Here I was ready to sleep through the morning, but no. Apparently I have a problem.
Let’s just jump in so that I don’t spend a billion years writing this post — as I tend to do with these updates. I’ll keep it short and sweet by focusing on three things addressed in today’s trailer:
Version exclusives, new Pokémon and… Gigantamaxing.
Gold, Silver and Crystal started the trend of different versions having unique legendaries that changed details about an overall identical story (though Yellow technically led the way by making an anime-inspired version of Red/Blue/Green).
Arguably the first major game-to-game change was the Magma/Aqua split in Ruby and Sapphire, even if they were just different villains in the same circumstances.
It wouldn’t be until Emerald version that they truly stood out as different entities.
In Sword and Shield we will be getting version exclusive Gym Leaders. Sword will have the Fighting-type Bea, while Shield will have the Ghost-type Allister:
This new Rock-type is essentially a mobile ball of coal with a lamp that must have been a godsend during the Galar Industrial Revolution. It’s new Steam Engine ability increases the Pokémon’s speed when hit by Fire or Water-type moves.
Like… Is this something we’ll have to breed onto our Pokémon if we want competitive Gigantamaxing over Dynamaxing?
I don’t know, man. The official website only has so much information, so I can’t fully speak to the merits of this mechanic.
All I can say is I’m unfortunately still not into it.
And that’s that, ladies and gentlemen. New Pokémon information to salivate over.
While I’m not enamored by Gigantamaxing and the latest crop of monsters are more on the weird side, I’m still plenty excited overall. Especially by the prospect of having more unique trainers to meet on each journey through Galar!
So let me know what you think of this latest trailer.
While you do that, I’m going to make use of this closure and go back to sleep.
Then the locale of Pokémon Black & White came up again when I was wandering Barnes & Noble with my sister and discovered a book of Santa Harukaze comics, put out by Viz Media.
I put off buying it because money, but figured if I saw the book again I might give it another thought.
Then we went to a different bookstore and the fateful book was there too.
I’m not one to tempt fate.
So here I am, reading through 300+ pages of comedic manga-style comic strips about Unova Pokémon, ready to teach you the gospel.
The first thing you need to know is these are “comedic” comics. Like Family Circus or any other traditional funny page staple, some of these one-off jokes are funnier than others.
It’s telling that the Stunfisk comic was my favorite of the bunch.
That’s peak comedy.
This comic is emblematic of what 70 percent of the collection is: Jokes about a design element or Pokédex entry.
The appearance bits are usually blasé, like Galvantula having too many eyes to cover in case of a surprise.
But I quite like seeing aspects of these Pokémon that I’d always disregarded as innocuous details:
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Another repeat detail throughout these comics are Pokémon being treated meanly, often for no reason.
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Apparently everyone in Unova is a mischievous trickster like Scraggy or in the wrong place at the wrong time like Oshawott.
Though these are Pokémon, so it’s not very surprising that they battle and act aggressively. What is surprising is the way we playing with continuity.
The creatures spend a lot of time playing with or referencing human technology:
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Their confusion suggests these guys are still animals.
But… They sure do spend a lot of time talking and having personalities like in the Mystery Dungeon games.
So maybe these comics take place in that universe?
Except then this page comes along and ruins everything.
Of course Nimbasa City exists here. Thanks, comic.
But then there’s the weird stuff.
Oh boy is there a whole lot of weird stuff in these comics. And it’s the best part.
Some of these are far better out of context. Trust me.
One thing I don’t fully understand about the collection is how nonsensically ordered it is. Though the individual comics are segmented by focusing on different Pokémon, they don’t proceed through the book in number or alphabetical order.
It seems entirely random, and that’s compounded by the fact that two-part comics can appear pages apart.
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There’s a particular comic about Woobat and Yamask that’s referenced more than 50 pages later and has a disclaimer telling readers to go back.
Twice.
Why not just order the pages to avoid that kind of problem if there’s no sensible ordering scheme in the book?
Though there’s a much more important question buried in these pages.
Why is Throh the only Pokémon with a two-part comic in which he is the named focus on both parts?
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The. Only. One.
Why Throh of all Pokémon?
Like I’m glad the collection has cool tidbits and quizzes on the sides of each page where I can learn things…
But I’m not sure I can forgive Santa Harukaze for making me feel this tumultuous about Throh.
So, in summary:
Is it worth reading through every Pokémon Black & White Pocket Comic in an afternoon?
Honestly… Not really.
The world of Unova comics has highs are pretty high, but the lows are very, very low. So much so that I don’t think I’d recommend reading through all of them except that you can only find the true gems that way.
I suppose I’d still recommend the book as something of a coffee table read to put out if you have Pokémon-loving guests. But as a Pokémon fan, I’m not sure I would buy the Kalos edition after this one.
…
That’s a real downer note to end a Pokémon-related post, so here’s a picture of Alyson ruining my attempt to get a Featured Image.
I spent a whole lot of hours writing and editing that instead of writing the book that I’m in the middle of.
Because, as I said, you sometimes just need to strike when the iron is hot.
In just over a week that story has been viewed 23 times and received one ‘favorite’ by a user named madcat3200.
Shout out to them.
Those analytics for a brand new platform are almost immediately better than the traffic per-post on my blog, so maybe it will be worth dumping the occasional story over there.
Which of course means now I’m thinking about all the fanfictions I want to write instead of my novel.
Though I think I’ve come up with a decent compromise.
Pokémon Black 2 and White 2 are some of my favorite Pokémon games. They have the most optimized 2D aesthetics and fantastic world building thanks to a two-year time jump from the original games.
The PWT had Gym Leaders and Champions from all five regions currently available gathered in one place to battle with a remix of their games’ original music.
It’s easily my favorite Pokémon post-game, and personal headcanons make the event even better.
For instance, I always loved the idea that Unova Poison-type Gym Leader Roxie performed the music for the PWT, as she’s the head of a punk-rock band.
I like Roxie enough as a result that I got this at Anime Expo some years ago:
Beautiful, isn’t it? I wish I took note of who the artist was so I could promote them… Past me was so insensitive.
Another character added in Black/White 2 was Yancy. To this day, she serves as my favorite almost-canonical relationship in Pokémon history due to a side-quest that involves your character building a bond with her. Very underrated ship.
Yancy also happens to moonlight as a superstar named Nancy — creative, I know.
So… Now that I have an outlet for fanfiction stories… I decided to do something incorporating a few of these characters in the setting I love.
I’ve written two chapters of my Pokémon World Tournament story, which in many ways is a similar dramatization to the Stardew piece. However I have some ideas for bigger developments should I keep the story going.
Thus, where Stardew a one-off, I’m now going to try and write a serialized piece with regular uploads.
Right now I’m imagining a chapter per-week every Monday.
That should be manageable for the first few expository chapters I’m well into writing. From there we’ll see how popular it becomes.
From here on I’m delving into the history of the PWT in my imagining of the story, then having match commentators introduce the preceding.
After that the sky’s the limit! Though there will probably be a lot of simulated Pokémon battles between various leaders from different regions.
Should be fun, right?
If you think so maybe you can follow along. If a few people I know from real life know about this goal, perhaps I’ll be more accountable for publishing once a week.
Let me know how you feel about the idea! It’s probably silly to start another writing project but…
What can I say? I have a lot to get out to the world.
Have you ever had the desire to play a puzzle game?
There are many varieties to get hooked on. Some of the most popular are grid-based matching games like Bejeweled or Candy Crush; fast-paced luck and skill games like Tetris or Puyo Puyo; and logic-driven games like Sudoku or crossword puzzles.
I like myself some Tetris and played Pokémon Shuffle for a long time, but my puzzle game crack is undoubtedly Picross.
Because I’m nothing if not a shill for Pokémon spin-off games.
In the 3DS’s Pokémon Picross, every puzzle creates a different Pokémon.
There were only about 300, and the game had a number of other restrictions including a stamina bar that depleted for each square filled and the requirement for an obscene amount of in-game currency (calls Picrites) to buy upgrades and access new areas.
Both of which were obvious ways to “encourage” spending money.
Even so I fully completed all of the Pokémon puzzles.
And the Omega Ruby/Alpha Sapphire tie-in Primal Reversion murals.
The game featured a daily challenge to gain meager amounts of Picrites for players who did not want to spend money, and I opened that sucked up every day for months to get enough.
It was worth it for me. Not only was Picross incredibly relaxing, but I wanted to see all of the Pokémon — including Mega Evolutions and Legendaries.
They had different skills based on their typing to help players complete puzzles faster. A neat idea that kept me coming back.
At the end I gave up on Pokémon Picross when it wanted me to enter the “Alt-World,” which cost 300 Picrites and used a weird mechanic I could never understand.
Didn’t think much of Picross for a couple years after.
But I didn’t want to buy a game for the Switch. Or bother with Alt-World stuff in Pokémon Picross.
So I turned to the iPhone app store.
My first attempt was a game simply called Nonogram.
This version is good for quick games. You pick a difficulty level and solve one puzzle. Lather, rinse, repeat.
The puzzles themselves were fine, but the game had issues. First, it gives you three incorrect moves before prematurely ending the session. Second, you cannot re-examine the puzzles you complete or use them in any significant way.
That second point sounds like a nitpick born out of high expectations from Pokémon Picross… And it is.
But the second game I found did fill that niche.
Picture Cross is a Picross game with amazingly worthwhile art direction. The sprites used for menus and worlds are insanely detailed and charmingly reminiscent of the Habbo social networking site.
Each world has a large amount of puzzles that cover up an image you slowly reveal.
Puzzles will often depict the objects they are covering up and can be re-completed, giving them a bit more value in my book.
So far I’m about 50 puzzles into the first of 12 maps, fueled by a combination of my feverish Picross addiction and other completion-driving elements like achievements.
It also helps that the puzzles look pretty good while varying in difficulty.
I really only have a few problems with Picture Cross.
First, the fact that it’s absolutely chock full of advertisements. The game’s free so I can’t complain, but they are long and show up after every puzzle. They’re also often necessary to view if you want to collect more tokens.
Speaking of: Tokens (the game’s main microtransactions) are required to unlock new puzzles. Players can hold 10 tokens that individually recharge every five minutes as a baseline, and more can be gathered via advertisements or awarded after a puzzle.
So far I haven’t run into any problems collecting tokens, but I can foresee Pokémon Picross levels of daily grinding in my future.
Picture Cross also falls behind Nonogram in at least one major category. Nonogram crosses out each individual number in a row or column as they are placed:
See the six on the fourth column.
Only entire rows are blacked out in Picture Cross, which can make things harder to track on a number-by-number level.
Frankly all of those are relatively minor complains to me. I enjoy the game a lot, and I can see it being a nice brain-teasing time-killer.
Plus… Downloading the game gave me stickers in iMessage based on its cute sprites.
Kicking off the Direct was a flashy cinematic of Ultimate’s World of Light in which Link was rescued by The Hero, our next DLC fighter and Dragon Quest representative.
You’d think that would be the big news. Yet Nintendo had one more trick up their sleeve to conclude the Direct:
I’ve never played a DQ game or Banjo-Kazooie, but I know plenty of people who love those series and I’m happy to see them so happy.
Especially given the love and attention both fighters are getting. The Hero has multiple alternate costumes and a final smash featuring different protagonists from that series, Grant Kirkhope was involved in doing the music for Banjo…
It’s just perfect.
Dragon Quest fans and Banjo fans getting their character announced on the same day. pic.twitter.com/duEKvje5nA
Masahiro Sakurai truly is the king of reviving Nintendo history, and looping in Rare was a great way to include a fighter with die-hard fans who fits in the roster far better than Minecraft Steve or Master Chief.
Look at how hype the Donkey Kong characters are for Banjo and Kazooie
The new trailer didn’t show too much more than its Sept. 20 release date…
EXCEPT FOR A TOP-DOWN 2D DUNGEON CREATOR.
THE THING I LITERALLY ASKED FOR WHEN I GRADUATED:
Now that I’m a grad I feel qualified to discuss the question that truly defines our age:
How many copies of #MarioMaker2 do we need to buy to get a top-down Zelda dungeon maker @NintendoAmerica? With themes for the NES Zelda, Link to the Past, Link’s Awakening, Minish Cap, etc. pic.twitter.com/IsJSASbyCK
It mainly featured lore that won’t make a ton of sense until the game releases in…
Wait, late July?
Damn, I thought I had more time. Stop making so many games I want to buy Nintendo, I’m still addicted to Stardew Valley for the next few months!
Pokémon Sword and Shield
I wasn’t expecting any new Pokémon news after the recent Direct, but Nintendo truly is a benevolent overlord.
During the presentation we found out that the Pokéball peripheral from Let’s Go can act as a modern day Pokéwalker and that the Water-type Gym Leader will be Nessa:
Look I played the first couple Olympic crossover games with my sister and they were decent minigame collections.
But the fact that this series is still going astounds me.
Some of you would probably prefer I put Cadence of Hyrule in this major slot since it looks cool and is only $25 bucks, which definitely entices me to buy the game when it drops this Thursday in spite of never playing Crypt of the Necrodancer.
New Horizons not only looks like a wonderful graphical update to the series, but an update that allows for 8-player simultaneous action while potentially building a town from scratch.
That’s… Pretty god damn incredible. Definitely worth pushing the release date to March 2020!
Breath of the Wild is getting a direct sequel, bringing it in-line with Majora’s Mask and the Wind Waker series. A sequel where Link and Zelda are going to be traveling the ravaged Hyrule together and discover some demented shit.
The trailer was just an “in development” teaser, but they sure did succeed in making it emotionally provocative. I’m curious to find out more… Though a lot of that is based on hype from my friends’ speculations.
Which means I guess I have to go finish Breath of the Wild.
Damn you, Nintendo. Quit monopolizing my time when you’re about to monopolize my time with all these new games!
Those were the big ticket items out of this E3 Direct for me, but there were a lot of smaller things that piqued my interest too.
So I looked for things to listen to while playing, and my newest obsession has been a series on Pokémon typings from Lockstin & Gnoggin.
There’s actually a somewhat interesting history behind my discovery of this series.
The channel’s “Every Pokémon Type Explained” has been recommended to me by the platform a number of times. Each episode was recognizable from a uniform thumbnail with black borders around images of different Pokémon with clickbait-y text suggesting they should NOT be that typing.
It always seemed over-the-top for my tastes, so I never watched any part of the series.
Cue life lesson about not judging a book by its cover.
TerminalMontage is another fairly recent addition to my watch list, but became a favorite thanks to his “something about” series where the plots of video games are just torn apart with a goofy cartoon style and memes.
Like his prior Pokémon battle royale video, it was full of interesting deep cuts that made me want to know more about the thought process behind putting the project together.
I enjoyed his style of commentary and seemingly well-calcified knowledge of Pokémon lore. Thus, I finally bit the bullet and started watching the typing videos I’d put off.
In essence each video takes one of the 18 types (minus two as of my writing this) and tries to divide each Pokémon of that type into categories of real-life equivalence. And yes, he does actually indicate which ones might not belong. Clickbait justified.
For instance the rock-type video divides monsters into living rocks or beings that adorn rocks, and further breaks down what kind of real mineral each Pokémon represents.
Meanwhile the ghost-type video (in lieu of real-world science) breaks down every monster into what mythological legend or ghost story they represent.
It’s a really interesting and analytical series about what many probably consider an innocuous franchise. I appreciate the depth and flashy style of editing that shows a lot of care on the production’s back-end.
As a result, that’s my recommendation for the day. I’m always a fan of pointing out great content where I find it… And I really don’t have that much else to talk about tonight.
But stay tuned.
Tomorrow I will complete my video game/YouTube/movie media trifecta with a review of a little movie I’m going to see called John Wick: Chapter 3.
You might have ended a decade of MCU movies, but Detective Pikachu played to my 20-years of investment in the subjectively best video game series of all time.
My development as a person and writer was kick-started by Mom teaching me to read with the text in Pokémon Crystal. I’ve been waiting for this movie ever since.
So, the objective side of my cinephilia can critique a few key issues. But that doesn’t take away from Rob Letterman giving me the breathing Pokémon society — focusing on more than just prodigal, battling children — that I’ve always wanted.
Detective Pikachu follows accountant Tim Goodman (Justice Smith) as he confronts the death of his mother and resulting alienation of his father after the man goes missing in a utopian city designed for Pokémon to coincide with humans.
He does so with the help of a talking Pikachu (Ryan Reynolds — clearly channeling Deadpool while still grounded in this source material) and aspiring investigative reporter Lucy Stevens (Kathryn Newton).
To be blunt, Detective Pikachu is bloated with clichés.
It mimics film noir and buddy cop tropes, such as a boy who needs to learn to love again and his amnesiac animal partner. There are also multiple plot points throughout the movie’s two-hour run you’ve seen before:
The shady, experimenting corporation.
The blossoming love between main (human) characters.
The incidents with a substance that causes loss of control (ala Zootopia).
Besides a surprise twist in the third act, the overall situations are well-worn. Yet the actors keep them from feeling stale.
Reynolds made me love the overplayed series mascot I usually scoff at. He’s snarky, heartfelt and delivers some solid (seemingly improvised) jokes.
Minor spoiler: At one point, he sings a depressed rendition of the original anime theme song, and it’s worth the price of admission alone.
Reynolds and Smith sell the buddy cop bit, and I liked Smith and Newton’s chemistry as well — especially since their burgeoning romance ended without a dramatic kiss.
Smith carried the movie handily, surprisingly so given my lukewarm reception to Fallen Kingdom. I really enjoyed his character arc and relationship with Pikachu that shined during a heart-to-heart mid-way through the film.
That scene in particular also has a gorgeous shot where Smith’s stoic face during a sad story is betrayed by a tear that makes the neon city lights outline his cheek.
Detective Pikachu had surprisingly pretty cinematography in my opinion, outside of some shots that relied too heavily on shaky dissolves and off-center angles for my taste.
On top of that, I never once felt like the CGI Pokémon were out of place. They always seemed believably real in the living people’s arms.
Granted I might be predisposed to believing in real-life Pokémon because of my history and encyclopedic knowledge with the series. But my sister (who saw the movie with me) is less of a hardcore fan and didn’t report any concerns.
We had a blast going together!
Ironically, I felt like the Pokémon CGI was masterful in-part because a lot of the practical effects were… Real bad? Most of the actors looked like they were slipping around on wires during action scenes.
But for me, that was barely a concern in light of the respect Detective Pikachu shows fans of the series in its overt and subtle references.
Alongside the anime’s theme song, most of the music throughout the film sounded like it could have come from the Sinnoh or Unova region games.
There are dozens of the 800+ Pokémon appearing as live models (both the recognizable Pikachu and less conventional Treeckos or Purrloins) and set-pieces (some favorites being the Latios and Latias stickers in Tom’s room, and a store named after Whismur).
Their appearances are true to established lore as well, with Charizard weakened as someone stomps on its tail flame and Slaking almost exclusively loafing around.
Mewtwo‘s powers are a less traditional example that sticks out, but even that strange treatment plays into an unexpected plot point that I enjoyed. Plus, they nailed the legendary Pokémon’s origin with an interesting new angle.
People who are not a fan of the games or anime may be somewhat lost. It immediately drops audiences in and lets most references quickly fly by. Yet enough is explained for the public to follow its plot, and the movie is funny regardless of pre-existing knowledge.
You might get more out of some jokes if you know Mr. Mime, for instance, but even if you don’t his scenes have some great slapstick with effective sound effects.
Frankly, I’m not sure what else I can say.
I’m obviously biased, but the movie is just as obviously tailored toward fans like me. From that perspective, I wholeheartedly recommend Detective Pikachu from my three-year-old heart and from the highly knowledgeable dork I am today.
But the movie also has enough family-friendly elements and appeal for non-super-fans. Some of the effects aren’t perfect, and the overall package leans on clichés, but the cast and world-building do more than enough to make up for it.
I had a blast seeing this movie with my sister. It’s a master class in video game adaptations — One that’s very much needed in the face of Sonic the Hedgehog and Angry Birds 2.
Go see it, so we can get more live action Pokémon movies. And cards to go with them:
There are few things which I will openly admit I have a massive bias toward.
Pokémon is something I unabashedly have a ginormous bias toward.
Pokémon Crystal was my first video game outside of some silly educational titles featuring Sesame Street or Elmo. I’ll always fall back on the story that it helped me learn how to read when I played with my Mom all those years ago because that memory is precious to me.
So whenever a brand new entry in the Pokémon series is announced, I truly feel young at heart.
Let’s just say I had to get up extra early for some meetings and intentionally overdid it to watch the Pokémon Direct live.
Though the announcement was seven minutes long, it offered a lot of hype.
Pokémon Sword and Pokémon Shield are new mainline games set in the Galar region. Kanto through Sinnoh were analogous to different parts of Japan, Unova was analogous to New York, Kalos was analogous to France and Alola was analogous to Hawaii.
Galar will take us into a world modeled after post-Industrial England:
I was a huge fan of the Let’s Go graphics because they were faithful to the original Red/Green/Blue/Yellow while updated for the Switch’s capabilities.
But just off of initial screenshots alone, Sword and Shield look like Pokémon games set in Breath of the Wild Hyrule.
That game’s minimalist style had an almost watercolor quality that screams out with the creative possibilities of a Pokémon region.
Just look at the battle screenshot. Its models may look similar to previous generation’s Pokémon, perhaps to save time, but having that countryside villa in the background is stunning.
The trainer models also look better than ever, featuring more realistic humans akin to the mobile app GO, but with far more personality than even Sun and Moon achieved.
Based on first impressions alone, all three of these starters are way too cute for their own good.
Unlike the Alolan starters where I immediately had a favorite (#TeamRowlet), I don’t know that I have one among these three.
The last time we saw a simian starter in Chimchar I wound up being a huge fan of Infernape. So the Grass-type Grookey has a shot.
Bunnies are also a favorite of mine in Pokémon, with Mega Lopunny being the first IV/EV trained ‘mon I ever bred in Omega Ruby and Alpha Sapphire. So the Fire-type Scorbunny has a shot.
But the Water-type Sobble is a wild card. It looks like Mudkip and uses a camouflaging gecko design reminiscent of Kecleon.
Any reference to Hoenn is appreciated, and that’s two in one!
I’ll honestly have to see their evolutions to decide who I want to stick by.
While these are the only Galar Pokémon we’ve seen thus far, I’m sure Game Freak will introduce us to the rest before the end of the year. Even if I do wish they would keep some more secrets this time.
In the meantime, we know the Galar region will represent a wide-range of Pokémon from other regions.
In this trailer alone we can see a Zweilous, Flygon, Wishiwashi, Hoothoot, Munchlax, Tyranitar and so much more.
Obviously I’m very excited to learn more, and there’s no doubt the next few months will be full of Sword and Shield information posts like I had for Sun and Moon!
These long periods of hype building up to the catharsis of a wonderful game have to be one of my favorite things about the Pokémon franchise nowadays. I live for the endorphines of new reveal trailers.
But what do you think about our first look at Sword and Shield, the Galar region and those new starters?
Let me know! I’m all kinds of ready for more and more Pokémon.
Turning 22 doesn’t offer nearly as many significant things to talk about as the ‘milestone’ 21, where drinking and properly oriented drivers’ licenses were officially on the table.
I won’t be starting this post off with a deep, important-sounding remark on the different milestones one hits in life.
Rather, 22 mainly stands out because… It’s symmetrical? I guess?
To be fair, 22 does have some things going for it. Most notably the fact that I’ll be graduating from college during that year. Yikes.
All of that is pretty forward thinking, though. Today there aren’t a whole lot of exciting things going on, as I’ll be saving the friend gatherings for later in the year when more people are back in town.
What I have gotten is a lovely breakfast made by my younger sister:
Homemade waffles with fruit compote and whipped cream? I’ve been spoiled.
And a couple of birthday gifts from the family that I definitely did not know about from being in the store with them.
That would be ridiculous! I was honestly, truly surprised.
Look at this adorable surprise!
Aly must know me real well if she thought to get me a Mimikyu-related gift again, totally without my input.
As much as it messes with my head that Sun and Moon came out almost three years ago, my love for this Pikachu lookalike remains strong. Even if I had to pull a Scizor out to take advantage of her weakness.
While Mimikyu and that new Switch controller are the main physical gifts I’ve gotten thus far, I have been eagerly watching all of the digital presents from various organizations roll in.
Like this cute little email from Nintendo helping me celebrate with all those Marro brahs:
C’mon Bowser don’t be like that. Have some cake with your son.
Unfortunately platinum coins mean basically nothing next to gold coins, which would allow me to buy new video games.
Just give me more gold coins, Nintendo. I promise I’ll keep shilling for you if I can buy more games.
Until you do, I’ll just go back to Planet Fitness for my free water bottle.
Not a joke.
I think it’s hilarious that my gym wants me to go spend my birthday working out as I’m sitting around eating ice cream cake, but to be fair I am planning on going tomorrow.
So I might actually use a free water bottle, as silly as that is.
At the very least water seems reasonable as an immediate necessity to keep my body working, which gives it an edge over this offer from Facebook:
I get the sentiment here, getting members to create fundraisers for nonprofit organizations. It’s a nice goal in-and-of itself.
But one dollar? Seriously, Mark?
Pretty sure you could stand to offer a bit more of a generous care package all things considered. I know you have a bajillion users and that money stacks up in the long-run, but even something like $5 would look less silly as a ‘present.’
…
Alright, I’ll stop fruitlessly complaining at social media companies. I just honestly don’t have all that much more to say. After breakfast we went out for a bit to visit my Grandpa and buy special pasta ingredients for dinner.
We were greeted by a little bit of rain while out shopping, keeping up the tradition of water falling on my birthday.
So that’s not an exciting direction to head down. Nor is all the homework that I’ll unfortunately be stuck doing tonight due to deadlines that leave no room for extensive birthday fun.
I think I’ll just wrap things up here, then. Get back to relaxing, spending some time with family and… Yeah, homework.
Just one more semester and I’ll never have to deal with that again.
As usual, thank you all for the support here on the blog and in my real life endeavors. Particularly to my old colleague/friend Ashlyn Ramirez who gave me shout outs on all the social media platforms unexpectedly.
That girl works hard, she deserves a little extra support!
But for all the rest of you as well, hope you’ll stick around for however many birthdays are still to come.
I had a totally different post planned for tonight.
But you know what?
The Pokémon hype train is too. God. Damn. Real.
Return to the Kanto region and experience a classic Pokémon journey in a whole new way with Pokémon: Let's Go, Pikachu! and Pokémon: Let's Go, Eevee! on the Nintendo Switch! Coming November 16, 2018: https://t.co/kXLdxUMjjA#PokemonLetsGopic.twitter.com/EKzQsTbDuE
That’s right folks, we’ve got a brand new trailer for a brand new Pokémon game, and you know damn well it’s time for me to go back to my Sun & Moon lead-up days of deeply analyzing anything and everything I can get my hands on.
This is about to be a long piece picking apart each and every piece of the trailer that I can.
Hope you’re ready. Because I am.
Let’s Go, Pokémon!
So obviously the first thing to address when it comes to discussing the brand new upcoming games of Let’s Go, Pikachu and Let’s Go, Eevee is the tie-in to the mobile app Pokémon GO.
However… The app didn’t have a whole lot of staying power.
It got stale rather fast for me, and there were things about the game that needed to be implemented that weren’t until it was too late.
I still haven’t gone back, even though they’ve officially started to release Pokémon from the third generation (my personal nostalgic favorite).
Where the trailer for Let’s Go begins, it seems as though they’re setting up this title to be almost like a port of Pokémon GO for the Nintendo Switch. Which, in all honesty, would make zero sense considering what the appeal is for GO.
But then as token young child sits down on the couch and Pikachu jumps into the television, all becomes clear:
Kanto.
Remake.
Even though the warning on the bottom left suggests that ‘game footage is not final,’ the intent is clear. That boy you’re watching on-screen is Red, the original protagonist. With a Pikachu on his shoulder. Standing in Professor Oak’s Pokémon Lab in Pallet Town.
Graphically, Let’s Go looks to have the same, if not better, quality models and environments than Sun and Moon — which to be fair does make sense considering the jump from the 3DS to the Switch.
Yet in terms of style, the world appears to be built more in-line with the philosophy of Omega Ruby and Alpha Sapphire (ORAS). Ostensibly this makes sense considering Let’s Go is being billed as a remake of the original Pokémon Yellow.
Keep the core of the world alive but update what we can see and juice everything up.
And sure perhaps I’m putting too much stock into the initial glances we get based on this trailer alone, but the way everything has been updated does look gorgeous. Environments on par with Sun and Moon being utilized for a faithful world recreation ala ORAS is by no means a bad combination.
Oh, and there are fully animated cutscenes too, just like the few that appeared in Sun and Moon. I enjoyed those as well, so I hope they’re utilized properly.
…
Seriously though you look at Vermillion City in the brief shot they provide and tell me it doesn’t look just amazing.
One of the reasons Pokémon GO got stale for me so quickly was because there really wasn’t a heck of a lot to keep me invested in catching Pokémon.
Yes I adore Pokémon as a series because the creatures are adorable and I wish I could have them in real life.
But I also adore Pokémon as a series because I’m one of those weirdos that actually enjoys the story and the characters.
Yeah that’s right, I play Pokémon for the story. Come at me.
Being an aspiring writer, the monster catching series was one of the earliest things that drew me to both the mediums of video games and writing. The plots of each of the seven generations of main series games are burned into my skull, and I can seriously throw down long diatribes explaining why I adore X character based on this line of dialogue they gave.
It’s that much of an obsession for me.
In that way Let’s Go, Pikachu & Eevee becomes a beautiful middle ground.
Granted, the Gen one titles of Red and Blue (plus Yellow technically, all things considered) are arguably my least favorite. I enjoy the spit out of Firered, but find myself less engaged in the world those games create than any of the others.
Despite that caveat, I do still enjoy the games and like the Kanto region for as classic and iconic as it is, so getting to revisit them is great. Especially considering those two remakes came out in 2004 and leave Kanto the only stand-alone generation not featured on the DS-forward.
The brilliance behind the marketing for Let’s Go comes off that point. This is the first time we’re getting a Pokémon game centered around the Kanto region, literally a remake of the first adventure as the trailer goes on to stipulate, since Pokémon GO was a mass phenomena and brought tons of people who played the original titles back into the fold.
Timing is everything, and I’ll be damned if that’s a coincidence.
But no, we know it can’t be a coincidence because Let’s Go is literally built with the same functionality as Pokémon GO.
The first of multiple different ways to interact with the game is through single joycon play. Literally you sit back with a joycon and play the game like it’s Pokémon.
But when you need to catch a random encounter, you chuck a Pokémon with the same minigame/spinoff style Pokémon GO offers. It’s just this time you literally throw like pitching a baseball rather than flicking your finger on the screen.
If that’s not a perfect way to not only utilize the functionality of the Nintendo Switch, but also bring the ‘catch Pokémon for real’ mentality of GO into contact with the story and immersive world of a mainstream Pokémon game, I don’t know what is.
It looks like there’s also probably a way to just hit A to throw as well, as I can already hear the complaints that this repetitive throwing will be too much.
Something iconic about the Pokémon series as a whole is its version splitting antics.
Whether you see multiple versions as a smart way to encourage kids to interact and spread a fervor for the game like wildfire, or whether you see it as a cheap cash grab that persists based on ‘tradition’ in a world where it has no place being there, you have to admit:
Playing Pokémon with a community of people is probably the core reason why it’s as popular as it is today.
The idea of the split versions has always had a particularly special place in my heart considering the fact that I have a younger sister. Going all the way back, I’d always buy both versions of a new generation so that I can play one while Aly plays the other.
Just a piece of my Pokémon collection.
… Granted she tends to give up, which makes both versions my playing grounds to try out different things. But that’s a different story.
Pokémon Let’s Go is going to take that to a whole new level by allowing us to play the same Pokémon game at the same time using both joycons.
Honestly? That would be a selling point alone even if nothing else about this were true.
That multiplayer is somewhat limited from the looks of things, essentially allowing both players to run around freely on the same screen but not putting them on separate journeys.
Instead, the catching game becomes more of a co-operative experience where things like having the right timing together improves your chances of catching Pokémon.
The way multiplayer interacts with battle is a little funnier, as it seems like player two gains access to another member of your party so you both can fight at the same time.
While I can only imagine creating infinite two-on-one situations will make the journey relentlessly easy, I can’t help but relish the idea of reversing the terrible circumstances of Sun and Moon where enemy Pokémon called for help all the damn time.
A few other things I’d like to note in this section:
From the brief battle sequences we see, as well as whatever capturing is shown off, it appears like most every environment in the game will have an equally unique battle locale. Which is amazing and highly encouraged, hopefully beyond even what Sun and Moon offered.
Pokémon appear to roam wild as overworld sprites in Let’s Go. I can only hope this will be less of a gimmick-y ‘hey look who shows up here’ and more of a way to flesh out the living world, as obviously a game that’s going to be a Kanto remake with a complete battle system will also have random encounters to facilitate grinding for the Elite Four.
While I love the idea of multiplayer, it does currently leave me second guessing the possibility of this being a Pokémon game with full online functionality too. It seems like the focus is going to be solely on Kanto Pokémon, so will there be wi-fi battling and trading? It doesn’t seem like it, which may cut down the game’s longevity, but we’ll see when more information comes out.
New Toys for Kanto
You can use the #PokeBallPlus as a Joy-Con in #PokemonLetsGo! Good things may happen if you place one of your favorite Pokémon into the device and walk around with it in the real world. It will be able to connect to Pokémon GO as well! pic.twitter.com/I18Y55odpp
Along with just using a single joycon, Nintendo is also going to be releasing a little Pokéball toy that can be used in place of the traditional controller as something to throw at wild encounters.
That seems to be the pattern for Pokémon games lately, releasing a gimmicky object alongside their titles. Remember the Z-Ring for Sun and Moon?
This one seems cute but not necessarily something I’ll be chomping at the bit to go out and buy. Beyond that capture integration, the chief thing it seems a trainer can do with the Pokéball is bring Pikachu (or Eevee) along with you to make noises.
According to this tweet, the functionality purely extends to Kanto Pokémon — which is what leads to my trepidation from before about the existence of wi-fi connectivity acting as an extender for Let’s Go.
It also seems to me that the Pokémon you bring in from the real world will only be accessible through a special location, GO PARK.
I suppose it could be wonky to have to transfer things like stats between such totally different games, so I understand… But that is a shame.
Makes me feel slightly less apt to pick up Pokémon GO again to transfer my cool Pidgeot over. But we’ll see.
More, More, More!
There are a number of other things throughout the trailer that warrant discussion as well, but I’ll try to sum them up more quickly since this is already getting long in the tooth.
Red and Leaf ride a hell of a lot of Pokémon in the trailer. An Onyx, a Lapras and a Charizard at least. I can’t quite tell based on this trailer alone whether or not all Pokémon will have rideable functionality for something or another, or whether this replaces HMs similarly to Sun and Moon, but we’ll see. I hope it’s the latter.
Concurrent with the previous point, it seems as though every single Pokémon does at least have an overworld model programmed in-game. There are scenes where it appears as though they can follow you as well, such as the red-and-blue striped underground tunnel where two players are followed by Nidoking and Nidoqueen. Will full Pokémon following return from Heartgold and Soulsilver, even if just for Kanto Pokémon?
Eevee and Pikachu are customizable! The player character probably isn’t considering they’re supposed to stand in for Red and Leaf, and I don’t have a problem with that, but the fact that the game’s mascots can have outfits is too cute for words. I just hope they stay dressed up during battle!
Someone somewhere used Seismic Toss on a Magikarp for the trailer and that person deserves a raise.
Did I mention there are full cutscenes in the game? Well, one of those is the Mewtwo encounter. Player model appears to have more facial range than the Sun and Moon protagonist, so that’s again a plus for Let’s Go.
Concluding Thoughts
Okay, so there are one or two other things to touch on oh-so-briefly before wrapping this sucker.
First: Eevee’s voice.
Look. I get it Game Freak. Pikachu got special treatment starting in Gen six, where it started to say its name because mascot. It was cute and I get it.
Eevee didn’t need the same treatment, even though you’re trying to fill that same cute mascot niche. I’m not a huge fan of Eevee saying its name like in the trailer.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m playing Let’s Go, Eevee all the way because Eevee is far superior to Pikachu in my opinion, but still.
Also at the end of the trailer was a tease to a brand new Pokémon being shown off somehow in-game. On Twitter, the Pokémon folks do confirm that this will be a 100 percent totally brand new Generation Eight Pokémon.
With #PokemonQuest and #PokemonLetsGo, there are so many new ways to explore the world of Pokémon! Trainers can look forward to even more with an all-new core series Pokémon RPG title in development for the second half of 2019! pic.twitter.com/d5uiIpenMI
Because oh yeah by the way, new main series Pokémon title in 2019.
That’s another thing to get hyped about, but hype will wait for another day in that particular train’s engine.
For now we still need to get through November 16, 2018 when Let’s Go Pikachu & Eevee will be released upon the world.
If you couldn’t tell already, I’m super duper excited for it. I was pretty burned out on Pokémon after the back-to-back release of Sun/Moon and their Ultra sequels, but this is a whole new adventure with tons of unique bells and whistles to get ready for.
I do hope after the 2019 games are released that Game Freak takes a bit of a break, both because it would be well-deserved and because fatigue may set on if they start to push out a big game every single year for too long.
Though Marvel’s been going strong for 10 years with the same philosophy and look where that has them. So who knows!
All I know is that despite trepidation for a few key points I’ve listed throughout this analysis, I’m excited for the Let’s Go Pokémon games all the same. It has probably pushed off Dark Souls as a major game to purchase for the console since I now need to save my money.
Sorry Dark Souls, we’ll have our day.
I’m also ready for more and more news to come out about the game in the coming months. How will the new character designs look? What sort of new things can we expect to be added into the game’s lore? Will Jesse and James appear as a part of Team Rocket like in the original Yellow?
Expect to see me blathering about it from now until November.
So, until the next news comes, tell me internet: What is YOUR opinion regarding these new Pokémon games? I’ll undoubtedly be seeking reactions on my own, but I’d like to know what the people who follow me think too.
Jason's Blog - Work in Progress 