I know that Let's Go and X&Y look similar, but the art style just works way better in the way that X&Y did it (simple, 2D-ish).

I'm with this guy. Not a huge fan of Gen 7 itself, but people crap all over the many things it got right. Why anyone would ever want HMs back, at least in the way they were implemented the first six gens, is beyond my comprehension. And the designs of the Pokemon are easily the most inspired and fitting to the region of any generation thus far, hands down. Most of the comMons may suck competitively, but at least they weren't B/W level cookie cutter designs.

They should keep and expand pokerides. Get rid of HMs was the best thing that happened to pokemon. Build teams without hm slaves improved a lot the team making possibilities (pokemon was always about choosing your team, and HMs always limited it).
Trials and totems was a good addition. But they should keep it along gyms. Maybe, 8 gyms and the other 10 types be represented as trials.

-You're certainly entitled to our opinion; neither of us are more right than the other on the other on our thoughts on this gen's roster. I'm prepared to give examples on why I disagree with you though, if you'd like to continue the discussion on it.

-I can't agree more on tweaking the HM system, but I was talking in terms of the HM system from gens 1-6 vs. Gen 7's Pokemon Ride system. And I think you'll agree with me that being forced to use plot-based Pokemon that don't take up a slot in your party >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> carrying around an HM slave or two for the duration of your solo playthrough, then having to go dig one out whenever you're hunting for an item later on and you find out it's behind a bush or on a distant island in a cave.

-I can't disagree with you about all the stupid cutscenes, but in my case, I skipped the original S/M, so I had a year's worth of complaining to hear about. I got Ultra Moon at launch, and the complaining online had become so exaggerated (and having recently slogged through games that are FAR worse when it comes to not letting the player just play the f'n game like Okamiden and *gasp* Metal Gear Solid), it didn't seem as bad as I was expecting.

-I thought I would hate Z-moves, but they are really not that bad. Speaking from the persepective of a competitive player, they are what mega evolution should have been: everyone gets access to them, and they are a one-time nuke instead of a constant nuke. They can turn the tide of a battle, but they aren't guaranteed to be gamebreakers. Even if you aren't a competitive player, they have their merits. Do you play the Battle Tree, or any of the resident Battle Towers of the past? If you have, then you know the opponent that loves to cheese Double Team/Minimize, or stall strategies. You see human opponents like this online too. Z-moves ignore evasion boosts. Z-crystals are versatile enough to not only make good Pokemon better, but to give some Pokemon just enough oomph to hit hard enough, or to make previously unavailable strategies with Pokemon that aren't built for attacking possible. I can live without Z-moves, but I can certainly live with them too.

-I don't care about the soundtrack. Once I finished the game, I mostly play with the sound muted because I'm usually watching or listening to something else.

1. That's a shame. Well, humor me for one example, will ya? Take the very first Pokemon you meet on the games very first route, Alolan Rattata and Yungoos. They carry a law vs. crime motif in tandem, with A-Rattata being a thief fashioned after a hokkamuri (Japanese bandit) and Yungoos and Gumshoos being fashioned after patrol officers and detectives.  This idea alone already had more thought put into it than any Route 1 mix of Pokemon than any game before it, but it goes way deeper.

You only run into Yungoos/Gumshoos during the day, and you only run into A-Rattata/Raticate at night. Now at first you think, "OK, it makes sense. The thief does his work under the veil of night and to avoid the law." But check this: did you know that mongoose weren't actually native to Hawaii, but were brought into to combat the rat population in a colossally bad idea?

" Like so many invasive species that now run amuck on islands around the world, mongooses were intentionally introduced to Hawaii. Sugar cane farmers took their cue from Jamaican plantation owners who imported mongooses to control rat populations. In 1883 the mongooses were let loose in the fields, an approach that proved to be colossally uninformed. As it turns out, rats are nocturnal and mongooses are diurnal. The exotic predators never came in contact with their rodent prey, and native bird populations began crashing instead."

https://green.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/06/11/an-invader-advances-in-hawaii/

Bam! Unlike ANY game before, you have two Pokemon that are intrinsically tied to the region they represent right at the start of the game. They simultaneously present a duality  theme AND tell a bit of history of the land that Alola is based on. This is even reflected in the Pokedex entries:

Sun - " With its sharp fangs, it will bite anything. It did not originally live in Alola but was imported from another region."

Ultra Sun - "Although it wasn't originally found in Alola, this Pokémon was brought over a long time ago when there was a huge Rattata outbreak."

And that's just one example among many. What other game has its roster tie in so intrinsically to the region they represent?

2. Because if you still  have to have at least one member of your team capable of learning Surf/Strength/Fly/Odor Sleuth/Horseshoe, then you still need HM slaves. No more HM slaves.

3. Still with you on this. All I'm saying is that I became desensitized after playing games that are just as bad if not worse. That doesn't excuse these games though.

4. Let me preface this by reminding you that I am once again speaking from the standpoint of a competitive player. However, I in no way intend to come across as, "Lol, filthy casual." Your opinions and playstyle are just as valid as mine.

With that said, everything you have typed is either objectively wrong (from the standpoint of how they affect a battle) or can also be said about megas. Let me brake it down piece by piece.

 The fact that not every Pokémon gets one might be a little 'unfair', sure, but it also makes them slightly more predictable, which is good - and they still involve strategy.

And using Z-Moves very much involve strategy too. Deciding which Z-crystal to use, which Pokemon to put the crystal on, and when to use it in the match? That is left up to random, dumb luck in the hands of a master, sir. The same with Mega Evolution. Gen 6 Gengar: "Not going to evolve it now so it can come in on my opponent's Earthquake." Pinsir: "Not going to evolve it now so my opponent can't bring in his Gengar, because Levitate won't protect it from EQ due to Mold Breaker." Period: Hmm, should I give the Mega stone to Tyranitar or Blaziken, and how long should I keep my opponent trying to figure out which one has it?"

Once you mega evolve a Pokémon, that's it, it's mega evolved, but you still have to battle. You still have to use your regular moves and put your abilities to good use, and if your opponent can counterplay the mega, then it's fair game.

Same with Z-Moves. Once you use it, that's it for the entire battle. Unlike Mega mon, you have one turn to get it right. Then you still have to use your regular moves and put your abilities to good use, and your opponent can counterplay the Z-move with good prediction. I've brought in Incineroar plenty of times on a predicted Let's Snuggle Forever on my opponent's Mimikyu, then burned the crap out of it with Will-o-Wisp, or brought in my own Hakamo'o to counter my opponents Clangorous Soulblaze. With both Z-moves and Megas, you learn counter strategies through experience.

It's not like a mega evolved Pokémon would always beat a non-mega evolved one either, they were never that broken, and most of them always had one or two weaknesses (not talking exclusively about type matchup kind of weaknesses by the way). Yes, some were bullcrap like Kangaskhan or Mawile or whatever, but that could just be fixed with a thing called "balance patches" which I don't think Game Freak knows about.

Uh, yes they were that freaking broken. Do you ever play competitively online? In Gen 6, Kangaskhan was on every other team, and Mawile was on every third. When these things are allowed to switch in freely, something on the other team is guaranteed to die. They overcentralized the meta game like an mf'er. And I'll tell you the same thing I tell everyone who uses the "one or two weaknesses" argument: if you can only name one or two specific Pokemon to counter another Pokemon, then all you're really doing is proving how damn broken that Pokemon really is. "Greninja isn't overpowered, you just need to bring an Electrode or Porygon2 w/ Eviolite!" Mega Salamence isn't OP, you just need a Choice Scarf Jynx!"

Like I said before, a one-time nuke (that can be mitigated or avoided altogether) is better than a constant nuke. And you kinda undermined yourself with the bit about GameFreak not discovering what a balance patch is. If you know it'll never happen, why mention it?

Z-moves, they're the total opposite. You can never see them coming, and once they come, that's it, there's nothing you can do about it because it's a one-time nuke. Every single time a Z-move happens it's like, you're just having a regular battle and then suddenly out of nowhere the cringy cutscene begins and you're like "oh cool, fuck everything I was doing", because there's barely any way to predict it and definitely no way to react to it. It doesn't really reward smart play because it doesn't allow the opponent to strike back in any way, it's like you're just carrying a hidden nuke card and can randomly drop it at any time for a free kill. It's just a dumb mechanic, which doubles as cringy 20-second long cutscenes for good measure. I hate it, I absolutely hate it. It's the worst mechanic ever put in a Pokémon game by far.

Again, not true. For one, you too can carry a Z-move. Everything you just said about your opponent applies to you as well. For two, maybe you need to put some beefier Pokemon that can take a hit on your team, or use some moves to boost their bulk. Because if they had even average bulk, most Z-moves wouldn't one-shot them outside of being super effective (which would be stupid of your opponent to waste it on) or stat changes working against you. Or use Protect if you predict a Z-move coming, or switch into something that resists it. Or learn to predict. For thirds, if you hate the idea of the one-time nuke so much, there are PLENTY of Z-moves that don't involve direct attacking. When I have Firium Z one Delphox or Incineroar, I sometimes use Z-Will o Wisp to boost their speed a stage to help with a potential sweep. On my Magnezone, Z-Metal Sound let's me get a special attack boost; prior to Gen 7, there was no other way to boost Magnezone's special attack. These are niche strategies, yes, and they go along with what you say about them being unpredictable, but for a guy who wants weird stuff like Steel/Poison Nidoking, I figured you'd like a bit more variety and unpredictability. It's not GF's fault that people are lazy and uncreative and primarily use Z-moves as nukes. Don't hate the game, hate the player.

Oh, and I wholeheartedly agree about the cringey ass animations that take forever. I can bake a potato in the time it takes Clangorous Soulblaze to finish.

(Edit: and about evasiveness, yeah, it sucks. But one crap mechanic countering another crap mechanic doesn't make any of them better.)

Tell me that after you face your first team full of Minimize Drifblims and Chanseys and waste 30 turns of your time trying to touch them.

5. Sir, please re-read what I typed. The game's music is very important to me and is integral to the experience. I said, "Once I finished the game." Because after beating the solo adventure, I spend 95 percent of my game time in battle, breeding at the ranch, or leveling up in battle against wild Chansey. My game file says I have logged 925 hours of play time. Would you want to spend the vast majority of that time listening to the same three or four tunes?

I am just a filthy gen oner, so my opinion does not matter. =P

Looking forward to returning to that world though next year.

Id would prefer a different solution.

There should be a menu for pokeride registration, where you associate to every type of ride a given pokemon you captured. Either if it is with you or in the box. So, you are not limited to bring a surfing, or pokemon with specific ability with you. The limitation of HMs is not only on the move, but also in the team building. If pokemon is about freedom of team, that would limit the choices of the player(everytime I tryed a monotype team was really frustrating to handle HMs). Also, it can potentially double the pokemon that are with you, 6 for battle, 6 for riding,. And if you wish, they can be the same.