It's squirtle, and it's always been squirtle, and it'll always have to be squirtle. Blastoise is my bro, okay? TO BE FAIR TO THE OTHER TWO, I love them both dearly, and they hold special places in my heart, but they're just not my guys.

He is tiny and cute both with and without flames. It's ya boi cyndaquil. (Special shout out to chikorita over there tho. I loved chikorita as soon as I saw her in the anime, but she's SO HARD TO PLAY AS UR MAIN STARTER. Eternal sad face. If I ever replay SoulSilver, I'm gonna finally do it, but cyndaquil is a warm buddy.)

MudkIIIIIIIIP. There's really no contest for me. I do love the others, but much like squirtle, I have to pick mudkip. It's a moral obligation.

Another easy pick. Turtwig is a cool little dude, and Torterra is a big friendly dinosaur with trees! Grotle also reminds me of Spike from the Land Before Time which automatically endears him to me as well.

Soooo about Unova. I never really fell in love with any of these guys. =T I picked Snivy my first go, but these days it'd be a pretty shrug emoji toss up between tepig and oshawott. Honestly, I want to replay the games from this gen foward, so maybe my opinion here will change.

edit: My partner and I played Black 2 in 2022, and I gotta say, I'm still not wild about any of these guys. ;o; Nothing against any of them! Just none of them are really a hit for me.

Chespin is v cute, and greninja is v cool, but do you know who's super cool from first to third evolution? It's fennekin. Man, what a rad, witchy aesthetic.

Ngl, all of these guys are cute, but how do you compete with Rowlet over there? The answer is you don't. He is smol and round and has a lil bow tie. He is best boy.

I LOVE ALL OF THE BABS FOR THIS GEN. I picked grookey my first run and while I love him, I'm not super in love with the rest of his evolutions, and I feel the same way about sobble over there. Scorbunny tho. Just gets cooler and cooler, and I love gigantamax cinderace.

I don't remember the last time I had a crisis over starters until this gen. I actually unironically love all of them and all of their evolutions (though I admit quaquaval took time time to grow on me), but fuecoc was who I ultimately started with. He is a little buddy, and I love him and his little fire bird friend. ;o;