6th Gen Who thinks the games need an evolution tutor?

[Howmander]

There's a number of pokemon that I don't know how you could possibly figure out on your own how to evolve them (Pancham needing another dark type in the party, Tyrunt and Amaura evolving during day or night only, etc) so does anyone else think it's time that Pokemon games have an NPC character (such as the one that tells you the happiness level of a pokemon, what their hidden power type is, and so on) that you can bring your pokemon to and it tells you how to evolve the lead pokemon in your party? I think there's enough pokemon with varied evolutions that this NPC would be a pretty great addition.

 

[GreenFlame]

There's a number of pokemon that I don't know how you could possibly figure out on your own how to evolve them (Pancham needing another dark type in the party, Tyrunt and Amaura evolving during day or night only, etc) so does anyone else think it's time that Pokemon games have an NPC character (such as the one that tells you the happiness level of a pokemon, what their hidden power type is, and so on) that you can bring your pokemon to and it tells you how to evolve the lead pokemon in your party? I think there's enough pokemon with varied evolutions that this NPC would be a pretty great addition.

This would be pretty cool, but Pokémon games in general have quite a lot of stuff that actually requires using the internet or other external sources to find out about. I mean seriously, how are people expected to find out how to pass down IVs and Natures through breeding? The answer: they can't, they need to find out on the internet. I think to actually do all of the optional things like completing the Pokédex, competitive breeding etc. you're supposed to use external sources.

 

[Cerberus87]

Well, part of the fun is in finding out by yourself, although the requirements are getting ridiculous. :P But think this way: back in 1st gen, no one told you that Machoke evolves by trading, or Nidorino evolves with a Moon Stone. You had to figure it out yourself. Even back then, there were guides to help you.

Now, things like Pancham needing another Dark-type in your party, or Inkay requiring you to turn the 3DS upside down after a level up, are pretty hard to figure out by yourself. I don't think there should be an NPC who tells you how a Pokémon evolves, because that would be too easy, but the evolution methods should be more intuitive. Like, it's easy to guess that Magmar evolves by trading while holding the Magmarizer, since it's quite obvious the item is related to Magmar (duh!) and you can't use the Magmarizer on him. Leveling up while holding it doesn't work either, so all that's left is trading while holding the item.

In the past, however, it was harder to figure out, because it didn't say in the description of the Metal Coat that certain Pokémon "loved" it. If memory serves me correctly, however, it was revealed that Onix and Scyther required the Metal Coat to evolve.

 

[Controversy]

This would be a great addition for casual fans of the series. Pokemon has always had obscure ways of evolution, I'm sure most of us would have had no idea how to evolve Feebas to Milotic back in Gen 3 without some sort of external guide and I'm sure a lot of new people to the series probably had no idea how to evolve their Inkay into Malamar due to it's completely ridiculous evolution method for example. So yes, having a NPC (towards the end of the game) give hints (as opposed to outright telling them) as to an evolution method would make the game much less confusing and frustrating to a lot of people most likely

 

[Howmander]

Well, part of the fun is in finding out by yourself, although the requirements are getting ridiculous. :P But think this way: back in 1st gen, no one told you that Machoke evolves by trading, or Nidorino evolves with a Moon Stone. You had to figure it out yourself. Even back then, there were guides to help you.

Now, things like Pancham needing another Dark-type in your party, or Inkay requiring you to turn the 3DS upside down after a level up, are pretty hard to figure out by yourself. I don't think there should be an NPC who tells you how a Pokémon evolves, because that would be too easy, but the evolution methods should be more intuitive. Like, it's easy to guess that Magmar evolves by trading while holding the Magmarizer, since it's quite obvious the item is related to Magmar (duh!) and you can't use the Magmarizer on him. Leveling up while holding it doesn't work either, so all that's left is trading while holding the item.

In the past, however, it was harder to figure out, because it didn't say in the description of the Metal Coat that certain Pokémon "loved" it. If memory serves me correctly, however, it was revealed that Onix and Scyther required the Metal Coat to evolve.

Well in that particular instance, Metal Coat is actually used to strengthen Steel type moves and since Onix can use Iron Tail, it's conceivable that a trade while holding the item could potentially happen, but who would ever think to turn their 3DS upside down for Inkay? And I mean going by what you guys are saying, did either of you complain when they made EV training easier by displaying the EVs on a bar graph in Super Training rather than keeping it an invisible number and the addition of the IV judge, or do you refuse to use them because it makes the game more challenging? If you think those things were a good addition, why wouldn't someone telling you that Aipom needs to know a particular move in order to evolve, or that Sneasel needs to be holding a razor claw AND level up at night in order to evolve into Weavile? Wasn't the IV judge a welcome addition in game, so why couldn't an Evolution tutor? (or whatever it could be called)

Edit: Actually, Controversy had a really good idea, it doesn't actually have to be an outright telling of the player how to do it, but rather hints and clues would be a good way of doing it as well actually. I like that idea.

 

[Pendraflare]

I think Black 2 and White 2 had something like that; you were able to call one of the characters on the Xtransciever (don't remember if it was Juniper or Cheren, I think it's one of those two), so if something like that were to come back it would definitely be helpful with all the unusual evolution methods today.

 

[CoffeeDrink]

This would be pretty cool, but Pokémon games in general have quite a lot of stuff that actually requires using the internet or other external sources to find out about. I mean seriously, how are people expected to find out how to pass down IVs and Natures through breeding? The answer: they can't, they need to find out on the internet. I think to actually do all of the optional things like completing the Pokédex, competitive breeding etc. you're supposed to use external sources.

It's funny, because the first I ever learned about IVs and the like were from a book. Granted it was a Pokemon book, but a book non-the-less. That's not to discredit your statement of the games needing third party knowledge, however. All in good fun. OT: I think that this is a good idea. I mean, you can fill an entire game with NPCs that repeat the same phrase over and over, but you can't replace one of those with someone more helpful?

 

[Megan]

As Pokemon is a game that seems to make more and more effort in telling a story and exploration of the surroundings, why not tell how Pokemon evolve via stories and pictures? Make a big picture of an Inkay that's upside down and put it into the palace. As the player talks to the picture there's a line saying "There's a picture of an Inkay. For some odd reason it's upsiide down.". It's not directly telling you that its the way to evolve it, but it's a hint nevertheless and players will keep an eye on the surroundings, hoping to find even more secrets.

I like subtle hints a little bit more than NPCs telling you; at least during a normal playthrough.

 

[Hikamaru]

I think Black 2 and White 2 had something like that; you were able to call one of the characters on the Xtransciever (don't remember if it was Juniper or Cheren, I think it's one of those two), so if something like that were to come back it would definitely be helpful with all the unusual evolution methods today.

For your information it was Cheren who told you about evolution.

But yes I would have definitely wanted this sort of thing in X/Y given how some Kalos Pokemon evolve in the most unusual methods possible. I remember how hard that would be if someone didn't look up the evolution methods on the internet or in a guidebook beforehand.

This is one of the biggest problems I see with in-game information. It lacks any way to come up with evidence on an evolution method. While I may doubt it, I do hope OR/AS can include some way of contacting someone via PokeNav to explain how something evolves.