I've been seeing a lot of discourse around Mega Victreebel and how it doesn't "follow the mega design philosophy" and I find it odd as someone who's been revisiting megas after understanding the design philosophy more from watching vids by people like Subjectively. So I decided to compare Mega Victreebel with another grass/poison mega Pokemon to see if there's any weight.
But first I should explain mega evos design philosophy. Mega evolution as a gimmick focuses on having a Pokemon go beyond the confides of their respective evolutionary line, and therefore their designs exaggerate the details of the base form to emphasize core features that relate to the Pokemon at it's core. For example most of Mega Gardevoir changes are to tie in with it's megas dress changing(Gardevoir dress is the most interesting part of the design as it gives them their silhouette) and chest horns(which are described as feelers connecting it to it's character in being an empathetic protector). Now that we covered the basis lets get to analyzing
Starting with Mega Venusaur when mega evolving it gets: A taller trunk, which now accommodates space for the vines, and smaller trees, it's lower leaves are darker, it head leaf is replaced with a flower, and it gains pattern between its eyes. All of this emphasizes the Flora on Venusaur's back.
Now onto Mega Victreebel and when it mega evolves it: body becomes bigger, it's pitcher plant leaf/stem grow bigger as well having the vine tie around it's "neck", the leaves(including the "one" at the tip of the vine) change color, it's lips become bigger, which alongside it's changed expression gives Mega Victreebel the look of holding in a liquid(like when you vomit). This all emphasizes the exaggerated feature being it's overbuild up of poison that it must contain, which ties well into how the plant it's based on is called the pitcher(a container used to hold liquids) plant(it also looks like a gourd bottle which is a nice evolution for a pitcher plant Pokemon.
Now despite having around the same amount of changes why is Venusaur more elaborate in design than Mega Victreebel. Is it because GF is a bunch of hacks that can't do shit. Well the answer is quite simple.
Venusaur is naturally a more detailed design compared to Victreebel and in context of megas would result in having more details. And the same could be said of megas designed back in xy/oras.
These are both megas of final evos of 3-stage lines from hoenn, yet only Mega Swampert has a lot going on(head fins change shape, color palette darkens, body changes size, gains more bumps, and the antennae also grows) compared to Gardevoir and their changes.
Simply because Swampert is a more detailed compared to Gardevoir. And that's perfectly fine, since sometimes a pokemon's concept just calls for a simpler design and even in mega evolution that shouldn't change as variety is what makes Pokemon designs what they are.
Another reasoning I've seen is that Mega Victreebel isn't cool or edgy, which like A. Gardevoir and it's mega aren't cool/edgy, and hot take B. Making Mega Victreebel cool/menacing while keeping the core concept of it's mega the same would just make it look worse making it look like something dopey trying hard to be seen as serious, and also takes away from how it looks like it's holding fluids in it's mouth(see analysis for explanation^)
All in all I don't get what people mean by the new megas designs not following mega Pokemon designs conventions and being simpler in soo, when they don't at all. All the new megas revealed follow the design conventions of Megas with: exaggerating core features by adding/changing 5-6 things in the design. Heck some megas in xy/Oras don't follow the latter part.
Slowbro makes four changes(different expression, holes for it's tail and arms to pop out, more teeth, and refined spots and spikes) and Kangaskhan only changes the baby(albeit the changes in the baby do add up to around five) and one of these isn't cool asf either. It reminds me of when people said newer regional forms are simpler and barely change, and all their examples are forms for simple designed Pokemon and even still they make around the same amount of modifications other regional forms do. Idk how to describe it but it kinda reminiscent of people who treat hc as canon.
Before I end this I want to bring up Mega Hawlucha as I didn't finish this til today so it was reveal about 2 hours ago
And look at that, a new mega that makes 5-6 changes(head feathers longer, mask patterns change, neck feather added, wing cape changes shape, buffer body, waist feathers change), that looks more elaborate cause the base design is naturally more detailed. Also since it's exaggerating features of luchador wrestling(what Hawlucha is based on) it maintains it's cute-coolness cause that what its designs concept calls for.
