Detective Pikachu top 5 scenes

Hello Pokémaniacs, Jim the Editor here.

Now, I’m sure you’ve all been waiting with baited breath for Chris’ thoughts on Detective Pikachu; well, I have some good news and some bad news.

The good news is that Chris has a very long post – so long that it might turn out to be 2 posts – with all the thoughts he can muster about the long-awaited live-action Pokémon adaptation.

The bad news is that there were some minor structural issues I had with the draft and Chris has begrudgingly agreed to make a few changes here and there to ensure that we put out only the best content for all of you.

In the meantime, because we promised Detective Pikachu content today, we decided to give you all a special Jim the Editor post containing my 5 favourite scenes from the movie!

There will be spoilers – you have been warned!

Continue reading →

Vaguely Curious asks:

Hi! Don’t feel any pressure to answer this if you don’t want (I know it’s a bit more personal than most of your questions), but if you don’t mind answering… Are you and Jim the Editor boyfriends? O:
(For context, I know you’re gay [I am too, so it made me so happy when I first saw you mention that], but I don’t know if it’s come up on the blog whether he is, nor if you’re an item.)
Again, sorry if this is too personal or awkward! I’m just curious, ahah.

I don’t think this is the first time it’s come up, but it’s definitely been a while. Anyway, I can kinda see how people might get that impression, but with apologies to anyone who’s been shipping us – no, Jim and I are not a couple; he’s straight, and lives on a different continent. We became friends in our last year of high school and studied classics together at university, after which we both went overseas to do our PhDs: me to the US, him to the UK. He actually just handed in his thesis recently (US PhDs take a lot longer; I still have a couple of years to go), so you could start calling him Dr. Jim the Editor, if you like. Also, by sheer coincidence (and we only found out about this when he met my parents), Jim’s dad, who is an anaesthesiologist specialising in epidurals, was one of the doctors present when I was born.

Jim the Editor is literally the editor – he proofreads pretty much everything I post here. This blog was also actually his idea in the first place; we had a lot of friends who used to play Pokémon and thought they might get a kick out of my addled raving about them newfangled gen-V Pokeymans. I suspect he and I will battle to the death upon the corpse of a fading star at the end of time, when the last words of the gods have faded from memory, but until then, he’s my best friend, and that’s a constant I’m glad to have in my life.

A rambling chat about game balance

In lieu of a Pokémon review (because what even is my life right now, arghghghl; next weekend my students are handing in essays and I have to write an exam for the week after that), here is a message log with a conversation between me and Jim the Editor about game balance in Pokémon (and elsewhere). This is the kind of thing I might post regularly to a Patreon page, if I ever actually create one? So, comments would be useful.

Screenshot 2018-10-21 at 6.41.51 PM.png Continue reading “A rambling chat about game balance” →

Blog Status: Normal??

We haven’t talked in a while. We should do that.

I spent most of the last year in Greece, participating in an intensive study program for PhD students in classical studies that takes us to archaeological sites all over the country and gives us opportunities for “backstage access” that would be impossible for almost anyone else (culminating in the incredible opportunity to spend three nights on the holy island of Delos – since there’s no modern town on Delos, any normal group would have to take the afternoon ferry back to Mykonos every day). A priceless experience that I wouldn’t trade for almost anything, but… less than ideal for blog productivity, I have to admit. Continue reading “Blog Status: Normal??” →

Squidward Tentacles asks:

I’d tell you a random fact about fish, but I work with them every day. I hate them. I hate working at the Krusty Krab. I hate the nautical nonsense of a ninny that flips burgers right behind me every day.

Good day sir! I SAID good day!

Mmm. I sympathise. Unfortunately fish are often very stupid, and sponges, I’ve heard, are worse (though strangely proficient in fine dining and breathing). Crabs, however, are the highest form of life in the universe, as demonstrated by the fact that evolution keeps trying to turn other animals into crabs, and you should feel honoured to work for one. If you need something to take your mind off your coworker’s ceaseless blithering, try Jim the Editor’s randomised Kingslocke playthrough of Fire Red, now returning after an unfortunate but necessary hiatus to focus on work – or try out the rules yourself, and let me know how it goes!

Anonymous asks:

hi u ok

Yes! Uh, probably. Still living in Athens; for a little bit I was on Delos where no one actually lives and the internet is crap, and in a few weeks I’ll be going to Corinth for a dig (or, I mean, people will be digging; I’ve been promised a chance to sit in the museum and play with the Roman window glass from previous excavation seasons, so… yay!). Not super busy this month, so you should see some more stuff here for once! Want to try and do Mudsdale this week, and another one the week after. And I’ve been working on… another minor thing… Greece-related rather than Pokémon-related… that you may all be able to read in some form in the months to come (apologies for being mysterious but I don’t want to promise things before I know I can deliver them). Continue reading “Anonymous asks:” →

Also, an announcement

Jim the Editor (originally so called because he proofreads all my writing for this blog, but now he’s also learning sound and video editing and is thus multiple kinds of editor at once) has just started a Youtube channel and begun a Let’s Play of Pokémon Fire Red version, run through a randomiser, using the bull$#!t drunken card game Nuzlocke-lite rules I posted a few weeks ago (which he has dubbed a “KingsLocke”). It promises to make about as much sense as everything else we do here at Pokémaniacal. Check out the channel here, and be sure to let him know if you like the first video!