#but like I said XY was my first pokemon game in a while so having a lot of oldies for nostalgia appealed to me

[death-rebirth-senshi]

Ha I don't care about regional dexes but I'll admit I do think Kalos kind of lacks identity because of it.

[samthesoupman]

My interpretation of the Pokemon Timeline

Quick few notes before I start this: I am aware that each pokemon game is it's own pocket universe, and timelines arent really important to the games, this is just for fun, side games like XD and Ranger won't be counted, remakes will take precidence over the origional versions, and if you have any evidence gainst this- please tell me! I'd love to have a discussion about this. Obviously the first game in the timeline is Legends Arceus, though the year is hard to tell- I'm gonna but it in it's own time period i'm calling "BE4" meaing "Before Elite 4" - so before the idea of catching and training pokemon became the norm for the pokemon world.

Then- the Kanto dilemma- is let's go cannon? Well the pokemon company swears let's go is mainline- the fact that the game starts with you isekai-ing into the TV is evidence enough for me that it's not real events- at best maybe it's a game in universe. Fire Red and Leaf Green's events can be dated however, the 96 on red's shirt in Ultra Sun and Moon and the constant references to "20 years ago" -fan service or not- show that FRLG take place in 1996.

Obviously, as stated many times in game, Heart Gold and Soul Silver take place 3 years after FRLG- not much confusion there at all. Briliant Diamond and Shining Pearl are also easy, as the game starts with talking about the Red Gyaradose incident in Johto. So, both these games would take place in 1999- in my opinion BDSP takes place maybe a month after HGSS.

The next one is a bit of a jump from what most expect- Black and White. I purely put this here because of Caitlin. Her hair is about 18 inches longer than it is in Platinum, taking into account how fast hair grows- that would put BW 4 years after BDSP in 2003. Then, obviously B2W2 happens 2 years after BW as stated in the story- putting it in 2005.

I put X and Y next, and I put it way ahead in 2013. There really isn't anything in XY that can help determine when it is- Dexio and Sina show up in USUM- so it can't be too far from those games. I just put it in it's release year. The most evidence I have for this is that they have portable holograms- a lot more advanced than the poketch's and X-Trancievers of the 2000's.

Next up I put ORAS in 2015 I'm sure a lot of you were shocked when I didn't put ORAS with FRLG like that one gamefreak guy said in his deleted twitter post- my reasoning? Wally is still a kid in the battle tree while Red and Blue are aged. Nothing really changes if ORAS is moved here, Steven is an adult when he cameos in HGSS, so it would make sense he hasnt visably aged 16 years later. At his oldest in ORAS he would be 32, well within the age range for a champion.

Then, one year later, USUM takes place in 2016. Obviously given the evidence i've used for many of the other placements this should explain itself, 20 years after FRLG.

Finally- Sword, Shield, Scarlett, and Violet... these games are almost impossible to place, but based on how far technology has come and some characters from BW having teenage children in the Blueberry academy- I'm just putting both these games in 2020- which would make the gym leader kids at around 17 depending on when they were born assumedly after BW's events.

so that's it! thank you for reading! share how you feel with me or i'll break you kneecaps.

[kooldewd123]

one of the smaller leaked details from the teraleak about plza got me thinking about what i'd like to see in terms of shiny hunting mechanics, and i ended up going down a rabbit hole and ranking the games by how much i enjoy shiny hunting in them (roughly ordered within tiers):

reasonings beneath the break, i've got a LOT of thoughts to infodump:

SM/USUM: sos chaining is my absolute favorite shiny hunting method. there's a really fun element of preparation to it that i think most other methods lack - researching your target pokemon, looking for any recoil or status move that may be an issue, figuring out how to plan around it, etc. it's a fun planning game that can easily make individual hunts much more memorable than simply “wow this one was so quick/long” when you see your plans come to fruition. usum improved it even further with some small mechanical tweaks, plus an expanded dex to hunt through. also in usum is the ultra warp ride. the wormhole shinies are honestly so easy that their allure wears off super quick, but the actual minigame attached to them is pretty fun. that said, the real star of the uwr are the legendaries and ultra beasts, all available through soft resetting. i love soft resetting for mostly the same reasons as sos chaining: you've got one chance to catch this legendary, so you better go in with a solid game plan and make it count once you finally see those sparkles. or if you want a different sort of challenge, you can always go for one of the gift pokemon instead: poipole, type:null, and ash cap pikachu. no battle required, but no shiny charm, either, with the added clout value that their shinies haven’t been available since. alola was my gateway to shiny hunting, but even trying to account for nostalgia, i still think it has some of the most engaging hunts to this day.

XY: i feel like kalos is really overlooked nowadays when it comes to shiny hunting, but it’s one of my absolute favorites. friend safari is always one of the first things that comes to mind whenever i think about shiny hunting. it’s a really cool community-driven shiny hunting experience. i spent so much time just exchanging friend codes to find the shines i needed, and i was always able to find a thriving friend safari community all the way up through swsh’s lifespan until i finally caught every possible shiny i could from it (i wonder how they’re doing now that the 3ds servers are shut down?). this is also the best region for fossil resets - most of the fossil are readily available in large quantities, so you can stock up as much as you'd like and revive them all at once to see if any surprises pop out at you. between friend safari, fossil resets, and horde hunting, xy has a lot of good mindless shiny hunts. a lot of the time, shiny hunting is just something for me to do with my hands while i’m bored, and xy excels at that. oh yeah, there’s also pokeradar in this one, too. i could never quite figure out how to work it.

SWSH: swsh gets massive bonus points for being the only game where masuda hunting is actually fun tbh. the fact that zl can be used as a replacement for the a button means that you can just gather up eggs one-handed at the route 5 nursery, then you can use the 3d camera in the wild area to easily spin in circles to hatch them without even needing to return to a pc box every five minutes like before. as for the rest of the shiny stuff in this game… the intended shiny hunting method is laughably pointless and dynamax adventures, while a neat concept, are only fun if you actually have friends to play it with. otherwise, you’re stuck dealing with either braindead npcs or even more braindead randoms. like i said before, i love planning out big hunts, but in dynamax adventures, so much of it is out of your control that it’s just completely unfun to me (at least we got the regis and swords of justice huntable through run aways. those are some really fun hunts as a consolation prize). honestly, i’m definitely placing these games several spots higher than they probably should be, but sword is possibly my most played game ever due to the sheer amount of masuda breeding i’ve done in it, so that has to count for something.

GSC: okay i know these are a curveball compared to everything else on the list. when these games came to the 3ds virtual console, i did some rby glitching to get a shiny ditto into them and honestly? probably my second favorite game in terms of breeding after swsh. because shininess is determined by ivs in these games, a shiny ditto parent gives every child a flat 1/64 shiny rate, balanced by the fact that the oval charm and flame body don’t exist yet. what you end up with is a situation where you get eggs much more slowly, but with hunt times still comparable to modern-day masuda hunting, and i personally found something about this arrangement really satisfying. every egg has so much more build-up to it, and so despite the slower pace, it somehow still felt more consistently exciting than perhaps any other shiny hunting method. crystal has some additional shiny fun with the odd egg if you feel like doing a bit of save manipulation with it (plus obligatory shiny celebi comment).

PLA: i know this is a very niche and odd opinion to have, but pla handles loading pokemon into the overworld better than any other game with overworld pokemon. the format of having distinct separate regions that you can load and unload at will, with pokemon (even those not yet spawned) being preset at the moment of loading and persisting until being forcibly unloaded, is something that i truly hope carries forward into future entries. it creates a world that feels much more natural, and yet is also highly exploitable on a gameplay level. resetting the regions until you find an outbreak, and then traveling to that outbreak to search for shinies, is a compelling gameplay loop that implements very video game-y elements in a way that i particularly enjoy. the differentiation between mass outbreaks and massive mass outbreaks also adds a fun trade-off into the mix: do you target a specific pokemon at lower odds or do you go for a grab bag of random pokemon at higher odds? i do have one big complaint, however, and it’s gonna sound kinda insane. it is nearly impossible to actually fail a shiny in this game. they persist through saves, they don’t respawn when you run, they even give off a distinct jingle when they’re in your vicinity. if there is a shiny near you, you are gonna find it, and you are probably gonna catch it. and personally… i don’t really care for this arrangement. the risk of failure is an integral part of shiny hunting. making it too safe makes the accomplishment feel a bit more hollow to me. i wish there was a way to disable the shiny sound. i feel like if they weren’t so blatantly telegraphed and were still a bit harder to find in the first place, it would balance out the safety nets the game gives you somewhat.

LGPE: i feel like i’ve come to appreciate lgpe a lot more as time has gone on. the catch combo system is a nice simple numbers game - just keep catching the same pokemon and shiny odds go up. simple, elegant, satisfying. the big drawback is the fact that the motion controls are uuuhh. less than ideal. but it’s easy enough to build a combo back up that it doesn’t usually feel like too big of a setback if something goes wrong. also the fact that you can use the in-game trading mechanics to hunt the alola variants is pretty nifty! i should get back in and try one of those hunts sometime.

BDSP: after not being able to get into pokeradar hunting in xy or the original dp, i was pleasantly surprised at how enjoyable i found it in bdsp. it has a really good sense of risk and reward as you try to map out the safest path you can, which makes it super gratifying when your skills and luck are good enough to bring your chain all the way up to 40. honestly, the fact that the shiny charm doesn’t work in this game is a complete nonissue for me, because the pokeradar doesn’t even need it. of course, this game also has the added fun of not shiny locking anything except some tie-in bonuses. you can shiny hunt any legendary from the first four generations, and you can even go for the sinnoh mythicals as well (the event to get their items is over now, but i believe it’s still possible to glitch your way to them anyway).

SV: sparkling sandwiches are probably the shiny hunting mechanic i’m most split on. once again, there’s a really good strategic element to it that i enjoy: trying to figure out where on the map you can locate your target pokemon with as little type overlap in the surrounding area as possible, and then once you’ve begun your hunt, finding the best path to spawn them in as quickly as possible. on the other hand, however, probably my biggest hot take of sv is that the sandwiches bump the shiny rate up way too high. in my first shiny hunting excursion of the game, i found five shinies in the span of two sandwiches, and as a whole, that’s been more the norm than an exception. most shiny hunts in this game are over so quickly that i don’t feel all that rewarded for accomplishing them. the process of acquiring herba mystica is a good bottleneck keeping it from spiraling entirely out of control, but it feels so distinct from the actual shiny hunting process that it doesn’t help alleviate those feelings for me.

ORAS: i don’t hate shiny hunting in oras or anything, but i don’t think it does anything exceptionally well, either. horde hunting is just as fun as it is in xy, although it’s fairly easy to exhaust the catalogue of huntable pokemon in both games. soft resetting legendaries is here, although for some of them, they require lengthy trips to the encounter point each time and you’re better off sticking with usum or even bdsp instead if you wanna hunt them. the standout is dexnav - frankly, i’ve warmed up to it a lot over the years, but i think it’s still the roughest chaining mechanic. the search function is simple to understand, and the mirage spots and hidden pokemon inject a bunch of new encounters to hunt for. that said, i think the sneaking aspect of it never feels quite right with a 3ds circle pad, and having to constantly swap between battles and sneaking means that it’s hard to stay in a groove. i don’t mind dexnav, but it’s rarely my first choice.

[pokenoire]

You mention that you have a lot of Anipoke fanfics ideas you never finished, can you tell a little about them? I'm just curious

Ok. This is going to be long, so as a cartoon from my childhood said, "Sit down because here comes a story."

The first time I wrote a FanFiction was in 2013-2014, it was basically an OC based on me and the people I knew, I even added the readers themselves to the story. It was a rewrite of XY, and took the early episodes from when Ash only had Froakie and Flechiling. I needed more characters for a revolution that would happen at least in a 2 story that would interrupt the Kalos League (funny that it was similar to the team flare arc) but with Lumiose's control I looked in practically 52 chapters and was close to Ramos gym, I changed some of Ash's Pokemon and included others keeping their Kalos mon at the same time as my Pokemon for them.

I also had an AU with Mirror Ash instead of an alternate character, a twin brother of Ash who was with his father, in fact this was before the Shudo novel was translated I didn't have much of an idea how Ash father is, the only thing i knew was "Ash will see his father for development" which i came across in the interviews looking for stuff about ash...As I had a cousin with an absent father similar to Ash and I witnessed similar situations with people close to me, I used this as a reference for Ash's father who ended up being very similar to Shudo. Less similar to Yuyama and Yajima UA (20 - 21 - 23 movie and Distant Blue Sky)

I started seeing a lot of real world stories without Pokemon so I decided to try something similar several times, always leaving Pikachu as some object, animal, plush, game or Ash's favorite thing in whole world.

Mirror Serena and Mirror Ash on their journey from leaving Kanto to arriving in Kalos

Mirror Ash autistic child non verbal, hiperfocous on Pokemon anime like it's your mirror version seeing your OG version if that makes sense lol Serena wasn't Mirror Serena, she was just normal Serena, so we can say it's Mirror Ash x Serena

The UA where Ash and Misty and Satoshi and Serena were a couple each with one was missing because I thought it would be fun to make a Pokeshipping fic BUT I COULDN'T PUT ANYONE with Serena other than Ash...so I reused it 💖😅

A whole journey, from Serena in Hoeen with a bit of Palleshipping and Rivalcrushshipping, with mention of the battle frontier and May's appearance.

A rewrite of Serena as Kalos Champion progress, while Ash was in Alola trying to practice all the things he learned from Ash after he failed in Hoeen due to the current chaotic state of the government on Pokemon world in 2017.

A story I've never written about Ashley X Serena, like Serena as sapphic Ash as bi, I think they's bi in pretty much 90% of my stories. Lesbian Serena only came to my mind for the first time because of the 2023 conflict, I admit, before for me they were both a Bi4Bi couple regardless of the universe I wrote, be it yaoi or not.

(Thanks to the Male Marinette and Fem Adrien Agreste versions - the concept of genderband as I only found out what non-binary was in 2019 to 2020 they were both cis)

Yaoi Amourshipping is the most recent of them all, I've simply been watching Serena's genderband for a long time but I've never been able to choose a correct name for it, so it was a bit "how do I can I write a character without a name?" so I was left without any idea updates and I stuck to that, just the desire in the back of my mind in 2015-2016 😭

- Crossovers -

A story based on a book I was reading, where Ash was an immortal and Serena was an incarnated soul that Ash would look for from time to time because in this story he loves her, but she doesn't know and has no idea who he is. I wanted to explore the concept of reverse crush UA but at the same time without going out of character, so it was a bit like Kanto- Diamond and Pearl - Advanced Generation and Kalos Ash mixed together in one character (a little bit of Dark Ash in the middle).

A crossover with Nisekoi, with the idea of recovering the two's memories of their camping days, taking advantage of the theory that Ash was the son of Giovanni and Serena by Lysandre for the first time. Just to give the same main idea of the anime I was basing it on.

A journey of May and Dawn as a crossover of DanMachi because a friend recommended this anime to me, I did something as if the gods were people with Pokémon powers like aura, electric, etc. Pokemon trainers were like the adventurers were like Pokemon trainers but I admit that Ash and Serena had a secondary role in 2016.

Many, many crossovers with Miraculous

A crossover where Ash was Chat Noir and Serena was Ladybug

A crossover where Adrien could go to school and wanted to be a Pokemon trainer and Marinette was there.

A crossover where Delia would work with Tom and Sabine, fleeing from Ash's abusive father in Japan (original Kanto) but they are in the Miraculous world itself. No appearance, no idea who he would be, keeping pretty much the anime, I didn't really involve his father outside of the sibling UA.

I picked up both ideas recently and now that I'm back writing, I thought about putting some of them together into one, but without a very definite spoiler.

I've already done a Bridgette and Felix journey too because they're my OTP in Miraculous but I admit I had a lot more ideas for them in the original universe of their own franchise.

[quartings]

Finally reading the full XY volumes!

For context, XY is my least favorite Pokespe arc, so I decided to give it a second chance hoping that the extra chapters and better art in the full volumes would help me like it more. But did it?

What I liked:

I will say that the extra “filler” chapters really helped pace out the story much better and warmed me up to the characters! The Pokemon-Amie and Super Training chapters in particular. It felt weird not having an explanation in the originals for Y’s Sylveon, let alone an Eevee. This is why I disagree with people nowadays hating filler content. Done right, it helps with character and worldbuilding in small subconscious ways that can help an audience enjoy a story more!

I do enjoy how bold the arc starts, having Vaniville be decimated by the legendaries in the first chapter!

Reading the XY arc chapter-to-chapter and mini volume to mini volume, it felt like X took much longer to even help his friends. Now reading the arc all at once, he feels much less stubborn and selfish, which is good!

Minor thing- removing Y’s nudity is the only instance of censorship in Pokemon Adventures that I actually appreciate. It doesn’t disrupt the plot or make no sense like censoring Green’s Pokeball booby trap, Emerald’s pee joke, or especially Norman and Mirei’s abuse.

Apparently, a lot of the Gurkinn stuff was added in the full volumes? My memory on it’s a bit foggy but that’s wild to me if true- it just feels so plot-important. No wonder I felt the arc was badly-paced on my first readthrough!

Speaking of which, I love that we get chapters dedicated to non-dexholders again! It feels like we last got stuff like that with Keldeo in BW or the Hoenn Gym Leaders!

A lot of the other things I like about XY have been said by most other people already and apply to Pokespe as a whole. Battles are fun and creative, making great use of Pokemon trivia from their dex entries, the leads are unique and well-written compared to the rest of the franchise, there’s a good mix of dark and light themes, and the returning characters are fun and meaningful cameos!

What I disliked still:

It’s still really hard for me to suspend my disbelief that Team Flare managed to silence or arrest everyone who saw the Xerneas-Yveltal battle or its aftermath, especially in the age of the internet.

The gang learning most of the important plot stuff from Team Flare constantly spilling their plans kind of killed some of the tension for me, to be honest. Also them letting all the grunts go instead of capturing them for info or just to turn them over to the authorities.

Sycamore not realizing Lysandre is evil is stupid in any version of XY’s story, I’m sorry.

Team Flare’s brainwashed victims having the “same personalities” felt a bit lazy still. Brainwashing is one of my least favourite tropes though, so I might be biased there.

I think the manga over-corrected with Shauna, Trevor, and Tierno. Instead of all being overly positive and aimless like in the games, being put in constant danger in the manga means they’re all similar levels of scared and stressed, so their personalities don’t stand out all that much either. Shauna especially just being a similar aggressive and serious type like Y, just with less of a backstory. That one weird sexist quip Shauna had in the Sylveon chapter also rubbed me the wrong way, too.

Minor- I still don’t get why Kusaka aged the main cast down from 17/18 to 12 in this arc. It just makes X and Y look like they got hydraulic pressed proportions-wise, and makes the aforementioned scene with Y feel gross.

Speaking of which, why is Clemont drawn SO short in this arc?! He’s normal-sized in the official art and the anime, so that’s another baffling change to me.

Minor- Malva gets her Pyroar back from Aliana after the Diancie chapter where she already has Pyroar- is there something I’m missing here?

While the pacing has vastly improved compared to the mini volumes, it still feels off in the final two volumes. Suddenly taking an intermission from the Ultimate Weapon to introduce Zygarde practically out of nowhere just feels clunky. Compared to the anime where they had both Zygarde and the Megalith planned months in advance with proper foreshadowing. Or a better comparison would be the RS manga, where both evil teams planned on using Groudon and Kyogre from the start, and that’s what we end the series on.

TLDR: Overall I’ve really warmed up on this arc! I had way less confusion reading through it thanks to the extra chapters, and I’ve grown to understand X a bit more as a protagonist. I still have some problems with the arc, namely how the rivals are handled, and how Team Flare is presented as an omnipresent all-controlling shadow government when their members at all levels constantly spill their secrets. If you have any other thoughts, facts, or even disagreements, I’d love to hear them!

I’d say this reread has put XY above B2W2 and maybe SwSh in my ranking of all the arcs, which is still something! Now we all have to wait and see how ORAS’ full volume release changes its place on the rankings, hehe…

[lollitree]

Your tags under the pokemon poll are SO TRUEE and it hurts how many people dont understand that

I grew up in the change from pixel art to 3D and have nostalgia for bw, xy AND sm. So i think because of that, I can see the good and bad in all the games but don't feel like any of them 'peaked''. They're all different games, so they are really hard to compare.

On a related note tho, its so sad to see so many fans praise one of my childhood games and not the others. And like, I get it because gen 5 is more similar to what they grew up with.....but every time I say I love xy, sm and even swsh i get told they are terrible and usually imply that I shouldnt like them :/

That only happens online, though......irl all the fans ive met, no matter their ages, just say something like 'i didnt like it, but i'm glad you did!'. Growing up in irl fan spaces and having to move online during corona was AN EXPERIENCE omg

Yeah! It's super interesting how much we are affected by nostaglia.

There's usually a pattern you can notice with this stuff too. There are two lines that go up as time goes on. The one everyone talks about as being great and the newer one people hate on, usually to do with nostalgia of the now older original audience of the game.

My full reply got long so putting it under a read more skfjsh

My first Pokemon game was Colosseum, so gen 2/3 pokemon and gen 3 sound effects are pretty nostalgic to me.

Then I grew up mostly playing Diamond/Platinum/PMD2/Ranger2. I LOVED Team Galactic. I restarted the games so many times just so I could play through the story again with Cyrus and the Galactic Grunt theme. (I have also played through pmd2 many many times). I remember in my early teens seeing people on the internet hating on DPPt a lot and it making me sad. I recall someone saying that the gen 4 Pokemon sucked and I remember thinking "aw I guess they're right, some of these pokemon are really boring or annoying" and then I learned later that the pokemon I was thinking of were all gen 1 pokemon sdfkjsh

Gen 5 was hated when it first came out because it wasn't very fun for new players. I bet it also didn't help that the advertising for B2W2 was pretty poor and also came out after the 3DS did. I didn't even know it was a sequel until years later. That's why they went in the complete opposite direction for gen 6, and added gimmicks!

I have heard multiple people call the designs from gen 5 horrible over the years (And they're all wrong). Those comments are nowhere NEAR as frequent now, but they almost always come from people with nostalgia for the ones they grew up with.

I was 13 when BW first came out. I think I've only beaten it once, MAYBE twice. I'm not entirely sure why, because I was still replaying DPPt a lot. I would guess it's because the game is super linear in terms of gameplay and every playthrough will start exactly the same. You don't really get to make decisions on your team and how you play until later. Kid me loved the beginning of the main pokemon games the most because they were the most fun bits to play usually. So I suppose when you've already played it once, the beginning becomes quite boring.

And to compare. I did not like XY when it first came out. I was 16 and very against change and also my fav types at the time were dark and dragon so fairy type was the worst thing ever. I said previously that I really liked Team Galactic, so Team Flare was just a bootleg version of them to me. BUT I did immediately replay the game when I finished it. The character customisation plus the huge dex gives the game a lot of replayability. Because while I didn't like a lot about the game it was still fun to play, and it was the first time online was really accessible to me. I went back to 2013/2014 on my blog and there's SO much positivity about the game it's amazing! Over time people only remembered the bad parts and started hating it. I bet there'll be an influx of nostalgia for it before long. We can even see it in the hope people have for SV having Kalos DLC.

I need to replay sun/moon or play USUM because in my brain currently it sucks. But I'm very aware that that's because I only played it once, it's been years, and I played it when I started to grow out of Pokemon. So I'm excited to play it again now that I can appreciate it better. (Also the Sun/Moon anime is my fav so I have a lot of love for the characters now)

And finally, I loved SWSH! I didn't finish it the first time I tried to play it. Mostly because I spent HOURS trying to get a shiny hatenna before doing the fire gym skdfjhs. But then I SPED through the game with a bug type only run before Legends came out and I really enjoyed the story! One of those things that's more enjoyable if you're only focused on enjoying the story (and playing the game through with a joltik as the lead and trying to make sure they stay strong enough to beat the game with pfft) Also Leon was the first ever Champion I actually thought was cool and enjoyed seeing while playing the game (as ridiculous as his outfit is)

If I were to logically plot out the best for me based on how nostalgia works and taking into consideration that public opinion ABSOLUTELY influences me. I would have said BW was the best and XY(or SM) was the downfall, even though I had way more fun playing XY than BW as a kid

[doubleddenden]

oh yeah, i never covered it on my blog. It's kinda small but the new anime revealed a new... form, new pokemon? unclear so far. Essentially this seems to be Liko's Ho-Oh- and for us, a peak at what will eventually come to the Scarlet and Violet DLC

So obviously this thing bears a striking resemblance to Terapagos. Not to mention it has a very... disk shaped body, hint hint. Tbh I do not really watch the anime much and I'm waiting to see how people think of the new series before I give it a shot, so I do not know the context of how this thing appeared. However, Liko does carry a pendant around her neck that's most likely connected.

Now this thing is probably just another Terapagos form. That being said, we can't 100% confirm anything. But you know what this reminds me of?

The last anime reveal we got of a special form of a legendary was Zygarde's Cell, Core, 20%, and 100% forms in the XY anime- of course they weren't added until Sun and Moon- most likely leftovers from canceled Kalos follow ups. The difference here is that Terapagos is heavily tied into the unfinished Area Zero story line and will be relevant in the DLC.

Its not really a lot- in fact a new form or evolution is somewhat given with these types of things. DLC at this point is basically "third" or "enhanced game" territory that gives the special Pokemon associated with them special new forms or evolutions, sometimes both. Look at Kubfu/Urshifu and Calyrex and his horses.

But this does set another important precedent: The anime will now reveal things again.

Again, Zygarde was the last time this happened with a legendary, and I guess for mythicals (which have been wonky territory for a while lately and for a while now basically only exist as movie souvenirs) the last time we had a new out of gen Pokemon revealed was Magearna. Before that, we would get reveals like Mega Mewtwo Y in the Genesect movie or Noivern from Black and White's ending run. Before that, Zorua and Zoroark in the DP Celebi movie. Long before that, we got a lot with Munchlax, Mime Jr, and Bonsly being revealed in the Advanced anime and Lucario and Manaphy in their movies. Latios and Latias in the last Johto movie, Duskull and Wailmer in some shorts, Keckleon in the anime, and then allll the way back in Gen 1 we got Marill and Togepi in the anime, Lugia in the movie, and of course, Ho-Oh in the very first episode.

Since gen 6? No special reveals until now. Not a Galar Pokemon in Alola- I guess we technically got the Paldean starters and Legendaries in post credit scenes in the Journeys anime, but by that point the games had already revealed those and were out, so it doesn't really count.

IMO I miss little drips of new things in the anime and movies and I hope this is a sign of fun things to come like it.

[jonphaedrus]

AO3 First Lines Tag Game

Tagged by @caparrucia

Rules: Share the first lines of ten of your most recent fanfics and tag ten people. If you have written fewer than ten, don’t be shy and share anyway.

o boy well fffx is no longer anonymous so

A Life for Compassion (Warriors Cats. Yes, really,) A desperate scream of fury, a ghastly choking sound, his body convulsed, his legs jerked, and Tigerstar felt the cut Scourge had given him open.

Nuits Blanches (with @insecateur, pokemon x/y) “So,” Augustine prompted, leaning over the café table towards where Diantha was checking her texts, “what’s this guy like?”

belief (pokemon x/y) Lysandre spent his day on his knees, bound by nothing and no-one, mouth split wide on a ring gag, blindfolded and waiting for use.

hearts always hurt more while they are learning (pokemon x/y, go read my novel go, go read it) A mountain of a man: They call him the ginger yeti, he’s secretly part bear, says fewer words than all the glaciers in the Alps combined, you’re more likely to get a full sentence out of the wind, the legendary, one and only… “Excuse me,” says Lysandre d’Orléans, dressed for the cold and the snow in the low witching-hour blackness of two in the morning, standing at the cable car up toward the Dent du Géant.

Diantha Carnet's Studio Award Sausage Surprise Explained (pokemon x/y) Diantha Carnet (40) made headlines earlier this year after the birth of her second child and her retirement as Champion of Kalos when she confirmed rumors about the true nature of her polyamorous relationship with the father of her children, Professor Augustine Sycamore (48) and his husband, Lysandre Sycamore (43).

that long-sought land (pokemon x/y) “Spread your cunt for me.”

what's the use of wavering? (pokemon x/y) Fourteen is not a particularly notable number when it comes to anniversaries (more notable is Augustine turning forty in August) but they are not about to overlook an opportunity to celebrate surviving and thriving.

Calamity Chef (tales of the abyss) Anise Tatlin has never had anything so gauche as manners.

babygirl (pokemon x/y) “I bet you could come just from being spanked,” Professor Sycamore had said, after he’d spent the better part of an afternoon beating Lysandre’s ass so swollen and red that it practically glowed.

plug and play (pokemon xy) When Lysandre comes in from the rain, shaking water off of his umbrella, he finds Augustine sitting sprawled out in his desk chair, capping and uncapping his pen, twisting it back and forth between his hands.

im not tagging anyone but if you want to feel free to do it. wow i write a lot of pokemon x/y porn

[claitea]

some thoughts about pokemon violet. spoilers ahead!

there are. quite a few graphical glitches and messes whbejrvhr. sometimes trainers and pokemons eyes get stuck closed for a while, camera clips into the floor during battle, a sunflora i was in battle with and therefore Very Close To moved at a lower frame rate like other faraway entities. hough the homeroom scene..... almost everyone in that room looked so janky.

but tbh? i've been having too much fun to care too much about that specifically. the rest of the game is pretty :)

wish i could stop the minimap from spinning. i can lock the map app to north but not the minimap????

THE FOOD ILLUSTRATIONS ARE SO GOOD I WANT TO EAT THE ICECREAM SO BAD

rip pixel pokemon and item icons though </3 i find them more charming. also the icon for persim berries is too red and its bothering me, persim berries are PINK this is BRIGHT SCARLET

idk how pokemon icons on the minimap work either i'll be running all over the place it indicates and not find the pokemon its showing. i want a charcadet :(

i chose sprigatito but was THIS close to choosing fuecoco because of the first cutscenes. quaxly having to tell fuecoco not to eat the burnt orange whjegjevdj

miraidon my beloved asshole lizard who eats all my sandwiches. i gotta rewatch any and all miraidon scenes with koraidon when i'm done with the game, the first cutscene with the houndoom was SO COOL

PEOPLE WERE RIGHT ARVEN IS THE PROFESSOR'S KID

there were a couple nods to older games! a book in the library talks about someone seeing the stow-on-side mural get broken by a copperajah, another book talks about pewter crunchies, and the meditative seat art installation in artazon are items you could buy in oras as decoration for your secret base. i know every game has callbacks to previous ones but the stow-on-side one caught me offguard because thats a spoiler isnt it?? the other one surprised me too but more becaue Why do i remember this one specific base item. i havent touched oras in years

a library book also said Hydreigon and Volcarona got alt forms like donphan did and i need to see them IMMEDIATELY

as far as i've seen in the library, the pokemon that get those forms are donphan, tyranitar, volcarona, hydreigon. and Delibird. which i find hilarious bc its all these threatening scary pokemon and then. DELIBIRD.

WHY DID MY BELOVED LECHONK EVOLVE INTO AN EMO BOY

so far out of the new pokemon. the only design i dont like is spidops. spiops. i forgot how to spell it. where did my cute little yarn ball go :( maybe its just New Pokemon Doesnt Look Like A Pokemon Yet Syndrome but there is just SOMETHING about spiops's design that doesnt sit right with me

miraidon jumping is a little janky sometimes idk??? also i got stuck in a pond once and it could NOT climb out no matter where i tried. i had to fly out

i already like tera raids a lot more :') i HATED how max pokemon could shield and move multiple times and all that. i dont have online so max raids are damn near IMPOSSIBLE for me to do because the ai sucks That bad. i feel like with the time limit thing and infinite revives i could stand a chance doing it solo. this is just me talking about the early 1-2 star raids though idk how it'll go later on

i did get one odd glitch where my first attack didnt appear to deplete the hp bar, but then a few attacks later it looked like it had hp left but it fainted? my damage just. Didnt Show for some reason while still registering as damage

i think they fixed the overlevelling problem bc i was even getting my ass kicked by wild pokemon sometimes HKWBDJBF. i was cruising through fast like i'd gotten used to in xy to swsh, so i was actually underlevelled a lot. mela almost curbstomped me

THE CAR IS A POKEMON THEY WERE RIGHT ITS AN ACTUAL POKEMON

mela walks like manga emmet lmao

clodsire. thats it thats the bullet point <3

in conclusion i am having a BLAST. i absolutely adore this game so far!! i'm honestly able to overlook anything that bothers me just because i enjoy it a Lot. like of Course i still wish the subpar graphics werent subpar but Who Care look at my clodsire his name is Mousse and i love him

[vuyosiyamba]

Pokemon XY Game Rewrite Part 3 (what if story) (WIP)

Hey guys. It's me. If you liked Pokemon XY Rewrite part 2 (what if story), please leave a like and comment your thoughts on it.

Disclaimer: I'm not doing this to flaunt my ideas and say that they are better than the canon game. It's just a what if story that I'm doing for fun.

Pokemon xy rewrite story part 3:

Trevor, Shauna and Tierno run to you and Rival, giving each other a hug, glad that each of them are unscathed.

Shauna: I'm glad you 2 are ok.

Rival: Are you guys ok?

Tierno: We got beat by the Glacier grunts but luckily Diantha helped us out.

Trevor: It's all thanks to the champion.

Rival: Speak of the devil.

Diantha appears and checks on you and your friends asking if you're all ok. Shauna is shocked to see Diantha and asks what she's doing here. Diantha says that she was here for Viola's photoshoot.

She said when she went to the gym, she heard that Viola went to the studio because Team Glacier was causing trouble so she hurried to the studio to help her (putting this here to explain why she showed up here and knew about the "Team Glacier planning to kill Alexa" situation).

Diantha says she's glad no more people got hurt. She excuses herself and leaves to tell the officers what went down alongside Viola.

2 cops are chatting with each other about what went down. One of them is taking down notes while the other is telling them what they've found at the crime scene.

Cop: Anymore Glacier grunts?

Cop2: Only one. The rest are... dead.

Cop: What about Team Flare?

Cop2: Gone. They did a number on the studio after fighting Glacier grunts.

Cop: Dammit! Him and his group are a pain in the ass!

The 5 of you hear them talking saying bad things about Ultraflare. Rival shakes his head at them in annoyance.

Rival: I don't know what their problem is. At least Team Flare came in time to help people, unlike them. They saved me from a Team Glacier grunt. I don't know what would've happened if they weren't there.

Trevor: Ultraflare is a controversial topic in Kalos because of the way he deals with criminals.

Rival: Some people see him as a hero, and other people don't.

You 5 hear some people talking badly about Ultraflare and some people defending him, saying that he was just trying to help. Trevor shake his heads and puts on a more serious look.

Trevor: We should go to the Pokemon center and heal up our pokemon.

You all nod, and head to the Pokemon center. All of you heal up your pokemon. After doing that, you head to the Pokémon Gym to fight Viola. Rival is already there, defeating Viola and getting their 1st gym badge.

Viola heals up her Pokémon. Rival takes a seat to see your first Gym battle. You fight Viola. Viola will have the same Pokémon (Surskit + Vivillon).

credit: Kajiatsui on Devianart

Surskit will have a regional variant form that I'd imagine would look like this. Vivillon will remain the same in the video game. You win and get your first badge.

As you're about to leave the city, you meet Rival. They congratulate you on your win and ask to fight you. You fight Rival and win. They heal your Pokemon and you leave to Lumiose City.

You meet Sina and Dexio as normal. When you go through the gate bridge thing that leads to Lumiose City, Shauna appears asking you to battle her. You see that her Scatterbug has evolved into a Vivillon. Her Vivillon will look similar to Viola's Vivillon.

Her Bulbusaur is still the same. You win and Shauna heals your pokemon. She thanks you for the battle. Shauna guides you to the pokemon lab. You go to the pokemon lab and meet Prof.Sycamore. He asks you to fight him as normal and you win.

Prof.Sycamore gives you a megastone that enables you to mega-evolve your starter Pokémon (that you picked in Aquacorde Town) in battle (depending on which starter you chose. You'll get to pick a Kalosian Bulbusaur, Squirtle or Charmander when the postgame stuff happens).

You meet Lysandre on the ground floor of Prof.Sycamore's lab as normal. Your friends come down and see Lysandre talking to Rival. Lysandre introduces himself. Rival tells you and everyone that Lysandre is his Uncle. He leaves saying that he promised to meet a friend at a Café.

Shauna: What should we do now?

You: Not sure. This is my first time here in Lumiose city.

Shauna: Oh! I can give you a tour around Lumiose City! Do you guys want to come along?

Trevor: I'll have to respectfully decline. Tierno and I need to go to the Lumiose Museum to learn more about the Legendary Pokemon of Kalos.

Rival: I can come with you Shauna. I've got nothing else better to do so I'll tag along.

Shauna: Reallt? Alright. We'll do the tour and when we're done, we'll go to the Lumiose City Museum to join you 2. Sound good?

Trevor: Alright.

You 3 head out for a tour around Lumiose City. The 3 of you take pictures together, eat Lumiose Galettes, and Shauna shows you the different places in Lumiose City (she even takes you to see Prism Tower).

Shauna: Let's take a break at the Café. My treat?

At the Cafe, You, Shauna, and Rival see Lysandre and Diantha. Lysandre and Diantha still have their normal in game conversation as normal.

In the cafe, one of the built in tv's there shows a news channel talking about an incident that happened at Lumiose City where terrorists, who are a part of team Glacier, attacked Santalune City 3 days ago, were sent to prison however they were able to escape somehow because of a Glacier grunt disguised as a cop.

The terrorists attacked the cops and some civillians. Some citizens and cops were injured and others were killed. Rival clenches his fist in anger and you see that he isn't happy about the news.

They comment about how unfair it is that team Glacier was able to get away and the cops weren't able to stop them from taking more lives. Rival comments how they weren't able to detain them either. You put your hand on their shoulder to try and calm them down?

Rival stomps out of the Café, visibly upset after hearing what was on the news channel. You and Shauna share looks of concern. You both leave the Café and go after Rival. You and Shauna manage to find Rival at the Lumiose Cemetery (by asking some civillians where Rival went).

End of Part 3. Part 4 coming soon.

[enthusispastic]

Okay so this is going to be a weird post but I have to put this out there on the internet somewhere. My Pokemon conspiracy theory is that the boxart legends of most Pokemon games have been prefigured by common Pokemon in the generation before them.

Think about it people!

Upcoming in SV we have a lizard-like duality of futuristic technology and the past. You know. Like combining a fossil salamander with a stealth bomber. Dragapult prefigures the SV legends.

In SwSh, we have two wolves, split between a speedier attacker and a bulkier build. Literally they're just a legendary upgrade to the main lycanroc forms.

In SuMo, we had a sun lion and a mystical bat. Like a fire lion and a dragon bat. Pyroar is Solgaleo and Noivern is Lunala. At a push, we even have a prismatic Pokemon that has lore about transformation and a legendary. Carbink as a Necrozma precursor?

In XY we have a vulture associated with death and a deer associated with nature. Oh yeah, like a skeleton vulture? Mandibuzz? And a deer that changes with the seasons? Sawsbuck?

Then in BW we have legendaries in a set of games often said to be callbacks to RB, with the box legendaries being a physical attacking electric type and a special attacking fire type, with themes of dualism and partnership, whose ice-type counterpart is obscured and forgotten in the lore. Oh. Yeah. Electivire and Magmortar parallel that strongly.

Then back in DP we have a pair of legendaries that in the lore are treated as incredibly powerful, and have associations with time and space. This is a weirder one, but I think if you bear with me, I can explain this. Gen III was the only generation to give us two pseudolegendary Pokemon. And one (Salamence) has a metamorphosis motif (change over time) while the other (Metagross) is explicitly an alien (from space).

Now, gen III wasn't really on the horizon during the development of GS, so I don't think they did any deliberate planting for RS, but there are two flying type (therefore weather?) Pokemon whose types do correspond to the RS boxart legends: Gligar and Mantine. They are even both strong ish and (at the time) standalones in their evolutionary lines.

And of course, GS were not considered at all during development of the first generation, so the trail runs dry here.

[quartersety-of-a-holsety]

Hey, y'all remember this shit I did years ago? Well, I had the most random thought to pick it back up again so here I am, back on my bullshit! As a reminder, since it's been a while, keep in mind that these are fandoms I'm personally into and don't necessarily [or accurately] reflect their popularity

The fandom districts are as follows and in order:

Def Leppard

Yu-Gi-Oh!

Yandere Simulator

Fire Emblem

Voltron: Legendary Defender

Mortal Kombat

Forever Knight

Touhou Project

Megaman X

Dark Parables

Pokemon

Wild card [each character is from their own fandom]

I'll reblog the icon sets sometime later. Fun facts and change log from hell under the cut!

~CHANGE LOG~

DISTRICTS

District 2: Fullmetal Alchemist to Yu-Gi-Oh!

District 7: Ouran High School Host Club to Forever Knight

District 11: Yu-Gi-Oh!/Pokemon to Pokemon

CHARACTER SWAPS

District 3: Osana to Akane Nemesis to Hanako [name change only]

District 4: Narcian to Marianne Tsubaki to Constance

District 5: Acxa to Allura

District 9: X to Alia Zero to Marino

District 11: Bakura to Jessie Kaiba to James

District 12: Carmen to Tobias Hitch to Edward

ICON UPDATES

District 1: Sav, Joe

District 2: Bakura, Kaiba

District 3: Hanako [recropped]

District 4: Eltshan

District 8: Remilia

District 9: Axl, Iris

District 11: Serena

District 12: Tobias***

Fun facts 1, 2, 3, and 4 here! New fun facts below!

Fun Fact #1: This is the most edited roster change since the first one. Way more has changed here than any other roster update

Fun Fact #2: The original season code had not been used in so long that when I tried to load it up, it failed because it was auto deleted a good two years ago. I had to completely remake this roster, plus the custom events, from scratch

Fun Fact #3: Allura's icon is from an edit done by a Tumblr user named r-i-v-e-r. Unfortunately, it seems the artist is no longer on the site

Fun Fact #4: Okay, let me make this clear: I HATE the post-XY art style for Pokemon. Fucking hate it. That said, I saw images of Serena's new design and she's??? Actually??? Decent??? Like holy shit a design I don't hate. It wasn't that hard of a decision at that point to replace her icon with a more recent appearance

Fun Fact #5: YGO and Pokemon were lumped together for the longest time and now I was finally able to separate them and let them go full throttle. Bakura and Kaiba, with new icons and as promised in a previous fun fact, took Joey with them, but they have Marik instead of Yugi since he's been growing on me a lot more. They took the place of the FMA district. Meanwhile, Serena and Clemont now have, again as promised, Team Rocket joining them

Fun Fact #6: While debating on characters and fandoms to include, Nick, Nat, and Divia seemed to just be easy inclusions to replace the Ouran district. It was deciding on their fourth districtmate that was difficult. It ultimately came down to either LaCroix or Janette [sorry, but Schanke is Babey and I refuse to corrupt him like this]. LaCroix was picked due to the potential for some interesting scenarios

Fun Fact #7: In previous updates, I mentioned Sav's icon somehow becoming more saturated even though the image had not changed. I discovered while updating the icon sets earlier today that this was indeed a Tumblr issue like I had initially thought. Apparently something happens when posting it live, causing the image to saturate. I was able to fix this, but this required, well, not using Tumblr. The image is still saturated in the actual post its in, but the exact link used in the simulator settings is now being hosted on Discord

Fun Fact #8: Back in the very first run of the Multifandom Hunger Games, District 6 was the Animorphs and Tobias was a part of that district. For this brand new run, I decided to bring Tobias back. ***He's listed in the change log for icon updates as I decided not to reuse the original icon he had. His new icon is from a comic version of the series

Fun Fact #9: The character hasn't changed, but this short comic dropped some time ago, revealing Nemesis' true identity as Hanako Yamada. Her information for the season was updated accordingly

Fun Fact #10: I initially didn't plan on updating Joe, Hanako, or Remilia's icons, but ultimately did. Hanako's uses the exact same image, just recropped to look less awkward

Fun Fact #11: The Fire Emblem district was supposed to be a one-character-per-game situation, but let's be real, Three Houses has way too many interesting characters to ignore entirely, so I added two instead while also updating Eltshan's icon. Ferdinand was briefly considered before deciding on Constance. Marianne's has a Black Eagles background instead of Golden Deer because I just like the Black Eagles more

Fun Fact #12: Amnesia was considered for a return, but I decided not to go with this. Sailor Moon was also briefly considered for inclusion

Fun Fact #13: Before deciding on Tobias, I was originally going to have Florence [Alchemists of Loom] take Carmen's place. Other wild card characters considered for inclusion were Nanashi [1bitheart] and Fletcher Raleigh [The Summoner series]

Fun Fact #14: Since Mulberry has been revamping a lot of older character art she's done, including the student council, I decided this would be a good opportunity to update Shiromi's icon. At the same time, I decided to replace Osana with another student council member. Imagine the scary implications. Also yes, I am aware how divisive YanSim is, but I ain't here for bullshit. I'm here to vibe. This district stays put

Fun Fact #15: X and Zero were replaced because they needed a break. End of, just let them enjoy some peace

Fun Fact #16: As I am no longer into SNK, dropping Hitch was an easy decision, and even though I dropped FMA as a full district, I did want to keep Edward, so he got to stick around and take Hitch's place

[miraculouscontent]

Pokemon anon again! I'd like to hear anything you have strong opinions on (either your personal ships, ones you dislike, etc). I just really like reading your thoughts, so whatever you feel like sharing is fine.

Welcome back, Pokénon!

And sure, I can do that!

Alright, so in terms of ships I dislike (I’m going to go with the English names just so I’m not constantly using both names)...

I guess I should get the obvious ones out of the way, because I’m not really a fan of either “Ash ship” extreme:

Poke//Shipping (Ash X Misty) and Amour//Shipping (Ash X Serena)

I don’t like either of them.

For Poke//Shipping, I have never liked aggressive tsundere characters and Misty is basically a textbook example of that. It’s not that I have a problem with strong/tomboy-ish (though honestly I don’t consider Misty a tomboy anyway) female characters, which I know it sounds like that when I have a distaste for characters like Alix too, but when they’re brash and angry and just so generically “TOMBOY GIRL POWER,” it grates on my nerves.

The idea of having an aggressive character - y’know - be aggressive to their love interest and then cue the sad music when the love interest argues with them or makes any sort of hurtful implication just... no.

Like, I want you to imagine the most sarcastic Clarity possible and then picture me as a little girl watching the scene where Misty is officially leaving the group, because that was literally just me like, “oh noooo, she’s goooone.”

It’s the same reason I don’t do Rocket//Shipping (James X Jessie). One character is too aggressive and the other character doesn’t even come close to balancing it out.

There’s also the fact that nothing comes out of Poke//Shipping. Misty is canonically crushing on Ash (*flashbacks to the friggin’ second movie where they shove it in your face*) but it’s just... there, not to mention that scene where Misty is talking casually to Ash like, “you and I will be married too someday,” which came completely out of left field and - whether for a joke or not - made little kid me very uncomfortable.

Like I said, it’s just there and doesn’t go anywhere, and Ash is already so oblivious that of course he wouldn’t get that Misty is in love with him. It’s basically a long-running gag of Misty pulling a surprised Pikachu face whenever Ash doesn’t understand that she likes him/wants to stay with him/literally wants anything specific from him.

As for Amour//Shipping, I did admittedly like it at first, but just--ugh, oh boy.

First, it’s shipping fanservice, kinda like Pokemon 2000 throwing a bone to the shippers except now it’s the whole two seasons. My followers know how I feel about fanservice just for fanservice and that’s basically all that Amour//Shipping is. That’s why Serena was already made to have met Ash when they were children; so the writers could get a “headstart” on all the blushy fanservice they could squeeze in on Serena’s end.

I fell off the ship sometime around Wulfric, particularly with the scene where Serena comforts Ash. Just that whole, “this isn’t like you,” and then trying to compare her contest losses to Ash’s battles as if Ash hasn’t been at this for seasons upon seasons and battles aren’t a completely different category because they involve actually watching one’s Pokemon get physically hurt (Pokemon battles are a sport, yes, but it doesn’t change anything; Ash also has a special Greninja so of course he’s going to be upset that having all this experience still isn’t enough to just sweep). Like, to relate to someone, yes, it helps to have something you can use as a mental comparison, but that comparison is (usually) supposed to stay mental.

Anyway, after Ash shouts at her because she doesn’t know how he feels at all (because she doesn’t) and he just wanted to be left alone (because he did), Serena throws snowballs at his face and that apparently helps make Ash feel better because Serena can do no wrong here and that just so happened to be exactly what he needed.

(I mean, that whole gym battle and what follows is already pretty trash but that solidified it for me. Basically everything XY&Z added were things I just didn’t care about.)

Oh, and Serena is also implied to steal a kiss from Ash at the very end of the season and you guys know how I feel about that. It’s mostly the fact that she’s so non-apologetic about it, just smiling and blushy and all happy whereas here’s me like, “Wait, I’m pretty sure we just missed a crucial step here??? Since when were you sure that Ash had a thing for you???”

So yeah, I’m not a fan of either ship. I have vague opinions about basically all other ships (The ship between Ash and Iris aka ”You’re such a kid” girl can rot), but Poke//Shipping and Amour//Shipping are the ones I have the strongest negative feelings for.

Brock being shipped with basically anyone is a no no for me. The guy flirts with anything that moves and I have never found it funny or charming. The closest thing young me ever came to a ship with him was Luck//Shipping (Brock X Pike Queen Lucy) but that’s basically it, and it honestly could’ve just been me thinking the idea that Ash and Brock both getting together with Battle Frontier people (I was for Ability//Shipping - Ash X Sailor Maiden Anabel - at the time) was a neat idea and both episodes that featured the respective ships had BLUSH FUEL.

I recall being into Advance//Shipping (Ash X May) when I was young (I was a multishipper back then, you see) but I avoided thinking about it too much because I wasn’t a huge fan of Max (aka “Iris before Iris existed”) and Norman’s game counterpart infuriates me even to this day so I just didn’t want to imagine Ash having to deal with those sorts of things. Plus, looking back on it, he and May were little too similar (then again, maybe that’s why I liked it?).

I expected to enjoy Aurelia//Shipping (Ash X Lillie) when I was getting into the Sun&Moon seasons but it didn’t really do anything for me. I guess maybe I was so burnt out after Amour//Shipping that I wasn’t in a shippy mood anymore? Though, it could also be that their relationship isn’t as “balanced” as I would’ve liked.

Anyway though, as for the ships I actually really like instead of just being indifferent towards or outright disliking, the big one really is just Pearl//Shipping. I suppose it makes sense given that I’m not a multishipper, don’t like Brock enough to ship him with anyone, and most other travel companions are ones I either hadn’t gotten attached to or that I’d paired with Ash long enough that, once I got older, I couldn’t really picture them with other people because my memory of their moments wasn’t strong enough.

Yeah though, PEARL//SHIPPING, I ADORE IT. Like, I’ll try to explain it as best as I can without rambling, but basically:

Dawn doesn’t make excuses when she wants to go with Ash. No “my bike," no meandering, just really casual.

THEY SING THE JAPANESE OPENING TOGETHER AND IT’S RAD. “High Touch” is like, my favorite opening theme???? And they do a duet for it??? I just???? Yes???????

It’s the little things. High-fives are like, their thing. They traded Pokemon with each other which is like, really rare for the series and it made total sense. They both have a Pokemon they keep out of their Pokeball who doesn’t want to evolve (Piplup was the Eevee partner from Let’s Go before it was cool) and no, Misty’s Togepi doesn’t count because it was Gold and Silver’s posterchild. Ash and Dawn also both gave up a speedy physical Pokemon (Primeape and Ambipom respectively) so they could participate in some sort of Pokemon sport that doesn’t exist in the games while I scream in the background because I really like said Pokemon.

DAWN IS ASH’S CHEERLEADER. SHE LITERALLY CHEERS FOR HIM DURING GYM MATCHES. THAT’S PRECIOUS.

They help and get ideas off of each other, which I think is really cool. Them trading Pokemon just furthers that sort of dynamic.

Them just supporting each other in general. There’s a moment where Dawn takes a pretty harsh loss and Ash can be seen sulking like he really gets how she’s feeling.

It also helps that Diamond and Pearl were one of the better seasons of the anime. Paul is a solid rival, I really like the creative battle techniques like spinning and countershield, and just Chimchar in general honestly. I remember the baking episode “Cooking Up a Sweet Story!” vividly and all the feels it gave me.

Yeah though. It’s not any sort of OTP pairing or anything, but out of all of the anime Pokemon ships, Pearl//Shipping is probably my favorite. I’d probably ship them a lot more if they were a little older (like, on par with the protagonists of the Black & White games, who are closer to 14/15; it’s just easier to get a gauge on personality that way).

[radramblog]

Some longer thoughts on Pokemon BDSP

I think at this point the absolute vitriol-fest thrown at the upcoming Sinnoh Remakes has largely died down, people moving onto greater things like the upcoming New Pokemon Snap release (I’m probably not buying it) or…whatever it is the #mainstreamPokemonFandom does when they aren’t spewing outrage about trees and dexits. It might be a bit early for me to do this considering the games still don’t have a release date, but I figure with the hype dying down a bit I can afford a few of my own thoughts as to what these games should look like.

Of course, we’ve all been burned before, and I’m not expecting an awful lot. But hey, it’s just my two cents.

I think the first thing that made people immediately bounce off of the BDSP reveal is the artstyle. And, I get it- it’s certainly A Choice. The models look kinda awkward, almost hearkening back to Gen VI’s first attempts at full 3D overworld but with a more deliberate style. The short, round characters look awkward against the more detailed overworld. And the full sized models aren’t especially impressive either- all the previous remakes updated the original’s character designs somewhat, as did third versions Emerald and Platinum, but BDSP doesn’t seem to have made any changes outside of model-ifying them.

And the thing is, I don’t care?

On the one hand, aesthetic in a game obviously does matter, and having the protagonist you’re going to be staring at all game look like that is going to be an issue for people. On the other, I actually really like how the overworld looks. On the other, other hand, I’m really not convinced that the artstyle of this game should make or break it, as it certainly doesn’t for me. Pokemon’s graphics have been arguably behind the curve for like, 8 years now? I remember all the complaints about Sword and Shield’s graphics, and that obviously didn’t kill that game. And like, I don’t want to go for the throat of a game I haven’t played, but, people don’t seem to mind Colosseum and XD’s artstyle from what I’ve seen, and those games kinda look like shit. They do have those dynamic pokemon animations though, and I hope we get to see that in BDSP- those (and that of Battle Revolution) were a result of outsourcing, I believe, and this game is outsourced to another studio.

More importantly, in my eyes, is the gameplay. Doesn’t matter how good the game looks if it plays like garbage. And herein lies the biggest sticking point, and potential blunder, of Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl.

Diamond and Pearl are like, easily some of the worst games in the series from a playthrough standpoint.

The pacing is all over the place, with backtracking that seems to be trying to emulate RSE but not quite making it. The level curve is messy, with the Elite Four being such a massive spike that they had to tone it down 4-5 levels on each Pokemon in the intentionally harder third version, Platinum. The regional Pokedex is sorely lacking- while Elite Four Flint’s infamous 2/5 “Fire” team is eminently memeable, Electric Gym Leader Volkner is just as bad (2/4, though he could technically be running…Pachirisu…), and of the 28 new Pokemon related to previous games�� evolutionary lines, 17 cannot be obtained in a regular playthrough. HM use is especially egregious in this game, with 6 of them being mandatory to complete the game (Victory Road alone requires 5) and of the other two, the games’ sprawling map and frequent backtracking basically necessitate Fly while without Defog the foggy parts of the map are absolutely miserable both to navigate and fight through.

How BDSP handles these issues is kinda my make or break with the game. See, a lot of the issues were solved in Platinum, and Heartgold and Soulsilver (the best remakes the series has had) solved much of the issues in GS by taking notes from Crystal and tweaking things in the transition. The thing is, the last remakes we got, Omega Ruby and Alpha Sapphire, did not take Emerald’s tweaks in mind, making them substantially worse games than they could potentially have been, and I’m worried BDSP are going to do the same. A particular sticking point for me is the HMs, interestingly- outside of the aforementioned Omega Ruby and Alpha Sapphire sticking too closely to outdated design, Pokemon for the last 4 generations has had light to nonexistent HM requirements. Black and White only had one mandatory HM use period (Cut in the Dreamyard after Gym 1), B2W2 and XY both only require Surf off the top of my head, and Gens 7 and 8 remove them completely from the game. Because that’s kind of what they are, outdated game design- I think the Alola games handled it best, where the interesting level design these obstacles can lead to is still present but tackling them is less restrictive on your party and is based on progression through the story. That’s the kind of design that makes backtracking interesting, something Gen 8 really lacked in the long run.

The final thing I want to bring up is kinda a combo of two things- postgame and connectivity. One would argue that the Battle Frontier is also outdated design based on development priorities, but it’s removal in ORAS was kind of a kick in the taint to fans- it’s a beloved part of the game, and it not being in BDSP would be a terrible shame. The other thing is whether or not the games will have online connectivity with Sword and Shield as far as trading and battling goes. While I’ve heard quite a few people express doubts that BDSP will do so, I’d be shocked if, unlike every other main series title, competitive battling stayed a primary function of Sword and Shield and BDSP didn’t get it. I’d also be surprised if the games weren’t able to trade with each other, considering that’s been a core facet of the series since day 1- not being able to trade would make Dexit feel more permanent almost, considering many, many of the Sinnoh Dex mons aren’t available to play at the moment, even with the expanded DLC Pokedex in Sword and Shield. In fact, one thing I noticed that leads me to believe that trading between games is absolutely going to happen is related to said DLC dex- namely, that the Crown Tundra added every single Fossil Pokemon to the SwSh Pokedex- except the Sinnoh ones, Cranidos and Shieldon.

 At the end of the day, we’re just waiting for more information to come out for these games either way. I can tell you right now, though, that I’m not preordering them (last time I did that was Y, I think), and whether or not I get them is really going to base around many of these factors.

[artesesarthouse]

My Pokemon Shield team!

Decided to use my Friends OC as the character I play in Shield because she's british and well this IS the british region so it fits.

So I've beaten pokemon Shield, finished about 90% of the Dex, and have gotten about a third of the way through Sword, and for the most part, I'm having fun with it. I say, despite the bad news that kept pouring over the last few weeks, it has enough good things to keep it fun and fresh. That said, there are some issues because not everything is perfect, and I'll detail the pros and cons I find with most of the important things about the game. Keep in mind I'm not a professional in the industry. I'm a casual fan who likes to collect Pokemon and a fan of the creature design. That said, let's get into it.

TLDR: Pokemon SWSH is good; its good on the things it improves on and adds to make the game more helpful to the grind, but it has many short cuts that make certain features tedious and time-consuming. Buy the game for the new mons and quality of life improvements. Don't buy if you expect everything to carry over from previous titles.

The Dex:

Of course, I have to talk about this as it was the biggest thing that started to change people's minds about SWSH and is a controversy that continued till release. For me, when I heard it, I didn't care because, for me, the only Pokemon I care about are the new ones. My team for each game is only the new Pokemon (including the alola and galar forms). But I do understand why people are upset because once pokemon home comes around, no doubt pokemon bank will close and you'll HAVE to switch them over and thus not be able to use Pokemon you've had for a while until they get added in future games. Which could be years. But let's switch gears and talk about what was added. Then just over 80 new pokemon, not including galarian forms. Now, this isn't the smallest amount of new mons we've had. XY had the least, but it still disappointing that there aren't that many new ones. BUT the new mons we got are fun and creative. I have many new favs, and GOD do I love that they brought back regional forms and made them better! obstagoon isn't the only one that got a region-based evolution, and I LOVE that they brought more. I think one of the unique things about Pokemon from most other monster catcher type shows and games is evolution and a big disappointment for me is whenever there is a pokemon with no evolutions because it feels like there's no potential and it's boring, and yes there is no-evolution pokemon among the new mons. My final note, though, is that there are more new evolution gimmicks, and I am not a fan, stones? Okay, friendship? Annoying but with berries, it can help. Trade? It can be annoying if you don't have friends, but you can use the GTS (OH WAIT :( ILL GET INTO THAT LATER), but making it, so yanmask needs 49+ damage AND can only evolve in a specific spot? FOR SHAME.

Wild area and Dynamax dens:

The one thing that was advertised the most, the thing that was in basically every trailer and hammered to death, the wild are. SO how is it after all this hyper? It's okay.

Pros:

It's big, way bigger then I thought, I thought it was just that beginning area in front of motorstroke but nope! Way bigger.

The wild area is split up into sections that each has their spawns and weather separate from the rest. This allows you to build a variety of teams early on; you don't have to wait till the end of the game to get an Ice-type or Dragon-type. If it's snowing in one section, there will be plenty of Ice-type mons.

The Dynamax dens are a great way to help the grind that pokemon games tend to have. Not only do you have a chance to get rare mons, but you get EXP candies which help level up your mons from 100 exp to 100,000 exp, so you can use those to level up mons you don't plan to use but need the evolutions for their Pokedex entries! It helps simplify the grind and tediousness of the grind.

Cons:

It's very tiresome to travel around, there are many hills and slopes you can't move through and have to take the path around it, which gets annoying very quickly, especially if you are trying to get into the water, but you can only access it from a lower level, what would've been nice is a rock climbing upgrade for the bike so you can traverse up the cliffs and cut downtime.

Overworld pokemon aggro too much and get in the way. They are a lot of Pokemon that can only be caught in grass, and the way you have to trigger a grass pokemon is by moving in the tall grass, the problem is the Pokemon that some pokemon that wander around will notice and charge at you, stopping your progress until you end the fight. It gets in the way, and from I've seen, there's no item to make them ignore you.

Weather spawns, one worry I had when I heard about the changing weather feature was that some pokemon are locked into only appearing during particular weather, and sadly I was right, but it's even worse! Not only is that true, BUT some mons can only be gotten in individual sections too! So there's an even smaller chance at getting them! Weather also is daily, and every section can get nearly every single weather effect, so it could be literal weeks until you get the one weather effect you need in that one section for your damn Pokedex.

GMAX raids are too infrequent, one of the big things that made people get on the side of Dynamaxing was the introduction of Gigantamaxing, which is just mega evolution with extra steps, but you can only get them from raids. Except for Charizard, Eevee, Pikachu, and Meowth. And they are a very low chance even with the event going on that increases some of the spawns.

The Wild area is a good idea which they will hopefully explore and improve in future games, but only time will tell.

Pokemon Camp:

The new substitute after Pokemon refresh. And it's okay, leaning towards Tedious.

Pros:

It's fun to see the Pokemon interact and run along and even play fetch with them, Cute and fun,

Cooking curry increases their EXP, friendship, and restores their health. So it's very convenient if you don't want to use potions or don't even have them.

Cons:

No way to level up affection quickly, in Pokemon Amie, you had those special cupcakes, and in Refresh, you had the rainbow beans. Not in this one, though, it's all involves the two toys you get. And it's slow and tedious after the 500th stick wiggle.

Getting berries for curry is tedious; this is part of the wild area problem, but there is no way to farm berries you need for specific curry, or in general, SM and USUM had the poke pelago which was a great addition especially the berry farm. But there is nothing to help with that in this game, so you have to resort to being lucky to get the berry you need from a tree and not be attacked by the squirrel.

No clear way of how to get the best rating for curry. It warns you about speed before your first curry session, but there are nothings to indicate how fast or slow you need to be for each section, additionally if you are using a controller, you can't stir as quickly as using each Switch controller separately.

Pokemon camp feels like a simplified pokemon refresh with a few improvements but not enough to streamline the process.

The starters:

Now about a week or so before the release, the whole Pokedex was leaked, including the starters, which stirred up controversy due to how they look compared to most other gens. I think they're fine. Each has its positives and negatives like every other gen. For me, Rillaboom is the best because it has a freaking drum set and is a big hunky boy. Then why did I not choose it as my starter for the pic above? Because of my complaint about the starters. They aren't dual-type, So they had no guarantee they could learn other move types from their base type, which for the most part, is true unless you use TMS or TRS. So it was either Intelleon or Cinderace because grass-type has so many weaknesses. I went with Intelleon because Cinderace just looked the most boring to me? It looks like a rabbit wearing pants, not that I don't get the theme, which is Cinderace as a soccer player, but still, it was engaging to me. Intelleon stirred up controversy due to its smug look and big hands, but I saw someone explain why he might be like that which helped warm me up to him, It's based on a lizard that is long and lean with big hands, and most likely is based on a spy theme. Especially with that official art of it doing a dodge with a finger gun attack (which it has in the game), so that made him more interesting to me. I think the biggest problem with Intelleon was that is has nothing to do with sobble's gimmick. Scorbunny kicks? Turns into a soccer player. Grookey using a stick to hit things? Turns into a drummer. Sobble cries a lot? Turns...into...a spy? Like the crying thing doesn't play into his final form at all, and that is probably why people were so off-put by the idea. Honestly, I say some of Drizzles design should've been for sobble. That way, it could help learn into the edgy lizard design. But I think the BIGGEST problem with the starters is that WE DIDN'T GET TO SEE THEM BEFORE RELEASE. I'm okay with not showing all Pokemon, but the starters are NEEDED. It's the first Pokemon we get and will spend hours leveling up. I honestly think the leaks helped save the game because if we didn't know the final evolves before the release and found out after, many more people would have been upset. The leaks helped give people a week to process and get used to them.

That's enough about the Pokemon, let's get into the story elements.

Rivals:

This game has three Rivals, and each represents the arch-type of Rival we have gotten over the years. Hop represents the friendly Rival who fights to get to know you and become strong with his Pokemon. Marnie represents the Rivals who are kind and respectful to you but also battle to be competitive and prove themselves. Bede represents the asshole Rivals, the ones who, no matter how much you beat them, they think they're better than you and won't shut up about it, but they might have a tragic past that makes up for them being jerks. My favorite is Hop, mostly because he gets the most development and because I like the friendly Rivals. It started for me in XY actually, when you got that group of friends it was nice because ironically in a game about companionship with pocket monsters, you're very alone. You only see your Mons when you fight or use Amie, Refresh, and Camp. So having a friend come around every once in a while feels nice and helps that feeling of loneliness. Anyways Bede and Marnie are nice but don't get enough time, but they serve their purpose.

Gym battles:

I love what they've done with the gyms; they are spectacles thanks to the crowd, the music (by toby fox C:), and Dynamxing makes each gym battle feel as epic as it should be. The pre-gym fight challenges and activities range from okay too annoying (looking at you pinball and collapsing trap puzzles), but they serve their purpose for getting more EXP before the final fight.

There is no Elite four, which makes sense since the game builds up Lee as the champion. Even without the Elite four, I do like the tournament aspect, it makes sense for the region, and you still fight four powerful trainers.

The antagonists:

Spoilers alert, if most of what I said isn't already a spoiler. Team yell felt disappointing; they weren't involved that much unless to block off an area until you beat a gym or something. But I did like Piers and Marnie's relationship that developed from around the team. Rose and Oleanna were great because Rose had charisma and was generally kind, so you can see why he gained the respect of the region. And his plan makes sense, but he went about it the wrong way by rushing and imprisoning a pokemon that caused a significant problem years ago. Oleanna was a treat because of how dedicated and stone-cold she was, and when she battled you, her expressions were priceless. Sordward and Shielbert were total jerks, and it was satisfying enough to beat them. The antagonists are alright, I say the plan from Rose came in a bit last minute, but it was still a good threat.

The story:

Now Pokemon stories aren't complicated; You want to become champion, you get a Rival, the evil team gets in your way, so you get dragged into a major conspiracy, you beat them along your journey and then become champion. There can be things to read into, and development for some characters that make them exciting and put simply, SWSH follows the same formula. I think the best part is Hop's journey, and seeing Sonia grow as well, most of the other major players don't change all that much till the end of the game. So it's not a bad story, just the same formula as before. It IS a kid's game so that I wouldn't expect anything complicated anyway.

The end game story:

This is where Sordward and Shielbert are introduced, and they fill the role of villains who only care about themselves if you didn't like what they did with Rose. Sadly they weren't introduced or even mentioned throughout the game, so it's not as fulfilling to beat them due to them just appearing out of nowhere. My only problem is that we have to go to every gym to fight dynamaxed Pokemon, but we don't get to capture them, and its a long road till we get to catch the game legendary finally.

The story offers new aspects, but for the most part, follows a formula, so don't expect something complicated or nuanced. Now on to the technicals.

Improvements:

They have made quite a few quality of life improvements that have helped make things tighter and more comfortable to access.

In battle, they made it so you can press X to go to pokeballs quickly for easy catching.

The PC link box. You no longer have to travel back and forth between poke centers to get Pokemon from the box so you can level and evolve them, now you can access it on your person anywhere which is convenient and handy.

The name rater, move reminder, and deleter is all the same person and in every poke-center at no additional cost too!

From SM-Lets go, there were ride Pokemon that took up the task of the bike and the Hm moves, which was great! No more annoying Hm moves you couldn't get rid of and had to have to move around the world. Now it's improved further with the bike being able to slip between land and seas without any menus, you get the ability to fly very early, AND there's nothing for strength, cut or flash. Less tediousness and more easy-to-access features, thank you.

You can organize the menus to your preferred order. The bag is easier to understand, and you can favorite things and organize it by favorites so you'll always be able to see them. There are more options in the settings to help skip through dialogue-heavy parts and make the game more accessible to get through if you want.

Bad advertising:

I think one of the things that hurt the game pre-release is that the advertising was crap, barely any of the improvements were shown outside of the wild area and Dynamaxing. I mentioned before how stupid it was that we didn't get to see the evolutions for the damn starters. I don't mind that we didn't get to see all the new Pokemon, I like the surprise, but we should've seen at least the other exclusives, so help people decided what to buy. I do say you shouldn't show everything, but the starters and exclusives are necessary for people to decided what to buy and who they are going to choose.

The worst thing about the game:

Now I can see the problem with Dexit, and I can see the problem with the battle animations, BUT I believe the worst part about the game is the Ycomm feature. It's the replacement for the multiplayer menu from the DS games, and it brought over the worst feature from let's go. No Global trade System. So if you're looking for exclusives or low percentage chance pokemon well you're on your own, there's nothing to help you find the Pokemon you need. There's link trade and surprise trade and no way to specify what you want if you have a friend who got the other game, then your lucky. If you don't have any friends? Well, your fucked, sucks for you, you friendless loser lol lol. That's not it, though, and there's no friends list either. You have to use a four-digit link code, which by the way a random can also use it as well. But you know what they do have? League card trading section, League cards are fun and cute but a section to getting them from randoms when it means nothing? Pointless, that slow should've been for the GTS or at least a friend list section. They do have a way to search through stamps so you can find battles or trades and even Dynamax dens, though! Oh wait... the list barely updates frequently enough until the person searching for a raid team has either quit or started anyway, but the game won't tell you that until you attempt to join!

Pokemon Sword and Shield is a good game with shortcuts and flaws that are tedious and frustrating, but the improvements and good things that were added make up for its shortcomings. Heres hoping next year's game will carry over the good changes and improve on SWSH faults.

[atrainernamedradish]

Top 10 Least Favorite Pokemon

You know what’s harder than making a top favorites list? A least favorite one. I was particular about this list because I wanted my own personal opinion on the matter instead of adding to the echo chamber that can be the fandom’s. I don’t hate these Pokemon. These are the ones I care for the least. Also, the placements kept changing for this list, but I feel like I finally put everyone on here in the right order now.

10) Whismur Line

The only reason this line is the Normal typing is because Game Freak hasn’t made the Sound typing official. Hell, Electric, or even Steel, would have made more sense. But nope we got these weird fleshy sound-based things that I’m never excited to see.

9) Greedent

I take back everything I said about Diggersby (still wished it didn’t have the belching model cry though), and I’m directing that towards Greedent. It looks like your typical fat, lazy, and not particularly bright cartoon character. Almost feel like they were a bit lazy in this design. Like… they could have done something more, or less since it’s large enough. I feel like Game Freak is trying to recreate a likeness to Snorlax, since it’s the poster child for obese Pokemon, but keeps falling short by giving us the ugliest designs. We don’t need more fat normal types. We’ve got plenty.

8) Electrode

Hey guys, let’s make this Pokeball based Pokemon flip upside down, make it less pissed off and call it an evolution! Also, it’s going to be crazy fast as well explode, most likely killing anything nearby, because why the fuck not? Boring and dangerous… what a match made in hell for a design!

7) Pheromosa

It’s an almost 7 foot tall sentient cockroach with legendary stats. Nope. Just nope. *flees*

6) Grimmsnarl Line

I have been disappointed with this evolutionary line since seeing the leaks of Impidimp. I know a lot of Faerie lore and it ticks me off that they chose a Goddamn Goblin for the first Dark/Fairy type. Also, and I know not all Faeries are cute and cuddly, but why does Game Freak keep trying to sneak in ugly Fairy types? About 95% of the Fairy typing has a cute or pleasing ascetic. That’s one of its themes, that and trying to throw pink on everything, so why give us this ugly line?

The only indicator of this thing remotely being Fairy typing at a glance is that it’s pink. I would have never gotten Fairy otherwise from it. Goblins might be in Faerie Tales, but they aren’t Faeries.

The only one in this line that remotely gives off the Dark typing to me is Morgrem. The other two not so much. Putting black on a Pokemon is maybe another indicator of the Dark typing, but even then it ain’t helping…?

Overall to me this thing is goofy to ugly looking with its design and typing a complete mess. It irritates me that our first combination of Fairy and Dark is this line…

Also, using it in a playthrough and it pisses me off that I’m not getting a Fairy move until it reaches its final evolution! That’s if I don’t want to grind up watt points in the Wild Area for a Fairy TR, or beat Opal before getting said evolution!

5) Shiinotic

Fairy typing makes sense for Morelull when you realize what it’s based on. Hell, even Ghost does. But Shiinotic? I don’t care if mushrooms are a big thing in Faerie Culture. You can’t just design some ugly ass alien mushroom hybrid then slap the Fairy typing on it because of mushrooms or lore from a pre evolution! While we’re at it let’s make the Amoongus and Breloom line Fairies too!

Morelull should have been a single stage line. It would have made sense. But no. They just wanted to make an ugly Fairy type just to prove they could say: “hey fandom I know you’re sick of all the cute and pink Fairy types so here’s an ugly one to change things up!”

And don’t get me *started* on that ugly ass shiny! Game Freak: bright yellow and muddy browns are a terrible color combination! Guess why?

4) Spinda

You know how I praised Alcremie for having multiple forms because of what it was and why it made sense for it? Well I have the opposite opinion regarding Spinda.

If I didn’t believe in the golden rule of everyone having a favorite of each Pokemon then I’d very much assume this thing wasn’t liked by anyone.

Everything about its design annoys me. Why is it a panda? And before anyone tries to tell me otherwise, it’s in its American/English name. Why is it in a constant state of vertigo? I literally was trying to think of a typing it would be better off as instead of the Normal typing and none come to mind. So it’s normal because a) it’s an animal or b) because they needed to give it a typing and no other typing fit.

And out of ALL the Pokemon why does this one have an almost endless possibility of “forms”? This thing has got to be a living dex collector’s worst nightmare!

3) Archeops

This Pokemon is on here for pure personal reasons. Technically there are a few other Pokemon that I feel the same towards, but this one was the worst about it.

You know you have a stupid powerful stat as a non-psuedo legendary and legendary when you need an ability to nerf you. What’s worse is when you need a pretty bulky Pokemon to soak up the damage you reap before said ability does nerf you.

It was always Goddamn terrifying to run into this Pokemon in White 2. Not only was a good chunk of my team weak to Flying, but my Samurott couldn’t take more than one hit from it. Not to mention it didn’t do enough super effective damage to OHKO this thing. So I was never happy to run into this thing because I would only get out of the fight with a lot of collateral damage to my party!

This wasn’t the only Pokemon that was this fucking difficult to deal with in Unova. There is definitely a power imbalance in these games which made playing them a pain in the ass. Don’t get me wrong. I LOVE Black 2 & White 2, but fuck me if this wasn’t my biggest issues with those games…

(Some of y'all are probably wondering about Slaking, and Slaking is actually easier to deal with thanks to its typing and ability readily triggering.)

2) Pelipper

This Pokemon was originally going to be my least favorite Water type on my favorite and least favorite typings lists, but I think its placement on this list suits it better.

I honestly don’t mind its pre-evolution Wingull. Wingull is kinda cute. Wonder Trade had me groaning every time I saw one, but that was more the player’s fault than anything.

Pelipper is just such a poorly designed Pokemon. Like, what were they thinking when they essentially fused the beak and stomach together? How can this thing carry its front heavy, well front? I assume it can handle all of that weight being airborne since I doubt it can get around any other way with its stubby little feet.

Then they gave it the Drizzle ability and suddenly people give a shit about its ugly ass…

The only time I’ve “willingly” used one was in my Wonderlocke, which was only due to the fact that I was in dire need of a water type, and I'll tell you that right now that I didn’t want to resort to using it. I’m pretty sure it died at the very end in the Champion battle… wasn’t all that sad to lose it if I’m being honest.

This isn’t just reserved for this Pokemon, but I absolutely hate the dual typing of Water/Flying. Nothing says “throw a rock at me” more than this typing combination. 

Overall I just don’t like anything about this Pokemon.

1) Greninja

This Pokemon used to be a lot lower on this list, but as I mentioned right before the list that the order changed as I was making it. I can promise you that this Pokemon isn’t on here because of how popular it is (there are others that would be on here if that was the case). There are many other reasons I will go over as to why this one is on the list.

The first is my experience using a basic one in XY. It’s learn set of moves is terrible, and that’s because it learns a lot of physical moves despite having a much better Special Attack. When I thought about the aspects of a ninja’s special attack being higher than physical it made much more sense. It had little to no options for Dark type moves with one of the best moves for it not being available till you’ve gotten the 8th badge for Waterfall. Greninja was the weakest member of my team with my Aromatisse putting in much more work than it! If Greninja is not competitively trained as well as has any of its hidden abilities then it’s not really that useful. I kept the one from that playthrough because I don’t have the heart to release it or get rid of it…

The second is its design. I very much don’t care for it (its tongue scarf is gross!). Its middle evolution looks so much better to me, and it made me sad evolving it into this ugly thing…

The third is its typing. I’ve had some time to think about it and I’ve wondered to myself: why is Greninja a Dark type? Thinking of the history, and to some extent the mythology of ninjas, nothing screams Dark type to me. I’m also taking into account of Dark being Evil in Japan, and nothing about ninja inherently screams Evil or Dark typing. Then I found myself thinking about its other typing in Water which brought me to the conclusion that the only reason Greninja is a Water type is for two reasons: 1) It’s a starter and 2) it’s a frog.

So you’re probably thinking by this point: “well Radish if you don’t like its typings then what would you change them to?” Unfortunately, I’d keep Water since it’s not the only Pokemon to have a typing based on the animal it is (looking at you Poliwag line!). Dark typing would be replaced with Ghost since ninjas in their lore and mythology can traverse and interact with the spiritual world.

I will address the elephant in the room for my closing thoughts on this Pokemon: Greninja and the fandom. I wholeheartedly believe that if Greninja didn’t have the hidden abilities that it did that it wouldn’t be as favored as it is among the fanbase. As someone who used a basic ability one in hopes of giving it a chance I was greatly disappointed, and didn’t understand why this Pokemon was so popular. That’s why I feel as though the competitive scene is where it has gotten all of its fame from. People give Charizard so much shit for being overrated but do they for Greninja? (Not a big fan of Charizard for those who wanna accuse me as such.)