Let's Play Legends Arceus, Part 14: The Iceberg That Walks

So after all literally travelling all throughout the entire Alabaster Icelands, I go and finally decide to do the actual main quest... which I probably really should do to get access to the ridable Braviary much earlier, huh? I guess I'm just a sucker for a good area to explore. Anyway, I go off to Avalugg's Legacy, which is a bunch of gigantic icy structures that not even Sneasler can climb. (Can the Ice-type Weavile do it though?) Adaman and Irida continue to throw potshots at each other ("tell the long story long"), but then we get to see another uncooperative warden, Irida's teacher Gaeric. And unlike the whiny bitch that is Melli or the cranky grandma that is Calaba, I actually really like Gaeric!

Gaeric is this guy who walks around the tundra completely and utterly shirtless, showing off the tattoo of his clan on his chest, and he's actually relatively polite considering that he's seeing the three of us as basically committing blasphemy of the highest order. After getting our answer, he repeats the same argument that Laventon makes earlier in this arc, except a lot more aggressively -- Avalugg really isn't hurting anyone, and who's to say that all this berserking is harmful at all? 

It is an argument that I would entertain... if I didn't discover that the Pearl Clan Settlement is in the Alabaster Icelands, meaning that a massive amount of human civilians hang out relatively close to wherever Lord Avalugg might cause a damn rockslide or avalanche or whatever. 

We do have a requisite battle with Gaeric (who does squats, of course), and he sends out the snow yokai siblings of Glalie and Froslass. It does make sense for him to battle me, I guess, although I'm still of two minds on whether I think Legends could have benefited from more or less trainer battles. If nothing else, it does fit the lore, I suppose. Anyway, I was already training my shiny Rapidash, but this is more things for him to kill. And... and I don't know. I don't like that Gaelic immediately goes 'yep, this one's all right' after I beat up his snow buddies. 

...also, Gaeric has that blue symbol of the Pearl Clan on his chest, yeah? At first I thought it's just a tattoo, because it's blue. But since it's the same shade of blue as his hair, is that... chest hair? Shaved to look like the symbol? If so, what the hell, Gaeric?

Also, I do like the running gag that the minimally-dressed Irida and Gaeric aren't actually cold at all, and it's Adaman that's feeling the cold. Irida keeps fanning herself because she's feeling hot (and I suspect because the GameFreak developers wanted to get their money's worth out of developing that one motion) and Gaeric walks around with his shirt off. These Pearl Clan people are just built different, I suppose, though their village is in these icy mountains, so. 

Everyone agrees that I need the help of the Noble Braviary to raech the top of Avalugg's Legacy, and to do it, I need to talk with the Diamond Clan's warden Sabi, who's a happy little child (or just a short person) who always strikes this weird pose where she raises both her arms and one leg. She's kind of cuckoo, her catchphrase seems to be "is it this thing... or is it actually that thing?" and basically insists that we play a game with her to prove ourselves. 

Also, I'm not sure who these guys are equivalent to. I think Gaeric is Crasher Wake's ancestor, but that might just be me conflating their shirtlessness. Sabi could be Hapu's? From their hairstyles and everything? Or I suppose since I'm mostly looking through Sinnoh characters, her hair colour does match Cheryl, the Chansey girl from Eterna Woods, but otherwise I'm not too sure about my guesses. Sabi also claims (maybe fraudulently) to be clairvoyant, but none of the Psychic/Fairy/Dark/Ghost trainers in the present day match her at all. 

This is just basically a bit of a 'follow the objective marker' to get us to run all the way to Snowpoint Temple, althogh since I've already done that it's a bit pointless. The next trial, though, is a lot more fun because we actually enter the Snowpoint Temple. Regigigas and those stupid ice floor puzzles aren't there, but instead we get an actually pretty cool mechanic where we've got statues of the three original Regis looking and staring at each other, and we have to remember the order and the direction to unlock each floor's giant door. It's not exactly a full Zelda dungeon, but it sure is surprisingly neat!

At the top of Snowpoint Temple, Sabi challenges me to a fight, and... the levels are not particularly scaled up, but she sics Electivire, Magmortar and Rhyperior at me. Three fully-evolved Sinnoh-enhanced Pokemon! I've had not-so-pleasant memories of being bullied by the former two in Platinum, so even though my Decidueye outlevels all of them, it's still a tense battle. Much more tense than Pelli siccing Golbats and Skuntanks at me for sure. 

And then at the top of the temple, Braviary himself challenges me to a fight, which... again, not too hard to defeat a single Braviary, it's just that my Pokemon party have kind of dwindled a bit fighting all the Gallades and Bronzongs to reach the top of Snowpoint Temple. It's not hard and more annoying, but the fact that there's an actual challenge and some tension makes it feel actually rewarding when Braviary finally joins my pager party. Oh, and gives me yet another plate. I'm pretty sure the amount of nobles and wardens don't match up to every single type, so I guess the rest might just be dumped at me?

Adaman does another 'is this a trial?' question, Sabi teases him for being wise for once, and then I'm home free to explore! Well, flying sure is fun! Braviary holds me like a hang-glider, and the controls are thankfully rudimentary enough to not be distracting. This is a Pokemon game, I don't need anything overly complex. As long as I have a 'speed up' and a 'nosedive' button, I'm a happy camper. 

After spending some time flying around the land, I go off and pick up the Eternal Ice from where the main quest asks me. Of course, good ol' Gaeric is there, doing squats, before jumping straight off the side of the icy outcropping because that's what manly shirtless men do, damn it! 

And then it's time to finally challenge Avalugg, Lord of the Tundra. I head off to the arena and there's an interesting moment where it isn't any of the four characters I've been interacting throughout the tundra that talks to Gaeric, but Volo! I honestly forgot he existed, considering my month-long hiatus from the game. He's here to deliver some Swordcaps for Gaeric. I guess that's what he uses to make the balms? Or are those like, the equivalent of protein milkshakes in this world? Volo talks a lot about the mightiness of Hisuian Avalugg, which apparently used to be 'hundreds of feet' tall and is able to manipulate ice and shit... I didn't really think too much of it, beyond the fact that I thought that it's a cute reference to Gigantamax/Dynamax?

But then Avalugg, Lord of the Tundra shows up, and what the fuck he's a big boy! A very very big boy! Shame that he's piss-yellow thanks to the berserking aura. Just for the sake of making him not look like that, I am now obliged to cure him, no?

Except it's hard. It's so much harder than Electrode and Aracnine before him, especially in the second half when he mixes up his attack patterns. The moving snowballs and the (very fucking impressive looking) ice beam aren't that hard to dodge, but the icicles that explode from the ground is hard to do when you're trying to balm Avalugg in the face. Or, well, the giant shovel-mandible-horns or whatever the fuck you call those. And then there are those surface-to-surface ice missiles that really does end up reminding me of Avalugg's comparison to some sort of aircraft carrier. 

It's hectic, it took me around five tries, I think, to fully get Avalugg down? At least it's a lot easier to trigger the battle, and it looked so badass to see little Decidueye and Rapidash facing off a gigantic Avalugg. 

See, back when I reviewed the Hisuian forms, I thought that Avalugg was just the creature looking cool with the addition of more colour and that ice-breaker horn attachment. But the size! No one ever told me that Avalugg is GINORMOUS, going from the size of a small rhinoceros to the size of a small Godzilla. 

And... and holy shit. I don't know. I don't know what to say. The boss fight is sure just a more chaotic version of the typical berserk noble lord Pokemon boss fight, but see, this whole thing? It made Hisuian Avalugg much more memorable, and also simultaneously ends up making the 'giant Pokemon boss enemy' much more impressive than anything Sword and Shield did, I'm sorry. Damn, though. That was an explosive badass fight! Avalugg lumbers off into the distance, all content to do whatever giant sentient icebergs do.

Anyway, at the end of the fight we get Irida and Adaman making up and recognizing my prowess and my progress, and discuss about what's happening to the space-time rift... It's kind of neat to see Gaeric still a bit morose over seeing his mighty lord Avalugg get quelled (shut up, Gaeric, Avalugg like murdered me eight times) and Adaman actually admits something about liking the Pearl Clan. Yeah, go hate-fuck already, you two. Anyway, with all ten noble and ride Pokemon all done, I guess whatever's going to come next is going to be the final arc of the main story of Legends Arceus!