped off to the Russian Tiksi Branch of the regions major corporation. Team Rocket and its enigmatic boss Giovanni are here in all their glory, as are the original crew of gym leaders and Elite Four.
In addition to the main region, there is a chain of islands. Here, there are some new quests and some of the Johto Pokemon are found out there.
The controls are pretty much exactly as they were in Ruby/Sapphire, which means the menus and commands are well designed and intuitive. A device called the Vs Seeker allows you to challenge trainers you've already beaten. It doesn't take too long to recharge and is a great way to level up your army and earn cash.
There is a help function triggered by hitting the shoulder buttons, but it's only for newbie trainers and gets annoying because I have a tendency to hit the shoulder buttons by accident. At least the help menu can be turned off. The game also does a "recap" of your recent accomplishments. It's cool the first two or three times, but then it just becomes a waste of time. There is no time function in this game, so time-dependent evolvers must be traded back to Ruby/Sapphire/Emerald, and that isn't possible until you've beaten the Elite Four and tackled an island sidequest. The music is remixed from the original games, but you'll still want to have your iPod handy.
Other than that, though, this game is an excellent RPG and involves a lot of strategy. Is it better than Emerald? Yes. This game takes place in a far more engaging world, the characters look better, and some of the Pokemon animations in Emerald look just plain dumb.
Note that the wireless battling is essentialty the same as before except without the hassles of cables. The wireless chat room is a good concept, but limited range of the included wireless transmitter really limits it.
If you can only pick up one of the GBA-generation Pokemon games, LeafGreen is the best of them all. The selection of Pokemon gives it the edge over FireRed, and the better-looking sprites and nostaligic feel combined with the current game mechanics places it well above Ruby, Sapphire, and even Emerald.
Again, I stress that the girl lead character from LeafGreen is super cute!
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9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Nostalgia, April 28, 2006
Fun:5.0 out of 5 stars
Everyone my age has played Pokemon Blue/Yellow/Red on the GBC, so EVERYONE of us knows that storyline. But what about the younger generation? They probably do not have access to an older brother/sister's ancient copy of Pokemon Blue or a Gameboy Colour (missing the back-piece battery cover, of course), therefore do not know the storyline for the game. But for those of us who do know it by heart, this is a fresh look at the old tale. The Pokedex has been greatly detailed, the most up-to-date one yet. It has down to the very last piece of info you could need about Pokemon in the game. There are also very slight twists in the game itself (people you meet and events). I will not diclose any for not spoiling's sake. Let's just say you won't be snail-walking to Cerulean City. There is the nice graphics boost, but I'm an old-school kinda girl and I like the original better. You also have a choice between playing a boy or girl character. The boy looks like an Ash-clone and the girl looks like she is going to catch bees or something (very large sunhat on her head!)
This game is still incredibly fun. I highly recommmend.
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12 of 13 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Very impressive, October 18, 2005
Fun:5.0 out of 5 stars
When this version first came out, I didn't buy it right away. Frankly, I was more than a little upset that Nintendo was trying to pass off this remake as a new game. But a few years later, I had the itch to play the original versions of Pokemon again, and figured, "Why not get the graphically updated GBA version?"
I won't bore you by describing the basic mechanics of the game; anyone who hasn't been living in a cave for the past decade knows how Pokemon works, and this is no different. Suffice to say, it's a remake of Pokemon Red/Blue.
What makes this well worth a purchase, though, is the surprising amount of new content. I was pleased enough to be replaying the best Pokemon iteration with vastly improved graphics, but I was euphoric when I discovered the boatload of new stuff to explore near the end of the game. There's an entirely original new area of Kanto to travel to, filled with Pokemon to catch, puzzles to solve, items to find, people to meet...even yet another Team Rocket-infested base. This is no tacked-on afterthought, it's a whole new chapter.
This, along with the liberal sprinkling of improvements throughout the game that I'll let you discover for yourself, make this a great buy for anyone who feels nostalgic for Red and Blue.
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