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Little things you like about Pokémon
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I guess where I disagree on the story tone there is that USUM aren't light in and of themselves, but they feel a bit less dark from the previous games.
My basis for this primarily pertains to the story climax, as S/M is smaller in scope but also feels more grounded in its subject matter. It's not about stopping an Apocalyptic event, just dealing with the fallout of a broken and abusive family life, without a lot of innuendo or obfuscation for younger players. Rainbow Rocket gets some "theme park" vibes to me given the whole premise is "here's a throwback to all the big villain bosses", even if contextually they are taken seriously, on a meta level there's a concession to having them there at all.
The resolution also sort of gets me. S/M Lillie and Lusamine start a path to healing, but things aren't "fixed" as soon as you beat the antagonist, with Lusamine still very sick (physically and possible mentally), Gladion's side of the issue not necessarily resolved, and Lillie not being able to stay with her friends or found family in an effort to help her Mom in spite of everything. US/UM by comparison has a conflict that can be and sort of IS resolved as soon as you defeat Ultra Necrozma, since the scars don't run emotionally deep, and even Rainbow Rocket, despite escalating the conflict, is very impersonal and disconnected from the main story one.
That's the main thing I think makes S/M stick out to people: The consequences don't end with the Crisis the way they do in most games (Gen 1-4 the teams kind of disband after you stop their big gambit, Gen 5 leaves N as a hanging thread which similarly made the character stick with players), which makes the S/M plot feel less idealized or like a "means to an end" to contextualize the gameplay journey, which I will say even about several gens I like such as Gens 3-4 and a lot of SV's main campaign paths.
In Sun and Moon the story ends on an abused child attacking her Mother with a Pokemon she raised (who was also abused by her.)
Not a Pokemon battle, just straight up attacking her, only censored by her technically being a weird fusion. Then, she goes into a coma.
Sun and Moon is literally a game about child abuse while USUM takes it and turns it into any regular Pokemon plot like RSE/DPP
And Ultra Necrozma shit is literally basic "Protagonist saves the day" arc
What makes Sun and Moon unique is literally the fact that it is objectively the darkest Pokemon game in terms of story lol.
Rainbow Rocket has all the darkness of a fucking Pokemon Masters gacha game arc where the entire point is for the player to say "Oh my god, that's Character! Character is so cool!" It's basic fanservice, lol.
this is literally just a case of Pokemon fans having no media literacy/only responding to basic shonen stuff, and the fact that you said you didn't even remember most of the game elements I mentioned only adds to me thinking this
I will say that Lusamine in USUM does still have work ahead of her and she's aware of it, but you only really notice it if you go out of your way to talk to her about it. To an extent, I think it's a slightly more interesting end point for her character than the end of SM (the last we see of Lusamine is effectively a hope spot to continue off the "when did you get so beautiful" line - her "recovered", all smiles and trying to join the party before collapsing vs the last we see of Lusamine in USUM if you dig around for it is a tired woman who is aware she's failed her children, her Foundation, her husband and to an extent herself but wants to do better), it just came at the cost of one of the better moments and Lillie's story climax being shuffled off screen (but not the lead up????).
Honestly "theme park" isnt a terrible descriptor but they probably should have comitted to the bit instead of stapling it onto the existing story mostly unchanged.
Rika is already avaliable in the Trainer Lodge in Pokemon Masters despite being released so recently. They really do know their public.
(for context, she scored first for two consecutive years in a japanese pool about women's fictional crushes, which is even funnier since it's on January and SV coming just in November didn't stop her from beating a lot of dudes)
(for context, she scored first for two consecutive years in a japanese pool about women's fictional crushes, which is even funnier since it's on January and SV coming just in November didn't stop her from beating a lot of dudes)
I saw reposts of "roster" images from the 2023 Poll and I think Rika was the only Female character in the list (albeit I don't know most of the characters so grain of salt there)?
She also beat out a bunch of really notable men, yes. It's very funny
I think Arven was also on those lists, which makes it funnier
Yung Dramps
awesome gaming
I heard about the 2022 poll and had a hearty chuckle but I didn't know Rika was reigning champ twice in a row. "Recency bias" chuds btfo
Source btw, you're welcome: https://note.com/_ui12/n/nd9d2bf752c5e
Source btw, you're welcome: https://note.com/_ui12/n/nd9d2bf752c5e
I was hesitant about replying to this due to the borderline toxic remarks in your last paragraph here, but I felt that I had to just to get all of this out of my head.
If we look purely at the quality of the stories, then I agree that S/M is superior. When I played S/M, I really liked the story, and nowadays, I’d say it is my third favorite story from all the Pokémon games I have played. I didn’t like the US/UM story as much as the story in S/M, I think the changes and additions made the story darker and more complex, but they didn’t make it better. I agree that it is far more generic than the story in S/M. I still like the story in US/UM though, but I find it inferior to the story of S/M. That said, I prefer some of the character conclusions in US/UM (notably Lillie and Lusamine) and I am a huge fan of Necrozma’s character arc (or what to call it).
But I still think US/UM were darker and more complex. The main antagonist is a Pokémon who is basically threatening the whole world, which I think is much more serious than some family drama. That’s not to say darker is better (since it isn’t in this case), but that’s how I feel.
I also agree about Rainbow Rocket when it comes to quality. It was pretty average on the whole. However, I wasn’t overly fond of the post-game story in S/M either. It was basically just a way for them to allow the player to catch the UBs. Can’t say I prefer either story over the other, but I think Rainbow Rocket was considerably darker and more complex (for better and worse).
It is not nice to assume that an entire fandom thinks the same way just because you happen to disagree with the opinions of a single individual. The Pokémon fandom is not a hivemind. It is fine to disagree with someone, but please be polite and respectful about it. You did this just fine in your first reply to me, I don’t understand why you had to change it in the last paragraph of your second reply.
As for why I don’t remember much of the things from the Alola games, the main reason is that it has been a while since I last played the story part of them (2017 for S/M, 2018 for US/UM). And I have no interest in replaying their main games. Another reason is that the games aren’t among my top favorites in the series, and the impression they left on me was not completely positive. I liked the story in S/M, but they have some pretty big gameplay issues which drag them down (not going to talk about them here since this is the wrong thread for that). On the whole, I consider S/M to be average Pokémon games. As for US/UM, I like them better. The story is worse than in S/M, and the Rotom Dex is much more annoying, but in terms of everything else, they are equal to or better than S/M. Still not the very best games in the series if you ask me, but far better than S/M.
A personal opinion that the larger stakes make it more serious and thus darker.
Related to this, we see that their view of Rainbow Rocket follows in the same suit. RR is a larger stakes story: multi-verse domination, hostile take overs.
We can then build on that information to how it went to being complex by being bigger stakes:
-More players are involved in both. The URS and the context of Megalopolois for the main story, the other team leaders in Rainbow Rocket.
-Additional worlds, in general.
-If we dig in deeper, the fact the leaders are from Bad End worlds, specifically.
Additional characters and concepts by definition add more complexity to the situation.
By their own admission (multiple times, throughout the post) this does not make those plots better. But, to them, it makes them darker and more complex.
You do not have to agree with it, but there's no need to smugly say they didn't explain anything and that your original post aged better.
[edited by a mod to remove references to deleted messages]
Anywho, Pokemon. Setting aside the matter of darkness, I've always appreciated SM Lusamine as a character. Without getting too personal, I'm being completely serious when I say that Lusamine helped early-teenage me realize that my own mother was narcissistic and verbally abusive (though thankfully not to the extent of putting me in Ultra Beast outfits), and that I didn't deserve to be treated that way - I've always found that moment in Ultra Space where Lillie finally stands up to her right before the Mother Beast fight deeply cathartic for that reason.
Likewise, I've always appreciated that Lillie's story in SM ends with her helping Lusamine to purify Nihilego's toxins and getting on the right track to rebuild their relationship. Lillie would be well within her rights to tell Lusamine to fuck off and never speak to her again, but I appreciate that SM respects the complexity of these relationships, and how people can heal and move on - and ultimately, it's on Lillie's terms.
I also like Lusamine's team a lot, particularly Bewear. A Pokemon that cannot control itself and hurts people by showing affection is the perfect encapsulation of her, really. On the whole, her team is a good mix of power and theme, with a lot of conventionally beautiful and graceful 'mons that suit her vibe really nicely.
Anywho, Pokemon. Setting aside the matter of darkness, I've always appreciated SM Lusamine as a character. Without getting too personal, I'm being completely serious when I say that Lusamine helped early-teenage me realize that my own mother was narcissistic and verbally abusive (though thankfully not to the extent of putting me in Ultra Beast outfits), and that I didn't deserve to be treated that way - I've always found that moment in Ultra Space where Lillie finally stands up to her right before the Mother Beast fight deeply cathartic for that reason.
Likewise, I've always appreciated that Lillie's story in SM ends with her helping Lusamine to purify Nihilego's toxins and getting on the right track to rebuild their relationship. Lillie would be well within her rights to tell Lusamine to fuck off and never speak to her again, but I appreciate that SM respects the complexity of these relationships, and how people can heal and move on - and ultimately, it's on Lillie's terms.
I also like Lusamine's team a lot, particularly Bewear. A Pokemon that cannot control itself and hurts people by showing affection is the perfect encapsulation of her, really. On the whole, her team is a good mix of power and theme, with a lot of conventionally beautiful and graceful 'mons that suit her vibe really nicely.
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QuentinQuonce
formerly green_typhlosion
Bulbapedia has the name "Jim Gai" as a redirect for the guide's page because apparently it was common in some fan circles to refer to the guide from Kanto, Johto, Hoenn, and Sinnoh by this name (never witnessed this myself, but I wonder if it helped inspire the name he was given in Alola)
https://bulbapedia.bulbagarden.net/w/index.php?title=Jim_Gai&redirect=no
Oh that's what I was thinking of!
Double checking tcrf shows that the sprite file associated with it was even called Danpei
I like Legends ZA being Kalos a lot because it's making me reconsider Kalos.
I loved it as a kid when it was new, and it was impactful to me. But then I started to think it was mid.
Replaying XY and rethinking the concepts of the region has me appreciating it more. If they just did Unova or some shit it'd just add more to a region being praised rather than add to regions that need help tbh.
I loved it as a kid when it was new, and it was impactful to me. But then I started to think it was mid.
Replaying XY and rethinking the concepts of the region has me appreciating it more. If they just did Unova or some shit it'd just add more to a region being praised rather than add to regions that need help tbh.
One thing I really love about the Alola games is the snarky dialogue trees the games gave the player character. Base Sun and Moon had a noticeably darker (though still family-friendly!) story with slightly more complex characters than usual, and I think the snarky dialogue went a long way in taking the edge off (shout out to Guzma wanting to smack a child, that's pretty crazy!). As good as BW1's story is, you're still essentially a personality-less mute who can just select Yes or No.
Yes, Alola protagonists are still mutes and have no real role in the story, and that's true, it's moreso Lillie's story. But even with that problem, I think they did a pretty good job with the funny quips.
Yes they’ve done a great deal better with that in the past few gens.