More Alpha Sapphire, in which I need to choose which Pokemon to use and whatnot.
Picking up from after I beat Norman, I decided to head up to check out the desert... which is kind of redundant now that May teleports you from Lavaridge straight to Petalburg. It used to be a shortcut and a new area for you to trek through with the brand-new Go-Goggles (which now actually materialize as cool red goggles! Neat) and curse as you experience the terrifying annoyingness of Trapinch's Arena Trap.
But the desert's got a cool battle background, the same four or five trainers are still hanging around, the sandstorm's still there and the same desert-dwelling pokemon are still mucking around and the Trapinch are still being doucheholes with their Arena Trap.
Also, apparently the sneaking-up thing is different in the sand (and as I discovered later, in the water). Instead of just sneaking up to a certain box that the pokemon is peeking out on, in the sand and in the water the pokemon just kinds of teleports here and there periodically, and it makes it a massive pain in the ass to get them... especially since the things you're going to encounter are relatively garbage like Baltoy and Wingull anyway.
I did get the Root Fossil, because I find Lileep and Cradily a lot funnier-looking than Anorith and Armaldo (though I like them too, those obscure precambrian creatures). Haven't revived Lileep yet, though, since I don't feel like backtracking all the way to Rustboro.
Afterwards I surfed eastwards of Mauville and got the Good Rod, captured a bunch of things and met Steven. And this is an encounter in the original game where Steven just hops down from a ledge and has some dialogue... and it's sort of expanded with some mega-evolution hints. But this time, as he turns out to leave, Latios swoops in! It's a whole brand-new segment, and Latios brings Steven and me to Southern Island, which is kind of awesome.
The Southern Island, to those who don't know, is kind of an event-exclusive area back in generation 3 that can only be accessed with an event item, alongside stuff like Birth Island (where you can catch Deoxys), Navel Rock (Lugia/Ho-Oh), Faraway Island (Mew) and whatnot, where you can get the Soul Dew item for Latios/Latias. It's pretty awesome how they've worked this into the main plot, making Southern Island and the Lati twins actually relevant instead of 'that jet-dragon thing that randomly wanders around Hoenn after Elite Four'. I'm a big fan of the Lati twins.
And as a rather big surprise and a change, I get Latias directly without even having to battle her! All I have to do is to beat up a pair of Team Aqua members in a nice little double battle with Steven, and I get a free Latias!
That said, this is the first appearance of Aqua Admin Matt in Alpha Sapphire proper, though I've already met him in the ORAS demo. And he's still as boisterous and dropping possibly-gay hints here and there, repeating his 'I love big strong dudes like my bro Archie' line, and going 'I'm going to love you' or something along that line to my character. He also calls the female grunt 'dull' or something along those lines. Matt's crazy funny. Also I do like how the two Admins have been more prominent and are given more personality and things to do, making them certainly a step up from previous evil organization admins.
Also, Matt has a Team Aqua-shaped tan-line. That's a freaking tan-line, not a tattoo or anything, which I find hilarious.
Again, the plot has been expanded to have Team Aqua searching for Mega Stones and whatnot and it making perfect sense thanks to Kyogre now having a Primal Reversion thing. Though, y'know, having a Latias in their ranks probably won't be so bad. It also nicely segues in to Steven giving me the Mega Bracelet, allowing me to evolve Latias into Mega Latias, as well as the Glalie sitting in my box and Metagross when Metang evolves. And Swampert, whenever I get that stone.
Latias comes with Mist Ball and she's level 30, but she isn't really up to par despite being a legendary and a mega. Probably needs a fair amount of training.
Also, Southern Island is pretty with those waterfalls and stuff, and while the layout's pretty spartan, there's this random cryptic message going 'those whose memories fade seek to carve them in their hearts'. What is that all about? Who said that? Why was it fragmented the first time I hear it? Guess I'll never know, since Southern Island seems to be off-limits now.
I head off to the right to the stretch of route that is sort of blocked off by a jump ledge, and I get TM Dazzling Gleam from a random fairy tale girl. Latias can't learn it, though, which is kind of bullshit.
The Berry Master's house and grove has been extremely expanded! There's a shit-ton of berries I've never even heard of, those new contest-only berries they introduced in generation 4 and 5. Whatever the case, though, I ravaged every single tree there and got all the berries.
I head up on north, and the route is still as long and filled with tall grass as before, with random bug catchers surprising you... and it's quite pretty with the nice waterfall and the camera angles as you pass the bridges and whatnot. Also you can bike in tall grass, which is awesome. The rain's beautiful, and I do like how it actually pitter-patters on my hat. It's the small things! It's a nice little grinding session for the lower-leveled members of my team like Volly the Shedinja and my new Latias.
The Ninja Boys now hide behind hilariously stupid tree platform things and don't engage you unless you talk to them. Back in Generation 3 they actually look like the pixelated trees, but I guess they can't keep up with all the 3D.
And, of course, the Weather Institute! The Weather Institute didn't wow me to the extent of all the other facilities, but it's gotten the Hoenn makeover as well, and those Hoenn power ranger things are hanging out too.
Shelly is menacing the professors, and outright bitchslapped one with a loud 'slap' sound effect, which I thought was hilarious! And, as with Matt, Shelly gets a bit of a personality upgrade, going on an on about how she's a bit empty and wants to fight the full-of-hope me, and how she haven't really figured out what is wrong and what is right. I think she's confused over the full scale of Archie's plans or something along those lines? We get a couple of nice close-ups as well, and she's talking about how Archie wants to bring everything back to the beginning, hence Alpha Sapphire. After the whole 'XY' thing didn't really amount to nothing, it's nice to see how they're at least putting thought to the Alpha and the Omega. Shelly's also a deeper character than being an alpha bitch (hee hee), which is certainly welcome.
Also the Weather Institute also moves the plot along somewhat, talking about the extreme weather patterns of times past, and how Kyogre's Primal Reversion caused a fuckton of rainstorms and whatnot. Also nice that while they didn't call Groudon out by name, they acknowledge his existence, which I thought was a weird thing how in the original Ruby and Sapphire they act as if the other member of the pair didn't exist.
Also May battle! I remembered having a lot of trouble with her here, but my Swampert just murdered everything in his path like a total champ. She gives me HM02 Fly.
Finally, after all that, I did some fishing around with my brand new Good Rod, fully aiming to obtain a Carvanha... and then a wild Feebas appeared. I have never, ever managed to reel in a Feebas. Not in generation 3, not in generation 4. I've had Milotics before, yes, but those are all obtained by trades or breeding other people's Feebases. So now, ten years after Ruby and Sapphire, I have finally captured a Feebas of my own purely out of luck. And it's a Modest nature, too, which is like the best thing I could've hoped for.
My Feebas is named Mimi after Ruby's Feebas in the Pokemon Adventures manga, who, like my Feebas, randomly shows up when he decides to fish.
Man, I'm stoked. Mimi the Feebas is definitely going to enter the team, and he's definitely going to get turned into a Milotic. I'm going to have to think of who to replace, though, since in addition to Feebas I'm also thinking of using a Lileep... eh, we'll see. Swampert is the starter, and I've been meaning to use Gallade and Shedinja for years, so it's either going to be Crobat (who I've used several times before but I really like), Metang or Latias (who's not really pulling her weight). Definitely not going to use Glalie, though, cause I don't really like Glalie all that much.
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