My neighborhood block became a battleground over Red vs Blue. Charizard super-freaks ran to Pokemon Red, ready to lay waste to their enemies with a sick Fire Spin. Fans of Blue thought they were cool as Squirtle as they unleashed their Butterfrees. The true winner could only be tested in battle!

But in order to catch them all, you needed to be friends with someone who had a different version. Sure there was that one kid whose parents bought them both Red & Blue and two Gameboys at launch but most of us were left scratching our heads over who would pick up the bill for the link cable.  

The Pokemon games were genius. They were designed for you to have to start over, essentially forcing you to buy another version to save your Pokemon on. Think of all the choices and pitfalls you had to struggle with in a single game- 

Kabuto or Omastar

Hitmonchan or Hitmonlee
Flareon or Jolteon or Vaporeon
Who to use the evolution stone on? i.e. Clefairy of Jigglypuff, etc.

And of course, the biggest decision of all would be who your starter Pokemon was. My favorite starter Pokemon was everyone's least favorite- Bulbasaur. 

Sure the little guy gets a lot flak being a head of lettuce whose basically useless in the late game but I love him! The main reason is because Bulbasaur is a boss on the gym leaders! While everyone else is trying to kill Onix with Charmander using Scratch, you are breezing by the first four gym leaders with no trouble at all. 

 

There was such an element of mystery in the Pokemon games, mainly because they didn't follow the show, most notably the weights and heights. The games played by their own set of rules. I remember gearing up for a fight against the Psychic Gym Leader Sabrina having just watched the episode where Ash does the same. I learned from the TV show that psychics are only weak against ghost types (and bug if you count trying to kill something with poison sting).

My plans were set. I caught a Ghastly from under the ghost of Cubone's mother. I lovingly raised the Ghastly into a Haunter and then when the time was right, I traded the Haunter for my ultimate creation- a Gengar! Surely Gengar would mop the floor with those near invincible psychics!

With Gengar in the top of the batting order, I was ready to take on Saffron City and pwn Sabrina's Kadabra and Alakazam! The battle was on but the only floor mopping was with Gengar's face as Kadabra took him down with confusion. What on Earth was going on here?!

 

My defeat at Sabrina's gym was but a temporary setback. I'd come back and beat her lineup with shear brute force. However, this gave light to the fact that Psychic Pokemon are pretty much overpowered in the original Red and Blue games. Without the Dark-type and stronger Bug-type moves introduced in later generations, Psychic Pokemon could wreak chaos on all other lifeforms.

For example, it is hard to think of a Pokemon that could reliably beat a lvl 100 Mewtwo. One of my friends wasn't able to catch Mewtwo in his game because he had used his master ball on a Graveler haha

  

I had heard rumors that a Parasect could take down Mewtwo by using spore to put it to sleep and then using a combination of growth and leach life. However, it's kind of a gamble on how long you can keep Mewtwo under without getting wrecked. Also, there is a very real chance that your opponent might switch to the lvl 100 Charizard in his lineup.

I'll tell you what is super effective against Mewtwo- Toxic. Just poison him and wait for the toxins to get stronger than his ability to recover and get in as many free shots as you can! 

That's what I love about Pokemon, there are so many different strategies and play styles. Just when you think that you have a stacked team, a trainer comes along and exploits a weakness. The combinations of Pokemon and move sets are endless.



The Missingo glitch, along with the Konami code, are two of the most well-known cheats in video game history. In the days before computer and internet usage was widespread, every kid knew to sail up and down the Cinnabar Island coast for infinite rare candies through word of mouth alone.

This is a testament to the incredible sense of community created by the Pokemon games. 

Seeing somebody with a Gameboy or set of Pokemon cards was a huge conversation starter. Several of my childhood friendships emerged from fellow Pokemon players. My friends and I would play Pokemon all night at sleepovers. My friend Chris had an SNES with a Gameboy adapter so we would pop in the game cartridge and play Pokemon on the big screen! What started as "I'll trade you a Weedle for a Caterpie" evolved into deeper conversations and relationships.   

 

What is absolutely incredible is how closely Pokemon crossed over into the real world. Seriously! If you were just walking around playing your Gameboy, people would seemingly jump out of the bushes like a crazed bug catcher eager to battle you!

There were toy Pokeballs with miniature Pokemon figures. You could even buy a Pokedex that would tell you what moves your Pokemon could learn, just like in the TV show! There was an entire underground for Pokemon. We had to play our cards on the bus and conduct trades in the hallways. Even where to buy Pokemon stuff was guarded like a Cloyster. I would even convince my mom to drive across state lines to the Wizard of the Coast store to get Pokemon booster packs.

Teachers and other adults were like Team Rocket, trying to cramp your style and steal your Pokemon! There was one teacher in the 4th Grade who seized my deck of Pokemon cards without even a warning. With my defenses lowered by her Zubat screech attack, I came back later that day to get my cards back, but she didn't want to give them to me! There they were sitting on her desk in plain view and she said that she had lost them! I pointed to them, and exclaimed "there they are" and she reluctantly handed them over.