With every Pokemon game that releases, new gimmicks are introduced, adding a special flair to that entry in the series. Many commonplace pieces of gameplay like abilities and held items were not available in the first games, “Pokemon Red/Blue.” However, not all of these gimmicks are equally impressive or important, so which one is the most impressive?
Starting in “Pokemon Gold/Silver,” Pokemon are able to be given items to hold and to be used in battle. These held items can do anything from healing the user when they reach low health, to boosting damage of a specific type of attack. Over time there have been hundreds of items added to the Pokemon series, with dozens of unique effects.
Held items are a key component of the Pokemon series nowadays, with casual and
competitive teams alike using them to their full potential. Items like leftovers can increase the amount of time players can keep a Pokemon in battle, and the choice band will increase their damage output significantly, while limiting them to a single attack choice. Overall, items have an enormous impact on battles, and are widely available, greatly impacting the Pokemon series as a whole.
Looking at modern Pokemon games, every Pokemon has an ability to help them in battle. These were missing until generation three, with “Pokemon Ruby/Sapphire” bringing them to the table. Now, in generation three, some of these abilities are useless or identical, but most bring a fun twist to any team, like drought enabling Pokemon with sun-based abilities to thrive, or guts allowing a Pokemon to fight through being burned.
Nowadays, there are dozens of abilities, with several unique ones locked to specific Pokemon, like the primordial sea ability on Primal Kyogre. Abilities are a great boosting factor to a team, allowing something that would otherwise be considered mediocre to shine brightly. While they may not influence most playthroughs much, abilities have grown greatly since Ruby and Sapphire.
Generation four brought the physical-special split (PSS). Previously, every attack did not have a specific physical or special attack assignment; rather, it was determined by the type of the move. So attacks like fire punch, which sound like they should use physical attack, would use special attack instead. This greatly hindered many Pokemon, like Hitmonchan and Gengar. The PSS gave every attack a specific assignment of physical or special, forever impacting gameplay and strategy. Though this was a massive change, it is usually taken for granted.
With all of these technical changes, there are also game-specific gimmicks, such as mega evolution. Mega evolution allows certain Pokemon to mega evolve, which grants large stat boosts, new abilities, and potentially new type combinations as well. These mega evolutions can completely change the way that battles need to be played, prioritizing the elimination of the suddenly-appearing threat.
Some mega Pokemon synergize very well with teams that needed a bit of a power boost to make it, like Mega Charizard using solar power-boosted attacks to KO Pokemon that just barely survived it before mega evolving. Even though mega evolution is locked to the generation six games, they can play a massive role in those games.
The most recent gimmick in the Pokemon series is Terastilization. Terastilization is when a Pokemon changes their type, to gain new weaknesses and resistances, or to gain a power-up on another move of that type (Same Type Attack Bonus, or STAB). Terastilizing is quite versatile, and can completely swing a battle around, as such, it is limited to one use per battle.
While the creativity of this feature is arguable, the results are sound. Many Pokemon that would otherwise be very
unstable due to a super strong weakness, like Scizor, are now able to switch to water type, for example, to resist the incoming fire type move that would have KO-d it otherwise. Overall, Terastilization is an interesting gimmick that likely will not come back, but will not be forgotten for a while.
While not every gimmick or change is made equal, they all impact their games in their own way. Be it Gigantimax or friendship, it plays a role in the series as a whole.
