And these Paradox Pokemon are a bit... interesting. On the surface, they are basically just... 'regional variants', only separated by time instead of space, right? A mad scientist built a time machine powered by the plot device Tera Crystals, and it allows him to breach time itself and toss Pokeballs and capture Pokemon from either the past or the future. Except... everyone insists that there's something weird about these Pokemon. They have weird names, they cannot breed, they cannot evolve, they have weird typings, they all have a shared ability between their respective 'sets', and while I roll my eyes when the cast insist that the past Paradoxes are strange-looking and completely unlike a normal Pokemon, I can get why the future Paradoxes unsettle our cast so much.
Hell, there's even a running theory among the fandom that it might simply be the power of imagination being made to manifest what the 'prehistoric' and 'futuristic' beings might look like, since a lot of the in-universe material are just vague occult magazines talking about this cryptid and that mysterious being, and what a coincidence that all these unconfirmed sightings actually all turn out to be Paradoxes! While this has been a running theory for a year, the two DLC's that were released for the game would shed a bit more context into the origin of the Paradox Pokemon, basically all but disproving the 'dream manifestation' theory and confirming that they're just being plucked from alternate timelines -- not too dissimilar with how previous generations have confirmed the existence of a Pokemon 'multiverse' across the games.
I also absolutely love the fact that these ancient records have very old-school-D&D-manual sketches of what the Paradox Donphan looks like.
As much as the Paradox Pokemon are the real gimmick variants in this generation (the 'convergent evolution' thing is a bit more of a decoy, huh?), however, I find it such a shame they have so little lore to them in the pokedexes itself. Every single dex entry are some variant of 'this thing resembles the [X] described in the Scarlet/Violet Book!' and while there are some cryptid-esque descriptions found in the in-game Occulture magazines, it's also not particularly useful at telling us much information.
Anyway, almost all the Paradoxes are clustered together in the Pokedex, with a pair of rarer ones being slotted with the pseudo-legendaries and the two mascot legendaries also being technically Paradoxes themselves.
Click here for the previous part.
___________________________________________________
#984: Great Tusk
The first of the 'ancient' or 'past' Paradoxes is Great Tusk. And right away I do want to say that I dislike these names for the Paradox Pokemon. I get that they wanted to be different, but I'm not sure. Either from the choices of the words used to describe them, or simply the space between them, I'm just not a fan of... well, literally all of the Paradox Pokemon names. I get that it does make them feel unique and more like a set, but eh.
Both games feature its version of a Paradox Donphan as one of the Titan Pokemon encountered in the main story, and a particularly large Great Tusk menaces our players in Scarlet. And in addition to its size, it definitely does look like what happens if you took a Donphan and told someone to draw it as a dinosaurian kaiju. Even though it technically would be a mammoth, being a 'monster dinosaur' seem to be the running theme across most of these ancient Paradoxes.
It basically makes Donphan look more monstrous in all facets, and I'm just a huge fan of most of the design work here. I love the super-curved tusks of this creature, and the rows of spikes down its dorsal spine. In particular, I really do like how the effect ends up looking with the tail and the trunk as Great Tusk slowly stomps across the Asado Desert when you find it. The in-game Occulture magazines note that Great Tusk is a 'relic of the dinosaur era'. Not the biggest fan of its mouth, though, or the fact that it gains the Fighting type for no real thematic or visual reason.
Also, I guess I'll mention here that all the ancient Paradoxes have the ability of 'Protosynthesis', which boosts their most proficient stats when harsh sunlight is activated, which in addition to how the prehistoric life is a bit more primal, is a nod on how weather conditions were the first 'field' moves introduced in the franchise.
Anyway, I'm going to take the idea that this is a prehistoric precursor to Donphan at face value. The biggest difference between Great Tusk and its modern Donphan descendants is that Great Tusk can't roll into a ball yet. A lot of prehistoric creatures do get streamlined and smaller as the climate of the planet changes, and real-world elephants are one of those. Presumably, as Great Tusks evolve into Donphan, they found mobility far more useful than its more monstrous traits.
4/6.#985: Scream Tail
So next up is a bizarre choice, a prehistoric Jigglypuff! And she is Fairy/Psychic, because ancient Jigglypuffs are psychic for some reason? Despite its adorable appearance, all dex entries and in-game books note how this 'billion-year-old Jigglypuff' is primitive and savage, and will attack anyone who comes near it. Its design basically sharpens Jigglypuff's toes, gives it adorable little fangs, golden eyes, and... a giant tuft of hair that trails back into something resembling a tail. Scream Tail's whole thing, as its name implies, is that it screams loudly at its enemy with a screeching voice, in contrast to modern Jigglypuff soothing its enemies to sleep with a lullaby.
This one is a neat enough variant of the familiar Jigglypuff design, but I honestly don't like this one all that much? It's very pleasant, visually, sure, but the lack of any real expansion on the screaming or any real explanation about the Psychic abilities really does dampen my enthusiasm for Scream Tail. And... and it's cute, don't get me wrong, but so is Jigglypuff, and a lot of my internal ruling for alternate forms and variants are how much they derive from the original... and Scream Tail just feels honestly like it needs one or two extra things to make it stand out from its inspiration compared to something like Slither Wing or Sandy Shocks or Iron Bundle on this page.
Also, a running theme with all the Ancient Paradoxes based on non-fully-evolved Pokemon in the modern days are those that would evolve with evolutionary stones (Jigglypuff, Magneton, Misdreavus), so this might've been their 'final forms' before those stones came into existence.
3/6. Pleasant one, though. Could be a 4/6 if it looked just a bit more different.#986: Brute Bonnet
Huh. Huh! Amoonguss also gets to play along, and I'm happy that we're slowly giving more and more Generation V Pokemon a bit more focus in terms of alternate forms. Not a huge fan of the name 'Brute Bonnet', but I really do think that design-wise, I like what they're going on here. Instead of Amoonguss's pig nose, we get a mean-looking sharp jagged teeth similar to Malamar. He's got spikes on his mushroom cap, and a bunch of green growths that resemble hanging lichen or something. Amoonguss's lower body now has been transformed into a centaur-like body shape, with four stubby legs and a tail -- a neat little detail that I wouldn't have thought up of myself. Interestingly, the Occulture books say that Brute Bonnet is an 'Amoonguss meets dinosaur', and... other than four legs and a tail, Brute Bonnet doesn't really scream 'dinosaur' to me. The Brute Bonnet is described as a savage, powerful fighter, translating it into a Grass/Dark type. Okay, kinda makes sense.
I'm actually not the biggest fan of the execution of the green hanging 'lichen' curtain, which just looks rather weird in terms of texturing and how well it fits into Brute Bonnet's design... but the concept of a lichen or moss-grown fungus monster is certainly a great one, and the green does make Brute Bonnet visually distinct with Amoonguss! It overall does give Brute Bonnet a more primal look... Some people note that the green parts might actually be the fungal parasite Syzygites, but I don't really think Brute Bonnet's design or lore really lends to it being parasitized at all.
Also to note that despite being a prehistoric Pokemon (and we know Pokeballs were invented around the time of the Hisui game) the Brute Bonnet already has Pokeball markings. Now it could just be that the Pokeball makers based it on Brute Bonnet's markings, but this was one of the bigger supportive facts to the whole 'dream machine' theory. Ultimately, I don't think we were meant to think about it too much. Design wise, I'm not the biggest fan of Brute Bonnet, but I respect what they were going for here.
3/6.#987: Flutter Mane
Flutter Mane here is one I didn't really care for until I saw how it moves around in-game. Flutter Mane is an ancient Paradox version of good ol' Misdreavus, and rather interestingly, the dex and the Occulture magazines compare Flutter Mane to a pterosaur, or the ghost of a pterosaur from a long-gone era. I've seen Misdreavus being compared to the Nukekubi, the banshee, the bruxa, and obviously a witch, but a pterosaur is not what I expected. But there are some dinosaurian elements to Flutter Mane's design, with her head trailing off to a structure somewhat similar to a tail, while her long flowing hair acts as the pterosaur's "wings". A rather interesting choice is that just one of her four head-tentacles kind of have an almost reptilian, scaly texture to it. Huh! It's still a tenuous comparison to a pterosaur, honestly, but I suppose that's where the 'cryptid' and 'occult' part of things comes in?
Flutter Mane here is a Ghost/Fairy, and... I can somewhat see that? Moreso than Scream Tail's typing, anyway. Taking into account the slightly nonsensical typing assigned to these Paradoxes, I could believe that at some point, the Flutter Manes behave a bit more like the fair folk? With so little in their dex entries about their behaviour, it's hard to say.
I do really enjoy Flutter Mane's design, though. Mismagius is a great update compared to Misdreavus, but it does lean a lot into the 'witch' aspects and does lose the original Misdreavus's concept of just being a floating head-demon with flowing hair. Flutter Mane, meanwhile, is all about making a Misdreavus that's bigger and creepier. I really do like a lot of what's going on here. The creepy, blood-red eyes, additional red spikes on her 'skirt' and spikes running down her head... Misdreavus's original purple hair accents being translated into terminal scales or feathers... this was a design I wasn't particularly keen about the first time I saw it, but I've grown to really appreciate Flutter Mane!
5/6.#988: Slither Wing
Oh, Slither Wing! Alongside Donphan, Volcarona is another Pokemon that receives both Ancient and Futuristic Paradox forms, which means that the design team really likes the two of them, huh? I do like how Slither Wing was theorized to be revived from Volcarona fossils... but apparently, scientists have never found a single Volcarona fossil from the period that Slither Wings are supposed to be around. It's originally another theory to the whole 'imagination machine' thing, but we now know that it's just timeline/multiverse shenanigans. Or, well, I suppose it could just be a nod to how poorly invertebrates fossilize.
Regardless, Slither Wing is Bug/Fighting, and... okay, yeah, I can see it a bit more after I saw Slither Wing in action. The artwork shows Slither Wing on four legs, scuttling around like a fat butterfly (or a Dimetrodon-style archosaur), but in combat, Slither Wing actually stands up on his hind legs. You can even see it in the art, where the hind legs are planted firmly on the ground with knees and everything.
Also, I really do like the comparisons not just with Volcarona, but also with Larvesta. You've got the folded-up butterfly wings, and basically a much more 'spikier' version of Volcarona's iconic sideburns, but the idea of a body that's mostly covered up in white down does resemble Larvesta a lot, yeah? Again, with these Paradox Pokemon seemingly not having evolutions, I do wonder if at some point the Slither Wings evolved from a non-metamorphosizing giant butterfly-dinosaurs to a fiery sun-butterfly with a worm-like larva stage. That said... I still probably would've liked it to be more explicitly buggier. I still really like this critter for what it is, but seeing it in action has made me really appreciate this guy!
5/6.#989: Sandy Shocks
Our final Ancient Paradox Pokemon here (we have a couple extras in the next episode) is Sandy Shocks, an Electric/Ground Paradox version of MAGNETON. Yes. The creature made of magnets, nuts and bolts has a prehistoric form, which exists before humanity exists. So I guess in the pokemon world, the invention of screws and horseshoe magnets really does stem from observing Sandy Shocks and the Magnemite line, yeah? Interestingly, while a lot of the other Paradox Pokemons are noted to have only been glimpsed or recorded in occult magazines, Sandy Shocks is noted to have been 'sighted numerous times in Paldea's arid regions', is reported to be aggressive to those who saw it, and is speculated to be a 'Magneton that lived for 10 thousand years'.
And... hoo boy, how do you even begin to describe this motherfucker? The two lower Magnemites on a Magneton only have a single magnet, and they are super-long and act as legs. The central Magnemite has tattoos around its eyes meant to resemble eyebrows, and a 'mouth' made up of iron fillings that make up like a hockey mask grin. On the tip of every single magnet are even more iron fillings that look like spikes, including a mass on the central Magnemite's head that resemble a samurai topknot. And just to make this thing super-weird, you can see that Sandy Shocks has a long, serpentine tail made up of more of these iron-filling spikes and screws, the latter representing vertebral bones.
This guy is Electric/Ground, because I guess it's 'grounded' to the earth with its longer magnets? So I guess it maybe drives its magnetism from the earth's own magnetic poles, and it hasn't perfected the generation of electromagnetism within its body? With no real explanation to its behaviour or what it does, Sandy Shocks is still hands-down the weirdest Paradox Pokemon. Hell, it's even weirder than some of the Ultra Beasts I've seen. And... it's just such a strange, unexpected concept. I still really don't know what to think of this one, other than Sandy Shocks itself seems to have a grand old time defying all logic as it toddles along on its long, stilt-like legs. I really have to respect this guy. I don't like how he looks, but I respect how weird he is.
4/6. #990: Iron Treads
We still have a couple more Ancient Paradoxes, but they're later on in the dex. Now we begin with the futuristic Paradoxes from Violet, and... let's be honest, other than one or two exceptions (Iron Treads here being one of them), the Future Paradoxes are all very samey. Just a familiar Pokemon, but as a robot with metallic bodies and neon lights. They all have the shared ability of Quark Drive, which boosts stats when Electric Terrain is active -- again, where very robotic and since terrains were introduced in Generation VI, a bit more 'futuristic' than the Generation II weather.
I am rather pleased that not all of the robotic Paradoxes are a lazy "original type plus Steel", and in fact Iron Treads here is the only one to actually be part-Steel! This is the future version of Donphan, and while Great Tusk is just a pleasant-looking dinosaur Donphan, they went all out in making a robotic creature that functions like Donphan and has a lot of the similar anatomical parts... but doesn't look at all like a Donphan when you get to the details.
Iron Treads' body is a sphere with Donphan's vertebra-wheel laid on top of it. Donphan's 'ears' have truly became stabilizing wings, the tusks are a lot less pronounced, and far more interesting are the fact that the legs are these robotic limbs that come out from recessed compartments and the head is just an LED screen in front of the sphere. More than any other Future Paradox Pokemon, Iron Treads feels less like a robotic recreation of an existing Pokemon. It's like it's a robot built to imitate Donphan. Probably by aliens, according to the Occulture writers. And while Great Tusk makes use of its massive size to slowly trod through the desert, Iron Treads spends almost all its time outside of battle just spinning around like a wheel. Basically, I do like the 'story' being told here, with the passage of time turning the non-wheel Great Tusk to the partially-wheel Donphan to the all-the-wheels that is Iron Treads.
And... honestly, I feel like my feelings about Iron Treads is similar with that of Sandy Shocks above. I appreciate what they're doing here, it's very creative, but I just don't find it in my heart to really love this guy. I can't hate it, though, and over time I've came to really appreciate this weirdo.
4/6. Bonus one ball for creativity. #991: Iron Bundle
Iron Bundle, meanwhile, is the Paradox version of Delibird, and it's another one that wouldn't be all that exciting without seeing it in motion. The artwork just makes it look like Delibird, but robotic, and... it's actually a fair bit more fun. The head can spin up and detach from its body almost like a toy cuckoo clock. It doesn't walk or waddle, but rather skis on those sled-feet. And its tail, replacing the cloth-tail of its regular Delibird cousins, is actually a spherical snow-cannon that, when attacking, unplugs from its butt and is held by Iron Bundle in the way shown here. It's only slightly visible in the artwork, but there's a metal wiring connecting the main body with the cannon. Pretty interesting robot design, and I absolutely appreciate that the ice cannon isn't actually an accessory, but actually part of Iron Bundle's anatomy.
Oh, and when it's moving and skiing around, the weird ice-cannon acts as an engine to propel him. That's adorable. The Occulture magazines give an interesting possible backstory, where it is supposedly "the product of a long-gone civilization", and apparently "ancient writings describe the design and usage of machines resembling Iron Bundle". Again, it all sounds like an interesting sci-fi trope that a lot of video games like to use... except the Iron Bundle is explicitly summoned from the future. Unless the Iron Bundle, for some reason, either got transported to the past? Or if some ancient culture created the Iron Bundle after the Delibirds, but there weren't a lot of them until the future-times? Ah, paradoxes.
Iron Bundle is Ice/Water in contrast to Delibird's Ice/Flying, and it's... interesting? I guess Iron Bundle can adjust the setting of its cannon to shoot either Ice Beams or Hydro Pumps. It's adorable. I also find it hilarious that Iron Bundle is actually a giant threat in the competitive metagame, and I always love it when unlikely goobers like this robo-Delibird ends up dominating the super-serious competitive scene.
4/6.#992: Iron Hands
Uhh... okay? I remembered my reaction when I first saw Iron Hands, and it was 'uh' followed by 'hmm'. And it... it sure is a robot version of Hariyama, but the giant sumo hands are disconnected from it and being held by magnetism or something. Iron Hands is Fighting/Electric, which is probably the other obvious typing you can slap onto all of these future Paradox Pokemon. And it's, uh... I don't like it? I mean, I think it's the face. Admittedly, it's a bit more pleasant than Hariyama's original face. They did a decent job with the neon skit and the floating giant hands, but I just don't really like the design.
According to the Occulture magazine, "Iron Hands was once an athlete who became mortally wounded but was kept alive by being made into a cyborg. Why it so strongly resembles Hariyama, however, remains unanswered." So, like, Cyborg from DC comics or RoboCop or something? There are a lot of Iron Hands in the game, so unless the mortality rate for athletes in the year 3200 or wherever the robot Pokemon come from is unusually high, I think this is one of the few origin stories in the Occulture magazines we can ignore.
And... honestly, that's about it. I do note that all of the future Paradox Pokemon can have their LED lights shut off when they fall asleep, which is neat, but otherwise without any real lore about their behaviours and the like, I really don't have too much to say about them when I'm not super-interested in their designs in the first place.
2/6. #993: Iron Jugulis
And now we get three Pokemon that are traditionally cool, and their future Paradox form is just... also generically 'oh, hey, let's make the cool Pokemon also a robot'. And, uh... I really like them, because as much as I realize that they didn't really change too much from the base designs, I also can appreciate a very cool-looking hydra that is also a robot! Iron Jugulis actually occupied a spot, swapping in and out with one of my party members in the tail-end of my Violet playthrough.
And it's something that the artwork doesn't really capture properly, but the heads of Iron Jugulis is actually an LED meshwork that changes as it emotes, which I thought was pretty cool. A lot of Iron Jugulis's other features are basically just... just Hyrdeigon, but robotic. The secondary heads have eyes, now, and I like how the legs and wings are segmented as robotic parts, but otherwise it sure is a robotic Hydreigon!
The Occulture magazine talks about how the Iron Jugulis has the power to raze entire buildings with its high-energy blasts... and apparently according to the Pokedex, it's the "offspring of a Hydreigon that fell in love with a robot". Um, hello? Did some... did some debauchery happen? And hopefully that's a robotic Pokemon, and not just a robot, otherwise that Hydreigon has some explanation to do. Looking up the egg group that Hydreigon belongs to, I guess it could've bred with a Duraludon, but... well...
Anyway, Iron Jugulis is Dark/Flying, and I guess it is more of a flying robot than a dragon? It does eliminate the Jugulis's 4x-weak-to-Fairy syndrome, and being Dark/Flying instead of Dragon/Flying does eliminate the 4x-weak-to-Ice that it would've had. So it is kinda interesting from that part. As far as the logic... I dunno, I guess Iron Bundle, Hands, Jugulis, Moth, Thorns, Valiant and Horns are all created not out of metal, but some kind of... plastic or carbon nanofiber or something? Anyway, I ended up liking this guy a lot more than I thought I would. I think I actually even like him more as a robot than I do the original organic design, which isn't something I thought I would say!
5/6. I have simple tastes and I'm not afraid to admit it.#994: Iron Moth
So, as mentioned above, Volcarona gets two different Paradox forms, and the Iron Moth is the future version. Design wise, it's a lot more derivative of regular Volcarona, basically just being a streamlined Volcarona. Everything about the anatomy is more or less the same, just slimmer and mechanical... oh, and Volcarona's six wings are now six disconnected solar panel-things. It's... it's still pretty fucking cool, because Volcarona herself is a very cool design, but I kinda wished they went a bit more in trying to make Iron Moth different? Or maybe I'm complaining. I dunno. The more I look at Iron Moth, the more I like it. The wings, the abdomen... even Volcarona's eyes translate well to a robot, yeah?
Iron Moth's Occculture backstory claims that it's a UFO being controlled by alien life, and is supposedly being used by aliens to wait for the moment to mount an invasion. OoooooOOooooOOoo! Insert one of those sci-fi B-alien movie sound effects here. I guess the Iron Moth could be based on a foo fighter. Not the badass band, no, but a type of UFO sighting that is often described as a ball of fire.
Interestingly, Iron Moth is Fire/Poison, and it makes sense that it loses its Bug typing since it's, y'know, a robot now. But I really wished that one of its dex entries would explain the Poison part. Does it spew toxic fumes somehow from its solar panels? What makes it more poisonous than the other robots like Iron Jugulis or Iron Hands? A lot of these Paradox Pokemon are really lacking some sort of additional lore, and I really hate the design team of the game for just copy-pasting very similar dex entries for these Paradoxes.
5/6. Again, I'm a simple man who knows what I like.#995: Iron Thorns
And our final Paradox for this page is the Iron Thorns, which is basically the proper MechaGodzilla to Tyranitar's Godzilla. After all, while Duraludon's neat, he's more BuildingGodzilla than a proper MechaGodzilla, yeah? Iron Thorns is basically what you expect from a robot version of Tyranitar. I like the glowing plasma vertebral horns and the shade of green they use for his main body.
Iron Thorns is Rock/Electric, using the Electric type to just handwave that it's a robot like Iron Hands... but there's unexpectedly some lore to it. Iron Thorns is noted to be 'coolheaded' and 'avoid unnecessary fights'. It loses regular Tyranitar's Dark-typing, so it's less of a jerk! Or, well, maybe not 'lose' per se. While it could be assumed that the Ancient Paradoxes are all precursors to the Pokemon species we know and love, we're still not sure if all Pokemonkind will evolve into robots in the future, or if these Iron-series Pokemon are the creations of mad scientists or aliens that try to mimic Pokemon. Or are they just modified Pokemon?
It is interesting that this isn't even our first Mecha-Tyranitar. That honour goes to MT from Pokemon Black 2 and White 2, and... I must say, I do actually prefer Iron Thorns a fair bit, though I do appreciate the more old-school rigidity of MT. I do ultimately find Iron Thorns a bit more obvious compared to some of the changes that the other futuristic Paradoxes have. It's all right, but I just don't quite get the 'oh, this is so dang cool' click in my head when I see him, y'know?
3/6. Could be 4/6. ____________________________________________________
Anyway, I had a lot less to talk about the Future Paradox Pokemon, huh? There's a lot less to really speculate or talk about, and with very little lore or gimmickry to them individually, a lot of my speculations are already kind of all used up at the top. And honestly, I didn't intend for the reviews to be so downers, because I do think the Future Paradoxes are very cool-looking! It's just that the Past Paradoxes are so weird and creative, and I'm not sure which I value more. Both? Why not both, I guess?
No comments:
Post a Comment