Not Me asks:

If you could pick an animal to base the next pika-clone on, what would it be?

can I pick something that doesn’t exist so it doesn’t get made

uggggghhhhh fine

obviously there is only one animal in all the infinite cosmos that is worthy of this… dubious honour

and that is its majestic lordship the capybara

Pros:

It’s a fat sack of $#!t, which I strongly empathise with
Can swim, which is an excellent excuse to have it be Water/Electric
Big enough to stack all the other Pikachu clones on top of it
I admit I’m not sure how that would be helpful, but it seems like a plus
Mysterious gland on its snout can be adapted for dispensing electric death
Often has a bird sitting on its head
Good excuse to do a Brazil/Amazon-inspired region
Despite being literally an obese guinea pig, can run as fast as a horse
Skin grease can be used in traditional medicine

Cons:

Literally none???

EDIT: I will it so, and it is done! Here’s reader voltorb1993’s take on “Zapybara”!

Squidward Tentacles asks:

Who would win in a fight? Your vastly superior intellect, or all the Gen V Pokemon sentenced to cruel, horrible deaths all those years ago?

Oh, I would get destroyed. This brain of mine? This is an ideas brain; moreover, this is a humanities brain. I’m not going to go all Home Alone on this $#!t; I’m just going to stand there, pompously explaining to them that criticism is part of the network of social relationships that give art its meaning, that a thorough understanding of a work’s flaws can actually deepen a sincere appreciation of it, and that we all have a responsibility to be critical of the media we consume, while they… y’know, variously incinerate, lacerate, electrify, putrefy, pulverise, exorcise, freeze and disembowel me.

Name (required) asks:

So with Q-Fusion Hyper Abilities being a thing in gen VIII, how do you think they will impact the metagame?

Well, it was certainly a bold choice to give such a significant buff to all Pokémon with the letter q in their English names, but frankly it’s a pretty short list, and if you manage to fit two of those Pokémon onto your team, and manage to spend a turn fusing them, you deserve to get the ridiculous hyper-abilities. Rayquaza would probably still prefer to mega-evolve than Q-fuse, but most of the others seem really powerful, and the beneficiaries are mostly Pokémon who haven’t gotten a whole lot of attention in the past. Nidoquanid should be a powerhouse with Q-BubbleForce turning all its best attacks into super-powered dual-type Water versions that bypass immunity abilities. Vespiqwilfish can stall forever since Q-Presstimidation drops the opponent’s attack stats every time they try to hurt you. Eviolite Tranquilladin being immune to Flying attacks (as well as truly a ridiculous number of other things) thanks to Q-BigPecksProof makes it a really interesting counter to a lot of Pokémon. Eviolite Squilava’s Q-FlashFireDish lets it heal not just from using Fire attacks or even being hit by Fire attacks, but from being in Sunny Day, or being in the party while someone else uses Fire attacks, or even just thinking about fire (and I admit it does seem a little excessive that the game will upgrade your Switch with a brain-scan capability just to facilitate this effect, but the flavour/design justification is so good that in my opinion it’s absolutely worth it).

Honestly these things are going to totally run away with the entire game if J-Armour GigaTech Moves turn out not to be the hard counter they’re supposed to be.

SkarmorySilver asks:

I remember a few years back when I challenged you to come up with a viable Dedenne evolution, but I don’t think I’ve ever asked you about one for Togedemaru yet. Seeing as you got burned out fixing up the worst of the Normal/Flying birds recently, though, I’ll spare you the pain and provide an idea for one I thought of a while ago – In some some parts of Asia and the Middle East, the hedgehog is credited in myth with bringing fire to man, so I combined that with the principle of electric heating and came up with a glyptodont/hedgehog hybrid critter with a spiny shell like a cartoon sun which could learn Fire-type attacks on top of the stuff Togedemaru gets already; it attracts lightning to heat up its spines, so it can gently warm its surroundings and allow life to flourish in cold nights (as well as learn Flame Charge or maybe even Flare Blitz if you’re daring enough). I still don’t know how to fix Zing Zap though, since I only thought about the pitch for Togedemaru’s evolved form, rather than improving the move itself (a damage boost is obvious, but IDK what additional effects if any could be included on top of it, just in case).

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Poipole and Naganadel

Finally, we’ve dealt with ALL the Ultra Beasts. Nihilego, Buzzwole, Pheromosa, Xurkitree, Celesteela, Kartana, Guzzlord, all seven of them have been reviewed.

…

…what do you mean, they added more!?

Okay, so… 802 Pokémon was not enough, it’s never enough, it will never be enough until I’m dead, so Ultra Sun and Ultra Moon added another five Pokémon that weren’t in the original Sun and Moon, and can’t be traded back to those games either. Four of those were additional Ultra Beasts, and for the sake of thematic unity I’m going to cover them before returning to the legendary Pokémon of Alola. Our subjects for today are the first two, the only Ultra Beasts to evolve: Poipole and Naganadel, the Poison Pin Pokémon (the same species name as Nidoran!).

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Pokémottos #803 and 804

House Naganadel: Chemical Chaos

N asks:

What would be the biggest culture shocks for someone that comes from the world of Pokémon to ours?

listen if you’re thinking of making the move I don’t recommend it

but… well, I’m gonna guess the absence of Pokémon would be the big one, to be honest.

People in the Pokémon world rely on their Pokémon for all kinds of things, and it often seems like it’s kind of unusual to be a person who doesn’t care about Pokémon and isn’t in any capacity involved with Pokémon. Like, in the real world, telling someone you don’t have pets is not a big deal. In the Pokémon world, sure, not everyone is a trainer exactly, but almost everyone has Pokémon in their lives in some capacity, maybe as pets or co-workers or even spiritual advisors. How big a change this is might depend on when and where you landed – people in real rural societies do “live with animals” in a fairly meaningful sense, while urbanites tend to be largely oblivious of even the animals we eat (and actually, this is a total tangent but my IRL friend Flint Dibble, who is a zooarchaeologist, talks a lot about this stuff on Twitter and is very good at making compelling stories of his work). Of course, maybe then the culture shock is “you eat your animals!?” (but then, are we so sure they don’t eat Pokémon too?). They would probably be confused at how far animals, other than pets, are kept at arms’ length in their involvement in modern society – and might think that we must be very disconnected from nature on account of that.

The dependence of children on their parents is probably the other big thing. In the Pokémon world, it’s generally seen as pretty safe for kids to travel on their own if they have Pokémon, who can provide both protection and emotional support. Adults are not necessarily better trainers than children either, so Pokémon are a big equalising factor in the face of any dangers you might face. In the absence of that security and freedom, modern childhood (even modern life in general) in the real world would probably seem stifling.

Ty asks:

Hello,

I don’t recall if you ever did a post on your thoughts on Z moves as a whole, or particularly how you reacted to their extreme animations. Would you share your thoughts on each one in a few words?

I haven’t, but I might have promised that I would later. Let me check.

…

[Also, just while we’re here, I feel I should note (just to completely weird out the Americans in the audience) that, as I think most New Zealanders would, I have always instinctively pronounced it “zed-move” (not “zee-move”) and this should be the way you imagine me saying it whenever you read my words on the subject.]

…

damn it Past Chris, get your $#!t together

Y’know, in the past I have definitely made noises about it, but I was never sure what I should commit to, because I thought I might end up talking about them in the context of my review of Necrozma, since the power of Z-moves comes from Necrozma’s light. That’s something I’m now less optimistic about, since there’s a buttload of lore to study and clarify surrounding Necrozma. I think I’m going to have to beg to defer this, because it probably does deserve a full article (I did one on mega evolution, after all; I mean, it was completely bat$#!t but I did write it) but I don’t think I can properly tackle the subject with my customary brilliance until I get my facts straight on Necrozma and the cosmic light.

State of the Blog

uh… nothing is on fire… none of the Pokémon are dead… the horrors of the space between the stars are quiet… I need to buy milk tomorrow but I can probably remember to do that… things are good! I think!

Y’know, there is something weirdly addictive about the WordPress stats page. Day by day, hour by hour, the figures go up, and some number of people are paying attention to my deranged claptrap, fuelling my long, slow and inevitable descent into crippling narcissism.

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