The Vile Lysandre

Lysandre certainly takes the cake for being the most evil person in the pokemon world.  Let me elaborate.

As the battle came to a close, Lysandre made note that before we removed the Yveltal batteries, the machine still had enough power to be fired exactly once to destroy the facility.  Lysandre was trying to take us all out with him.  Cue Metroid-Style Escape!

Lysandre killed himself while trying to kill the kids that defeated him.  This is a bit crazy, but the thing is, he kept his pokemon on his person when this happened, so he also killed all of his pokemon.  I can't be the only one that finds this a little macabre: he killed himself and killed his pokemon too.  I don't know what could be more evil than this.  I guess the real-world analogue would be if you set your house on fire and died with all your pets and family.

I guess it makes sense for Pokemon to be able to die--otherwise what is the purpose of Lavender Tower?  I have just never actually witnessed the death of a pokemon.  I was the last one to see that Gyarados alive...then I beat it up...and then it was gone forever.  My character was the last person to see that Gyarados, and the last thing I did to it was Aura Sphere it in its big, stupid face.
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The pokemon gang was apparently doing a lot off screen to help the cause and this only came up at the very end.  After escaping from the facility and watching the whole place get vaporized and sucked back into the earth, we all regrouped amongst the ashes. Tierno (the dancing one) was apparently helping to release all the captured pokemon in a nearby route and Trevor was helping evacuate the town (or something). 

The fact that you were a part of a big Anti-Flare effort actually goes a long way towards bringing you in as a believable main character--and makes the world a lot more alive.  This is much easier to swallow than the idea that you could single-handedly take out all the Rockets.  The whole game is a lot more believable from this standpoint.

I never quite got the idea of purposefully disturbing Groudon or Kyogre--who are literally in the process of tearing the world apart at the time that you hunt them down to battle them.  In this game, you do end up fighting a scary legend, but it kind of happens by accident.  When you end-up catching Yveltal, its really only because the thing was so angry from being asleep for so long that it wanted to hurt you.  You weren't just looking for trouble and a new catch, you were attacked and you sent out your pokemon to defend you.  You only catch Yveltal because if you don't, it would hurt you.

A lot about this game is incredibly well thought-out, especially when compared with previous installments of the game.  This may be the best game since Red version.

Current Squad:

GRENINJA/Froakles/lvl.42
VENUSAUR/Venus/lvl.41
FLAREON/Hotfoot/lvl.42
SCRAFTY/Scrappy/lvl.41
HIPPOWDON*/Leviathan/lvl.43
AERODACTYL/Scarydactyl/lvl.40

On Rotation: Lucario, Gardevoir, Pikachu, Skrelp

Lysandre's Reckoning

No sooner had I caught Yveltal than Lysandre barged-into the door to try to steal Yveltal back from me.  This was the first instance of real hand-to-hand human conflict in the pokemon series and I was surprised to see Lysandre use his obvious height and size advantages to his benefit to just take the pokeball out of my hands after beating me up.
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Nah, I'm just kidding, he challenged me to a pokemon battle instead.

I had the option of using my newly-caught Yveltal.  Remembering how much trouble I had against Mienshao in my last fight, I took the Flying-Type advantage of having Yveltal in my squad and sent Ziggy the Linoone back to the box.
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Yveltal is Dark/Flying, so Mienshao's Hi Jump Kick dealt about 60% damage to me right off the bat, but I knocked him out that same turn with Oblivion Wing, a powerful Flying type move.

Next, against Lysandre's Pyroar, I sent-in Greninja, who was too slow to move first.  As a result, it had to eat one of Pyroar's Hyper-Voice attacks and survived it with exactly 1 HP left (wow).  Water Pulse did about the same amount of damage to Pyroar, but I was able to pick it off by using "Water Shuriken", a move which always moves first.

Pikachu took out Honchkrow in one hit, and then stays-in against Gyarados.  This is Lysandre's final pokemon, and I knew that Pikachu would move first and destroy that Water/Flying type with a powerful Thunderbolt move.  But Gyarados did the unexpected.  Gyarados evolved into Mega-Gyarados.

This is the point where the tide of the battle begain to turn.  Gyarados tanked Pikachu's Thunderbolt--only taking about 50% damage (this will be important later on)--and one-hit-KOed Pikachu with Earthquake.  I sent in Hippopotas to try to whittle its health down with sandstorm, but he was taken out in one hit by aqua tail.  I sent in Venusaur hoping it would survive enough to poison it, but poisonpowder missed and Venusaur died on turn two of Gyadaros' outrage.  Mega Lucario was next.  Mega Lucario was LAST.  It was over, Lucario just couldn't hit Gyarados hard enough with Shadow Claw and my fighting-type moves will be too weak.

But wait a minute...flashback...

"...Gyarados tanked Pikachu's Thunderbolt--only taking 50% damage..."

Exactly half damage?  Could it be?  When Gyarados evolves, is it no longer a flying type?  Will Aura Sphere still work?  I take a chance with aura sphere:  super effective!  Mega Gyarados is Water/Dark!  KO!

Super Secret Team Flare HQ: Top Secret

I found Team Flare's Secret Underground Headquarters in the rock-gazebo to the North of the town (exactly where I chased that Grunt I found after I got my second badge).  Team Flare really struck me more as the kind of group that would shell out the money for a moon base.  My Rival Serena was already there waiting for me and followed me down the elevator.  I guess this is it!

Lysandre was waiting for us at the bottom with more expository dialogue to explain the plot to me.  Apparently the legendary pokemon Yveltal is being used to power the device--which is currently charging and at around 99% power.  Here is where Lysandre showed his hand: not only are all the people except Team Flare going to be killed, but all of the pokemon in the world as well, including his own.  Lysandre started crying about this and I'm wondering if he actually told his Gyarados at any point in time.  I imagine a Gyarados would have a few things to say if it knew it was being used by Lysandre to secure its own destruction.  I imagine it would be quite cross with him...

Lysandre admitted that he didn't need to beat me anymore--just to delay me enough so that the machine reaches 100%.  The following battle was actually quite difficult: Lysandre lead with a Mienshao which wrecked my team, but after I brought in Hippopotas to tank all of his High Jump Kicks, I eventually stalled it to death.  Pikachu ate his Gyarados alive despite a huge 10-level difference and Greninja took on Pyroar.  Pikachu then reprised his role of "Destroyer" against Lysandre's Honchcrow.  I may be renaming PikaPi "Pikamonster".

Serena followed me down to the lowest sub-level of the facility via a stairwell packed with Team Flare double battles for the two of us to take-on, and at the bottom, we found the chamber housing Yveltal.  Oh, and a few other Team Flare battles for me to warm-up with.

Current Squad:

GRENINJA/Froakles/lvl.41
VENUSAUR/Venus/lvl.41
FLAREON/Hotfoot/lvl.42
SCRAFTY/Scrappy/lvl.41
HIPPOWDON*/Leviathan/lvl.43
AERODACTYL/Scarydactyl/lvl.40

On Rotation: Gardevoir, Skrelp, Pikachu, Lucario

The Legend of Blah Blah Blah Blah

I think I was a little vague in my last post with reference to the major plot of the game and I admit that this reveals how terrible I am at stressing the importance of things.  Surely the plot of a story is the thing that should be explained in the most detail and not, as I have done, in one terrible run-on sentence?

So here it is in greater detail, and hopefully with fewer grammatical errors:

As I made it to the lowest sub-basement of Lysandre's Cafe Teleporter Maze-O-Madness, I happened upon Lysandre himself and a mysterious man I had seen only once before.  Lysandre was obviously holding the eight-foot-tall man captive (the electrified fence gave that away) and the captive launched-into a monologue describing the 3000-Year Legend:
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Three thousand years ago into the future, back when everything was in black-and-white and there was a lot of film-grain and text on the screen explaining what the actors are doing (fine, I'll stop), there was a man who loved his Floette.  His Floette went off to fight in a war between two nations.  Floette never came back.

The man was apparently so angry that he used science and magic, but mostly science, to resurrect his Floette with a machine he built, but to power his machine he killed scores of other Pokemon in the process.  As it were, all those strange stones around Geosenge City are gravestones of these pokemon, which is just creepy enough to be totally awesome.

After this, he was still really really angry, so he modified his resurrection machine and made it a doomsday weapon, which he used to kill a whole bunch of people and pokemon, ending the war.  A little bit of an overkill, but most definitely effective.

Then his Floette left him anyways.  It's times like these where I wish I knew the definition of irony...

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I am about 100% certain (you read that right) that the old giant in the prison cell was that man from 3000 years ago and if he isn't then he definitely thinks he is--because he all but admitted to it during his monologue.  I am very curious, however, how the legendary pokemon Yvetal relates to this.

Professor Sycamore told me earlier that there was a destructive pokemon called Yvetal linked to the 3000 Year Legend, but this pokemon was not mentioned even once...  Maybe the answer can be found in Geosenge City.

Team Flare Makes a Move

No sooner had I left the gym than I got a Holo-message from Lysandre, the fellow with the lion's mane who introduced himself to me as the villain near the start of the game (which was nice of him I guess).  Apparently, he was sending this message to trainers everywhere that he was ordering Team Flare to kill everyone in the entire world.

I guess I kind of forgot what was going on in this game and this message reminded me that there was still a story in this thing--and now it is most certainly the time for me to figure out what is going on. 

I pursued Team Flare to Lysandre's Cafe in Lumiose City and found the secret entrance hidden behind the bookcase in the back guarded by two Team Flare Table-Waiters.  This seems familiar...
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Another one of the things I really loved about the earlier games is that they would tell you what to do (or not) by making you put the pieces together yourself.  Pokemon White (and, to a lesser extent, Pokemon Sapphire) spent far too much time talking about what was going on and where you should go.  Go to the Dragonspiral Tower, which is where the legendary dragon pokemon are found, Now go to the Relic Castle to get Zekrom, No, Zekrom isn't here, go back to the City with the Swamp whatever it was called in that game.  That game could not stop explaining things to you and I just felt dumb having to deal with its constantly condescending dialogue.  Not to mention the dialogue was shit to begin with.

This game is kind of a happy middle-ground.  I was shown Lysandre's Cafe earlier in the game in a scripted story event where I met the Professor (on my second tour of Lumiose City), so I knew where it was and that Lysandre owned it.  My fellow Pokemon Thief gang-member (and game Rival) Serena told me that we should look for Team Flare's HQ.  All I had to do was put these two pieces together and I found the place.  Not quite as difficult as curing cancer (and most certainly not as hard as figuring out the opposite-day logic that you needed the Pokeflute to get into the Silph Co. Building), but it was enough to make me feel good about using that fancy Graduate-School education I've been neglecting for the past two years.

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After battling Lysandre himself (he had a Pyroar, go figure), I made my way through a conveyor-belt/teleporter maze, trying to find the administrator with the lift key (yup, definitely been here before).

Along the way, I encountered battles ranging from easy to absurdly difficult.  Of special note was a Malamar which kept boosting its own stats while using Superpower (due to its ability, which raises stats instead of lowering them) and one particularly hairy match against a high level Drapion, who used Acupressure two consecutive times to luckily sharply raise its Attacking power and Speed.  That Drapion tore me apart my first attempt.

At the end, I was treated with a story that I guess was supposed to explain all the "3000 year legend" references people have been making this whole game, but which in reality just made matters even more confusing.  The story was about a guy whose Floette died making a machine that brought it back to life at the cost of the lives of many other pokemon.  Team Flare made it perfectly clear that their doomsday machine is the same machine as this one.

After I failed to stop Team Flare from activating the machine, I was pointed in the direction of Geosenge City again.

Current Squad:

GRENINJA/Froakles/lvl.41
VENUSAUR/Venus/lvl.40
FLAREON/Hotfoot/lvl.42
SCRAFTY/Scrappy/lvl.42
HIPPOWDON*/Leviathan/lvl.40
AERODACTYL/Scarydactyl/lvl.40

On Rotation: Pikachu, Gardevoir, Lucario

The Good Kind of Tough Choices

I ended-up spending a lot more time than I expected screwing-around in the Route 4 hedge maze getting a feel for this new fairy type and I still haven't decided on whether I prefer Ralts (who was on my main team back when I played Sapphire Version and has always been a sleeper favorite of mine) or this Dandelion thing I just caught.  Ralts is a known commodity, but Flabebe, as I have found after fighting the scores of Combee that inhabit Route 4,  is something of a Special Defense Tank.  I have always been more of a fan of stall-teams, probably because I'm such a huge pussy, so having a Special Tank like Flabebe is fairly fulfilling for me.  For now I'm just going to keep a seven-pokemon rotating roster until I decide I'm tired of something.  These kind of tough choices are the good kind, I feel.

Professor Sycamore as he appears in Pokemon Red

As soon as I made it to Glitch City (Lumiose City), I met up with Professor Sycamore, who immediately challenged me to a battle.  I was expecting a battle against three magnemite or maybe a
Porygon, a Grimer, and a Cubone (These are typical pokemon carried by a "Super-Nerd") or something weird like that, but he surprised me with Bulbasaur, Charmander, and Squirtle.

Updates: Fire type added

And it is at exactly this moment that I found out that Fairy Type Attacks are not very effective against Fire Type Pokemon (sigh).  I updated my chart to reflect this new data, but Flabebe still has not forgiven me for this oversight.


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I'm not quite sure if I was good all this year, but apparently Christmas came for me anyways: Professor Sycamore gave me my choice of his three pokemon.  I was thinking of picking up Charmander because I really wanted to see that Charizard in 3D, but I decided to stick to my roots and pick Bulbasaur--who was my very first pokemon ever.  I named him "Bulby".

Which brings up that question of what to do with my pokemon team--which is now made up of eight pokemon.  Bulbasaur, Froakie and Raich--I mean, Pikachu are non-negotiable and I'm still pretty high on Flabebe and Ralts...

Guess I have an eight-pokemon cycle for now!

My gang of pokemon-thieving friends arrived just after the battle so that Professor Sycamore could give us all a nice pep talk about following our dreams and finding others who have different views or some "Mr. Roger's Neighborhood" nonsense like that. I really wasn't paying attention, I was too high on Bulbasaur at this point--which is a problem because I think he said something important about Mega-Evolving Bulbasaur in his monologue and I definitely missed it.  Hopefully this isn't going to be a problem (SPOILER: it probably is).

On the way out the door I met the obvious villain-du-jour Lysandre.  Why did I immediately identify him as the villain?  Because he said he wanted to save the world.  Only bad
guys say things like that, this is the first thing you learn at protagonist school.  I should have been intimidated, but who can be scared of a guy named Lysandre?  That's like being afraid of a guy named Lloyd!

Current Squad:

FROAKIE/Froakles/lvl.13
BULBASAUR/Bulby/lvl.10
PIKACHU/PikaPi/lvl.11
BUTTERFREE/Felix/lvl.11
FLABEBE/Pixie/lvl.11
FARFETCH'D/Quacklin'/lvl.11

On Rotation: Ralts, Zigzagoon