Gotta Review 'Em All - Shinies, Generation II Families

Generation II, now!

 

I reasonably like the pale colours on Bayleef, but Chikorita just looks kinda washed-out. The brown leaf at least makes him look explicitly shiny, though. Meanwhile, shiny Meganium is just disappointing.

A huge m'eh for all three of the original shinies of the Cyndaquil line, which just look slightly paler. Shiny Hisuian Typhlosion doesn't even look that different, and being a shiny from a Generation VIII game he has even less of an excuse. Honestly, just disappointing all around.

 

 

Kinda okay. The teal is different enough from the base blue that the three members of the Totodile line normally have, but it's the addition of blue fins that really make them stand out.

 

Both are pretty great! How different shiny Sentret kind of depends on the specific game, but being yellow with slightly purplish rings is a nice look. Shiny Furret is the clear winner here, with adorable link highlights that makes hom so much cuter compared to his regular counterpart.

 

Again, yellow/golden shinies are always cool, and Hoothoot is one that makes it work. Shiny Noctowl is featured prominently in the anime, although I personally think it's not the best shiny in this generation. It's all right, though.

 

They're just anemic and barely different. Poor Ledyba, you really can't catch a break in anything, huh?

 

 

While I do like shiny Ariados's pinker shade and the nice baby blue highlights on the legs, I do really find shiny Spinarak kinda cute, with its muted blue and somewhat pink legs. It actually calls to mind Spinarak's original colour from Gold/Silver which is dark blue/purple, before Crystal changes it to match the anime and Sugimori artwork!

 

 

I feel shiny Chinchou having green light organs is sonehow more "shiny" than shiny Lanturn becoming a bit purpler? I felt like mixing the colour alterations of both -- purple body, green lights -- would've made for a properly good shiny.

 

It's a bit not-so-obvious, but the joke is that the red and blue triangles of the Togepi line all switch their colours in the translation from normal to shiny. It's very much difficult to tell unless you put the sprites side by side.

They sure are paler, and it's these kinds of shinies that are really frustrating where it's hard to tell if it's just the art style or the monitor saturation, or if Xatu here is really shiny. 

 

 

Flaaffy is barely changed, but it's worth it to get the gloriously pink Mareep and Ampharos-es. The pink works very well particularly on Ampharos, and the additional blue accents on the orbs work well too!

Very great colours for all of them. Neon green works very well on shiny Azurill and Marill, but yellow Azumarill is equally as refreshing. I honestly actually like yellow Azumarill more than the official blue.

 

Serviceable, I guess? The wooden parts becoming a slightly greener shade doesn't flatter Sudowoodo, but the fake leaves being pink and red respectively kind of makes thematic sense for them. It's like they're pretending to be sakura trees or some such. 

 

I like all three of these! Entirely-green shiny Hoppip is fun and honestly looks somewhat more adorably mundane or natural. I find it cute that the helicopter vines remain green.

Pink Skiploom and Jumpluff are both great as well, again, reminding me of sakura flowers and generally being a pretty great usage of pink.

 ...less of a good usage of pink. Sorry, Aipom, you chose a rather sickly shade or pink. Ambipom's a bit better, but then it's a bit too close to the official purple colours?

 

Disappointing. Sunkern looks sunburnt, and Sunflora looks like it didn't get enough sunlight.

Ooooooh shit. Shiny Yanma is a gloriously 90's shade of bright blue with neon green as the goggles, and that's already cool... but shiny Yanmega tops it by having an even more pleasant baby blue and a nice shade of magenta. I 100% prefer this colouration to the regular Yanmega! See? This is how cool a shiny palette can be, compared to the rather minimum efforts we had before!

LOVE! Shiny Quagsire rocks that pink pretty well, but the lighter, whiter pink on shiny Wooper is even better. Whether it's coincidental or intentional, it makes shiny Wooper actually look like a real axolotl!

Shiny Paldean Wooper and Clodsire have a serviceable and very distinct shiny palette with that purple-gray shade, and are pretty cool, too, just not to the degree of the pink Wooper.

 

 

Mmm... not a fan of these pink shinies. I feel likr it's okay on Murkrow, but I kinda felt like Honchkrow's red accents should've been more distinct.

 

The green is okay on Misdreavus, but shiny Mismagius looks like piss.

 

 

Blue Unown. They sure are blue. Are they blue ink Unown?

 

Pretty adorable! Pink works on both Wynaut and Wobbuffet. I think I prefer the slightly brighter shade Wynaut has.

 

 

Girafarig is disappointing, you'd think they would just go for the obvious and swapped the black and orange parts? Or, heck, anything more special than just giving him a blue nose and spikes? This isn't even a reindeer!

Farigiraf, a Generation IX Pokemon, has even less of an excuse. At least they changed the yellow legs and head ridges to white, but... eh.

Huh! Shiny Pineco being yellow/gold is actually pretty damn nice-looking. I kind of wish Forretress was a bit more bling-y, or at least had more contrast between his 'shell' and his 'inner armour'. A golden Forretress is actually pretty damn badass looking, but the actual shades of yellow they used is a bit lacking. 

A fun pink shiny! Mostly because they only swapped out the blue for pink, which makes for a pretty adorable colour scheme next to the yellow and white. Dunsparce and Dudunsparce are both pretty funny-looking, too, which adds to the effect. 

A very nice variant. Pale blue on both Gligar and Gliscor look good, and it's particularly interesting with Gligar since regular Gligar normally has the highly-contrasting blue wings with pinkish-purple body. Now with the purple parts becoming pale blue, the colours blend together a bit better and it's not a bad alternate look! Pale blue and yellow accents on shiny Gliscor is also not a bad look!

Shiny Granbull is a rather safe metallic yellow, which is actually a slightly more naturalistic colouration for this bulldog-man. Shiny Snubbull is... uhh... how best to describe him? He's like a photo negative, I think that's the most accurate way to describe him. I'm not sure if I'd like him better or worse if the feet aren't randomly orange instead of following the different shades of purple-blue that the rest of his body is. 

Shiny Qwilfish is a very distinct but very washed-out looking shade of pink. Not a fan. Shiny Hisuian Qwilfish and Overqwil make for a much nicer alternating shade of gray and creamy-white, with bluish-purple lips and spine-tips. Not the best shiny, but a neat one. 

A simple change of the shell from red to blue, but shiny Shuckle's pretty neat. It's a nice shade of blue, too. 

Both Heracross and Mega Heracross sure are bright pink! I dunno, being almost solid pink isn't the best look, but it's at least very vivid? Comparing him to his rival Pinsir, though, I much prefer Pinsir's more subdued lavender. 

Shiny Sneasel and Weavile, on the other hand, are much better usages of the pink shiny than Heracross had, and I think that's mostly because of the fact that it's contrasted very nicely against the yellow accents. Both Sneasel and Weavile are pretty fancy-looking!

Shiny Hisuian Sneasel kind of inverts the shades of gray, but replaces the dark-purple accents with the yellow of shiny Johtonian Sneasel. Pretty interesting look! Sneasler doesn't share any of the yellow that its shiny cousins have other than the tip of its ear, but the ghostly-white main body is an interesting enough alternate palette, and fits a mountain-dwelling yokai. 

Not a big fan of all of these. Shiny Teddiursa probably has the nicest one out of them, being a nice metallic green, but the darker neon green is not a good look on Ursaring. Shiny Ursaluna is at least not green, but going from brown to maroon isn't a particularly easily-noticeable change. 

(At the time of writing, Bloodmoon Ursaluna's shiny colouration hasn't yet been revealed.)

Shiny Magcargo would be an okay pink shiny... but silver shiny Slugma is just so damn good that putting it side-by-side with Magcargo just puts the evolved form to shame. No, seriously, a silvery goop-monster just looks pretty damn cool. 

Green Swinub looks like it's overgrown by moss, and I think it's a nice look for it. Yellow Piloswine is pleasant. Darker-green shiny Mamoswine is... okay? I like shiny Mamoswine the least. 

Shiny Corsola with the baby-blue coral just looks so pretty! It's a very adorable shade of blue, and it fits Corsola very well. 

Shiny Galarian Corsola and Cursola are still intent on keeping the ghostly part... but interestingly, only the 'coral' bodies are changed into a darker shade of gray, while the 'ectoplasm' ghostly coral are still milky-white. It's different, even if it's not my favourite shiny out of Generation VIII. I do feel like it's neat that they took the 'we must keep it looking serious and tragic' mentality going on here. 

Purple Remoraid is... okay, but dull brown Octillery is kind of disappointing. 

M'eh. It's purple, not red, I know, but it's not the best-looking colour alteration. 

Mantyke is a nice teal, but Mantine just looks washed out. 

It's all right. Changing the red blade-wings to green for Skarmory isn't the worst thing out there, though I wished they changed the metallic body a bit more drastically. 

Oh, yeah, no. It's obvious that they're not the regular colours, with the snouts being so pale, but I really wished they gave Houndour, Houndoom and Mega Houndoom better shinies. Going from black to dark blue isn't that interesting. 

Shiny Phanpy is barely different. Shiny Donphan's green-gray body is icky, but the muddy tire tread is interesting. 

Shiny Stantler is neon green, not very flattering. Shiny Wyrdeer is still neon green, but a more subdued shade that looks... I won't say great, but at least it's not terrible.

An interesting move, changing Smeargle's normal green paint on the tip of his tail to red? THe rest of Smeargle gets a bit paler. I personally would've gone a bit more drastic, but I can respect this.

Blue Miltank! This particular art makes the blue be a bit more better. Shiny Yanma and shiny Corsola above wears it better, but it looks okay on Miltank. 

I really like the change done to the shiny legendary beasts, where they become a bit more subtle and make the contrast with the colours a bit less. It makes the designs a bit less cluttered and busy, even though the amount of details are still the same. Raikou, I think, changes the most with not just his face-greebles but also his cape-cloud going a bit more subdued. Honestly, I vastly prefer shiny Raikou to regular Raikou.

Shiny Entei also reduces a lot of the colour, changing a lot of the details to gray and vastly reducing the colours in the face. This one is the least changed, though. 

And finally, shiny Suicune, which still looks pretty classy even with its minimalist palette. I also think he looks better than the regular-flavour Suicune?

It's kind of weird that it's just the 'striped' belly that changes colour the most, with Larvitar and the two Tyranitar's armoured belly going pink and purple. Pupitar, being entirely made of that belly, is bright purple. I think it's not interesting enough or different enough, particularly on Larvitar. 

Pink-highlights Lugia is... it's certainly a thing? It's at least different, though I have the same feeling that I have with shiny Mewtwo that it's not the best look. 

Shiny Ho-Oh is pretty majestic, going for a palette of orange and silver, with red wing-tips. I like the colour scheme, and the fact that this might be a joke on 'Gold and Silver', the Johto games, is also pretty great. Easily the stronger shiny out of the two Johto birds.

And we cap Generation II off with my favourite shiny 'pixie', shiny Celebi. Pink is a great colour on Celebi already, but the fact that they kept the green eyes and the green antenna-tips really is what makes shiny Celebi work particularly well for me. A huge fan.