#I wanted to hunt a new Gen mon

[tundrakatiebean]

Hunted tarountula for like 20 hours and then went to do story stuff and dex completion so my team would keep obeying me. Then this little fucker showed up.

[she-toadmask]

I am not one to be negative about Pokemon but Scarlet/Violet is the second worst main game on Switch (BDSP is the worst mostly for being a disappointment)

Legends has better shiny hunting

Sword/Shield had better raids

I didn't play Let's Go as much as the others but it is polished and an enjoyable experience

All three run better than SV and have fewer glitches

[crystalelemental]

What do you wanna see the postgame in Pokemon you want? I feel like it's kinda tricky to figure out myself when I replay the postgame content in numerous times.

Okay this might go for a while, because the short answer is "I don't think I know anymore."

Part of the issue is defining what count as "postgame." Like, is Kanto Redux in Gen 2 postgame because the League is the finish point, and Red is optional superboss content, or is that part of main game? Is the second half of Unova optional postgame content, or is it main game because you technically never finished your League quest? Some situations, like the Emma and Anabel quests in Gens 6 and 7, feel pretty decisively postgame, as do things like Delta Episode. But what counts and what doesn't is up for some debate, and I'm...not really sure where I draw the line. I've referred to everything in the second half of Unova as postgame, but now I question that decision.

More to the point, postgame runs into two specific problems in both story and gameplay areas.

Gameplay is probably best explained by Bopper's Gen 2 video. In it, he expresses that a major selling point of Pokemon is the emphasis on continued growth and development, talking about how moves being learned late or late appearing Pokemon give players something to work toward, and keep the game fresh and interesting. And to be honest, this tracks. As someone who's owned cheat devices most of his Pokemon career, you do try to hack in final teams right at the start and they get stale really fast. Having something to work toward is part of the fun.

Postgames tend to run into the problem of not having anything left to specifically work toward. The difference between Crystal's Kanto Redux and Platinum's battle island is that in Platinum, my team is done and has learned everything. As a result, that island doesn't really offer anything particularly fun. While I've been a proponent of Gym Leader and League rematches in the past, they also have the issue of...not doing anything different. Red as a new final conflict requires a different approach from facing off against Lance and the League, but Cynthia 1 and Cynthia 2 go down to exactly the same strategy. There's less to work toward, so the island feels entirely boring to me. It's a complete slog.

While there are opportunities to switch up the team, sometimes that comes a bit late, and isn't exactly...engaging. It works in a game like Crystal because of how type matchups work, where Misdreavus can be caught and immediately blank Red's Snorlax, or Tyranitar countering half of Red's team. Or in Emerald, Mawile can hard counter Steven's entire team with careful play. But later games don't have that opportunity. It's just lower level stuff, sometimes weaker stuff, with no real gameplay benefit.

Which leads to the main thing. This is a Monster Collecting game. Its postgame is effectively completion of the dex. Which is something Pokemon is uniquely terrible at. A game like Nexomon (which is excellent and should be played) lets your postgame be hunting down everything, which is all available in that one playthrough. But Pokemon has version exclusives that demand two games, and internet connection, and with Switch paying for online connectivity. In addition, while Nexomon has a ton of Legendary status mons, it also gives a ton of Golden Nexotraps for assured captures to simplify the process. Meanwhile, Pokemon gives you one (1) Master Ball, then gives you a gauntlet of like a dozen Legendary Pokemon that are wretched to catch because of how annoying their systems are. Monster collecting in the most popular Monster Collecting Videogame is terrible by design. It's never been good, and they're never going to make it good. Though I guess they tried with Galar's Dynamax Adventures and Paldea's fights with main legends. Though they both still do the stupid catching thing in other ways, like the Galar birds and Treasures of Ruin.

I think ideal gameplay actually gives you something to work toward, but also Pokemon really just needs to improve how it operates with catching everything. Which I think it has. To its credit, Galar and Paldea do make it easier to complete the dex by making near everything available. But that's also predicated on dealing with the awful raids and dens, which is somehow worse.

The other element, story, is where things get dicey, and I'll use a comparison to explain. In Nexomon, your postgame events are...honestly the most story intensive segments. They're really good, and my personal favorite parts. More critically, they're continuations. Nexomon 1 follows up the main story of defeating Omnicron with your story of destroying his soul so he can't regenerate (spoilers I guess). Neoxmon 2 follows up all the heavy stuff that happens with a bit of a departure, but only in the sense of setting up the connection between things that happened and things that are about to happen. It's all excellent, and the postgame story is the hook. Granted, alongside new boss fights and challenges and developments that are engaging too. Shame about how the hunt for Tyrants goes, but I digress.

Gen 2 and Gen 5, while they offer postgame, tends to be very light and disconnected on story. There's not as much relevance. Even with things like XY and SuMo and the Paldea DLC, which are much heavier on story, they have...literally no significance to the main event. Like okay, you can argue the thematic relevance of Emma as a character, or that the UB hunt is related to Lusamine's actions, but like...it's really not that connected to what was going on before. Teal Mask is just 100% disconnected, and when they do connect in the Mochi Madness thing, it kinda sucks ass and they wrote Carmine out of it entirely like assholes. I will never forgive that.

I can't say Pokemon's ever really had a great story-centric postgame. It completely lacks in that area, and tells the story it wants to tell centrally. Not that Pokemon's ever been that intense on story. So this is an area it can't really work for. But the ones that do stand out...also run into issues. XY and SuMo have great events with Looker, Emma, and Anabel...but the actual playing of those segments isn't great. And going back to the initial question, does Teal Mask count as postgame if you can do it, entirely, from nearly the start of the game?

The final issue is one of...well, the Battle Facilities. I hate them, personally. I have no investment in playing literal cheating AI at reading minds. Gimmick frontier stuff like in Emerald and Platinum can be fun, but stuff like the normal Battle Tower sucks. Add to it that legendary Pokemon don't count, and there's also very little benefit to gathering legends. You don't really get to do much but stomp the League with the box legends, and...then what? Do a bunch of extra stuff? Run battles that don't allow them? What's the point of having the postgame without those benefits? Galar fixes this a bit by letting anything into Tower, but it's a small concession more than a proper fix.

Honestly, I don't really know what this all adds up to. Part of it is desperately wishing Pokemon had better capture mechanics, because god do the current ones suck. Part of it is thinking that postgame should be a little quick, because usually my complaint is it goes on too long. But I really don't even know what I'd expect anymore. I think that, to some degree, postgame in Pokemon works while the generation is current, but falls off in importance on replays. It's why Daybreak made Legends Arceus worse.

[elendsessor]

the peace walker x monster hunter collab is amazing for so many reasons and while i doubt konami would ever collab the same way again, i’d love for other games to have a proper crossover with it too. i mean yeah in other mh collabs there’s unique weapon designs and monsters based on the other ip, and with games like sonic frontiers there was some goodies.

what i mean is the actual interacting part aka actual side content. actual hunting monsters.

this is real.

the collab was a promo for portable 3rd, however there’s no third gen monsters that can be fought. rathalos and tigrex are the only large mons, both representing freedom and freedom 2 (and rathalos was also included bc series mascot mon), but the main star of the show is definitely gear rex.

a monster was made just for this collab and it’s sick as hell. i mean it’s a metal gear rex but an actual dino. this is what i really want in any future collabs—make some new monster based on the property and stick it in said property bc why not.

[a-wynterwonderland]

Yet another idea of mine - the Hunting Dogs, but in the Pokemon universe.

Personally I think it would be like this: Tecchou, Jouno, Tachihara, and Teruko would be members of the Elite 4, and Fukuchi would be the Champion of the region. They'd be absolutely terrifying. But what would their teams look like?

Well... big time Pokemon nerd here, and I managed to comprise teams for the Hunting Dogs in this hypothetical AU.

Let's start off with the most obvious one being Tachihara. Since he manipulates metal it's fairly obvious he'd have Steel types:

Steel types are sturdy as they are powerful and his team would reflect that. Aegishlash is his ace due to it's ability to change it's defense and attack stats. In Shield Forme it's physical and special defense are 150, and it gets those stats swapped in Blade Forme - 150 physical and special attack. That thing is no something you want to mess with.

For being loud, energetic, and fiery as she is, Teruko would specialize in Fire types:

Yes I gave her two dog Pokemon on purpose lol

I know, I know, people find Charizard annoying since he's incredibly overused, but I can see Teruko using it as her ace. The fact that its dex entry says its flames are so hot it can melt boulders would probably make her want that on her team imo.

Let's talk about Jouno next. Personally, I think he would have Psychic types:

Why Psychic? He canonically likes to get into people's minds in order to break them, so it makes perfect sense for him to use Psychic. Delphox is powerful super underrated imo, I'm not entirely sure why but I can see Jouno using one.

If you thought Tecchou would be a Fighting type specialist, you thought wrong. Tecchou actually uses Dragon types:

Why Dragon over Fighting? Dragons symbolize power, strength, honor, and over in Japan are seen as mankind's protectors. Those traits describe Tecchou as a Hunting Dog, so his specialty being Dragon makes more sense.

The fact that he has three Pseudo-Legendaries is just pure nightmre fuel lmfao. Like if you thought the first three were easy then you fight this guy and BAM! this bitch pulls out three Pseudo-Legendaries. In gen 7, Kommo-o straight-up gave me nightmares, so of course Tecchou would have one.

Now... if you defeat these four, on to the Champion battle with Fukuchi. I had trouble creating his team but I think it would look something like this:

Following the trend of multiple Pseudo-Legendaries of course lol

I think Fukuchi would have mons that specialized in physical power, as all of these mons are physical attackers. Given the godly sword he has in canon I can see him usig an Aegislash. But honestly? I'm not sure what else to say about his team - at the end I was like, "Random bullshit go!!"

With that being said, I actually had a ton of fun making these teams! Pokemon was my childhood and even as an adult I'm still playing the games, and I'm eager to see Black & White get remade and what new games will be released in the future.

Maybe I'll make more teams in the future for other BSD characters - it's fun giving them Pokemon based on their personalities!

[lunzoic]

Review of Scarlet/Violet so far (NO SPOILERS for the story or specific new mons, just general gameplay)

The Pokemon: I'm hella biased as someone who basically loves all monster designs and little guysTM, but I've genuinely liked every new Pokemon encountered. Some really knock it out of the park in terms of overall design and concept. Some I didn't like when I saw them in a still image, but really grew on me when I actually caught and used them in-game. I'm surprised by the number of animations some Pokemon have for attacking, moving around, and interacting with things, which is small but really makes the whole world feel more alive. Also makes it more understandable why 'just importing' every Pokemon in existence is not that simple (I'm bitter to admit). I'm spoiled as to the general look of most new mons, but encountering them in-game and getting to see them in action is really on another level this gen. I have... so many surprise new precious babies...

The core gameplay loop: still great. Exploring and finding a new area or hidden cave or TM or rare Pokemon while traversing a bunch of varied environments is really exciting. Suffers a little bit from same-ness in spawns if you go to every nook and cranny, like there's some areas that don't have many unique Pokemon to encounter. On the other hand, it can make hunting for a particular Pokemon more fun since you may have a bunch of different locations to choose from. I'm enjoying the methods you can use to boost spawns and the visible scale differences for unusually tiny or large Pokemon (but WHY is size not a innately part of a Pokemon's summary... you just have to guess until you go and ask one specific NPC, afaik). The challenge of fighting trainers and gyms has is about as easy as it was in SwSh (if you stay to the recommended quest order), which is to say it's not challenging at all. Actual battles with NPCs seem to take on a much smaller role so far compared to the appeal of just exploring and catching wild Pokemon, which I don't mind at all but some players might miss the thrill of running into a really tough random trainer or a particularly fiendish gym leader (there have been some non-gym boss battles that were definitely pretty tough, however, and I expect some of the later story battles will give a bigger challenge).

I haven't had any bugs that actually affected gameplay in any way, although having the fore-knowledge that this is Pokemon Skyrim edition has made me cautious in avoiding things that I think might result in glitchy behavior. Restarting every few hours seems to avoid significant memory leak stutter, and the only immersion breaking graphics I've seen are the stop-motion movement on distant characters and the shadows randomly deciding to turn on or off depending on camera angle (which I've actually found very handy when getting pictures from all sorts of angles, but uh, probably not an intended feature?).

Wilderness landscape textures and meshes: no getting around the fact that there is a lot of ugly here. Cliffs and stony areas are a travesty in terms of repeating patterns and looking like play-doh in the distance. I also noticed something I haven't seen since playing janky user-made level in Spore, where in some spots the mesh also appears squishy like play-doh and warps up and down depending on how close you are (I don't know enough about 3D rendering to know exactly why that happens, but it's definitely a phenomenon that seems to occur in unpolished and 'underbaked' level meshes, or out of bounds areas no player is supposed to see). It... really brings in to question if there was a reluctance to hire more 3D map artists? I get staying loyal to a core dev team and wanting to reduce potential for leaks, but even just external devs/consultants who work solely on non-Pokemon related lighting engines, environmental textures, meshes, etc.?? Maybe they did actually do that but it just doesn't show in the final product, because even a whole team of talented people would create 'underbaked' maps if forced to rush. Unpolished textures and rendering are not that impactful on actual gameplay, the whole concept of the entire game being one massive wild area & open world was insanely ambitious and I'm not surprised to see mixed results, but it is still really jarring to see how unfinished a lot of the wild areas of the game look.

Town design, environmental props, etc: Props and non-wild areas honestly feel on par with X&Y so far with with just a higher resolution and more intricate level design. I maintain that that X&Y had such a fantastic look and art direction, especially for its time and the limitations of the 3DS, that similar graphics & aesthetic still feel serviceable even now when playing on mobile, but it's a little sad that the 9 year later successor doesn't blow X&Y out of the water. That being said, it is really fun jumping off buildings and around rooftops in town with your living bicycle (if you keep in mind finicky collision on edges), all the towns are really beautiful to look at (if kind of devoid of actual gameplay things to do besides the gym), and the seamless transition from most towns to wilderness is really lovely (but I do wonder what serious optimization costs/design considerations that decision came with). Now, NPCs within towns... are basically non-entities, sometimes literally due to pop-in and phasing while walking around. The random NPCs were never a big draw for Pokemon, usually just a chore to find out which ones give you important items/quests, but I've found so few NPCs who say anything more than 3 words that I'm actually starting to miss walking into a house and someone's grandpa regales me about how much he loves looking out at the sea with his Pokemon... and that was the entire point of that house. I guess it is kind of antiquated game design to add flavor in this way and far more labor intensive to create interiors than it was in previous games, but it is something quintessentially old school RPG (which I'd argue Pokemon still is!) that is now almost entirely missing. Named NPCs do have a hell of a lot to say, on the other hand...

Main Story and Characters: I have the least to say here because I haven't gotten too far, but it does seem promising? The whole school thing is kinda weird, I don't think this game was promoted as being academy-core, but good for the people who are into that I guess? The actual characters have been great so far, I don't play Pokemon for the human character designs but the devs clearly know that a lot of people do... The story NPCs have definitely had a lot of love and care put in to their looks and personalities, even though not many have really stood out narrative-wise so far. I have heard good things about where the story goes, and I'm especially interested in the sandwich questline (can't believe I'm saying that but it's true).

Difficulty: Definitely pretty bad so far. Making the exploration so compelling was really a double-edged sword for me here, it is way too easy to get distracted from whatever you're supposed to be doing and wander into an area that will crush you. I figured out the rule of thumb that if you get a zone transition and there is no recommended quest in that area, get the hell out. But it's difficult to keep track of which quests you are even supposed to do next. And if you do explore a lot within the recommended quest areas first, you can easily get overleveled for that set of quests and make them a cakewalk. OTOH, this definitely makes it the easiest Pokemon game ever to have a team composition of way more than 6 mons and rotate them, since powering up newly caught underleveled Pokemon is very easy with the exp share and exp candies. Autobattling makes grinding very easy too, if you gotta do it, and rare candies are actually fairly common scattered across the landscape. I've been using rotating teams to play through Pokemon games since X&Y, so I welcome the ability to use as many Pokemon as possible throughout the main storyline. As for accidentally getting to areas you are underleveled for... there's really no excusing the lack of signposting for what level the enemies in a given area are. Since you can avoid both wild encounters and trainers fairly easily, there's nothing stopping players from getting to a new zone and making a beeline for the boss without even realizing they have no way to beat it. Even just displaying level on nearby wild Pokemon and putting slightly stronger spawns in the area leading up to a tougher zones would do a hell of a lot, and is something that any RPG with freedom of exploration would do. It really reeks of lack of play-testing. Pokemon games have not always been great in terms of having what feels like a well-tested difficulty curve, but making every time the average player strolls into a new zone feel like a sequence break really takes the cake. I do wonder how well actual kids are going to be able to get through this game?? I know that every Pokemon Center has the 'where to go next' option that gives you a waypoint too, but kids are absolutely not going to remember that as an option (and a lot of adults aren't either. I'm also not sure how useful it actually is, given it's already recommended I go to the 4th gym when I haven't done the 3rd gym yet? I had to look at a guide to even know that I haven't done the 3rd gym though). On the OTHER other hand, it is kinda interesting to be able to get to lvl 40+ areas right off the bat without any exploits at all? Not good game design, not fun for a lot of players, but could make for some insane challenges. People finding routes for 100% speedruns and the like might be crazy entertaining.

[krcdgamedev]

I haven't been working on this as much because I've been job hunting (anyone need a mediocre dev?), so let's get back into it by trying to make a game in the engine as it is now.

I envision a game where the "mons" are just wild animals in a forest. You wake up one day and decide you're going to do on a journey and kill God, you know, typical JRPG plot stuff. Game won't be very long, something like 3-4 main areas.

Menus are fucked until Godot makes hboxes and vboxes work properly with items added by scripts. I could probably do something about this (ie not add items by script) but idgaf

Species: I'll be adding a single new stat, magic, which acts as a secondary attack stat with both attack and magic using the target's defense stat. So it's like gen 1 Pokemon's special stat but it's the defense stat that's doing double duty. Will this add a massive amount of intrigue and ingenuity to gameplay? No, but it's slightly different, so I'm doing it anyway.

While on my desperate quest to figure out how to get jerb I did end up making a species editor webapp that's made to work with Mondo, so I can use that to, you know, put together the species data.

Unique type system of course. Probably just single type per species. Not sure if they'll have abilities, probably not. Since you only recruit one of each species, no unique stats (IVs/natures), probably no EVs either.

Moves in the engine are currently very rudimentary. Priority of all things is fully implemented, but secondary effects and power points aren't… not sure this game will even have a PP system versus something like a mana pool. The species editor can be used to edit a moves database as well.

Battlescenes… none of the basic ones will actually be used. You'll always have all three party members (two early on) on the field, versus like 3-5 enemies per battle, and the mon-swapping mechanics/menu won't be used at all. (Neither will the items menu which I haven't made yet, probably.)

Sorting battle participants by speed is something very Pokemon-like, so I might want to do something different. Maybe have a random buff/debuff to each participants' speed before sorting, and have the resulting order for the turn visible to the player. That's a but like the old Pokemon contests actually, so maybe have moves that change the order in the next turn. Dunno if priority would be added on top of that. The speed-sorting function is in the basic battle functions, but it's only called on the highest level script, so the user can just swap it out there for a unique one.

In terms of balance I'm thinking something like, the weaker earlier critters level up faster while the later stronger ones take more EXP to level up. So both groups of party members have upsides and downsides, with later critters not being quick easy strength immediately. So EXP growth classes will be implemented.

For assets (mainly music and character models) I'll be relying heavily on OpenGameArt. Looking at the animals available gives some amusing ideas- how about you encounter a whale as a subboss in a lake halfway up the mountain?…

[sl33py-g4m3r]

Wish I could get to the end of Violet, lol. My sibling did, the music is awesome~~ But for some stupid reason I just keep restarting it. idk why.

Also I don't exactly have a coherent team atm. I took on the Flying Titan after the second gym and most of my team was fainted, lol.

Makes me think i suck at strategizing tbh. Probably not true tho; I've just been using pokemon that I've found. Finally found a mudbray with the stamina ability.

Been working on the pokedex and I change up my team constantly for new encounters in the areas I'm in. Probably not a good idea however, as I'm underleveled tbh. Only mon that was admittedly above the level cap for the bombadier fight, was my flamigo which is level 23. everything else wasn't even 20 yet, lol

I need to actually make a good team. I'm not doing a monotype run, so there's that. Nor do I want to overlevel much past the level cap in game.

Currently I have a team of pick up pokemon that hopefully I'll get to level 100 to have a 10% chance at a big nugget pickup. Gathering money the old fashioned way, lol.

So maybe it's not that I suck at strategizing, it's just that I'm underleveled and I forgot the thing had rock type moves, most of my team was weak to rock at that point, rip.

Might run around the map with a run away pokemon just to get the fly points, or is that not fun? Why do I play this way? lol.

Minor gripe that fishing is gone; I think someone doing a speedrun mentioned that, and eddaket mentioned it in a speedrun he was doing, now I'm sad that fishing is gone entirely now. Bring fishing back in pokemon games nintendo~~~

If i keep restarting the game I'll never get the pokedex done either or get the shiny charm, and shiny hunting is fun for what little I can see, lol.

Also just a pokemon question in general, but why now does the rival choose the pokemon that's weak to yours at the beginning? I think pre gen 5 that didn't happen much and they always went stronger against yours. Then gen 5 had a rival that did actually choose one weaker, cause there was 2 rivals, not counting N. Or I should've said 2 rivals who also get a starter pokemon as well as the player. But then when you got single rivals again (I think gen 6 did the 2 rivals thing too? i don't remember) they always got the one that's weak to yours.

Of course in Nemona's case, she could be challenging herself, cause in an earlier run where I got farther, quackival kicked my butt with aqua step really hard.

Moreso rant rather than an (I'm thinking about pokemon post), didn't intend to rant here but here we are. hope someone enjoys it, lol.

Hee ho...

why can pokemon spawn in walls?? rip any shiny that you couldn't lock on to or notice because it was in a wall.

[nyarados]

what a coincidence you mentioned legends arceus, bc i picked that up last week 😅 i really like that i can craft items in it! running for my life from pokemon is new and terrifying. filling out the pokedex is gonna be a major pain since i have to catch mons multiple times per entry, but it's nice that i dont have to battle every single one.

as for scarlet & violet, i picked sprigatito for my starter, bc its obviously the best & correct choice. my bf went with fuecoco.

the future & past mons are a cool concept. i mourn their absolutely ridiculous names though lmao. ceruledge is by far my favorite from this gen (go funky ghost knight, go), but i find the shiny version lackluster 😔

shiny hunting is a lot easier too - i actually stumbled across my first two in one day by chance :)

i was disappointed in the fact you can't really change your outfit much beyond the 4 seasonal school uniforms. i do like that none of the accessories or hairstyles are gender locked & that the uniforms are gender neutral, though.

in spite of its various bugs & glitches, i really like sv. the story is very charming and i totally didnt tear up a bit at the end haha. i havent completed a pokemon game since xy - i haven't really felt the need to. after a certain point, collecting gym badges started to feel tedious rather than fun and exciting, but these newer games have just enough oomf to keep me engaged. i may end up picking up swsh or lets go after i finish arceus 😊 or "borrow" them from my boyf for a time lol

- 🌸

LOL yess I've seen the videos of the alpha pokemon giving chase which is like. honestly hilarious to watch. and ooh I didn't know that's how the pokedex is filled. now that I'm on pokego that "catching without battling" thing feels a lot like pokego too! hmm getting that itch to maybe want legends arceus again.... between this and scarlet violet which one would you prefer? 🤔

help bc I always go for the water starter (unsurprisingly?) but I am naawwwtttt that big a fan of the quaxly line 😭😭😭 like the only part of that line that I like is quaxly and even then I still find the other two more adorable 😔 I'm ashamed

ohoho easier shiny hunting you say? 👀 <- spoken as someone who has never partaken in shiny hunting

a bummer abt the lack of outfits but a win for them not being gender locked! 🏆 they need to bring back the stylization available in xy with the accessibility to everything of scarlet violet

I don't know the story and now talking abt it with you makes me kinda want to get the game so nooo spoilers!!!! and omg I think the last pokemon game I completed was also xy.... the last game I PLAYED was alpha sapphire but I paused right before entering victory road 🧍🏻‍♀️

[hazelplaysgames]

   my annual February shiny hunt is on soon! February, if that title is to be believed. this year, i’ll try to get two games going: Y and Legends Arceus! i’ll prefer hunting in Y if i have to choose, but i think it could be fun to get the two working together.

   in Y, i’ll be in Route 4. i am specifically going for a Shiny Combee, and the closest thing to a zonk is gonna be Ledyba. i expect four, even if i stick to the Yellow Flowers.    that said, every other encounter on the route i consider good. if i somehow manage to get plenty of all ‘mons off of that route, i’ll swoop around to route 22, as that gives a pretty healthy selection with no repeats and no real misses to me. if i somehow manage to get a bunch of ‘mons there too, then i’m gonna call it a good month. :p

   as for Arceus’ role in this, it’s to hunt in those Space-Time Distortions. Johtonian Sneasel, Porygon, Magnemite, Cranidos, and Shieldon are exclusive to the bubbles, and i want to make a solid effort to get a full-as-possible living shiny dex in that game, since those are really the big things holding it back. also, Cherubi, sorta, but because i expect there to be a ton of waiting around for the former to pop up, i think it’ll be nice to weave the two together.

   depending on exactly how many encounters i get, we might be looking at weekly updates from Y, or possibly a mid-month and end-of-month update about that. Arceus, if i’m lucky, will have enough encounters to stitch together a video for. i’ll hit a bit a ton on the plans and ideas for the rest of the year, i excluded a tangent that seemed a bit much. i’ll just put it under a Keep Reading, because details can get long and i want to respect Dashes.

   first things first, the most common thing on this blog, Switch games. hopefully, there’s not gonna be much going on in Splat 3 in Feb. i’d give a sigh of relief if, if there is some event, it was at the end of the month. the rest of the year is gonna be fine, i just don’t want it crunching on the shiny hunt. i expect the DLC this year, but no sense in rushing that. the new game i got for the holidays(i’m excepting World’s End Club) are queuing up, not much to say there. if i get the majority of Distortion Pokemon in Arceus, maybe a small uptick from that afterwards.    about like a week ago, i learned i can way more easily move my teams from any game that can connect to Pokemon Home to my main files, so i want to do a Poison monotype in Shield this year. if anyone wants me to specifically try another type sooner or later, i’m open to the idea, i was thinking about it a bit and realized that Shield is a shockingly light game for me, and i won’t feel too roughed up about replaying that a bit more. that said, if i’m the only one, i already got a priority list lined up(i’m feeling Rock, ice, and Dragon, to match gens 6 & 7, and Steel, which i’ll elaborate on when i get to it, so i know now next years monotypes for X and UM). i doubt i’d do all 18 types, but i’m already considering five, what’s 13 more? maybe trim content, at that point badge completion is more a formality on my end. i don’t feel the need to do a major revisit to any other games i played before.    you know, i think i’m getting a better handle on why i like Nemona so much...

   i think the only new full game i know about this year will be Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom. it’s on my radar.    that said, 30 minute(maybe more like 3 hour) break, taking a bit to look into planned releases coming up, and a quick browse through the eShop, i got myself a list of other games to keep an eye out for, i figure i’ll get them as i get them if i want to get them. i’m kinda leaning towards other Monster Master sorts of games, the three big ones i saw on there being Temtem, Coromon, and Nexomon. Temtem’s the priciest by about double, i’ll look into the trio sooner or later, see what’s up with them. Dark Souls Remastered sounds serviceable on Switch, and there’s a few others i didn’t expect to find either.

   off of the Switch, a small liveblog of Digimon Dawn, which i figure i’ll go with way less posts compared to Dusk, more so detailing differences. for that, i think i’ll aim to start mid-March. then i got some Dragon monotypes between X and Ultra Moon, the latter of which we can expect to see photos from. to better guide me on timing, i know i have a trip to visit family in July, and after that i’ll do a liveblog for a Smeargle team in Moon. maybe a handful of photos from that one? it’s kinda silly to have multiple photos of a single Pokemon over a whole game, especially since the Photo Club isn’t actually IN Moon, and it just gets sillier when the idea of doing an Ultra Moon run is still not wholly off the table in my book.    i don’t want to do a Smeargle run in Ultra Moon yet because, frankly, Molayne scares me more than Hala. this is meant to say more about Molayne than Hala, truthfully. in either case though, the relatively early Route 2 provides Smeargles in both games, so this marks the first time i won’t feel i need to trade a team in. exciting! i got a few ideas already, but i’m not gonna look up much details until later, i’m planning to do this sometime starting in July after all.

[requiemforarainbow]

Loooooong story, so a Read More is needed. Click through if you enjoy talk of Nintendo, handhelds, and a shitload of Pokemon talk.

Earlier today I went on a hunting spree, looking for all my gaming handhelds. All of them are Nintendo, and I have at least one of most versions going back to the original Game Boy.

My original Game Boy is actually a "recent" acquisition. When I was a kid, I had the grey brick. It was my favorite thing in the world. When the Game Boy Pocket came out, I got it for Christmas. My original? I was "asked" (read: guilted/forced) to give it to my sister's then best friend, so she could play games with us, as her parents weren't able to afford to buy her one. I hated doing it then; I see the wisdom now and honestly, I'm a little angry at my younger self for not just offering it.

Anyway. For years it was the ONLY one I was missing of the line. I had and kept the others (Pocket, Color, Advance & SP, DS, 3DS, 3DS XL, and Switch), and legit, ALL of them are still in working order. But not the original.

At a con in 2018, I spotted a games vendor with tons of Nintendo stuff. And there, lying on their table, was a beauty. An original Game Boy...in green. The vendor informed me that the green one was a Japanese import (not sure if true, didn't care if not). I informed him it was the only one I was missing, and that green is my favorite color, and inquired on the price.

$45.

SOLD.

I had about $300 total to spend on souvenirs. This was a FIND. If it had cost ALL my spending money, I would have spent it.

It works like a dream, btw.

My Pocket and Color have been MIA since about 2013. I know they're around here somewhere. Just not sure which box I put them in. It's probably the same box that has my Advance SP's charger. I also managed to find my GB Advance: a special one, the gold New York Pokemon Center edition. (My sister and I were very lucky that year.)

(I do know I sound kind of spoiled, having all these things and not having had to ever sell them. I know I'm privileged. Trust me. If I can manage to not ever have to sell my collection, I won't. If I have to ever sell my things, they'll be the very last things I do. And hopefully to someone who will appreciate them.)

What spurred me to do this? I wanted to finally catalogue all my Pokemon games. The name I gave each Trainer, what starter I picked, and any relevant notes.

Do I have all the games? Not myself. But between my sister and I, we do. And yes, still have them. Some don't work, but they're still in the collection. (My sister no longer plays. Hasn't since Black & White. Wish me luck in attempting to nab her copies! And no, I will not overwrite her games. I want to keep them mostly intact and maybe try to bring over any 'mon I can.)

I've tried to give each Trainer a unique name since Gen 2, so that when I trade up a 'mon, I can trace it back to what game/gen it originated in. In cases where I own both/all the games in a set, each one has a unique name, as well as alternating gender for games you can choose it.

For instance: - My sister had Ruby; I had Sapphire. Trainer's name was Lilya. - I have both Brilliant Diamond & Shining Pearl. BD's trainer is Melpomene; SP's trainer is Morpheus. (I'm a Greek mythology nerd; it's also a reference to the book series I've been writing. Two royal siblings, and Morpheus is older.)

So I found the games (most of them, at least), and piled them up. Charged the systems that required it, fresh batteries in the ones that take 'em. (BTW, the 3DS and the 3DS XL can use the same charger. I misplaced one of them, so this is a nice realization.)

Games in, on, check Trainer/starter. Enter data in spreadsheet. Save game, turn off; insert next one. Repeat.

Here's what the cataloguing revealed:

- 1 game currently MIA (Sun) - 2 games busted and data loss (original Silver cart. and Pearl cart.) - 1 game half-busted (Sapphire's internal clock borked) - 4 games total with original trainer and starter long gone (reset, likely multiple times in some cases) - majority of transferrable Pokemon transferred out and up (Pokemon Bank, Pokemon Home, or on higher gen cart.) - at least 6(!) total games with some version of my name (Jordan/Jordi) as the trainer name, so would make figuring out provenance of Pokemon very fuzzy for earlier gen catches - I FOUND MY SHINY MEW! It's in Ultra Moon.

I don't remember if Legendaries/Mythics can be traded into Bank/Home and up. I HOPE they can. My Shiny is a "recent" trade but... I have a legit Mew I've had since Yellow. It's ALSO in UM. And I desperately want to make sure I can keep it. The Mew was given to me in middle school by a friend who got it in either Japan or Korea (I can't remember which) and hated it. Mew's always been my fave 'mon, so he gave it to me. It's been my lucky 'mon. It's level 100 now. If it can't be transferred out and up, at least I know where the little one is now.

I'm pretty sure the Shiny Mew is a hacked one; I got it in a Wonder Trade, so no idea of the provenance of it. Don't care. Shiny Mew is my absolute fave; it's blue, it's Mew.

I also have tried the Mew glitch in Yellow multiple times over the years. It's never worked for me. But...my Yellow is one of the games that I evidently reset and reset and reset (after trading stuff out and up). So I might try it a couple hundred more times. I know I still have the cables somewhere that the old systems required for trading, and we have enough systems that are compatible with the cables and games. So theoretically, if I can get it to work, I can get the Mew out.

I've also had some people try to get me to admit my "legit" traded Mew was also hacked. My friend's parents confirmed their vacation to...I think Japan or Korea, really can't remember after all this time. Met his pen pal there, and his pen pal had an extra Mew from an event that he gave my friend. So it is, as far as I know, and as far as my friend knew, legit. (Looking at the Mew events from around that time and prior, they were all in Japan. So it's a Japanese Mew. But I'm not sure of my friend's pen pal's nationality, and can't remember what country they resided in that his family visited on vacation.)

And while on this cataloguing excursion, I discovered that I have 2 copies each of Yellow and Silver. One each of a hard copy (cartridge), and one each of a digital copy on my 3DS XL. Neither digital copy has been completed, either. The digital copies are nice because I'll be 36 in two weeks and the original Game Boy's screen is a NIGHTMARE for my broken-ass eyes now. (Diabetes isn't helping my eyesight any, either.) So I can play Yellow on a screen that actually lets me SEE SHIT.

And as for Silver? The cartridge is busted. The internal stuff is so old that not only is the internal clock broken, but it's corrupted to the point it won't save. So if you start a new game, you either can't turn it off EVER, or you have to start over from the beginning every time. Kinda gives an old Nintendo fan war flashbacks of Super Mario Bros. 3, actually... The digital copy of Silver ACTUALLY SAVES. I've apparently got a game started on it, too. It's one of the Jordans. I might restart that and give them a different name, since I'm not too far in.

The other totally busted game is my hard copy of Pearl. I put it in the system, tap it to play, and...the system crashes. So that's nice. It's sister title, Diamond? Either I let my best friend play it, because the trainer's his nickname, or it's a copy I bought that just coincidentally has that name. At least I have Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl, and they're basically the same game as before.

If I can't snag my sister's copies of the other games, I might see about attempting to buy them. Slowly. Probably from newest gen to oldest, though at the rate I could afford them now, the Gen 1's might end up prohibitively expensive. I might also at some point attempt to snag physical copies of the digital ones I own. Just in case. Physical media will always beat downloads for me. It's the reason I still have DVDs.

Okay, this is seriously long enough. I'm going back to playing Pokemon. Scarlet, this time. Maybe with a side of Arceus if I get bored.

[silvermuffins]

Pokemon Scarlet liveblog!!! Part 5

I dunno if anyone's reading these but someday I might so we're still doing this.

now where was i? oh right. olives.

okay that's a weird bug....there's a little sprite of Flittle dancing around my screen....it relates to my camera positioning??? how do i get Rid of it

i am going to fly back to the school and show my dex to teacher and then fly back here to see if that fixes it

the flittle is still there at school. ....okay i THINK it's gone.

nope it's back when i go outside.....okay we're gonna save, close, and reopen!

there we go all better

you know, it'd be goofy if they like. Put a picture of Mew on the bottom of a truck model. Easter egg for those who could finagle a way to see it. Xylly the Kricketot has joined us.

Special tera Diglett! The fuck type is THAT? Fighting??? Dig is super effective...your hame is Hotdog and- that was rock. Huh!

fuck i keep tripping over Diglett as im trying to explore. ooh, found a Vespiquen, now I don't need to hunt for a female combee. You're Frank now, in lieu of other words.

Wanders about, exploring the orchard, kills a chewtle....ooh there's another special tera mon and it....is invisible. I can hear it sparkling. But I cannot....see it.

i fixed it. it's a Fletchling, fire tera....booooring you get that type anyway! Bronzor, tho, you're Dinnerplate. Finally got a Chewtle to name Faxly. Now we reach Cortondo!

We're gonna take a break for a minute to eat some punkin pie.

that turned into a break for the night. Back at it, now that England and the US have come in at a draw 0-0 but DAMN that was a good game.

Cortondo!

the usual shops....with a few new items! i should maybe doublecheck the stores in Artazon for different ingredients....

oh there's a really cool treehouse or something here. OH it's the arena.

man EVERY house here has a pool. okay quick artazon check then we return. ....alright i believe we just unlock additional stuff as we make progress. i do not have a flabebe to give this man.

aight let's tackle this gym. Nemona you're absolutely sneaking ahead of me just to play "wow weird coincidence" and we both know it. ....wait didn't you promise you'd battle me next time we met? now you're going back on it? we've only battled twice so far what's going on WHO ARE YOU AND WHAT DID YOU DO WITH NEMONA

ooooh olive soccer ig. steamrolls by. throws the ball over a fence. time to destroy Katy. oh what a swetie she is...alas I am OP. ....oh i get it....she has a BUGBEAR. i...am not gonna get tooh yes i will. oh the buggy hat is so cute!

SHE GAVE ME CUPCAKES

i've seen this man at school! I have seen him in the art room specifically i think. the fuck you mean he's E4?! I wasn't sure we were doing that this gen!

two artists in one generation huh....looks something up rq....noppe

anyway. how to answer his question....

"All paths lead to the Great Crater of Paldea"

all paths lead to the great crater

ALL PATHS LEAD TO THE GREAT CRATER holy shit i have Fears

oh Nemona is the youngest Champion in history? time to steal that from her. ....sir this conversation has made me very uneasy.

anyway back to class. oh Salvatore is A Guy. Possibly the most guy ever. aaaa he said mata ne i have feelings unrelated to pokemon (sayounara, mata ne!)

hassel is great at asking questions that make me nervous and also i don't know why but I feel a great deal of concern for him? hm. HEY we have Penny in class instead of Nemona for this one?!

anyway friendship time. i love the teachers so much. awah, Miriam...

okay, now then...where to next....maybe off to Iono's town??? I think that will work. I'm trying, here. Anyway, Tripto the Magnemite. The hell's a Varoom and where do I get one?

aaaaa i Continue On im nearly to Iono's city. OH Pebbles is evolving....i'm not getting it on the field? this one has like a classic evolution background... Tinkatuff! Found an office worker who is letting himself act like a child to relieve work stress.....this feels like a cry for help....and a guy wanting to be like the wind which gives me mata ne-related feels. Those who know me well know what I mean.

Awright Levincia here we are! Ooh, Grimer. You'll be Bort. Hey, a Kirlia! idt I got a Ralts before but I'mma need two anyway! oh shit, oops. Right, gonna need some luck with a quick ball then. doot, your name is Duck. ROTOM you're gonna be Prodro.

The usual food shops...OH and a sushi place! Hat shop, shoe shop, are these gonna be all the standard accessory shops? ooh one is a bit higher end. Too rich for my blood. Oh, and a fancy restaut=rant. All the big cities are so big.

Running around Levincia's skyscrapers is uncomfy. I think it's because of all the capitalism.

Now the other side of the city....oooh, Chinese food place. Once again confirming that POkemon are dietary staples, with a pickled Toedscool dish.

I got a bag that looks like bones!!!

Now we head in to do this gym thing. Nemona I am going to steamroll you. She's got something called a Crocalor.... Croc. Calor is hot. Thaaat's a Starter. That animation....she can't control her Tera orb well? Almost looked scared of it for a second... ...Nemona. Nemona what would challenging me again literally right now change? It wasn't even close. Nemona I am begging you please stop assuming I want to just battle you 24/7 that's unhealthy.

Anyway let's go handle Iono.

WHY IS CLAVELL HERE

oh my god

y'know if i were a viewer i think iono's streams would bore or annoy me very quickly. thankfully i am neither! and these gym trainer battles are going to tell Iono exactly how I'm gonna beat her: mud shot spam.

Oh her Bellibolt is actually kinda scary idk what its ability does...and it's beefy, too. Okay, recalculate. That's a clean switch, Salt Cure will take it down while I revive Pebbles... Ooh, she has a Mismagius, huh? Those have levitate, right? That's fine, i have Smack Down. ...Oh. Oh Sotero can't take two hexes and won't outspeed...okay Jupe, take over, OH COME ON WHY IS HEX SO POWERFUL. Do I have NOTHING that can do this??? Maybe if I use Scoots or Daya... we're gonna try Scoots. Okay, Scoots can take multiple hexes.

That was annoying.

oh hey that's Miss First Champion, isn't it? Geeta! Chairwoman of the league...

The last League Chair i dealt with was a megalomaniac with a messiah complex, you know. Please don't be like him.

alright back to school, there's classes and probably friendship available....i oughta check for new sandwich ingredients and such, too!

i have midterms?!

doo de doo classes....oh hey Arven's in Art with me this time...oh so there IS a way to change a pokemon's tera type!

doing some friendship before the exams. awww Dendra.....and i just adore Saguaro....oh no he has other fans...oh no he felt pressured and went for the spicy sandwich...OH oh aaaaa i love this this is so cute. don't worry professor i am here for you!! i will protect you

who dat??? in Hassel's event???? she's dressed like a superhero....

okay! midterms!

back to cortondo after the literal blood sweat and tears poured into midterms on fani's part. we heading north now. And....wait the map says theres an eevee here somewhere

gave up on the eevee, found a Capsakid. gonna call you Choods.

wanders along.....man i thought i saw a person with a picnic table.....oh well i can BE the person with the picnic table.

whyyyyy do my sandwiches always have weird slopes that destroy my plan by yeeting my ingredients into the ether.

I FINALLY GOT AN EGG!

now there's a tera Buizel....ice type, I like it. Crit capture, you're Spink from now on!

ohhhh we gonna have to play dodgeball to get to the next titan. boy howdy i can see it from here.

made it up without even getting on Koraidon or getting hit once! Bombirdier? It's...it's a stork.....oh my god are the bombs babies

okay so it powered up and then i OHKO'd it....with Nuzzle. And then the moon went flying into place.

arven why do you hate koraidon so much??? oh wait, no, you're tsunning. !! Koraidon learned Surf! well, not the battle move. but i don't need to fear water now.

arven what is going on??? do you have miraidon or something???

DOG. HE HAS SICK DOG? or old dog.....oh no....baby....

oh no this is gonna be something like the family dog was more of a parent to him than his mom was....but the dog's old and he's scared and lonely.....and he resents Koraidon because mom's research kept her away. something like that????

dog is hurt oh no....oh no did KORAIDON hurt him???

;A; ARVEN, BABY.... WE'RE GONNA SAVE YOUR DOG

once again, sada....how do you KNOW

aha HERE'S flabebe. I need two of these. Names of Morley and Kad. wait, technically i don't need two, I realize as I throw a second ball and crit capture...

don't think i should jump off this cliff til koraidon can scale it but....i see another lid thing? in yellow this time...fuck it let's go see. This one has the ruinous sword.

oh shit, electric tera jolteon! I think i want that? ....EXCEPT IT'S LEVEL 50. I need to get out of here!

wheew. Got Boydey the Numel tho. Gonna get a Bombirdier, name it Pachetti. FUCK i muscle memory killed it. Will ned to find a new one.

The superhero clothes are back and on someone else, turns out they're for dragon tamers!

i think I am about done for the night. I accomplished a lot!

[victory-duo]

BDSP came out a while ago! What do you think of it?

Heya! Still trying to do the legendary mon hunt postgame, but I have mixed thoughts about it being such a strict remake yet removing some things, but honestly, BDSP's been a fun revisit to Sinnoh as a game, personally!

Naturally, I treated this run as a revisit of Oliver's run but just in another timeline. :D

I'll put out my cons first:

- I was disappointed in the watering down of contests 'cause they were one of my favorite side activities. The rhythm game would have been nice if they didn't remove the dress up and move appeals completely :(

- I also didn't like that the Underground lost the traditional secret bases and traps, as I was so excited to play with my sister and friends. That said, honestly, the main reason I wanted BDSP was to be able to play Sinnoh with others (I missed out on the DS wifi), so the lack of features to connect and play with others even as simple as poffin-making made me disappointed.

- I am so polarized with the topic of difficulty and balance in this game. This mainly impacted my personal way to go about my journey with my team in Pokemon games, so two things:

1) I did not appreciate affection mechanics being merged with friendship, keeping it separate like in SWSH camp at the least would make me feel less bad that I have high friendship with them but not triggering the OP affection mechanics lol. I didn't like using herbs to lower friendship just to lessen affection so I just lived with it. I don't like battling online so I'd have preferred to experience the competitively-adjusted trainers in the main game with fair battles.

2) The EXP Share topic is a hot one, but it was weirdly balanced yet not in this game? Gen 4 games were not built around it at all, and it was so apparent with the Gym levels after Gardenia that I had to make a backup team to soak up the extra levels. I'm personally in the "make it optional" camp because I liked keeping my team up to speed and turning it off once I feel they're strong enough, but it saved some time pre-Cynthia for me not to be TOO underleveled lol.

And for the pros!

- Playing through it reminded me that there's something I really liked about the older game designs that incentivized backtracking and getting lost out of the way, and I wish future gens moving forward will get that charm of adventuring back. (SWSH dlc felt like that in a good way!)

- The new stuff they can get away with were nice!! I loved having such a tough time with the E4 and Gym rematches.

- I LOVE how they were serious making the trainers competitive and tough. I went in a deliberately underleveled run with the E4 and I like... spent the whole afternoon genuinely struggling with the levels AND their strategies. And Cynthia's Milotic???? MY NIGHTMARE

- I've rambled about it a bit in my twitter once in a while, but the DPPt soundtrack is my favorite from all of the others, and I am so happy to hear how it was approached!

My personal favorites---those I prefer much more now than the ogs, were Trainer battle (I already was obsessed with it before), Eterna, Route 209, Canalave, and the Ending theme.

- And did I mention how much I love the DPPt credits theme?? And BDSP ambushed me in the best way possible once I finished it, wow, I did not expect them to actually base the whole thing mainly from Platinum and add DP elements?!?! It's probably one of my favorite credits sequences as a whole now because of everything they did there, I was so emotional by the end!!!

- My personal favorite part? My sister and I were especially adoring all the new outfits for the O-sibs---they may be few, but I can feel that someone in the new dev team really likes fashion design, and I thought they did such a good job matching the outfits to them as existing characters!!

I wanna doodle all of them sometime, but for now I'll end this post with some of the ones I did while playing:

(I will compile these in a separate post once I complete the outfits!)

All in all, I enjoyed my time while it lasted despite my gripes! I do hope they update the game more 'cause I love Sinnoh, but atm I'm slowly focusing more on Legends. I'm really excited for it and hoping we learn more of it soon!!!

[reshrom]

So after completing Legends Arceus, I finally allowed myself to explore tumblr unafraid of spoilers and saw a bunch of negative posts on the new weather djinn, Enamorus. I weirdly felt bad about this and decided to defend this mon. Which is going to be ironic for me because . . . I think the Forces of Nature are dumb. I think their designs are weird and I think their concept is stupid. Humanoid pokemon are nothing new, I have to remind people that we’ve had these uncanny monsters since Gen 1, but these guys (and now one girl) take the cake. I’ve never liked them and the anime never made them any better in my eyes, especially since they don’t talk. Now I’m not here to tell people what they should feel, everyone’s got their own opinions of what pokemon should be and a few years after B&W, I don’t hate them THAT much anymore, but I don’t like them much either. I’m just playing Devil’s Advocate. 

That being said, back to Enamorus, I don’t understand the hate for her. She’s as badly designed as the others, her legs are clouds, she has a weird tail, and she looks alien like her brothers or boy-toys or whatever relationship they have. I’ve even seen some complaints about her being too “feminine” or eye rolls at the fact she’s 100% female? What’s wrong with that? Ever heard of Mother Nature? Who is a complete bitch! I call bullshit. That works just as well as the others. If you want gender neutral mon, go hunt voltorb or magnemite. Many have called her ugly . . . yeah and? Not like the other three are walkway models. They’re just as ugly looking and their designs are dumb. The only thing I like about all four is their Therian Forms. Even Enamorus’ is pretty cool looking!

Personally, I think this alien-looking pokemon provides some nice lore to these three and i think they developed a good excuse for why she was not amongst her brethren in Black and White. She’s not a pokemon that I want on my team, but I think she should be as loved as the others considering how many people are defending those three weirdos.  

[stuckinthewrongworld]

These are some of the ideas for new Pokemon I've thought of for a midwestern US inspired region. I think maybe around 100 new Pokemon would be good? I want to make sure I have fair amounts of each type too. Again these are just rough ideas.

-raccoon

-Cardinal (Indiana's state bird, would be the typical starting bird)

-a dragon based on Gen Con's mascot, Genevieve (Gen Con is a huge convention for table top games and card games. I already have names for these guys and types. I just need to come up with the drawing)

-hawk

-snake (we have so many different species of snakes around here, possibly a corn snake or water snake)

-opossum (could be the route 1 rodent? Yes, I know they're not rodents...)

-deer

-not deer (cryptic, already have a good idea and name for this one)

-turkey

-turtle

-crane

-paddlefish

-bobcat or cougar (the cat for the region)

-beagle (for the dog if the region, hunting is really big here)

-poison ivy based mon (could be the grass girl of the region?)

-peony (Indiana's state flower, could also be the grass girl of the region)

-possible fossil: dire wolf, as the first one was found very close to where I live

-possible fossil: short-faced bear

-arrow hear based mon (there are tons of arrow head found here and Angel Mounds is also near by, which is a native American heritage site)

-cows

-gooey butter cake (for the fairy type food mon)

-corn based mon

-winery themed mon

-salamander

Again. These are all rough ideas! Any input would be appreciated. Or if you live in Indiana, Michigan, Ohio, Illinois, or Missouri and have ideas, please toss them my way! I'm coming up short on ghost types. Or pokemon I could base on urban legends or ghost stories around here.

[yourfavepokemontype]

Have you seen the PLA leaks? What are your thoughts?

I'll stick it under a read more and slap a few spoiler tags on, one sec!

Final spoiler warning lmao

Ok so I like a few of the new forms! I was going to take Oshawott as my starter cause frankly I don't like any of the starter selection to begin with but I'm taking Cyndaquil now cause holy shit the new Typhlosion is a cutie pie.

SNAIL GOODRA MY BELOVED???? I'm going to shiny hunt em so I have one normal and one shiny, then name them after my snails. I cherish them.

Arcanine is...underwhelming. after all the hype of Growlithe and some fantastic fan predictions it feels it could have had more work done. I also find some of the other forms a little lackluster but that one just makes me sad.

Idk what the fuck is up woth the new weather pokemon is. What weather is that supposed to be? Lovecore? Idk i like the descriptions of it being gay and homophobic /hj

I don't like the new Dialga Palkia forms at all. I like the concept, but they look half finished?

I'm intrigued to hear the possibility of a PMD "you die, you lose all your items" mechanic. It sounds like the game will have a decent amount of challenge and risk vs reward strategy. Graphics look great, I'm enjoying spotting ancestors, and while Gen 5 isn't my fave I'm curious why a certain subway guy is in the past as well (or why time travel is being used at all.) I was talking theories with a friend on how maybe this is a precursor/explanation for future choices for when gen 5 remakes are on the table.

Overall I feel the pros outweigh the cons for me. I wish the aron line was in the game and I'm disappointed that Darkrai will be DLC rather than in game or even an event. I'll probs get the base game but if DLC isn't crazy expensive then maybe I'll get those too (I'm not paying full game price for DLC tho, I'll just trade the mons I want and watch gameplay on YouTube at that point)