[Pokémon] Pocket Hearts (Crossover with KH)

This fic is basically a Pokemon/Kingdom Hearts crossover. It has new characters, characters from the anime and various games.

Since parts of Ships, everybody goes through a mysterious portal to go to other worlds. This series take place in the Pokemon world,and instead of using Gummi ships, they go through strange multidimensional portals that lead to the other worlds. And this fic will have all worlds from the original Kingdom Hearts (excluding 100 Acre Wood, due to a rather insignificant plot, and the severe lack of Heartless there)

Eric, a character I based off myself, is equivalent to Sora. He has the Keyblade for a weapon, and his Pokemon are Infernape, Tropius, Floatzel, Dusknoir, Skuntank, and Rhyperior. Eric is a devout follower of Arceus, despises anybody whom he would consider "Evil" (especially Giovanni, Team Rocket's leader), and is loyal to his girlfriend Kiki, who recently went missing, and Eric's temper can be very fiery. Eric also has an ability called the Dimensional Scream, which allows him to have visions of the past and future.

Barry is equivalent to Donald and is energetic supportive of Eric and Paul. He uses a Staff for a weapon, and his Pokemon are Empoleon, Roserade, Gardevoir, Staraptor, Heracross, and Garchomp. It's very hard to calm Barry down. His father, Tower Tycoon Palmer, disappeared recently.

Paul is equivalent to Goofy, and can sometimes be a bit pessimistic, but he's still a likable guy. Paul prefers to use a Shield for a weapon. His Pokemon are Torterra, Weavile, Drifblim, Electivire, Bibarel, and Scizor. Paul's brother Reggie suddenly vanished not too long ago.



(Destiny Islands, Part One)
Eric's island village between Snowpoint City and the Battle Zone has been attacked not only by the infamous Team Rocket, but also by strange beings called Heartless.

Barry and Paul had just arrived on the island via a small ferry, because the captain normally used the island's pier to get supplies. Unfortunately, most of the people had been destroyed the the attackers, who had disappeared from the scene minutes earlier.

The captain shouted "BARRY! PAUL! GO SEARCH THIS ISLAND FOR SURVIVORS! I'll go check if I can get the supplies!"

Eric was unconscious on the ground, with Mewtwo keeping an eye on him. Barry asked Paul "Is that Mewtwo?" Paul answered "Umm.. Yes it is." before noticing Eric beside Mewtwo, and adding "Oh no! I see somebody lying there right next to Mewtwo!"

Eric was dreaming, and he heard the voice of Arceus say, "You are the Chosen one."

Eric asked "Wait a sec, Arceus! Who were those guys? I think I recognized them from somewhere. And what WERE those things that they brought with them? And WHERE'S Kiki?"

Arceus explained "Those thugs call themselves Team Rocket. They are the bane of my existence. I despise every 'Team' ever known, except for the Pokemon Rangers and Team Snagem. And those dark creatures are called Heartless. They are made from darkness and are very dangerous. They are swarming in other worlds, including this one. There are few weapons that can destroy them. Here is one of them. It's called a Keyblade, and it will help you get your revenge and save all worlds from evil. And I have no clue where Kiki is.."

Eric received the Keyblade, and woke up, saying "Thank you, Arceus. I won't let you down!"

Mewtwo teleported away before Eric got to thank it and before Barry and Paul could get to Eric.

Eric got up, but fell due to exhaustion. Barry and Paul helped him up, and Paul asked "Are there any other survivors here?"

Eric said, weak, "There is one. Her name is Kiki, she's my girlfriend ,and I have no idea where she is. I hope she's safe."

Eric's reddish hair was spiked up, and his clothes were clean despite being mauled by Heartless several minutes ago. His emerald eyes were half open.

Barry then looked at Eric, who was holding the Keyblade, and added "That's good to know.", paused, and said "Paul. He has that Keyblade thingy that the king was talking about!"

Eric said "Thanks for saving me. I'd be a goner if you hadn't come. Who are you, anyways? Oh, and the name's Eric."

Barry and Paul stated their names, and Barry said "We came to find the Chosen One of the Keyblade. That would be you."

The captain was busy trying to start up the boat, but unfortunately, it was out of gas now. Eric, Barry, and Paul realized this when they made it there. Eric was now full of energy somehow, and got up on his own feet and Barry and Paul moved away.
Eric asked "Arceus told me that these.. Heartless... things were coming from other worlds. How do we get to them?

Paul explained "Odd portals are appearing everywhere, and we need to stop the Heartless in other worlds so they don't come through to this one."
Eric nodded since he understood.

Eric, Barry, and Paul sent out Floatzel, Empoleon, and Bibarel respectively, and surfed to the Battle Zone, in search of the first portal.

(Main theme for this fic: "Brave Heart" by Ayumi Miyazaki, from the Digimon Adventure OST {Simple and Clean/Hikari doesn't fit in this fic at all})
(Voice of Eric: Ryan Drummond)
(Voice of Kiki: Colleen O'Shaughnessey)
(Voice of Gonzap: Adam West)
(Voices of all other characters: Their most recent voices in the anime/KH or FF games/Disney movies)

Sorry about that ,and I like imagining my characters with voices.

The next chapter will be their arrival at the Battle Zone.

Destiny Islands part 2

They arrived at the Battle zone after a few miles of Surfing. Looking for the first portal, Barry checked the Battle Tower, to see where his dad, the Tower Tycoon Palmer himself, happened to be. Eric, Barry, and Paul called back Floatzel, Empoleon, and Bibarel, to their Pokeballs. Right afterwards, our heroes' Poketches started going haywire, and they headed toward the Battle Tower.

Apparently, Barry saw a sign that said "The Tower Tycoon has mysteriously vanished. The Battle Zone, as a whole, is closed until further notice." Barry then looked up and said "Dad, where ARE you?!"

Eric and Paul arrived, and Eric leaned on the door of the Battle Tower.

Eric had a momentary dizzy spell, and groaned, then he blacked out for a second, and had a vision. Tower Tycoon Palmer was in it, and he was in a cell somewhere, and there was a raspy voice with a slight British accent, that said "It's been too long, Palmer. Where is the Keyblade?! If you don't tell me, you'll be in for a world of pain!" Palmer calmly said, "I don't know what a Keyblade even is. And if you don't let me go, Giovanni, the police will HUNT YOU DOWN!"

The vision ended and Eric got up on his feet, and Paul asked "Are you OK?!" Eric then explained, "I had this weird vision. There was a man named Palmer, and this voice of some guy named... Giovanni, and Palmer was being interrogated about the Keyblade by this Giovanni person."

Barry asked 'You had a VISION?! And not only that, you saw my DAD in it!?"

Paul then added, "Giovanni was in his vision, as well. Eric, Giovanni is the scumbag who leads Team Rocket. He must've organized the attack on your island. I have no idea why."

Eric then noticed the portal nearby, and the trio of young heroes was sucked into it.


This first world was a peaceful archipelago, but our adventurers were on the largest island.

Many kids were there, playing around, and Eric prayed to Arceus, asking "Why did I have that vision of Palmer and Giovanni? Arceus, I must know." Arceus's voice explained "Oh, the Dimensional Scream. It's an ability you have now that you are using the Keyblade. It allows you to see visions of the past and future, and sometimes these 'visions' are just voices. It could possibly help you find Kiki."

Eric said "Thank you, Arceus.", and up in the sky, a purplish cloud appeared, and Heartless appeared, and the islands' inhabitants disappeared." Eric then added "This is exactly what happened when Team Rocket attacked MY island! We have to do something about this!"

They made it to the docks, and the Darkside Heartless appeared, and Barry and Paul were blocked from reaching it by an odd barrier, and Eric had to face this adversary alone, and his Pokemon were too scared to come out of their Pokeballs.

Eric noticed Darkside's hands, its weakpoints, and how it called upon Shadow Heartless to attack. Eric called upon his Keyblade, and had a long drawn-out battle with Darkside, and Eric won, relatively unscathed, because Eric was aiming for the hands, and Darkside vanished. The islands were quickly getting consumed by the darkness.

Then, Barry and Paul noticed the barrier was gone, the trio ran to the portal home, and made it out, barely.

Eric said "That was TOO close! Are you guys hurt?"

Barry said "I'm fine."

Paul added "I am not hurt, either."

Our Trio's Poketches started beeping, revealing the next Portal, in Pallet Town, Kanto.

Eric said "Kanto? How do we get there from HERE?! Our Flying-Type Pokemon won't support us in the air for such a distance."

Mewtwo appeared, and told them, "There IS a way. You must imagine going to the route nearest your next destination, and your Poketches will teleport you here, or at least the one Eric has."

Eric said "Thanks for the tip, and for saving me, Mewtwo!"

Mewtwo vanished.

Then, our heroes imagined Route 1 in Kanto, and Eric's Poketch transported them there within seconds.

(next will be Traverse Town)

Err...
I like the storyline, but the language is... iffy.
Allow me to explain:

You tend to focus on the dialogue of the characters, but you aren't putting in a lot of details about the setting, the characters, or the plot.
For example:

Eric's island village between Snowpoint City and the Battle Zone has been attacked not only by the infamous Team Rocket, but also by strange beings called Heartless.

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This is quite a basic description of Eric's home and what had just happened. But you might want to clarify a bit. What's the island like? Who's Team Rocket? Who the heck are the Heartless? You have to understand that not everyone has played Kingdom Hearts or Pokemon Diamond, Pearl, or Platinum (Or Red, Blue, Yellow, Firered or Leafgreen since you're including Team Rocket.) . Because not everyone has played these games, they might not know completely what is going on. Plus it adds emotion to the story. You could add details to it to make it sound more real.
Don't get me wrong, I like the story quite a bit. It's neat and exciting. But the lack of detail can cause confusion and tends to make the story a bit bland.

Like this:
Instead of saying, oh say, "Mushi was really excited about getting her first Pokemon, so she ran to Prof. Oak's Lab."
You might want to word it a bit like this:
"Mushi shivered as she hurridly put on her shoes. She had been waiting for this day for a very long time. Her first Pokemon...! She hurridly kissed her mom goodbye, and rushed out the door to the Lab..."

I'm not condemning your writing style. If you want to write like that, then it's OK. It's just that it's hard to get anything out of the dialogue. The lack of detail makes it difficult to understand. The story is amazing, though. You just need more color and shading to an otherwise black and white picture.

I'll keep that in mind for the future.
EDIT: If this fic had an ending theme for each Chapter.

for Destiny Islands, Traverse Town, Olympus Coliseum, Deep Jungle, and Wonderland: Never Give Up (by Sonar Pocket)
for Agrabah, Monstro, Halloween Town, and Atlantica: The Biggest Dreamer (by Wada Kouji)
for Neverland, Hollow Bastion, and End of the World: Gou-ing! Going, My Soul (by Dynamite SHU)

I know, I like Digimon OST for this fic, it suits it well!

EDIT 2: Teams Magma, Aqua, Galactic, and Plasma will also be villains, but Team Snagem and Pokemon Rangers will be helping out the good guys. And guess who the King is! You probably already know, though.

To be honest, Turbo, this fic hasn't improved much since you first posted it on Bulbagarden. You've managed to de-text wallify your chapters, I'll give you that, but IMO, it's still not a very good story. Things happen way too quickly with little to no explanation, which is a big flaw in many fics.

Please do try to add more substance to this story, I implore you.

Alright, instead of going over your whole story, I'll just do one little snippet as an exemplar:

Eric was unconscious on the ground, with Mewtwo keeping an eye on him. Barry asked Paul "Is that Mewtwo?" Paul answered "Umm.. Yes it is." before noticing Eric beside Mewtwo, and adding "Oh no! I see somebody lying there right next to Mewtwo!"

Eric was dreaming, and he heard the voice of Arceus say, "You are the Chosen one."

Eric asked "Wait a sec, Arceus! Who were those guys? I think I recognized them from somewhere. And what WERE those things that they brought with them? And WHERE'S Kiki?"

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The first line is the absolute first instance where we meet Mewtwo. However, you just stuck him in there as you pleased without telling us that he was even there in the first place. It just suddenly jumped out at me, which wasn't a good thing.

That second line is just.... too sudden. Arceus doesn't even take the time to introduce himself? Nothing happens in between?

The third line was just a bit better.

This kind of problem happens everywhere else in that chapter as well. Just... take the time to fill us in on things, instead of zooming through it all like you're giving us a summary. That would make it much better.

(The thing about summaries is that they're easy to organize information with, but are horrible for the actual content.)

Jabberwocky said:

To be honest, Turbo, this fic hasn't improved much since you first posted it on Bulbagarden. You've managed to de-text wallify your chapters, I'll give you that, but IMO, it's still not a very good story. Things happen way too quickly with little to no explanation, which is a big flaw in many fics.

Please do try to add more substance to this story, I implore you.

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I am heavily concerned about the state of Bulbagarden's fanfiction community if this is the kind of reviewing one of its mods pulls. :| If you'd rather call a story crap instead of giving the writer a constructive review that points out specific details, you're not helping anyone. You're just making the writer more inclined to either blow you off, blow all reviewers off (which has happened in the past when snarky reviewers -- who I'd like to keep nameless to avoid drama -- decided to flame a person instead of work with them), or stop writing altogether. In other words, you're not helping the community itself because you're not being a productive member within it.

With that being said, I have to admit I skimmed over the author's note at the beginning, Kaiser. The reason why is because if there's anything important contained within it, it should be brought up in the story itself, provided the narration is strong enough. In other words, it's more or less a test. (I'm not saying that you yourself are a weak storyteller just for having an author's note.)

I'm also not really touching on grammar, in part to warm up for the reviewing challenge and in part because I'm suffering a bout of laziness. I'll point out anything important, but if this ends up being a few short paragraphs about your characterization, plot, and use of language, I hope you'll still accept that.

And now... *knuckle cracks* The review proper.



...Which starts off right away on some concrit. I have to agree with Dragonite. It feels like a lot of this is rushing, so we're not really getting a good picture of what's going on. For example, if an attack just happened, what kind of damage are we looking at? Are buildings leveled? Are bodies everywhere? Are there still stragglers, or did all of the Heartless and Team Rocket just up and leave? If it's the latter, why did they attack the village and leave it without a few remaining soldiers to hold the metaphorical fort?

Then, there's a couple of nitpicks I have about that first line. First off, if this is taking place in Sinnoh, why is Team Rocket there? Sinnoh is Galactic turf, after all, and even in the anime, Team Rocket had never established a proper foothold in that region. That's why Jessie and James were sent there (besides to spy on Galactic's activities). I'm just asking because it seems like a lot of people, when they want an evil team, either use Team Rocket or make Team Galactic/Magma/Aqua seem exactly like Rocket.

On top of that, while I understand Kingdom Hearts fans would automatically know what a Heartless is, you could use some description of them (and Team Rocket, for that matter) somewhere in here. I mean, you're doing what's practically an in medias res, so rather than summarize what happened that led to Barry and Paul going there, it might be a wise idea to show us what went down. Show us the creatures/Team Rocket attacking the village and how they did it. Give us some visuals (i.e., imagery) to help us develop some mental image of what's going on. If you start off by describing the battle itself, you'll actually start off on a stronger note because action = exciting to a reader. In other words, if you make your beginning seem exciting by showing instead of merely summarizing, you'll draw more readers in because they'll think to themselves, "Wow. This fic is awesome! Stuff's happening already!"

Dialogue's a bit tricky to puncutate, and although I could go into the rules, that would take up a lot of time. What I'll do instead is just show you this guide and tell you that, yes, proper dialogue writing can make a difference in how the quote comes off. For example, attempting to use one dialogue tag for two different sentences like you did with Paul's first line causes the entire quote to read as if it's only a single sentence. As in, you're implying that his first line reads as: "Umm.. Yes it is oh no! I see somebody lying there right next to Mewtwo!" This is because there's no proper punctuation between both halves of his line, and one dialogue tag is trying to merge the two sentences together. A dialogue tag is only tied to one half of the quote or the other. Once you tie it to one or the other, it's automatically implied that the rest of the line goes with the tag as well.

Which brings up another thing. Whenever you change speakers, you need to start a new paragraph. For example, Barry's line just before the part I quoted above goes in one paragraph, but Paul's needs to go in a completely separate one. I say "needs" here not only because it's grammatically correct if you do but also because that helps clarify who's speaking each part of the quote once you separate Paul's properly.

Moving on, also agreed with Dragonite. Mewtwo seems to show up randomly, and that's a bit jarring as well as baffling. You don't really explain why Mewtwo is there; it just shows up out of nowhere. What's stranger is that neither of the characters comment on the fact that Mewtwo is there. If we're going by anime canon (which I assume so because you're using Paul here), they shouldn't even know what it is, so it strikes me as strange that they just sort of shrug it off and pay attention to only Eric.

Meanwhile, remember what I said earlier about why I skimmed the author's notes? Here's where it comes into play. We still don't know who Eric and Kiki are. You don't describe Eric (despite the fact that you had a perfect opportunity if you went into description of what Paul and Barry were seeing on the island), and although it would make sense for Eric to call Kiki by her name, we're not really given any description of what he's seeing around him and what he's thinking, which would provide a perfect place to mention that Kiki is his girlfriend. As a result, if the reader doesn't read the author's note, we just don't know who Eric and Kiki are at all, and that's a bad thing because, as I've said, these are the sorts of things you should actually bring up in the story proper to have a strong story. Don't rely on author's notes to tell the story for you.

(Yes, I realize that you describe Eric later, but it comes several paragraphs too late. As a result, it feels like it's just stuck in there when it should have been more appropriate right around the part where Barry and Paul discover him and the reader first gets a glimpse of him.)

Side note, by why would Arceus have no problem with Team Snagem? They're a group of petty thieves who aligned themselves with Cipher, after all. Also, the Pokémon Rangers are not a team a la Team Rocket. It's an actual occupation, more like trainers.

...Why was Mewtwo there if all it did was sit there, watch over Eric, and teleport away? It seems strange because, well, it could have been any other Pokémon that did that job for Arceus. Mewtwo, meanwhile, was a legendary that not many people in the anime canon know about. So, it ends up being a little weird because no one comments on the fact that it's there, and it doesn't even really do anything ground-shakingly important before teleporting away.

While we're on the subject of plot holes, how does Eric know that Kiki is still alive, even though he has no idea where she is?

Also, what king? While I understand this is a Kingdom Hearts crossover, there isn't a king in Pokémon canon, which is where Barry and Paul are from. (Well, no modern-day kings of the entirety of Sinnoh, anyway.) Because of that, you'll want to explain a bit more about who sent Barry and Paul and what sort of differences there are between the Pokémon world we're used to and the one you're using, just so we, the readers, can have a better grasp on what's going on.

Furthermore, how did they know the first portal would be in the Battle Zone?

Going into chapter two, all I can say from the get-go is that Barry's reaction to his father's disappearance feels a little wooden. He doesn't stop short. He doesn't question whether or not it's true. He doesn't react to it emotionally (through body language or just the way he says things). He just yells into the sky and continues on as if barely anything has happened. I mean, if you were told one of your parents disappeared, how would you react to that? Try to base how your characters react on how people in real life would. Think about what the people you know would do. Generally think of your characters as people, and you'll be more likely to make them believable and interesting.

How does Paul, who's lived in Sinnoh all his life and never actually encountered Team Rocket besides Jessie and James, know who Giovanni is? Not to mention in canon, he doesn't seem to care who Jessie and James are, so it seems unlikely that he would really care who their boss is. (In short, Paul is pretty much a cold character who, while he cares on a level about his own Pokémon, doesn't particularly give a crap about anyone else. So, his role in this and the way he reacts seems a little OOC to me.)

It also seems rather convenient that a portal just happened to be right there. No looking for it. No need to fight anyone for it or overcome any obstacles to get to it. It just happened to be right where the characters were. Remember that part of what makes a story interesting is whether or not characters have to struggle to get what they need. Don't just make things easy for them, and don't just have them know exactly where to go or what certain things are. Have them work for their happy ending. (This will also allow you to avoid a Gary Stu. Gary Stus are essentially characters whose mere presence in a story causes reality to warp in order to make things go a certain way for them. The classic Stu is a character around whom reality revolves to make things easy. As I've implied just before this long semi-tangent, a story is made more interesting when the character has to put in some work to finish whatever they need to get done. A story that just hands everything to its characters isn't as interesting because there's nothing to watch. We already know how the situation will end as soon as it's mentioned.)

Arceus's voice just talks to him whenever he asks? O_o You do realize that's basically like chatting with or demanding answers from God, right? Even then, it seems rather convenient that all of the answers can just be told to Eric, rather than make him wonder what's going on and try to figure things out for himself.

If you're going to mention any sort of battle, you'll need to describe it. That's because your story, given its nature as a Kingdom Hearts/Pokémon crossover, will probably focus a lot on battling as well as the quest itself. That and it's just not as exciting to say, "It was a long drawn-out battle that Eric won." That doesn't let the reader picture what's going on, so they don't feel as connected to the story. It feels more like they're reading a summary instead of standing right at the edge of the battlefield, watching the action.

Weren't they in a completely different dimension from Pallet Town/the Pokémon world? I mean, they did just go through a portal, so.

Overall, I'd hate to say it, but this needs a lot of improvement. It was readable, but it feels like you're rushing a lot. As a result, there's a lot of apparent plot holes, and a lot of things feel like they're just given to Eric and the others. Moreover, you don't really give the characters room to develop. You don't let them react like people (or developed characters), and every time you present them with a possibility of trying to figure a problem out for themselves, either the problem resolves itself conveniently (example: instead of trying to search for the portal, it just happened to be right next to them) or a legendary comes and gives them the answer (example: Arceus explaining the Dimensional Scream, Mewtwo explaining how to get to Pallet Town). As a result, it's a little harder for a reader to focus on what you're trying to tell us because we're not given any opportunity to picture what's going on, we're not shown the characters struggling, and we pretty much know that every problem will essentially be solved within a few lines of it being brought up.

However, I will say that it's not bad for a start. You seem to react well to reviewers, which tells me you're eager to learn and keep developing. My advice to you is to sit down and take your time. Plan out details in your story. Describe as much as you can. Avoid summarizing and making things easier for your characters. Even read other fics on this forum or published books to see how they treat description and different problems. You can get better; it'll just take a bit of hard work to do.

Good luck!

JX Valentine said:

I am heavily concerned about the state of Bulbagarden's fanfiction community if this is the kind of reviewing one of its mods pulls. :|

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I try not be like this on Bulbagarden, honest D:

But yes, our fanfiction community at Bulbagarden is very underdeveloped just like my reviewing guide at the moment.

Also, what were you saying about 14,000 words being too much? Your review right there is something like 25% of that already C:

A reminder - if you want to have a discussion about reviewing is to take it over to VM or PM, etc, rather than in someone else's fic thread when the topic moves away from the fic itself. Just so you know and all.

...and it seems you already did, but public reminders never hurt anyone. ;p

Team Galactic and the Organization XVIII won't be in much until CoM (for the debut of the Organization) or Pocket Hearts II (for Team Galactic), and Team Plasma will be in the third one.

It's too much having all the teams in one series. Rocket, Magma, and Aqua are enough bad guys for the first one. In this fic, Jesse and James got kicked out of Team Rocket for their constant failures to get one of the King's Pokemon, as they will explain later on.

Oh, and I need to explain this is technically an alternate Universe type thing where stuff can be a little different, like Jesse and James getting the boot from Giovanni (Eric will see it in a Dimension Scream later whenever he meets Giovanni).


Traverse Town Part One will be up soon-ish.

@JX Valentine: That by far is the longest review I've ever seen. How'd ya manage to write all that? :\

@everybody excluding bobandbill and Digimon Kaiser: ...I don't think a story warrants a half-argument, guys. Let us get back to reading the story as we originally intended to, yes? :D

@Digimon Kaiser: An alternate universe... That's a cool idea. I like that. And it's ok if you can't squeeze every bad orginization into this story all at once. That would be pretty hard to do...
I can't wait for the next chapter, by the way!

mew_nani said:

@JX Valentine: That by far is the longest review I've ever seen. How'd ya manage to write all that? :\

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Not only that, she's going to start putting analogies of elephants into her reviews for February.

Digimon Kaiser said:

It's too much having all the teams in one series. Rocket, Magma, and Aqua are enough bad guys for the first one. In this fic, Jesse and James got kicked out of Team Rocket for their constant failures to get one of the King's Pokemon, as they will explain later on.

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Well that's a relief. Had you tried to put every single evil team in there, I probably would have started screaming at you or something. Unless the whole fic revolved around them and you included a lot of details about their interactions. Then it might work. But then the story would spiral into a quarter million or even more words.

Oh, and I need to explain this is technically an alternate Universe type thing where stuff can be a little different, like Jesse and James getting the boot from Giovanni (Eric will see it in a Dimension Scream later whenever he meets Giovanni).

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That's totally fine. It's only the storytelling style that I have a problem with. I just skimmed over your second chapter, and it looks like you were still in a muddle about including details. It still reads like a summary.

Digimon Kaiser said:

Team Galactic and the Organization XVIII won't be in much until CoM (for the debut of the Organization) or Pocket Hearts II (for Team Galactic), and Team Plasma will be in the third one.

It's too much having all the teams in one series.

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That... still doesn't explain why it had to be Team Rocket. :/ I mean, Team Galactic is already a pretty good evil team. It's got clear goals that are pretty standard for a basic anime series. (Remake the world in their leader's image.) Team Rocket is a lesser kind of evil -- one that isn't hellbent on destroying the world so much as it is just making a profit.

Not to mention my question was why Team Rocket was in Sinnoh, which is just not their turf at all.

Also as a side note: Magma and Aqua have no business being in Sinnoh either; their goal is basically to take control of Hoenn's legendaries and use them to modify the environment based on extremely delusional perceptions of what's good for society. (That is, Aqua's would be, "More water means we can grow things! Therefore, let's capture Kyogre and cause controlled flooding!" Magma's, meanwhile, is "More land means we have more space to live! Therefore, let's capture Groudon to create more landmasses!")

My point is I really hope you're not going to be forgetting what these evil teams actually stood for just for the sake of having evil teams. (Not saying you are; just that I hope you're not.) If you do, then you've got a generic villain who might as well be any other group you create yourself. (Or, to be a little clearer, if you can substitute any evil team for the one you're using, you might as well just stick with one evil team that's of your creation because the team in question is just not recognizable anymore. It's the same kind of logic for why you don't take a canon character and make them act out-of-character.)

Oh, and I need to explain this is technically an alternate Universe type thing where stuff can be a little different, like Jesse and James getting the boot from Giovanni (Eric will see it in a Dimension Scream later whenever he meets Giovanni).

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It would be a good idea if you explained at the very beginning in some way (within the story) that this is actually an AU. Otherwise, starting off by mentioning canon characters who belong to a particular canon universe causes readers to automatically think the things in your fic will be recognizable and what they're used to. Or, in other words, if you don't put enough detail in the very beginning that it's not the same universe as the one in canon, then the reader will automatically assume that you're just throwing canon out the window because they have no reason to believe otherwise.

(Of course, I wouldn't recommend this kind of AU anyway because if you don't bother keeping characters in-character and whatnot, you'll probably disappoint readers who come in here and think they'll be reading about canon!Paul and everything else, only to find out they're not.)

mew_nani said:

@JX Valentine: That by far is the longest review I've ever seen. How'd ya manage to write all that? :\

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Patience. Also, you should see some of the reviews the real elitist jerks do on other writing comms. That was considered brief in some circles.

@everybody excluding bobandbill and Digimon Kaiser: ...I don't think a story warrants a half-argument, guys.

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O_o Who's half-arguing?

JX Valentine said:

It would be a good idea if you explained at the very beginning in some way (within the story) that this is actually an AU. Otherwise, starting off by mentioning canon characters who belong to a particular canon universe causes readers to automatically think the things in your fic will be recognizable and what they're used to. Or, in other words, if you don't put enough detail in the very beginning that it's not the same universe as the one in canon, then the reader will automatically assume that you're just throwing canon out the window because they have no reason to believe otherwise.

(Of course, I wouldn't recommend this kind of AU anyway because if you don't bother keeping characters in-character and whatnot, you'll probably disappoint readers who come in here and think they'll be reading about canon!Paul and everything else, only to find out they're not.)

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And here's the point that I missed. Although I'm not really against the AU idea in and of itself, there should be hints of it in the story itself, or in a note. (Also, what's wrong with throwing canon out the window? It's what I do with my fics ._.)

Also, when you're doing a crossover, make sure it goes smoothly. Even if the characters act in character, a crossover might not go about well if you're just sticking elements of one story into another, such as having Eric just get the Keyblade for no apparent reason, and having Barry and Paul just go through the portal without so much as a passing glance.

Patience. Also, you should see some of the reviews the real elitist jerks do on other writing comms. That was considered brief in some circles.

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That review would be considered a mammoth on Bulbagarden. Just goes to show how juvenile we are about these things :D

O_o Who's half-arguing?

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Same here. I have no idea.

Dragonite Ernston said:

And here's the point that I missed. Although I'm not really against the AU idea in and of itself, there should be hints of it in the story itself, or in a note.

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Amen to this.

(Also, what's wrong with throwing canon out the window? It's what I do with my fics ._.)

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This is a good discussion to have, and it's what a lot of fanfic comms need to address. Since it's also something that should be thought about in this fic (because of all the talk concerning AUs and such), I'll just go ahead and explain it here, and if we need a more general discussion, we could probably take it to a new thread.

The simple answer is really the same for why you should put a note about whether or not you're doing an AU. When a reader goes into a fanfiction, they're going in with preconceived notions about the characters and general facts. For example, there's a lot of Paul fans out there, so when they read a fic about Paul, they expect to see the same kind of character they see in the anime. Sure, there's such a thing as different fan interpretations, but there's certain things that are just generally true about a character that all fans would be able to pick up on -- things that make a character recognizably that character. Going back to the Paul example, he's normally a stoic character whose priority is on getting his Pokémon to be as powerful as possible. This is both shown and stated explicitly in canon, so a lot of fans tend to see him as at least that. (In other words, a lot of Paul fic tends to deal with the fact that he's not exactly the friendliest face on the planet. Either it shows him getting over it to warm up to other characters, or it shows him just being a giant jerk. That's where the fan interpretation comes in, really.)

So, here's the problem. When a fan goes into a work that doesn't give them the cues to read it a certain way, they're going to think that the character is just the character in name only. This becomes a disappointment on two levels. First, again, to the Paul example, Paul fans just expect Paul to be recognizably Paul. When he's not, they're not getting the kind of character they'd expect to see, and oftentimes, because of that, the role that they think he's going to fill as soon as they see his name just doesn't get filled. So, his character ends up falling short. The second problem is, of course, that if you're a fan of a certain character, it makes the author seem shallow (at the risk of putting it far from diplomatically -- sorry about that) because you're basically taking people's favorite characters, stripping them of the personalities they enjoy seeing, and using those characters' looks and names for your own OCs. In other words, at the very worst, you might come across a ticked-off fan (who's ticked off because you're saying half of what makes their favorite characters what they are doesn't matter). At the very best, you'll cause people to judge you a little because they read that as a lack of creativity on the author's part (under the assumption that the author in question was too lazy/not good enough to create their own characters).

Same kind of principle with everything else in canon, really. If a reader goes into a fic thinking something is true, you'll need to explain from the get-go why it isn't. Otherwise, it'll come across as a plot hole -- or worse, a sign that the author doesn't know their canon/didn't do their homework (depending on what's getting changed) -- because they're used to things being a certain way in canon. To go back to what I said about Team Rocket, they're an evil team, yes, but in the anime, they're more thieves than an evil overlord and his minions. They want to take over the world, but they do it for profit. And more importantly, they're not Galactic, Magma, or Aqua in that they don't want to destroy the world to remake it in whatever image they please. That's counterproductive to them. They just want to use a display of force to bully everyone else into doing what they want. They'll use any means possible to get to their goals, but they're not a cult or whatnot. They're simply the Pokémon mafia. I'm not saying that every fan sees them this way, but a lot of fans see bits and pieces of this and would at least agree that they're just not Galactic, Magma, or Aqua. If you try to cast them in those same kinds of roles, you end up making Rocket seem like a very generic villain organization, which might not strike Rocket fans as being something as interesting as what Team Rocket actually is, basically.

Not to mention the whole "took concepts, gutted them, and used the names" philosophy applies to just about everything. If you have a Team Rocket that's only Team Rocket in name only, people are going to see it as, at best, a sign that there's something lacking in the creativity department. That's why you've got to be careful when you work with canon. I'm not saying that canon is like prison, of course. It just requires a certain kind of creativity to pull off well. Namely, a combination of an understanding of the source material along with the mental nimbleness to work with and around it. Think of it more like a jungle gym. You can't really change the layout or shape of the bars, but that doesn't mean there's one set way of playing with them, you know?

Of course, the stuffier explanation is that, as fans, we just need to respect canon on a certain level because fanfiction's all about showing our appreciation for the source material through writing and that gutting parts of it and using the names of concepts for something completely different than what the original author intended isn't exactly flattering. Buuut because this is a more complicated and a potential hot bed for debate, it's probably just best to keep the above in mind for now.

Otherwise, definitely not against AU in general, just not one where it's basically "characters of a canon universe in name only." I've seen this a lot in fanfic, but to be honest, the term "AU" is meant to refer to fanfic that takes a point in the canon storyline and asks a "what if" question about it. For example, if a story describes Ash's adventures if Brock hadn't decided to leave Pewter City to become a breeder, that would be an AU fic. Alternate Universe, after all. Refers to the idea that for every decision a person makes, an alternate universe is created to house what would happen if the person decides to take the path they didn't choose in the main timeline. Heavy stuff, I know. But since not a lot of authors in this fandom know that (and generally assume AU = deviating from canon in general), if it floats your boat, by all means. I'm just not personally as interested in it. *shrug*

(You guys are confusing me!)

I think it sums up to this, in very loose terms: if you're going to use canon characters, you should keep them in-character, because that is what we have established them as from the source material; if you're going to write an AU, you need to make it clear that it's an AU, and set it up in a way that it makes sense. Of course, that is in no way a replacement for the impressive essays brought up previously, but it's kind of a baseline. Read them through again, I'd say, and do your best to follow what they're saying - it's all advice for you, after all, so you should try and get a grip of what they're talking about.

Also, adding in my own bit, you kinda need to work on your pacing and word choice. Everything goes very fast, and is very bare-bones to boot. You need to take it a little slower, really imagine what your characters are doing, and write it in a way that takes all the details. I'll use the following passage as an example.

Eric was dreaming, and he heard the voice of Arceus say, "You are the Chosen one."

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That was... very brief. And let's summarixe what happened in that one sentence: Eric, collapsed on the ground, is having a dream. In his dream, the general equivalent of God comes down from the heavens and remarks that he is the Chosen One (I'd pick a different name for that, personally, because there was already a Chosen One in Pokémon 2000). This is important. It needs more than one sentence. It demands a paragraph. More like...

While Paul and Barry stood on, watching, Eric continued to lie unconscious on the dirt. Soon, though, something came through to him - a dream, in the middle of the dark fog that was his mind. At first, to be honest, Eric didn't quite know what was going on, whether he had woken up or not - but the answer soon became apparent as a figure descended from the haze, a white creature with a golden ring surrounding its chest. Eric knew what that was - now, it was just a matter of believing it.

"A-arceus..." he breathed, not entirely in control of himself in this dreamlike state.

"Yes," the deity continued, looking down at him with an expression almost like reverence in its bottle-green eyes. "Eric, I must apologize for intruding into your thoughts this way, but there is something which you must know."

"What's that?"

Arceus looked at him for an agonizingly long second, and then bowed his head deeply. "You are the Chosen One."

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See? That was much more entertaining to read, because there was actual conversation and description. It's important to learn about that sense of being in your writing.

(Alrighty, then. Eric, to explain this, is the Chosen One of the Keyblade.)