Gen VI's EXP Share: Good or Bad?

There is an item in Pokemon called the EXP Share. In gens II-V, it can be equipped to a Pokemon, and that Pokemon will get half of the EXP from the battle, even if it didn't get used. Gen VI revamped it to a key item, which, when active, gives EXP to your entire party, and still lets the battlers have the maximum EXP yield.

Of course, this has its detractors. Plenty of people say that it makes X and Y too short and easy. Well, all it really does is cut out grinding time, and removing any grinding in a game is a good idea.

I don't know where digital RPGs developed their obsession with grinding levels and items, because I know, as a player of tabletop RPGs, that this doesn't tend to happen.

For those not in the know, grinding is when a player is forced to spend time repeatedly massacring random enemy NPCs in order to gradually build up to a reward. In some cases, you're doing this for item drops as part of a "Bring me twenty bear asses" fetch quest. However, in Pokemon, you're just doing it for more levels.

Ergo, Gen VI's EXP Share is a good thing. Sure, it meant that I breezed through Y a little faster than I would have liked, but at the same time, it meant that there was never a point where I ran up against a brick wall and had to spend two hours mulching the same five wild Pokemon over and over until it went away.

To give you an example: Yesterday, I picked up Ruby, my Gen III game. I got so bored of having to grind before Roxanne that I wiped her out by spamming Bullet Seed. Then I got so bored of having to grind before Brawly that I just walked in and wiped him out with a Ralts and Wingull. Then I got so bored of having to grind before the second battle with May (Third in Emerald) that I wiped out her Marshtomp with a Shroomish that was four levels below average. If it was Gen VI, I would've gotten that done in half the time, and wouldn't have been so irritated. Hell, Gen IV didn't do this.