Little things you like about Pokémon

Can't post this on the SwSh site, Hilarious video on Reddit I found on Bulbagarden Forums: See Here.
So basically someone defended GF saying Computer Animation is hard and even included #don'tbringthenational dexback in response to the fans opposing GF. So a first year Computer Animation student decided to fix the Wingull problem by re-modeling and animating the whole wingull from scratch in around 24 hours. Its a lot more expressive than GF's work.
 
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cityscapes

Take care of yourself.
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WARNING LONG POST AHEAD

this post is dedicated to my mans, user Ransei

ok with all the talk about removing mons from the game, i feel like it's the right time to bring up a past game that did the same thing: pokemon conquest. with a detailed piece of artwork required for each mon [example] as well as a less detailed sprite with a set of animations, it's somewhat understandable why they'd need to do something like that. as a result, only some select strong mons/fan favorites are in the game, with all my favorites being gone and only 199 pokemon total making the cut. it's a pretty bleak situation.

the gameplay is kinda cool, but can get somewhat repetitive with only 1 real way to play. there are two main things to do, managing your kingdom and participating in battles. for those, i have to explain a few core mechanics of conquest:

the ransei region, where pokemon conquest is based, is composed of 17 little regions, one for each type (fairy didn't exist yet). inside each region, there are a couple areas where you can find wild pokemon and warriors/warlords of the corresponding type. (for example, you'd find fire-types in the fire region). some also have things like a shop, a gold mine to get money, and a ponigiri shop (to increase your mons' energy).

each of the 17 little regions can hold up to 6 people (warriors or warlords) at once, with each person being able to "hold" multiple mons but only being able to use 1 in battle. also, each region has its own dedicated warlord, with some having one or two additional ones. the warlords generally function the same way as warriors, except they generally have stronger mons.

your initial goal is to conquer the entire ransei region by challenging each dedicated warlord on their region-specific battlefield. battles work on a grid system, by the way, with you having all your mons out at once. each mon only has one attack depending on its species (all gurdurr will have wake-up slap), which really simplifies things, but some attacks hit varying spaces, like water gun hitting the 2 spaces in front of you. here is an example of the gameplay in case this explanation wasn't sufficient. it's pretty fun the first time, but what happens when you get to the postgame?

each warlord gets their own specific "mission", where you start as them and usually have to conquer at least some of the region. there are like 50 warlords. it's easy to see how this could get boring really fast. so, what else is there to do?

perfect links.

a link is basically like a level, with each pokemon being assigned one, links increasing after every battle, and the number ranging from 2 to 100. but each warrior only has 1 pokemon species (or evolution line) with which they can achieve a 100% link; all others are capped at lower numbers like 50 or 70. it's also worth noting that the pokemon carry over after you move to the next story (although their link levels don't).

this completely changes the dynamic of the postgame. instead of just a slog through the region 50 times, the goal is to try and get perfect links on all the warriors. you can really feel your hard work pay off when you start a new story and instead of the usual oshawott/piplup/panpour you immediately have perfect linked samurott/gyarados/quagsire at your disposal.

and this is also why i don't really care about all the mons not being in the game. because this is the game that, more than any other pokemon game i've played, really encourage you to use every pokemon in them. each story starts you off in a different place, with a different warlord, so you don't have to go out of your way to avoid using the same stuff as usual. the high amount of postgame stories mean that you never have a permanent "party".

something else cool is that the game is actually remarkably well balanced. in most pokemon games, you just want the mon that hits really hard and a couple guys to complement its type weaknesses. but in conquest, things work differently. most of the hard-hitting and bulky mons are slow-moving (they can only move 2 squares at a time, compared to most which can move 3 to 4). playing a fast and strong pokemon recklessly will cause it to quickly get revenge killed by nearby pokemon due to lack of bulk.

the less powerful pokemon often have potent abilities that allow them to remain good. froslass has flame body but for freezing, spiritomb has shadow tag for pokemon adjacent to it, and audino automatically restores the hp of adjacent allies. defense is also a viable strategy, because if your kingdom is being conquered, you automatically win if you can stall out the turn limit. i've gotten some neat wins vs super strong pokemon this way. field control ends up being as important as raw power.

now obviously, there are some things that are just really dumb. forretress sucks because his move is gyro ball, so if you make him stronger his move gets weaker (and there's also a weird mechanic where if the other mon is significantly faster, your move becomes really inaccurate). the guardian charm item is BROKEN and carries between stories. mons like gyara and hydreigon are a bit too powerful. musharna's move is uhhh...dream eater (so it can't do anything unless someone is asleep). arceus is broken, although i guess that's how it's supposed to be. but in the grand scheme of things, these aren't a super big deal, and most mons are balanced out pretty well.

one more thing that i want to point out is how in the postgame, the opposing kingdoms naturally get more powerful, so you can kinda set their own level curve and beat the game at your own pace. this is super helpful for getting stuff like hydreigon, stone evolutions, and swarms (swarms SUCK tho they only happen like once every 25 months and there are like 10 swarm exclusive mons). this is just generally cool plus it feels awesome when u really take your time and everyone has broken mons.

so yeah. pokemon conquest, despite having only 200 mons in it, one (1) thing to do in it, and relatively exploitable ai as the only thing you can fight, still manages to be one of my favorite games to this day. shoutouts to conquest, man.
 

Karxrida

Death to the Undying Savage
is a Community Contributor Alumnus
I should qualify that the Deoxys, Hoopa, Shaymin, and Genesect movies are the ones the collective fanbase tend to regard as the worst, or the ones that pop up in discussion the most. Individual taste open to interpretation.

To tell truth, I haven't seen the Genesect nor Hoopa movies and found the Deoxys one passable (I liked the parts focused on Plusle and Minun of all things, something I bet nobody else would agree with).

I do find the Shaymin movie absolutely terrible, mostly because how much of an unbearable brat Shaymin is.
The Genesect movie's just kind of boring tbh. People just don't like the Mewtwo retcon (which is admittedly stupid).

The Hoopa movie is straight-up garbage, though. The XY movie era in general wasn't too hot.
 

Pikachu315111

Ranting & Raving!
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The Genesect movie's just kind of boring tbh. People just don't like the Mewtwo retcon (which is admittedly stupid).
There's no retcon, the Mewtwo in the movie is a second Mewtwo. How did they make a second Mewtwo? Who knows.

Boundary Breaking XY:
A video that recently caught my eye is from a series called Boundary Break, where they go out of bounds with the camera in video games to see what we're not normally supposed to. They did one for XY a week or so ago and, while having plenty of things I expect, also had things I didn't:


1. When you start the game the Gender Select shows the players in a mirror, except their not: it's the age old trick of just having the player model standing behind a framed semi-transparent object.

2. Same for the mirror in your home, it's actually a second player model mirroring the player's input in a mirror room. Also both floors of your home are loaded for some reason including the mirrored player who is teleported far away in the void.

3. For some reason, some of the fountains have a intricate design underneath them. Why? Was at some point were we supposed to see the underside of a fountain?

4. Remember reports that in one of the buildings you saw what looked like the shape of Missingno? Turns out, it's not a random easter egg, but rather it's actually a shadow of another entrance you're seeing through the model. You're just close enough to that building to make the entrance load in but far away that the "distance hiding fog" is trying to cover it up.

5. For some reason, the Holo Caster model for Malva doesn't have any legs and the podium is fully modeled. While not needed for the scene sure, for other holocaster models it's just the model tinted blue with an effect applied to hide their body below. Because of this you'd think the same would be done for Malva while making the podium model cut off right short. But not, they went through more effort here. Makes me wonder if we were suppose to maybe see Malva while she's at work at some point (though that wouldn't explain the missing feet).

6. For some reason they added eyebrows to the Hex Maniac's model even though you can't see it under the hair.

7. The characters for the Magearna event are always loaded up and stored out of sight in the Pokemon Center.

8. The device around Trevor's beck is designed on the part I don't think you ever get to see, but I can sort of see why they would do that just incase they ever did have Trevor mess with it.

9. The Defenders of Kalos actually have their eyes behind their mask revealing they've been Dexio and Sina the whole time!!1! Joking aside, I wonder if at some point they were going to take off their masks to reveal their identity to the player (or felt it wasn't needed to remove the eye as they were just going to cover them up anyway).

10. Dwebble has a tail you never get to see under the shell.

11. AZ's story pictures are actually all next to each other in a 3D space. This is kind of add as I thought it was just a video playing, but it's all done in-game. Was it easier to do it this way then loading up a video?

12. The Ultimate Weapon's power core room actually has two versions of it right next to each other: one for when the cables are attached and another for when the cables are broken.

13. The Hero Ceremony cutscene only has the player (and maybe Sycamore & AZ) models loaded, all the other characters are 2D sprites using clever camera angles.
 
I really, really enjoy the feeling Gen 7 has after you complete the Aether Foundation portion. Most Pokémon games when you beat the big mid-late game evil team area keeps the energy going; almost like it gives you this big second wind to keep pushing forward with gyms and the like. But in Gen 7, while the plot progresses; from the moment you land on Poni Island there is a remarkably calm and laidback vibe to the game which lasts until about Ancient Poni Canyon. I'm not entirely sure how to quantify what works about it or why I like it so much... but I do. I really, really do. I've got many things about Gen 7 I can criticise, but it had a lot of high points and this was definitely one of them.
 

Pikachu315111

Ranting & Raving!
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So a page back I posted Ken Sugimori interviews about Gen V designs from a site called "Lava Cut Content" (who also has a Youtube channel also about cut video game content). So far I had posted parts 1 & 2, but I went back and saw parts 3 and 4 had been posted! So, much as I did then, let's see if anything interesting is mentioned (comments by me will be in parenthesis and colored red):

Gen V Monsters Part 3:
In addition to Sugimori, he's joined by Yusuke Ohmura (later become director of B2W2) and Takao Unno (later became lead designer for Sun & Moon).

Unova Starters:
1.
When creating the Starters they start by doing three things: it doesn't resemble a pre-existing Pokemon, making sure the motifs fit the Type (which takes the longest to do) and that they are animals everyone is familiar with. They aren't designed to look strong at first but start doing so when they evolve.
2. Tepig was first designed followed by Snivy, Oshawott was last. Water-types apparently take them the longest to design. They make a lot of designs but some don't look good for a Water-type. Grass sometimes has a similar problem, they don't just want an animal with plants growing out of them.

(Huh, with how common Water-type is you'd think they would have a whole back catalog of Water-type designs they could fall back on. Though maybe that's the problem, since they don't want to overstep pre-existing designs in a way they made designing Water-types difficult since they have so many. There ideas about designing the Grass Starter is also interesting as starting with Gen VI I think either this thought has changed or they became a bit experimental to see how far they could push a Pokemon being a Grass-type without being directly fused with the plantlife)

3. When designing Snivy family they decided to go with snake as they didn't want to do another lizard. However they were afraid it having no hands or feet would turn off most players, so they gave Snivy hands and feet and gradually had it lost them as it evolved. However it doesn't completely lose them, Serperior may have no feet but it does have hands, it's those two leaves sticking out below its head, it just keeps them behind it folded up to look more regal.

(SERPERIOR HAS HANDS?! How has no one ever reported this? Well, I guess its easy not to notice, I don't think anyone told the anime animators nor the 3D designers about this as sometimes in the anime the leaves looked fuses to its body and they don't move around when playing with Serperior in Pokemon Amie/Refresh. Shame, it actually having hands it just doesn't use often could have probably been used in at least some jokes)

4. For Oshawott they decide the Water-type Starter would be an otter but couldn't come up with a good design. Ohmura went to a zoo to observe some otters when he also saw a sea lion show and impressed by their powerful movements. It was then Samurott's design came to him first and then worked backwards to connect it to Oshawott.
5. They assign the basic stage Starters the following "roles" or personalities: cool one, serious one, funny one. Tepig was the funny one, Snivy was the cool one, so Oshawott was made the serious one hence its stock art expression.

(Now this is interesting! We all knew the three Starters had these "roles" but we never really knew what the three exactly were. Like Youtuber Lockstin & Gnoggin believes them to be "cool, tough, and feminine". But turns out Sugimori had told us the roles were in an obscure magazine interview! Lockstin was mostly right, except a Pokemon's design being feminine was coincidence that he got off modern design choices. But using this let's see if we can't figure out which Starter goes where:

Cool: Charmander, Cyndaquil, Treecko, Chimchar, Snivy, Fennekin, Rowlet, Scorbunny
Serious: Squirtle, Chikorita, Mudkip, Turtwig, Tepig, Froakie, Litten, Sobble
Funny: Bulbasaur, Totodile, Torchic, Piplup, Oshawott, Chespin, Popplio, Grookey

Huh, that's a bit harder then I thought it was. Hardest I think was the Gen 2 Starters, and for the most part I couldn't decide whether one was cool or one was funny (serious was mostly easy to tell as they give it the straight face... I think).)


6. They then do a second round of "roles" for the final stages, and this is where they introduce a theme which seems to change each generation. Gen V's theme we already knew: they're based on different cultures since Unova is based on New York which has a lot of diversity. Snivy's is European based on a knight, name dropping Lady Oscar from the anime "The Rose of Versailles" specifically. Tepig's is Chinese and based Zhang Fei from "Romance of the Three Kingdoms". Oshawott's is Japanese and based on a samurai with it using the shell on its stomach as its blade (from what it sounds like it already had the shell on its stomach, it was when this second round of roles happened did they have it be used as a weapon).

(Lava Cut Content goes into a bit more context about what inspirations from Lady Oscar and Zhang Fei influenced Snivy's and Tepig's designs, respectively. There's a lot these so if you're curious I suggest go checking it out)

Zorua & Zoroark: When deciding the "main" Pokemon for the movie that would become "Zoroark: Master of Illusion", they wanted a Dark-type which hadn't been done before. Well, turns out they were actually working on the basic concepts of the Zorua family at the time so chose them. A key design of Zoroark is it's long mane standing in for its tail, apparently.

Patrat, Pidove, Tranquill & Unfezant:
Patrat and Pidove, as well as Rattata and Pidgey (and probably all the other gen rodents and birds) shows the value of a standard design without much of a twist. As in, there's only one standout trait. For Patrat, it's the eyes, saying if it also had an usual tail it would be too much so they hold back. For Pidove... it gets complicated as it involves a Japanese pun which Lava Cut Content explains. But to start off, they wanted to make Pidove a pigeon from the start but, feeling a bigger pigeon wouldn't look any more powerful, made Tranquill an oriental turtle dove and Unfezant a pheasant. Simple enough.
This is where it gets complicated, the Japanese name for pigeon is "hato" which sounds like the Japanese transliteration word for how English pronounces "heart", "haato". So, they incorporated a heart-shape into Pidove's design. Note that this heart shape sticks with Pidove throughout its evolution line, though it goes from being on its chest to also covering its face.
Now, why does it evolve into an oriental turtle dove and then pheasant? The oriental turtle dove's Japanese name is "kijibato". "Kiji" means pheasant, and if you combined "kiji" together with "hato", "kijihato", due to Japanese pronunciation rules it sounds like "kijibato".

(That's right, the confusing Pidove family's evolution line can actually be logically explained via Japanese word pun...)

Victini: Masuda wanted a "lucky" Pokemon and had an idea for it to have a "V" shape on its head.

Minccino & Cincino: Masuda wanted cute Pokemon, they asked Atsuko Nishida to make one, she did. Okay, to be less sarcastic, it is heartwarming that Sugimori said Atsuko's skill to design cute Pokemon is second-to-none and that they made no alterations to the designs she submitted. They also mention it's the equivalent to Gen I's Clefairy family and it doesn't grow any bigger when it evolves, just more elegant.

Audino: Since Unova will only have all-new Pokemon then this would also be true for the anime. Jokingly worried what Pokemon would be Nurse Joy's partner, so they made a Chansey equivalent just so Nurse Joy had a Pokemon by her side. And since Chansey had importance *coughNostalgiacough* it affirmed the importance of designing Audino.

(That's actually heartwarming in a way in addition to being funny. Though I wonder if this was why they also made Comfey (though, if so, why did they skip a healer-like Pokemon for Gen VI?))

Munna & Musharna: Musharna came first and was designed by Nishida when she was told to draw anything so made a Tapir with a dream coming out of its head. This was before the idea of the Dream World was even thought of, and when they did think up the Dream World they realized Musharna would be a perfect fit for it. As it turns out, it's quite common that the Pokemon design team would make a Pokemon that would later be a perfect fit for a new mechanic or story element they would later think up. They also made Munna because they needed more 2-stage families.

(Now, while Lava Cut Content says this debunks the rumor that Munna is a reference to the Gen I Picnicker line, I don't think so. Nothing in the story says that, when they decided to make Munna, someone on the team did know of that line and thought this would be a good opportunity to make it into reality. For all we know, that line could have been based on a staffer's actual desire for a "pink Pokemon with flowers on it" Pokemon and wasn't till Munna was able to do it)

Throh & Sawk: A little more on them. Throh was made when Sugimori during Gen IV wondered what fighting-type they hadn't made a Pokemon for yet: judo, a Pokemon that uses throwing techniques. He submitted the design but went unused. For Gen V he polished it up and was accepted this time. Later they wanted to make a rival for it so, using the idea karate is the rival to judo, make Sawk.

Emolga: So a major requirement to being a Pikaclone is being cute. But to do something different, this time they wanted it to be a duel-type. They decided on a flying squirrel thinking a Pikachu-like Pokemon soaring through the sky would be picturesque. They made it fly via a cape and the design came out as they wanted: cute. And since Gen V had moving sprites they could show it gliding.

(So I guess we'll never see a tough-looking Pikaclone, that's a shame. I also guess that's why no other Pikaclone evolves, and when they made an Alolan version of Raichu they amped up the cuteness)

Elemental Monkeys: Knowing the first Gym's gimmick (three Gym Leaders, specialize in Grass/Fire/Water, Gym was a restaurant, Leaders were waiters), Unno thought their signature Pokemon should be able to cook. Grass carries vegetable and herbs, Water provides delicious water to cook with, and Fire monitored strength of the cooking flame. Since they were carrying hot stuff originally made their hands to resemble mittens which was then he decided to make them monkeys.
And just like the Starters they were given distinct personalities: Pansage is kind of a punk, Pansear is carefree, and Panpour is gentle but smug. While their personalities isn't as obvious as the Starters, gave them details to know of their different personalities like with their eyes. Also another designer created their evolutions which furthered emphasized the personality traits.

(Now unlike with Munna, this right here I feel debunks the theory they're based on the Three Wise Monkeys. All the aspects people try connecting them to the Wise Monkeys, just coincidence of them trying to get their real personalities to show. Which in that regard I do feel Unno kind of failed at as I don't see any of those traits in the basic stages. If you ask me, Pansear looks like the punk, Panpour looks carefree, and Pansage looks smug. But their evolutions do say otherwise)

Shelmet, Accelgor, Karrablast, Excavalier: They were making a Pokemon based on a species of beetles that ate snails (Karrablast). It evolved into an armor wearing Pokemon (but the armor wasn't the shell of the snail) and also planning on giving it a snail Pokemon rival which it would eat (not clear on what they mean by that, would that have been an actual mechanic or just a Dex entry, my guess the latter). Meanwhile, Shelmet was being designed completely separately from this. However, seeing Shelmet's armor gave them a revelation: what if Karrablast's evo armor was Shelmet's shell! So they threw out the original snail rival and made Shelmet the rival to Karrablast. They also thought what would happen to Shelmet after it lost its shell, probably sulk around and kept that in mind for its evolution.

Timburr, Gurdurr, Conkeldurr: Timburr was made to be Pokemon that worked on construction sites carrying timber. They had doubts the design could work but then remembered Gen I had Pokemon carrying leeks and spoons. They decided what was important was it looking interesting when animated. Gurdurr was designed to focus on its pure physical strength while Conkeldurr made to look like a strong but intelligent veteran. Timburr is the apprentice, Gurdurr a full-fledged adult, and Conkeldurr the honorable master. Also their legs are designed to look like knickers, baggy pants worn by Japanese construction workers, they don't have short/no legs.

(Surprised they didn't mention their relationship with the Machop family. Also funny how even they forgot some of the silly stuff they did in Gen I, lol! Also not sure how I feel now knowing that they actually have normal legs but its covered by what I can only assume to be a sack of skin...)

Trubbish: With many main locations being cities, wanted a pollution Pokemon. Decided on trash as that's the most common pollution in a city, designed Trubbish to be a Pokemon that disguises itself as a trash bag. Sugimori also added in that the design made sense as you can be startled by a plastic bag outside a convenience store at night (I think that's more of a you thing, Sugimori).

Cubchoo: Someone wanted to make a Pokemon with frozen snot and they got their chance to because moving sprites let them animate the snot going in and out of Cubchoo's nose. Sugimori jokes pretty much every gen has a Pokemon that's leaking something like Gen I had Gloom's saliva.

Sigilyph: While final design makes an impression, the initial design was "intense" that Sugimori wasn't sure what to do with it. They had to meet with the artist several times to make adjustments to make it more Pokemon-like.

(This REALLY makes me want to see what the original looked like! From what it sounds like the designer gave them a Mega Level Digimon, lol! Or at the very least a possible basis for an Ultra Beast, or Mega Evolution... *sigh*)


Wow, that was really long! I'll post my thoughts on the fourth entry tomorrow. For now I'll post the link to it PLUS a link to a quick but still interesting Kotaku article asking some GF staff what Type they would specialize if they were a Gym Leader:

Gen V Designs Part 4: Human Characters
What Type Of Gyms Would Game Freak Staff Have?

Seeya tomorrow!
 

Pikachu315111

Ranting & Raving!
is a Community Contributoris a Top Smogon Media Contributor
Sorry for double-posting, I feel these articles are big enough that, since I couldn't go into the other one in my previous post, I might as well make a new post. If I'm wrong, no problem, just tell me and I'll delete this post and edit my above post.

But for now we actually step away from the Pokemon (though that might be because not all interviews are collected, at this time they're missing four volumes of the Japanese magazine "Nintendo Dream" which has the other interviews: 202, 203, 206, & 207. If by weird coincidence you're able to track down these issues contact Lava Cut Content so he can translate them for everyone) and move onto the human characters! These interviews covered a lot of design aspects of Black & White, makes me curious if any of the missing volumes also talked about locations. But onto the subject at hand (once again, my personal comments are in parenthesis and colored red):

Gen V Humans:
This time it's only Ken Sugimori and Yusuke Ohmura.

Protagonists, Hilda & Hilbert:
* Masuda gave the order to make them older than 10/11.
* Masuda had already created the concept of N, a villain who's sense of morality was closer to the protagonists.
* Sugimori noted N was wearing a hat so they decided to have all the characters wearing hat, including Hilda.
They continued to think ways to make Hilda different from previous female protagonists, such as wearing shorts. They also observed what girls usually wore when going around town (that's not creepy at all... BTW were any woman involved in these design decisions?).
* Hilbert was designed to be the opposite of Hilda, deciding to give him a vibe of coolness. Sugimori notes he actually doesn't like doing "cool" characters and avoids them when he can, he then explains Brendan (male protag of Gen III) and Lucas (male protag of Gen IV) was drawn to be energetic and hot blooded with short hair.

(I think we mostly knew about the hat thing, but it aspiring them to give the girl a cap this time is neat. That bit concerning Hilbert is interesting. He was drawn to be cool meaning other past male protagonists (and possibly female, such as Hilda) weren't. Well Sugimori, if you say so, because I don't really see it. Nor the energetic & hot-blooded personality of Brendan and Lucas (I see that more from Gen IV's Rival Barry). Hilbert just looks like a plain ol' kid. Hilda looks cooler. But I will say one thing, certainly a lot of the male player characters look like dork at times (also looks like for most of the girls the personality they chose to go with was "cute"))

Professor Junipers, Aurea & Cedric:
* Masuda's original orders was both Professors to be men: one fat, one old.
* Sugimori complained the orders were unpleasant and wanted to make a female Professor this time around. Ohmura was originally going to be given the duty, but since Sugimori was the one who spoke up he decided to handle Aurea's creation himself. Aurea was designed to be a New York career woman, one who would wear sneakers around the office.
* After Aurea was changed they revised Cedric's design so he would look like her father.

(So we have Sugimori to thank for the first female professor (if you don't count Ivy from the anime). Curious if the older Professor was always meant to be the other Professor's father or that was a decision made when Aurea was changed to a young woman)

Rivals, Cheren & Bianaca:
* Designers were only given basic concepts of the character to do whatever they want with. Since they were also allies and supporting characters, they wanted them easy to get along with and not too serious.
* Cheren was described as "inflexible but intelligent". They hadn't done a rival with dark hair and glasses before so went with that. They also thought he would be a head of a student council, designing his jacket as such. They wanted to give him a necktie but many characters they designed with neckties to that point had been pompous and smug so instead designed his shirt to look like he was wearing a tie from a distance.
* Bianca was described as a "pure-hearted girl who dances to the beat of her own drum". At this point they had drawn all the female Gym Leaders and upon review noted they didn't use that many round lines in their design nor looked child-like. Hilda was made to be sporty and wearing shorts, so they made Bianca the opposite by not having her show much skin.
* They didn't want the rivals to be too cool or showy. Like Elesa is a super model so isn't that relatable, having charisma most people don't have. They wanted the rivals to be a contrast of that, in lack of better words, not good looking nor stylish. They made them characters who were more bold when teamed up together.

(Not good looking? And Cheren isn't supposed to be pompous? Also it's really only Bianca who isn't that bold (at least in the early parts of the game) alone, Cheren's problem was his noted inflexibility making him single minded in his goals. Eitherway, this is an interesting case of designers intent vs. what the audience perceives. Lava Cut Content also mentioned how it's also a possible window to how Sugimori view things, like maybe Sugimori doesn't consider himself cool so prefers to design quirky characters that more reflect him. But in the end all that really matters is that they gave us two characters who went through a satisfying character arc. Also from all this I can sort of see where maybe they got their designs for B2W2, but that's an entirely different speculation we don't really have interviews for)

Team Plasma, Grunts, N, & Ghetsis:
* Masuda provided the original concept art for N (and they're creepy looking, like N is a crazy killer). He asked for a genius character and a woman staff member asked what he meant by "genius". After long thinking and probably discussion, they made N look androgynous, an artistic guy that's a foe who isn't necessarily a foe. He's also supposed to be cool and attractive, his pose telling you he's not an average person. His genius had a dangerous air about him. Additional specific details were given from above.
* They wanted something unusual with Ghetsis, wearing strange clothes and having an extraordinary form.
* They had reservation for the designs of the grunts everyday, Ohmura handling their designs. The idea was "a group of soldiers who protect a king". Ohmura puts focus on the shape of their heads, how it was an adventure to design them and how they looked kind of stupid. However, they're grunts, so it was alright. The male and female grunts looked the same so he wondered what to do about that, but in-game when you see a group of them together with their strange head-shapes he thought it looked kind of cool.

(I'd say the most interesting parts here is on Ghetsis and the grunts. They did certainly achieve their vision for Ghetsis looking strange with his elaborate clothes. Lava Cut Content has pictures of Masuda's original concept which showed Ghetsis looking like a shorter, pope-like character. Sounds like they weren't that satisfied with how the grunts turned out, or at least their heads. They just decided to settle on them looking dumb cause they're grunts and as long as they looked intimidating when together in a group that's what mattered)

Lenora:
* Sugimori describes her as a mother with a lot of spirit. (Now that's rather interesting because, as far as we know, Lenora isn't a mother. She's a wife, she runs the Nacrene Museum with her husband Hawes, but we never got the feeling they had kids. Was the intent she was like a mother figure to the player and rivals? That also didn't really come off, she more felt like she was the boss, a leader you can say)
* In Black & White they wanted to focus on including multinational and multiracial vibes. They made Lenora a black woman and got orders to give her a strong body type and motherly qualities. To add that motherly quality, they gave her an apron. (uh-oh)
* However, the apron made her look too much like a regular mom. So since she worked at a museum and dug up fossils they added details to the apron to make it into a "work apron". They never had a Gym Leader wear an apron before and thought this was a good reason to have Lenora wear one.

(And so Lenora never had a problem with her apron again... until the US audience saw her. It's kind of morbidly funny how much focus was put into making her apron... only for it to be removed internationally. But from this interview its obvious there was no original malice intended, if there was any stereotype to Lenora's apron it was that she was meant to be a mother figure but they recognized that so tried to make the apron look more work-related. Lava Cut Content also mentioned that originally the questions in her Gym was cooking related which I didn't know, and I gotta agree with the change to being Pokemon related because there's no reason for them to be cooking related inside a Gym that's an archaeology and history museum)

Chili, Cilan & Cress: Originally the design team was ordered to give them all the same face, but for the first Gym Leaders for a brand new generation they felt that would have been dull looking. So they gave them individuality relating to their type: Chili's hair looks like fire, Cilan's look like a tuft of grass, and Cress like flowing water. However they didn't go over-the-top as they wanted to stick to the waiter concept.

(Ohmura also jokes the triplets ended up not looking like triplets, guess he never heard of fraternal twins/triplets? Like, okay, they would definitely had to design their hair to look as they way they do, but being this is in an anime world there's nothing to say those aren't their natural hair and eye color. But yeah, good idea to make them look different and not all the same because what made that sound like a good decision for Gym Leaders, aka notable characters that is suppose to have an impact on the player?)

Burgh:
* Told to come up with a cool, stylish artist guy which proved difficult for Ohmura. He didn't really know what that meant. They also already did a straightforward attractive guy with N and specifics for Burgh asks for long hair. Burgh was given tussled hair to give him some lovable charm.
* Then comes the well known story about Burgh's design: Ohmura took aside female staff members and asked what they their idea of a cool guy is. Apparently the same names kept coming up and Ohmura figured that if that's what the standard is he'd better implement them in Burgh. Burgh was given slightly drooping eyes and the bridge of his nose being straight among other features gathered.

(So who were the names that kept coming up? I'm guessing celebrities, would be kind of awkward if those names were fellow staffers)

Clay:
* Clay was difficult to design. He's a tycoon and president of a mining company. He's also Japanese descent of who lives outside of Japan, hearing about people who move abroad chasing the American Dream. (Okay, this is kind of sounding like they're surprised there's Japanese people who live in other countries, or rather people of Japanese descent who aren't from Japan. I'm sure it wasn't meant to come out like that, but it kind of does)
* They wanted to give all the Gym Leaders different body types, so in contrast to Elesa (I'm noticing Elesa is being used a lot as an example... or model... wait is that the joke here?) they made Clay short, stout, and rotund.
* To show he's not a guy who sits behind a desk, someone who wouldn't delegate things he can do himself, he was given a cellphone and other things (guessing the watch he's constantly looking at and a briefcase) to give the impression he's a busy guy.

(I'm still curious about the whole Texan appearance, was that from the owner of a mining corporation and chasing the American Dream concept?)

Skyla:
* They were told to design Skyla as a "caring older sister"; she's carried luggage around the airport, pilot a cargo plane, and rally all the men. (Um, GF, you do know those jobs are all handled by different positions: luggage carriers, pilots, and ... actually, what do they mean "rally all the men"? Do you think cheerleaders work are airports? And no, that is not the job of flight attendants... well supposed to be...)
* Her early designs gave her wild facial expressions and they decided that the "caring older sibling" trope had been done before so went with a standard cute young girl. (so "caring older sibling" was considered already done, but not cute young girl which every Lass and Beauty are? Just admit you wanted to draw cute girls...). But it worked out as they didn't have a Gym Leader like that. (Elesa is meant to be sexy and I guess when they thought they had already done the "older caring" person they may be referring to Lenora who was described as a motherly figure?)
* Still, her "slightly sexy" outfit is what's left of her original design. (caring older sister = sexy. GF you gotta let your artists go outside once in a while...)
* The bags she wears on her legs carry her Poke Balls. I gotta quote this next part: "We figured these were kind of like little holsters someone might typically use to hold gun magazines, but instead Skyla fills them with Pokeballs - when she takes one out, the next one is ready to go. We added these holsters as a way to accentuate her design". (I don't know what to say... why were gun holsters even part of the design? She's a pilot, they typically don't carry guns as you don't want to fire a gun thousands of feet in the air inside a pressured tube)

(These are just great, lol! And next up we have Elesa, hold on tight boys!)


Elesa:
* Being a model they gave Elesa long legs. They worried it would make her look out of place, but since she's a model that's the impression they wanted to give off. (You know I thought it was odd how Elesa bluntly introduced herself as a model in BW, but now I think I see why)
* Sugimori chimes in with this quote: "Even with models in real life, they often have those almost inhuman, but attractive faces after all." (Okay...)
* They wanted to get across the idea that models do really have different bodies from marital artists and fighters; Elesa's figure was something she had worked hard and trained for.
* Since the way models walk down the runway expressionless makes them look like robots, they designed Elesa with a mechanical look resulting in her looking like an android. Since she was the Electric-type Gym Leader it meshed well.
* Originally her headphones didn't have cords, but the scenario writer says Elesa listens to to a lot of music (She does?) so they added them in. They made them look like long strands of hair to match with her android appearance.

(Oh boy, that went some interesting places. Look GF, we understand you're all dweebs, but runway models aren't these mysterious creatures from an alien planet, they're human beings like you and me. Joking mostly aside, obviously they aren't being disrespectful as they mention Elesa works hard for her body to be the way it is, though at the same time I feel they don't know what they're talking about. Like if Elesa was a real person I would be honestly worried she's anorexic which I can imagine a major issues many models have as they try to keep to a certain body size for their job and livelihood)


And that's it for the Lava Cut Content stuff, for now hopefully. Don't forget to check out Lava Cut Content and his Youtube channel for more cut content info.

But we're not done yet! We got that Kotaku article about what Type of Gym would GF staff members have:

However there is a catch: it's only two of them, Junichi Masuda and Shigeru Ohmori, since this is a question asked of them at E3.

Masuda says he's be an Electric-type Gym Leader due to his musical roots. He says his Gym would have a lot of synthesizers at work and "Christmas tree-like" lights and when suggested would it have lasers he nodded vigorously. (So sort of sounds like Masuda would have a club rave party Gym with ton of colorful neon lights. Guessing Masuda would probably be a DJ-type of character, at the back of the Gym mixing tracks)

Ohmori's pick was a bit more practical, choosing to be an Ice-type Gym Leader since he doesn't like the heat and E3 was being held on hot day in Los Angeles. All he said was that that his Gym would be very well air conditioned and just wanted a place to chill. (Doesn't leave much to the imagination, maybe a spa-like Gym which focused on cold and cooling-based treatments)

So, what would your Gym be? (My Gym would be Fire. While I don't like the heat as Ohmori doesn't, it's still my favorite Type. Not quite sure what my Gym would be, thinking maybe pull a twist that its a technological place which works on solar power. In order to keep the place up and running there needs to be a balance of the heat which provides energy and the cold needed to keep the computers from overheating)
 
So, what would your Gym be?
I have two ideas, both centered around Volcarona being my favorite Pokemon.

My first idea is a Fire gym, taking place on top of a dormant volcano. Because the volcano is dormant, the area is covered in snow, and the gym puzzle would have something to do with melting ice. Volcarona would be my ace, but I would also have a Froslass with Will-O-Wisp, as I really like when a gym leader has a Pokemon of a different type, as long as it knows a move of the themed type.

My second idea would be an early Bug gym. I don't know the puzzle specifics, but I do know what the team would be. My lead would be Surskit, to thwart anyone who thought they could be clever and use a Rock or Fire type. My second would be Larvesta. Finally, my ace would be Scyther, my original favorite Pokemon.
 
Can I take a moment to appreciate what a warm and welcome environment the Orange Island Forum is? Or heck even all of Smogon. It's just so rare to have a video game forum where everyone can share their opinions on the games and be met with either support or criticism but never personal attacks and astoundingly little trolling.

Not going to lie, I've been having a rough day and made the bad decision to enter the cesspool that is the Gamefaqs forums which really puts things into perspective on how unique this site is.

So if you're reading this right now? Give yourself a hug because you're beautiful and thanks for making this a great place.

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Pikachu315111

Ranting & Raving!
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While I don't play GO I do like keeping track of the special events they do, and the new Team GO Rocket takeover one is just AWESOME! Not only because it's a villain team from the games, but there's continuity to it plus an additional (and fridge horror) element!

For the continuity, we go to the ending of the USUM's Episode RR. Giovanni and Rainbow Rocket are defeated, Rainbow Rocket and the villain team leaders they took are returned to their world, but Giovanni sticks around for just a bit to muse to himself before vanishing into an Ultra Wormhole:


And, at the end of the Team GO Rocket trailer what does the encrypted message say: "Earth is where I shall unleash my evil schemes next!"

Curious if that was what was being planned or the ending USUM line was meant to be an open-ended excuse to just have this dimensional travelling Giovanni be used in any game, be it the core series or spin-offs. Well, whatever the intention, it's at least neat to see the small bit of continuity, though since the Team Rocket in USUM was called "Rainbow Rocket" and the one in GO is called "GO Rocket" if that means Team Rocket will now have a new adjective depending on where they pop-up. Guess Giovanni has to find some amusement somewhere. :P

But the fridge horror has me really interested: Shadow Pokemon. Not seen since the Colosseum games, it's both a neat twist (at least on paper) but also has some fridge horror/unfortunate implications. There's a dimensional travelling Team Rocket which have a way to close Pokemon hearts and turn them into furious Shadow Pokemon.

Now the Japanese GO Twitter shows a silhouette image of Giovanni with 7/28 next to it, so Giovanni will likely make an appearance though who knows if that means you'll be able to challenge him right away (though would be interesting to see him drawn in the GO art style, lol). However parts of me wants them to do another twist, like we're all expecting Giovanni but when the reveal the silhouette it's not Giovanni but rather Ardos, having been picked up by Giovanni and shared the secret of the Shadow Pokemon process with him. Would be another nice reference to continuity (and maybe encourage Pokemon Company to make another Colosseum game...).
 

Pikachu315111

Ranting & Raving!
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Originally I was going to post this in the Pokemon Master's thread, but thinking about it it's more fitting for this thread. It's more related to little neat things that Master is doing and not exactly about Masters. In fact, I'm going to copy & paste a post I made there for similar reasons:

Not sure if it's related to Pokemon Masters directly, but the next TCG expansion looks to be also focusing on the trainers with a new mechanic/gimmick. Called "Dream League" in Japan, while they don't have any Pokemon cards called "Trainer's Pokemon" like they done with the past Gym Leader and Villain Team themed cards, the GX Pokemon do sometimes feature the trainer associated with that Pokemon in the card art (like in Vileplume GX you see Erika, Silvally GX you see Gladion, etc.).

HOWEVER there's more, last few sets introduced GX "Tag Team" cards, a GX card which featured two Pokemon with had a super powerful GX move though if they're knocked out your opponent takes 3 prize cards. It's here where they new set's mechanic/gimmick comes in. Right now we only know of two, but some (or maybe all, aren't sure yet) GX "Tag Team" feature a trainer in it associated with those Pokemon. As with other GX "Tag Team" Pokemon their GX move is powerful on its own, BUT if you played a Trainer Card associated with the trainer on that card the GX Move gains an additional effect.

GX "Tag Team" Reshiram & Zekrom features N. Their normal GX move just does 170 damage to one of your opponent's Benched Pokemon (BTW, you can only use one GX Move per game so, while certainly powerful, isn't too broken... but yeah power creep really has taken over the TCG). BUT, if you played the Trainer Card "N's Preparations" (which, if you're playing a Dragon deck, is a pretty handy card itself), you can select two of your opponent's Benched Pokemon to do 170 damage to.


GX "Tag Team" Solgaleo & Lunala feature's Lillie. Their normal GX move just does 200 damage to the Defending Pokemon (which considering their normal move does 230 with the only side effect being you can't use that move next turn, seems pretty weak). However if you played Trainer Card "Lillie's Resolve" (which is a bit of a pinch situation card so not as good as N's, though I don't really play the TCG so I could be wrong), while it still only does 200 damage, it also protects all your Pokemon from any damage and effects on your opponent's next turn. Another fun factoid, the name of the GX Move is "Light of the Goddess", lol.


And as always we have other Trainer cards named after characters from the game, like this set has Roxie and Clay. But going back to the new mechanic/gimmick, it looks like they're really focusing a lot on the Trainers of the franchise this gen which, like with my initial thoughts with Pokemon Masters, I like seeing. Pokemon may be the selling point, but the Trainers and their personalities and stories add depth and stakes to the games (and regions and locations in that region add the setting, atmosphere, and world building). And even if this is only for one TCG set to loosely tie it in with Pokemon Masters, just glad to see all the human characters we're meant to form a bond or at least experience with before they're thrown away once we're done with them are getting some more spotlight on them.


So, what was the new neat thing I noticed from Masters? It has to do with the Sync Moves, or rather some of the odd cases and possibilities of others. Many of the Gym Leader's (and one of the Frontier Brain's) Sync Moves involves their Gym Leader/Frontier Brain Title, or something close enough to it I counted it. However there are a few Gym Leaders (and a Frontier Brain) where this isn't the case:
  • Candice's Sync Move is "All-about-Focus Avalanche". Her Gym Title is "The Diamond Dust Girl", however there is another explanation for this Sync Move name and is that she does say "all about focus" before you start the Gym battle. However is that line really that memorable you wouldn't name her Sync Move something like "Diamond Dust Abalance"?
  • Crasher Wake's Sync Move is "Crashdown Aqua Jet". His Gym Title is "The Torrential Masked Master!" and, aside it having "crash" in its name, I have no idea where they got "crashdown" from and why they used it instead of "Torrential Aqua Jet".
  • Iris's Sync Move is "Dragon Sage Outrage". Her Gym Title is "The Girl Who Knows The Hearts of Dragons" and she is never referred to as a sage (if anything that's more Drayden). Though I can see having some difficulty turning her title into a Sync Move name, "Heart of the Dragon Outrage" maybe?
  • Korrina's Sync Move is "Give-It-All-Ya-Got Power-Up Punch". Her Gym Title is "The Evolution Fighter" but she does say something similar to her Sync Move's name when you're about to face her in the Tower of Mastery: she tells her Lucario "Let's give it all we've got!". This is another title I'm also having problems thinking what a Sync Move name would be like, "Fighting Evolved Power-Up Punch"? I guess they could have maybe done something with her other title of "Mega Evolution Successor".
  • Brycen's Sync Move is "Lights, Camera, Ice Shard". His Gym Title is "Ice Mask", with his Sync Move obviously being a reference to his actual identity being a famous movie actor. "Ice Mask" is also kind of hard to work in a Sync Move name, I can't even think of anything.
  • Janine's Sync Move is "Ninja Spirit Cross Poison". Her Gym Title is "The Poisonous Ninja Master", a title she inherited from her father, but I have no idea where "spirit" comes in. Unless this is supposed to be a in-joke how they give the "Soul Badge" due to them accidentally switching its name with Sabrina's Badge. Still, "Ninja Master Cross Poison" would match her title better.
  • Clair's Sync Move is "No Mercy Dragon Pulse". Her Gym Title is "The Blessed User of Dragon Pokemon" and no point she says "no mercy" (not that it doesn't fit her attitude). I can only guess maybe they didn't want to use the word "blessed" like "Blessed Dragon Pulse".
  • Thorton's Sync Move is "Post-analysis Flash Cannon". His Frontier Title is "Factory Head", the same as Noland who is also a recruitable character in Masters and he uses "Factory Head" in his Sync Move so that's probably why they didn't with Thorton. Thorton also talks a lot about analyzing things so the name makes sense for him. Though it also makes me wonder if maybe both Thorton and Noland shouldn't use "Factory Head" so directly. Like maybe Thorton could be "Factory Analysis Flash Cannon" while Noland's would be "Factory Knowledge X-Scissor". Makes me wonder what they would do with Anabel and Palmer since, at least in the Japanese version, they're both the Tower Tycoon (and English creates more complexity as the renamed Greta's Title to being the Arena Tycoon).
  • Tate's Sync Move is "Zen Headbutt of Duality" and Liza's Sync Move is "Psychic of Duality". Since you fought them in a Double Battle they share a Gym Title, "The Mystic Combination". I get them wanting to link them together as they did, though also wouldn't mind maybe seeing them also give them some individuality like "Zen Headbutt Combination" and "Mystic Psychic".
  • Wulfric's Sycn Move is "Unstoppable Avalance". His Gym Title is "Tough as an iceberg, hot as a furnace". They didn't even try here from what I can tell. There's also a few things they could have done with his Gym Title like "Tough & Hot Avalanche" or "Iceberg Furnace Avalanche".
But other then those the Sync Moves usually references something about their Gym Title. Now, the Elite Four and Alolan Captains were never given titles so, since the Gym Leader's Sync Moves reference their Gym Titles, could that possibly mean the Elite Four and Alolan Captain's Sync Moves would be a hint of what their Title would be if they had them:

Karen is "Beguiling Dark Pulse"
Flint is "Burn-It-All Overheat"
Shauntal is "Dark Tales of the Shadow Ball"
Lorelei is "Freezing Tower Blizzard"
Will is "Mystery Masquerade Psychic"
Drake is "Righteous Heart Dragon Claw"
Olivia is "Shining Gem Continental Crush"
Wikstrom is "Shining Knight Iron Head"
Kahili is "Supersonic Skystrike Drive"
Bruno is "Trained-to-the-Max Dynamic Punch"
Agatha is "Tried-and-True Hex"
Hapu is "Ultimately Worthy Tectonic Rage"
Mina is "Wandering Artist Twinkle Tackle"
Siebold is "Water Pulse Du Jour"
Marshal is "Way-of-the-Warrior Focus Punch"
Sophocles is "Whiz Kid Gigavolt Havoc"

While I can see some of them working, others I think would need work (or they would be like the above oddities). Now I've personally given each Elite Four and Alolan Captain a "Title" (and a few other characters like Champions and giving some characters more specialized titles), and while I think I came up is clever it makes me wonder if these are going to be the closest we get to an official "Title" for these characters.
 
A nice about little detail about Dialga and its signature move, which you probably didn't notice, because well, who uses Roar of Time aside from 1v1 and maybe a base move for Devastating Drake?

If you look at the anime, you'll notice that it when prepares to use the attack, it extend its fin on its back.
189527


And it has a unique animation in the 3DS games that mirrors the anime:
189528


No other attack on Dialga reflects this. For all the problems all the Pokemon animations, its a nice little detail that they didn't have to do but they did.
 
A nice about little detail about Dialga and its signature move, which you probably didn't notice, because well, who uses Roar of Time aside from 1v1 and maybe a base move for Devastating Drake?

If you look at the anime, you'll notice that it when prepares to use the attack, it extend its fin on its back. View attachment 189527

And it has a unique animation in the 3DS games that mirrors the anime: View attachment 189528

No other attack on Dialga reflects this. For all the problems all the Pokemon animations, its a nice little detail that they didn't have to do but they did.
I suspect it does, just you don't often see Dialga's whole body like this. (I swear the animation is used for other beam style attacks like Flash Cannon)
 
When I use Flash Cannon on Dialga in-game, it never extends the fin to use Flash Cannon. It’s only used on Roar of Time.
Huh. I thought it did, but wasn't seen because only around its mouth is shown during the attack. I probably remembered wrong; it's been awhile since I've seen Dialga in action. (mostly because I've been playing through Y lately)
 
I had originally planned that my previous post here would be my last post in this thread before the release of Sword/Shield, but that changed. I came up with a lot more things that I like about Pokémon, so I decided to make one more post here with all these things.

To start with, something simple. I like the Location Previews in FR/LG and HG/SS. They were a really neat feature, letting you see an image of every special area before entering it. The ones in FR/LG were fairly basic, but I think some of the images were really cool and well done. My favorites are the ones used for the forests, the Safari Zone, the Power Plant, the Pokémon Mansion, the Pokémon Tower and Silph Co. But in HG/SS, they really went all out with the location previews. I think most of the images are really beautiful. There are four different variations for them depending on the current time when you enter the area, and there's a Pokémon in every image, many of them are different depending on the current time as well. Some of the Pokémon are slightly hidden, requiring you to look closely in order to find them. I always liked looking at the images whenever I entered a new special area in HG/SS, sometimes I even went back and re-entered the area just so I could see the image again. There wasn't a whole lot of things I liked from HG/SS, but the location previews is definitely one of these things. So that is another thing I like from my least favorite games.

I like how there are some things that aren't standard in all video games, but that the Pokémon games have always gotten right. Some examples:
- The games have always allowed the player to save the game everywhere and at any time (with a few small exceptions).
- There has always been some sort of way to travel faster. The bike has existed since Gen 1 (and there's Tauros in Gen 7 which has the same function), the Running Shoes have been in every game since Gen 3, and there was the Roller Skates in X/Y.
- There has always been a well-done and efficient quick-travel or "warp" system with Fly (and Charizard in Gen 7).
- The games have always featured a way to completely heal your party for free in Pokémon Centers, and you have always been able to use the PC system in any Pokémon Center whenever you want to.
- You can continue playing the games for as long as you want after you have beaten the main story.
There is probably more but this was the main things I could think about regarding this.

I like how you often have to go through a cave or something before you get to the lair of a legendary Pokémon. This makes it feel a bit more like a test or a challenge to see if you really are worthy of catching the legendary, as opposed to just getting them served on a silver platter. I think this was something that the earlier generations (1-5) did very well, but there are some instances in Gen 6-7 where it is also very well done.

I like how we are able to give nicknames to Pokémon in the games. I think it is fun to give them nicknames as opposed to just having the default names all the time. I like trying to come up with creative and fun nicknames. I also like how you can have a nickname for your player character in some games. While this has only been done twice, first in Join Avenue in B2/W2 and then in X/Y (where I think the rivals are the only ones that call you by your nickname, though I might remember incorrectly), it was still a pretty fun feature.

In addition to the above, I like how Gen 6 expanded on the number of characters you can use for Pokémon names and nicknames, allowing for 12 characters as opposed to 10 in previous generations. This makes it possible to have longer nicknames, which I think is great as it allowed me to give nicknames that wasn't possible in previous generations. In addition to this, I also like how Gen 6 expanded on the number of characters you can have regarding the name of your playable character. There are some character names I couldn't have had if it wasn't for this, I also remember that it was a bit annoying at some points in the earlier generations when I couldn't give a certain name to my character because it was too long. Now you can have longer names for both Pokémon and trainers, and that is something I like a lot.

I like the Battle Styles in Gen 7. They are really fun feature, I like how you can customize the way you throw your Poké Ball and what pose you have before and after a battle.

I wrote a lot about Battle Facilities in my previous post in this thread. I thought I had said everything I wanted to say about them, but I came up with two more things I like about them. The first one is this: starting with B/W, every first pair have had a secondary facility to go along with the main one. B/W and X/Y had the Battle Institute to go along with the Subway and Maison, while S/M had the Battle Royal Dome in addition to the Tree. The new standard for Battle Facilities in every game is 2 as opposed to 1 in previous generations, I think that's really good.

The second thing is pretty obvious, but it is this: I like how every follow-up game that isn't a remake have had one or more Battle Facilities to go along with the one(s) from the first pair. R/S only had the Battle Tower, Emerald added six more facilities and created an entire Battle Frontier. It was the same in Gen 4, D/P had the Tower while Platinum expanded it into a Frontier. In Gen 5, B2/W2 had the PWT and Black Tower/White Treehollow in addition to the Subway and Institute. In Gen 7, US/UM added the Battle Agency to the Tree and Royal Dome. So that's cool.

Next up, I want to give some praise to another game pair I like even if they aren't my very top favorites. Looking back, I have been unfairly and unnecessarily harsh towards these games in the past, and that is something I regret because I have realized that I really like them. The games I am talking about are OR/AS. I think they are really good games, they were a lot of fun to play. When it comes to the things I personally think are the most important in Pokémon games, OR/AS does a lot right and very little wrong. Two very notable things that they get right are these: epic training spots and having a National Dex. The latter of these things is especially notable. OR/AS are tied with X/Y as the games which has the largest National Dex to date, and they are currently the last main series games released to feature the National Dex at all. While I won't deny that OR/AS have some flaws, I find them to have way more positives than negatives on the whole. And like with X/Y, I'm willing to look past their flaws just because of everything they do right. I really like OR/AS, and I have gotten to appreciate both them and X/Y a lot more after playing Gen 7. In the end, OR/AS are among my favorite games in the series, beaten only by B/W, B2/W2 and X/Y.

Finally, something that's unrelated to this thread but that I wanted to say anyway. This will probably be my last post here on Smogon for a while. My original plan was to go on hiatus during most of the pre-release period for Sword/Shield in order to avoid getting too spoiled for them, and despite losing most of my hype for these games, I decided to stick to this plan. This hiatus should have started earlier, but it got delayed for various reasons. It will start now instead, better late than never I guess. I am going to take a break from the forums as well as most other Pokémon and gaming sites until the games are out and I have played through the main story of one of them. I might still come back here and visit once in a while during this hiatus, but don't expect it. So this is goodbye for now. See you on the other side of Gen 8!
 
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Pikachu315111

Ranting & Raving!
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So when Pokemon Masters was announced one of the things I was looking forward to was possible remixes of the Gym Leaders, Elite Four, Champions, Rivals, Villain Team, etc.. However, all I thought would be remixes using different instruments and/or pacing of the music.

Little did I know they did complete remixes of all themes...

EDIT: Since I just don't want this post being only a link to my review of the themes in the Pokemon Master's thread, here's my favorite remix: it's the Gen 4 rival Barry's:
 

Xucrute

mt tchola
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These days I’ve been enjoy a lot, like a lot the Pokémon Refresh, petting the mons is so nice and heartwarming, I’ve paying a lot of attention to some of the animations, I like high fiving them much it gives so much personality and life to a lot of them, even tho I’m not planning on getting SwSh I’m looking forward to see the Pokémon refresh of the generation and all the possible improvements they might have made to it.
Edit: where’s my boy Bulu high five GF, it’s the only guardian I couldn’t get a high five :puff:
 
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Codraroll

Cod Mod
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Minor thing, but I really like how Pokémon Go somehow manages to showcase most of the otherwise forgettable Pokémon out there.

With some five hundred Pokémon in the game, and counting, one would think the dregs of the Pokédex would fall into obscurity as easily as they do in other Pokémon media. There are quite a lot of Pokémon out there with nothing really going for them, that you see once or twice in-game and then forget about. But those Pokémon still tend to find their way to the forefront of Go players' minds.

The designers achieve this in two main ways: Some Pokémon that would otherwise be known as forgettable crapmons are really common in Go. 'Mons like Drowzee, Gulpin, Snubbull, Mankey or Barboach are found on every street corner. You won't be forgetting them anytime soon if you play Pokémon Go for a while.

The other way is to make the Pokémon so rare that you jump for joy when you see them appear. Ones like Pineco, Burmy or Finneon are rare enough that they're always worth it to catch. Unown achieves a sort of mythical status for its rarity in the wild. Clamperl, Hippopotas, Cherubi, Kecleon... those are Pokémon few bother with in-game, but are all 'mons a Go player will take a long detour to catch if they appear nearby.

Then there are regional exclusives, Pokémon that only appear in certain parts of the world and are highly coveted for trade. Pachirisu, Chatot and Relicanth are almost legendarily rare to come by outside of their spawning areas. Having ones like Tropius or Uxie on your team really shows you're a world traveler (or a dirty spoofer, I guess). I've found myself badly wanting a Torkoal for months now. How could that ever happen? When was the last time anybody ever wanted to obtain a Torkoal?

There are also ones like Swablu or Wailmer that require vast amounts of Candy to evolve, so you need to catch many of them. When you see them, you grab them, and consider them a good catch. Cherubi, Chingling or Miltank are rare Egg hatches, and always a neat surprise to see.

In sum, I really liked how this collector game managed to make even boring, plain Pokémon be highly sought after. Ones that players want to find, instead of overlooking them because they are underwhelming in battle. Sure, the model can make you really tired of some Pokémon too (particularly the ones that spawn often), but at least you're not forgetting them.
 
I really love a lot of things in pokemon, firstly, I really love scenario, indeed this is classic but I love the scenario of DPP and BW2, the scenario of DPP is just perfect because there is action, the same as BW2 but we can catch more legendary pokemon. Next, this is strategy in Pokemon Showdown of course, with PS, I can meet lot of nicest user and become friend :) and we can play with a lot of choice. The strategy is very nice for me :). Thirdly, there is a TCG, another things to play with friends but in real life, TCG is the same as PS but with a card, this a good entertainment too, and we can collect a lot of card for having a big collection ^^. I really like inconsistencies and mystery of pokemon, inconsistencies make pokemon a little bit unique :), and mystery make pokemon is mysterious, and I love it. Finally I want to speak about anime, this is a good things because this is another way to relax while watching television from his passion: Pokemon. I really like Pokemon :).
 
Not about Pokemon but Smogon itself:

Compared to other forums, I love how organized and personalized Smogon is. Pretty much every section in this website is reasonably distinguished from one another (i.e. Competitive play is clearly distinguished from casual play which a few other forums I've been on have issues doing) and clever naming gives each forum a nice dose of personality. Lots of effort is put into keeping the forum clean rather than overflowing with threads dedicated to asking random questions (asking questions isn't bad, but there's a Q&A thread for a reason). Smogon nails the personality aspect really nicely, between default avatars being Pokemon sprites, and most importantly, badges. I remember back when I was 13, I thought this was the coolest shit ever since it clearly separated the pros from the novice users and I tried so hard to get one since it showed my "rank" was on another level. Since my actual life during middle school wasn't the best, getting a badge was, no joke, one of my happiest memories during that time. Its funny looking back on it now, since being a mod on other forums isn't even that big of deal, but the fact that it felt like a big deal just to earn a badge made my experience on Smogon so much better than it was on other forums.

Something else I love is the dedication to creating content on this website. Between writing Pokemon analyses, programming for Pokemon Showdown, and creating sprites and art that ends up being used in articles or Pokemon Showdown, there is a huge amount of creative talent and community effort that's expressed here, which is an area that I find most other forums lack. Alot of content here feels meaningful and like it'll have lasting impact rather than being forgetting within the next 40 minutes.

Smogon isn't perfect obviously and my interest to be part of the community has dwindled drastically, but as far as forum experiences go, its still one of the best out there and I don't regret any time I've spend in the community.
 
Lot of people are giving Sinnoh discredit recently, so I wanted to introduce something that Sinnoh does well: The implementation of mythical Pokemon. Think about it. Throughout Sinnoh, the plates, myths, and Cynthia foreshadow a being more powerful than Dialga/Palkia, the original one. And when you achieve, the Azure Flute, you finally enter the Hall of Origin, to catch the Original One, located on the Hall of Origin, at the top of Mt. Coronet, where Sinnoh Began. Ok, I'm aware the Azure Flute was never properly distributed, but it was still nice foreshadow.

Darkrai is mentioned when you listen to the Sailor's son cry in his nightmare, and when you encounter it, its through a an abandoned building, adjacent to the Pokemon who cured the nightmares, Cresselia.

Floroma Town, a wasteland originally burst into flowers after someone gave gratitude. Considering the Gracidea is obtained in Floaroma Town, as well as the fact that Seabreak Path and Flower Paradise are covered in Flowers, its heavily implied to be Shaymin.

Even Manaphy has its own sidequest in Pokemon Ranger so its not entirely given away for free.

And the best part is that these all ( except Manaphy ) have boss fights. But unlike, previous boss fights, there's a lot of foreshadow and build up towards these fights unlike the ones from Gen 3, which are just there; not to mention that all of them are on islands that aren't even part of Hoenn/Kanto, so they feel disconnected.

So back to my point, Sinnoh has the best mythical Pokemon because they all have some lore in the region, and have boss fights. Most other mythical Pokemon usually only have one or the other. Now days, all mythical Pokemon seem to lack both, with SM's Magearna, Marshadow, and Zeraora having no boss fights or lore and just seemingly exist to promote merchandise like the movies.
 

Yung Dramps

awesome gaming
This is a little detail I like that I'm having difficulty finding the words to explain well so apologies in advance if I sound like I have brain damage

As some of you might be aware, I really, really like regional variants. One of the things I like the most about them is how... ...I'll say "integrated" into the region they are. Unlike the menagerie of alternate forms out there, regional variants are not really considered "special". You don't get high praise for getting one, you don't talk to special NPCs to figure out their true power, they aren't even really noted much more than native Pokemon. They're just like everything else in the region. That may sound like a criticism, but that's a complement, it gives the vibe they are essentially a part of the region despite being a refurbished version of a pre-established Pokemon. When you find an Alolan Geodude or Exeggutor in the wild or fight Alolan Marowak or Ninetales in the Battle Tree somewhere, it doesn't say "You found an Alolan Geodude!" or give a special message or whatever, it's just called Geodude, or Marowak, or Ninetales in battle messages and the menus. I really, really like that, and with Galar giving us overworld encounters it'll be awesome seeing these guys wandering around with the unaltered old mons and the brand new stuff, as if they are a part of the Galar crew.
 

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