Anonymous asks:

Is it just me or have Psychic types really gone through an overhaul? In the first generation it was populated by bizarre, unnatural creatures like Mr Mime, Hypno, Exeggutor, and Starmie and now it’s basically the generic legendary type.

Well, I mean, I agree completely with your assertion that French mimes are bizarre and unnatural, but other than that, I don’t think so. Inkay and Malamar the mind-controlling land-squid in VI fit the bill of “bizarre and unnatural” to me, and V had Gothitelle, Sigilyph, Reuniclus and Beheeyem. I think partly you’re maybe just noticing that there are very few Psychic-types in generation VII. Like… Cosmog, Cosmoem, Solgaleo and Lunala are basically all one thing, then there’s that freaky prism demon, and Tapu Lele, and other than that, there’s… what, Bruxish and Oranguru? And honestly Oranguru (a.k.a. the Stalker Pokémon) gives me the creeps every bit as much as Hypno ever did.

Anonymous asks:

Why is it that if I challenge a Gym Leader like Misty, who carries 2 Pokemon, that I’m allowed to use up to six against her? Surely the people that makes the rules don’t honestly believe she or any other Gym Leaders have strong enough Pokemon and strategies to contest a potential 2 vs 6, right?

I know people hate it when I do this, but my instinct here is to point to the anime and say “well, they do restrict the numbers available to the challenger; that fact just gets elided to produce a smoother gameplay experience.” Besides, a single Pokémon can and will wreck an entire team’s $#!t if you don’t know what you’re doing (looking at you, Whitney’s Miltank and Winona’s Altaria), and the Gym Leaders are, for the most part, supposed to be testing a trainer’s basic/intermediate/advanced proficiency, not trying to block them or halt their progress.

Anonymous asks:

Finneon and Lumineon get Silver Wind via level up, being the only non-Bugs who do so. What?

Well, I think it’s because of their butterfly-wing fins. Silver Wind is an attack associated not just with bugs but specifically with butterfly and moth Pokémon, all of whom have access to it aside from Vivillon, and they account for most of the Pokémon who learn it by levelling. Lumineon is clearly meant to resemble a butterfly (for what reason I’m not sure, though Bulbapedia suggests a link to the freshwater butterflyfish). The “wings” also net Lumineon access to Gust, for what it’s worth, and are perhaps responsible for her getting U-Turn as well.

Anonymous asks:

People wonder why Psyduck isn’t a Psychic-type, and I do too, but why isn’t it a Flying-type? It’s a bird, and all other generation I birds are part Flying-type (including Farfetch’d, who is also a duck, and Doduo/Dodrio, who are also flightless).

I think this may in fact be the best argument for thinking that Psyduck is not a duck at all, but a platypus, which I know people have suggested. There’s an important caveat here that even at the best of times Game Freak doesn’t quite seem to know what the Flying type actually is, and frankly neither do I, but other than the beak there’s not a lot which is especially ducklike about Psyduck. He has arms and webbed hands rather than wings (likewise Golduck), learns no Flying-type or bird-themed attacks aside from Aerial Ace (which… look, just f&$% Aerial Ace), and his body doesn’t really look feathery the way most bird Pokémon do.

Anonymous asks:

I think anime Jessie would find Team Skull appealing, don’t you? What with her growing up poor and becoming a criminal to ‘stick it to the man’ as it were, that’s some Team Skull motivation right there! Not sure if she and Guzma would get on, though… Maybe a frenemy relationship with Plumeria?

Well, I’ve seen exactly one and a half episodes of the Sun/Moon anime, and Team Skull did not feature, so grain of salt and all that, but yeah, I actually think all three of our Team Rocket trio would find a lot to like in Team Skull as they’re presented in the games. Jessie and Meowth would sympathise with their disadvantaged position in Alola’s society and respect their ambition, and I think James – despite his own privileged background – has enough of a rebellious streak to appreciate their desire for change. Also, given that a lot of individual members of Team Skull are actually not particularly malicious, I kinda think James and Jessie would fit right in, with their “only evil because I’m supposed to be” attitude. Jessie and Guzma would immediately battle to the death for control of the team though.

Random Access asks:

So the fundamental concepts of modern physics is older than the concept of the four classical elements?

(follow-up to this)

Ehhhhh, I wouldn’t go that far. It’s more that Thales lived in a time of… let’s call it experimentation. The Greek philosophers of the 6th century BC were kinda throwing stuff at the wall to see what would stick. His notion that water might be the one fundamental “stuff” was just one of several ideas being tossed around at the time; other philosophers suggested air, or aether, and of course the idea that wound up dominating was Empedocles’ belief that there were four different kinds of fundamental “stuff” (earth, water, fire and air). Continue reading “Random Access asks:” →

Anonymous asks:

We all know you hate Arceus and the Jewel of Life, but what’s your FAVORITE Pokémon movie? This does not count TV specials (like the Mewtwo origin) or Origins/Generations. Mine’s probably The Power of One, simply because of pure nostalgia!

Y’know, I gotta be honest, most of them are pretty dumb in a lot of ways; like, I give Jewel of Life a lot of $#!t but Rise of Darkrai gets seriously trippy in places and I’m still not sure what the point of Victini and Reshiram/Zekrom was supposed to be.

Also, in fairness, there are several I haven’t seen.

But I guess I’m a fan of Power of One too, and that probably is nostalgia to some extent, but I still feel in retrospect like the way it treated its legendary Pokémon was relatively sane, most of the characters felt like they actually had reasons to be there (even Team Rocket), and, y’know what? The whole “thus the world shall turn to Ash” thing was satisfying. Dumb. Corny. But satisfying.

Random Access asks:

I think Macargo’s nonsensical body temperature makes a lot more sense if it’s interpreted as an internal body temperature rather than a surface temperature.

…does it, though? It’s still hot enough to vaporise tungsten. What are we supposed to imagine Magcargo’s body is even made of at that point?

EDIT [response]: Well if the heat isn’t on the outside, it would be less dangerous for macargo to, well, exist, as it wouldn’t be on the outside where it’s hot enough to vaporize the atmosphere.

Okay but even then Magcargo’s body still has to be made of something that a) won’t instantly turn into stellar plasma, and b) can actually keep all that heat in.

Anonymous asks:

Do you think Poké Rides should continue to be a thing in future games and/or remakes? I personally think it would be super neat to see different Pokémon in different regions be used for the same purposes (namely, field traversal). Like in Kalos, Rhyhorn fills in the shoes of both Tauros and Mudsdale!

Sure. I think they’re a cool little immersive feature that shows how much people depend on their Pokémon, and using different Pokémon in different regions would be a neat way of showing the uniqueness of their cultures. What’s more, now that Game Freak seem to have finally forsworn the HM system (godawful clunky relic that it was), they probably have to keep doing it. It doesn’t really make a lot of sense to stop at this point.