What other pokemon items do you think about? I mean to list EVERY item you can give to a pokemon and how it actually works might be signing your death wish, but are any that you have a good idea for, or some that you hate to think about? My favorite is how the silk scarf apparently makes normal attack stronger

Eh. I think about Pokéballs because they’re so unmissably integral to how the setting works. How Pokéballs function has massive implications for the way Pokémon interact with humans, so I can’t really avoid the damn things. Other items, not so much.

I think a lot of those type-boosting items are probably viewed as either confidence boosters of some sort (the scarf, the Hard Stone, maybe the Charcoal), as directly increasing the potency of attacks in some way (the Poison Barb, possibly the Magnet) or as being actually magical – it’s a common belief, for instance, that the body parts of magical creatures are magical as well, and Dragon Pokémon are ridiculously magical, so one of their fangs could very well have some sort of talismanic properties; we’re probably supposed to imagine something similar regarding the Mystic Water pendant.

I suppose some of the others might have special properties because they’re made of materials unavailable in the real world, for instance, the glass in Choice Specs is made from the ground-up core of a Starmie and bends the light in such a way as to reveal the points of a Pokémon’s body most vulnerable to magical attacks, or a Choice Scarf is made from… I don’t know, like, an Alakazam’s moustache hair or something.

The sixteen Plates, which determine Arceus’ nature and powers, are probably important, but goodness knows how they work. In… *ahem*… that movie… Arceus is able to use all of the Plates he possesses at once, changing his type at will in order to block incoming attacks. I think the way we’re supposed to see it is that Arceus, in his natural state, belongs to all types, but is in a weakened and diminished form without the Plates, which contain a portion of his ‘essence’ and can be used as a source of power either by him or by any other Pokémon.

So, yeah. The answer is that for most items I don’t have a clue; don’t even ask about evolution stones (and don’t say ‘radiation’ because that isn’t an answer; that’s just more questions).

What do you think of the new designs about X and Ys new starters? I know you’re still early in on BW2. I’ve heard some interesting from other about the starter’s evolutions. For example I heard that Chespin is based off of a mole and a knight. That’d make for an interesting type combo (I’m thinking Grass/Steel or Fighting).

It’s sort of too early to tell. The designs look a little bit generic, but that’s how they tend to start off; I’d really need to hear how they evolve.

The whole chestnut thing they seem to have going with Chespin is amusing enough. I’d like to know where you heard this about a mole and a knight? If you look at Chespin’s various names in other languages, it seems like they’re working off a hedgehog, not a mole (reasonably enough, since we already have mole Pokémon but not hedgehog Pokémon) but a knight is certainly possible.

EDIT: I stand corrected: Shaymin. Still, I think we can all agree that nobody cares about Land Shaymin.

Fennekin… well, my biggest worry with Fennekin is that she’s going to be Vulpix. There’s plenty of room in the design for her not to be Vulpix if they choose to take it in another direction, but the fact that she uses what seems to be a Psychic attack in the trailer makes me… uneasy.

People are making all kinds of predictions about Froakie, and saying he’s obviously going to go into Water/Flying because of the white parts on his body that look like fluffy clouds, and while that could potentially be interesting, I think the white is just as likely to represent foam, so… *shrug*

The bottom line, for me, is that people all over the internet are going to be wildly guessing at what these three are going to turn into. By sheer dumb luck, some of them are going to be right, but they don’t know, and neither do I, and I don’t much care to join in.

White 2 Playthrough Journal, episode 4: Sex, Drugs and Pokémon

Official Nintendo art of Roxie. Something in this design makes me feel like she should be a Bug-type specialist. Is that just me? I suppose her signature Pokémon *is* Whirlipede... At last permitted to leave Aspertia City and Floccesy Town behind us, Jim and I head for Virbank City. Outside Floccesy Town, Cheren accosts us briefly to explain the significance of dark grass, something we remember perfectly well from Black and White, thank you very much. I decide to muck around in the area for a while to see if any new Pokémon will appear here that we haven’t seen elsewhere on the route, and I am rewarded with a Venipede. I add the spiky little bastard to my party, naming him Tyrion, and hang around to train him up a little. Jim, meanwhile, heads east into Virbank City, and fields a call from our Dear Mother. One of the other contacts available on our XTranceivers, Mother possesses an encyclopaedic knowledge of the Unova region and can tell us anything we might need to know about any area we visit. We prefer to avoid Mother because she is a controlling bitch queen, but she has decided to call us this time, since we simply must know about the Virbank Complex, an industrial sector in the south of the city which is, for no goodly reason, infested with wild Pokémon. The words ‘infested with wild Pokémon’ pique Jim’s interest, and he veers south to check the place out. On the way, he takes a moment to eavesdrop on a domestic disturbance between two of the locals. The captain who runs the ferry service to Castelia City is no longer fulfilling his duties, because he… has decided he would rather be a movie star. Yes. Well. Fair enough, I suppose, but it leaves us trapped in Virbank City. Well, we have Pokémon; we should be able to hijack a ship easily enough. Of course, there are other, far less important, people who are also trapped in Virbank City, and it is on their behalf that the captain’s loud, angry daughter is taking him to task. His daughter’s name is Roxie, and he has apparently been inspired by her – after all, she’s always managed to balance her passion for rock music with her responsibilities as a Gym Leader, so-

Wait, what?

Okay, all right. The punk chick is the Gym Leader. We can work with this.

I catch up with Jim as he tails Roxie to a small, dingy building in the middle of Virbank City. I open the door, revealing a dilapidated, poorly lit stairwell, and immediately stagger as I am hit by the stench of dried vomit. The faint sound of music wafts up from the basement. We have apparently followed Roxie to a seedy nightclub. Jim points out the Unova League insignia in flickering pink neon over the entrance, and the sign by the door which reads ‘Virbank City Pokémon Gym. Leader: Roxie. Poison days, poison on the stage!’ Poison in the air too, I think to myself, peering at the unidentifiable stains on the concrete floor. I shake my head firmly and hold up both of my palms in protest. Jim looks at me accusingly and points down the stairs. I hold my nose and continue shaking my head. Jim rolls his eyes, grabs me by the collar and drags me off to the Virbank Complex for some training.

The Virbank complex. Screenshot stolen from Serebii.net.

The Virbank Complex seems to be an oil refinery, filled with tanks, distillation towers, and smokestacks. Naturally the game puts on its ‘educational’ hat at this point by introducing a scientist who wanders around the complex muttering explanations to himself about how all the different pieces of equipment work, and running away if anyone overhears him. As profoundly strange as this man is, I have to applaud the effort. I really do like it when Pokémon tries to do this sort of thing, just because I like entertainment to be educational on principle (if you’re clever, you can trick the kids into learning stuff without even realising it) but it’s not exactly subtle; it feels rather ‘pasted on.’ The Slateport Oceanic Museum in Ruby and Sapphire made a bit more sense, if only because oceanography is actually relevant to the plot of those games, and the Oreburgh coal mine in Diamond and Pearl was at least trying to integrate things into the game by using Pokémon workers. Anyway, in blatant defiance of any pollution the place might be pumping out, the Virbank Complex is overgrown with tall grass and teeming with many different species of wild Pokémon – offering us a perfect opportunity to beat some Pokémon up for their sweet, precious XPs. Most of our Pokémon evolve as we train here; first Sansa and Elisif become a pair of adorable Flaafy, then Jaime evolves into a feisty Dewott and Ulfric into a cunning Servine. Finally, almost unthinkably, Jim’s Riolu, Dovahkiin, evolves at a shockingly low level into a noble Lucario. We both decide to pick up Fire Pokémon while we’re here – Jim catches a Magby and names him Falk, while I find a Growlithe. Ruminating on names, I briefly consider Tywin, but reflect that my party is fast turning into Team Lannister, and settle instead on Barristan (I receive immediate confirmation that I chose correctly when my Growlithe’s nature turns out to be Bold). Suitably prepared for battle, we return to the filthy dive in which Roxie has chosen to make her Gym.

I stagger down the stairs holding my nose as Jim walks ahead trying to pretend he doesn’t know me. We come to the basement and enter what appears to be a studio owned by Roxie’s band. Roxie herself is up on the stage, eyes screwed shut, caressing her electric guitar, accompanied by a second guitarist and a drummer. I am forced to take my hand away from my nose to plug my ears as Jim clambers onto the stage to challenge Roxie, who is totally oblivious to the world outside her guitar. Jim looks down at me, shrugs, and goes to talk to her marginally more aware backup musicians. While he tries to get their attention, I haul myself onto the stage and, unable to take any more, push aside Roxie’s long white hair and scream in her ear, as loud as I can manage,

The Virbank Gym. Screenshot stolen from Bulbapedia.

“YOUR MUSIC SUCKS!”

That gets her attention.

Tyrion, luckily, is quite as annoyed as I am. With the classic Defence Curl/Rollout combo, he manages within a few turns to build up enough force to smash Roxie’s Koffing. Now several turns into his Rollout, there’s no question of Roxie being able to do anything about him, and her poor Whirlipede is made to suffer the indignity of a one-shot knock-out from one of its own lesser cousins. Roxie indignantly throws a Toxic Badge at me and tells me to get the hell out of her Gym, before healing her Pokémon for the next challenger. Of course, with Dovahkiin now a Steel-type and therefore immune to all of Roxie’s most powerful Poison techniques, Jim’s challenge is quite as much a walkover as mine was, and we leave Roxie a broken wreck, sobbing over her guitar as her backup musicians give us dirty looks.

A man with brilliant yellow hair tails us as we leave, apparently anxious to speak to us. He is somewhat taken aback when I collapse, gasping for breath, on the street the moment we leave the noxious Gym, but to his credit presses on, telling us about the exciting new opportunity he wants to offer us at Pokéstar Studios in the north of Virbank City…

Just a reminder

I want the latest poll in this group Pokémon-designing effort of mine to stay open a couple more days – so vote, if you haven’t already! The current poll is to decide which of several design concepts we want to use; the winning concept will be turned over to any artists who want to take a crack at drawing the thing.

http://pokemaniacal.tumblr.com/post/40509072465/lets-vote

I’ve set the poll to close at 9:00 on Saturday night (New Zealand time, so for a lot of you that’s probably Saturday morning or very late on Friday night). At the moment it’s a very close contest between some sort of giant tube worm creature and a fusion between a squid and an oil lamp, either of which I think could be really interesting, but don’t count the others out yet!

White 2 Playthrough Journal, episode 3: Graduation Day

Official Nintendo art of Cheren. Er... is it just me, or has he gotten really pale and skinny since the last games? Jim and I head back to Aspertia Town, eager to check out the first gym of our new quest. We are delayed on the way by Alder, who leaps off a cliff again to prove that he hasn’t become any less manly since we last saw him. Alder has a precious gift for us, something that will make us even more unbelievably powerful than we are already: a handful of Oran Berries. We stare at him in disbelief for a moment, then throw the berries in his face and run for it.

In Aspertia City, we quickly learn that the new Pokémon Gym is actually an extension of the Trainer’s School we saw earlier. The interior of the building contains the School itself, which boasts all the usual books and blackboard diagrams explaining things like status ailments and type matchups, complete with a couple of intense-looking students trying to memorise everything. Out in the backyard is the Gym – a fairly plain dirt field with a couple of battle areas marked out in white. The Gym Leader is none other than Cheren, the other rival character of Black and White. Cheren is an uptight, bossy fellow who is nonetheless very clever, hardworking and loyal. He’s also a great deal more powerful than either of us have any right to be at this point. We shrug and decide to go for it anyway. Cheren orders his minions to assume their positions, before taking his own place on a platform at the back of the arena. This place turns out to be a tremendously unimaginative Normal Pokémon Gym. Both of Cheren’s trainers boast one Lillipup and one Patrat each, and fare poorly against our now quite well-trained Pokémon. Cheren himself is just as uninteresting (and appears surprisingly sweaty) – he turns out to have only a Patrat and a Lillipup himself, although much higher in level and spiced up a little with his signature move, Work Up. He complains later that he’s having trouble getting used to battling without his regular partners; I guess he’s supposed to tone it down for us noobs. Sansa manages to defeat both of them quite soundly by paralysing them with Thunder Wave, while Jim has been level grinding with Dovahkiin so obsessively that the little guy now knows Force Palm, a move Cheren’s Pokémon are utterly unequipped to deal with. Cheren muses that he’s glad his first ever challengers were so impressive, and hands over a pair of Basic Badges (the same badge formerly given out by Lenora in Nacrene City), along with the TM for Work Up.

This Gym is meh.

The Aspertia Gym. Screenshot ganked from Bulbapedia.

The first Gym of a game usually is, I grant you. Unlike most other Pokémon Gyms, which normally sport gimmicks or puzzles to work around as you fight your way to the Gym Leader, the first one typically features only a winding path that may or may not allow you to bypass the other trainers and head straight for the leader (Brock, Roxanne and Roark’s Gyms allow this; Falkner’s does not). The first Gym of Black and White, the Striaton Gym, went the extra mile to change that with its triplet Leaders, who took on challengers with a Pokémon that had an advantage against the player’s starter. Now, I certainly think this could have been done better, but I really loved the concept as a basic introduction to the type system by new players; if nothing else it really hammered home the importance of the Grass/Water/Fire relationship and encouraged players to use it to their advantage rather than simply blundering in with the strongest Pokémon available. Cheren’s Aspertia Gym doesn’t do any of that, which is especially ironic given that it’s based in the backyard of a school for Pokémon trainers. I don’t mean to suggest that the Aspertia Gym should have tried to replicate the lessons of the Striaton Gym, because it should be clear that it would just feel forced and artificial for anyone who’d played Black and White. It would make more sense, since the Trainer’s School has just been teaching us about status conditions and battle items, to have players fight Pokémon that emphasise one or both of those themes. It might be effective, for instance, to give players some firsthand experience with the different status conditions by including one trainer who uses paralysis, one who uses poison, and one who relies on sleep, before giving Cheren a selection of Pokémon that employ all three. Anyway, that’s enough soapbox time for me; back to the story.

Remember how awesome these Pokémon are? Neither do I!

As we leave the building, Jim and I are once again accosted by Bianca, who, delighted by our progress, presses upon us the TM for Return and a pair of C-Gears, the godawful devices that permanently occupy the lower screen of the DS and facilitate the multiplayer functions of Black and White 2. Cheren emerges from the school and greets Bianca, whom he apparently hasn’t seen since the events of Black and White, almost two years ago. He doesn’t even have her XTransceiver number, which provides the opportunity for everyone to swap contact details. Jim and I are thus introduced to the people we can contact for help on the XTransceiver (a wrist-mounted video-phone capable of managing up to four-way calls) and the types of assistance they can offer. Bianca can check the strength of your friendship with each of your Pokémon, any time and any place. Cheren can list the weaknesses of any Pokémon in your party, or explain the effects of your Pokémon’s abilities (including a few details that aren’t included in the ability description, like Magma Armour’s secondary effect of making eggs hatch more quickly). Professor Juniper, of course, can check your Pokédex and will give you hints about catching more Pokémon, but she can also tell you how to evolve any Pokémon in your party. She even knows the really obscure ones; I later tested her on Eevee and she listed all seven methods. While these are clearly useful features, I have mixed feelings about them. They greatly diminish the amount of important information the game hides from you, stuff you need to know but probably won’t find without looking up a walkthrough on the internet. Goodness knows I would have loved Professor Juniper’s help when I was mucking around on Sapphire version trying to evolve my Feebas. On the other hand, they put all of that information right there, just for the asking, so that there’s no longer any interest in playing around with the game to try and find it for yourself. I suppose what I’m asking for is a middle ground, where the game will tell you how all the weird evolutions go, but only if you work for it. Of course, perhaps this way of doing things simply recognises that most players in this day and age will just look it up on Bulbapedia or what have you.

Once all this is done, Hugh arrives to challenge Cheren to a Gym battle, right there on the street. Cheren indicates that he’d be happy to have another battle, but he needs a moment to prepare, and asks Hugh to follow him into the school. When Cheren leaves, Hugh explodes with indignation at being put off, and proclaims Cheren ‘weak’ before storming into the school after him. I… am beginning to think that every entry of this playthrough journal is going to include at least one hint that Hugh is a dangerous psychopath. Jim firmly declares that he is not our problem, and we turn to leave Aspertia City for our next destination: the second Unova League Gym in nearby Virbank City.

I don’t want to be a bother, so I’ll try to make it quick: Great balls. I’ve read your articles about how you think Poké Balls work, which I love, but where does Great Balls, Ultra Balls, Net Balls, et cetera, fall under that theory? If the Pokémon chooses to be captured, how can these “better” Poké Balls be better at capture?

I think there might have been a discussion about this in the comments to some other question a few months ago… somewhere. Not sure I remember it all that clearly now. Hmm.

The eventual conclusion was that stronger Pokéballs are more effective because they are more comfortable for the Pokémon inside them. I think that being in a Pokéball is a lot like dreaming; their awareness of the world around them is dimmed and their perception of time goes completely out the window, but they can still hear, and they can ‘wake up’ if they realise something is seriously wrong. Great Balls and Ultra Balls might introduce a mild euphoria into this sensation – a pleasant dream, if you will – so that the Pokémon simply enjoys being inside enough to think twice about a trainer it might otherwise reject. After all, the trainer has gone to the trouble of buying a more expensive Pokéball, or selecting a more appropriate one.

That does still leave a major difficulty, though: dealing with all the specialised types of Pokéball. Some are reasonably easy to explain – I imagine that being in a Lure Ball feels like dreaming of swimming, while perhaps being in a Moon Ball feels like being bathed in moonlight. Others, not so much – some Pokéballs work based on circumstance, like Dusk Balls and Timer Balls, and I have no idea how those would function. The most troublesome is the Luxury Ball, since the name seems to imply that it is extremely comfortable for Pokémon, and makes them more friendly as a result, but has no effect on how easy they are to capture in the first place.

In short, this is my best guess at how they work, but I am painfully aware that some types of Pokéball simply do not appear to fit the model.

I love how you describe Black and White 2s’ protagonist designs. I cannot stand these, and this is the first pokemon game where both the main characters look terrible to me. Do you have a favorite “protagonist” of any of the pokemon games (including X and Y). Mine’s the X and Y girl, as she looks like she actually has a personality other than being ambiguously heroic

Oh, I don’t think I’d go so far as to call them terrible. They look a little bit ridiculous, but I think one of the things you just have to accept about this universe is that anyone even slightly important is going to look ridiculous (to a degree that, broadly speaking, increases through generations). The player characters generally haven’t done that as much, but really, Brendan’s hair… hat… er… whichever it is…

Personally? I’ve always had kind of a soft spot for Ethan (the male GSC/HGSS player character) although I agree with you regarding the new female character; she does has a certain je ne sais quoi.

Let’s Vote

Okay. We have a selection of design outlines for a Water/Fire dual-type Pokémon. The next step is to take it to the artists and have them figure out what this thing will look like, but first we have to pick one! The design submissions are all collected in the last post here – http://pokemaniacal.tumblr.com/post/40241228717/lets-recap-this-whole-making-a-pokemon-business – so I’m not going to describe them all again. Read before you vote!

P.S. There should be a poll visible in this post. PLEASE LET ME KNOW if you cannot see it!

White 2 Playthrough Journal, episode 2: Achievement Unlocked!

Our protagonists, ladies and gentlemen! That's me on the right and Jim on the left. I'm not usually a chick; I just play one on TV. Official art is copyright of Nintendo. Where we last left our intrepid heroes, Princess Leia and the Cornfield Kid, they had just left their home of Aspertia City and were marching boldly towards nearby Floccesy Town in hopes of finding Hugh, ‘cause if that kid’s left alone for too long I ain’t being held responsible for whatever happens. On the outskirts of Floccesy Town, however, we encounter… oh, good lord; it’s Alder. Alder, famous in Black and White as Unova’s Champion, is an exuberant giant of a man with flaming red hair, pecs of steel, and a poncho that makes him look like he belongs in a Peruvian folk band. He has a disturbing habit of jumping off cliffs in order to get to the ground faster, which he demonstrates now, leaping from on high to land smack in our path as we attempt to enter Floccesy Town. Alder proclaims that he is going to train us, and marches purposefully into Floccesy Town. We follow, hoping for some sage advice like “one strategy is to use Pokémon that you capture in your party!” (that is a legit quote from the official strategy guide, by the way). When we reach Alder’s house, however, it turns out that he has changed his mind. He isn’t going to train us, because we already have something we’re supposed to be doing – finding Hugh and delivering our spare Town Map. This is, admittedly, important. After all, if Hugh gets lost and starts to feel confused and alone, he could…

…anyway. Alder sends us on our way, and we wander off to the east of Floccesy Town to see what we can find. Here we meet a few trainers, who give us sage advice like ‘if you make eye contact with a trainer, you have to battle!’ and tell us how amazed we’re going to be by their Patrat (undoubtedly, it is in the top percentage of all Patrat). We encounter a typical Pokémon-style roadblock in the form of a Hiker who won’t let anyone without a Gym Badge pass, and, unimpressed, turn north to Floccesy Ranch. Here we finally track down Hugh, raring for a couple of practice battles; Jaime and Ulfric stomp him quickly enough. At this point the owners of the ranch, a husband and wife team, wander past and greet us, casually asking whether we happen to have seen a Herdier, since they have two who normally stick together, but can’t find the second one at the moment. Not to worry, it’ll surely turn up… right Hugh?

Uh… Hugh?

This is Hugh, who may be a sociopath. He is our best friend! I would trust him with my life!

Hugh is glaring at the owners with utter vitriol, fists clenched, a vein popping on his reddening brow. He demands to know how they can possibly be so nonchalant and storms off to find Herdier and make sure it hasn’t been killed or eaten or whatever. Jim and I look at each other and shrug as Hugh’s muffled obscenities fade into the distance. We split up to determine what Pokémon can be found at Floccesy Ranch. Jim almost immediately finds a Riolu, the juvenile form of his favourite Pokémon, which he captures and names Dovahkiin. We quickly determine (unsurprisingly) that Riolu is very rare here, and chalk this up to Destiny. He and I both capture Mareep as well, out of sheer Gold and Silver nostalgia, naming them Elisif and Sansa, respectively. We continue to hunt, and reflect on the number of Pokémon species we’ve found so far. Almost from the get-go, Black and White 2 have been offering us a great deal more variety than their predecessors, with Pidove, Sewaddle and Sunkern appearing on the road out of Floccesy Town in addition to the more standard Patrat and Purrloin, but Floccesy Ranch is making things very interesting indeed. We soon identify Azurill and Lillipup in addition to the Mareep, Riolu, Patrat and Pidove we’ve already noted, and later find a few Psyduck as well. If this keeps up, it’s going to make Black and White 2 much more enjoyable to replay than the previous games, which offered a grand total of five species before the first Gym battle, counting the starter (Patrat, Lillipup, Purrloin, and one of the elemental monkeys). We applaud this change, and move on. While Jim hangs around level-grinding, I wander off to find Hugh, who is searching the ranch for the missing Herdier. I decide to humour him and help look. We eventually manage to track down the sheepdog Pokémon by the sound of its barks. When Hugh realises its voice is coming from just around the corner, he dashes off to find the owner… leaving me to deal with the black-clad ginger fellow who seems to have abducted Herdier. The villain introduces himself as a member of Team Plasma, the organisation that attempted to conquer Unova two years ago. He proclaims his annoyance at being interrupted in the middle of his mission, and prepares to deal with me using his most ruthless methods: he throws a TM at me and runs away, leaving Herdier behind.

Uh… okay?

I mean… if that’s how Team Plasma handles its opponents these days… by throwing useful items at them and then legging it… well, then, honestly I’m totally fine with it. I hope one of them has a Master Ball.

This is Alder. He jumps off cliffs and we hate him. Not necessarily in that order.

Hugh drags the owner over to see Herdier, screams at him again for not being more concerned, and leaves in a huff. What can I say? Kid’s got issues. Jim and I stick around a little longer to train before heading back to Floccesy Town to consult Alder and see if he’s ready to teach us yet. Alder, for his part, seems keen to keep jerking us along. He comments in surprise that we’ve already grown a great deal in the time we’ve been away, and now he would like us to help him teach someone else! We mutter darkly that the time we’ve been away amounts to more than two thirds of the time we’ve been trainers, but grudgingly follow him into his house to indulge in practice battles with two young trainers and their elemental monkey Pokémon. This little episode seems intended to replace the Striaton Gym sequence of Black and White, which teaches new players how to make use of (and avoid falling foul of) the type chart. Alder first has you fight the monkey who is weakest against your starter Pokémon (in my case, Pansear), and then the one who is strongest (Pansage), similarly to how the Striaton Gym pits you against a Gym Leader with a type advantage, but gives you the monkey capable of defeating him. Honestly, I think the Striaton Gym’s method was clearer and more instructive, though the point was somewhat hamstrung by the very limited variety of Pokémon available, which forced the lesser Gym trainers to use Lillipup rather than actual Grass-, Water- or Fire-types. Alder’s way of doing it is neat enough, though I fear it may not be explicit or forceful enough for anyone who doesn’t already understand the system.

Alder explains to us that a new Pokémon Gym has just been opened in our hometown of Aspertia City, and suggests that we return there to check it out. This will be the subject of my next entry, though there’s one more thing to talk about today: achievements! Pokémon now has an achievement system, which is introduced to us by a very peculiar and rather pushy fellow known only as Mr. Medal as we leave Alder’s home. He hands us Medal Boxes containing a bunch of silvery disks stamped with question marks. These are ‘hint medals,’ and contain somewhat vague hints at things we can do to earn the actual medals that will replace them, like ‘catch a lot of Pokémon,’ ‘save often,’ ‘visit Pokémon centres,’ and so on. Mr. Medal has people stalking us to keep track of when we earn our medals, and will track us down at Pokémon Centres whenever he needs to deliver one. Many video games (perhaps even most, these days?) have similar systems, and although receiving medals for catching 5 Pokémon or using not-very-effective moves 10 times or whatever is a bit groan-inducing for experienced trainers, I actually think it’s quite a nice way of encouraging new players to explore everything they can do with the games and ‘learn the ropes’ as it were. It’s reasonably unobtrusive and doesn’t slow the game down much, so it’s not as if it’s getting in the way of anything, and I’m fairly happy with it.

Anyway, that’s all for now – see you next time, when we challenge the newly-minted Aspertia Gym!

Have you ever read the Cave of Dragonflies’ theory on history of pokemon training? It seemed to match-up most of what you said on how pokemon’s reasons to train. I know the franchise especially the show and manga tries to show the partnership a mutual beneficiary relationship but I felt its efforts were lopsided depending on which form of entertainment especially the game, but since its gameplay and the show being for kids.

I can’t say I have, but let’s take a look… Go go gadget Google.

You mean this, I imagine?

Hmm.

Yes, I think I would agree with most of that; it makes a great deal of sense. The theory on apricorns is… interesting, put it that way. I never thought to imagine them as a carnivorous plant that consumed Pokémon as an energy source. Apricorns and apricorn trees are normally portrayed as entirely benign; I can acknowledge the possibility that they are extremely dangerous to the unwary, but it’s still difficult to swallow (particularly given that Pineco and Beedrill have been shown not merely living in but outright infesting apricorn trees). It’s a very clever explanation, though.

There are only two other points that I have real trouble accepting.

One is that ‘experience points’ are a real and measurable property of Pokémon distinct from any real world phenomenon; I remain convinced that experience and levels are just abstractions designed to simplify the process of growth and evolution for the purposes of gameplay, and that we’re supposed to imagine Pokémon as getting not stronger exactly but more skillful and more confident. I am likewise convinced that evolution is prompted by emotional and psychological factors in many (most?) species, and closely tied to that increase in confidence and self-awareness.

The other is that humans are in some sense ‘outsiders’ in the Pokémon world, who evolved in our world and were somehow transported there. It’s true that humans are generally treated as being fundamentally different to Pokémon in some sense that’s never quite defined, but I think that the general feeling created by the franchise is that humans and Pokémon are ‘supposed’ to be together, that they developed together (granted, this could be a result of human cultural indoctrination, but honestly I’m not yet willing to rule out the possibility that the Pokémon world is the result of a Judaeo-Christian style creation by Arceus). I don’t think it’s impossible for humans to have evolved in the Pokémon world at all (putting aside the fact that it would be an astonishing coincidence), in spite of their obvious physical defects in comparison to most species of Pokémon; actually, I think that this suggests that the ability to train and command Pokémon came first, followed by superior language ability, upright stance, advanced vision, weaker musculature, and all the other attributes we associate with the evolution of anatomically modern humans.

But that’s just me. The Cave of Dragonflies version does make a lot of sense.