Pokémon Ultra Sun and Ultra Moon Have the Most Legendary Pokémon

As a long-time Pokémon trainer with over 20 years of catching, battling, and collecting these fascinating creatures under my belt, I can definitively say that Pokémon Ultra Sun and Ultra Moon contain the highest number of collectible Legendary Pokémon.

The Legendary Roster: By the Numbers

Let‘s break down the exact count:

As you can see, Ultra Sun and Ultra Moon have over 10x more total catchable Pokémon than the original Red/Blue/Yellow, but they also have over 12x more Legendaries – 63 compared to just 5.

In terms of percentage, almost 8% of all catchable Pokémon in Ultra Sun/Moon are classified as Legendary, compared to just 3% in the first generation.

This massive spike in Legendary availability completely changed the postgame experience…

The Thrilling Postgame Legendary Hunt

Now before delving into the specifics here, it‘s important to distinguish between Legendaries that are readily catchable throughout the main journey of the games, versus those obtainable only in the postgame after becoming Champion.

For example, while Ultra Sun/Moon make over 60 Legendaries accessible total, only a handful can be caught during the main story chapters as you complete islands and trials. Legendaries like the Tapus and Solgaleo/Lunala play a central role, but the vast majority are left for dedicated postgame quests and episodes.

I still remember my sheer excitement after first rolling credits in Ultra Moon, only to then discover dozens of wormholes opening up, each leading me to mythical dimensions where I could encounter elusive beasts like Raikou, Latios, Heatran, and more. This endgame content kept me glued for over 200 additional hours!

Now compare this wealth of postgame Legendary hunting to a game like Pokémon Black and White – those titles only featured 16 total Legendaries, and a paltry 4 were left to chase after becoming Champion. It offered little incentive to keep playing and catching once N and Team Plasma were defeated.

Clearly Game Freak wanted to extend Ultra Sun/Moon‘s longevity by making this treasure trove of Legendaries the carrot on the stick to pursue after you beat the main chapters. And it worked brilliantly in my opinion!

The Satisfaction of Completing the Pokédex

Catching even a fraction of those 60+ Legendaries became my driving motivation. Finally feeling like I could make legitimate headway on "catching them all" for once!

I haven‘t crunched the numbers fully, but estimating roughly, if you caught every Legendary available Ultra Sun/Moon, that would likely contribute anywhere from 7-10% of progress toward completing the entire National Pokédex. Quite meaningful when you consider those are just a single category of Pokémon!

So in summary – Ultra Sun and Ultra Moon set a new benchmark by making almost every past Legendary catchable in these Nintendo 3DS titles via expansive postgame content. Let‘s analyze a few reasons why…

Game Freak‘s Push for Pokédex Completion Support

Encountering and catching Legendary Pokémon has always been a premiere selling point and favorite activity among players in the core RPG series. But Ultra Sun and Moon took efforts to actively accommodate Pokédex completion like never before. Some underlying reasons likely include:

• Celebrating Pokémon‘s 20th Anniversary in 2016 – What better way than letting fans catch their favorites?
• Knowing the Nintendo Switch was looming – A capstone for the 3DS games before moving consoles
• Responding to feedback – Players asked for more ways to finish Pokédexes

Additionally, producer Junichi Masuda commented that Ultra Sun/Moon contained virtually every Legendary as a means of "preservation" while they future-proofed assets for the Nintendo Switch.

This philosophy contrasts with previous generations‘ bait-and-switch tactics when it came to certain popular Legendaries…

The Curious Cases of Missing Mythicals

Why were incredibly in-demand Legendaries like Mew completely unobtainable without glitches or hacks in the original Red/Green? Why did Ruby & Sapphire initially lack Legendaries like Lugia, Ho-Oh, Celebi thatmany players came to expect?

The likely unfortunate answer is that Game Freak leveraged FOMO (fear of missing out) and drip-feeding concepts to push more sales, merchandizing, and hype over time. By removing certain Legendaries, they could entice players to keep buying the "third" game or sequels to finally collect their favorities.

But this strategy caused frustrations in cases when no follow-up option included the MIA Legendaries. Just look at fans begging for a way to legitimately get Celebi in Gens 3-5 before Virtual Console eventual workarounds!

In any case, Ultra Sun/Moon seemingly flipped the script by granting player wishlists and enabling comprehensive Legendary acquisition. Now let‘s examine which of these elusive creatures deservedly capture player imaginations the most…

The Top 10 Most Popular Legendary Pokémon

While power levels, battle viability, shinies, and stats all appeal to some collectors, when it comes to Legendary fascination and prestige, nostalgia and emotive connection matter enormously. Let‘s countdown which Mythical beasts spark the most intrigue by leveraging fan surveys and merch sales data:

Hard to dispute Mewtwo as #1 based on its god-like portrayal across media fuelling public intrigue. And Lugia constitutes another fan-favorite front and center in a classic film.

While popularity doesn‘t always align with in-game viability, it‘s still thrilling for collectors to finally hunt down established fan-favorites like these from past generations. So kudos to Ultra Sun/Moon for inviting our old mythical friends to Alola!

Now speaking of excitement, let‘s switch gears and examine the opposite: frustration over version exclusive Legendaries…

The Frustrations of Version-Exclusive Legendaries

Despite the positives of Ultra Sun/Moon making hundreds of Pokémon fully catchable, I do need to call out one enormous annoyance: restrictive version-exclusive Legendaries barred from opposite games!

Just picture it – you spend 50+ hours painstakingly catching over half the total Legendary list in Ultra Sun, only to discover your buddy with Ultra Moon nabbed 4 Mythicals you‘ll never obtain! Infuriating, right?

Unfortunately Game Freak loves employing this tactic to encourage trading, community coordination, and multiple purchases. But in reality it often backfires, instead fostering resentment or resignation rather than motivation. I myself succumbed and eventually bought both versions just to complete my living Alpha Sapphire/Omega Ruby Legendary compendiums!

Now granted, the Ultra wormholes do offer some version leeway – I could luck out and encounter Thundurus in a Sun distortion after enough attempts. Yet the probabilities are astronomically low. And it would never grant me Ultra Moon-distinctives like Blacephalon or Xerneas.

In a perfect world, I believe event items or mechanics could toggle accessibility to all Legendaries in a single game. But alas, maybe I‘m asking too much…

On the bright side, it does seem the upcoming Scarlet & Violet may enable catching every new Paradox Legendary in either version! So fingers crossed the days of restrictive Mythical exclusions are fading.

What Does the Future Hold?

Trying to predict Game Freak‘s plans is often foolhardy. But I‘ll go out on a limb and speculate here!

I expect the Paldea region in Scarlet & Violet will introduce around 8-12 new Legendaries. However, I anticipate the total catchable in-game won‘t exceed 16-20 at most between the Paradoxes.

They likely don‘t want to overwhelm new Switch owners with too many intimidating battles right off the bat. My guess is they‘ll focus Legendary integration around the time-distortion premise initially while holding some Classic beasts for post launch DLC.

But further down the road – who knows! The capabilities of the Switch may eventually enable every Legendary we know (and don‘t yet know) to manifest in one game world. A collector can dream, right?

In closing, while flaws persist, I applaud Pokémon Ultra Sun and Ultra Moon as unprecedented celebrations of Legendary diversity and accessibility. They set a new high bar I hope future Generations can match or even surpass.

Now if you‘ll excuse me, I need to grab my 3DS and get back to inter-dimensional wormhole hunting!