(Little) Things that annoy you in Pokémon

[R_N]

It's pretty odd they never came up with another use for the Dawn Stone. Immediately in Gen 5 they found new uses for the Shiny and Dusk stones and later gens would continue to do so as well; and even Gen 7's Ice Stone would get new uses. To say nothing of course of Gen 1's stones and the Sun Stone. But out of all the evolutionary stones, the Dawn Stone has uniquely only ever had a use for Pokémon introduced in its generation; and only two at that.

It's not even like they strayed away from gender-specific evolutions in later gens either, with Pokémon like Meowstic and Salazzle. I wonder if they just want to keep it to its very specific use (new cross-gen split evolution specific to one gender) and have never come up with anything like that since Gallade and Froslass that they really want to do.

Yeah it seems like they want it as "that stone that split an evolution line into very gendered directions" so they probably wouldn't want to use it for "just" a gendered evolution (ie: salandit to salazzle) and would be weird for what's basically just a standard gender form change (meowstic line) and it'd be weird (even despite their recent slight retconning of methods) to use it for a species that already existed while the dawn stone existed (ie: what if we got a femme Machoke split). And designing a new species that did fit that criteria would probably be weird when they can just...do a gender split evo or a gendered form or have an entirely unique evolution method.

They basically made themselves a design conceit maze to navigate and just don't want to bother coming out of it.

 

[Bakugames]

i wonder why froslass just doesnt evolve with the darkness stone, it DOES get the ghost type after all. i think the light stone would fit for gallade too. you could keep the genderlocking if you really wanted, though i think having very feminine/masculine designs be both gender is much more interesting + i think theres more engaging gender evos/forms (salazzle with a harem of salandits is fun as hell) than "these are gender locked because uuuh that is a woman pokemon"

 

[Yung Dramps]

Not my first time ranting on this subject but meh w/e I'm in a pissy mood

"Yo check this out we made a Mewtwo spiritual successor except he's a robot hovercraft transformer bug with a giant back cannon made by Team Plasma"
"Wow Game Freak, that sounds rad! Oh man this could make for such a cool boss fight, you even have a sequel game with a new scientist character who could make use of it, there's just so much you can do with this guy and plenty of screentime to work with-"
"LOOOOOOOOOOOL NAH BRO IT'S MYTHICALSLOP HOPE U LIKE MYSTERY GIFT"

never EVER going to stop seething over this, at least shaymin, victini etc. made sense as bonuses with no main story ties

 

[Volt-Ikazuchi]

Not my first time ranting on this subject but meh w/e I'm in a pissy mood

"Yo check this out we made a Mewtwo spiritual successor except he's a robot hovercraft transformer bug with a giant back cannon made by Team Plasma"
"Wow Game Freak, that sounds rad! Oh man this could make for such a cool boss fight, you even have a sequel game with a new scientist character who could make use of it, there's just so much you can do with this guy and plenty of screentime to work with-"
"LOOOOOOOOOOOL NAH BRO IT'S MYTHICALSLOP HOPE U LIKE MYSTERY GIFT"

never EVER going to stop seething over this, at least shaymin, victini etc. made sense as bonuses with no main story ties

Speaking of which... Mythicals, as a concept, are awful.

Here's this Legendary-esque Pokémon! You can't use it pretty much anywhere but linked battles. Banned from VGC, banned from the Battle Tower... What a waste.

 

[ant4456]

we are one page away from hitting the Pokedex # of Genesect, and then later crossing over into Kalos numbers

that's a lotta little things that annoy (royal) you in pokemon

 

[Yung Dramps]

Speaking of which... Mythicals, as a concept, are awful.

Here's this Legendary-esque Pokémon! You can't use it pretty much anywhere but linked battles. Banned from VGC, banned from the Battle Tower... What a waste.

For someone like me who basically doesn't care about anything besides the mainline games most Mythicals may as well be fakemon to me. I cannot develop any real attachment to the likes of Genesect, Zeraora & Marshadow when I'll never be able to engage with them beyond pretty looking jpegs on Bulbapedia and sakugabooru clips from their movies. "Oh this guy looks awesome, wish he actually existed"

 

[R_N]

Well, of those, you would actually have had the best shot of developing attachment to Genesect since they gave it away at level 15 for the start of BW2

Which was a fun thing that I passed on but they should do again some time. It was cool of BDSP to give access to an early Jirachi & Mew, too, for that matter; I even used jirachi this time

Pokemon Go could even help facilitate this if not for the stupid "you can't put legendary et al Pokemon into games that have already had them" thing.

 

[Hugin]

Well, of those, you would actually have had the best shot of developing attachment to Genesect since they gave it away at level 15 for the start of BW2

Which was a fun thing that I passed on but they should do again some time. It was cool of BDSP to give access to an early Jirachi & Mew, too, for that matter; I even used jirachi this time

Pokemon Go could even help facilitate this if not for the stupid "you can't put legendary et al Pokemon into games that have already had them" thing.

I did an entire run of BDSP with Jirachi, Mew, Rotom, Manaphy, Roserade, and Infernape. I'd been planning on glitching Shaymin too, but they fixed the bug. Roserade was key to beating Cynthia, extremely impressive of her given the lineup. (leech seed+status into Big Root Calm Mind Mew). Honestly OP, but it was a good time, and I like when the games allow that sort of weird run.

 

[Esserise]

At the very least, I’m glad that Mythicals aren’t arbitrarily locked out of Max/Tera Raids. I’ve actually had a reason to use a few of them because of that. I think the only times I’ve ever been able to use them on my in-game story team have been with Melmetal in LGPE, and Manaphy, Jirachi, and Mew in BDSP runs.

 

[QuentinQuonce]

Manaphy is great fun to use in the Sinnoh titles, had a great experience using it in Platinum a while back. As a pure Water mon with no gamebreaking signature move it barely feels like a mythical so it's not even that OP. Rotom, though, is OP as hell and my firm stance is that no Platinum run is half as fun without using it (which initually sucked that the Secret Key was only ever event-only, but now thanks to DNS trickery it can be used by everyone)

Keldeo is ace in B2W2 as well, basically the ultimate Kyurem. In fact in B2W2 you're spoiled for choice legends-wise, you've got Genesect, Keldeo, Meloetta, Tornadus, Thundurus, Landorus, Ho-oh, Lugia, Dialga, Palkia, and Giratina all potentially available at low levels to use in a playthrough.

Never used Jirachi in any of the Hoenn games but I really should at some point. I'm sure at some point I've used Mew in RGBY since it's catchable so early.

 

[CynicalGiant]

One thing that bothers me about the ‘hard’ Pokémon types (other than Ice not resisting Normal - it’s weak to Fighting, it should resist Normal), is that stacking them together makes them easier for Fighting to break.

Ice is kind of a weird type in that it has like an equal amount of hard and not hard mons in it. Pokemon that dwell in the cold and icy areas as well as pokemon that are literally made of ice. It's a lot like if Rock and Ground were a combined Earth type rather than being separate.

I've often wondered if this is why Ice has such a strange type chart defensively, other than balance reasons. Something like Regice or Avalugg absolutely should resist Normal but something like Lapras or Jynx resisting it would feel odd.

 

[Karxrida]

Speaking of which... Mythicals, as a concept, are awful.

To think Mythicals came about because someone decided to sneak Mew into Red and Green at the last minute.

Also: remember when Mythcials actually had short little sidequests attached to them? That was kind of fun.

 

[QuentinQuonce]

Also: remember when Mythcials actually had short little sidequests attached to them? That was kind of fun.

Honestly Faraway Island is cool and all, but nothing will ever just beat doing the long-range trainer glitch to get yourself a Mew. I remember first reading about it and it sounded like the most deranged internet conspiracy. But then it actually worked!!

Would have been so cool if FRLG had incorporated it in some fashion as the method to unlocking a Mew encounter. Such wasted potential that neither FRLG or HGSS had a way to encounter their native mythicals.

 

[Bakugames]

honestly i wouldnt even consider most mythicals having sidequests, if anything because that implies theres something more going on than receiving a ticket that directly sends you to a new place to encounter a pokemon. sometimes you have to walk around a bit/click things to start the encounter, but that doesnt elevate any of these into sidequest territory, compared to something like the regis or the treasures of ruin, where theres a bit more effort put in piecing together where they are and how to get them.

the new areas are cute and better than just getting something from mystery gift, but thats such a low bar to clear and never really made these mythicals feel any more part of the world than just "we made up a random island so you can encounter them". I think 70% of them being islands didnt help... why are these guys so obsessed w islands damn!!!!

 

[ant4456]

My take is I'm always more into fleshing out existing areas than just making new ones. I think it'd be cool if we got more shit like Celebi in GSC where you straight-up walk through where the event is.

That makes it feel more whimsical imo.

 

[Yung Dramps]

honestly i wouldnt even consider most mythicals having sidequests, if anything because that implies theres something more going on than receiving a ticket that directly sends you to a new place to encounter a pokemon. sometimes you have to walk around a bit/click things to start the encounter, but that doesnt elevate any of these into sidequest territory, compared to something like the regis or the treasures of ruin, where theres a bit more effort put in piecing together where they are and how to get them.

the new areas are cute and better than just getting something from mystery gift, but thats such a low bar to clear and never really made these mythicals feel any more part of the world than just "we made up a random island so you can encounter them". I think 70% of them being islands didnt help... why are these guys so obsessed w islands damn!!!!

Gotta love Legends Arceus not even bothering to implement Seabreak Path & Newmoon Island with their respective Mythicals not being any worse off for it. If anything much like ant said it might've been a change for the better: I can't speak for the Darkrai sidequest because I don't have BDSP but Shaymin's quest doubling as the Floaroma Town origin story is pretty cute and better incorporates it into Sinnoh's world to the point where it leaves you wondering why it wasn't just put there to begin with

 

[R_N]

Gotta love Legends Arceus not even bothering to implement Seabreak Path & Newmoon Island with their respective Mythicals not being any worse off for it. If anything much like ant said it might've been a change for the better: I can't speak for the Darkrai sidequest because I don't have BDSP but Shaymin's quest doubling as the Floaroma Town origin story is pretty cute and better incorporates it into Sinnoh's world to the point where it leaves you wondering why it wasn't just put there to begin with

Probably because the visual of a giant land bridge appearing in full bloom was really good. Even if the bridge itself is kind of...weird, even ignoring its comical length, since its' not really part of Shaymin's power set...

Darkrai in L:A is a lot of nothing comparatively, you're just sent towards some cliffs in the highlands after hearing from the pearl clan about nightmares. The only kind of thematic thing about the encounter is it's at night at approximately the opposite side from the moonview arena (where you also fight Cresselia)

 

[AztecCroc]

Probably because the visual of a giant land bridge appearing in full bloom was really good. Even if the bridge itself is kind of...weird, even ignoring its comical length, since its' not really part of Shaymin's power set...

Darkrai in L:A is a lot of nothing comparatively, you're just sent towards some cliffs in the highlands after hearing from the pearl clan about nightmares. The only kind of thematic thing about the encounter is it's at night at approximately the opposite side from the moonview arena (where you also fight Cresselia)

I feel like the rocks along the sides were more of an engine thing and it was just meant to be just like a long intertwined bridge of greenery and flowers.

 

[Volt-Ikazuchi]

After last night's discussion on the OI cord, I remembered some things that really bother me.

- The Treecko line not having their Atk and SpA swapped. Game Freak is averse to deeper changes like these, but let's be real, the only reason Sceptile has a higher SpA is because Leaf Blade used to be special, and the design behind that mon has always been "haha, Leaf Blade go brrrrrrrrrr"
Its movepool is geared towards physical moves. This should've been adjusted back in Gen 4, and by now, there's really no excuse. It's not even a buff to help it keep up with power creep, it's an adjustment to have it work as intended.

- Speaking of which, Tinkaton having 75 Base Attack. GF really gave it a 160BP Steel-type move and got shook. It's not even a great offensive type AND they made Bloodmoon Ursaluna later! Commit to it!

- Split evos with uneven branches, like Hydrapple, who makes Flapple and Appletun look even worse than the shitmons they already are. Also counting regional cross-gen evos for this.

- Megas for unevolved mons are MISTAKES. Mawile is the poster child for this. Mega Mawile's stats with the same abilities would make for a perfectly serviceable Mawile evolution, even if it's not a great one. (Huge Power is busted)

 

[pika pal]

honestly i wouldnt even consider most mythicals having sidequests, if anything because that implies theres something more going on than receiving a ticket that directly sends you to a new place to encounter a pokemon. sometimes you have to walk around a bit/click things to start the encounter, but that doesnt elevate any of these into sidequest territory, compared to something like the regis or the treasures of ruin, where theres a bit more effort put in piecing together where they are and how to get them.

the new areas are cute and better than just getting something from mystery gift, but thats such a low bar to clear and never really made these mythicals feel any more part of the world than just "we made up a random island so you can encounter them". I think 70% of them being islands didnt help... why are these guys so obsessed w islands damn!!!!

So my take is that the one case of a true "Sidequest" Mythical is DPPt Shaymin, since the extra Victory Road section and Route 224 would only have reason to be traversed to reach the encounter, while also being more substantial than "walk through a no-encounters area" or "speak to this NPC with an item" in terms of interaction or ground to cover.

 

[Basedwell]

Speaking of which... Mythicals, as a concept, are awful.

Here's this Legendary-esque Pokémon! You can't use it pretty much anywhere but linked battles. Banned from VGC, banned from the Battle Tower... What a waste.

I do like the artificial scarcity, because getting my hands on Celebi in Crystal VC was great, but after doing the DNS hack for the Gen 5 games it is certainly disappointing, i’d love to use Gensect and Keldeo in the PWT.

My personal thing is that they should legalize them for competition without making them more available. It would be cool to go to Worlds and some countries have different meta games because different Pokemon are accessible… not really an issue anymore based on how they’re distributed but it would have been cool in previous eras.

At the very least, I’m glad that Mythicals aren’t arbitrarily locked out of Max/Tera Raids. I’ve actually had a reason to use a few of them because of that. I think the only times I’ve ever been able to use them on my in-game story team have been with Melmetal in LGPE, and Manaphy, Jirachi, and Mew in BDSP runs.

Using Rachi in BDSP was cool in theory but with how easy most of the game felt it didn’t feel special. Same thing with Legends: Arceus getting mythicals didn’t feel special to me because there wasn’t any real need for them.

Manaphy is great fun to use in the Sinnoh titles, had a great experience using it in Platinum a while back. As a pure Water mon with no gamebreaking signature move it barely feels like a mythical so it's not even that OP. Rotom, though, is OP as hell and my firm stance is that no Platinum run is half as fun without using it (which initually sucked that the Secret Key was only ever event-only, but now thanks to DNS trickery it can be used by everyone)

Keldeo is ace in B2W2 as well, basically the ultimate Kyurem. In fact in B2W2 you're spoiled for choice legends-wise, you've got Genesect, Keldeo, Meloetta, Tornadus, Thundurus, Landorus, Ho-oh, Lugia, Dialga, Palkia, and Giratina all potentially available at low levels to use in a playthrough.

Never used Jirachi in any of the Hoenn games but I really should at some point. I'm sure at some point I've used Mew in RGBY since it's catchable so early.

Sinnoh feels incomplete without using the DNS hacks tbh.

 

[QuentinQuonce]

Sinnoh feels incomplete without using the DNS hacks tbh.

Unova is LITERALLY incomplete without it since you can't get Zorua/Zoroark in BW otherwise.

But agreed. Way back when I got a Shaymin from an event shortly before Platinum came out, so during my first playthrough I took it to the Gracidea girl as soon as I arrived in Floaroma and had her do the whole "oh? A Shaymin?" bit. It now feels fundamentally wrong if I replay Platinum and don't do this. Ditto playing HGSS and not doing the Sinjoh Ruins event as early as possible.

Though why the hell the latter wasn't made a post-E4 event is baffling. What is some scrub without a single badge doing with an Arceus exactly?

I know, I know, it's probably because you can get the creation dragon(s) at level 1. But still.

 

[Basedwell]

Unova is LITERALLY incomplete without it since you can't get Zorua/Zoroark in BW otherwise.

But agreed. Way back when I got a Shaymin from an event shortly before Platinum came out, so during my first playthrough I took it to the Gracidea girl as soon as I arrived in Floaroma and had her do the whole "oh? A Shaymin?" bit. It now feels fundamentally wrong if I replay Platinum and don't do this. Ditto playing HGSS and not doing the Sinjoh Ruins event as early as possible.

Though why the hell the latter wasn't made a post-E4 event is baffling. What is some scrub without a single badge doing with an Arceus exactly?

I know, I know, it's probably because you can get the creation dragon(s) at level 1. But still.

Reading about the Platinum postgame without the DNS hacks feels like that meme of Squidward watching other people have fun. There’s so much to do that’s hidden behind events, you feel absolutely teased.

I was doing the DNS hacks today, and was amusingly thinking of the statement applying to the lesser events “I can’t imagine playing through Sinnoh without the Alarm Clock pokétch app” “I can’t imaging playing through Sinnoh without the Shing Milotic.” Lol

On that note, can you only get Manaphy and Shaymin directly (without the event) in D/P? I’m asking because I was trying for an hour with no luck, which would be fine, but some places on line suggested the event was unavailable in Platinum. Which is fine, but I will get out my copy of Diamond in that case.

The arceus event in HG/SS absolutely rules. I love little stuff like that in the game, and it’s a large part of what drew me to Pokemon initially. I wish they did even more stuff like it that you could find on your own (I obviously didn’t find out about that one on my own).

 

[Esserise]

I think Mythical Pokémon are generally at their best when the game shows us what their unique traits and powers can do.

I give Mew a pass in Gen 1 because it wasn’t even supposed to be in the game, and Crystal probably wasn’t technically capable of doing much of interest with Celebi’s time travel ability, but from Gen 3 onward, I grade on a much harsher curve. Like, how do you have a Pokémon that can grant wishes once every thousand years, or a Pokémon that can grant victory to whoever it allies with, and not tell a story about that?

The post-Gen 3 Mythical Pokémon that I actually like the handling of have been Deoxys (I could get into the weeds with caveats on this one, but let’s just say ORAS gets most of the credit), Shaymin, Arceus (and although the Sinjoh Ruins event was really cool, I’m not entirely sure I’d have included Arceus in this group until Legends), Meltan, and Pecharunt.

Ones that I think get, I guess, a decent showing, albeit far from ideal, are Celebi in HGSS, Keldeo in general, and Hoopa in ORAS (thanks to the portal rings). I suppose I’ve got an honorable mention for Manaphy, too — they’ve never done much to display its unique properties, but they at least come up with amusingly complicated ways to obtain it that remain memorable to me.

What they’ve done for Darkrai just barely scrapes by into passable territory, but aside from that and the above examples, I think pretty much every other main series portrayal of a Mythical Pokémon has been severely lacking.

 

[ant4456]

the problem with mythicals as a concept is that they are fundamentally defined by how little screen time they get.

diegetically, having long or even just having real questlines to get mythicals goes against the very concept and foundation laid out by Mew, which intentionally or not it was one, Pokemon that explicitly aren't really super developed into the plot or world and are just elusive Pokemon you may see for a short while.

when we see mythicals in media outside of the games, they don't go far off from the tree unless it's a movie dedicated to them, and even in those it's generally the case that they simply find the mythical where it naturally belongs, a pixie that only shows itself if it cares to

that's why I like Celebi and think that that's the perfect iteration of the idea. I don't think Darkrai is actually a well-designed mythical quest because it honestly matters too much, it's actively showing its presence rather than being something that is more passive. If we think of the world in layers of knowing, mythical Pokemon should be something that could always be there, even if it isn't. A Schrodinger's Cat style of Pokemon. Mew could be anywhere. It could be between these trees, under this truck, it could be right behind you - and I think that's honestly more interesting than making them just go "I fuck with humans and that is how you find me" because that should just be the role of legendaries, damnit.

I think that "mythical screentime" should come from players moving past where the mythical ends up. ie. imagine if you went to Liberty Garden in the main story, or it was even like a place you passed through to an important area, and then Victini would show up in the event. I think that sells the concept significantly better.