Summary
- Pokemon spin-off games challenge players with difficult dungeons, boss battles, & unique game mechanics.
- The Mystery Dungeon series offers compelling narratives & tough gameplay, setting a high bar for difficulty.
- Pokemon Conquest features turn-based strategy gameplay with challenging battles against powerful foes.
The Pokemon franchise is known for its ease of accessibility and genre appeal across different demographics of gamers. Often leaning on the easier side of the role-playing game spectrum, the Pokemon games are regarded as straightforward RPGs.
Although the mainline Pokemon games vary in difficulty, with titles such as Pokemon Diamond featuring infamously challenging champions like Cynthia with her pseudo-legendary Pokemon Garchomp, the main series of games are comparable in providing a low level of difficulty for gamers.
Strongest Pokemon In Diamond & Pearl (Based On Stats)
Diamond & Pearl introduced a variety of Pokemon to the series, but these stood out as Generation 4's strongest.
Alternatively, the Pokemon spin-off games are more challenging than their main series counterparts, with numerous spin-off titles putting players to the test in the quest to become the very best.
6 Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Red and Blue Rescue Team
The First Pokemon Dungeon Crawler
Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Red Rescue Team
You've caught them, you've trained them and you've battled them – but now you can find out what it's actually like to be a Pokémon!
In Pokémon Mystery Dungeon: Red Rescue Team, you wake up in a world inhabited entirely by Pokémon, as a Pokémon yourself, with no knowledge of how you got there or how you can return to human form.
But perhaps there's a reason for your arrival. Now that you can understand the Pokémon language, you learn that a series of natural disasters is threatening the community. You soon befriend another Pokémon and form a Rescue Team to help Pokémon in distress.
You receive missions to rescue Pokémon trapped in dangerous dungeons, which are always randomly generated (meaning that you'll never play the same dungeon twice), battling wild Pokémon using a turn-based style of combat.
As well as taking on missions deep underground you also have a vast overworld to explore, where you can make friends with hundreds of Pokémon and recruit new members to your team.
In Pokémon Mystery Dungeon, having fun and making friends is just as important as fighting. So assemble your best Rescue Team and discover your destiny as a Pokémon!
- Released
- September 18, 2006
- Developer(s)
- Spike Chunsoft
- Platform(s)
- Nintendo Game Boy Advance
- Genre(s)
- Roguelike
Pokemon: Mystery Dungeon: Red and Blue Rescue Team was the first game in the series to introduce players to the concept of a dungeon crawler.
Not shying away from classic dungeon crawler difficulty, Red and Blue Rescue Team, originally released on the Game Boy Advance and Nintendo DS, had players explore vast randomly generated dungeons to find answers to their character's transformation into a Pokemon.
Best Defensive Pokemon Of Each Type
For Pokemon players who prioritize defense over offense, here are the best defensive Pokemon of each type.
Difficulty-wise, Red and Blue Rescue Team was brutal. Dungeons featured mechanics such as restarting upon player defeat and boss battles with legendary Pokemon. Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Red and Blue Rescue Team was the first entry to a difficult spin-off series, setting the tone for more challenging titles.
5 Pokemon Ranger
Original But Difficult Capture Mechanics
Pokemon Ranger
CAPTURE ON!!!
With the help of Pokémon, set out on a fun-filled adventure! You play as a Pokémon Ranger in the Fiore Region, and work to preserve nature and protect Pokémon.
- Released
- October 30, 2006
- Developer(s)
- HAL Laboratory, Creatures Inc.
- Platform(s)
- Nintendo DS
- Genre(s)
- Action RPG
One of the Pokemon series' most popular spin-off titles, Pokemon Ranger, offered a unique but challenging gameplay style when released in 2006. Utilizing the touch screen of the Nintendo DS and the system's stylus, players had to draw loops to capture Pokemon.
Players were tasked with maintaining peace in a new region, Fiore, and preventing the music-loving Go Rock Squad from taking over. Although starting rudimentary in difficulty, Pokemon Ranger quickly upped its game with players having to capture numerous powerful Pokemon such as Entei to progress through the story. Pokemon Ranger was a distinctive game with difficult gameplay mechanics that offered considerable challenge to the most experienced players because of its originality.
4 Pokemon Ranger: Shadows of Almia
The Pokemon Ranger Series' Hardest Bosses
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Pokemon Ranger: Shadows of Almia
Become a Top Ranger and protect hundreds of different types of Pokémon from an evil corporation in Pokémon Ranger: Shadows of Almia. The second title in the Pokémon Ranger series once again calls on you to capture Pokémon on the Touch Screen, and then use their abilities to save the day. This time around, however, you’ll encounter 50 additional Pokémon that weren’t in the original game, including many from Pokémon Diamond and Pokémon Pearl.
Starting out in Ranger School as a Student Ranger, you’re bursting with enthusiasm at the prospect of one day becoming a Top Ranger and using your knowledge for the good of Almia and its many Pokémon. Little did you know, after graduation you would soon be putting your new skills to work in a quest that would determine the very future of the region.
Playing as either a boy or girl Ranger, it will be up to you to find and capture Pokémon that can aid you on your journey. To do so, you’ll need to use the Capture Styler, a special tool that enables you to capture Pokémon by drawing lines around them on the Touch Screen using your stylus. Whether or not you successfully catch Pokémon will be determined by the strength of your Capture Styler and the ability to call on help at the right moment from Friend and Partner Pokémon you have already caught.
- Released
- November 10, 2008
- Developer(s)
- Creatures Inc.
- Platform(s)
- Nintendo DS
- Genre(s)
- Action RPG
Set in the region of Almia as the second installment in the Ranger series, Shadows of Almia elevated the difficulty from the first game with new Pokemon to capture and enemies to defeat. Shadows of Almia had players travel to a new region to stop the evil team Dim Sun from controlling Pokemon.
Climaxing in an epic showdown with the Legendary Pokemon Darkrai, the Pokemon Ranger series peaked in difficulty. Other notable fights include Regigigas, which is nearly impossible to capture due to its sheer variety of sporadic attacks. The game also has the most difficult bosses in the Ranger series.
3 Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Explorers of Time and Darkness
A Challenging But Beautiful Story
Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Explorers of Time
AN EPIC EXPLORATION THROUGH TIME AND DARKNESS!
- Explore as a Pokémon in a world of Pokémon!
- Discover the secrets of Time and Darkness, and form a team to explore the world!
- Find ever-changing dungeons!
- Send out SOS Mails using Nintendo Wi-Fi Connection!
- Released
- April 20, 2008
- Developer(s)
- Spike Chunsoft
- Platform(s)
- Nintendo DS
- Genre(s)
- Roguelike
The second set of games in the Mystery Dungeon series, Explorers of Time and Darkness, improved on the original Mystery Dungeon titles in nearly every way. The game featured over 400 new Pokemon, dungeons, and an original story long regarded as the best in the entire Pokemon franchise.
Enrolling as an explorer at the Wigglytuff Guild, players were quickly taken on an epic journey to defeat evil hellbent on engulfing the world in darkness.
The Best Pokemon Of Each Type, Ranked
With every type of Pokemon, there is always one that stands above all of the others.
Meeting key characters along the way, such as Grovyle and Dusknoir, nothing is what it seems as friends become foes and adversaries become companions in a narrative worthy of Shakespeare.
Boss fights, such as those against game antagonist Darkrai, one of the series' best-designed Pokemon, testify to the title's difficulty. Alongside defeating the legendary Pokemon, players must battle numerous enemies, such as fire-type Magmortor, in the aptly named Dark Crater Pit dungeon. Players completing the battle will have finished the game's final story arc.
2 Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Explorers of Sky
A Pokemon Fan's Greatest Challenge - Destiny Tower
Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Explorers of Sky
NOW YOU CAN GO BEYOND DARKNESS...OUTSIDE THE LIMS OF TIME...TO THE SKIES!
Be a Pokémon and experience the world in a whole new way!
Learn more secrets of Time and Darkness... Journey with your friends on remarkable adventures and save the world!
- Released
- October 12, 2009
- Developer(s)
- Spike Chunsoft
- Platform(s)
- Nintendo DS
- Genre(s)
- Roguelike
Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Explorers of Sky is a direct sequel to the first Mystery Dungeon series of games and an improved version of Explorers of Sky and Darkness. Often touted by players as the best game in the series, it is also regarded as its hardest.
The difficulty level is increased by featuring new playable heroes, locations, and several special episodes that explore the story behind the game's main quest. Special mission 'In the Future of Darkness' explores Grovyle and Dusknoir's pursuit to defeat Primal Dialga in the game's future. A heart-wrenching tale, the special mission is difficult, adding to the game's overall challenge.
Furthermore, Explorers of Sky included the spin of the series' most difficult dungeon, Destiny Tower. Starting at level 1, players must traverse the 100-floor dungeon to reach the top and find the statue of the Pokemon god Arceus. Players will be given the Space Globe item upon completion, which doubles all stats.
1 Pokemon Conquest
Turn-Based Strategy At Its Hardest
Pokemon Conquest
- Released
- June 18, 2012
- Developer(s)
- Koei Tecmo
- Platform(s)
- Nintendo DS
- Genre(s)
- Tactical, RPG
Pokemon Conquest is the most challenging spin-off title in the series. In collaboration with Nobunaga's Ambition games, Pokemon Conquest had players controlling pocket monsters in a turn-based strategy game to conquer the many regions of Ransei.
Core gameplay consisted of player-controlled Pokemon, each with a single move and objectives that must be completed to defeat the game's various warlords. Players can also recruit warriors upon their defeat to aid in battle.
A rigorously difficult spin-off, Pokemon Conquest had fans fight progressively harder enemies, facing series protagonist Nobunaga and one of the best shiny black Pokemon, Rayquaza, in the game's final battle . Pokemon Conquest's challenging strategic gameplay and enemy difficulty make it the most difficult spin-off game in the Pokemon series.
35 Rarest Pokemon In Brilliant Diamond & Shining Pearl
There are many Pokemon available in Brilliant Diamond & Shining Pearl, but some are much rarer than others.