Topic: Pokémon Sun & Moon - Discussion & Speculation

yeah but you weren't friends with them, not really. your character was new to the city and meet your rival Serena/Calem and his/her friends. they weren't technically your friends. and sorry but when you move to a new city and befriend one person, generally you hang out with their friends. I know this from personal experience as I moved around a lot when I was younger. This isn't unheard of. and I enjoyed having friends instead of a rival in Pokemon. In Ruby & Sapphire you didn't really have a rival in the sense of Gary either.
I hope they go this route again

Well there HAS to be a rival, there's no doubt about that, whether it's done like Blue or Serena it is a series staple that would make no sense to drop at this point. Still I agree that the way X&Y went about things was a bit toss, at least Black/White only had Cheren and Bianca and they were somewhat likeable. Same with Diamond & Pearl having Dawn and Barry who were both great, I think they just got carried away a bit recently.

@DefHalan: That would probably work. I'd like to see that.
@Maxz cool theme tune!

Well, if they are competing with you, shouldn't they want you to lose?

Anyway, I wouldn't mind friendly characters nearly as much if you became friends with them on the journey. As it stands right now, you are just thrown into the story and told "Hey, these are your best friends".

@Blast because Pokemon isn't a story-based RPG. It's an adventure based around the individual. So the game needs to make you feel connected in some way to the character at hand, but must do it with a very limited amount of text.

I'm personally a big fan of Silver, as you aren't given any exposition about the character. You meet him in the world. He rudely shoves you, and then you find out he's a thief. Plenty of reason to dislike the character, without any forced exposition.

My brother and I compete with each other but we don't want the other to lose. When one of us do (me, mostly) we talk about what went wrong and work out how to do better in the future.

Interesting. Maybe it's just that I'm a competitive person, but for me competing usually means I'm in it to win it, which by default means everyone else loses, even if they are my friends or family.

I definitely have people I measure myself against who I don't want to lose, but I don't consider that competing, as the goal is for both of us to succeed.

Then would you count the friendly rival as competing if they are mainly there to measure yourself against?

@DefHalan: Then you're not really competing. You're just playing co-op. When you truly compete you want to win, and you want your adversary to lose. That's the whole point of competing. Then again, your "competitions" probably don't have the same weight to them that becoming a Champion would. In the Pokemon universe becoming the Champion is the end all be all. It's your life dream, but it's also the life dream of your rival. Both of you know that only one of you can win, and you both should have the drive to destroy each other in order to achieve victory.

@BlatantlyHeroic: Right, and my idea was to have both types of Rivals. You have 1 to compete with and another that is more friendly and helps you out more.

@DefHalan: Why? I've always found the goody two shoes rivals boring. They're just there most of the time and they seem like a waste. They're not truly there to get in your way and be a challenge. Most of them falter off before the Pokemon League, Blue was the only rival to stand in your way as an absolute until the very bitter end. That's just good story telling. Someone isn't a rival unless they're actively rivaling you, your power, and your dreams. May, Barry, and every rival afterwards were pretty much just side characters.

I propose a twist in Sun and Moon. After you defeat the Champion and become the Champion yourself, I think your rival should show up right after you register your Pokemon and challenge you, putting you in Blue's place this time. If you win, you get to keep your title. If you lose, you go home in defeat and have to defeat the Pokemon league a second time.

@BlatantlyHeroic: But some people like those characters. Friendly characters allow for more world building and help you feel more engrossed in the world of Pokemon. Only having a Jerk Rival makes everything a challenge and you aren't interested in the Jerk's story because he is a Jerk. But when the friendly rival appears and tells you about this guy that might be able to help you, you listen. You don't need one or the other, you can have both.

@Calllack: Thank you!

@DefHalan: I'd be up for both a Jerk Rival and a Friend Rival. I like having a Jerk Rival so I can feel smug about beating his/her stupid face. But I like having a Friend Rival to add more meaning dialogue to the journey that "small ya later".

Maybe you're Friendly Rival could be all interesting, thoughtful and introverted (but still friendly), and have more complex (but noble) motives than your Jerk Rival (who just wants to be the strongest in the world). At the end of the game, you could defeat your Jerk Rival, defeat the Elite Four, and then in a remote location, find Friendly Rival who has grown super-powerful pursuing a different path than either of you. They could act as a sort of 'Red Figure' in this respect.

Maybe they'd defeat the first six Gym Leaders, along with you and your Jerk Rival, and then mysteriously disappear.

Even if that doesn't happen, it'd be nice to have another main story person who motive isn't either 'Defeat Elite Four' or 'World Domination'.

Anyway, I'm gonna keep plugging this because I'm very proud of it. I've made a battle theme for the bad guys, so please give it a listen!

I don't mind learning more about jerk rivals if they're written well and are maybe protrayed as a generally good person who's had a rough life and therefore have developed into the jerk you see now.

If you find out little bits of background about the jerk rival throughout the journey that turn them into a dynamic character, they can be every bit as interesting as a friendly rival.

@Detective_TeeJay: I could see that being interesting but difficult to do from the limited perspective Pokemon games normally show. Maybe it could be done through side stuff, maybe through going to the Jerk Rivals house after each encounter, their parents could tell you a small story about the rival that clues you into how being defeated all the time makes them upset and how maybe their older brother/sister or something always made them feel weak. That way they keep the story content light and moving forward while giving players that want more backstory have a place to go for it.

@DefHalan: A very similar type of rival was your rival in Black/White 2. I really liked him. He was a hothead who had the wrong idea about what it was to be a pokemon trainer because his sister's pokemon was stolen or something like that.

Though I guess at the same time he was the exact opposite because he was more of a friend than a jerk. But he was a jerk to other people, not you.

Also, he had a sweet battle theme but that's beside the point

@Detective_TeeJay: Black and White 2 is the only Main series Pokemon games I didn't play. I didn't enjoy Black and White as much as other games. I remember loving it when I first played it but then it slowed down for me a lot. Training was way harder in B/W than any game before. I also got confused and distracted by the heavy story elements.

@DefHalan: Well, I think you should gove Black/White 2 a chance at some point. The rival is dynamic and the heavy-handed story that was in Black/White isn't as present, though I personally enjoyed the story of Black/White.

Also the pokemom selection is WAAY more varied than on Black/White, since there are pokemom from all gens and not just 5th gen.

Not to mention, Black/White 2 has a special building where you can fight EVERY previous gym leader and champion from EVERY region, with updated versions of all their battle themes and sprites. You can even fight Red eventually. It'll be nostalgia overload since you've played every other game.

Honestly I enjoyed Black/White 2 much more than Black/White.

@Detective_TeeJay: I think I am just going to wait for B/W and B/W2 to be remade lol

@DefHalan: Ah, that's a shame. You'll be waiting for a long, long time then

@Detective_TeeJay: I have enough games that I need to play to be ok with skipping BW2 for a while. I am also trying to complete the Pokedex before Sun & Moon release and BW2 won't really help with that lol