Outside the movie, how often is Lugia actually treated as the master of the legendary birds? I know the first mystery dungeon did it, but has it ever been brought up in a mainline game (or any other spinoff)?
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Directly no. But since the beasts go with Ho-oh, they'll still ocasionally sort of...force a connection? In passing.
Namely, to the top of my head:
-In terms of Spin offs XD had the final boss with shadow legendary birds, I guess
-The HGSS commercial had the birds show up, then Lugia like how the beasts preceeded Ho-oh
-XY had the birds eventually come to rest at the "Sea Spirit's Den" which feels like a fairly direct Lugia allusion
-BDSP has the trio & Lugia exclusive to Shining Pearl, and you must capture the trio to capture Lugia.
Its very, very loose. There's never been any lore about it in the games (NPCs, pokedex entries, etc) and when it does come up it just feels like either wanting parity with ho-oh (the commercial, BDSP) or slight nod to the movie.
I suppose even if the connection between Lugia and the birds is tenuous at best in the games, since Lugia was originally designed specifically for the second movie, that means it was always meant to be the master of the birds. Which I guess also means Lugia isn't really a Gen 2 Pokemon? It's a Gen 1 Pokemon that doesn't appear in the games, or it's like Melmetal where it's somewhere between generations.
QuentinQuonce
formerly green_typhlosion
One might also say Ho-oh is a Gen I Pokemon in that case.
Nah, Ho-oh was designed for Gen 2, and then included in the first episode as a teaser for things to come. Lugia was designed for Gen 1 media and then adapted into the Gen 2 games.
no I'd say it's pretty definitely gen 2. It may have been made for the movie in mind, but they were in the midst of creating GS at the time and it makes sense to consider it a gen 2 pokemon; they likely made it with the express purpose of then adding it to the games.
It's like saying Bonsly, a pokemon you could literally play as in XD, is a gen 3 Pokemon. Or how Togepi was running around the anime for like a year.
QuentinQuonce
formerly green_typhlosion
That's quite a nebulous distinction. Pokemon the Movie 2000 is not what I'd consider Gen 1 media; GS's development was almost finished at the time and several Gen II Pokemon appeared in it. The whole Orange Islands segment of the anime is a bridge between Gen I and II; it's not really either of those.
I'm aware that it initially was designed solely for the movie and not for the games, but that doesn't make Lugia a Gen I Pokemon any more than Donphan, Togepi, Marill, Slowking, Elekid, or any of the other Johto mons that appear in M02 I've forgotten about are.
That's why I also said it could be like Melmetal, where it's somewhere between generations (I guess fitting with Orange Island being in a weird transitional period between Gens 1 and 2, like you said). It's been a long time since I saw that movie, I only remember Slowking.
Shudo's recollection is a little...off the cuff, selective.
He made it "solely for the movie" and was "surprised" to see it in the games and later in the TV show. And then shrugged it off saying he wondered what happened with the directors and game development. Which would be weird for a number of reasons.
But then in other blog posts he mentions how it was a fairly big team effort. Ken Sugimori was involved, and likely other members of both the anime staff and game staff.
While he created the "character" of Lugia, and likely spearheaded some of the design efforts, I imagine the plan once he brought up this new Pokemon was always to put it into the games.
Its actually the only Pokemon not designed by a GF employee, the designer (Takeshi Shudo) was surprised to see it being used in the games. And honestly its not really surprising that the ingame lore is mostly absent for Lugia, aside from being created a Generation later, it was also back in the day where legendaries weren’t anywhere near as big of a focus, and of course in its introductory Generation the legendary birds weren’t even available. I enjoy what they did with BDSP, iirc its the first time they included Lugia and Ho-oh (outside of Crystal) as needing their trios to be captured prior to them. Something similar would’ve been nice in HGSS but not feasible unless they just made a Crystal remake instead (yes they should’ve!)
I’m assuming he more meant the fact that it became the game mascot for Silver, and later XD too. I’m sure there were plans for it to be in the games (I mean would they make a Pokemon not in the games) but not with such a big role.
That's not really true, they bring on other artists from time to time (though Shudo may have been the first). The final designs of the Beasts were a guest designer, and that's held up for various generations I believe. I know that in Gen 6 Hitoshi Ariga was brought on to offer some designs of his owns (Honedge, the fossils, etC) and he's done various in Gen 7 & 8 too. But I dont beleive he formally works for gamefreak.
I mean.......HGSS was effectively a Crystal remake. The things it was missing you can count on one hand.
My take on Lugia is that all speculation or anomalies about being "only" intended for the movies aside, it's a Gen 2 Pokemon. We have had mons show up ahead of the release of their "proper" generation in the anime, and then through in-game cameos (Gen 3 had quite a few like Bonsly, Munchlax, and Lucario), Togepi being a famous case as well for Gen 1.
Putting aside the game/gen in which the debut proper was, my metric is usually what generation was reasonably in concept development when this Pokemon would be as well. Most of these sneak-preview Mons like Togepi, Snubbull, Marill, Lugia, etc. showed up first in one Generation's games, but it was after those generations had come out, meaning they had long since "finalized" their regional Dex and any new Pokemon were probably being saved for a distinct release now. Lugia is a Gen 2 Pokemon because Gen 2 was the first generation where its inclusion as a functional Pokemon the player could catch or interact with would be.
We have had anomalies on this front but very rarely do they happen in that generational gap anyway. Mew was a secret even from the Development team, but I'm inclined to believe this simply refers to Mew as a Pokemon they show off directly rather than the concept of it, given the entire concept of Mewtwo necessitates a Mew. If Mew hadn't been a development gag, my guess is it would have shown up in a later Gen in a manner similar to Regigigas debuting after the Regi trio and being designed to slot into some of their lore statements.
The others that throw a wrench into this idea of mine are the Ultra Beasts from USUM and Meltan/Melmetal, but the UB's as a concept aren't strictly conventional Pokemon, so I kind of take the lazy answer by saying that's just one more oddity on the pile for them. Meltan and Melmetal are the exception since they are fully playable in Let's Go with most all the code conventions and trappings needed to work as a full Pokemon, they simply are not among the data in the other Gen 7 entries. In an odd sense they kind of hearken back to RBY Mew in that they're fully coded but do not appear in the game without some external influence (in this case transfer from Go).
I'll throw in an explicit "I like that" for Meltan in LGPE as closing, since I find it a cool way to have a Mew throwback without the usual obnoxious availability of Mythicals. Since Go is a F2P game, the Box works with HOME as well as LGPE, and the frequency is kept to a wait that's long but not too obnoxious so that (combined with the candy mechanics) Melmetal will still be available-but-scarce in the main games over time
Putting aside the game/gen in which the debut proper was, my metric is usually what generation was reasonably in concept development when this Pokemon would be as well. Most of these sneak-preview Mons like Togepi, Snubbull, Marill, Lugia, etc. showed up first in one Generation's games, but it was after those generations had come out, meaning they had long since "finalized" their regional Dex and any new Pokemon were probably being saved for a distinct release now. Lugia is a Gen 2 Pokemon because Gen 2 was the first generation where its inclusion as a functional Pokemon the player could catch or interact with would be.
We have had anomalies on this front but very rarely do they happen in that generational gap anyway. Mew was a secret even from the Development team, but I'm inclined to believe this simply refers to Mew as a Pokemon they show off directly rather than the concept of it, given the entire concept of Mewtwo necessitates a Mew. If Mew hadn't been a development gag, my guess is it would have shown up in a later Gen in a manner similar to Regigigas debuting after the Regi trio and being designed to slot into some of their lore statements.
The others that throw a wrench into this idea of mine are the Ultra Beasts from USUM and Meltan/Melmetal, but the UB's as a concept aren't strictly conventional Pokemon, so I kind of take the lazy answer by saying that's just one more oddity on the pile for them. Meltan and Melmetal are the exception since they are fully playable in Let's Go with most all the code conventions and trappings needed to work as a full Pokemon, they simply are not among the data in the other Gen 7 entries. In an odd sense they kind of hearken back to RBY Mew in that they're fully coded but do not appear in the game without some external influence (in this case transfer from Go).
I'll throw in an explicit "I like that" for Meltan in LGPE as closing, since I find it a cool way to have a Mew throwback without the usual obnoxious availability of Mythicals. Since Go is a F2P game, the Box works with HOME as well as LGPE, and the frequency is kept to a wait that's long but not too obnoxious so that (combined with the candy mechanics) Melmetal will still be available-but-scarce in the main games over time
I was just quoting the Bulbapedia page where it says its the only Pokemon created by a member of Game Freak.
And sorry if I didn’t make it clear but I was referring more to Lugia and Ho-oh being semi-added to the story and being forced to battle them after beating Team Rocket. If they’d done something similar to Crystal, where Ho-oh was only available after catching all 3 Legendary Beasts, I would’ve preferred that, but obviously they were involving Legendaries and particularly mascots much more heavily by this stage. Honestly for HG/SS it really felt a bit unnatural having Lugia and Ho-oh almost forced upon us within the story, one of the few things in those games I’m not really a fan
I consider them Gen 7.5 Pokémon.
I just consider them Gen 7 Pokemon. And the LA pokemon are gen 8 pokemon, just like the SWSH DLC pokemon.
I blame these pokemon breaking everyone's brains on those ancient fakes where BW2 was positioned as having a bunch of new pokemon complete with new starters. That was where the idea really took root of "a half step generation?!", where those thoughts recurred throughout Gen 6 as copium for the small generation of Pokemon. And then Meltan/Melmetal in particular broke people because Let's Go were switch titles instead of 3DS titles.
I blame these pokemon breaking everyone's brains on those ancient fakes where BW2 was positioned as having a bunch of new pokemon complete with new starters. That was where the idea really took root of "a half step generation?!", where those thoughts recurred throughout Gen 6 as copium for the small generation of Pokemon. And then Meltan/Melmetal in particular broke people because Let's Go were switch titles instead of 3DS titles.
Now that you mention it, the boundaries between generations are more blurred than ever; Let's Go is part of Gen 7, but has pretty much no elements introduced in the Alola games except maybe a few moves. Meanwhile, Rescue Team DX is part of Gen 8, but literally the only parts it takes from Sword and Shield are minor cosmetic things, one of which only applies in English. (All female Eevee having a curvy pattern on their tails, and Vice Grip being changed to Vise Grip, which bothers me because "vise" rhymes with "eyes" in my head.)
GameFreak and ILCA's own code for HOME is not making the situation clearer, either:
:P
Scarlet & Violet will be mysteriously marked as gen 15
I figured SV would do it regardless just because it's the simplest option and one they were getting closer and closer to pushing as time went on anyway.
The kerfluffle of gen 8 just expedited the process
QuentinQuonce
formerly green_typhlosion
Here's a fun thing that tickles me: the Elder in GSCHGSS is named Li. This means that, in GSC where his trainer class is "Sage", he's sagely. In HGSS, where his trainer class has been changed to "Elder", he's elderly. An amusing under-the-radar gag.
I did not expect such a long discussion to spawn from a random and minor thing I just added at the end of my previous post. The fandom can certainly get passionate about discussing even the most minor things. Looking back now, I agree that the connection between the birds and Lugia isn't very strong in the games. I have always thought of Lugia as the master of the birds because I watched the second movie as a kid, and I think I might have been influenced by it from other sources as well. Notably Bulbapedia which mentions it, and it how it is a common "fact" within the fandom. And in the games, the lore behind the birds and Lugia is very lackluster which is another contributing factor since that makes it easier to see fandom theories as facts. So I guess Lugia being the master of the birds should not really be seen as game canon. But Regigigas and the Regis were the main ones I was thinking of for this subject, Lugia and the birds just came to me as thinking of trio masters made me remember the second movie.
As for what a generation is, I agree that it has become more blurred over the years. Personally, I consider a new generation to start when we get a new starter trio and a new region. If they introduce new Pokémon in a follow-up game or DLC, I consider them a part of the current generation.
As for what a generation is, I agree that it has become more blurred over the years. Personally, I consider a new generation to start when we get a new starter trio and a new region. If they introduce new Pokémon in a follow-up game or DLC, I consider them a part of the current generation.
Perhaps it's by coincidence, but something I am kind of enjoying aesthetically is that the Pokemon games coinciding with major departures from the game's more "solid but formulaic" early entries (Gen 5's Story and Regional Dex shake-up, Gen 6 jumping to 3D, Gen 7 trying a not-Gym challenge while doing the "Evil Team" as the main plot again like Unova) are the games that happen to be when Pokemon Regions expanded to being based on other Countries, as compared to Gen 1-4 having identities but often feeling like neighbors being the games that were based on parts of Japan. The large scale shift in the franchise formula also matched a similarly large shift in the settings for them.
Maybe not main games but it is fair to note that Mystery Dungeon Rescue Team does make a more explicit note that the Birds gathering is the key to reaching Lugia, both because their powers being together on the Friend Camp Island stirs up the Sea Dungeon and you need the Whirl Stone they create to enter it. At least one spin-off game depicts Lugia much more overtly as Master or otherwise linked to the Bird Trio, so this would then just get into Semantics about what makes a Trio Master (do they need a hand in the Trio's existence or just to exert power over other members?) and if "game canon" has separations between main-game and individual spin-offs.
QuentinQuonce
formerly green_typhlosion
The games themselves aren't consistent on that, quite deliberately I think.
Rayquaza is the master of the weather trio while also being part of that trio, and it definitely didn't create either Groudon or Kyogre; the same applies to Landorus. Kyurem might be the internal master of its trio or not depending on how you look at it. So it's not even game canon/other canons that's the issue here: the term trio master is one purely invented by fans (which is not to say that the concept is not valid as it's very evidently a thing in the series) and the specifics differ from trio to trio.