![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
kjorteoBefore getting into this entry, I would first like to give huge thanks to xaq_the_aereon for this lovely artwork! To be honest, I started this run with a sort of glum "I don't expect anyone to read these or care, but I've already written them so I may as well post them I guess" outlook, but... wow, you know your playblog is doing something right when it has fanart.
This really re-energizes me. If people are going to be inspired by this blog, then I want to make this blog inspiring. I want to continue on with this adventure, and make something grand enough to be worth this kind of reaction. I want to live up to this.
I don't feel like I have to, mind. Not in the "oh no now people are watching and I'm stressed out" way, or at least not yet. I feel like my disclaimer in the first entry still has that covered pretty well. But at least as of this writing, I want to keep going with this.
Thank you,xaq_the_aereon, for the encouragement. May you enjoy today's entry as much as I enjoyed your lovely gift!
Last time: We ventured to Violet City, did a bunch of stuff, and got a gym badge.
Pokewalker bounty since last entry: A ton of items, from a Heart Scale to some Balls and TMs to "sell for lots of money" sundries and other miscellany. Also, probably enough Pokemon to solve every major "this battle is coming up and I'll need something with a type advantage" problem that's going to arise for at least half the game.
Before advancing the game further, I should take stock of what all has been raining down on me while the game itself was off. I should get properly situated, and at this point that means sorting this pile of Pokemon into several smaller piles. Specifically, three smaller piles.
The active party is what I'm carting around and currently using (obviously.) PC Storage Box 1 is sort of an active bench, for Pokemon who are still in the active party but maybe making temporary room for eggs or HM users, or so that some other active party Pokemon can gain experience. I'll switch in and out between the active party and Box 1 as needed, depending on what types of trainers I'm going against. By contrast, Box 2 is the deep bench. Things could change, of course, but the Pokemon in there now are the ones that I currently consider obsolete, or there more for the sake of collection, or otherwise not likely to move back into the active party any time soon.
After rearranging everyone, we set out from Violet City looking something like this:
Party:
The Chikoritalike Empress (F, Lv. 11)
Staryu (Genderless, Lv. 10)
Murkrow (F, Lv. 11)
Psyduck (F, Lv. 10) (For HMs)
An egg from Primo that we know will become Mareep
The mystery egg given to us by Mr. Pokemon
Box 1:
Magby (M, Lv. 13)
Gastly (F, Lv. 10)
Machop (M, Lv. 8)
Dratini (F, Lv. 10)
Box 2:
"Scout", Hoothoot (M, Lv. 16) (Scout will likely never be used in game, but he's my dedicated envoy into the world of the Pokewalker)
Ponyta (F, Lv. 7)
Magnemite (Genderless, Lv. 11)
Smoochum (F, Lv. 12)
Doduo (F, Lv. 9)
"Rocky", Onix (M, Lv. 10)
My total combined party across all three piles is eight females to three males and two genderless. I want to say almost all the girls came from the Pokewalker, which does feel like it has a lot of females in it compared to the main game. Pokewalker Pokemon are actually set and not randomized as far as level, gender, etc., and in fact the course list even includes that info, so I guess they just decided to make a bunch of them female. (That list is wrong about the Lv. 8 Machop in Dim Cave, though. that's where I got mine, and he is definitely a boy.)
On the other hand, not just the girls, but most of my Pokemon period came from the Pokewalker. So who knows.
Another takeaway from this shuffling is that there was a very quick reversal of fortunes for my Doduo and especially for Rocky. Poor Rocky went from carrying my team not one update ago (and me even going out of my way to trade and grind just to acquire him!) straight into Box 2 as soon as the threat of Falkner's gym was over and I got a new team.
Empress is still cool, though. Yes, if this were a fair evaluation based on actual combat prowess then she'd be in Box 2 as well. Hell, Chikorita are weaker even than a good portion of the Pokemon already in Box 2, let alone the ones in Box 1 or the active party. However, main series Pokemon games are easy enough that you can get away with running a team you like instead of a fully optimized one, and I like Empress. In fact, she'll be leading the party for now, because I want to build some more levels for her.
As far as our next move, we have a few options, at least at first glance. Violet City has exits to the west and south, and there's another route north that we ignored when we chose to go to Violet City instead. In addition, we now have TM70 from Sprout Tower, and there's a man just outside of Violet City (west exit) that gives us HM06 just for talking to him, and both of those open up even more options.
For those not familiar: TMs and HMs are usable items that teach a certain move to a single target Pokemon in your party, provided it's something they're allowed to learn. They have been tweaking this formula in the later games, but back in the earlier days up to and including HeartGold/SoulSilver, the difference between the two was that TMs were single-use items that were consumed immediately, that taught decently powerful combat moves with no field use (major exceptions: Dig, Flash), which could themselves be erased and replaced later if you so chose. HMs, by contrast, can be used as many times as you want, permanently graft their move onto the target Pokemon, and the move is usually terrible and useless in battle (major exception: Surf) but has a field use that lets you climb walls, push or destroy boulders, or otherwise get around obstacles and open up more of the world.
That TM we got from Sprout Tower is a single-use item to teach almost any of my Pokemon the move Flash. Flash is a fairly useless combat move, but using it outside of battle allows us to light up dark caves which would otherwise be impossible to navigate, like the "Press T to light a Torch" of Pokemon. Why this isn't classified as an HM, I don't know. Regardless, there are not one but two locations marked "Dark Cave" on the map that we can access now, and we'll need a Pokemon that knows Flash for those. Meanwhile, the HM we got that really is an HM will teach the move Rock Smash, which does about what you would expect. This lets us deal with obvious "there's a single tile wide path to continue to the next area but oh no there's a rock in the middle of it" roadblocks.
Predictably, players of earlier games went out of their way to find weak but versatile Pokemon that would never see actual combat, but could learn a decent spread of HM moves. That way, you can teach all the HM moves to that one Pokemon, rather than having to spread useless-in-battle moves across your entire party just to deal with that one room where there's a climbable wall and a pushable boulder puzzle on top and then you have to ride across the water to the other side from there. In HeartGold/SoulSilver, there are a total of nine HMs with moves that we'll be needing (well, eight plus Flash,) and yes, I have already worked out the right team in order to compress those down into two dedicated HM users and a Water type in my active combat party to take the actually-good Surf.
That's for later, though. For now, we only need to worry about one HM user slot, for Rock Smash, which our Psyduck can handle. We could teach him Flash, too, but that's a single-use TM and I don't want to waste it. We're not actually going to Dark Cave just yet, so there's no rush to use that.
Where are we going, then? Well, as I said, it looks like we have a few options, except not really. Dark Cave is open to Flash users (two Dark Caves, even!) but if we try going there, it turns out that both start you at the bottom of a hill with those one-way ledges, or on the other side of a body of water we have no way of crossing, or otherwise some other obstacle where we can't actually make progress yet. West of Violet City, it's only about half a screen before we encounter a strange rock-like Pokemon that's blocking the road.Fortunately, we just got the Rock Smash HM, so we can smash the offending Pokemon into tiny chunks. It's surprisingly violent and gory for a Pokemon game, but as long as we make sure to hide the dismembered body and confirm there aren't any witnesses, we can proceed along We obviously can't do anything with that Pokemon just yet, so we can't go that way either.
South it is, then. Azalea Town is to the south, and Falkner did say we should go there next. Convenient.
Even the southern passage has a fork-but-not-really, in that it has an almost immediate offshoot into the Ruins of Alph, but I don't want to go there until we get a certain Pokegear upgrade for reasons you'll see when we do. No, the game has politely implied that we should put on horse blinders and go in a straight line to Azalea Town, and in the interest of making this run not-200 hours, I'm inclined to agree.
A random NPC along the way recognizes that we've been cleared Violet City's gym (was this yet another check to make sure you don't go where you're not supposed to until you're supposed to?) and gives us a souvenir to remember Violet City: A Miracle Seed! This is a hold item that, when equipped, boosts the power of the wearer's Grass-type moves. Well I'm taping that to Empress's back right now, thanks.
I make my third official in-game catch: a Hoppip. I can't explain why. I have no intention of actually using the thing. I just saw it and had this urge--probably the old "Gotta Catch 'Em All" instinct that's hard to suppress even when I'm actively trying. I name him Skippy because I don't know and send him straight to Box 2.
Great moments in enemy trainer dialogue: "I'm going to try to be the best with my prized Pokemon. I'm not using the same tough Pokemon as everyone else." Empress and I look at each other and nod. Good on you, kid.
This route has the obligatory newbie fisherman who comes at you with a team of four Magikarp. It also has Fisherman Ralph and Picnicker Liz, both of whom take my number after the battle.
Oh hey, my Mareep egg hatches! You'd have thought, since I knew this moment was coming, I'd have used the time to come up with a good name. Uh... looks fluffy and cloud-like, but zappy... "Kracko." Sure.
Empress hits level 16 and evolves into Bayleef! That was my primary goal with this excursion. With that achieved, I promptly put her in the back of the active party and start working on everyone else. I put Kracko in the lead just to switch him out immediately at the start of each battle, because he's level 1, with... oh... let's say Staryu tagging in to receive the rest of the leveling attention for now.
Youngster Joey calls me to tell me that he saw a wild Kakuna and tried to catch it, but failed. Thanks for sharing! At least he's trying with the whole "I should catch more Pokemon" thing. Later, he calls again to inform me that he took down a Pidgey, which is only natural because he's so tough and all. Didn't want to try catching that one, I guess?
There's a Pokemon Center as a sort of rest station before the route continues, so we stop in there for a quick heal, but not before a sketchy NPC outside tries to sell us a SlowpokeTail for $1,000,000. Sorry, but the Pokewalker didn't make me that rich. Also, this sounds illegal as hell, but I'm just a kid and the police are useless, so whatever. Inside the center, a random fisherman gives us the Old Rod, or asxyzzysqrl calls it, the Magikarp Stick. The world of fishing is now open to us, assuming that by "the world of fishing" you mean "The Old Rod = everything you catch is always Magikarp 100%." The Pokewalker already gave us a better Water type, so I don't expect this to see a lot of use, but thanks.
Speaking of key items that we won't use, we also get a Pal Pad! This allows us to register friend codes so we can battle and trade and such over Nintendo WFC. Ahaha... oops.
Back outside, a smashable rock guards a Shell Bell, a wearable accessory that restores the wearer's HP every time it inflicts damage. Nice. Whoever I'm training (currently Staryu) can hold that, unless it's Empress, because she's fine with the Miracle Seed.
Union Cave connects the route we just got through to another route, with Azalea Town on the other side of that. This is a long journey, which is why there was a Pokemon Center at the halfway point. Union Cave is not dark, making me wonder why they bothered to give us the Flash TM at Sprout Tower. The only caves we can enter right now that would need it aren't meant to be visited until much later anyway.
Kracko hits level 10 and learns ThunderShock, which means he's big and powerful enough to fend for himself, and doesn't need me leading with him and switching to Staryu to finish the fights anymore. They grow up so fast.... *sniffle* Now that I no longer have to train them both at the same time, I put Kracko in the back and focus exclusively on the Staryu, who should grow a bit faster now that it's not having to share half its experience.
Bug Catcher Wade calls me to tell me about the time he one-hit KO'd a Weedle so hard he almost felt bad for the poor thing. Giving everyone my number was the best idea, clearly.
Great moments in NPC dialogue: "Zubat's Supersonic keeps confusing my Pokemon. I'm seriously upset about that!" We all are, buddy, and yet they keep putting caves like this in every game. I don't know, either.
We are challenged by Poke Maniac Larry, who doesn't trade numbers with us or anything but I just have to point him out because oh my god I love the Poke Maniac class. After some Early Installment Weirdness in which they were just that creepy emo kid in the back of your math class who was probably a closet furry, they've finally and fully come out and are now working on slowly acquiring the parts to their ideal Pokemon fursuits. It's truly inspiring. Live the dream, Poke Maniacs.
After battle, Larry informs us that you can hear Pokemon roars from deep inside this cave every Friday. That's good to know, though we don't have the means of investigating the area he's referring to just yet.
Outside Union Cave, we just have one more route to go, and it's raining pretty heavily. That effect wasn't in the original Game Boy games, and seeing it here adds a neat unique feel to the area. We beat and then trade numbers with--oh geez, before I can even open the phone menu to double-check the guy's name, the phone rings. Bug Catcher Wade says he found all kinds of berries and can share some with me if I head back there. However, I have no means of fast-travel and there is no way I'm going through Union Cave plus two routes again just for some berries. Sorry, Wade.
Hiker Anthony, that's whose number we just got.
Oh God, Azalea Town. We made it, finally. And this...
Oh. Oh, wow, this...
Azalea Town's music takes me back. Wow. It wasn't my favorite song in the original game, but it was definitely up there. It sounds so happy and carefree, and it lends itself well to that whole sense of "Life getting you down? Come live inside this game instead" that enthralled me so much as an angsty teen. The remaster is great; it's clearly faithful to the original but it's, well, remastered. It's the sort of balance that instantly struck me and took me back, but then lifted me upward with the new enhancements at the same time.
This... this is the feeling I was trying to recapture with this game. I've been standing on the town outskirts just... enjoying it, taking it in, as I write this. I fully expected to have that reaction in a few places in this game, and I probably still will for the ones I'm thinking of, but I wasn't expecting that to happen here.
This may sound cheesy, but hearing this song seriously just made my day. At this moment, I am an excited child who loves Pokemon Silver all over again.
... Okay. I probably can't bask in this forever, as much as I kind of want to, so let's move on. *Wistful sigh*
It turns out that, as happy as the music is, all is not well in Azalea Town! Two NPCs are having a standoff. "Don't you know who we are?" one exclaims. He identifies himself as being from Team Rocket, the evil mafia group last seen being dismantled after their defeat in Pokemon Red/Blue/Fire Red/Leaf Green. The Rocket grunt admits that yes, they did break up for a while there, but now they've come back "to pursue Giovanni's ambition." He then shoves the other person, who runs away, and stands in front of the entrance to the town's well. "Nothing's going on," the Rocket grunt claims. "It's unsafe to go in there, so I'm standing guard to make sure people don't wander in." Uh huh. Sure.
Wade calls again asking me why I'm not there for his berries yet. Dude, no.
After all this walking, Mr. Pokemon's mystery egg hatches! It's a Togepi, who is a Normal-type in this game because the Fairy-type hadn't been invented yet. I don't really have a use for him, so I name him "Sprinkles" and immediately put him in Box 2. That frees up a slot for me to move the Dratini from Box 1 into the active party, though I'm not actually training her just yet. I'm still working on that Staryu for now.
Because this is Mr. Pokemon's big important mystery egg and all, Professor Elm immediately calls me (how did he know?) and wants to see what kind of Pokemon Sprinkles is. Dude, later. Go stand in line next to Bug Catcher Wade. I am not doing that cave again right now.
Azalea Town houses a renowned local figure in town by the name of Kurt, who has a reputation for being able to make special Pokeballs out of Apricorns. Apricorns are berry-like items of various colors that come from special trees scattered around here and there. You can collect one Apricorn per tree per day, which was one of those details that blew my mind back when the clock itself was a novel feature. You get more Apricorns by coming back tomorrow? Like, in real life? Whooaaaaa.... Now, I've just been sort of quietly gathering the ones I happen to pass my first time through each route, but I'm not really going out of my way to go back and harvest the same ones daily or anything.
Kurt's Apricorn balls will have to wait, though. He's too worked up about the local Team Rocket situation. It seems as though the Slowpoke, which normally live in Azalea Town's well (Slowpoke Well, they call it) and peacefully coexist with its residents, have been disappearing and haven't been seen recently. Why? Well, Team Rocket is (presumably slaughtering them and) harvesting their tails, of course. Apparently those sell for a high price, because they're illegal and delicious. Oh, hey, remember that guy who tried to sell us one for $1 million?
And here we see the prime example of the difference between Team Rocket and all the other Teams that followed them in the Pokemon series. Later Teams tend to have world domination schemes that are more grandiose but more goofy, like Saturday morning cartoon supervillains. Team Rocket was always just the local mafia, doing low-key unethical things for criminal gain, which made them both more and less terrifying than their successors. They never aimed as high, but they were more serious about the things they did. A later Team would plot to gather ancient artifacts from around the world to harness their power to summon a Legendary Pokemon to harness its power to blow up the ocean from their secret base on the moon, and the player would stop them just before anything bad happens. Team Rocket sets goals like "poach local wildlife to sell on the black market" and achieves them.
Kurt is having exactly zero of this, and rushes out of his house in a fury, to "teach them a lesson in pain." Being the player character, it is guaranteed that we will have to go help him before the plot can progress any further. (Sure enough, there's a Rocket grunt blocking the entrance to the gym for no in-game reason, his only dialogue being "Hey, did you know SlowpokeTails are delicious?") In the name of the Slowpoke, Celine and her party will go Captain Planet on their asses...
... next time.
xaq_the_aereon for this lovely artwork! To be honest, I started this run with a sort of glum "I don't expect anyone to read these or care, but I've already written them so I may as well post them I guess" outlook, but... wow, you know your playblog is doing something right when it has fanart.This really re-energizes me. If people are going to be inspired by this blog, then I want to make this blog inspiring. I want to continue on with this adventure, and make something grand enough to be worth this kind of reaction. I want to live up to this.
I don't feel like I have to, mind. Not in the "oh no now people are watching and I'm stressed out" way, or at least not yet. I feel like my disclaimer in the first entry still has that covered pretty well. But at least as of this writing, I want to keep going with this.
Thank you,
xaq_the_aereon, for the encouragement. May you enjoy today's entry as much as I enjoyed your lovely gift!Last time: We ventured to Violet City, did a bunch of stuff, and got a gym badge.
Pokewalker bounty since last entry: A ton of items, from a Heart Scale to some Balls and TMs to "sell for lots of money" sundries and other miscellany. Also, probably enough Pokemon to solve every major "this battle is coming up and I'll need something with a type advantage" problem that's going to arise for at least half the game.
Before advancing the game further, I should take stock of what all has been raining down on me while the game itself was off. I should get properly situated, and at this point that means sorting this pile of Pokemon into several smaller piles. Specifically, three smaller piles.
The active party is what I'm carting around and currently using (obviously.) PC Storage Box 1 is sort of an active bench, for Pokemon who are still in the active party but maybe making temporary room for eggs or HM users, or so that some other active party Pokemon can gain experience. I'll switch in and out between the active party and Box 1 as needed, depending on what types of trainers I'm going against. By contrast, Box 2 is the deep bench. Things could change, of course, but the Pokemon in there now are the ones that I currently consider obsolete, or there more for the sake of collection, or otherwise not likely to move back into the active party any time soon.
After rearranging everyone, we set out from Violet City looking something like this:
Party:
The Chikoritalike Empress (F, Lv. 11)
Staryu (Genderless, Lv. 10)
Murkrow (F, Lv. 11)
Psyduck (F, Lv. 10) (For HMs)
An egg from Primo that we know will become Mareep
The mystery egg given to us by Mr. Pokemon
Box 1:
Magby (M, Lv. 13)
Gastly (F, Lv. 10)
Machop (M, Lv. 8)
Dratini (F, Lv. 10)
Box 2:
"Scout", Hoothoot (M, Lv. 16) (Scout will likely never be used in game, but he's my dedicated envoy into the world of the Pokewalker)
Ponyta (F, Lv. 7)
Magnemite (Genderless, Lv. 11)
Smoochum (F, Lv. 12)
Doduo (F, Lv. 9)
"Rocky", Onix (M, Lv. 10)
My total combined party across all three piles is eight females to three males and two genderless. I want to say almost all the girls came from the Pokewalker, which does feel like it has a lot of females in it compared to the main game. Pokewalker Pokemon are actually set and not randomized as far as level, gender, etc., and in fact the course list even includes that info, so I guess they just decided to make a bunch of them female. (That list is wrong about the Lv. 8 Machop in Dim Cave, though. that's where I got mine, and he is definitely a boy.)
On the other hand, not just the girls, but most of my Pokemon period came from the Pokewalker. So who knows.
Another takeaway from this shuffling is that there was a very quick reversal of fortunes for my Doduo and especially for Rocky. Poor Rocky went from carrying my team not one update ago (and me even going out of my way to trade and grind just to acquire him!) straight into Box 2 as soon as the threat of Falkner's gym was over and I got a new team.
Empress is still cool, though. Yes, if this were a fair evaluation based on actual combat prowess then she'd be in Box 2 as well. Hell, Chikorita are weaker even than a good portion of the Pokemon already in Box 2, let alone the ones in Box 1 or the active party. However, main series Pokemon games are easy enough that you can get away with running a team you like instead of a fully optimized one, and I like Empress. In fact, she'll be leading the party for now, because I want to build some more levels for her.
As far as our next move, we have a few options, at least at first glance. Violet City has exits to the west and south, and there's another route north that we ignored when we chose to go to Violet City instead. In addition, we now have TM70 from Sprout Tower, and there's a man just outside of Violet City (west exit) that gives us HM06 just for talking to him, and both of those open up even more options.
For those not familiar: TMs and HMs are usable items that teach a certain move to a single target Pokemon in your party, provided it's something they're allowed to learn. They have been tweaking this formula in the later games, but back in the earlier days up to and including HeartGold/SoulSilver, the difference between the two was that TMs were single-use items that were consumed immediately, that taught decently powerful combat moves with no field use (major exceptions: Dig, Flash), which could themselves be erased and replaced later if you so chose. HMs, by contrast, can be used as many times as you want, permanently graft their move onto the target Pokemon, and the move is usually terrible and useless in battle (major exception: Surf) but has a field use that lets you climb walls, push or destroy boulders, or otherwise get around obstacles and open up more of the world.
That TM we got from Sprout Tower is a single-use item to teach almost any of my Pokemon the move Flash. Flash is a fairly useless combat move, but using it outside of battle allows us to light up dark caves which would otherwise be impossible to navigate, like the "Press T to light a Torch" of Pokemon. Why this isn't classified as an HM, I don't know. Regardless, there are not one but two locations marked "Dark Cave" on the map that we can access now, and we'll need a Pokemon that knows Flash for those. Meanwhile, the HM we got that really is an HM will teach the move Rock Smash, which does about what you would expect. This lets us deal with obvious "there's a single tile wide path to continue to the next area but oh no there's a rock in the middle of it" roadblocks.
Predictably, players of earlier games went out of their way to find weak but versatile Pokemon that would never see actual combat, but could learn a decent spread of HM moves. That way, you can teach all the HM moves to that one Pokemon, rather than having to spread useless-in-battle moves across your entire party just to deal with that one room where there's a climbable wall and a pushable boulder puzzle on top and then you have to ride across the water to the other side from there. In HeartGold/SoulSilver, there are a total of nine HMs with moves that we'll be needing (well, eight plus Flash,) and yes, I have already worked out the right team in order to compress those down into two dedicated HM users and a Water type in my active combat party to take the actually-good Surf.
That's for later, though. For now, we only need to worry about one HM user slot, for Rock Smash, which our Psyduck can handle. We could teach him Flash, too, but that's a single-use TM and I don't want to waste it. We're not actually going to Dark Cave just yet, so there's no rush to use that.
Where are we going, then? Well, as I said, it looks like we have a few options, except not really. Dark Cave is open to Flash users (two Dark Caves, even!) but if we try going there, it turns out that both start you at the bottom of a hill with those one-way ledges, or on the other side of a body of water we have no way of crossing, or otherwise some other obstacle where we can't actually make progress yet. West of Violet City, it's only about half a screen before we encounter a strange rock-like Pokemon that's blocking the road.
South it is, then. Azalea Town is to the south, and Falkner did say we should go there next. Convenient.
Even the southern passage has a fork-but-not-really, in that it has an almost immediate offshoot into the Ruins of Alph, but I don't want to go there until we get a certain Pokegear upgrade for reasons you'll see when we do. No, the game has politely implied that we should put on horse blinders and go in a straight line to Azalea Town, and in the interest of making this run not-200 hours, I'm inclined to agree.
A random NPC along the way recognizes that we've been cleared Violet City's gym (was this yet another check to make sure you don't go where you're not supposed to until you're supposed to?) and gives us a souvenir to remember Violet City: A Miracle Seed! This is a hold item that, when equipped, boosts the power of the wearer's Grass-type moves. Well I'm taping that to Empress's back right now, thanks.
I make my third official in-game catch: a Hoppip. I can't explain why. I have no intention of actually using the thing. I just saw it and had this urge--probably the old "Gotta Catch 'Em All" instinct that's hard to suppress even when I'm actively trying. I name him Skippy because I don't know and send him straight to Box 2.
Great moments in enemy trainer dialogue: "I'm going to try to be the best with my prized Pokemon. I'm not using the same tough Pokemon as everyone else." Empress and I look at each other and nod. Good on you, kid.
This route has the obligatory newbie fisherman who comes at you with a team of four Magikarp. It also has Fisherman Ralph and Picnicker Liz, both of whom take my number after the battle.
Oh hey, my Mareep egg hatches! You'd have thought, since I knew this moment was coming, I'd have used the time to come up with a good name. Uh... looks fluffy and cloud-like, but zappy... "Kracko." Sure.
Empress hits level 16 and evolves into Bayleef! That was my primary goal with this excursion. With that achieved, I promptly put her in the back of the active party and start working on everyone else. I put Kracko in the lead just to switch him out immediately at the start of each battle, because he's level 1, with... oh... let's say Staryu tagging in to receive the rest of the leveling attention for now.
Youngster Joey calls me to tell me that he saw a wild Kakuna and tried to catch it, but failed. Thanks for sharing! At least he's trying with the whole "I should catch more Pokemon" thing. Later, he calls again to inform me that he took down a Pidgey, which is only natural because he's so tough and all. Didn't want to try catching that one, I guess?
There's a Pokemon Center as a sort of rest station before the route continues, so we stop in there for a quick heal, but not before a sketchy NPC outside tries to sell us a SlowpokeTail for $1,000,000. Sorry, but the Pokewalker didn't make me that rich. Also, this sounds illegal as hell, but I'm just a kid and the police are useless, so whatever. Inside the center, a random fisherman gives us the Old Rod, or as
xyzzysqrl calls it, the Magikarp Stick. The world of fishing is now open to us, assuming that by "the world of fishing" you mean "The Old Rod = everything you catch is always Magikarp 100%." The Pokewalker already gave us a better Water type, so I don't expect this to see a lot of use, but thanks.Speaking of key items that we won't use, we also get a Pal Pad! This allows us to register friend codes so we can battle and trade and such over Nintendo WFC. Ahaha... oops.
Back outside, a smashable rock guards a Shell Bell, a wearable accessory that restores the wearer's HP every time it inflicts damage. Nice. Whoever I'm training (currently Staryu) can hold that, unless it's Empress, because she's fine with the Miracle Seed.
Union Cave connects the route we just got through to another route, with Azalea Town on the other side of that. This is a long journey, which is why there was a Pokemon Center at the halfway point. Union Cave is not dark, making me wonder why they bothered to give us the Flash TM at Sprout Tower. The only caves we can enter right now that would need it aren't meant to be visited until much later anyway.
Kracko hits level 10 and learns ThunderShock, which means he's big and powerful enough to fend for himself, and doesn't need me leading with him and switching to Staryu to finish the fights anymore. They grow up so fast.... *sniffle* Now that I no longer have to train them both at the same time, I put Kracko in the back and focus exclusively on the Staryu, who should grow a bit faster now that it's not having to share half its experience.
Bug Catcher Wade calls me to tell me about the time he one-hit KO'd a Weedle so hard he almost felt bad for the poor thing. Giving everyone my number was the best idea, clearly.
Great moments in NPC dialogue: "Zubat's Supersonic keeps confusing my Pokemon. I'm seriously upset about that!" We all are, buddy, and yet they keep putting caves like this in every game. I don't know, either.
We are challenged by Poke Maniac Larry, who doesn't trade numbers with us or anything but I just have to point him out because oh my god I love the Poke Maniac class. After some Early Installment Weirdness in which they were just that creepy emo kid in the back of your math class who was probably a closet furry, they've finally and fully come out and are now working on slowly acquiring the parts to their ideal Pokemon fursuits. It's truly inspiring. Live the dream, Poke Maniacs.
After battle, Larry informs us that you can hear Pokemon roars from deep inside this cave every Friday. That's good to know, though we don't have the means of investigating the area he's referring to just yet.
Outside Union Cave, we just have one more route to go, and it's raining pretty heavily. That effect wasn't in the original Game Boy games, and seeing it here adds a neat unique feel to the area. We beat and then trade numbers with--oh geez, before I can even open the phone menu to double-check the guy's name, the phone rings. Bug Catcher Wade says he found all kinds of berries and can share some with me if I head back there. However, I have no means of fast-travel and there is no way I'm going through Union Cave plus two routes again just for some berries. Sorry, Wade.
Hiker Anthony, that's whose number we just got.
Oh God, Azalea Town. We made it, finally. And this...
Oh. Oh, wow, this...
Azalea Town's music takes me back. Wow. It wasn't my favorite song in the original game, but it was definitely up there. It sounds so happy and carefree, and it lends itself well to that whole sense of "Life getting you down? Come live inside this game instead" that enthralled me so much as an angsty teen. The remaster is great; it's clearly faithful to the original but it's, well, remastered. It's the sort of balance that instantly struck me and took me back, but then lifted me upward with the new enhancements at the same time.
This... this is the feeling I was trying to recapture with this game. I've been standing on the town outskirts just... enjoying it, taking it in, as I write this. I fully expected to have that reaction in a few places in this game, and I probably still will for the ones I'm thinking of, but I wasn't expecting that to happen here.
This may sound cheesy, but hearing this song seriously just made my day. At this moment, I am an excited child who loves Pokemon Silver all over again.
... Okay. I probably can't bask in this forever, as much as I kind of want to, so let's move on. *Wistful sigh*
It turns out that, as happy as the music is, all is not well in Azalea Town! Two NPCs are having a standoff. "Don't you know who we are?" one exclaims. He identifies himself as being from Team Rocket, the evil mafia group last seen being dismantled after their defeat in Pokemon Red/Blue/Fire Red/Leaf Green. The Rocket grunt admits that yes, they did break up for a while there, but now they've come back "to pursue Giovanni's ambition." He then shoves the other person, who runs away, and stands in front of the entrance to the town's well. "Nothing's going on," the Rocket grunt claims. "It's unsafe to go in there, so I'm standing guard to make sure people don't wander in." Uh huh. Sure.
Wade calls again asking me why I'm not there for his berries yet. Dude, no.
After all this walking, Mr. Pokemon's mystery egg hatches! It's a Togepi, who is a Normal-type in this game because the Fairy-type hadn't been invented yet. I don't really have a use for him, so I name him "Sprinkles" and immediately put him in Box 2. That frees up a slot for me to move the Dratini from Box 1 into the active party, though I'm not actually training her just yet. I'm still working on that Staryu for now.
Because this is Mr. Pokemon's big important mystery egg and all, Professor Elm immediately calls me (how did he know?) and wants to see what kind of Pokemon Sprinkles is. Dude, later. Go stand in line next to Bug Catcher Wade. I am not doing that cave again right now.
Azalea Town houses a renowned local figure in town by the name of Kurt, who has a reputation for being able to make special Pokeballs out of Apricorns. Apricorns are berry-like items of various colors that come from special trees scattered around here and there. You can collect one Apricorn per tree per day, which was one of those details that blew my mind back when the clock itself was a novel feature. You get more Apricorns by coming back tomorrow? Like, in real life? Whooaaaaa.... Now, I've just been sort of quietly gathering the ones I happen to pass my first time through each route, but I'm not really going out of my way to go back and harvest the same ones daily or anything.
Kurt's Apricorn balls will have to wait, though. He's too worked up about the local Team Rocket situation. It seems as though the Slowpoke, which normally live in Azalea Town's well (Slowpoke Well, they call it) and peacefully coexist with its residents, have been disappearing and haven't been seen recently. Why? Well, Team Rocket is (presumably slaughtering them and) harvesting their tails, of course. Apparently those sell for a high price, because they're illegal and delicious. Oh, hey, remember that guy who tried to sell us one for $1 million?
And here we see the prime example of the difference between Team Rocket and all the other Teams that followed them in the Pokemon series. Later Teams tend to have world domination schemes that are more grandiose but more goofy, like Saturday morning cartoon supervillains. Team Rocket was always just the local mafia, doing low-key unethical things for criminal gain, which made them both more and less terrifying than their successors. They never aimed as high, but they were more serious about the things they did. A later Team would plot to gather ancient artifacts from around the world to harness their power to summon a Legendary Pokemon to harness its power to blow up the ocean from their secret base on the moon, and the player would stop them just before anything bad happens. Team Rocket sets goals like "poach local wildlife to sell on the black market" and achieves them.
Kurt is having exactly zero of this, and rushes out of his house in a fury, to "teach them a lesson in pain." Being the player character, it is guaranteed that we will have to go help him before the plot can progress any further. (Sure enough, there's a Rocket grunt blocking the entrance to the gym for no in-game reason, his only dialogue being "Hey, did you know SlowpokeTails are delicious?") In the name of the Slowpoke, Celine and her party will go Captain Planet on their asses...
... next time.
no subject
Date: 2017-09-04 08:02 pm (UTC)Also for heaven's sakes when you're traversing caves please remembers Repels exist. I never do until it's too late.
no subject
Date: 2017-09-04 08:11 pm (UTC)Like, I could have used Repels to get through that cave unscathed, but then I'd have to run back and forth and back and forth in circles to get the equivalent gains (Empress from Lv. 11 to 16, Kracko from 1 to 10, Staryu from 10 to... I think it was 14 when I stopped?) And running around in circles for no reason than to grind is maddening. Raising Rocky in the last entry was easily and by far the low point of this entire run so far. I hate doing that.
If I can go about my plot-furthering business as usual, perhaps even slightly on the side of staying in the tall grass a few steps longer than I strictly needed to, and don't run/use Repels/otherwise do anything to avoid the fights that come naturally, then that gets me nice and trained up just through playing "normally." I definitely noticed that this game has random encounter rates like I've been caught pirating Earthbound, but even "walk three steps toward the goal, fight" doesn't feel as grating as "reach the goal immediately and then go back and run around in circles, fight" to me.
no subject
Date: 2017-09-05 06:10 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2017-09-05 08:44 pm (UTC)Celine x Youngster Joey is now officially my headcanon CuteTP. Nothing explicit, just the wishful thinking of a lovestruck, preteen Ratatta user and the adorable mental images it produces.
no subject
Date: 2017-09-05 11:32 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2017-09-05 02:25 pm (UTC)They did this in gen 1. It was horrible, since part of the whole thing about HMs is that you cannot remove them from the pokemon without special assistance. You slap one on Jimmy the Joltik, it's on there for good.
And as you said, Flash is a useless move in battle. You essentially wasted a slot on whatever pokemon you decide to give it to. And technically if you have a map and/or are willing to step-count, you can get through every cave in the game without it.
...who am I kidding, they removed Flash from the HM pool because they realized Whirlpool could be even more inconvenient than it was. Fuck Whirlpool, fuck Flash and Defog and Rock Climb and to be honest I'm glad HMs are dead.
no subject
Date: 2017-09-05 02:42 pm (UTC)But if you are stuck playing an older game where they haven't realized how much everyone hates HMs yet, and you still have to use a move like Flash to get around dark caves, I'd much rather that move in this game be classified as an HM.
Let's face it; all HM moves (except Surf) are useless in battle. The inability to delete them is a giant pain (and an entire separate "why would they do that" design problem) but odds are good you're using a dedicated HM utility Pokemon for them, so the need to rearrange their move pool is kind of diminished; if you're bringing Jimmy the Joltik into an actual battle anyway then something went horribly wrong somewhere.
Thus, I see those issues as fairly minimal, versus the "oh okay you still need this move but now it's single-use and you can accidentally waste it if you're not careful, good luck :3" side effect which is a much bigger problem.
no subject
Date: 2017-09-05 02:48 pm (UTC)Really, the only ones that are awful are Cut and Flash/Defog/Whirlpool (depending on gen). Fly is a fringe case in either direction - it sucks for competitive play, but the in-game Pokemon AI doesn't understand how to compensate for moves with an invulnerable wind-up turn, so at least it's not openly a liability.
I think they de-HM'd Flash, really, because it wasn't 100% mandatory for progression. (Only 85% so.) There's no caves too dark to see anything without it, and while it's not as useless as Defog (which is openly harmful to yourself in-battle and just removes a white filter in some areas out of it) you're still not soft-locked if you end up in an area without it.
no subject
Date: 2017-09-05 11:53 pm (UTC)Well... huh. That's a thing, then.
I mean I'm still including Flash in the "let's cram these nine field moves into two HM users (the Water type from my actual combat team can handle Surf)" calculations, because I want to go to those areas too. And they still could have made it... actually you know I think the thing I'm stuck on here is the just fact that this is back when TMs were consumed on use. Like, I wanted Flash to be an HM just so I had an infinite Flash generator whenever I needed it, rather than worrying about choosing wisely who's going to learn it. At no point was I defending the "okay but once you invite an HM move in it will never leave" part.
no subject
Date: 2017-09-06 12:45 am (UTC)It's gonna be hard to find perfect coverage, and you'll very likely end up shunting, at the very least, Fly onto your birb, whomever that is.
no subject
Date: 2017-09-06 01:28 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2017-09-20 08:18 am (UTC)I'm glad you came around to her. :3
A trainer should always have a strong emotional bond with their starter.
...
Even if it's that damn monkey, I guess.
Worst fire type starter.
Worst starter.
God I hate monkeys.
...wait Flash isn't an HM in this game?
Oh, I guess in gen 4 it was demoted.
Well, good.
Flash sucked as an HM. You used it for only a small part of the game and then needed a move deleter to remove it.
At least as a TM you can overwrite it when you're done with something not trash.
I hate the SuMo riding Pokémon outfits but it's so nice not to have to manage HM moves in my team any more.
I like getting an early magikarp and grinding it into a gyarados early on, myself. It's a trial but I love the raw strength for early game. Sadly, I rarely end up actually doing it because swap-raising the magikarp to 20 is such a pain in the neck. Some day, Mr. Fish. Someday you'll help me mop up the early game again.
That frees up a slot for me to move the Dratini from Box 1 into the active party, though I'm not actually training her just yet.
Geez, the things I'd have given to have an early-game dratini... I'm seriously jealous.
Hm, with Pokébank I can probably set up giving myself one when I do my next SuMo run on my second cartridge.
I could even IV breed a really good one.
Hm.
Oh man, apricorns. I loved that feature in the original GS.
I loved all the different types of balls (even if I only used like, two), and I loved being able to grow the balls, getting a new free one every day.
...
I might have a thing in games about getting free items.
Once abilities were added to the game I pretty much always crammed my free team slots with spare mons with Pickup.
Team rocket is totally the team I'd be least surprised to suddenly pull out an actual firearm.
no subject
Date: 2017-09-20 03:17 pm (UTC)That monkey was doubly doomed because it was from the same game that brought us Turtwig. Torterra is one of my all-time favorites so, yeah, that's not much of a decision.
"Flash sucked as an HM."
Like I mentioned in the other comments, I didn't mind Flash as an HM, but mostly because the "you can only use this TM once so don't waste it!" drawback to not being an HM struck me as a larger problem than the permanence of it when it was. To be fair, both catches are awful and I'm glad they were fixed.
"Geez, the things I'd have given to have an early-game dratini... I'm seriously jealous."
Let's just say... every generation has that one mechanic that's really cool but never comes back even though people liked it. For most people, HG/SS had the whole Pokemon walking with you thing in that role, and yes that is awesome and I miss that one too.
But so long as they keep making Pokemon games, in the entire series, I will never, ever miss one game's feature and wish it was in all the others more than I'll miss the Pokewalker when this LP is over.
"Oh man, apricorns. I loved that feature in the original GS.
...
I might have a thing in games about getting free items."
For me, it was the time-based aspect of it. Older, less innocent me sees the restrictions of it now (you can only get one apricorn from this tree per day?? Maaaan) but back then, having time-based mechanics was witchcraft, and checking in on Kurt every day to pick up the ball he'd started working on yesterday just blew my young mind.
As for having free items raining down on me in this game... have I mentioned how much I love the Pokewalker?
no subject
Date: 2017-09-20 03:29 pm (UTC)I wish I hadn't missed almost everything between DP and XY. I would have loved to play with the walker. :/
I couldn't afford to get new Pokémon games for a while there.
Torterra is awesome. :3
I always have trouble deciding between Piplup and Turtwig when I restart Diamond.
Yeah, as much as it makes them "less special", on the balance I'm really happy that TMs finally aren't one-use any more. I don't have to save my copy of a great TM until the perfect Pokémon, and ignoring all the great but not great enough times I could have taught it.