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thewritingof-therose · 3 years

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Hi! Last week, with the publishing of the 20th chapter of Hasard, I reached the 100 kudos on the fic, so to celebrate it, here’s some kind of bonus chapter where I talk a little about the conception of the story, along with comments about each chapters.

Enjoy!

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So… 20 chapters and 100 kudos already. To be honest, by the time I started imagining this story, I wasn’t really expecting to be able to celebrate that milestone of kudo on a single fic and even if I already celebrated the 2000 kudos in general this year, if we make a quick calcul based on the numbers of kudos and all the fics I’ve published, at the time I’m writing those words, it’s the same that if each one of my fic had only 20 kudos… So yeah, finally reaching the hundred on a single one makes me so happy \o/

Anyway, here’s some trivia and fun facts about Hasard and the first twenty chapters of the story.

First of all, some history:

I had the idea for Hasard in May 2018 as I was watching the tv show Lucifer (I am not up to date with it, please don’t try to spoil me this show ^^’) and I imagined one scene that just… shaped the entire story and it took me less than a few hours to know that I would write it. Even if I wasn’t sure how long it would be and that there had been some changes. And no, I won’t tell what scene kickstarted it all because she still has to come and it could be quite a huge spoiler.

Following it, my brain quickly went into developing the full story and a few things changed. On the top of my head, I can say that Maiev was meant to be more on her own, almost a complete independent Hunter that would have also been resented by the other Hunters, along with a way more black and white view of the demons. She was meant to be more aggressive against all demons and really thinking that they all deserved to die, but I softened that side of her as I shifted the world building with the presence of hybrids.

At first, the hybrids were meant to be a really rare kind and I wanted to keep that status for a few select characters because it could have brought some really good story for them. Then, as I kept working on the worldbuilding, I came to the idea that actually, hybrids were extremely common, but at the same time, the demon’s presence was still a secret from most of the world because most hybrids started centuries ago and their blood and physical attributions were weakening the more they were reproducing. So, about 80% of the world is made of hybrids of all kinds of generation (who is my way of scaling the demonic influence on their life) and the 20% left is shared with the full demons and full humans.

Full demons are simply people who don't have a single drop of human blood in them. Usually, they are born from two other full demon parents or they just appeared like that (that’s the mytho). They are extremely powerful and good magic users, but now, they are rare. It was easier to be a full demon millenia ago when they ruled over the world and the few that are left in the current world of Hasard, survived either by hiding really well, manipulating their way to stay alive, or simply because they accepted to work with the humans and they went on.

My best example of a full demon is Velen.

The full humans, are the humans who either had never gotten a single drop of demon’s blood in their bloodlines, either they purged the bloodline after making sure that there had been at least 10 generations since the last time a hybrid was born (technically, every child following it would be considered as an hybrid, but the other parent would be a full human to weaken the demon’s blood which each new generation). Full humans are rarer than full demons and they tend to be bad news as almost all of them are associated with the Priesthood (who’ll get some more explanation later.)

I haven’t presented yet one of them to give an example, but one is ready to show up in the Second arc of the story. Won’t say who to not spoil the surprise x)

As for hybrids, there are two kinds. The one born from a demon and a human, and or hybrids (two hybrids will keep creating hybrids and technically, as long as one of the parents has human blood, the bloodline will stay a hybrid one). And the second one hadn’t been introduced yet. We have characters that are that kind, but it’s some worldbuilding elements that will show up later and so, I'll keep it to myself for now. Feel free to theorize though! And usually, most hybrids will simply call themselves demons instead of showing signs of weaknesses by not being a full one.

For the title of the story, it had been extremely hard for me to find one. Ever since I started preparing everything, it had a codename and it was “Modern AU” and it stayed like that until the very minute of the publishing of the first chapter. I was already going towards “Le Hasard Fait Bien Les Choses” but I was bothered because it was French, and no matter what, I couldn’t find a good English idiom that would have all the nuances of the French one. The only thing that comes close to it would be “Fate is a funny thing” and yet, I’m not entirely satisfied with it. So, after a long debate with myself and help from other people, I came to the conclusion that I had to keep the French title if I wanted to be happy with it.

It might not help much to get people interested, and I’m considering adding “Fate is a Funny Thing” after it but I’m debating it.

I think that's already a lot, so let's move to the trivia per chapters:

A Muffled Shout In The Night

Oh boy, first chapter! I was so excited to finally start the story but I was also really stressed. I tried to give away a quick summary of how the universe was working, along with my two main characters + showing up the first supportive characters towards Maiev. Trying to present all the cast (so adding Illidari and more about Illidan) right in that chapter wouldn't have really worked so, instead, I went to show that a more "Legion-y" timeline could be expected thanks to Khadgar and Velen's presence in the chapter.

I kinda hope that I succeeded to already show Maiev's obsession towards the Betrayer through her first lines.

Though I will be one hundred percent honest with you. The end of the chapter with Illidan running away, don't expect much from that interaction. I kind of always forget about it unless I'm reading back the chapter… I only needed a reason for them to stop fighting and the chapter to carry on.

But who knows, maybe I'll tie it to something one day.

Two Black Coffees And A Meeting, Please

When writing it, I always knew that Drelanim was on the other side of the call (or at least another Hunter) but as I read the moment a few times, I realized that I could have gone for a completely different way. One that would have probably surprised everyone.

But yeah, in another universe, it's Illidan who calls Maiev because he's in front of her place as they decided to meet for breakfast there. It would have been quite nice and unexpected for the story, especially that Illidan would have gotten right away the reveal that Maiev was actually the Warden as she would have complained about the wounds of the night.

In the end, I went on with my first idea and made them meet for good in the chapter.

And, like with the first chapter… the "current problem" that he talks about to Kor'vas went nowhere… I'll more than probably get him to acknowledge some uninteresting side story for it at some point.

Memories Of A Rainy Day That Will Never Be Forgotten

For that one, one word: Ouch.

By the time I started to write this chapter, I was also preparing the Advent Calendar of 2019 and I had decided on telling Naisha's story, and I had to realize that I still had to foreshadow some elements from it to make it work. Of course, the title is fully referencing the day she died and the demon that Maiev killed right at the beginning of the chapter was similar to Naisha, putting Maiev in a stabbing mood. And it led us to another necessary addition for the Calendar's chapter: Malfurion.

(I'm also wondering how many people guessed right away that Malfurion was the one Illidan was calling…)

Brother, My Brother, Tell Me What We're Fighting For?

Even if Malfurion had more of a cameo than anything in the Calendar's story, I felt the need to introduce him to put the bases of the twins' relationship. I always knew that he was a doctor and that he was mostly helping Illidan when he was getting in trouble, and as their backstory is different from WoW and that they are both demons, I didn't want to go on the canon path for them.

I cannot tell much about it because we'll get fast to their backstory (Second arc) but here, Illidan and Malfurion mostly grew up in a world where it was them against the rest of the world. They were born during the glorious days when demons ruled the world and they saw it change through the millennia that followed. After everything, they would be devastated to lose the other and suddenly be the only one left. This is why they are way closer than they could ever be in canon (and also Tyrande isn't part of their backstory so it helped them keep a good relationship). Sometimes, they part ways for a few decades. Malfurion goes back to medical school somewhere and makes sure that he's up to date for it, or Illidan just moves with his clan to experience new things. But they stay in contact and always come back in proximity of one another.

The end of the chapter was my obligatory "shock reveal/cliffhangers" before a break. But well, I wanted to keep the Legion's existence in my sleeve for a little longer, but I realized that it would allow me to make them into a concrete threat as the story will progress + allowing Illidan and, mostly, the Illidari to be a little more presents into the story.

Actually, the chapter's name comes from a song from the occidental version of the first Pokemon movie. It's a line from the song that plays when the Pokemon and their clone fights, and i used it mostly for the brother's mentions and because it would totally be a thing said by one of the twins in their past…

A Flower Arrangement Made With Your Face In Mind

At that time, I wanted to make a chapter to develop a little more the supporting characters of the cast, and as I was taking back the writing of the fic after a four or five months break, I thought it would be nice.

So, we got a little side dish of Illidari for it and that’s pretty much the only chapter (until now) where Illidan or Maiev barely appears in it. Yet, I threw some worldbuilding and foreshadowing in it and I still like it, so it isn’t really a filler.

I’ll probably do more chapters like that in the future, but I’ll see with the pacing of the story.

Willingly Accepting Your Death Isn't As Easy As I Thought

I don’t have much to say about this chapter. I still really like it and especially Maiev and Velen’s interaction.

Along with showing that we were far from a potential romantic relationship, at least on Maiev’s side x)

A Laugh That Will Echo Through The Ages

Oh my God, that chapter! I could probably talk about it for hours but we would quickly reach the spoiler territory so I’ll see what I can tell without shooting myself in the foot.

I loved giving Khadgar some more identity and I like his relationship with Maiev. In the story, they are around 10 years apart, with Khadgar being the youngest. He’s like an honorary younger brother to every Hunter and even if Maiev won’t admit it, she’s kinda thinking the same.

If he had been in the spotlight for this chapter, it was actually because I was thinking of writing his backstory for the Calendar of 2020 but in the end, I scrapped the idea and wrote something else. But It’ll happen at some point.

You Were In My Dream Last Night, And I Found You That Morning

A simple and nice chapter to calm down from the action heavy that was the precedent. I do throw some crumbs of foreshadowing and backstory, mostly for Maiev, but we will have to wait quite some time for the full one. Even if to be honest, before I release it fully, there will probably be some people that will stitch everything from my crumbs.

Illidan’s dreams are meant to be a plot point all through the story, and I decided to start them with this chapter. And of course, we can see that it’s the first chapter where Illidan, even if he isn’t conscious of it, starts to like Maiev more than he should have at that point.

A Red Dress And Heels To Hide The Knife In Plainsight

I loved writing that one. Showing that Maiev had more hobbies than hunting demons, along with showing how you had to act to get her to do things that she would refuse to do otherwise. Most of the time, if Sira gently asks if she wants to go do some shopping, Maiev always has something else to do. Not that she hates shopping, just that she thinks there’s better things to do.

I could probably go more about Worgens and their existence, but it would spoil some part of the story :/

And honestly, I had an alternate version of this chapter where Illidan saw Maiev and Sira hurrying in the streets, followed them and he would have eavesdropped on the conversation about him. It was obviously bad because it was confirming that Maiev was at least a Hunter (which he won’t know until a while by that time) and it would have been totally an excuse for smut x)

A Warning Falling In Deaf Ears

With this chapter, I’ve been working on mixing the idea of chapters 5 (to concentrate on rest of the cast) with more of the main story. Like that, I show that there’s more than Illidan and Maiev in this universe, but at the same time, I’m still progressing their story by sharing the chapter between the two. I really liked writing Kayn like that and I think that one of my favorite things to write in this story, it’s Illidan and Malfurion interacting.

A Touch So Familiar, Yet So Strangely Threatening

I remember writing that chapter and suddenly realizing that it was going to be longer than the precedent, and i thought for a moment that I had to cut it in half, but I couldn’t find a satisfying way to do it, and it would have fucked up my outline, so I just carried on with it until I had told everything that I had to.

With that chapter, I’m trying to show that Maiev can be really crazy when it comes to the Betrayer and his followers, but I can assure that she wouldn’t wound any of the Hunters, even if they cannot really be sure about it. And the little dialogue with the B-word made me laugh and yes, Maiev already called the Betrayer a bitch to his face. In 13 years, it would have been weird that she didn’t think of it at least once.

For the rest of the chapter, I just wanted to show that Maiev and Illidan were becoming comfortable with each other + setting up a reason for her to be worried about Illidan to show him her good side.

Screaming Under The Full Moon Won't Change Your Fate

The one thing I keep from this chapter, is that I can’t wait to dive more into Velen and Maiev's relationship.

Otherwise, yeah, if Illidan were to go into a fight only wanting to use magic, he could kill Maiev without breaking a sweat. But he likes the challenge and feels like it wouldn’t be satisfying to annihilate her with just a spell, so he’s fighting blade against blades, unless Maiev is really close to kill him.

A Fateful Call That Only You Can Be Blamed For

I have nothing much to say about it. It was one chapter that I really wanted to write and publish, because it’s the one where Illidan just let his guard down around Maiev for good, and now that he won’t try to trap her into admitting that she is the Warden, it allows him to see Maiev in another light.

That anyone can guess what it is.

Oh yeah, just that I threw some good crumbs of the fact that Illidan is a self-loathing addict in my fics and that it’s one of the reasons he falls so hard for Maiev after this chapter. But it’ll be a good talk for either another chapter, or later.

Going Separate Ways For A Night But Not The Life

Nothing to say, it was a transitional chapter to show that Illidan really believes that Maiev isn’t the Warden, and that there’s more than the fight to them.

Stab Me Once, Shame On You. Stab Me More Than Twice...

A fun little chapter. Velen is more modern than most people can believe and once again, I like writing about the interactions between Illidan and Malfurion. Of course, if you go back to read this one after chapter 20, you might see that I already knew how it was going to happen from this chapter, as the 20th got his title in this one.

I just hope that people read the story from the Advent Calendar 2020 to know what happened in the middle of it.

And From There, Fate Laughed At Them

I could talk for hours about Cordana in my AU. I just love what I’m going to do with her characters and I hope that my readers will like it too.

But to give some crumbs, Maiev and Cordana have been best friends since high school and she’s the first long-time friend that Maiev had made in her life and thanks to Cordana, she met with Sira and the group, but most importantly Velen. Cordana is a hybrid of sixth generation, so her demonic attributes are almost non-existent, but she kept some supernatural ability from her legacy. She knew from a very young age that she wanted to hunt demons and protect people, and met with Velen early to prepare her future job. Once she discovered that Maiev had some natural abilities to hunt demons, she saw them as the future “Best Best Friend and Hunters” and convinced Maiev to give a go to the hunt. She was forced to move out in another city but she kept contact with Maiev and the rest of the group. In terms of strength, abilities and hunting score, she is right behind Maiev.

Otherwise, I will add that I had a lot of fun writing the conversation between them about Illidan and how he would be better than the Betrayer *winkwink*.

I didn’t make it clear in that chapter and it won’t be important, but Khadgar has a crush on Cordana.

Cordana meant well with the message, and even if in real life, I would condone such action, here, I needed it to move things around because yes, neither Illidan nor Maiev would make the first step if it wasn’t for Cordana.

During the fight, at the beginning of the scene, Illidan totally complimented the Warden on her abilities but don’t try to make him admit it.

Last thing: my nickname is Fate. I’m the one laughing.

Games, Games, All Is Games

I don’t really have anything to say about this chapter.

Sometimes, Cowardice Allows The Survival Of The Smartest

To be perfectly honest, I regret how I handled Cordana’s week in the story because I’ve barely done anything with her but I can explain where the problem is. I knew that I wanted Illidan to discover the warden’s identity on chapter 20, and I planned all my updates around that one fact, but when it came to the outline, I wasn’t sure what to tell between the chapter 13 and 20 to reach that point and thanks to the Calendar, I moved things around that one and I ended up having the idea of making Cordana appears (She should have come in person in the story much, much later). And as I needed chapters 18 and 19 to build up to the reveal, I ended up completely stuck and making her appearance too fast and if it wasn’t for the message, she would have been useless to the story. But I realized it too late and I couldn’t rework my outline in time.

But well, i’ll give her a better mini-arc in the second arc of the story to atone for it.

Otherwise, I hope that the feel of the countdown to the reveal starting by the end of the chapter had been caught by some people x) It’s obvious to me, but well, i’m the writer.

Step By Step, Tick Tock Said The Clock

Just a build up chapter for the 20th. Even if I really like it and that I’m preparing the ground for future plotlines but I’ll let you guess which one it could be x)

I know I haven’t make it clear in the chapter, but Malfurion knew that Illidan was lying when he pretended that his problem was the Warden “may-be-may-be-not-a-hybrid/demon” but as he also know that his brother is a “stubborn motherfucker” he let it slid.

And yes, somewhere in my mind, there’s an alternate universe where Maiev accepted Illidan’s invitation and that they would spend the evening at her place. Without a reveal first.

Any Last Wish?

I don’t really have something to add to this chapter. I succeeded to write it just as I wanted.

I just had a long debate with myself as to how I wanted it to end, as I had the choice between cutting it right as Illidan is saved by the Warden (maybe not revealing her identity before the next chapter, or it would have been the last line) or just as I did, by them reaching her place first. I chose the latter because I want Chapter 21 to start with a really specific scene and I thought that it was better than a cheap cliffhanger.

The last thing I'll add, is that for the story to go well, I had to make Illidan be the first to be aware of the identity of the other, mostly because he can be the one to change his mind more easily about wanting to kill the Warden. If it had been Maiev discovering that Illidan was the Betrayer at this moment of the story, he would have died.

And now, because I'm not done yet, here’s some info about the bonus chapters that were published independently from the main story!

AC Day 8: A Morning

First calendar, in 2018, and I already knew that I was going to write Hasard. It had no name by this time, but I had written that small scene to try out a few things and see how it’ll work.

There’s a really high chance that I end up rewriting it for the main story, but I think that a few elements will change. We’ll see.

AC19 Day 24: Hasard: Naisha

Probably the worst (in terms of feels) chapter of the story yet.

Naisha is probably the character who had a story and fate the closest to canon and I wanted to keep it like that, as it allowed to shape even more the hate between the Warden and the Betrayer. Honestly, she wasn’t deserving of a death like that, especially that if the Betrayer hadn’t intervened that day by trying to kill Maiev, Naisha would have survived.

Actually, in any other universes/storylines possible, she would have survived. Unfortunately for her, she fell right into the feud and became a victim of it.

At this point of the story, Illidan isn’t even completely aware of what happened that day, and he has no idea who Naisha was. All that he knows is that he thought to have killed the Warden, only to find her, even more angry in the following week. He just knows that he had killed the wrong person, but he had no idea who. Maiev herself doesn’t know for sure that it was the Betrayer the culprit, as she couldn’t see clearly in the rain.

Of course, it’ll end up being brought up in the story :)

AC20 Day 8: Hasard: Malfurion’s Hellish Day

It should have been Khadgar's backstory actually for that Calendar. But even if I have a good idea about it, I realized that I wasn’t completely inspired and that I was missing a few details to be able to write it. So, in the end, I went desperately after another idea and thanks to Melowen, I think, she got me on the idea of writing about Malfurion.

In the end, this chapter, meant to be a funny one with Illidan and Maiev forced to be in the same place for the same job, with Malfurion, aware that it would be a catastrophe to let them discover the truth, ended up shaping the last chapters currently published.

And if you are wondering, no, Illidan wasn’t trying to trick his brother in giving him the secret identity of Maiev. He was just trying to get his brother approbation about the woman he was starting to crush on.

The line: ‘“Yeah, everyone tells me that I look like a famous actor,” Malfurion faked a chuckle, glancing at the woman.’ is a reference to my Bodyguard AU where Illidan is an actor.

Alright, that’s all for the trivia! Thanks for reading this bonus chapter, and the main story until now, and I hope you’ll keep enjoying reading Hasard!

Rose

#world of warcraft #illidan x maiev #long text

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fluffybunnybadass · 4 years

Text

Obligatory Father’s Day fic

Title: Get Rekt With Embarrassment, Silver (no, I will not be taking CC) (yes you can shorten it to ‘get rekt silver’)

Characters: Silver, Gold, Blue; brief appearances by Lance

Word Count: 4600

Rating: idk pg-13 for language?

tw: uhhh cursing and bad dads club, threats of violence by silver but none actually happening

inspired roughly by masters but mostly because it’s a funny idea of silver sending lance a “happy father’s day” text and then it spiraled from there thanks to plot bunnelbys. please enjoy and leave your feels in the tags or rbs, thank you.

You can read on ao3 here cuz my theme is atrocious to read on desktop, I apologize

also please don’t tag this as ship wrt lance and silver or else.

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“Are you going to text him?”

“Gold, you know about my father.”

“No, not him. I meant Lance!”

The redheaded teen gave a suspicious stare at his friend, who was mirthfully grinning at him, playing the innocent but well-intentioned fool. He knew what Gold really meant, but he decided to play along, seeing if he could get his companion to drop the conversation before it even started.

“Why.”

“Because it's Father's Day!” The redhead's face went full flush and he angrily glared at Gold, who only grinned more at his best friend, knowing that he had hit his target. “C'mon Silver! We all know that Lance has been a better father figure to you than your actual father. The guy's got total dad vibes!”

Silver gritted his teeth, his anger and embarrassment growing more with every word that Gold said. “Don't even--! I don't have a dad and that's it, Gold!” He barely held himself back from getting in his friend's face, wanting to hit him but knowing that he would regret it if he did.

Gold help up his hands in a defensive, placating manner. “Okay, okay! I get it! You don't have a dad. You came straight from an egg like Togepi and Sneasel did,” he said, laughing at his own joke.

“... Let's just get on with training today.”

The two had planned to hang out for part of the day. Gold knew that days like today brought his friend some unnecessary reminders of the past that would always haunt Silver, and he wanted to help distract his friend from the cloud of despair, at least for a little bit. Blue was going to join them later on, her understanding of Silver's feelings too good for the redhead to stop her from dropping by unannounced. Silver knew exactly what his friends were doing, and when Gold had asked him to hang out today and train, he shrugged and said, “Suit yourself.” Now he was starting to regret that decision, if Gold was going to be like this the entire time....

They had spent a few hours training. They sat down for a break, letting their Pokemon rest as well. Gold looked over at Silver, sizing him up as he tried again.

“Hey Silver! Can I borrow your phone real quick?”

Silver gave his friend another suspicious stare.

“. . . Why.”

“I wanna see something.”

“No.”

“Aw, c'mon, please? Pretty pleeeeaase? With a cheri berry on top?” Gold had clasped his hands together and bowed his head, begging pointedly.

“The answer's still no.”

Gold gave his friend a pout, and Silver shook his head, sighing a bit. But Gold was relentless in his teasing, and pushed once more.

“You know, you really should send him a text.”

“I'm not sending Lance a text!”

“But he really is a dad! It's courtesy to send your friends a 'Happy Father's Day' text if you know they're a dad.”

Silver gave Gold a skeptical look. In the time that he had spent training at the Dragon's Den in Blackthorn, he had never heard any mention of Lance having kids. Even though the man was pretty private for a public figure, he felt that the bond he shared with his mentor would have earned him some information like that. Not even Clair, who loved to share embarrassing things about her cousin with Silver, had made any mention about being an aunt, any niblings, or anything embarrassing about Lance and fatherhood.

“Oh really? Who's this kid I haven't heard about?” Silver asked, a smug look on his face. He was probably going to regret this, but he felt confident about his information.

“You!”

Silver flushed redder than a Charmeleon. He lunged after Gold, who cackled and leapt out of the way of his glaring friend who shouted at him.

“I'M GONNA PUNCH YOU!”

Silver chased after his friend for a moment, stopping only when he noticed Blue had join them for the day. He stopped and put his fist down, embarrassed that Gold had gotten a rise out of him. He turned away, glaring at where Gold had stopped to watch him, grinning at his friend.

“Don't let me stop you two from your games,” Blue said, teasing her best friend.

“I'm not playing any games...!” Silver said, gritting his teeth. He took at deep breath to calm himself like his two mentors had taught him, and turned around, putting on a smirk to mask that he had been caught acting like a fool.

“We were training.”

“Uh-huh. And part of your training involves literally kicking Gold's ass?”

“...Not literally.”

“That's not what it looked like to me,” she said, teasing her friend still in a playful greeting. Gold caught back up with the two trainers, slinging an arm around Silver's shoulders, who shrugged him off with a groan.

“Hi, Gold.” Blue exchanged a look with him, and the other teen shook his head slightly at her when Silver wasn't looking. “Have you guys taken a break yet? I brought snacks.”

“Nah. We were in the middle of one when Silver got mad at me all of a sudden,” Gold told her with a huge grin on his face, looking at Silver when he said it. “Don't know why though. All I did was ask to borrow his phone...”

“You...” Silver growled in warning, but he shook his head to rid himself of his frustration. “I wouldn't let you borrow my phone even if it meant you were dying.”

“Yeah, because we all know you would be the one using it!” Blue and Gold both laughed, and Silver's face flushed.

“Tch...”

For all their ribbing at him, Silver was grateful that he had earned himself some true friends. He had spent a lot of his life alone, with only Blue beside him as part of a childhood promise they had made. But when they got separated, he vowed to never have any friends again, the pain and ache he felt without them too much to bare. He had spent a lot of his childhood and early teen years telling himself that it was better off that he was alone, that he operated better like that, that he didn't need friends because they'd only hold him back. He didn't need anyone. Not a father, mother, any siblings or any cousins either; just himself. Even his Pokemon were tools to him, no companions in any way that he could have wanted.

But things changed when he met Gold. He kept running into this trainer who kept beating him, even though he knew his Pokemon should have been stronger because he trained them to the ground. He evolved them as soon as was possible. And Gold, who still had a Togepi, a Pichu, Pokemon that were unevolved and powerless on their own, had won against his team that he trained harder and harder each and every time this dopeyheaded trainer crossed his path. It was unfathomable to him that he could ever lose to someone who spent his time laughing and playing with his Pokemon as much as he did train them.

And then he ran into him.

Lance had thoroughly trounced his team with no effort at all. The Dragon-type trainer had given him a pitying look, as though he felt sorry for Silver and his Pokemon.

“Why...? Why? How did I lose so terribly against you?” He had been holding back tears of frustration, shaking as his emotions played with him, the defeat stinging far worse than any against the kid he kept running into. Tears slowly filled his eyes, threatening to fall once the child closed them. He couldn't cry on top of the embarrassing defeat, he just couldn't--

Lance looked at the prone Silver, who had his hands curled up into fists as he slowly beat on the ground, the frustration the child felt too much for the young adult's heart. Lance let out a long sigh, and stood in front of Silver. He knelt down to the child's level, as much as he could.

“You lost because you don't trust your Pokemon. You don't love them.”

Silver found the empty despair within himself burning up with anger. His shaking stopped. He looked up at Lance, and spat on the ground next to him.

“Tch. I lost because of a thing like love and trust? Don't mess with me! I don't need things like that.”

Lance let out a sigh. The child, a preteen, wouldn't be open to hearing an explanation, but he wanted to try anyways. If nothing else, maybe it could plant the seed that would let this kid grow into becoming a better trainer to his Pokemon, and a better human. How he had acted during their battle... To treat his Pokemon so terribly during the match, he almost wanted to stop it before the child had called out the other half of his team. How much had this kid gone through, anyways, to think like this?

“Listen carefully. If you really want to become strong, then you'll need to love and trust in your Pokemon's abilities, and they'll fight their hardest for you. It starts with treating your Pokemon with respect. They're not tools; don't run them ragged in an attempt to be better than someone. Having a rival is all well and good, but don't use it as an excuse to abuse your Pokemon. I hate that. It's things like that, that will cause a trainer to lose, no matter how much training their Pokemon undergo. Once you've established respect with them, spend time with them outside of training. Play with them. It's okay to let go and be childish every once in a while. You won't be able to establish any sort of connection or bond with them if you don't show them love and appreciation. And that bond will turn into trust.” Something it felt like the kid hadn't seen a lot of in his life. The realization pained him to think about, but there was nothing he could do about it if the child wasn't open to him.

“I don't get it....! What does any of that have to do with being the strongest Pokemon trainer there is?!”

Lance let out a half-chuckle, shaking his head. He didn't know how else to explain it to him, but... “I hope that one day you will be able to understand. Please let your Pokemon have some well-earned rest. Even with how poorly you treat them, they still made an effort, and deserve some time off. I think that you, as well, should take some time off to think about things. If you're ever near Blackthorn City, stop by the Dragon's Den. You might be able to find some answers there.”

That had been several years ago.

Silver had grown a lot since then. He had made friends, and re-connected with someone who had vowed to stay beside him. He had confronted his own father, the weak, spineless man who had abandoned him years and years ago, and while he hadn't exactly made peace with his feelings on the matter, it didn't eat him up inside to think about his old man like it used to.

That didn't exactly mean that days like today --where good-natured salesclerks brightly asked him about his plans for Father's day as part of their scripts, or tried to push a sale on him under the notion that he would be seeking a gift for or spending time with anyone who could even remotely be considered a dad-- were any easier or better than they had before. But as he watched Blue and Gold talk and laugh, as they sat around and ate the snacks that Blue brought them, it made him feel a little better to know that he had such good friends that stuck by him. Friends that trusted him, and people that he could.... rely on.

His hand reached into his pocket, absentmindedly tracing the edges of his cell phone.

“Hey, Silver?” Blue asked, pulling him out of his thoughts. He quickly pulled his hand out of his pocket, crossing his arms over his chest.

“...Yeah?”

“Can I borrow your phone real quick? I think I left mine at home and I wanna call to find it.”

Silver gave her a suspicious look. She was good at talking her way into and out of things, being sneaky while seemingly innocent. He looked over at Gold, who was busy playing with his own phone and feeding an Aipom he was training today.

“Can't you get Gold to do it?”

“Gold doesn't have my number saved and I don't remember it.” She gave him a plaintive, sad look.

“You don't-- What do you mean you don't remember your number!?”

She shrugged, looking at him sadly and innocently.

“Grrr....”

“Pleaaaaase? Pretty pleaaaase? It's just to call it!”

Silver had a feeling he was going to regret this. “...Fine.” He jammed his hand into his pocket and pulled out his phone, shoving it at Blue. “Take it. Just don't do anything to it, and definitely do not give it to Gold.”

“Aye-aye!”

He rolled his eyes and turned towards his Pokemon, remembering Lance's words about raising them. He had learned how to love and care for them, from his time watching Gold in order to figure out what exactly made the trainer stronger than him, back when they were still kids. Now they were older, practically young adults, and he wondered what he would have thought of himself back then, if he saw who he had become now. No doubt he'd call himself another bleeding heart like he did Lance that one time... But his Pokemon were happier than they had ever been; his Golbat had evolved into a Crobat once he had learned how to change himself and his attitude towards his Pokemon. He had gone to the Dragon's Den a reviled child, but now he was considered respectable among his peers there. Even Clair had remarked on his change, and it was hard to get some good praise out of the easily jealous, haughty lady.

Blue nudged his phone back at him.

“Thanks! I found it! Turns out it was on vibrate in my bag the entire time!” She laughed at her foolish mistake, waving her phone in her hand.

“...You're welcome.”

“Oh cheer up! You did a good deed today! You helped an absolute damsel in distress.”

He rolled his eyes, and was about to speak, but a text notification on his phone went off, nearly startling him. He gave Blue and Gold a suspicious glare, but they only grinned at him.

“Oh? Wonder who that's from; Gold and I are already here, so I'm not sure who else would be texting you...”

“Shove off.” Based off his friends' grins, Silver had an idea of what had happened. He shoved the phone in his pocket without looking at it, turning away from his friends who were waiting expectantly for the chain of events that were about to happen. “It's probably some spam mail or something.”

“You didn't even look at it!”

“I don't need to look at it to know that it's spam!” he yelled. “You two are right here, as you said! Leave me alone!”

The two other trainers exchanged looks, and Blue sighed. “Fine, fine. So what have you guys been up to?”

Gold and Silver explained to Blue what they had been working on as far as training went, and Blue offered to join in. The two boys weren't about to turn her down, so the training regimen for that day was adjusted to allow for a third person, including a three-way battle amongst the trio. Curiosity had itched at Silver's mind. He had managed to put the text out of his mind by focusing on training, but now that they were having another break, their Pokemon cooling off in the nearby river, Silver couldn't help but wonder exactly what it was. He wasn't signed up for any text messaging offers like Blue was, and he didn't give his number out to just anyone, like Gold did. Silver looked over at his friends, who were busy chatting and dipping their feet into the cool riverbank.

Hmph. They sure are spending a lot of time talking to each other today, he thought with mild bitterness. He chided himself before the selfish, jealous thoughts could spiral, and looked at them once more. They were distracted enough that maybe... Maybe he could sneak a glance at the mystery message.

Silver slowly pulled out his phone, looking around quickly to make sure no one else was nearby. The teen took a deep breath, turned on his lock screen, and took at look at the name on the message preview.

Lance.

He immediately threw down his hand holding his phone, the screen turning back off. His face flushed immediately as he looked over at his friends, knowing exactly what had happened.

“Ho-oh damn these people with its Sacred Fire...” Silver muttered under his breath, trying to calm himself down. It could have been a coincidence, but he didn't believe in things like that. Okay. Fine. What did they send him?

He took a deep breath, and looked at his messages.

<<< Happy Father's Day

That's it. That's all they sent. He breathed a sigh of relief that it had been something simple, nothing big, silly, or extremely out of character for him to send; only to seize up once he realized what the implications were, since he was still very certain that Lance had no kids of his own, biological or otherwise. In a mixture of frenzy and fear, he looked at Lance's reply, worried that the Champion had questioned the message at all, or said something equally as embarrassing as the sheer fact that his friends sent this message at all. Silver's thoughts were rapidly trying to figure out how to escape any exchanges that could have happened, as he looked at Lance's response.

>>> Awe, thanks Silver. :-]

Silver stood there, stunned into confusion as his face flushed. He just.... accepted it? Didn't question it? Didn't press for more? There was no comment on if it was in relation to the implications of Silver sending it. There were a lot of people among the Dragon Clan who swore that the mentor-mentee relationship had evolved into one more familial, of a father and son, and he didn't seem phased at all by them being proven right, had the text been truly sent by him? But more importantly....

<<< What the fuck is :-]

Was that... supposed to be an emoji? A clown? Did it even mean anything? Silver was too embarrassed by the entire thing to even remember to deny any implications that the message could have given Lance, or any that the Champion could have inferred...

His phone's text notification went off almost immediately, and it startled the redhead out of his confusion as he quickly looked up to see if Gold or Blue had noticed what he was doing. He didn't see them by the riverbank anymore, or anywhere nearby, and he wasn't sure if that was a good thing or a bad thing.

“Well... Whatever.” He looked at his phone again. An arm was suddenly swung over his shoulder, as Gold leaned against him, chin resting on his friend's shoulder.

“Soooooooooo, who was that message from?” Gold asked loudly, peering at the phone with the biggest grin on his face.

Silver scowled and tried to shove him away. “None of your business!”

But Gold held on as Silver struggled to push his friend away. In the process, Silver's phone dropped. Before the redhead could retrieve it, a purple flash ran by, swiping the phone in the process. Gold's Aipom had the phone gripped in the hand on its tail, waving it around playfully before passing it over to its trainer. Gold quickly unlocked the phone and read the message aloud.

“Awww, he said thanks! Aren't you lucky to have such a good dad in your life? He didn't even question it! It's almost like he knows.....”

“GOLD...”

Blue was standing by Gold, and read over the younger trainer's shoulder, before looking at Silver with a mock gasp. “Silver! You really use that language with him?”

“That's none of your concern!”

“Eh, I'm not surprised,” Gold said, as though Silver weren't right in front of them. “Though I'm surprised Lance didn't tell him something like to mind his language or anything. He seems like the kind of dad who would frown on cursing. What is that thing he put anyways? Oh, he replied! Let's see....... 'A smiley face'. What is he, fifty? Use an emoji like the rest of us. Or call it that...”

There was a pause. A devious smile crept onto Gold's face. “I'm gonna reply!”

“DON'T YOU DARE.”

“D...A....D, That's dad.... space... P...L...S..... please. There, sent!” He tossed Silver's phone back to him, darting away from Silver before he could lunge at him.

“I'M GONNA KILL YOU!!!” Silver growled at Gold, who was busy laughing his ass off. Blue wasn't helping, as she was trying to stifle her own giggles. This was great. Just great. He loved his friends, but sometimes.... Sometimes he regretted being friends with them. This was one of those times.

“You--”

There was another text notification. Silver snarled at them, then quickly looked at the message to see what kind of damage had been done.

>>> Did you just type dad?

Hastily, Silver replied back, his face hot from embarrassment and ignoring his friends' teasing laughter, asking him to read Lance's response out loud.

<<< NO. MY PHONE AUTOCORRECTED

<<< YOU'RE NOT MY DAD

<<< I DON'T HAVE A DAD I WAS JUST BEING NICE

For some reason, he didn't have the heart to tell him that Gold and Blue had gotten a hold of his phone and sent those messages. As easier as it would have been to explain it, his flustered feelings had gotten in the way, and he found himself responding in a panic before he could even think about his responses. Silver's own panic had given a response to Lance that was possibly worse than telling him that his friends were pranking him and not Lance,which would have meant that there were no good feelings in the messages at all. He could have at least spared him that had he just been more honest and upfront about his feelings, but his own denial made it difficult to even see that he cared about what the older trainer had thought of him until it was too late.

Silver groaned, slapping a hand to his forehead. “Arceus end me, please.”

He ignored his friends, shrugging them off when they gave him apologies for the teasing, asking what he had furiously texted back. Silver showed them, embarrassed, head hung as they read.

“You guys couldn't just leave well enough alone, could you?” Silver snapped. He shook his head, realizing that was harsh. He knew they actually meant well, despite all of their teasing. They really were just trying to get him to open up and see that he had at least one potential paternal figure in his life that cared about him, that he could have had given the barest recognition to. Another groan escaped from Silver and he crouched down, embarrassed and ashamed of all the hard work that he had done thanks to Lance, resulting in this rejection of him. “...He's going to hate me now.”

“I don't know... He didn't seem to hate you when you met; actually, I remember him being concerned about you during the shutdown of the Mahogany hideout,” Gold said, trying to be helpful.

“Gold's right! He's helped you grow and change your life around so much! I think Lance knows you better than that. You're pretty tsundere after all.”

“Ugh. I hate it when you guys call me that.”

“Well, maybe you should stop being one!”

“Nah, if he did that, I don't think he'd be Silver!”

There wasn't a very long wait to find out, as Silver's phone now began to ring in his hands.

All three of them looked at the caller id at once.

“Oh.”

“Should I answer it?”

“What do you mean should you answer it. Do you really think he's going to just give up if you don't answer him? He knows that you're looking at your phone right now!!”

“I don't know! I've never had this issue until you guys made it a thing.”

“Hey, don't look at me! I told Gold it was a bad idea.”

“You still took part!”

“Guys...” Silver sighed loudly, trying to quiet down the squabbling. “I'm answering it.” The other two immediately shut up.

“Hey.” His voice was unsteady as he tried to play it cool, like his usual, detached self. The other two listened intently, trying to hear how the conversation was going. Silver turned away from them, going a few paces away.

“Y-yeah.... Sorry about that. ….Mhmm.... Yes... No, not like that! It's just...” There was a sigh and the other two trainers leaned in, straining their ears to hear as Silver walked away further from them. Blue pouted. Gold threw his hands behind the back of his head.

“Think we might'a pushed it a little too hard?” he asked Blue.

“Mmm.... Maybe? It's not good for him to pretend like he doesn't feel some sort of way towards his mentor. Lance really has been the father figure that Silv's lacked in his life. And I felt a little guilty for awhile that I got my parents back while he still... but the few times I've seen him with Lance, it's like... he actually has a parent for once? Even if Silver hates to admit it, he doesn't wanna let Lance down. He wants to surpass him, sure, but...” She frowned, looking at the silhouette of Silver in the distance. “He's probably wanted a better dad than what he had, and now that he has someone who could fit that bill, he... doesn't think he's good enough for that? I don't know how to explain it. I just know he needed a push in the right direction and I'm pretty sure that Lance isn't gonna sign some adoption papers unless Silver wanted it. And,” she gestured in Silver's direction. “We all know how that would go if we don't.”

“Yeah, that sounds 'bout right for him. Well, maybe one day he'll feel okay. Maybe next year he might actually send him a text without us saying anything!”

Blue laughed. “Wouldn't that be nice? 'Hey Silver, did you remember to text your dad this year'?”

“ 'Yeah, I did, and he said I was a good son'--” Gold broke off, snorting in laughter. “Okay, okay. He probably wouldn't say that. But maybe we could try again next year. Who knows? Maybe by the time we're thirty, they'll have adoption papers.”

“Pffffft.”

The two broke off their chatter when they saw Silver heading back towards them. They watched as he approached, his expression surprisingly calmer than it had been the entire time they had spent together. He looked... relieved?

“Okay... Yeah. ….... Bye.” Silver put his phone away as he walked back towards his friends, the smug expression they were used to back on the redhead's face.

“What happened?”

“What'd Lance say?”

“...Heh. You two are in sooooo much trouble.”

#champion lance #pokemon lance #pokemon silver #pokemon blue #pokemon gold #pokemon #anyways this was a lot of fun #get rekt silver #writing #my writing #pokemon fanfic #trainer silver #trainer blue #trainer gold

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askmerriauthor · 5 years

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Pokemon SwSh Thoughts - Post Game

So I’ve finished Pokemon Sword’s primary content. All that’s left is to finish up the PokeDex and drive myself insane trying to whip up all the variations of Alcremie. That, and delaying buying an online subscription for as long as possible before I bother with trading to get the other game’s exclusives. Here’s some thoughts on the game after the fact:

Pokemon SwSh really needed to come out in late 2020, period. I’ve enjoyed the game so far, but I’ve played it for about a week without putting in too much time/effort grinding and I’ve already done pretty much everything there is to do. I had my Starter leveled up to 100 before I even left the Wild Area for the very first time. The pacing and content depth of this game are pretty much non-existent, whereas the majority of the effort has clearly been put toward refining the competitive combat development. That’s great for those players who really like the battle system, but not so much for those of us who like story and broader gameplay elements.

Pro - Streamlined Gameplay One thing I’ve wanted in Pokemon for ages has been the ability to skip tutorials. I understand the necessity of having them, as every game that comes out is going to be some player’s first and their presence is for that player. But at least having the option to skip them for us old hats would be nice. SwSh does that! I was delighted to discover that the game allows you to bypass tutorials with a simple yes/no prompt when a new element is introduced. How to catch Pokemon, type match-ups, how to heal at Pokemon Centers, and so forth - all the stuff previous games led us through by the nose has been made optional this time around.

I’ve seen some people saying that this game holds the player’s hand too much as it leads us from one gameplay element to the next and doesn’t let us progress at our own leisure. To some degree this is true, but it’s far less egregious than in previous games, such as SuMo. There’s yet to be a good balance between giving the player free reign and giving them enough guidance to ensure we never feel lost, but this has been an inoffensive example as far as I’m concerned. The game does end up feeling rather railroaded, but I don’t necessarily consider that a fault of hand-holding. I’ll get to this matter later on.

Pro - The Style Galar is a very pretty region and the game makes good use of the Switch’s higher capacity to produce excellent backdrops for the player to explore. Many of the Pokemon have charming animations (Falinks is my favorite on this respect). The towns are all really well-designed in terms of visuals, especially compared to the bare-bones looks of older generations. I feel like there could have been more, but what we got is still great.

Pro - Implications in Lore Those of you who know me know how much I love lore and world building. Pokemon, as a franchise, is ripe with opportunity to examine its lore to the most tiny and obscure detail, so any new addition to the franchise is welcome on that front. Galar has some pretty fascinating nuggets to contribute.

I love that the League in Galar, as well as competitive Pokemon Training in general, is treated like a career sport. In specific, I love that this view and practice is exclusive to Galar - I wouldn’t like it at all if the entire franchise shifted to this angle, but it works great for a one-off region. I like that Kabu specifically relocated himself from Hoenn to join the sports league as it doesn’t exist in his home region. The Champion being a sort of major celebrity/superhero, the way Gym Leaders can recruit proteges or even inheritors of their rank from among contenders, the sort of clique all the Gym Leaders have with one another - it’s a really neat dynamic. I also like the notion that actually completing the Gym Challenge isn’t something common and most Trainers who try rarely make it even halfway through. That’s an interesting contrast to other regions where collecting Gym Badges seems almost as a given and the League itself is considered the real challenge, or where the whole endeavor is designed to be finished as a matter of course, like in Alola.

There’s also some really neat additions to the overall lore brought in from the Pokemon Masters mobile game. While its place in canon is questionable, it does specifically mention Galar in a few places. The idea that Pokemon who do not appear in the current Dex are banned from Galar by customs (perhaps identified as potentially dangerous/invasive species) is an interesting one. So is the claim that Iris - the Champion of Unova in BW2 - is a cousin of Leon and Hop. I love it when there are connections amid titles like that as it really helps build a more unified setting.

-Edit-: Darn, apparently those screenshots were fakes. Strike that positive from the list, I suppose.

Mixed Pro/Con - The Availability of Pokemon and the Wild Area I’m not talking about Dexit - I have my own thoughts on that explained elsewhere and frankly don’t think it’s going to end up as bad as everyone is fretting over in the long run. No, in this particular case I’m focused on the availability of Pokemon that are in the game itself.

To put it simply... it’s too easy. I know that filling out the PokeDex isn’t supposed to be a huge challenge, but I’ve gotten the majority of it done - evolved forms, item-reliant forms, gender/size/color variations included - with pretty much no effort whatsoever. I like the idea of the Wild Area in principle but what it ends up being in practice is lacking. It’s too easy to just hoover up Pokemon at a breakneck pace, which leads to other zones and the Wild Area itself becoming pretty much immediately obsolete. I have no need to return to them once I’ve gotten everything I need and there’s not enough general content to urge me to visit again.

The Wild Area itself is a big open sandbox that you can roam around in, which is nice compared to more linear zones in past games. Galar has its railroad routes, but they’re brief (aside from the obligatory overlong water route, which even then is still quite a lot smaller than other regions’ have been). However, it’s just that - a big open sandbox. You can wander through it very easily and even traipse into the “high level” zones without fear because you can see all the Pokemon coming and give them a wide berth to avoid them. There aren’t any obstacles or challenges within the Wild Area itself, and the game makes it supremely easy to find Pokemon even under specific weather/time conditions, which I feel is a missed opportunity. I would have rather the Wild Area been MUCH bigger and more involved, full of places to explore and puzzles to solve. Similarly, I would rather that Pokemon were more difficult to come by as well - that a greater deal of effort would have been put toward tracking and discovering certain harder-to-find Pokemon, with more in-game detective work to find your prize.

Mixed Pro/Con - The Characters The ensemble cast of new Gym Leaders are great - I enjoy the majority of them and frankly want more interactions, more encounters, just more in general. That’s sort of the problem though - I want more. The game itself criminally under-utilizes these characters, especially compared to how much more involved and explored Gym Leaders have been in recent games. There is precious little content using the Gym Leaders here in Galar as it stands and I constantly found myself wanting them to hang out longer and have the chance to learn more about them. Their League Cards are a neat little addition full of interesting tidbits about their histories, natures, and relationships with each other, but I would MUCH rather have gotten to see all that play out in the game itself rather than read it as a flavor blurb.

On the con side of this, however, is the fact that all of the characters are extremely one-dimensional. We’ve been seeing a steady increase in the depth and development of supporting characters in the games since BW onward, with SuMo arguably having the most to date. The overall characterization in SwSh is incredibly lacking by comparison as we don’t get nearly enough time to be with the cast, nor is the cast given the chance to present more than one note per. Nobody has any sort of emotional growth or development. The closest thing to a character arc in the game is Hop’s acceptance of the idea that he’s not going to be the Champion, but it doesn’t have anywhere near as much punch as it could and is over in the blink of an eye compared to how he spends THE ENTIRE GAME repeating the same “I’m gonna be the Champion/Hokage/Pirate King!” spiel every time he’s on screen.

Con - Dynamaxing and Max Raid Battles I’m not really on board with the whole “Mega-Evolution is best! No more gimmicks!” train because that’s just silly to me. Every game has its gimmick and the way Pokemon gradually picks up tricks and traits from its past versions to consolidate into newer titles is one of its strengths. That said, Dynamaxing is worthless and a pointless addition to the game, both in presentation and practice.

The visual of a Pokemon going kaiju is a neat concept and one I was initially intrigued by, but in practice it falls flat because it’s as thin as cardboard. It’s just Mega-Evolution and Z-Moves smooshed together with an additional 3 round time limit tacked on. All it functionally does is buff your Pokemon’s HP pool and add additional weather/status effects to certain attacks, but in some cases the Dynamax versions of attacks are actually weaker/less useful than their base form. In Gym Battles all the way through the final League fight with Leon, I didn’t bother with Dynamaxing because my Pokemon were strong enough to not need it. I could one-shot Dynamaxed Pokemon with ease using a non-Dynamaxed Pokemon and that really shows a flaw in the design if ever there was one. Dynamaxing doesn’t add or improve anything vital to gameplay - it’s just fluff.

Max Raid Battles as found in the Wild Area are even worse. For those of you who don’t know, these are instanced battles against a Dynamaxed/Gigantamaxed wild Pokemon where you team up with three other players/NPCs. If you win, you get a bunch of useful items and have the chance to catch the wild Pokemon as well, which is the only way you can get certain Gigantamax-capable Pokemon reliably.

The issue with these Max Raid Battles is that they’re an absolute slog. In the early stages of the game they’re all super easy to the point that I could solo them and thus gathered mountains of EXP-boosting candies, which let me overlevel my Pokemon beyond reason. Since the whole “your Pokemon is too high level and won’t listen to you” thing apparently doesn’t apply to Starters and special Event Pokemon, I was able to max-level and run rampant across all opposition with my Starter and my special “thanks for buying early” Meowth. HOWEVER. The difficulty scale of the Max Raid Battles increases with your game progress, so by the time I finished the game and went back into the Wild Area, the Max Raid Battles’ difficulty had ramped up. That’s an okay compromise on its face, but the manner in which the difficulty has increased is poor game design. The battles aren’t any harder, they just take longer - the wild Pokemon has more HP, tosses up a few rounds of shields to soak damage at the start and again halfway through the fight, and purges stat boosts from the player and party throughout the battle. It just makes the fights a pain in the ass to get through rather than making them more challenging or fun, and it’s gotten to the point that I don’t even bother with them anymore. They’re just not worth the trouble, not even for the sake of trying to farm EXP candies because, at this point in the game, all Pokemon in the Wild Area scale up to level 60+ and thus are perfectly serviceable as EXP farming fodder themselves.

On a lore side of things, Dynamaxing is really confusing. There’s the whole visual aspect of the Pokemon growing to giant sizes and sometimes changing their appearances, and there’s these massive arenas built to facilitate the whole thing. But the game itself goes out of its way to impress the fact that the Pokemon aren’t actually getting bigger. They just appear to grow in size and haven’t actually physically changed themselves so Dynamaxing is more like a giant hard light holographic projection than anything else? It’s just a really weird design choice to have made and I don’t understand why it was included.

Con - The Writing So, writing is very important to me. It’s literally been my job for the past decade with various game studios. I don’t consider myself any sort of literary snob as I feel there’s a place for schlock right alongside masterpieces - they all serve a specific purpose and fulfill a particular hunger the reader would like satisfied.

That said, SwSh’s writing is abysmal.

Right on the face, there’s not enough of it. The game is criminally short and light on content, which directly impacts its pacing. Remember earlier when I mentioned that things felt railroaded? That’s because there’s not enough story to rest on - it all flies by as fast as can be, forcing the player along a very narrow and brief chain of events that don’t feel consequential at all. Further, the player has no agency in events whatsoever. It’s not the player’s story - it’s Hop’s story. We’re the supporting role to his journey, shallow as that arc may be. Hop is the one who initiates the events of the game without our input as a character and then we spend the entire game following him around, or being pushed into the next event by other characters who are facilitating Hop. At no point is the player ever given the chance to express their own characterization, motivation, or even opinions. Nearly every two-choice dialogue option that appears boils down to “Yes” or “Slightly More/Less Enthusiastic Yes”, which is a huge downgrade from the genuine negative responses and NPC reactions that were present in SuMo.

In terms of overall plot, SwSh has pretty much the same level of depth and complexity as the original Red/Blue titles, and that is as scathing a criticism in this modern age as I can possibly imagine. The whole story is “run in a circle, collect badges, fight vaguely present villainous threat, fight league.” We are actively forced from one gym fight to the next with no time to breathe, no story-focused events in between, and not even any chance to appreciate the gym, its leader, or even the towns they take place in. It’s one and done - once you’ve got the badge there’s no reason to hang around and the story shuffles us along quickly as can be. I mean that literally in some cases - there are hints of a greater plot at hand with Sonia investigating the history of Galar’s legends and the potential machinations of mega-corporate mogul Chairman Rose. But each time those are broached in game play, the game pushes the player off-screen and says “Well, that’s not something you need to worry about. Go get another badge!” I mean, LITERALLY! There’s a point where The Plot begins to kick in where Pokemon begin to spontaneously Dynamax and cause havoc, which is the narrative queue for the player to become involved and for the story to reveal a new facet. But when that happens, Leon LITERALLY says “leave this to the adults, you just focus on your Gym Challenge” and runs off-screen to handle it himself. It would be a good narrative subversion if it led up to things eventually getting out of hand and the player getting roped into things, or the player having the ability to defy such warnings and interject themselves into danger. But that doesn’t happen - the game just forces us to focus on the Gym Challenge alone and keeps all the actual plot of the game off-screen away from us. This is very poor narrative design and game design alike, and it all comes to nothing because we’re forced to clean up everything in the end anyway by battling the villain and legendaries as per usual.

Though I should also point out that there’s no villain in this game.

But what about Team Yell and Chairman Rose, I hear you ask? They’re not villains, both literally and figuratively respectively. Team Yell never really does anything other than act as brief gate locking elements throughout the game until you finish the Gym you’re at, then they bounce off to the next part of the route they’re set to block. They don’t do anything bad and, as it’s later revealed, they’re actually just a bunch of Spikemuth Gym staffers who are posing as hooligans to support Marnie. They’re literally not villains and, once you beat the Spikemuth Gym, they actually become supporting characters who cheer for the player character and help out against the actual supposed villain of the game.

The actual “villain” of the game is Chairman Rose and his assistant Oleana. However, they’re only villains because the script says they are. They don’t actually do anything bad throughout the entire game nor is there any indication that they have some sort of grand master plan. The most we get is some unusual happenings like small quakes and explosions in the distance, but the game never allows us any chance to investigate - we’re just shoved off toward the next Gym each time. So when Chairman Rose is finally revealed to be the Big Bad, it comes completely out of left field and seems to happen for no reason whatsoever. Further, IT IS FOR NO REASON WHATSOEVER. Chairman Rose’s plan and goal is never explained in depth - all we get is the vague indication that he believes that Galar isn’t sustainable and there will be an inevitable energy crisis in about 1,000 years, and somehow his EVIL SCHEME will fix it. But, like, even Leon flat-out says “I understand your concern but you’re being hasty, this doesn’t need to be rushed, chill out for five seconds and let’s figure this out reasonably”. Instead Rose interrupts the Champion match and announces his EVIL SCHEME on global broadcast for literally no good reason. There was no dire immediacy that required him to do it right then and there, or in that manner, but the plot needed to move us along so that’s how it goes.

It really doesn’t help that, prior to all this, there’s absolutely no indication at all that Rose nor Oleana are bad guys. They’re just business folk who appear to have nothing but good intentions and support for Leon, with the other adults of the cast all happily trusting them. There is nothing to make them seem suspicious in practice and they offer no reason to doubt them at all, so them suddenly being the bad guys is just confusing. Further, how the player is first introduced to the concept of them being antagonists is easily the most ridiculous logic jump and overreaction I’ve seen since the old Adam West Batman television show. So get this: after a battle, Leon says he’ll meet Player and Hop for dinner to celebrate. Player and Hop wait for Leon, but he never shows up. Another NPC explains that Leon was called in for a last-minute meeting by Chairman Rose (who is his boss and has made such requests of Leon’s time throughout the game, as I feel is important to point out) and apologizes for having to miss the dinner plans. Simple enough sort of situation, right? The sort of thing that any reasonable person would shrug and say “Well, that sucks but okay, let’s go eat on our own then” to, right? So what happens here instead?

The Player, Hop, Marnie, and her Gym Leader brother GATHER A SMALL MOB AND STORM CHAIRMAN ROSE’S BUSINESS HQ, FIGHTING THEIR WAY THROUGH SECURITY.

I mean, escalation much? We all have smartphones - just send Leon a text, for goodness’ sake. I’m playing through these events constantly going “why the hell are we doing this and why is everyone acting like it’s some sort of dire emergency?”. And do you know what happens when we finally kick down the doors to Chairman Rose’s office? We find Chairman Rose and Leon quietly having a peaceful chat, after which Leon apologizes for having to cancel the dinner plans and we all walk out together like nothing happened. It was just this huge, needless overreaction that has no consequence and that neither Rose nor Leon even bat an eye at. We, as the players, learn absolutely nothing of importance and are back on the Gym Challenge immediately with no functional changes to the narrative.

Like... what was the point of that?! How was that the best option to try and put Chairman Rose and his underlings into the role of antagonists for us to oppose?

So what is Chairman Rose’s EVIL SCHEME anyway? Basically he wants to provide Galar with renewable clean energy which... uh... is bad? Somehow? Apparently he plans to use a Legendary Pokemon called Eternatus - apparently the source of Dynamaxing - which is literally never mentioned at any point in the game except precisely when it’s time to fight/capture it, nor does fighting/capturing it have any impact on the story or setting. You would think that the player being in control of a massive Eldritch horror that has UNLIMITED POWER at its disposal would be something of a sticking point somewhere in the story, but no. Eternatus and Rose’s plan are never mentioned until precisely the time you need to deal with them, and once that’s done they’re both never mentioned again. Done and done all in one. No gradual seeding of information, no hints and clues throughout the game, no development of lore - just wham, bam, thank you ma’am and off we go.

Y’know, call me silly but in a game that has undertones referencing climate change, extinction of animal species, and criticisms against capitalism run amok, is it really a good idea to depict the guy advocating for clean energy to be bad? That feels like a missed mark to me.

The post-game plot, should one bother to call it that, is just inane. It basically boils down to a pair of one-shot baddies who show up and say “Ha ha! We’re rich and that means we’re better than everyone! Watch as we cause trouble for vague reasons, get hoist by our own petard, and then fuck off forever! Byeeeee~!” The post-game is completely pointless and doesn’t add anything of value at all. Which, again, compare to older games like ORAS’ post-game expansion content and it’s nothing but a damn shame.

SwSh’s writing is shallow and limited at best, with one-dimensional characters, no genuine conflict or resolution, terrible pacing, and repetitive elements that boomerang around over and over and over again to the point of annoyance. Compared to what we’ve seen Pokemon achieve in earlier titles like BW, ORAS, and SuMo, it makes it all the more obvious that SwSh was not given ANYWHERE near the time and love it needed in development and is a massive downgrade in that respect.

Con - Lots of Style, No Substance To wrap all this up - I enjoyed playing SwSh as much as I did any other early Pokemon game. I think that, as a first installment on a new system, it’s fine. That’s all - it’s just fine. It’s serviceable as a means of establishing the franchise onto the Switch and completing its move off purely-mobile mediums like the Gameboy and 3DS. It’s pretty to look at and has a superficial level of engagement, but its prettiness and level of content very quickly reveal themselves to be only skin deep. Once you get past the initial gloss there’s really nothing to this game compared to the content, involvement, and writing quality displayed in past titles on lesser-powered systems. The towns are all pretty but there’s nothing to do in any of them aside from a Gym battle - there’s no additional fun to be had in each location, making them little more than set pieces. The characters have initial appeal and potential for more, but the game never explores them at all. There’s room for a bigger narrative and interesting story with the elements presented, but no opportunity to actually see them fleshed out. The Wild Area seems big and involved at first, but as soon as you’ve gone around its loop once or twice you suddenly realize how small and compartmentalized it really is, and it lacks any reason to revisit in the end game. The major game play function - Dynamaxing/Gigantamaxing - is little more than a novelty that is basically irrelevant to gameplay itself and, in an absolutely baffling decision by the folk behind the official competitive scene, is actually somehow banned from being used in competitions? Like, not even “we’ve disabled the Dynamax button in online” but rather “if the competitive Pokemon you’ve spent so much time perfectly constructing has a Gigantamax form, it will not even be allowed access at all, so you better have an identical non-Gigantamax version on hand if you want to play”. So, what exactly is the point of even having Gigantamax Pokemon then?

Everything about SwSh seems half-baked. The ideas are there but they aren’t finished. It should have been given much more development time and, having been in the position of the creative/dev team under demands from the shareholders, I completely sympathize with Game Freak’s devs in all this. SwSh is ultimately a weak product but one with a lot of good ideas that weren’t given the chance to really shine. As such, I’ve got rather high hopes for the next installment to improve on the unfortunately thin foundation SwSh has set. Game Freak’s team has given us some amazing Pokemon games in the past and, assuming they’re given sufficient time and resources to make a title to their satisfaction, I have every confidence they’ll do so again.

#pokemon #pokemon swsh #game review #wall o'text #game freak #thank you game freak #hey nintendo - quit breathing down the dev team's neck and stand up to the shareholders for them #spoilers

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semitura · 5 years

Text

Pokemon sword and shield anime: What I want to see.

Okay so I want to talk about what I want to see in the Pokémon sword and shield anime. This is not going to happen, but let me share with you my ideas.

I’m going to focus on who’s going to be travelling along Ash and the relationship between them, along with some plot points and starter.

The names would be Grizel for the female companion and Blair for the male companion.

As you know, the female MC usually travels along Ash. This won’t be different in this season.

Grizel, Guriza in Japanese (グリザ) has her fanon personality: a loud Scottish girl, always ready to battle and fight everyone on her way. Very energetic and ready to kick your ass, her ass and everyone else’s ass.

Her voice would have a very strong accent and she would have a different dialect from everyone else. To put some examples: Having a Scottish accent and dialect in the English dub, Using Kansai dialect in the Japanese dub (known for having a strong pronunciation), using Latin Spanish in the Spanish dub and vice-versa...

Given the way she speaks, Ash (and the audience) would have a bad time trying to understand her. Blair would often act as a “translator” for Grizel. This way, we’re not just making her voice different and unique, but we’re making a character that offers the audience a way to learn new words and expressions!

Unlike all the other female companion, Grizel is taking the league challenge, making her Ash’s “rival”.

Grizel would always be the one rushing the group to get anywhere. When a girl hits on Blair, she would save him every time threatening them or flirting with them.

Grizel and Blair are childhood friends. She is the one who has to drag Blair out of his house and make him go out. She wants him to make friends and be more confident, but she knows these things take time. Grizel knows he can count on Blair to cover her back at any time. She knows Blair will always be there to protect her. She feels safe around him. For Grizel, Blair is his shield.

Grizel and Ash wouldn’t get along at first and they would fight against each other and argue a lot. Grizel would always make her best to annoy Ash and rug any small victory on his face. As the plot advances, Grizel learns to tolerate Ash and vice-versa. They become good friends and even have double battles together.

Starter: Scorbunny

As I mentioned, Ash often has a male companion along the female MC. It would be the rival from Pokémon Sword and Shield.

Blair, Burē (ブレー) in Japanese is our rival. He is the polar opposite of our female companion: calm, logical, fearful and always there to help others.

His voice reflects this, being calm, sometimes a little too much. He is very well spoken.

However, he is a whole different person when it comes to Pokémon contests. Yep, unlike most male companions, Blair’s dream is to be a Pokémon coordinator.

When he’s on the stage, he is confident, putting his heart and soul in each show. When he talks about pokemon contests, his voice has a happy tone, you can see the excitement on his face, you can feel how much he loves what he does.

Blair would be the one making food for everyone, he would provide facts and he would get hit on by cute girls, making him uncomfortable, only to be “saved” by Grizel.

Grizel and Blair are childhood friends. He is the one who has to calm down Grizel in order to stop her from doing something very stupid and dangerous. He wants her to think twice before acting, but he knows these things take time. Blair knows he can count on Grizel to overcome any obstacle. He knows Grizel will always be there to fight for him. He feels confident around her. For Blair, Grizel is his sword.

Ash and Blair have a peculiar relationship at the beginning. Blair has a lot of trouble speaking with Ash. Ash soon discovers that Blair is completely different when talking and participating in Pokémon Contests, amazing Ash in the process. As the plot advances, Blair builds enough confidence to ask Ash to be his friend. They start to interact more with each other and see their friendship become stronger.

Starter: Sobble.

Ash would get Grookey.

[Plot points]

> Blair becomes the “Contest king”, making him the first companion to win the contest championship in the story of Pokémon.

> Ash WINS the Pokemon league, only to be defeated by Grizel minutes later.

> Obligatory Grizel participating in a Pokémon contest episode. She only does it for Blair.

> Lots of tea time. There’s an episode dedicated to brewing tea or how to brew tea.

> Grizel, Blair and Ash having a trio battle (between each other or against someone)

> FLASKBACK EPISODE FOR BLAIR AND GRIZEL.

> Grizel getting along with Team Rocket. No, really. She enjoys hearing their motto (and joins them in doing it), invites them to tea time, gives them advice and sees them as annoying recurring rivals.

> For an episode, Grizel JOINS them out of free will. She gets to wear the uniform. It is a wholesome episode.

> Blair getting to wear the female contest outfit. Please. Let him. Also, Grisel wearing the male one. Let her.

> Blair having autistic traits… pls…

> Grizel being a huge lesbian icon… pls…

> Reference to the whole Blair being Grizel’s shield and Grizel being Blair’s sword. It would be awesome. Pls.

That’s it, feel free to add more stuff.

#pokemon #pokemon sword #pokemon shield #pokethings #pokeani

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sweetheartjeongguk · 6 years

Text

love letters

pairing: namjoon x reader

genre: high school au, fluff, minimal angst

rating: g

warning(s): insecurity, slight jealousy

word count: 2.2k+

summary: you’ve held his heart in your palms since the age of eight years old, but there was a difference between true love and wishful thinking.

masterlist

He writes you the first letter at the tender age of eight years old.

It is filled with numerous grammatical errors and multiple ink streaks from him forgetting that he can’t erase pen marks. He signs the bottom as “Joonie” because everybody calls him that.

Everybody being his parents and his sister.

The next letter is written when the two of you are graduating middle school and heading to the same high school. He is extremely ecstatic that day when he finds out, kicking his feet up and down and jumping high on his bed until the springs yelps in agony (more so, when his sister barges into his room and screams at him to stop bouncing or else she’ll take away his Pokemon cards). Needless to say, Namjoon bottles up his excitement and lets the words flow onto paper, all summed up with a shaky “Kim Namjoon”.

The third letter comes nearly a day after the homecoming dance. Namjoon is forced to go by his best friend Seokjin who ends up vomiting on the dancefloor after eating a few bad shrimps and has to be picked up by my mom. Namjoon writes about this in full concern, hoping that you would share his worries too.

Not that you’ll ever see these letters, but Namjoon would like to think that despite not knowing Seokjin that well, you’d feel sorry too.

He also comments on your beauty that night – how the yellow dress you wore brought out your smile and the lipstick was a nice shade of red.

‘You looked like a princess that night. Kind of like Belle from Beauty and the Beast. I wish I could have told you that myself, but you wouldn’t want to be seen by a guy like me.’

Namjoon tries to write a fourth letter, but he finds himself unable to do so. He watches you from a distance – seated at the back of the cafeteria, vaguely listening to Seokjin’s rant about the cost of school lunches while staring intently at your figure as you walk across the room to your friend’s table. Ever since your debut at the high school, you’ve been dubbed popular royalty by pretty much the entire student body. Boys grovel at your feet while girls are desperate to be called your “best friend”.

Call it wishful thinking, but Namjoon likes to think that he understands you. He likes to think that he can understand your emotions better than your “friends” can, better than the boys who claim to be in love with can. While Namjoon could very well be sucked into the “boys-who-are-hopelessly-in-love-with-you” category, he likes to think that he’s different.

He hopes that, given the opportunity to get to know you, you’d start to feel the same way.

That night, he writes you the letter. He recalls the look on your face in the cafeteria when your friends are joking around you and aweing at your every move. He could see the pain in your eyes at the insincerity. He could see your longing for more, for something real.

‘It’s okay to feel sad and anxious. It’s okay to feel like you’re fighting against the entire world. Just know that I’ll be by your side when the time comes. I’ll fight for you.’

His fifth letter is written at the back of Biology class during a boring documentary about biodiversity. The side of his hand smears at the pencil markings, but he’s too desperate that he doesn’t seem to care that grey stains his skin. Today, you come into class late, your hair a tangled mess and the lipstick smudged at the corner of your mouth. If you had looked closer, you could have seen that the concealer over the reddened mark on your neck didn’t cover a thing.

Namjoon feels a sharp pang in his chest – no doubt, jealousy – but he also feels anger towards himself, more than anything.

‘Why am I too cowardly to do anything? Why must I force myself in the distance while you drift further away?’

This time, he signs off as “KNJ” – someone mysterious, someone unknown.

Exactly what he is to you.

For a while, he stops writing you letters. It feels awkward to write to you now. Looking back on his old letter, he’s ashamed of the way he thought of you. You weren’t his – everyone knew that, Namjoon especially. This is why he stops writing to you – in an attempt to collect his thoughts and not spew them out of the pages like an immature teenage boy. Seokjin would disagree and say that ‘Yes, we are immature teenage boys’, but Namjoon still enjoys a little blissful ignorance once and a while.

The two of you are reaching the end of your junior year, heading closer to your last year of high school. Soon, you will be off to college, off on your own separate paths.

He overhears one of your friends’ conversations that you had been planning on going to a university in America. You have been desperate to study abroad and to experience a culture so different from your own. This is no secret to everyone – even the janitor knows. Namjoon decides to play it safe and aim for a university closer to home, possibly even in Japan if he tries hard enough.

He tries to ignore the innate feeling to pick up a pen and scribble down his thoughts as they rush through his brain and spill onto the paper. He tries taking an extracurricular afterschool despite his teachers telling him not to overload his already-packed schedule. He takes his dog out for walks almost twice as long as usual, in hopes that the cool breeze and scenery will force him to forget. He even takes a minute to text Seokjin back, even during his scheduled My Hero Academia binging.

No matter what he does, you always seem to creep back into his thoughts.

The start of senior year kicks off before Namjoon could even take a breather. Homecoming is shoved down their throats, demanding for school pride and support for the upcoming homecoming game. Namjoon sees on the senior board that you have been nominated for homecoming queen. He has no doubt that you’ll win and even puts in a vote with a heart at the end of your name in the little bucket at the front of the cafeteria.

When you finally do, he’s sitting there on the bleachers, clapping alongside everyone else. He smiles at the look of complete surprise on your face as you walk down onto the field with your partner Jung Hoseok to receive the obligatory crown and sash.

As you link arms with Hoseok and wave at the crowd, Namjoon gulps as your eyes meet.

Your stare lingers until Hoseok nudges your side and pulls you in for a group photo. Namjoon sighs (from relief or dissatisfaction, he doesn’t know which) and starts down the bleachers to head towards the parking lot. Seokjin is waiting by the car for him, and Namjoon gets in without another word, ignoring the look of bemusement on his best friend’s face.

Certainly ignorant of the wandering eyes that had been watching him from the bleachers for quite some time.

His sixth and final letter is written hours after prom. Once again, he is forced by Seokjin (as well as his parents) to attend. Something about it being “one of the most important moment in your high school career, nay, your entire life!”

He could have told Seokjin (and his parents, primarily his mother) that he was overreacting, but he didn’t exactly want a smack in the face to leave a big bruise on his cheek before the “big day”.

Namjoon sits on the gym bleachers, awkwardly holding onto a flower corsage that his mother bought for him to give to his so-called lovely date. He didn’t want to mention to her that he may or may not (emphasis on ‘may not’) have asked someone to the dance, but the teary smile on her face is too precious to destroy with his devastating news.

The flowers are a simple yellow color – a symbol of happiness and sunshine. Yet Namjoon is sat here with no one to share it with.

Seokjin is dancing it up with his date amidst the large crowd of teenagers by the DJ, making her laugh with his ridiculous rendition of the Chicken dance mixed with some other obscure dance move that is certainly outdated. The gym is filled with sweaty teenagers either standing around while waiting for someone to ask them to dance or grinding it up and making the teachers stew angrily at the blatant provocative moves.

Namjoon twirls the flower in his hand, pausing to scratch behind his ear and scan the crowd for anything interesting to watch. Suddenly, the visual of Seokjin crowd-surfing isn’t enough to satisfy his entertainment needs. No one seems to pay him any attention as they pass by, shouting over the loud music or laughing drunkenly. Namjoon scrunches his nose when he catches a whiff of the strong alcohol, but he stays silent in his seat. He couldn’t care less about what those people were doing – besides, what he is doing isn’t any special either.

“Mind if I sit?”

Namjoon turns with widened eyes at the sudden voice. More specifically, your voice.

You stand at his right with a hopeful expression on your face, wearing a fluffy peach dress with matching heels. Namjoon wipes his sweaty palms on his pantlegs in an attempt to rid his mind of his lovesick thoughts.

“S-sure.” Namjoon stammers.

“Thanks.” You settle down next to him, fluffing up your skirt in an attempt to avoid catching it on your heels.

The two of you sit there in silence for a few minutes – Namjoon trying hard not to sweat profusely and you bobbing your head to the upbeat song playing throughout the gym.

“So…” You start, shocking Namjoon back into reality. “Where’s your date?”

“My…date?” Namjoon asks stupidly.

“Yeah, your date.” You point at the corsage in his hands. “Isn’t that for her?”

“Oh…” Namjoon’s gaze shoots down to his lap where the sad excuse of a corsage lays. “Y-yeah, my mom got them for me, but I-I couldn’t tell her that I…”

“…didn’t have a date?” You finish.

“Y-yeah.” Namjoon chuckles nervously. “I know, it’s stupid, right?”

He half expects you to agree and laugh at him too, but you do nothing of the sort.

“Of course not!” You frown. “I think it’s sweet!”

“R-Really?” You nod, your frown replaced with a cheeky smile.

“Yellow’s my favorite color, so you get extra points for that.” You wink.

‘Oh, god, I feel like my heart is about to explode in my chest.’

“Any girl would be lucky to be given flowers by the one and only Kim Namjoon.” You continue as you fiddle with the rings on your fingers.

“Y-You know my name.” Namjoon stutters, fumbling with the flower in his hand and nearly ripping out a couple petals as a result.

“Of course, we’ve been in the same classes since elementary.” You hum knowingly. “Also, between you and me…”

Namjoon waits for your next words, his heart pounding in his chest. He wouldn’t be surprised if he died in the next five minutes.

“I’ve heard from Seokjin that you like me.”

Namjoon pales.

‘What the fuck, Seokjin?’

“Actually, not really.” You backpedal on your words. “Seokjin was telling his girlfriend about you and it just seemed to come up. She’s one of my friends so…”

Scratch that, Namjoon is about to die in approximately five seconds.

“What?” Namjoon awkwardly laughs. “He’s just lying, he just says all that to rile me up.”

Namjoon’s crooked grin falls flat when he sees the expression on your face drop. “Oh…I’m sorry then.”

You shift in your seat, suddenly wanting to leave and never face the boy ever again.

‘Seokjin, you said he liked me!’

As you begin to rise up from your seat, Namjoon starts to panic.

‘Shit, this isn’t supposed to be happening!’

In the span of the five seconds that you begin standing up, Namjoon has already visualized the future.

You ignoring his very presence at graduation and proceeding to move out of the country, never to see him again.

Namjoon decides that it’s not a future he’s willing to live in. Not if he had anything to say about it.

“Y/N, wait!”

You turn on your heels to face him again, your face flushed from heat and embarrassment.

“Seokjin wasn’t…wrong.” Namjoon watches as you raise an eyebrow. “I…”

‘Suck it up, Kim.’

Taking in a gulp of air, Namjoon begins to speak again, but the soft touch of your lips to his cheek startles him into silence.

You pull back, the familiar grin pulling on your lips.

“You busy this Saturday?”

“Um…no.” Namjoon coughs. “Why?”

“Good.” You turn on your heels again as you begin walking towards your group of friends that stay clustered next to the food bar. “Pick me up at 6! We’ll go see a movie!”

Namjoon stammers as he shoots up from his seat, clutching onto the corsage for dear life. “What movie?”

“Your pick.” You mouth from across the room, turning back around to dance with two of your friends.

That night, Namjoon rushes upstairs and throws his suit jacket on his bed. He instantly picks up a pen and begins to write.

‘This is a start of something unknown, but I’m no longer afraid. I’m no longer scared of taking hold of your hand and telling you how I feel. This time, it’ll be different. This time, you’ll see the real me.

Signed, Joonie.’

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sydchan · 5 years

Note

Hilbert, Hilda, Nate, and Rosa for the ship meme?

Hilbert- My NOTP for themNone come to mind- My BROTP for themObligatory Cheren/Hilbert/Bianca as the BroT3. I honestly feel he’s equally close with both of them, just in different ways. He may have been best friends with Cheren first, but meshes better with Bianca personality wise- My OTP for them N/Hilbert no contest. My absolute fav ship out of all Pokemon ships- My second choice pairing for themCheren/Hilbert. It’s almost always one sided when I do anything with it though due to my love for the above ship. - My fluffy pairing for themWhile N/Hilbert has a lot of easy angst potential, I like them too much to make them suffer in the long run. I’ll always make it fluffy by the end.- My angsty pairing for themGhetsis/Hilbert because I only like it for awful bad end angst potential. - My favorite poly ship for themI don’t have a serious poly ship involving him so Ghetsis/Hilbert/N for bad end drama. - My weirdest pairing for themHilbert/Hiker Andy to contrast shipping Hilda with her same sex ferris wheel date

Hilda- My NOTP for themNone, but if you want my controversial opinion, I don’t actually like N/Hilda. It’s in no way a NoTP, I’m just neutral on the pairing. My hangup being I don’t view Hilda and Hilbert as interchangeable (despite the fact they obviously are).- My BROTP for themShe’s a lone wolf in my own personal headcanons so no one, but I can see the appeal in Hilbert/Hilda- My OTP for them Honestly, no one. I sort of lowkey ship her with a lot of characters, but don’t strongly ship her with anyone. Hilda/Waitress Aurora (her autumn ferries wheel date) wins by default since I am fond of the headcanons I’ve come up with for them. - My second choice pairing for themRosa/Hilda. It was the other ship I almost went with in the next gen AU. - My fluffy pairing for themHilda/Aurora is overall fluffy, despite the ups and downs.- My angsty pairing for themElesa/Hilda since out of all my ships for Hilda, it’s the one I see working out the least- My favorite poly ship for themElesa/Hilda/Skyla, to the point I gave it some serious consideration in my next gen AU. - My weirdest pairing for themHilda/Aurora (talk about a rarepair out of nowhere)

Nate- My NOTP for themIt’s not actually a NoTP but I’ve never understood the appeal of shipping Colress with either of the BW2 protags. But I’ve also just never understood the appeal of Colress in general. - My BROTP for themWhile Hugh/Nate are the true bros, I do like the idea of Hilbert/Nate becoming really good friends. - My OTP for them Hugh/Nate- My second choice pairing for themN/Nate, but only in an AU where N/Hilbert would be impossible (Hilbert is dead or something)- My fluffy pairing for themHugh/Nate. - My angsty pairing for themN/Nate, because I only like it from the viewpoint of N being attracted to Nate because he reminds him of Hilbert. Their ship name (SecondbestShipping) says it all. - My favorite poly ship for themN/Hilbert/Nate where Hilbert is the main one both N and Nate are initially attracted to.- My weirdest pairing for themWhile N/Nate isn’t that weird since there’s at least a basis for it, it’s still very uncommon.

Rosa- My NOTP for themOther than what I mentioned above for Nate, none. - My BROTP for themYancy/Rosa end up becoming very close in my headcanons due to both becoming actors.- My OTP for them Hugh/Rose. Nate and Rosa are the only opposite sex protags I tend to view interchangeably.- My second choice pairing for themHilda/Rosa. - My fluffy pairing for themCurtis/Rosa. I’ve discovered I find them a bit boring due to this fact. - My angsty pairing for themI don’t tend to do angst ships for Rosa, but I guess Hilda/Rosa by default. - My favorite poly ship for themHilda/Aurora/Rosa. Hilda living the dream. - My weirdest pairing for themHilda/Rosa since the other two ships are common

#I assume this is the ship meme you meant?#since it was the last one I reblogged #but controversial opinion as a whole is the male protags are canon in my heart soooooo #I don't ship any of the girls as if they were the protag #Dawn is actually the next one I see as more interchangeable #and then maybe May #asks #tyranitardude #pokemon #touya #touko #kyouhei #mei

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ghostmartyr · 6 years

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Pokémon White Randomized Nuzlocke Run [Part 9]

Eight badges have been earned! All that’s left is the plot, the Elite Four, and possibly some other stuff I haven’t decided on that gets us through the rest of the map!

Our starting roster, in its current order:

Batman, Lv. 48 (Escavalier)

Palm, Lv. 51 (Breloom)

Ptera, Lv. 46 (Archeops)

Frogger, Lv. 47 (Seismitoad)

Fido, Lv. 49 (Entei)

Gelding, Lv. 47 (Tornadus)

Possibly the end of this wild adventure awaits, so awaaaaay we go!

First up is, as tradition dictates, someone immediately bothering me the second I walk out of the Gym.

Yay!

Only if you actually described how to do that, I completely missed it. I caught something about directions to Victory Road, which I already sort of knew about thanks to trying to avoid the plot earlier, but nothing about bringing back dead things. ...Wait, are the dragons dead? Or just rocks?

Well luckily, I don’t really care either way.

Professor Juniper walks us over to the edge of town, and asks if we regret going on this journey.

...I wanted to say no just so I could see what the dialogue would be like, but that... no. That would be too mean. I couldn’t possibly. Professor Juniper is a kind lady who gives us sweet stuff.

SPEAKING OF.

This is intended for Zekrom.

I think I might go ahead and use it as intended, honestly. Fighting Zekrom could result in one of my team dying, and I believe the fight is mandatory. Since Zekrom is not touched by the Randomizer, I will not give it a nickname, rendering it ineligible, but catching it is safest, and it is my belief that Zekrom will be the first catchable pokemon in the area it appears. So if I wanted, it could be eligible. But I really think I want to stick with randoms only.

...By the way. Is the roadwork on the right side of town done?

Curses.

I guess the plot truly is calling us now.

Then on my way to the Victory Road area, the attendant who keeps the... hell, I don’t know what they’re called. I went with liminal space last time. They aren’t bridges. Waypoints? Anyway, the attendant says that there’s some sort of storm going on at Route 7.

-looks at Gelding-

Gee.

I wonder.

What could it be.

Let’s go avoid the plot and investigate!

It was a dark and stormy night.

Which pokemon could you possibly be speaking of, mysterious old lady.

She invites me inside for soup and gives me another mythology lesson. This time about the Legendary Thundurus. It creates thunderstorms. She also gives me a note on where to find it when, but that’s really not a concern of this run.

But thanks for the soup.

Hey.

Gelding.

Can you guess. Which cloud pokemon legendary of this gen. Is my favorite?

Aw no, the thing I’m not allowed to catch flew away. Darn.

Okay, back to plot and Victory Road.

Dang it, Cheren. I was not meaning to refer to you with that remark.

Bianca’s here to watch, but I couldn’t get a proper screencap of it.

...Batman is setting a record for flinching against Cheren’s Unfezant. Meanwhile, Unfezant spams Detect interspersed with flinching moves and my sanity goes down the drain. But eventually, the evil is defeated.

Liepard goes down without a fuss, but Batman’s complete lack of Speed means her HP is lower than I’d like, so for Meganium we’re giving Ptera a chance to stretch his wings. That goes well, and Simisage is up next with similar results.

Battle over.

See Cheren, this is why you’re one of my best friends.

Ha ha ha ha Bianca gave me Max Revives.

Ha.

-sobs silently-

Your attempts at help are appreciated, Bianca. Stay wonderful.

They both see me off with words of kindness, because the people who make these games realized at some point that the people who play them could really use some friends.

Or so I like to think. ...That sounds sort of mean, I guess, but it truly is nice to have rival characters who are your actual friends. X & Y are even more blatant about it, and I really, really liked that part of them. Go team friendship.

Now then.

It’s time...

d-d-d-d-duel!

Or something. Onward!

This gen is committed to the power of Aesthetic, and I respect that.

It’s just so pretty.

Wait, crap, this pretty place has grass.

Uh.

...Rules for doubles?

...Oh to heck with it, the pretty badge gardens do not count as places. I’m just. Gonna faint you guys. Because I’m too lazy to think through the trouble of catching one of you.

Still pretty.

Admittedly, this one is sort of weird.

...And the music has gone major, major Wind Waker. I own that soundtrack. It is one of the most expensive ones I ever bought myself, and this music is giving me feels, man.

This gen is focused on all the right things and its wonderful.

The guy standing in front of this gate mentions that each gate is like its own world, so, if we do happen upon another pokemon in another gate that is easier to acquire, I’m going to count it as a different space.

...Maybe.

Where does the map say I’m at?

Oh, actually, I’m still in Route 10, so the Ariados and Sentret were out anyway.

Even though I just said that the gates count as different worlds. I am a hypocrite and an opportunist.

Honestly, I just wanted to check if I’d used up my Victory Road slot or not.

Hey Clay.

Clay.

You know who didn’t skimp on aesthetic values?

The Gym Leader who’s also a model.

Maybe you could learn a thing or two from her section.

(Still, A+ glowy green rocks.)

At this point I’m just really convinced that someone working on this game really loves Wind Waker. This person playing it obviously does.

BRYCEN DO NOT PULL THIS ICE PUZZLE NONSENSE IN THE FINAL QUARTER. UNCOOL BRO. YOU ARE SUPPOSED TO BE THE MASTER OF COOL. REINSTATE YOUR CHILL TO BETTER LEVELS.

(Ice pretty.)

I can’t actually complain about dragon sculptures. They are awesome and worthy of love, even if the color value is low. It’s not all about pretty. The feel matters just as much, and by golly, this is the ancient feel of dragon power right here.

So of the eight...

I’m torn between the garden with the pretty bridge and the electric zone.

Think I gotta give it to the butler squad. You mastered the pretty.

Victory Road! Officially!

...Am I going to need Bandit for this?

..Well. If I did have Bandit with me, I would be looking at a new teammate.

Sorry little guy, there’s not enough value in attempting to catch you. Maybe next time. If there is ever a next time.

...Oh come on.

Okay, there’s a Simisear. Something to kill.

Actually, at this point, Ptera might be the best pick for the front. Batman’s in secure shape. Meanwhile, the water has Pansear. Careful, that almost feels like a planned random.

Fingers crossed for getting away with not going back to get Bandit. I think this is the gen that’s extra kind about things like HMs, and the Dragonspiral Tower would seem to support that with its easy route (if you have HM) and the long way round (if you don’t). So I’ll just. Keep walking forward.

Besides, if memory serves (obligatory laugh), that boulder is for the quick way back out from somewhere near the top.

This level has Chinchou.

Oh, and I get to slide down cliffs! I’d fully forgotten that!

Outside has Machamp. Is outside a different route?

...Fine, no.

Back inside, we have Baltoy, Kabutops, Dragonite, Clefable (who. hits. with. Sing. because. of. course.), Sentret, Rattata, and Bronzong.

I always liked Kabutops. I think back when the first gen was the only gen, it was one of my top tier favorites. It’s a rock with scythes. What more could a child ask for?

...Okay, see. This? This is why me playing a Nuzlocke is a bad idea. I do stupid things.

Ptera, buddy, I’m sorry I put you so close to death. Have a Hyper Potion. I won’t make you fight any more Bronzong with Gyro Ball. I am very sorry that happened at all, and have no desire for it to happen again.

I’ve avoided thinking about the Elite Four, but this Ace Trainer has a level 45 Stoutland and a level 45 Scolipede. That starts moving well into the danger zone, and this Victory Road, truth be told, is not the greatest spot for grinding.

Outside again, and there’s an Amoongus that might just be a Randomized find.

PP is running low enough that I’m just going to hit a Pokemon Center. It isn’t like I’ll lose much progress. ...Thanks to me cliff sliding down for an item, but I stopped recording every item I picked up a while ago.

(It was a Taunt TM.)

Hey, the first floor has Rufflet, too. More things to get no exp from. And then Voltorb! I like Voltorb.

...I am, however, having a concern about my future prospects. My best option, if I want to go with grinding, seems to be standing outside and slaughtering Machamp.

...I go into another section of cave and find Castform. Then there is Solosis.

Where were all you pre-evolved forms when I started this venture.

Cool, I found a healing.

Elite Four is... Fighting, Psychic... Ghost. Aaaand. And.

I know Alder has Escavalier, Volcanabugthing, and Accelgor (is that the spelling?). He might have an Archeops, but that could also be my memory skipping out on me.

I’m watching TFS play Nuzlockes, and I think one of them said that the typings for the Elite Four cover things not covered by Gyms.

Hey, a Cradily. Look, opportunity everywhere!

...And as I sarcastically spew comments, a Haxorus appears. Yeah, okay.

The first Gym counters your starter, so it’s basically Fire/Grass/Water. Second is Normal (brb sobbing forever). Third is Bug. Fourth is Electric. Fifth is Ground. Sixth is Flying. Seventh is Ice. Eighth is Dragon.

(Gothita is also outside, apparently. Yay.)

What does that leave... Steel, Rock, Dark.

Wait. Grimsley, right? Hell, is it really Dark? That is one really aesthetically... dark arrangement.

(Hi Shaymin. Nice to see you again.)

I keep having to start all over at the bottom because I go item chasing. Maybe I should save the item chasing for after I’m through. And have Bandit with me to push the boulders into being shortcuts.

Would you look at that.

All hidden away on the first floor.

A wild Huntail appears. We’re vaguely getting somewhere. Then we’re back to Sentret and I am back to fretting.

Oooh, a Ninetales.

Now the thing to remember is that I am not going to go cliff sliding. Exploration once Bandit is with us. Now is the time for progress. Not detours.

HA, Ptera has learned Rock Slide! Happy days.

I have no idea which is the right way.

;-;

HEY GUESS WHAT RIGHT WAS WRONG.

Aw, there’s Axew in this section. Best Dragon boy. Though the one I first murdered is a girl. Best Dragon girl.

This Veteran has a level 45 Gigalith. My comfort level with this is low, and Sturdy in the hands of others continues to be an abomination.

Frogger learns Hydro Pump because I have not actually been using Aqua Ring. If I need extra health I’ll just throw an item at him. If I need extra health, I will be in the kind of trouble Aqua Ring isn’t going to solve, anyway.

Fido drops Leer for Fire Fang thanks to the same fight.

Veterans are scary, but great exp.

I HAVE ARRIVED.

Okay, yes, important battles.

But.

Bandit, it’s time for your walk.

Fido, I think you’re in the box for a while. It would be Gelding, because Ptera covers his specialties, but Gelding knows Fly, and we’re going to be doing a lot of that as we skid down the mountain.

Before I walk right back out, I just need to say that this is one hell of a venue.

This gen’s aesthetic game is so on point.

Vullaby has been found on the giant mountain of maze. Maze of mountain? Horrorfest? Place. Also Pupitar.

Batman gets to be in front for a while. The spawns seem to be favoring her a little more at the moment.

This is the... Ground/Fighting beast’s chamber? I think? Can’t access at the moment, and will never need for any reason in this run.

...

Sigh.

Anyway, cliff sliding has produced a Nugget so far.

A wild Taillow appears. Followed by Remoraid.

Batman has to leave the front so I can actually run from all of this. Gelding, it’s your turn on the disappointment.

Cool, a Dragon Claw TM.

Whoa, a Seadra.

...Okay, yes, I’m past caring. There’s a limit to how much I’m okay with being delayed. Usually wild pokemon every five steps can at least be useful, but that’s not exactly the case of late.

...

I. will stick with that as my statement.

Look, an Electrode!

...I was going to attack it, then it occurred to me that it might know Explosion. Quietly walking away it is!

I’m finding that a key problem with this exploration is that I find it very easy to end up lost when I’m basically walking in circles. I remember all the various pieces, but don’t remember how they fit together.

In other news, a Bulbasaur is here.

I am. Relatively sure that the original Victory Road has nowhere near this level of variety. I think the Randomizer has some interesting rules regarding cave levels. Most caves change what they have by level, but keep the basic cave set. Victory Road has a lot of separate rooms in this version (and I just met a Rampardos on the water). Not bound by the laws of what is usually found in caves, I think it just assigns every single room (Ferrothorn encountered) a different everything. Because there are [x] number of things meant to be there!

I adore the Randomizer, but this is actually getting to be a little dizzying.

Possibly because I am lost.

And now there is a Flygon.

...Yeah, Flying back to the top for some perspective.

(It’s at this point I start to wonder if I’ve actually covered everything, but I haven’t done the swoopy grey floor sliding, but that might be connected to the room I can’t go in yet.)

Gelding has learned Crunch!

...Look, all that text gets boring without pictures. Let there be meaningless color.

Suddenly, Leavanny.

Here’s a wild thought.

Maybe I don’t care if I miss an item.

-slides down cliff side-

-sees item I don’t have-

...

It’s that Doctor Who gif all over again.

So I slide down from somewhere higher on the right side to get there.

...I have a horrifying thought.

I find those are often right.

...Also Frogger is level 54, pal, you are now off the Exp. Share.

Yeah.

Yeah. That’s.

Don’t ask.

The trick was sliding more to the left of the Ranger hanging out above than I initially did. More to the right, and you get the Nugget I mentioned picking up. More to the left, and you get this.

It’s a TM. Wild Charge.

-waves tiny, battered flag-

How about this. How about we go back to things that are fun!

Like death and dying and being dead!

Okay.

It’s going to be fine.

And I guess I have my answer about whether dealing with Team Plasma comes before or after. Castle nonsense post-this. Okay. Right.

I spent a bunch of money on Full Restores.

I also spent a bunch of money on the quirky poke balls they sell up here. Operating under the theory that I’m going to continue this run until I have had the option of catching a thing from every route.

I don’t know. It’s a nice dream.

Look, someone working on this game loves Zelda.

I’m pretty sure my above guesses about who’s got what are correct. I am less clear on who is where. I can’t remember if this begins a trend, or is just a quirk of the gen, but I have the option of picking the order I take them all on in.

Fighting, Dark, Ghost, Psychic.

...That is a really grim lineup.

If I’ve got it right.

Not for me, just. It’s Fighting + all of the sort of. witchy Types. I have a vaguely funny comment about that for later that I might remember unless I’m about to be traumatized.

I think I always took on Ghost girl first, then maybe Psychic girl last? Or was it Dark first? It might have been Dark first?

Let’s do a fun (sad) game. I’ll go clockwise, starting from the far left. Here’s my guess at who’s where:

Dark

Ghost

Fighting

Psychic

There. The stage is set for laughing at me.

............

I did not need to bother with a stage.

I went to take this screenshot with the intent of showing off my team without throwing more bullet points up before the final battle(s). The very first thing I noticed is that Gelding is missing health.

I think to myself, that’s weird, I was just in the Pokemon Center.

Yes. Yes, I was.

Guess what you forgot to do.

It’s not. terrible. Gelding’s missing 5 PP for Air Slash, but I have spare Super Potions from that time I mentioned buying Super Potions.

Anyway.

With that sterling start.

Let’s go find out what’s behind door number one.

Fuck it is Ghost girl first.

Maybe. That will be my loss for the session?

So. I have choices here. Ptera and Gelding both know Crunch. Fido knows Bite, but since none of these guys have STAB with Dark, Crunch buddies is the way to go. I’m also pretty darn sure she has a Jellicent, and there’s... something about its Ability. I can’t remember what. Same with the Mummy thing. Or maybe they just have moves that make it good to switch.

...It’s just now hitting me how much I played this gen. I have done the coming fights so many times. This is the first gen I really did EV training and IV breeding, and I did what I could to get all my choices up to level 100. I can’t believe I forgot that.

I think she starts with the Mummy thing. Which. That’s not its name. Something with a C? Mummy is its ability, though. I think. That might make Ptera a good start. His ability is used to keep him balanced (Defeatist lowers stats when his HP goes below half), and I don’t want balanced. I want obscene and broken creatures who I don’t have to watch die.

Cursed Body! That’s the Jellicent’s thing.

.I don’t remember what it does.

Okay.

Ptera up front, no item because I don’t want Acrobatics to lose out on its damage. Gelding can have the Lucky Egg, because I’m pretty sure this is a fight that I end up switching a lot over, and Palm will have an Amulet Coin because I like money and know I want him to take out the Jellicent.

Plan?

Sounds like.

Shauntal sends out a level 48 Cofagrigus, aka the mummy thing. So my usual level advantages aren’t going to be as steep, but I think part of getting your pick of who you face first means that there is a stable base for all their leveling. It shouldn’t get worse until Alder.

Or possibly N and the plot posse.

I’m not used to the Elite Four being wrapped up in the Team stuff.

Ptera’s faster, and Crunch does more than half. Cofragigus uses Wil-o-Wisp (which I might be spelling wrong; I’m not allowed guides and passed the text bubble because I figured of course I knew how to spell it), so Ptera is now burned. That’s not great for his damage output, but he still has enough to get the job done with one more Crunch.

Jellicent is up next so I was going to have to switch anyway. I’ll just go over to Gelding instead of Ptera after Palm (hopefully) makes quick work of the Jellicent.

It’s level 48 as well.

Seed Bomb just barely doesn’t get the faint, and Jellicent’s damage does 57 damage. Palm’s at 89/146 after one hit, and we’re in scary town. Palm’s faster, so even if Shauntal heals, the Jellicent should be done before this is a problem, but I do not like seeing massive chunks of health vanish in one hit.

Unless I’m inflicting it. Then it’s okay.

Yeah, she goes with a Full Restore.

The next Seed Bomb succeeds in slaying the beast, which is a nice bonus I wasn’t expecting, and whatever my worries about the Jellicent’s ability, nothing happened, so that’s good.

...Ah. Chandelure’s up next. That one I did forget about.

Want to put all those extra levels to work, pal?

And yeah. That is a level 50 Chandelure. That thing with obscene Special Attack.

Frogger’s Water/Ground. With a massive HP pool. He should be fine.

...

-picks Hydro Pump instead of Surf to try to get it done with quickly-

Chandelure goes first because Chandelure is amazing and Frogger is really more of a tank, and it does 73 damage because this game doesn’t care about my comfort levels, but lucky me, Hydro Pump’s accuracy does not fail, and that’s enough to take the best flaming ghost chandelier down.

Shauntal’s last pokemon is a Golurk. Ghost/Ground, right?

This is uncomfortable. My natural inclination is to spam Water against all things Water is super effective against. That is just a thing I am prone to. I also put a great deal of faith in Palm. I love Breloom, even when it has the wrong Nature.

But the thing is, we’re basically at the stage where my pokemon can take a hit, but if that hit is followed by a critical, they’re goners. Frogger and Palm have both taken heavy hits. Ptera hasn’t taken a huge hit, but he has no Defense and is BRNed.

Putting in a Flying thing against a Ground thing feels incredibly counterintuitive. Ptera surpasses that by being obscenely powerful. Gelding does not have that faith.

Nonetheless, I think maybe the safest thing to do here is to swap Frogger out instead of hoping he can one-shot the Golurk. I... think Golurk is another tanky type. None of its Ground moves can hit Gelding. Ghost will still pack a wallop, but. Well. I am guessing Gelding can live through one hit, and hopefully that will be enough.

Fido and Batman aren’t even options because they will definitely die, so.

Let’s go for it.

At least we’re back to 48s?

Crunch does over half, so even though Shadow Punch does over 60 damage we should be in the clear.

-collapses in heap-

I feel like I’m not doing enough justice to Shauntal, since my mind is very much not on anything but the battles at the moment. She’s got a cute design, and Ghost trainer novelist is wonderful. I think she quotes different passages from her books at you depending on when you fight her. Or she just switches through the lines at will. She’s a good character, and I really love the way she’s decorated her room.

...So I’m healing my pokemon and realizing another thing I forgot to do. I forgot to buy Full Heals. I used my last Burn Heal on Ptera just now. I think I have a small supply of Full Heals thanks to what I’ve grabbed walking around, but. Heh. Planning fail everywhere.

Okay, healed up and ready to go to door number two.

Yeah, I got Ghost girl and Dark boy swapped. Whoops.

The plan here. Is for Palm to murder them all. Palm gets Lucky Egg and first slot, Batman gets Amulet Coin. I believe Liepard will be coming out first, and I know he has a Bisharp.

...Drawing a complete blank on the others.

HEY HOLD THE FUCK UP WHY DO YOU HAVE THE SCRAFTY.

(He has a level 48 Scrafty.)

It’s Dark/Fighting, but I could’ve sworn that was the Fighting guy’s thing.

...Wait.

Is the Fighting guy even this gen?

Uh oh.

Well. Palm’s not a terrible choice for this. I don’t really want Ptera near a Fighting thing. ...Gelding could have handled this one, but oh well.

Mach Punch or Sky Uppercut is the question. I favor Mach Punch because it doesn’t miss, but Sky Uppercut’s accuracy really is not that bad. I think Sky Uppercut will do enough damage to maybe force healing, so... one then the other? Sky Uppercut gets first dibs in case of crit?

Scrafty’s very securely in the orange, but Palm is at 84/146.

I don’t know why I didn’t grind before this, but it’s a little late to keep finding ways to criticize my choices.

Grimsley uses the Full Restore, Palm uses Mach Punch, and yeah, Scrafty’s still in the green from that. Another Sky Uppercut hits, and Scrafty’s down.

Liepard’s up next.

Liepard is not nearly so heavy on damage, and Palm’s Defense is not bad. I think it’s safe to try, even though I’ll have to eat a Fake Out.

Wait, no, I have Batman. Batman’s swapped in.

Level 48 Liepard. Uses Fake Out, does 6 damage because Batman is the damn Batman.

...Liepard uses Attract.

Did you know. That through sheer happenstance. Batman is the sole female member of my team? And thanks to pokemon mechanics, falling in love as a status problem is purely a male/female dynamic?

“Batman is immobilized by love” oh please.

Thankfully that only takes up one turn. Then Batman remembers that Batman does not have time for love and goes to back to the wars. Thank goodness for emotional stunting.

Ugh. Now things are awkward. Krookodile is up next. That. Is worrying. I can’t remember if it or Bisharp is the level 50, but normally I like sending Palm up against the Dark croc line. But those things pack a major punch. Crits mean death. Batman has a Type disadvantage against Earthquake, which it most likely has.

....Heeeeeeey, Frogger...

Oh, right. That. Yeah, let the Special Attacker handle it.

I think I’ll go with Surf first. I also think Krookodile outSpeeds Frogger. So this. Should be. You know.

Yep, Krookodile uses Earthquake, and 79 HP is gone.

...But Surf can one-shot, so sweet.

I guess something that I have failed to keep in mind is that Frogger is competing with giants. In all fair assessment, my team is stacked. Frogger is one of the few standard team models from this gen. ...Even though a surprising amount of my team is. from this gen.

Good boy, Frogger.

And then there’s the Bisharp. Which is likely to be level 50.

Palm does 4x STAB damage to it.

Bisharp is a prime Attack pokemon.

Bisharp is also 2x weak to Fire.

Fido has yet to take a hit.

Sorry Palm, we’re playing this cautious.

Yep, level 50 Bisharp.

Fido uses Flamethrower and it is down. Awesome.

That’s two down.

Everyone’s healed.

Door number three time.

DAMN IT.

Yeah, fine, I got none of the order right.

Ptera’s out in front, no item in case of Acrobatics. Batman with Lucky Egg, Gelding with Amulet Coin.

Deep breath now.

Throughout all my memories of these fights, I definitely did not remember your name was Caitlin.

Level 48 Reuniclus out first. I think she also has a Gothowhatsit. Her others are... Things I should remember better but don’t.

Ptera uses Crunch, leaving Reuniclus in the red.

WHAT DO YOU MEAN REUNICLUS USED THUNDER.

Um.

UM.

I cannot begin to express how much this is a very bad problem.

...Fuck, that’s bad.

I will get to sad later maybe. For now it’s just. I am in so much trouble.

Gelding’s out on account of Thunder. Batman’s up.

Caitlin uses a Full Restore, naturally.

Batman uses Twineedle (wanted the poison just because/in case), and that actually faints it. Gothitelle’s up next, and honestly, if I’m right about the next guy being Fighting, I have no business risking Gelding. So.

Level 50 Gothitelle.

I’m just going to hope X-Scissor one-shots it.

Oh look, it has Thunderbolt.

...Why?

I get that Special Attack moves are great and all, and Thunderbolt and Thunder are both powerful Special Attack moves. But they don’t cover up a particular weakness. Water and Flying? That’s not stuff Psychic has a hard time with.

......No I’m not upset shut up.

X-Scissor gets it down to the very, very red, so Caitlin uses another Full Restore, giving me a free shot. Twineedle again in hope of poisoning. Success, and Gothitelle’s back in red. Another Thunderbolt, and Batman cleans up.

Next up is Sigilyph.

...I don’t know about Thunderbolt, but I think that thing has Ice Beam, and Bug is good against Psychic, but not Flying.

Fido, you’re my best best here.

STAB or 2x Bite, STAB or 2x Bite...

Wait. That’s math. Math I can actually do. Flamethrower beats Bite.

Fido’s faster, and that gets it down to orange (it’s level 48, by the way). It uses Psychic, and that does 64 damage. One more Flamethrower to finish it.

Oh.

And our final contestant is a Musharna.

Special Defense is too high. Fido’s use isn’t terrible, but. Then there’s Batman, with 82 HP left. That goes a long way when you’re made of Steel, but Fido does have Bite.

...Leave Fido in, if Fido gets slept, spend a turn healing Batman and then swap Batman in. Hopefully Fido does more damage than I expect. By a lot.

Level 48 Musharna incoming.

Bite leaves Musharna in the green, but I think two more will actually finish it, and more importantly, Fido is faster and Musharna flinched. So. Not a bad start.

Another Bite and Musharna is red, which... I hope Caitlin’s used her Full Restore allotment. Musharna uses Psychic, which scares me to death but only leaves Fido in the orange.

Please. Do not. Use a Full Restore.

Oh good.

Fido gets the final Bite, and.

And.

Fuck. Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck.

I have no ace for the last Elite Four member. Assuming I’m right about him being Fighting. I have Gelding, and things without bonuses. ...Fuck, that’s uncomfortable. And that’s without taking Alder into consideration. Which... depending on N and plot, and.

This is really bad. Team wiping is a serious concern here.

...Sorry I didn’t remember the Thunder, Ptera. You’ve been amazing.

Great.

I’ll guess... Mienfoo’s evolved form, the pillar behemoth thing, Sawk and Throh.

At least one of those will know a Rock move.

No Lucky Egg. Gelding’s equipped with a Sharp Beak.

-taps keyboard-

Well it’s not like there’s a way out, anyway.

So before I was really overwhelmed by everything I love dying, I had the thought that every member of the Elite Four is some kind of goth, and then this here is their jock boyfriend.

It was more amusing back then.

Ghost goth is cute goth, Dark goth is dramatic goth, Psychic sleeping beauty goth is prep goth, and then there’s Marshal.

Yeah, I don’t know, let’s just. Yeah.

Level 48 Throh.

.Air Slash misses, and Throh knows Stone Edge!

Gelding has 53 HP.

Fido isn’t an option because Rock. Frogger’s a tank, but a squishy one. Palm won’t be able to dish out much damage. Batman’s Bug escapes Fighting being super effective, but. Batman’s greatest strength is damage, and she can’t do that against this team.

...Frankly, I’m shocked Gelding could survive Stone Edge. There’s no way that works against Sawk. But against Sawk, there would be a chance of fainting it in one hit. Throh does less damage, but has more HP. I never had delusions of getting it down in one hit, but I thought I would at least be able to hit it.

This is going to be a switch thing.

Frogger has one point less in Defense than Palm, but 50 more HP. Frogger’s in. Ground typing keeps Stone Edge from doing too much. Unfortunately, I am pretty sure that Throh does the least damage of everything on Marshal’s team. That means that this is where I can take hits and heal, but it’s going to switch to Fighting moves, probably, and those will be worse for Frogger and--

I am going to heal Gelding.

Throh uses something called Storm Throw, and. That’s actually not a move I recognize. I have Frogger use Surf, because in the ludicrous imaginings where I survive this, I want to have Hydro Pump available.

...That’s a dumb reason actually, I have Ether and Elixir.

On the other hand, Surf hits. So.

That puts Throh in the orange, but Throh uses Payback. Oh! But that’s a Dark move! I don’t know why I thought it was Fighting for a second. Yeah, great, so Frogger’s still alive, and is going to get the faint.

Enter the Sawk problem.

Frogger’s at 79 HP. I need to heal him if I want to use him. I think Gelding can get Sawk down in one hit.

...I just remembered that Gelding has Fly.

Wow, okay, that changes things.

So I’m pretty sure Gelding will be faster than Sawk. If I’m wrong, Gelding is dead. If I keep Frogger in, there’s a good chance he can take a few punches, especially since he got Throh down to orange in one blow.

But Sawk does more damage than Throh.

If I’m wrong about Frogger being able to take the hits, I lose Frogger. If I’m wrong about the Speed, I lose Gelding, and then will possibly lose Frogger anyway. ...Then I worry that Stone Edge is one of those moves that can hit Flying opponents, but I don’t... think it is?

...I’ll switch in Gelding.

Gelding is faster, and Stone Edge doesn’t hit in the air. See? It’s all. Fine.

what do you mean Sawk has Sturdy.

oh hey Gelding’s still alive with 37 HP.

Marshal will probably use a Full Restore, which will create the same problem of Sturdy (I... think? I have kind of a dim thought of that being a once-per-fight ability, but that might just be my distant hopes of a fair and just world talking, and I do not trust that). Two Air Slashes in a row is probably my safest move for all involved parties.

Wait, no, scratch that. Gelding has Extrasensory. That does not have Air Slash’s 95 accuracy. So that’s one definite hit, then Fly or another Extrasensory depending on the damage.

Full Restore happens. Extrasensory gets Sawk down to orange, so we’re going to do another of those and hope Sawk doesn’t have a priority move! Which I hadn’t considered until this moment!

I could play it safe and switch to something, but. Really, exposing more of my team to this is not safe.

Oh hey, Marshal went with another Full Restore. By all means man, use them up.

Gelding takes the Sawk down.

And now we have a new problem.

My guess is that everything on this team has Stone Edge. That is a guess born of how everything so far has Stone Edge, as well as the too-late reminder that Stone Edge is really popular for Fighting types to pick up.

Conkeldurr is up next.

In a perfect world, Gelding Flys and it’s all over.

Gelding has 37 HP left, and Conkeldurr is a bit of a beast. All it takes is a sliver of health, and Gelding is gone.

The problem is. Like I said, exposing more of my team to this is not safe. I could switch in Batman and heal up Frogger and Gelding while she takes a few hits, then switch over to Frogger and hope things go like they did with Throh, but. It is not beyond thinking that the two pokemon Marshal has left could just destroy my team at will.

Then there’s the last one. I think. There’s a halfway decent chance it’s faster than Gelding.

-breathes in-

So Extrasensory does 80. 2x that’s 160. Fly does 90, 135 with STAB, then the 2x super effective bonus. That is a lot of damage. 160 got Sawk down to orange, but Sawk’s more of a glass cannon type. Conkeldurr’s. a cannon.

Fido can’t be used to switch in. It’d survive a hit, most likely, but not a crit. Palm could maybe survive a crit, but if I heal, I want to heal Gelding and Frogger. Batman could probably take the hits, but then there’s the problem of what happens to the thing that gets switched in. That lost move could be life or death. By which I mean death.

...I’m going all in on Gelding being a powerhouse.

Level 48 Conkeldurr.

I love how there isn’t a Cry option.

Gelding’s faster, uses Fly, and.

Okay so.

It doesn’t hit.

Because Fly.

But Conkeldurr knows Retaliate.

I hate this game. ;-;

....

-buries head in hands-

...M-miss?

-screams a lot forever-

Palm, you have Mach Punch and Marshal’s used two Full Restores. So. That should work?

Level 50 Mienshao. I switch to Batman to heal Frogger, and also possibly to stay, I don’t even know.

...Jump Kick did nearly 70 damage, guess what Batman, you’re switching out!

It does 88 damage to Frogger. Neat. So I’ll just be using Hyper Potions and waiting for Frogger’s Poison Touch to take effect sometime this century. That is my strategy.

.........

I. do not want to talk about how this happened.

Let me tell you how it happened.

I was going through to click yet another Hyper Potion. Because autopilot. Only I did not click the Item menu. I clicked the Fight menu. Still on autopilot, I watch, in horror, as I pick Mud Shot.

Mienshao’s Jump Kick misses and takes half its health.

Mud Shot’s good enough to take the rest.

I’m learning a few things here.

The fact that I’m an idiot is nothing new.

The fact that I routinely underestimate Frogger is my only prayer of surviving what’s next.

Because in case the scoreboard’s somehow been overlooked:

I am in so much trouble.

I don’t even know who I’m fighting next. N? Alder? Ghetsis?

Zekrom?

But you know what I think I remember?

I’m pretty sure that your team gets healed after you face Zekrom. Without you having a say in the matter. That’s... awkward? At best? Ptera and Gelding are not built for doing nothing and dying. I realize they’re both dead, but they did a lot of killing beforehand.

I think I will stick with screaming.

And switching Frogger to the front.

Other things to do: Putting a damn damage boosting item on everyone left instead of trying to pump the Elite Four dry of resources like money and exp.

...Only it turns out I don’t really have many of those kinds of items. Frogger gets Soft Sand, Palm gets Miracle Seed, Fido gets a Shell Bell, and Batman can keep the Lucky Egg.

I don’t foresee this going well.

Team.

Please, please prove me wrong.

I have criminally neglected complimenting aspects of the Elite Four because my head is busy screaming. The dramatics of this many stairs is one such thing that deserve praise. There are others. I might remember them one day.

There are so many stairs, guys.

You know, I’ve realized that if the N and Ghetsis thing is happening now, maybe I don’t have to fight Alder?

That’s a good thing, right?

-grabs popcorn-

Why is this a thing.

“This is Team Plasma’s castle” HOW DOES THAT EXPLAIN ANY OF IT. IS THIS EXPLAINED? I DON’T THINK THE PLOT REALLY CARES BUT I NEED SOMETHING TO FOCUS ON AND THIS IS IT RIGHT NOW. N WHY CAN YOU SPAWN A CASTLE BY ASKING THE SKY FOR IT.

So... Am I maybe going to get a chance to grind before the next big fight?

Dare I hope?

BUT WHY IS THIS HERE.

IT’S TEAM GYM LEADER. KNEEL BEFORE THEIR MIGHT.

Looking at the sets of pairs, I realize that Burgh and Lenora; and Clay and Elesa (please let that be her name) are both established friendship duos between Gym Leaders. It is cool.

Also Bianca asked them to come.

Thank you, friend.

The plot isn’t going to let me leave, is it. This is all just one big stall to make the pain hit that much harder. Geez. Won’t this game think of the people who have self-imposed rules that make everything complicated?

HEY.

Talking to the weird ladies who know N’s tragic backstory healed my pokemon, so now I am walking around with two zombies I need to get rid of kind of right now.

...No disrespect, guys.

...Seriously, where is this PC the Ninja mentioned.

There we go.

A moment of silence for the fallen.

Gelding, I never voice my appreciation of you during these posts, but you always came in handy. Your wonderful Attack stats and diverse movepool was a pleasure to have aboard. When I first caught you, I thought I’d change you out for the next thing I caught. But then I got attached.

You got your comrades this far. I don’t know how long that will last, but thanks.

Ptera... hell, I never really thought you’d go down. You were always this overpowered rockstar. From the second we met. ...You destroyed one of my team prospects. You were always reliable. If I ever wanted to turn my brain off and just expect victory, you were who I put in front.

I really don’t think I can do this without you guys, and I never wanted to.

Goodbye.

Sooo. Access to my PC lets me do away with the problem of zombies. It does not solve the greater problem of the huge trouble I am in. Nothing in my box is a high enough level to assist.

Zekrom is coming up, and I’ll have the option of having him on my team, and he is the first pokemon in this area I’ll have the option of catching.

But the spirit of this run is that everything on my team is randomized. That’s why I ditched my fossil. That’s why I ditched my chimp option.

It’s these four.

I have no idea what happens if I lose and get sent back to a save point inside the castle. Do I just have to keep throwing my box at it until I have no eligible pokemon left and have to declare the Nuzlocke a failure?

This section should have been finished a while ago, since I’m apparently wordy when stressed and there are now a lot of words, but I have kept going because. Well.

I think I know what happens next and I do not like it.

...Wait.

Wait.

YES.

I CAN GRIND.

#Pokemon #Nuzlocke Challenge

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ramblings-of-a-mad-cat · 2 years

Note

Have you played BDSP?

I have not. At some point perhaps, I will, but when the games came out I didn't really feel that motivated to get one of them.

The art style doesn't bother me. It's goofy, it's stilly, and I can't take it seriously for one second, but I wouldn't say the chibi style offends me. Nah, when I first saw it in the trailer, I broke out laughing for at least thirty seconds. And then, the next handful of times I saw promotional material for the game, it happened again. I would forget about the new style, and then see it again, remember, and crack up. It just never got old. Nah, my problem isn't the art style, it's more that these games just...don't feel necessary? I know Gen 4 is a fan favorite and people were clamoring for this, but I'm more of a Gen 5 shill and frankly, my expectations were low to begin with.

This isn't BDSP's fault, of course. But unfortunately, my interest in the remakes has waned over the years. The last one I thoroughly enjoyed was Heart Gold. That one felt like a labor of love. But Alpha Sapphire didn't have anything of value to offer me apart from The Delta Episode, and a whole lot of condescending dialogue to get there. People complain that Sun and Moon have handholding, but in ORAS, I actually felt like the game was condescending me. Far too many scenes where they directly tell you what to do and try to make it sound like natural dialogue. And here's the obligatory mention of the middle finger they gave to fans of the Battle Frontier. I've never cared about the BF, personally, but I know how many fans loved it, so to see them consistently refuse to bring it back and even mock fans for wanting it...yeah, that's not right.

The "Let's Go" games aren't...well, I wouldn't say they're awful. But they are the ultimate example of an unnecessary remake. People don't like Kanto nearly as much as Gamefreak thinks we do. Getting to choose Eevee over Pikachu is a nice addition. But the catching mechanic from Pokemon Go is easily the worst part of that app, and I can live without a whole game that uses it. Not to mention forcing the player to catch fifty pokemon to get into a mid-game gym? Forcing them to bring a grass pokemon to fight Brock? No, that is forced easy mode and it's not okay. Why can't I just catch what I want? While I do like the introduction of overworld pokemon and I want to see it become a mainstay, this game also introduced the mandatory EXP Share. I am still, still waiting on the devs to wise up and remove that. Any day now. The VS Seeker is right there. That's all I'm saying. It bears repeating - no one likes a forced easy mode.

So, yeah. I don't see much reason to buy Brilliant Diamond, especially with everything I'm hearing. I don't mean to be negative, if you're enjoying the games than I'm glad for you. But apart from the Grand Underground, I don't see much reason to go back to Sinnoh in this title. If I did, I could just play Platinum again. I know, I know the devs have never remade the definitive version, always the original games, but just because that's what they've always done, doesn't mean it's what they should be doing. And nowhere is that more obvious than here. Platinum didn't just build upon DP, it fixed a lot of problems the game had. Problems that from what I hear, are back in the remakes because, "Something something, faithful adaption." I see no excuse for that. Not to mention excluding the Darkrai, Shaymin, and Arceus events. What gives?

I'm sure that if I played the game, I would enjoy it. I've said this before but it would be quite difficult to make a Pokemon game that was outright poor in quality, rather than just mediocre. Even if you put the bare minimum amount of effort in, which is what happened with Sword and Shield in my opinion...the formula is so addictive and the world they've created is so enchanting, that going on a Pokemon adventure still leads to a fun experience. I believe you'd have to actively try to make a Pokemon game bad, that even just phoning it in wouldn't be enough for the core fanbase to stop enjoying them.

On a more positive note, I am beyond hyped for Legends: Arceus. It was such a surprise to see that game's trailer and as someone who enjoyed Breath of the Wild and likes open world RPGs in general, I'm counting down the days. I don't think I've been this excited for a Pokemon game since Sun and Moon. No idea what they're going to do with it, but that's a game I'm definitely going to get and I'll be happy to share my thoughts as I play through if anyone is curious.

#Pokemon #Pokemon Games #The Ramblings of a Mad Cat #Pokemon BDSP #Brilliant Diamond #Shining Pearl #Pokemon ORAS #Pokemon Let's Go #Pokemon Platinum

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marawis · 7 years

Text

Pokémon Villain-Champion Switch Scenarios Part 2 (well more like “villain is not the villain now and the rival is on some jelly-fish” scenario)

Yeah I’m still at it, now in Alola~. This time the prompts were:

Kukui wants to bring progress and a Pokemon league but in a dismissive manner towards Alola’s traditions.

Hau takes Guzma’s words way worse to heart, eventually winds up stumbling upon nihilego and going batshit.

I took some liberties with it and this came out. And this ended in an even longer post than ever before, even with a Rainbow Episode-like postgame and all. You are all warned. (Check out Hoenn, Sinnoh and Kalos here)

Intruders have invaded Aether Foundation, and the alarm has been set.

Is the Ultra Recon Squad.

Lusamine in this world didn't fall into despair after the wormhole incident with Mohn because she thought her kids needed their mother more than ever now, so she is way more sane this time around.

There isn't much in the Foundation except for their Ultra Space research, so she fears these strangers are trying to get Nebby. Lusamine asks Lillie to run away with it and to look for Burnet, an old friend of hers. She will keep them safe.

Lillie then runs away but is almost caught by the URS. Nebby manages to teleport them away before it's too late though.

Lillie then gets lost, but is found by Burnet anyway, who in turn asks her husband Kukui to care for them while she investigates some more on this whole Ultra Wormhole business that seems related to Nebby and the URS.

Everything should be ok now, right?

Three months later, you are a kid from Kanto who just moved to Alola for reasons.

Fastforward here, you go to the tall grass, get your starter from Kukui, then go to meet the kahuna to make it official, meet Lillie, almost fall from the bridge, sparkling stone, festival oh wow even marawis made this thing the same story!

The similarities stop right in the festival though.

Hau was introduced as "the kahuna's grandson" in what was pretty much his debut battle to the town, and he lost to you, a foreigner "who met Tapu Koko".

Is pretty obvious he is hurt by how the battle ended, but still tries to fake a smile and say that "it was fun".

Nebby keeps getting out of the fucking bag, and two members of the URS are nearby looking at the whole place.

One wants to just go and grab Nebby, but the other says they must wait a bit, since it is a bad idea to go in when the place is full of trainers, and a kahuna to boot.

You go to Kukui's place, where he gives you the Rotom Dex.

He then asks you what do you think about the Pokémon League in Kanto. You mention that you have an autograph from a gym leader. You love the system and can't wait to go in a pokémon adventure of your own in Alola.

Kukui is sorry to break the news to you, but Alola doesn't have a League. They have an Island Challenge, so you will have to go with that for now.

But don't worry! Kukui is already working on getting a Pokémon League in Alola. Or at least he would, if the local system wasn't so obstructive on the matter.

Hala and Olivia are ok with the idea, but Nanu refuses to give his vote and there is no kahuna in Poni, not much that can't be done unless you have all the voted to your favor.

Oh well, Island Challenge will be.

You go around doing your usual stuff in the first island, with Lillie at your side because she feels safe with you.

A couple of Team Skull members approach you and challenge you to a battle, all while asking you to get away from the girl.

Of course, it isn't until you beat them that they make clear they thought you were a kidnapper or something, and were just trying to save Lillie.

They can't tell you much on the matter (mostly because they don't understand), but they were asked to keep an eye on Lillie by their boss, so they warn you to not try anything harmful for her, or they will have to do more than just bad hip-hop.

Lillie is confused, but doesn't try to give it too much thought neither.

You move to the next island with Kukui, Lillie and Hau.

Hau leaves to who knows where once you all arrive, and Kukui also leaves because he has some stuff to do. He is a busy man now.

You explore the place with Lillie. When you try to go into the Tunnel for the first time, the URS appears.

Lillie recognizes them and asks you to run.

The URS won't let her go now, not when they finally managed to get them on an isolated area.

Battle starts.

The first URS trainer is terrible so you defeat them easily.

The other one wants to give it a try but they are then interrupted by the Team Skull music in the background.

They may not be any better than the URS in trainer skills but still challenge them into battle so you can get away. After all, you were told they had orders from their boss to keep an eye on Lillie, weren't you?

You manage to get away, and ask Lillie what the hell is going on.

Lillie doesn't really want to break it all to you just now, at least not herself. She tells you to follow her to Burnet's work place.

You go there and Burnet explains to you all there is to know about Ultra Wormholes and Ultra Beasts, or at least the few stuff we know so far.

Burnet also takes the chance to ask why Kukui is not with you all, and Lillie just says he left to do something.

Burnet is a bit annoyed but it can't be helped. It must be related to all the League paperwork her husband is stuck with since forever.

You then go to do your usual trial stuff with Lillie still around. In the middle of the road you encounter Hau who feels confident in his abilities and challenges you to a battle.

You win, and Hau still tries to fake a smile, saying that even if he lost it was still fun!

Someone who was watching the battle can't believe he is seriously saying that, and says that if he keep that mediocre mindset he will never get better.

It's Gladion.

Lillie recognizes her brother, and is both happy and shocked to see him, asking him where he was these last 2 years.

Gladion is a chuuni so he can't explain all the details, but lets us know he is working with Team Skull and that he heard about the orders to protect Lillie and about the fight they had with the guys from the URS. He doesn't know why Team Skull suddenly cares about her nor who these guys are, but asks you to stay alert anyway, since he doesn't really trust the Team. He then leaves.

Hau tries to not think about Gladion's words.

You visit the Battle Royal Dome for your obligatory tutorial with Masked Royal, who is totally not Kukui.

You and Lillie aren't fooled tho, you aren't Hau after all.

Lillie thinks Kukui must be doing this Battle Royal stuff to get some extra money for his League project. What a devoted man.

You finish your trial business, but right after your final battle with the kahuna you meet Faba with his gay partner an Aether employee, although Faba doesn't really look like, well, Faba. He is using a cloak to try to disguise himself, with little success if Lillie's reaction is anything to go by.

"This is why I hate kids!"

Faba escaped from the URS's takeover of the Foundation a few weeks ago, and has been hiding.

Lillie asks how everyone is doing in there.

Faba refuses to talk on the matter, and just tells Lillie to stay away from this mess as much as she can, or otherwise the URS will get their hands on what they want and Faba's work will be all for nothing.

With not much you can do and finally solving this puzzle on your own (since Lillie still doesn't want to do healthy communication), you leave to Ula'Ula, arriving to not-Johto Town.

There you find Kukui having a talk with another guy, but seems the tension is growing between them a bit.

The other guy of course is Guzma. He seems to be accusing Kukui of being an idiot and a hypocrite. Kukui says he doesn't know what he is talking about.

Guzma screams at him to stop feigning innocence. He saw the construction workers near Tapu Village and is not a secret that Kukui wants to do a Pokémon League.

Guzma doesn't mind the idea, and in fact is all for Alola finally being on par with other regions, but he is well aware that Kukui is doing all of this without the permission of all the kahunas. And is doing construction in a sacred area too.

"You know what happened to Tapu Village just for a supermarket, what do you think will happen with what you are doing in Mount Lanakila?"

Kukui won't take these words from Guzma of all people tho. What does Guzma care about traditions anyway? He who went and revived the team made by that rebel kahuna. If anyone should be getting the tradition talk is Guzma, not him.

Kukui stops the argument once he sees you and Lillie, and leaves.

Guzma is really pissed and with some desire to beat the crap out of someone, so he challenges you to a battle.

You win, and Guzma is more pissed. But at the same time it sure feels nice to let the frustration out, so it's all good now.

You may have gotten the idea by listening to Kukui, but still he introduces himself as the leader of Team Skull. He then recognizes Lillie, and mentions that she indeed looks a bit similar to the Aether prez.

Lillie is surprised, and asks him if he knows her mother.

He does. She supported him back when no one else would and is grateful to her. So when she suddenly called him and asked him to protect Lillie, he agreed without a doubt, even if that's not exactly what Team Skull is about.

He assures you his team will be around to check on your safety, and seems they have already fought the URS more times. Still, you shouldn't let your guard down just because of that. After all, what good does a weak trainer?

You leave to do your trial stuff still, but now the NPCs are doing some talk around. They have noticed the construction work in Mount Lanakila, and most of them aren't happy about it.

You reach Tapu Village and understand what all that talk comes from.

You encounter Kukui there, and question him about going on with the League project without all the votes and permissions.

Kukui is still on a good mood about this. He says he is sure there is no problem with it. If the Tapus had any problem they would have already acted about it.

You have some serious doubts on that statement since Tapu Bulu didn't rage against the supermarket until it was finished and construction for those things aren't done in a day.

Kukui still thinks you worry too much, and leaves to do other business somewhere else.

But whatever, you still have to do some trial stuff to do, which btw is taking it's sweet ass time to get done, looking at these many points I have done already.

Hau catches up to you and challenges you to another battles. You win again.

You are all expecting him to smile and say he had fun, but he acts more pissed out this time, and saying a PG curse under his breath.

You keep curbstomping him, so he starts to wonder if everyone else in the island is going easy on him just for being the grandson of a kahuna.

He is not in the mood to try the Ghost trial after this, so you leave Lillie with him in the Aether House that Acerola helps on. It seems the URS's influence hasn't reached there.

But when you come back oh surprise was that a big mistake.

On your way there you find Skull members in shock about what happened, screaming and crying about how if only they managed to finish their Island Challenge then maybe they would have been strong enough to stop those blue weirdos.

At the house Hau is hating himself on how weak he was, how he couldn't protect Lillie and instead she had to let the blue guys take her away to save him.

Lillie has been kidnapped for real.

Gladion arrives and of course is fucking pissed at Hau after listening to that.

If Hau just stopped being such a mediocre trainer earlier on, this wouldn't have happened!

But ok no time to panic, we need as much help as we can to save Lillie, so he has to tag along with us.

Since the URS took over the Foundation, is pretty much a given that is the first place to look around.

You all go to the port and are met with this Skull Ferry (I still can't believe it was a thing).

Guzma is there waiting for you. It's time to go and play hero for once.

You go to Aether Foundation, where you are greeted by Employees with Nihilego hats. The place doesn't look like the Foundation from the intro scene neither.

This is all starting to look more and more disturbing the more you get in.

You make your way to Lusamine's main room to reach the room where all the creepy stuff takes place on.

The URS is there, with a captive Lusamine getting high on Nihilego toxins, and Lillie caged in another corner.

Nebby is trapped and unable to teleport away.

Well this wasn't what you expected when you heard Alola was a chill place.

The URS members feel like having a chat, so they tell you what they did.

Lusamine refused to give them access to her technology, it was a very difficult task to make any progress like this.

They found good old Mohn's research on Nihilego though, and with it they used their own Wormhole to open a portal to Nihilego's dimension.

They let the Nihilegos prey on everybody in the Foundation, which gave them enough freedom to finally access what they wanted.

You see, they have their own technology to travel and all, but Aether had way more means to accomplish the plan they have in mind, all for the greater good!

Their world is suffering. Is a world of darkness.

A very long time ago, their source of light died, but a pokémon made of pure light appeared and let them survive.

Their people became greedy, and tried to control the pokémon by force, making it lose it's light and be in pain.

They now need to find a way to restore the pokémon to it's original state, or else they will die. And for that they need a Solgaleo or Lunala, the legendary pokémon from Alolan Legends.

Of course, they DO have one of those, or else they wouldn't be able to do this wormhole travel. But then again, if they lose their Legendary they wouldn't be able to travel anywhere, is in their best interest to find one in another world and use it to feed their Light.

So now they will take Nebby and make it evolve in their world.

They thank you all for being a nuisance and leave with Nebby, but not without sending some Nihilegos to you to stop you from following them.

You of course aren't buying any of this and run right behind them to follow them through their wormhole.

You were followed by Gladion and Guzma, good thing all the gang is here! We aren't forgetting anyone at all.

You reach Ultra Megalopolis and go throught he only hallway there is in the whole place.

You find the URS and you are really pissed off, wondering if they really had to do this convoluted plan and if they couldn't just migrate to another world if they have Wormhole Travel Express.

It's not so simple. It seems their Light pokémon can also do wormhole travel and if they just leave like that it will reach a point where it may go out to hunt for light all by itself.

"Y'all are stupid."

You ask them where is Nebby.

They tell you that with the borrowed technology, the cloud is on it's way to reach it's final evolution and be fed to their light pokémon, not much for you to do now.

You call bullshit and go up their weird tower they have. Seriously this city is a disaster, which architect greenlighted this?

You reach the top right on time to see that this light pokémon is Necrozma, and it just did some questionable methods of fusion with the evolved Nebby.

You fight and defeat it, freeing Nebby in the process too.

The URS panics and in a moment of scared retardation they send their Legendary against you.

Necrozma then grabs the URS' legendary and fuses with it instead, and reaches it's final form.

Necrozma has not forgotten what the people from this world did to it, so it starts to rage and destroy the whole place.

The URS doesn't even have time to ask for you to help them, for they are the first to bite the dust.

Nebby picks you all and returns to your world before Necrozma can burn you out too, arriving at the Lake.

You take the moment to take a break, but this is far from over. Gladion reminds you that you need to go back to the Aether Foundation and get rid of those Nihilego hats.

You all go to the Foundation and start making those Nihilegos faint with Nebby's help.

You even manage to save Lusamine, yay for you.

Lillie apparently looks too much like a Nihilego so they didn't really bother to suck her head. Good thing we guess.

You wonder where is Hau, but Lillie doesn't known what happened to him after you all left through the wormhole since the light of it was too intense and she couldn't make out much of it.

Gladion thinks he may have gotten away, since he isn't really a strong trainer, he must be smart enough to run away. You hope so.

Faba suddenly appears with some medical help, all while acting as if saving the Foundation was his doing (from a mastermind point, that is). None of you take that and Guzma outright bullies him on the spot.

Lillie is grateful for your help on this, and for saving Nebby too. She entrusts Nebby to you since you seem to be a strong trainer, and she decides it's time to let you go on your own, since she now has to take care of her mother after all that Nihilego juice. Gladion will also stay behind this time.

It's ok, you have no time to waste on this plot. You still have some trial stuff to do! That's why you play this game after all.

Guzma gives you a ride back to Ula'Ula on the Skull Ferry, since you still have to fight the kahuna of the place.

You go to Po Town and visit Nanu on the house he is staying in.

At first he is all "go away kid I'm on my free day", but Guzma calls him out to do his duties, this kid here was a hero a few moments ago!

Oh well. Nanu fights you and you complete the Ula'Ula stuff.

Guzma gives you a ride to Poni. He wishes to fight you once you finish the Challenge.

Poni doesn't have much to offer, except for that stoner girl who can't come up with a trial. You are encountered by Hapu tho, who just got named Kahuna by Tapu Fini.

You battle her and win, congratulations you finished your Island Challenge!

But we still have more to do.

Tradition says you have to do a Boss Rush with all the kahunas, but for now things can't be done like that.

Now that Hapu is a kahuna, she wants to have a serious talk with Kukui, who just went on and began construction of a League in sacred grounds without permission, and she wants to do it before the Tapus run out of patience on the matter.

You go back to Tapu Village with her, and there you meet with the other kahunas too. Hala and Olivia are a bit hurt about this trust betrayal. Nanu just wants to avoid having to deal with an angry Bulu if things don't get resolved.

You go all the way up the mountain.

Seems construction of the place is almost done, and Kukui just came back from where he left a few points ago.

He is really excited about the news he has. The International Pokémon Company, er I mean, League Association said all the construction's regulations are in order so they are all ready to add Alola to the group of leagues. He only needs the local authorities (aka the kahunas) to sign it and Alola will finally be on the map as a serious place and not just some tourist hole.

Hala stops him bluntly.

He tells Kukui he was aware that Alola needed to finally move on and make some progress to get with the times of the rest of the world, but he is hurt that Kukui went ahead with his plans without waiting for Nanu to give his vote nor for Tapu Fini to choose a kahuna. Olivia seconds his opinion.

Nanu then says Kukui is really dumb if he thought the Tapus not acting right away meant they were giving him the thumbs up. At best, the Tapus are waiting for him to finish the whole project before coming and blast it away. That's the kind of karmic punishment they like to do.

Hapu says she knows Kukui meant no harm, but still the way he acted on it was what made them all decide to not greenlight this League project.

Yeah that's right. They are all voting now to decline the League.

Kukui finally stops being all merry on the matter, and gets angry at this sudden turn of events.

"See this is why Alola can't move forward!"

Kukui blames this antiquated system as the reason Alola is stuck in the past. People live just following these traditions blindly, without wondering if they are truly necessary anymore.

Kanto and many other regions do well without kahunas saying what people can and can't do, for one!

Kukui asks you for validation on this.

You agree that Kanto doesn't really have such a strong presence of a high authority nor guardian deities, but that doesn't mean Alola should work the same way. There must be a middle ground between tradition and progress, you think.

Well, there is only one way to decide this, a method that is probably the only timeless thing in the Pokémon World: a pokémon battle.

The battle for the fate of Alola's ways starts!

You fight Kukui and defeat him.

An awkward silence follows, which is not broken until Kukui talks.

Your moves were really strong and well coordinated, you truly are a talented trainer.

He agrees on at least stick with traditions this time and cancel the League project. There is no point on forcing progress like this, or else he will be met with even more opposition and no one will be happy.

Hala is happy that Kukui listens to reason, and promises that if he works hard on making ammends they can rethink this whole League thing.

Everything is good now, you think.

Until a weak laugh sounds.

Your turn around and are greeted with a disturbing image.

Hau was standing right behind you, with a Nihilego at his side.

Hau applauds the whole scene. How everything was all just decided with a pokémon battle.

Kukui's beliefs, ideals and convictions he holded for years, all meant nothing the moment an 11 year old kid defeated his pokémon team. What a funny world we all live in. All so simple.

Hala is worried and asks Hau what's wrong. Hau screams him to shut up. He is not in the mood to listen to another lecture of his.

Hau is tired, you know? All so tired. He at first hated his father for leaving his family behind, not being able to live under the shadow of the mighty kahuna Hala. But now he understands what his father felt all his life.

Ever since he got his Pichu, everyone was comparing him to Hala. 'Oh I bet you will be as strong as your tutu!' 'Are you going to specialize on electric types instead of fighting like your grandpa?' 'You have a Pichu because Raichu can beat your granfather's type, right?'. So annoying! He hates his stupid town!

He at first thought if he only concentrated on battling for fun and not to win, he would overcome this sentiment, but it didn't work.

His debut battle against you only left shame to him. The grandson of the kahuna, defeated by a foreigner. And Tapu Koko recognized him instead of the great kahuna's grandson. That is a really shitty burden to have.

And of course, the next battles didn't help. The only fights he won were against people who were very aware of who his grandfather was. Even he could tell Olivia went easy on him on the trial battle, even after she gave him that talk about being himself.

And of course there were Gladion's words and how he couldn't save Lillie from the URS. It was all because he wasn't a strong trainer. Because he couldn't be like you.

You don't really know what to tell him to make him feel better, but not that it will matter. He has been under Nihilego's influence for too long, you doubt your words can really reach him.

Nanu is the only other who understands what is going on. He tries to talk down Hau while getting ready to battle and knock out the jellyfish.

Nihilego is not taking any of that and throws an attack at Nanu, leaving him unconscious.

Everyone else also gets ready to fight while still trying to talk some reason to Hau.

Hapu tells him she understands what he was through. After her grandfather died, she was sure Tapu Fini would choose her to be the next kahuna, but it didn't happen. She then traveled all around the islands, training and getting stronger until Tapu Fini recognized her strenght. She is sure that Hau only needs to believe on himself and train to get stronger.

Hau says that isn't necessary, not anymore. Not now that he got Nihilego with him.

You don't like where this is all going.

Nihilego is set and absorbs Hau, fusing with him.

The other kahunas try to fight him, but he and his team with boost auras defeat them easily.

Kukui tries to stop Hau. Being used to test pokémon moves on himself, he manages to withstand his attack's more than the others but is still left on the ground.

Kukui wasn't really trying to defeat Hau himself, but analize what they were going against.

Before falling unconscious he tells you all he could get from his moves. Nihilego must be Rock/Poison, but most of his moves are Poison type. What you do with this information is all on you.

This is your real final boss battle.

Hau first sends 5 pokémon with boost aura against you. You manage to defeat them, but now comes your worst fear. Now you have to fight the Hau/Nihilego fusion.

The fight is tough, but mostly because you are afraid of hurting Hau.

Hau takes out most of your team. You need to stop him.

Remember the professor's words. Rock/Poison, Poison moves. Don't you have something powerful enough and with type advantage to that?

You send out Nebby as your last pokémon, your very last hope to stop and save Hau.

Nebby fights and weakens Hau enough to make the Nihilego get away from him, and Nebby returns it to it's rightful dimension.

You approach Hau, who is lying in the ground, barely awake.

He asks you if you are hurt. You are ok. He smiles and apologizes for the trouble. You ask him if he really hates you, to which he replies he never did.

He then falls unconscious.

All fades to black.

It has been days since that happened, and you haven't heard much of Hau's state.

You don't even care about not being able to finish your Island Challenge yet, you just want to know if Hau is doing well.

Suddenly Kukui arrives. He has good news for you. Hau is doing well, the doctors they brought from Kanto managed to take away all of Nihilego's neurotoxins out of his system, and you can go visit him now.

You of course go to check him out.

Hau is genuinely happy to see you. He apologizes again for all the trouble he caused and for the nasty words he said.

He can't say those weren't his feelings, but still it was really rude to just scream them like that. You tell him it's all ok, no harm done.

Hau then asks you how your Challenge went. You haven't finished it yet. He then tells you that he heard the kahunas were all ready to be challenged at Mount Lanakila, and asks you to go and be a Challenge Champion for them both.

You promise you will win, for them both.

You go to Mount Lanakila, and meet the kahunas there.

Yes, even Nanu is there. Not that he really wants to.

They are ready to give you your Boss Rush, so you can finally be the Champion.

You fight them all at their strongest, and win.

Hapu asks you to follow her.

Why is she taking you to the cancelled League building?

Once you reach the Champion's room, Hapu smiles and asks you to register your pokémon for the Hall of Fame.

The project will take a while to be greenlighted, but is good if they already have a Champion for when it happens.

Congratulations, you are Alola's First Champion!

Credits roll.

RAINBOW CHAMPION EPISODE (remember this is still set in the Villain-Champion Switch bunch of scenarios, so expect the according champions here!)

Postgame happens, your mom still has your stuff in boxes.

Someone knocks on your door and she asks you to go see who it is.

You don't even reach the living room and you already hear the door open.

"Wow they don't lock the doors here neither."

"That doesn't mean you can get in just like that!"

Hey a tanned guy and a nerd are in your house now.

The guy in glasses apologizes for the way they got in, and introduces them both. He is Maxie and the other guy is Archie, they both come in representation of Hoenn.

Usually when a new region gets a League, it just gets credited and they are all done with it. But seems Alola is a different case.

The kahunas sent a note to the League Association, saying that the Tapus told them they were going to accept this League stuff on their grounds only if they could test the elected Champion.

This is a bit of a special case, so the League Association needs to make sure all this passing gets recorded because...

"What do I know? Weird traditions of yours."

Archie tells you to go to Mahalo Trail to start this process, and he and Maxie leave, since he wants to go check the stores from Hau'oli City.

You go to Mahalo Trail.

Once you reach the place you meet with Hala, who introduces you to the League member who will supervise your battle against Koko: Kanto-Johto former champion Giovanni.

Giovanni has heard stories about Tapu Koko's love for battles, so he expects your trial to be an interesting sight. He could also learn a thing or two from Alola's regional guardian pokémon with that (remember, he is a researcher now).

You go to the Ruins of Conflict, and get your Totem battle with Tapu Koko.

A tough battle, but you manage to win.

Giovanni congratulates you and tells you your next point are the Akala Outskirts. For now he must leave to fill his report for the League.

You leave to the Akala Outskirts now. There Olivia meets you.

Or at least she would, if she wasn't so busy trying to woo Maxie there.

A redhead who knows how to appreciate rocks is a rare sight in Alola after all, better get him now.

Maxie doesn't mind the attention, but Archie takes the opportunity of you being there to stop this nonsense.

You being there means you already defeated one Tapu, Olivia is proud. But she warns you that Lele can be quite merciless despite being known as a healer, so she warns you to not let your guard down.

Archie and Maxie are a bit worried, since their experience with 'merciless' local deities isn't the best, but they trust Lele won't go apocalyptic on the region.

You all go to the Ruins of Life.

Now that you are there the battle against Tapu Lele can be done.

You fight Totem Tapu Lele and win, as usual for you.

Archie gets all excited and congratulates you on passing this test. Maxie is more calm about it and informs you that Haina Desert is your next stop.

You leave to Haina Desert.

No familiar face is waiting there for you, just a blue-haired guy with an emotionless face.

He introduces himself as Cyrus, the former champion of Sinnoh. He is here to see how you do against this so called Tapu Bulu. He is also interested on exploring the desert, since it is said to be an ever changing maze. It kinda reminds him of a place he was on a few years ago, and wants to know how such a place works in this dimensional plain.

You navigate the desert, get lost a few times until you finally reach the Ruins of Abundance.

Knowing Tapu Bulu's description, Cyrus wonders if the Desert is the way it is so Bulu can be left alone.

No time for getting all existential, you have to fight your Tapu.

You battle against Totem Tapu Bulu and win. Is kinda easy when his terrain heals you tbqh.

Cyrus is satisfied with what he saw, and tells you you are almost done with this test thing. Your last stop is the Poni Breaker Coast.

You arrive to Poni Breaker Coast.

Not a soul there to greet you. Hu.

You walk a bit to get to the Ruins of Hope, and right in the entrance you meet Hapu and other guy.

They notice your presence and the lion-hair guy introduces himself as Lysandre, Kalos' former champion.

Hapu says she was just talking with Lysandre about how exactly the people in Poni live, since he was wondering how they manage in such a hostile island. He is quite amazed with the way the Seafolk people live. Like water nomads of sorts. An interesting way of living.

But enough of this boring chat, you must want to fight Tapu Fini.

You all go to the Ruins of Hope and there Fini makes a presence. Lysandre is astonished at how beautiful the Tapu is, and guesses it's beauty must match it's strenght in battle.

You fight Totem Tapu Fini who spams Aqua Ring and is a pain in the ass for stalling, but you manage to take it down.

Lysandre is amazed at your skill, and Hapu congratulates you for passing the test of the Tapus. Now the League can be greenlighted for real this time!

Lysandre interrupts the merry celebration though, saying they aren't really done yet.

Yes, the League Association sent him and the other former champions to be witnesses of this "ritual", but they all agreed on their way there that it would be a waste to only let the Tapus test the Alolan Champion.

Oh yeah, you are set for a Champion Boss Rush now.

Lysandre asks you to get ready, they will all be waiting for you at Mount Lanakila, where the League should be set.

You go to Mount Lanakila yet again, and there meet the former champions.

They all have seen your skill and strenght in battle, now they want to test your Champion material.

No more teams of 5 pokémon, no more easy mode. No. You better get ready for full teams of level 80 with held items, perfect IVs, trained EVs and no brakes on the rape train.

You at least get the chance to choose the order you fight them in.

When you get to choose Archie and Maxie, they ask you who you want to fight, but no matter which of the two you pick they say they were joking. No escape from the double battle here.

After you defeat them all, they welcome you to the ever growing club of regional Champions, and wish you the best of lucks to hold that title for a very long time.

Thanks for reading!

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tumblunni · 6 years

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Today’s random Thought about gamemaking, I guess? Does anyone else get inexplicably super pissed off when a song seems to give the wrong meaning to a scene?

Like seriously i do not know ANYTHING about making music, I don’t even know how to read music notation at a basic primary school level. So it seems bewhildering to me when super talented viddygame musicians seem to take a ‘ehh it doesnt matter’ attitude to their soundtrack. I can’t understand why any game would not even TRY to have music match to the story stuff that’s happening, seriously why are there so many mediocre products like that. EVEN STUPID BUNNI CAN SEE IT!!! WE EXPECT BETTER FROM YOU!!! Good retort for any other ‘don’t listen to the players, they couldn’t make their own game’ type argument- you don’t have to be a master chef to know a cake is burnt.

sorry, sorry, I’m getting offtopic here, I’m just a little fired up!

Well basically what I mean is that music can be REALLY IMPORTANT to enhance an emotional moment in a game, and it can backfire horribly if one of those moments has a bad soundtrack. Not that it’s the be all and end all of sorywriting though, I mean there are plenty of games out there with forgettable soundtracks that still made me cry. But.. I mean.. usually they were just forgettable, and not outright terrible. Not many games where I had to play the whole thing muted managed to stir up as much emotion, yknow...? RAMBLING AGAIN Summary: music is not > writing, but can add +1 to writing if they work in harmony.

But the point that bothered me today is remembering how a failed musical moment can confuse players on the meaning of a scene, if the writing didn’t outright spell it out. Or if the writing is very clear on the intended reaction and the music still seems to say something else, the disconnect can ruin your immersion even if you still understood what was trying to be said. or, hypothetically, if a situation exists with two versions of the same story and one of them has a fitting, meaningful song while the other has a rather generic one, that moment could seem to hold more ‘importance’ in the narrative depending on which version you bought. JUST SAYIN’

which actually happened once in pokemon ruby and sapphire and it still rustles my jimmies!!!

okay so we have two versions of the same game where the villain guy has a different personality and tries to harness the power of a legendary monster of either fire or water. They both still follow the same general plotline, and both have a moment where villain guy’s plan fails and he isn’t able control [insert monster name here], thus causing Apocolypse Time for some damn reason this was chosen as one of the only songs that differs between games, despite its emotional resonance being CRITICALLY important to this goddamn scene

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I guess that’s bad? I suppose?

but then the other one gets the fuckin creepiest music i have ever heard in a pokemon game

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I THINK THAT EVER SO SLIGHTLY CHANGES THE TONE OF THE SCENE, GUYS

seriously, the water one sounds more like a vaguely ominous dungeon exploration theme and like.. a music.. in general??? not a YOU DONE FUCKED UP! YOU DONE FUCKED UP! alarm blaring right in maximillian’s goddamn face. it’s deliberately dissonant non-music, and the other one doesn’t even try to capture the same sort of aesthetic!

and lil kid me had only played Sapphire Version, so I never even heard the spookier version until I played the Ruby remake a decade later I know it sounds weird to not grasp the gravity of a literal apocolypse if the music isn’t scary enough, but I mean.. its a jrpg cliche. The world is always under threat and we already knew it was under threat and that’s why we wanted to beat this guy. That spooky music moment was necessary to sell the audience on something that’s often lost its shock value in this genre. And it was also an emotional moment because its where the villain sees the consequences of his actions and realizes what he was doing was wrong. It shouldnt be just a ‘wow, new sea adventure dungeon, better get moving kiddo’ sort of thing, but something that knocks you off your tracks for a second and makes you pause to take in what this guy is saying and feel sympathy for his horrific realization. Its a moment that’s so disarming for him that you just have to leave him there nigh-catatonic as you rush off to fix his mistake, and he only properly teams up with you to help save the day a dungeon or two later. That just seemed like a plot contrivance in Sapphire because there wasn’t that same desperate urgency that you have to rush off NOW, and can’t wait for this guy. Apocolypses happen all the time in rpg games, you need to specify to the audience when you want it to feel like an URGENT apocolypse! FF7 had a similar moment where you learn a bunch of revelations about the main villain and he succeeds in summoning the magic meteor that was more of an abstract threat this entire time. Now you can see it hovering in the distant sky, and the world map music has a drastic spooky change similar to this game. it worked there, it worked in pokemon ruby, pokemon sapphire why did you change it?

also, a more random minor issue I had with another song in the same game

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Is it just me or does Wally’s theme sound more like ‘classy rich guy’ than ‘unconfident younger child with a chronic illness whom you play a mentor role to’? It also sounds really cheerful and upbeat and reminds me more of the generic ‘HI I AM GIRL AND CUTE AND CRUSH ON YOU’ rival characters like May and Shauna. Its just kinda got that ‘hyperactive and clumsy but in a way that’s supposed to be seen as a love interest’ sort of vibe. So yeah to me it says ‘fancy high class characters are usually egotistical jerk rivals, but I personally want to assure you that this rich lady is actually super nice and adorable and possibly has cute comic relief aspects’. Aka Sonia Nevermind from Danganronpa. Is this just my brain making nonsensical associations or does anyone see where I’m coming from??

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Also ‘Wally Emotion’ doesnt seem to have ANYTHING in common with it and I never even knew this was a Wally-only theme AT ALL until I saw the track listing.

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THINGS THAT SOUND WAY MORE LIKE THAT: THIS seriously why is this just the generic song for the town the guy lives in, instead you don’t even really take enough time passing through it to hear the full thing...

also obligatory mention to possibly the greatest change in the whole remake being SPECIFICALLY GIVING THIS GUY ANOTHER ACTUALLY FITTING REMIX SONG hey guess what didnt give me emotions in the first version hey guess what gives me all the emotions now FUCK YEAH that’s how you sell ‘the student becomes the master’ entirely without words! this thing was so goddamn successful that it took me half an hour to even find a video of his ‘main theme’, youtube search was overwhelmingly shoved full of cover of this badass piece i cant believe that the original game just used the same old minor trainer battle theme for him...

#blunni thoughts

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demonphannie · 7 years

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dan and phil - june 2017

6/12

first week (1-7): dan wants to eat and be alone for his birthday. phil likes snuggling with cats. politics and pizza and chill. new gaming video: ARE GAMERS NERDS? - Google Autocomplete Game! dan puts the succ in succulents. barbecue becomes floorbecue (context but dan and phil have barbecue with dan’s grandparents). phil is recognized as the dan and phil guy! dan and phil release a shirt to support manchester. phil relaxes with some attack on titan. dan liveshow! (highlights: new webcam, gonna make a new youtube banner, loved the one love manchester concert, at his all boys school when they got shots they all punched each other because it would hurt more, his grandparents visited, his grandma brought an or-rey-o cake, cake scene whom, he and phil and friends played dungeons and dragons and dan was a fucking edgelord, he went to the gym and jogged 10km and couldn’t move the next morning, he went because phil wasn’t there and he was bored, cavemen over dinosaurs existentialism over nihilism, he has nothing against wearing dresses, he’s practicing piano more, he has ten succulents) + bonus thumbnail. new gaming video: MOTION CONTROL VIOLENCE - Dan vs. Phil: ARMS.

second week (8-14): dan wants you to VOTE. phil wants you to VOTE. edward snowden and jeremey corbyn interact with dan on twitter. obligatory democracy selfie. phil liveshow! (highlights: listened to a sexual podcast when going to the gym, he ate very unhealthily as a child, beauty tips with phil: dry shampoo in hair before you go to sleep, toothpaste on pimples, don’t drop things on your feet or they will bruise, daddy cleaned us, cake scene whom, the ampersand is broken, he was gonna live in the gaming room but decided they needed more space for the gaming so now he lives in a broom cupboard under the stairs, martyn moved, he’s been watching love island, his bday gifts for dan are things phil wants, he has two coffees a day). jeremy corbyn is one thicc bih according to dan. new gaming video: THE MOST FRUSTRATING GAME EVER MADE - Dan and Phil play: I Am Bread. dan loves wonder woman. dan and phil went to wahaca (food for before dan’s bday). DAN’S BIRTHDAY!!! phil posts a pic of dan playing mariokart and it’s like pretty cute. “i don’t feel 26 but when you consider i have a 16 year old’s body and the crushed soul of someone aged 36 it kinda makes sense” (does dan know how to do math). bryony posts some cute pics on her insta story confirming they went to a sushi place and a sky bar (1+2+3). rare birthday boye pic. it stops the bees tweets from cat for dan’s birthday. phil bought dan (himself) a fidget spinner. new amazingphil video: TRY NOT TO CRINGE - My Dating Emails (tinder ad). phil almost blinds himself with the fidget spinner. dan’s life is on hold now that nintendo is releasing a pokemon switch game (and also he’s going to leave dead animals on nintendo’s doorstep if they do not make an animal crossing game). dan changed his twitter icon from this to this. dan liveshow! (highlights: birthday, comic sans, phil’s used the fidget spinner more than him, also got a weather crystal thingy from phil, dan also got sunflowers, dan HATES sunflowers, i HATE dan, terrarium of the day, his family has a pattern of giving dan colin themed gifts this time being a tshirt, friends got him a skull filled with vodka, he loves the babadook, phil is away, no phil liveshow, dan is phil’s pr agent, pokemon gotta catch em all, rant about how annoyingly perfect chris pine is, steven universe discourse, he cringed at phil’s video). also dan’s tweet for his liveshow mentioned (and friendzoned) phil for no reason. also here is some weird shit dan thought he would make his icon. wow young people these days and their exam memes. phil is a finger guns kinda guy. new gaming video: DIL GETS PREGNANT - Dan and Phil Play: Sims 4 #41.

third week (15-21): when phil is away dan will post irrelevant sceenshots of what they text each other and it’s sorta sad sorta cute. angery wasps. dan’s houseplants are thriving. phil craves that mineral. new daniel howell video: The Memeing Of Life. centipede drama with documentarist phil lester (also phil doesn’t have wooden floors in his room but ok). dan wishes happy fathers day to dil? phil liveshow! (highlights: thank you for all the fathers day wishes, strong air conditioning in his “room”, he got his dad jams and hacksaw ridge, he has a big family and a lot are in australia, dan was scurred of the centipede, he’s trying to get louise to name her new baby phil, dan is worth £6, he hurt himself with the fidget spinner, not watching love island anymore, chris pine is distracting, some beauty tips, flat earth). “england more like fuckimmeltingdeargodhowcaniescapethisunbearableheatimsweatingoutofmyeyeballswhereisallthebloodyrainweresupposedtohaveland.” some limited edition merch. dan and phil appear in an anthony padilla video. new gaming video: THIS GAME IS TOO BLOODY HARD - Dan and Phil play: Keep Talking And Nobody Explodes #3. oh no phil almost went live in the bath. wow going to america (or are they). phil likes topless guys showering horses. dan and phil appear in #youtubers4grenfell livestream.

fourth week (22-30): dan and phil #spotted at the airport. dan and phil at vidcon! night of community where dan and phil have a bicker about whose fault it was that they missed their flight to la (run down: dan lost his passport and phil booked the car late and they almost missed vidcon). also the try guys do a funny impression of dan and phil. dan explains. nice pics of the night of community. pics of dan and phil leaving the night of community. phil slept nice. youtube water. dan and phil and tyler. dan and phil meet and greet (not all the pics but some highlights: one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten). lil peek into a markiplier vlog. dan and phil @ a party just eating and playing ddr (one + two + three). dan and phil with cute doggo. new gaming video: HELP WE ARE SO LOST 🌎🤔 - Dan vs. Phil: GeoGuessr. dan apologizes for being extra even tho he’s always extra. dan’s an edgelord. dan and phil are jean jacket boyes. dan and phil on the fine bros instagram story + on twitter. dan and phil and badly drawn models. dan is angery on facebook. phil is going to another dimension. new amazingphil video: DAN CURLS MY HAIR! fine bros video: YOUTUBERS REACT TO NICKI MINAJ CHALLENGE (#NICKIMINAJCHALLENGE). dan is an edgelord pt 2. they are on cat’s insta story. ACurlyPhil selfie. dan and phil in a tomska vlog (@ 22:57 and 33:00). just touched down in london town. new gaming video: WATCH US WRECK SOME LOSERS ONLINE - Mario Kart 8 Deluxe. dan and phil play with cat’s new pup in this video which made my entire body tingle. wow crash bandicoot is out.

the floor is my undying love for dan and phil.

#phan #dan and phil #daniel howell #amazingphil #2017 timeline

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roxannarambles · 7 years

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This is a story about spoilers and betrayal. I'd like to discuss the deeper nature of spoilers, as both a positive and a negative force and how they've played out in my experience of the Fire Emblem series. Your obligatory spoiler warning, of course: behind the cut I discuss major plot points of Fire Emblem Birthright and two of the GBA games, Blazing Blade and Binding Blade.

Let’s Plays and First Experiences

I was introduced to the Fire Emblem series a number of years ago when one of my favorite pokemon Youtubers did a Let's Play series of Blazing Blade. I'm an individual who plays very, very few games, although I watch plenty of Let's Plays just for entertainment value. I was intrigued by the Fire Emblem series and thoroughally enjoyed the Let's Play series, loving the colorful story, rich characters, and strategy-focused gameplay. At the time, it didn't occur to me to play it myself. Like all the other Let's Plays, I simply enjoyed watching it and then moved on.

Something about Fire Emblem stuck with me, though. The YouTuber did several more Let's Play series based on Fire Emblem games, and I really enjoyed those, too. I started warming up to them to such a degree that I felt the urge to do something I almost never did-- actually try playing one of the games myself.

Already very familiar with Pokemon ROMs, it didn't take me too long to actually locate a copy of FE7 and give it a go. I was incredibly uncertain at first while playing, intimidated and convinced it would be too difficult for me to get the hang of. Picking it up was actually very easy, though, and it rapidly became an addictive and deeply absorbing game for me.

Because it had been quite some time since I'd watched the initial Let's Play of FE7, many of the story details had, at that point, faded. Therefore I came at it fairly fresh, and much of the story was exciting and 'new'-- or a 'oh yeah I totally forgot about that until it happened again just now!' sort of situation, which is fairly close to experiencing it new firsthand. There was enough familiarity-- oh yes I remember Kent, I always liked him-- that it was nice to see familiar faces, but enough time had passed that it felt like a fresh new adventure again; plus, this time, I was in charge. It really allowed me to experience it as my own thing.

Some plot details, of course, I hadn't completely forgotten about. Those major plot twists/reveals/very dramatic events are going to probably stick with you forever, and no amount of time will make them fade. So yes, I remembered Ninian and her brother were dragons; I knew at some point in the story, Eliwood accidentelly killed Ninian in dragon form. I also had a vague memory of the final showdown with Nergal, although many of those details had faded. Interestingly, the detail that Ninian was miraculusously saved from death had also faded from my mind. It helped that it really had been a few years since I watched the Let's Play before I tried playing the game on my own. In the end, it made for a very enjoyable experience. Yes, some major details were not a surprise to me, but I didn't mind that in the least. It didn't stop me from absolutely falling in love with the game and playing it several more times over.

Eventually, I decided I wanted to try some more games from the Fire Emblem franchise. The second game I played through was Binding Blade. Overall, I found the gameplay and the increased challenge of Binding Blade (when compared to FE7) to be very enjoyable and satisfying (with a couple REALLY frustrating exceptions, namely a few maps with freaking Bezerk staffs all over the place), although I found the characters and story to be a little lacking when compared to FE7. The writing just wasn't as top-notch and I didn't fall as deeply in love with the cast of characters. Of course, some of that could be attributed to the fact Binding Blade was a fan translation. It was an excellent translation, but even the best fan translation probably doesn't compare to the professional localizations. Even with that consideration, though, I suspect FE7 is just stronger in terms of story and characters. I'm hard pressed to point out ANY character from FE7 that I don't like or can't find some sort of interesting thing about them, and the game is just brimming with richness and depth in storytelling. Still, FE6 had been well worth playing.

Something made me stop right on the final chapter of Binding Blade, however. And I'll get back to that later and explain why.

Modern Fire Emblem

After completing Binding Blade 99%, I felt like it was time to try out one of the more modern games. As I mentioned previously, I've never been a huge video game person, but I did own a 2DS-- mainly to play Pokemon on. Although I was very attached to the GBA Fire Emblem games and loved the art style and feel of that era of games, I was also intrigued by the idea of trying one of the more modern games. The new art styles, the new system, the new mechanics and all of that would take some getting used to, and lacked the charm of the GBA, but still, I thought it was worth looking into. Why was that? Because once again, I had seen some Let's Plays, done by that some YouTuber. In particular, the series had been on Awakening. I had really deeply enjoyed the characters and story from that series, and it seemed like it recapured a lot of what was special about Fire Emblem. There was its share of problems, sure-- I wasn't blind to the gross fan-pandering "waifu" phenomenon and its objectification of a lot of female characters-- but overall it seemed like an excellent game, and really, you're going to find flaws in any game. The Let's Play series convinced me that the newer, modern games were worth trying out.

There was a problem, though. The Awakening Let's Play was still fresh in my memory. It hadn't been several months or a year since I'd seen it; I'd only watched the last of it a week prior or so. I wanted to wait before buying Awakening to play for myself, wait long enough for some of those memories to fade. My solution was to buy a different game in the meantime, but still one of the newer ones. After some research and deliberation I chose FE Fates: Birthright.

Birthright

'What fun,' I thought to myself, 'The first Fire Emblem game I'll be playing completely blind! Not even the slightest vague memories of Let's Plays about it!' I read enough about Fates to know it branched paths as 3 different games depending on which kingdom you sided with, but I really did know little more than that. It seemed like a great opportunity to go in 100% spoiler-free. So many great surprises awaited!

Once I started playing, I found Fates was . . . definitely not as good as Awakening. The story just did not appeal to me as strongly, and many of the characters failed to appeal to me, either. They seemed more tropey than usual (and yes, I admit FE characters always are tropey to some degree, but they felt even more so), the ideas more bland or worn-out, and the game seemed to suffer from the problem of even more gross objectification of women than Awakening. The cutscenes with the character models (as opposed to the full-fledged cinematic cutscenes) were awkward at times and hard to take seriously. (When the Avatar falls into the bottomless pit of doom or whatever, their wooden figure falling stiffly just looks utterly ridiculous and makes what's supposed to be a tense, dramatic thing and unfortunately makes it purely moronic. Not their fault, just the limitations of the technology right now.)

So, yeah, all in all, Fates seemed OK, but not the best. I wasn't really digging a lot of the plot and characters, and the maps were often a little on the bland side, but it was alright. I took solace in the parts that I actually did enjoy. A few of the characters were pretty neat. I liked Subaki, and I liked Kaze, and I liked Silas. Jakob seemed pretty cool, too, and I liked Hinata and Hinoka. I was enjoying the MyCastle stuff, even though it's a bit silly. Capturing units in a jail to recruit was intriuging, and forging weapons was fun. I liked inviting allies over to my house, and I was enjoying the support conversations. I was also enjoying learning the new support mechanics that were so new to me. I was slowly but surely grinding Moku up to a decent level and I was just starting to Master Seal some of my units and think about my choices for promotions.

It was going pretty decently! I had A-support with Subaki, and was ready for S-support, but I decided I wanted to get up to A-rank with Kaze and Silas first before making the final choice. And then I went off to play chapter 15.

No, I didn't know I was about to get screwed over by the game. The plot killed off Kaze because I wasn't currently A-rank with him; when the chapter ended I hit the 'save' without even thinking about it. Just ingrained habit. Besides, surely if the game killed him off as a plot point, it couldn't have possibly been prevented, right? So there was no need to avoid saving the game anyway, right?

Nope. Because I failed to fulfill an arbitrary requirement that the game didn't inform me about, I was now locked out of the 'good' ending for Kaze. If I wanted to continue with the game with my unit (which I dumped a lot of resources and time into, by the way) and get his good ending, I would have to start the game completely over.

This is just bad game design. I'm not even about to argue that a unit should never be killed off by a plot point instead of during battle. Sure, it would be very annoying and upsetting to have a unit you spent a lot of time investing in to be killed off no matter what you do, but at least there would be a purpose to that: to serve as a surprise, to demonstrate death cannot be avoided sometimes even when you replay a chapter, to be a poignant and meaingful plot point in the overall story arc. Kaze's death was none of those things. The scene was awkwardly shoved in there, completely void of any emotional impact, and entirely meaningless. (Basically, rocks fall, Kaze dies.) But, worst of all, it could have been avoided if you had simply been "in the know" about a very easy secret requirement to fulfill (a-level support). One stupid little thing like that, sullying my entire run.

I mentioned I stopped playing Binding Blade when I was 99% complete. And the reason why is largely the same kind of situation. In the GBA games there are these Gaiden Chapters that can be unlocked. Often the requirements for unlocking them are pretty secret and arbitrary. You have to either stumble across them or look at a Wiki. The idea of these easter egg chapters is to increase the replay value of the game and have extra added bonuses, and that's fine. Nothing wrong with that idea. I ended up playing most of the Gaiden chapters in Binding Blade just for fun. I knew they existed from the Let's Play I had watched, so I made sure to look up in a wiki how to unlock them.

I did not know, however, you needed to complete 100% of the Gaiden chapters to unlock the full, true ending of the game.

Now, something like that isn't as bad as what Birthright did. I would argue the the "full, true ending" was supposed to be more like "bonus content" to reward players with more stuff if they want to replay. But not knowing about the secret, arbitrary requirements ahead of time and thus playing through the entire game only to be locked out of several of the final chapters? It left a bitter taste in my mouth, enough that the desire to even finish the last chapter of my current run just was killed. To this day I still don't know how Binding Blade actually ends. I always meant to return to it eventually-- I just didn't feel like replaying the ENTIRE game again anytime soon to get the true ending.

Well, after Kaze died and I was locked out of using him ever again, I'm pretty much in the same boat now. It leaves a very, very bitter taste in your mouth. As much as I'd been enjoying playing, it pretty much kills all desire to continue with the game. If Kaze was destined to always die due to plot reasons, I would have been completely fine with continuing onward. But the fact that one small mistake due to not knowing a secret requirement means he's gone? That's beyond absurd.

I honestly don't know what to do now. I would love for my desire to play the game to return to me, but I really don't think it will at this point. I certainly don't want to continue with the bad ending, but I don't want to spend the enormous chunk of time and effort to get all the way back to the middle of the game again. It's a massive shame. And, quite frankly, even if I did continue, how could I trust the game at this point to not screw me over again in a similar manner with more secret requirements?

Playing a game blind means you, as a player, are giving a certain amount of trust in the game to give you a satisfying experience. That's not to say you don't thrust surprises upon the player. Of course there should be surprises. A good story has surprises and heartbreaks. But to break the basic rules of the game itself and say, "Oh yeah, you get the bad ending, and it's your fault, because you didn't do this thing I didn't tell you that you needed to do" is just assholery. You are betraying the trust of your players. And that's not necessarily something that can be quickly regained once it's lost.

Conclusion

So that's my tale of spoilers and betrayal. Spoilers can be such a double-edged sword. It was because of Let's Plays that I discovered Fire Emblem to begin with and sought it out to play on my own, so obviously some spoilers are not bad. Often spoilers can completely rob a story of its emotional impact, though. We know this. So we try to minimize them.

But spoilers could also have prevented the bullshit I ran into that trashed my run of Birthright. So, it's tough. I guess a good policy might be "no spoilers, except for extremely bullshit DICK MOVES that the game is going to try and pull on you." I don't know.

In any rate, if anyone actually read even a part of this post, I would really love to hear your opinions and thoughts on the issue. Did you also have Kaze die in your run/save over it? How did you react when you learned it could have been prevented? Is Fates too shitty of a game to bother playing anyway? (lol) I admit part of why I am so salty is because I dislike so MANY of the units in this game, so when I'm locked out of even using one of the ones I happened to like, it certainly didn't do me any favors.

Or do you think I'm being a dramatic asshat? Whatever your thoughts, I wouldn't mind hearing. In any case, thanks for reading!

#fire emblem #long post #fire emblem fates #fire emblem birthright #spoilers #chapter 15 #wolfskin peak #mystuff #fe14

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krokonoko · 7 years

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It’s been a while since I completed this meme for all the other regions, and I felt it finally was time to add Alola!

Again, these are just my opinions, and if you find some of your favs among my least favs, remember than I would probably find some of my favs among your least favs too and that’s ok ^^

As you can see, a lot of Alola forms made it on this list, both on the positive and the negative side.

This gen had heaps of Pokemon I liked or even loved, but Alolan!Ninetales and ESPECIALLY Alolan!Vulpix kinda have a special place in my heart. When I was a kid, Vulpix and Ninetales used to be my fav Pokemon for a while, but my weird penchant for rarely liking Pokemon that are red or orange in color kinda made my love for them wane a bit over time. Most of my favourite Pokemon are either blue, green, or grey, sometimes yellow and even more rarely brown. What a coincidence that GF would release the EXACT same Pokemon with a blue color swap, as if made specifically for me! With their elegance, cuteness and A!Ninetales’ unique typing, these two quickly made it to my list of absolute favorite Pokemon of all time.

Decidueye is a complicated case. I'm a grass starter kinda guy, and not only was Rowlet adorable, but Decidueye was EXACTLY my kind of Pokemon for several personal reasons. Everything from its huge wings to its fluffy, long legs to the facial design and hood are perfect! My only problem with it is its Ghost typing. It feels like EVERY Pokemon knows some Dark attack move and so many Alolan forms are Dark types. Decidueye is also incredibly slow. All that made it very unreliable, when I think your starter Pokemon should always be your most reliable ally.

Salazzle is another complicated case. I loved Salandit from the moment I first saw it and heard its evil little cackling cry. Finally, we got a cool Fire type Pokemon!! And while I absolutely ADORE Salazzle's design, the way it is framed by the game, the way its model is posed and everything just really rubs me the wrong way. BUT I refuse to let this weird... sexualization-of-a-Pokemon thing... ruin my love for the first cool fully evolved Fire type we got in YEARS!

Still a bit on the fence about Alolan!Raichu, but ultimately, who can resist this adorable critter. Its design in Pokemon Ami are the cutest thing ever, the way its surfing on its own tail is SUCH an amazing idea, and the Psychic type is SUPER interesting. I'm just generally a fan of unique typings, and I was super happy that Raichu got a bit more attention this gen!

Who. Could not. Love Jangmo-o. Even when I'd only seen its silhouette, I already loved it to bits and pieces. The cute little grumpy face, that quadrupedal body-form that I actually miss a lot about many Pokemon nowadays... It's just the most cuddly dragon ever! ...Unfortunately, things happened. More on that later.

I really like elegant, feminine-lookin Pokemon. Lopunny, Gardevoir, Salazzle, they're all awesome. Frickin hate what the internet is doing to them, but as I said before, I'm not gonna let that ruin my love for these cool Pokemon. Tsareena is another one of those cases. It looks so cool and pretty, with the long leaf-like hair and Idk, what are those, boots?? It kicks people to death with those! How much more badass can you get? Can't wait to have one on my team.

Mudsdale, the obligatory awesome Ground type. It's a 2,5m tall horse, what's not to love???

LOVE the spikes on Alolan!Sandslash! They look all translucent and icy, it's great!

Alolan!Marowak is almost too cool to be true. A Ghost type as a nod to the Marowak mom of Lavender Town? But its also a Fire type and its bone can be used as a fire-staff?? I wish GF just followed through with these kinda trains of thought more often.

honorable mentions go to Primarina, cuz it’s super pretty, and Minior, cuz I love the idea and the different colored versions!

Now on to the negatives.

I’m sure I don’t have to explain the “every single UB and legendary” part anymore. Always hated them, always will hate them. Some less than others (Celesteela is kinda cool and UB Adhesive looks cute), and the sheer amount of UB hasn't really helped my attitude towards legendary Pokemon (cuz lbr, UBs are just that.)

Ah. Yes. Incineroar. From the moment the Dark typing and the whole “wrestler” deal was confirmed, it somehow became forbidden to criticize it. Cuz that's apparently such a cool, new and unique idea. Not like Emboar and especially Pignite are already based on wrestlers. Not like wrestlers are effectively the same thing as fighters. Not like Incineroar's Z-move literally conjures up a fighting rink. Not like Incineroar learns p much the same amount of Dark and Fighting moves. ...All in all: Not like this Pokemon is a Fighting type in all but name, right? If you like it, cool. But you gotta agree that the ppl disappointed by it were lead to believe Litten would evolve into a quadrupedal tiger that would be something ELSE than a frickin Fighting type for once. I know I'm constantly bemoaning the state of the Fire type and how they just don't make 'em like they used to, but honestly. Imho, this is a HUGE missed chance, and one we aren’t gonna get again any time soon.

Gumshoos... I don't understand why we needed a Trump Pokemon.

I've heard Araquanid has a LOT of fans, actually? And I'm not trying to criticize its design, I'm sure many people like it! It's just that personally, I'm a bit freaked out by it ^^��°

Okay these three Alola forms really baffle me?? Because I mean. Five out of my ten fav Pokemon are Alolan forms, which shows they CAN be cool. Why did GF have to troll so much with them? That kinda includes A!Persian and A!Exeggutor, tho I don't really dislike these two. I just wish GF hadn't wasted so much time with dumb jokes and given us more badass and interesting Alolan Pokemon like Marowak instead.

Last but not least, Kommo-o. Oh Kommo-o, I was so disappointed with you. It's not like it's a bad Pokemon design, it's just that again, I expected something completely different. Which is kinda my own fault I admit, but still. I really wanted Jangmo-o to stay all stout and. Well. QUADRUPEDAL. But considering GF's vendetta against fully evolved quadrupedal Pokemon, Kommo-o really shouldn't have come as a surprise. The other thing tho is that it really disappointed me on my team. For a semi-legendary Dragon/Fighting Pokemon, it kinda kept letting me down again and again. Alas, this was just not meant to be...

And that’s it! All in all, I was pretty satisfied with the Alolan roster, though it's the first gen in a long time that also made me think: This could've gone a lot better. And again, if you find your fav among my least favs, remember that I’m just some dumb person on the internet posting their opinions on their unimportant blog for their own personal entertainment, nothing more ;D

#Pokemon #Pokemon meme #meme #Rob rants

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furimmerfrei · 7 years

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Title image credit: Panthers Images

Miika Wiikman is in his second season with the GMB Nottingham Panthers and is arguably one of the best net-minders in the Elite Ice Hockey League. This season he has won silverware for the club along with the rest of the team and secured the Continental Cup for the Panthers, making them one of the first British clubs to ever do so as well as qualifying for the Champions Hockey League for next season. Though as always, this interview seeks to take you Behind the Mask and into the mind somewhat of the man who wears it.

Wiikman was born in Sweden to Finnish parents. He actually has dual citizenship, but it was in Sweden that he grew up. He went to school there but once he’d finished with school he went to Finland to play hockey back in 2003 . I asked him what made him leave Sweden and move to Finland in order to pursue his career.

“This was back in 2003, the goalie coaching in Sweden wasn’t really at the same level as it is today. I knew Finland was the leading country for goalie coaching and I pretty much get a better offer from a better league in Finland, Mestis. It’s their second league and I didn’t really have any good offers after Juniors in Sweden so I thought I might as well try it and it’s also my Mum’s hometown actually, so we spent a lot of summers there so it was a place that I knew and it was pretty easy to go there. I knew they had a really good goalie coach with a really good reputation so there was really nothing to think about. Just sign and go there. I only stayed one season there, I had a really good season and then I got a contract with a really good league, with the SM-liiga. I played three seasons there for HPK.”

I asked if he had a favourite team from the Liiga. “Not right now, though of course the first team I played for HPK, great memories. I won the championship there and everything, It’s a smaller club, they don’t have the same money as those big teams like IFK or Helsinki. So yeah, HPK is probably the closest to my heart. I was also with Saipa for a couple of months and that was a really, really nice club, good club, great people around the team and it was fun to play there for a few months.” Miika explained.

Photo credit: Panther’s Images

Next we move on the the Panthers and talking about the Elite League. Claire Bentley wanted to know if he would he want to play again next season with the Panthers? “Yeah, absolutely.” No hesitation in his answer. “I mean if I don’t have any really good offers from like KHL or the Swedish Elite League or Finnish League then I don’t really see any reason to go anywhere else. I mean, I like it here, my family loves it here too.”

The move to Nottingham, how was that for him in comparison to where he was before? “Well I played in Slovakia and Slovenia the year before and it was a horrible experience.” He still hasn’t been paid for his time there and this doesn’t sound like he’s an isolated case in that repect, as Desbiens of the Steelers has also played there and didn’t get paid both with the Olimpija Ljubljana. “I’m close to giving up on that too.” He comments when I mention that it might take a while and possibly won’t ever come his way.

Photo credit: Panthers Images

Back to Nottingham; and we talk a bit about his family life here, thank you for Audrey Davis for the question. “My son he goes to school here and he’s there for more than half of the day.” I asked him about if there were any places he liked to go with the family in Nottingham.”He loves to go out and search for Pokemons, but he’s so tired when he comes back from school that we don’t go out much. When we do that’s pretty much what we do. It gets us outside and walking everyday and we go to parks and do stuff, like play football. Actually we just came back from the rink just now since he’s got half term so we went skating for an hour and a half. He’s a really active boy and there is a lot of stuff to do here in Nottingham so that’s good, but we don’t have any particular places we like to go or anything.”

How does he enjoy the crowd in Nottingham? It’s one of the biggest arenas in the league. Does it have an effect on his game? asked Panther’s fan Pippa Morley. “Oh yeah of course. Especially when we’re winning. When we’re losing it’s pretty quiet in the arena.” He begins and it’s interesting when he begins to compare to places he has played around Europe. “It reminds me of Finland a little bit, it’s pretty quiet in the rinks. In Sweden it’s completely different. People are happy and cheering for their team and it doesn’t matter what the score is, it’s always nice and loud. Here sometimes it gets so quiet, I mean we got a big arena and a big crowd and it’s so quiet, it’s just weird sometimes but these are probably some of the best fans I’ve played in front of but then again I’ve played in Finland and North America and in Slovenia we had like 50 people at the game, so here it’s a little bit different.”

And now for the obligatory, did you always want to be a goalie question. I always like to hear the different stories on how they moved from wanting to play hockey in general to wanting to play goalie. “Ah, not really. I did a lot of different sports when I was a kid, football, wrestling everything. I started as a player in hockey and I think I was nine or ten when I started playing goalie. Every guy on the team got a chance to try it and I guess I was the best at it, I got stuck there pretty much.”

Miika preparing to make a glove save, his favourite when he was a child. Photo credit: Panthers Images.

“I always wanted to make glove saves and catch the puck, the was the big thing. I remember when I was a kid, every practice I counted how many glove saves I made. It was my favourite way when I was a child, now it doesn’t really matter so much.”

Routine is something that I’ve found to be crucial for goalies specifically, as it helps them get into the zone or head space they need to be in to be able to play their absolute best. Miika is one who takes his routine incredibly seriously as he describes. “Obviously it’s a bit different between home and away games as you have to take a seat on a bus for a couple of hours. It takes a lot of time and energy to prepare for a game for me at least. I know a couple of goalies and they don’t care, like they can do whatever they want, do grocery shopping or whatever but I can’t do that. I can’t leave the house pretty much. I try to stay in and do the same thing every time, it’s kind of like an OCD, it was way worse when I was younger though. I’m a bit different now I got the kids and stuff, I can do more stuff with them, be a little bit more relaxed and it doesn’t have to be that strict but I still have to eat the same breakfast, try and do the same things in the morning. Like if I have a morning skate I do the same things. If I don’t have a morning skate I still try to do some of the things. It’s almost overdoing it and a bit OCD. I try not to let it stress me out though if things don’t go to plan.”

His main example of this was in Italy during the Continental Cup campaign and the fact that the breakfast wasn’t even close to what he would normally eat. He had it anyway and then got a shut out in the first game. It seems to take the pressure off if he can break his routine and still be okay in games. “Oh yeah.” He continues. “Exactly, when I was younger it was a disaster, if even one thing went wrong it threw me off completely, now stuff like that doesn’t really affect me anymore.”

So does he have a favourite NHL team? “Not anymore really, when I was younger I was a Vancouver fan.” Why Vancouver? I ask, with a small grin. I wonder what it is about the team that drew him in. “Oh, the jerseys.” He says with a small laugh. “And the logo, I just loved it and Kirk McClean was my favourite goalie when I was a kid.”

Team Russia and Columbus Blue Jacket’s stating goalie, Sergei Bobrovsky.

“Of course I watch the NHL goalies, there is always something you can try and I’m always open for new stuff and I’m a pretty quick learner too so it’s pretty easy for me to put that into my game. One guy I’ve been watching recently is [Sergei] Bobrovsky in Columbus. Obviously Holtby.” That makes me chuckle, Holtby is my favourite goalie and when I mention it, Miika makes a comment about seeing my twitter. Consider me busted! “I actually played against him in the East Coast, I beat him 7-0. I’ve played against a lot of those guys who are in the NHL right now. Halak, Rask. I played against Rask a lot in the Finnish league. Quick, all those guys and it’s just crazy how I have actually been when I start thinking about it. You just have to be in the right place at the right time and making good choices I guess.”

So what advice would Miika give to an aspiring netminder? “Learn how to skate, without gear and then try the gear on. That’s where everyone starts.” He says, like it’s the most obvious answer in the world. I ask him about the weight of the gear and if it’s really as heavy as I’ve heard. “Well it’s getting lighter every year, those Bauer pads are real light, CCM’s are a little bit heavier. Some guys like that a little bit more, like me. I’ve just had CCM all my career and I tried the Bauer stuff and I just didn’t like it. It’s really just individual. How you like it, working out what gear you want. I feel comfortable in mine. I’ve been thinking about trying some other brand but I don’t know if there’s any point because I really feel comfortable in what I’m wearing now.” If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it!

I had to ask him about the inspiration behind his mask design as it has become quite the talking piece this season, I wanted to know why he chose to make it the way he did.

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Thank you to Juha Peltonen of Paint It Black in Finland for the images of Miika’s mask.

“I kind of forgot about the whole Pokemon thing, coz I played it when I was a kid, with my brother and then Pokemon GO came up and me and my son started playing it, then we started talking about maybe putting it on my mask and he was all ‘Yeah, we should do Pikachu on mask’ So I said let’s do it then, so it was pretty much my son’s idea. On the other side I have Megaman, remember that? From the old Nintendo? I’m just a huge fan and I love those games, I still play them on the Wii back home. The back plate is the logo and I think there is a smaller logo in the front somewhere too.”

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This is not all that we spoke about in the hour, but I wanted to break it down into more manageable chunks for those of you reading it. The other topics we spoke about are:

His time with the New York Rangers organisation

Continental Cup experience and the CHL

Junior Hockey in the UK

Moving to the Elite League.

Team that taught you the most about yourself.

Best goalie in the league besides yourself.

Who do you not like taking shots from?

Movies, Books, Podcasts and other on the road trip entertainment.

Discussing the league and how the goalies should be used according to Miika.

If you want to me to post more of this interview with Miika, leave me a comment on my Facebook page @chasingthepuck or tweet me @freiheit_1989 with which one you’d particularly like to read about next.

I want to take a moment to say thank you to all those who have helped me in providing images and also permissions to do this interview and to the Panther’s organisation as well. Thank you so much to Adam Gouldson and Karl Denham of Panthers Images for the images of Miika Wiikman that have been used in this article.

Behind The Mask 4 | @miikawiikman : @panthersIHC Title image credit: Panthers Images Miika Wiikman is in his second season with the GMB Nottingham Panthers and is arguably one of the best net-minders in the Elite Ice Hockey League.

#Behind The Mask #EIHL #Interview #Miika Wiikman #Nottingham Panthers

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