Revisiting Kanto - Vermilion City Is A Place Of Joy That We Destroy

thegamer.com:

Hello, intrepid explorers, and thank you once again for joining me on my journey through Kanto. Today, we take our first steps into Vermilion City, the Port of Exquisite Sunsets itself. If you're a newcomer on this journey, allow me to catch you up. I've been exploring Pokemon Blue for around three months now, taking in each setting at a slower pace in order to absorb its stories. Less interested in the battles and the gym badges, I'm here to explore Pokemon Blue as a tourist to figure out why Kanto itself is so compelling. This week, after a fortnight's stay in Cerulean, we head through the Underground Path and onwards to Vermilion. The exquisite sunsets don't really sell themselves on the Game Boy Color, but hopefully there's a lot more to drink in.

I have a ticket for the S.S. Anne burning through my pocket, but I don't intend to go running through the streets crashing into everyone a la Leo in Titanic. The S.S. Anne can wait until next week, so right now we'll be looking at the city itself. I've played through Kanto several times, across Pokemons Blue, Yellow, Gold, FireRed, HeartGold, and Let's Go, but I have always held the washed-out, technologically limited version presented in Pokemon Blue as the definitive one, even as other games offered more depth and detail. The rich burnt orange of Vermilion City is the best example yet of exactly why this aesthetic has resonated so deeply.

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Despite this, it also feels like the one which loses out the most in the limitations of the Game Boy. All of the other locations have felt like places to simply pass through. Oddly for a port city, Vermilion feels like a destination. It has a homely, settled quality to it. I live in a