Pokémon Red/Blue/Yellow Version | Review

Developer: Game Freak

Publisher: Nintendo

Reviewed on: 3DS (Virtual Console)

Available on: Game Boy & 3DS (Virtual Console)

Released: September 28th 1998

For the first time since the late 1990s Pokemon is once again gaining huge amounts of media attention, everyone is talking about it and everyone seems to not be able to get enough of it. This is mostly due to the hugely popular Pokemon Go app being released on mobile devices, you can't go anywhere without seeing someone playing Pokemon Go and I think this is great because it's a franchise that I really like and it's good to see both old fans and new fans alike talking about it.

But in this Pokemon resurgence let's not forget where the series started, let's rewind to the first Pokemon boom and revisit the original Pokemon games which were released on the original Game Boy in 1998. The original trio of Pokemon games have recently been released on the Nintendo 3DS making them more relevant and easy to get a hold of than ever before (the specific version I played for this review is Pokemon Blue Version).

The game opens with a cutscene which is a tradition that's followed by the later games in the series. This cutscene was even replicated at the start of the Pokemon anime in the first episode.

For anyone unfamiliar with how the main Pokemon games work, let me quickly explain why they're split into three games (despite being the same game). Pokemon Red and Blue are the original games (at least in Europe and America, but we won't get into the technicalities) and despite following the exact same story and being the same game, there are a few Pokemon that you can only catch in one particular version. This makes it so it's impossible to 'catch em' all' without trading certain exclusive Pokemon between the versions. Simple right? Then Pokemon Yellow comes along. Pokemon Yellow is a sort of extended version of the original Red and Blue versions, it still has the same story and is the same game, but a few elements have been changed in order to fit the Pokemon anime which was a huge hit at the time.

For example, instead of choosing between three starter Pokemon you are given a Pikachu (you have no choice in the matter), the Pikachu remains outside of it's Pokeball and walks around with you and can be interacted with. Beyond that certain Team Rocket encounters (more on them later) have been changed to more closely resemble the Team Rocket duo Jessie and James from the anime. Other sprites have been changed too in order to match their anime counterparts, such as the nurses in Pokemon Centers looking more like Nurse Joy from the anime (complete with a Chansey). Even when playing Pokemon Yellow you still can't get all the Pokemon without trading with the Red and Blue versions, so no matter what you do, you'll need a friend to trade with you if you're going for one hundred percent completion. There are some other differences between the Yellow version and the Red/Blue versions, but that's the basics.

At the start of the game you're able to name your character but as far as customisation goes that's about it.

With all those technicalities out of the way, the story of Pokemon begins with an introduction to the world given to us by Professor Oak. He explains that this world is filled with creatures called Pokemon that are used by people as pets and some people use them to fight other Pokemon which makes them stronger and gives them a closer bond with their owner.

The game then starts with the player character (his canon name is 'Red') venturing out of his small town and being stopped by Professor Oak because it's dangerous to go without a Pokemon to defend yourself. You're taken back to his lab where you meet a character called Blue (at least that's his canon name). Blue is Professor Oak's grandson and your childhood rival and you'll keep bumping into him throughout your journey. Professor Oak tells you to take a Pokemon from a table and you have the choice of choosing between Bulbasaur, Squirtle and Charmander.

Professor Oak then gives you your primary and secondary objectives, firstly, you must travel the region and defeat the eight gym leaders, these opponents are some of the best at raising Pokemon and own gyms to challenge worthy trainers. Upon defeating them you'll earn gym badges which give you passage to the Pokemon League where you can battle the Elite Four. The Elite Four are the best of the best and if you mange to beat them you will be crowned the Pokemon Champion.

The Gyms are all themed to fit in with what type of trainer the leader is. The later Gyms also feature puzzle sections which give the game some variety.

Your secondary objective is to fill a device called the Pokedex which, upon finding and catching a Pokemon species, will fill with information about that particular Pokemon. The Pokedex is used as a research tool and with Professor Oak being a scholar of Pokemon, it would come in handy to have one completely filled with all of the species of Pokemon in the region.

After battling a few gyms you come across a criminal organisation called Team Rocket. At first they come across as being petty criminals who have ransacked a house looking for a precious TM (TM stands for Technical Move and is a method of teaching an ability to a Pokemon even if they don't naturally learn it, but more on those later), but after traversing the region some more you discover they are more of a threat than previously thought.

You eventually make it to Lavender Town, and come across a tower filled with ghosts. These ghosts attempt to stop you from reaching the top of the tower due to a hostage situation taking place. Team Rocket have kidnapped Mr. Fuji, a kind old man who attempted to stop Team Rocket from hurting (and it's implied, killing) innocent Pokemon. Upon finally reaching the top of the tower you're stopped from progressing by a ghost who won't let you pass. Luckily you learn of an item called the Silph Scope which allows you to identify the ghosts of Pokemon, thus being able to defeat the ghost and stop the hostage situation.

Team Rocket is slowly introduced to the player by being mentioned by some NPC characters and later becoming an actual threat when you encounter them committing petty crimes. The threat then gradually increases as you discover more about them.

Learning the location of Team Rocket's base, you infiltrate it and defeat every member that they throw at you. You also have a brief encounter with Giovanni who is the leader of Team Rocket and uses Pokemon to commit crimes. After defeating him you are handed the Silph Scope and head back to Lavender Town and successfully rescue Mr. Fuji.

Team Rocket later take over Saffron City and have infiltrated the Silph Company (who create various different types of Pokemon technology) in order to use their prototype tools to capture and use Pokemon for their nefarious deeds. You break into the Silph Company headquarters and once again defeat all the members of Team Rocket and battle Giovanni, being victorious once again.

After saving the city and Silph Company itself, the president of the company gives you a rare Pokeball (items used to catch Pokemon) called the Master Ball which a Pokemon can't break out of. It's speculated that the reason Giovanni wants this Master Ball is to capture the most powerful Pokemon in the game, Mewtwo, and use him to make Team Rocket unstoppable.

Finally, after defeating Team Rocket once and for all and battling through seven gyms across the region you come to the final gym. The leader of this particular gym has been gone for the entire game until this point and it's finally revealed that the leader is none other than Giovanni himself. A final confrontation with him engages and you once again defeat him in a Pokemon battle. He finally accepts he's been beat and hands you the final gym badge. He also states that he's turning over a new leaf and is going to devote his life to Pokemon study.

Sections of the Team Rocket Hideout and Sliph Co. feature maze-like puzzles which have teleportation devices and locked doors which you need to find a keycard to open. Things can get very complicated and you'll lose your sense of direction quickly.

You now make your way to the Pokemon League and defeat the Elite Four. Unfortunately, someone has already become the new Pokemon Champion just before you, so you'll now need to have a final showdown with the newly appointed champion. The champion is revealed to be Blue who you've been bumping into and witnessing him becoming more and more powerful as the game goes on, but now he's beat you to the end of the game and a final battle ensues to determine who the true Pokemon Champion is.

You defeat Blue and secure your status as the best Pokemon trainer in the region. Professor Oak then takes you to the Hall of Fame where you and your Pokemon are inducted and registered in the history books.

After the end of the game, you can go and finish what Giovanni started and visit a cave where it's said Mewtwo resides. Until now the cave has been closed due to having very powerful Pokemon inside and it being too tough for a normal trainer. But being the Pokemon Champion, you're granted access and after making your way through the cave you find the most powerful Pokemon you've come across in the game, Mewtwo. You can then choose whether to use the Master Ball to capture him or you can simply battle him and defeat him without capturing him at all.

While on the face of it the story is very minimal because it's just about you traveling around battling everyone you come across, there is more going on than that. The inclusion of the Team Rocket story, the multiple encounters with Blue and lots of other side story sections like gaining entry to a boat called the S.S Anne all make the game more interesting to play and you always want to find out what's going to happen in the next area.

Blue poses a threat throughout the game and appears at key points to make sure you're progressing at a decent rate. He mocks you almost every time he sees you making him feel like a true rival and it's always satisfying to beat him.

The reveal of Giovanni being the final gym leader and Blue being the new Pokemon Champion may be a little bit predictable but they add enough of a twist and tie everything together to make the ending to the game satisfying.

I like how Team Rocket's motivations are implied but never explicitly stated to you, it's always been weird to me how villains say what their intentions are to the main character before they fight because why would the villain want their plans to be known or care about what the main character thinks. Enough is said about Team Rocket to understand that they're clearly evil but they're also mysterious and not a lot is said about what they're trying to achieve which gives the player the ability to come to their own conclusion.

When you beat Giovanni at the end of the game it is a little bit odd how easily he gives up and decides a life of crime isn't for him. It comes out of nowhere and seems very out of character for him. Why would he decide to abandon Team Rocket just because he loses in a battle to you?

There are parts of the game where nothing is really happening to progress the story, but this is fine as it isn't the focus of the overall game and it's more of a side note to keep you engaged in the world.

Overall the story is great, it keeps you wanting to find out more about the world and the people in it, and gives you more to do than simply battle gym leaders, when you're fighting Team Rocket you're fighting for a greater purpose and this makes a nice change of pace from the rest of the game.

One of the most difficult choices in the game is what to pick as your starter Pokemon. Squirtle is always my first choice though because lets face it, he's the best.

The main gameplay of Pokemon Red/Blue/Yellow is split into the overworld sections and the battle sections. The overworld sections are where you'll spend most of your time, this is where you can interact with things, solve puzzles, manage your items, walk around the different landscapes and access the main menu. The battle sections are where your Pokemon are pitted against either another trainer's Pokemon or against a wild Pokemon. The combat is turn based which means once you select an attack (or use an item) you will attack once then the enemy will attack you and then you will be free to select an attack again.

Pokemon each have their own 'type' which is weak or strong against other types, for example a water type Pokemon will be strong against a fire Pokemon but it will be weak against a grass Pokemon. There are fifteen types of Pokemon in the game which means it can get quite complicated keeping track of which ones are good against which, but it adds a lot of depth to the battle system and makes it more tactical rather than constantly tapping the A button to select your most powerful attack.

Pokemon also have their own individual statistics, these are HP (Health Points), attack, defense, speed and special. These stats affect how much damage the Pokemon deals, how much damage it receives, it's overall health, whether it can attack first and much more. It's important to check a Pokemon's stats to see where it's strengths lie. Is it a tank Pokemon that can take a lot of damage? Is it a quick Pokemon to be used when getting the first hit is important (maybe to cause a status effect)? Or is it a Pokemon with high strength who focuses on attempting to deal as much damage as possible in one hit? All of these questions can be answered by studying a Pokemon's stats.

You can view basic Pokemon statistics from the Pokemon menu and for more detailed descriptions you can view each individual Pokemon to see what moves it knows and other specific details.

Certain moves a Pokemon can learn will cause status effects which can affect Pokemon in different ways. An electric Pokemon is likely to cause the 'paralyzed' status effect and this makes it so the opponent Pokemon's speed is reduced as well as sometimes making the Pokemon unable to move during battle (making it skip a turn). Other status effects include poison, sleep, burn and frozen which are each assigned to a certain type and have different effects (poison even carries on affecting your Pokemon while outside of battle). If you know a Pokemon is particularly fast, you'll want to paralyse it so you can gain the upper hand making it more than just about what Pokemon type beats which.

Confused is another status effect but this works differently from the others. While all other status effects can only be cured with an item, visiting a Pokemon Center or by waiting for the effect to cure itself naturally, confusion can be cured simply by switching your Pokemon while in battle and it's confusion also doesn't stay after battle like the other status effects. While a Pokemon is confused it can also have another status effect placed on it whereas with normal status effects a Pokemon can't be two things at once (so for example poisoned and burned). The effect of confusion is that the Pokemon has a chance to hurt itself instead of using it's attack on an enemy which not only deals damage to itself but wastes it's turn in battle.

Status effects can often be used to gain the upper hand in a Pokemon battle, even if the opponents Pokemon are a type which is strong against yours.

After battling, a Pokemon will eventually get stronger and level up, upon reaching certain levels a Pokemon can learn new moves and sometimes will evolve. When a Pokemon evolves it changes it's form and becomes more powerful, it receives a boost to all of it's stats and gets more health. However, sometimes when a Pokemon evolves it will learn new moves slower than if you stop it evolving (or in some cases it won't learn new abilities at all once it's evolved), so you may want to refrain from evolving straight away. I actually don't like that Pokemon can evolve and never have the opportunity to learn new moves, I think this only occurs when you use a stone item to make your Pokemon evolve but even so, the game never tells you that your Pokemon won't learn new abilities so it feels a bit unfair.

Another problem with the way Pokemon learn new moves is that there's no way of looking what the move it's learning actually does, and because a Pokemon can only learn four moves (to stop it being over powered) you may end up getting rid of a good move and replacing it with one you don't want. No information is given on the move's type, whether it causes status effects, how powerful the individual move is (Pokemon moves have their own set of stats as well as the Pokemon using the move having it's own stats) or whether the move takes more than one turn to use. This is one of the main problems with Pokemon Red/Blue/Yellow.

Each attack has a different animation that makes the combat feel satisfying, even if the Pokemon sprites themselves are completely static.

Needless to say, the Pokemon battle system is very deep and could be potentially too complicated, but the way the game slowly introduces different elements and Pokemon types makes it so that it's very easy to learn and anyone would be able to understand it. Even without going into the Pokemon and move stats too much you'll still be able to play the game and have a lot of fun, it's only if you're trying to create the perfect Pokemon team for your play style that you'll need to look at that.

While in a battle with a wild Pokemon it is possible to catch the opposing Pokemon and use it for yourself in your own party (your party can consist of up to six Pokemon that you have with you and you're able to battle with, other Pokemon you catch will be stored in a PC so you can swap members of your party at will). To catch Pokemon, you use items called Pokeballs (or the upgraded Great Balls, Ultra Balls or the Master Ball).

Even when catching Pokemon you still need to be somewhat tactical, if you lower the opponents HP and give it a status effect it will become more likely to be captured when you use a Pokeball. Different Pokemon will have different catch rates (how easy they are to catch) normally with the rarer Pokemon being more difficult to capture and common ones being easy. This is where Pokemon differs from a standard RPG. Whereas a normal RPG has you fight using your playable character(s), in Pokemon it's the creatures you collect that do the fighting. Each Pokemon has a distinct look and a unique set of moves it can learn which gives the player a lot of freedom in how they want to approach battles.

Each Pokemon has a back sprite (which is what you see when the Pokemon is yours) and a front sprite (which is what you see of the opponent Pokemon) which gives you an impression of what the Pokemon look like in 3D despite being a 2D game.

The battling system in Pokemon works very well for the most part but it falls down in some areas because of small annoyances that detract from the flow of the game. Examples of these kinds of problems are that you can't see what a new move does before teaching it to a Pokemon (which I mentioned earlier), you can't see if you've already caught a Pokemon when you're in a battle (resulting in often catching more than one of the same Pokemon when you don't need to), you can't see how much EXP is needed to level up without entering a series of menus and it doesn't give you any information on moves that your Pokemon have learned without actually using them. None of these problems are game breaking, but they are annoying and they could have all easily been fixed too.

The rest of the time playing the game will be spent in the overworld, in the overworld you'll be able to walk around and properly explore the world of Pokemon. You can interact with people who will often give advice about the mechanics of the game, give hints to what you're supposed to be doing or offer to trade Pokemon with you (sometimes the only way of getting certain Pokemon is to trade with these Non Playable Characters). You can visit buildings in the towns and cities you come across (some of which are shops where you can buy useful items) and you can initiate battles by making eye contact with other trainers or by walking around where wild Pokemon live.

Many of the games characters will give you important hints and tips about what is going on in your current location or about the more advanced mechanics of the game you might not know about. So it's worth exploring and talking to everyone you see.

In certain situations you'll also need to solve various puzzles while in the overworld, most of which are maze-like areas where the objective is to make it through a complex building or cave. As the game goes on these puzzles become more and more complicated sometimes involving different floors and switches which open random doors which you need to make your way to. These puzzles (at least the ones towards the end of the game) become slightly annoying, not just because of how complicated they become but in the way that in most of these areas wild Pokemon can appear at any time which interrupts the flow of the puzzle solving and makes the battling seem like a chore. You can use an item called a repel to stop the random Pokemon encounters but it's only temporary and doesn't last particularly long.

The game has a progression system in the overworld as well as in battles too. In certain parts of the game you'll gain access to HM moves. These teach a move to your Pokemon that can be used in battle and outside of battle. Some examples of these are 'Fly' which enables you to effectively teleport to any area you have already visited (fast travel), 'Surf' which lets you ride a Pokemon on water to let you travel the sea and reach new places (as well as opening up some previously inaccessible paths in areas you've already been to) and 'Strength' which allows you to move heavy blocks out of the way, which then introduces another puzzle element to the game. There are others but the thing they all have in common is that they in some way power the player up by allowing them to get through various terrain they couldn't before which gives the player the feeling that they've become stronger and better than they were at the start of the game. An issue with using these HM moves is that they require you to enter a menu and select the Pokemon with the ability and activate it and when you enter a new area you'll need to reapply the ability going through the same menu again. A much better way of using HM moves would have been to have interacted with an object that can be manipulated with a HM and for it to just be used automatically.

Moving boulders around with 'Strength' can be annoying in later sections of the game because you need to keep moving to different floors and having to reapply the ability when it should stay on all the time if you have a Pokemon in your party that has the move.

While in the overworld you can access the main menu which allows you to access your Pokedex, items, the Pokemon you have in your party, save the game, and look at your trainer card (which displays your gym badges as well as some other data with progression information). A lot of the time you're playing the game will be spent in this menu, the reason for this is because you have to constantly manage your items and Pokemon due to having a limited amount of space for them. Items and Pokemon can be stored in a PC (which can be accessed from Pokemon Centers) but even when stored in the PC there is a limited space. Item management inparticular is very frustrating because you find TM items (which teach powerful moves to Pokemon that they're unable to learn naturally) and you don't want to get rid of these because you might not be able to get them if there's only one in the game, but you can't keep them all otherwise the PC will get full and you won't be able to pick up any other items.

Pokemon management is annoying for similar reasons, you won't find yourself running out of space on the PC for Pokemon but instead of just having a simple list of every Pokemon you've caught they're arranged in boxes and each of these boxes can only store twenty Pokemon. If you try to catch a Pokemon with a full party and a full PC box then it simply won't let you catch anymore, and if the Pokemon you're catching is a rare one then it could be very irritating to simply not be allowed to catch it and have to travel to a Pokemon Center to change the PC box and then find the Pokemon again (which can take a very long time if it's rare).

It is possible to keep your items organised but it takes time and requires you going back and forth to a Poke Mart to get rid of your unwanted items.

Organising items and Pokemon is very slow and tedious, you can organise things how you want but it's difficult to do so because of having to constantly scroll through menus and change PC boxes (which requires the game to be saved taking up even more time). I can't help but be frustrated with this even if it is because of the hardware limitations of the Game Boy.

Using items in the overworld is annoying for similar reasons to using HMs, in order to use an item you have to go through a menu but if the item you are wanting to use is near the bottom of the list it can be very time consuming to go through the whole list. It just feels like the item list could have been better organised to enable a quick selection and quick management.

Aside from the horrible menu systems, there aren't too many huge faults with the gameplay. There's no option to play the game as a girl and no character customisation at all (changing clothes or your appearance) which I feel is a missed opportunity due to the game appealing to both genders and the player character supposedly being a representation of the actual player, yet not being able to look how you want. However, this could be excused due to the fact the game was on the original Game Boy and it was already pushing the system quite hard as it is.

In order to buy an item from a shop you need to open five windows which all layer on top of each other, it looks a bit messy and while it gets the job done there must be a better way of doing it. Another thing that makes it visually unappealing is that it is just a text list rather than having any pictures.

The game does suffer from getting repetitive at points, particularly around Route 13 (routes are paths which take you from one town or city to the next) where you battle fourteen trainers in a row (adding up to a total of forty five Pokemon you need to defeat) and this is in part due to the fact that you're basically always either walking around or battling and after a while it does get slightly stale. But being a handheld game means that you obviously aren't supposed to play the game for hours on end. You're supposed to take your time, playing it in short bursts, but nevertheless it is a problem that it somewhat lacks variety.

The game doesn't offer any kind of end game content besides the objective of collecting all the Pokemon, but this task quickly becomes a chore and no one I have ever spoken to has ever successfully caught all one hundred and fifty (technically one hundred and fifty one) of them. The inclusion of side quests would have been great but unfortunately there aren't any. The only mini game sections are the Safari Zone and the Game Corner slot machines (which is a questionable thing to be included in a game aimed at kids) but the only reason to do either of these things is to get a Pokemon as a prize so it's not worth it unless your attempting to fully complete the game.

Another slight problem for me is that the overall message of the game is to not abuse Pokemon and to love them and look after them, this is shown in the way that your rival seeks power and loses because of it and in the way that Team Rocket are portrayed as evil for using Pokemon in a similar way. But the player character is just as bad because the only way they use Pokemon is for battling and traversing different terrain. Maybe a mechanic where you can feed them or clean them or something else would have been good to show that it isn't all about using Pokemon for your own personal gain. The game does attempt to show this in the way that some other characters interact with Pokemon (I.E. not riding them, battling them or forcing them to do manual labor) but this isn't reflected in the way the player uses Pokemon which takes away from the overall message.

Items found in the overworld are displayed as Poke Balls which make them stand out from the environments and other sprites. Later in the game is a section where Pokemon called Voltorb are accidentally battled because they look like Pokeballs and just sit on the floor so you approach them thinking they're items and then get a surprise when a battle starts. It's good stuff!

I mentioned earlier in the review that you could interact with other people who had different versions of the game in order to collect all the Pokemon and battle each other. This is done using a link cable which connects the two Game Boys to each other. This allows someone with Pokemon exclusive to one version to send them to another version and vice versa. This is essential if you want to collect all the Pokemon (and certain Pokemon only evolve if traded) but it does seem a little bit seedy looking back on it because it basically meant that people would pressure other people to get the game to help them complete it or alternatively buy both versions to have multiple saves (because the game doesn't allow multiple saves so the only way to do this would be to have another version). It seems a bit like they were condoning peer pressure, but I guess no one cares because everyone already had the Pokemon games anyway.

The battling using the link cable added another layer of interaction between players, it isn't just about working together to get all the Pokemon, it's about finding the right combination of Pokemon and training them to becoming powerful and use them to defeat each other. The battling system works in exactly the same way it does on the single player mode apart from you don't gain EXP for beating another player (presumably to avoid becoming too overpowered for certain sections of the single player).

Pokemon Centers can be used to heal your Pokemon (the Pokemon universe features a free health service), to manage your item box and Pokemon boxes using the PC and to start trading or battling with other players using a link cable (or wirelessly on the 3DS version).

Pokemon Red, Blue and Yellow are available on the 3DS Virtual Console and you would expect this would mean that the multiplayer aspect wouldn't function due to the link cable not being compatible with 3DS consoles. However the 3DS ports of these Pokemon games feature wireless trading and battling which simulates having a link cable plugged in. This can only be done via local play and not over the internet but it's still a great addition and makes things a lot easier than having to take a link cable everywhere you want to play the game.

The only other difference in the 3DS version is that Pokemon Red, Blue and Yellow are going to be (but aren't yet, at the time of writing this review) compatible with Pokemon Bank which means you'll be able to transfer the Pokemon you catch in the older games to the upcoming Pokemon Sun and Moon games. Pokemon Bank is a paid service that is only available via a subscription which may put some people off, but it's still good that Game Freak went to the effort of making them compatible with the service in order to keep the old games relevant to the newer games.

The 3DS also doesn't have a screen tint like the original Game Boy had, meaning the graphics appear more smooth and you can see them much more clearly.

Certain Pokemon abilities (such as 'Surf') can give you entry to previously inaccessible areas which normally contain hidden secrets such as items or even legendary Pokemon. 

The graphics in Pokemon Red, Blue and Yellow are actually very good despite it being on the Game Boy (and therefore being black and white and having a very limited amount of room to store game assets).

While in the overworld sections you'll be going from towns and villages to caves, fields, the sea, forests and several interior sections and all of them look quite distinct from each other which offers variety in gameplay and in the visuals. While I did find myself getting bored from a gameplay perspective at times, I never really found the game to get boring visually. It does reuse some assets and themes a lot but I feel like this is acceptable due to when the game came out and the system it was on.

The graphics while in battles are quite minimal, basically consisting of two static images on opposite sides of the screen to each other which have very primitive animation when performing an attack. You do have to use your imagination quite a lot in these sections but I actually kind of like that. While whats taking place on screen is sometimes quite dull the way that you perceive the simple animations make the battles seem like more than just two pictures standing still and shooting things at each other.

Having said that the battle graphics are quite minimal, what is impressive about them is that every single Pokemon in the game has a unique sprite and each one distinctly stands out from the next. A lot of people consider this game's Pokemon to be the best in the whole series and I can see why. The designs range from cute, to threatening, to outright weird and every one of them is great in their own way.

One of my favourite areas of the game is the S.S. Anne, just something about the theme, the music and the interactions with the characters makes it a stand out area for me.

Being on the Game Boy, the Pokemon games only use four buttons and the d-pad. This makes the control scheme very, very simple, but it doesn't need to be anything other than that. The A button is used as the interact button in the overworld and the select button in menus and in battles. The B button is never used as anything other than the back button, the Start button is used to pause the game and access the main menu while in the overworld and finally, the Select button is used to rearrange items while in the item menu.

The controls work perfectly for the most part but there is one thing I noticed which kept bugging me. For some reason when I was on a PC the controls were slightly delayed and it sometimes made me select the wrong thing or quit too many menus resulting in me needing to access the PC again and go through the same menus multiple times, and going through menus is already an annoying task without having to do it more than once.

The game's environments all look great, as well as looking different some also are mechanically different. For example the forest area progresses in a zig zag pattern while cave areas are mazes which feature random Pokemon encounters (you don't need to be in tall grass to come across them).

The music in Pokemon Red, Blue and Yellow is absolutely spot on. Obviously it sounds very basic by today's standards and sometimes it seems to struggle to play sound effects and music at the same time, resulting in this strange problem where the music loses some of its layers while the sound plays and then regains it's layers after the sound has finished, but like with most of the issues with the game, this is down to hardware limitations and isn't the game's fault.

The music itself ranges from being slow and relaxing like the Pallet Town theme, to upbeat and adrenaline pumping like the Gym battle theme, to mysterious and eerie like the Lavender Town theme to threatening and tension building like the Team Rocket Hideout theme. The music really helps to complement the visuals and helps to stop the game becoming boring. There's nothing the music does wrong at all. There are approximately 45 tracks in the game which is a hell of a lot when you consider it's a Game Boy game and when you also look at how big the game is already. You can't help but appreciate the game just based on how far it pushed the Game Boy.

There aren't that many examples of sound effects used in the game. I can't actually think of many at all in the overworld section, the obvious ones that spring to mind are the menu noise which is just a simple beep and the noise of a door opening which happens when you move to a new area. Most of the sound effects are in the battle sections where every Pokemon has a unique 'cry' which it does when entering the battle (to give it some personality) and each move a Pokemon performs makes a noise which makes damaging your opponent extra satisfying.

Near the start of the game you can see the entrance to the Indigo Plateau (where the Elite Four reside) but you can't access it because you don't have the gym badges. This keeps you wondering what's inside throughout the whole game and gives a sense of accomplishment when you finally gain entry.

Pokemon Red, Blue and Yellow are games which I'm sure most people reading this have already played, so you probably know how good they are already. They aren't just great games (that are particularly good for introducing people to the turn based RPG genre) but they're revolutionary in the way that they had a open world, one hundred and fifty playable characters (each with there own move sets and abilities) a good story with lots of memorable sections and accomplished all this on the Game Boy (which is a handheld console originally released in 1989). It's quite an incredible feat and it's no wonder it left such a mark on not only the gaming industry but the media industry as a whole.

Anyone that hasn't played the games before may be a little put off by the game's flaws in its menu systems and generally how it has dated in some aspects but if you give it a chance I don't think it would be hard to appreciate why Pokemon Red, Blue and Yellow were so much of a big deal as they were. If you think the games have dated too much you could also play Pokemon LeafGreen and FireRed which are remakes of Red and Blue and fix a lot of the original game's flaws, but if you want the true experience, you need to play the originals.

7/10

Pros
- Very deep battle mechanics with status effects, type weaknesses and strengths, different move sets, Pokemon evolutions and unique statistics for all one hundred and fifty Pokemon.
- Open world which rewards exploration by finding important items and information about the game's universe by talking to the the game's inhabitants.
- Even though the story isn't the primary focus it's quite competent and keeps you wanting to progress.
- Great graphics and music despite the obvious hardware limitations. The different areas you travel through all look visually different and this is reflected in the music and what kind of Pokemon you encounter while in these areas.
- The 3DS Virtual Console port is fantastic and no changes to the game have been made other than the wireless trading and battling. This and the fact the 3DS doesn't have a screen tint and has a back light on the screen technically make the 3DS version the best one to play.
- It's a great introduction to turn based RPGs because of the simple interface and controls and how it isn't overbearing with lots of complicated mechanics at the start of the game. You can play the whole game without an in depth understanding of the more detailed mechanics but the experience is enhanced if you take the time to learn about them.
- You get a lot of game time out of it despite it being on the Game Boy. In the playthrough I did for this review I spent 26 hours in the game and that's without catching all of the Pokemon (I caught 90 of them).

Cons
- Too much time is spent organising things in menus. Item storage in the PC should be infinite and when a Pokemon box becomes full it should automatically place them in a new box.
- It does become a bit repetitive after long sessions of play, you are fundamentally doing the same thing over and over again. The game isn't particularly varied.
- No side quests or optional objectives meaning that once you've finished the game there's nothing left to do aside from collect all the Pokemon which quickly becomes boring.
- Certain battle mechanics are dated, not being able to see EXP, not being able to see a description of what moves do and not being able to see if you've already caught a certain Pokemon while in a battle is quite annoying.
- The game's overarching message is somewhat hypocritical due to the fact the player is using Pokemon in more or less the same way the villains are.