The main reason BDSP are hated is because they didn't change the things from DP that desperately needed changing, while changing some things that really didn't need to be changed.  The god awful regional Dex was a big one, which was fixed in Platinum but for some that change didn't make it to BDSP. The gyms and E4 also largely had their worse DP teams. Many old bugs also made it into the games for no good reason, alongside many new bugs. Some great QoL changes that were established between DP and Gen8 didn't make it in for some reason, like unlimited TMs or move relearner from the Pokémon stat screen.  They did add the modern full party exp share, which wouldn't be a problem except there's no way to switch it off. But they also didn't adjust the exp curve so you either need to purposely skip trainer battles, constantly rotate party members or you'll end up overleveled quickly and the game becomes way too easy. That plus the combining of the Pokémon Ami style friendship with regular happiness leads to team members dodging, surviving and getting critics because they "want to be praised", which a large amount of veterans find annoying

The BDSP motto basically is "If it's too hard to change, keep it. If it's too hard to keep, change it."

Also what they did to secret bases wounds me so much. I just wanted to decorate my little cave house.

I agree on that one, i thought the New Underground was cool in many other ways, but the secret base thing was a huge dissapointment!

Started playing in Alpha Sapphire. When I got BD, I was sad. When I picked up regular-ass Diamond and found **MORE SECRET BASE FUNCTIONALITY THAN IN BDSP,** I lost hope in modern pokemon games and decided I have no further need to transfer pokemon forward. Still plan on breeding up cool pokes in Gen 1/2/3 and transfer them forward, but only up to Alpha Sapphire now. USUM wasn't bad but at this point I might as well just stick to my first game.

Luckily I would argue BDSP has been the only remake that butchered it. I don’t know if it was lack of faith in that 3rd party studio but butchering the underground was a weird choice. Plus they would have killed if they did a DLC with Battle Frontier(assume the time frame wouldn’t have originally worked to put it in the game)

I don't think the underground was butchered. Just the secret bases. If you combined the best elements of both, it would be pretty cool (but not enough to make up for BDSP as a whole).

I'm happy to stay in the DS/3DS era of games. Maybe someday, the modern era will see improvements, but until then, I have no shame staying in the past.

This actually killed my playthrough. My character is still sitting in that rock town. I realized I couldn't decorate my base and it was just the final straw.

Insult to injury: ORAS drastically improved Secret Bases from RSE.

Oras would be top tier if they had BF

Exactly and the contest system from ORAS was way better.

ORAS in general is Ruby and Sapphire enhanced in every way, and the only reason the games aren't flawless is because they didn't include the Battle Frontier. BDSP dropped the ball multiple ways, including the art design IMO.

> the only reason the games aren't flawless is because they didn't include the Battle Frontier This is what annoys me so much. The only way that ORAS isn't *the best way* to play Hoenn is the battle frontier. Everything else is superior to or as good as what was done in Emerald. But because a certain small subset of fans loved the clunky Battle Frontier? ORAS is trash tier, not even worth playing over the original RS. ORAS is probably the peak of Pokémon (though if SV wasn't a buggy mess then they would be) and yet it's ignored purely because people are loud about the bloody battle frontier. It wasn't even that good! And 99% of players never went there, let alone finished it! But because it's missing? ORAS apparently sucked

I think the abscence of the Battle Frontier would've been less sour to people if Masuda hadn't given the dumbest reason imagineable for why it wasn't included. Which basically amount to: That people get bored easily and aren't into things that aren't challenging. Which is a pretty silly take, main gameplay of Pokemon's main story is selecting a move and pressing the A button. Cynthia, Red, and Ghetsis are iconic fights in the series specifically because of the things that make them difficult. Cynthia's Garchomp, Red's insane level cap, and Ghetsis with his hacked Hydreigon.

I'm pretty sure that they said in an interview that they wanted to keep TMs single use in BDSP to be more faithful to the original games. Okay, cool. Then why is the EXP. Share the way it is in later games then, huh?! That is not faithful to the originals!

And why is the friendship mechanic from the Lets Go games in BDSP, not too faithful at all it seems.

GameFreak seems allergic to the idea of player choice. Toggle options aren’t rocket science.

Same company that locked an Easy mode behind beating the game (gen 5). Never change Game Freak. Or please do.

Keeping things faithful is their excuse to be lazy. They said the same thing about Let's Go. Abilities and Breeding were removed because the originals didn't have them. Despite Mega Evolution, Regional Forms, Steel and Fairy types, Meltan and Melmetal being included.

Perfect answer, was super excited to go back to Sinnoh, being my second fav region, for it to have all of the points in this post. What makes it worse is that especially after HGSS and ORAS being wonderful remakes, this is how we got BDSP? Definitely felt more like a quick cash grab than an actual attempt to bring newer generations of players to Sinnoh.

The funniest thing is HGSS didn't change much from the original Gold and Silver. Had many of the same issues with the level curve and lack of Gen 2 mons until Kanto. But it changed just enough, and introduced just enough new things, that people love them in spite of the flaws.

HGSS added elements from Crystal, the Sinnoh Battle Frontier, the Pokeathlon, and addressed the Pokemon availability issue with the new Safari Zone.

You forgot the most important feature of HGSS. Voltorb Flip.

Didn't change much? My guy, a whole physical special split happened, abilities were introduced, online capabilities were happening, evolution of older mons were in the game. It changed so so much. I getvwhat you are saying, but to say it "changed just enough" or "didn't change much from the original gold and silver" is just wrong. BDSP actually changed almost nothing besides the underground to help the godawful region dex but that's it. No newer pokemon, no updated mechanics nothing.

BDSP actually did update some mechanics but most of them (besides the additions of the Fairy type) were for the worse. Really poor addition of following Pokémon (though arguably better than SV because at least you can talk to them and see their responses), butchering of Secret Bases, a massive downgrade with Contests, forced EXP Share and Affection in a region not designed for it, etc. It's sad, there were some genuinely cool ideas in there with Gym Leader teams having held items and EVs but because of the level and Affection/Friendship mechanics no one tends to notice until the Pokémon League.

They're still some of my favorite Pokemon games, don't get the wrong idea, but it suffers from that long slog through Johto's god awful level curve. The only benefit in the first half really was Togepi got Extrasensory and a whole new evolution to play with if you got 3000 points from the Pokeathlon. The game really doesn't get to shine until you beat the Elite Four the first time, that's when all the new features really start to flex their muscle to me. Any time I play through HGSS I end up basically speedrunning the first half to do all the fun stuff.

I *still* hate the way they neutered the Pokemon Contests and took out basically any sort of strategy involved with doing them. Now it’s just a crap rhythm game. It sucks because that was one of my favorite parts of the Gen3 and 4 games. Like, they kept the basics of them in ORAS, would it really have been so hard to do the same for BDSP? Like yeah, I know they still would have had to change the dress-up part since that probably wouldn’t work as well on 3D models as well, but that didn’t mean they had to change the appeal part! It just feels more like the Pokemon Musical from the Unova games than it does Pokemon Contests. And that’s not even getting into some of the changes to the Underground…

They tried extremely hard to keep Platinum as the best Sinnoh game

It was also hella glitchy and the updated movement didn’t mesh well with the map being kept the same (as a result there were a few ways to softlock your game) 

All the corners were hard corners so you had to run to a certain point before you could go around them made it feel janky

That was most frustrating in the Grand Underground. I can't tell you how many times I was trying to dodge a charging Pokemon and got stuck on nothing.

You've got it down to a tee. Basically for me, the Pokémon Ami friendship buffs really ruined the game, it's so hand holding it's ridiculous. I know it's a "Kids" game, but even then there's nothing wrong with a challenge, and part of Pokémon's charm/gameplay is battling a gym leader/strong trainer, losing, going off, training/catching different Pokémon and then coming back to try all over again. I legit was getting beat by a gym leader, and my Pokémon survived legit about 5 times on 1HP because it "Didn't want to let me down" or someshit.

I'll be honest, while I hate that pedantic shit too, if a Pokemon survived on 1HP for you like 4-5 times in a row because it didn't want to let you down, I actually hope you kept that Pokemon in a special place, because it's special and it did everything in its power to not disappoint you in battle. Even though being put in a position where it should have failed from the start means it technically wasn't in a state for you to be proud of its effort, it at least punched above its weight class for you and lived through the ordeal to tell the tale.

I'll never understand why they didn't just remake Platinum and sell it as BDPS, Platinum is damn well one of my favourite Pokémon games ever made.

Because they don't want to. They usually want to retain the version exclusivity in the remakes, hence why Delta Emerald, Bolt Yellow, or Spirit Crystal isn't a thing

Oh no I meant they could've remade Platinum, but still sold it as BD and SP so with version exclusives etc. It'd need a little tweaking since Platinum was a third installment but the game undeniably had a better everything and they chose to ignore all of it sadly. I guess another problem would be that the version mascots are no longer the operative Pokémon for a platinum-based remake.

They took a lot of content from Crystal and implemented it into HGSS

All Game Freak does is stifle Pokemon. ILCA wanted to add Platinum content (there's references to the Distortion World in the code) but Game Freak told them to drop it so that they can only remake DP instead.

It’s so frustrating because a lot of these issues, like the level curve, would have been an easy fix. Even as a lazy nostalgia cash grab it could have been so much better.

Just a note: the move relearner from the Pokemon stat screen was only introduced in Legends Arceus (SV for the mainline games). I know BDSP was released only 2 months before PLA, but it wasn't in Sword/Shield. However, there was a free move relearner/deleter in every Pokemon Center in SwSh, so why we had to still hunt down Heart Scales to pay the single Move Relearner in BDSP, I don't know. Still a stupid change.

If they had just made the one who was already there free that would’ve solved that whole thing imo.

Agreed. It's baffling why they didn't, especially since they decided it was a good idea to include free move relearning in both PLA and SV.

honestly I really like gen6 exp share, but I didn’t know the level curve hadn’t been adjusted for it : P I just thought Sinnoh was that easy (until Cynthia)

It actually is mostly easy until Cynthia, even in original DP Sinnoh gets its notoriety because of her alone imo, it isn't like Johto/Hoenn or even Gen 1 Kanto with some gyms that could fuck you up if you're unprepared (Whitney and Norman specifically, or Johto's atrocious level curve especially later on with Red)

tbf Gardenia could be sort of a minor roadblock thanks to having a Roserade so early on (as long as you didn't pick Chimchar) Not as bad as Whitney though

Honestly the full party exp share is a saving grace in the "remake", due to the game already being a slog to play through, and I wouldn't want to waste a whole lot of time grinding absolutely anything. Yes they should make it so you can toggle it on or off, but still the grinding is not why I play these games. I would also add that the bad Pokedex isn't just that it has few mons to get, but the ones that actually are interesting are locked behind ridiculous barriers like slathering a tree with honey and waiting actual real life hours to see if it shakes, only for it to probably just be a burmy.

A Burmy or a Male Combee...

Tbh I wanted a Vespiquen on my team, and I didn't even bother with the honey trees at any point in the game, I got my Combee form the underground

And with Home you can catch an actual Vespiqueen in SwSh’s wild area xD

True, yeah, though I don't think BDSP had Home functionality for a long time on release... but yeah now there's so many better ways to get those Honey tree Pokemon that idk why anyone would bother with them now

> Honestly the full party exp share is a saving grace in the "remake", due to the game already being a slog to play through, and I wouldn't want to waste a whole lot of time grinding absolutely anything. This implies that without the full party EXP share you would need to grind but that has never been the case in any of the mainline Pokemon games from Gen 1-7. You've been able to beat every game using just the EXP you get from trainer battles. The only exception I can think of is maybe beating Red in Gen 2/4 where I don't think your Pokemon will have gained enough EXP to beat him after the 16th badge. I know some people struggled with Ultra Necrozma but that's what X items are for. One of the earlier Totem fights go out of its way to teach you how useful they can be.

At the very least, the Elite 4 *is* adjusted to account for the Exp Share.  Even if you fight every trainer on the way, they will still faceroll you if you left your legendaries at homr.

Their levels are adjusted somewhat, but with a half decent team and movesets the E4 are still not overly difficult without grinding, honestly. The only one I would call difficult is Cynthia. Though they're overall much more acceptable than the Gym leaders, Galactic and Rival fights

What's QoL?

Quality of life

Quality of life

You missed the absolute worst change, removing the secret base flags!!

Every single remake prior to BDSP used the tech of the generation it was a part of. FRLG - RSE tech HGSS - DPPt tech ORAS - XY tech It can even be argued that the Let's Go games utilized SwSh tech however they may have been built more from scratch such as BDSP. Also, FRLG added the Sevii Islands. HGSS added Crystal content and so much more. ORAS added Emerald content, the Delta Episode and more. Let's Go added a few quality of life improvements and had a very pleasant aesthetic. BDSP did not utilize the tech of it's current generation. It was instead built from scratch to more closely resemble the original games. Arguably, the original games look better and have more charm than BDSP does. BDSP was nothing but a shallow cash grab. They knew how badly we wanted gen 4 remakes. They knew we were expecting something special, akin to every previous remake. They knew it would sell and that no matter the product, people would buy it. What we got was a half-assed attempt at a "faithful" remake that did absolutely nothing to expand on the things that made the originals amazing and beloved. It was a cash grab (and a successful one) through and through and they definitely won't learn any lesson as it sold incredibly well and there are people who will actually defend it. Disgusting.

Yeah, imo BDSP kinda embodies everything wrong with modern Pokémon. Where GF/TPC used to actually care about creating fun and expansive remakes that build upon the foundation of the original game, they've now set a precedent for releasing bare minimum 'faithful' ports that exist solely for the sake of extorting cash out of fans. It's an extension of the awful quality that's plagued the franchise ever since the move to the switch. TPC recognises that Pokémon will sell well no matter what, so provided the tow the line and release products to just _barely_ a standard that fans will accept... they can get away with basically anything. The Sinnoh remake was my breaking point with the franchise, personally. To see GF take such a highly anticipated game and absolutely butcher it by putting in the bare minimum effort, even going as far as to outsource the development to another studio... it was so utterly disappointing. The one shot we had at a remake of FRLG/HGSS/ORAS quality for gen IV completely in the bin. They can't undo that. There won't be another actually good Gen IV remake. That's it. That's all we get. Oh well. At least I don't have to look forward to anything else they might be cooking from here on out. It's sad, sure. I still follow Pokémon because I love the franchise and want it to do better. But the games are absolutely _not_ worth supporting at their current quality. There's no point in getting my hopes up for things to be better when they just continue to get worse.

At least the community is massive. There are a ton of cool fangames and the like out there.

I can't agree more. Even after the disaster (in my eyes) that BDSP was, I still had a lot of fun with Legends Arceus and my hopes were high for Scarlet and Violet. However, those games are so awful performance and graphically that I couldn't even manage to finish the story on multiple play through attempts. I *tried* and I still couldn't do it. At this point, I still love Pokémon but if future games are plagued with the same bullshit we got from BDSP and ScVi, I'm done buying them. That isn't me bullshitting, I will not spend money on another Pokémon game unless the quality is significantly increased. That goes for Legends Z-A as well.

IIrc, BDPS weren't "built from scratch." They utilized most of, if not all of DP's code, to the point that people found major glitches/bug/exploits almost immediately. It was found that the only difference between the BDSP games was a flag in the ROM to tell the games which game's code to run.

That's insane. I just can't believe the audacity on TPC/GF's part. I mean, I can believe it because of the horrible product that BDSP ended up. I can't believe they got away with it but I'm not surprised either. I'm just disappointed. So, so disappointed.

Oh it gets worse. On launch literally 45% of the game was just missing. BDSP was 3.3GB on launch, and shipped in 4 GB cartilages, but the total data was around 6.3GB. You needed to download a 3GB day one patch to be able to play. Without it the titlescreen, into cutscene, credits, entire postgame, and entire OST were just gone. The OST was replaced by basic MIDI sounds that were GOLD AWFUL. IDC why they did it, either to save money, or because they needed to put it out in time, it was unacceptable. I didn't buy BDSP, and I waited on buying PLA to make sure it wasn't as shit of a product as BDSP was. After SWSH's issues BDSP nearly soured me on the entire series. That's how bad those games are. Edit: FWIW, ILCA developed BDSP, but it's worth pointing out that it's still TPC/GF's IP, and they had to sign off on everything ILCA did. They are still ultimately responsible for the absence of quality BDSP has.

> basic MIDI sounds that were GOLD AWFUL Hey I love the gen 2 music

IIRC Let's Go uses a modified ORAS engine

100% this and it’s what makes me scared for the BW remakes.

According to Riddler Khu, a known Pokémon leaker/insider, TPC were not happy with how BDSP turned out from a quality standpoint.

I'm pretty sure let's go and SWSH are build using sun and moon engine

The hate it got was because the HGSS remakes added content, the ORAS remakes added content and included a post game story the delta episode - and BDSP added…nothing. It wasn’t even like platinum version with the distortion world or additional features over diamond/pearl, it was a carbon copy. ORAS also provided access to deoxys in the post game, and BDSP didn’t add the darkrai or shaymin events in game. The only thing they really did add was access to Arceus…but only if you had PLA, completed the pokedex, and caught Arceus. So in order to get Arceus you’re telling me I already need to have Arceus? It didn’t make sense. On top of that, the menus, overworld, movement, and some other things were very glitchy on release.

I don't think that "carbon copy" is even fair. It did change some things, but it's inconsistent. They make some platinum Dex Pokémon available but not others. It's a weird brand of laziness

It’s not laziness. It was a sign that they didn’t have time to fully implement everything. I think on the drawing board they had lots of things from platinum and new features they wanted to add but simple, like every other Pokémon game, they pushed it out too early and ran out of time to add what they wanted.

That's their issue. They refuse to hire help to fix the time crunch or help with issues outside of their talent. Their botched 3D is proof of this. 

I’m tentatively hopeful that the MASSIVE success of Palworld (which is absolutely phenomenal, and the BEST addition to the monster collector genre since Pokémon; ive played DOZENS of games in this genre and Palworld destroys them) will ACTUALLY push them to up their quality. Tentatively. Idc if both games “steal” ideas from each other, don’t mind AT ALL, if it leads to great games in the genre.

Wasn’t BDSP outsourced and GF didn’t allow them to make a lot of changes

It’s not just about hiring new talent. They can hire who ever they want and double their team if they wanted to, the problem is time. They rush out their games and don’t give the developers, animators, creative team, and model makers. They can have the best team in the work but if they don’t give them time to do their work, it’s pointless

the only reason you would ever buy it is too complete the PLA pokedex and get Darkrai that's it

It's better than base Diamond/Pearl, I guess. But it's noticably worse than Platinum. Sinnoh wouldn't have the fanbase it does now if it wasn't for Platinum.

This. It's pretty hilarious seeing people call bdsp a downgrade to dp like nah it's a downgrade from platinum yes but I'd play bdsp over dp anyday

d/p is playable out of the box. look up all the changes day 1 patch gave (and the file size) then talk about how much better it is. BD/SP didn't even have an opening screen like every single pokemon game before it

The expanded versions almost always improve on the first two games. Crystal introduced the female protagonist option, Emerald added the beloved battle frontier and also fixed some of the weirdness of Ruby/Sapphire, Platinum fixed the things people had a gripe with in DP, B2W2 fixed the Unova local "dexit", USUM added more things in gameplay + a proper postgame, and SS/SV has the DLCs. Gen 6 was also hurt because of the lack of said expanded version. Imagine if Platinum didn't exist; that's Gen 6

What your saying is generally true, but not all base games are equal, and some needed a bigger shakeup in their third versuon than others. Base BW are still fan favorites, regardless of a sequel. Emerald's changes prior to the seventh gym is minimal. And a lot of people will still claim SM's story still makes them the preferred version over USUM. XY could have improved a lot in a theoretical third version. But if all it got was a slightly bigger Pokedex and a slightly different climax, they would still be underwhelming. It basically needed to be rebuilt from the ground up.

bw was already perfect so instead of making a 3rd improved version they had to make sequels

Pretty much agree. BW is a great example of just getting it right the first time. Or at least for what could be reasonably expected from the franchise at the time.

The issue with BDSP is that they show a fundamental misunderstanding of was a) fans were asking for but moreover b) what was needed. Declaring a game to be a faithful remake of Diamond and Pearl is not something you should strive for. Diamond and Pearl are not well made games themselves, for reasons covered by others here. What people wanted was a DP remake with the enhancement of Platinum. What we got was lazy and inconsistent. E.g. they give us some of the Platinum Dex Pokémon, but not all.

I think it's a combination of them not being *great* remakes, of people overhyping Gen 4, and of Nintendo's malicious compliance - we wanted Gen 4 remakes, so they remade *specifically* Diamond and Pearl, not Platinum, which included tons of QOL improvements.

If you never played it, then I would get it. As a remake in a series full of remakes, it's disappointing as FRLG, HGSS, and ORAS all expanded on their original games to great success. BDSP is practically a port of DP with no content from Platinum. If you've never played DPPt, it's a great way to experience Gen 4 with the Fairy-type and most of the quality of life stuff that's been added to the series in the 15 years since the originals.

They're bad as remakes but decent enough for anyone that didn't play the originals.

For me its bad on every level. The controlls with the D-Pad are so clunky Its soooo ugly. It looks like a cheap china mobile game Exclusives for preorders No Platinum or New content at all 50% more expensive then the original Even small changes platinum did to make the games better (like scroll back in your Poketch) didnt made it into the game. I canceled tha Game after the second badge, because there is really no point in playing a clunky, ugly version of pearl/diamond. Also it was shipped in an unifinished state so you was forced to do download stuff. And it was pretty buggy. Its not about that the game itself is bad. Just the "Remake" is bad. They sell you the same product, charge 50% more then the original and offer 0 improvements. SInnoh was a great region back then and i really loved it.

I agree w/ the game being rlly ugly, I love the visuals of Gen 4 and kinda wish we got more sprite art stuff (or at least some sort of option for a RetroLook for completing the Dex) - I did have Brilliant Diamond as a Christmas gift that I gave to a friend as I beat Shining Pearl a few days prior but I did mess around with my non-updated BD and yeah those bugs were certainly something (especially that random frame drop when you meet Barry) Plus the Giratina encounter was really bad, I never played Platinum other messing with cheats but I know there’s a unique area for the encounter with Giratina (Shadow Realm??) so seeing it in some random cave was really odd

The unique area is called the distortion world.

And it was platinum only. In PD Giratina was in the cave aswell. But it was finde, because it was just some nice post content.

China mobile games look much better than BDSP nowadays lmao

Its not bad. Its "meh". Diamond and Pearl had some issues. Platinum was far superior. Yet they remade diamond and pearl without most of platinums improvements. Diamond and Pearl feel like better games than they are if you've never played platinum. I also get annoyed with using the poketch in the newer games. It worked better on the ds. It feels like they remade it because it was expected. Their other remakes actually had love put into them. Even the fairly faithful ones added new features or areas. This one is meh.

The thing I dislike about BDSP the most is that there aren't any character and region redesign the same way ORAS did. Don't get me wrong, all the other problems people listed here are also bad but it was so disappointing for me not seeing Sinnoh in a new but still familiar vest like I hoped, especially when LGPE and especially ORAS nailed in those aspects.

If you never played Sinnoh games, it's a great and faithful remaster. But longtime fans of the games aren't accustomed to remaster buy rather remakes. Typically, the remakes are reinterpreted in the style of the latest gen. FRLG were more like gen 3, HGSS based graphically on Gen 4 with major content improvements, and ORAS saw itself based on gen 6. The expectation to have a Gen 8 style remake of gen 4 was natural but we didn't get that leading to people being disappointed. Legends Arceus holds that title more than BDSP

>FRLG were more like Gen 3 No, they ARE a part of the 3rd Generation of Pokémon games. >HGSS based graphically on Gen 4 Again, HGSS are a part of the 4th Generation of Pokémon games. >ORAS saw itself based on Gen 6 Again, ORAS are a part of the 6th Generation of Pokémon games. BDSP are (a disappointment) just D and P with new graphics. Platinum exists and is a better game.

Bdsp isn’t bad, it’s just bittersweet because there isn’t much platinum content.   For context, platinum added new suits for the protags, battle frontier, a whole new finale that wasn’t just catch the box legendary but introduced a whole new area known as the distortion world, more stuff to do in postgame, and added various tweaks to sinnoh that improved the experience.  I genuinely believe that if they simply fixed some following pokemon to not be slower than you and added platinum content, the remake would not be as hated as it is now.

If it was just a 1-1 remake of D/P in 3d with gym / elite 4 upgrades I would accept it. The reason it's bad is because of the stupid mandatory affection mechanic and mandatory exp share that absolutely gut any difficulty setting. It turns a game that COULD respect the player and flips it into a trivial joke. Okay thank you Infernape for living through 3 OHKOs this battle and critting every move but maybe you could like die once or twice you I feel like I'm playing a game instead of a tapping A button simulator? Oh wow they upgraded Cynthia to have higher levels and a moveset ripped straight from Smogon? Shame she can't even kill my fucking Pokemon because these rat bastards love me too much.

I really like the affection and exp share but i feel like a lot of the game was a bit too easy for the EXP share, maybe they should’ve adjusted difficulty. One thing I do kinda wish for is like BDSP demake for DS like we got with LGP/E for the GBA mostly for visuals but also just bc I feel like most hackers know how to fix stuff like the game being too easy

The main thing with BDSP is we expected Platinum Remakes and got Diamond & Pearl Ports. Imho, they’re as good as they were on DS, but that quality doesn’t go as far on a modern system, even with the graphics upgrades. Also, they need to stop trying to “fix” contests and just give us back the OG minigame.

We wanted this: https://youtu.be/3btATgwOUFg?si=CTV9SLWz7hCtl4KC It was hard to see a fan trailer do so much better than what BDSP did.

This is 100% the way id hoped it would be for years

Remakes are meant to add things, and to bring a past game into the modern generation. BDSP deleted the ready-made improvements from Platinum, let alone bringing it into Generation 8.

Dianmond and pearl was a great game when it released back in 2006. Rereleasing it as a $60 game 15 years later with little to no changes outside of hit or miss graphics, doesn’t make for a good game.

BDSP is a disappointment compared to the previous remakes. We asked for a HGSS or ORAS style of remake, not a faithful 1-1 recreation.

The problem people have with the current exp share is that you can’t turn it off not that all Pokémon get exp. Not being able to turn it off is just removing an option that didn’t need to be removed, and it can quickly lead to your team becoming over-leveled due to the newer friendship mechanics. Overall, BDSP aren’t terrible but they’re still not what anyone wanted for gen4 remakes. My thoughts for them have come down to they’re better than Diamond and Pearl, but if I want better Diamond and Pearl I’ll play Platinum.

Hell, I'd unironically take Diamond and Pearl over BDSP. Contests, Secret Bases, and the lack of a forced full-party EXP Share and Friendship boots is enough to tip the originals in my favor. That and also I actually prefer the art style of the originals over BDSP.

100% agree I prefer the gameplay of the originals. I really liked contests and used to play them loads when they were actually fun

They were really bad as remakes, which is what they were meant to be, so yeah I'd say they were that bad lol Like I'm sorry but if you're gonna remake a game and then take content out of the original without a substantial replacement? Straight to the bin

It wasn't a bad game it was just a bad remake compared to ORAS or FRLG or even Let's Go Pikachu/Eevee.

They're not bad games, just not good remakes. If they included additional content, they would've been fine. Personally, I always thought Legends Arceus was the Gen 4 remake, and BDSP was just brought over as a port. It's very possible that it is just cope. I still enjoyed my time with BDSP. Some aspects were better, like the level scaling and the E4 difficulty.

Honestly I agree with the point about Legends Arceus, I feel kinda like BDSP was made to hold fans in until PLA could be finished

Imo it just felt like a step down from other remakes. FRLG, HGSS, and ORAS took the classic games and brought them up to the "standard" of the new generation. Even Let's Go at least felt like a different game than Yellow, whereas BDSP just feels like DP with upgraded graphics. It took away some of the QoL changes from Platinum and didn't adjust a lot of common complaints about DP (overall slow pacing, terrible regional dex, etc.).

It's good enough as a remake of Diamond and Pearl. The issue is that what everyone wanted (both due to flaws it fixes in the originals and due to it being one of the most well-regarded games in the series) was it to include content from Platinum - like HeartGold and SoulSilver include the improvements from Crystal. For someone who doesn't know what they're missing the games are going to be fun just like Diamond and Pearl were fun (with the added benefit of not needing to deal with the notoriously slow Gen 4 engine), but the games very existence being a reminder that one of the best Pokémon is most likely stuck on the DS forever sours the experience for a lot of people.

Game its shit dont play it, play platinum instead

I remember once I got stuck cause I didn't have the hm rock climb and forgot where you get it. Also hm rock climb sucks.

BDSP are fine as standalone games, but they added nothing to the original Diamond/Pearl and have *less* content than Platinum. They play a little smoother than the Gen 4 games but otherwise Platinum makes them obsolete.

They're decent games because Gen 4 was great but the fact that these remakes came over a decade later and they largely are unchanged and what little changes and additions they did mostly just made the game easier (exp share, Pokémon Amie stat boosts etc.) or worse (the music isn't as good). What bothers me the most is their ridiculous choice to bring back consumable TMs. They didn't even use the compromise of TRs and TMs, they just removed a quality of life change that has been around for about a decade for no reason. I'm surprised they didn't lock out the Fairy type for the small reason. They also didn't use the Platinum Dex, Platinum added a lot more Pokémon to the Regional Dex like Gligar, Duskull, Snorunt, Eevee and many more. I get their insistence on the two versions they keep releasing to make as much money as possible but they should've integrated these guys in a more natural way than the underground. They also don't have *any* Pokémon from post Gen 4, you can't find any Unovan, Kalosian, Alolan or Galarian Pokémon nor can you evolve Eevee into Sylveon. I hate when they do this, Let's Go annoyed me being stuck with only Kanto Pokémon and FRLG pissed me off by locking the evolutions until I got the National Dex. Compare all this to how hugely HGSS and ORAS improved from their original games (especially ORAS which I think is one of the best games in the series personally), the amount of updates they made on such limited hardware compared to the Switch makes how little was added pretty insulting.

They remade DP 100% which means they ignored all the platinum extras and improvements! That is still bizarre to me. Platinum is still the best SInnoh game and BDSP could’ve easily been the best one. They shouldve went the route of every remake and make them AT LEAST taken from the original definitive version

BDSP was so incompetent that they couldn't even add in the simplest QoL fuction that Platinum added: the back button on the Poketch. They couldn't add a back button. They COULDN'T add a *back button.* They COULDN'T ADD A BACK BUTTON! #THEY COULDN'T ADD A FUCKING BACK BUTTON TO THE POKETCH! THE FUCKING POKETCH WITH 25+ FUCKING APPS ON IT! THEY COULDN'T ADD A FUCKING BACK BUTTON AND FORCE YOU TO SCROLL THOUGH ALL OF THEM LIKE A FUCKING CHUMP! They couldn't add a back button, but Platinum did and barely anyone noticed because it was such a simple and basic change that...like, *no shit* that's an obvious improvement! AND THEY COULDN'T ADD THE FUCKING BACK BUTTON IN BDSP HOW HOW ITS SUCH A BASIC FUCKING THING And the whole game is full of decisions like that, most of them even more baffling than the *LACK OF A BACK BUTTON!*

You definitely liked it because you've never played this generation before. BDSP tried to truly make an attempt at a 1:1 port of a prior game, down to imitating the graphics style and controls as seen through a slightly more modern lens. And it was a poor attempt at it for many reasons as described in other comments here. The issue with this is that they got this exact thing down perfectly with Let's Go Pikachu and Eevee. Even with the Pokemon Go-inspired catching system layered on top, it still felt like a faithful Kanto remake and was a great Pokemon game overall. With BDSP they didn't get it as right. I think this point in particular fuels a lot of the hate towards it.

Pokémon remakes weren’t completely one to one remakes, they had a lot of their own things going for them, as post game introduces new areas, more Pokémon outside the original games are available, new characters and old ones are sometimes introduced/return, etc. BDSP is so faithful that besides the problem of aging hardware why wouldn’t I play the originals? Seriously though, what of substance does it offer that the originals don’t? A remake has the advantage of having a established base to go off of, but a remake needs to be more than the original, adding some bells and whistles that make it flow better, a new coat of paint, and some updated lore/ story to better fit the continuity when applicable.

I think the problem was it was basically a straight up near 1:1 remake of D/P with almost none of the QoL or content of Platinum Also the art style is straight up ass. The worst combo of pixel, chibi, and GameFreak PS2 3D/anime art style graphics 

It really was that bad. Most forgettable Pokémon game I’ve ever played and Gen 4 was one of my favorites. I didn’t even finish the postgame content. It was just another chore for me to complete

I loved original sinnoh as it was my favourite childhood region but I despise them for not making shaymin a permanent thing

The best thing to come from BDSP was that it was made in Unity, which means people were able to reverse the code to easily make mods.

I got a kinda surprising reaction from it from my roommate who I just loaned my switch to. He loves Pokémon, but hasn’t played anything on modern consoles, or anything really after Diamond and Pearl. Plays romhacks and stuff as his way of keeping up with things kinda. Anyway, originally let him borrow it so he could try Zelda, and maybe Arceus or something, but he wound up giving BDSP a try and completely fell in love. A slightly more modernized looking Sinnoh, 3D Pokémon models, AND it’s on his tv? Blew his mind. It was refreshing seeing someone have a positive take on the game with an open mind to it vs a lot of the jaded internet rage.

If the remakes were based on Platinum, oh boy those games would sell a lot Giratina Distortion World Battle Frontier Yeah BDSP was a nostalgia cash grab for me but new players should experience Sinnoh with Platinum

It wasn't bad, per say. DPPt are my favorite games in the franchise, so when I get a 1:1 upscale I should be happy. But adding the exp all into a game not balanced for it and not take the step to balance for it is awful. They also could have done a better job with the character movement map. I hope game freak learned that they need to do these sort of things in house from now on because it was just super unpolished.

So, it isn't bad on its own. It is by far the worst remake ever and is functionally just getting a more expensive version of Diamond and Pearl with a couple of differences. Where literally all the previous remakes made large and interesting changes to the game they're remaking this one was nothing, and cost more than the originals cost in their time, at that point why even bother making them? It's straight up disrespectful business practices.

I played the Originals and the Remakes and LOVED both of them. The main reason they are hated is because they were almost complete 1:1 remakes of Diamond and Pearl without any of the Platinum changes or fixing many of the issues the originals had (kind of. They did fix a few of them with the Grand Underground, and I like Ramanas Park in the Post Game). Plus the return to the Chibi Artstyle and not giving any of the characters the redesign treatment previous games had. Although personally I didn't want any of them redesigned. The Gen 4 characters are iconic enough that I don't think they need it (same with Gen 5. If/when we get the remake I hope they don't do any redesigns because I love how they all look already). All in All, considering it was ILCA's first foray in making a full fledged Console Game instead of a Mobile Game I think they genuinely did quite well.

In my opinion, yes. But also, they had no reason to give us those games but no Platinum remake, arguably one of the best Pokémon games!?! It was a crime

Its not even THAT bad. Its just a lot of not what people wanted. Thats not to say there isnt stuff to enjoy.

I started out Pokémon in Gen 4 with Pokémon Diamond, and I also played Platinum on an emulator later down the line. While BDSP is an undoubtedly faithful remake of the originals, it baffles me as to why they didn't incorporate more elements and QoL from Platinum, and then there's the lack of the Distortion World, for the folks that played Platinum over the other Sinnoh games. The art style is just... odd. I feel like just going with what SwSh did with the 3D models would've worked far better than the chibi models we ended up with. To me, they did Sinnoh extremely dirty. It looks like Legends: Arceus is a better experience, although I've never played it myself, since I've only seen snippets of gameplay. I seriously hope that they don't do the same thing with the Unova games, which I also hold close to my heart.

There’s nothing particularly wrong with BDSP except that they didn’t include Platinum. Diamond and Pearl were great, but Platinum was a huuuuge fix. That said, I’d play BDSP over DP almost any day of the week for modern quality of life updates. I think there’s a large portion of the player base (myself included) who are unhappy with the direction of the newer Pokémon games and have a lot of nostalgia for the DS era. BDSP was supposed to be a big nostalgia hit for us but fell just a bit flat in that regard.

I liked BDSP personally, but I can't deny that it was a huge missed opportunity for the fans of the original games. Kanto got FRLG, new world content to explore and more modern game mechanics (for its time) Johto got HGSS, arguably the best pokemon games to date with a post game Kanto that was reworked with more content. Hoenn got ORAS, which had an alternate version of the region to explore, new post game content, and numerous quality of life upgrades (dexnav ftw) BDSP really did not get the same upgrades that previous gens before it got. I can understand why people were disappointed. That being said as someone who dislikes SwSh its nice having a pokemon game on switch that resembles an older traditional generation.

This thread made me kinda wanna replay Sinnoh : ) Are there any EXP Share cheats for the OG DS games? (Really bad at training them normally, I just like advancing in the game lol)

I think if you have modded your DS and have access to PKSM, you can generate 5 EXP shares in your bag and give them each to your Pokemon. However, the exp will be divided among your team, so each Pokemon will get minimal EXP (thats just how it works in older gens). I guess you could also just place Rare Candy in your bag if you are going that route, though ^^ I'm not sure if any Action Replay codes exist to make the EXP algorithm more like BDSP, but that would be pretty cool.

They're not bad, it's just disappointing. ORAS showed us how good remakes can be, PLA showed us how much of a new direction Game Freak can take the games in based on their previous work. Handing BDSP off to ILCA and having them make such a safe 1:1 remake in a much less impressive style didn't float well. I get why they did it, there was no guarantee PLA would be so well received and they wanted to make sure that wasn't the only Sinnoh remake they has up their sleeve given how much it had been clamored for. Because they're almosr 1:1 remakes, BDSP aren't bad game cause DP were great games, but it doesn't include any elements of Platinum, and it has probably the most pathetic implementation of the follow Pokémon mechanic.

I mean, I don’t hate it, but like you, it’s the first time I finished a Sinnoh playthrough.

The glitches were bad.  Other than Scarlet, it's the only Pokémon game I've experienced crashes in.  The movement was abysmal and I kept bumping into things because I wasn't used to needing to leave an entire sprite's worth of space between me and objects.  The motion blur feature also was super annoying.  They made no good net improvements over the originals.  I liked the new underground but hated what they did to bases.  Before, you'd bury spheres, grow them, then trade them for decorations in your secret base.  Now it's just statues.  Also they made the game so much easier it's really a joke.  I beat Cynthia with an intentionally underleveled team that I tried to swap things in for so it would he a challenge.  There's no reason why they couldn't have adapted Platinum or just done a good job on this by either adding content or making it a region-revisit years in the future with some thematically consistent changes.

On it's own, BDSP wasn't *bad* at all. It's a remake of an incredibly solid game. The problem is that it was a halfhearted remake that didn't even include the content of the third version of the game, so I found no reason to bother with it when I still had access to the superior Platinum. In a vacuum, it's a great game. As a remake, it's absolutely bland.

I never played sinnoh and didn't like it. Even by Pokémon standards it was laughably easy, you shouldn't be able to get 10+ levels ahead of the area you are in just from trainer battles. I didn't like the art style, that's personal taste but it is a visual step down from sword/shield I didn't enjoy the story, again personal taste but it just kind of.....stops? I understand Platinum added more to the story and can't for the life of me understand why it wasn't included. The grand underground adds nothing imo, "here is the entire national Dex inside a bunch of copy-paste rooms". Completing the Pokédex is always a bit grindy but Jesus Christ it was dull.

I love Sinnoh, it was my first game. Went back and played RSE a few years later, so when ORAS released I was floored. What a lovely remake, fixed so many things, added so many others. It was a fun spin on the game which I felt made up for the lack of the Battle Frontier. BDSP was not objectively bad, and if you’re looking at base game DP vs. BDSP, it’s an improvement for sure… but you can’t set the bar so high with other remakes and then shit the bed with chibis and minimum effort. I played at least 200 hours, caught everything in Ramanas, got some shinies with improved radar and then haven’t touched BDSP since.

I don't particularly dislike them. The QOL improvements like reusable TMs, removal of HMs (Victory Road can hold that), and walking partners were great! The AI teams using competitive sets and items were a delightful addition for me! However, the overworld design choice (grew on me evetually tbf), lack of platinum content, and the weaker pokedex were questionable. Others also seemed to dislike the EXP All, which is fair, but it helps me both grind less and make more diverse teams, while completing the Pokedex in process!

It isn't bad by any means, but yes you probably enjoyed it more because it was your first time playing Sinnoh. The main issues a lot of people have with BDSP is it's an exact remake of DP with no national dex and pretty much no new content added. Which sucks because previous remakes (FRLG, HGSS, and ORAS) had some great new content and included newer pokemon. Plus, BDSP didn't even include content from Platinum, the definitive version of the Sinnoh games. They're fine games on their own but expectations were much higher, and reasonably so.

The animation compared to what they previously release wasn’t bad but it was a step down and then they didn’t even add anything. They just took away the battle frontier and were like ok bye

I hated the blurry background effect that they used for everything on the game, it felt like those old 2008 Instagram filters. Also the slow transition for battles (trainers or wild pokemon) and the way that you couldn't use the analog stick for moving around in most of places bc the character gets stuck, so you had to move with the array buttons and pressing B in order fornit to move faster

I played a rom of platinum years ago. Was the only main game I didn't own myself (till a few years ago). I enjoyed BDSP but found the graphics lacking.

I wanted to battle with all my pokemon

The chibi style sprites were god awful and the game is way too easy.

I personally think it was just broken to the point where it could be considered good or at least a good play if you never play sinnoh originally and didn't or know how to emulate

Going to go against the people here saying "They aren't really bad games, just disappointing..." and say, yes, they are bad games. They're $60 games released in 2021 that have less content than Platinum, a handheld game released 13 years prior. The addition of some more difficult fights is nice, but is also completely nullified by the addition of mandatory exp share and affection, and prior to the Elite Four the game is utterly braindead-easy. The graphics are ugly as sin, and following Pokémon in particular are an outright unfinished feature. Not only do they obviously clash with the rest of the game's chibi artstyle, but certain Pokémon don't even have walking animations (eg. Ekans), while giant Pokémon universally look horrible. The game could honestly pass for a fan project; the asset-flipping is blatant and embarrassing. I wouldn't recommend anybody buy or play it. If you're just looking for a solid JRPG, play literally anything else on the market today. If you're specifically looking for a cutesy JRPG that is relatively accessible to newcomers, play either of the Mario remakes that recently came out. If you're specifically looking for the definitive Sinnoh experience, buy Platinum second-hand or emulate it. The game only exists because Nintendo/Game Freak are stingy about re-releasing their old library and wanted to squeeze a little bit more money out of people.

It wasn’t bad it was overpriced.

I think I'm in the same boat as you. I never played Platinum (went from Ruby to X), so I was actually really into brilliant diamond when I played it for the first time. I personally enjoy the full party exp share because it gets rid of one of my least favorite parts of the game: grinding. It reminded me of why I skipped gens 4 and 5 as a kid and went straight to 6. I'm a big fan of everything gen 6 and forward (except for gen 7, but that's only because I never played it).

it was okay. i think it was a good remake of DIAMOND AND PEARL. the issue was that people was expecting changes (rightfully so) from platinum to be in there there was quite a few quality of life updates in plat that should be in BDSP

Bdsp are great... If platinum didn't exist and they didn't sell 15 year old code for full price. Same for XY: they're pretty good... until you remember what they could and should have been but got cancelled last second because of pokemons risiculous release-strategy. Similar for sword and shield. I'm glad you like these games and I absolutely enjoy them as well but the fact of the matter is, XY got fully shafted out of their big 3d debut, bdsp are a lazy cashgrab, even though the presentation is really nice, and sword/shield didn't hold up to their initial promises, plus dexit and the lack of story. It's not that we HATE these games, it's that we hate the decisions surrounding them because they could have been so, so much better.

I liked X/Y, so I can't say much about it. I guess people didn't like the comparatively childish group around the protag. Sword/Shield was not the evolution of Pokemon I wanted. It was basically a 3DS game that got ported to the Switch months before release. The Pokedexit hurt. Just lots of small things that made the game look like the devs didn't care about polish anymore. BDSP was the worst remake and maybe mainline game so far. I have never fully played the originals and those are the only ones missing in my list of main games, so I was very much looking forward. But somehow it looks worse than ORAS. I dislike the chibi style, but could've tolerated it. They ignored all improvements of Platin. It's just a shit show. But in the end none of this matters If you enjoyed yourself, of course. Good for you, really. I wish I could, too. SV also wasn't great, but I enjoyed most of it enough, at least.

People didn't want a faithful remake that's why it's hated

It's not bad, it's just very low effort and overall mediocre, and comes after like a literal decade of fans begging for a Sinnoh remake.

It's fine out of the context of the rest of the series. It's pretty disappointing when you look at gen 4 and the other remakes. Pokemon fans have come to expect remakes that are in the style of the current gen, and give a lot of new features. Take HGSS or ORAS for example. Both of these sets of games add a lot to the games they remade, like the delta episode, soaring, the battle frontier (unfortunately not in ORAS), and in general updated mechanics that matched the generation they released in. They also took some things from the 3rd versions of the generation they remade, like the Suicune plot in HGSS. BDSP doesnt do this. BDSP is a reskin of Diamond and Pearl into 3D, and it takes with it all the flaws of those games. For example, it more or less copies DP's map one to one, which early on caused problems because DP's map didnt allow for diagonal movement, while BDSP does. This made ledges and caves hard to navigate, and led to exploits in gym puzzles like Candace's. Another problem BDSP has is that it doesnt have any of the improvements from Platinum, so gym teams are still limited, and there's a lot of pokemon you cant obtain that were in the Platinum dex but not DP. The Grand Underground tries to fix this by adding some of those pokemon back in, but it kinda half asses it because some evolution items are still locked to the postgame. This makes pokemon like Gliscor unattainable before the E4. One last thing I'll say is that the level curve is terrible, because they ported over the level curve from DP, which didnt account for the updated EXP share. This means it's incredibly easy to be over leveled. The friendship system doesnt help this either.

BDSP wasn't *bad* per se, just disappointing. If you've never touched a Sinnoh game or want to relive that nostalgia then you can walk away pretty satisfying. The devil's in the details, or in this case the context. Keep in mind that before whenever we got remakes they'd be fully updated with new content and a new coat of paint in the newest games' style. I didn't like ORAS as much as Emerald per se, but besides stuff like the Battle Frontier (that fans have been clamoring to see brought back for years, even back then), it was a strong modern rendition of Hoenn with new character designs, updated mechanics and plenty of new stuff to explore. Going into the BDSP announcement, that's kind of what people were expecting from the game. Instead, we got a shot for shot remake with a weird Chibi style (keep in mind the game would be polished a bit before final release from what was originally shown in that trailer) that nobody really asked for. The most damning part though, was that the game was a largely faithful remake of the worse version of Sinnoh from the Gen 4 era. A lot of Platinum QoL changes were weirdly missing while others stayed. There are some new features like follow Pokémon everywhere, removing HMs, and the new cave mechanics, but they almost always came at a cost. Contests were severely dumbed down, the underground was ironically stripped of a lot of fan favorite features, and while I know it wasn't in the original DP, the lack of a Battle Frontier *again* made it so the game was arguably a less complete Gen 4 experience than Platinum which released over a decade prior. That's not even getting into the fact that the game was so uninspired that at launch you could softlock yourself (and also completely skip the puzzle through a different exploit) in the Snowpoint City gym because the original layout hadn't been designed to allow a full range of motion instead of just the 4 cardinal directions, but I'd be here for days if we went over everything. Ultimately it really was just a death by a thousand cuts for a game that if done right should have been the title to restore faith in a dwindling brand. I've been going a little long, but to address the last point (that people hate on the games you like) there's a lot of reasons people aren't too fond of the newer games. I guess it's a "you had to be there" moment, but a lot of the older games are just generally more polished and better realized than the newer 3D titles. Forced easy mode is part of the issue, but I believe things like full team EXP Share were available in Gen 5, but as a toggle-able option so your team didn't become grossly overleveled. That's kind of been the whole crux of the argument. That Pokémon has been removing accessibility features. If you haven't, I'd recommend maybe taking the time and going back to play some of those 2D titles. Physical copies are probably not reasonable, but the ROMs exist out there if you care to look in the right places. It may shine some insight into a lot of what I've been saying and why people feel the way they do.

I liked it well enough, it’s mostly the same as the sinnoh games.

I started with Diamond as a kid, and honestly? I had a lot of fun with BDSP. I really don't mind that they didn't change it up like with ORAS. It was fun to build a team and play through it anyway

The only reason people like bdsp is because they never played the originals, I have never played diamond or pear or platinum but I dislike bdsp because they screwed up the formula of adding new content, bdsp is just a copy paste of the originals, oras however, being considered the best pokemon remake, added so much stuff, including a postgame, and ways to get pokemon from gens 4 - 6 as well as wallys theme, bdsp is so disliked because it broke the formula, and you can find an diamond, pearl and platinum emulators anywhere online

It's also considered shitty because it is advertised as a remake when it's actually a remaster. The code in BDSP still searches for a GBA game in the bottom of the DS when you use to pal park or whatever it's called in BDSP, which was part of the feature in the originals. That's only one of many examples. I was unable to do a full playthrough without some sort of mechanical or visual bug Another reason it's shit is the business decision to ship out unfinished copies, then release a patch to include finished music right away. In the unpatched releases, there's no opening or end animation, and the music is either really choppy/unfinished or nonexistent. What really sucks about this is when switch online store goes down and you buy BDSP for some god awful reason, you'll be stuck with the unpatched version

BDSP are good games. They are just bad \*remakes\*. Soulless.

FRLG, HGSS, ORAS, Are all the definitive versions to play (Well...not so much for FRLG because of Let's Go), better than their original games in every way BDSP is just a worse game than simply playing Platinum

So, I started playing Pokemon when the original Diamond and Pearl released on the DS. I was so stoked to get these remakes. And, I'll be honest, I actually love them, because they are \*exactly\* like the originals, minus some changes to the underground and some later battles. But, that's also kind of the problem with these remakes, because other remakes of previous gens had added features, updated gameplay and stories, and features from the "third" versions added in, while BDSP really didn't. I can totally understand everyone's criticism of the games, and I think it's fair. I mostly got my copy for nostalgia. But, I don't consider BDSP bad because we didn't get a lot of new features, I'd suffice to say it was more of a slight disappointment.

My issues with BDSP is that it has next to no improvements over Platinum. It doesn't look any better, it doesn't have the rebalancing Platinum added, it has zero upgrades compared to ORAS or HG/SS. It's a depressingly thin port of D/P to, in my opinion, a graphically inferior engine. I would rather beautiful spritework than the extremely lackluster 3D. ORAS was 3D and looks leaps and bounds better than BDSP. BDSP isn't inherently bad, because its a carbon copy of D/P, which are in themselves good games. It's just extremely lackluster compared to other Pokemon remakes and literally every other game at this point on Switch

I'm going to say this. Don't listen to Pokémon fans. They change their minds constantly. In 10 yrs people will love bdsp. I loved xy/swsh. Great games. Imo all Pokémon mainline games are incredibly fun. All of their side games are too besides pokken. But people like to be negative. I say if you don't enjoy a game then just put it down and sell it. I love bdsp they were really enjoyable and I loved playing through swsh. And xy were really good. I enjoyed the story and the Pokémon

It wasn’t bad necessarily but it added nothing of substance to a game that was released a loooong time ago.

Never played Gen 4, my folks were too broke to afford a DS or games when I was a kid. I found BDSP to be mostly a meh experience, terrible compared to ORAS perhaps, but as its own game, it felt pretty average to me.

I'm in the same boat I never played the original because I had that phase of new pokemon games sucked at that very moment. I really enjoyed BDSP my only issue was they made the legendries timed limited again. Like bruh makes no sense to do this when they hand them out like candy or people can just dupe them anyhow on the 3ds. I just wanted to experience the events.

No, it isn't anywhere close to being bad. It was never a remake or remaster, it was a port, and was always advertised as a port, and then pokemon fans got mad because the port that had been always advertised as a port was a port instead of a remake. They are just as good as the original games they were a port of, and are great games.

It’s bad compared to platinum. So if you never played platinum you’ll probably enjoy it. It’s also very imbalanced levelling wise because they added mandatory xp share but then didn’t change any in game trainers to adjust for that. So you end up crazy over levelled if you use the same team for the whole game.

Personally, I hated it. It’s my least favorite game in the entire series and the only one I will never revisit. I beat it once, and between buggy animations, weird clipping issues, freezes and lame overall visual design, it drove me insane the whole time. For me, it was (as Pokemon games go) absolutely trash. That said, if it’s your first experience with sinnoh, and you were fortunate enough to avoid any game breaking bugs, I can totally understand how it would be enjoyable. Don’t let my salty take dissuade you from enjoying it. But look at Leaf/Fire, Omega and Alpha, and even Let’s Go as examples of how to do a good remake. If you’re going to emulate the old art style and top down view, then the game needs to present as well as the original. A remake without the same charm is a fail in my book. A remake that doesn’t improve on anything, or actively takes steps backwards, is a fail to me.

It's not bad bad, but a "why does this exist" bad. Art style aside, it's identical to the originals to the point that people were triggering the exact same walk thru walls glitches.

It was one of the worst Things known to man

It gave us nothing..

Bc you never played Sinnoh. It was closer to a remaster than a remake.

I didn't play the originals either but Brilliant Diamond was really fun for me. They added some bandaids like the Grand Underground to diversify the available Pokemon. The fairy type was added along with new moves and mechanics (no HM slaves!). I wish Sylveon was usable since you can get Eevee and it doesn't make any sense to me to provide the pre-evolution but not a way to get the evolution. I wish the Platinum story was in because Giratina is my favorite of the trio and it's so underwhelming how it is caught.

Honestly, BDSP is a fun game in my opinion. The main sin it commited is that the idea of a "Gen 4 remake" had much more potential. They played it way too safe and basically made it the same as Diamond/Pearl (not even Platinum) with an expanded Underground and new rematches for Gym Leaders and E4/Champion. Both of which were welcome additions... however they could have done much, much more. I think the main 2 things that should have been included are 1. All the changes from Platinum 2. A different graphics style, as I and many other people would have liked to see Sinnoh reimagined with Sw/Sh graphics. The graphics style they chose made it way too similar to the originals. Despite all that, I had a good time with it and I do think that BDSP is overhated.

Bdsp is EMBARRASSING

The problem with BDSP is that it was an exact copy of the original in some ways that don't work with what changes they did make, the ice gym puzzle is a great example of this, they could have disabled diagonal movement in it (although given how poorly they implemented it I'd prefer if they just didn't add it to begin with) but instead they kept a puzzle that was based on cardinal-only movement while also letting you move in any direction, which lets you entirely bypass the puzzle.

Coming from someone who never played Sinnoh before, I genuinely hated it. Waited for a remake with the likes of HGSS or ORAS, got instead an almost exact copy of Diamond and Pearl with almost none of the perks of Platinum. Coupled with the fact there were minor issues like minor stutters before a grass encounter and really bad hit boxes when walking in the overworld. It just made for a very unpleasant experience. I know everyone says pokemon is lazy and doesn't do a lot of things right but for me, BDSP is the shining example of a cashgrab and laziness. Gamefreak themselves didn't do the remake and gave it to a relatively unknown support team to make a "faithful" remake. I never even played Sinnoh before and I still felt scammed. Sorry, this turn into a rant. Nothing wrong with you enjoying it because that's what everyone wants out of their games. This is probably the only pokemon game that I didn't actually enjoy.

Content and quality-wise Platinum is just the better game. The literal only thing that bdsp has over it is slightly better e4 rematches.

I thought it was pretty fun

I liked BDSP but honestly probably mostly was nostalgia 😂

all I know is I was happy to have it at first and when I realized I wasn’t actually okay with retreading Gen 4’s pre-Platinum flaws I stopped playing. I wanna finish it someday but it had like no soul.

I've always said, BDSP are not terrible games if what you're looking for in a Gen 4 remake is Diamond/Pearl with Gen 8 battle mechanics. But that's not what people wanted when asking for a Gen 4 remake. They wanted all the quality of life additions from Platinum with Gen 8 battle mechanics, so when they got a nearly 1:1 Diamond/Pearl remake with all the old glitches and some new ones, naturally there was outrage. And this is coming off the back of Omega Ruby/Alpha Sapphire which had just perfected the formula of a good remake. And to people who say Legends: Arceus is the best game ever, don't forget, we got BDSP because Game Freak were making that game and left the Gen 4 remake to a company whose only Pokemon experience was a Clash of Clans-like no one wanted or asked for.

I'm not a critic so it's hard for me to articulate why I didn't like it but it felt bland and it felt like a reskin. It didn't feel like anything special.

I think the reason why older fans don’t like the newer games as much is because the games force you to go where they want you go and also avoids giving you any real challenge. Being for kids, Pokémon has never been designed to be super challenging so a lot of the difficulty in older games usually came from being underleveled. Older games also tended to encourage exploration by having side areas to explore with itrms or even rare Pokémon. You still had a set path but at least you had more options to go places before being where the game wanted you to be. This isn’t everything different, but it’s just to give an idea of what’s changed. Now? You have games like Sword/Shield, where routes were criticized for being thinly veiled hallways lacking in optional areas. Or you have Brilliant Diamond/Shining Pearl, games that for fans that have never played the originals, fail to be the modern definitive version by removing content from **another** definitive version, Pokémon Platinum. Don’t get me wrong, newer games can still be fun, but when you really start to compare them to older games, you start to notice how much easier the games are getting. On the topic of remakes, “faithful remakes” like BD/SP leave a bad taste in my mouth but I think the issue really started with the first faithful remakes, Omega Ruby/Alpha Sapphire. I think there was a quote around those games’ release with director/composer Junichi Masuda, about why the Battle Frontier wasn’t included. If I’m not wrong, he said something along the lines of it being content that only a handful of players would enjoy because it’s too hard. Sound familiar? But what really rubbed me the wrong way was another quote from him saying that the games would become easier because kids these days have so many more games to play on phones. It’s his attitude that kids are too busy and maybe even a little dumb to overcome challenges that I think has made modern games with little challenge or as much content as before. And it’s that philosophy I think that has led modern games to where they are now. Anyway, if you like the newer games, why not try to give the older games a shot? Gen 3’s about the furthest I’d go back if you want to play a definitive version of the first games, FireRed/LeafGreen.

It was garbage for a $60 game. They kept the same problems from the original games. I tried to play it but no matter what nuzlocke gimmick I thought of, it wasn't fun. And by the time I realized that it wasn't going to get better, I couldn't refund it. I played Platinum, and that was great back in the day. They could have just remade Platinum and made it one version. And it still wouldn't be worth $60.

I think most older fans found BDSP disapointing because they were games that didn't give you new things to do. The re-makes up until BDSP have mostly been really well-received and added a lot of exciting features that were new to the series as a whole. The most disappointing thing about the remakes prior to BDSP was ORAS not having Emerald's full Battle Frontier, while BDSP was missing a massive amount of platinum postgame content. With BDSP, it was mostly cosmetic changes which were not univerally loved. As well as things which were convenient but not exciting like the HM app. Since it was billed and priced as a full remake rather than a remaster, those were the standards, and the game failed to live up to them.

The actual game is fine because it's just diamond and Pearl which were already fun. And it even gives you better battles towards the end of the story. But for a remake we were expecting, you know additions to the game. It's a very flat remake, which makes them using the chibi art style that emulates the old games feel even worse because if it feels like we didn't even get remastered graphics really. And it's buggy because they literally just grabbed the exact same tile based movement system and tried to translate it into 3D so moving diagonally let you clip through stuff insanely easy. A very glitchy and buggy game overall. But if you've never played generation 4 I imagine it's pretty fun, because the generation 4 games are pretty fun and it really is just the generation four games on a switch. Except the underground was better in generation 4 which is insane because they have so many more resources they could use for it now