The set up:
As we use to say "very old player from ISS days"
, i will keep on the cliche and say, very old player here since the Red/Blue/Yellow on Gameboy. I have played almost every game from Red/Blue back on 1999 on gameboy, up to the 3DS game Ultra Moon, with the one or the other way. Technically i have played everything.
Practically i have not still finished Saphire/Ruby/Black/White/White2/Y/Moon/Ultra Sun. My collection is: Red,Blue,Yellow,Gold,Silver for GB. Stadium 1 & 2 for N64. HeartGold, Black 2 for DS, X,Y,Sun, Ultra Moon for 3DS. And i plan to go for Sword and Shield on Switch this Xmas. The rest games , i have old played them on emulators.
So having said this i can say i am a pokemon RPG fan. I was a complete pokemon fan back in 1999 in my 13's. I read the manga pokemon adventures, i watched the anime, which i stopped after the second season (the silver conference), when i realized that the show is completely a promo without a serious plot and that it is targeted to bring new little kids to the franchise.
Starting from Red and Blue, i can't hide, that i had zero clue back in 1999 when i bought the game,about Pokemon. I purchased the games, cause there were from the last published for GameBoy and because of an advertisement and an article i read in a magazine back then. The game proved much different from what i expected, no Youtube back then, no Google, not even Yahoo for god shake!!! I just made a blind purchase. From the magazine i expected a platform game where you would have to chase little monsters and catch them. But the game had very different content to offer. Additionally to this i had neither zero clue about J-rpgs and RPGs at general. So the whole concept was very strange to the 13 me. Turned Based battles ( I WILL ANALYZE ON THIS LATTER) , complete world with towns, no stages, having to speak to everyone to progress to the story...Everything seemed so difficult for me , so boring, so disappointing.
I played it very rare in the beginning, leaving it to dust in my shelf. I used to power it up every weekend after the anime episodes, just to make the comparisons. And then the miracle happened. I started figuring out the mechanics, i became familiar with the battle system, i started loving the RPG play style, explore the towns/cities/dungeons, talk to everyone that may give you a useful tip.
As i had not yet had access to Internet ,faqs, cheats, walkthrough , was something out of space for me. This resulted to some funny points like, i released free my first starter, BULBASAUR, over-grinding my Pidgey, which ended in a 100LVL Pidgeot, in the very endgame one-shot sweeping everything and me being stuck in the point where i had to play for two months the game, without being able to advance past Vermillion City , as i did not know how to use the HM01 Cut, to cut the bushes in the overworld! It was also responsible me, who did not pay attention to SS Anne captain, when he gifted me with the HM01. Cause in his text he explains pretty clear what CUT does, shame one me!
The rest are history, i completed the game, my save corrupted after some months, due to the many play-hours possibly, i restarted having the knowledge , i battled friends, i traded with friends, thanks to gameboy link cable, i started also my Red Version, i completed it too. I had a BLue save where i had 149 pokemon, except for Electabuzz, which was EXTREMELY FAKIN RARE!! I was seeking it for months, with not any success. This was my one and only closest attempt to complete a pokedex. I did not have neither MEW, but it was only available by Nintendo special events, which were not a thing back in the 1999-2000.
