What are your thoughts on the breeding restrictions on the nidoran family and the reasons for it?

For the benefit of readers who don’t know what this is about:

Female Nidoran and Nidorina can breed with male Pokémon from the Monster or Field egg groups and lay eggs which will hatch into Nidoran of either gender. This makes sense. Male Nidoran, Nidorino and Nidoking can breed with female Pokémon from the Monster or Field egg groups, who will then lay eggs which will hatch into Pokémon of the mother’s species. This also makes sense.

What makes no sense at all is that Nidoqueen are sterile.

EDIT: I was mistaken; I think I had several Bulbapedia articles open at once and looked at the wrong one at some point. Nidorina can’t breed either; only female Nidoran can. This is actually what I *thought* was the case originally, until I decided to check my facts and then misread the reference. Oh, the irony. Anyway, this makes all of my speculation below much less plausible and I have no longer have any sensible explanation. Game Freak are just silly.

Adult Nidoqueen cannot breed at all. No, not even with a Ditto. As far as I can tell, this is merely one of the stupider oversights that Game Freak haven’t quite gotten around to fixing yet for some reason. I couldn’t tell you why; someone probably made a mistake in the original coding when they did Gold and Silver (given Nidoqueen’s unusual gender status, it’s not unbelievable that they could slip up with her) and it’s been copied and pasted ever since. Strange that they didn’t fix it when they overhauled the entire game engine for Ruby and Sapphire, but perhaps they hadn’t noticed it by that point. Hmm.

Anyway, there is actually a perfectly reasonable in-universe explanation they could use if they wanted to. There’s a conjecture in anthropology, which has been floating around for a while now and has never gained a whole lot of support but never quite seems to die either, called the grandmother hypothesis. Basically, the idea is that human women are able to live well beyond reproductive age because having older women around to help care for the children presents a tangible benefit to the survival of the community. It’s a common sense explanation for the phenomena of menopause and post-menopausal longevity, but it’s very difficult to prove scientifically (you can read more about the hypothesis in P.S. Kim et al., “Increased longevity evolves from grandmothering,” Proc. R. Soc. B. 2012). If you wanted a good reason for Nidoqueen to be unable to breed, this would be a solid place to start: Nidorina are the breeding adults, while Nidoqueen are the ‘grandmothers’ who hang around to help their daughters raise their own children and protect the whole group. This makes a great deal of sense considering that very few Nidorina would ever make it that far – they evolve using Moon Stones, so in the wild you’d expect to see one, perhaps two Nidoqueen in an entire herd. They have a more complex social function than just continuing to reproduce.

Nuzlocke- The idea of playing the game where you have restrictions on what Pokemon you can catch and that when a Pokemon faints, it dies. What are your thoughts on the phenomenon? Do you think it says anything about the Pokemon “culture”? What about the comics that are often a part of these challenges? Do they offer any particularly good/bad insight into the Pokemon world?

I’ve tried that a few times (I always knew it as ‘hard mode,’ though, I only encountered the term ‘Nuzlocke’ fairly recently). I was really terrible at it. I always had fun writing little obituaries for the Pokémon who died, though, like so:

“R.I.P. Altheia, the serious Illumise. Exploded in a tragic Metronome accident, aged 28 levels.”

(That one is a true story)

Anyhow, as for your actual question. Hmm. I suppose it’s a natural extension of the way people use the words “die” or “kill” in Pokémon, and other video games, when they actually mean “faint” or “incapacitate” or whatever. It’s a very different way of looking at battles, because of course the official media always portray battles as non-fatal (although there is occasionally a suggestion that deaths could potentially result if trainers pushed their Pokémon too hard). On the other hand, one of the traditional rules of hard mode is that you have to nickname all of your Pokémon, to create an emotional attachment to them; the rules have the impact they do because you’re supposed to imagine them as your friends (I’ve even seen a couple of accounts where people have named Pokémon after their real human friends to stress the point).

What’s interesting about this is the way it turns Pokémon into a roleplaying exercise. Technically the Pokémon games are within the RPG genre, but there’s remarkably little emphasis placed on the player’s choices and personality – the ‘RP’ of ‘RPG’ doesn’t really come into it much. The more detailed view of the world presented by the anime – I think – is meant to encourage players to imagine for themselves all of that extra stuff that the games leave out, like interactions between the player and his or her Pokémon. Part of the aim of hard mode or Nuzlocke rules is to provide an added challenge, obviously (once you know what you’re doing, the single player game is trivially easy until you get to places like the Battle Subway; this rules give players the added challenge that often seems to be missing from the game), but I think the way the rules are generally expressed demonstrates that they’re also used with a view to increasing the feeling of immersion in the game world. You’re supposed to imagine an actual emotional connection with each Pokémon and desire to protect it. Although the presentation of the challenge is much darker than anything the official franchise likes to give us, it actually supports the aims of the game designers rather well. Might be something for Game Freak to think about…

The Ethics of Pokémon Training

When you get a title like that, you know there’s some serious sh*t gonna go down.

So, I’m writing this because of a question that turned up in my ask box a couple of weeks ago, which I will reproduce here:

“You’ve touched on the moralistic complaints about the Pokemon franchise before (your post on Torchic, Combusken and Blaziken). I’m on a similar ground to you, seeing teamwork etc being more of what Pokemon is about, but you can’t ignore the fact that violence and animal abuse seem to be essential in fostering that partnership between trainer and Pokemon, can you? Teamwork it may be, but the Pokemon take 100% of the physical side of things. Would you consider doing a post on this issue?”

This is, as it happens, a particularly good time to be talking about this.

PETA (People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals) has just gotten a lot of attention in the Pokémon community for producing a short online video game, Pokémon Black and Blue http://features.peta.org/pokemon-black-and-white-parody/, in which Pokémon free themselves from their cruel and sadistic trainers and start a rebellion with the intention of showing humanity a better way. I urge readers to take a look at the page and the game for themselves, however the gist of it is as follows: Pokémon trainers are horrible people who keep their Pokémon trapped in Pokéballs most of the time, keeping them from getting exercise, and let them out only to have them beat each other bloody, and provide them with medical care only so they can send them back into the arena more quickly. PETA has gotten a lot of flak for this, as they do for a lot of their stunts; from what I can tell, even the people who are theoretically on their side often think they’re insane. Naturally, jumping on the bandwagon and attacking them would be too easy. As always, I like to think I can outline a more nuanced view of the matter. Here goes nothing.

I’m actually not convinced any of this is meant seriously. I think the game itself was clearly made by someone who has more than a passing familiarity with Pokémon Black and White – in fact, I half suspect it was made by a fan with a black sense of humour. I strongly doubt anyone at PETA actually believes that Pokémon is a genuine threat to their cause; it’s more likely that the game is a tool for sparking controversy and drawing attention to PETA than a real attempt to damage Pokémon. I think there is something of a risk that going after Pokémon like this will risk trivialising the very real abuses they spend most of their time trying to tackle; however, I also think that attacking not just real instances of animal abuse in the world but also the cultural phenomena that appear to tolerate those abuses (in, I must again emphasise, what seems to me like a fairly tongue-in-cheek way) is actually a quite insightful strategy. They’re probably not going to make any Pokémon fans change their mind about the franchise (they certainly haven’t changed mine), and I think they must know that, but they are going to make people react to what they’re doing, and in the course of that reaction people will be made to think about what makes real animal abuse different from Pokémon battling. This, of course, means that people are thinking about animal abuse and why it’s horrible, which is exactly what PETA wants you to do, so the moment we even start having this conversation, the game has done its job. Since I actually quite like what they seem to be doing here, I’m going to go along with it and discuss some of these ideas myself.

First of all, I wish to acknowledge one very important fact: they have a point. Pokémon is a game about capturing wild animals, stuffing them into tiny balls, keeping them in there most of the time, and letting them out mainly so they can fight other animals, often for the amusement of spectators. You can argue – and I’m going to – that this is a very simplistic reading of the ideas in the franchise, but bear in mind that it’s actually not the absence of good, wholesome ideas in Pokémon that’s the problem. It’s very easy to point out the themes of partnership, discovery, charity, heroism and all the rest that we see everywhere in the Pokémon franchise; this is exactly what you see hordes of fans doing whenever PETA’s recent stunt is discussed. The problem is that this doesn’t actually address their complaint at all. It’s not the absence of good, wholesome ideas in Pokémon that they’re objecting to – it’s the way those family-friendly themes are mixed up and bound together with a premise that potentially has a lot of morally repugnant implications. To quote the game’s website, “the difference between real life and this fictional world full of organized animal fighting is that Pokémon games paint rosy pictures of things that are actually horrible.” Of course cockfighting is okay – after all, it’s no different to Pokémon training, and Pokémon don’t seem to mind… right? That train of thought probably sounds as ridiculous to you as it does to me, but people believe and do ridiculous things every day. Can you imagine that train of thought passing through the head of someone who already endorses cockfighting anyway? How about an eight-year-old kid who’s never heard of cockfighting before and doesn’t know whether it’s supposed to be good or bad? Frankly… I can. For most people Pokémon is only going to be one of a hundred different influences pushing and pulling in different directions, but it’s still there, pushing very subtly in a direction the creators never intended. So, again, yes: I actually do think PETA have a legitimate point here.

How, then, do we avoid this problem? Don’t even try to, says I: tackle it head on.

The basic premise of the Pokémon franchise is really quite morally ambiguous. That’s part of the reason I find it so interesting, and part of the reason I write for this blog at all. In general Game Freak likes to avoid touching on the moral ambiguities, but when they do it creates some of the most fascinating stuff the franchise has to offer. This is exactly why I’ve always felt that Black and White leave all the previous games in the dust as far as storytelling goes – the idea of Pokémon liberation trumpeted by Team Plasma (whom many people see as a pastiche of PETA) is potentially a perfectly noble goal. Black and White, for the first time, actually acknowledge that there is something slightly fishy about the basic assumptions on which the series operates. Maybe Pokémon shouldn’t be forced to battle – are we really so sure this is right? Many of the characters in the game are indeed won over by Team Plasma’s questioning of the established order, and even the Castelia Gym Leader, Burgh, admits that they might be onto something. The problem is that the debate eventually winds up being very one-sided. The Team Plasma grunts you meet are brutal, unthinking zealots. Their leader, Ghetsis, is cynically manipulating his followers to achieve his aims of conquest. Even N, the undoubtedly benevolent spiritual leader of Team Plasma, turns out to have been deliberately raised in the company of Pokémon who had been hurt by humans in order to influence his worldview, which begins to collapse once he sees what real Pokémon trainers are like. What about the Pokémon N was raised with? What about the people in this world who really do mistreat Pokémon horribly, like Team Rocket, such a major fixture of earlier games? What about Team Aqua, Team Magma, and Team Galactic, who tried to destroy the world by enslaving Pokémon? N is presented as naïve, his worldview as noble but warped… but would he really seem that way with Team Rocket on the scene? I think the best path for Pokémon to take from here is to look at what Black and White have done and improve on it: find ways to highlight the moral ambiguities instead of whitewashing everything, and explain through their storytelling “this is good, and this is bad, and here’s why.”

What’s my take on the ethics of Pokémon training, then? Well, if you’ve read a lot of my anime commentaries, you’re probably aware that I think there are a lot of unwritten and unspoken rules connected with Pokémon training, a code of conduct that regulates the way trainers and Pokémon relate to each other. Although explicit references to this code are few, I believe that most characters in the franchise do implicitly follow it. The first and probably the most important point to discuss is what it means to “capture” a Pokémon. The anime rarely presents capturing a Pokémon as requiring a trainer to beat it into submission; often, particularly in the later series, it’s more a question of winning a Pokémon’s respect. Furthermore, when the villains capture Pokémon, they rarely use Pokéballs. When they do, no-one seems to mind. When they try to capture Pokémon in other ways – even wild Pokémon, who should in theory be fair game – all the law-abiding characters are outraged. I think what this implies is that the process of battling a wild Pokémon and capturing it in a Pokéball is in fact about convincing it that you are worthy of being its trainer. This, in fact, is the reason knocking out a Pokémon in the games renders it impossible to capture: if you’ve beaten it completely unconscious, you’ve deprived it of the opportunity to test your skills and perseverance to its satisfaction. Capturing a Pokémon under such circumstances would be an unforgivable transgression of the rules that govern interaction between humans and Pokémon. Capturing Pokémon without Pokéballs – by physically restraining them, for instance – likewise violates the somewhat ritualised process of capture. So, now that we’ve established that Pokémon have to permit trainers to catch them, why would they even want to? The obvious reason is that they become more powerful under human training, but this is an oversimplification of the issue. Gaining “levels” represents a Pokémon gaining a greater understanding of its own innate powers, coming closer to becoming an ideal paragon of its species. This is most noticeable in species that experience evolution, of course (which, incidentally, I believe to be closely connected to the removal of psychological blocks and the achievement of a more advanced state of mind) but all Pokémon have unique abilities which even they may not fully understand by instinct alone. At the same time, travelling with humans forces Pokémon to learn a wider range of skills and use their abilities for a wider range of purposes than they ever would in the wild. As a result, they develop greater versatility and creativity than their wild counterparts. They may even gain skills of leadership and cooperation as a result of working together with Pokémon of other species (if you watch the anime episode Bulbasaur the Ambassador you’ll see exactly what I mean).

But what good does all this serve, beyond making them better able to serve humans and fight in human tournaments? Simple. I don’t think Pokémon are ever necessarily supposed to spend their entire lives with humans once caught. Many may decide later to stay with their humans forever, but I believe most Pokémon initially join trainers with the assumption that, like Ash’s Butterfree and so many of his other Pokémon, they will eventually leave, either returning to the wild to use their newfound powers there, joining other trainers to explore their abilities from a different perspective, or even assimilating completely into human society in one way or another, like Squirtle eventually did. Pokémon, in short, should not be viewed as passive tools to be used and discarded by trainers. They are independent, thinking beings who may partner with humans, temporarily or permanently, in order to further the goals of both, in accordance with an unspoken but well-established and very complex code of honour that dictates the actions and conduct of both sides.

Yes, I did just try to completely change the way you view every aspect of Pokémon training from the ground up.

Damn, it feels good to have my honours dissertation finished.

You’ve discussed trading a bit in your overview of Episode 15, but I was wondering if you had any more thoughts on it? At first it seems odd, but there are actually consistencies within trading. Pokemon gain more experience because they are put in completely different situations, and a traded Pokemon won’t respect a trainer who isn’t powerful because there was no bond formed in the catching process. Along with those, are there are other things, like trade evolution, that you could talk about?

Hmm. All right.

So, the thing about trading, as you note, is that it broadens a Pokémon’s view of the world. Being with different trainers puts Pokémon in a wider variety of situations and exposes them to different styles of training. In the process they learn greater independence and versatility, gain additional perspectives on their powers, and work together with a wider group of other Pokémon. Basically, traded Pokémon get all the things Pokémon could possibly want out of having relationships with humans, only they get more of them, hence the boosted experience deal (the larger boost for Pokémon received from a person who speaks a different language is a natural extension of this, representing the effect of a Pokémon being transplanted not just to a new trainer but to an entirely different cultural context).

On the flip side, trading a Pokémon most likely means abandoning your relationship with it and handing over the reins to someone else. Taken in the context of my theories about what it means to “capture” a Pokémon – namely, that Pokémon cannot be captured unless they are at least open to the idea of being trained by humans, and that the act of capturing a Pokémon represents the formation of a sort of implied contract – this is potentially not a totally legit thing to do. Your Pokémon challenged you, tested your worth, and permitted you to become its master. Now you’re letting this other douchebag take over? What the hell, man? Of course, potentially a Pokémon might accept that you’ve made a good choice and go along with it, enjoying all the benefits I outlined above. It’s entirely possible, though, that a less powerful trainer will be found wanting – and this may be true even if the new trainer is actually higher in formal rank than the original one! After all, the original trainer is still the one the Pokémon tested and accepted.

As I suggested in the entry on Battle Aboard the St. Anne, the way you as a trainer feel about this says a lot about your relationship with your Pokémon. It’s oversimplifying things to say that being willing to trade means you don’t care about them, because there are obvious benefits. It does, however, imply a very different point of view: trainers who are prepared to trade their Pokémon around at the drop of a hat are likely to have a more condescending view of Pokémon as a whole – they may very well be concerned with doing whatever is best for their Pokémon, but are very sure that they know what that is better than the Pokémon themselves do.

Trade evolution, of course, is the other big thing. Here, Black and White have done something that annoys me a little. See, prior to Black and White, I could say quite easily that the idea of Pokémon such as Haunter and Kadabra evolving when traded works as a natural extension of the way evolution is typically presented in the anime – as a process closely tied to a Pokémon’s psychological development. Evolution is triggered by all of the beneficial effects of trading that are also responsible for the experience boost. The problem with Black and White is that they introduce Shelmet and Karrablast. The Pokédex makes it clear that these two evolve when they are “bathed in an electric-like energy” together. The implication is that their dual evolution – and, by extension, perhaps other trade evolutions – is triggered by some aspect of the trading process itself (which, in both the games and the anime, is facilitated by a needlessly complicated machine). Now, personally I think that Karrablast and Shelmet’s dual evolution, while a brilliant concept, could have been much better-handled all around, so I’m going to suggest, firstly, that they’re an exception to the general rules for trade evolutions, and secondly, that there are actually many processes and phenomena which can cause Shelmet and Karrablast to evolve, trading being only the simplest and (for the majority of trainers) the most accessible.

I don’t believe my theories about trading are by any means comprehensive, but I think they should at least stand up to casual scrutiny. If you can think of any more specific examples that might support or refute anything I’ve said (particularly from the Hoenn and Sinnoh series of the anime, or the manga, which I’m not familiar with) I’d be happy to give that some thought.

Hey, dude! I was wondering about your opinion on PETA stating Pokemon encourages animal abuse, as well as your opinion on the game they made for it that parodizes Pokemon Black 2 and White 2. They really seem to have nothing better to do, right?

This is actually going in an article I’m writing, but it’s being pushed down the schedule a little bit by the fact that my dissertation is due on Friday! Fun times! So, yeah; all will be revealed, and stuff.

There’s a “Philosoraptor” meme going around the internet that goes like this: If two trainers with a Slowpoke and a Shelder respectively are battling, and the Shelder bites the tail of the Slowpoke, who gets the resulting Slowbro? An episode of the anime seems to state that the Slowpoke retains the control and allegiance for the Slowbro even if the Slowpoke is wild, but it got me thinking about symbiotic relationships in Pokemon. Mantine & Remoraid are another interesting pair. Thoughts on this?

Interesting question.

Purely from a practical perspective, the Shellder is sort of the ‘passive’ partner in the symbiosis; it just feeds off the Slowpoke’s scraps and moves wherever the Slowpoke decides to go. Assuming the Slowpoke remains loyal to its trainer, it makes sense that the Shellder would be dragged along for the ride. This, of course, raises the question of why a Shellder belonging to a trainer ever would willingly join with a Slowpoke belonging to another trainer, or with a wild one. In the Slowbro episode of the anime, the Shellder actually belongs to Jessie, but abandons her when it joins with the wild Slowpoke who lives with Professor Westwood. The obvious explanation is that Shellder didn’t really want to be with Jessie anyway, but unfortunately that explanation doesn’t work for me because of my weird theories that Pokémon are always able to resist capture if they don’t want to be partnered with humans. I think the best answer for me is that Shellder are very fickle Pokémon (which, in fairness, does seem to fit them) who are perfectly prepared to work with humans just for the possibility of finding a Slowpoke. They may develop true loyalties before that happens, and if they do, they will refuse to join with wild Slowpoke from then on, but in the early stages of your relationship with your Shellder, you might want to keep it away from any Slowpoke you meet…

Remoraid and Mantine are sort of a different case, because they actually can and often do separate again later (in its sprites, Mantine is shown without attached Remoraid from Diamond and Pearl onward). The Remoraid assists with evolution, but an ongoing symbiosis relationship is only necessary in the wild. Of course, if a wild Remoraid did attach itself to your Mantyke (or adult Mantine, for that matter) you might find that you had a new Pokémon! They wouldn’t change allegiance the way Shellder do, though.

Something that gets me is Levitate–the fact that so many Pokémon whose flavor would lend itself to an interesting ability are stuck with Levitate on purely physiological grounds. Would you consider looking at the Pokémon that have Levitate and coming up with some alternate abilities for them? (The Lake Trio deserve better!) One of my ideas: Gastly (and only Gastly) with a super-annoying ability that makes all physical-contact moves fail. Because how do you punch smoke, really?

Mmm; it is rather overused, isn’t it? On the other hand, for most of those Pokémon, it would make no sense at all for them to be vulnerable to Ground attacks. What’s more, Levitate is one of the better abilities out there (immunity to Earthquake, Spikes and Toxic Spikes? Yes please!). I think Levitate is probably one of the better arguments for allowing Pokémon to have two of their possible abilities at once. As it stands, though… well, no, I honestly wouldn’t want to take it away from them!

Something interesting i saw on “Did you know gaming” recently. That the reason that psychic is weak to bug, ghost and dark is because they are fears, and fears affect the mind, i dont know why im telling yo this but i feel you should know! Kinda fits in with your “fighting is a type about honour” idea. Maybe a post about what you think all 17 types represent similar to how you view fighting?

I’ve always thought their reasoning for Dark and Ghost was something along those lines, yeah. I didn’t originally tie Bug in with that, but it becomes pretty clear when you look at the ability ‘Rattled.’ As for the meaning of all those types… well, there are only a few that I associate with more abstract ideas like that (definitions for Fire, Water, Grass and so forth are really quite straightforward). I sort of think that, if more types were defined in that kind of way, there’d be a lot more freedom in designing new Pokémon, because you can tie a Pokémon’s element to its personality rather than its specific powers. Still, here are a few:

Fighting – ‘honour’ is part of it, but I don’t think it covers all Fighting-types; I think that Fighting Pokémon are the ones who are most like humans in their attitude to combat. They’re the most likely to fight for a cause, the most likely to consider fighting a skill worthy of exaltation, and the most likely to spend a lot of time training. Some, like Poliwrath, are more about athletics than combat, but they still have a more human than animal view.

Ghost – I think that a lot of Ghost Pokémon aren’t actually ghosts per se. Some clearly are, but I believe most of them simply have the name because they have powers related to death, the dead, and fear of death.

Dark – Dark is tricky, because there is something of an instinct that it should represent actual physical darkness, and Umbreon (one of the only five Dark Pokémon who existed in Gold and Silver) is very strongly associated with the moon and the night, the way Espeon is connected with the day. These characteristics aren’t actually shared by most Dark-types, though. The Japanese name literally translates to “evil type” and that’s the unifying theme of it: Dark Pokémon have abilities related to treachery, malice, fear, and brutality. This is not to say that they are universally evil – but they are pragmatic, and likely to use methods we might associate with evil.

Dragon – Back in Gold and Silver, one of Clair’s gym trainers described Dragon-types as “Pokémon that are overflowing with life energy” (or words to that effect) and that’s the definition I’ve used since then. Dragon-types aren’t necessarily connected with any one cultural stereotype of what constitutes a ‘dragon’ (just look at Altaria, Kingdra, Vibrava, and Shelgon). They are what they are because they have a special connection to some sort of ‘life force’ (which, I will remind you, is a very real thing in the Pokémon universe), and this is the source of their spectacular powers, incredible vitality and long lives.

Does all that sound reasonable? I’m sorry I don’t quite have what you asked for, but for most types it really is a lot simpler than this! There are definitely ways you could shift some other types in that direction, though – associating each Psychic Pokémon with an aspect of the human mind, for instance, or broadening the associations for Fire (which, at present, normally has only connotations of speed and destruction) to include warmth, nurturing, creativity, and passion.

More Aliens

Yeah, I’m going to keep doing this, mostly because it’s fun and it doesn’t take a lot out of me, which is sort of what I need at the moment since I have two weeks to research and write two essays, one on the meaning of imperium in archaic Rome, the other on the only female poet in classical Latin literature, as well as mark a few dozen undergrad Greek history essays. I’m working on an article on the ethics of Pokémon training, but it’s a very tricky and nuanced subject (or at least, it will be once I’m through with it) and I don’t have a whole lot of time for it.

So in the meantime, you get Animorphs aliens converted into Pokémon. Why not?

Taxxons and the Living Hive

The Taxxons are a remarkably unfortunate race. They resemble gigantic burrowing centipedes, and are afflicted with an insatiable hunger that drives most of them to the brink of insanity unless they eat constantly. Taxxons will feast involuntarily on any injured creature nearby, including other Taxxons, and have even been known to start eating themselves. When the Taxxons first encountered the Yeerk Empire, they willingly became slaves of the Yeerks in exchange for the promise of a stable food supply. Most Yeerk parasites are even capable of controlling the Taxxon hunger… some of the time. In the Yeerk Empire, Taxxons are normally technicians, engineers and pilots because of their multiple appendages and excellent reflexes. On their homeworld, they are controlled by a being known as the Living Hive, described as a glowing red mountain of flesh hidden deep underground, which seems to embody the collective intelligence of their race.

I’m going to stat the Living Hive as a Vespiquen-style evolution to the Taxxons: only the females evolve, and only one in every eight are female (that still sounds like an awful lot of Hives, so let’s claim that they evolve at a fairly high level – say 50).

Type: Bug/Ground
Bug for obvious reasons, Ground because they’re burrowers by nature and spend most of their lives in underground colonies.

Ability: Gluttony or Compoundeyes (Dream World) for the Taxxons; Pressure or Unnerve (Dream World) for the Living Hive
The Taxxons’ abilities don’t require much explanation; Pressure and Unnerve for the Living Hive because Vespiquen has them, which seemed like a reasonable precedent and, well, based on its one appearance in the series, being in the presence of the Living Hive is pretty damn unnerving!

Stat Spread: 50 HP, 89 Attack, 40 Defence, 30 Special Attack, 40 Special Defence, 101 Speed (Taxxons)
130 HP, 54 Attack, 78 Defence, 90 Special Attack, 92 Special Defence, 30 Speed (the Living Hive)
Although they’re the same species, theoretically, the Hives are completely different to the Taxxons, and that’s reflected here. Taxxons are better at certain things, but overall the Hive is far more powerful.

Notable Moves: Well, on the one hand, I have to be careful what I give the Taxxons, because any attacks they have will automatically be available to the Living Hive as well. On the other hand, because their attack stats basically flip around, I can at least be guaranteed that if I give the Taxxons attacks like Bug Bite and Dig (for obvious reasons), Earthquake and X-Scissor (just to be nice to them) or Crunch and Slam (for a bit of variety) the Hive will be rubbish at using them anyway. We can probably also get away with giving them some junk like Gastro Acid, Sand Attack, String Shot and Lick – and, of course, Stockpile and Swallow are practically a given (but not Spit Up, because once a Taxxon eats something, it damn well stays eaten).
The Living Hive will also gain access to Bug Buzz, Earth Power and Psychic for nuking stuff, Calm Mind for being better at nuking stuff, and Vespiquen’s Attack Order, Defend Order and Heal Order techniques for bringing its Taxxon horde to bear on the enemy. I want this thing to use a lot of support moves, so Hypnosis, Safeguard, Disable, and maybe Spikes and Toxic Spikes are on the cards too.

Chee

Strangely enough, there doesn't seem to be any official art of the Chee from the knees up. Like, at all. In this picture you can see what their legs look like through the hologram, though. Generally allies of the protagonists, the Chee are a race of pacifistic doglike androids who have been hidden on Earth for thousands of years, quietly helping humanity to advance. They were created by an ancient, now-extinct species called the Pemalites, and subsequently fused the souls of the Pemalites with Earth wolves in order to create domestic dogs (this is the in-universe reason dogs are so friendly and loyal). The Chee have advanced holographic technology that makes them the ultimate spies, and allows them to cover for the kids at home when they go off on extended missions. Physically, they’re also incredibly powerful. However, their programming utterly forbids them from harming living beings – or even, in some cases, from allowing living beings to be harmed. Since the Yeerks are, in fact, living beings, this sometimes limits the amount of help the Chee are able to give.

Type: Steel
Androids. Duh.

Ability: Illusion
To simulate their holographic projections, I’m giving the Chee the Illusion ability used by Zorua and Zoroark – they can take on the appearance (but not the powers) of any Pokémon on their own team. Pretty nifty for confusing people.

Stat Spread: 90 HP, 5 Attack, 138 Defence, 5 Special Attack, 122 Special Defence, 79 Speed
The Chee are the next best thing to indestructible, but they do not hurt things, ever.

Notable Moves: Since they’re pacifists, the only damaging techniques I’m prepared to give the Chee are Counter and Mirror Coat (like Wobuffet, except that they’re missing several of the features that make Wobuffet so good at using those moves). However, they have zillions of support moves. The most important things I want them to have access to are Iron Defense and Protect (self-explanatory), Refresh and Recover (since they can repair themselves), Reflect, Safeguard, Light Screen and Heal Pulse (fits with their flavour), Thunder Wave and Imprison (I can see them disabling enemies to capture them without hurting them), Trick Room, Magic Coat, Magnet Rise and Gravity (they’re super-advanced robot aliens, why the hell not?). To be honest, I’m not totally sure how useful these guys are likely to be, because their only concrete offensive option is Thunder Wave. They’re probably just going to wind up providing openings for opposing Pokémon to buff themselves (still, that does kinda fit with the way the books present them…). I guess I could let them have Encore to keep them from being set-up bait, or maybe Calm Mind and Baton Pass, so at least it’d be dangerous to leave them to their own devices for too long.

Leerans

Art by Adam from Cinnamon Bunzuh. The Leerans are one of the other races the Yeerks are attempting to conquer during the early part of the series. A froglike aquatic species from a distant world, the Leerans possess formidable psychic powers and can effortlessly read the mind of anyone who comes within a few metres of them. Naturally, if the Yeerks manage to conquer them and Leeran hosts become widely available, everyone is in a lot of trouble.

Type: Water/Psychic
Aquatic aliens with advanced psychic abilities. Next, please!

Ability: Telepathy, Forewarn, or Regenerator (Dream World)
Leerans are telepathic mind-readers who can regenerate lost or damaged limbs and organs. Fairly straightforward, really.

Stat Spread: 102 HP, 65 Attack, 64 Defence, 115 Special Attack, 79 Special Defence, 71 Speed
Leerans are a little slow and clumsy, but they’re tougher than they look and are probably the most highly psychic species in the series.

Notable Moves: Generic Water- and Psychic-type attacks, to start with. Wrap, Tickle, and later Wring Out, for the tentacles. Mind Reader and Detect, because duh, and similarly Miracle Eye, because why the hell not? Recover because it makes sense, and Calm Mind to go with it and make ‘em big and tanky. I’m tempted to give them a bunch of support moves as well, like Confuse Ray, Charm, Encore, Disable, Reflect, and Light Screen, as well as a few more special attacks that are vaguely thematically appropriate, mainly Focus Blast and Ice Beam. Basically I’m aiming for these guys to be bulky special tanks.

Helmacrons

Art by Adam again. The elephant has been brought down to a manageable size by the Helmacron shrink ray. Oh, the Helmacrons… the Helmacrons are a diminutive race of megalomaniacal insectoids. Although their average battlecruiser is the size of a child’s toy, the Helmacrons are determined to conquer the galaxy, remaining convinced that they are its rightful rulers. During their appearances in the series, they manage to adapt the kids’ morphing technology into a shrink ray of some description, to allow them to fight other races on a level footing (for this reason, I’m going to assume when statting them out that the Helmacrons are dealing with opponents of their own size; doing otherwise would be too much of a headache). They are a matriarchal race, with stunted, weak and subservient males and loud, aggressive and utterly insane females (the Animorphs manage to start the Helmacron equivalent to the suffrage movement after their first encounter with them, which leads, naturally, to zany antics). Among their… interesting… customs is their practice of ceremonially killing any Helmacron chosen for a leadership position, on the grounds that a dead leader cannot make any mistakes.

Type: Bug
Y’know, because they’re insects. I considered Bug/Psychic, since they’re telepathic and seem to have some sort of hive mind thing going on, but telepathy isn’t exactly rare in the Animorphs universe and the hive mind is sort of covered by the Bug element anyway, so I’ll just go with Bug to avoid splashing Psychic all over the place too much.

Ability: Fungible
Adam suggested this ability to represent the curious hive mind ability of the Helmacrons; they don’t exactly act as one the way hive mind species typically do in science fiction, but their minds, thoughts, personalities and experiences are uploaded into a sort of collective instantaneously upon death, making it impossible to truly kill a Helmacron. This ability effectively allows Helmacrons to Baton Pass for free upon being knocked out – any and all boosts (and penalties) on a Helmacron are sent along to the next Pokémon you call out in its place. This is easily the most useful thing about them, and is probably a reason to use them on its own.

Stat Spread: 65 HP, 86 Attack, 54 Defense, 61 Special Attack, 54 Special Defence, 90 Speed
Helmacrons are strong and fast, considering their minuscule size, but tend to have something of a kamikaze mentality and attack with little regard for their own safety.

Notable Moves: Bug Bite for those nasty mandibles, and U-Turn so they can have a Bug attack that’s actually useful (no, switching out with U-Turn doesn’t activate their ability; that’d just be asking for trouble). Taunt, Torment, Pursuit, Night Slash and Knock Off because they’re jerks. Assist because it fits in with the whole ‘fungible’ thing, because the world needs more Assist insanity, and because the Helmacrons are just the people to bring it on. Double Edge and Flail for their self-destructive tendencies. It probably won’t hurt to give them some weird stuff like Triple Kick, Superpower, Aerial Ace, and Acrobatics too, just for a bit of variety. Now… let’s give them some nasty boosts to pass with that ability of theirs. Growth and Minimise can represent their shrink ray technology, and Nasty Plot is sort of a given because they’re crazed megalomaniacs. Agility seems like a good fit too, since they’re an extremely frenetic bunch. Basically, their job is to go in, hit things, cause frustration, hopefully find a moment to boost up, and then die, sending those buffs to something less dumb in the process.

Well, that’s it for me – for now, anyway. Maybe I should post a small extract from my dissertation, just to prove that I am actually doing legit work during this blog’s hiatus… then again, it’d be pretty dull stuff to anyone without a specific interest in what I’m studying, so maybe not.

Let’s stat up the Animorphs aliens as Pokémon

If you’re the same age as me, or a bit younger, you might remember the Animorphs series. It’s about a group of Californian kids who turn into animals to fight an invasion of alien brain-slugs. It… look, it makes sense in context, okay? Anyway, I follow this one blog, Cinnamon Bunzuh, where two charmingly crazy people named Adam and Ifi review books from this extremely prolific series (and, in Ifi’s case, write truly absurd fanfiction about it), and, as a result of a recent conversation in the comments, I am now going to stat up the alien races of the Animorphs universe as Pokémon.

Why? Because I feel like it, damnit.

Andalites

The inventors of the technology that allows the kids to morph into animals, the Andalites are an advanced race of militaristic but highly spiritual centaur-like aliens who basically see it as their responsibility to police the regions of space surrounding their territory and generally stick their noses in other people’s business. They are extremely aloof and typically disdainful of less advanced species. Andalites have no mouths. They eat by crushing grass and absorbing it through their hooves, and communicate by telepathy. One of the Animorphs, Ax, is an Andalite cadet stranded on Earth.

Type: Fighting/Psychic.
I was originally going to call them pure Fighting-types, because of their obsession with honour and because they don’t have the advanced telekinetic powers that normally characterise Psychic-type Pokémon, but Adam has pointed out that they do have a wider range of psychic abilities than I realised (hey, gimme a break; it’s been a while since I read these books!) so Fighting/Psychic it is.

Ability: Telepathy, Justified or Defiant (Dream World)
No-brainers, really.

Stat Spread: 79 HP, 106 Attack, 70 Defense, 65 Special Attack, 93 Special Defense, 112 Speed
Andalites are not physically tough, but they’re lethally quick with those scorpion-esque tail blades.

Notable Moves: Slash, for obvious reasons. The high-level ones can have Sacred Sword because, let’s face it, that makes way more sense for Andalites than it does for Cobalion et al. Gotta give them Taunt and Swagger, because that’s just what they’re like, as well as Fake Out and Knock Off to represent their above average finesse. Tail Whip, Swords Dance and Double Kick are all thematically appropriate, and maybe Agility, Psycho Cut and Iron Tail too. Stone Edge, because every halfway competent physical sweeper gets Stone Edge. We can probably justify a fair few weird Psychic-type utility moves like Telekinesis, Reflect, Imprison, Guard Split, and Gravity. And, of course, Transform is a given, but since this is a technological ability I’d require them to obtain it from a move tutor or something. Basically, I envision these guys working in a similar manner to Mienshao: fast, powerful physical attackers who also have a toolkit of tricky support moves.

Yeerks

The Yeerks are the primary antagonists of the series. In their natural state, they are small water-dwelling slugs who communicate using sonar blips and can’t do much of anything. Unfortunately for the rest of the galaxy, however, Yeerks are parasites capable of entering other creatures’ brains through the ear canal and taking complete control of their bodies. Much of the series focuses on fighting off their stealth invasion of Earth, which is an incredibly rich prize for them because of its massive population of potential hosts.

Type: Bug/Dark.
Bug for being slugs, Dark for its general connotations of malice and deception. I flirted with Water/Dark, but since they don’t really have any abilities related to water, I figured it wasn’t important.

Ability: Parasite
Okay, we’re going to have to make something up here in order for these guys to work right, and it makes sense for that something to be an ability, which works thusly: when a Yeerk is hit by an attack that requires contact, it will (assuming it survives – be sure to pack a Focus Sash) slither into the Pokémon that delivered that attack and take control. The opposing Pokémon leaves its owner’s team and replaces the Yeerk on the other side of the field. The host’s nature, IVs, and effort points are overwritten by the Yeerk’s own, but its base stats, level and moveset are unchanged. In a link or wi-fi battle, the host Pokémon is returned at the end of the match; in a battle with an AI trainer, you get to keep the host until it is knocked out, at which point the Yeerk slithers out, the host escapes, and you need to find another one.

(I’m not sure how useful this would actually be in practice; it could use some tinkering)

Stat Spread: 35 HP, 25 Attack, 40 Defense, 20 Special Attack, 50 Special Defense, 20 Speed
Unhosted Yeerks are incredibly vulnerable and basically useless.

Notable Moves: Very few. Supersonic and Water Pulse seem necessary for thematic reasons, Taunt, Torment and Snatch would probably be appropriate, and it seems only fair to give them some STAB moves, so Leech Life and Payback will do. As I said, though, they’re not much use without host bodies.

Hork-Bajir

The Hork-Bajir are the slave-soldiers of the Yeerk Empire. Pretty much their entire population is infested by Yeerks, who use their vicious arm blades to slice up their opposition in close-combat. What the Animorphs don’t realise until some time into the series is that Hork-Bajir in their natural state are incredibly peaceful, if dim-witted, herbivores. Their culture didn’t even have a concept of aggression until they were conquered by the Yeerks (at which point the Andalites released a crazy sci-fi face-melting virus on their planet to keep the Yeerks from getting them all). Those terrifying blades? Those are for stripping the bark off the massive, kilometer-high trees that dominate their homeworld.

Type: Grass/Fighting.
I was initially resistant to making these guys Fighting-types, because of my personal interpretation that Fighting as an element is more about honour, pride, and fighting for a purpose than just having ludicrous abs, but then, if Heracross can be an exception, so can these guys (in terms of personality, they’re actually pretty similar).

Ability: Leaf Guard, Unaware or Forewarn (Dream World)
Leaf Guard to reflect their natural advantage in forest terrain, Unaware for their characteristic obliviousness and ability to keep fighting against overwhelming odds. Forewarn as the Dream World ability is meant to represent the Seers, one-in-a-billion prodigies with genius-level intelligence and a gift for strategy.

Stat Spread: 90 HP, 130 Attack, 100 Defense, 40 Special Attack, 65 Special Defense, 81 Speed
Physically tough, but rather dim and much slower than an Andalite, Hork-Bajir are basically brutes in combat.

Notable Moves: Swords Dance, since the Hork-Bajir are, as Ifi likes to say, made of knives. Slash, Night Slash and Leaf Blade are likewise to be assumed. Needle Arm is only appropriate if you squint at it a bit, but would make a good low-level alternative to Leaf Blade. Close Combat makes a lot of sense, and I could probably get away with dumping a bunch of other typical Fighting attacks like Hammer Arm, Submission, Superpower and Reversal on them. Bulk Up, Scary Face and Endure are probably suitable, Rock Climb would reflect their normal lifestyle, we should be able to get away with Earthquake and Stone Edge, and let’s slap on Guillotine just for the hell of it. Amnesia because their minds are pretty empty anyway. Their stat spread is making them look like tanks, so I want to give them Slack Off for healing, since it fits with their natural, indolent lifestyle.

Phew.

It’s getting late, so that’s enough for now. I might do some more of these if people respond positively to this lot.