Pokémon Diamond Version and Pokémon Pearl Version

[SlowPokemon]

As of today, it's been a full seven years since Pokémon Diamond and Pokémon Pearl came out in the United States. I feel so goddam old. I was only 11 when they were released but I can still remember it like it was yesterday.

I figured that it would be fun if we all shared our favorite memories of the original Pokémon games for the Nintendo DS, the two that really set the groundwork for what a Pokémon game should look like on that system.

I'm going to use the following format, and the rest of you can feel free to as well, or you can just share a fond memory or something. Have fun, and dedicate today to remembering the first time you experienced a two-screen battle, laughed at your hyperactive rival, or tinkered around with a Pokétch.

Favorite town or city: Floaroma Town. It may seem like an odd choice, but the music theme is so lilting and lovely, and walking among the flowers there gives a real sense of peace and beauty.

Favorite route: Route 209. It's just a short little stretch leading from Hearthome City to Solaceon Town, but it's got the Lost Tower and Spiritomb's little thing there, and it has what might be the most loved music from the game.

Favorite new feature: Having different music play during the day and at night. It was such a clever touch, and done extraordinarily well, and I wish they would have kept doing it for the other games.

Favorite music: "Battle! (Dialga/Palkia)" has to be my favorite. It's just so well-written, and it's a highlight even among this excellent soundtrack.

Favorite new Pokémon: I honestly have to go with Turtwig. It's such a cutie and its charm has never worn off for me.

Favorite new evolution: Leafeon--Eevee FINALLY gets a Grass-type evolution! It was about time! Honchkrow and Dusknoir are right up there though, for being just so damn cool.

Favorite new pre-evolution: Mime Jr. I cannot get over how adorable that Pokémon is.

[mikey]

Favorite town or city: Um I really liked Sunnyshore because of how it was sort of split between the ground and the walkways, and it had a lot of fun stuff to rock climb!

Favorite route: Route 209. Is this even debatable?

Favorite new feature: Um the uh GTS.  I got a Shiny Palkia for no reason, probably hacked :/

Favorite music: Galactic boss battle.  It sounds AMAZING.

Favorite new Pokémon: Toxicroak was amazingly cool

Favorite new evolution: Honkchrow.  It was a much needed evolution.

Favorite new pre-evolution: Chingling, I really liked Chimecho from 3rd gen.

[Clanker37]

Favorite town or city: Jubilife City. Dat music and the first big city you see in "3D." Even if most of the buildings had no doors.

Favorite route: Route 216. You know, the snow one. Music played big time for this one again. From a frosty beginning into an adventurous melody. I feel damn awesome. Then sinking into the snow. That was pretty crazy.

Favorite new feature: As a 9 year old, I was pretty impressed with the "3D graphics". But then again anyone with a 9 year old's brain capacity would like pretty pictures. I would have to say the introduction of walking with Pokemon now.

Favorite music: This is tough. I've narrowed it down to the Pokemon Centre (Night) theme. Just something about the chillness of the classic theme. Someone made an arrangement of it a while back. I love you, whoever did it. If I ever find you, do not be surprised if I hump you leg a little.

Favorite new Pokémon: Vespiquen. Something about this hive with wings is super cool.

Favorite new evolution: Mismagius. I came into gen 4 from gen 3, having no idea what idea with a Misdreavus was. Mismagius is super awesome. I don't know why. Perhaps I just like feminine things in big dresses. Hmm... I hope that's not indicative of something...

Favorite new pre-evolution: Mantyke. IT'S SO CUTE OMG I WANT TO HUG IT UNTIL IT DIES ;_;

[Waddle Bro]

Pokemon Diamond is one of the rare games I can say I've played for over 1000 hours. The Christmas Eve when I got this and started playing it is possibly one of the best gaming memories from my childhood.

Route 228, it just felt so epic idk and the music

Gonna say The Underground was my favourite new feature, even though Secret Bases were in Gen III. I remember good times with friends digging cool shiz and customizing our bases. I now appreciate they made moves either physical, special or status.

My favourite piece from D/P is the Game Corner, mostly because it has been a really fun song to work with.

Fav D/P poke has to go to Spiritomb. It was so cool and I was never able to find out how to get one legit. I'd usually say Togekiss, but I discovered it in Platinum.

Fav Evo Empoleon aka the Piplupking.

Fav pre-evo Budew my dawg. That cute little bastard took names and body bag'd bitches. Don't mess with Budew. You're gonna get rekt.

[mikey]

Jeez this game really is old isn't it
I don't remember what it was like to be that young

[Nebbles]

Favorite town or city: I really love Celestic town. It's small, but I like the fact it's associated with mythology, which is very rad.

Favorite route: Hmmm... route 212, maybe? It's got really great music, and the rainy atmosphere it has is really nice.

Favorite new feature: Definitely loved the different music during day in night. Bring that back. Please.

Favorite music: The credits song. It's so beautifully done, but I have to mention the Game Corner and Route 209 as well.

Favorite new Pokémon: This might come as a shocker... but Drifloon!

Favorite new evolution: Togekiss or Mismagius. Cute and such great Pokemon.

Favorite new pre-evolution: Eerrrmm I'm not very fond of baby Pokemon but I guess Budew??

[davy]

Favorite town or city: Definitely Celestic town. It took me so long to figure out you had to speak with the galactic grunt in Pastoria that it felt like a real achievement when I finaly reached it.

Favorite route: route 203. It never took that long in a pokémon game untill you had your first battle with your rival, and I was really looking forward to that.

Favorite new feature: The pokéball decorating I guess? There weren't many new features that I really liked about DP. While the super contest was nice, it felt like a step back from the contests in Hoenn which allowed you to use five moves, score up to four points per move without drawbacks and didn't had multiple judges (and yes, Sinnoh had dancing, but that wasn't my favorite part of the super contest anyway).

Favorite music: I am really fond of the surf theme. In fact, it's my favorite theme of the entire series (shocking, isn't it?). It's a shame that all those tentacools had to ruin it.

Favorite new Pokémon: Luxray. It was the only pokémon that I used during both my Diamond and my Soul Silver playthrough.

Favorite new evolution: Mamoswine. Not only did Piloswine (which was already one of my favorite pokemon) get an evolution, it was also a mammoth!

Favorite new pre-evolution: I'm not very fond of baby Pokémon eighter, so I guess Munchlax because your Rival uses it in the battle against Mars and Jupiter?


I never knew Hearthome Gym had any gym trainers untill I read the Bulbapedia article. In the game, I appearently managed to get the correct door every time.

After defeating Saturn in lake Vaylor and Mars in lake Verity I didn't know how to continue. I mean, sure, the next gym was in Snowpoint, but I needed strength to get there and I hadn't obtained it yet. But when I looked in my bag, it was there! Much later I found out that strength was found on top of the lost tower which a friend of me had climed for me.

[BlackDragonSlayer]

Favorite town or city: Aside from Hearthome City and the three "Area" locations, I stayed in Pastoria City most (perhaps because of the berries), so I suppose I would consider that my favorite.

Favorite route: I always found Route 213 to be fun in terms of layout, and I also enjoyed 228 (Shiny Rhydon yeah!)... on the other end of the spectrum, contenders for least favorite are Route 206 (Cycling Road was alright, but traversing underneath it was always a pain) and Route 210 (fog!!!).

Favorite new feature: Underground; I would say the Day/Night system, but technically, that wasn't new (as others have pointed out, though, the change of music brings a new atmosphere to each area at different times of the day).

Favorite music: Not sure.

Favorite new Pokémon: Rampardos, Torterra, Spiritomb, Toxicroak, or Regigigas. I'm so indecisive...

Favorite new evolution: Gallade, Dusknoir, and Weavile. Out of those, probably Gallade.

Favorite new pre-evolution: Mime Jr.

[blueflower999]

Wow, time to take a trip down memory lane to my first Pokemon game. 

Favorite Town: Probably Solaceon Town. Not entirely sure what I like about it other than the Day Care, but I spent a lot of time there for whatever reason.

Favorite new feature: Oh, so many. Underground was a ton of fun, the Poketch was super cool, and the GTS is still a ton of fun to this day. (Although I really hated the Honey Trees.)

Favorite music: Route 209, Arceus battle theme, Dialga/Palkia battle theme, Sunnyshore City music

Favorite new Pokemon: Magnezone, Turtwig line, Bidoof line, Kricketot line, both fossil lines, Porygon-Z and most of the other new evolutions, Rotom, Regigigas

Favorite new evolution: Magnezone of course! Porygon-Z for close second.

Favorite new pre-evo: Mantyke's pretty cute, I like Munchlax, and Chingling is pretty cool too.

[JDMEK5]

Awww... I started on Platinum.. That sucks that I can't join in cuz I didn't have Diamond or Pearl.. Well too bad cuz I'm doing this anyways.

Favorite town or city: Sunyshore City. Not a fan of the tune, but I love the place and especially those skyways.

Favorite route: Mt. Coronet Summit. I never forgot climbing that huge mountain to this day. I thought it was even more awesome and memorable than climbing Mt. Silver in HG/SS.

Favorite new feature: The touch screen. I know this is not technically part of the game but it was a new feature of 4th-gen so I'm going with it. I loved just being able to tap battle options wherever they happened to be at any given time, and in HG/SS, they actually made it possible to play the game fully without using the A, B, X, or Y buttons at all; adding their functions to the touch screen.

Favorite music: "Battle! (Champion)". Yes, I'm one of those people.

Favorite new Pokémon: Infernape. My first level 100. Was stolen with my first Platinum copy. I'm offering a $10 reward.

Favorite new evolution: Garchomp. I'm assuming this "favorite new evolution" can be an evolution of a new Pokémon. Never said it couldn't be.

Favorite new pre-evolution: Budew. My first shiny. Also stolen with my first Platinum copy. I'm offering a $10 reward.

[Echo]

Favorite town or city: Snowpoint City, because of that one in-game trade where you get a Haunter with an Everstone. Trollfreak at their finest.

Favorite route: Route 206. Cycling Road.

Favorite new feature: Physical/Special move split. For people that aren't familiar with the older games, I'll explain. In every game before this, whether an attack used the Attack/Defense or Special Attack/Special Defense stats depended on the type of the move. So for example, all Fire, Dark, and Dragon attacks would use Special Attack (even Fire Punch, Crunch, Dragon Claw, etc.), and any Ghost or Poison attacks would use the physical Attack stat (like Shadow Ball and Sludge Bomb). So yeah, this is probably the change that I appreciate the most, since it added so much diversity with what moves to use in battles.

Favorite music: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qvCboyezCWw

Favorite new Pokémon: Darkrai's pretty cool. Luxray and Staraptor are up there too.

Favorite new evolution: Roserade's pretty classy, and stands out since I don't care for Roselia at all. Frolass, Gallade, and Porygon-Z were cool ideas too.

Favorite new pre-evolution: Don't really like any of them, but Bonsly has a really clever name, so I'll pick him.

[mikey]

Favorite new feature: Physical/Special move split. For people that aren't familiar with the older games, I'll explain. In every game before this, whether an attack used the Attack/Defense or Special Attack/Special Defense stats depended on the type of the move. So for example, all Fire, Dark, and Dragon attacks would use Special Attack (even Fire Punch, Crunch, Dragon Claw, etc.), and any Ghost or Poison attacks would use the physical Attack stat (like Shadow Ball and Sludge Bomb). So yeah, this is probably the change that I appreciate the most, since it added so much diversity with what moves to use in battles.

To be honest I never could memorize which types used which attack stat.

[Nebbles]

Oh, goodness, how could I forget the physical/special split. A true godsend to us all.

[SlowPokemon]

This is pretty nitpicky, but the Arceus battle theme wasn't actually in the Sinnoh games, it's just in HeartGold and SoulSilver.

[K-NiGhT]

Favorite route: Route 214, because of all the cool things you could find there (including Giratina)

Favorite new feature: The Underground, of course! I would be there for hours just mining things.

Favorite music: Canalave City. It was so relaxing!

Favorite City: Sunnyshore, due to the cool walkways, the awesome gym, and the upbeat music!

Favorite new Pokémon: Piplup. It's so adorable!

Favorite new evolution: Rhyperior, cuz omahgah it's such badass.

Favorite new pre-evolution: Budew because it was easy to get and was a solid team choice throughout the game.