In case you couldn't tell, I hate all the new sprites with the fire of our little cloaked friend here. Don't debate this with me, because I will drown you in my own salty tears.
WARNING: RANT ON CHARACTER DESIGN The flame neek was one of my favorite pets as a little kid, emphasis on WAS. I liked it because it looked like a powerful little fire mage that could be both good and evil depending on the context, and got even cooler as it evolved. The modern flame neek is heavily sanitized and has none of that cool factor. The old one looked powerful and mysterious whereas I could crush this one underfoot and it would do nothing except look at me with that dumb, cocky little face. It looks like its one brain cell bounces around in its head like the DVD logo and when the brain cell hits a corner it has a thought. I bet it's not even sure what it's smiling about and it just has a terminal case of resting smug face. It looks like that one little cousin that always begs you to let him play on your phone and when you say no, he throws a tantrum. It reminds me of the annoying Hoopa from that one awful Pokémon movie that was just made to sell toys, and that's what this is; a way to sell toys. I had a deep respect for the old flame neek and it heavily influenced my character design, as well as the other old pet sprites. I could punt this thing half a mile and all it would do is give me that emotionless thousand-yard stare. The new neek doesn't even have quality shading and looks like a small child's mindless doodle. I could draw it with a freaking circle tool and it'd look IDENTICAL. Take this as a lesson about character design and DON'T RUIN CHARACTERS THAT ALREADY LOOK AMAZING.
