possible hot take, but colosseum is the worst pokemon RPG. tedious, grindy, unfun, just an absolute slog.
the only reason it's not the worst pokemon game with the classic battle system is because battle revolution exists.
Yeah, while I have a lot of fond memories, I'm not sure I'd exactly recommend it to anyone. I'm at 25-ish hours and sooooo much of that is just Mt Battle loops.
Isn't that pretty much what JRPGs are? I mean yeah, Pokémon probably had it worse having to grind each individual Pokémon without an EXP Share. But yeah, JRPGs have always been grindy.
A problem with the old games is that the enemies levels just stop after a point, and you just get stuck trying to get your Lv 40 Mons to Lv 50 fighting nothing but Lv 20 Wild Pokemon. And no short cuts like Blissey or EXP candies.
Colosseum's Mt Battle at least offers infinite Trainer fights at just about any level threshold you'd need, although the game has lengthy attack animations that drag on. And you got to grind to purify the Shadow Pokemon, then grind again to actually level them up since they don't exactly gain experience until then. And just catching them in the first place can take ages, especially the Legendary Beasts.
... which is all a big shame since Colosseum is entirely Double Battles, which are criminally underused in the main games. One playthrough I actually got a lot of use out of
Plusle of all Pokemon, having him support Suicune with Rain Dance and Thunder.
Anyways, I fought the SECRET boss in the game, who's theme is... distinct: