One lunatic's love-hate relationship with the Pokémon franchise, and his addled musings on its rights, wrongs, ins and outs. Come one, come all, and indulge my delusions of grandeur as I inflict my opinions on anyone within shouting distance.
Was there a question in there?
The problem is that not all Pokémon actually have the traits of animals. Are Grass Pokémon plants? If so, then either Grass-types are not Pokémon (clearly they are), “Pokémon” is a classification that includes all plants as well as all animals (clearly not), or “Pokémon” is a paraphyletic designation that has no actual meaning in an organism’s evolutionary history.
Hmm. Yes, I suppose ‘alternate universe’ is a much more neutral way of putting it. That will do.
I did not; do you have a link or a source or something I could look at?
It is certainly a legitimate point; I discuss this issue (among others) in this entry.
Y’know… that could probably be an entire series of entries on its own. I’ve only played Mystery Dungeon: Blue Rescue Team, but I enjoyed it. I thought it was a good game. It has its flaws, but I think there are probably a few things the main series could stand to take from it in terms of both gameplay and storytelling. As for your last question… can the answer be “yes” to both? Obviously the setting is wildly incompatible with the main games, the anime and most of the other spin-offs in a number of fairly blatant ways, and I don’t think there’s really any point in debating that, but I think that the actions and personalities of the Pokémon characters in the Mystery Dungeon series can probably be taken as exemplary of the way the designers of those games saw the various species in question, any specific abilities demonstrated by Pokémon in those games are as likely as not to be ‘canonical,’ and the roles played by the various legendary Pokémon make at least as much sense as their equivalents in the franchise’s other incarnations. Perhaps the events of this series could be interpreted as a legend or fable told within the context of the world we know from the main series or the anime? *shrug* I suppose ‘non-canon’ is a legitimate label to apply, but it really seems rather too dismissive a term for my taste.
…damnit; I was hoping no-one would ask that.
Okay. So. What the hell is a type, anyway? This is… tricky. Let’s look at a couple of Flying-types to illustrate some of the problems here. Dodrio is a Flying Pokémon because he has birdlike physiology, even though he can’t actually fly, while Drifblim is a Flying Pokémon because he can fly, despite having nothing in common with Dodrio, physiologically speaking. They share the properties we associate with the Flying type, though – weaknesses to cold and electrical damage, for example. What this suggests is that types are actually just a set of categories created and defined by humans, and used to describe the sets of strengths and vulnerabilities Pokémon possess in battle. That is, Dodrio and Drifblim are both considered Flying-types because they have those common strengths and vulnerabilities – even though they have them for completely different reasons. What’s a little awkward about this is that the system is so perfect. With few exceptions – namely, those Pokémon with abilities like Levitate and Thick Fat that alter their defensive capabilities with respect to specific elements – the strengths and weaknesses of all the Pokémon that are known to exist fit perfectly into the type system. It is possible, for instance, to make complicated predictive statements like “any Pokémon that resists both Lava Plume and Dragon Rush will cease to resit one or both of them after exposed to either Gastro Acid or Worry Seed.” With our privileged out-of-universe knowledge, we can predict with quite a high degree of confidence that a statement like this will always be true, even though there may be many Pokémon in the universe that we don’t know about yet. What this suggests is that type is (or describes) real properties which can be objectively measured, and which are common to all Pokémon of a given type.
So which is it?
I think we can probably agree that a shared type does not necessarily imply shared ancestry – that is, there is no ‘common ancestor’ of all Dark Pokémon, for instance; Absol and Mandibuzz are more closely related to other Pokémon in the Field and Flying egg groups, respectively, than they are to each other. Eevee, I think, has to be the clincher to this, since she demonstrates conclusively that there can be a Fire Pokémon (Flareon) who is much more closely related to a Water Pokémon (Vaporeon) than to any other Fire-type. It follows, therefore, that any traits which members of a single type have in common are the result of convergent evolution (like bats, birds and butterflies, they have physiological traits or abilities that are outwardly similar and serve common purposes, but actually function differently at their most basic level). This is less true for some types than for others – for instance, Bug, Dragon, Flying and Grass all map quite closely onto corresponding egg groups, so one imagines that for many of them, their shared traits actually do indicate shared ancestry, but these types are exceptions (as is proven by the outliers within those types, like Flygon, who is a Dragon Pokémon, but is a member of the Bug egg group and not the Dragon egg group). This seems to provide more support to the idea that ‘type’ is actually a human idea used purely to describe the way a Pokémon fights.
I am rather inclined, at this point, to suggest that type is a human construct that doesn’t necessarily have any impact on the way Pokémon live their lives in the wild but is a useful way of simplifying the complex web of interactions between various powers and abilities that make one Pokémon more effective against another but less effective against a third. That still leaves us with the question of why Dodrio and Drifblim share so many apparent tactical strengths and vulnerabilities when they seem to have nothing in common, and for that I have only the unconvincing answer of “coincidence.” In the case of the more supernatural elements, like Psychic and Ghost, you could easily argue that two Pokémon from the same type have independently evolved to draw power from a common source, and that the nature of these sources inherently renders attacks and protections drawing upon one of them more or less effective against those that draw upon another. This works as a general explanation to the extent that all Pokémon are in some sense magical (I think you would be hard-pressed to find one that has no access to any supernatural powers at all) however it seems awfully like simply giving up on the question, and it is besides much less convincing for the more mundane types, especially Normal, which is defined mainly by its lack of any unifying characteristics. At present, though, I’m afraid I’m unable to give any fuller answer.
…I’m… gonna need someone to explain this to me.
What an odd question.
Hmm.
Red/Blue/Yellow: Imagination.
Gold/Silver/Crystal: Mystery.
Ruby/Sapphire/Emerald: Discovery.
Diamond/Pearl/Platinum: Ambition.
Black/White: Truth.
I haven’t played Black 2 or White 2 yet, so I’ll have to defer an answer on those two.
I’ll leave you to speculate on why I chose those words. :-p
Hmm. Well, simply put, it would be a massive project. The sheer scale of it would make it utterly different to everything Pokémon has done before, as well as extremely difficult, and would necessitate throwing out a lot of the established gameplay and storyline conventions. As cool as it would be, I think that such a mammoth project would be impractical for a cartridge game, and that the details would suffer as the designers attempted to cram everything in. Now, for something like an MMORPG, it might be more practical, but to my knowledge Game Freak have never expressed any interest in MMO Pokémon (besides, I just plain don’t like MMORPGs). Maybe for a strategy game it could work? But no, for a traditional Pokémon game, I just don’t see it happening, and I think the attempt would likely be ruinous.
Dark is a strange type. Dark Pokémon aren’t necessarily connected with darkness or the night at all, although many of them do prefer the dark. ‘Dark type’ is actually a somewhat imprecise translation of the Japanese term literally meaning ‘evil type,’ but that just throws up more questions – whole species of Pokémon that are just ‘evil’? That can’t be right, can it? Dark Pokémon are associated with evil, and also with trickery, and often with fear, but they aren’t necessarily evil themselves; they’re part of that old stereotype of the ‘misunderstood brooding dark hero.’ Dark Pokémon may well work towards good, but they can and will lie, cheat and steal to do so, and they will not on any account fight fair, because the ends justify the means.
Umbreon is one of the game’s oldest Dark-types, and naturally he grabs this concept with both hands. Umbreon is a badass, but in a very different way to Jolteon: dark and dangerous, but in an understated, subtle way. The yellow-on-black of his ring markings is bold, like the light of the moon against the black of the night sky, but minimalistic. This is not a Pokémon who goes in for glorious battle and flashy displays of power; this is a Pokémon who gets things done quickly, quietly and, if at all possible, without ever being seen. He’s noted for his poisonous sweat (oddly, Umbreon doesn’t naturally have any Poison attacks – maybe Game Freak always anticipated that everyone would teach him Toxic?) and for his supernatural ability to cause fear in others when the rings on his body glow in the moonlight. An ambush hunter, he prefers to move around at night, when he can remain hidden and wait for his prey to present a vulnerability. Umbreon seems to be empowered somehow by exposure to moonlight (hence his in-game ability to heal himself with Moonlight, a move analogous to Espeon’s signature Morning Sun but shared originally by Clefairy and Oddish) but the exact nature of his powers seems to be mysterious. The result of all this is that Umbreon’s particular brand of charm falls somewhere between Jolteon and Espeon, based on a combination of decisive power and elusive mystique, exactly the combination that captured the imagination of Karen, leader of the Johto Elite Four, all those years ago. Personally Espeon is still my favourite, but I can definitely see Umbreon’s appeal too.
As I’ve been looking at Eevee’s evolutions so far, I’ve been interpreting them with a view to understanding the environments that might have caused Eevee to develop all of these forms in the first place. In Espeon’s case I concluded, based on the stimulus that triggers her evolution and the nature of her powers, that she represents a form of Eevee specially adapted to domestication, and particularly to the defence of settled communities. Now, Umbreon evolves from Eevee in more or less the same way as Espeon – by forming a particularly close bond with his trainer – except that Eevee can become Espeon during the day and Umbreon during the night. Logically, one assumes that partnership with humans had some hand in the development of Umbreon as a species as well, but why the split between the two? I think the answer is in what it means to be a Dark-type. Espeon is all about community and empathy; she developed her psychic powers to defend homes and families. Umbreon, by contrast, is all about solitude and individualism – this species evolved at the same time and for similar reasons, but for different purposes. Espeon is a protector, active during the day, staying close to the settlement and looking after the old and the very young as they go about their domestic work. By contrast Umbreon, a strain devoted to survival, efficiency, stealth and cunning, developed out of the Eevee who partnered with hunters and scouts whose tasks were related to the night – although they do live in settled villages, they fulfil their most important roles beyond the community’s borders. This is where Umbreon’s whole attitude and demeanour come from. The quintessential Dark-types, they do their work out in the wilderness where they have no-one to rely on but their human partners, and where no-one else will rely on them, hence the ‘ends justify the means’ approach they take to combat. They work for the good of their communities, but out on the frontiers they have no time for rules.
Where his brothers and sisters tend to combine powerful support skills with dangerous attack options, Umbreon is instead a totally defence-focused Pokémon. He’s slow, his attacks are weak, and like all the others, his movepool is limited, but for all-around defensive ability, Umbreon is difficult to beat. Back in the heady days of Gold and Silver, an Umbreon with Rest or Moonlight and some nasty trick like Charm or Confuse Ray was nigh indestructible, free to fling Toxic around and then wait patiently for everything to die. That was really all you needed to do with him (aside from keep him away from Poison- or Steel-types, obviously), although, like most of Eevee’s other evolved forms, Umbreon had a nifty trick to use with Baton Pass: Mean Look. Mean Look traps an opposing Pokémon in play until Umbreon switches out or faints – wonderful if it’s something Umbreon can handle. If not, though, Baton Pass will take Umbreon out of play and replace it with another Pokémon who can deal with the victim… and keep the trap effect, which would be ended if Umbreon were to switch out normally. This would eventually become Umbreon’s main tactic. He gained Taunt and Wish in Ruby and Sapphire, which were useful toys for ruining other support Pokémon and keeping his teammates healthy, respectively, and the addition of physical Dark attacks in Diamond and Pearl made it possible to use Umbreon as a slow physical tank with Curse (Payback, which is more powerful when the user moves after its opponent, is noteworthy – if you’re using Curse, you’ll be slower than anything else around anyway). The combination of Mean Look and Baton Pass was his big trick, though; it’s a difficult strategy to pull off, but succeeding at it would almost certainly doom at least one opposing Pokémon, trapped in play against a Pokémon of your choice, and Umbreon is tough enough that he could and did make it work.
And then they took it off him.
For reasons that escape me, Mean Look was removed from the list of effects that can be transferred by Baton Pass in Black and White. It couldn’t have been for thematic reasons, since there’s never been any real logic to what gets transferred and what doesn’t (and how is Baton Pass imagined to work, anyway?). Could it have been for balance reasons? Well, only a handful of Pokémon could ever do this anyway. Absol was terrible at it, and murdering things with Swords Dance is a much better use of her time. Smeargle, likewise, had better things to do unless you wanted to put him into a Baton Pass chain, and even then he has more important moves. Essentially, the only things that changing the mechanics of Mean Look did were stealing Umbreon’s favourite specialty tactic and finally eradicating the only reason ever to use Ariados (who used Spider Web in place of Mean Look). Since it is an inescapable truth that no-one in the world has ever actually used Ariados anyway, I am forced to conclude that Game Freak just woke up one morning and decided they hated Umbreon. It’s just such a bizarre thing to change, when there are so many other inane things that they insist on keeping the same.
Okay; rant over.
Don’t get me wrong. Umbreon is still a wonderful defensive Pokémon – in fact, he’s the toughest Dark-type in the game; only Mandibuzz is comparable, and Umbreon leaves her in the dust for special defence. His Wishes aren’t as potent as Vaporeon’s, but he’s still a decent Pokémon to put on healing duty, and he can threaten to put things to sleep with Yawn. Curse remains an option too if you want a more aggressive Umbreon, and it looks like Black and White 2 have given him Foul Play, a powerful Dark attack that circumvents Umbreon’s poor attack stat by allowing him to use his opponent’s instead. His abilities are fairly plain, as abilities go; Synchronise is nice to have but not particularly useful, as for Espeon, but unlike Espeon his Dream World ability is garbage – Inner Focus? Immunity to flinching? I guess if you really hate Togekiss or Jirachi… but Togekiss will just smack Umbreon in the face with a super-effective Aura Sphere, and Jirachi is immune to Toxic, which means Umbreon can’t actually hurt her anyway. This is, essentially, the crux of the matter for Umbreon: passing Mean Look was easily the most threatening thing he could do; now anything immune to poison just doesn’t care about him anymore. Steel-types in particular, who resist Dark attacks, no longer have any reason to pay attention to Umbreon. They can just get along with their own thing, and Umbreon will have no choice but to flee, maybe dropping a Wish on the way out if he’s lucky. Vaporeon, by way of contrast, is much harder to block completely; sure, Water-types will largely ignore her main attacks, but thanks to Water Absorb and her good special defence, she’ll ignore them right back!
In spite of my rant, I really do think that Umbreon works. He’s sleek but bold, not quite like any of the others, and as such he appeals to, once again, a different segment of people. His total defence focus is different as well, not just from his brothers and sisters but from the stereotypes of his element as a whole. I just have to slam the mechanical change to Mean Look one more time because it actually reduces diversity and uniqueness instead of increasing it by eliminating a previously difficult but powerful and interesting tactic; I just find it fundamentally absurd on grounds of design philosophy. Umbreon is far from ruined, though; if you need a bulky Dark-type, there’s none better.
That is definitely something for the wrap-up entry, but I hadn’t thought of that particular way of looking at it. I’ll certainly look at it now, though, so thanks!
Pokémaniacal 