The basic premise of Pokémon never really changes. Catch ‘em all. Win all the battles. In doing that, trainers are bound to come across some Pokémon that may not be the most…shall we say, useful? And yet, we know that a lot of Pokémon take a bit of work and TLC and eventually you’ll have yourself something that can really shine whether that’s in battle or just in your collection to show off to your friends. This is a list of just that; twenty horrible Pokémon that you can’t wꦕait to evolve.
Before we jump in, I do want to clarify: horrible is a phrase used fairly loosely here. I mean, what first stage Pokémon in a three stage evolutionary line is going to be stellar, you know? That being said, I am going to have to bag on them just a little bit. It’s nothing personal, just the fact that their fully evolved forms are coole🐠r, more desirable, and generally all around better. Got that? Cool.
Let’s jump right in.
20 Pidgey
We’re going to start this list off with the simplest of simple, the most basic of basic, a Pokémon that won the title of “first ever encountered” for so many of us all those years ago; Pidgey. Aside from the simple f🍷act that you encounter it so early, there’s not🤡 much of an argument that can be made for Pidgey itself. It’s frail, it’s delicate, and it’s not going to do you many favors in the Pewter City gym.
Pidgey’s final evolved form, Pidgeot, though? That’s reason in and of itself to pick up a Pidgey as soon as you step out of Pallet Town. On top of just being pretty imposing and badas🃏s as the granddaddy OG of early game flying types, Generation Six grants Pidgeot a Mega Evolution, a gift that lets it shine in the Overused tier of the Pokémon metagame especially in Generation Seven. When it comes to badass bird Pokémon, if we discᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚ𒀱ᩚᩚᩚount legendaries then Pidgeot easily reigns supreme.
19 Zubat
Zubat is that friend that’s always around when you never ever want them to be. Always in your face, never able to take a hint, and somehow always able to get off that exact Supers🅷onic that’s enough to make you rage quit. Even its second evolution, Golbat, is silly looking and equally as annoying, more often than not being tied to some in-game villain or something like that. So you may be wondering; why is Zubat on this list?
Well to be honest, if it stopped at Golbat, it wouldn’t be here. But Gold and Silver gave✱ us the chance to treat that big mouthed bat to a bit of friendship and introduced us to a much cooler final evolution, Crobat. From the sheer aesthetic differences between Golbat and Crobat, you can see why it would be worth the time of any trainer who felt the need to snag a Zubat when they saw one. The thing is a bit of a speed demon, too, letting it really put the hurt on anything unfortunate enough to come up against it in battle. Zubat is annoying. Crobat makes it worth it.
18 Gastly
Gastly isn’t horrible, it just falls victim to the same fate that so many on this list suffer: it’s not really great. It’s an easy catch, and training him may take a bit of work to get him up to level 25 where he evolves into Haunter. From there, though, you had to whip out your link cable back in the day, have mom drop you off at your friend’s house, and trade your Hau🐻nter away before forcing your friend to trade back that iconic purple mass of awesome that has a spot in practically everyone’s list of favorite Pokémon.
Gengar is a worthwhile investment and addition onto any team. It’s fast, and packs a pretty damn impressive base 130 special attack as well. Not to mention it just looks cool, too. I mean, that grin could make any trainer quake in their boots. As if Gengar wasn’t badass enough, X and Y intro⛎duced Mega Gengar into the fray, giving Gengar an impressive stat boost that earns him a spoཧt in the Uber tier of the competitive metagame, which is the highest tier possible. Whenever Gengar is a candidate for your team, it’s no wonder you want to get him leveled up as fast as you can.
17 Torchic
Let me just go ahead and warn you all right now; if I ever get my hands on a Pokémon related article where I can talk about this Pokémon I absolutely will, because this evolutionary line leads to my all-time favorite. Why, then, would I consider Torchic to be horrible? Well, here’s the thing: regardless of whether you picked up Ruby or Sapphire, Torchic was always the worst starter to opt for. Team Magma specialized in rounding their teams of usual Pokémon villain staples with fire types where Mudkip would have been so much more useful, and Team Aqua boasted water types where Treecko would have excelled💝. In terms of gym leader progression too, there’s no logical justification of starting with a Torchic; there’s nothing it’s going to truly shine against until about the fifth gym, by which time you will have hop😼efully gotten him past level sixteen and evolved into a Combusken and taught him a fighting move or two.
By level thirty-six, though, your Combusken will evolve into what I’m going to hail as the most badass Pokémon of all, Blaziken. Blaziken boasts an impressive base attack of 120, and a special attack trailing not too far behind at 110, meaning you have opti𝔍ons when it comes to setting it up as a physical or special attacker. With the right moveset and strategic thinking, Blaziken can plow through practically anything, and when you’re in a pinch, Blaziken’s mega evolution grants it𒆙 a speed boost each turn and sends its attack stat through the roof. I don’t know about the rest of you, but whenever I fire up a Generation Three game, Blaziken stays in that first slot of my team at all times.
16 Beldum
Beldum, the starting form of one of Hoenn’s two psuedo-legendaries, is only available after you beat the Elite Four and its champion the first time around, gifted to you in Mossdeep City. Beldum is ro𒊎ugh, because it has only one move: take down. Without the rock head ability to nullify recoil damage, that’s not going to keep it in the fight very long. I don’t know how though, but after slamming itself into other Pokémon over and over again it ends up evolving into Metang at level twenty, which opens up more move options (thank goodness) to make the grind up to level 45 hopefully a little bit easier.
When you finally get there, Metagross is a force to be reckoned with, as if you didn’t get that from him being the cornerstone of Champion Steven’s team, the chance to have one on your side will definitely bring you around. Metagross may be a♏ bit on the slow side, but what it lacks in speed it makes up for in durability in the form of high defense and power in the form of a high attack stat. If that’s still not enough for you, throw in a mega evolution to really ruin your opponent’s day.
15 Tyrunt
Pokémon’s fossil game was always a little odd to me, and with the exception of Aerodactyl, I was never really sold on any of the fossil Pokémon; nothing ever really struck me as something that I absolutely had to have. Then a certain fossil based evolution line came around and𒁃 finally gave us what I🥃 think every region’s fossil maniac was looking for: a fossil Pokémon based off of a dang T-rex. It’s so simple, I have no idea why they didn’t do it in generation one. Once you revive Tyrunt from a jaw fossil and level it up to 39 during the day, the little runt will evolve into one of the coolest Pokémon in the game.
And if you’re going to have ൩a Tyrantrum in your party for any reason at all, I bet nine times out of ten it will be because he’s just so damn cool. A tyrannosaurus with a unique rock and dragon typing, this beast has a sturdy defense stat to compliment its massive attack, allowing it to be a physical powerhouse with the right moveset. ♊This is without a doubt the type of Pokémon we want to see coming out of fossils from here on out.
14 Jangmo-o
Oh look, another pseudo-legendary. I told you you were going to see them, and Sun and Moon’s end game three stage☂ Pokémon is up to bat. Jangmo-o is a little different in that the level that you find them at in Vast Poni Canyon is generally pretty high, so it doesn’t take long to get it to evolve from its weaker form to its second evolution Hakamo-o. From ther🐷e, it’s usually not many more levels till a Kommo-o is yours.
With a unique dragon and fighting typing, Kommo-o can round off any team by filling the role of jack of all trades. Its stats are the mo🌊st well-rounded out of all the pseudo-legendaries meaning it’s versatile and that’s great news for any trainer. On top of that, it’s super imposing to look at which makes catching a Jangmo-o and training it up that much more worth it.
13 Magikarp
Let’s be real, you read the title of this article and knew that this Pokém𓆏on would show up SOMEWHERE on the list, right? Of course you did. We know how it goes. Old Rod it up in literally any body of water and up comes a Magikarp for yo🌳u to love and call your own and yell at it to splash, tackle, or flail as much as your little heart desires all the way up to level 20.
Now, straight out the level twenty gate, Gyarados may still only be strapped with Splash, Tackle and Flail, but dangit you’ve got yourself a Gyarados and if that’s not worth something then why are we even playing Pokémon in the first place, right? And that’s exactly why Magikarp/Gyarados makes this list; it’s a testament to the spirit of the game by training weak Pokémon to meet their potential. And when their potential is a wicked l﷽ooking sea serpent, well more power to ya.
12 Eevee
If Magikarp wasn’t your first thought on this list, then🃏 maybe it was Eevee? You know, potential to evolve into a bajillion different evolutionary forms is a pretty impressive potential. One so impressive that you may even wonder “Why bother keeping Eevee as it is? Might as well evolve it immediately🦂 and then start training so I can have it doing what I need it to do as soon as possible.”
And what you need it to do can be literally almost an🤡ything. From choosing a Jolteon to deal with type coverage to Sylveon as one of your primary special attackers, Eevee reigns supreme when it comes to versatility with its evolutions and as long as whatever special conditions your evolution of choice requires are met (be it an evolutionary stone or maxing out a stat at a certain time of day) evolving Eevee can be done exceptionally quickly. If you hav⛦e holes in your team you need to fill, an Eevee-lution can always be considered.
11 Lotad
While I may be a bit more partial to Lotad’s cousin Pokémon, the Ruby version-specific Seedot and its evolutionary lin🅺e, Lotad makes the list for a reason I’ll get to momentarily. More to the point, you start finding Lotads very early on in Sapphire, an🎶d they aren’t all that impressive fighters at level 3. Or beyond that really, and even after they hit level 14 and evolve into Lombre, it’s still not going to pack that much of a punch against anything,
Once your Lombre is substantially leveled and learned some decent moves, however, take a water stone to it and see what Ludicolo, as ridiculous of a Pokémon as it is, can do for your team. While on paper it may not look like much and it doesn’t really have much of a place in the metagame, I’ve battled my own teams against enough Ludicolos to know that these Pokémon are sturdy. With a decent defense and a slightly better special defense coupledꦆ with its Water/Grass typing, it’s only hit super effectively by flying moves, poison moves, and bug type moves and if you don’t have a Pokémon on your team that has a flying move in its set, then you probably won’t have either of the other two either. If you’re a fan of weird Pokémon and can appreciate a decent defense against all of the more common offensive types, Lotad is a Pokémon worth training and evolving.