Gambling Not Permitted

If you play the Pokémon main series games, you might have noticed that the first-generation up to the third-generation games included the Game Corner with certain mini-games, most notably slot machines, that can allow the player to earn more coins out of coins to get certain things. In the fourth-generation games, these became spotty (or replaced with Voltorb Flip for example), and they simply disappeared from then on. The reason is that the slot machines are of course gambling machines, and with the games being supposed to be friendly to different ages, this just would not do, and gambling was ousted.

Understandably, for a good number of people, gambling is a scourge. It has the potential to be helpful, but much of the potential is also harmful. There are stories of addicts who can't stop spending their wealth to try to get more, and big losers who keep losing large amounts of money. It's just not a good thing to bring up people and possibly lead them to do this, and people who have understood this have taken to restrict (even simulated) gambling in games, at least for the oldest of gamers. Naturally, the Pokémon main series games follow suit to maintain appeal to a variety of ages.

I personally have had little interest in the gambling mini-games. I rarely obtained good results out of them, even on my best of days. Wherever the coins concerned were directly purchasable, I went ahead and purchased them right away, though I always ended up short for the higher rewards. I found Voltorb Flip to be a good replacement since it is almost completely logical and isn't technically gambling. Ever since these kinds of mini-games disappeared, I haven't missed them, except for Voltorb Flip.

Pokémon appeals to everyone, but gambling is a different story. By some standards, the latter is more of a bad thing than a good thing, let alone something that younger people should deal with. There may never be a trace of gambling in the main series games again, but that may very well be a blessing. Everyone can and should enjoy what this great big world has to offer without the need to turn over wealth to the odds.

One year ago: One Thing