In this part of the let's play, Ura finally slogs his way through snow and hail and even more hail and a lot of ice rink puzzles to reach the remote Snowbank town, where he immediately sets off to challenge the gym leader and the holder of the secrets of mega evolution.Also, lots of dragons are involved. Not much to say here, as usual, click to go after the break.
Current party:
Last we left off, I was utterly frustrated by the pretty bland and repetitive ice route. I genuinely am not sure just why -- if it's just the Hail, or the cave, or the ice puzzles, or a combination of all of them, but I don't think I've ever felt as frustrated with Uranium's level layout as much as I did in this sequence.
But hey, at least good old Cerebella the Brainoar learned Psychic, finally getting rid of Psybeam for the most reliable heavy-hitter among psychic moves. My team's slowly growing stronger and stronger.
Oh yeah, Puffluf's stupid snowboarding evolution is the rare encounter on the route. Anderind here is Ice/Ground for some fucking bizarre reason -- not all Uranium Pokemon are the best at communicating what type combination they are, and I've been mostly quiet because some official Pokemon share the same problem... but really, this dumbass random cartoon bear with clothes and a snowboard tail and goggles and a nonsensical typing is probably easily my least favourite fakemon in the game .
I name him SSX, a game I don't necessarily remember fondly either.
Anyway, we've finally reached Snowbank Town. It's snowy. That's... that's about it, I suppose, about the uniqueness of the town? It's at least got some neat modified building models with snow on its roof and whatnot.
I'm so happy to be out of the snowy icy route that I engage in a whole lot of city exploration.
Framing a move tutor with all of the elemental fang moves (and also Crunch and Super Fang) as a pokemon dentist is hilarious, actually. None of the Pokemon I have need any of these. Crunch would maybe kind of be okay on Harptera, the only team member I have that's physically inclined?
Oh hey have you heard of mega evolution it's in this town, by the way, mega evolution MEGA EVOLUTION
And I guess I can't be too harsh on this fan-game, because Generation VI did basically have every second NPC talk about mega evolutions as well. But this grandpa just goes into a full-on tutorial rant about the damn thing, though, something that's a lot different than "hey, did you know this one single trivia about mega evolution". We get a Drilgannite out of the conversation, but I don't have a Drilgann.
...That's a random move that has nothing to do with an icy town, a dragon-themed town or mega evolution at all.
There's this random lady who wants a Pokemon that knows the move Overheat. I briefly allow LV-426 to re-learn Overheat (reusable TM's are great) and she gives me some rare candy, before warning us about how dangerous the gym is.
Well, the previous one, Rosalind, was kind of a challenge, I guess.
...Huh. Theo?
Shit, does that mean the repeatable experience farming in Maskara Island is now gone because Theo's progressed with his story? Dangit
I genuinely didn't pay enough attention to Theo's overworld model to realize that he looks different. Pokemon's one of those games where your protagonist is just inherently tough enough to go through any sort of actual hostile terrain with no problem.
And, besides, Ura's been known to brave a radioactive fallout zone. A little bit of snow won't bother him.
I get it MEGA EVOLUTION is in this gym.
Also, no, Theo, I don't think just putting on some winter clothes makes you a badass. Not everyone can pull off that Jon Snow look.
AW FUCK. Okay, so apparently the gimmick of this gym is having to deal with it alongside an excitable little kid like Theo?
Also, what is the logistics of this challenge if, say, a single person shows up? Do they just wait until a second challenger shows up? What if one of the challengers is just super-incompetent? What if they refuse to work together? After all, it's only by fluke that Ura arrives with Theo, a person he knows about. What if Random Ace Trainer Man shows up instead? So many questions.
Yes, okay. Fine. You're so excited that I'll feel bad showing my utter disdain of working alongside you on my face. I am still filled with naught but disdain, though.
...so it's basically individual tests, then. I am genuinely and utterly confused how the fuck the gym's supposed to be all about two people taking the tests together if they're not going to interact at all until the final battle.
What if that brain-dead dumbass Theo fails in his trials, while Ura scores a perfect score? This make-a-no-sense.
Okay, Greybeard Man, whatever you say. I am far more worried that Theo will have some sort of problem in his trials, honestly, more than anything else.
So I guess if Theo fails, Ura will just have to awkwardly wait at the summit?
Also, haha, Strength? Ura will move boulders with the power of TECHNOLOGY.
This dialogue is repeated every. Single. Trial. Which is just utterly stupid and unnecessary.
Oh wow, it's a Strength puzzle. Fuck your Strength requirement, I've got a glove. It's a genuinely simple Strength puzzle to.
At the end of each trial we fight an acolyte, like Trogdor over here. Apparently instead of just having a tower erected to honour Mega Evolution like in Kalos, the people in Tandor just straight-up go into LARPing with their own cute little hoodies and mega-evolution aprons and whatnot.
They use Dragon-types, mostly. I don't bring Taxonomaly, so my normal anti-dragon repellent isn't around, and I refuse to use any of the Ice-types, but I've got a one-man omni-killer in Blight the Nuclear Hyper Beam cannon.
Halfway through the battle I remembered Cerebella has Ice Beam, and it's 4x effective against silly two-headed ground-worms pretending to be dragons.
I did too? I'm pretty sure I beat a different guy than you, Theo, unless yours is also called Trofgar, and he ran from one room to the next really, really fast.
Wisdom for this LARP Acolyte Cult is apparently walking through a hilariously simple and minimal-effort maze. They didn't even put any effort in designing this thing.
Yeah sure, man, "think critically and navigate" this room. Even if I wasn't looking at the maze from an overhead view, mazes aren't really a proper measure of someone's critical thinking.
Anything with two types is allergic to Blight. Also, some of the acolytes use Ice-types for some reason, and that's the theme of the gym, I guess. Ice and Dragons.
I keep forgetting Cerebella is slower than I remember her to be, and she nearly gets killed by this random acolyte's Coatlith. Fortunately, Ice Beam-one shots the coatl. I think this is the first Coatlith we've seen in this let's play? It's the final evolution of... Chicoatl, I believe it's called? It's cute, but nowhere as impressive both visually and in-game as the game's NPCs want to make it out to be.
Okay, that's new. I'm not sure what type Voltasu is. It's like a lightning three-legged crow, so maybe Electric/Flying? But the fact that it's being used in this gym makes me think it might be Electric/Dragon. Probably should've used Blight here, but my UFO kills it with rocks. Presumably the 'fluff' for this attack is LV-426 using its abduction beam to levitate rocks and launch it through his alien UFO cannons.
Yeah, they repeat this dialogue after every room. It's dumb.
"The elements" in this case is more fucking ice rink puzzles. God, the game just made me go through a lot of these, man.
This trial sort of lets us see Theo trying his best to go through the trial on top. But, y'know, he's not actually moving. You know, an actually competent and thematic game would've actually made us give orders to Theo as we solve some Indiana Jones puzzle or something. Nope, this is just genuinely just annoyances placed one after the other.
Piss on your force of Mother Nature, it's just an ice rink with rocks.
You want to see the force of Mother Nature, go to the center of anthell and find the monstrous brood-queen of man-eating bugs.
Oh yeah, Dunseraph. You're a bulky thing. You're also dual-typed, making you hideously allergic to my hakai kousen, my beam of destruction. Dunseraph's face looks really goofy, and if Nintendo really wants to give Dunsparce a draconic evolution (they won't, because Dunsparce's a specific cryptid), Dunseraph's goofy angel-serpent wouldn't actually be that bad of a direction to go.
Oh hey you're a Steel/Dragon! I will Earthquake you!
The Tractor survives with a sliver of health, chooses to shift gears or something...
...only to die form hail.
Also, Tractons apparently have Speed Boost, which honestly makes them probably pretty damn fucking useful if not handled by the AI. It's a shame that they're located in the Victory Road according to the Pokedex, and the only way to get them prior to that is to do the stupid gambling shit in Beachball city.
Can you tell I'm really sleepy at this point? Because why the fuck would I send out a part-Grass-type against a Water/Ice monster? E. coli still murders Glavinug the turn after that, but it's still pretty stupid. Or maybe I'm just tired at this point from the nonsensical trials and the previous ice route.
Ooh, faith in Pokemon? Is this going to be like that one battle facility in Pokemon Emerald where you let the Pokemon fight without direction and just put your trust in your Pokemon's decisions?
Nope, it another one of those fucking invisible-platform puzzles like Sheldon's gym.
Fuck this puzzle, by the way. I just straight-up googled the solution. There's a reason these sort of annoying strength puzzles and ice rink puzzles are given to us in small spades in official games -- they're annoying when you clump them together so much. They're not difficult, they're tedious.
Havost has a Glaceon, so we have an Eeveelution combat!
Nucleon's actually kind of at a disadvantage against other Eeveelutions since they are all mono-typed, so Blight's nuclear-type attacks don't do 4x damage. Thankfully, Glaceon can't outspeed Blight and is about as fragile as Blight himself.
What the shit, Dermafrost, get out of here with your dumbass OHKO moves.
...again, I look back at these screenshots and wonder why I would send LV-426 out against Dermafrost, when Blight's 4x-effective Hyper Beam would've probably been the ideal situation here.
You look like a Neopet, Terrabbit. Like, I'm pretty sure there's a Neopet that looks exactly like that, a Bloomaroo or some shit. Terrabbit's head is a wee bit too cluttered, and I know those are supposed to be ram horns or some shit, but from a distance it looks like he has a weird bob haircut. He's also like this weird kangaroo-rabbit?
My memory's a bit foggy, but I think his evolution line is one of the pseudo-legendaries in the region.
Just go straight, okay, I got it. The buildup to this trial actually involves a lot more dialogue and panning to Theo for what's essentially a battle against a gym grunt.
Oh, okay, finally a wrinkle in these fights. Not being able to use items is definitely something interesting in these games. Like, I don't depend fully on hyper potions all the time, but it's definitely an interesting stipulation.
Okay, Verum Rex, let's fight!
I have no idea what you are, Antarki. I'm pretty sure I've seen you before because I did that "review em all" segment for Uranium's fakemon, but I don't remember you existing. What are you? Some sort of bizarre scorpion-crab thing hugging a ball of fire? I guess he's like a ghost-type will o wisp thing since he shoots out Shadow Balls?
Antarki fails to kill Blight, and dies to a 4x effective Swift.
Bulky serpent vs. bulky fish.
E. coli versus Air Slash. Flinching's a bitch.
Also, Pajay has flamethrower. Really dumb for me to send out the partial grass-type against the Fire/Flying monster. Again, I was really sleepy when I played through this part.
"Hey, LV-426 has Ancient Power, it can OHKO Pajay", completely forgetting that LV-426's a slow shitbag (his UFO's hyperdrive is shot) and also Steel-type.
I end up just flamethrowering Pajay to death. Man, this was kind of an embarrassing battle.
"Hey, you fucked up real bad against the Pajay, we're giving you a do-over, go to the Pokemon Center and lick your wounds."
It would be real useful to know what Pokemon could mega-evolve, by the way. Since I'm operating under a strict don't-look-shit-up rule, there really is no indication who to bring for someone that's playing blind, unless they play safe and bring Gyarados or Ampharos or one of the canon mega evolutions that is in the game.
A trip to the pokemon center later, and my team's in tiptop shape.
Unfortunately, I can only deign to work with Theo to progress.
Vaeryn is a lot less impressive than Paarthurnax, as far as leaders of a robed cult living in an icy mountains go. He looks like a cheap Viking Santa Claus.
Also, six trials? More like rock-moving, simple labyrinth, dumb ice rinks, puzzle ripped off from Sheldon and the ability to walk straight ahead. I've seen game shows with more challenge than this, you stupid old coot.
What is this, Undertale?
BUT THERE'S ONE THEY FEAR
IN THEIR TONGUE HE IS DOVAHKIIN! DRAGONBORN!
You know, calling yourself "Vaeryn the Dragon" would look a lot more impressive if you didn't put on a cheap mall reindeer cap, have sleepy eyes, a crappy hobo beard and a cheap-looking staff.
Honestly, you look like a hobo mall Santa who's so sleepy you ended up wearing Rudolph's hat instead of Santa's.
Oh okay it's a double battle with Theo. So it's 12-vs-6. Seems fair. As with all of his acolytes, Vaeryn uses dragons and ice-types in tandem.
I forget Hyper Voice hits both targets, so I went for Swift instead, which is significantly weaker, and fails to kill either one of the bulky boys.
Sky Fall is a move that's exclusive to Dunseraph in this game... and honestly, probably pretty shit -- it's super-effective on Blight, of course, and Blight's pretty fragile, so not being able to kill really makes me lose any respect I have on Dunseraph.
I also lose respect for Theo's stupid bird, who dies in one shot to the Glavinusg.
SUPER NUCLEON BROS
When did Theo get a Nucleon? I guess Blight decimated his team enough times he decided to get one. Also, his Nucleon's bigger than my Nucleon, apparently. Man, Theo's been grinding.
I switch out to a UFO, though, because I don't want Blight to get knocked out, and being paralyzed he's liable to be too slow either way. Meanwhile, Theo's Nucleon properly uses hyper voice to take out both of Vaeryn's things.
Vaeryn the Dragon's next wave of Pokemon are these two dumb skiing furries. There are like a lot of dragons in this fangame. But no. Give Vaeryn the Dragon skiing furries.
Theo's Nucleon tanks an ice beam...
...before proceeding to one-shot both the dumb-looking Alpico and the stupid-looking Anderind.
God damn, Theo, your Nucleon is a badass.
Fafninter is the big furry reindeer-dragon that's evolved from Faffurr. He seems fluffy. Ampharos is Ampharos.
Also, Vaeryn shows of mega evolution.
Hahahaha Mega Ampharos looks just so fucking pissed at the world. All depictions of Mega Ampharos in official material keep Ampharos's regular derpy happy face, and seeing him just so pissed is hilarious.
Okay, Theo, your Nucleon's nearly dead thanks to the hail, maybe you can chip off some of the health of Vaeryn's ace, and LV-426 can finish the survivor off with Psychic...
...or not, because Theo's Nucleon's hyper voice just one-shots both the massive, bulky Fafninter and the power of Mega Evolution.
Man, fuck the enhanced super mode given birth by the bond between man and pokemon. Nuclear-empowered screaming, that's what true power is.
The resulting level-up from killing two huge things with massive EXP yields allow LV-426 to join Cerebella in being things in my party that can use Psychic.
Vaeryn admits defeat.
We both get the Apex Badge while Theo continues to be somewhat embarrassing.
Caustic Breath is a Uranium-original move, a Dragon-type special move that deals damage and debuffs both of the enemy's defense stats. It's... it's actually pretty freaking powerful. I've nothing that can use it, though.
Blah blah blah even more introdump. I've played through XY, give me the thing and let me fight.
Theo picks the mega stone to allow Metalynx to fight even better, clearly tired that Metalynx has been nothing but a joke throughout the entire playthrough.
I could be dramatic and pick the Archillesite for Charlie... but I take the Unidentified Fallen Object (ha ha get it ha ha) for LV-426, because... well, I know that item's also from the casino, whereas the Archillesite is brought from the daily shop in Beachball Town, so yeah, practicality.
The game then moves LV-426 onto the forefront of my party.
Oh, and obviously, we're going to fighty-fighty, although Vaeryn is kind enough to heal my party.
Oh GOD Theo what is wrong with your neck, that can't be healthy.
Also, for someone who claims to have brought a jacket, Theo looks like he's aged a decade between his old sprite and the new one.
So I swap out LV-426 immediately with Charlie, trusting him to tank a single attack from Metalynx. Or, well from Mega Metalynx. Turns out Theo wastes the first turn doing Swords Dance, which raises Metalynx's attack... which won't matter.
Because, as always, as ever, Charlie one-shots Metalynx, mega evolution or not, a sprite that's not laughable or not. Because Metalynx... he's kind of shit, yeah?
It's not until when I write this let's play that I googled and realized Mega Metalynx received Heatproof as an ability, which halves fire damage... which means half of Charlie's flamethrower output while in a non-mega-evolved state is enough to one-shot-kill a Mega Metalynx. You know what, all those times Theo ranted about having the weakest starter? Probably true.
E. coli hasn't been faring well against random things I pitted her against in the gym.
But with Theo's party, I know what to do. First up, Energy Ball one-shots Escartress, even though it's finally evolved into its final form.
And Theo's Splendifowl is a slow fat bird, so I don't have to worry about air slashes or anything, and this fat bird dies to a Thunderbolt.
Okay, let's try out our own mega evolution against Miasmedic...
Yep, S51-A's mega evolution is... it's the stupidest looking thing in the world. It's just so dang goofy. It really boosts LV-426's special attack, but I didn't realize it loses Levitate for... Mega Launcher? What?
Also, really should've used Psychic here, because Magnet Bomb is a shit move, Steel or no Steel.
With the first Magnet Bomb reducing Miasmedic's health to the red, Theo tries to switch out, dropping in Herolune...
...Who jumps basically into the way of LV-426's mega-evolved Psychic attack, dying without doing anything.
Hello again, Miasmedic. Goodbye, Miasmedic.
NUCLEON FIGHT HERE WE GO
That is a strong Nucleon, and I forget Nuclear resists itself. I open with the strongest move in my arsenal, Hyper Beam...
...which is resisted. To add insult to injury, the foe Nucleon uses Mirror Coat, which reflects double of the damage to me. Well crap.
Chykka's fast and hits hard, and has never really seen a whole ton of action, so she gets to show up, and X-Scissor Nucleon to his death.
Theo loses! Pretty dignified loss, though, and that Nucleon sure is a pretty awesome nuclear fox.
Theo is always behind me, Mega Evolution or no.
Shut up, Vaeryn, Ura learned absolutely nothing from the trials other than your acolytes are dumb.
This time around Bamb'o doesn't learn about our victory from his old drinking buddy, so Theo has to call Bamb'o himself.
HE IS EXCITE!!!! EXCLAMATION MARK!!!
Oh wait, is Bamb'o going to give us Fly? It's telegraphed, right? He's Flying here, and he's finally going to give us something so we don't have to backtrack through the stupid ice route since Snowbank's pretty isolated, right? Good show, game, you're doing something right.
Oh boy oh boy it's fly
Yes, you flew here. Good job!
Yes yes it was awesome I won give me Fly.
Oh, hey, character development! Ura's not sorry he has Metalynx, which... it's nice for him to say that, considering how hard he's been on the poor kitty.
Of course, doesn't change the fact that Metalynx sucks ass and was felled by a supposedly-resisted flamethrower from Charlie, but at least Theo will treat his cat nice.
Blah blah blah find other stones for other Pokemon. Okay, got it.
Oh I can see forms in my Pokedex. Neat-o-burrito.
Oh yeaaaah I guess I really should've called Bamb'o about Larkspur a while back, huh? Probably should've called the cops too, but Ura clearly doesn't trust that deadbeat dad Kellyn.
Yes. Garlikid will make a good team. I haven't left it to fend for its own in the wild or anything, that dumb onion-headed faux superhero.
Yes, traveling is difficult. And pirates (oh no, One Piece vs Naruto incoming). Please make traveling less difficult with Fly.
Oh yeah I bet the power plant plot will pick up once we get to Tsukinami. Been a long while since the last nuclear plant storyline.
Please give me Fly so-
-WHAT THE FUCK.
Fuck you, Bamb'o. DIVE? I thought you were cooler than this.
Yeah, knock yourself out catching Chinchou and Clamperl or whatever, Theo.
Piss on your research, I've got a tamed Nucleon in my belt, and it's tame, unlike your silly, slow research. I'm disappointed, Bamb'o. I thought you were cool. Turns out you're just a disappointment like everyone else.
Piss off, you didn't give me Fly. >:(
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