Yeah, they're unusual in terms of rhythm and pacing.
We got more info on the Diamond/Pearl remakes and Legends: Arceus:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kdja...
This Legends trailer is much better than the first one a few months ago. The world looks a bit empty, but I like that they're actually going for the open world thing. And the sort of active time battle system they are using seems like it could be cool. Anyway, I'm now cautiously optimistic about that one.
I think Diamond/Pearl remakes look amazing. As many seem to be I'm still not a huge fan of the chibi look, but the rest of it looks a step up from Sw/Sh's overall look (technically). Underground thing looks a bit like Mystery Dungeon lite.
Arceus continues to show promise, but I can't help but hedge my expectations due to it being GF.
I'm eager for both, but that new look at Arceus moved me from "interested" to "excited". It's starting to look like they may be building upon the Wild Area designs from SwSh in ways I hoped they might!
I thought the last trailer was a big improvement over the reveal... This one isn't doing much for me.
I'm still glad Game Freak is trying something new, but this world just looks so bland and empty, especially compared to games like BotW or Xenoblade 2 which both released 4 years ago.
New trailer for the Diamond/Pearl remakes too:
That's kind of where I'm at with the two games as well. I'll probably be getting Arceus around launch unless the reviews are really bad (although it comes out just a week after Elden Ring). I'll still be keeping an eye on the D/P remakes if the reviews are good and when they go on sale eventually.
I would still like to check out the Gen 4 games updated with some modern quality of life improvements (like unlimited TMs), just not at full price.
So I grabbed New Pokemon Snap on sale, and have sunk a bit of time into it. If I could describe it in a single word, it's pleasant. It has the same theme park feel as the first game did, but it's much, much prettier, and it's fun to see all the Pokemon in their "natural" environments.
One thing that's a bit noticeable is that it is a bit grindy. You have to do each zone several times, to level it up by taking better photos. The way it works is that you go in and take photos (obviously), and there 4 different level photos of each Pokemon, and each is worth their own points amount of point. So for instance, a picture of Pikachu standing still is 1-star, eating an apple is 2-stars, and doing something cute like dancing or whatever is 3 or 4-stars. And each star ranking is worth it's own set of points, so if you want to level up a zone to get more Pokemon to show up or get the ones there to behave differently, you need to improve your score for the 1 star photos, the 2 star photos, and so on for every Pokemon.
So to level up zone, or unlock new zones, you have to do a couple of runs through and get a variety of photos for each Pokemon. I think you probably have to go through most zones twice to get the points you need to move on, and I often find myself doing it a third time or more as I'm trying to get better photos of each star ranking or trying to level up the zone. So it's certainly doing the same route over and over, just with pictures getting better each time as you experiment with your tools or get better at timing. Fortunately, each trip through a zone is fairly brisk (maybe like 5 minutes), and it still seems like it has a lot more content than the original. I could probably skip some of the grind and move on sooner than I am, but I don't mind it.
I'm having fun with it since it's very charming and polished, but I'm also kind of glad I didn't buy it at full price, either.
Absolutely. I rented it from my library and we loved it at first and less so each time we had to grind a level. I'm hoping they do a sequel and remove some of the archaic gamified parts and make them an optional mode or something. Alternatively, a basic "explore" mode would be cool in addition to the regular mode.
Pokemon Legends: Arceus is due out in a few days, but apparently the whole game leaked last week, and now everything is out there; the new pokedex, all regional variants, gameplay, etc. Some spoilers are in the link, if you care about that.
https://www.polygon.com/22891556/pok...
I've looked at some of the leaked gameplay and reviews. Early returns seem to be mixed; it's a fun shake up for the Pokemon franchise, but I'm not sure how much depth it has compared to other games in the genres it is expanding into. There are a lot of Monster Hunter-lite comparisons, for example. I'm still waiting for more reviews to come out before jumping, though. I am interested enough that I'll grab it at some (price) point.
So unrelated to the Arceus release, I’ve been doing a Nuzlocke run of Fire Red, which is the first time I’ve gotten the old cartridge out in a long, long time. Was feeling nostalgic, I suppose. I'm doing a fairly standard run, where I can only catch the first Pokemon I see in each route barring duplicates, anyone who faints is "dead" and can't be used again, and no legendaries. I've only attempted one Nuzlocke run before, so I'm still fairly new to this.
Anyway, the game started normally enough. I often go with Squirtle as a starter since he’s tanky, and is useful mid to late game (need someone to surf and use Ice Beam against Lance, after all). I also rolled with Pidgey for awhile, lucked out and caught an Abra north of Cerulean, and got a Diglett to beat Lt. Surge. This would look very similar to many runs I did back in the day, except that I usually don’t get Abra that early. I wound up dropping Pidgeotto, since Alakazam could do what I needed her to do (take out fighting types and poison/grass types) even more effectively. And since I was fighting every trainer, I was over leveled for all of my fights.
But the I got to Celadon yesterday and things started getting mixed up. First, was getting Eevee who I quickly turned Jolteon, since I had a huge gap in taking out water and flying types. Plus I leveled up Eevee until it learned Bite before evolving it, so I have a great anti-psychic and ghost attacker as well (reminder that Dark is always a special attack before Gen 4). I don’t think I’ve ever used Jolteon in a run before, so this is kind of a fun experiment. But the real kicker is I lost Wartortle to a critical Mega Punch from Giovanni’s Kanghaskhan in the Rocket Hideout. Totally unexpected, and kind of a record scratch moment, since the starters are usually the crux of my team.
And so that leaves me with two problems. One, I need a water type who can surf and be useful against Lance (and Blaine and Giovanni, too). And the second problem is now my team is Alakazam / Dugtio / Jolteon. All fast, and all hit hard, but all have huge defensive weaknesses. Wartortle was going to be the defensive pivot and the one I could switch to to take a hit or two when I had a bad matchup. But now that’s gone.
I spent a little time looking at what would be available to me that could be a suitable replacement, and seem to have surprisingly decent options, with a bit of creativity. Tentacruel is fast and has good special defense, plus learns Barrier to shore up the physical defense; Poliwrath is a little slow but has reasonably good defenses and a good movepool; and Omastar is an option way down the line with some very good physical defense and great special attack, but that will be a 50/50 if I get Swift Swim which it will need. So next stop will be getting through the Pokemon Tower as fast as possible so I can get to Fushia City asap to get the Great Rod, so I can start catching water types in all the towns that I've visited before so that I can see what my options are, so I have time to grind the lucky winner to catch up with the rest of my team. And to add to the shake up, I don’t think I’ve ever used any of these water types in the Kanto playthroughs before, either.
Anyway, I’ve now entered the part of the game where the Nuzlocke run gets real. The theorycrafting after things go sideways is actually pretty fun.
Wow, reviews are quite good, I'm positively shocked. More so because it sounds like this is THE Pokemon game so many of us have been hoping for over the past decade.
Pokémon Legends: Arceus Nintendo Switch Review - Is It Worth It?
Arceus is the first Pokemon game I've enjoyed in a while. It feels more fresh - to me - though YMMV cause I haven't played a Pokemon game completely through since the original Ruby. I'm excited to sit and play through this one.
How approachable is this for younger kids in the 5-6 range? The open world exploration looks like something my kids would really enjoy, but only if they can freely roam without getting into many battles. If you largely get to choose when to battle (over being forced into battle) that would be ideal.
In the new game is there much to do other than finding and catching Pokemon? Side quests, trading, crafting, puzzles, that sort of thing?
It’s frustrating to me that this game has such small fonts and no cloud saves. I know I’m in the minority on this, but I play most of my games on a Lite and then cloud save to an OG Switch that stays plugged into the TV. So with this game I can’t read the fonts in the game without readers and I can’t use cloud saves with my other Switch because my mid-40s self might duplicate my Pokémons and ruin the economy or some such nonsense.
Oof, you aren't kidding about that font size. I only played docked on the weekend and the fonts were perfect on the tv. Just tried a little portable time this morning and was startled at how different it felt.
New game same goal. Get all the eevees.
I'm enjoying this game ALOT!
Who's up for some trading soon?
First time I ever caught a shiney. What do I do with it? I don't think it will end up on my final team (it's not an Eevee).
Also, one Eeveelution away from the full crew. I think this is the fastest I have ever done this.
I’ll go ahead and give an update on my Fire Red Nuzlocke run. I’ve made it to the end of the big mushy middle of the game, where you can do the events in Celadon/Lavender/Fuschia/Saffron with some degree of flexibility. I’ve beaten Sabrina, and am now moving on to Cinnabar Island.
I mostly stuck to the plan I had: rushed through the Pokemon Tower to get the Poke Flute, woke up a Snorlax and got down to Fuchsia fighting as few trainers as possible; got the Good and Great rods, and caught a bunch of water Pokemon from the towns I visited. Then I ran through the Celadon gym, Fighting Dojo, and Fuchsia gym all with Alakazam, who rolled entire playing field. Not being able to take a hit doesn’t matter if you never get hit, after all. From there, I could finally use Surf and went and caught a Tentacool (Even got one with a Timid nature), and went about grinding it up to a useful level on the roads leading to Fuchsia. Thank you VS Seeker for letting me refight a bunch of trainers to make this as painless as possible. From there I cleaned up a bunch of trainers on all the routes, got through Silph Co pretty easily, and then had Jolteon mop the floor in the Saffron gym (since Bite is still a special attack in Gen 3).
For the most part I am just sticking with the core three of Alakazam, Jolteon, and Tentacruel, so I don’t spend time grinding anyone else up. Dugtrio is sort of kept up level wise, but it doesn’t quite hit hard enough to offset its defenses, and it doesn't have any specific battles I need it for that someone else isn't better for, as far as I remember. I also have a Snorlax and a Jynx as interesting backups just in case I need them. So since I’m just rotating through a core of three now, they’re all pretty over leveled, and are tearing through the midgame.
I’m kind of playing with the end in mind in this game, and lining up certain Pokemon to take on their easiest counterparts in the Elite 4 down the road. Jolteon for Loreli, Alakazam for Bruno and Agatha, and now Tentacruel for Lance and Gary. I have some plans for Tentacruel that involve spamming Barrier to make him neigh indestructible against something that can’t kill him, getting some buffs with X Special, and then sweeping. If I can keep him alive until then, that seems like my safest bet for the end game. Really though, I’m relying on all 3 to carry me through the end, since they each cover most of what I need to take down at the Gyms and Elite 4. The flip side is that also means if someone dies prematurely, I could be in trouble. I suppose having Tentacruel Barrier up and tank his way through battles is my backup plan if it comes to that.
The thing that I am being reminded of in this game is kind of how sparse the Pokemon mix is. The variety and types are much lower than later games, plus the movepools are a lot more limited (and the one use TM’s discourages experimentation). It makes playing the game actually fairly simple even in a challenge run like this, since there’s not too much to account for.
I successfully finished my nuzlocke run of Fire Red!
I got through the last two gyms uneventfully. The fight against Gary before Victory Road was a good primer, since I tested out the idea of having Tentacruel tank his way through large parts of the endgame. I almost had a serious problem, though, since Tentacruel was just Surfing against Alakazam, and it didn’t do near enough, plus Alakazam used Calm Mind twice, and I just barely able to kill it before it actually attacked. If it had, I don’t think I had anyone who could have killed it at that point, so that could have been game over for a dumb mistake. So, lesson learned – I have those X Specials for a reason, and use them earlier in the fight against something not a threat to make the sweep easier. Something I had already thought of, but I didn’t do it in this battle, and it was only because the AI chose not to attack that I didn’t get a total party wipe. And I've seen the stat boosters used in speedruns, which is why I thought they would be a good tactic.
Joleon died to a random critical hit fully powered Revenge from a wild Machoke in Victory Road when I was grinding before the Elite 4, which leaves me with just Alakazam and Tentacruel of my team who were leveled appropriately, and I wasn’t about to go and try to grind someone else up to usefulness. This mad things a lot trickier, and more stall intensive, but it still seems doable. I finished grinding everyone up, and went ahead to the Elite 4.
So to start with Loreli, I had to get creative since Jolteon was now gone. I brought in Tentacruel since they ice and water attacks weren’t going to do anything. I had Tentacruel mainline X Specials to boost his offense, then eventually used Giga Drain, which wasn’t enough to kill even Dewgong at just +4 as I found out, so I bumped it up to +5 just to be safe. It was enough to kill everything else in one or two hits, although I then had to use an Ether to restore uses of Giga Drain against Lapras, who paralyzed me 4 times in a row with Body Slam. I kept healing, and she kept hitting that 1/3 dice roll. I was never too worried here since I had plenty of heals, but it was annoying.
Bruno and Agatha were nothing. Sent out Alakazam, and mowed everything down with Psychic. Nothing of interest in these battles, other than sort of wondering if a standard damage Psychic would be enough vs. Onix. It was.
Against Lance, I basically set up on Gyrados; lead with Tentacruel, Barrier’d a couple of times, then used X Special a bunch of times to boost my offense, and healed periodically when the Dragon Rages started adding up. He never tried any other attacks, since between Barrier and Tentacruel’s naturally high Special Defense, nothing else would have done damage. This then lead to a quick sweep of Lance, once I was comfortable I could one shot all the dragons with Ice Beam.
Against Gary, I led with Tentacruel against Pidgeot; used X special 4 times but got greedy and got whirlwinded out for not attacking sooner. This brought out Dugtrio, who I let die and then brought Tentacruel back in. This time I Barrier’d once since I was taking some decent incoming damage, then X special’d only three times, then hit with an Ice Beam before I could get tossed again. From there, it was another clean sweep, since +3 Surf and Ice Beam could make short work of everything except the Gyrados, but this one has the same problem as Lance’s that it simply couldn’t do any damage outside of Dragon Rage, which makes it fodder for healing and setup. The only part where I was really worried was if +3 Tentacruel was enough to kill Alakazam, since if not, death was coming back on me. If Tentacruel had gotten knocked out there, my plan there was to bring in my own Alakazam and basically set up Calm Mind’s until I was invulnerable and could one shot everything again (with Gyrados the only one I was worried about since they have a really high special defense as well). It never came to that, but I had the backup plan at least.
The overall lessons from this run was 1) I think the later games are more mechanically interesting, since there are a lot more options and things to consider, 2) when you have to be sure you can get the kill with mediocre offense, stat boosters are good, and 3) in Gen 3, Tentacruel can absolutely wall out quite a few Pokemon, and the fact that certain Pokemon like Gyrados are absolutely nerfed before the physical/special split in Gen 4.
MVP goes to Alakazam, for being a tactical nuke against everything (which really isn’t a surprise for the Kanto games), but the surprise this game was definitely the Tentacruel. I've typically thought of them as the annoying things you run into while surfing, but high special defense and speed, plus access to a very fast barrier makes for one sturdy Pokemon, and in a challenge mode where fragility can equal a quick trip to the graveyard, being study is valuable. Reminds me of Furfrou in the nuzlocke run of Y a few years ago, who had insane physical defense with the right ability that got me out of more than a few scrapes when I had no good options.
The planning is actually a big part of the fun in these runs, and I’ll probably do a few more eventually.
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