When it comes to a series spanning over 25 years, it's an unfortunate truth we have to face: not all Pokémon moves are created equal. Whether designed for aesthetic purposes, created for early game only, or simply lacking in nuance, some moves do not have the wit or the power to hold up in battle, and should be forgotten as soon as possible.

RELATED: 10 Pokémon Moves That Harm Your Pokémon As Much As Their Opponent

The overall usefulness of a move is easy to calculate when it comes to damage-dealing attacks, but the field becomes murkier when judging status moves, E.G. moves that do not directly deal damage, but rather affect certain stats or battle conditions. Today we'll be ranking the worst of the worst: the 10 most useless status moves in the Pokémon franchise.

10 Mud Sport

Mud Sport ranks fairly high on the list because of its potential use in double and triple battles. Being able to protect one's electric-type ally can be useful, for sure. In single battles, however, Mud Sport is rendered utterly useless, as its effects end when the user switches out.

Being a move often known by Ground-types, having a resistance to electric-type moves is pointless unless the player takes extensive time to breed the move onto a water-type Pokémon who can utilize it correctly. Even after that effort, wasting a precious turn to protect Pokémon from electric attacks is not the most common strategy amongst competitive players.

9 Assist

Once the signature move of the adorable Skitty, Generation IV began to introduce the move to several other Pokémon, such as Glameow, Purrloin, and Meowth. Assist allows the Pokémon to randomly select a move known by any of the player's party Pokémon and use that move. The Japanese name for Assist is Cat's Paw, a likely reference to the Japanese saying "猫の手も借りたい neko no te mo karitai", which means  "I would even like to borrow a cat's hands". This means the speaker needs as much help as they can gather, including using a cat's paw.

In a cruel twist of fate, however, Assist does not offer as much assistance as its name promises. The randomness of the move selected leads to unpredictable results, which is undesirable in competitive battle. The move is also unusable in Pokémon Sword & Shield, as are several other moves on this list.

8 Kinesis

What move does one usually associate with the Abra line? Psychic, Teleport, perhaps even Future Sight? Not many players might think of Kinesis. A move only ever able to be learned by Kadabra and Alakazam, Kinesis has the user bend a spoon in order to distract the opponent Pokémon and lower their accuracy.

RELATED: 10 Greatest Psychic Pokémon Of All Time, Ranked

The move has only 80% accuracy itself, making it a gamble to use in battle. Accuracy-lowering moves with improved accuracy are out there, and considering how many powerful attacks Alakazam can utilize, wasting a move slot on Kinesis seems truly counterproductive.

7 Fairy Lock

Of all the trapping moves out there, Fairy Lock may just be the most useless. Known as the signature move for Klefki, Fairy Lock prevents the opponent Pokémon from switching out in the next turn. Unfortunately, Fairy Lock simply doesn't offer enough to make it a viable move, especially when there are so many other Fairy-type moves your Pokémon could use instead.

Mean Look, for example, stops the opponent Pokémon from escaping for an indefinite amount of turns (however long it takes for either Pokémon to faint). To make things even worse, the battle animation for Fairy Lock will cause the console to crash in version 1.1 of Pokémon Sword & Shield.

6 Dark Void

Many status moves endeavor to lure the opposing Pokémon to sleep in order to attack without retaliation. Dark Void is one of those moves, featuring a rather eerie animation as well. The signature move of the nightmare Pokémon, Darkrai, Dark Void has absolutely seen better days.

RELATED: Pokémon: Ten Of The Best Signature Moves

Ever since its cruel nerf in Generation VII, Dark Void has become essentially a coin toss, with even Sing having better accuracy (55% vs. 50%). Losing its place on many competitive players' moveset to Hypnosis, Dark Void has fallen onto dark times, all thanks to a loss of accuracy.

5 Extreme Evoboost

Yet another exclusive signature move graces this list, but Extreme Evoboost is slightly different. This move was gifted to Eevee in Generation VII to take advantage of Z-Moves, as Extreme Evoboost is a Z-Move itself. Drawing energy from all the Eeveelutions, Eevee raises all its stats (Attack, Special Attack, Defense, Special Defense, and Speed) by two stages each.

The problem lies in that every one of Eevee's evolved friends is more powerful than Eevee itself, therefore Extreme Evoboost has little use on the battlefield. Perhaps the move would have been useful in Pokémon: Let's Go, Eevee!, but currently it only exists in the other Generation VII games, making it even less useful.

4 Gear Up & Magnetic Flux

As touched upon in this list, signature moves can often fall flat and offer little advantage in battle, especially if they are designed to work only with Pokémon oft not used in battle. This is the case with both Gear Up and Magnetic Flux, moves designed to only offer benefits to Pokémon with the abilities Plus or Minus.

RELATED: The 10 Best Steel-type Pokémon, Ranked

Gear Up is the signature move of Klinklang in Generation VIII, and raises the Attack and Special Attack of ally Pokémon with Plus or Minus by one stage each. Conversely, Magnetic Flux raises the Defense and Special Defense of Plus/Minus ally Pokémon by one stage. How many Pokémon can take advantage of these moves? 12, in total. Not very versatile at all.

3 Celebrate

A move purely about fun, Celebrate is an event-exclusive move introduced in Generation VI. The Pokémon using the move will disappear and pop out of a present box, displaying the text "Congratulations, <player>!" Other than these words of praise, the move has no functional purpose in battle.

The move was given to several different Pokémon in events, including the Kanto starter trio, all the Eeveelutions, and even Ho-Oh and Rayquaza. If you're in need of praise, what better way to feel celebrated than to have a Rayquaza pop out of a box?

2 Hold Hands

Much like Celebrate, Hold Hands is an event-exclusive move introduced in Generation VI, only given to four different Pokémon via events: Charizard, Pikachu, Vivillon, and Pikachu again. The move's description is undeniably cute: "The user and an ally hold hands. This makes them very happy."

Though it is a delightful sight to see Charizard hold hands with its battle partner, the move, unfortunately, has no actual effect in battle. Truly, event-exclusive moves often only provide bragging rights and funny scenarios, rather than actual power. Otherwise, it would create a disadvantage to many other players unable to obtain the event Pokémon. Is it absolutely adorable? No question. Is it useful in any way? Not at all.

1 Splash

Predictably, Splash is number one on this list, with its signature catchphrase "but nothing happened!" Interestingly enough, the reason Splash is a normal-type move that can be learned by many Pokémon in the game is because its original Japanese name is "Hop", in where the Pokémon playfully jumps around. This certainly explains why Hoppip and its evolutions can learn the move.

Splash's only saving grace was its ability to become a Z move, with it granting a 3-stage increase in the Pokémon's attack stat. Now that Generation VII has come and gone, Splash again takes the crown for the most useless status move (and also most useless move) in the Pokémon games.

NEXT: Pokémon: 10 Moves Stronger Than Water Shuriken, Ranked