So the next batch of sequence is basically just me side-questing, and I suppose there's enough for this to make a full mini-article because I do plan to close of 'Teal Mask' with the entirety of the Perrin side-quest, which I am just waiting for a nice couple of hours to sit down and focus on a game. It's just that I've been needing to play on the move, and while that's easy enough to catch some legendaries, do some generic battles and talk to the delightful nonsense that is Billy and O'Nare, I do want to give the story at least the respect it deserves.
So, yeah. Billy and O'Nare. They are... they are hilariously obnoxious rich people, and done in a way where it goes from them being utterly insufferable and it loops back to them being charming because of how much they aren't even trying to look down on people and otherwise just seem to be just entirely deluded people on a vacation. They're not like, pompous jerkwads like Joffrey from Game of Thrones or the Celestial Dragons from One Piece. They don't trample on the peasants out of a sense of superiority, they're just... really, really rich, kinda nice, and they just don't realize just how much of an ass they're making out of themselves.
Not my favourite Pokemon characters, honestly, but I didn't mind them. The fact that they give me a lot of money probably helped. I do like that we also get to go back and forth between Paldea and Kitakami, too -- many times in these games with huge overworlds, it's always nice for quests released later to give us an excuse to go back to older areas.
Anyway, the rich twits are hanging out in Fury Falls and are surprised at how non-grandiose they look, give me 15 Big Pearls, and then O'Nare gives this supposed 'pearl of wisdom' about how money and positive energy are connected, and it can bring calm and stability. Billy over-acts at the advice being too profound for a child, but... but I can vibe with that, you know? Not in the faux-zen way that O'Nare says it, but anyone will find some modicum of stability if they have a fuck-ton of money, is what I'm saying.
Next up is a bit more vague, and I do really unironically enjoy trying to find them in the large areas. Turns out that judging by the amount of unclaimed items in the area, I haven't actually really explored that plains in the border between 'Area Five and Area One' on Paldea's southern side. I mean, it's not much, but I do enjoy my exploration. The couple are just hanging out in one random cliff, and... it's neat, y'know? They give me just enough clues to make the search challenging but not frustrating.
And, of course, only really rich tourists arrive at a brand-new country or city they've never been in, and instead of looking at the great sights of nature or grand buildings that the location has to offer, Billy and O'Nare decide to pick this place because "it's so ordinary!" I don't know what the two are talking about, though, the landscape is kinda pretty. I think it's because it's kinda near sunset when I arrived, so. We get the revelation that the couple are the owners of Paldea Realty, and O'Nare briefly considers building something in that huge, open land.
PLEASE BUILD A BATTLE FRONTIER THAT'S MORE THAN JUST A STUPID TOWER I BEG YOU, YOU'LL BE MY FAVOURITE CHARACTERS EVER.
Ah-hem. Anyway, they sure are in the lucrative property business, and that honestly explains their condescending nature. They give me 15 nuggets. Afterwards they decide to go to see some commoner fruit in Kitakami, so we return back to the apple fields. O'Nare is shocked to learn that it's not someone's garden, but a full-on damn orchard. Such a strange commoner world with commoner scale and commoner fruits! O'Nare fights me again and I beat her Persian up easily. They talk a bit about how commoners have "gum-shon", or gumption, which isn't a word I really hear particularly often.
They then go to the biggest body of water, the Casseroya Lake, and O'Nare gets confused on whether it's a pond or a lake or a big puddle, but turns out she's not being uber-rich. She's just dumb. I also don't really know what the difference between a lake and a pond, though, so I'm equally as dumb, but I bedazzle her with a random commoner answer and they get super-shocked. I am so learned in the commoner ways of the common commoner, and for my common knowledge, the two super-shocked millionaries give me pearl strings.
The next sequence is probably the hardest one to find, because they tell me that they're going to hike up the snow mountain in Paldea. It's a big-ass mountain and it took a while for me to finally find them hanging out on the north-east side of the mountain. Probably a bit too long for me to admit, though I did level up some of my Pokemon and fill in a couple of Pokedex pages. They apparently can withstand the cold with the sheer high-quality of the golden material used to make their outfits. They get shocked that as a commoner, I can withstand the cold with the commoner clothing I have... and frankly I'm surprised that the Uva Academy school uniforms can withstand this cold, but that's nothing! You guys should see Dawn from Generation IV, she literally climbs an icy mountain in a miniskirt!
After insulting my clothes, the Glitterati talk about how commoners must have built up an endurance to the cold because we're exposed to the elements, and then talk about how since the Glitterati are said to 'line their pockets with money', that's how they manage to withstand the elements. Okay, sure.
The moral of the story is, I guess, rich people can say anything short of insulting my mother and I'll be happy to take it as long as they give me loads of money.
The final part of their passage is the edge of the Great Crater, another one that's a bit harder for me to find mostly because that ring of rocks doesn't really offer for particularly fun exploration. Turns out money can't buy them access to the Great Crater, and they have to petition the Pokemon League for passes. Yeeeeah, you and your weak-ass Persian would be devoured alive by the Paradox Pokemon and the unreasonably violent Corviknights in Area Zero, it's probably better that you guys didn't go. I am surprised the lunatics didn't go yolo and brave Area Zero anyway since they're such lunatics, but I guess while they're rich they're not willing to break the law?
O'Nare is a bit baffled why I'm allowed to enter the Great Crater while she's not, and she challenges me with two Pokemon now, a whole two Pokemon. A Persian and an Arboliva! Lady, your whole point is that you're super fucking rich and you're in a region where there's a Pokemon themed around money and Gholdengo hasn't even been featured as a signature Pokemon for anyone, you couldn't pay someone to make a Gholdengo for you? Loser.
Anyway, O'Nare finally decides to resume work as CEO properly and somehow all of this exposure to commoners caused them to realize that there's no real difference between the Glitterati and the commoner... um, no. There are a lot of differences, in that I have a level 80+ Lokix that stomps all over your stupid cat, and that you're much, much more fucking rich than me.
They go off into the distance, and maybe they'll show up in the Indigo Disk, finally getting permission to enter Area Zero or some such? What weirdos. They make me rich, so I don't mind.
Speaking of money, the Caretaker in Kitakami Hall gives me a side-quest that I'm not willing to do. He barely disguises the fact that the shrine, despite being built to honour the false memory of the Loyal Three, is destroyed and rubble now, and he wants to rebuild it to restore the tourism to Kitakami. He's barely catching himself from outright saying 'tourism' and has to interrupt himself to say culture. He sets up a fund to restore the shrine, but... but fuck the Loyal Three, fuck tourism (see the caliber of tourists you attract), fuck your attempt to take my money, and last of all... my buddy Carmine hates Kitakami being turned into a tourist trap, so it's not going to be a side-quest I'm doing.
It certainly isn't anywhere as appealing as giving money or battle points or whatever to Honey back in Isle of Armour, where we at least get incremental upgrades to renovate the dojo. This is just restoring a shrine dedicated to three jackasses. And even then, the reward I get is like a differently-coloured jinbei. Nah, I'm good. I'd rather use the 1 million poke-euro to go around Paldea and buy every single hat and bag and whatever limited customization the game offers.
Speaking of the Loyal Three, I go and capture all three of them where they hung out before. I would really like to say something about them, but I really do find the design of all three to be pretty uninspired. I like the story with Ogerpon, but without that context I really feel like the three end up feeling so underwhelming.
Anyway, I also hunt down the rest of the Ogre Clan guys. I... I really don't have a whole ton to say here? Most of them follow a type theme, have level 70+ Pokemon with seemingly leveled-up EV's. One guy was atop a waterfall near the town, another one was on top of the giant ogre-skull mountain... there's an Electric one, a Fairy one, a Water one... a very disappointing Normal one.... ultimately, I do feel like they could've added a couple extra lines here and there to make the individual trainers a bit exciting, even if it's just giving some exposition about their chosen types or the locations they're at.
I meet the quest-giver, Muramasa, who gives me a whole lot of items before revealing himself to be the big boss of the Ogre Clan. He's got five Pokemon, all Ghost-types, and after the battle ends he reveals that this is all supposed to be a festival game for the kids, but the powerful trainers he recruited to be the Ogre Clan members all take things a bit too seriously and end up going too hard on the poor festival kids. That was a pretty fun challenge even for me with an end-game party, and... again, it's just a shame that it ends so quickly.
Anyway, next up we'll be bear hunting and then we say goodbye to Kitakami for a while!
Random Notes:
- There are a lot of talk in the fandom, or at least forums and stuff, that Billy and O'Nare are 'confirmed' to be Nemona's parents. I do remember that Nemona has rich and absent parents, having a big-ass mansion and I think Penny or Arven offhandedly ask Nemona about her parents during the Area Zero trip, but... I can't find any real conclusive evidence of it? If anything, O'Nare is confirmed to be the CEO of Paldea Realty, while Nemona's parents, as far as I can remember, are part of the Rotom Phone company?
- Honestly, what I think makes people jump to this conclusion is that there are some datamine of the two of them showing up in Nemona's house... which doesn't happen in the game. Unless it's a revelation saved for Indigo Disk, I'm going to assume they're not related until proven otherwise.
- The fact that Scarlet/Violet's engine has some, er, problems about rendering things at a distance gives some additional challenge in looking for Billy and O'Nare in the Paldea areas. I think this is an unintentional bit of extra challenge, though. Oh, Nintendo Switch.
- This little runaround of the base-form Paldea gives me a chance to make use of the gorgeous TCG cards for the Generation IX Pokemon, which I think is a gigantic step-up in terms of how creative they are.
- Speaking of customization, there are some rather hilarious joke glasses in the mask shop that I neglected to mention last episode. The Dipplin eyes are pretty hilarious!
- With a little more polish, the re-challenging of the Loyal Three could really be cool, like they're terrorizing the Kitakami civilians and we need to capture them to subdue or rehabilitate them? Instead of them just standing around? For being legendaries built up to be characters, they really do peter out after the one big twist.
- I didn't realize because they are, y'know, Pokemon I've captured before, but everyone got a brand-new dex artwork for the Kitakami Pokedex. Special kudos go to Maushold's, which is adorable as hell.
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