Gotta Catch 'Em All! - Pokémon Thread

Caldwin

Woobie Destroyer of Worlds
Citizen
So I was on vacation with my mothers side of the family this week. We went to a mall today when impulse hit me. I got Dragon Quest XI S for my cousin and Pokémon Scarlet for myself. I still have a bit to go on Violet, but I should be good to go with getting the duck myself. I'll still need the fire starter at some point.

Edit:
My starting team for Scarlet...
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The Mighty Mollusk

Scream all you like, 'cause we're all mad here
Citizen
Running Tera Raids online is really annoying. Aside from people jumping into raids they clearly aren't ready for (which happened with SwSh all the time too), the time limit just doesn't work when the servers lag all the time. Not helped by a lot of animations that just waste a lot of time posing before actually doing anything. Really wish they'd just kept a turn limit like last time instead.
 

MEDdMI

Nonstop Baaka
Citizen
Ok, so to trade:
1. Go to Poke Portal in the menu
2. Link Trade
3. Set Link Code*
4. Begin Searching

* The Link Code is a 8 digit numerical code that is agreed upon by both parties. Naturally they both have to be online at the same time.

I also have all starters if anyone needs one.
 

Caldwin

Woobie Destroyer of Worlds
Citizen
I have Shadewing, TMM, M. Virion, Daith, Coglestop, Wonko and Ironbite on my friends list. It's possible some of these others are also Allsparkers,I just don't recognize the Switch Friend name.

So, for those who don't have me as a friend:

7457-8143-2029

You'll recognize the user name.
 

Caldwin

Woobie Destroyer of Worlds
Citizen
Okay, so I now have all the starters (divided between two games, but still). I haven't gotten too far in Scarlet (not even to the school yet). But all I have left on Violet is the Team Star leader, Elite 4 and whatever happens after those paths are cleared. So if anyone needs Violet exclusives, I can probably help.

Edit:
It seems even though Violet and Scarlet both have Tauros, the typings are different between games. Violet Tauros is Fighting/Water while Scarlet Tauros is Fighting/Fire.

I don't have too many Tauros at the moment, but they're easy to find if you Scarlet players want me to hunt some.
 

Echowarrior

Well-known member
Citizen
Alas, while I own copies of both Scarlet and Violet, I've yet to start playing either. Definitely on the to-do list for before the end of the year, however.

Anyway, for those who wish to add my Friend Code - 5062-3502-2833.
 

Caldwin

Woobie Destroyer of Worlds
Citizen
*tries to put in Echowarrior's code in*

Huh? Who's this William guy? Oh...okay. Hmm..not time for Violet, but you seem to be doing just fine playing Sword. Hmph! I see how it is! :p

So, anyways, I'm done with the fight with the Team Star Leader. That leaves me with the Elite Four and then Area Zero after that.

I was able to use most of the Pokemon from the teams I used against the Team Star leader to help build my teams against the Elite Four. I'm building an entire team for each of the Elite Four and the champion. That should make it really easy once I get there. Of course, it's also going to involve a lot of grinding to get there.
 

Caldwin

Woobie Destroyer of Worlds
Citizen
Was it a Tera Lucario you found in a cave, because I found the same one.

And instead of grinding a whole crap ton, I decided to use my ringers from the Team Star Leader fight and see how far I could go. I won. I'm now ready for that crater thing.
 

M. Virion

If Hell is forever, then Heaven must be a lie
Citizen
And with a total playtime of just shy of 87 hours, I've 100% the game.

The only thing I have left are repeatable post game things. Shiny hunting, Ace Tournament, Raids.

It's definitely in my top 5 Pokemon games, probably my top 3. There are issues, but it, like Arceus before it, feels like such an actual revelation for the series that I can overlook a LOT of those problems.

One thing I love is how we got a bit of the usual story beats, gyms, 'evil' team, main/legendary story - but since they weren't all so wrapped up and forcibly shoehorned together as they have been in some of the titles, each felt more fully fleshed out and like they had room to actually breath. At least for me, this feels like what Pokemon stories need to be striving for going forward.

Fully developed plotlines, that aren't obligated to intersect unless it makes sense for them to.
 

MEDdMI

Nonstop Baaka
Citizen
I've been taking my sweet time. Prioritizing Titans for the exploration abilities, then gyms for catching stuff. I really hope we get non-uniform clothing options in DLC.
 

Caldwin

Woobie Destroyer of Worlds
Citizen
I'm at the Zero Zone right now. I agree, it is nice that they separated the story bits. It did leave me googling what order to do things in so that my levels would be appropriate, but that's what Google's for after all. And you're not just locked into that order. I just love that, like you said, the separation allowed them to flesh out each individual part.

I'm of two minds about the performance issues. Like I've said (repeatedly) before, having played Cyberpunk 2077, Saints Row (2022) and other games; I think I've become a bit forgiving when it comes to a certain amount of performance issues. But on the other hand, I think maybe I may have become a bit too forgiving. It used to be that you didn't get second chances with patches and updates. As an industry, gaming has grown just a bit too comfortable with releasing unfinished.

----------

Now, here's what I hope to see in the future:

TM's :
I really love how S/V did this . You don't want to be in a position where you learn a move, not thinking you learn another move and lose the one you learned from the TM and now you can never get it back.

Reusable HM's were a step in the right direction. Removing the need for HM slaves so that even if you lose a move forever, it's not a game breaking mistake because you don't need them for flying/swimming/etc, was a much needed change on so many levels.

But I like this idea. TM's are breakable upon use, but as long as you have the materials, you can always make more. This makes it so you have to be conservative and not just unthinkingly use TM's and learn moves all willy-nilly like you could with unbreakable HM's, but you always have the chance to try again as long as you get the materials. I want to keep this going forward .

Crafting:
Going along with this, one of the things I absolutely loved from Arceus was that you never really had to buy things like pokeballs, potions, revives, etc. You could buy them if you were in a pinch, but you didn't have to. You could make your own using materials you found out in the wild.

I would like to bring this back going forward. Crafting and managing resources was such a fun part of Arceus.


Battle:
I'm not sure what to say here. Arceus was just so perfect in so many ways. It's options for how you go about battling were unparalleled. But once you got used to V/S, it had its ups and downs. So I'm really just not sure what I really want going forward.


High Level Pokemon:
Now here's something that's really bugged me about these games. Once you hit about lvl 60-70, leveling your Pokemon just becomes a slog. Whether you doing Battle Ground fights, farming candies from Max Raid battles, going around high level areas...no matter what, it just becomes a slog.

I think the only game where fast leveling wasn't a slog was in Alpha Sapphire with the Blissey Bases. And maybe that just spoiled me because the very first Pokemon game I ever played gave me an opportunity to level up an entire team to level 100 in less than half an hour. And maybe it shouldn't be that easy.

But I do wish there was a way to get Pokemon up to level 100 without it being such a slog. By the time you get to that point anyway, it's not like you're trying to keep the endgame from being too easy. You're already most likely in post-game. Just give us a non-sloggy way to max out levels. Like, seriously, bring back Blissey Bases.

Shinies:
Oy! I don't know how many shines I've probably walked right past in V/S without even knowing it. Now I will admit that Arceus had a real problem with it being so easy to get shinies that they stopped being special in a way. Arceus made it way too easy. But here, it just seems like they've gone too far in the opposite direction. There needs to be some indicator when you're around a shiny. It becomes too easy to miss otherwise, particularly when some Pokemon already have more than one color (Oricorio, Floette), when the shiny color is very similar to the normal color (Pikachu) (particularly with the graphical issues this game has)...or maybe its a new Pokemon that you have no idea what the normal/shiny colors are even supposed to be.

Like, okay, I understand that Arceus made it way too easy. But this is making it way too hard. There needs to be something they can do to meet in the middle.

Camping:
Camping was okay in V/S. I think I prefer the curry mini-game over the sandwich mini-game. But it was alright. But where V/S really fell short was in playing with the Pokemon.

Arceus you can talk to your Pokemon and they emote. V/S it felt like whenever I tried to talk to my Pokemon they just stand there. Arceus let you play ball and had a feather stick. These were fun AF. V/S also has a ball you can throw, but not a single one of my Pokemon would run after it. Maybe I'm just doing it wrong?

And while I don't know how you would do this on a TV screen as opposed to the DS which has a touch-screen (yeah, the Switch has a touch-screen, but not useful in docked mode), I'd like to see them find some way of bringing back Pokemon-Amie. I mean, yeah, it can help build friendship/affection. But really, who doesn't want to get an Eevee/Fenneken and just pet their cute widdle faces!
 

Caldwin

Woobie Destroyer of Worlds
Citizen
I mean, it could. But for it to be anything like the original Aime, it would have to be hand-held mode only. And if the next generation doesn't even have that option, well...that would be sad.
 

Caldwin

Woobie Destroyer of Worlds
Citizen
Aaaaand...DONE!

I really want the soundtrack to this.

Hmm, that's odd. Usually when I go use the restroom while the credits roll, they'd still be going when I got back. The credits must've been oddly short.

And now I have a Master Ball. But...I already have the box Legendary. What am I supposed to use it on? Huh!
 

The Mighty Mollusk

Scream all you like, 'cause we're all mad here
Citizen
I don't think I've actually used a Master Ball on anything that wasn't a running legendary since Gen 2. I usually forget all about it. Typically you get it too late to be of much use anyway.
 

Caldwin

Woobie Destroyer of Worlds
Citizen
Well, I guess there are legendaries to catch. Problem is, it's one of those "Collect every single one of these things from all around the region to make it apear. What's that? You forget which one's you've already gotten? What a shame! Well, good luck with that."

I'm not sure I'm up for that kind of pain.
 


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