The Johto Region is known as a favorite for many. It introduced, currently, the third most Pokémon of any region and also gave the player a chance to win 2 regions. However, the Johto region is not perfect, this information may be controversial.
Many of the issues of the region involve oversights of game design in Pokémon’s second outing. No one game designer can achieve perfection, but being the second game in the series it’s prone to comparisons to the first game and the many subsequent games that came after that. So here are 10 things that make no sense about the Johto Region.
11 The Money Spender
This Pokémon region’s “Mom” is a heavy spender if your dare let her “Save up” your money. During the beginning when your character’s mom gives you the offer to save up a percent of your money to be used when you need it, it sounds like a great idea.
But then you get the first phone call… She goes and spends all the hard-earned money on a “Berry.” Then it gets to the 100th call where she calls after each match to tell you she spent the money that got sent to her, and it’s easy to see she has a “Problem.” Just be hopeful she might send a Moon stone.
10 Gamble Pokémon
All are gamble Pokémon can’t be found in the region, and it’s always well known that it’s the only place to find them. It’s so obvious that it’s touching that the police should be all over them, but it seems police in the Pokémon world are way less effective than a chipper 10-year-old with a grey-area sense of judgment. The main character will happily be apart of the capita of buying the Pokémon but then go right after the evil team doing it because they’re the bad guy group.
9 Can’t Get Around This Tree
One of the biggest gameplay mixe plot elements of Pokémon is also the biggest running plot holes in the series. The “I can’t get around this tiny tree!” attitude, just makes the player shake their head. It would be much more understandable if it was a thorn bush, but based on the Sudowoodo event the intention is most certainly that it’s a tree because of the similar parallels. Actually getting around a tree is no issue, and fitting past one to get where you need to go is a slight inconvenience that has a payoff, it takes the player out of the experience because the character’s/game’s logic is ridiculous.
8 Apricorns of All Things
Being classified as a fruit means Apricorns don’t have a hard shell. Using them as shells for Pokéballs makes little sense. It gives the impression of having a mushy mess like a rotten tomato instead of a Pokeball. A hard fruit would be classified as a nut unless the Pokémon world has them backward, or worse Aprocorns have an extremely unnatural crunch to them.
7 The Main Character Nearly Arrested
The police in the Pokémon world seem to prioritize arresting kids rather than crack down on organized crime. During the start of the game, your rival steals his first Pokémon, when you go back in to report what you’ve seen, the police officer immediately thinks you’re the one who stole the Pokémon even though the professor specifically asked you to be there in the first place.
That officer is all for arresting you on the spot without good reason if you didn’t describe the other perpetrator vaguely. SPOILERS Your rival is never arrested or gets justice for the crimes he committed throughout the game.
6 Trainer Card But No Starter
The worst part about your rival stealing the Pokémon is that he already has a trainer card. The only place ever shown to give out trainer cards is the Pokémon professors’ place. Meaning, he had already visited a Pokémon professor to get his ID but never received his starter. That leads to a big mystery of how he has one and not the other.
5 A Lapse of TMs
TMs make up most of the good moves for fighting competitively and the Elite 4, but the whole Johto region has a pandemic level of TM shortage. No dark type is gifted with a decent stab move, at the time, making the new types useless. Many starters do not learn good moves until upper-level 30s, meaning your Quilava is still stuck with Ember as their stab move by late 20s and early 30s. If there was a region that needed a decent supply of TMs for its move pool, It’s Johto.
4 Huge Level Gap in Wild Pokémon
Once you get to the 5th and 6th gyms in the Johto region, the wild Pokémon become nearly useless with how big the level gap is between the trainers and the wild Pokémon, sometimes with a 5-10 level difference. The amount of grind to have a usable Pokémon becomes immense for a Pokémon game. This is something you rarely see in other generations/regions but is a sore thumb in Johto.
3 Pretty Short
Compared to other regions, this one comes off more as a DLC extension region for the original Red/Blue rather than a full-fledged region. Johto can be gotten through rather quickly because the main appeal of the game is the duel region effect. Johto even gets screwed with how a number of Johto Pokémon aren’t possible to obtain in Johto, but can only be obtained in Kanto. This leaves a huge issue on why they aren’t just Kanto Pokémon.
2 Gym Leaders Don’t use Johto Pokémon
It is actually rare when the Johto Gym Leaders have primarily Johto Pokémon, showing how bad the Johto Pokémon got screwed as far as usability. The first Johto Gym leader that actually uses Johto Pokémon is the 3rd, Whitney, with her Miltank. Miltank is a known challenge so it’s a wonder why other Johto Pokémon weren’t given a chance to really shine.
1 Stone Johto Pokémon Without the Stone
As with any Pokémon region, new Pokémon that involve stones were introduced, however, in Johto, it’s nearly impossible to find stones. Besides the occasional moon stone given to you by your shopping addict mom, completing the Johto Pokedex using stones from the Johto region is a losing game to bet on.
NEXT: Pokémon: The 10 Fastest Grass-Type Pokémon, Ranked
