Unironically better than any other pokemon game official or otherwise. Thats what happens when the super fans who know the games better than the people making them actually get to make the game.
On top of that almost all the designs being from rando anons across /vp/ just tickles me, thats adorable and despite not being a 4chan freak anymore its still the only time ill try to curb my gag reflex to call it 'soulful.' Oh yeah, right. 4chan
Its irreverent and offensive in the most 4chan way possible, pure apathy for the emotions of others for the lels to top all else, like having the de-facto HM 'slave' be, well ill give you three guesses. Not actively evil but i can understand how that 14 year old style humor can be a massive turn off for people who didnt unfortunately grow up in that space. Tho personally i can stomach the gross reminders for what still feels loving to the community who let it happen at its core with most of the references to the culture not being offensive and just being cool to see in an environment like this. The design of Foryu still gets me and tentaquil just being there makes me smile. Fucking notridley are you kidding.
Again, even if you arent a weirdo you can still find enjoyment out of this if you just want a hard pokemon game that makes you think and is still fair. You even get a chance after the elite 4 going into the orange islands equivalent to massively switch up your team comp so you can really see how much this game has to offer in terms of battling, which gamefreak has fallen short on for the past who even knows how long at this point.

What a complete shit this game is.

I wasn't too happy with my initial review. Copping out my conflictions by refusing to rate a game I know that even half a star is too generous a rating. Just because I like the gameplay doesn't mean I should cloud my my judgement.

I remember when I first played this game. It was just after my 18th birthday, and I thought games that were full of offensive and edgy humor were what you were supposed to play as an adult. I had friends saying how cool this game was. Needless to say I was a reactionary chud, and I did like this game back then, even if some stuff was too much for me. I let everything slide because "mechanics good" and I liked some designs. Honestly my memories of this game continue to gaslight me to some extent, but I try to move past that.

Yes, game is fun, but even in the gameplay there was stuff that made me uncomfortable. When trainer classes and pokemon designs are meant solely to make fun of minorities, as someone who is a minority themself, I have a hard time laughing. I can't simply "turn off brain" and "enjoy things" when said things prepetuate such harmful mindsets. Even if they're passing jokes, they normalize hate and can snowball into thinking these ideas are ok.

For every mon I think genuinely works as a fakemon, there's a nazi furnace. For every meme I think is funny, there's a ones that lack taste. For god's sake the default name for the male protag is french for rape. Yes, I'm offended, and yes I'm a soy leftist crybaby tr*nny who uses tumblr and twitter; I literally made this review because someone told me to cry about it on my previous one.

I could have just said "good gameplay doesn't excuse hate", but this review isn't for backloggd, it's for myself. I needed to tell myself to let this game go. It's not like there aren't good Pokemon games official or not, and I shouldn't let myself rot as I try to figure out if this game should be praised or bashed.

The game may be made with passion, but it was not made with love.

Went into this expecting pure garbage, i remembered hearing about it years prior, and went into it completely blind.
The core pokemon gameplay this hack has to offer is incredibly well crafted and consistent throughout, its very clear a lot of thought was put into game balance and difficulty, which is great for more experienced players.
The main issue i have is pretty much the same as the other reviewers, its that the game takes the 4chan bit way too far at times, to the point of being genuinely upsetting for some. I didn't think many of the jokes were in good taste either.
HOWEVER, looking past some of the shitty political views this game perpetuates, is one of the most entertaining and engaging rom hacks i have played. The adventure and its conclusion alone made the entire game feel worthwhile, the incredible soundtrack, sprite work, and in game locations felt amazing when it all came together, and only got even more amped up towards the end. If overworld exploration is something you enjoy this game has a hell of a lot of it to offer.
im not defending the edgy humor, but give the game a shot, look at it like something spawned from chaos rather than made to cause harm.

A highly offensive Pokemon ROM Hack filled with references to 4chan memes, most of them outdated by now. There's even a special pokeball that works better for offensive designs.
Of particular note is that all the original 386 creatures have been swapped by new ones with completely different design, typing, moves, etc. Pretty much all of them are comedic in nature, but they actually took the time to make them competitive and fill a specific niche. The attention to detail that went into creating nearly 400 of them can't be understated.
This game also implements a ridiculous amount of quality of life features and design elements from increased difficulty mods. You would think something like this would be merely a vehicle for offensive jokes and references, but it's not, it's actually good. Great, even.
I also have to mention the music because there are plenty of original tracks too and they are all winners in my opinion, my personal favorite is the Team Karma theme. On a similar note, many of the original characters have been replaced by new trainers with their own story and motivation. The post game in particular is very extensive and fleshes out the world a lot.
To conclude, I personally found this game hilarious for the most part and very fun overall. It's also doomed to niche status by its highly offensive nature, I'm surprised it's even listed in this site. However, I have a high tolerance for intolerance so I don't mind it, I think Pokemon Clover is great.

It might just be a sign that I've spent a bit too much time on anonymous message boards, but the humor didn't really bother me all that much.

An astounding labor of love by a highly insular community for said highly insular community. The amount of unique content on offer here is staggering, featuring 386 fakemon and a massive postgame. What really makes Clover stand out among the mountains of mediocre hacks is it's balance. Rom sites are littered with projects titled something like "radical opal" substituting bloated stat totals for difficulty. Clover presents a legitimate challenge for hardcore fans without sacrificing the viability of a casual playthrough.

Highly recommended to just about anyone with an interest in competitive pokemon.

This romhack has some features and overall region direction that would put it in the upper tier of Pokemon romhacks ever if it wasn't the most reddit fucking thing on the planet. Like, even during early stages of this romhack's development, the humor felt decrepit. It isn't even a thing I can suggest you play through and just ignore the unfunny parts, because so much of this game's design is baked into "isn't rickrolling someone funny?"

People have complained that it's offensive and in bad taste, and they're right to do so. I also like Deadly Premonition 2, and that game makes JK Rowling look like Leslie Feinberg. If it's funny, I'll bite. None of the jokes in this humorous romhack land. There isn't a "Oh, if they just went back to the drawing board, this might not have been a total shitshow", because that would imply a 2016 /vp/ could come up with a better bit than "what if we replaced the gym leader's battle theme with sandstorm". So much collective effort and time went into a project that probably never stood a chance.

One of the best Pokemon games I've played despite being fanmade. The sprite work for all of the designs is consistently well done and hilarious, and all of the Pokemon are designed to have at least decent stats and move pools. The routes are true gauntlets full of plenty of trainers to keep your team in shape. The added quality-of-life improvements, such as the EXP share and revisions to HMs, all make the game feel very fair, despite its steep difficulty curve. It will test you in a way no official game does, but it is completely doable and well worth the time.

The 5-stars on this one is very genuine. No meme, no joke, no bullshit: I fully believe this game deserves the rating. Not only is it what I now consider to be my favourite Pokemon fangame, but also what I would say is the BEST Pokemon fangame. This game is honestly peak ROM hacking which I didn't expect from what is at the offset, and at it's core, a silly cringe-worthy 4Chan homage. But the word homage rings very true here, because despite mocking Pokemon itself and those who take it too seriously this is an honest love-letter to fans of the series with many a community reference and wonderfully balanced gameplay that provides a tough but fair challenge which reasonably scales along the journey.

But this game has a reputation which I cannot just ignore here, can I? As already mentioned, Pokemon Clover is a homage to 4Chan and was made by numerous anons from the /vp/ board across years of collective work. Starting life as a simple FireRed edit the game has developed over it's nearly 10 year lifecycle to become what it is today; I can't admit to having played any of these older versions of the game but I was aware of it for most of it's developmental lifespan. I never thought a whole lot of it back then as I had mainly come to know it as "the ROM made by a bunch of fans at once" which alone was a cool concept... but I guess I just never looked into it much more than that. A bit of a shame, but better late than never with this one.

Of course the one thing most people will bring up with this game is the 4Chan aspect, which is very well reflected in the game's tone. Both the creature designs and the humour of the game world. To start with the former, I understand that there are absolutely offensive designs here with many of their basis being abnormal, memes, itself offensive, or in-jokes. However, unlike most edgy/"offensive" ROM hacks I feel Clover does something incredibly well with the creature designs; making them work as actual Pokemon. Your typical edgy-era hack would just put in crudely draw genitals and nazi symbols as "creatures" and call it a day, but the Clover devs really ran with the concepts given and made creatures that- although obviously based on things that wouldn't be on the table for the official games -still look like believable Pokemon. I'm dead serious and I WILL die on this hill, because it's a very valid point. Yeah, names like Furnazi kinda spell out the reference for you but divorced from the name/basis it really does look like an official Pokemon; likewise for Finasoven, the thing it evolves into. Lizakbar and Vandash are perhaps too closely on-the-nose to be justifiably real but still work as creature designs despite that, rather than "let's put in an Osama Bin Laden PNG" or "let's draw blackface on an NPC sprite" which would've been the lazier and cheaper route to get shock factor in there. Then you get the unsubtle designs like Rainglock, Barbarkley, Motherfuck/Hofucno... and especially Kuklux/Kuklan. But dare I say these few unsubtle designs being the exception make them work? ...let me explain; the game builds itself up as having Pokemon based on various edgy/offensive/random concepts, only to then chuck out something like Motherfuck or Kuklux at you out of nowhere. The sudden appearance of these very blatant designs is what makes them humorous, offensive or otherwise. There are then Pokemon designs that aren't even offensive at all and are just genuinely cool ideas for creatures with amazing spritework to bring them to life: The Clovermon selection is a brilliant spread of cringy, offensive, straight-up cool, and everything in-between. It's absolutely wonderful and I loved discovering it throughout my playtime.

For the writing/game world, yeah. What the hell else would you expect from a game like this... basically nothing is off-the-table: If you exist, no doubt some part of your existence is going to be made fun of in this game. And here's the thing, here's my spicy hot-take. I don't mind it; I don't think it's as offensive as people make out; I don't think it existing is wrong, either. Yeah there absolutely are very dated and unfunny lines in this game, I cannot and won't deny that. The second city is a 'feminazi' dig after all, something that hasn't been relevant in years. But it's important to consider the timeline of this game's development, as well as how everyone gets made fun of here. I will emphasize again: EVERYONE gets made fun of here. There are lines of text that insult the game itself, for fuck's sake. I am part of one of the marginalized groups that is mocked in this game and yet I didn't take offense to it despite having received legit harassment before (face-to-face, in the real world, not someone sending petty online messages). Not all of it made me laugh, but there were points where it got me either because it was unexpected or because despite the over exaggerations it felt relatable in a sense. And that's something I think is important, being able to laugh at yourself. If this game was all "haha n-word" and saying gay people should die or whatever, yeah it'd absolutely cross the line from funny to plain offensive. This game not only makes fun of literally everyone, not only exaggerates things to an often unreal degree, but lampshades itself constantly. The neo-nazis for example are portrayed as being right because that's how they see themselves, yet are given trainer names that insult them for being obviously in the wrong. The merchants (no prize for guessing what these are reskinned to be) are constantly around tinfoil-hat NPCs who spout total bull pretty much every point in the game. The gym leader who is literally a nazi gets to have a spot of development by showing how his beliefs came from his bad upbringing and how he's considering a change for the obviously better. The overall writing in this game isn't top-tier or anything, but to write it all off as just being pointlessly offensive isn't exactly correct either. It's edgy, it's shameless, it takes no prisoners; Clover does make fun of people, absolutely. But it does more than just yell slurs at minorities. It goes after everyone, including itself, the people who made it, the people who are playing it, with hyperbolic humour. Whether or not this humour is for you is another question, and if it's not? More power to you. The game does warn you upfront though that the game is going to be edgy/offensive, if Googling it alone somehow didn't give you an idea of what to expect. It's not like it's tricking you into playing an offensive game.

So far all I've really done is defend what I see being the most attacked parts of the game. And honestly I will die on these hills, the game is obviously offensive but it's not promoting an agenda. Whether or not some of the hundreds of anonymous contributors held any kind of beliefs is not for us to know, but a few rotten eggs in this case wouldn't (or shouldn't) taint the entire product. Because it's quite obvious to me that the intent isn't to spread actual hatred; if anyone played this game and had their own sick thoughts "justified" from that, then they would've already been looking for that approval from literally anywhere else. The fault lies on the individual, not the game openly mocking people who believe such things. I digress, though... the serious talk is all well and good. But this is a game, not a political debate. How does the game part of this game hold up?

...well it's Pokemon, big surprise. But with a whole roster of brand-new monsters it really does feel like stepping into a new official release, albeit with this thing most of the main games don't know; challenge. Pokemon Clover features a really great difficulty curve that although starting off as your standard Pokemon fare will gradually turn into making use of EV-trained teams with idealistic moves and items, whilst never once leaving you feeling like you're lagging behind. The game especially takes advantage of this by having its first half not require any serious EV-training of your own, whilst heavily encouraging it in the second half. At the same time however the game makes training-up a competitive grade team incredibly easy very early into this portion of the game, with it being theoretically doable even before then if you're determined enough to max-out a certain Pokemon earlier on. Better still, this game is built around trial-and-error with you expected to lose most major fights at least once before acquiring a victory. Unlike most other difficulty ROM hacks, too, these eventual victories feel satisfying. Playing around with all the new Pokemon to find what works for specific matchups is incredibly fun, with training them up taking no time at all too it's easy to just pop on some background noise as you grind-up a new team member before setting back off into battle and see how your new crew matches-up. Most of this, for me, came during the first half of the game and primarily around the last three gym leaders who ended up exposing some bad type coverage in my team building. Yet all I did was try out a couple new members (two of whom ended up staying for the rest of this part of the game) and found success not long after, rather than being actually roadblocked for what felt like ages because the AI would cheat or have items/Pokemon obviously better than my own. The game actually tests you with engaging team designs, encouraging you to mess around with the options presented before you and using your brain for tactical play. It'll gradually ease you into the tougher battles whilst still giving a nice sprinkle of challenge earlier on without making you feel like you're losing due to bullshit, the game keeps you pretty much on-par with your opponents as much as it can.

For me the best part of this game's difficulty was felt in the second half of it all, where despite things being generally tougher than the first half of the game? I managed to pretty consistently stick with just one team of six that I bred-up. I'd argue few of the Pokemon on said team could be considered exceptionally great, too, especially my water of choice (Substarr). Yet I still got through the game's harshest battles using the team I liked best, because the game wasn't throwing dick moves or unstoppable mountains at me. The game is engaging, satisfying, and rewarding: But most importantly, it's FUN. Pokemon Clover is one of the most fun monster-taming RPGs I've played and ranks up as perhaps the most fun Pokemon experience so far, really only challenged by the Gamecube titles and Emerald Rogue. This is not to dismiss the other mainline Pokemon entries, but as far as games which are instantly memorable for their challenges and how I loved overcoming them? Colo/XD, Emerald Rogue, and now Clover rank as the cream of the crop for me. Of these... I would say Clover is most likely my favourite, considering by the end of the game I had half a box full of backup team members from how many I loved using and swapping-around. This game put a ton of effort into making so many of the Pokemon interesting with not just their (sometimes questionable) designs, but their kits; the type combos, moves both custom and canon, and likewise for abilities. My first team consisted of about eight or nine members swapped in-and-out, with a number of others used for early-/mid-game progression before being replaced, and my second team being more or less a consistent new six Pokemon that I'd caught, bred, and trained-up. This, however, says nothing of the number of Pokemon I wish I could've used and still want to use in future runs of the game. There are so many interesting ones I considered using but eventually settled on a group I became properly attached to, it's a really great feeling and does end up being reminiscent of an official Pokemon experience in that regard. Just exploring this big new world full of unique monsters, finding which ones are your favourites. I can't say enough how fun this game is, because fuck me sideways it's absolutely top-tier stuff.

Graphically this game is absolutely incredible considering this is a fan-project and running on the GBA hardware. I have seen some of the past sprites and despite looking far more rough once upon a time, the version of the game I played had basically nonstop graphical euphoria. Seriously, this is one of the most authentic looking fangames that I've ever seen. The trainer sprites and Pokemon sprites both fit the GBA style to an absolute T with the artists making the absolute most of the GBA's limited sprite sizes whilst still making visually distinct sprites with plenty of life and detail. I of course think of the dabbing youngster sprite whilst typing this sentence out, but in all fairness it is perhaps the best dabbing youngster sprite I've seen. For real though this game is graphically amazing from the creatures, to the trainers, to the backgrounds, tilesets, move effects, dialogue portraits... not everything is 100% original of course but the majority of this stuff obviously is. It's wonderful to see how much care was given to what really could've been a crappily-drawn meme game and it adds so much charm to the experience that I simply cannot gush about it enough.

Story is where this game both did and didn't surprise me. Going in, I didn't really have any story expectations considering this is a 4Chan game. The main villains being a Reddit expy was comically expectant though and I do like how they manage to be stupid goofballs whilst also somehow managing actual impact on the game's events, showing a level of competence despite making Team Star look like actual villains. Coming to a head with a boss showdown that manages to build itself up as something bigger, then get resolved right after with the kind of humour expected at this point in the game. But what did surprise me? How they managed to make these reddit wannabes into something far, far more interesting and a legitimate threat by the second half of the game. Not only that but calling attention to how nonsensical their actions were and describing them as such; it's a great surprise that layers on actual intrigue, especially since until now this is an evil team whose highlights include trying to steal something open-source and housing two weak fodder grunts that randomly shout a gamer word before battle. The fact that the game could make this same villain team into an actual threatening force but an interesting villainous presence, with the elites of this group serving as some of the most challenging, interesting, and fun fights in the entire game. How these guys get their story concluded is really nice as well, having a real-stakes final fight that itself is another fun challenging yet fun battle with incredible music behind it all. Yet despite this, the game never truly loses it's roots as being a primarily funny experience. It has genuine moments for sure but the most of this game- including the post-defeat speech of the main antagonist -carries a humorous tone that is primarily consistent. It takes a little to fully get into gear, but when it gets going it feels like one big enjoyable ride. Whether or not you find it funny is another story; objectively, though, it keeps the tone up really well despite wanting to tell more of an actual story during the latter portions of the playtime.

The soundtrack... yes the soundtrack here was (as far as I know) primarily made by some of the guys behind SiIvaGunner so meme remixes are rampant, and for the GBA they fit really really well. They are remixed pretty much flawlessly for the console limitations, without bastardizing any of them (the first gym battle music- Darude Sandstorm -is a perfect example). All of this despite me not really caring for the SiIvaGunner project; I do genuinely enjoy and appreciate their contributions here though. Not only are the remixes great, but so SO many original tracks are earworm material with how well composed and catchy they are. Always suiting the situation they're used for, being great to hum along with if that's your thing too. Battle themes are especially notable for this, with the Shadow Council theme being one I've gone back to so frequently despite hearing it five times in one sitting. Something like that is how you know you've struck gold, having a player wanting to obsessively listen to your soundtrack after they've already been hearing it for ours on end. Full props to everyone who contributed their musical talents, because there are very few songs I didn't care for. So many songs got me hyped-up, a lot of sudden meme remixes got actual laughs out of me when they appeared, and my work playlist got a fuckton bigger because of this game. Give it a listen... or play the game to hear it all in context. Either works.

I already said it at the start of this lengthy behemoth of a review. But this game is overall fantastic, easily what I consider the best Pokemon fangame and currently my favourite one too. The big fuss with this game is surrounding the content within it, but after having it hyped up I really was left asking "Is that it?" because all-in-all it wasn't anything outstandingly offensive. Maybe my unfortunate real-world exposures have left my senses simply fucked, but I really can't think of anything that genuinely made me go "Damn that's gonna hurt someone". It's a Pokemon game with embarrassing humour and designs that range from awesome to Kuklan, this is the kind of thing where you just have to embrace it and realize- as said -it IS just a game at the end of the day. If you're getting legitimately angry or offended over a game that openly advertises itself as having lowbrow humour, then quite frankly I don't think you have the right priorities in life. Feel free to have your own opinion of course: You can dislike this game, I have no issues there. But disliking it and being hurt or offended by it are completely different things.

I love this game so, so much. Far more than I ever expected to; I went in thinking it'd be just an alright but fun game with some stanky humour, but got one of the best Pokemon experiences to date. It is so shameless that I can't help but laugh along with the funny moments, or cringe-up at the shameful/edgy moments. And I do feel like that was at least half of the intent on part of the team behind this monolithic project, considering the origins behind it and all. If you're a fan of Pokemon and can tolerate, ignore, or enjoy this kind of humour then I 100% recommend this game to you. This is an absolute gem of a game that deserves to be known as more than just "the offensive 4Chan game", because it has so clearly gone above and beyond that original premise to become something truly special. It is absolutely packed with content, and I completed it all. Pokemon Clover is such a special piece of work, such an amazing video game experience, that for the first time in years I was compelled to complete the Pokedex all the way. This game is a golden nugget, a crown jewel, an absolute diamond of fangames. And as my log dates show, I did sit on this review for a while because I had so much to say and so much to think on. Even retrospectively, this game really sticks out as something truly great in my mind.

Despite going the completionist route, I still didn't want to put this one down when I was finished with it. One more time now... I fucking loved this game. Will absolutely be replaying it again in future, for many years to come. Godspeed, Clover devs. Thanks for all your hard work.

the references are dated
the humor is fucking embarrassing
the fakemon designs juvenile
the people behind it are questionable
the update releases are glacial
yet its still somehow the best pokemon game ever made

Ugh.

This mod is mechanically very sound, the game itself is much tougher than traditional Pokemon games, and some of the jokes in it were actually funny (there's an NPC in the first Pokemon Center that made me laugh harder than I've laughed at a video game in quite a while). It's clear that Squeetz and co. put a lot of time into the game, and the quality-of-life changes added are solid.

I'm having fun with it, but I can't in good conscience recommend playing this shit.

I spent a lot of time in high school and college browsing 4chan, time I wish I did something else with instead. I learned a lot about memes and internet culture, and I'm grateful for that at least. But the edgy "offensive" humor that's present in this mod mostly just makes me cringe more than anything. I'm a big fan of juvenile humor (see: the entirety of Beavis & Butthead) but I don't know about this one.

Credit where credit is due though, there's a Pokemon in this game that's just a Graveler that they slapped Golbat wings and a Kadabra mustache on and called it "Motherfuck"