Its actually interesting that in this day in age with all these adventure and RPG games that have multiple save files, Pokemon one of the biggest RPG's rarely ever gets criticized for only having one save file. Seems like something most people just ignore.

Its never been a big deal to me because I usually just stick with the one save file. If I ever want to play over again I just restart an older Pokemon game that I haven't played in awhile.

Are you an only child?

I know I've quoted you a ton in this thread, but bear with me. I'm not arguing against anything you're saying, but I just want to point out that starting a fresh new file is a lot more costly now in this generation than it's ever been previously because of event-only megastones. Now this is can be a moot point if you have a trusty friend to hold your mon for you like in the good ol' days, but let me give you an example.

There was an event back in July and August for X/Y based around Pinsir and Heracross, the fighting beetles. Pinsir is exclusive to X this generation, and Heracross is exclusive to Y (barring trades). Therefore, you can only find a Pinsirite stone in X and a Heracrosite in Y. But in July and August, you could download the bug not in your game as a gift straight to your DS, and later on you could go to Gamestop to receive a code to get that bug's megastone so you could take it to the next level. I happen to use a Mega Pinsir as part of my Super Six now, because of that event.

If I restart my game without finding someone I trust to hold my Pinsirite until I can receive it back, I lose it forever. I could technically trade for another one online, but I'd have to move Heaven and Earth to convince someone to give up such a valuable item that is in limited supply. And me personally, I ain't got jack crap worth trading for.

Decided to crunch some numbers for Gen I (point out where I went wrong):

Each Pokemon can have a name of up to 12 characters long. Can be uppercase or lowercase letters (so, 26*2 = 52 characters), or 17 special characters, 52+17 = 69, can be represented in 7 bits. Means that a Pokemon's name equals 12*7 bits = 84 bits, or 10.5 bytes.

A Pokemon can be one of one hundred levels, can be represented as 7 bits.
Also saved is the amount of experience, highest level of experience is 1640000, can be represented as 21 bits, or 2.625 bytes.

A Pokemon may possess up to 4 moves. The best way to do this would be to store an indexed move list on the rom, and just save the 4 indices. Total number of moves in gen 1: 165 (give or take my miscount). Can be represented in 7 bits. 7 * 4 = 28 bits, or 3.5 bytes.

There are 151 kinds of Pokemon, an index representing which Pokemon it is can be stored in 8 bits, or 1 byte.

Means each Pokemon will take up 10.5 + 2.625 + 3.5 bytes + 1 byte = 17.625 bytes.

The player can hold 6 Pokemon in their party, as well as store up to 20 Pokemon in one of 12 boxes. Meaning that the player can store up to 6 + (20 * 12) = 246 Pokemon. 246 Pokemon * 17.625 bytes = 3105.75 bytes, or 3.03 kilobytes.

... and now I'm bored, I might come back to this later. Need to look at: player name, enemy name, play time, badges, position in world, position in story, money, backpack, seen Pokemon in Pokedex. Others? (did the game have optional side quests? Honestly cannot remember).

- So you don't get to choose the other pokemon (like starters), they want you to catch or trade.
- And since the game is very big, maybe it cant handle 2 save files.
- And what most people are saying

Here are some variables that each game has to save:

Each Pokemon has an associated 8(?) digit trainer code. An IV-stat determinating code (six numbers, 1-31 per). An EV-stat determinating code (six numbers, 0-255 per).

There is only really the main quest but you can always go off the beaten path and do "quests" that are for things like acorns or berries (in the latter games), as well as trainer fight data (single-player and online) which doesn't seem to have a "memory cap" as you can keep adding trainers, battle records, and battle data.

It was a technical reason when it started. The SRAM chip can only hold so much complicated data at once. But now no. Besides you can deal with this with 3rd party hardware, by backing up your save file. I've done this before on past games. Or just transfer your pokemon between series. Even if you don't buy every version. You usually will buy one remake and or 3rd game. Or now Pokemon box. I've had all my pokemon from R/S/E etc. transfered all the way up to X/Y. If I wanted to restart. I used Emearld, Col, GC Box as storage when I wanted to reset.

No, why does this matter? Myself and my brother shared whatever. We had Gold beat 30 times overbetween us before we finished, on a 1 save fle system. Learn to share bro. Don't be greedy. 

Hell that question is way off-topic. 

Also an example, me and my brother have 2 PS3s between us. When CoD MW2 came out, we both bought a copy for ourselves so we didnt have to share. There is nothing wrong with having multiple games, or both versions of the game (since you need both to complete the game with Pokemon). The only people who complain about this are the ones who have been forced to share things...  

In the beginning, it was a hardware limitation. Now it's just tradition. It's a tradition that needs to change.

I have no connection with videogame code and AI.