Pokémon Legends: Arceus (28th January 2022)

[Glen-i]

3 minutes ago, Ike said:

Funny how an NPC tells you that you can only carry 6 Pokémon, but no one has ever caught that many before. How do they know, who or what is enforcing the rule?

The only thing that makes any sense is that Lucas/Dawn, being used to the League's rule of 6 Pokémon, simply enforced it on themselves through muscle memory, and everyone else ends up following suit.

Yeah, I know. Why would that NPC mention it? But I think that's an acceptable break from sense in order to tell newcomers that 6 is the limit. It's a bit clumsy, but given the setting, I can't think of a better way...

[Julius]

49 minutes ago, Glen-i said:

The only thing that makes any sense is that Lucas/Dawn, being used to the League's rule of 6 Pokémon, simply enforced it on themselves through muscle memory, and everyone else ends up following suit.

I don't believe it's meant to be Lucas/Dawn, just considering the "official" player character names of Rei/Akari, but if nothing else their looking so similar to Lucas/Dawn is consistent with all of the familiar-but-not-so faces found throughout the game. Honestly I just think it was Game Freak being lazy. As cool as it is to see some familiar faces either gender bent, aged up or aged down, I absolutely hate the idea that all of these characters are around each other at this point in time and are ancestors to the characters that their design is based on, just because it makes the world feel stupidly small. 

At best I think we can guess that the player character is from Kalos based on...

Spoiler

...their t-shirt design being plucked from X & Y, which isn't present in any of the other games. 

And from Serebii: 

But that could totally be clutching at straws, just considering all of the ways one could get a t-shirt from another region. 

 

2 hours ago, MindFreak said:

What happened to the Hisuian variations when the world turned into Sinnoh? Would have been nice with some explanation. 

Yeah, that's probably just migration or extinction, seeing as there are plenty of Pokémon present in the game/Hisui already not native to modern day Sinnoh and won't be around come Diamond & Pearl. It sucks that we probably won't get an explanation though. 

2 hours ago, MindFreak said:

How do they know the names of the Pokémon when you catch them if they haven't got any data on them in the first place? And who decided their number in the Pokedex? 

I mean, it kind of depends on your head canon of whether a Pokémon in the games is actually making a cry like they do in the games, or if they say their own name all of the time like they do in the anime.

Because if you think it's the latter, then yeah, that'd be how. I do wonder if they consult the Pokémon on how they spell their names, though...

As for Pokédex number, yeah, that's a question that stretches back with these games as far as I can remember. It gets even weirder when you consider that the research tasks imply that they already know a fair bit about each Pokémon.

If anything, I'm really surprised that they didn't decide to integrate the Arc Phone into the Pokédex process in some way (you gather data on the Arc Phone - you know, a phone upgraded by a Pokémon equivalent to God who would know all this stuff - which the Professor then transfers across to the physical Pokédex that he's collecting all of this in). 

2 hours ago, MindFreak said:

I wish the story revolved more around that ancient civilasation there are traces of. It would have deepened the lore in the games and would be way more interesting than what was ultimately offered.

Yeah, this most of all. We should be seeing fossil Pokémon out in the wild and outside of rifts, damn it! 

Unfortunately, at the best of times, Pokémon world-building is implied more than it is stated when it comes to the history of the world. Which is a very roundabout way of saying that it's, unfortunately, not a priority at all for Game Freak. 

[Glen-i]

2 minutes ago, Julius said:

I don't believe it's meant to be Lucas/Dawn, just considering the "official" player character names of Rei/Akari, but if nothing else their looking so similar to Lucas/Dawn is consistent with all of the familiar-but-not-so faces found throughout the game. Honestly I just think it was Game Freak being lazy. As cool as it is to see some familiar faces either gender bent, aged up or aged down, I absolutely hate the idea that all of these characters are around each other at this point in time and are ancestors to the characters that their design is based on, just because it makes the world feel stupidly small. 

At best I think we can guess that the player character is from Kalos based on...

  Reveal hidden contents

...their t-shirt design being plucked from X & Y, which isn't present in any of the other games. 

And from Serebii: 

But that could totally be clutching at straws, just considering all of the ways one could get a t-shirt from another region. 

 

The official names of Rei/Akari apply to the gender of the trainer you don't choose. But the one you choose comes from modern day Pokémon, so that would have to be Lucas/Dawn, wouldn't it? Unless you're suggesting that there's another person called Rei in modern times who happens to look exactly like Lucas? Because that's less believable to me.

Of course, these days, the official names matter even less compared to the DS era, because you have more options for skin tone and so on. Apart from Red, who's developed into his own character, the playable trainers mostly don't need it. Then again, Pokémon Masters uses them, so it's hard to tell.

14 minutes ago, Julius said:

I mean, it kind of depends on your head canon of whether a Pokémon in the games is actually making a cry like they do in the games, or if they say their own name all of the time like they do in the anime.

Because if you think it's the latter, then yeah, that'd be how.

For the majority of Pokémon, sure. But not every Pokémon says their own name. Charizard being the most obvious example, Nidoqueen is also one that pops off the top of my head.

11 minutes ago, Julius said:

As for Pokédex number, yeah, that's a question that stretches back with these games as far as I can remember. It gets even weirder when you consider that the research tasks imply that they already know a fair bit about each Pokémon.

These days, Regional Pokédex numbers are mostly sorted by how early you can find the Pokémon. This appears to be the case with Legends.

[Julius]

6 minutes ago, Glen-i said:

The official names of Rei/Akari apply to the gender of the trainer you don't choose. But the one you choose comes from modern day Pokémon, so that would have to be Lucas/Dawn, wouldn't it? Unless you're suggesting that there's another person called Rei in modern times who happens to look exactly like Lucas? Because that's less believable to me.

Of course, these days, the official names matter even less compared to the DS era, because you have more options for skin tone and so on. Apart from Red, who's developed into his own character, the playable trainers mostly don't need it. Then again, Pokémon Masters uses them, so it's hard to tell.

Yeah, you're right, I stand corrected -- the official site refers to an image of the pair of possible player characters as "The player character and Rei or Akari". So I see where you're coming from, and considering the player character's age in this game (15 - a cheeky nod at how long we waited for the Diamond & Pearl remakes?), maybe the implication of them wearing that t-shirt is that this is long after their journey in Sinnoh has been complete and they've journeyed across more of the Pokémon world, getting so far as Kalos. 

You know. Before becoming the protagonist in an isekai directed by Arceus. 

Though, I don't think it really matters what is believable at this point re: Rei, because let's face it, the Pokémon timeline is a bit of a scrambled mess and in a game with so many lookalikes, it's not that hard to believe -- I really do think they just got lazy and decided to use the same designs for no reason other than that they could, otherwise I think they would have been a bit more clear about our origins (I've yet to complete the game, so maybe that's something that they do delve into). Not to mention the fact that the games have opened themselves up the further question that, if this is Lucas/Dawn, which Lucas/Dawn is it? The one from Diamond & Pearl, or the one from Brilliant Diamond & Shining Pearl? I guess Brilliant Diamond & Shining Pearl because we can choose our own skin colour? 

As for the official names mattering even less, that's only really as a result of Game Freak not choosing to ever have player characters turn up again beyond Red, so like you said, it's hard to tell. I always thought it was a shame they didn't make use of a save transfer to have your characters from other games be NPC's you can face. 

13 minutes ago, Glen-i said:

For the majority of Pokémon, sure. But not every Pokémon says their own name. Charizard being the most obvious example, Nidoqueen is also one that pops off the top of my head.

Well it's a good thing that neither of those are in these games  I get what you mean though, so I guess I'll rephrase that to "most Pokémon in the anime say their own names, so if that logic applies in the games, then that could be how". 

As for Nidoqueen, is that also true of Nidoking? Because if not then I guess even if Nidoqueen don't say their own names, if Nidoking does then I can understand why it ended up with that name. 

20 minutes ago, Glen-i said:

These days, Regional Pokédex numbers are mostly sorted by how early you can find the Pokémon. This appears to be the case with Legends.

Yeah, sure, though I think @MindFreak was asking for an in-universe reasoning for their assigned numbers, which is what I was responding to. Otherwise we've got to deal with the implication that someone else has already gone on this journey, experienced areas in the same sequence as we have, and started registering Pokémon in the Dex from the same spot as us. 

[Glen-i]

1 hour ago, Julius said:

I always thought it was a shame they didn't make use of a save transfer to have your characters from other games be NPC's you can face. 

As much as I think Black 2/White 2 gets a hell of a lot right, one of the two big open goals it misses is that it had a feature that let you transfer some data from the first Gen 5 games, but didn't use it to stage a battle between the two playable trainers, with the CPU using whatever Pokémon your latest Hall of Fame entry in the first game has.

Instead, you're just told that they went off somewhere since the first game, which corroborates your theory that they just go to other regions when they become Champion nicely.

1 hour ago, Julius said:

As for Nidoqueen, is that also true of Nidoking? Because if not then I guess even if Nidoqueen don't say their own names, if Nidoking does then I can understand why it ended up with that name.

Actually, yes. Granted, I'm going off of Pokémon Puzzle League, which uses the anime voices of both Nidos, but it is almost 22 years old at this point. Still, I'm confident they haven't changed it to actual spoken lines since then. Why bother?

Nidoqueen sounds kinda like a truck horn in that game.

1 hour ago, Julius said:

Yeah, sure, though I think @MindFreak was asking for an in-universe reasoning for their assigned numbers, which is what I was responding to. Otherwise we've got to deal with the implication that someone else has already gone on this journey, experienced areas in the same sequence as we have, and started registering Pokémon in the Dex from the same spot as us. 

I think we're just gonna have to accept that as a more acceptable segregation for gameplay purposes. Regional Pokédexes are just easier to deduce where a Pokémon you're missing might be if they're in order of when you find them. (Legendaries are normally an exception, since they almost always appear at the end of the Dex)

[Mokong]

Starting to get a nice collection of Alphas now and starting to have them take over my team.

Managed to catch the Alpha Infernape without a fight

 

Replaced my regular sized Infernape with him. Now have 4 of my 6 as Alphas, Infernape, Alakazam, Golem, Luxray.

Have a bunch of others but not feeling them as part of my team. Aside from Golem the others have been like for like replacements, with Golem replacing Rhyperior (so like for like typing )

 

Also anyone else loving the new Pokeball catch animations with the steam causing them to jump in the air? Small thing but def love it more than the ball just shaking on the ground.

Especially love the critcal catch animation.

 

[Glen-i]

I pretty much catch every alpha without fighting them, why bother fighting when it's so much easier to just hide in grass until they turn around, and then lob an Ultra Ball/Heavy Ball?

I don't really like how brain dead it is. There's no risk, and I think it would've been better if the player was forced to fight alphas if they want to catch them, especially seeing as they tend to be 20 levels higher then everything else in the area.

[Mokong]

I try to catch without a fight but I am sometimes not as stealthy  

[MindFreak]

I don't always succeed at catching them without being spotted. But then I can usually catch them with an Ultra Ball very early on in the fight.

The later Alphas are much higher level, though, and here they need to be weakened a bit before catching.

[Julius]

38 minutes ago, Glen-i said:

I pretty much catch every alpha without fighting them, why bother fighting when it's so much easier to just hide in grass until they turn around, and then lob an Ultra Ball/Heavy Ball?

I don't really like how brain dead it is. There's no risk, and I think it would've been better if the player was forced to fight alphas if they want to catch them, especially seeing as they tend to be 20 levels higher then everything else in the area.

Yep, this. The tried and true strategy if there's no grass around is to just throw down a Smoke Bomb to reduce the risk of them turning around and spotting you, then getting the right angle to throw an Ultra Ball at their back. I've caught most of the Lv 70 Alpha Pokémon in the fifth area with this method, not having to engage in battle at all. 

To be fair, though, I've rarely battled Pokémon in this game when trying to catch them, and I'd guess that's been the case for 80% - 90% of my captured Pokémon so far. Despite the surprising speed at which battles start and the pace they go along at, it just doesn't feel like part of the wider feedback loop in these open spaces where exploring, throwing a Ball at a Pokémon or throwing a Pokémon at some resources is a constant dopamine barrage in and of itself. 

And yeah, the fact that you can just run away from every Pokémon that attacks you just furthers my point that you don't really to stick around. It's why when catching multiples of a Pokémon that doesn't freak out when I'm near it, I throw a Ball at it and don't even bother waiting for it to confirm the capture or not. This could probably be alleviated a bit by having aggravated Pokémon instigate battles rather than just getting mad, though that would slow the game down substantially. 

Essentially, I'm treating this as a Pokémon Safari. I think this is a natural place to end up after Gen VI introduced earning EXP for captures, and I'm still enjoying it a whole lot! 

[Glen-i]

43 minutes ago, Mokong said:

I try to catch without a fight but I am sometimes not as stealthy  

I used a mod of Metroid Dread to make the EMMIs harmless, if I can do it, anyone can.

If you get spotted, just hop on Wyrdeer and leg it until you lose them, then go back and try again. If you crouch in long grass, or use a smoke bomb, you're effectively invisible. So it's just a waiting game.

[Ashley]

20 hours ago, Glen-i said:

Take the number underneath Research Level and add the number of unreported tasks (These are coloured green). If any of these unreported tasks are on the same row as a task with a double chevron, add 2 instead of 1.

If the total is 10 or more, then it's completed and all you need to do is show the professor to get the full Dex entry.

Thanks. It was the speaking to the professor I wasn't aware was needed. 

[Julius]

Digital Foundry have released their technical breakdown video for Legends: Arceus --

Looking forward to digging in later! 

[Ashley]

So I'm 3:30 hours into it and enjoying it (especially after the first hour of introduction which was a bit stop start). I've got to the point where I've been asked to see the first alpha but haven't yet as I'm enjoying just exploring and filling up my Dex for the first time in ages. There being a mixture of Pokémon (not just weak bug and weak flying at the start) and it's more than just battle>catch>battle>catch does certainly make it feel fresh. 

[Julius]

The fifth Balloon Race suuuuuuuucks

EDIT:

Spoiler

WHY WAS THIS THE HARDEST THING IN THE GAME?! Swear some of those hit boxes made me want to nosedive Braviary straight into Stark Mountain...

 

Edited February 8, 2022 by Julius

[Mokong]

7 hours ago, Glen-i said:

I used a mod of Metroid Dread to make the EMMIs harmless, if I can do it, anyone can.

If you get spotted, just hop on Wyrdeer and leg it until you lose them, then go back and try again. If you crouch in long grass, or use a smoke bomb, you're effectively invisible. So it's just a waiting game.

That sounds like cowardly talk not hunter talk  

If you are trying to sneak up on a Rathalos and he spots you do you hop on your palamute and run till he loses you? No. You run at it with your SnS, slash with your sword and bash its head with your shield.

Well here instead of having a switchaxe to run at Alpha's I've got 6 monsters in my pocket and they are very happy to see the Alpha.  

[Ashley]

Jeez you fall out of the sky one time and people won't shut up about it

[Glen-i]

45 minutes ago, Mokong said:

That sounds like cowardly talk not hunter talk  

If you are trying to sneak up on a Rathalos and he spots you do you hop on your palamute and run till he loses you? No. You run at it with your SnS, slash with your sword and bash its head with your shield.

Well here instead of having a switchaxe to run at Alpha's I've got 6 monsters in my pocket and they are very happy to see the Alpha.  

Sounds like you're basically siccing 6 Felynes on it while you do nothing.

[Mokong]

8 minutes ago, Ashley said:

Jeez you fall out of the sky one time and people won't shut up about it

I know right, I've progressed the story a good bit now and I as a player had forgotten about that then an NPC brought it up and I'm like, you still remember that?

 

8 minutes ago, Glen-i said:

Sounds like you're basically siccing 6 Felynes on it while you do nothing.

Yeah 6 Meowscular type felynes. Sure they gotta make themselves useful

[Hero-of-Time]

This evening I missed out on catching a shiny Mantine. Now I'm sad.  

[Mokong]

2 minutes ago, Hero-of-Time said:

This evening I missed out on catching a shiny Mantine. Now I'm sad.  

Did you not drop a hard save beforehand that you can reload to?

[Hero-of-Time]

2 minutes ago, Mokong said:

Did you not drop a hard save beforehand that you can reload to?

Nah. I was rift farming and it was part of a mass gathering. The thing popped up but swam off. I wasn't willing to reload due to getting what I needed from the rift.

[Glen-i]

I'd probably be more sympathetic if this game didn't give out shinies so often.

[Hero-of-Time]

Just caught a shiny Gastly. All is right in the world again.  

Edited February 8, 2022 by Hero-of-Time

[Glen-i]

Way to beautifully prove my point.