Pokemon's LOST Multiplayer Features - Tama Hero

[@Tama-Hero]

Check out blisy's video for how we were able to play together online! kzbin.info/www/bejne/h5bagKWHrZaibdU Using the power of technology now these features can be experienced in a whole new way Bibliography of research for this video: pastebin.com/tqWtvVth Ruby & Sapphire video discussing the cultural context: kzbin.info/www/bejne/kJabppujmqunbaM

[@TheNewtypeblue]

Population density really is key. I worked in a large hospital at the height of Streetpass and managed to add dozens of players just by having my 3DS with me!

[@m30w7h]

@@TheNewtypeblue i had a similar experience as a hotel manager. Sold out nights and tons of people-circulation + tour groups usually bringing young adults or schools meant I was very lucky to have a lot of connections. We were also in a mall plaza, going there on breaks :D

[@SiniAnimations]

Obscure NPC interactions have gotta be my favorite game deep lore.

[@Atomhaz]

Hi! I like shorts! They’re comfy and easy to wear!

[@estebanmayo24]

After you beat the elite four: HEY WHATS WRONG WITH YOU? YOURE STILL NOT WEARING SHORTS

[@Placeholder501]

6:13 People have made remarks that Gen 5 has more voice acting SwSh. Now we can make remarks that RSE have more voice acting than SwSh.

[@blaineishere3851]

Really awesome vid as always, Tama! Somewhat related: I was playing ORAS the other day for some nostalgia, and discovered that I still have you and JWitzz’s secret bases saved from a literal decade ago now.

[@kotalee2106]

secret bases in OR/AS were actually so cool. I spent more time playing with that than some entire other games.

[@jdb2002]

I was able to mix records with a 10 year old girl while at a Toys R us waiting in line for Manaphy. Seeing this made me wonder where her life went and where she is now.

[@SaturosCombato]

Thats the same event where i learned about ev training from another person there.

[@Deoxys911]

Part of me still wonders if the Shiny Articuno a boy traded me while in line for Mew at Toys "R" Us was legitimately obtained or not. I'm assuming probably not, but I'll genuinely never know for sure! Either way, hopefully he enjoyed whatever I traded him for it.

[@EmeralBookwise]

2.07% is absolutely a huge difference compared 4.14%. They might both seem like only a small fraction of the overall population, but the second is still proportionally twice as big as the first. Seriously though, yes, this is why the limited location mythical distribution events worked in Japan, but were always a pain here in the US. Most Americans who don't already live in one of our major cities don't visit those major cities with anywhere near the same frequencies. It just takes too much time and is too expensive to bother unless it's part of a vacation. Whereas in Japan, baring only the most isolated of rural communities, most people can easily catch a train to Tokyo for an affordable price and not even need to worry about the additional cost of staying overnight at hotel, because they can just as easily take another train back home as soon as they are done.

[@darkenedzone]

Yea, for a bit more statistics, if we assume you asked 20 people if they had RSE, in the US, you'd have about a 34% chance of finding at least one other person with the game. In Japan, you'd have a 57% chance of success! And that also ignores how easy/hard it would be to find 20 people you could ask "Do you play Pokemon?"!

[@GeorgeDCowley]

The populations _were_ about 25 apart.

[@eastonair]

My brother and I had Ruby and Sapphire as kids, so we got to experience a lot of the local multiplayer features! Now I appreciate those experiences a little more, thank you.

[@shawnheatherly]

It's insane seeing just how much stuff can impact your friends' games. I love the idea of being able to get in-universe updates on TV, showing how far everyone else has reached.

[@FreezaiPokemon]

This was such an interesting video, I grew up playing so much Ruby, Sapphire, and Emerald but I'd never even heard of 90% of these features. Few people in my friend group played Pokemon, even fewer had a wired link cable, and forget about finding a situation where we could connect to trade (school banned video games). Despite probably thousands of hours of Gen 3, the one time I ever used a linked cable was exactly once at summer camp. Nowdays online connections are so easy we take it for granted. Loved this video

[@Tinte648]

What in the WORLD?! It could sing?!

[@Placeholder501]

More singing than SwSh.

[@MarioSonic46]

@@Placeholder501 Ah yes foot tapping and no music change. What a great concert.

[@MarioSonic46]

This. This is what I miss from Pokemon. The extra multiplayer features were what kept me playing these games. Its sad that we don't see as much of this these days.

[@JohnnyBsKillz115]

I loved secret bases when I was a kid. I linked up with a couple of friends and it was so nice to be able to see them and battle them daily. Helped a lot especially when we couldn't hang out over break. I was also a gremlin who replayed ruby/sapphire repeatedly together a full party of Rayquaza. Leveling them was way easier when I did the daily battles with my friends before going back to grind the elite 4. Such good memories. Thanks for the vid!!!

[@Kuma5655]

It’s really neat that these are packed in , but as someone who has only ever been a current gen buyer as of recent, it bums me out sometimes how many “you had to have been there” features there are.

[@truegreen7]

The vibes of these videos are underrated. The Early 2000s atmosphere is perfectly simulated with the music and visuals.

[@neildwivedi1302]

The 1000 flag requirement in ORAS to obtain the Garchompite, although initially annoying, eventually became one of my favourite things to do in the game and gave me a reason to open my 3ds every day (to obtain my flags for a particular day). All before of course, the 3DS online shut down :( RIP 🕊

[@gaminggenji397]

Wow! I had no idea the original Hoenn-based games had so many social features. I remember the TV announcements and trendy phrases but thought those were just flavor for the single player experience. It's wild to see so many social features like this before wi-fi became ubiquitous, yet the current games that can take advantage of it don't have social features this ambitious. It's shame.

[@Link4750]

I was lucky enough to experience a good chunk of these features thanks to having siblings and each of us having our own copies of gen 3 games and gameboys. Sometimes when we went over to a friend's house we would also mix records and then bring it back home to mix again, and our world grew slowly from that. We'd also sometimes reset our saves infrequently, so then we'd mix records again and have doppelgangers in our new saves. This was rural America, so I'm now realizing how lucky we were to really experience this

[@Magic_Ice]

I experienced most of these through the remake and ORAS is one of the best uses of Streetpass as it kept automatically updating what my friend was doing in his game. I wish i could be in the zeitgeist to fully experience these games.

[@thenewdarling1]

This is so interesting!! (Honestly all of your throwback videos are, but this one especially!) I had no idea the Gen 3 record mixing and the FRLG minigames weren't used often in America -- in the UK we used the FRLG ones constantly because of the adaptor in the box! One of my earliest memories in Gen 3 was record mixing with my brand new Ruby cartridge on holiday with some Spanish kids

[@Forever_Zero]

The fact that you can manipulate even the Feebas tiles is mind-blowing, can't imagine how it would be to play with a friend and get tips on how to catch it... can't imagine it because I had no one else to play with, of course

[@BlueEye096]

WTF I had no idea about like half of these things and I was a PokéNut as a kid who also didn't get a DS until 2010 so I was stuck replaying Gen 3 for 6 years. But also population density, definitely feels like something that GameFreak as Japanese devs did not consider at all when it came to overseas markets, "this works here in Japan and that's all that matters". Finding fellow Pokemon fans to play with was probably much harder in the US than in Japan but that's peanuts compared to the low population and low density countries in Europe, particularly my own. Pokemon was never that huge there and faded away in like 2002, I didn't meet a fellow Pokemon fan until middle school in 2010 and even then he wasn't nearly as interested in the franchise. Gen 3 will forever continue to fascinate me with its secrets.

[@wheatthins4565]

1- I like the Drowzee popup I've not encountered that before 2- The Animal Crossing singing is so fun!

[@Michelle4PTG]

Didn't missed this one out. Mixed records frequently with friends also replayed my second game multiple times to get more secret bases in the game. Was a fun feature. Love this game. 🎮🎮🐱🐱❤️❤️

[@kazinwho]

Yeah I had no idea about most of the things in this video, wild.

[@ReaperCreeper]

Was able to do a bit of record mixing with friends as a kid, but these kind of features always left me a little bitter that there was no easy way for me to really take advantage of them.

[@dompedrito25]

omg how i love a fresh new video of Tama discussing some curiosity or quirk from the Pokémon games

[@TheYouTubeGame]

Thanks for the overview; really cool. I was fortunate enough to experience some of these things organically. Got a copy of Pokemon Sapphire for either my birthday or Christmas when I was younger and I loved playing it so much. I remember my friend picking Treecko for their starter where I had Mudkip, so their team at their secret base naturally walloped my Swampert. I'd always believe I could withstand a Leaf Blade and kill his Sceptile with a non-stab Ice Beam. It never worked.

[@ShadowZone1996]

Can't believe the timing of this video. I'm currently playing through two copies of Ruby and a Sapphire to make cool Secret Bases to mix with for my Emerald

[@crls4726]

wake up babe new tama just dropped

[@Megagalaktikarea2]

there's a certain charm about the older interactions. The TVs always reminded my that my friends are having their own adventures and you could see how they developed since then.

[@dcommet]

I used to love Gen 3 a ton, but these days whenever I play them they always feel a little lacking - just realized its because of this stuff! I used to mix records with other kids all the time and now the game feels kind of desolate and lonely to me without all the extra caves and trees and tv shows. I still remember us arguing about who would be the one who got to have their base in a specific bush or something lol

[@joshuafisher5447]

What are the odds. I was literally just rewatching the ruby sapphire video

[@LagrimaArdiente]

I did NOT know about the 3 Lilycove ladies. Now I feel like I missed out on them... 😢

[@alexhowlett3100]

4:45 yeah I'm sorry tama I'm gonna have to agree with the interviewer here, 92 net balls is WAY too many Also, I REALLY want to see the dialogue for the contest lady doing really badly, it's gotta be hilarious Great video overall!

[@Deoxys911]

One of my favorite Pokémon memories was mixing records using my copies of Ruby, Sapphire, and Emerald along with my two friends' several Hoenn games to make our own little "settlement" in the Hoenn region of like 6-8 Secret Bases in close proximity to each other on northern Route 115, all decorated to appear like homes and other sorts of buildings you'd see in an ordinary town. I dubbed it "Trainer Town" since you can go and battle every person there. I am very happy to still have those games in which I can revisit our fan-made community from nearly 20 years ago-I was actually just touring it a few months ago! Honestly I wish I could have made a spiritual successor in ORAS with the Secret Shore or Secret Meadow; a Trainer apartment complex sounds fun, too, haha.

[@zillence]

Thank you so much for always reminding me that there are actually people out there as deeply interested in the games as I am :') this was so cool

[@HybridAngelZero]

I wish I could have done more of the stuff in this game, but sadly this was right around the time it went from everyone I knew being crazy about Pokemon to just me being crazy about it all by myself xD I'm so glad they brought a lot of this back for ORAS, though, Wi-fi and the PSS really made a lot of these features sing!

[@chrismyers7794]

Well done video Tama! I actually prefer these shorter form videos rather than the long form ones, so it was nice to wake up to see this.

[@RageGS]

Im literally playing old Gen 3 Emerald and this comes out bless

[@webster1211]

I didn't know about the rare (shiny) pokemon segment on tv! super interesting

[@Jomanuelrg]

Love this kind of videos, i never knew any of these things you just said. Keep it up!

[@sheismymom]

last night I was thinking about your old Beta Secrets videos and now you post this I love it💖

[@SaberWolf94]

Awesome to see another gen 3 vid! As someone living in a rural country that's not Japan or North America mixing records was possible once you knew what other kids in the neighbourhood or at school had Ruby or Sapphire. That and my brother too. I remember making sure to bring our GBAs and games on shcool day trips to do that since we technically weren't allowed to bring stuff like that on regular school days. Of course once I got a second GBA then I could create strong trainers in bases from my extra Ruby and it became the bets way to train strong pokemon that needed more expereince than what was in the Pokemon League.

[@goldgamer487]

Gen 1 has some obscure multiplayer stuff like "Colosseum 2" in Yellow

[@dramaticScar]

9:48 actually I somehow managed to get a Banette to win all 5 kinds of contest. I tell you … winning the Beauty category was not easy

[@BigBadSkullBoss]

It's such a shame just how much of the older games are either lost from the disconnection of WFC or because we no longer live in a time where people walk around with their game consoles. I don't know if it's just me, but especially after covid I feel like I'm beginning to resent everything being online way more than it used to be. We don't see each other as much anymore, and now the things that used to bring us together are arguably giving us excuses to remain apart which is sad.

[@PinkSkunkSleepy]

I didn't know anyone who had a link cable that played Pokemon, and I also didn't have regular Wi-Fi access until Gen. V. Features like this always seemed so mysterious to me, and even now they still sorta do

[@sonicwave779]

It really seems like the only way to fully enjoy gens 2-5 was by living in Japan when they were current.

[@Tiberius22495]

I remember mixing records with my friends at school it was so cool hearing about what Tyler or TJ were doing in game.

[@thomasjames5757]

What can I say about gen 3 that you haven't already said? It's absolutely mind-boggling the number of obscure multiplayer features and weird peripherals they packed into this game that the vast majority of us never saw. When I was a kid, I had one gba and one copy of pokemon ruby. Now thanks to Ebay, I have multiple copies of every GBA game, Colosseum and XD, the Jirachi disc, the Eon Ticket, the Regi Dolls card, and Pokemon Box. But I still can't go to Faraway Island without glitching my game. Thanks, Gamefreak.

[@szellemsam]

Tfw no friends in early 2000 to take advantage of pokémon connectivity fatures with 😔

[@danilosolera6206]

I loved this video I grew up in the 90s early 00s and your thoughts on gen III feeling like a lonely experience resonate on me. Im from Brazil, I imagine it was even lonelier here Thanks for another great video

[@evanjmiller72]

The devs expected INHUMAN levels of effort and understanding from the kids playing this. I miss that.

[@RadikAlice]

I love how this went from explainer, to cultural crash course to urbanism video. Latter had me like "Yeah, you tell them Tama!"

[@mellow8176]

the population density + generally more nerds buying nintendo stuff is still wild in japan today, back in the 2010s in america i very rarely got a streetpass at highschool and pretty much only did it at anime cons. in the 2020s, one of my absolute favorite gaming experiences has been filling up a fresh 3ds' spotpass in tokyo. you never go without tagging at least five people or so!

[@Infernape102]

Not only did I not get to use Gen 3 multiplayer features, I didn't even get to use Gen 4's either. My family didnt get a wifi router until 2012 when we all got smartphones. X and Y were my first true multiplayer experience with the PSS system. Thats probably the reason why I hate trade evos so much. Mindy in Snowpoint city didn't help either.

[@thisismyaltaccount4195]

Very cool video! Loving the look into gen 3! I actually completed the 200 jump challenge for Pokemon Jump with a buddy at work a few months back! Haven't managed to get the dodrio berry picking milestone yet, but it's the last trainer card star I'm missing, and I've even collected all 3 platinum stickers from the braggart!

[@Tama-Hero]

Oh man thats awesome! I havent gotten either star yet, Im probably going to have to bribe a non gamer friend to help me do it lol

[@thisismyaltaccount4195]

​@Tama-Hero i feel that XD. The guy who helped me with Pokémon Jump was a pro rocket league player, and had never touched a pokemon game before that, but he said he loved the mini game XD. Once you get into them, the joyful game corners games are actually pretty fun despite what you'll see in most videos mentioning them! I even managed to get 5 players to do it a few months back! Excellent combos are for sure the best way to get points, and totally possible to do by yourself! Just gotta use both hands and at least one foot!

[@loreleiceladon]

This is the perfect surprise treat after I've been working all morning

[@snarkychan7504]

love this kind of thing + the collab I've dreamed of yay

[@TheCreepypro]

fascinating to learn about all this so that it all makes sense now!

[@joshmadrid5253]

some of this existed in my elementry school for me but I really wish this kinda stuff still existed

[@johnnypollack3243]

Keep up the amazing work and videos Tama love the video

[@OnlyUsagiHere]

Great video Tama!

[@moomoomang]

wow I had no idea there was so much to these games. I kinda feel like they needed to be better communicated to players, because I lived in Australia back then and would totally have done these things

[@AedraRising]

Japan really does have signifigantly better cities than the US, god damn. By the way, I also recently started a playthrough of Diamond and Pearl with a friend (well, Pearl and Platinum, with me playing Pearl) with one of my best friends and we're making use of all of the local multiplayer features we can! It kinda makes me miss all the little side activities you could do in the earlier games that seem to have been lost in more recent years.

[@MagnaLynx21]

Shout-outs to the Bard for not being able to say Celebi

[@samuelmelendez7566]

Pokémon is full of features that have never returned, for better or for worse

[@terryechoes3192]

I'd like to hear how you can find people playing the games at the same time who will be willing to do all the multiplayer stuff with you.

[@drskelebone]

I love learning more about games I have never, and will likely never, play. The fact that there was so much friend-inclusion in a game that I would have written off as "too old to do that" is bonkers. Then again, this was the same time that Solid Snake was snooping on save game records to be weird, so it's not that surprising. Surprise: I don't care if it's not Solid Snake, it's a Metal Gear guy, and I don't care beyond that. They're all Solid Snake. The naked lady who can't talk? Solid Snake. The old guy? Solid Snake. You? Solid Snake. The giant metal monster? Solid Snake. They're all Solid Snake. Or Gary. Gary is the appropriate version here. Whatever, Gary.

[@zLance2409]

New Tama video lets goooo!

[@TheEbrithil2]

As a child I did multiplayer contests with friends but battling was more fun

[@KevinEontrainer381]

Here's my like for putting May on the thumbnail

[@AlexanderGreensmith]

Do you have a link to that 2000s social commentary of Japan in Gen 3 video that you hinted to at the start?

[@Tama-Hero]

The link is here! kzbin.info/www/bejne/kJabppujmqunbaM

[@AlexanderGreensmith]

@@Tama-Hero Thank you!

[@bhirawamaylana466]

its really shame the beauty contest never become big, its will interesting to battle Pokemon but not in power but in technique and beauty instead.

[@Centaursixtysix]

I always forget that shiny was added as an official term in gen 5

[@samwill7259]

Pokemon multiplayer was lost to me because everyone in my school only ever wanted to play Mario Party DS.

[@PredictableEnigma]

Mario Kart and Scribblenauts at mine 😂

[@GigaMan91]

Lovely Kiss, Liquid Ooze? Ayo.

[@carcas77]

Amazing video

[@_mllejace]

Bro, a SpinDash cameo 10:27

[@AlexanderGreensmith]

Also had no idea ‘shiny’ was not an official term. When was it? Gen IV?

[@frankj.1077]

Will you complete the Pokémon Colosseum Battle modes too?

[@Tama-Hero]

Already did :)

[@frankj.1077]

@ Neat! I’ll hunt for it! I’m getting sucked into your Gen 3 spiral! :-)

[@cesarramsan]

I love the comments about urbanism!!

[@inviolet]

Came for Pokemon content, stayed for the land use/urbanism rant

[@yoshipilot]

I wonder what the actual number of kids in the 2000s that actually used these features. It can't be more than 100.

[@Tama-Hero]

I used them a little bit, my neighbors had the game and knew other kids who had the game, and I mixed records with them, so I have a ton of bases in my games still from that save file

[@PranjalDhungana]

you should change the thumbnail. I almost didn't click it because i thought this was a reupload of the gen 3 nat dex video. the thumbnail looks nearly identical.

[@Placeholder501]

Those stats in the first minute are interesting. Due to new records being made in media in recent years I’ve become curious how much of it is due to inflation and population growth.

[@andersandersonn]

Already saw on patreon!! Just adding to the view count

[@Seth_rs]

1:16 hell yeah im from mexico and have all gen 3 games except for firered

[@darkraifan6058]

Good morning Tama

[@thomaswinwood]

I'm curious to know if you can pull together information about sales and population density in the UK. My anecdotal experience is of going to school with my new Pokemon games and finding nobody to play with like I had done with the previous games. I've been attributing that to the end of Pokemania like you said, but your argument would imply that since the UK is also an island with a fairly robust public transit infrastructure and high population density these features would pay off better than in the US - if they didn't, why didn't they?

[@Tama-Hero]

This I do not know, it would take some additional research to find UK sales numbers (would they be separate from other European sales for example?) and then I would need to learn a whole lot about population density in the UK and infrastructure there.

[@TheOfficialJaack]

5:40 Song ID?

[@feinted]

really cool vid

[@MasterFallenHero]

Anecdotal evidence =/= fact and while I hear what you're saying I want to push back on this video. It feels like it's leaning into the "Japan is living in 2099" image westerns have. I'm not japanese, but I lived in Japan for a year of high school via a foreign exchange program. This stuff wasn't common. What was common was growing up in middle school in 2004-2006 and playing gen 3 on the bus and playground in my rural New Hampshire town. In high school in 2010 a bunch of people organically bought gba and the wireless trading packs because we never saw them. I remember spending way more of my junior year playing fire red in history class with people I never talked to ever than my actual childhood when gen 1 came out. I really do appreciate the content and I've been watching since this was a rom hack channel. So I'm not here to bash you. I think this is good stuff to inform people. I just think the thesis of "Japan just gets this more than the US" is fundamentally flawed and is based on a cultural misunderstanding of Japan. Again. I'm not Japanese. I go back yearly to meet with my found family. So I can't speak on behalf of an entire people or culture. I just tend to see individuals online portray this mythos of the super sophisticated Japanese society. Hell, I was a weeb. That's why I went. So my bias does color this immensely. But I can say this to close out a lengthy comment - there may very well be a bunch of japanese kids who grew up playing this way. I wasn't there during gen 3's height.

[@Tama-Hero]

I also am not Japanese and have never lived there which is why I chose to base this on statistics rather than other evidence which might be more anecdotal. There is a larger online nostalgia scene for these games in Japanese for example, but I felt like talking about sales and population was less about what I personally think or experienced. On sales numbers alone Japan may have purchased the game more than the US just based on that 6 million is for all of North America.

[@thdotaku]

which video talks about the issues in 2000?

[@Tama-Hero]

I linked it in the card, but its the Ruby and Sapphire video. kzbin.info/www/bejne/kJabppujmqunbaM

[@thdotaku]

@@Tama-Hero thx

[@ynnos9779]

Video hype!

[@Zonaverdi_]

Hype hype hype

[@mariotaz]

That'd cool but what's a Pokémon?

[@wigglerfan10]

Hi Tama