Quick and dirty HG/SS release thoughts

Normally Pokemon games get their street dates shattered about a week before release, but Heart Gold and Soul Silver managed to go until the day before release before getting squirted out to the teeming masses.

And between Smogon, Serebii and Pokebeach, we now know 80% of what's going to show up in an FAQ sometime around April of 2010. There's some things I like about the remakes... but the amount of sickening fanservice in this game makes me wonder just how far shoved up their nostalgic ass we have to go.

First...
The things I like:









The Gravity tutor.

Legends and even STARTERS from previous generations available. Now all we need is the Ruby/Sapphire dongle Pokemon catchable.

Gym Leader fights that pose a challenge, assuming we can ever get to them.

The delicious tears that flow because people STILL haven't figured out the easy mode to beat Whitney's Miltank (it's called Geodude, guys...)

Being able to rape the game in half and stuff it through a mailbox (IGN.com) with the Origin Form Giratina learning everything before L50. (Even Aura Sphere.) If you have a Movie Arceus, this game is officially a speedrunner's dream.

Aqua Jet/Belly Drum Azumarill being legal for a few hours (then again, this happens every time).

Death to the Defog HM. (Of course, Whirlpool... yeah...)

Togepi not only has an attack when you hatch it... it's Extrasensory.

Kanto is actually a usable continent, pending the release of the wild Pokemon locations.

The things I can do without:

The Gym rosters staying largely the same or regressing (see: Whitney). Couldn't they have at least given Bugsy Ledian and Spinarak? And Clair getting Gyarados just makes it easy mode.

Pokemon following me. And it sounds like you can't turn it off. I'm sorry, I just found that annoying in Yellow (and evolved my rats as soon as they learned Thunderbolt so I could get rid of the things) and now that I CAN'T GET RID OF IT... I'd say more, but Penny Arcade sums it up quite well, I think. Unless they start finding Master Balls.

Raising a Caterpie to Butterfree. I might have to adjust the ingame monsters list as I forgot just how much of a pain in the tukus it is to get to Butterfree in the first place. Still, 98% Sleep Powder...

The rumored tutors (priority moves ahoy) falling through, and no expansion to Rapid Spin... yet they found room to make String Shot a tutor. String Shot. I wish I was making this up. Without question, the worst tutor move ever.

Most of the Johto Pokemon still being stuck in Kanto (Houndour, Murkrow, Larvitar, etc) while I have to trudge around without a Fire type for the nth time.

And probably the one thing that makes me irrationally angry... the GB Player. Maybe it's because I play with the volume at minimum so I can listen to podcasts and such, but the fact is they devoted programming time to 1999 graphics and sound to appease people who are living in the past. That's time they could have devoted to, I dunno, making Chikorita not suck.

But this is the hand we got dealt, and I suspect my clean game is going to end up as Soul Silver while I run through Heart Gold whenever I'm really bored and not beating the best Pokemon game of this generation (Platinum).