I remember I got Pokemon Crystal from a friend of the family who didn't really play Pokemon games. I really was taken with the concept you could not only choose your gender, but also travel back to Kanto.

Loses some points for just being a slightly more refined version of Gold/Silver. The endgame is a nice addition though. If you want peak Pokemon, here it is.

Amazing childhood memories with this game. I definitely wouldn't dig it as much today as I did when I was 12, but back then it was my most played game with over 200, perhaps even over 300 hours of gameplay. That definitely had something do with me having less money to buy a lot of games, though.

Crystal is the highest Pokemon would ever reach again aside from the later remakes of Gold and Silver.

My favorite Pokemon game. It made everything about the original games better, had a properly hard engame, and the story was quite nice.

in many ways, the apotheosis of Pokemon. it's expansive, somewhat challenging and is the part of the only generation to feel like a true sequel rather than a retread. future games in the series improve the battling, but they never quite capture that feeling of growth and progression. that time is so integral to the mechanics of GSC is wonderfully appropriate.