Pokémon Ruby and Sapphire were the shiny, new Pokémon games released on a new platform: the Game Boy Advance. Taking players to a new region, it was a journey designed to bring tons of new fans to the series while giving old trainers a reason to get back into the groove of catching new creatures and training them to battle the Elite Four.

The world of Ruby and Sapphire became some of the best-selling games on the GBA, and were many fans’ introduction to the series. As a result, they are some of the most beloved games as well, with tons of people clamoring for a proper remake on the 3DS before Omega Ruby and Alpha Sapphire came out. Now that everyone’s need for Hoenn has been satisfied, we can look back on the region fondly.

As fun as Ruby and Sapphire were, though, that’s not to say they were perfect. In trying to take the series to a new region with new mechanics, Game Freak took a risk. While the risk paid off in the long run, it wasn’t without its hiccups along the way. Some of the new systems and Pokémon introduced in the games hurt the quality of the adventure.

Ruby and Sapphire are far from bad games, but they had their fair share of problems. There are a lot of reasons the games are good, but there were plenty of mistakes made during its development. We’re looking at 25 mistakes in Pokémon Ruby and Sapphire only true fans noticed.

25 Constant Surfing

As much as IGN's “too much water” criticism became a meme for how ridiculous it sounded, it’s hard to deny that there is a lot of water in Ruby and Sapphire. While the Hoenn Region is based on real locations, it’s quite a chore to constantly travel through water to reach a chunk of the game’s areas. There are constant trainer battles on every route, and players susceptible to wild Pokémon encounters while surfing. It made the journey in those sections feel much longer.

24 Too Many HMs

HMs, as a mechanic, were horribly outdated, even by the time Ruby and Sapphire came out. These moves had an impact on the overworld, and players had to take up one of their Pokémons’ move slots to have it. There were a total of eight HMs in Ruby and Sapphire, meaning that some Pokémon often had more than one in their moveset. Furthermore, three of those HMs were water-type moves, meaning that players would often have to bring more than one water-type Pokémon with them.

23 More Wild Encounters

As an extension of surfing through at least a third of the world, Ruby and Sapphire had tons of wild encounters, which is saying a lot for a Pokémon game. To travel swiftly through the world (and to gain any of the Legendary Pokémon), it was necessary to always bring repels, just so the adventure could continue without constant interruptions. By the end of the game, the encounters just became tedious and unwanted. At least Omega Ruby and Alpha Sapphire tightened up the traveling system.

22 Pointless Mechanics

With Ruby and Sapphire came the introduction of some new ways to categorize a Pokémon, like abilities and natures. While these further enhanced the customization that went into a player’s team, there were also some introduced that were extremely pointless. Certain abilities served as a crutch for most Pokémon while some natures were practically useless. It made creating a team a grind fest, as players were subject to RNG the entire time. With later entries in the franchise, it became easier to create an ideal team.

21 Double Team Buffed

One new stat that entered the series in Ruby and Sapphire was evasion. This meant that moves like Double Team, which increased evasion, were some of the best to use. There were several trainers and Pokémon who would constantly use the move (in tandem with Sand Attack) to essentially turn any match into something that could take nearly 10 minutes. The reason they took so long is because the player’s Pokémon wouldn’t be able to land a hit because of that ridiculous evasion stat.

20 Subpar Pokémon Designs

Whether it’s because of the idolization of the original 151 or because the designs were objectively bad, there were some questionable choices with the Gen III Pokémon. Some of them were shameless rehashes of older Pokémon, like Gulpin and Swalot. There were a few that stuck out from the crowd, like Metagross and Salamence, but they were the minority in that generation. Most people wouldn’t be able to recall what Mawile, Electrike, or Lombre looked like if you asked them.

19 Two Bikes

Bikes became a primary method of travel in the Pokémon series, allowing trainers to travel from place to place even faster. In Ruby and Sapphire, there were two bikes thrown into the mix: the Mach Bike and Acro Bike. One was built for speed, and the other for tricks. The problem is that the Acro Bike could be used to get to new areas but was slow. Forcing the player to travel all the way to the bike shop to change bikes for exploration purposes was downright tedious.

18 Pokéblocks

Do you remember Pokéblocks? You’re not alone. This was a new mechanic introduced in Ruby and Sapphire where players could make Pokéblocks for their Pokémon. These blocks would be used to raise stats that were only relevant in contests. Naturally, few people used this feature. It could only be done in specific locations and could even be done with a friend who had a link cable. That said, it was easier to just catch a Pokémon that had all the right stats.

17 Pokémon Contests

Instead of just battling, another thing that players could do in Ruby and Sapphire was partaking in Pokémon Contests. The problem with them was that the rules were so ill-defined that it was hard to gauge which strategies worked and which ones didn’t. Without any serious rewards for coming out on top, there was almost no point to engage in contests. Why spend all that time trying to figure out how to win if there’s nothing in it for the player?

16 The “Nice” Rival

One of the most universally-hated tropes in the Pokémon franchise is the rival who is just a nice and upbeat fellow who playfully accompanies players on their journey. This trope started in Ruby and Sapphire, where May or Brendan was a nice person that happily competed with the player instead of being a downright jerk. There was no drive to defeat them because they weren’t insufferable. It’s surprising that Game Freak continued the trope for years after Ruby and Sapphire’s release.

15 Catching Milotic

One of the best Pokémon in Ruby and Sapphire is Milotic. Good luck trying to find one, though. First, you must catch a Feebas, which is the trickiest Pokémon to capture in the entire game. There are specific squares you can search for one, however, they have an extremely low chance of spawning. After that, you must level it up to 40, when its stats are like a Magikarp’s. Only then can players add a Milotic to their team, but it takes a lot of hard work and patience.

14 Wailord And Skitty

The breeding mechanic from Gold and Silver made a return in Ruby and Sapphire. Pokémon were separated into breeding groups, meaning that only some could breed with each other to create an egg. Most of the breeding groups made sense, but the one that still has people shaking their heads is the Wailord and Skitty group. The largest Pokémon in the franchise and one of the smallest ever made can somehow have children together. It has never been explained and Game Freak hasn’t addressed it.

13 Roaming Legendaries

If there’s one thing more frustrating than trying to catch a Pokémon with an extremely low spawn rate, it’s trying to catch a roaming Legendary Pokémon. In Ruby and Sapphire, players could hunt for Latios or Latias. They would be on different routes in the region at any given time, so it was a matter of tracking them down and encountering them in the wild. When battling them, players had to act quickly, because they would usually run away in one turn, forcing players to track them all over again.

12 No Day/Night Cycle

Gold and Silver introduced a day and night cycle, where different Pokémon would appear at different times of the day. It was a neat feature that helped flesh out the world. It was surprising that this feature wasn’t carried over to Ruby and Sapphire, despite the games being on better hardware. The entire time, players are just strolling through the day, never worrying about certain Pokémon hiding behind the cover of night. The feature was added back in Diamond and Pearl, though.

11 Pointless New Pokémon

While the designs of the Gen III Pokémon are up for debate, their usefulness in battle is no question. Many of the new Pokémon in Ruby and Sapphire were pointless. They didn’t offer any unique moves or advantages in combat, meaning that only players trying to catch every creature would ever have them. Pokémon like Seviper, Zangoose, Luvdisc, Plusle, Minun, and Crawdaunt were all useless later in the game. This led to many players catching Pokémon from past generations for their teams.

10 Very Few “Good” Pokémon

In Gen III, there were a lot of Pokémon that didn’t have a lot to offer on the battlefield. Many of Hoenn’s exclusive Pokémon didn’t evolve or didn’t have the stats to take down some of the stronger opponents. There were only a select few that were worth anything, including the starters, Salamence, and Metagross. If one of those didn’t make it to a Hoenn team, it was a sight rarer than a Feebas. Despite having a larger amount of new Pokémon, Game Freak forgot to make them decent.

9 Event Legendaries

The existence of event legenadaries was simultaneously a blessing and a curse. While Pokémon like Ho-Oh, Lugia, Mew, and Deoxys were obtainable through events in Pokémon Emerald, they were limited time deals. If players missed the deadline, they would never catch them. However, to make matters worse, these events were never put in Ruby and Sapphire, but they were in FireRed and LeafGreen. It made these Pokémon impossible to get in Ruby and Sapphire without trading with someone lucky.

8 False Rumors

In the days of Ruby and Sapphire, there were rumors going around about getting Legendary Pokémon like Deoxys and Jirachi. Because they weren’t noticeably attainable in any part of the game, it started a rumor that involved Mossdeep City. People online claimed that players could ride the rocket at a certain number of successful launches, where they would be taken to space to catch Jirachi and Deoxys. There were several other rumors that circulated about these games, and all of them were false.

7 No Transferring Pokémon

One of the reasons Pokémon is more beloved as a franchise than other series that have yearly releases is because players get to keep their Pokémon. Through the powers of transferring, players can send their old Pokémon to newer games to keep their original partners. However, Ruby and Sapphire cut off the Pokémon from Red, Blue, Yellow, Gold, and Silver. Without any method of bringing those Pokémon over, many players had to say goodbye to the friends they had on their adventure in the Kanto and Johto Regions.

6 Random Breeding

The breeding in Pokémon is entirely random, but it was even more random in Ruby and Sapphire. In later games, there was a system where players could mess around with Pokémon Natures and Abilities to have some control over what the babies were like. This isn’t the case in Ruby and Sapphire. Getting a decent Pokémon out of an egg was nothing more than luck of the draw. If you thought breeding for the proper IVs and hidden abilities was hard in later games, Ruby and Sapphire made it nearly impossible.