It’s only been two days since Pokemon X and Y were released, but it’s probably already my favorite game in the series (I got Pokemon X, my boyfriend got Y). While staying true to the previous iterations of the series, there are enough new features and changes to give long time fans the same sense of wonder and discovery that they got the first time they set foot in the Kanto region all those years ago.

There seems to be way more different types of wild Pokemon in Kalos than in previous regions. I’ve only earned one gym badge so far (after spending 16 hours in the game already!), and have already had run-ins with 91 different types of Pokemon. There is a nice mixture of brand new Pokemon and Pokemon introduced in previous games (I’m always super excited when I encounter a gen 1 Pokemon in the wild). The sheer amount of Pokemon can be almost overwhelming since there is no way to give each Pokemon captured the attention they deserve, but it also makes the newly implemented online features more engaging and fun. If there were fewer types of Pokemon, new features such as Wonder Trade wouldn’t be very fun at all.

At first, I thought the Wonder Trade feature would be lame, since of course most people are going to be trading level 3 Pidgey and Bunnelby, but I’ve already gotten enough cool trades to make the feature well worth using. I got a Riolu, or rather リオル, as he is called since he was originally caught by a Japanese trainer. I was super excited when I got him. That is, until a couple hours later when I got my adorable little イーブイ (Eevee) from another trainer in Japan. Not only was it exciting just to have an Eevee in my party, it was also exciting to know that Eevees are apparently common enough in Kalos that I will be able to easily acquire more (since no one is going to be trading something that they can only get one of). I hope to get enough Eevees to have one of each Eeveelution. I can’t decide if I want a Vaporeon or a Sylveon first! Even when you get something lame in Wonder Trade, it is easy to simply trade it again until you end up with something Awesome.

It’s also fun to see all of the different places where other Pokemon Trainers live. My first Wonder Trade partner was someone from the Cayman Islands. I’ve also met a lot of people from Japan, and quite a few from Chile, France, South Korea, Canada, and various other places. Normally when I play games online, everyone I run into is either from the US or Japan.

Aside from Wonder Trade, trading and battling with friends is now even easier than ever. You don’t have to stop what you’re doing, run to the Pokemon Center, and change out your party Pokemon before connecting with your friend anymore. You simply click on their face on the PSS and go from there. I especially like the fact that you can choose any Pokemon from your computer storage boxes. It makes it convenient to trade as soon as you catch a Pokemon for your friend.

It’s also way easier to level up your Pokemon now, via the experience share item you get early in the game. Now you don’t ever have to send your Caterpie or Weedle into battle to get a Butterfree or Beedrill. The only downside is that my Braixen, Mozilla, is almost level 30 and I haven’t gotten my Cliff Badge yet. He might have to go into storage for a while until I need him again.

Anyway, Pokemon X and Y are pretty awesome so far. My only big complaint is that the over world isn’t in 3D. I was looking forward to an entirely 3D Pokemon game since the 3DS first game out, so it was pretty disappointing when I noticed the 3D turned off after the opening sequence. The battles and inside of caves are still in 3D though, so at least it does use the 3D capabilities somewhat.

The only other small complaint I had was that it wouldn’t let me name my blue Flabébé “Violet,” since apparently “viol” means something offensive in French. I understand that they don’t want people giving Pokemon offensive names and then trading them to children, but come on. Violet is a perfectly nice name for a Pokemon that looks like a flower. I settled on naming it “Lily” instead.

That’s it for now. There are still a lot of features that I haven’t fully explored yet in Pokemon X. If you want to add me to trade or battle, my friend code is 4596-9463-6149. Please comment with your friend code or send me a message on Facebook (my FaceBook link is on the top of my blog’s sidebar) if you’d like to be my 3DS friend!