POKEYMANS thread

Lago PARANOIA · Post by **Lago PARANOIA** » Wed Jan 07, 2015 3:13 am

So I've been watching the first few minutes of other people playing Pokemon Omega Ruby and already I'm not feeling it. I hate how they stuck you with an idiotic Everyman doofus, Professor Birch is kind of a lame-o, and your starting Pokemon suck. The X/Y starters were no Squirtle (my favorite) / Charmander / Bulbasaur, but at least the future evolutions looked reasonably cool -- especially Greninja. Does this game get much better after this lackluster opening?

name_here · Post by **name_here** » Wed Jan 07, 2015 4:10 am

When the fire chicken becomes a kung-fu fire chicken, much is forgiven.

Maxus · Post by **Maxus** » Wed Jan 07, 2015 7:30 am

When the water-type mudskipper grows to being a water/ground-type and solos the Electric Gym, there is much rejoicing.

Edit: And yeah, it grows on you. The DexNav is interesting, and there's enough diversions that I still haven't beaten the Elite Four. The only day-to-day flaw is not having pokemon following me around.

If it makes you feel better, I can trade you a Squirtle--either hatched or an egg.

Shrapnel · Post by **Shrapnel** » Wed Jan 07, 2015 1:58 pm

You can also catch a Deoxys after the post-game. That alone forgives any sins the game may have committed.

Maxus · Post by **Maxus** » Sat Jan 10, 2015 9:13 pm

Just got a Shiny Aerodactyl from reviving a fossil.

Aerodactyl is one of my all-time favorites.

Just a little thing to make the day better...

Maxus · Post by **Maxus** » Mon Jan 12, 2015 1:25 am

And there we are, I did the Delta Episode.

That was actually pretty cool, all said. Even if it did make me cross Hoenn about five times.

And I liked the shoutout to the old Ruby/Sapphire in there. I hadn't expected that...

Shrapnel · Post by **Shrapnel** » Mon Jan 12, 2015 4:34 pm

CoroCoro recently officially confirmed Hoopa, who will be in the upcoming Pokémon special, The Archdjinni of the Rings: Hoopa, which is an awesome title.

Of course, no word on when any of that shit will hit the States or the rest of the not-America world.

Darth Rabbitt · Post by **Darth Rabbitt** » Tue Jan 13, 2015 12:10 am

Shrapnel · Post by **Shrapnel** » Tue Jan 13, 2015 6:14 pm

Sucks to be Brazil.

Lago PARANOIA · Post by **Lago PARANOIA** » Fri Jan 16, 2015 6:02 am

Well, assuming that the link is true, you can't really blame Nintendo for that decision. Those kinds of tariffs are fucking ridiculous. They're pretty much just asking Nintendo to ship a whole bunch of units that aren't going to sell to anyone but some rich Nintendo fanboys.

Seriously, $700 USD for a Wii U?

Darth Rabbitt · Post by **Darth Rabbitt** » Fri Feb 13, 2015 1:39 am

Whipstitch · Post by **Whipstitch** » Fri Feb 13, 2015 4:22 am

Lago PARANOIA wrote:Well, assuming that the link is true, you can't really blame Nintendo for that decision.

Particularly since Nintendo doesn't treat their consoles as a loss leader.

Lago PARANOIA · Post by **Lago PARANOIA** » Fri Feb 27, 2015 11:34 pm

So, as someone whose only exposure to Pokemon was Gen1 and Gen6, how would you people who have been in the fandom for awhile rank the games?

The general feeling I got was that Gen5 was the worst of the series with BW2 barely redeeming it, Gen4 was decent but where the problems started, Gen2 was mostly just an expansion pack to Gen1, and Gen3 was relatively the best of the series -- even better than Gen1 and Gen6. Gen1 was a very good start but lacked a lot of the quality-of-life features that later games would have and Gen6 is like the Transformers Animated of Pokemon.

Maxus · Post by **Maxus** » Sat Feb 28, 2015 1:07 am

Lago PARANOIA wrote:So, as someone whose only exposure to Pokemon was Gen1 and Gen6, how would you people who have been in the fandom for awhile rank the games?

The general feeling I got was that Gen5 was the worst of the series with BW2 barely redeeming it, Gen4 was decent but where the problems started, Gen2 was mostly just an expansion pack to Gen1, and Gen3 was relatively the best of the series -- even better than Gen1 and Gen6. Gen1 was a very good start but lacked a lot of the quality-of-life features that later games would have and Gen6 is like the Transformers Animated of Pokemon.

Gen 1 was only a nice start because of the raw potential. Seriously, there's all kinds of weirdass glitches and imbalances in those games. One of my favorites is a move, Focus Energy, was supposed to increase critical hit chance, instead it DEcreased the chance of criticals. Beating Gen 1 consisted of "catch Abra, evolve it to Kadabra, then to Alakazam if you can manage it, take Confusion and Psybeam and Psychic, murder everything". A lot of pokemon were weak to attack types because weakness/strength was binary instead of multiplicative. There were some combos that were just flat-out hard to beat, with some multi-hit moves denying the target the ability to move.

Gen 2 refined about everything to it. Added a day/night cycle--and a day-of-the-week cycle. Sorted out attacks, increased the number of attacks so now Haunters had something they could use on Psychic-types. The type chart became multiplicative. Bigger world, bigger story.

I never played Gen 4, but I understand that's where it really started to sort out, once they got the Physical/Special divide based on something other than a move's type. That alone made a bunch of pretty cool pokemon viable.

Koumei · Post by **Koumei** » Sat Feb 28, 2015 2:38 am

Best: XY, B2W2, HGSS, probably the remakes of Ruby and Sapphire
Good: DPPl
Acceptable: FRLG, GSC
Bad: RGBY
Worst: RSE, BW

I can't say how I'd order the specifics within a tier, but that's roughly how I'd put it. If you want reasons:

I needn't reiterate why BW is the worst, and RSE shat me up the wall in ways that might not piss others off, but plenty of people at least agree that it's a slow, boring start, and that the E4 have a sudden difficulty spike after the rest of the game. It's also where Legendary bloat went truly bananas.

The originals are bad because of what Maxus said. The remakes definitely improved upon them, but still suffered from 3Gen issues. GSC were a lot of fun at the time, an improvement, but had plenty of problems, largely related to the way Typing worked (where you didn't have Physical Ice and Special Ice moves, Ice was always Special).

DPPl is where I got back into Pokemon after a long break, so I am biased, but the 4th Gen really did introduce so many good changes to the system that I'll forgive it for vomiting up 200 new Legendaries. It helps also that it added evolutions to previously lacking pokemon that really helped, and it has a bunch of my personal favourites.

HGSS has all the good stuff from DPPl except is better, and YOUR POKEMON FOLLOWS YOU AND DOES CUTE THINGS.

B2W2 just lets you have so much fun doing stuff unrelated to battling pokemon, it's just a good piece overall.

6Gen introduced some really good changes mechanically, and I am happy about Mega-Evolutions and the Fairy Type and Poke Amie. Pokemon: France is a good game, marred only by the fact that post-game interest falls flat pretty quickly.

Shrapnel · Post by **Shrapnel** » Sun Mar 01, 2015 2:55 am

My favorite Pokemon game will always be Crystal, because Kris is awesome. My biggest complaint about HGSS, aside from Ethan and the Kimono girls, was that Lyra wasn't Kris, and Ken Sugimori should've been gently slapped because of that. (Conversely, the only thing I genuinely liked about BW was Hilda's design.)

For me, I'd rate it this way:

Best: Mystery Dungeon: Explorers of Sky (fuck you, spin-offs count), HGSS, XY, ORAS, Crystal, the Ranger series

Good: DPPl, Emerald, Yellow (it introduced the friendship mechanic and was the first game to have a walking Pokemon, so screw the rest of Gen I's flaws), B2W2, XD: GoD

Okay: RGB

Absolute shit: BW

Koumei · Post by **Koumei** » Sun Mar 01, 2015 3:51 am

Oh right, yeah, spins-off.
Ranger was kind of cool. At the very least I recommend checking it out. It used the stylus as an active game mechanic (rather than just an extra way of pressing the buttons in menus) in a way I didn't hate, and I like +- too. Mainly thanks to how cute they are in whichever movie it was.

Mystery Dungeon: Sky/Time is the bestest ever, in Arceus-tier quality. That said, the 3DS one is still good, it just has a disappointingly limited cast. But you can play as Haxorus. The previous Mystery Dungeons don't suck, but Sky/Time are a pure upgrade.

Nobunaga's Ambition: it's kind of good, but grinding friendship levels is a real pain in the arse, and the mechanics are too simplistic. Pokemon only have one attack each, and basically all of your stats are determined by compatibility, so it plays out more like shogi with a grinding element. Also, after the main campaign, a lot of the extras are stupid in their difficulty. So fuck it.

Shrapnel · Post by **Shrapnel** » Mon Mar 09, 2015 3:30 pm

Re-reading this thread has made me realize that I've done summarizations/reviews of the various villainous teams at least five times.

edit: Also; my spelling and grammer use to be terrible.

Shrapnel · Post by **Shrapnel** » Fri Apr 10, 2015 2:05 pm

http://bulbanews.bulbagarden.net/wiki/G ... Youngsters

AndreiChekov · Post by **AndreiChekov** » Mon Apr 13, 2015 8:02 pm

I only play Nuzlocke.
As far as quality of games goes, OR and AS are pretty decent. The gym leaders actually have decent moves on their "best" pokemon. I was wiped by that altaria that winona has, because my team was all physical attackers, and that x4 defense with roost, it becomes indestructible.

Dexnav is op for nuzlockes, you can guarantee the pokemon that you get everywhere. Most of the mega evolutions make the game too easy. Blaziken is powerful, but hi jump kick is stupid. The miss chance and self damage is not worth the risk in a nuzlocke. Mudkip, the mega evolution has the stats of a legendary, and swift swim. Pick that guy for easy mode. Sceptile has some great potential. If you use the training bags to max it's attack, you can use a nice variety of moves, or you can use grass pledge, frenzy plant, leaf storm, and quick attack. It seriously doesn't do anything.

flying on latias/os is awesome. I didn't know anything about that when i got the game, and when latias joined my team I was super happy, and called it "Waifu"

The number of magikarps that you get is crazy ridiculous. Gyarados is quite powerful, and having 4 or 5 at once is a pretty good strategy for nuzlockes.

[rant]
I hate the team stuff. Maxie and team magma are just one big joke. There is literally zero chance of any of their pokemon posing a threat to yours. When a teams most dangerous pokemon is Mightyena, they are probably doing it wrong.
On the other hand, team aqua is ridiculously strong. Sharpedo, and whatever it evolves from/into is really good and killing pokemon. I have lost a pokemon pretty much everytime I've fought one of those. Oh, and megasharpedo was able to OHKO my skarmoury with assurance.
[/rant]

tl;dr - Alpha and Omega are decent games for nuzlocke. Just challenging enough to be interesting.

Koumei · Post by **Koumei** » Mon Apr 13, 2015 10:48 pm

I really don't understand Nuzlocke. Not "I don't understand how someone could enjoy this", because it adds challenge to a game that typically only has a few challenging points before you get to post-game steel cage matches. And even the frustration where things are permanently gone forever, some people dig frustrating games, as IWBTG and company show.

What I don't understand is what it's supposed to represent in-game. Some of the rules are a little baffling. "If it gets KOed, it's DEAD" makes sense, sure. "If your team is wiped out, you are eaten alive, GAME OVER" makes sense. But the restrictions on how many things you can even attempt to catch is weird.

Also, Mega Hoopa. Wow. Has Roggenrola not taught them what happens when you have a big round pokemon with a sort of wrinkled hole in the middle of that circle? But this time with fingers on the sides!

AndreiChekov · Post by **AndreiChekov** » Tue Apr 14, 2015 1:17 am

Koumei wrote:
What I don't understand is what it's supposed to represent in-game. Some of the rules are a little baffling. "If it gets KOed, it's DEAD" makes sense, sure. "If your team is wiped out, you are eaten alive, GAME OVER" makes sense. But the restrictions on how many things you can even attempt to catch is weird.

There have been many justifications for this. In the original comment he makes no pretense that it is anything other than an arbitrary rule to make the game harder and it gives him a reason to use zigzagoon.

In Black and White, which is a fantastic grimdark nuzlocke story, the reason is because pokemon are scarce and so the government of the elite 4 have that as law.

Another comic that I can't remember the name for had the concept that pokemon only go with trainers that are speshul snowflakes, and so not all pokemon think that you are that.

In general, I just try not to think about it too much.

Koumei · Post by **Koumei** » Tue Apr 14, 2015 1:33 am

I think a more sensible/fun "add challenge" rule would be "Before you play, have a Malibu and Coke. Then have seventeen more."

Prak · Post by **Prak** » Tue Apr 14, 2015 6:29 am

Or any if the various pokemon cocktails

AndreiChekov · Post by **AndreiChekov** » Wed Apr 15, 2015 3:55 am

Koumei wrote:I think a more sensible/fun "add challenge" rule would be "Before you play, have a Malibu and Coke. Then have seventeen more."

And no defeating wild pokemon.