Gen 1 and 2 were to best for me.
I could never really get myself to replay gen 3 as much as I did the others.
I mean, I have a rom for Ruby on my phone, but also Yellow and Gold. I have the cartridges for all 3 as well as Heart Gold.
Heart Gold/Soul Silver are the best DS Pokemon games (I haven't and do not plan on trying Black/White - the Pokemon look retarded).

As for gen 3 vs others (1&2):
Gen 3 did have secret bases and actual color. It also had double battles.
But.
Gen 2 doubled the freaking map. 16 badges, yo.

Having had my doubts (and hearing many naysayers in the weeks leading up to the release) about Black and White, I ended up getting both last week, haven't opened White, and I just beat Black yesterday. Despite having some of the single worst pokemon ever made (that's you, clink and vanillite), which are only marginally worse in design than other counterparts (haha voltorb), and some that are just on par with past terrible ideas (the new Sawk and Throh versus Hitmonchan) and despite them making Cryogonal look hideous despite an acceptable idea, I have to admit to liking a lot of the new pokemon after getting through a single run.

Snivy was a bro throughout the game, although I hear he's the weakest starter. Liligant looks cool but I never got to use it, hopefully in White...
CHANDELURE IS A BRO AND I LOVE EVERYTHING ABOUT HIM.
Golurk because who the heck doesn't want a goddamn flying robot?
And Joltik is the most adorable thing ever.

Pokemon design aside, from a game-design perspective, there was only one flop right at the 7th gym, where there's a dead space in the plot and nothing to fill it. You walk into town, nothing happens, wander around, nothing to see, give up on the town, go and beat the gym leader, and leave. The rest of the game was the best Pokemon game I have ever played, had fantastic music (Driftveil theme is great), and brings in some nice features (also loses a few )

<ramble>Yeah, I got a Snivey, traded her away because she really sucked compared to my Victini and Throh, and I am now raising a Sigilyph because he looks like a god. I spent half an hour after catching a female one, simply trying to find and catch a male one. I am a sexist trainer. I just beat Nuvema's gym leader last night, soloing it with my Victini. Tonight, I am going over to my friend's place. We three will play Pokemon, Minecraft and Cortex Command all through the night. One of my other friends bought White, and then got Black for his birthday on St. Patty's. Sucks to be him, since he lacks a Victini to complete his set.</ramble>

The Liberty Pass is still being distributed. I haven't caught my Victini because I have no idea what Nature to go for, what with the flat 100 base stat line. Probably Adamant for the one in Black, and in White I might get two (or more) since I may restart to get starters traded onto Black rather than trade for them.

I really want to replay Black at some point though, I like Reshiram better than Zekrom now that I've seen them both.

Meh, personally, I think Reshiram looks like a gay angel fox. Zekrom is awesome in looks, and he is both dragon- and electric-type. I like electric-types better than fire-types, but that is my personal preference.

Most of the things in pokemon has changed for the better but the only pokemon I actually like the designs of are in pokemon r/g/b/y, yeah there are a few here and there in later games (the number of which decreases with each new release) and I hate pretty much all the pokemon in black and white. In pokemon r/g/b/y the majority of the pokemon are pretty good and the starting pokemon were three of the best pokemon in the entire game, since then the starting pokemon have been pretty rubbish with usually just one decent choice, it seems like they are trying to make the pokemon cuter rather than making them awesome (who are targetting their designs towards? little kids around 6 to 8 years old and their mums?). Here's a few examples of good designs that the pokemon devs should be looking at (also they should team up with studio ghibli for one game in the future):




The stupidly high amount of pokemon is something that was also putting me off, but they've fixed that now. There's also a ridiculous amount of pokeballs now and other pointless items, and I hate random encounters. I played pokemon crystal again a week or so ago and stopped after a couple of hours because the pokemon encounter rate is way too high and the game felt more tedious than fun, plus walking and other actions seemed way too slow and I wasn't enjoying it.

Also they need to stop doing this dual release bull♥♥♥♥ like gold and silver, diamond and pearl, black and white... It's a ridiculous scam to sell the same game twice but most people are too in love with pokemon to see sense.

Considering 90% of people only buy one, it's more to encourage teamwork and trading.

Blaziken kicks you in the throat. Your argument is invalid.

Tbh, a bird shouldn't be a fire starter. It'd fit more as a grass starter.

This man speaketh the truth. Typhlosion will bite your silly Blaziken's throat out.

Blastoise is quite obviously cooler.

Typhlosion dude, right here! My favorite starter is by FAR Cyndaquill, and Typhlosion is beast. I think the coolest int he evolution tree was Quilava, though.

Flame Wheel was the ♥♥♥♥. ♥♥♥♥ that stupid flame monkey for trying to steal it, it is Typhlosion's signature move and chimchar can go fall down a ravine for all I care. Piplup (Evolves to Empolean, Water/Steel, hells yeah.) is the best Gen 4 starter.

Mudkip.

Yes. So much yes.

Kanto - Squirtle
Johto - Cyndaquil
Hoenn - Mudkip
Sinnoh - Turtwig
Unova - Oshawott

My spellchecker is going wild.