The Pokemon League Controls the Paths!

Hi, today we're going to be discussing the idea that the Pokemon League are in charge of the paths in a given region and that's why you need to do certain things in the game. But first, we need to go on a little tangent.

My Little Tangent: Thinking Randomly is Magic: Why Do Pokemon Need HM Moves?

For some HM moves this is pretty obvious: sure your Pokemon can swim, but can they do it with a 10-16 year old on their back without dropping them into the water? However there are some moves that seem pretty pointless.

For example, why do you need Cut? Surely any sufficiently powerful Pokemon can cut down a small shrub? Especially considering they can have much more powerful moves than the wimpy base power of 50 that the HM provides. Even some of the Pokemon that can and can't learn it seem a bit silly.

Can't learn cut. Seriously

Can learn cut, despite lack of arms.

But it could be that the Pokemon world legally requires Pokemon trainers to only use Cut on the shrubs in the path, and no others. But why? That requires explaining of the big theory that underlines everything.

The Pokemon League controls a certain route around each and every region that has the Pokemon League Challenge, and requires Pokemon Trainers doing the challenge to follow the set path, as to make sure they went to the gyms in the right order.

This would explain why they would only let you use Cut on shrubs. After all, they would want the shrubs to grow back, so that they would block the next Pokemon Trainer to go down that path unless they had the required Gym badges.

This would also explain why you need Gym badges to use certain HMs in the overworld. It's part of the rules that your character signs up to by taking on the Pokemon League Challenge. We just never see it because... seriously, no-one even reads Terms and Conditions for real life stuff, they wouldn't do it for a video game.

In addition, if the Pokemon League rules meant you could only go on certain paths, they could also limit access to Pokemon Trainers to certain areas of cities, so that the city isn't overloaded by trainers going everywhere, which would explain why there are so few houses and no shops in what are meant to be large cities. In addition, there could be paths in these parts of the city (that aren't shown because the player will just never need to see them) which the NPCs use, since they aren't taking the challenge and thus aren't limited like the player character, which would also explain why people could live in places like Pallet Town without dying of utter boredom, and how there can be tourists without Pokemon.

Plus, the trainers that stand on the path could have been paid by the Pokemon League to battle trainers that pass by, as well as maintain the area - especially what level Pokemon are in the area. How else could Dejourner Way keep so low level Pokemon right next to Victory Road?

The things that could be taken from this theory are nearly endless, but I'm going to stop here, so that this post isn't ridiculously long. See you all next week!