Many folk like to know beforehand what is to be set on the table; but those who have laboured to prepare the feast like to keep their secret; for wonder makes the words of praise louder.
Age 34, Male
Sacred Defender
Deathless Lands
Joined on 10/9/07
I think you read too far into that meaningless "history of the world" detailed in the fourth Generation. It would do well in the eventual Literature Portal. But until then...
lolololol u fag u rote dis shit about Pokeman???
But in all seriousness. "I wanna be, the very best..."
This will serve as an apology to the Pokémon world for my claims that it "jumped the shark after Crystal" or whatever.
"Like no one ever was..."
Oh, no worries. I thought that Ruby version was the best thing ever for Pokemon once I got my hands on it. But the game was also the first to have uninteresting prizes at the Game Corner (no Pokemon as prizes, which still pisses me off), and there was a significant difference between the "good" pokemon and the "shitty" pokemon. Causing us to use the same team over and over. Why use a Slugma when you can have Torkoal? Why use a Spoink when you can have a Gardevoir? But most of all, the starters were terrible. The only good one was Blaziken. Treecko was so shitty throughout that I never bothered to remember the name of its final evolution. And he was my starter for my most recent playthrough that I finished just six months ago! Sure, he attacks first all the time, but that's no fair trade for weak attacks and low stats.
Anyway, the fourth generation fixed all the previous flaws, and brought back the concept of balanced Pokemon and powerful starters. Aside from adding new attacks and the much needed separation of physical and special attacks.
The only thing left that I want from the games is a different story. It always seemed like saving the world from impending doom was second to our "dream" of becoming a Pokemon master for the fourth time. I want something that doesn't feel tacked on. Oh, and make the main character talk, please. Maybe even sequences where we can choose what we want to say. But being a mute kid doesn't add anything interesting to the story.
"To catch them, is my real test..."
I'm sad to say that I picked up Emerald less than a year before joining NG, and I shouldn't have to tell you what I was like back then. You've heard it before, over and over and over again, as much as Captain Planet told you not to pollute. I was at a bad time in my life, and it just didn't impress me. The character design wasn't as good as the Johto years, the gameplay hadn't improved much, the only good part was no more fucking dogs running around. Or so I thought. In reality, it was a fine game, no worse than Gold or Silver, probably better than Yellow (I never liked Yellow, all the G1 problems plus Brock was near-impossible and no Missingno). The gameplay didn't need to change, and if I were to consider my usual dislike of the graphical obsession among certain subsets of hardcore gamers, being pissed about bad Pokémon design was just plain old hypocrisy. I re-played it before getting SoulSilver, and, WHOA. Did I ever fuck up. It wasn't anything resembling a shark jump!
Just for the record, I picked Mudkip. The first Gym Leader was a Rock-type, so using the Water starter made it easier, just like in the old days. I haven't liked Grass starters since Bulbasaur proved to be completely useless and not learn any useful moves against Brock until later than Squirtle did.
The story doesn't really need to change, though how they're going to surpass having God (Arceus) and a kinda-not-evil Satan (Giratina), I don't know. These Legendary Pokémon have gotten out of hand. Remember when the Legendaries were nowhere near the storyline? The first bunch of birds might have been Pokéfications of their elements, but we never got an explanation in the games. Mew was the generalized ancestor of the others, supposedly, and Mewtwo pretty much existed to be powerful. That was it. Gen2, we got two new birds (one of which could bring the dead back to life), three stupid fucking dogs which had some back-from-the-dead bit and served as the first contact between legendaries and story in Crystal, and a time traveler. It kinda was Gen3 when it got out of hand, with weather-controlling gods based on Jewish legends plus the Legendary Golems (no relation to Golem the evolved form of Graveler, but definitely related to Jewish legend), possible Pokéfications of gender roles, and a couple of space aliens. Then came Gen4, which allowed you to capture God and Satan, the rulers of time and space, the creators of free will, emotion, and thought, moon-related beings connected to dreams and nightmares, an even bigger Legendary Golem which created the other three and moved the continents to their current locations... Oh, and there were some others. And then it gave in-game kinda-sorta-Legend status to the Unown with an event in HG/SS, which is why I put them in the story. The show already gave them status in the third movie, so it was a no-brainer to do it in-game.
It doesn't really need a different story, though, just better integration between the "Stop the criminal team from doing something bad involving Legendary Pokémon" story and the "Get all eight badges and beat the Elite Four" story. Of course, the basic formula isn't likely to change much, since it's already been working for 14 years in Japan and 12 years here. I just hope they go ahead and move the timeline forward though, even if it's only to have an excuse for more Pokémon in the Pokédex, and so they don't have to make another set of remakes.
Hey, what's wrong with silent protagonists?! Man, you're on the wrong page to suggest that a character not speaking is detrimental to a game.
"To train them is my cause!"
Ahh, Yellow was my first game at the age of six. I'll have you know I fought Brock's Onix with a Metapod, and I have memories of training Pikachu to at least level 15 so that his Double Team evens out the disadvantages he has. Even though training him to that level took at least five hours of grinding. I was a determined little guy back in the day. I brought my Gameboy Color everywhere I went.
I always go for the Grass type when first playing a new generation. If you were to put Bulbasaur in Generation four with his newer move set, he'd be the best out of his two comrades. But at the times of their releases, all grass types of each generation were a bit lacking. Except maybe turtwig. That Grass/Ground combo was very interesting. Taking away his weakness to Fire.
Bulbasaur holds a secure place in my heart though. If only Sunny Day was around in the first generation. It would have really complemented his Solar Beam, which I believe he is the only one who learns it naturally.
I decided against paying attention to each new Legendary of the fourth Generation. Because it seemed there was a new one each month. The only ones I ever caught were Dialga, Giratina, and two of the three pyschic guys who hang out in the Lakes. They've really taken the Legendary Pokemon concept and got it out of hand. Apparently, Dialga was responsible for creating the land of Sinnoh, or something (look, I was just skimming through all that dialogue, all right?), and he was only Level 47. Geez.
So we have to have around 20 Legendaries right? It wouldn't feel right to bring back some of them since they all have some kind of reason for being where they are. Maybe they should just quit the references to mythologies and religions and just make powerful beings that can be used to rape the Elite Four? Or maybe no Legendaries at all? I've certainly stopped using them. I even just went through SoulSilver using faithful teammates.
Don't you think it would be cool if they did what they did in the second generation and expanded? How you went to Kanto and fought Ash after obtaining another set of eight badges? It was brilliant! And you know how at the end our Pokemon Journey, our Pokemon will always be in their level 50s and 40s? How about we end up revisiting all five regions for all the badges and taking on five Elite Fours? By the end, our Pokemon can be almost Level 100! I've never gotten a Pokemon's level that high, have you? They're stats keep building. All they need to do is add more attacks to the end of each Pokemon's moveset.
Ok, yeah. That is shamelessly filling the game with unnecesary, repetitive content, but it could work! I know it could, even if the entire game would take over 100 hours to complete.
Silent Protagonists have bothered me for years. Since the days where I was getting my hands on every Metroid and Zelda game I could find. I must have been 11 then. Speaking of Zelda, that's probably what you were thinking when I brought this up! The Zelda stories had a way of telling themselves. Beautiful cutscenes portrayed what was going on. But with Pokemon, it's a different issue. The story is never able to tell itself. There's always some other main character (whom I would normally pass off as a minor character because they don't have a real personality either) ends up doing ALL the talking.
We're not advancing the story, THEY are. We're not the ones showing Giovanni that he should just quit, HE did. We're not the ones showing Team Magma/Aqua the error of their ways, THEY'RE figuring it out for themselves as they talk out loud. We're not the ones asking to go on a quest to catch every Pokemon, we're TOLD to do it. And it's starting to piss me off. How can we truly "save the world" if we're not doing anything? The world is saving itself! We're just there to do some battling and hear redundant talk about how "we'll never understand their goals" or "our world can never be achieved if this kid can beat us".
Look, Pokemon is fun, it has to be somewhere in my Top 5 best video game series of all time, but everybody has a different peeve about it, and mine is the same unfulfilling story that we have to go through each time. At least Pokemon Colloseum and XD Gale of Darkness didn't have that problem. Those games were much more awesome.
"I will travel across the land, searching far and wide!"
Posting from dad's office right now, will respond in full when computer gets back from the shop. As for why I didn't respond before the computer went down? Having trouble focusing. But hey, I'm getting a chance to play Platinum and catch up on the shit I missed, so it ain't all bad.
(Finally) responding, 6-14-10:
I didn't like Yellow. Too much grinding against wild weaklings going on just to beat the first Leader. Even if you managed to catch Mankey or Nidoran (good luck with all those annoying Ratatta), you have to grind for hours, way up from your meeting at level 2 (the first few matches you're switching into Pikachu after the first turn), just to get Double Kick or whatever was good against Brock. Completely different from Squirtle, whom you'll usually first go into the wild with at level 7 and which gets Bubble at, what, level 9, 10? And that does quad damage, plus the low Special and high Defense of Rocks means that Special-based Water did even better when compared to Attack-based Fighting moves. Yellow added Jesse and James, but that was the only improvement compared to R/B.
I'm admittedly a bit prejudiced against Grass starters. Bulbasaur took so much longer to learn a direct damaging move than Squirtle did, grinding that you'd have to do against wild Pokémon which could take hours. Chikorita was at a huge disadvantage against most of the Johto Leaders: Flying, Bug, Steel, and Ice all had direct advantages over Grass in one way or another, and all of Morty's Ghosts were part Poison which is also hard to damage with Grass. Admittedly by that point you should have someone other than your starter to rely on against different types, and even before the first Gym there's a place to catch Geodude for a quick advantage, but yeah, having any member of the starter trio weak against the first Gym Leader is a bad move on Game Freak's part, one that puts the weak starter at an immediate disadvantage and one they refuse to correct for some unknown reason. Generation 3, while not as bad as I originally thought and nowhere near a shark jump, is still in my opinion the weakest generation. More on that later. Generation 4 has a good Grass-type, who evolves to include a Ground-type (good against Infernape's main Fire type and Empoleon's secondary Steel type), but I'm already set in my "No Grass" ways.
I fell in love with the whole Legendary mystique back in Gen1. You're never going to pull it out of me. Mewtwo, still my favorite after all these years, started it with the First Movie (why do you think I referenced it?), though after Mewtwo I came to know and like most of the others as well. Then came Gen2, which did even more for my opinion about Legendaries, and the third movie which was a permanent hook. As much as those dogs still piss me off at times, Entei is still a personal favorite among the Gen2 Pokémon, and the Unown finished it. It's one of the reasons I like the fourth generation so much, and a saving grace for the weak third: more Legendaries, more story time for the Legendaries, and the Legendaries start to get that much bigger and better, actually seeming like they could be gods of some pagan religion at times, with Arceus being, ya know, THAT God, the one Jews, Christians, and Muslims worship.
You have a problem with silent protagonists, I have a problem with weak postgame. Gen1 is forgivable, since they were still working shit out: it certainly wasn't the biggest problem with the early games, though taking out the eventual Oak battle that should have happened (and existed in the game data) was pretty damn stupid. Gen2, it was a bit of a weak point that you had nothing to do after Red, but the longer adventure made up for it. Generation 4 fixed those problems, with the postgame including the final defeat of the criminal team, the Heatran thing, and rematches with Leaders in a density that actually works, and in a centralized location, where you get rematches whenever it suits you rather than when it suits the Leaders. That leaves, ugh, Generation 3. The postgame in Gen3 is pretty much limited to the Battle Frontier, which is designed specifically for metagamers. It highlights a big problem in Gen3: most of the "improvements" over Gen2 were only important to the metagame, aside from the Abilities which were unfortunately often useful only for Berry holders (I'm not a Berry fan and never was) or in situations where you'd be better off healing the HP damage or status effects that triggered them. The postgame, based around the Battle Frontier alone, was playable solely to Smogon-type players, which left out those who like me didn't have the Internet (and thus couldn't read up on proper strategy for who to use, much less things like IVs and the effects of Natures), those like probably most of the kids who didn't have the patience for it, or those people again like me who would rather move onto a new game once all the exploring and storyline were over. If the postgame was going to be that bad, I figured, I'd treat it like a Zelda game: "Postgame? What postgame?" And yes, you're right about Zelda being why I didn't like your comments about silent heroes.
If Pokémon ever needs a grand finale, where they need to slaughter the cash cow for its beef because it stopped giving milk, that would be how they'd do it. I've gotten Pokémon to Level 100 before, yeah, but not so epic as that. Not even legitimately, actually. Missingno. was the best part of Generation 1, you see, and to not use it would be idiotic to say the least. But that "grand finale" game is a long way off, if it could ever happen at all, because for it to happen Pokémon would need to stop being so damn profitable, an unlikely event in America and almost impossible in Japan. That being said, when the 20-year anniversary rolls around in 2016, someone should make a fangame based on such a concept. Flash would be a possible medium, in which case I'd love to see it on NG (provided I'm around, since that would be getting near the nine-year mark), but there would probably be better ways of making it. The added plot, the justification for sending you from region to region, could center around Legendary Pokémon acting up, and eventually to an ultimate criminal, preferably one tainted by Missingno. (in the above fic, the Chaos Wills were inspired by Missingno.) torturing whatever is the ultimate Legendary at that point, which sends all the others into chaos. Mewtwo wreaking havoc because of his rage at humanity may also come into play, or he'll be the one who explains everything once you defeat/catch him. Maybe both. And unlike the others, where the League happens after the climax of the Legendary/criminal tale (one of the only complaints I have with Platinum is how the League seems like an obstacle during the Galactic saga, and an anticlimax after it, no matter how much I love Cynthia), the criminal story should build across Leagues, bringing in Leaders and Elite Four and Champions, and the ultimate boss should be the supreme criminal leader, Chaos Boss Missingno.
Of course, the main protagonist (and the appearances of the previous heroes as Champions) should be silent. Yes, you never hear the player character speak since it's series tradition which can't be broken without major decay, and yes, Archie and Maxie are coming to all those realizations about upsetting super-ancient Pokémon and the balance of nature and how the land and sea blah blah blah heart of the cards mostly by themselves. But that's no problem to me, and maybe for some of them the creator could throw in a partner, like Cynthia was in Platinum, in order to have someone else provide the necessary lines. Steven and/or Wallace could serve in the Hoenn part, Lance in Johto, kinda like that.
I'm coming unfortunately close to the character limit. You drove me here, Gustavos, and fulfilled the prophecy of one of the spammers back in my first news post. We can gush about a possible fangame all we want, but unless we do something to make it, it won't likely happen. And it would be a crying shame if it didn't.
"Teach Pokémon to understand
The power that's inside!"
i wish i have no souls
What was that, Cyrus? You think "spirit" is incomplete? Yeah, tell that to Giratina or Arceus, they'll laugh their Pokédeity equivalents of asses off at you.
blam the kitty krew
Brah, you're going to need to be a Hell of a lot stronger than you are, and you're going to need a Hell of a lot more people than you have, to stop the plague of savewhores that eat at this site like a parasite and Save the crappiest of crap that often makes the Kitty Krew look like Brackenwood. You haven't even seen the worst of the spammers. Your sign-up date tells me that you've not even known Chris Beer while in possession of your current account, much less anything of the older spammers. You know a few KK members because they've submitted recently, but you haven't run into all of them by any means, much less known all that you've run into.
But it's good to see that someone fights on for the good of Newgrounds, whatever they perceive that good might be. It gives me hope that this place won't descend into a Hell of bad corporate games and Sonic the Hedgehog sprite parodies.
I got so confused... I never have really understood Poke'mon. I just remember blasting through Team Rocket all the time in Fire Red. Adding theology into the equation just gives me a headache.
Nice fic though. ;)
A fix for your confusion: Arceus is God, and yes, that's canon. Palkia is responsible for the existence of space, and Dialga for the flow of time. Giratina is one of Arceus' strongest creations sealed away in an alternate world for being a bit rebellious, kinda like Satan but not really evil. Then there's a whole shitload of other Legendary Pokémon involved in everything from creating "spirit" to pulling the continents with a rope to reviving the dead. Really, you have to be paying a lot of attention to the Legendaries in Gen4 to know most of this, which most players don't. I'm probably the only one who does, mostly due to my continuing love for the Legendary mystique and power.
Son, I don't fuckin' care how brilliantly nerdy your fic was.
Pokemans are some of the best things ever. I swear.
Reading through your guys' rants, I see some of the points you made, and I wholeheartedly agree with most of it.
I started on a GBC, playing Silver. Still have it, too. Hell, I'm holding it.
But what I wanted to say was how pissed I am at general version preference.
EVERY GODDAMN TIME I CHOOSE A GAME, IT'S THE UNPOPULAR ONE.
I chose Silver.
EVERYONE GETS GOLD.
I chose Pearl.
EVERYONE GETS DIAMOND.
Planning on SoulSilver, and...
I just about cried at a Best Buy when I looked at a shelf, and the half tagged with 'Pokemon HeartGold' was totally empty, and the one with 'Pokemon SoulSilver' was completely full. Literally, completely full.
I don't see what makes people prefer one version to another. I'm always the one to try the unpopular one to see why people don't like it. I tried Pearl, and I loved the venture. But that brings me to my next point.
After not playing it for a while, my brother takes my game, saps all my good Pokemon from my storage and person WITHOUT MY CONSENT, and uses them for his own benefit, on the basis that 'I don't play it anymore'.
WELL YOU DON'T PLAY FFIII ANYMORE, THEREFORE, I GET ANY AND ALL RIGHT TO TOTALLY DELETS YOUR SAVE FILE.
How exactly do I handle this.
Also, Zelda is a very beautifully done series, and I can't wait for the announcement of the 13th(?) installment this year.
Don't be pissed off about everyone you know having the other game. The way Game Freak does it, you're almost certain to have Pokémon that they lack, and they'll have all the same sets of Pokémon, meaning they'll have to trade with you, and you get to pick who you trade with based on who offers the better deal. Personally, with the main games of each generation (aside from Gen1), I pick the third because it has the best adventure, or at least the best chance of seeing and catching as many godlike Legendary Pokémon as possible. Especially in Gen3 and Gen4, when I didn't even waste my time with the first two games, seeing as how the third one is canon (evidence: Red wouldn't have had that Pikachu so powerful and not evovled if Yellow wasn't canon). As for HG/SS, I decided on SoulSilver with a coin flip.
There is a way to stop your brother from doing it again: do the same to him. Drain all his good Pokémon and hand him Ratatta/Zigzagoon/Bidoof in their place. Delete his FFIII saves. Or you could just give him the Johnny Cage treatment...
You best believe that if the next Zelda looks good, I'll buy a Wii for it. Though, really, I'm not sure how they'll do it. The Zelda fans aren't exactly the ones who are enthralled, or even impressed, by motion control, you know? But it's a Zelda game, so I have faith that Nintendo can do it right.
Also, sifting through the past, I realized you and Gustavos remind me of two nostalgic old men ranting on a park bench while children remind you of what once was.
It amuses me.
Time. Time? It passes in an instant. Eleven, nearly twelve years ago I was obsessing over Pokémon, when there were only 151 and there was no real balance for Psychics. Now there's over 500 (with the Black and White announcements) and far more type balance. Back then, there were no held items, no Berries or Apricorns, no special Poké Balls, and you had to change PC Box manually. That's all changed. And yet I could have blinked and missed all the steps on that path.
The sun is risen? Wait, when did this happen? How will we know?
Also, I don't think I have to say it, but the 3DS is simply a beast.
We'd need to discuss the significance of the sunrise on MSN. She says I probably should have waited until you got on anyway.
I haven't seen much of the 3DS, actually, and I don't know how it works. All I know is that Nintendo trying new things does a Hell of a lot better than Nintendo trying to be like Sony.
my first pokemon game was pokemon blue, my favorite was gold. im 20 years and and still play pokemon games. i dont care what internet kids say about that. its my life and th way i live it. i last played diamond great game. lost it wish i still had it. someone send me the latest pokemon game please. and sorry I AM THE VERY BEST.
Get to 1500 Blams without sending your Saves over 9000, and I'll send you a copy of whatever is the most recent main series game at the time. By then it might be Black and White's third version, but I'll do it.
Squidge is Clock-Ninja.
Ah, I see.
omtish
Screw you, hippie!
Makaga
Pokemons?