Pokemon W2 - I luff this game~

Dis my pic. Click to make big n' stuff. 

WARNING: This blog post will, *most likely*, contain spoilers. 

Before I go any farther, please lemme remind you about how dissatisfied I am about the variety of wild Pokemon you experience in this game, at least toward the beginning. I need a water-tyyyyyyype! ; A ; Alright, done. 

Midnight (Zorua) ♂ - 25 
Luke (Lucario) ♂ - 30 
Eris (Krokorok) ♀ - 30 
Cesar (Servine) ♂ - 31 
Corro (Golbat) ♂ - 31 

Okay, real talk. I'm not personally a fan of Pidove and his evolutions because...well, just meh. He's a little boring. But I kinda want a flying-type, and I know that they had Zubat in the sewers of Castelia City, so broke down and got a Zubat, because frankly, Crobat is one of my favorites. Also...I have a Zorua now. I'm in Driftveil City at this point, and you get a Zorua droppe off on you when you get there. He's cute, and he has pretty decent stats, but I'm not sure...I already have a dark-type Pokemon on my team, so I'll just have to see what happens with him. I'll train him for a while, at least. But anyway...

Alright...this pleases me. As I'm slowly plowing my way through the game and finding out new things, I'm finally beginning to realize that the gym themes are more various now. I mentioned in my last blog post about the ambient bug-like music in Castelia's gym, and I experienced the same thing when I got to Nimbasa. I PROMISE I won't post about every gym's music, but this really excites me, considering I had grown almost more-than-used to the generic gym theme whenever you enter a gym. But anyway, back to Nimbasa. If you played B/W, you remember that Elesa, Nimbasa'a gym leader, is a fashion model. In B/W, you challenged her in an amusement park. In this sequel, they changed things up a bit. You can still access the theme park, but now you get to challenge Elesa on a freaking RUNWAY. Like, a catwalk runway. This music here is what you hear when you've beaten all the trainers and have only her to defeat. It is SO cool. No lie.

But yeah. I'm in Driftveil City, now, and it is the hosting spot of your Pokemon Tournaments. Now, I realize that this aspect of the sequel was well-advertised before it even came out in Japan, but I never thought that you'd get to experience it so early on in the game. I thought it would be an extra for after you beat the main storyline. but nope, it's PART of the storyline. It's enjoyable, albeit a bit stressful at times. Mainly because the first match you have is against your rival, and he has a Tranquill that knows Roost. I'm sorry, but that is BITCH MOVE. Otherwise, you get Battle Points to redeem, and it's a cute idea to help plan battle strategies.

M'sorry for the abrupt edit. I'm a silly person who doesn't do her research enough.
- Churl

Pokemon W2 - Creepy Crawlies

Picture es small. Click to make big.
WARNING - This blog post WILL contain spoilers.

So, I've done a bit of changing around with my team. Here's who we have now.

Cesar (Servine) ♂ - 20

Maverick (Darumaka) ♂ - 20
Luke (Lucario) ♂ - 21

Eris (Sandile) ♀ - 22

Maverick is a bit of a...guest team member for now. Mainly because I'm not the fondest of his stats and would prefer a different fire-type, but I'm not in the best shape, currently being in the Castelia City gym, filled with bug-types. I also released Ross. He won't hold up well in the next few gyms, if my predictions of where I'll be headed next are true. But yeah, I'm in Castelia City now, and am looking for Team Plasma with Hugh.
Oh, by the way, this is Hugh:

Instead of Cheren and Bianca being your companions in this one, since it's two years from the prequel, you get this little twirp. He means well, but JESUS CHRIST, he's like a Sasuke for Pokemon. Don't get me wrong, he does mean well, cares about his Pokemon and whatnot, but he's a little churlish! (Neheh...churl-ish.) Regardless...back to Castelia City.

M'kay...this is more of a personal issue than anything else, but people who know me - my boyfriend, my parents, my close friends - will all tell you that I'm not at all fond of bugs. By bugs, I mean insects, spiders, crayfish, (except Corphish...Corphish is adorable) and everything related to creepy creatures. Over the years of playing Pokemon, I've become okay with them being around. You have the occasional gym and whatnot that'll be host to Bug-Type Pokemon and I've been just fine. Well...y'know how Burgh's Bug-Type gym was all art and honey? Oh no...it's not pretty and gooey anymore. It's THIS:

Pardon the quality...

You stand in front of these cocoon sort of things and they SUCK YOU UP and DRAG YOUR BODY down a thin tube to another part of the gym so you can eventually get to burgh, hiding up top in a creepy sort of rainbow art room. Go look it up. Not only does this new gym design resemble an actual hive, but listen to this background music! ; n ;

No me gusta. That is all.
Sorry this post was a bit longer than usual. I'm thoroughly enjoying the game thus far, though. <3

- Churl

Pokemon W2 - Pretty Graaaaphiiics~

Das my picture. Please don't steal it. I like it. ; n ;

WARNING - The following blog post may contain spoilers.

I'm not gonna lie, guys, I was relatively surprised at this game. I mean, I've never played an actually sequel to a Pokemon game. Yes, Pokemon Coliseum had a sequel, but it didn't necessarily have a 2 beside it. But I digress. Say hello to my new team. <3

Cesar (Snivy) ♂ - LV 16

Luke (Riolu) ♂ - LV 18
Ross (Flaaffy) ♂ - LV 18

Lemme get this out of the way, first. I love the variety the game gives you this early in the game. I have a freaking FLAAFFY and RIOLU. I really can't complain too much. I look forward to some more variety later on in the game, but for right now, I'm stoked with the team I was able to scrounge together. I had a Purrloin named Coya at the very beginning, but I can't deny, after I started seeing Mareep and Riolu, I knew I would end up having to make some difficult decisions with making my team.

Anyway, I'm pretty satisfied so far with the gameplay. Not only have they shifted the story line for the game, but they've improved a bit on the graphics of the game. They're mainly small little things, but they've added some touching animation to the game. For one, your battlefield is more animated! What I mean by that is, well, blades of grass move when you're in battle on a grassy field. Plus, all of your opponents have animations as well. I had noticed that a little bit in some of the previews, but I never imagined that they'd let your Youngsters and Lasses have their own animation at the beginning of battle, too. Like I said, small stuff, but they make a difference, to me. If you have a copy, see how many little details you can pick up on. 

Another difference I noticed is that you have a bigger map of Unova to explore. Your character starts out the journey not from Nuvema Town, which you see at the very bottom right of the map, but in Aspertia Town, at the very bottom left of the map. I find this to be rather interesting, because you still have only 8 gym badges to collect, to my knowledge. Three of your gyms are new, and this makes me wonder if you get to interact with the other gym leaders in the game.

I'm not exactly far in the game, but I've beaten past the first gym, which happens to be your good pal Cheren, who is now a Normal-type gym leader. And yes, Team Plasma makes a comeback; I'll make mention of them later on in this little tutorial. So that's that, a little summary of how things are running thus far.

By the way, I PROMISE that I'll have a new chapter up for Glitchy Red Retold. I just recently got a small break and I'm working on it as we speak. 

OMG YES PLEASE

Do you see this? Here, look - I'll show you:

This is a box. For the new freaking Pokemon game. I bought Black for the previous one, so I figured, why not get the opposite for the sequel? So yes, I now have in my possession the game of Pokemon White 2.

I'm gonna do something fun with this. Remember back in the day when I used to do semi-walkthroughs of different games? I think I'll do one for this game, too, only this time, I'll be a first-timer.

...And this is where I grow sad inside. You see, it is midterm week, and I have much to finish and turn in before Wednesday, when I'll finally be in my fall break. I may play a few minutes here or there between now and Wednesday, but I won't have anything to post most likely until this weekend, so be patient, and I'll whip up a nice blog sequence for White 2. <3

Also, I know I've been neglecting my story remake of Glitchy Red. Have no fear, though. I promise you - no, I pinkie promise you, I'll have a new chapter up by this weekend as well. Hope you'll like it. :D

-Churl

9 Reasons Why Johto is my Favorite Gen.

Everyone who's ever immersed themselves in a few Pokemon games will tell you that they have a preference for a specific generation, usually with reasons to back them up...usually. Most of the time, the winning candidate will be the original Pokemon Red, Blue and (in Japan) Green, with Yellow on the side. Though I will definitely agree that the simplicity of these GameBoy games are unmatched in some aspects, I truly cannot deny that I enjoyed playing Pokemon Gold, Silver, and Crystal far more, and here's why...in no particular order.

9 - Timing

(Behold, my childhood in a closet.) Anyway, Pokemon Gold and Silver came out mid-to-late 2000. I, at the time, had recently turned 7-years-old, just about the time for my vocabulary to sprout its wings and allow me to actually play video games without my mother reading everything to me. Silver, which I had chosen, was not my first Pokemon game - Blue was. The only problem is that when the very first Pokemon came out in 1998, I wasn't familiar with how to read. My mother taught me how to read through video games, to a certain point; she would sit me on her lap and let me hold the GameBoy, but would read to me whatever people said to Red in the older generations, so now that I was old enough to comprehend what people were saying for myself, that made the experience twice as memorable. I'm sure you've all experienced something like this, you gamers since childhood.

8 - Graphics

I've lightly mentioned this in a previous blog post about Pokemon graphics, but when I played the very first Pokemon games, the sprites tended to freak me out, until Pokemon Yellow sort of fixed that. Still, the grave images of...Golbat (shudder) and some others were branded into my memory. Pokemon Silver helped me believe in cute little pocket monsters again. I won't go into too much detail, but I thought they looked far nicer, and polished, particularly the newer additions, with these sorts of graphics. Not only that, but when I picked up Crystal the next year, I was amazed in a childish sort of way at the little animations they had added to all the Pokemon. It truly gave you the desire to "Catch 'em All."

7 - Rival Silver

Alright, I have a confession to make...I thought Rival Blue was awesome. He was a good rival in the first game, and though he didn't often provide too much of a challenge, he always popped up in places where you never expected him too, especially when you hadn't healed your team...

...What? This is about Silver, not Blue? Ah, really? That's interesting...what? Noooo, I never had a crush on Silver when I was younger, why would you say that? He's a redhead? Yeah, I know, but what difference does that  make? He was an abusive and self-centered trainer, and though he had a beautiful change of heart later on and spoke to you like an angel whenever you'd run into him...NO. I NEVER HAD A CRUSH ON HIM. NEVER. I DENY THAT STATEMENT.

6 - Exploring Two Worlds

It honestly took me a while to plow through all the gym leaders so I could take on the Elite 4 and eventually beat the game. But after that, I figured that I would simply pass on to the next Pokemon game like it was nothing, just like what happened in Pokemon Blue. When I did defeat Lance and get the Pokemon Champion title, however, something interesting happened. I got a call from Prof. Elm and he shipped me off to Kanto. And at first I was like "Psh, yeah right." They were serious. It hadn't been that long after the first game that I did beat Silver, but it was almost like nostalgia to me, and it most certainly is now that I've played through HeartGold to pass on to Kanto. Though everyone somehow knows you're from the foreign region, you still get to take these more advanced trainers on and beat through the Kanto gym leaders, which I thought was an excellent layer of icing on the Silver cake.

5 - Shinies 

I'm not gonna lie - I played through Silver and Crystal quite a few times, and throughout those times, I did indeed hear people say things about some Pokemon being different. When you encountered the Red Gyarados in the Lake of Rage, it never occurred to me too much that it was a shiny. At the time I didn't have internet access to tell me what a shiny was, so I just thought it was a weird Gyarados, whatever. Then one day as I was playing Crystal I was breeding Eevee with my Ditto, and had like, 10 eggs. (I like Eevee, okay?) Then one hatched, and I noticed something different about it. It was a lot grayer than usual. Little did my small mind know that I had hatched one of the rarest shinies to grace Pokemon. I raised it to be an Espeon and nicknamed it Essence, and soon afterward...I erased my game. After I realized what I had done, I was almost heartbroken. These two shinies (Stantler and Tentacruel) are the only remaining ones I've caught on record, both on HeartGold. Thus, I will never again erase my HeartGold data...I'll just go pick up SoulSilver one day. ; w ;

4 - Berries

I honestly don't have too much to say about the Berries in G/S/C, because they weren't as advanced a system as they were in the next generation. Berries came in like...well, Berries, and status cure Berries. Very simple, eh? Well, when I was younger, this provided me with some sort of Animal Crossing effect - Berries grew once a day, since time had now been installed in the games, so I HAD to check the trees every single day so I would have all the berries. I dunno what was wrong with me at the time, but I spent a lot of time whilst playing through the games making sure I had all the berries I could ever need.

3 - Team Rocket

I initially didn't think much of Team Rocket in Pokemon Blue. I knew they were there, and I knew they were always causing trouble, but I really didn't display any emotion over whether or not they existed. Sure, they provided something to level-grind with, but that was just about it. Then they returned...3 years later, in G/S/C. I guess the return effect was what got me when you came across them in this generation. They had relatively the same Pokemon, but there was something different about them. Maybe it was the debut of your enemy's theme music? Yup, you got an epic battle theme when you ran into these guys. It pretty epic, too. Go look it up. Regardless, with their abrupt return and new look, they gave me another reason to be excite about playing this game.

2 - Breeding

Ah, what fond memories I had when I was younger, putting together two helpless Pokemon and pacing baaack and forth and baaack and forth on my bike between Goldenrod City and Route 34 in an effort that I would get an egg. It was usually just my Eevee and a Ditto, though, because my parents were too cheap to get me a strategy guide for a silly GameBoy Color game, so that's all I knew about. It was also an interesting epiphany that I had when I finally realized how the eggs randomly kept popping up at the Daycare center...Skitty/Wailord much?

1 - Overall Feel

I really dunno what it is about Pokemon Silver and Gold. Is it the concept of day and night that you experience when you decide to stay up past your bedtime under the blankets? Is it music style? Is it the plot difference? Or maybe the concept of Pokemon happiness? I really dunno. But it has my favorite starter of all time (Cyndaquil) along with your first debut for a female protagonist. Though I will never forgive GameFreak for replacing Kris with that bish Lyra in HeartGold/SoulSilver as your female character, I have very fond memories of playing this game, memories that I will share with my children when they learn to read. Video games are timeless, particularly Pokemon games, and I know that I will never forget this generation.

Sorry for the extremely long post, but I hoped you like my insight. <3

Chapter 8 - Nightmares

[DISCLAIMER - This chapter may not be for the faint of heart. You have been warned.]

Derrick allowed his eyes to glance at his counterpart occasionally as they made their way down Route 8 toward Celadon City. Red easily cut through the various trainers that challenged him on the way, but there was a different air about him that made Derrick uneasy. He knew that, somehow, Red was angry at him for letting the Raticate die. He felt bad about it, too, not being used to Pokemon ceasing to exist instead of simply lying immobile in his team's list, awaiting recovery at the Pokemon Center. But how was he to know?

"Red?"

The trainer made a silent acknowledgement toward the boy.

"I think I know what might cheer you up. A bit later on, we'll be able to try and find MissingNo."

...What's MissingNo.?

"It's a glitch that--"

Glitch?

Derrick cursed under his breath at making another game reference. He bit his lip and rapidly scrambled around in his mind for a cover up.

"Sorry, I didn't mean glitch. It's this extremely rare Pokemon that no-one's ever seen or caught, and it's really difficult and dangerous to find. It lives in the ocean. Think you're up to finding and catching it?"

Hmm...that'd be interesting. But how do you know about it if no-one's ever seen or caught it?

"Because I'm God, remember?" he blurted, wishing he could kick himself for saying so.

Suddenly, Derrick's vision went completely white. He covered his eyes and groaned, but the white remained strong in his sight. His head pounded softly as he heard his name being called. His stomach gave an all-too familiar heave as, after what seemed like hours of staring into a white void, he regained his vision just in time for a prepared hand to slap him across the face. He rubbed his cheek and looked around in bewilderment.

"Dude, are you okay!?" came the voice of Scott. He was back in his friend's room with a sore cheek and a queasy stomach.

"What happened..?" was the first thing he could muster. Scott knelt before a dimmed GameBoy SP that had clattered to the floor when he smacked Derrick.

"Turn this thing off and let's find a place to burn it. You've been playing that Pokemon stuff for waaaaay too long." Derrick knit his brows together.

"What was I doing?"

"You had your head leaned against my bed as you were playing on that thing, and you had the creepiest face, too. It's like you were possessed or something!"

"I was out of the zone, that's all..." Scott set the SP on his bed and grabbed Derrick by the shoulders.

"Dude...you weren't even looking at the screen and you had played for like, 10 minutes before I finally decided to try and shake you out of it. You just had this blank expression on your face. That thing's taking over your head!"
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Derrick sighed as he paced the coast of Cinnabar Island, trying to perform the Old Man Glitch. I flew to Viridian City to talk to the old man, but why isn't MissingNo. popping up now? I'm not even getting any other Pokemon... He clacked his tongue in frustration and allowed Red to cross onto the shore again; he needed to continue on into the Pokemon Mansion anyway so he could take on the gym leader.

"Derrick, it's 1am! Lights out!"

"'Kay, mom," Derrick responded, pulling the switch on his bedside lamp and leaning against his pillow as he maneuvered Red into the mansion. As Red took his first steps into the mansion, he stopped, and a text box appeared beneath him on the screen. It read:

RED: Nice try.

Derrick's eyes widened as he stared dumbly at the screen, rereading the text. Had Red just spoken to him through the game? Pulling his bed covers to his chin, he flicked the SP's power off and laid the device on the floor, rolling over and nestling into his covers. He needed some sleep.

That evening, Derrick dreamed vividly. A pale body loomed behind him as he walked in the void of his dream. As he caught a glimpse of it, he began to jog in an attempt to shrug the entity from his presence, but it only got closer. He dared not look back at it as his jog soon turned into a run, then a sprint. Still the body stayed close to him, arms reaching out. Suddenly, Derrick was jerked into the creature's grasp. The entity faced him about and ferociously began clawing at his chest cavity. Derrick could only watch in horror, looking dead into the face of his captor. It was a little boy with bright, red eyes, dark hair, and a Pokemon cap.

Red is DEAD!

Nooonono, this has nothing at all to do with my little story chapters. This is an entirely different manner of exclamation.
Last night I accomplished something that I had only dreamed of accomplishing, something that I never thought I'd have the patience and courage to do. Last night, I climbed Mt. Silver in my cartridge of Pokemon Heart Gold with this team:

Zippity (Jolteon) ♂ - Lv. 68
Essence (Espeon) ♀ - Lv. 70
Venom (Umbreon) ♂ - Lv. 66
Dipper (Vaporeon) ♂ - Lv. 68
Calor (Flareon) ♂ - Lv. 68
Dominic (Rhyhorn) ♂ - Lv. 35 (As an...HM whore.)

I had plenty...PLENTY of medicine with me, because honestly, I'm not the aggressive sort of gamer - not unless I absolutely must be. That being said, sometimes I cut corners because I have so much medicine.
Regardless, I took my team, climbed Mt. Silver, and promptly kicked Pokemon Trainer Red where the babies float.
No...actually, it was more interesting than that. See here for yourself.

As a disclaimer, this was a 25-minute-long battle, so I had to speed it up. Also, I've no idea why the camera kept refocusing. Hopefully you can still see well. I took the most ghetto of means to record this: my cell phone, taped to a plastic sweets box my boyfriend's mother got me for Christmas last year...yup.

I know those of you who've already beaten Red are probably ready to give some nice, critical comments about my form. Well MURRH. I'm proud of this accomplishment. He should have had more heals, being up there on that mountain all alone.
It was, I cannot deny, THE CLOSEST battle I have ever encountered. Once false move at the end and I would be throwing my DS against the wall on sheer rage and impulse. (Thank you, Zippity~)
Thankfully, though, that wasn't the case.

Don't worry - my next post will almost definitely be a new chapter.
My heart is simply still jittery from that battle. Thank you for reading this little ditty! Now I can truly call myself a Pokemon nerd.

- Churl