History VideoGame / PokemonRedandBlue

** Dragonite is intended to be this. It is tied with Mew for the second-highest base stat total, and it has the highest Attack stat in these games and a diverse Special move pool. However, it is only obtainable by evolving the rare (and weak) Dratini, which can be rarely caught in the Safari Zone or bought at the Game Corner. After [[MagikarpPower babying it until it hits level 55]], you'll discover that Dragonite doesn't quite live up to its in-game hype as the only true dragon. It has surprisingly low damage output since it can't take advantage of STAB at all -- its only Dragon-type move is the weak, [[FixedDamageAttack fixed-damage]] Dragon Rage, and it doesn't learn ''any'' Flying-type moves (not even Fly, as in later games). Its Speed is mediocre, and its typing gives it a crippling weakness to Ice. Its only real utility ends up being abusing Agility and Wrap.

** The badges in the original Japanese games are named after colors: Gray Badge, Blue Badge, Orange Badge, Rainbow Badge, Pink Badge, Gold Badge, Crimson Badge, and Green Badge.

** There's an NPC on Cinnabar Island who offers to trade you his Electrode for a Raichu; if you speak to him afterwards he claims "the Raichu you traded me went and evolved!", which of course, isn't possible. In the Japanese ''Blue Version'', which provides the script and engine for the international releases rather than having them directly based on the original ''Red'' and ''Green'', the NPC traded you a Graveler for a Kadabra, both Pokémon that evolve by trading, and his line afterwards was meant to be a hint on how to obtain their final forms. For the English release, the localizers changed the Pokémon being offered to what they were in ''Red'' and ''Green'', but simply forgot to alter the rest of the dialogue to match.
** Tail Whip. The name suggests that the user would smack the enemy with their tail to lower their Defense, but it is actually far less hardcore then that. Its original name is actually "Tail Wag", which is apparently used cutely to lower the enemy's guard. Later games would support the original depiction more in its description and animation.

** In the original Japanese Red and Green versions, if you evolved your starter BEFORE delivering Oak's parcel and thus before getting your Pokedex the game will think you have your Dex already but still won't let you progress beyond Viridian City.

*** Cinnabar Island is water-locked, so the player can't leave without a pokémon that knows Surf or Fly--so if a player releases all pokémon that have or can learn those moves and bankrupts themselves such that they have no pokéballs and cannot purchase more, they can trap themselves on the island permanently. (If a player ''really'' wants to make it inescapable, they will also rid themselves of every pokémon except one, so that they cannot even trade for pokémon that can use the needed abilities).

** A player who wishes to can trap themselves in Lorelei's room by ridding themselves of all but one pokémon, either a Fighting-type or Poison-type, whose only usable move is Rage. Players must defeat Lorelei to proceed to the next room, which is impossible because Rage will never muster the power to beat Lorelei's Dewgong, which will always use the Psychic-type healing move Rest against a Fighting-type or Poison-type because the "smart" A.I. of the game prioritizes ElementalRockPaperScissors over all other considerations, and then Rage locks the player's Pokémon into only using it until it faints or the battle ends, while also never running out of PP. This Rage vs. Rest issue will inadvertently lock the game into a HealingLoop that cannot be escaped from.
** [[DesperationAttack Struggle]] is treated as a Normal-type move, so Ghost-types are immune to it. This can potentially make a [=PvP=] battle unwinnable if both players' last Pokémon is a Ghost with no PP left (since AI opponents have unlimited PP in Gen 1, this cannot happen in single-player.) Future generations make it a type-less move to avoid this. The recoil damage from struggling is also treated differently, with the Pokémon taking half the damage they managed to deal. Gens II and III would reduce it to a fourth of the damage, while Gens IV onward would make it a fourth of your max HP, regardless of how much damage you inflicted.

* TheArtifact: One NPC still says her old line from the originals, wondering what Pokémon would look like if they had distinct genders... despite them having them since the second generation.[[note]]In her defense, Pokémon having distinct appearances between genders would be introduced in Generation IV.[[/note]]

* AscendedMeme: Many new features and secrets seem to call back to the wild rumors that surrounded the original games. For instance, Bill granting you access to a new area (in this case, the [[SideQuest Sevii Islands]]) and the ability to find something by the truck near the S.S. Anne.

%% * GettingCrapPastThe Radar: Due to overwhelming and persistent misuse, GCPTR is on-page examples only until 01 June 2021. If you are reading this in the future, please check the trope page to make sure your example fits the current definition.

%% * GettingCrapPastThe Radar: Due to overwhelming and persistent misuse, GCPTR is on-page examples only until 01 June 2021. If you are reading this in the future, please check the trope page to make sure your example fits the current definition.

%% * GettingCrapPastThe Radar: Due to overwhelming and persistent misuse, GCPTR is on-page examples only until 01 June 2021. If you are reading this in the future, please check the trope page to make sure your example fits the current definition.

** When a boss trainer has a type of potion as their item, they're programmed to only use it when their Pokémon's HP drops below a set percentage-based threshold. Blaine however, who has Super Potions as his item, was not programmed with any such threshold and so can randomly used them at any time. This means he'll often randomly use Super Potions in situations where his Pokémon don't need the healing, or may even try using them when his Pokémon aren't damaged at all. Never mind that a Super Potion heals too little to be useful for this point of the game when it wouldn't even recover half his Pokémon's health.

* OpeningBossBattle: Once you get your starter Pokemon, your very first battle will be against your Rival.

* StinkyFlower: Gloom is a Pokémon that resembles a flower and it drools honey that is said to smell terrible. Its pistil is said to have a foul smell as well.

* DungeonBypass:
** By using a Pokédoll on Marowak's ghost in Pokémon Tower, you can skip the Team Rocket Game Corner hideout in Celadon City. Though without the Silph Scope, you won't be able to catch any Ghost-type Pokémon of your own.
** If you trade for a Pokémon that already knows Cut, you won't ever need to step foot into the S.S. Anne to get the Cut HM (and can also skip the Blue battle there in the process).
** If you don't mind going through Rock Tunnel mostly blind (or trade for a Pokémon that knows Flash), you won't need to go through the Diglett Cave to get the Flash HM from Oak's Aide.
** If you trade for Pokémon that know Surf and Strength, you can skip having to go through the Safari Zone to get the Surf and Strength [=HMs=].
** By returning to Pallet Town and surfing south to Cinnabar Island, you can skip the Seafoam Islands.
** If you exploit the Color Case in ''Pokémon Stadium 2'' to get one of the drinks on your file before reaching Celadon, you can give it to the Saffron guards early and get access to the rest of Kanto, allowing you to skip having to go through Rock Tunnel to reach the rest of Kanto after Vermillion. This also lets you skip Diglett's Cave, as there's absolutely no reason to get Flash anymore.

* NoFairCheating: If you hack Mew or Deoxys into the game to skip having to need the events for them, since they don't get a special flag otherwise, they will disobey your every command reagrdless if you have the Earth badge. {{Downplayed|Trope}} in the sense that the anti-cheat measure only worked if you directly hacked them into your game. Hacking to teleport to their location and catching them there wouldn't.

* NoFairCheating: If you use a glitch to spawn and catch a Mew in the Virtual Console version, you will be unable to transfer it to newer gen games through Pokémon Bank. [[SubvertedTrope Unless you use another (very long and very, very convoluted) glitch to force it to have the appropriate Original Trainer and ID number, which fools the system into thinking it's a legitimate Mew from an event.]]

* CompetitiveBalance: Improved in comparison to the Gen. I games, but the Psychic type still has a tremendous advantage owing in large part due to the sheer lack of Dark- and Steel-type mons. Further, while more and better Ghost-type moves are present, the only Ghost-type line (Gastly) is part-Poison and thus weak to Psychic type moves. A good Psychic-type Pokémon can still run roughshod over most of the game, with only the odd Dark or Ghost-type ''move'' being used to worry about. Even then, this was before the physical/special split, so the aforementioned Gastly line couldn't really take advantage of either of their [=STABs=] due to being special attackers, and Psychic types could tank the few offensive Dark-type moves easily since they still ran off the Special Attack stat (most Psychic types have high Special Defense).

* EasterEgg: An NPC near Lorelai's house will tell you that she comes back with plushes whenever she returns from the Pokémon League, which is something that actually happens in-game. If you rematch and beat the Elite Four many times, her room will gradually start filling with more Pokémon plushes, with the last being a large Lapras plush after ''225'' rematches.

* ReadTheFreakingManual: The sidequest to trade with the other Gen. III games, which also served as a requirement to enter Cerulean Cave and capture [[OlympusMons Mewtwo]]. It involves interpreting Braille puzzles ''visually'' by comparing the Braille symbols against the manual's Braille alphabet.

* OffModel: [[InvertedTrope Inverted]]. It's a common misconception among Pokémon fans outside Japan that most of the Pokémon sprites in Japan's ''[[UpdatedRerelease Blue]]'' and the international releases are this, but in reality, [[OlderThanTheyThink the sprites in all Japanese games before Yellow predate the official artwork by Ken Sugimori]], therefore making the official artwork ''and'' the anime off-model. This misconception stems mostly from the timing in the Western release of the anime and the games. In Japan, the anime was released a full year after the games, and the monster designs in it would be based off updated art by Ken Sugimori, who wanted to unify the art style for the creatures, as they were all originally [[DependingOnTheArtist drawn by different people]]. In the West, however, the games came almost a month after the release of the anime in 1998, therefore creating the impression that the monsters were poorly drawn versions of their official artwork. This would change with the release of ''Yellow'', which would again update the Pokémon sprites to make them more closely resemble the official artwork.

* AccentAdaptation: Bill's Kansai dialect is translated as a [[DeepSouth Southern accent]]. All future games in the series drop this aspect.
* AcrophobicBird: Despite having Flying as a secondary type and being depicted as flying throughout other Pokemon media or even with their in-game sprites, Charizard, Dragonite, and the Zubat line all can not learn the move Fly. Charizard would gain this ability in ''Yellow'', while Dragonite would get it in ''[[VideoGame/PokemonGoldAndSilver Gold and Silver]]'', and Zubat and Golbat would have to wait until ''[[VideoGame/PokemonDiamondAndPearl Diamond and Pearl]]'' to finally learn it (though their final evolution added in Gen 2, Crobat, could learn Fly in its debut in ''Gold and Silver'').

* ExcusePlot: There's really no overarching plot other than "Become a Pokemon Master!" The only real subplot is Team Rocket, which has virtually nothing to do with your main quest other than Giovanni being the last Gym Leader. Likewise, the Legendary Pokemon are completely divorced from the plot and pretty much just optional treasures to collect.

** The PC in ''VideoGame/PokemonStadium'' and the Color Case in ''Pokémon Stadium 2'' allow you to freely transfer items between Generation I games (if you only have one game, starting over after saving the items in the Case works as well). Thanks to this, it's possible to bring a Fresh Water or other drink to the Saffron City guards right after helping Bill, enabling access the rest of Kanto before beating Misty and completely bypassing Rock Tunnel. You can even defeat Lt. Surge before Misty, provided you beat Koga and gain Surf in advance. There is still no way to access the Celadon gym without Cut, so you'll still need to beat Misty before you can fight Erika. This is what led to the developers implementing Green Tea as a key item in the remakes, to prevent new versions of this exploit[[note]]While the remakes couldn't connect to Pokemon Stadium (and thus couldn't use it to transfer items), trading in a pokemon that was holding a Fresh Water, etc. would have accomplished the same thing[[/note]].

** One of the gym leaders is a teenage girl with magic powers named [[Series/SabrinaTheTeenageWitch Sabrina]].

* UniqueEnemy: Each member of the Elite Four has a Pokémon that only appears on their team within the entire game. Lorelei has Lapras, Bruno has Machamp, Agith has Gengar, and Lance has three (Aerodactyl, Dragonair, and Dragonite.)

** Substitute, as unlike in later games it doesn't block status moves here, removing much of the effectiveness it has in the future (in ''VideoGame/PokemonStadium'', however, Substitute does block status moves). Additionally, recovering the HP the move uses without items is a lot harder; hold items aren't a thing, recovery moves outside of Rest are scarce, and the LifeDrain moves are all weak.

* GoldTooth: The Safari Zone Warden has a full set of gold dentures, which he lost in the Safari Zone. He'll reward you for returning them.

* WhipItGood: The Ace Trainers (then named Cooltrainers), Tamers, Rocket Grunts, Cue Balls, and Sabrina all have whips in their battle sprites.

** Normal-types are supposed to be at a disadvantage against Fighting, Rock, and Ghost types, and held back by having no real resistances (only having an immunity to damaging Ghost moves, which practically means just Lick). However, the one type super-effective against them, Fighting, is uncommon, countered hard by the aformentioned Psychic-type, and only has a few poor moves available; the best one, High Jump Kick, is exclusive to the awful Hitmonlee, and the next-best and only widely-distributed Fighting move, Submission, is an inaccurate move that deals recoil damage to the user and only has 80 power for such significant drawbacks. Rock-types resist Normal moves and Ghosts are immune, but Normal types tend to be able to learn a large variety of [=TMs=], and many can get Water or Ice moves to take down Rock- and Ground-types that could withstand their Normal moves, and many get Earthquake and/or Dig to hit both Rock-types and Ghost-types hard (with the latter all being part Poison as covered prior). Then, while most types tend to have lackluster and/or limited options for STAB in Gen 1, Normal types have a lot of good moves to use, most notably the 85 power 100% accurate Body Slam that inflicts Paralysis 30% of the time (except to other Normal-types, another significant advantage for the Normal-type), and the terrifying 150 power Hyper Beam that skips the recharge turn in this Gen if the opponent is knocked out by it. In competitive play, Normal-types ended up even more prevalent than Psychic-types, with three omnipresent GameBreaker Pokémon that are on nearly all teams being Normals (Tauros, Snorlax, and Chansey).
** About half the types in the game were woefully treated, as besides the questionable direct type advantage/disadvantage balancing, many types only have a few mons with the typing available while Water and Poison Pokémon together consist of nearly half the entire Gen 1 roster, and most types have few moves of their typing available, while nearly half the types don't even get a no-drawbacks move of at least 80 power, significantly weakening their damage output. The TierInducedScrappy section on the YMMV page goes more in-depth on the types that got shortchanged during the balancing.

* ContractualBossImmunity: The storyline dictates that the Marowak ghost found in the Pokémon Tower must pass on via you beating it up, so don't even think of trying to catch it. Not even the Master Ball (if you use cheats to get it at this point) will work on it[[note]]though due to an oversight, a poke doll can be used to complete the battle without actually fighting[[/note]]. And of course, Pokémon owned by Trainers can't be captured either.

* WatchingTheSunset: The hi-score screen of "Pikachu's Beach".

While the game's CompetitiveBalance is undeniably broken and [[ObviousBeta glitches]] abound...it's ''Pokémon''.