This part of my Let's Play of Pokemon Uranium features copious grinding, a lot of random backtracking, a lot of team shuffling, and replacing a couple of party members with a bunch of... provisional new members, shall we say. I'm starting to sort of do a bit of research -- not too much, and I'm still picking things I like more than actual meta-defining things (otherwise we'd be replacing Charlie with a perfect nature perfect IV Inflagetah), but I dunno, I sort of want to try new things, y'know? This one isn't a super story-heavy episode, just a lot of training and grinding and doing a couple of side-quests and filling up the pokedex. I actually did play through the next bit of story in Silverport Town, but we'll save that for the next bit since there's... a lot of screenshot in that one.
From what Professor Bamboo told us, there are two options we could've take from Venesi town... Snowbank-via-Silverport to the North, or Tsukinami to the South. This seems to imply that we're given an option to pick which gym we want to be the seventh and which you want to be the eighth -- a bit of a callback to the first and second generation games where you're actually not railroaded to do the gyms in a certain order except for the first and last ones.
Except, well... if you use Surf to go to Venesi's south-east, you're quickly blocked by the fact that the way to progress requires the HM Dive. So there's really only one way to go, which is North.
Also, we've got a bunch of swimmers. And that's Fortog's final evolution, Blubelrog, who has one of the most awkward names in this game, and just looks like the frog version of that skeevy, possibly slightly perverted friend that everyone has in their life.
Also, LV-426 manages to take out a Brainoar that's higher level than him with a critical Dark Pulse.
Okay, back to Maskara Island, and Theo... Theo has shit peripheral vision. I genuinely thought that he was going to plot-block me when I try to get past him from behind.
Anyway, I still find it hilarious that Bamb'o thinks it's necessary to set up a fight between the two of us.
Yep, I'm still better than Theo and one step ahead of him.
Theo, to his credit... has matured a lot. No more screaming and whining about how he's supposed to be the best and shit. Good show! I guess after that freak-out with Ripley in Legend Town, he's matured a little. You know what? I like this. It's not the perfect character development at all, and the writing's a bit spotty to jump from "throwing a hissy fit" to "suddenly mature", but I do like that he's developed offscreen. Shame that the poor kid has to have (seemingly) lost his dad to get said development, though.
Theo also learns consent.
Eyeless psychic brain fish versus colourful long-haired bird of paradise!
Otherwise known as "Air Slash vs. Surf" round... round whatever. I feel like I've been in this deja vu before, with Cerebella fighting against faster air slashes and flinches while trying to wear down a flying time. Was it Tiko's Pajay?
Eyeless psychic brain fish versus plague doctor with a witch hat!
Spritzee gains an alternate evolution in this game instead of the relatively poorly-received flamenco dancer Aromatisse. Miasmedic is a Poison/Fairy, and is basically a pretty neat plague doctor inspired evolution of Spritzee that still looks pretty cute. Probably the only added evolution to a canon Pokemon that I'm actually liking a lot.
Miasmedic is still part-Poison so falls to repeated super-effective Psybeams. He did give Cerebella a run for her money, though, with repeated Moonblasts. Thankfully, Cerebella is tanky as shit with amazing physical defense.
Beach-carrying coconut tree crab versus-
Sableau goes down so fast that I didn't take a screenshot in time. Anyway, we've seen Coconut and E. coli beat up that poor Sableau enough times.
Queen of the insect fairies versus bone-wearing werewolf superhero!
Dazzling Gleam is STAB Fairy, which is super effective, but Taxonomaly doesn't have the best special attack. Also, I forgot that Herolune is part-Ground. Thankfully all he knows is Bone Rush.
The damn superhero furry somehow survives with two pixels of health. Also I didn't realize just how much elemental hero furrybait here outlevels most of my party other than Charlie and E. coli.
Damn it, furry superhero!
Burning pyromaniac giant raptor versus asymmetrical flower-pattern cyborg lynx.
Seriously, that flower pattern on Metalynx's main body looks like something someone's grandma's pillow would have. Honestly, I really don't want to make fun of Metalynx, but he's just such a wacky design both visually and functionally.
Six times you battle me, Theo, and six times Charlie unleashes a OHKO. Maybe someday I'll see a single move that the Metalynx has.
Indeed I am. You're improving, though! Hell, your party's outleveled most of mine, and if not for type advantage, I might've actually had trouble against Theo.
Theo then talks about how he's going to stay here and train... meaning... rematches?
Holy shit. I've been underplaying it, but Uranium has really sudden level jumps and I tend to try and at least keep a couple of my Pokemon in front of the curve (hence Charlie and E. coli being higher-leveled than the other four in my party) but that's mostly because it's so dang hard to grind for levels in Uranium, y'know? Wild evolved Pokemon are so rare, and like, taking down a level 40 Eevee or Jackdeary really nets a miniscule amount of experience points.
Regardless, I began spamming Theo for battles. It's like... a couple dozen times, as I just level up my team slowly against Theo's evolved Pokemons.
Oh, huh. Charlie learns an Uranium-original move, Flame Impact, which is a priority fire-type physical move. It's pretty awesome, and the only thing that makes me think twice about replacing Blast Burn with Flame Impact is that Charlie is decidedly a special-inclined attacker. Archilles actually have a pretty decent Physical/Special attack balance, but Charlie's got a physical attack reducing nature.
Fuck yeah, a powerful physical Bug-type move! Taxonomaly's been struggling (if succeeding) to kill shit with Silver Wind. X-Scissor is far more accurate, and plays off of Taxo's superior physical attack. Now if she can only learn Play Rough...
Poor Metalynx dies even to LV-426's Overheat. The damage that LV-426 sustained there was thanks to the Miasmedic and not Metalynx.
Oh yeah, I've been rotating out the sixth member of my party. Say hello to Meganeura the Unymph, who quickly evolves into the Bug/Flying Harptera.
Harptera has a shitty moveset, so we swap out three out of four moves for the STAB Aerial Ace, and the decent coverage of Steel Wing and Rock Slide. Harptera is faster and hits harder than Taxonomaly, with the far superior ability of Moxie (as opposed to Nimflora's Swarm).
For the time being, I'm putting Meganeura here on a trial basis. I did grind Taxonomaly up to the 40's, but I am trying to see if my team is better served with the theoretically faster-and-stronger Meganeura. Losing the Fairy coverage is a blow, but... I do want to experiment with other Pokemon in my collection.
Coconut's enjoying some beachside holiday with Wigglefoot the Ludicolo while I decide which bug for me to bring into battle. Maybe both.
He's always been the most... disposable member of my team, to be a bit mean? Very reliable, but at the same time, grass coverage's sort of taken up by E. coli, while ground coverage's taken up by Charlie. And both E. coli and Charlie have access to far stronger moves than Coconut's current movepool. Still, Coconut is pretty damn powerful and valuable, and he's not being retired because I'm disappointed in him, I just wanted to have a rotating party, y'know?
HUZZAH EVOLUTION!
S51-A is a lot less adorable than S51, regrettably. I'm going to miss those adorable pink sock-hands and the genuinely innocent and huggable little green face, but we need the firepower of S51-A's flying saucer to lay waste to our enemies.
Like Cerebella, though, LV-426 doesn't have access to Psychic, and can't really make the best use of his pretty powerful special attack stat until then.
Also, I went to the move relearner, and... Magnet Bomb is still a physical move, but it at least deals more reliable damage than Gyro Ball.
The Ratsy in Venesi apparently respawn. Not that I want any more of these things.
After grinding against Theo for a while, I decide to take a break and return to West Tandor! First up... Kevlar Town! I talk to the crying boy who I wasn't able to interact with before.
Maury's precious item is left in "Passage Cave", a cave where a bunch of local street thugs hang out in. Time to rescue the citizen in peril!
You also need Strength to get into this cave, and... and I never actually returned to Kevlar Town before this, so yeah.
This is a completely separate part of Passage Cave than the Tonemy-infested one we went into early in our adventures.
The DUNSPARCE GANG? Hahahahahahaahahahaha
I'm sorry. The name caught me by such surprise, and Dunsparce is like, the absolute last Pokemon anyone should name a street gang after! It's so ridiculous, I love it.
There are three gang members, and... and they don't all have Dunsparce! In fact, they each only have a single Dunsparce, with the rest of their party being made up of other random Pokemon like Tanscure and Tofurang. Mostly I try out Meganeura, who speed-blitzes a good chunk of their team... but these are, again, admittedly low-threat dudes.
Very intimidating, gang member man.
Yeah, making grown men cry. Sure you do, Dunsparce Gang. I wouldn't call Maury a grown man.
For a moment I read that first like as "fuck the police". And... and apparently the Dunsparce Gang is, um... the only evil thing they do is fighting the police? I'm sorry, man, I think you sort of get the whole concept of a "gang" pretty wrong. Good on you for protecting the environment, cleaning up litter and helping old ladies, though.
In addition to a Dunsparce, he's got a Guren Lagann drill mole thing. I... I still don't get the joke here, and Drilgann just looks awkward to me.
DUNSERAPH and okay I really should've thrown out Taxonomaly the Fairy-slayer here, but I sort of wanted to see what LV-426 could do. Dunseraph is Dragon/Flying, I believe, and it learns a Uranium-exclusive move Sky Fall, which is a surprisingly powerful move (presumably flying?) and paralyzes.
Being an angelic serpent dragon thing doesn't save Dunseraph's mind from being turned into jelly by LV-426's telekinetic beams. You should be grateful LV-426 only fucks up your brain, and he's not like those nasty Bee-hee-yems from Messier-82. They probe other things.
Pussy!
Wow, Ura, judgmental much? Just because he doesn't have a whole ton of money (and $2000 is not inconsiderable!) doesn't mean you can mock him for freaking out for losing his wallet! I lost my wallet once. My ID, license and a credit card was in there, in addition to money, and it was extremely distressful.
...I can relate to this. Sweet sweet money indeed.
Instead of rewarding us, though, Maury just tells Ura to fuck off for daring to ask a reward, and begins to plot about how to make use of other people's kindness for his benefit.
It's... it's honestly sort of a bit of a silly subversion of a normal RPG side-quest, and... I dunno, I genuinely fail to get the joke here. It's just... what?
A montage of evolutions! I needed to fill Pokedex pages, and just decided to evolve a bunch of my shit. First up Mad Sweeney the Jackdeary turns into Winotinger, and I do so by feeding it carrot wine. Winotinger's actually a neat Pokemon to have, judging by the base stats. and Fairy/Fighting's a pretty neat move. I just don't really like it, that's all.
Good old Chippette is allowed to reach her final form. I don't own a regular Kinetmunk, despite having a nuclear one.
Jellyeater the Glaslug apparently evolves via water stone into the water/ice Glavinug, so me leaving him in the day care was sort of pointless. Glavinug is pretty cool looking, Water/Ice is a neat counter to dragons. But I already have Cerebella and I'm not replacing her, but I do like my little Glaucus Fakemon here.
Dreadfort has evolved into Sableau. We've seen a lot of these, courtesy of Theo. Well, I have, since I've re-challenged him many a number of times, but I don't screenshot much of the rematches.
Also, I've been breeding Eevees, mindlessly auto-piloting running around in the route in front of the day care center while watching Kamen Rider.
Also, Eevees make for very quick pokedex-fillers, especially since the three post-generation-II ones are given simple item evolutions. Have Jolteon, Leafeon...
Glaceon and Sylveon. If this wasn't a fakemon game, I would be significantly more excited.
Anyway, I wasn't looking too hard for a perfect nature, it's just that literally every Eevee I caught had a negative special attack nature, and two of the Eevees I bred (the Glaceon and Sylveon here) also had negative special attack nature.
...yeah these aren't as interesting of Bamb'o rewards as I thought it would be. I mean, these are apparently supposed to tie into the earlier Minicorn gift, but I really don't care to use her.
Besides, I have a party member that I genuinely plan to use. I let Caesium the nuclear Corsola out of the anti-radiation room for a while, and fight a bunch of random Pokemon...
Evolve, my child Manhattan! Manhattan has an Attack-reducing nature and a Speed-increasing nature, which is probably ideal for...
NUCLEON!
Nucleon is probably the best name in this game, and it just works so perfectly for both a nuclear-themed Pokemon and an Eevee evolution, whose name all ends with -eon, and "Nucleon" is just such a clean name to say. From the same team that came up with "Blubelrog" and "Forelog" and "Garerwl", it's surprising.
Also, Nucleon is one of the very few natural Nuclear-type Pokemon that's not a corrupted version of a pre-existing critter. And unlike Caesium the evil devil nuclear Corsola, Nucleon will actually listen to orders.
Current team! Taxonomaly is taking a bit of a breather, while I train up Manhattan and Meganeura. I'm not 100% replacing Taxonomaly with Meganeura just yet, since I'm still thinking of matchups and is just sort of mindlessly running around all excited about making a Nucleon, but we'll see as we transverse the next area.
...CUE OFF-SCREEN GRINDING
There was a lot of off-screen grinding. And a bit of a recording where my save file got rebooted after I exited the Labyrinth, which is why there might be some slight inconsistencies.
...and off screen renaming. "Meganeura" was a mouthful to type, so she's now Chykka after the giant alien dragonfly boss from Metroid Prime 2.
I also renamed Nucleon from Manhattan into "Blight", after the Batman Beyond villain.
Blight is a very speedy, very powerful special attacker, and being Nuclear type, this means Blight can hit hard but is pretty fragile since he gets special effective damage from everyone else. Blight also has the ability Atomizate, which is basically the Nuclear-type version of the canon abilities Pixilate and Refrigerate... making all normal-type moves Nuclear-type moves.
Which is swell, since Nucleon learns only the pretty shitty "Gamma Ray" as a Nuclear-type move.
And if we're going to go big with normal-type moves... might as well as go for the literal nuke.
Finally, after beating Theo and his team of five to the curb multiple times -- literally enough times for Blight to grow from a baby fox hatching from an egg into a walking nuclear cannon -- I enter the "Labyrinth". Which is... it's not really more labyrinthine than anything in this game.
Whaaaat the fuck I completely forgot this thing exists. He's cool!
This concept really could've been a typical Edgy McEdgy creepy fan Pokemon, but the usage of the Substitute doll makes Linkite actually charming, and the fact that he's also apparently the Voltorb 'fake item' equivalent, as well as the backstory actually making some sense (it's no more creepy than canon ones like Phantump or Banette) actually makes Linkite pretty cool!
Unfortunately, my attempt to add him into my party is quashed when I learned that he evolves by trading. Well, mine's called "Hollow", after the Bleach enemy. Alternate names: Heartless, Nobody, Faceless, Chain Chomp.
It also took me this long to catch a Modrille on my own. He was available in a couple of earlier routes, but I've never encountered him. As a Guren Lagann reference, I sort of half-assed a name that's a pun on Lagann.
Your pokemon punching rocks is training, sure. You punching rocks is just masochism.
Have we seen Vilucard, the evil supervillain bat Pokemon? I suddenly realized I forgot to ever look for Minyan, but at this point I'm waaay too lazy to backtrack. I really am considering putting a Vilucard to my team, but I just built up Chykka and Blight and got everyone up to the 40's.
Random show of LV-426 destroying an Espeon.
Other encounters in the Labyrinth, includes Chupacho, which we met in Venesi. He's pure-Poison, apparently.
Also, Masking, who we saw a lot in the gym. I resisted pulling a Shakespearean joke and just called mine the PHAAAAAAAAANTOM of the Opera is here, inside your heart.
The Labyrinth is genuinely a cakewalk. I wasn't even lost at any point in my journey.
Water routes mean that E. coli will feast on these multi-cellular organisms and add to his biomass. Feed, E. coli! Phagocytize these foolish serpents and molluscs!
Randomly a Super Rod! Also, this fisherman-wannabe drops random hints about the fact that apparently pirates sail the seas.
Are they surfing pirates, too? Is this going to turn out to be a dumb Naruto-vs-One-Piece standoff?
There's a rest house, and I get a cookie!
Rest houses are great, as even with E. coli sweeping out everything, my baby paramecium still needs to rest and recharge her chloroplasts.
Random battle against a duo of trainers who only have official Pokemon! I didn't know Floatzel was in this game.
Oh yeah, Saidine are also in these waters. The ninjas use them! I can't think of a pun like "Finjutsu", so, uh... Elektra the Marvel superheroine uses sais, right? And eels are vaguely fish, right? Eelektra it is. If it was a male Saidine, I would've called him Raphaeel.
What? It's late at night, and I wasn't fully motivated to think up of names for something I'm shoving in a box.
That'd be useful some ten levels ago before E. coli naturally learns Thunderbolt.
Also, random item that's only useful if you really love an unevolved stage of a Pokemon. Or if it's something like Magneton or Crabrawler in the Alolan games where you simply can't evolve it to its final stage until the final part of the map.
Random trainer lines! We get a reference to the Kanto games, and a lady that really loves her hot body.
Ah, it's one of these dumb Primeape evolution things that Kellyn uses. Now, I could whip out my Cerebella...
But Blight just one-shots the dumb shit with a Atomized Hyper Beam, basically unleashing a localized nuclear strike to wipe this dumb pig monkey and reduce it to monkey atoms.
In other words, Ura really has some severe daddy issues.
Oh holy shit that's what Feleng turns into? That's... it's a cooler cat that Purugly, but it's also pretty puntable.
Apparently it's this game's version of Slaking, where it's a pretty powerful Normal-type that has a debilitating ability, but instead of Truant, Feliger has "Lazy" which makes it asleep... so it just eats a sleep-awakening berry. So all of the Yawn attacks that Maria did back in the first gym... they were thematic to Feleng's evolutionary line!
Blight is especially useful against anything with two types, since all types but steel take double damage from Nuclear. He also outspeeds a lot of things, including Baashaun's final evolution here, Baariette... who genuinely doesn't look all that impressive despite being the final stage of the evolution. He also dies in one shot to a Atomized Swift.
This random swimmer talks about "Shrimputy" but lobs a dumb Daikatuna at me. E. coli turns it into tuna sushi like every other Daikatuna he passes.
Oh yeah, I randomly find the special defense training hut. Neat.
My party fight a swimmer with two Pokemon we haven't seen before. Selkid is adorable as shit and I feel bad for killing her. Syrentide, on the other hand, looks like a bad first draft for Primarina and her sprite genuinely feels unfinished and unedited, even by fan-game standards. She's Water/Fairy, and... I guess Uranium pre-empted Primarina?
Ah, finally, Silverport Town. It's not the town with the seventh gym, and I need to do some work to get there.
You can't wear your miniskirt? Lame. Candace would mock you! Also, I find a random useless TM.
Random exposition. This is basically a fishing outpost and the city itself doesn't have a whole lot of interesting people.
Just foreshadowing about Lanthan, Heatran's brother or whatever. And a crass ball joke.
And more Naruto versus One Piece shenanigans. Although this is honestly more of a generic pirates-vs-ninjas argument. Man, remember when that was a thing?
Oh, okay, lady. This is like such a random place to have the hidden power fortune teller or whatever in the game. In most official games you have this NPC pretty close to where you'd get the hidden power TM.
I figured out E. coli has got water-type Hidden Power, which is... it might be useful in matchups against fire-types, but E. coli will probably deal far more damage with the STAB Energy Balls and Thunderbolts.
Chykka having Dark-type... helps her maybe to fight Ghosts? It's a special move on a physical attacker, so not super useful.
Now LV-426 having an Ice-type hidden power is actually interesting. I don't super-need ice-types at the moment, and I'm pretty sure Cerebella'll learn Ice-types, but having another dragonslayer in a team can't hurt.
Charlie having Hidden Power fire is pretty fucking redundant, but also confirms that he's a pyromaniac of the highest caliber.
Cerebella's Ground-type hidden power is kinda neat. Doesn't really shore up any specific weakness that a Water/Psychic type has, and I already have Charlie in my team, but it's neat.
I don't care what Blight's hidden power is, because whatever the case, he's just going to be a one-trick portable M-920 Cain Heavy Weapon that only knows how to unleash nuclear-atomized Hyper Beams and Swifts. Even if he faces off against something that's weak to poison, unleashing a super-effective-to-everything Nuclear attack is still better.
Ah, okay, the main attraction of this town is Larkspur research lab, which we'll cover tomorrow.
Larkspur, by the way, is a poisonous flower.
Other than that, Silverport is realyl empty, and I'm just led out to the Lanthanite Cave, which is Tandorian Ice Path.
I caught this baby thing, Fafurr, who is an adorable deer-dog-blanket thing with a :3 face. She's cute. Ice/Dragon's also a pretty powerful typing. Type-wise, she's actually pretty suitable to fit in our team, but I am really happy with the members of my team.
She's Skadi, after nordic goddess of winter and skiing. Alternate names for this Nordic-themed ice dragon: Nidhogg, Frigga, Friggid, Jotunheim and Angrboda.
I also caught this cute little snow tick. I know he evolves into Snow Mothra, but... but I did just raise a Bug-type to level 40 and I probably should've picked Colarva instead of Harptera? Maybe? Eh, Chykka's still pretty cool, and it's not like we're in desperate need for an ice-type.
Current party:
Taxonomaly and Coconut take a brief break, and welcome new party members Blight and Chykka!
Next up... we fight the Larkspur labs and the conspiracy within!
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