The Pokémon franchise is over twenty years old now and has grown into a behemoth. Over the years we’ve seen many games, films, and anime series come out and add to the franchise's popularity. But it all started with the very polarizing first generation of games. While first entries in a franchise this huge are typically looked at fondly by the fan base, the first Generation of Pokémon games are pretty divisive; with some fans loving them dearly and others pointing out that they’ඣre an inferior product two de♋cades after their release.

Looking back on them now, there are a ♚lot of things not to like about the Geᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ𒀱ᩚᩚᩚn 1 games. Of course, there are still some things that redeem the first generation. The biggest problem in Gen 1 were the glitches. There’s a whole bunch of them that really ruin the game when you look at what they did – or in some cases prevented. It’s one of those things that didn’t seem like much of a problem at the time, and was only really exposed once more entries came out in later generations. Despite all the bad, there are still some things that Gen 1 gave us which we can all appreciate.

So let’s go and take a look at the 20 worst things about Pokémon Red & Blue and the 10 best.

30 Worst: Some Bad Quality Sprites

The Pokémon games haven’t used sprites for a while now, and despite the clean, new look to the more recent games, some fans still like what the sprites brought to the t🍃able aesthetically. However, not all of the old sprites have aged that🦩 well.

There are some Gen 1 sprites that just look downright bad.

While the majority of Gen 1 Pokémon sprites were pretty solid, some have left a bad taste. When talking about awful Gen 1 sprites, those fܫor Golbat, Mew, Poliwrath, and Machoke are just a few that instantly come to mind.

29 Worst: Multi-hit Crits

Getting a much needed critical hit in battle can really swing the tide in your favor. On the other🍨 hand, having it happen to you can lead you one step closer to a loss. There’s a bug in Gen 1 th🔜at made those critical hits all the more annoying to deal with.

Multi-hit moves caꦬn be pretty useful at times, but in Gen 1 they were💜n’t always the best option in terms of damage dealt. They all used the same number for damage, meaning that if one dealt critical damage, they all did.

28 Best: The Simplicity Of It All

We’ve focused so much on the bad, why not move on to something Gen 1 got right? As the Pokémon games have gone on, Game Freak has tried different features, both adding and subtracting mechanics with each indi🐻vidu🐷al generation.

Sometimes things are better the simpler they are.

But one thing you had to appreciate about the original ✤games was how fun they managed to be while remaining an incredibly simple adventure. It seems fairly bare bones when you go back toꦇ those games today, but it definitely worked out great in its time.

27 Worst: Rest Doesn’t Reset Stats

Rest is an annoying move to deal with if you’re not the one using it. At the cost of putting the♏ user to sleep for a few turns, Rest replenishes HP and even restores status. Sounds pretty good, yeah? But a glitch made it so Rest wasn’t as effective as it should have been in Gen 1.

When utilized by a Pokémon that was either burned or paralyzed, Rest would keep the stat reductions assꦗociated with these conditions, despite relieving the user of the🌊ir effects. This essentially only made it half as useful as it should’ve been.

26 Worst: Hyper Beam Glitch

Hyper Beam was an incredibly intimidating move in the earlier games and remains one of the most iconic moves in the entire franchise. Suffice to say, you didn’t want an opponent to hit you with one of these. You especially didn’t 𒁏want one to knock you out with it.

Due to a glitch, Hyper Beam – which typically requires the user to recharge the turn after using it – doe🗹sn’t require its usual cool down period if it completely knocks the opposing Pokémon out. That can get really annoying, especially against the Elite Four and Champ.

25 Best: The Iconic Soundtrack

One of the most memorable things about the Gen 1 gam🔥es was the soundtrack that played over your adventure throughout Kanto. The 8-bit themes might ꧟be a far cry from what we have now, but still have an irresistible charm to them all these years later.

The battle music was intense; the various themes were catchy enough to get stuck in your head early on into your playthrough and some pretty iconic songs came out of it. There’s always a bit nostalgia to factor in when you’re discussing things this old, but the Red/Blue & Yellow soཧundtrack was undoubtedly one of the best thingᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ𒀱ᩚᩚᩚs about Gen 1.

24 Worst: Leech Seed Stack

Games are almost always going to have some g💮litches that certain pla🍬yers will discover and take advantage of. There were quite a few glitches and problems in Gen 1, with the Leech Seed & Toxic stack being one of the more notable.

It turns out that when stacked together, Leech Seed and Toxic would use the same damage calculator. This meant that Leech Seed would drain twice as muc൩h damage as Toxic dealt and vice versa. You could’ve been doing this by accident for years and no🥃t have known.

23 Worst: Critical Hits And The Speed Stat

Whether or not you manage to get a critical hit is pretty much a luck of the draw situation in most RPG’s, but in Gen 1 there was one stat that hel☂ped better the odds a little.

In Gen 1, critical hits were highly dependent on a Pokémon’s speed sta🍬t. That meant that the faster the Pokémon, the higher the possibility it would land a critical hit was. This also meant that fast Pokémon would get crits more frequently than ot♊hers as well.

22 Best: Pokémania

From the mid 90sﷺ onward, Pokémania helped establish the Pokémon franchise as a juggernaut in not only the video game, but the entertainment industry in both the East and the West. For those who grew up around this time, it was a time of fond memories and an unrelenting fascination🐓 with anything and everything Pokémon.

Though the original games are 🌜dated in many ways, fans can always look back to them a𓆉nd what they meant for so many kids of their generation. The excitement, enthusiasm and lifelong fanaticism is something many fans will always remember fondly.

21 Worst: Tricky To Fight Psychic-types

One huge criticism directed towards the Gen 1 games involved Psychic-tღypes. There was a pretty noticeable balancing issue that made them some of the strongest in the game🦄, and didn’t give players all that much opportunity to counter them as easily as they would any other type.

You heard it right, Psychic-types were even tougher to handle than Dragon-types in Gen 1.

The Psychic-types dominated Gen 1 so bad🔴ly that starting with Gen 2 change❀s were made in order to balance things out. Steel and Dark-type Pokémon were added along with moves strong against Psychic-types as well as a weakness to Ghost-type moves.