Pokémon Legends: Z-A General Discussion

[Coronis]

actually, come to think of it, the ghost girl appeared in the building where that karate guy from kanto is trying to revive the fighting dojo. that building isn't in za for whatever reason, but there is a full-fledged dojo in the game, and it does have a pretty prominent female ghost-type user...

G-volt was the one she was waiting for.

Actually my personal head canon is now randomly that AZ is the one she was waiting for.

AZ settled in Lumiose post XY. Ghost girl isn’t in ZA. Clearly she had been waiting for him. For thousands of years too, poor girl. One of her Pokemon was probably killed by the Ultimate Weapon.

 

[BlazingBarrager]

Something that peaked my interest is a certain reveal Corbeau drops during the DLC:

DLC Spoiler

That he might have past ties with Team Rocket, and perhaps even had close(ish) ties to Giovanni.

 

[TeraVolt]

If I overwrite the Special Scan for a legendary pokemon without catching them, would I be able to get them again?

 

[Perriechu]

I've spent the last 4-5 days or so playing this and I have.. thoughts!

Spoiler

Okay so, from the off I do not believe this DLC has been worth its price, usually I tend to zone out when it comes to Pokémon and "is it worth £60" cause all games are that now, BUT, this DLC is fairly barren compared to SVs, or even SWSH's.

The only feature really are the hyperspace portals and the new dex additions with a few new megas? That's pretty.. nothing-y for an entire DLC, for which Gamefreak themselves have provided more for in the past.

I get there's only so much that they could do given that they've boxed themselves in with the setting but the amount of missed opportunities ultimately for returning characters, beefing up the battle royale, making the hyperspace locations more engaging and even amending some of the existing base game features is frustrating.

The story ultimately leading to Darkrai making nightmares/dreams bleed into an alternate universe was quite interesting, even if Darkrai being the culprit was a little.. boring. But the fact the whole "this entire Lumiose is made up of the dreams / nightmares of its inhabitants" is such a cool premise that was ultimately wasted IMO.

That plotline alone is enough to make AZ return and be some form of corrupt version of himself, considering that the MCs sometimes had doubts about AZ, dreaming him up to be the villain would've been interesting for plot development, they could've still included the original AZ within this too.

Overall I'm quite disappointed- I genuinely wasn't expecting so much but Gamefreak did very well with the SV DLC I did have higher expectations. (Seriously, having Larry and Geeta discuss a tournament in another region during SV's DLC where Larry was asked to attend, giving us mega Staraptor and mega Glimmora and then having.. none of them make an appearance? Still no Clemont and the "who" got him? No Diantha despite her daughter? No Caleb/Serena for Absol Z?)

To end it on a positive note though, I am happy that we've been given the chance to catch mythicals and that hopefully they seem to be making them more accessible. I can finally add Apriball'd mythicals to my collection <3

(I lowkey think they're doing away with the concept all together going forward but)

Jett is highkey the most useless character ever

Anyway I can potentially see them adding an epilogue patch of sorts for Pokémon Day that adds Garchomp Z and actually.. y'know, finishes the "redevelopment" considering it was confirmed to still be ongoing. (and hopefully add more to the Royale) if not, Gar Z is just the season 8(?) reward.

 

[Esserise]

Spoiler

Still no Clemont and the "who" got him?

Just for the record, the dialogue you’re thinking of there is from a screenshot that was edited for a joke. That’s not from the game proper. All Z-A ever says about Clemont is the passing NPC dialogue of “I wonder if that young Gym Leader has been inventing anything new...”

 

[Coronis]

Ugh I can’t believe this.

Spoiler

Battled Mega Ray maybe 10 times before I realised how to dodge the big tornado attack at 50%

 

[Coronis]

Spoiler

There’s no way to have Meltan and Melmetal at the same time right? Gonna ruin me trying to import a living dex straight to Home

 

[R_N]

[

Spoiler

There’s no way to have Meltan and Melmetal at the same time right? Gonna ruin me trying to import a living dex straight to Home

I might have misread the quest synopsis on Serebii, but

Spoiler

I believe you're given a separate Melmetal, not forced to evolve the one you have

 

[Perriechu]

Just for the record, the dialogue you’re thinking of there is from a screenshot that was edited for a joke. That’s not from the game proper. All Z-A ever says about Clemont is the passing NPC dialogue of “I wonder if that young Gym Leader has been inventing anything new...”

oh.. I genuinely believed it was that hahaha

 

[Esserise]

Banging my head against the wall rerolling hyperspace zones at the bench just to fill in these last few Hyperspace Dex slots. Galarian Farfetch’d where ARE you???

Spoiler

There’s no way to have Meltan and Melmetal at the same time right? Gonna ruin me trying to import a living dex straight to Home

Quite the opposite.

Spoiler

You catch Meltan, and then are given a separate Melmetal from an NPC in a hyperspace zone.

 

[Shujinkō]

Story Spoilers

I think its really interesting that DARKRAI appears to be the main antagonist (or misunderstood antagonist) of this DLC. I get it got a Mega Evolution, but usually in Pokemon games, the central antagonistic legendary is a Pokemon from the region - not a mythical from a different region. At most I would have expected Darkrai have a small sidequest dedicated to it, but it being the main cause of Hyperspace Lumiose was an interesting direction for the story. They even gave it those legs from the movie and brought back the Sinnoh Legendary theme!

Each region is usually treated in isolation so its really interesting that they went and decided to give Darkrai more spotlight here - doubly so since I don't believe it was even mentioned or acknowledged in the original Kalos games.

Spoiler

With Mega Dimension, Darkrai now has the dubious honor of being the main antagonist/final boss of 4 Pokemon games:

• Mystery Dungeon Explorers (Main Antagonist and True Final Boss)
• Pokepark 2 (Main Antagonist/Final Boss)
• Shadows of Almia (Final Boss)
• Z-A Mega Dimension (Main Antagonist/Final Boss)

 

[Coronis]

[
I might have misread the quest synopsis on Serebii, but

Spoiler

I believe you're given a separate Melmetal, not forced to evolve the one you have

Banging my head against the wall rerolling hyperspace zones at the bench just to fill in these last few Hyperspace Dex slots. Galarian Farfetch’d where ARE you???



Quite the opposite.

Spoiler

You catch Meltan, and then are given a separate Melmetal from an NPC in a hyperspace zone.

Oh awesome, good to know. Now all thats left for me is gonna be these special scan exclusive mons and grabbing another set of Charcadet armour. (Apparently they’re also spawnable from Pokeballs in the 4* zones but I’ve done so many times with lv 3 special items and absolutely nothing)

Also yes! Galarian Farfetch’d was so annoying! Was my 2nd last Pokemon I found, only one that beat it out was Treecko of all things. I rolled Grovyle and Sceptile multiple times, but that dang thing wouldn’t spawn.

 

[Fivepoint]

Banging my head against the wall rerolling hyperspace zones at the bench just to fill in these last few Hyperspace Dex slots. Galarian Farfetch’d where ARE you???

i want to know what the individual pokemon appearance rates are, because it took me literally the entire main story to actually get munna and gulpin even though those two are 1★s available from the very start. and i STILL haven't gotten an alolan meowth, too. (at least you don't need that one for dex completion)

also i "like" how there can actually be more than the 3 preview pokemon in a hyperspace zone so if its a large one or the preview shows pokemon + its prevo you have to waste a donut to find out what the others are. very good and not at all annoying mechanic.

 

[R_N]

i want to know what the individual pokemon appearance rates are, because it took me literally the entire main story to actually get munna and gulpin even though those two are 1★s available from the very start. and i STILL haven't gotten an alolan meowth, too. (at least you don't need that one for dex completion)

also i "like" how there can actually be more than the 3 preview pokemon in a hyperspace zone so if its a large one or the preview shows pokemon + its prevo you have to waste a donut to find out what the others are. very good and not at all annoying mechanic.

It was definitely a horrifying realization going into my first 4* hyperspace to grab a cyclizar and then running into more than the listed Pokemon and knowing that I might have to be doing a lottttt of donut dives.

At least I don't think 1-3* can have mroe than their listed. Either that or I've just been lucky (unlucky?).


By the way I hate the "catch pokemon without being seen" missions. A lot of the time they come up its like, well. The pokemon are in a wide open area without anywhere to hide and they have can just see me approaching from a mile away and there's a limit on how far I can throw the ball. I'm going in enough hyperspace to not really care about not hitting the mission criteria but brother these squawkabilly are NOT being snuck up on.

 

[Valoo]

It was definitely a horrifying realization going into my first 4* hyperspace to grab a cyclizar and then running into more than the listed Pokemon and knowing that I might have to be doing a lottttt of donut dives.

At least I don't think 1-3* can have mroe than their listed. Either that or I've just been lucky (unlucky?).


By the way I hate the "catch pokemon without being seen" missions. A lot of the time they come up its like, well. The pokemon are in a wide open area without anywhere to hide and they have can just see me approaching from a mile away and there's a limit on how far I can throw the ball. I'm going in enough hyperspace to not really care about not hitting the mission criteria but brother these squawkabilly are NOT being snuck up on.

I haven’t paid attention to the stars but I think it’s just the large zones that can have more than what is listed (excluding evolutions etc).

I hate how few pokemon are in each of them generally though. Completing the dex is such a slog going in to a zone just to catch the one thing. They all should’ve had at least 6 species like most of the regular wild zones do.

 

[DaddyBuzzwole]

By the way I hate the "catch pokemon without being seen" missions. A lot of the time they come up its like, well. The pokemon are in a wide open area without anywhere to hide and they have can just see me approaching from a mile away and there's a limit on how far I can throw the ball. I'm going in enough hyperspace to not really care about not hitting the mission criteria but brother these squawkabilly are NOT being snuck up on.

i think you can use smokescreen to hide yourself from mons and sneak up easier but i've never used smokescreen and neither has any other living human so i can't be certain

 

[R_N]

Finally found a Porygon hyperspace and greatly regretting not using a longer lasting donut so I could roll more spawns because I forgot how much of a pain these things are to catch. Even with the catch window, the odds didn't go up that much. Eesh. Time to take advantage of that autosave I suppose...

 

[Coronis]

It feels like shiny offs have gone way up even outside of hyperspace. I’ve found multiple shinies in hyperspace and multiple shinies when I’ve been travelling to hyperspaces. (not a hunter here) I found one shiny throughout the entire base game and have about 12 now. Maybe I wasn’t walking around after I got the Shiny Charm? Idk

 

[DaddyBuzzwole]

It feels like shiny offs have gone way up even outside of hyperspace. I’ve found multiple shinies in hyperspace and multiple shinies when I’ve been travelling to hyperspaces. (not a hunter here) I found one shiny throughout the entire base game and have about 12 now. Maybe I wasn’t walking around after I got the Shiny Charm? Idk

probably a coincidence in the main world but the shiny rate is absolutely higher in hyperspace. usually i encounter a shiny around every 5-ish times i pick up the game (except when i'm actively hunting) but i've run into 4 shinies in hyperspace during the past 2 sessions i've played without even trying and i've seen a lot of people having the same experience

 

[CPU]

I don’t exactly disagree here, but personally I would contend that even the old Mythicals are, for the most part, not particularly well-developed. Deoxys is no less “one sentence worth of lore” than Volcanion, the only difference is that (assuming you had the means to attend a special distribution event) you could go catch it yourself on a dull little island.

I think a lot of peoples’ impressions of the lore of older Mythical Pokémon is a lot more informed by the movies than they think (well, the movies and playground rumors), so in my opinion “it was designed for a movie” isn’t necessarily an issue, even though the in-game implementation the Gen 6-8 Mythicals could definitely have been better.

I feel like you can actually narrow down the period in which Game Freak were doing a semi-decent job with Mythical Pokémon to a very precise 2008-2012. That’s when they were both much more widely available for the audience (as opposed to “Hope you can afford to fly to New York!”) and implemented with bespoke in-game events that, while not astonishing, at least said/portrayed something about them in a unique location. This was also the period where I feel they put a little more emphasis on alluding to the presence of these Mythicals prior to their distributions, like how they did with Mew, which I think helps to build up anticipation.

I don't really even care if they have developed lore, just that they can be directly connected to the world in some way. Deoxys is weak in that regard (so both of Gen 3's mythicals fail that test), but having a location to tie it to still makes it feel like they cared a little more, at least to me. It was also the first Pokémon to have forms (or "formes" ) that could be changed semi-freely, and it also received its own special battle theme. I just personally see more effort behind Deoxys, even if it was a one-off encounter with no build up. I'm probably a little biased because I did get to catch it on Birth Island via event distribution, though.

I can't argue that Mythicals not having a location somewhat fits their "cryptid" status, but I feel like that works better when said Mythicals are small and spritely, or have other means of quicking escaping a tight situation.

 

[Esserise]

i think you can use smokescreen to hide yourself from mons and sneak up easier but i've never used smokescreen and neither has any other living human so i can't be certain

Funny enough I did use this strat during the early game and it worked alright there, so I remembered it when I was feeling like I couldn’t sneak up on shit in hyperspace… but even with the smoke, the hyperspace mons always seem to spot me anyway.

I don't really even care if they have developed lore, just that they can be directly connected to the world in some way. Deoxys is weak in that regard (so both of Gen 3's mythicals fail that test), but having a location to tie it to still makes it feel like they cared a little more, at least to me. It was also the first Pokémon to have forms (or "formes" ) that could be changed semi-freely, and it also received its own special battle theme. I just personally see more effort behind Deoxys, even if it was a one-off encounter with no build up. I'm probably a little biased because I did get to catch it on Birth Island via event distribution, though.

Personally I don’t care as much about them having a bespoke location, though I certainly think it’s an effective and efficient method for lending them some sense of importance and grounding in the region, so I do understand the appeal. For my part, I mostly just think it should feel like we’re the ones having the cool encounter, rather than merely being handed the Pokémon.

I can't argue that Mythicals not having a location somewhat fits their "cryptid" status, but I feel like that works better when said Mythicals are small and spritely, or have other means of quicking escaping a tight situation.

For what it’s worth, I think some of the bigger ones can probably justify their elusiveness. Volcanion is often surrounding itself in thick steam. Marshadow hides itself in, well, shadows. Zeraora is as fast as lightning.

 

[CPU]

Personally I don’t care as much about them having a bespoke location, though I certainly think it’s an effective and efficient method for lending them some sense of importance and grounding in the region, so I do understand the appeal. For my part, I mostly just think it should feel like we’re the ones having the cool encounter, rather than merely being handed the Pokémon.

I actually think that's a good way of looking at it, having a place for an encounter makes them more memorable.

For what it’s worth, I think some of the bigger ones can probably justify their elusiveness. Volcanion is often surrounding itself in thick steam. Marshadow hides itself in, well, shadows. Zeraora is as fast as lightning.

Volcanion was actually the one I was thinking of as an outlier; I fully agree with the ways Marshadow and Zeraora would evade people. You're probably right about the steam cloaking Volcanion, but finding a pocket of our-of-place, dense fog would be a giveaway that it's in the area.

That actually sounds like it could make for an interesting method of implementing a roaming Pokémon.

 

[Esserise]

You're probably right about the steam cloaking Volcanion, but finding a pocket of our-of-place, dense fog would be a giveaway that it's in the area.

That’s true if you know already what you’re looking for; if you’re some kind of dedicated Volcanion-chaser. But Volcanion’s reputation as a rarely-seen mythical creature would probably come about from common people who just happened to cross paths with it unexpectedly and witnessed the sudden appearance of a cloud of fog, with them maybe only glimpsing a vague shape within the fog to later report on.

 

[R_N]

probably a coincidence in the main world but the shiny rate is absolutely higher in hyperspace. usually i encounter a shiny around every 5-ish times i pick up the game (except when i'm actively hunting) but i've run into 4 shinies in hyperspace during the past 2 sessions i've played without even trying and i've seen a lot of people having the same experience

Since getting the DLC the only shiny Pokemon I've found have been 2 Fletchling outside of hyperspace and a single Skrelp in hyperspace.

I don't think hyperspace has been juicing the numbers.

 

[DaddyBuzzwole]

Since getting the DLC the only shiny Pokemon I've found have been 2 Fletchling outside of hyperspace and a single Skrelp in hyperspace.

I don't think hyperspace has been juicing the numbers.

i found 2 more since posting my post. i am going fucking insane