21 07 2022

X:So far feels very darts hitting ideas on a corkboard motivations right now. Get called to a route stuff happens on route. Do random thing. Go somewhere else. Do a thing. Definitely going to be slow goings. I think when I first played Y, I really really needed a game with character customization and this became it, I’m seriously trying to remember why I put so much time into it. Could’ve been just social stuff, I got a 3DS around the time of Animal Crossing New Leaf and greatly enjoyed going to events, conventions, tournament, and school for street pass.

Sun: Just wanted to boot this up, but might restart the intro. It starts as a video call immediately after setting up the language. I kinda like that abrupt start, especially after GenV’s video intro that’s almost a trailer. Though, do wish there was more 3D. It does look more polished and better for ditching it though. Definitely one of those 3DS games that feels like a mix between higher fidelity games and 240p games. The animations and perspective for the in game cutscenes are pretty fancy. Next scene is Lillie running away and escaping with Nebby. Oh, I forgot it explicitly says three months later after that cutscene. Wait, was Lillie just homeless these last few months? I guess there sorta gotta be a support network for people in Pokemon world (Hawaii edition).

Heart Gold: Went into Mt. Mortar and got Tyrogue. It took a while to figure out how the map was translated to the DS from my hazy memory. I figured it out by looking up the maps. Ha! Nah, I picked this up on a random day to check if game would aggravate wrist. 

Black/White: In white I quickly ran through cold storage and the gym. Upon second/third reading Ghestis feels way more mafia. He got people who could be interested in this town, Clay. Got a Karrablast, did the trade for Accelgor/Shelmet. Still unsure if I’ll use them, but at least I have them again. I actually forgot where the ones I did this trade for originally went. I don’t remember seeing them in Y or Moon. 

    Brycen’s gym was easy because I had the fire starter. Super easy, didn’t even run back to the pokecenter. Outside his gym, I run into the hometown friends and brycen shows up. He asks “who are you” and basically calls out the shadow triad ninjas. Wow. He’s cool. Now N wants me to go to Dragonspiral tower. Cheren heads there with Brycen. I head over after healing up and Prof. Juniper (Dad) is there and explains that a bunch of Plasma people broke on through, Cheren and Brycen following. Inside the tower, so much is going on upstairs it’s shaking the tower and columns are crumbling. Honestly the tall tower interiors are kinda cool. Part way up run into Giallo giving a lecture about lord N becoming a hero. Oh he noticed me. 4 trainer gauntlet? Easy. Beat them and oh hey it’s N and the thing on the box of the game. Well the other game. Brycen and Cheren show up and we retreat? Back outside, while recapping what happened, Alder shows up to explain that ‘yes, there are two legends.’Brycen and dad return to the tower to inspect things while we head to relic castle. Outside the castle Cheren stops me and… He had trouble dealing with the desert’s pokemon? Dude, what have you been doing? Seven Sage Ryoku is here saying Ghetsis is testing me. And he is. Really? Sand maze wasn’t too hard but still felt bleh to go through. At the bottom of the place is Ghetsis saying the stone I need isn’t there. He also insults Alder. Also Alder had a pokemon that died from a disease??? Back outside Prof. Juniper wants us at the museum. Oh. Lenora has it. Right. Now I have the light stone. I actually forgot the whole pacing of this game.

    On the way to the last badge city with the dragon experts (and gym) I run into Bianca. She’s doing surprisingly well. High bulk pokemon with lots of power up/defensive moves and I don’t have full counters to them yet. She got quite a few crits on me and this battle has been surprisingly not easy. Her offering to be a body guard makes so much more sense now lol. On the Tubeline bridge, they do a wonderful job of making it feel gigantic. Pokemon has a lot of walking paths taking over where cars would go, but this is a walking bridge with trains (and cars?) running under. 

    At the end of the bridge is Ghetsis. Uh. So the plan so far, and he clarifies in his lecture here, is to have the ‘hero’ N battle it out against me to prove who is the true hero. N’s plan is to command people to let go of their pokemon. His plan is that by commanding people to do so… eventually peer pressure will win out?

    Route 9 has the game’s shopping mall. Ah, the one thing they captured about the american mall. A bunch of them are in the middle of nowhere or just right outside the city. Now that I’ve arrived at Opelucid, I remembered the version gimmick. This city and another place look different depending on what game you have. I think another place. White is an ancient looking city that I haven’t seen yet and Black is a cyber future city. (Not cyberpunk tho.) Ghetsis is giving a lecture saying that N has combined with the legendary dragon to make a new world where pokemon are considered superior and should be let go.  After, Drayden and Iris are there and Alder asks them to explain the legendary dragons. Who we are going to make fight. Two legends who they hint at getting along with each other. Alder says battles are for getting to know eachother better. And uhh. Yeah that kinda works in competitions or games. And shounen anime. We’re shounen anime Ryu from streets. But for battling monsters. Honestly been thinking about Tokusatsu and Kaiju stuff while playing this one. THe befriending living together thing works when I think about cats. The battle part works when I think that I’m using kaijuu and super sentai monster suit villains to battle out. It is also making me appreciate how part of the world tournaments and battles feel. The obsession and how intwined pokemon are gives it a good feel over tournament anime/game stuff. 

    I’m not going to go over the whole explanation, but Reshiram and Zekrom (the box legends) are described as Twins and the region was founded by twin heroes. And then further clarify that the dragons split? Pretty sure they’re playing around with legends and myth here. So basically if they fight things go kaboom. People and pokemon working together is what prevents them from happening. 

    The gym’s interior looks really cool. Seeing all the low polygon and sprite work stuff on the DS and 3DS really makes me hope they find their aesthetic stride on the switch. I seriously do not get some of these pushes for taxing graphics when this series needs art direction. Anyway. Tons of waiting for objects to move and throwing ice attacks later I have 8 badges. Professor Juniper is nice and greets me outside. She hasn’t figured out how to turn stone into dragon and wake it up, but she thinks someone worthy will be fine. She shows me where the next route to Pokemon league is and it makes her nostalgic for when she walked us through the first few routes. 

I decided to go through the route, the gates, and victory road sooner than later. I remembered that the Pokemon league and Victory road both have flight points. Route 10 isn’t that long and I think I’ll need a few levels on pokemon. It’s a short route but feels like a proper walking path slightly up a mountain. Cheren battles us here to test us for pokemon league. He isn’t the easiest battle but my matchups work well. The fights here are the typical Ace Trainer and Veteran trainer types with harder pokemon, and dragons. The better kinds of these routes feel like a hiking trail or some other place where you run into people who like doing the thing you do too. If you go backpacking enough, you go on paths with backpackers. If you play playing TCGs or fighting games, you play locally and then go somewhere there is a larger tournament. It is Pokemon World’s Mandalay Bay Food Court before an EVO. 

Black and White bring back Gen 1’s full gate system where every gate checks each individual badge you have. This time each room is more themed to the gym you had to beat. Victory road feels properly vertical and has more of GenV’s use of the DS’s polygon pushing hardware. Feels like a proper maze without feeling annoying. Maybe it’s because there’s multiple ways to leave to heal up or if you forgot something. I forgot to restock pokeballs for the new pokemon and flew back a few times. Still no Fraxure. I want to catch one just in case, I don’t think I’ll get a Haxorus because this game makes you use the Box Legend. Victory road is a tiered mountainside with inside rooms and stairs. Outside there are walkways and places to slide down. Also, a new terrain to cause random battles in rough ground. I’m trying to remember if this ever returned, but I do think it’s a good concept. Though, maybe it worked better in more pixel-art adjacent games. Up at the top, I’m finally at pokemon league. I need some levels, I’m going to back track to some stuff I could’ve done after getting surf but put off. I think the chain of legend stuff ends at victory road, so I should’ve probably done that before buuuuut oh well.