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Little things you like about Pokémon
- Thread starter Kurona
- Start date
This all comes from a student's experience as crazy as it sounds but I want to get to the point.
Mirage spots in ORAS are, looking back at it...fucking awesome. I have no idea why I never appreciated them as much as they deserve despite praising how you get the Mythicals in the Switch games.
If these games had came out before the Internet, I'm confident Pokemon's popularity would have gone crazy. Let me elaborate: they are the perfect playground rumour.
Take the Lake Guardians for example. Relatively easy to bump into them. But you can only catch one depending on the time of day. Kids may figure that out. It wouldn't be that easy, at least for the ones who didn't play the Sinnoh games, but nothing crazy. What would be a way more difficult task would be finding Giratina, since it requires trading extremely rare Legendaries. Still, just think about how "playground rumor-y" it gets: 《you need to be friends with 3 Pokemon in your team, then you have to catch 3 special little elfs at different days of the week, then you get a cool dragon who controls time or space, and if you have the two dragons from both games a cooler spooky dragon appears!》
But it gets crazier. For Tornadus and Thundurus, you need to have Castform in your team. Who would do that!? (I mean as a kid I did try in RSE because the form changing was wild to me, but the novelty didn't last long and ORAS already has Megas) and Landorus is another Giratina situation.
But then we get to the crowning point, the peak. Needing a level 100 Pokemon for Reshiram or Zekrom. THAT'S LITERALLY A PLAYGROUND RUMOR FUELED BY CHILD WONDER!" Children were obsessed with level 100 Pokemon supposedly unlocking stuff even as late as in Gen 4 days. This time it would actually be true.
As an adult, I find the whole system archaic and needessly complicated, just as I did as a teenager. But trying to look at it from a child's eyes...it must have been so awesome to play ORAS blind, specially as your first game. All these mysterious, strange Pokemon with their own music themes and obscure ways of getting them. Sure, you can argue that, as always, GF was late to the party and most players didn't have this experience, but the idea of it being a possibility is amusing to me.
Mirage spots in ORAS are, looking back at it...fucking awesome. I have no idea why I never appreciated them as much as they deserve despite praising how you get the Mythicals in the Switch games.
If these games had came out before the Internet, I'm confident Pokemon's popularity would have gone crazy. Let me elaborate: they are the perfect playground rumour.
Take the Lake Guardians for example. Relatively easy to bump into them. But you can only catch one depending on the time of day. Kids may figure that out. It wouldn't be that easy, at least for the ones who didn't play the Sinnoh games, but nothing crazy. What would be a way more difficult task would be finding Giratina, since it requires trading extremely rare Legendaries. Still, just think about how "playground rumor-y" it gets: 《you need to be friends with 3 Pokemon in your team, then you have to catch 3 special little elfs at different days of the week, then you get a cool dragon who controls time or space, and if you have the two dragons from both games a cooler spooky dragon appears!》
But it gets crazier. For Tornadus and Thundurus, you need to have Castform in your team. Who would do that!? (I mean as a kid I did try in RSE because the form changing was wild to me, but the novelty didn't last long and ORAS already has Megas) and Landorus is another Giratina situation.
But then we get to the crowning point, the peak. Needing a level 100 Pokemon for Reshiram or Zekrom. THAT'S LITERALLY A PLAYGROUND RUMOR FUELED BY CHILD WONDER!" Children were obsessed with level 100 Pokemon supposedly unlocking stuff even as late as in Gen 4 days. This time it would actually be true.
As an adult, I find the whole system archaic and needessly complicated, just as I did as a teenager. But trying to look at it from a child's eyes...it must have been so awesome to play ORAS blind, specially as your first game. All these mysterious, strange Pokemon with their own music themes and obscure ways of getting them. Sure, you can argue that, as always, GF was late to the party and most players didn't have this experience, but the idea of it being a possibility is amusing to me.
okay I know this one is kind of cheating but it's awesome so
do you remember Boomerang, that offshoot of Cartoon Network that showed their backlog?
When they reran Pokemon in the 2000s, for whatever reason, they decided to go absolutely hard with the background music for the promos with some drum and bass going crazy as a total power move and it's like
GUYS IT WAS JUST POKEMON
do you remember Boomerang, that offshoot of Cartoon Network that showed their backlog?
When they reran Pokemon in the 2000s, for whatever reason, they decided to go absolutely hard with the background music for the promos with some drum and bass going crazy as a total power move and it's like
GUYS IT WAS JUST POKEMON
So I mentioned this before and stick by it but also I like speaking with the legendary Pokemon because most of them speak Eloquently Like Such As Befitting Their Station and then Raikou & Kyogre are speaking with ya'll, you hears and are one cowboy hat from maybe saying a yeehaw. (Volcanion similarly speaks casually but in a very "cranky (but endearing) old man" tone)
Ho-oh is probably my favorite, since it's too big to recruit properly so all its dialog is unique if you talk to it. It also speaks very politely but it also throws out lines like "I'd love to speak with everyone here, but the dearies are all scared of me!" Which aside from being a cute bit of flavor on its own I love that it throws out dearies. What a charming word for Ho-oh of all Pokemon to use.
Something I've been noticing about XD: Gale of Darkness is that there are a lot of Pokémon I want to try out. While some of them are obvious staples from the mainline games (e.g. Shroomish and Ralts), you have other mons that are usually undesirable that instead shine in Orre due to better availability, bonus moves from purification, and some Doubles-specific perks. For example, Seedot isn't too bad here because it comes with Grass STAB in Giga Drain (even if it's the Gen 3 version with lower BP and PP than what we have now), access to Fake Out, a decent TM/Tutor movepool, and super early Leaf Stone letting you go for Shifty before the first boss if you really want. Shifty's stats actually work in this context instead of how Hoenn locks it off until super late.
Another decent example is Spheal. Having it immediately instead of waiting until the 7th Gym (or the equivalent for XD I guess lol) means you have a reason to use the line and also have access to an Ice-type in early game for once. And it does okay thanks to Aurora Beam!
There are others I could potentially talk about like Duskull (Helping Hand and later Will-O-Wisp for support), but I can only use so many of these guys in a single playthrough. It's just nice having a good selection of guaranteed encounters to build with.
Another decent example is Spheal. Having it immediately instead of waiting until the 7th Gym (or the equivalent for XD I guess lol) means you have a reason to use the line and also have access to an Ice-type in early game for once. And it does okay thanks to Aurora Beam!
There are others I could potentially talk about like Duskull (Helping Hand and later Will-O-Wisp for support), but I can only use so many of these guys in a single playthrough. It's just nice having a good selection of guaranteed encounters to build with.
God, I was sitting here for a few minutes jamming to that track and remembered part of what got me back into Pokemon was catching their reruns on Boomerang back then. Almost qualifies a core memory for me thinking back on it.
I can’t remember if I’ve discussed this yet in this thread, so I apologize in advance if I actually have, but I honestly really like something that’s become a franchise staple ever since Gen 6- the idea of “sub-regions” within newly introduced regions. This doesn’t have an officially recognized name that I know of, but I’m basically just referring to when a region’s, well, regional PokéDex is divided up into multiple different sections for different parts of the region’s geography.
We’ve seen this kind of thing in two different styles. Kalos started the trend off with the Central, Coastal, and Mountain PokéDexes which combine for a record-setting total Pokémon count, and Alola fully leans into this which makes perfect sense seeing as it’s an archipelago region and having one of those for each island. We wouldn’t see this in Galar or Paldea, but Hisui also opts for this style which I really like as a full expansion of the whole “Mt. Coronet splits Sinnoh in half” thing that the original Sinnoh games barely do anything with outside of Shellos and Gastrodon. Speaking of Galar, Galar instead opts to treat the DLC locations as its own sub-regions as opposed to mainland Galar itself being split up, and this design philosophy would be revisited in Paldea and technically also in Legends Z-A if you count Hyperspace Lumiose as its own separate area.
The reason I like this so much is because it creates a natural sense of identity for different parts of these newer regions, often times with their own lore and episodic story progression. An under-appreciated of why Alola’s risen into a Top 4 spot for me in terms of how I’d rank all of the regions by how much I like them is because the controversially long and drawn-out earlygame and tutorial segments wouldn’t work nearly as well as I personally think they do if it wasn’t taking the fact that the player lives on Melemele Island into consideration. Tapu Koko feels more connected to the player and to Hau and Hala than something like Mesprit does to the Sinnoh protagonist, for comparison, and I really enjoy that dynamic.
We’ve seen this kind of thing in two different styles. Kalos started the trend off with the Central, Coastal, and Mountain PokéDexes which combine for a record-setting total Pokémon count, and Alola fully leans into this which makes perfect sense seeing as it’s an archipelago region and having one of those for each island. We wouldn’t see this in Galar or Paldea, but Hisui also opts for this style which I really like as a full expansion of the whole “Mt. Coronet splits Sinnoh in half” thing that the original Sinnoh games barely do anything with outside of Shellos and Gastrodon. Speaking of Galar, Galar instead opts to treat the DLC locations as its own sub-regions as opposed to mainland Galar itself being split up, and this design philosophy would be revisited in Paldea and technically also in Legends Z-A if you count Hyperspace Lumiose as its own separate area.
The reason I like this so much is because it creates a natural sense of identity for different parts of these newer regions, often times with their own lore and episodic story progression. An under-appreciated of why Alola’s risen into a Top 4 spot for me in terms of how I’d rank all of the regions by how much I like them is because the controversially long and drawn-out earlygame and tutorial segments wouldn’t work nearly as well as I personally think they do if it wasn’t taking the fact that the player lives on Melemele Island into consideration. Tapu Koko feels more connected to the player and to Hau and Hala than something like Mesprit does to the Sinnoh protagonist, for comparison, and I really enjoy that dynamic.
I like Koraidon and Miraidon. One thing I like about their signature Abilities is how they do not clash with each other, but can work simultaneously. Koraidon sets Sun and Miraidon sets Electric Terrain. Since weather and terrain do not cancel each other out, it means that they can be active at the same time. Compare this to Groudon and Kyogre, which both have weather-setting Abilities, meaning one will always cancel the other in battle. Koraidon and Miraidon does something different, and I like that a lot.
Another thing I like about Koraidon and Miraidon is how their Abilities suit their themes very well. Koraidon sets Sun, which makes sense for representing the past. In Pokémon, weather was first introduced back in Gen 2, which is almost ancient at this point. It is thus very suitable for Koraidon since it represents the past. Miraidon, on the other hand, sets Electric Terrain, which makes sense since electricity is the future (and the present). In Pokémon, the terrains were first introduced in Gen 6, which is admittedly almost 13 years old at this point, but it is way more modern than Gen 2, so it makes sense for Koraidon to have an Ability that references perhaps not the future (regarding the Pokémon universe), but something more modern than Koraidon at least.
Another thing I like is how Koraidon and Miraidon can work well together with Reshiram and Zekrom (at least in theory). Reshiram appreciates the Sun support that Koraidon can give, while Zekrom benefits from the Electric Terrain Miraidon can set.
Another thing I like about Koraidon and Miraidon is how their Abilities suit their themes very well. Koraidon sets Sun, which makes sense for representing the past. In Pokémon, weather was first introduced back in Gen 2, which is almost ancient at this point. It is thus very suitable for Koraidon since it represents the past. Miraidon, on the other hand, sets Electric Terrain, which makes sense since electricity is the future (and the present). In Pokémon, the terrains were first introduced in Gen 6, which is admittedly almost 13 years old at this point, but it is way more modern than Gen 2, so it makes sense for Koraidon to have an Ability that references perhaps not the future (regarding the Pokémon universe), but something more modern than Koraidon at least.
Another thing I like is how Koraidon and Miraidon can work well together with Reshiram and Zekrom (at least in theory). Reshiram appreciates the Sun support that Koraidon can give, while Zekrom benefits from the Electric Terrain Miraidon can set.
Of the Abilities for the new Megas just shown in Champions, I have to hand it to them just once.
Glimmora has its association with Tera, and I've generally headcanoned that its version of Corrosion works with that idea (since it removes a type-based feature from the opponent). I wasn't really expecting the Mega to do much with that flavour: it doesn't change typing and has several other things going on mechanically, after all. But Adaptability mirrors the STAB increase that Tera provides to an already existing type. The fact that it's Adaptability has me even more impressed. I had written it off as boring. Necessary for Beedrill, excessive for Lucario, but boring for both. And here there's a clear flavour reason for its presence.
Absolutely incredible that Pokemon Sleep of all things is the only game to remix anime tracks