Was this game flawed? Absolutely! The environments are pretty generic looking and the visuals can be kinda muddy at times. The story, while actually very good for a Pokémon game, still leaves a bit to be desired as far as complexity goes. The endgame is very grindy, which sucks as some of the best content is locked behind that grind.

Still, even with all that in my mind, and knowing that there are probably more issues I could list, this game went too hard in actually making good on the idea of Pokémon that I just have to overlook them. As someone who has played this series for practically my whole life, being actually able to go out in the virtual wilderness and track down Pokemon that are actually roaming around just felt like the realization of what the initial games were going for. The fact that this actually shakes up the gameplay of the series itself (which was getting a bit too stale, hate to admit) is the cherry on top. And it's actually legitimately challenging at points too!

When I think about all that (and the shiny Togekiss, Lucario, and Hisuian Typhlosion I caught in this game lmao), it's hard for me not to give this 5 stars. I see why it isn't on that level for everyone, but for me, it totally is, and I only stopped playing this because I basically ran out of things to do in it.