#i wanted to get pmd things for so long..

[calmcraggyarea]

PMD COLLECTION SO FAR..

[arolesbianism]

Thinking abt my oni pmd au again. I'm making Jackie a furret and no one can stop me

[snekkerdoodles]

[OPTIONAL] Doodle Request/Challenge: Draw 2 Glitch Pokémon if they were members of a PMD Duo (I both would love to see how you'd approach this, but also I think the concept of two things that shouldn't be of this world wearing scarves that somehow fit while being on a team to save Pokémon is cute (Note that the easiest of the Glitch Pokémon to draw are the ever present Bad Egg, and the Generation III Question Mark Sprites).

Also, while I'm here, I just wanted to say I really enjoyed the Fangz name origin comic. Both something very heartfelt while also hilarious. I can't wait to see whatever you post next!

Thank you so much! This is such a sick idea btw. Notes/research under read more.

Two mysterious Pokemon that, despite their good intentions, should probably be avoided when seeking allies for dungeon runs. Other exploration teams assume that they came into existence during some sort of time distortion that occurred before temporal tower was fully repaired.

Em constantly carries around tons of berries in order to make up for the fact that being around her decreases her allies' ability to heal wounds naturally, not to mention that reviver seeds don't seem to work in her presence. Because Em's treasure bag is constantly filled to the brim with oran berries, she often forgets to pack other useful items.

Polly is a Pidgeotto... or perhaps a Noctowl? Her colors don't exactly make it very clear. She speaks in a song-like voice, and once your get her to start singing, it's very difficult (if not impossible) for her to stop, and there's many things that inspire her to start. In dungeons, her song has the ability to paralyze anyone who listens to it, even allies.

The egg the two carry with them has remained unhatched for a long time, so they've decided to try and take care of it on their own due to feeling bad about taking up space in Chansey's daycare. Most Pokemon have come to associate this egg with bad luck, so the two try their best to keep their eyes on it at all times so that nothing happens while they're not looking.

[fortuneravine]

Tell me about each of your PMD teams!

OH BOY ok okok

starting off with team obsidian (explorers of sky)

Mistral is. complicated. for starters i have played as her in rescue team, explorers, And super because at the time they were kinda just. me. less of an oc and more just my self insert (i actually changed their name because her old name is. just my name now)

but lately i've wanted her to be her own character and not me in totodile form so i'm kinda in the process of redoing everything about them.

Cinder i can say more about! they are a disaster. an absolute mess. sopping wet kitten born in a cardboard box all alone. she's wanted to be an explorer since she was little, but being a huge coward kinda got in the way of that. they got that scar on their chest when they went into a dungeon alone and it scared them away from exploring for a long time. it wasn't until she met mistral that she started to get her confidence back and they're much calmer and less afraid of everything nowadays!

now rescue team. i played as mistral again in my first pmddx playthough along with a cubone partner but. i have kinda replaced them as my Main pmd1 team with these guys. oops.

campfire are much more developed characters anyways so im gonna talk about them!

fig (she/any) is very quiet, as are basically all of my heroes because my selectively mute ass keeps latching onto silent protagonists. she's definitely the one i've given the not talking trait to the most though. chive is extremely extroverted and chatty so she handles all the talking. others tend to see them as closed off or mysterious because they can't get a good read on her. they're really sweet though

chive's main gimmick is she likes cooking! will probably settle down and open a little cafe once she's done with the rescue team business. likes to experiment with random berries and nuts she finds (fig keeps joking she's going to poison herself, but she owns like 3 different foraging guides, she knows what she's doing.)

next is team hydra! their ref is old and i need to redo it so here's one of my heropartnerweek pieces badly cropped. their names are Ceru (she/xe) and Olivine (he/they)

it turns out i lied when i said all my heroes are quiet ceru is actually pretty outgoing. still the more introverted of the duo but mainly because olivine is a people pleaser extraordinaire. she actually had a pretty boring life as a human and is a lot happier as a pokemon. she was Devastated about returning to the human world, mostly because xe didn't want to leave xyr friends, partially because oh come on it's so much cooler here i don't wanna go back to working retail

olivine, as i said, is a people pleaser, often to his detriment. he's always prioritizing other pokemon's happiness, even when it's at the cost of his own. they get better at this over time (ceru helps him a lot with learning to say No). he and ceru are inseparable besties. they're like a comedy duo. 2 things have olivine's undying commitment, his friends and The Bit

finally. super. again i already talked about mistral so here is Basil.

honestly? i feel like they don't have much of my own spin. pmsd partner is already a perfect character. they are so full of love. they love making others smile and they're maybe a little too enthusiastic about it. they tend to come off as overly friendly at best or annoying at worst. before meeting mistral they were pretty lonely despite trying so hard to make friends. they're very happy to finally have a real close friend who likes them how they are

this ended up a little rambly!! oops!! but there's my guys hope you like em :)

[sincerely-sofie]

I'm struggling to name my own charmander, do you have any tips?

I want the name to sound natural for a pmd environment (aka not a human name)

Smol bits of character I have are:

- likes to fight

- acts first, ask questions later,

- bit of an airhead

- nerd

Oooh, this is a topic I love. Names are such a joy to tinker with when creating characters. I'll start out with a preamble on naming characters in general before getting into specific names I'd recommend for this charmander in particular!

Something to keep in mind about characters when you're naming them is who in the story is doing the naming. What is their relationship with the character? What is their opinion of them? What is their personal background? All of these things will influence the types of names your character might be given. The same is true if your character is naming themself. 

(You can ignore these things if you want to free yourself up as you name your character, of course! I just find it helpful in narrowing down my miles-long lists of names I end up with.)

In the case of Twig, I knew Grovyle was going to name her, and that he was going to come from his grass-type background with most names he had been exposed to. He named her Twig because that's a common name amongst grass-type communities that implies smallness, youth, and on the namer’s end, a devotion and determination to protect the one being named. 

Note that there's no such real-world implications in the English word Twig. It's more often used as a way to call someone scrawny and weak. The beauty of writing a story is that you can do what you want in it, and if you want the pokemon language to have a whole plethora of implications and connotations in their naming system, go for it! Just try and communicate it in the narrative somehow so that readers can enjoy it in full. 

Alright, preamble over. Let's get into the names I've found after searching up “fire related words” and exhausting every online thesaurus known to man. I'm going to assume that your charmander character is named by a fire-type, likely a family member, which will center most of them around literal flames and heat, but I'll throw in some less obvious connections as well

Hearth. This name implies a more cozy, homey setting along with a tame sort of fire. However, it may be fun as a contrasting name for a hot-headed character. 

Ember. A classic fire name, and one with a gentler sound than some of the harsher names below. 

Spark. This might be a good name if your character has moments of brilliance despite their airheadedness— like if their nerdy streak has applications that seem to give them sparks of genius. 

Pepper. An indirectly fire-related name, which may be given by a grass-type or its botanical root or a character who enjoys cooking. 

Illumina. A name describing light— again, something that might be fun for emphasizing a nerdy streak!

Fizz. An onomatopoeia of a campfire hissing and crackling. It might be good for a character that surged up in their temper, but is quick to fizzle out. I think this one is really fun, but that's just me!

Wick. Like a candle wick. I love how this sounds. 

Halo. This name emphasizes light and purity, and might not make much sense with its Christian implications in the PMD world. However, it could be used to refer to halos of light around the sun and similar things, which would negate that issue!

Aurora. I see this as being a name popular among both ice-types and fire-types. 

Sol / Soul. Depending on how you spell it, this name is a reference to either the intensity of the sun or your character’s shining spirit. Or both, if you use some fun worldbuilding shenanigans!

Pine. A bit of a stretch, maybe, but I like the idea of referencing pine cones which release seeds amidst forest fires. 

Mallow. Like the above, a reference to bush mallow and baker's globe mallow, types of plant that thrives in the aftermath of fires. 

And finally, Lychee, at my little sister's recommendation!

[front-facing-pokemon]

I just found this blog so I'm jumping aboard the plushie bandwagon.

First we got Absol. (i feel like maybe i should've taken a closer-up picture but it's the face sooo)

Then a Wooloo

And, saving best for last, this Leafeon plush I own... of which I swear on my life is official merch.

I also have some more eeveelutions (plus an eevee and a few more) but: 1. I didn't want to send too many. 2. Eeveelutions are more popular so I wanted to give some other people the chance to submit their own. 3. I don't know where my Pikachu and Snivy plushies are cuz I own too many stuffed animals.

Only reason I submitted Leafeon was so I could show off this ~masterpiece~ of a plushie I own. And it's face isn't the only thing wrong with it too lol. Also I just noticed I accidentally had one of the ears hanging back but I'm too lazy to go take another photo but i hope this amuses you nonetheless.

ALRIGHT THERE'S BEEN A LOT OF YOU AS I'VE BEEN OUT WITH MY FAMILY FOR CHRISTMAS HUH

let's start with these guys. beautiful. wonderful. i do not believe that that leafeon is official merch. this statement is baffling to me. welcome to the front-facing pokémon family. i love the eyes on that absol and wooloo is one of my faves. i was rather obsessed with it when it first came out and have a whole wooloo tag on my main blog because of it. though i guess i cleared that whole thing out recently so i don't anymore

let's get the nose ratings out of the way:

↑ this is a lie. 10/10 chespin

it's very wide and also 10/10 you're being too harsh. merry day to you too

circular face indeed. did i already post this one? if i did you can have it again

clodsire be upon ye. clodsire fans this is your treat until gen 9

this is a trend now. i think tumblr just crunched this image to hell for some reason so here's what the text says:

"Felt like joining the others for front facing pokeplushies [images] I have more pokemon but its early morning and these are the plushies that are easy to access"

i have not but i imagine "a moment" has long passed by now. my apologies but apparently today was an important day or something? idk

YEAH it's super unbelievably fucked up. i think i kinda remember the circumstance being a bit dire so everyone else was more worried about either 1. protagonist getting stomped on brutally or 2. saving the world from kyurem / the bittercold. i was totally under the impression that he was dead in that moment but i guess the characters may have known that he would just come back? i seem to vaguely remember partner being surprised that he came back and being like "but we watched you die :OOO" but maybe i'm misremembering that. i do create a lot of pmd lore on my own time so i have a hard time telling the difference between canon and fanon sometimes

two a day makes the world go round! this blog started when i started college, paused for 80% of my college career and now has started back up and i just graduated college a week ago. i would say "how time flies" but it has been a very, very long year

i've said it before and i'll say it again: gen 6 is my favorite gen, so you'll be seeing lots of favor for this gen from me in the tags i'm sure. maybe gen 6 is my excuse to start doing other things here. like that stream i keep talking about

if they put meloetta as a little obscure puzzle thang in sv, i'm sure they'll do something for genesect. i hope. at least for keldeo probably. genesect i'm not sure is very popular, unfortunately, outside of the tumblr crowd. if the general public's opinion on genesect is favorable, then maybe

okay and then i tried to scroll down further in my screenshots for more asks and saw the wobbly will smith in a hospital bed Gimme a Hug, Man that i copied from the "i get a little bit genghis kanghis" post so that's it. to everyone who christmases: merry it. it is today. although it's basically over by now so! merry boxing day for tomorrow if i don't say anything tomorrow. but i probably will. now i'm gonna go queue up today's 'mons because i haven't done it yet today. see you all in a few weeks when those post

[greencharisard]

I don't think I've ever shared this guy here, he's an old character that I had semi-abandoned after the group he was made for on dA disbanded (Glowchus). It was something I longed to be part of since I first found out abou it in 2013 or so, and I finally won a spot from a contest... it lasted a few months before being nuked from the internet and tbh I still don't fully understand what happened.

You may wonder what exactly spurred me to work on him again. Well I found out Glowchus have been revitalized and like... have a website and stuff??

I could use his first design and register him on the new site, but tbh I've learned my lesson about trying to develop a character while relying on other people's OCs to create interactions.

So he's not a glowchu anymore, where does he go? Why into the PMD universe of course! He's a regular old pichu obsessed with a book series that sees two factions of special 'chus at odds with each other.

He loves to infodump about the lore to anyone that will listen, including his best friend Nathan (Nathy for short) the shiny lotad! They love to play pretend and want to become a rescue team when they grow up.

He evolves into a pikachu by his mid teens and that's when he started becoming a bit delulu.

Because he has a bit of an unique tail marking he convinces himself that he's a descendant of the characters from his favorite book series (he isn't). He starts adding a marking to his tail with fur dye, wearing leather gloves and earbands to also mimic it, gets a tatoo; the works.

He and His friend Nate become a rescue team and he names it "Team Elementals". Since they're both pokemon that evolve with elemental stones they make a promise: they'll waith for each other and evolve together.

Things are going great for a while, despite Tobio's habit of taking on dangerous outlaws; that is until they finally got their hands on a water stone and a thunder stone. Tobio had gotten so deep into his delusion that the possibility of the evolution not reaffirming it terrified him, and when they eventually got to evolving his fears came true.

He was just a normal raichu, no special traits, no fancy markings, no elemental powers...

For a while he's deep in denial, he keeps dying his fur and drowns himself in dangerous jobs, until reality comes and kicks him in the face: on a mission to capture an outlaw he and Nate punch too far above their weightclass. They go after an extremely dangerous Salamance criminal and while Nate comes out of it with just scratches and bruises, Tobio in his stubborness to prove himself a hero gets his leg bitten off.

It's an harsh wake up call, the recovery takes months, but Tobio's spirit is what takes the hardest hit. He becomes jaded, bitter, starts taking on jobs based on the reward only, stops caring about the dye job on his fur ecc.

Aaaand that's how far I got here! I have a multitude of ideas on how to continue his story but that will come later once I have more characters ironed out. Love my idiot son and I'm glad I decided to bring him back to the pokemon world <3

PMD by Nintendo

art and characters by me, do not copy, trace, repost, reuse ecc without my permission please.

[residentialsinyomakai]

♤ INTRO TIME! ♤

Hi hello!!! Idk how these work very well still so. Lemme do this to the best'a my abilities zzz

This is my sona! I draw 'em a lot (I have like. 2 more main ones but they're not important,,,zz,zzzzz,zzzz,,,,)

Detailed info under cut!!

GENERAL INFO:

♤ I'm Yōmakai, Yomo, Res, any variation of my user really (*￣∇￣*)

♤ ENG/ESP, learning JP, but certainly not enough to hold my own yet wahaha ! ;=u=

♤ I use Any Pronouns, and no particular honorifics! Get creative w it for all i care ((o(^∇^)o))

♤ My posts are sometimes very frequent, or maybe I'll go months without one!! Hard to tell augahjfkrif

♤ Chronic user of caps, emojis, kaomojis (the cool little face things I love em,,, ( =＾ω＾)), emoticons, etc. So basically pretty informal language y'know y'know.

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INTEREST STUFF:

♡ Maaaaaajor hyperfixation AND special interest in Yokai Watch!!! (all interations)

I also like;;;;

♡ Swan Lake (1981 Toei Version)

♡ Kirby (all iterations)

♡ Pokémon (all, pref. Johto, PMD, Kalos)

♡ Everything But Your Life

♡ Homestuck (I'm pretty new tho!)

♡ MY FRIEND' OCS...

♡ Way of the Househusband

♡ Yakuza (Just 0 for now! Also new djgjeoe)

♡ TMNT (1980's, 2003, 2012, RISE, MM, Bay!)

♡ Yu Yu Hakusho

♡ Oswald the Lucky Rabbit

♡ Entomology

♡ Cephalopods

♡ Grammar

♡...And more! But. I'll keep this not too long..,,.

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ADVISORY FOR INTERACTION:

◇ HAVE BASIC DECENCY (Not okie doki to be racist, homophobic, proship, etc...I wish mental recovery and healing for all those ill-learned.)

◇ I'm like. Really awful at responding to messages. Personal reasons and generally I keep busy!

◇ Please don't DM me unless you either A: Ask permission please,,, or B: Are a mutual, I'm more comfy w/ y'all bc most'a you know I'm Insane and Fantastic already/j/lh

◇ Sorry if I Spam sometimes!!! I get a lotta motivation in bursts sometimes so you might see like 5 things in a day. Or if I'm doing requests =u=!!

◇ My bad forgot to add this one a while ago, but unless i know you irl, please don't make any "I'm in your room" or "outside your house", "I'm watching you", etc typa jokes. Dhsoxiwod seems like an overreaction but I have pretty bad paranoia and don't take kindly :< (I don't care if it's something like "I'm rapidly approaching your location" or something nonsensical like you're sending a missile to my mailbox bc ik that can't happen ^^;) thank you for your consideration!!

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FINAL THOUGHTS?:

♧ Don't be afraid to tag me in anything! (Within reason ofc ofc)

♧ NEVER HAVE TO ASK TO DRAW OCS....GHHAGSH.....If you do @ me please ^u^

♧ Trad. and digital art will be posted!! May not be the best but it's my favorite hobby :)

♧ OH!!! SPEAKING OF HOBBIES. Wanna know some of mine? I like art, singing, crafts, writing, and hanging out outside,,,

♧ OTHER SOCIALS:

• YomakaiResidentials - Tiktok (I,,, get the most anxious on this one. Don't expect much response!! If you want me to see your cool stuff, absolutely mention me or send me the video :> just try not to spam ghhhgagsg)

• ナガバナ愛 - Pixiv

• roughraffspompadour - Insta (best for messaging!!! Worst for posting EXPLODES)

• There's a secret other two but. They're more personal so Only Close Friends!!

• Not a social but I also have a blog called @askbabblong ......Babblong Ask Blog As You Can Tell

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TAG SYSTEM:

I organize all my posts and reblogs into tags because it's easier and I'm used to tagging things like on Ao3 and Fortelling,,,, I expect that if someone needed something specific they could sort it by the tags 🍌💬💜 so in short, here's explanations!!

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☆ [● Posts from Yomakai] - Well. Posts by me!!!

☆ [• nagareblog] - Reblog tag! So if anyone wants ta see what else i like and or block it I GUESS....SIGH..../j

☆ [♤ Resident Rambles] - My yap sessions or general speaking tag. I chose the spade cause it's my favorite suit :)

☆ [☆ Favesposting] - Anything including fave characters....my little guys....

☆ [¤ Summoning...] - Friend stuff! Most (all) of these are yokai related if you couldn't tell wahaha!

☆ [Yolo Watch 2!] - Had to make a ykw specific tag because,,,,ghhshhdjd yokai,,z,,

☆ [|| refs 4 l8r ||] - Forgot about this one for a while....Refs for characters i wanna draw sometime!!!

☆ [¥ Aus I like! ¥] - WAHHH ALSO FORGOT THIS ONE! Typically the reblog for au masterposts or first encounters with'a cool thing EEEEYAAAAGH

☆ [《Cool Features!》] - Specific things I really like! Colors, future inspo, amazing stuffs....so much so it's hard to decide whether or not to put it in sometimes ghgahahhhgg...

☆ [~ Helpful!] - Info that can be helpful for future stuff

☆ [♧ Shameless Self Promotion] - promotions for stuff I make or just. In general things related to me (;´∀｀)

☆ [◇ Important] - Donation posts, Gaza, fundraising, etc!!

☆ [♡ babblong's stand up] - (wow. Subtle with this reference huh) Anything funny to me.....remmeber.....my humor is bad/lh

☆ [` repo reblog rule `] - Repo related stuff from rottmnt because!!! HIM!!! kinda turned into a general tmnt tag, but mainly repo

☆ [{bugging}] - bugposting when I remember!!

☆ [¡quene!] - stuff from the Yōmakai backlogs,,,, aka my quene!

☆ [₩ delete later ₩] - if the second hand embarassment is really bad or if it's vent-adjacent then. After a while. Into the bin/post privately section it goes %o%!!

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WOWZAS. I YAP A LOT!!! Can you see why i like Babblong....my little guy. Thanks for reading! Enjoy your stay :] tell me if there's anything i should add!

[txttabloid]

hello remember a while ago I had some questions about the pmd Au well I’m back to ask more if you have the time.

ok first one: had you ever made a fakemon region? This is like a sequel to the first question list I asked about so it I’ve be the same answer or something different.

anyways next one: …why are there no humans in this universe like I’m not saying that there should be humans in this universe I’m saying why there aren’t any do the Pokemon take the role as humans or is this some weird planet of the apes going on where all the Pokemon umm murder all of the humans and took over’ I’m thinking about that too much?

next question: how did the roatoms become evil did they become evil cause of something or are they evil cause they want to be evil?

last question: do ze and doll have their powers like the original series or not?

also I have this thought not really a question’ question but what would happen if you put mimkyu cyn and giratina in the same room together would they fight to the death or would they get along?

so that’s everything I have hope you find this and answer them so till next time good bye and have a good night.

I mean yeah when I was like itty bitty. Made it with my brothers though I don’t think any of the drawings of that survived all the the moves :(.

Idk man I am working of PMD logic they never really explain that in the games. I mean we know in every PMD you were once human turned into a Pokémon, but never explain much after that or they do and I haven’t played enough PMD

Eh I think the solver is just one particularly evil and powerful Rotom. I don’t think all Rotom’s are necessarily evil

I mean I don’t see why not. As a Kirlia I definitely think Doll would have some similar abilities

(Sorry this took a insanely long time to get to I kinda just blanked on things)

But in other news I have blog just for this AU depending on how fast I am at drawing it may be up and running by next week it’s @ is

@ask-team-domination

If the @ doesn’t work click this LINK and it should take you to the blog straight away thoug it is pretty barren rn

[shima-draws]

Ooh what’s Darker Destinies sounds interesting!

!! It’s my PMD AU!! It basically serves as a third installment to the PMD Sky plotline since it focuses on Giratina and the Distorted Realm (PMD-verse Distortion World basically lol). It’s got a lot of twists and is actually pretty dark for a PMD AU but it’s one of my all time favorites 🥰 When I first came up with the concept I had just finished watching Made In Abyss for the first time so that influenced it a lot. And it’s perfect bc the dungeon Giratina rules over in Sky is called World Abyss so I was like OH YO I can DEFINITELY use this haha

Long story short Pip gets whisked off to the Distorted Realm as just an extension of her soul, while her body remains in the real world. Chimchar asks Dialga to send him to the future so he can recruit the Future Trio—so they can help him figure out what’s going on with Pip and where she went. Meanwhile Pip starts running into lookalikes of her friends and realizes they’re from a different timeline where things did NOT end very well for them. Grovyle has become sort of a mercenary and adopted Dusknoir’s “survive no matter the cost” outlook, and has had his fair share of devastating losses (both his own Pip and Celebi being killed before they could go back to the past and retrieve the Time Gears). The guild is in shambles due to the world literally ending; they were forced to turn rogue, Chatot is dead and Chimchar took over as Guildmaster because Wigglytuff’s too emotionally distraught to lead. Everyone existing in the Distorted Realm is miserable and trying to kill each other and have turned even more dark and twisted than the Dark Future. It’s a MESS. But luckily Pip’s there to start getting things into gear and get everyone moving in the right direction. Starting with heading down into World Abyss (which, to the surface Pokemon, is considered to be an absolute death trap to be avoided at all costs) to meet with Giratina ;)

There’s a lot more going on in the AU but yeah it’s one I’ve had for a while! And one I’ve been wanting to work on more. If I could turn this into a ROM hack one day that would be SO neat

[stingraywipe]

Here's a piece I wrote about my PMD Explorers of Sky OCs based on a scene from the game that really stuck with me. I wanted to explore how the reveal in the dark future would play out with my renditions of the characters, and I had a lot of fun with it! I'll definitely do more stuff like this in the future.

An Untimely Reunion

“The passage of time should be just up ahead! Let’s hurry along now.”

Clay, Leo, and Grovyle followed Celebi into the clearing. Sure enough, the passage was just across the way. Grovyle took a deep breath. He was exhausted, but there was no time to rest. When Dusknior had taken him back to the dark future, he thought for sure that he had failed his mission. Now he had a second chance, and there was no way he was going to let it slip.

“So this will really send us back home?” Leo asked. “Can we finally go back to our time?”

“Yes,” Grovyle responded. “The passage of time will allow all three of us to return to the past. I used it when I came to your time originally.”

“That’s right!” Celebi added, nodding. “And I’m the only one with the power to open it! Isn’t that fun?”

Clay let out a long sigh of relief. “Thank goodness. I was worried we’d never see our friends at the guild again. They must be worried sick about us right now.”

As the group approached the passage, Grovyle took one last look around. If everything goes as planned once returning to the past, this will be the last time he sees the dark future. He turned his gaze to Celebi. He knew she could fend for herself, but he couldn’t help feeling a tinge of sadness about leaving her alone here yet again. 

“You’re sure you’ll be ok here on your own?” he asked her.

“Yes of course, Grovyle dear! How many times do I need to tell you that I can’t ever be caught?”

“I wouldn’t be so sure about that,” a familiar voice sneered.

Grovyle felt a crushing wave of dread come over him. He looked back towards the passage of time to find Dusknior waiting in front of it. He had a smug grin on his face.

“You…” Grovyle muttered.

“You’ve grown careless, Grovyle. I already knew you’d be coming here, but you were also unexpectedly easy to follow. You’re usually cautious enough to not let that happen.” He chuckled. “That sudden change will spell your demise. Now Sableye! Seize them!” 

Grovyle groaned. “Shit, we’re surrounded. Looks like we were followed. I’m sorry everyone, but we’re going to have to force our way through to get out of this.”

“That’s fine,” Clay said, readying himself. “Team Sunspark has faced far more difficult battles than this before.”

Dusknior smirked at them. “Oh, you lot won’t be going anywhere. NOW, MASTER DIALGA!”

The ground trembled beneath them. The group looked on in horror as the enraged legend slowly appeared on the mountain in front of them. Clay turned to Grovyle, who wore a distraught look on his face. “Is that-?”

“Yes. This is Primal Dialga,” Grovyle said through gritted teeth. “Dammit. It looks like this might be the end for us.”

Leo looked at him, shocked. “But we can’t give up! Not when we’re so close!”

“Don’t you get it? Primal Dialga is just far too powerful for us to face in our exhausted state. There’s simply nothing else we can do.”

“I see you finally grasp the gravity of your situation,” Dusknior sneered. “The dark future will never be changed. How does it feel knowing that you failed the one thing you devoted your entire life to?”

“I might have failed, but the cause isn’t lost. You seem to have forgotten that I didn’t go to the past alone. My partner is still there, and I have faith that he’ll succeed. I may fall here, but you haven’t won!”

“So you’re still desperately grasping to hope then. If you don’t mind, would you be so kind as to share the name of this beloved partner of yours?”

“Stop toying with me,” Grovyle growled. “You know who Clay is, and you know I’ll never forgive you for what you tried to do to him.”

Clay jerked his head towards Grovyle. Did he hear that right? “Did- did you just say his name was Clay?” he asked. “Because MY name is Clay.”

Grovyle scoffed at him. “Must be some sort of twisted coincidence. I wish you could have met my Clay. You two probably would have gotten along. Not that it matters now.”

Dusknior chuckled. “Oh, I can assure you that the similarities extend well past sharing a name. You see, our good friend Clay here used to be a human! He washed up on the beach one day as shinx with no memories of his past.”

Grovyle’s eyes widened. “Wha- What are you trying to say?”

“And it gets even better! Clay also happens to possess a very special ability. When he touches certain things, he sometimes has visions of events from the past or the future. Does a power like that sound familiar to you?” 

Grovyle’s heart dropped. “The dimensional scream? No… there’s no way. It can’t be true. You’re lying.” He turned to Clay and grabbed his sholders. “Please Clay… please tell me he’s lying.”

Clay looked back at him, terrified. “I’m so sorry Grovyle, but everything he said is true. As hard as it might be to believe, I really was a human. It’s the only thing about my past that I’m certain about. And I don’t know why, but I also can use the dimensional scream. It’s helped Leo and I complete tons of rescue and explorations. I told Dusknior about this in the past before we were taken here.”

“It’s true,” Leo added. “His dimensional scream has helped us locate main outlaws and points of interest during our guild work.”

Grovyle’s heart dropped. Tears began welling up in his eyes. He slowly turned back to Dusknior. His voice trembled as he spoke. “No… This is really?”

“Do you finally get it Grovyle? CLAY is your partner! He’s even wearing the same scarf YOU gave him; I don’t even know how someone as perceptive as you could miss that! I found him before you in the past and took advantage of his amnesia to convince him to fight against you. It made capturing you two laughably easy. The unwavering faith in him you so foolishly clung to won’t matter. The timeline will not be changed, and I’ll eliminate both of you here to guarantee it!”

Celebi went pale. “What? There’s simply no way. I could sense that the temporal distortion around you was stronger than Grovyle and Leo, but I thought nothing of it. To think you were Clay the whole time…” She trailed off.

.  

Clay didn’t know what to think or how to feel. He felt a rush of tears beginning to form. He was from the future? And Grovyle was his partner? But he had spent the past few months desperately trying to take down Grovyle! Was he really just being used all this time? The thought of it infuriated him. He glared at Dusknior through his wet eyes. “So thats it then? Was I nothing more than a pawn to you?”

Dusknior gave him a dejected look. “Trust me Clay, it wasn’t anything personal. I took no joy in this. You clearly had no knowledge of your previous mission, but I couldn’t risk your memories and motivation returning. I HAD to make sure the future remained intact. Taking advantage of your memory loss was the only way for me to guarantee that.”

“HOW CAN YOU SAY THAT?” Clay screamed. “None of this was personal? Bullshit! Everything you’ve ever said to me was just a lie! You turned me against my own family! You made me HATE him! You nearly made us KILL each other! And now you have the nerve to say you DIDN’T want to do it? Pfft. Yeah, sure. Ok. I hope it was worth it then. I hope your life is better once Leo and I are dead and gone, because apparently killing us is the only thing that will let you sleep at night.” He took a shaky breath before adding, “You’re the most pathetic pokemon to ever walk this earth.”

Leo thought he saw Dusknior cringe at Clay’s last comment. “What? Is he actually upset by this?” He quickly shook the thought. Right now he had to focus on finding a way out of this. Surely there was something they could do. “Wait. We just need to get past these sableye and we’d be able to make a run for it. Could Celebi send us forward in time to achieve that?”  He slightly nudged her to get her attention. “Yes dear?” she asked.

He leaned closer to her and whispered, “You can travel through time right? That’s how the passage of time works, I’m assuming. Are you able to send us slightly into the future?”

“I can, but not by much. Especially with Dialga here. His command over time is significantly stronger than mine, so he could interfere with anything I try to do.”

“That’s fine. It only needs to be a few seconds. Just enough to let us get past these sableye.”

“Oh, that’ll be quite easy. A few seconds is nothing.”

“Good. Just wait until the moment right before they attack us. I’ll let Clay and Grovyle know.”

He turned back towards Clay, who was an absolute mess. He was still sobbing, and his front paws were soaked from trying to wipe away his tears. It killed him to see Clay like this. He had never really even seen him sad before, so to see him crying this much was heartbreaking. He wasn’t sure if he would ever forgive Dusknoir for doing this to him. He kneeled down next to him .“Clay? Hey Clay listen–”

Clay looked up at him. “Leo?” he said quietly, voice breaking. “I’m so sorry. I’m so so sorry. You’re here because of me and my past. It’s my fault we’re going to die. If you weren’t–”

Leo cut him off. “Look at me Clay. None of this is happening because of you. Dusknoir said it himself. But we don’t have the luxury to think about that right now. I know how difficult this is for you, but you have to keep fighting. After all, we’re both still here! Team Sunspark hasn’t been defeated yet!”

Clay’s eyes widened. He sniffled and wiped away his tears again. “You- you’re right,” he croaked. “I think I’ll manage for now. But Grovyle…”

They both looked over towards him, where he stood frozen in place.

—

Grovyle' stood frozen in place's thoughts were racing. His vision was blurred. His ears were ringing. His heart was pounding. He could barely breathe. 

“This is my fault,” he thought. “I did this to him. I’m the reason why he went to the past. I’m the reason why he lost his memory. I hurt him. I hurt his friends, and I didn’t care. I didn’t even bother to learn anything about him. And now he’s going to die because of me. The future won’t even be changed. ”

“Grovyle…” a quiet voice called out.

“Clay?” He turned his head to make out a familiar figure. A young human boy with dark, messy hair stood there. He had bright green eyes and a blue scarf wrapped around his neck. It was Clay. “What- how did–”

Clay’s voice called out again. “Grovyle!”

He blinked hard and rubbed his eyes, only to find that Clay was gone. In his place stood a shinx with the same eyes and scarf. “That’s right. This is what Clay looks like now. It’s because of me. It’s because I couldn’t–” 

“GROVYLE!!!” Clay screamed. Grovyle jolted back to reality, regaining his senses. He looked around wildly. They were still cornered by the sableye, and Dusknior remained a few meters behind them. The passage of time was still out of reach. He looked back over to Clay. His eyes were filled with tears, and his whole body was trembling. His fur was sparking with electricity. Grovyle opened his mouth to speak, but he could barely get any words out. 

“Clay,” he stammered. “I- I’m sorry. I couldn’t- this is my–”

“Grovyle please!” Clay cried, voice cracking. “I understand how you feel! This hurts for me too! More than you could imagine. But we can’t think about that right now!” He gestured towards the passage of time. “We can still escape! Despite everything, we’re all still alive! You haven’t lost me yet! So please… I’m begging you! Keep fighting! Don’t give up hope!”

“But what could we possibly do? We’re outnumbered, and we’re up against a legendary. With our injuries we don’t stand a chance.”

Leo put a hand on his shoulder. “We don’t need to win! We just need to escape. And we have a plan to do it! Just wait for my signal, and be ready to run for it.”

“Hey!” Dusknior shouted at them. “Done saying your goodbyes? Good. Now Sableye, finish them off. Be sure to kill them this time.”

“YES SIR, MASTER DUSKNIOR!” the sableye cheered. They flared their claws and leapt at the group. Just before they struck, Leo called out: “NOW CELEBI!”

Suddenly, the four of them disappeared. “WHAT?! This can’t be” Dusknior screamed. “Reveal them, Master Dialga! They cannot be allowed to escape!”

The legend let out a monstrous roar. The air began to ripple a few meters in front of the passage of time. A moment later, Clay, Leo, Grovyle and Celebi reappeared.

“SIEZE THEM SABELEYE! DO NOT LET THEM ESCAPE!” Dusknoir screamed.

Celebi winced. “I’m sorry, but it looks like this is as far as I can take you.”

“This is enough! We can make it from here!” Leo responded.

Grovyle hesitated for an instant.”But what about you, Celebi? I can’t just leave you! Not when-”

“Grovyle, we have to leave now! This is our only chance!” Clay yelled. “Celebi said she’d be fine, so we have to trust her!”

“He’s right,” she said. “Go on now dears! Change the future for all of us!”

Grovyle took one last look at her before turning towards the passage of time. With tears still in his eyes, he nodded at Clay and Leo. The three of them sprinted in, leaving the future of darkness in their past.

Thanks for reading! I hope you enjoyed :D

[ifbench]

Pokemon Mystery Dungeon

So, here we are. It's been over three years since the last PMD game, and almost 8 since the last one that wasn't a remake. Where does this leave us? Will we ever get another new PMD game? I don't know. Personally? I have hope that the series isn't dead. That one day, we will get another. But I can't say for certain. But even if this is the end…what a legacy PMD has left us with. Five lovely games, each with their own story to tell, their own joys to be had. Sure, some may be better than others, but they all carry the spirit of PMD within them. Rescue Team is a story about finding yourself in a foreign world, of finding home in the unlikeliest of places, of how even when the rest of the world is against you, you'll always have some people who believe in you. Explorers is a story about overcoming impossible odds, of staying true to oneself, of shining bright at world's end, of how if your legacy is still remembered, in a way, you'll still be alive. Adventure Squad is a story of finding joy in the little things, of how even simple acts of kindness can turn around the hearts of a whole village. Gates to Infinity is a story about holding onto hope even in the most desperate circumstances, of friendships that never truly die, of kindness begetting more kindness, of changing the world for the better, one step at a time. Super is a story of learning who you truly are, what makes you yourself, of how negativity is a necessary part of life, of globe-spanning friendships, of entrusted hope, of how you can do amazing things, of how it's ok to need help. Each one has its own, unique take on PMD. Each one has its own themes, its own joys it wants to share. Each one complements the rest, and all together? They make something truly wonderful. While it's possible that PMD might never return, that attatchement we have to it? That love we have for our partners? That joy we have when we remember our favorite moments from it? That will never truly fade. It might be buried, might be forgotten, but it will never truly die. It will always be there, waiting to return. In a way, PMD will never end. Like Special Episode 5 of Explorers teaches us, if our legacy is remembered, then we're still alive, in a way. Our spirit still shines bright, still affecting others. As long as we continue to cherish PMD, it will never die. I'm crying so hard as I type this all. I love PMD. I love it with all my heart. I think a good way to show why PMD will never truly die is to take a look at the fanworks made for it. There are hundreds, if not thousands of fanworks created about PMD. Comics, fanfics, askblogs, and more, all telling their own stories about PMD. All created because of love for PMD. Silver Resistance. Victory Fire. Hands of Creation. Warped Skies. Quenched Torch. Legends Legacy. Shatter. Daily Life in Pokemon Paradise. Flake-N-Rudy. Askanotslownotking. Free Fiction. The Dreamstone. Places We Call Home. Galaxies Above. On Borrowed Time. Fledglings. Liberators of Fate. Sierra 10. Flowerbeds. Irau's Journal. Psychic Sheep. Zero the Hero. Path of Valor. Even those of us who aren't telling full stories, those of us who make fanart, those of us who make fanmusic and remixes, those of us who just gush about PMD. We're all keeping PMD alive. To everyone who has ever made any sort of PMD fanwork, discussed their love for the series, or even just recommended it to a friend. To anyone who has ever helped keep PMD alive. Thank you. Even if we never get a new PMD game, it will never truly die, as long as we continue to cherish it. Thank you all so much.

I have my own PMD fanworks, if anyone wishes to check them out.

Eternal Shadows, a PMD story taking place post-Super, about a human-turned-Oshawott who wishes to return home.

In Tandem, a hybrid PMD and trainerfic, about a PMD Tropius who wishes to become a trainer in the human world.

Then, Then, and Now, a hybrid Rescue Team and Legends Arceus story, of a protagonist who goes through both.

A Comprehensive Guide to Items, a guide to items in the PMD world, and how they work, written in-universe by the Rescue Team partner.

A Way to Reunite, a Gates to Infinity oneshot, about an alternate epilogue if the Worldcore didn't exist.

Day of Heroes, a oneshot celebrating the four main PMD games. The protagonists and partners of each game celebrate a holiday dedicated to them, together.

I also have a variety of PMD askblogs.

@ask-team-searchlights is an askblog for the cast of Eternal Shadows, and @ask-world-savers-council is an askblog for the cast of Day of Heroes. And @adventuresquadharvest is a new askblog I started today, for giving love for Adventure Squad.

If you decide to check out any of these, I hope you enjoy.

I'm also always available to chat about PMD! I have a bunch of headcanons and worldbuilding about the series that I'd love to talk about more! Feel free to either approach me in DMs, ask me on this blog, or contact me on Discord! My username there is ifbench, same as here.

I hope you've all enjoyed my PMD rambles. Thank you for listening.

[hongluboobs]

Please tell us the reason behind the pokemon choices! I get most of them, but am curious about Meowstic and Nihelego in particular. Is it for the nihilEGO pun?

OKAY i am on my iphone so i’m typing this from scratch again instead of my drafts. also it is night. tumblr decided to not give me notifs until now but it’s okay!! we ball😁

I’m unsure how much you know abt pokémon so I’m gonna do my best to explain but this is a lifelong special interest so i may miss some things^^

Quick going over the ones you didn’t ask about:

Mewtwo: clone created to replicate Mew, Went Horribly Wrong, ended up destroying the lab it was born in. It’s even a really long time since I’ve seen the movie but i believe the mewtwo there is neglected child core. This is REALLY Angela especially because in pokedex entries they often talk about the thing that makes mewtwo nothing like mew is that it’s “heartless”. poor poor angela baby…

Mega Gardevoir: This is a mostly aesthetic pick. That thing really looks like her if it’s shiny (see image) and the colors match perfect. the way gardevoir is portrayed in pmd reminds me a lot of Angela. Gardevoir is about immense loyalty to a trainer (even if it ruins your life forever and the trainer does not care, as shown in pmd) and i read it as something about the script

Porygon2: Honestly this could be any of the mons in this line but Porygon is a digital being and the first fully synthetic pokemon which begins acting in ways which were not programmed as it evolves. Kind of represents Angela acting in ways a machine should not and breaking free of her predetermined role to me :)

Now onto the pokémon you actually asked about!! :)

First up, Meowstic!

This first part is a small design thing but this thing has Angela’s face to me, especially with the yellow eyes with red pupils. Angela’s eyes are inconsistent in canon but I like to represent them with both red and yellow to represent both of her “parents” (sorry Benjamin… i love you but u aren’t included there😔)

This pokedex entry is one of the main reasons this is an angela pokémon to me, aside from vibes.

It has the same “closed eyes to repress” thing that Lobcorp angela has going on, just with repressing incredibly explosive powers instead of repressing The Horrors!

These pokedex entries are really goofy but they read very angela to me :) its unfriendliness is part of its charm!

Also i have no idea when i’ll ever get to post these so now is a good time as any to drop meowstic angela :)

Nihilego is a slightly different case because it’s tied less to dex entries and more to how it is used in the story of sun and moon. I haven’t played those games in YEARS so i might be a little bit questionable with my reasoning but this one’s really important.

Nihilego is intentionally designed to mirror one of the human characters in pokémon sun and moon.

(image i found online. i see it somewhat differently but it’s close enough for this)

Anyway this human character’s mother has neglected/abandoned her in obsessive pursuit of this pokémon and other Ultra Beasts.

The fact this pokémon not only has a similar silhouette to angela but serves as a “replacement” for a human character in a parent’s mind while also being Distinctly Nonhuman… it’s by no means a perfect comparison but there’s Something There

This dex entry always gets me too… it’s just a girlie… :(

It really makes me want to replay sun/moon because i feel like my memory of the story being really shaky has me on the edge of a breakthrough about this thing… but it looks like angela and i can draw story parallels basically:)

I have No Idea if this is coherent but I hope it cleared things up a little ^^^

[yo9urt]

Pokémon Fushigi no Motherfucking Dungeon !!!!

(i would put a screenshot here but my deck couldn't upload them for some reason.)

thoughts & comments on pmd in japanese below (VERY LONG)

28 new flashcards!!

uncountable new words that i did not add for various reasons!!

observations:

blessedly, the game is so far not using a lot of formal language. the personality quiz did use formal language but the actual characters themselves are speaking very casually (i’m actually really excited to see how the npcs speak in the future, i want to see how they’re characterized via their speaking styles)

one thing that really interests me in japanese is the 2nd person pronoun system and how people (or characters) choose to refer to each other and this was super fun to watch for in the game. in the first chapter, i counted 1 use of あなた (only in the “what’s your name?” menu input), several uses of きみ (most of which occurred during the personality quiz, but some of which were used by the partner pokemon prior to learning MC’s name; every time, it was written in katakana), 1 or 2 uses of おまえ (used by zubat towards the partner), and i noticed that after learning MC’s name partner exclusively refers to them by their name and does not use any kind of suffix. my guess is that this is either 1. because they are not human / this is standard practice in the pokemon world or 2. hinting at the fact that they end up having a very close relationship and that partner trusts leader immediately. i’m half expecting wigglytuff and/or chatot to be referred to as 先生 or something like that so we’ll see in chapter 2!!

speaking of expectations, i had a couple going in: 1. that there would be a lot of onomatopoeias, because they seem to have a huge amount of use in creative writing, & 2. that i would see a lot of the little stylistic bits & bobs i’m already familiar with in japanese that tell you more about a character. both of these came true! i’ve already added some new onomatos to my flashcards AND i noticed some fun things about the characters:

male partner uses ぼく (sensible - it’s either that or おれ, and he is NOT an おれ character at all) (funnily enough and perhaps somewhat embarrassingly i did name the partner in this game majima and in hindsight i’m thinking wow they are literally not like each other at all but it’s ok i’m just choosing to ignore it i cba to redo the entire save anyway. plus i customized it so he's gastly and i'm clefairy which is already the cutest duo ever and i don't want to change that especially because i also had to give them custom stats and movesets so WHATEVER majima is just going to be different in this universe and he can handle that. also the partner is written very cutely and giving him that name made him even cuter to me so its no big deal really)

speaking of cutely i literally can’t explain this because i don’t remember it being the case in the english version but genuinely there is something REALLY endearing about how the partner talks in the japanese version. i guess thats another reminder that things really do get lost in translation like im sure the TL team did the best they could but english partner and japanese partner already feel different from each other and the latter is so cute, in a way it does feel like he has a fuller range of expression here

i think male MC also uses ぼく? i swear i remember a “ぼくじしん” in there but who knows

ぼく and ほんとう (spelled ほんと by the partner but ほんとう in MC’s thoughts) were almost entirely in katakana (i think ほんとう might have been hiragana), also for some reason なぞ (“riddle” or “enigma”) was in katakana too???? just for artistic flair, maybe? おまえ was as well but that makes sense

zubat and koffing (zubat in particular) both had a rougher, more masculine speaking style, which is exactly what i expected from them. lots of sentence-ending ぜ and ぞ (male partner uses さ from time to time, but not ぜ/ぞ), and they called partner 弱虫くん which made me so mad on his behalf! so rude!!!!!!!

other thoughts:

i was worried about the lack of kanji but honestly it’s not impeding my reading at all. a lot of the words are words that don’t need kanji, and if they are kanji-based words then they’re either ones i’ve never seen before (and i can just look them up online) OR they’re ones i can recognize by their reading/the context/just generally being familiar with them after seeing them a bunch in other places. i definitely feel like my intuition for like…word boundaries and that kind of thing has already gotten stronger and will probably improve from playing this game lol

HOLY FUCK, READING PRACTICE. you would not believe the amount of reading i did. when i got to beach cave (literal very first dungeon in the game) i sat in the menu for maybe at least half an hour just straight up muddling through the 700000 words the game was putting in front of me. some of them i looked up, some i grasped from context, some i gave up on (but the last category was pretty small)

i was reading the entire menu and i got to the “hints” section and it was so long that i just gave up. a treat for future me

speaking of context, playing a game i know by heart was ABSOLUTELY the right decision. i could largely figure out what moves my boys have without knowing what the names of the moves meant by reading the descriptions and going “hmm…ghost…physical…low power…this is astonish!!!!!” or “normal…no damage…always lands…YAWN!!!” etc.

i also think i’m playing this at the right stage of my learning. just beginner enough to heavily benefit from the mass exposure/immersion aspect of it, but learnéd enough to recognize a great deal of what’s put in front of me, and already knowing the game really well makes it SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO (X1000000000) much easier to bridge the gap between what i do and don’t know. i got a tiny bit mentally exhausted from all the reading lol but it was soooooo worth it, most of my studying right now comes in the form of kanji/vocab + grammar/structure + listening to music so i’ve been sorely lacking in the “just straight up reading things normally” department and this game really fixes that up for me :)

keeping it real my speaking is definitely shit because i never practice (unless you count singing…) but i found myself reading out loud as i played to help figure things out and i do feel like i improved a tiny bit by the end. the partner pokemon in particular was really fun to read for because they gave him a fairly emotional/heart-on-his-sleeve speaking style (not dissimilar to the english version, but it feels much stronger here as previously noted) so i got to have fun reading his lines :P i definitely felt like i was hitting the consonants much better and keeping everything flowing well

im trying to upload screenshots but it wont work, so for personal recordkeeping: SENTENCES THAT I READ AND UNDERSTOOD ALL BY MYSELF AND AM REALLY PROUD OF

いちどきめたことはさいごまでやりとおす？ roughly = “once you’ve decided to do something, do you see it through to the end/do you stick with it?” (lit. “one time decided thing TOPIC end until carry through?”)

「はどう」とは　きみのからだがはっするみえないエネルギーのことだ roughly = “[aura] is the energy your body gives off” (lit. “[wave motion] QUOTE TOPIC you POSS body SUBJ emit energy NOM thing is”)

オレンのもをたベると　HPがかいふくするぞ！Xボタンでメニューをひらき　「どうぐ」コマンドからたべてみよう！ roughly = “if you eat an oran berry, your HP will restore! try eating it using the ‘item’ command after opening the menu with the X button!” (lit. “oren NOM/CLASS fruit OBJ eat.NP IF ‘HP’ SBJ restore do EMPHATIC! ‘X’ button MEANS menu OBJ open(NOUN) [tool] command from eat-and-see-VOL!”)

why is the tutorial using ぞ???

is it because i picked boy during the quiz? is it trying to be manly with me??? am i reading too deeply into this? (probably)

i was surprised to see 道具 here because i just recently learned it and i was like “tool? there’s no tools in this game…” but i could tell from its menu position that it was item/inventory so i was like, huh, interesting use of the word…

この　かけらが　はまる　ばしょを　いつか　はっけんしたい！ roughly = “someday, i want to discover the place that this fragment fits into!” (lit. “this fragment SBJ fit place OBJ someday discovery do-want!”)

i did have to look up はまる but i knew all the other words on my own!!!!

it was so fun seeing words i recognized especially higher level (higher relative to where i am, at least, i.e. more recently learned) kanji words like 場所 ＆ 発見。noticing them in kana felt kind of like seeing your friend at a costume party and knowing it’s them without them telling you or something lol and i always get so excited seeing vocab words i know in the wild!! it feels great to recognize them naturally like that :)

[whentheleahvesfall]

1 and 10 for the ask game?

Have I played all of the PMD games?

I have not and therefore I’m not actually really a true PMD fan, I guess I’m gonna die-

For real though haha, the ones I have beaten are Rescue Team DX and Super, which was my introduction to the series after having watched a playthrough of Gates on YouTube. I do have a emulator copy of Sky which I hope to eventually get around to playing as well as a digital copy of Gates I bought just before the 3DS eShop got shut down, so hopefully I’ll get the time to eventually play them whenever I get the chance.

Hopefully soon.

Very hopefully soon.

Definitely hopefully and maybe very well truly soon.

*looks at backlog of games*

…Ah shit.

Opinion on Nuzleaf’s character? Also were you surprised by that twist?

Yeaaaaaaahhh, Leaf Dad my beloved! I love Nuzleaf’s character in Super and eventually beginning to warp into beating Dark Matter just to love his surrogate child is probably one of the sweetest things a twist antagonist has out of any of the PMD games. He reminds me a lot of Gengar and Dusknoir who become both unlikeable in the main story but gradually both attached to the relationships of redeeming themselves to the ones they love.

For Gengar, his relationship with Gardevoir as her former partner makes his warped heart finally gain rest as he proves he has love inside of him even after making Hero suffer through absolutely horrible conditions based on nothing than pure conjecture. It’s his love that breaks the curse placed on him and that’s his redemption.

For Dusknoir, him betraying Hero and Partner and the player realising that Grovyle was a main antagonist allowed I feel headcanons to grow about what came after in SE5 and then PSMD which canonically comes after all three other mainline games (I think?) in the series. Dusknoir realising that he has something to fight for makes his love for Grovyle more apparent after their talk, and him even being willing to fight for an unlikely future just to see a sunrise means to me at least he grew into the person who would eventually care for Hero were they ever to reunite.

Nuzleaf’s plot twist definitely hurt when I saw it, as for Hero, the first Pokémon they met is also the very one who supposedly “wiped all their memories” and him going as far to turn them to stone made me go “holy shit” and sit there for a minute to process what happened. After you realise that he’s been nothing but a pawn for Dark Matter the entire time, I feel once he eventually reconciles with Hero and sacrifices himself to attempt to defeat Dark Matter means he would really end up showing love for his child much in the same way Carracosta did. And I really, really want to imagine during when Partner leaves, that Nuzleaf pours his heart and soul into looking after his grieving child.

Hero’s lost everything.

A purpose in the world, as they already fought Dark Matter. Their lifelong friend, one they knew in TWO different eras, and one which they fought alongside as their shared story. Their will to see into the future (hence my PSMD fanfic title 😂).

And rather than kidnapping Mew to reunite themselves with Partner before eventually connecting with them once you reach Master/Grandmaster rank in the game, I think he just wants to do nothing more than to support his lost child for as long as it takes.

Giving everything he has just to make his child happy again. To smile again.

I never really liked the epilogue depiction of his character (the cream gravy line makes me laugh though), but the welcome home line and the found family trope always makes his bond feel really special and hopefully if I can eventually get around to doing it, I definitely want to write a chapter or a one-shot focused squarely on just those two.

Then it can just as much become the Hero’s main story after the Partner had their turn. :)

Waffling aside, thank you so much for the ask!

[theotherluxray]

May I ask you how you plan out you panels and compositions for your amazing comic pages?

Haha thank you for the compliments!

I'm not the best at this, I'm rather messy, so take my advice with a grain of salt. You'd probably get some better advice from more professional comic artists. Nevertheless, here's what I can say!

1st) I often study and reference how my favorite manga and comics do it. How to block out a page, what amount of detail to include, what needs to be the center of focus, what corners need to be cut... This comic is my first time making a comic, so studying those that did it successfully has been hugely important. My role models for this have been Hiromu Arakawa (Fullmetal Alchemist), Kentaro Muira (Berserk), and recently @do9bessa (artist who makes PMD Rescue Rangers, and recently made a really good Avatar comic). Hiromu Arakawa and FMA in particular have been good teachers for how I should lay out and pace pages.

2) Planning the flow of the panels. Personally I think I still need to work on this, but the most important thing for any page and story is pacing, and making sure each panel of a comic guides smoothly to the next panel and thus keep the readers eyes following along. Kentaro Muira does this pretty well (as does Arakawa too), but I think the best artist who did this in a "simple yet impressive" way was Akira Toriyama (Dragon Ball).

3) Thumb-nailing and Scripting! I do scripting kind of ad-hoc, but I always do thumb-nailing... even if I kinda hate it. Thumb-nailing, for those who don't know, is basically a pre-sketch of the art you wanna make but in a really tiny canvas space, typically 1x1 inch or 2.5x2.5 cm (adjust as needed to properly scale to a full page of course). Doing it this way forces me to focus more on how the page will be laid out and flow than anything else, and gives me a blue print to improve from when i actually start sketching. it's hard to draw in tiny spaces, so I need to get the most important details put down for the thumbnails to even make sense (and thus, for my pages to make sense). Scripting helps make the thumb-nailing process easier, though sometimes I combine the steps and do them at the same time.

4) Practice and f*cking up. The big one, the one that haunts all artists. You just gotta do it. You just gotta put the time in and make bad art sometimes to "git gud". Half of the first chapter of my story is kind of painful to read because of poor art and messy page layouts (not to mention how long that first chapter got). At the end of the day, this is a fancomic; who cares if the art is bad or the pages aren't well laid out at first, or even every now and then? Or if you decide you can't keep up with it due to life issues or new passions? It's very low stakes, and though I take it seriously because I want the comic to be good, it's freeing to know "I can just take a break, half ass a page sometimes, or even quit if I don't like this" because this sort of thing happens all the time with fancomics. If I was making an entirely new comic for a new IP, the stakes would be higher, because I would need to bring in trust and fight for the merit of the IP, but not so with a fancomic. It's the perfect project to practice, put out bad art sometimes, and have fun without high stakes.

tl;dr: Look at your favorite manga and how they do it, practice and use thumb-nails to plan pages, and be comfortable with fucking up or half-assing sometimes.