#nessa is the best. we mesh so well together.

[doomfully]

my gf and i are moving to austin in january. and i am so incredibly looking forward to it. 😭

[baby-grayson]

Nessa and Gray at a halloween party IMAGINEEE the power they would hold dressed up as a playboy bunney and hugh hefner (or if you can think of a better one 😊😊)

I’ve tried to write the introduction to this concept, but I think Mean Girls said it best:

“In the regular world, Halloween is when kids dress up in costumes and beg for candy. In Girl World, Halloween is the one night a year when a girl can dress up like a total slut and no other girls can say anything else about it.  The hardcore girls just wear lingerie and some form of animal ears.”

Ness was very well aware of this fact but was reminded when Samantha walked into the dorm room one day carrying nothing but a black mesh teddy and a pair of cat ears. Ness’ eyes traced every inch of the garment laying across her roommate’s bed, internally debating whether or not to ask about it.

“It’s for Seth Lamontie’s Halloween Party,” Samantha mused, struggling to put her ID card back into her wallet.

“Seth? I didn’t know we were going to Seth’s?”

“We’re not,” Samantha said plainly, dropping her wallet on her desk and sitting on her bed, “I figured you were going somewhere with Grayson,” Samantha shrugged, “That’s why I didn’t get you on the list.”

“Oh,” Vanessa went back to her homework, trying to focus on her textbook but being constantly distracted by the question of Halloween. She let the question haunt her to the point where she blurted it out while cuddling on his couch that night.

“Halloween-we-uh- are we doing anything? Or well, do you want to do anything?” Still new to being in a serious relationship, Vanessa was unsure of how to approach topics that weren’t prefaced by how sweet Grayson was.

Grayson nodded, pausing their Netflix show, “Travis and April are throwing something at their place, I wanted to take you with me,” Grayson smiled at Ness with eyes so warm they could melt her heart. Vanessa broke out into an immediate grin, feeling a few butterflies explode inside of her stomach. This would be the first official outing where Grayson wore Vanessa on his arm and called her his girlfriend.  

Grayson took her enthusiastic expression as a sign of agreement and continued, “You want to think of our costume? Since we’re together,” he motioned a hand between them on the couch, “we should go together.”

Vanessa had never thought of her own Halloween costume before, much less a couples costume. She went online to find inspiration and was intimidated by the images she saw of girls of incredibly short Disney princess dresses, breasts spilling out from the top of shirts, and heels that would make her taller than Grayson. Suddenly, Samantha’s teddy seemed like a conservative Halloween option.

Nessa was truly uncomfortable with the idea of wearing such revealing clothes to meet Grayson’s friends for the first time. She went to him with her concerns, and he comforted her: telling her she should feel no pressure to look sexy and that he would never want her to try to be something she was not. Not even on Halloween.

Grayson was the genius mastermind behind their costume.

Although he didn’t feel like a genius as he tried to tuck his genitals into the costume while Vanessa cringed at the appearance of his bulge in the costume. She suggested he wear a short pear of spandex over his costume to protect his modesty and he agreed.

They strolled into the party, a confident duo erupting in fits of giggles.

Grayson dressed in bunny ears, a playboy corset, and fishnets while Vanessa wore a casual red, velvet robe on top of her yoga pants and slippers, with a plastic pipe hanging from the corner of her mouth.  They were a sight to see.

Walking into the party, Grayson’s ass was slapped no more than six times by his teammates. Vanessa was more than happy to get the opportunity to meet Grayson’s friends while feeling both comfortable and confident. Grayson was elated to her comfortable enough to sit in the corner with a group of other football girlfriends, talking and laughing without him there. He felt happy to know that she was getting to know people, being independent, and letting everyone else see how wonderful she was.

A few hours into the party, Grayson looked over at Ness and the group of girls to see one of the cheerleaders, dressed as what she claimed was a teddy bear but could pass for a Victoria’s Secret ad, sit on Vanessa’s lap while she spread her legs and pretended to take a smoke from the pipe. He was embarrassed at the mixture of jealousy and arousal in his reaction.

He quickly ran over to Ness and took her by the hand, apologizing to the cheerleader bouncing off her lap. Grayson said quick goodbyes as he dashed through the party, pulling Ness along with him. It wasn’t until they got back into his car that she got to ask, “Woah- what’s wrong?”

“Nothing,” Grayson said, trying to be nonchalant as he put the key in the ignition.

Vanessa raised a brow in the passenger seat, unconvinced by his answer.

“I just,” Grayson sighed, “I want to be the only bunny in your lap.”

Vanessa broke out in laugher and giggles, both horrified and pleased with his answer.

[atlas-the-worldbuilder]

Final thoughts on Pokemon Sword/Shield

So in case you weren’t aware (which is most of you, I’m sure), a few months ago I started a Pokemon Shield blind Nuzlocke Run.  And recently, I completed the main portion of the Nuzlocke by defeating the Champion.  Having played through the game, though, I thought I’d give my final thoughts on it as a Pokemon fan, a gamer, and as a storyteller.

The Story & Characters

In all honesty, I rather enjoyed the main story of this game.  The Pokemon League has always been presented like a professional sport (at least in the anime/cartoon), so it’s fun to see the games taking that perspective and rolling with it.  It felt like an actual tournament/championship, to compete for the title in an officially organized manner, rather than just running a gauntlet of preset combatants.

In addition, I liked how they incorporated both the gym leaders and our rivals into the league story as not only combatants, but also as individuals with their own lives and aspirations.  Marnie and Team Yell are adorable, Hop is... mostly tolerable, thus far, but by far my favorite rival character has been Bede, the Psychic/Fairy trainer.  His haughty and prideful demeanor make him a delight to defeat, and his arc is a wonderful story to see unfold.  I’m really curious to see what he gets up to in the after-story! The Gym Leaders are also fun to meet and battle; the Pokemon games as a whole have been gradually attempting to give more and more character to each of the Gym Leaders you meet, beyond just trials to overcome on your journey to victory.  And while I always have a soft spot for the Hoenn & Sinnoh gyms, I like that they opted to have the Gym Leaders return in place of having more Elite Four members to fight  I only wish I could get more opportunities to get to know them better, cuz there’s some standout leaders from this batch which I truly enjoy!

My biggest complaint with Sword/Shield’s story, though, has been the “Heroic Quest” plotline which has become increasingly common these days.  I like the character of Sonia the researcher, and Oleana is satisfying to watch lose, my biggest complaint has been the pacing of the plot; the first 2/3rd’s of the story are us teaming with Sonia to gradually get the backstory revealed to us, and then in the last half hour, right as the Tournament’s getting underway, all the villains suddenly crawl from beneath the floorboards and run amok while you have to chase them down!  There didn’t feel like there was a proper buildup explaining why the villain wanted to summon the legendary Pokémon, especially one which we heard next to nothing about! This brings about an interesting idea, however... what if instead, they had completely forgone any Legendary-Summoning stories until after the league?  Honestly, I was way more invested challenging the gyms and fighting the champion than I was stopping the literal POKEMON APOCALYPSE from happening... so what if for future games, they saved those for after you became champion?  As a sort of test of your skills, to prove your worth to bear the mantle you have taken!  Maybe it wouldn’t have meshed well, maybe they needed to show of the game mascot more, I dunno...  it’s just my thoughts.

The GamePlay

THEY FINALLY LET US TURN OF THE GODS-FORSAKENED TUTORIALS!!!  PRAISE THE ALL-FATHER!!!

Ahem... In all honesty, I think I’d grown a bit too used to the 2nd screen of the DS-series games, but after a couple days of getting used to the mono-screen style again, I am pleased to say I found it very easy to settle back into.  Though there are still some features I wish would make a return (the HM moves as opposed to public transportation, poison’s effect while walking, wild double battles, etc.), there are alot of fun mechanics introduced and remedies to older problems that have been introduced!

I think one feature which hasn’t had much said about it is the introduction of the Poke-Jobs system; this system allows you to send your Pokémon out on timed “away missions” to gain both experience and items.  In the old days, if you wanted to passively level your pokemon, the only real option you had without introducing a second player was the Daycare center, and they could only raise two pokemon at once... and you had to pay for it.  With Poke-Jobs, though, I can send anywhere from 5-10 teammates out for whatever amount of time I want them to be out for, and then come back later to see them lively and with goodies to show for their work! At first, I didn’t think I’d get much use out of this system; I, like many players out there I’m sure, prefer to guide my pokemon’s training personally, honing their movesets and guiding their levelling and points the way I want from them.  But as I progressed further in my Nuzlocke, and as my daily life became busier and busier, I found myself sending my backup teammates out on jobs to keep them on par with my main team.  Given that the Move Deleter/Tutor and Name Rater are now services that have been rolled into the Pokemon Center, yet another good thing this series has done, I found it much easier to keep my reserve Pokemon prepared in case I needed a substitution. Some Nuzlocke “Purists” may call that taking the easy way out, but... frankly, I don’t have the willpower to do that much grinding.  I’m here to play a game and have fun doing it, dammit.

The Wild Area is another thing I’ve wanted to see from Pokemon for a long time - taking more steps to make the regions seem like an open world, with vast sprawling environments full of pokemon and secrets to uncover.  I’ll admit, though, the execution is... not entirely perfect.  While open expanses are fun to explore, the Wild Area did seem a bit... flat to traverse.  And while the weather mechanics translating into battle are fun to deal with, the same sets of wild pokemon appearing did start to wear me down.  I think what the Wild Area really needed, in the long run, was a system similar to how Black/White/Black2/White2 did - having seasonal progression ingame, where different pokemon would show up during different seasons, making the different places unique and novel all over again throughout the year. And for the record, many of my gripes with the Wild Area were addressed in the Isle of Armor’s expansion island.  VASTLY superior, and much more fun to navigate and traverse.

...I’ll openly admit this: I was not a fan of Mega Evolution when it was first introduced in X/Y.  I felt it was fine enough to see Pokemon battling without power boosts or “digi-volving” or whatever you wanna call it.  When Sun/Moon Introduced Z-Moves, it felt like a step in the right direction, but at the same time, I ended up not using it very often.  If I had to have a power boost to my pokemon, I would want it something that couldn’t be used as a crutch when the going gets tough - something that has a limited usability, and offers benefits specific to the time it’s being used. I say this because I initially approached Dynamax the same way: as just another power boost to level the playing field and shake up the battle meta which I don’t keep track of.  However, after barely surviving all 8 gym leaders without using a single dynamax pokemon, I decided to give it a chance: after having completed the Isle of Armor’s subplot and gaining access to the Max Soup, I fed it to my Toxtricity Spike, and started running dynamax raids.  As I started using it more and more, I started gaining a certain appreciation for it that I hadn’t before; this was something written in to being a unique cultural effect!  This literally is imagining Pokemon as Kaiju!  And for the most part, it works! While I still feel mega-lvl-power-boosts in pokemon are a huge waste, at the very least I can say Dynamax didn’t leave me with too bad a taste in my mouth.  I do hope, however, that Dynamax stays a Sword/Shield exclusive power; given it’s cultural importance in Galar, and how Mega-Evolution was in the previous generation, I think having power boosts specific to regions works better than having the same stuff used across the board for every meta onwards,

What Do I hope for the Future?

I can’t say for sure if they’ll release a sequel game for Sword/Shield, but if they do... I would want them to make these minor changes:

Hold off the Heroic plot for after the League plot; devote the main first half of the game to just the gyms and league story like was done here, and then save meeting uber-god-tier Pokémon for after you’ve claimed the title of Champion.

Having said that, fix the pacing of how the Eternatus/Darkest Day subplot feels as it’s being played out.  Offer us more insight into Rose and Oleana’s mindsets as they go about their business, and give us more coherent exposition from our field trips with Prof. Sonia. 

Fix how the Wild Area looks - give it more variations for each sub-region and offer more varieties of habitats, like in the Isle of Armor.  Or, alternatively, try to implement a seasonal mechanic to make the same areas change over the year, opening new paths and new avenues to explore!

Let Bede defeat Oleana.  Give my boy some closure.

Allow us to see and interact with the Gym Leaders outside of the gyms more.  I had, like, barely 2 lines of dialogue with Nessa, and even less for Milo.  Not asking for a whole lot, just a bit more to tie us into who they are as people.  Piers is best big brother.  <3

That’s all I had written for now.  If y’all want a biography of my champion team for my Shield Nuzlocke, let me know, and I’ll scrap a post together! <3