Many fans of the Pokemon series were excited when remakes for Gen 4 games were announced to release late this year, in the form of Pokemon Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl. There have been many Pokemon games thus far, and it has been around fifteen years since players explored the region of Sinnoh for the first time. As such, revisiting it in Pokemon Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl will be a joy for many, and especially those who began their journey in the Pokemon world with the original Pokemon Diamond and Pearl back in 2006.
Pokemon Diamond and Pearl were far from perfect, though, and several players reported issues like the sluggish speed at which HP were deducted in battle. Another lamented issue was the fact that Pokemon Diamond and Pearl had a low number of Fire-type Pokemon in the base game, an issue that was only partly solved in Pokemon Platinum, and one that might still be lingering in the remakes. But there's also one more obscure feature that the original Gen 4 games had which no Pokemon games before or after included, one that Pokemon Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl shouldn't bring back.
Why Pokemon Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl Shouldn't Bring a Specific Feature Back
This feature is something never officially disclosed by Nintendo nor the Pokemon Company, but rather it came to light when dataminers found it in the leaked source code of Pokemon Diamond and Pearl. The gist is that Pokemon players could encounter more or fewer critters depending on the day of the year, and that's because there were several dates that would positively affect the encounter rate for wild Pokemon, as some others would decrease it. On happy days, national holidays for different countries, and global holidays, the encounter rate would go up by 10 percent, which translated into more wild Pokemon appearing.
This was meant to be a positive effect, as it would help players finding and catching rarer critters on those occasions, but it could also be experienced as something negative because of how annoying wild encounters may be for some. These players would then indirectly benefit from the decrease in encounter rate in Gen 4 games on a few dates that were marked as tragedies or unhappy days. Holidays with positive increases included dates like St. Patrick's Day, Independence Day, and Christmas Eve; whereas tragedies referred to anniversaries like the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, or 9/11.
Because this feature can be a painful reminder of tragedies for people, and also one that celebrates all sorts of holidays for only a few countries, Pokemon Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl should not include it. From a gameplay perspective, it also makes little to no sense, especially because players can change the date on their Nintendo Switch at any given time, meaning it could either be abused in some way or defeat whatever purpose it had in the originals. As such, it would be best to leave this one out of the remakes, no matter how faithful to the original Pokemon Diamond and Pearl they are meant to be.
Pokemon Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl will release on November 19, 2021, for Nintendo Switch.