It's been a while since I completed the Teal Mask and finished up Kitakami's storyline. Since then, I've been distracted with playing a lot of Persona 5 Royal, as well as Marvel's Spider-Man, both of which have been pretty engaging. But here we are in December with a brand-new Pokemon DLC, and the last content that Scarlet/Violet will apparently have, and as always, here I am again with my text-based walkthrough/blog/reaction!
Anyway, after downloading the required DLC data pack, Clavell calls me and asks me if I'm ready to go to Blueberry Academy for another exchange program or something, and the director of Blueberry Academy has requested me basically by name to go there. I'm greeted by Cyrano, director of Blueberry Academy, but he's just ready to bring me and go immediately to Unova. Of course, we can't have that, and Clavell has this whole deal of talking to Cyrano -- we can't have a story start without some prologue banter, after all.
Clavell and Cyrano are best buddies from the good old days, apparently, and Cyrano has very little respect for Clavell's discipline and just wants to yolo things. I bet Clavell wears his hair in a pompadour when he was younger. Cyrano is a bit of a scatterbrain, but he eventually remembers that it was Carmine that put in a request for me to be included in this trip. Because this DLC is still framed as taking place at any point in time during the main story, Clavell still needs to add the disclaimer that this is part of my Treasure Hunt. Okay.
Now I am completely unspoiled by anything in the Indigo Disk other than the very first trailer, and I love the concept that they kind of did with Aether Paradise back in Pokemon Sun & Moon with an underwater giant facility. Only instead of a couple of conservation gardens, Blueberry Academy goes full-on James Bond with the whole shebang, and I love it. We first show up on the sea-surface portion of the facility, which is a giant walkway on top of the ocean surface. Some random NPC's nearby explain to me that it's connected with an 'underwater subway' to Unova, which is a nice touch of tying this to Unova in general. I've been glancing at the Unova map to figure out where Blueberry Academy would be, but there's a surprising amount of water in the Unova region that an underwater facility could just be chilling.
It's a very blue facility, and I do like the design of the outer dome... but of course, the real appeal of the Blueberry Academy is the gigantic terrarium -- sorry, TERArium -- underneath. Cyrano and I are greeted immediately by one of the students, Lacey, a girl with pink hair and some hairclips. She's a second-year student, and it's a rather common trope that I feel I've seen many times in anime and manga, with the absent-minded teacher and the super-competent student. It's all kinda neat, and we learn a bit that it takes extra effort for Cyrano to remember even students' names in the first try, so clearly I have to be special.
Cyrano tries to pawn off his responsibilities of giving me a tour to Lacey, and there's this whole gag of Cyrano apparently often shirking his responsibilities. Lacey initially refuses... but then decides to do it anyway, but only because she wants to know the new student.
And it's exposition town at that point. Blueberry Academy, as established in the previous DLC, has a gigantic emphasis on Pokemon battling and the first thing we see is a battlefield court. Lacey is a member of the student body's Elite Four, so at least we have a version of that in Paldea. I also like that Lacey is super excited about telling me that 'wild Pokemon... sometimes Terastralzie here!' and even the game itself hangs a lampshade at how un-special terastralization is to someone who comes from Paldea.
Oh, and we learn that Lacey's dad is one of the Unovan gym leaders, which actually threw me for a loop and is just such a huge, unexpected surprise. It's actually nice to see characters connected to each other in these ways. I'm not saying I want every gym leader in the next generation to be someone's child/parent/spouse, but it's just such a huge, nice little detail that they didn't need to do... but they did anyway!
And I actually stopped to speculate which gym leader that is, since they specified it's Lacey's dad. Which... I would've known almost immediately if I'd had shut up and played the game. But I was wondering if it's Brycen, Drayden or Clay. It could be Marlon or Burgh, but I don't see those two as parents? And I plain forgot Marlon existed when considering it. But turns out that Lacey's Clay's daughter... which in retrospect should be obvious based on their names.
We have a battle with Lacey immediately, and... we get the glorious return of double battles. I've been saying since Generation V that the game really would've worked better with a mixture of single and double battles, and I really am happy to see this represented. And... she sends out Plusle and Minun. It's kind of disappointing, but it's also kind of charming to remember those stupid twins under the Mauville City bridge, and just how many of them use Plusles and Minuns with Helping Hand. Oh, how utterly ineffective they were! I tried to give Lacey a couple of turns to do stuff, and... hey, combining Discharge with Volt Absorb and Lightning Rod abilities are much more cooler!
...if, of course, these two Pokemon aren't Plusle and Minun with their rather sub-par stats. My Paradox Pokemon mop the floor with the two rats, and then Lacey mumbles about her plus-minus strategy not working well before sending out Excadrill, confirming the identity of her dad.
Anyway, Lacey tells me that she's disappointed that I didn't Terastralize during the fight, and... sorry, Lacey, I don't like that gimmick, and I honestly didn't need it to kick your ass. They then force me to dress in a rather bland uniform. It's still nicer than the default Uva Academy uniform, though my favourite look is still the full-purple 'new winter' suit. I'm particularly not a fan of Blueberry's spring uniform. The autumn and winter ones are surprisingly okay, and I think the winter Blueberry uniform looks like My Hero Academia's outfits. Oh, and I also get the Indigo style card. Nice to have all of these, even if my engagement will be a bit minimal with the new fashion. I like the look with the full suit and changing clothes in this game engine has so much lag associated to it (unlike the DS games, Sword/Shield and even Legends Arceus) that I just don't really care.
Lacey and Cyrano introduce me to the Terarium, which is split into four biomes and being held together with the power of SHUT UP IT'S COOL, I mean technology. It really does feel like a more epic version of the Safari Zone from the older games, though my excitement turns into befuddlement when I realize that their aesthetic for the place where the students can hang out is... made up of... weird rainbow tetris blocks? What is this, the city from Pokemon: Destiny Deoxys with the square robots?
It is admittedly a bit distracting compared to the very naturalistic enivornments around it. I learn that there are four biomes -- Savanna, Coastal, Canyon and Polar. Each biome has its own Pokemon, its own temperature monitors, and its own rest stations... with 'self-serve healing machines'. Oh no! Nurse Joy! The AI took her job! Also, instead of shops, we've got vending machines with everything.
Cyrano acts all like he doesn't really know what's going on, and it's around 50/50 on whether he's just a dumbass or if he's pretending to be nice like Chairman Rose. But there's a giant green disco ball on top of the Terarium, called the Terarium Core, filled with 'fluid packed with material from Paldea' that constantly emits Terastral energy. Even Lacey doesn't know what the mysterious Paldean material is, but mumbles something about how Briar is the one that put the whole thing together.
Yeah, Briar was pretty suspicious in the Teal Mask DLC, with her obsession with Area Zero and Terastralization, and I look forward into seeing just what this will come to! I do really like this buildup, and the sinister implications to whatever Briar is doing does feel pretty well-done.
After some exposition about dorm rooms and me getting the Blueberry Dex, I decline to go to the Coastal Biome class with Lacey because there's been a couple of cutscenes, but also because I really want to explore. And the first person I meet? Perrin! Perrin and her Hisuian Growlithe from Kitakami. I love that we can bully her a bit with a 'do I know you' question. She is excited that the Hisuian Growlithe she gave me has evolved into an Arcanine. Perrin is apparently employed there by the school as a photographer, and she has a hot tip... that she's not going to willingly part with for free. I have to register 200 Pokemon in the dex. Okay, so it's the same sidequest she gave me before in Kitakami. I do wonder if this will lead to another cryptid hunt, and if we're going ot get another unique form of a Pokemon just like Bloodmoon Ursaluna.
So I just wander around the Savanna Biome, taking my own sweet time. Lots of older Pokemon show up, and they really give me the vibe of the Kanto Safari Zone! Scyther, Doduo, Chansey, Exeggcute, Venonat, Venomoth, Rhyhorn... yeah, there's a Deerling here and there, but for the most part it really does give me a nice memory of the Kanto Safari Zone.
Speaking of memories? The battle music is... Unova's battle music! It took me a while to realize what it is, but it's adorable! We are technically in a location in Unova, so...
I walk through an outbreak of Milcery, which is a weird Pokemon to find in a savanna... and one of them is shiny. Okay, shiny Milcery has black eyes and that makes Milcery much more badass than it otherwise would be. I don't remember Milcery exists most of the time. But look at that thing. Look at those dark, black eyes. This Milcery has seen some shit.
And... and I realize that there's a bunch of special event outbreaks with shinies. I bet this has been going on for a while, but I just wasn't playing Pokemon between August and now. But turns out that Kitakami has multiple breakouts of Litwick, and... shit, Chandelure is one of my all time favourite Pokemon, and is easily top ten in terms of being a favourite shiny.
I mean, the flames go from blue to red, how fucking cool is that?
So I spent around two hours running around and beating up Litwicks and trying to get a shiny to spawn. It isn't the easiest, since shiny Litwick's blue flames don't exactly stand out that well when the overworld models are so small, and the regular Litwick's purple flames kind of look bluish anyway.
And I finally found a shiny Litwick...
And like a dumbass, like a thundering dumbass, I didn't save. I was so intent on catching this thing in a Luxury or Premier Ball, so I just prolonged the battle as the Litwick goes through a bunch of moves like Imprison and Overheat. Pretty basic stuff for an overleveled first-stage Pokemon...
And then the Litwick uses Memento.
The SHINY Litwick uses Memento.
Motherfucking Memento, the completely and utterly useless move that I briefly talked about in my Generation III moves coverage. Memento, the move that KNOCKS OUT THE POKEMON from full health in exchange for a minor enemy debuff. What the hell?
What the actual fucking hell?
So yeah, for the second time in my entire life, I lost a shiny to a self-inflicted knockout. God damn! And it's one of my favourites, too.
Of course, it took me a while but I eventually ran around through all the LItwick swarms, exhausted all the swarms and finally found a blue-flamed Litwick. I saved in front of it, and immediately chucked a fucking Quick Ball to capture him in the first go.
This Litwick gets pumped with vitamins and exp candies immediately, and I transform him straight away from a blue-flamed Litwick straight up to the glorious, red-flamed sentient chandelier that is Chandelure.
This has been a journey to get this damn thing, let's just say.
But the result? The result is worth it. Shiny Chandelure is very pretty.
Of course I had to name this guy 'Memento Mori'.
Anyway, that was my shiny sidetrack. I should've been talking about the Indigo Disk, but I spent my first day with the DLC shiny-hunting instead. Oops! But whatever, I have a happy shiny Chandelure now and he's never ever leaving my party.
Random Notes:
- If you're reading this and playing Pokemon Scarlet/Violet, claim a bunch of mystery gifts! Just google and look for the codes out there. Of note are a Master Ball, a Darkrai and a Shiny Lucario. There are also a bunch of active codes for a bunch of random ones like a Cetitan and a Gimmighoul, but the legendary and the shiny are definitely what you'll want to watch out for!
- (I actually have that Darkrai TCG from a random pack I purchased in 7-11 earlier this year).
- I didn't really care for the Lucario, but the Darkrai is hanging out in my party alongside a mixture of my main story and Teal Mask teams.
- Cyrano has this hat-flipping animation that they really like to show off. Lacey, meanwhile, has a cross-hands 'no' animation that she uses alongside her catchphrase.
- I swear when Lacey first walks up, I thought she's got elf ears like Princess Zelda. Turns out it's just hairclips and they don't look particularly elf-y from the front.
- I also got a bunch of rewards, as always, from the Blueberry dex because I basically captured everything I could capture in mainland Paldea.
- So Blueberry Academy's students wear their gloves only on one hand? Cute.
- No, seriously, FUCK Memento.
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