Pokemon: Ultra Sun & Ultra Moon: New Ultra Beasts

I haven't kept up with Ultra Sun and Ultra Moon news a lot. I don't get super-excited about remake games, although I'll doubtless play them. But the new games seem to have some more content beyond just a couple of new forms and new areas (like a Valley of Pikachu or some shit?) in Alola. Oh, and new Z-moves or something, I dunno. I think Lycanroc and Kommo-o gets new Z-moves? Eh.

We get confirmation from trailers that the ugly-looking fused Solgaleo/Lunala stuff are actually Necrozma, having stolen Solgaleo and Lunala's powers all Kyurem-style. And they still look ugly as hell, even in-game cutscenes. I'm also having some trouble thinking about them as Necrozma forms, since they're so clearly still shaped like Solgaleo and Lunala, with Necrozma's parts glued on to them. While I don't think they're as messy as Black/White Kyurem, Necrozma's Dawn/Dusk forms really look kinda crappy, and easily rank among my least-visually-attractive Pokemon list. Like, the story at least sounds somewhat interesting, as far as the little hints we see, but I'm still not a huge fan of Necrozma's forms.


But thankfully, Necrozma's weird new forms and the minimal-effort orange Lycanroc aren't the only new things we're getting in these new games. New Ultra Beasts! We get UB-Burst and UB-Assembly, obviously not the real names of these Pokemon. And they're insanely bizarre, as Ultra Beasts are wont to.

Burst is like this very wacky disco ball placed on top of a bunch of... I don't even know what they are. A stick? A clown neck-thing? That throws the disco ball and it explodes in fireworks? Some kind of decorations lumped together? It looks like Xurkitree's party freak cousin. Genuinely not sure what the hell this thing is, or what type it's going to be. Fire, fairy, psychic, fighting... you can probably make a case for any of them.

Assembly's a lot cooler IMO, this huge walking pile of bricks with legs, and the bricks keep flipping open and close to reveal robot eyes beneath. It's not the best-looking Pokemon out there, and ungodly bizarre as Ultra Beasts are wont to, but at least I kind of get to see what they're trying to do with him. Obviously Assembly's a defensive creature, maybe Rock or Steel type, but Burst's just weirds me out.

It's a pretty cool bit, actually. We never quite get new Pokemon in the middle of a generation -- new forms and new mega-evolutions are the only things we've gotten before, but actual spanking brand-new Pokemon is a first, and considering how relatively little we've gotten in the last two generations, it's a cool little addition.