Continuing the fun on Platinum, note this contains spoilers. :) Check out Erik's Blog for official coverage, and if you want to follow my journey, make sure you've read my first entry, Road to the Rival. Best viewed on Azure Fantasy Style.
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Last time we left off at the second battle with Takao, my rival. (East of Jubilife City) I have Anti and Deano in my party. In case you don't already know Anti is Piplup, Deano is Shinx. I head to the Pokémon Center after the battle and recover the wounds Takao gave us. We go straight back to battle some of the trainers. Locking eyes with the first youngster, Shinx takes on a Kricketot. Much to my surprise, it's faster and uses Bide. Knowing it has intimidate factored in, someone's going down. I attack some to weaken it, but switch to Anti to face the expected one hit knock out. :| Deano comes back in to finish it off. But losing Anti like that to a Kricketot was not cool. So, time to round up more party members. I head over to Route 218 (West of Jubilife City) and get that old rusty (yet lovely) Rod. Then go on a Magikarp fishing trip! :D
First encounter is a level four splashing Magikarp, bubble it down with Anti and catch it. Then I chat with Morkula on MSN and name the FEMALE Magikarp, Mork. But of course, he didn't approve of such. (Bummer ;;) So, I fish around some more and catch a level six male. Trash the girl and now I have a useless Mork Pocket Monster as the third party member. Battling the rest of the trainers we pick up the usual items scattered around the Eastern Route. Most of the trainer's Pocket Monsters use Leer. Deano and Anti handle all of them with relative ease, with a couple of slips here and there. Once we got in the cave I switched Anti to lead to deal with all the rock types. And the first battle? A Machop. :| Deano comes in to take care of it and we move on.
Now, interesting little observation. Jubilife City and Oreburgh City did not have any patches of snow. Perhaps the climate is different in other areas, but for those two locations, nothing. Still loving the sprites and their movement too. Anyhow, going through the Oreburgh Gate, a hiker gives me the HM, Rock Smash. (Although I have no one I want to use it currently) I come to find the upbeat music City of Energy we all know and love, Oreburgh. A boy at the entrance walks me to the Gym, Takao's waiting there just like usual. Of course, Roark should be at the coal mine if I remember correctly, so I head down there. Should be easy, I'm leading with Deano just to play around with Intimidate, Piplup shouldn't have any problems with bubble & switching in. Also, seems the AI is also smarter in wild & regular battles, Geodude and the like predict the switch and Defense Curl, so it looks like it's not just major battles where the AI is smarter. (Mork asked that question while I was playing, so yeah) Also, the coal is active and moving around, nice to see it in action. (I don't think it actually moved in DP? o_O;)
Everything is running smoothly, Deano intimidates the coal Pocket Monsters while Anti bubbles them into submission. We battle a miner, Anti swept that just fine. We see Roark in the distance, and a level seven Onix appears. I'm like "Oh, okay, we'll just bait it down with intimidate and finish with bubble" Easy right? No way. I start off and intimidate surely enough takes that negative one stage tole, switch over to Piplup and Onix screeches, I switch back to Shinx and that's where I make the mistake. She wraps Deano with that -2 stage attack, and starts setting up with like no tomorrow with Harden and Screech. I can't use Spark on it since it's a ground type and it just rips Deano to pieces. :| I switch in Piplup ready to take care of it and after exchanging attacks, (I clicked Pound <.<) she gets a critical hit. Yeah, that's right, a level seven Onix is running through my team. ಠ_ಠ It's in critical health, but I have to catch it with a PokéBall to save myself from a blackout. Luckily enough, I caught the girl. Named her Nica! =D (Zet's idea) After dealing with that nightmare, I lead with Magikarp to run away from everything. Talk to Roark, he smashed the bolder and goes back to the Gym. Again, not that much different from Diamond & Pearl, but I'll take what they give me. Barely make it out of there thanks to Magikarp's speed.
At this point I've only caught five Pocket Monsters, one released. Searching around the region I heard from Tortured_Soul that Ponyta appear in Route 207. (North of Oreburgh City) That's new, so after searching around for a while, find one, level seven male. Caught it thanks to Nica's wrap, and named it T.S. Afterwords I start training around the Route, leveling Magikarp around ten. Deano taking care of all the Machop, Anti washing Geodude out of the way. One battle Machop shows up and Shinx comes in for Spark knock out, it does so and afterwords reaches level fifteen! The first evolution of the team takes place, and Shinx then evolves into Luxio. Looking at the structure of my team. Things are pretty good. Soon to be Gyarados at lead, being able to trade around intimidates on the opposition with Luxio. While Piplup (Whom I will not be evolving) takes care of the special attacks. Onix to take major hits and slave over HMs. While Ponyta can clean up any mess, with Physical attacks. Overall a solid core of five Pocket Monsters. >:D
Anyway, of the differences, Ponyta in a new area is a plus, I have yet to face the Gym, so not a bucket load of changes, but I'm still liking this far more than Diamond. Again, no snow in the area, and it'll probably be like that for a while. Sprites still look incredible, and I forgot to mention that the new HP bar in battle looks sweet too. Already have some challenging battles under my belt, lets hope the intensity keeps on coming.
So after some training I head to the Gym. Piplup lv. 15, Luxio lv. 16, Magikarp lv. 12, Ponyta and Onix both at lv. 7. Blast the trainers out of the water with Anti, and stop it's evolution. Go back to the center, heal, and it's time to take on Roark. I lead with Mork (Magikarp) so he can benefit from the tough battle. I walk up to him, and the battle begins. First impression, they added high quality leader sprites on the "vs screen" as you seen in the picture to your left.
^ No longer that blown up version. :)
He starts the ball game off with lv. 12 Geodude, I switch Mork out, Geo setting up Stealth Rock. Anti soon downs Geodude with bubble with ease. Switch back to Mork as he sends out a lv. 12 Onix. Again, switch to Piplup and bam, bye bye Onix. At this point I was a bit disappointed, but then again I had a huge edge with Piplup. He brings out his trump card, Cranidos. (Lv. 14) I thought it'd be just like the other two, so I start it off with Magikarp. Notice the awesome sprite too. 8D Anyway, I switch to Piplup just like usual and he used Pursuit! DX Mork dies in a flash and I then bring in Anti for the revenge killing bubble. It was faster and just ate Piplup alive with Zen Headbutt, just ripping out a huge chunk of health. I needed to save Anti, so I switch to Onix to absorb the hit. We exchange attacks and Cranidos downs her as well. Now I'm worried, if I bring in Anti it's gone. I switch out Deano, intimidate slicing a stage. It attacks almost finishing Luxio off, but it hangs on and attacks back with Spark. Cranidos goes down and we win the Coal Badge! :D Also awarded TM76. (Stealth Rock)
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And that's all for now. For more screenshots, and a look at the new party members. Check out the attachments.
Catch ya next time~
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Last time we left off at the second battle with Takao, my rival. (East of Jubilife City) I have Anti and Deano in my party. In case you don't already know Anti is Piplup, Deano is Shinx. I head to the Pokémon Center after the battle and recover the wounds Takao gave us. We go straight back to battle some of the trainers. Locking eyes with the first youngster, Shinx takes on a Kricketot. Much to my surprise, it's faster and uses Bide. Knowing it has intimidate factored in, someone's going down. I attack some to weaken it, but switch to Anti to face the expected one hit knock out. :| Deano comes back in to finish it off. But losing Anti like that to a Kricketot was not cool. So, time to round up more party members. I head over to Route 218 (West of Jubilife City) and get that old rusty (yet lovely) Rod. Then go on a Magikarp fishing trip! :DFirst encounter is a level four splashing Magikarp, bubble it down with Anti and catch it. Then I chat with Morkula on MSN and name the FEMALE Magikarp, Mork. But of course, he didn't approve of such. (Bummer ;;) So, I fish around some more and catch a level six male. Trash the girl and now I have a useless Now, interesting little observation. Jubilife City and Oreburgh City did not have any patches of snow. Perhaps the climate is different in other areas, but for those two locations, nothing. Still loving the sprites and their movement too. Anyhow, going through the Oreburgh Gate, a hiker gives me the HM, Rock Smash. (Although I have no one I want to use it currently) I come to find the upbeat music City of Energy we all know and love, Oreburgh. A boy at the entrance walks me to the Gym, Takao's waiting there just like usual. Of course, Roark should be at the coal mine if I remember correctly, so I head down there. Should be easy, I'm leading with Deano just to play around with Intimidate, Piplup shouldn't have any problems with bubble & switching in. Also, seems the AI is also smarter in wild & regular battles, Geodude and the like predict the switch and Defense Curl, so it looks like it's not just major battles where the AI is smarter. (Mork asked that question while I was playing, so yeah) Also, the coal is active and moving around, nice to see it in action. (I don't think it actually moved in DP? o_O;)
Everything is running smoothly, Deano intimidates the coal Pocket Monsters while Anti bubbles them into submission. We battle a miner, Anti swept that just fine. We see Roark in the distance, and a level seven Onix appears. I'm like "Oh, okay, we'll just bait it down with intimidate and finish with bubble" Easy right? No way. I start off and intimidate surely enough takes that negative one stage tole, switch over to Piplup and Onix screeches, I switch back to Shinx and that's where I make the mistake. She wraps Deano with that -2 stage attack, and starts setting up with like no tomorrow with Harden and Screech. I can't use Spark on it since it's a ground type and it just rips Deano to pieces. :| I switch in Piplup ready to take care of it and after exchanging attacks, (I clicked Pound <.<) she gets a critical hit. Yeah, that's right, a level seven Onix is running through my team. ಠ_ಠ It's in critical health, but I have to catch it with a PokéBall to save myself from a blackout. Luckily enough, I caught the girl. Named her Nica! =D At this point I've only caught five Pocket Monsters, one released. Searching around the region I heard from Tortured_Soul that Ponyta appear in Route 207. (North of Oreburgh City) That's new, so after searching around for a while, find one, level seven male. Caught it thanks to Nica's wrap, and named it T.S. Afterwords I start training around the Route, leveling Magikarp around ten. Deano taking care of all the Machop, Anti washing Geodude out of the way. One battle Machop shows up and Shinx comes in for Spark knock out, it does so and afterwords reaches level fifteen! The first evolution of the team takes place, and Shinx then evolves into Luxio. Looking at the structure of my team. Things are pretty good. Soon to be Gyarados at lead, being able to trade around intimidates on the opposition with Luxio. While Piplup (Whom I will not be evolving) takes care of the special attacks. Onix to take major hits and slave over HMs. While Ponyta can clean up any mess, with Physical attacks. Overall a solid core of five Pocket Monsters. >:D
Anyway, of the differences, Ponyta in a new area is a plus, I have yet to face the Gym, so not a bucket load of changes, but I'm still liking this far more than Diamond. Again, no snow in the area, and it'll probably be like that for a while. Sprites still look incredible, and I forgot to mention that the new HP bar in battle looks sweet too. Already have some challenging battles under my belt, lets hope the intensity keeps on coming. So after some training I head to the Gym. Piplup lv. 15, Luxio lv. 16, Magikarp lv. 12, Ponyta and Onix both at lv. 7. Blast the trainers out of the water with Anti, and stop it's evolution. Go back to the center, heal, and it's time to take on Roark. I lead with Mork (Magikarp) so he can benefit from the tough battle. I walk up to him, and the battle begins. First impression, they added high quality leader sprites on the "vs screen" as you seen in the picture to your left.
^ No longer that blown up version. :)
He starts the ball game off with lv. 12 Geodude, I switch Mork out, Geo setting up Stealth Rock. Anti soon downs Geodude with bubble with ease. Switch back to Mork as he sends out a lv. 12 Onix. Again, switch to Piplup and bam, bye bye Onix. At this point I was a bit disappointed, but then again I had a huge edge with Piplup. He brings out his trump card, Cranidos. (Lv. 14) I thought it'd be just like the other two, so I start it off with Magikarp. Notice the awesome sprite too. 8D Anyway, I switch to Piplup just like usual and he used Pursuit! DX Mork dies in a flash and I then bring in Anti for the revenge killing bubble. It was faster and just ate Piplup alive with Zen Headbutt, just ripping out a huge chunk of health. I needed to save Anti, so I switch to Onix to absorb the hit. We exchange attacks and Cranidos downs her as well. Now I'm worried, if I bring in Anti it's gone. I switch out Deano, intimidate slicing a stage. It attacks almost finishing Luxio off, but it hangs on and attacks back with Spark. Cranidos goes down and we win the Coal Badge! :D Also awarded TM76. (Stealth Rock). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
And that's all for now. For more screenshots, and a look at the new party members. Check out the attachments.
Catch ya next time~
