At the time of review I'm taking a break from the game in the final tier of postgame (groudon gauntlet can suck my dick). I think it's safe to say that this is my favorite pokemon fangame and maybe the best pokemon game. Everything in the game for the most part is lined out to teach you how to be a better pokemon player, to learn and grow. It's really cool to see a pokemon game that forces you to interface with every aspect of the combat system rather than just building a team of blorbos and rolling the entire game. It's an insanely compelling rpg and unfortunately it does kind of lose steam at the end. Tbh the entirety of Episode 19 up until the postgame feels like a dud and the postgame doesn't exactly salvage the story unless you really like Lin. I do not. I think Lin is really annoying in adult form and really really annoying in kid form and the entire last quarter of the game focusing on how cool she is really takes a lot of the wind out of the story's sails. Despite this gripe, it's still a fantastic game, it just doesn't really stick the landing. If you do plan to play it I can recommend a few passwords that'll give you the "legit" reborn experience without sacrificing your sanity.
-easyhms
-hardcap
-flatevs
First two are pretty self explanatory and should be uncontroversial. The third removes the hackmon stat buff given to certain fights later in the game (also mainly in e19) that imo is not very fun to deal with. Can't recommend enough for anyone who wants a pokemon game that will kill them.

I love the custom shinies and the increased shiny rate. Lots of them look way better than the OG shinies. I like the storyline, even if it is a bit edgy.
What I don't like is the difficulty. I got to the 3rd gym leader and I've never been able to beat her. I get wrecked every time I try. Badly. You can't level your mons up, either, because they hit the disobedient level right at the gym level.
The game needs an easy mode, or at least a normal mode. It is stuck on hard mode right now.

EDIT: So, uh, apparently there IS an easy mode using a password. Epic. I updated my review.

I used to hate this game when I first completed it when EP19 came out with a friend. It was tedious, the puzzles were more infuriating than fun and the fields felt less like a gimmick and more just a win more for certain opponents.

However I think nowadays this is actually the best Pokemon fangame to date. There are problems here and there that are unavoidable but it's also partly a product of it's time.

While I don't know if this should be allowed, I'm going to talk in this review with the AllGen mod in mind and some other QoL mods in mind. Since that's how I'm getting my replay value and imo is the best way to experience this game.

Story is actually pretty okay, I used to think it was shit but considering what it started out as I think it did a good job. That doesn't mean it's perfect though, there's a lot of characters who only get their development postgame and the story feels incomplete partly without playing that. However considering what they were trying to do, put a more dark spin on the Pokemon formula they succeeded, ofcourse there were still "cringe" escue elements but atleast it's not like Insurgence or generic like most other fangames which don't even try.

Characters are probably the biggest weak point of this game. The main cast and side characters actually feel pretty strict until Gym 9 or so where they introduce like 10+ characters at once whom also are hard to sometimes to tell apart. So at times it can feel like there's multiple copies of the same character on the screen.

Honestly the highlight here has to be Cain who doesn't even feel like he should be in this game. He's like a joke character who one of the developers snuck in trying to make fun of the game by being as disconnected from the narrative as possible but then you remember he exists cause his dialogue is absolute garbage. Which is explained a bit more postgame but I don't think it's valid reasoning. He's simultaneously the best and worst character. Speaking about postgame, the fact that so many characters backstory is relegated to it is a bit unfortunate but it is what it is. Sigmund for example is probably one of my favourite characters but you don't really get any of his motivations till midway postgame, so your essentially grasping at straws and he just feels like someone who does things cause they needed such a character in the story till then.

Battles are mostly balanced, there's some fields that are pretty bullshit though, mostly the fairy field. I think most other fields are fair with maybe the exception of any which lower speed if your not flying or water. Cause they essentially force u to always be slower. Field transitions are healthy for the game though, it's just unfortunate that often they are extremely specific to achieve.

Pokemon wise, basegame includes up till gen 7 which is a decent roster. If u play with AllGen which is the definitive experience in my opinion. You'll be seeing pretty much every pokemon appear in some way. (7.2a at the time of this review includes every pokemon) plus custom content which is always a plus. Custom megas in that mod also exist and dynamax forms are also added to give more spice to your team. The Future of AllGen all in all is looking pretty promising with Tera on the horizon and the development of the AG switches to make the game even more difficult.

Visually the game is pretty good, had me suprised sometimes even on how the sprites for the legendaries are rendered so well in postgame. My only complaint visually is probably the characters, often from top down they look very samey if their hair colour is the same.

OST is phenomenal. I didn't actually realize how many of the infuriating puzzles in this game are atleast doable cause the music keeps you going. There's a ton of original soundtrack which is well made, "Splash" for example pretty much saves that entire sewer area. "Crystal" is a great track if given time to build up. Not to mention the many amazing battle songs. "Umbral" and "Elite 4 Battle" to mention a few. Some of the tracks are remixes of some other Pokemon games but they're far and between.

Overall I can't believe I'm giving this a 4.5* years later. Probably one of the most solid Pokemon experiences you can find assuming you can deal with some of the puzzles. At worst u can just use wallhacks on subsequent playthroughs.

Quickly overtook Pokemon White and Pokemon Conquest in being a fav Pokemon game. Gives you so many options and so many opportunities to try new things, especially for me, someone who had competitive pokemon. Reborn is geared towards high-level play, but with a couple easy mode options enabled I found it perfect for my experience. I hate how easy basic Pokemon games are, and I hate playing Pokemon Showdown, and this ended up sinking right in between both of those in difficulty level.

That isn't even to mention the incredible plot, too! Aside from like- a handful of eyerolling interactions, this is incredibly well-written and makes it's eccentricities rlly fun to engage with. Imagine all the god awful shit you'd expect from something that's an "edgy, mature Pokemon game". Now imagine that shit actually written well. It's genuinely a shock any of it 'works' as well as it does! Stuff like murder, divorces, and animal abuse, which should in any other case come off like an awful attempt at edgelord-ism, actually turns out rather emotionally engaging. I got pretty emotional at points, even! How fucking wild is that!?

And that isn't even touching the post-game stuff. Supposedly, it's gonna be a tough time. I'm so excited to try it soon! For now, I'll remain just the Reborn City champion. Finished the game with Rotten (Skuntank), DIsh (Klinklang), Meals (Aggron), Chicken Parm (Galvantula), Breakfast (Walrein), and Eggshell (Kricketune).

Victory road and honestly the entire second half of this game was dragged through shit. The story whilst not being great in the beginning had potential but just turned into this mess of introducing trans characters with different hair colors for a statement rather then trying to make likable characters.

Terrains while initially seeming like a good idea and can be a fun gimmick early on. The developers went too hard with this gimmick and started making terrains which straight up are unfair in so many ways (Primarily water gym). I wouldn't mind adjusting my strategies in this game. But the lack of any type of legit training areas makes this impossible, i don't know how this wasn't considered whilst making the game considering the sheer difficulty. The game wouldn't even be difficult if it weren't for the terrains.

Incase it matters, i played this through EP17 to EP19

The only positive i can give this game is the fact that the redrawn/recolored shinies look very good.

A fun ROM hack with interesting gameplay mechanics. I like the fact that it's made me use pokémon I wouldn't usually choose and it's been really fun, especially with the added difficulty that a lot of fangames don't pull off as well as this one does. I like the control scheme and how easy it is to actually play with a mouse and keyboard, as most ROM hacks are tedious to play without a controller. Also, I think it's a neat detail that shiny pokémon are more common. It makes sense from a story standpoint and it can make your team just that little bit more interesting—I wish more ROM hacks did things like this!

However, that's mostly where my praise for it ends.

The graphics are inconsistent with different art styles clashing due to the combination of original sprites and assets from official games. The music of all the wards I've been to so far use the exact same looping motif which leads to you hearing what is essentially the same song playing on loop for hours and hours on end. I've tried looking for ways to change the music in the game as I'd still like to play with sound, but there's no easy way to do that as far as I can tell.

The dialogue is needlessly edgy to the point of being cringeworthy and just comes across like it's trying way too hard. It feels like this game is dark for the sake of being quirky, rather than subtly crafting an immersive environment that makes the tone feel natural. This kind of theme could have been done so much better if the dialogue wasn't so lacking and if the characters were more compelling and three-dimensional.

I do intend on finishing it regardless—I've sunk too much of my life into this game to not see it to the end, and despite my complaints I have actually enjoyed my experience so far. Hopefully it just has a slow start and it'll pick up in quality further on in the story; I really do want this game to be good. It's an incredibly ambitious project and I admire the developers a lot despite the game's flaws.

De longe, foi e ta sendo a melhor experiência com pokemon, fugindo dos jogos tradicionais, e também das hack rom's e fã games (sim galera, existe uma diferença entre as 2 coisas, hack rom's usam o ''esqueleto'' do game original, para fazer edições no jogo, de forma limitada por conta do tamanho do jogo, enquanto isso, fã games usam o ''esqueleto'' como ideia, mas não necessariamente o jogo original, assim tendo mais liberdade de adicionar novas coisas e mecânicas ao game) e lembrar que comecei a jogar por volta de 2016~2017, e só agora o jogo veio a ficar completo, foram 5 anos jogando e jogando esse jogo sem se cansar, fiz a proeza de jogar por bastante tempo, igual ao jogos originais, me fez reacender o gosto pela franquia novamente, porque depois de black e white 2, fiquei enjoado de como os jogos originais são ''fáceis'', somente restando o competitivo (coisa que na época eu não gostava muito, mas cheguei a jogar o competitivo da segunda geração), mas quando joguei reborn, as coisas mudaram, como o jogo foge do tradicional de ser fácil, aqui você ao menos tem que saber o básico de natures e iv's, porque caso contrário, certas lutas ficam ridiculamente difíceis de passar, e talvez seja uma barreira para jogadores casuais (mas é uma parada bem fácil de aprender e executar no jogo), e ai eu comecei a me interessar pelo competitivo do jogo também, porque uma coisa puxou a outra, no final só tenho que agradecer ao jogo por ter me aberto mais uma janela de uma das minhas franquias favoritas.

Falando um pouco do jogo, ele usa a terceira geração na gameplay, com sprites da quinta geração (o jogo até o momento tem pokemons até alola, com sprites e variações de regiões próprias), e com o sistema de lutas da 7 geração (mega evoluções e mega movimentos), também possui fakemons (graças ao deuses que eles somente são usados como lutas de chefões, então nada de bizarrice pro nosso lado kkkk), aqui executaram algo que está presente no anime/mangá, as lutas nos campos de batalha afetam bastante pokemons e ataques, tornando pokemons/ataques fracos, em verdadeiro poder destrutivo, então não fique surpreso se por exemplo, um volbeat depois de usar um Tail Glow, sair destruindo o seu time, mesmo que você tenha vantagem na tipagem, então não é supresa que pokemons/moves fortes, ficam ainda mais fortes do que nunca, também não fique surpreso em usar pokemons que você não gosta/ligava, o jogo te forçar a buscar novas estratégias pra poder seguir na história, e quebra o conceito de usar somente 6 pokemons principais+ 2 hm ''slavers'' como fazemos nos jogos comuns, então você vai ter uma experiência de usar várias estratégias em pontos chaves do jogo, mas ainda da pra manter o uso dos seus pokemons favoritos. O jogo conta com 18 ginásios, fora quests secundárias (sério procure fazer todas), exploração de mapas, puzzles bons e ruins, tornam a experiência bem única pra cada pessoa, o jogo atende bem as demandas de quem se cansou dos jogos tradicionais. A história é legalzinha, tem os seus momentos legais, e uns outros... que eu particularmente, acho bem m*** ou chato, vide quando somos puxados para essas situações, sem opção de escolha, aos dramas e problemas de alguns personagens, e sim o jogo tem escolhas que fazem certos personagens gostarem ou te odiar ao longo da história do jogo, afetando certos eventos nele. O jogo possui um modo online, não igual ao showdown e o jogo original, podemos lutar/fazer trocas, diretamente com alguém ou com pessoas aleatórias, mas não podemos colocar filtros de escolhas, na hora de lutar ou trocar (claro a não ser que tu combine antes com alguém diretamente que tu for lutar ou trocar), também não podemos ficar de espectador em lutas avulsas, mas felizmente ainda passa minimamente, o sentimento de experiência dos jogos originais.

Depois de escrever essa muralha de texto, 2 avisos rápidos pra não deixar o texto mais longo, o jogo tem possibilidade de jogar no celular (não testei particularmente), e também possui mods, pra deixar ele mais fácil e direto (*no sentido de quem ja jogou várias vezes e quer adiantar certas partes do jogo), ou até mesmo mais difícil, mas recomendo que não use mods na primeira vez que for jogar, pra não ter uma experiência afetada com a facilidade que os mods trazem.