How did you get into Pokemon and consequentially, Smogon?

How people got into particular franchises has always been an interesting topic to me. Whether it be the anime, games or the cards, everyone on this website has their own story and experiences to share as to how Pokemon got into their lives. I find this pretty damn cool.

For me personally, the anime did it's job as a marketing tool. It all began when my mum went out to a video store to get some cartoons for me and just happened to pick up a Pokemon DVD. Thanks Mum! This basically lead me to become a huge pokemon fan a long time before I even played games.

It was only until I was around 8 when I played my first game, Pokemon Pearl. Played the shit outta that beautiful game ;'). Played almost every single main series game and a few spin-offs ever since.

As to how I got into Smogon, it was around the BW era when I noticed how this Smogon website kept popping up anytime I googled a Pokemon. Decided to check it out and found out there was a whole new side to Pokemon I never knew about. Spent hours reading the old Pokedex and what pretty much every pokemon did on the competitive side. Started watching a lot of shofu, whose videos singlehandedly taught me how to play competitive pokemon. It was 2013 when I decided to make an account but was a full lurker until early this year.

Alright enough from me, now it's your turn!
 
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My first experience with pokenon was watching the anime with my siblings. We only watched it every once in a while and thought it was very stupid, but in a funny way. At that point I was not a Pokemon fan. However, one day my dad brought home one of those huge tcg boxes for me after work outta nowhere, and... I was hooked. A few years later, I got my first game- Pokemon sapphire. The rest is history.

As for how I discovered smogon, it all started when my friend and I began doing playthroughs together. We started with a few one runs in Sapphire and Ruby, but one day we decided to try out some sort of competition on platinum. We battled every few gyms and after the Pokemon and so on, however during the postgame we began to realize that some Pokemon were just much better at battling than others. Anyway, we ended up in an intense arms race to see who really was the Pokemon master between the two of us. After training up numerous Pokemon to level 100, I began to win all the battles. My friend went back to the drawing board, and that's when he discovered smogon. Unfortunately for him, despite utilizing competitive sets and doing a bit of IV breeding, he could not take down my pseudo legendary squad (high BST for the win!). Jumping to a few years later- I'd just completed my first playthrough of X and we once again decided to try out hand at battling. My friend had had the game for about 6 months longer than me, so I figured he might beat me a few times. Wow, did I underestimate him or what. He straight up demolished me. Every time. It was at this point that I looked up competitive Pokemon, which brought me here. I mostly used the strategy pokedex, but after awhile, I wanted to make an RMT and find some battle spot strategy (after having initial success on battle spot, I lost a ton and got frustrated). Although I came for the competitive Pokemon, the main reason I'm still here is that I've settled down in this great forum- Orange Islands.
 
I don't know how I discovered Smogon, but I have been following the community since 2012 or 2013. I believe I became interested in the rest of the site when I found out about the "cool fakeymons" of the CAP Project. At that time, Mollux (CAP 14) was about to finish up. Then I tried to understand more about Overused, although my favorite tiers to learn about are Underused and Rarelyused. I tend to participate and play in CAP, Orange, and Smeargle, the last of which I didn't even know existed until I joined.
 
I don't know how I discovered Smogon, but I have been following the community since 2012 or 2013. I believe I became interested in the rest of the site when I found out about the "cool fakeymons" of the CAP Project. At that time, Mollux (CAP 14) was about to finish up. Then I tried to understand more about Overused, although my favorite tiers to learn about are Underused and Rarelyused. I tend to participate and play in CAP, Orange, and Smeargle, the last of which I didn't even know existed until I joined.
I didn't even know about smeargle studio until someone mentioned it in a thread the other day. I checked it out and let's just say *MIND BLOWN*! That's one of the reasons why smogon is great, I've been on here for awhile, but there always seems to be something awesome I haven't checked out before. I think that's where smogon gets a majority of their members- they come for competitive, stay for everything else.
 

Cresselia~~

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Back when the anime first aired, it was already a cool thing and I wanted to watch the anime. (I wasn't normally allowed to watch TV at home)

One summer, my mum had to visit grandpa in another country, so my dad took me to his friend's house. His friends had a son who watched Pokemon back then.
That's how I got to watch Pokemon.
I thought it was cool.

Soon, all the kids who visited his house were role playing about Pokemon, and it was really fun.
I had never experienced so much fun before.

Soon after that, I started a Pokemon Battle Club thingy in my church, and lots of kids joined my club, and I got to be "the big sister" and boss them around.
I had never had so many friends before.
I used to be a really shy girl sitting in the corner watching ants crawl.

Back then we each chose a Pokemon to become our nickname. I initially chose Raichu, but then the boys thought it wasn't feminine enough.
They said Jigglypuff was way too weak for me, so we ended up choosing Jynx.
At first, I was really unhappy. But then they told me how strong Jynx was, and told me to try using it.
(Back then, we purchased lots of those plastic Pokemon figurines. They were easy to obtain in the nearby Japanese department store)
So I had this Jynx figure and I tried their role play battle, and they kept letting me win.
That was how I started to like Jynx.

I thought, the whole thing that made Pokemon so much fun is that you can play it with other people, especially when it comes to battle.
It's not like other anime (Sailor Moon, etc), there's not much to discuss after the show was over.
But for Pokemon, there's endless combinations of conversations you can make with other Pokemon fans.

I had always viewed battling as an important aspect of Pokemon.

I also joined the unofficial tournament of Hong Kong Pokemon Alliance in 2002, with my Crystal.
Although I only won one battle, and got eliminated on the 2nd round, these guys taught me the art of Pokemon battles.
I realized that there is just so much depth to Pokemon battles, that it is hardly child's play.

I furthered studied how to do Pokemon battles properly, and quickly discovered Smogon during the RSE era.

Unfortunately, the Smogon's battle system, Netbattle, did not work on Chinese windows, so I wasn't able to play it.
However, I found Smogon strategies useful in my league.
I found calculating Pokemon damage using the formula quite challenging, that I even calculated Ppokemon maths during my physics lesson. My teacher probably knew, but he said nothing. (I'm one of his favorites anyway)
He even told me that his son loves Pokemon, and sometimes ask me questions about Pokemon.

I took a slight hiatus from Pokemon in 2006~2008 due to pressure from my church.

But then, I just couldn't get the same satisfaction I had.
I knew that Pokemon was very important to me.

During the DP era, I started using the Pokemon Battle Online simulator, which was developed by people in China.
It was very similar to Showdown, apart from it was in Chinese and it has way more bugs than Showdown.
(The bugs cause certain move combinations to be "illegal" even when they are completely legal in tournaments)

I met more friends and looked forward to VGC.

I scored around 1700 during the BW era.

All in all, I think Pokemon is about challenging myself and to make friends.
It's really an important part of me, and it's very difficult to find another thing that can achieve similar results.
 

Xen

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Gonna be a semi-old fart here.

I still remember the Pokemon craze taking off in the US around 1999. I was in kindergarten at the time, and I can still remember every kid and their brother talking about Pokemon; during recess, it was a common sight to see some of my classmates pretending to be Pokemon, while others were trading and battling with each other using their Game Boys and link cables. At first, I didn't really understand what the whole fuss about the series was about, until a close friend of mine invited me to his birthday party. I still remember seeing his house and all the little Pokemon-based nick-knacks everywhere; this was when I was finally able to see and put names to these strange creatures I've heard so much about. After the party, all the guests received little bags containing candy and some sort of Pokemon-themed toy (mine was a tape measure modeled after Poliwhirl). Once we got back home, I immediately asked my parents if I could get a Game Boy and a Pokemon game. That wish came true on my own birthday when I got a Game Boy Color and Pokemon Red, and I've been a fan since.

As for Smogon, I've been lurking around the site since late D/P/early Platinum, but didn't make an account until mid 2012. I heard a lot about the site from other sites such as Serebii, so one day I decided to check things out for myself. I was intrigued that this franchise that I've been a part of for 10 years (at the time) could be played competitively, and the introduction of WiFi was a perfect time to get into the competitive aspect of the games. One thing about the site that especially hooked me was the early guide to RNG abusing the DPPt games. I was amazed that I was able to find a hidden "secret ID" by determining the IVs of a shiny Shellos I found, and was able to easily breed shiny eggs as a result from it. After getting into RNG abuse for the Gen IV (and eventually gen V) games, I ended up getting involved with Pokecheck (RIP), uploading my RNG'd Pokemon there for others to download and use. That was around when I finally made an account here, since the people I befriended on Pokecheck also used Smogon.

I don't really play as much anymore due to college, work, and life in general, so I mostly just hang around OI and help out in the WiFI subforum every here and there.
 
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Going down memory lane here!


I was... 6, 7, maybe 8 and visiting my cousins. They brought their game system with them, and invited me to play. What game were they playing? Pokemon Stadium! I fell in love. The game was so much fun! I preferred the minigame portion, but it enchanted me! I subsequently got into the anime (Indigo League, on VHS tapes.) but then kind of dropped out of the series until a couple years ago.

Hanging out with the cousins again at a garage sale. I'm looking around and there I see on one of the counters.... two DSi cartridges. Pokemon Pearl and Pokemon Diamond! I freak out, as they're only $5. I beg my younger brother to let me use his DSi to play on. Then I convinced my mom to let me get one and that I'd pay her back when we got home. It was that day I got my first Pokemon game, Pearl. Me and my older cousin, a Pokemon fan, planned a team that would allow me to have every type possible. It was something like Murkrow/Empoleon/?/?/Rapidash but I never did make that team.



Flash forward to about a year ago. I'm on the Pixelmon forums. Pixelmon is a Minecraft mod that adds Pokemon. I've made a thread getting advice about improving my casual team to make them competitive worthy. Someone then tells me about a site specifically for what I was asking about, called Smogon. I go and sign up, make an RMT (That was locked because the format was REALLY wrong. :P) and then found myself wandering Orange Islands. And here I am today. Stillll wandering OI, procrastinating on making an actual competitive team.
 
Not long after Pokémon came out in the US, one of my cousins showed me a Dragonite card (not a TCG one). From that point, I was hooked. I watched the anime often, I have quite a few toys, and I even had Stadium for my N64. But since I didn't have a Game Boy (nor did I think to tell my mom about the GB Tower in Stadium), I didn't own a game. In 2003, after the start of Hoenn in the anime, I lost interest in the show and since it was the only thing about the franchise I could enjoy at the time, I stopped caring.
Flash forward to Spring 2009. The same cousin who showed me that Dragonite card gave me his old DS Lite since he got a replacement (the shoulder buttons didn't work) the past December. My friends recommended I buy Platinum after it came out. So, the day before my sixteenth birthday, I went to Best Buy and bought two games, Phantom Hourglass (which I don't play often) and Platinum. And, once again, I was hooked.
My friends tried to teach me competitive play, but for some reason, it just wouldn't stick back then. Partially since it was VGC, which was a pain in the butt to get a decent team for back then. And partially since TMs were such a limited commodity, I didn't want to waste any. Around this time, I did discover Smogon (Bulbapedia's links did that), but I didn't pay it much attention.
By the time HeartGold and SoulSilver came out, I understood more of the mechanics, but still didn't know anything about competitive play. It wasn't until Black and White came out in Japan that changed everything. I learned that TMs were infinite use, so with that obstacle out of the way, I figured I could go with the effort of EV training. So I came to Smogon after someone of the Pojo forums recommended it and started working on a competitive team.

My favorite part about me getting into Smogon is how I accidentally was one of the earliest people to use weather teams in the emerging BW meta. It started when I was trying to figure out a team but before I came to Smogon. I was asking friends for Pokémon suggestions. A common one was Tyranitar. I kept saying no for one reason: I said that if I were ever to use Tyranitar, it would be a team based around it's ability. When I found this article on such a concept for Generation IV, I decided to do just that.
 
Wow reminded of so many things after reading all of these stories. So why the heck not write down my own experiences. It all started when my brother had to go to the hospital when he was like 6 and my mom bought him a gameboy advance and pokemon Silver. Which is a weird combination now that I think about it. Anyway, I was immediately hooked even though he didn't even let me play. The Pokémon craze was at its high and everybody talked about the show and cards. And as my brother never let me play, I had only those two things. The worst thing was that Pokémon was on at around 7 am, and the rules at our house didn't allow watching television before 8 am. This meant watching Pokémon was mostly limited to sleepovers with friends and monthly marathons in the weekend. I wasn't really into the TCG, but I had a binder full of cards and I was really proud of that. (That binder is still missing as of today)

My cousin owned a N64, but he never played on it. That is why he gave it to my grandma and me and my niece would play Pokémon Stadium everytime we went there. As the Pokémon craze died down, my brother got sick of his gameboy. So he gave it to me together with Pokemon Silver. I was so into playing it, that I completely missed the release of Ruby and Sapphire. But when I was six I bought my second Pokémon game: emerald and not much later leafgreen. I have so many fond memories of those games. Playing, battling, trading with my best friend and investing more hours in a single game than I probably should have.

That years following that I got: Pearl, Soulsilver, White, Black 2, Y and OmegaRuby and a few spinoffs like Battle Revolution, Super Pokemon rumble and Ranger. Around 2008 was the time I got introduced to the competitive scene. It started with watching a few Poketubers on Youtube. But I never understood how everything worked, but I remember looking up damage formulas on Bulbapedia. I was so amazed that Pokémon could include such mathematical problems and I started doing calculations during class. (My math teacher would always ask me what the hell I was doing and me being to shy to admit to playing Pokémon would just say I just made up some functions.) I only discovered Smogon by accident after looking up calculations. The most interesting thing was the competitive dex and I would always talk about competitive sets with a friend who was also into competitive battling. I officially joined Smogon 2 years ago when I was sixteen, mostly because I was to lazy to sign up. But I am so happy to have done so, even though I'm mostly a lurker. In the last year of secondary eduction ( I'm not sure if it's the same as High School, but whatever) my love of Pokémon got a sudden boost.
But this led to me buying every single Pokemon game (released in Europe that is, curse you Hey You Pikachu) that I had missed during the years. This was also the time my love for the competitive scene increased and I started following a lot more youtubers and streamers. But even though I love competitive play, my time on Smogon is mostly spent on the Orange Islands. I just love speculating and discussing with people about the thing I love so much. Despite of university, social life and my daily amount of series, I always make time to read the posts here and watch both VGC and Showdown on Youtube. It was what made me happy when I was younger and what keeps me happy today. And in the end that is all that matters.
 
Got into Pokémon with the Gen I craze in 1998-1999. Played RBY, watched the anime and collected the cards. Latter two died down somewhat as I progressed to Gen II (around 2000), as did fellow people playing it cue sad violin.
Gen III I basically played all on myself, which is why I own every GBA game plus both GC games bar LeafGreen (AND THE NATIONAL DEX STILL FUCKING ELUDES ME BECAUSE OF THAT ASSHOLE SLOWPOKE). I learned about EVs, IVs and Natures at this stage (2003). Tried some egg hatching in Ruby (this was prior to Emerald), which was painful. 2 boxes full of Absol until I got an Adamant one only to find it had 1IV. Yeah...

Gen IV reinvigorated my love for Pokémon as I finally had a lot of other manchildren to play it with. Being on-the-know of the finer details of Pokémon, I discovered Smogon around this time (2007) as it was around the only community that realised there was something more than just shiny Pokémon (and later into Gen IV, EV'd Pokémon became hot business outside of these forums). Interest reinvigorated again when RNG abuse was discovered and the announcement of HGSS.

Gen V killed interest for the franchise for me, then finally about 6 months back I finally got a (2nd hand) 3DS and caught up with Pokémon again.
All in all, I think I have all mainline games bar LG, Black and Black 2.
 
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Like others, I started in the heyday of Gen 1. I had a Gameboy that didn't see much use on anything else besides Tetris, Link's Awakening, and Super Mario. My mom got me Red version but I didn't have a great interest in playing it right away. I didn't become hooked until I saw the anime -- I think it was the episode where Gyarados attacks Ash and Co. after the S.S. Anne sinks. From that point forward, I was hooked. I had every card and was buying japanese toys from LA's toy district. I don't think I've ever been a bigger fan of anything else.

As for Smogon: I joined the Serebiiforums make more friends who liked and played the series. I joined a battle clan there and met user BKC. Eventually we both migrated over here because the competition was superior. Wifi, Cong, The Sports Arena, Stark Mountain /Dragonspiral Tower, and old Firebot were the places I frequented the most.

Nowadays, Orange Islands is where I feel most welcomed.
 
I first got into Pokemon when I was a kid. I am pretty sure it was in 1999 as that's when it first reached Europe. When I was in second grade at school, it was THE big thing. Literally everyone was into the Pokemon TCG. Not so much the games and anime at that point. Everyone was trading cards and talking about them. At first, I didn't want to get involved. I thought it was unbelievably overhyped and overrated and wanted to stay away from it. Then I gradually got more interested in it, and when I bought a 11-card TCG pack and got a holographic Blastoise, I was hooked. I later lost that Blastoise in some stupid trades, but the memory of it still lives on.

The TCG was how it started for me. I later got into the anime and thought it was amazing, much better than most western cartoons for children I was otherwise used to at that time. It took a while before I got into the games as I wasn't very much into video games as a kid. Pretty sure I watched some of my classmates play the games on their Game Boys in the schoolyard, then I visited one of them and got to try Pokemon Stadium which was a lot of fun. I eventually got myself a Game Boy Color and Blue as my second game for it. Then I also bought Silver. Had originally only planned to buy these two, but they were so much fun that I ended up buying all the other games that existed then as well, in this somewhat strange order: Crystal, Yellow, Gold and finally Red.

Continued with Ruby and Sapphire even if most of my other friends had lost their interest at this point. As for myself, I had lost interest in the anime and TCG at this point, but still loved the games. During the FR/LG and Emerald days, most people I knew had stopped playing, and I no longer knew anyone IRL who played the games. Speaking of Emerald, that was when my interest in the series got even higher. I learned about IVs, EVs, Natures and more complex battle strategies which let me enjoy the games more than previously. It also allowed me to actually win at the Battle Frontier, which I am very happy about. This continued even further with D/P.

Then, in late 2008, five months before Platinum was released, I got burnt out on Pokemon. I had completed literally everything there was to do in D/P. Emerald and the older games were not as interesting for me at this point. I got Platinum and played it, had a lot of fun with it but it was not enough to bring my interest back to the previous sky-high levels it had been on. I have learned to appreciate Platinum a lot more in retrospect though. Then, HG/SS were released. I bought and played them too but they only made my interest lower than it had ever been before, they were not what I had been looking for. They didn't measure up to the levels of hype my nostalgia glasses had blinded me into. I was still burned out. Chances are it sounds more serious than it was, but considering how interested I had been in Pokemon before (and would be after), it was a huge difference.

Then, Black and White. I know this thread asks how you got into Pokemon, but I'm expanding that to how I got back into Pokemon as well because that is equally important for me. It might even be more important to me. Simply but, Black and White got me back into Pokemon once and for all after my burnout. The Fresh Start feeling really helped with this. These games were just what I needed after HG/SS (and to a lesser extent, Gen 4 as a whole). During 2011, my interest in Pokemon was at its very top, it was higher than it had ever been before, and it has not been as high since.

I continued with Black 2 and White 2 which were just as awesome as their predecessors. Then X/Y. While I don't think they are as good as Gen 5, they are still good games and I think they are better than everything apart from Gen 5. I wasn't very happy about the announcement of OR/AS though, I never wanted any Hoenn remakes. In fact, I never wanted them to do any more remakes after the garbage that HG/SS had been. I didn't buy the games at first, was hoping we would get "Z" last year so I could get it instead. But "Z" never happened and I got OR/AS instead since I needed something to keep me occupied until the next real games. They are fine for what they are but not everything they could and should have been. I'm currently playing them until we get Sun/Moon later this year.

That might have been a little off-topic, but that's my whole Pokemon story in short.

Now, as for the second question... I originally joined Serebiiforums in late 2005, it was the first forum I ever became a member on and I am still active there. I first heard about Smogon in 2006 I think but didn't think very highly of it since most people who were talking about Smogon as the one place to be were complete jerks and bullies, and I didn't want to have anything to do with them at first. Then I lurked here a bit but wasn't very impressed, it only confirmed my prejudices to an extent and the forums then wasn't what I was looking for (Smogon 2006 was vastly different compared to Smogon 2016 from what I remember). I am not, and have never been much of a competitive player, so this place doesn't really suit me perfectly. I thought about joining back then, but never did.

After getting back into Pokemon in 2011, I finally decided to join Smogon. Had planned to get active here but it never really happened. The reason being that I was still not a competitive player, though I really appreciated what the site had to offer in terms of guides for semi-competitive things like the Battle Subway and RNG. Nowadays, I'm not super active either, but I feel like the site has gotten better with the years. I like the main site as well as the OI and Wi-Fi subforums but don't care much for the rest of the forums as they aren't that interesting to me.

To round this off, I should say that Pokemon has been a big part of my life for many years, and still is. Smogon on the other hand, not so much, though I still appreciate this site for what it is and has been for me in the past.
 
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Ah memories

I suppose I first got into Pokemon when I was quite young, like very. My siblings had this game called "Pokemon Ruby" and I don't really remember how it got into my hands, but it did. I have few memories but I must of been surprisingly good for my age at the time given that most people at that age probably couldn't get past like Littleroot. (I got to Groudon). I never lost steam for Pokemon, I went to Gen 4, 5 and 6 just as, if not more enthusiastic than before. I got into Smogon via PS!, which more people tend to be doing now. As for how I found PS!, I watched a YT video that made me curious so I checked out the site. I don't really do much on Smogon outside of a few OI posts or stuff w/ friends on PS! but I like reading over a lot of threads from other parts of Smogon.

It's safe to say Smogon and Pokemon will probably be parts of my life until either the world ends or Game Freak/Nintendo go bankrupt, which ever comes first.
 
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I heard about Smogon from some German Youtubers. ( in battle video they were mentioning that they play after Smogon's rules ). Some time last year after Pokemon X/Y was released I got so much into breeding and competitive Pokemon. Just because of boredom I searched Smogon in Google and it was the first search result. So I clicked it and went to the forums and I began to be active in the WiFi Forums to trade Pomeon with other people. I must say due to fact that I was sick of breeding sometime after summer last year I became sick of breeding. I discovered ways to cheat Pokemon and to battle against people in the WiFi forums. Then I discovered Pokemon Showdown. I heard about it before and to he honest I wasn't a fan of it because the graphics on cart were looking better, you breed your Pokemon yourself and so on. I found out that I haven't been skilled I began only playing the game on Pokemon Showdown since it is a great way to get better in a certain tier.
 
To be honest, I don't even remember how I got into the franchise, the only thing I know is that I've always been obsessed with it. I remember waking up early in the morning every saturday just so I wouldn't miss a single minute of it, and I'm talking about 6AM kind of early. I guess some of the pokemon fever simply rubbed off on me without notice before burning itself out.
Many, many years later, I found out that pokemon games existed and I remember, vividly, how awestruck I was by them after going through the torture of using the now long-departed dial-up internet access in order to watch gameplay videos on youtube.

As for smogon, I simply used to hear a lot about it and its strict, near facist, policies and regimen and at some point I simply decided to check it out myself. Fortunately, people were just exaggerating lol.
 
I got into Pokemon when I was a child, at about 8 years old, I believe. I watched that weird commercial with the bus-driver smushing the Pokemon together.



Before I ever played the Pokemon game physically, I first started seeing Pokemon in my life via Lunchables, believe it or not! Portable lunch packages marketed towards kids. I collected some of the cardboard cutots of various Pokemon, specifically Mr. Mime, Arcanine, and Electrode. I really loved Electrode's face, and decided he would be one of my favorites. I remember roleplaying with pencil and paper with my childhood friend Brian. He'd actually draw replicas of Pokemon battle screens while I tried to win with Voltorb! I remember throwing a bit of a bitch fit when he tried to make me understand that using Selfdestruct makes me faint, but it seems my determination won over somehow, and we agreed to just make it do very heavy recoil.

In some of my dreams: I thought Pokemon was gonna be like a platformer, where two characters (The trainer and Pokemon) ran around and fought other Pokemon with platform mechanics, (pouncing, real-time dodging, etc). Boy! I really didn't know what an RPG was back then. I finally got Pokemon around August or September, I believe, in which my cousin encouraged me to name myself and my starter Butt and Buttox, and the rest is history! Woooo!
 
i got into pokemon when I was around 6 or 7. My mom got me a copy of Pokemon Crystal; I got really hooked, and I spent a lot of time on my game boy color. I eventually came along smogon when I was looking for stuff on the battle frontier, in 2006. I joined it but I hated how "elitist" the community seemed to be, and I refused to do anything/get involved, so my first taste of competitve stuff I suppose is just the battle frontier from emerald. I knew about netbattle as well, and I even tried it out, but again I didn't like it too much. The forums were a strange place that I didn't like till I got older, and I never really got into PvP, till around BW; but BW with its weather wars turned me off to the game, and then I left for boarding school and was deprived of pokemon for ~2 years. So in May 2014 when I got out of school, I logged on to smogon randomly, and learned about PS!; and then I decided to check it out, and slowly I started getting into/learning older gens as well. The 2 years I've had of playing the game competitvely have probably been some of the most fun I've had, and I've made a lot more friends here/on PS! than I thought was ever possible. The community in general is geared towards a much larger age demographic than I thought was possible. I thought Pokemon would be something that I just played and that'd be that, but the more people I got to know/make friends(on PS!/smogon/skype) the more enjoyment I've been having to the point that the thing that hooks me more than the game, is the potential for friendships/and a sense of community that can be created over a shared common interest. It's been a blast smogon, hoping to be here for much longer!
 
I'd have to say I got into Pokémon at the high of the Pokémon Phenomenon. I'm normally shy, and try to stick with people who have similar interests (toy cars, for example. I remember sending out Hot Wheels down the school slide after school while waiting to get picked up), and considering that I was badly in need of friends, and how popular Pokémon seemed to be at the time, I figured that it couldn't be all that bad. This wasn't the only fad that I got into. Anyone remember Crazy Bones (I think that was what it was called?).

After asking my mom, she finally surprised me with a deck of TCG cards...where I immediately traded a Jynx for a Potion. Naive move right there. I miss going to the Pokémon gym at Zany Brainies. As time went on, I got better, and I still have the cards and decks I accumulated over the years until around Gen 3. Unfortunately, that is where the TCG ended for me, as people I could play with dropped to zero.

It took longer to get into the video games. My mom and dad let me rent a Game Boy Color and Red Version. Problem is, I enjoyed it a little too much, like as in non-stop, and refused to actually buy it for me. And then the announcement for Gold and Silver came about, and I was determined to get one. Many chores and $100 later, I was armed with a Pichu Pikachu Edition Game Boy Color, a Silver Version, and a guide book that is now falling apart, but is still upstairs to this day.

My interest in Pokémon caused me befriend a boy named Chris, and another person who's name I don't remember to this day. Of course, due to access to a Game Shark, I was never able to beat him. I wonder if they still play Pokémon?

Moving from Georgia was a dark time. I found I didn't have anyone to play with, and what's worse, for the first time, I had bullies to deal with, who eventually stole my Game Boy Color and Crystal Version. Fortunately, a gardener found it behind a bush, before I was kicked out of that useless school for picking fights with my tormenters in retaliation for my missing Pokémon. Goodbye and good riddance! Fortunately, it wasn't all bad. I did make some friends, who even gave me a Game Boy Advance, which I planned to get anyways by exchanging my Game Boy Color for the upcoming Ruby and Sapphire.

But these events, and the lack of friends, as well as the lack of a post game like in Silver and Crystal left a sour taste in my mouth with Sapphire. Emerald was better, and fortunately, I found a friend in Patrick, who was hit with the Autism stick even harder than I was (though he is a decent battler, though I'd usually beat him). If not for him, Diamond version wouldn't have been as fun, and for the first time in a long time, like Chris, I had a friend who we could agree on which Version we'd get, so we'd have access to most Pokémon. He even gave me his Manaphy Egg, which I have to this day, and made Diamond (or was it Platinum?) at blast. Yes, I highly recommend Surfing on a Manaphy. The music just matches Manaphy's ridiculous cuteness perfectly.

Black and White came out, and I got White, while Patrick got Black. At this time, I was in college, and was honestly loosing interest in Pokémon. Getting White Version was a formality, the fulfilling of a tradition. I didn't like the lack of presence of the older Pokémon, even though there were some gems. And with late night art classes, I really didn't have the time. Black2 and White2's release date came and passed, and I hadn't even beat the Elite Four yet, and so decided not to spend the money on another game I didn't need. Looking back now, I missed a lot with that decision. Fortunately, I started to get back into Pokémon after trying my hand at online battling, and getting my ass handed to me. And fortunately, I got into the Dream World way before it closed down (I think they should have kept it for Gen 6 TBH, it was great!), in order to search for better Pokémon. I managed to get most of the UU and above worthy Hidden Abilities, though I wish I got a Moody Bidoof, looking back now.

However, my attempt at one of the first online tournaments and online battles with friends as I searched out for Friend Safaris for Gen 6 showed me I still had much to learn, even though I had some limited success. Eventually, a friend introduced me to Pokédit, and that is when I started using Smogon's Strategy Pokédex in order to create perfect Pokémon to give me a chance against all of the hacked shinies littering the battlefield, as well as to give me breeding stock, so I could make legitimate example for tournaments. That is a constant work in progress, due to just not having the time. I'm stockpiling perfect hatchlings, but I'm pretty slow about raising them.

I don't think I actually went from lurker to actually registering until before ORAS came out. Between that and Y Version, my interest in the series started to rekindle. Strangely enough, I've put any plans of trying to become the Greatest Pokémon Master on the back burner. I'm probably too old anyways, and won't amount to much in the end. I still need to devote time to becoming a concept artist, and it is shameful that I haven't submitted one thing the the Smeargle sub-forum. That, and I spend enough time playing as is, and it seems that entering these competitions is a full-time affair when you get to breeding for your perfect team, and soft-reseting for the perfect legendaries is almost impossible. Maybe one day. I haven't lost interest in battling per say, but struggle to find time for tournaments, let alone competitive battling. I'll really only use time for a tournament if there is a worthwhile prize in it for me, at this point. And now that I have a job, and am getting into politics as this political season heats up, I guess Showdown will have to give me my battle fix when I can find the time. For now, OI has been my home.
 
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I'll be honest and say that I have forgotten about either.

Well, in the first case, more specifically whether I got drawn into the Pokemon games due to the anime, or viceversa. That being said, I think it was the former. All I remember is that it was circa 2000, with our family getting our very first PC... and thanks to nothing else than piracy. My brother had brought some diskettes that had a GB/GBC emulator and several ROM images, with Pokemon Red, Blue and Yellow among them. Now that I got my first job last month, and once I get a brand new computer, I'm going to save money for a 3DS and get Pokemon Moon for a very belated 'thank you'. I did it with Football Manager, I did it with the classic Need for Speed games (Albeit thanks to some allowances from my father), and I will do so with Pokemon. I'd like to do the same with Puyo Puyo but that's a little way more unlikely because no export.

Smogon is a little harder to remember. I think I was playing Pokemon Diamond by 2007 and I was looking which were the most competent Pokemon... and somehow, I ended up here.
 
I watched some of the anime when I was like 4. I mostly joined Smogon because I wanted to learn how to do competitive battles, because I used to be horrible at Pokemon (and I'm still pretty bad at it)
 
Back quite a few years ago, I got a GBA and Pokemon FireRed for Christmas. It was the first time I had ever played a Pokemon game, and I loved it. I eventually also got Sapphire, Gold, Black 2, Red, and Platinum versions, and even borrowed my friend's Emerald version for a few weeks. I was hooked. And for Christmas 2013, I got a 2DS and Pokemon X pre-installed on it. Since I did not play online in Black 2 (And a few months after I got it, the wi-fi for 5th gen got shut down), Pokemon X was my first opportunity to battle and trade online with people across the world. I always used the Battle Spot, and wondered why so many people used Kangaskhan and Talonflame while I just sat there using my starters, Golurk, and Simipour that I used in-game.

About the same time, a friend was trying to explain to me, to no avail, the concept of EVs and IVs and said that Smogon and PS would be a good way to learn about battling competitively. I practiced on Showdown over the summer and got the hang of it. I eventually decided that I would breed my own team for competitive use.

Many hours of sweat and toil later, I had bred my first competitive Pokemon, which I still have (In Alpha Sapphire) to this day: El Diablo my treasured Barbaracle. I EV trained it and gave it Shell Smash, Razor Shell, Stone Edge, and Cross Chop. It had 5 perfect IVs (Only 9 in Defense, though... I wasn't really that picky) and it wrecked teams.
 

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My adventure into the Pokémon world began when I was in second grade. My brother got Pokémon Platinum, which really interested me, so I asked for it for my birthday. The game might not seem like much today, but it was one of the best games intended for second-graders like me. The sheer amount of content was enough to keep me playing until HGSS and BW came out, and even to this day (not to mention the fact that my brother was also interested in it, and we stole each other's flags in the Underground). I didn't have much of an opinion on BW because I didn't appreciate the old Pokémon enough to hate the similar new ones, but at the same time I wasn't really old enough to appreciate the plot. This was around the time I learned about the Internet. The first site I got into was actually Bulbapedia because it introduced me to Pokémon locations and concepts such as trade evolution; sites like Serebii and Psypokes followed suit (I used them for walkthrough information when I got stuck). I remember getting up early in the summer to copy the Sugimori art of Pokémon I liked with a pencil by first tracing the outline, then doing the inside details (How Not to Draw 101).
I first learned about Smogon in a very strange way: finding the Gen IV Battle Frontier thread through a Google search. Jumpman16 immediately became a legend to me because of his amazing winning streak. However, I wasn't aware of the reasoning in his team (I didn't know what TrickScarf was, and I remember the time I tried to RNG. Never again.) and further exploration told me that I was ineligible for a Smogon account because of my age. So I went back to Bulbapedia.
Fast forward a couple of years and I got Pokémon Y (my brother got X). I noticed that when I typed in "Pokémon" into the Google search bar, "Pokémon Showdown" was the recommended result, and one day I decided to click on it. I was amazed by all the crazy stuff (actually, not really. It took me a few minutes to find out how to select a meta.) and decided to dive right in. Having no idea how OU worked, I made a Hackmons team ("You can use anything, so you can't go wrong! ...Right?) and managed to lose my very first competitive Pokémon game. Pretty badly. I really liked Hackmons, though, and I ended up making a unique team for it (Wonder Guard Mega Absol FTW -- shoutouts to those who were there). After realizing that I could now join Smogon because I was 13, I did.
For some reason, the moderators decided to remove Hackmons while I got into Minecraft. I still don't know their reasoning behind this decision, but I got really mad. I got into OU, made an RMT, PM'd a moderator with the updated RMT, got replies critiquing my terrible Roserade set, and realized how bad a competitive battler I was in general.
Nugget Bridge was a site I found when looking for XY breeding info. I went back and realized that there was a whole new side to competitive Pokémon -- VGC. I'd heard the legends about the Pachirisu of 2014 and decided to get into it.
Within a few battles, I realized that VGC was a completely different beast than I thought it was. For those who don't know, this year's format lets you use up to two legendary Pokémon. Also Mega Kangaskhan is everywhere which is dumb. I was constantly having these new revelations: Protect is good! People use Tailwind! Ban Smeargle! It was pretty overwhelming, but I kept playing with my terrible team. I looked at Pokémon.com and saw that there was a regional at my area in a few months. I kept practicing, and my terrible team turned into a bad one, which turned into a mediocre one, which turned into a decent one, which became... a good one? It still had Zygarde and Ho-Oh as the two legendaries, though, while the people around me were using Primals and Xerneas. I entered the competition, and this is what happened: http://www.smogon.com/forums/threads/the-lake-valor-regionals-v3-primals-not-included.3575014/
Looking back, I think that the real reason I got into competitive Pokémon is because you don't have to be in the top percentage of people. As a kid I was pigeonholed into sports such as baseball, soccer, etc. which I wasn't very good at due to my skinny frame. Here, though, no one has an inherent advantage. Everyone starts out using their favorites and ends up using what they hope will win.
I came across the Orange Islands while I was browsing Smogon, which is usually pretty fun (hi Firebot). I've found it as a nice place to chill when I get haxed by Sacred Fire missing or I just can't find that female Combee. Keeping up with the Sun and Moon news has been pretty nice, too.
JES Don't give up on your memes dreams! Maybe one day? Maybe today! Show the world your Pokémon skills!
Anyway, thanks for reading. I know this might have been a bit boring, but I wanted to share my story.
 
I still remember that I had begun my interest in Pokémon in fourth grade, about December 2006. If I recall correrctly, a few kids in the classroom were working on a project that involved designing a product for the annual holiday botique, so I joined the one with the cute little animals on cards. I figured out that they were called "Pokémon," and immediately wanted to know more about the creatures. My parents, specifically my mom, were heavily against the franchise due to being a pious Lutheran, and I shuddered when I got home that day. I told that old hag that it revolved around Pokémon, and she bitched about how I could get obsessed with a Nintendo franchise, saying it like it was a bad thing. Keep in mind that her side of my family is generally racist regardless.

It took me a while to discover Smogon, and I had encountered this place in 2012, looking to improve my game (pun intended). I found some cool Fakemons from the Create-A-Pokémon Project, which discussed Fakemon for the generational OU metagame. I lurked during Aurumoth's project, and started lurking more during Malaconda and Cawmodore's durations. I joined a week before X and Y were released, and voted for Cawmodore's later flavor-based processes. I started lurking more during Volkraken and Plasmanta's collaborations, and I had become hooked when I witnessed the creation of Mr. Boat Naviathan. I also stayed for the art in Smeargle, already knowing of some of the users from DeviantArt. (That hell-hole has really gone down the shitter, as they can legally steal people's munny.)
 

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