Your Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man S01E03 Review: Deal with the Devil

Your Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man, Season 1, Episode 3: Secret Identity Crisis

So yeah, we finally start this episode off with Norman Osborn actually being a proper character instead of relying on audience knowledge that he's normally a maniac that flies around in a goblin costume. I have criticized the amount of characters we are supposedly 'building up', but I enjoy the fact that at least one of the future main antagonists, Green Goblin, the Spider-Man antagonist, gets to be built up quite a bit as Spider-Man's mentor. This is a relationship that would never have worked anywhere as well in a movie series, so I'm happy to see some focus given to this more sinister mentorship in this series. If nothing else, I do feel like the idea of a version of the Spider-Man mythos where Norman starts off as Peter's mentor and confidant to be quite cool.

And it is interesting to see how my initial knowledge of who Norman Osborn is in the comics does make what he does a bit more sinister. It wouldn't be out of character for Tony Stark to also hire out a whole expensive restaurant in a none-too-subtle way to 'wow' Peter Parker, after all. But Norman reveals that the whole Oscorp internship thing has been a way to locate Spider-Man, with the relatively reasonable deduction that Spider-Man must be getting his fancy equipment from somewhere. And if not from Oscorp, one of the biggest technological firms out there, then from someone off-grid and very smart. Hence, hiring the four smartest youth to work for him. It's, allegedly, 'pure luck' that he hired Spider-Man himself instead of his supplier. Norman then spins this into a recruitment pitch, wanting Spider-Man to work for him. Peter turns this down, initially, which Norman takes surprisingly well. 

Lonnie Lincoln, the future Tombstone, who we've gotten to know a bit in the previous couple of episodes as a charming, super-popular school superstar athlete, gets a different 'deal with the devil' himself. His little brother has joined the 110th Street gang, and Lonnie charges in to confront the gangsters to get his brother out. His little brother feels utterly upstaged and inferior to Lonnie, but the 110th confrontation ends just about as well as you expect it for Lonnie. He ends up joining the gang in the place of his brother, and one can't help but think that the gang recruited Lonnie's little brother exactly for this response. It's an interesting start to the build-up of the gang wars storyline that's going to take over a significant chunk of this season, if nothing else, and a nice bit of social commentary. Lonnie is essentially 'held hostage' by this gang, despite having such a great future in front of him, and it's interesting to see what choices he makes in the season. Knowing that he's otherwise known as the supervillain Tombstone in the comics does take a bit of the wind out of the sails for me, but the setup is good, if nothing else. 

The episode then has its big fight scene against a supervillain Bonnie-and-Clyde duo -- the minor supervillain Speed Demon, and an even more minor one called Tarantula. They've gotten their hands on some supervillain tech, with Speed Demon having, well, super-speed; while Tarantula has some slashing blades. Spider-Man zips in to fight them, and gets into a bit more trouble... until Norman chimes in from an earpiece and ends up helping Spider-Man in a 'guy in a chair' manner. Just like Lonnie, Peter ends up taking Norman's offer by the end of the episode, though he insists that it be done 'his way'. 

This is another slower episode, but a bit of a nice set-up. I do acknowledge that a lot of the scenes could stand to be a bit more interesting, and I'm not sure if it's the voice-acting or animation that doesn't quite 'grab' me as well as it should. But we get some neat buildup for the Peter/Norman relationship and the genesis of Lonnie's relationship with the 110th. It's just rather slow, is all, but being a bit slower to focus on relationship growth isn't necessarily a bad thing. 

Marvel Easter Eggs Corner:

• New characters:
• Speed Demon, a.k.a. James Sanders, is a supervillain that was part of the Squadron Sinister -- a group of supervillains who challenged the Avengers with powers "suspiciously" similar to that of Marvel's biggest competitors, DC comics' Justice League. 
• Tarantula, a.k.a. Maria Vasquez, is the fifth character to utilize the mantle of minor Spider-Man villain "Tarantula". Maria was a heroic character in the comics, being a member of the Heroes for Hire team. 
• Big Donovan, better known as "Big Ben" Donovan in the comics, is a lawyer and a supporting character and sometimes-antagonist for Luke Cage and Daredevil. He has previously already appeared in the MCU in Luke Cage, as an antagonistic lawyer fully aligned with the mob. 
• Norman shows a video of Spider-Man stopping a bus with his bare hands, alluding to how Tony Stark showed a similar video when confronting Peter with his superhero identity in Captain America: Civil War.
• When rattling off upgrades for the Spider-Man suit, Norman name-drops night vision lenses (seen in Spider-Man: Homecoming) and a drone (seen in Spider-Man: Homecoming). Hilariously, Norman dismisses the drone as being 'too much', which was one of the main complaints that a lot of the detractors of the 'Iron Man's protege' angle that the MCU takes.
• The other upgrades are a bit more non-specific, but 'a mild electric shock to ward off attackers' seems to recall the Batman movie The Dark Knight; while 'a police scanner wired into the mask' seems to be a general enough superhero gimmick. 
• Norman snarks that Peter would've had an easier alibi pretending to be Spider-Man's friend. This is a common handwave-excuse for a lot of older superhero comics, and Spider-Man himself has utilized this excuse many times. In particular, the Tobey Maguire Spider-Man trilogy had him use this excuse to justify him getting pictures of the superhero.

Let's Play Pokemon Shining Pearl, Part 7 - God of Time

So yeah, this is the climax of the game's legendary Pokemon story. But what comes before that is a long, winding, and boring trek up Mt. Coronet. Again, caves in Sinnoh are super-duper boring, and I think the only new wild Pokemon encounter in Mt. Coronet would be Clefairy? It's otherwise the same glut of Graveler, Golbat, Machoke, Chingling and Medicham that we've been seeing all around Mt. Coronet throughout the game. There is the outer area with some snow, which is cute I guess, but I just super repel'd and didn't bother. There are a bunch of Team Galactic goons, but there weren't enough to really pose much of a threat or even to set up the vibe that they've 'invaded' Mt. Coronet. Again, the rather inconsistent direction in having some Team Galactic grunt rant about the Anime Plan of Universal Ennui and Destruction while the next one bitches about bad work benefits just... doesn't work for me. 

Ultimately I climb up to Spear Pillar, and two Team Galactic Commanders await me to fight. Mars and Jupiter seem utterly unconcerned about the madness that their boss is up to, and is about to fight me in a double battle. My rival Barry shows up, and we get a double battle. Barry has apparently 'leveled up'... which is to say, he leads with a rather useless Munchlax. The Staraptor that came out after I earthquaked the field is a lot more useful, I must say. 

Mars and Jupiter have a party of a Bronzor each, a Golbat each, and a Skuntank and a Purugly. By dint of having a party of six and both Galactic Admins piling it on my Torterra, it's actually a somewhat decently challenging battle. But Earthquakes followed by Giga Drains allows ol' Torterra to beat down Mars and Jupiter's minions, and some of Barry's too. It's neat, perhaps the first Team Galactic battle that didn't feel like a chore. 

Barry then heals my party, talks about how he's "hit a wall", how he can't help anymore... and buggers off? Yeah, that's some very confusing writing and messaging on Barry's part. Even if he feels he can't help to fight, at least have him stick around for the finale? I dunno.

Anyway, I walk up to the tip of Spear Pillar, where Cyrus summons Palkia with the Red Chain. Palkia, the dimensional ruler of space, appears and is immediately enveloped by the Red Chain created from the essence of the Lake Guardians. There's an admittedly cool mosaic colour effect that radiates from Palkia on the sky, which is neat! We get to see this spread over some recognizable landmarks in Sinnoh, which is, I suppose, a nice attempt at making Palkia's arrival on the material plane feel somewhat apocalyptical. 

Cyrus rants about how the world can't be modelled into what he wants, so he's going to use Palkia to wipe the world out and create a brand-new world without fighting. That he will rule over as god, of course. Yeah, Cyrus... isn't the best-written Pokemon villain, really, particularly with the Diamond/Pearl script. But Palkia roars a bit, Cyrus gets overwhelmed by Palkia, who starts creating a galaxy beneath him. As the music slows... Uxie, Mesprit and Azelf show up, make some noises, and shatter the Red Chain. 

And the three lake pixies just disappear after that. My character goes :o and... and I suppose it's supposed to be the culmination and the reward for releasing them from Team Galactic's lab, but it feels like it's barely five seconds after Cyrus subjugated Palkia. Other than the psychedelic light show bit, there was really not much of a menace here. 

Mesprit stops in front of me briefly and teleports away. Cyrus is confused, and he's angry! It's final boss battle time. And... and I wish I could say Cyrus was a challenge, but he's not. He's got four Pokemon -- a Honchkrow, a Gyarados, a Weavile and a Crobat. They're... they're all right, but at this point they're not very challenging. My Gastrodon wipes out his two fliers, my Drifblim make sashimi out of his Gyarados, and my Toxicroak breaks his Weavile. 

Cyrus rants about perfection, about how he will make the ultimate 'his', and fucks off -- a horrid exit for the character, especially since I was way more familiar with how his character is handled in. I've been hyping up Platinum a lot compared to Diamond and Pearl and I honestly feel kind of bad. I have a whole paragraph detailing that in the 'random notes' section below. 

Professor Rowan and Lucas show up, and gives a brief talk about Palkia being 'saddened or angered', and how it's kind of out of control after the Red Chain... but it's also waiting for me? Make up your mind, guys! Again, in Platinum, at this point it's Cynthia that's going around talking to me, and Cynthia has been going around the game being a proactive ally. Rowan and Lucas are just two real nothing-burgers.

Palkia's boss fight happens now, with a very cool portal in the sky and the always welcome score behind it. Bitch as much as I want about the plot of the Sinnoh games, I really do like the soundtrack! Palkia has a nice moveset of its signature Spacial Rend (which still 'shatters the screen', albeit differently than the very cool 3DS version), Slash, Ancient Power and... Aqua Ring? 

Small problem... I don't have Poke Balls. Or rather, I had like 5 Poke Balls and nothing else, because I forgot about the legendary encounter and totally did not prepare anything at all. Oops! And... and honestly, I don't think I care enough to save it, so I just chuck the Master Ball at Palkia, and catch it. Hooray, Space Godzilla is in my pocket! Rowan and Lucas congratulate me, I run to the edge of the altar to grab the Lustrous Orb, and... and the game awkwardly tells me to go to Sunyshore City and beat the last gym, before going to the Elite Four. 

So I fly down to the previously blocked road leading to Sunyshore City, beat some trainers and as I enter Sunyshore, I am greeted by Flint! I think Generation IV is the first generation to have a non-champion member of the Elite Four show up and actually be a character in the overworld? And actually foreshadowing the Elite Four? Anyway, Flint talks about how his boy- er, best friend Volkner is in a funk and that he thinks that I could give him a riveting enough battle to get him out of said funk. Okay, then. Apparently an Elite Four member can't do it, but I can. 

I do really like the design of Sunyshore, with solar panels that double as walkways and bridges around town. I don't think it's something that would be practical in real life on how hot the panels would be, but it's quite a cool concept for a town. 

There's also quite a bit to see in Sunyshore, even if there's not much to do exactly. Lots of trainers in the route both before and after it. There's a cute little market building that sells stickers. There's a little shack with an eccentric Poketch developer. Jasmine from Johto has a cameo on the beach, which if I remember correctly was a cheeky easter egg for HeartGold/SoulSilver back in the day. 

Speaking of easter eggs, there's also the random couple who briefly talk about Cyrus and note that he used to be an antisocial kid that likes machines. That's... that's honestly hardly enough of a backstory, is it? Elden Ring and its ilk get away with it because the little 'hidden' lore are actually a bit more elaborate than 'the emo antisocial man doesn't have friends as a kid'. 

And of course, there's a watchtower where Volkner is just lurking, watching through the binoculars at the Pokemon League. Somehow, my arrival is exactly enough to get him out of his funk, although he also notes that he'll challenge the Pokemon League if he's still bored with me. My man, the League is literally a couple of blocks away from you. Just... just go. This is even the game where you have an Octillery! 

Anyway, with Volkner reinvigorated, the gym's open. It's the final gym, an Electric-type one... but I start the game with Torterra. Oops! I do like the Sunyshore gym, though. It's pretty straightforward, but the gear-and-platforms puzzle is cute enough, and as usual ILCA actually delivers quite well with the backgrounds and the giant rotating gears. Again... it's just a bit of a shame that the rest of the game really didn't receive as much polish as water physics or battlefield backgrounds. 

Volkner himself is... y'know, I've always been of two feelings about the original Diamond and Pearl rosters. On one hand, I like the idea that not all gym leaders need to 100% dedicate themselves to a theme. But there is, I think, a spectrum between using exclusively a Pokemon of a single type to only having 50% of your party be tied to your theme. And Ambipom and Octillery? Other than how hilariously out of place they are, you can't even really make a case about them the way you could for Candace's Medicham. Volkner himself is also hilariously easy in original Diamond and Pearl, making his boast about taking on the league and being so bored with all the trainers in the realm sound like utter hyperbole. His two Electric-type Pokemon, Raichu and Luxray, are utterly fragile and a far cry from the Electivire that Platinum and most secondary media assign to him. Ambipom isn't much of a threat, and Octillery is just there, I think, to catch people unawares with the odd Aurora Beam or something. 

But anyway, Volkner was a cakewalk. He gives me the final badge, and sends me off to the Pokemon League. I get the HM -- or rather, Poketch app -- for Waterfall from Jasmine at the beach, and it's off to the Victory Road and Pokemon League for now!

Random Notes:

• Wow, yeah, the story of Cyrus and the legendary Pokemon... is really truncated and short in the base Diamond and Pearl, huh? I'm way more familiar with the Platinum version, where Giratina intervenes, drags Cyrus into the Distortion World, and both Cynthia and the Lake Guardians were more involved in the attempt to stop the angered Giratina. With some actual consequences of a legendary god-like Pokemon raging, it really puts into perspective how small and nonsensical Cyrus's plan was. Instead, the simplistic 'you can replace Dialga with Palkia and no one would notice' plot here feels so bland. There isn't any real pathos to Cyrus's ego being shattered by the sheer strength of the god-like beings he's trying to subjugate, or by having his 'emotions is unnecessary' thrown in his face by a very angry Giratina. Cyrus's more muted exit in Platinum after being dragged into the Distortion World and properly cowed after being defeated, kidnapped by poke-Lucifer, shown a different world and rescued by me and Cynthia... feels a lot more emotionally significant than 'throws a tantrum, gets his Crobat beaten, and fucks off forever'. 
• There really could've been something for the game to acknowledge about Cyrus, Mr. "Emotion is Useless", actually flipping out in anger and challenging me to a fight after his precious Red Chain shatters. Again, all the thematic pieces are there, but the script is so bad and it's something that could've been fixed in a remake.
• It really feels super bland, even compared to the Hoenn games were at least Groudon/Kyogre were allowed to rampage and we get to feel the effects of the weather on the region; or the Unova games where the legend of Zekrom/Reshiram and N's parallel with the protagonist was actually built up across the game. 
  
• The boss fight against Cyrus, at least, gives us a really nice background with galaxies and pulsars. This is a nice escalation from the Galactic Grunts having just space, the commanders having planets, and Cyrus having the whole galaxy. Say what you will about the third-party developers of this game, they put in some effort in the backgrounds. 
• One of the houses on the beach leading to Sunyshore is filled with a bunch of Pikachu and a Poke Kid among them. In the original DS games, the joke was that the model actually looked similar enough that it was a surprise. Here, not so much. 
• Next to it is the Remoraid house, where a fisherman really gets excited on wanting to see my big, giant Remoraid that he saw in a dream. 

One Piece 1155 Review: Davy Back Fight

One Piece, Chapter 1155: The Rocks Pirates

Right, I'm a bit late with this one. I thought it was a break week! I actually don't have the most things to say about this chapter, though, which may be a bit surprising because everyone seems to have a lot to say about this. It is an exciting chapter, don't get me wrong, but it's also a lot of buildup. 

Rocks's meeting with little Loki shows off a bit more of his personality, where he's a bit of a dick. I do like the subtle characterization of Loki still under the impression that all humans are weaklings -- which is nicely built up as being the result of his own need to have a 'might makes right' mindset. Rocks proved it wrong by bitch-slapping baby Loki, except bitch-slaps from these guys are enough to like, break mountains and kill giant Elbaph bears or something.

We then cut to the third page, which flashes back to the epic Reverie that Harald alluded to last chapter, and we get in my opinion the most hype page of the chapter. Imu continues to play with his butterflies in her room, noting that the 'lives of mere kings are no threat to Mu'. And then we get the revelation that ROCKS made it all the way to this strange flower room, posing like a goddamn punk with his gun out. The narrator made it clear that this is the first time in a 'historical anomaly' that anyone's ever made it into the Chamber of Flowers. Also in the Chamber of Flowers is a woman with long hair that appears to be Gunko. 

Rocks is described as a 'follower of Davy Jones', the first time that Davy Jones is actually brought up as a historical (or god-like?) figure. Rocks is also noted that he 'did not do more than this, as he knew he could not'... but promises to Imu that he will be back. Ominous!

We then cut to Rocks escaping the room (and he's wounded, and whether this is from Gunko/Imu or the Admiral he killed we're not sure) while Harald is also running away, being on fire and being blamed for the kidnapping of kings that Rocks did. Harald and Rocks happen to run across each other and they swing their weapons at each other. The art's not the most clear, but I think they also have the whole 'there is a gap between their swords' that is the newly-minted hallmark of a Conqueror's Haki clash. Rocks takes an immediate liking to Harald while Harald views Rocks as an annoyance. and the more world-savvy Rocks instructs Harald to aim their next slash at a nearby town to avoid the Celestial Dragons catching him as a slave. Not the first time in the story that the Celestial Dragons wanted to enslave a giant royal that arrived on the Reverie. 

As they apparently blew away all signs of life within 5 kilometers (!!!), Rocks and Harald make their way out. Harald straight-up jumps off the Red Line, which is badass. I mean, he's a giant, sure, but it's still a gigantic mountain! Harald isn't too pleased about accepting help from a criminal, and we later get a sequence describing Rocks rising to infamy. Apparently his clash against the Admiral caused that nameless flashback Admiral to 'die of his wounds', and he also destroyed ships with heavenly tributes and destroyed the Gates of Justice. Yep, I can see why the Celestial Dragons hate him!

We also get the glorious, glorious revelation that Rocks built up his crew with the Davy Back Games. THE DAVY BACK FIGHT, a.k.a. the fucking Foxy arc. Glorious callback, and I love that somehow, this bit of worldbuilding tied back to Rocks D. Xebec. It does make sense that this is how Rocks managed to gather a lot of massive-ego pirates like Whitebeard and Shiki, people who don't seem like they'd ever be tied to another's captaincy. This is apparently something that some fans managed to even guess, which... kudos to them, tying this back to the Foxy arc is nowhere on my radar. 

We then go back to the 'Rocks meets Loki' part of the timeline, and turns out that despite Loki's pessimism, King Harald did come back when he heard Loki is injured. And little traumatized Loki is actually shocked that his father would come back for him. This whole stunt, by the way, is just Rocks wanting Harald to join his pirate crew, which Harald refuses. It's a bit of a matter of principle, where Rocks tells Harald that he should be fighting the World Government since they're getting in his way, while Rocks wants everyone in the world to be equals. Harald and Rocks argue about philosophy while Loki looks at Rocks in awe. 

We then get to see the members of the Rocks Pirates at this time period. We get the "Mobster" Shiki, the future Golden Lion, who notes that their Pirate Crew isn't tied together by any sentimental feelings, they won't feel a thing if Rocks dies. It is very nice to see some of these future legends wouldn't get their epithets until later. We get the 'Science Robber' Miss Buckin, and I guess that's her modus operandi since we see her as part of MADS later on in her life. And we also get Whitebeard, or rather, future Whitebeard.

But some new faces! We get a brand-new character, Don Marlon (named after actor Marlon Brando of Godfather fame), who I assume based on his gangster style and origin, is either Capone Bege's father, mentor or rival. We get Ochoku or Wang Zhi, future commodore of pirate island, who has been mentioned since forever. We finally get to see his face, and it's... it's a multi-chinned obese vampire that people have taken to comparing to Caribou/Coribou or Gekko Moriah. And we get a big guy called 'Pirate Smuggler' Ganzui, who is a new name but not a new face, since he's one of the General Zombies among Moria's zombies. I swear, I love how the random zombies Moria summons are actually ancient legends. 

Turns out that Hachinosu or Fullalead Island used to be a prisoner penal colony, but the prisoners end up finding a lot of gold under it, and have established themselves into a nation. That's... that's just real-life Australia, what the hell! But Rocks made a deal with the government to 'get the island back', which seems like a prototype version of the Shichibukai... except Rocks also plans to take over the island and make it Pirate's Paradise. 

Of course, Harald refuses to have anything to do with this mission, but Rocks keeps giving this huge speech about being King of the World, how this is merely the prologue to his life, and a whole lot of other huge boasts. Which impresses little kid Loki, who is eavesdropping on all of this and seeing Rocks's mentality as his salvation. And the chapter ends with the Rocks flag, happening four years after this meeting as he caused the world to quake with terror.

Great buildup, nice to see some faces and the context between Rocks and Harald's meeting, but it is admittedly just a lot of buildup for these legendary characters.

Random Notes:

• No cover story for this chapter.
• There are some theories that the heterochromatic-eye woman might not be Gunko due to longer hair, but I don't think a haircut's going to be what convinces me that this isn't Gunko, or at least Gunko's mother. 
• Notably, the tankobon release actually retconned Gunko and gave her the 'Saintess' title and the Manmayer family name, a Celestial Dragon clan we've seen before in the God Valley incident. 
• Rocks's laugh style is Vohahahaha. 
• Of course Rocks's bounty poster 'censors' his actual numerical bounty. 
• Disregarding the bullshit anime filler, Rocks's showcase of the Davy Back Games actually matches the three games that Foxy played in manga canon, except Rocks is deadlier on the two non-boxing games.
• The four-armed gunslinger that we see in the God Valley flashback and as a zombie has been established by Oda to be 'Gill Bastar', who, like Ryouma, is imported from one of his pre-One-Piece works.
• Franky beat up Ganzui's zombie in Thriller Bark. Remember that, Franky beat a Rocks Pirate member. Ha!
• We're only one Silver Axe away from knowing what all the Rocks pirates looked like!

Let's Play Pokemon Shining Pearl, Part 6 - Snow Way Home

So welcome back to Pokemon Shining Pearl! And... there's a lot of road going from where we last left off -- Lake Valor -- to get to Snowpoint City. There's really not much to say about the Mt. Coronet segments. With Strength and Surf, I can now bypass the roadblocks on the upper entrances of Mt. Coronet, and finally run around the insides. There's literally not much of interest, though, other than the customary item collection, since, again, just like Iron Island, the caves in Generation IV are unbelievably boring. There are Chinglings and Bronzors there to slightly break up the pattern, I guess? 

But going through the snowy terrain is a bit more of a delight. Three long routes is admittedly a bit of a slog, but the Pokemon are new. Snovers, Swinubs and Sneasels patrol the grass, and the environment is actually nice to look at instead of caves, more caves, and cave-with-a-lake, populated by Pokemon with Sturdy. The snowy areas first gives us a nice two-tiered route with grass on a valley and log bridges on the cliffs; which opens up to a massive snowstorm-y area with thick snow that's hard to get through and a bunch of log cabins to find shelter, before we get to the mass of trees and tall grass that leads to Snowpoint City and Lake Acuity. It's a slog, but it's a nice-looking slog, you know what I mean?

There's really not much in Snowpoint City other than the relatively unique novelty of having a city being snowed in. Snowpoint Temple, the place where Regigigas slumbers, is sealed off and guarded, and there's really not much else in the city other than the gym. Again, it's kind of interesting to compare what existed in Diamond and Pearl and how much they expanded it in Legends: Arceus.

The Snowpoint gym puzzle is probably one of the few gyms in this game that could actually be called a puzzle instead of just being a bunch of slightly-decorated corridors, yeah? I think the only other gym that qualifies would probably be Maylene's, which is kind of cute since Platinum would establish Maylene and Candice as BFFs. This isn't a typical ice-crack puzzle either, but you have to calculate momentum (based on the altitude that you slide down from) to smash snowballs; and all the floor tiles are slippery except for several spots. It's not actually difficult, but it's fun. 

Also, a bunch of the Ace Trainers in this gym also utilize non-Ice Pokemon. We've got Tentacruels, Pelippers, Steelixes and Quagsires mixed into the Snovers and Sneasels. Which... I don't mind as much because at least some of the Pokemon are Ice-types. It sure is a lot less boring than Byron's, where 80% of the Pokemon are Onix, you know? I think I'm of two minds about keeping a gym 100% 'on-theme' to the type it's supposed to represent. Obviously having none of the typings make sense is bad, but there's also something to say instead of just looking at the regional Pokedex's list and just picking out a representative of each evolutionary family. 

Candice herself has a rather... interesting team. It's got a Snover and Sneasel, both first-level Ice-types. Her ace is an Abomasnow, which I think is quite accepted. But where I'm used to Candice's other ace being a Froslass, she actually tosses out a Medicham as her third Pokemon. Which is... kind of random! There is, I suppose, some merit to this -- I think there's an argument that Medichams are found in the grass outside Snowpoint Temple, and it's a representation of Candice using a 'tough' Pokemon that can survive the extreme weather despite not being Ice-type. There's also the Maylene connection, too. 

...but that said, at least in the base Diamond/Pearl game, there's nothing to really lead you to that. No NPC that mentions that Candice uses Pokemon from around Snowpoint, or that she likes training tough Pokemon, or anything at all. What could have been a very cool characterization-via-Pokemon-roster like Oleana having Garbodor in Sword/Shield or Karen having Vileplume in Gold/Silver ends up just feeling very random. 

That said, Candice is probably the only gym leader that gave me a bit of a pause in this fight, mostly for the reason that I insisted on fighting her with Torterra, who holds the Amulet Coin. Putting a 4x-weak-to-Ice Pokemon before a horde of ice-types led to Torterra being knocked out at some point in the fight, 10+ level difference notwithstanding. 

Candice gives me the badge, which is seven out of ten. I walk out and head out to Lake Acuity, where the Team Galactic Grunts have finally made their way... and walk in to see Barry being bullied by Jupiter. Jupiter gloats that they have taken the Pokemon of the lake, Uxie, whose cave also appeared around the time that they blew up Azelf's lake. So I guess Barry and Jupiter just have been fighting for all the time that I took to scale a mountain, go through multiple icy forests, and beat a gym. At the bare minimum. M'kay. Jupiter wasn't subtle at all at telling me where she's going to go, telling me 'don't follow me to Veilstone'!

Barry mutters something about being weak and runs off, while I fly to Veilstone. In another string of bad Team Galactic HR, the guard standing outside of Galactic Headquarters rants about how Team Galactic took his Clefairy (No! Grunts! Use! Clefairy!), how they demoted him and his friend, and now he's totally not going to drop a Storage Key in front of me as he totally quits. That's a nice little character arc... if that grunt was actually a recurring character that we could've remembered. But oh well. With the HQ still sealed other than the cover-story lobby, I go to the Galactic Warehouse and use the Storage Key, opening the Team Galactic Base at last. 

And... it's quite linear, honestly. The underground base that's connected to the Galactic Warehouse does have a bunch of teleportation panels and whatnot, but it's hardly an interesting puzzle. It's at least a fair bit more fun than Iron Island, though, with the Team Galactic Grunts having rather fun dialogue (even if it really feeds into the whole 'they can't commit to a vibe or gimmick' vibe of Team Galactic in general) and the music being all right. It's mostly beating up a bunch of Dustox-es, Stunkys, Glameows and Zubats, though.

After a bunch of teleportation pads, I reach Cyrus. Cyrus waxes lyrical about how I'm here out of sentimentality and emotions, and how those are completely illogical and irrational, and that these emotions are borne out of my lacking heart or something. Cyrus fights me with the frankly very embarrassing team of Golbat, Murkrow and Sneasel. It would've been a cakewalk even without the insane level-scaling of the remakes! 

After being beaten, Cyrus goes on another rant about how the basis of my power is my compassion... but that's wasteful and illusory, and they will 'fade over time until death banishes them forever'. Which, by the way, are pretty cool lines if taken on its own. It's just that Cyrus's execution and portrayal as our big bad is so few and far between, and there isn't really even an attempt at making his team threatening. He also gives me the Master Ball, because... he... doesn't need to catch Pokemon, because... he... doesn't view Pokemon as partners or tools, but make their power his own? Yeah, I felt like they could definitely have tweaked Cyrus's infamous nihilistic ranting to be a bit more palatable. Don't change his character, because I kind of get where they're trying to go with him. It's just the execution that fails. 

Cyrus lets me go into the secret corridors, where in a nice little touch, we get a couple of scientists actually feeling bad and in horror once they realize the depths of depravity that Team Galactic is willing to get into. In the secret lab, we get to see Azelf, Uxie and Mesprit held in little cages, overseen by Saturn. Saturn openly questions why Cyrus would allow me to run around the Galactic HQ uncontested, but... y'know, it's not like Cyrus could stop me with his weak-ass Golbat and Murkrow! Saturn fights me with the same team of Kadabra, Toxicroak and Bronzor, and it's actually hilarious that Saturn actually is a harder fight than Cryus is. I mean, marginally -- he's not a challenge in this fight, but at least he could theoretically be a bit more dangerous.

After beating Saturn, I press the button on the machines, opening the mechanical seals around the three Lake Guardians, who promptly teleport away. Saturn, too, teleports away with that convenient NPC black-screen ability. From Cyrus and Saturn's words, they were planning to dispose of the Lake Guardians... for... no real good reason. I think you guys are severely lacking powerful Pokemon, Team Galactic. Maybe using that Master Ball on one of the Lake Guardians would've made you guys more credible as villains. 

By the way, hidden in one of the random interactable laptops (and not all laptops in this game are interactable) is an actual reason why they need the Red Chain. They managed to find out via research that the Pokemon in Mt. Coronet -- Palkia in this game -- can't use all its power if subjugated with a Poke Ball. However, using a Red Chain made from parts of other legendary Pokemon would allow Team Galactic to dominate Palkia and force it to use its power. That's a really nice thought put into this game's otherwise meandering storyline, and I really wished they had given these to Saturn, or to the scientists, or someone.

Anyway, Saturn and Cyrus both hint that the next step of their plan takes place on the peak of Mt. Coronet. I'm not really feeling up to going through another cave, though, so I've been running around gathering items now that I've unlocked a bunch of HMs. Rock Climb, Surf and Strength allows me access to a bunch of stuff -- in particular a lot of trainers and items south of the hotel network between Pastoria and Veilstone. I really, really do appreciate the water effects that the remakers did -- the way the water parts as the rental Bibarel swims through it is genuinely pretty. 

Not so pretty? The Rock Climb segments that are now a lot harder to spot behind houses, since the way the 3D modeling is done, the hotels actually do cover a bunch of the stuff behind them, making it a bit irritating for me to try and guess where the rock climb spots are. It's these little moments where you can really tell that they were focused more on making a one-to-one remake with pretty graphics, without really understanding how those graphics would translate into the new engine. Compared to HGSS and ORAS, you really can tell.

I've also completely missed the long route below Hearthome, filled with security guards who would only battle at night, as well as Mr. Backlot's mansion. The little minigame isn't active yet until after I beat the Elite Four, though. I always found the concept of the Backlot Mansion to be so weird, with rooms blocked away by maids who never go away even until the post-game, and the implied 'comedy' that Mr. Backlot likes to show off so much that he makes his butler run around, kidnap/buy a bunch of rare Pokemon and let them loose in his backyard just so he appears to be telling the truth. It's a cute mechanical way to get an area with rare Pokemon, but considering so much of base Sinnoh is so repetitive, I really felt like they could've just introduced a lot of the Sinnoh-dex's Pokemon they hid in Backlot's garden to actual wild encounters. 

Anyway, I actually did spent a bit of time running around the routes I haven't explored, but... there's just not much that's interesting, honestly. It's just trainers, and with how slow battles are paced in this game, I really don't have much to say here. Next up will be the climax of the game, though, so I hope it'll be a fair bit more fun!

Random Notes:

• There's a skier that talks about 'ghost stories' in the mountains, which I thought is just a clever reference to Froslass... but turns out we actually do meet what I think is a ghost. A friendly ghost! One of the cabins has a woman who speaks slowly and mutters about how not a lot of travelers come her way, and gives me a Spell Tag. Exit and re-enter the cabin, and she's gone! OooOooOO!
• The notorious trainer that will trade you a Haunter for a Medicham is still there, and she still puts an Everstone on her Haunter, with the same line of dialogue saying that she's doing it on purpose to stop her Haunter from changing forms after evolving. Little troll!
• At some point I went shopping in the Veilstone Department Store for TMs...  but decided that the game was easy enough thanks to, again, the level scaling, without me having to also have perfect Thunderbolt/Flamethrower/Ice Beam/Psychic/Shadow Ball coverage. 
• I do find it charming that half of the Team Galactic employees are grunts yelling about "the world will be purified, space and time will be rewritten before our great leader", typical villainous minion stuff....  while the other half are corporate jokes like "I haven't been promoted despite working for five years, FML". 
• One of the funnier things is the little post-it notes in the Team Galactic office cafeteria, with a lot of notes in the vein of "a healthy meal leads to a healthy life" and then our character sees that the sink is dirty and the fridge is filled with filthy crap. 
• Turns out the epic scene of Cyrus addressing his army of Team Galactic fanatics, and our player witnessing it from the shadows, is another Platinum-exclusive scene. And I'm not saying that Platinum's Cyrus is some kind of masterpiece in writing or anything of the sort, but the extra scenes would definitely have worked to make him feel less like a first draft. 
• I also remembered the Backlot Mansion maids having a little gauntlet battle minigame, but, again, another Platinum addition. 

Reviewing Monsters: Elden Ring, Part 16

It has been some time since I've last touched Elden Ring, but it's inherently a game that I need to be 'in the zone' to play. And last I left off, I was partway through exploring the Volcano Manor as well as the Leyndell. The thing is, I kind of want to complete the Volcano Manor questline but the final parts of it require me to travel to areas beyond Leyndell. No excuse not to sneak around the manor and progress through the dungeon, though, which is what I've been doing.

And while I'm doing that, I'm just going back and forth between Volcano Manor and Leyndell the Royal Capital dungeons, because they're both super long and... frankly, neither are the most interesting to go through. Volcano Manor's a bit more fun because the visuals and enemies are neat, but it's also a bit of a nightmare to navigate and it's a bit hard just bumbling around not being sure where to go. (I also fear going too deep into the Volcano Manor and accidentally screwing up some quests. I do really like Volcano Manor, though -- I've covered the enemies before, but there are a lot of Albinaurics being captured and tortured by the local cult, and they're also the ones responsible for the Abductor Virgins that have traumatized me just a little bit. 

Meanwhile, Leyndell is immense. From a design standpoint, I absolutely love that this is a massive city that actually does feel like a city instead of just a block. But the lower levels are just super-duper boring to go through, all the streets do look the samey, and there are so many knights that can one-shot me. Leyndell actually became extremely not fun for me to go through, and that lower half of the city takes up so much time to explore. It's not until a fair amount of running around and being confused that I actually get to see what the game wants me to see -- the giant petrified corpse of a gigantic dragon the size of the city; giant tree roots that scale up and connect different parts of the capital; even a strange little parallel of the familiar Roundtable Hold, complete with all the same rooms. Except it's abandoned. Hmm! Some timey-wimey shenanigans? Extradimensional shenanigans? 

Eventually, I did reach the boss room in Leyndell first before I did the Volcano Manor. Which is where  this segment of the review nicely concludes. I would've liked to move the snakes into their own page with Rykard, but that would leave this review extremely short. Oh well, we'll see what enemies we see in the next leg of the game, and Rykard can hang with them. 

Anyway, I'm progressing, bit by bit. 

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Gelmir Man-Serpent

Rather subtly at first but a bit more evident later on, Volcano Manor has a very heavy 'serpent' theme to it. And once you start exploring what's beyond the bounty-hunting 'face' and go into the actual 'legacy dungeon' where a town seems to have sunken into lava, you find a bunch of these guys patrolling around. These Man-Serpents most often present themselves scrunched up, looking more like chunky lizard-people or something but with disturbingly gangly humanoid limbs growing out of it. They've got big, smiling faces that look quite accurate to snakes. And they fight with a glaive and a cute tiny buckler shield, although some have pretty nasty fire-whips... that are stored in a candlestick, ha! 

They can also stretch, which they don't actually do often and caught me off guard when I first saw one do so. They stretch fully into the length of a giant snake and shoot straight up, which looks glorious but also hilarious when you see those tiny toothpick-like arms and legs hanging off of its giant snake body. In this form they kind of act like sentry towers, allowing them to attack at wacky angles and reach you when you're behind them. They're quite funny, and I actually really find it refreshing that we have a race of 'snake-people' that aren't poison-themed in any way, shape or form; and neither are they doing the typical 'humanoid upper body, snake lower body' look. This looks both comical and unnatural, both qualities applying very much to the Man-Serpents. 

Living in a volcano, next to lava and the lava-slugs they are also resistant to heat... which doesn't come to play in my playthrough since I don't use fire incantations, but it's a nice little detail. I also like that, again, they don't just breathe or control fire, they're just resistant and able to live around lava. Some even hide in lava to ambush you! That's neat. 

But while most of the Man-Serpents we fight in the game are hostile and just act like snakes, one of the recurring NPCs is a sweet girl called Rya. She has a very pronounced hunchback, like her spine refuses to bend 'properly' like a human. Taken on its own, it's just a quirkly little thing, maybe a medical condition or something along the lines. Rya's quite sweet and a bit of an airhead... and as we progress in her questline, she'd reveal her true self... she, too, is a Man-Serpent! One with a unique colouration, and she wears part of her dress like a poncho. And she never stops being kind in her dialogue, being more confused and a bit embarrassed that she needs to hide her true snakey form. 

Unfortunately, as you continue on the Volcano Manor quest, you also meet Rya's mom... who made Rya through a 'hideous ritual'. The game is classy enough not to elaborate more on that, but knowing how Mother Tanith acts towards the serpent god she fanatically worships, it's not hard to put two and two together. And while it's implied that Rya was just born a shapeshifting serpent person, the implication is that maybe all the other serpent-people we see in Volcano Manor are also conceived this way? Or are they "merely" humans who get transformed over time, like so many other Elden Ring monstrosities? Our buddy Rya is genuinely horrified that her status as a snake person is due to this horridness and not the 'grace of a king', which apparently is something that's both unacceptable to men and serpents. 

In any case, the Man-Serpents join the Living Jars and Demi-Humans in actually having friendly representatives that will talk to our hero.

Serpent Snail

We've seen the model of this thing a bunch of times before, with the Crystal Snail and the hilarious Spirit-Caller Snail boss, but the Serpent Snail here seems to be the most 'basic' of the snake-snail monsters. Its proximity to Volcano Manor also makes it feel a bit more natural, too. The design is pretty much what you'd expect. It's a snake body, the lower half sticks on walls and ceilings, it's got a snail's shell, and probably my favourite aspect is the upper half of its head, which doesn't have a regular snake face but terminates in the eyestalks of a snail. 

Not a whole ton to talk about beyond being a weird animal, but it sure is cool! 

Frenzied First-Generation Albinauric

I thought I talked about these guys earlier, but apparently I haven't! These guys show up in Leyndell's lower cities and sewers, but a lot of them appear in the Volcano Manor, seemingly left curled up in pain in the more abandoned segment of the mansion that's sinking into the lava. These Albinaurics used to be the 'First-Generation' Albinaurics, the ones that look like old silver men with stumped legs. These guys look way more wretched, however. Their heads are wrapped up in burlap sacks (which based on item descriptions are torture devices), with only their ragged beards and extremely angry mouths being visible. 

These Albinaurics are extremely feral, having been driven insane by aforementioned torture. They are kind of blind, so most of them are just curled up in dark corners in the dungeon until you do the foolishness of walking into the room, at which point they scuttle and moan and charge you like a rapid dog. It does really make for a very terrifying jump-scare. It's a nice reuse of the same animations we've already seen for the 'sane' First-Generation Albinaurics, but the presentation and the much more frantic and animalistic sounds they make really do make these guys far more terrifying. 

The 'non-tortured' First-Generation Albinaurics are still around, but they are mostly found in cages hanging on ceilings, looking down and screaming to alert their brethren like little watch-birds. While we've seen the Village of Albinaurics being put to the sword, turns out that the Golden Order's hatred towards things 'outside of the Order' goes to pretty terrifying torture. Whether it's the discarded Albinaurics (who hang out with Omens!) in the subterranean shunning-grounds of Leyndell, or the straight-up hellish torture grounds in Volcano Manor, these poor Albinaurics can't really catch a break,  can they? 

Lesser Bloodhound Knight

Volcano Manor is also home to these guys! We've fought a couple of 'boss' Bloodhound Knights before, but this is the first time they appear as regular enemies. They're a bit funnier now that I realize they can actually cling on walls like Spider-Man with their very bestial stance and the giant claw-weapons on their feet. It adds a bit of goofiness to a knight in a game with a lot of knights. Not much to say about them, otherwise, or the many different humanoid enemies in Leyndell.

More Random Bosses

I did clear these guys a while back, but never got to put them in a 'reviewing' segment. We get a proper, larger Full-Grown Fallingstar Beast, hanging out in a crater and looking as creepy as ever as a giant earwig meteor monster. I get to see a bit more of its gravity magic attacks, and it's quite fun fighting him while riding a horse as well. I think it's got some unique boss moves, like the ability to lift everyone around it up and then slamming them down to the ground.  I also cleared a couple of caves with multiple unnamed Crystalians fighting me together. There were also some Magma Wyrms and Black Knife Assassins that I also fought in different parts of the world, which I guess is neat that older bosses are now just more troublesome enemies. 

I also get to fight another Demi-Human Queen, Margot. Pretty cool monsters, but they are variants of things we've covered before. There's also Magnus the Beast Claw, who's just some dude I have to kill for a mission. A lady called Perfumer Tricia is hiding in a sealed dungeon tending to the Misbegotten, and I'm not sure why I have to kill her. I also killed a troll knight called Bols, Carian Knight which is kind of an unfortunate name. Cool to see a troll magic-user as the item descriptions have hinted at.

There's also Necromancer Garris, who's a psycho hiding in a dark dungeon filled with skeletons and illusory walls. Garris, your dungeon was shit to go through. And you're holding a flail called 'Family Heads' made up of the heads of your dead family? You're nuts, buddy. His dungeon also has a second boss, a Black Blade Assassin (who we've talked about before)... except she's invisible, which, yeah, the designers really wanted to fuck people up with this dungeon. 

Skeletal Snail

The more notable thing about Garris, I think, are the minions he summons. Which are Skeletal Snails! Which are undead versions of the Serpent-Snails we talked about above. We've got a very nicely-detailed snake bone body, with some very accurate game sculpting for the snake head and the ribcages running down the body. Only instead of a snail shell, the Skeletal Snail hangs out inside of a giant skull! It's great. Undead variations that aren't just 'skeleton with a different weapon' is great. And in a game with such a rich bestiary, I very much appreciate this as a 'reskin' attempt to save on animations, but still deliver a really distinctive enemy. 

The Skeletal Snail doesn't just spit poison or whatever, they can actually cast necromancy spells, sending screaming necromantic skulls chasing you around. They are undead half-snake half-snail skull-shelled necromancers! What's not to love? 

Duelist

We leave behind the Volcano Manor and assorted bosses for a bit to go to Leyndell, Royal Capital. The vast majority of the enemies in the Royal Capital are variations of the Knights (those damn knights), Pages, Perfumers and the odd rotten dog or two. Oh, and a small wing overrun by Misbegotten. While the capital initially looked promising with a bunch of the Oracle Envoys, it really is just a slog of humanoids between entertaining minibosses. We do get some new ones, the Duelist, which are just former gladiators that fight for entertainment in the coliseums similar to the Pumpkin Heads. These guys have giant axes or hammers that are attached to their bodies with chains, and God of War style swing them around with the chains. It's gloriously over-the-top, I can't hate them for that.

Valiant Gargoyle

I have actually met these giant winged statue-men several times before, or at least enemies with the same model, but my principle is to only talk about them after I've beaten them instead of running away with my tail between my legs. And the Valiant Gargoyle serves as a mini-boss both within the Royal Capital dungeon itself and in a sub-area outside in Leyndell. Pretty impressive guys, these gargoyles tower over your characters, who barely reach their knees. Their design looks like some kind of emaciated stone angel, with a pair of jagged wings. It's a bit had to tell as it tries to murder the shit out of you, but the Gargoyle does have very prominent ribcage and a head that looks like a masked human. 

They are insanely fast, jumping around and swinging those massive weapons of theirs. While we've had other large enemies like dragons and golems before, the gargoyles are nowhere as lumbering as the golem, and their attack patterns are way more erratic and frantic compared to the dragons. Honestly, playing as a 'glass cannon' sorcerer, these things are the bane of my existence since they catch up with me very fast and have pretty unpredictable spins that are a giant pain to fight. Oh, they also have a sonic screaming blast with an insane range. I don't have the energy to describe every attack that the gargoyles can do, but suffice to say that they are a gigantic pain in my playthrough. One of the boss fights in Nokron had you fight two of them at the same time!

There isn't much telling us what the gargoyles are, though, beyond them being big and stony. At least, not this variant...

Black Blade Kindred

Another variant of the gargoyles, the Black Blade Kindred, shows up as a 'gatekeeper' boss in a weird little passageway after leaving Leyndell and going up another elevation up to the Mountaintops of the Giants (which, spoiler alert, does mean that I did beat Leyndell). The Black Blade Kindred is a black-and-gold angel of death, and you can see a grinning exposed face beneath. They are specifically identified by item descriptions as being created to serve Maliketh, the demigod in charge of death, which is probably why he's hanging out guarding the pathway up to the Mountains. More disturbingly, however, it's also noted that the gargoyles and Black Blade Kindreds are created using 'corpsewax', and indeed looking at the equipment it does seem like they've 'patched' together black and golden material together. So these things aren't just stone giants in the shape of starving giants, they're also made up of corpses. Lovely. 

Taking aside their insane abilities in combat aside, I do find these takes on gargoyles to be quite disturbing for the simple reason that they look quite similar to humans... in all the wrong ways. It would've been obvious to go for a 'demon' or even an uncanny valley 'angel', but going for a starving, gaunt old man as the base design and making the proportions just a bit off is a great, creepy way to make these things traumatically memorable. 

Vargram & Wilhelm

Found within Leyndell's strange copy of the Roundtable Hold are two more targets for the Volcano Manor -- Vargram the Raging Wolf and Errant Sorcerer Wilhelm. Again... we know absolutely nothing about these guys beyond the vague bit of 'kill them for rewards', only learning a bit more about them from item drops. For as much as I do love Elden Ring's method of world-building, I'm not a fan of this. It would've been a bit more interesting to know who these guys are even if you don't want to waste time showing us their stories, at least tell us beforehand! Vargram is one of the founders of the Roundtable Hold, and Wilhelm is one of those sorcerers who was taken by the 'primeval current' and in following it, got into conflict with his old buddy Vargram. That's some backstory, but the game just tosses them at us and then they just die. I do find them notable for having some of the nicer-looking armour sets in the game. 

Godfrey, the First Elden Lord

With the game prominently telling us in the prologue how everything went to shit after Godfrey died, it was definitely an unexpected bit when he randomly shows up partway through the Royal Capital. Boss music suddenly plays, and this hulking golden shining brute holding a battleaxe bigger than my character is tall just charges menacingly towards me. 

He sure is a big guy with a big axe. It is cool because of the lore related to the character and the sheer surprise of the name of the boss showing up above the health bar, but he's just a straight-up Dark Souls melee fight. And design-wise it's a bit hard to see what's going on when he's literally shining, but he's just some warrior king. Okay!

Morgott, the Omen King

"Have it writ upon thy meagre grave... felled by King Morgott! Last of all kings."

This guy. Ooooh, this guy. In a plot twist, turns out that the demigod guarding the Royal Capital is... Margit the Fell Omen, the very first plot-relevant boss we met all the way guarding the gateway to Godrick's castle so many dungeons ago! Literally a year ago for me, since I took huge breaks in-between playing chunks of Elden Ring. It was quite nostalgic to hear his voice again. I was admittedly spoiled about Morgott/Margit's appearance as a boss fight later on, although to be fair it didn't take too much of a leap to guess that the demigod named Morgott might have some connection to this 'Margit' fellow we met earlier in the game. Not the best disguise there, buddy!

Morgott does have a killer of an opening cutscene. He counts down all the demigods, some we've slain, some we've helped, some we've yet to meet... and denounces all of his siblings as 'willful traitors, all'.  Morgott then does a killer sequence as he smashes the walking cane he's in, Bleach style, to reveal one hell of a cool-looking sword within. And the giant dude starts the boss fight with that quote on top about thy meagre grave!

Pretty cool, even if for his first phase Morgott does a lot of the same things he did as Margit, just with a sword instead of a wooden cane. He still summons holy golden weapons (and the revelation that he's a god adds context to that) and still leaps around with his massive scorpion tail. I actually found Morgott much easier than Margit for the simple fact that we're not fighting in a bridge anymore, and the larger arena gives me more space to dodge and to snipe him with my spells. Morgott does have a phase two where he gains a lot of wide-area flame explosions and rains of holy swords falling from the sky, but ultimately it's just a couple of extra spells. He still beat me a couple of times, of course, but out of the demigods I'm pretty sure he was the fastest for me to slay. Did get to hear "put these foolish ambitions to rest" a couple of times. 

Of course, as his titles note, Morgott is actually an Omen -- explaining those nasty growths on his face which are actually bony horns. Omens, if you remember, are cursed mutants that the Golden Order despise, and the official decree from the gods and the churches is to either kill or lock up these Omens, and all the Omens we've met are implied to have gone feral. That Morgott is an omen born to gods means that he's a pariah among his siblings, but he's living proof perhaps that Omens are not as cursed or separated from the Golden Order as religious propaganda made it out to be. He's clearly still able to use holy swords, and by his 'willful traitors' comment, it's notable that Morgott is probably the only demigod still protecting the Erdtree and doing what is supposed to be the duty of these demigods. Alas, he stands between the path of the Tarnished and the throne of the Elden Lord I still hold a fucking grudge over that bridge, okay? I'm sorry, Morgott, your story is cool and all, but honestly, I am glad I put you in the ground after the many, many times you killed me before Stormveil Castle. Ahem. I mean, I actually do think Morgott might be my favourite boss in terms of story, if not design. Shame he didn't actually get a second phase transformation.

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Anyway, after quite a fair amount of real-world time since I unlocked Leyndell, Royal Capital, I've finally finished it. Next up will be me going through the Mountaintops of the Giants, as well as wrapping up Volcano Manor! 

Let's Play Pokemon Shining Pearl, Part 5 - Libraries and Bombs

We start off this time in Canalave City, the little lazy port town on Western Sinnoh. I really like the design of Canalave City, it's a city split in half by an opening bridge and a little docking area for the ferries that come into the harbour. First up, though, we've got a battle with our ever-hyper rival Barry, and this is the first time that he's actually a bit of a challenge. Not in this game with its whack level scaling, no, but he now has five Pokemon, has actually evolved his Starly, and he's packing a Heracross in addition to his normal gang of early-game Pokemon.

This is also probably the first time in the game that I buy that he's actually beaten the gym leader of the town. Between Monferno and Heracross, I can almost believe that he beat Byron before me.

Canalave City's got a lot of things to do and see. We've got the Move Deleter, who is useless now that HMs are no longer a thing. We've got the ever-mysterious Harbour Inn, with its faded signs and its tightly shut doors... since we get the Azure Flute in the remake, I assume that the previously Nintendo-event-locked location might actually be something accessible in this playthrough? One can only hope. 

At this point in the game, too, Sailor Eldritch's son is still running around happily and yapping a lot in their home, with Eldritch's wife commenting on how the child is a bit too energetic. Ominous, ironic foreshadowing, anyone? 

My favourite part of Canalave City is, of course, Canalave Library, which has a lot of foreshadowing about the world-building. It's filled with a lot of the Sinnoh Myths, which I remembered spending a lot of time reading and cross-referencing with Pokemon dex entries back when I first discovered Generation IV and V after my hiatus. Lots of fun bits here, and I always love the extra effort the development team spent on making the mythology actually sound like the verbage of real-world mythologies. From the strange, esoteric mentions of how Pokemon decide to join humans from tall grass; or the oft-memed one where 'Pokemon and humans dined at the same table'... to more specific myths like Arceus creating the world with a thousand hands, or the horror stories of how Uxie, Azelf and Mesprit can steal your emotions and memories if interacted with wrongly. Always maintained that the three Lake Guardians would've been a lot more memorable to me if they had actually been more distinctive about their themes instead of just being the same design wearing different hats. 

"Look not into the Pokémon's eyes. In but an instant, you'll have no recollection of who you are. Return home, but how? When there is nothing to remember?

Dare not touch the Pokémon's body. In but three short days, all emotions will drain away.

Above all, above all, harm not the Pokémon. In a scant five days, the offender will grow immobile in entirety."

How much cooler is that than how the Lake Guardians are in the actual gameplay? 

Out of the myths in the game (which I don't have the time to talk about every single one in this let's play) I do think that the one titled simply 'Sinnoh Myth': "Betray not your anger, lest ??? will come. Weep not with sorrow, or ??? will draw near. When joy and enjoyment come natural as the very air, that is happiness. Let such be blessed by the hand of Master ???. Those words were spoken often as customary." is probably the one I'm not sure about. I don't think it's referring to a specific Pokemon that I know of, unless anger and sorrow are more references towards Mesprit? 

Also, in probably one of the more obscure cross-game references is a 'newly decoded' book in the Canalave Library's second floor -- every other interactable book is on the third floor -- which talks about the 'Seaside Hollow', and how a Mantyke, a Buizel and a Qwilfish with longer horns recognized a human and brought them to the Prince of the Sea. I wasn't super active in the online communities, but apparently this brought a lot of discussion about a potential Qwilfish evolution... and the payoff would be Pokemon: Legends Arceus, which takes place in ancient Sinnoh and features Manaphy and the Seaside Hollow, and a Qwilfish evolution at that. Very cool, very 'guide dang it', but it's a nice little fanboy moment. 

Next up is the Canalave Gym, which I think is one of the few gyms to be identical between Diamond/Pearl and Platinum. It's a serviceable little maze, I suppose, with elevators going up and down that I think is meant to resemble a construction zone? Not the most memorable gym puzzle, and to be frank not the most memorable gym in general. My team having two Ground-types (Torterra and Gastrodon) with access to Earthquake and Earth Power, plus a Toxicroak having access to Cross Chop, also really trivializes the gym trainers that the only problem here is PP. All the trainers also almost exclusively use Onix, which isn't even Steel-type. There is a very random trainer with an Azumarill in the gym, and I'm not sure why... but I actually like it? I like it if gyms throw us little curveballs like this. 

Byron himself is... all right. I've always found it funny that he looks like an extra from Fairy Tail or something, particularly with his 'construction worker with a wanderer's cape for some reason' design. Byron tells us that Roark is his son, before challenging me to battle. His team is... all right? His Bronzor starts off with a Trick Room, and then he follows up with Steelix and Bastiodon. Of course, Earthquakes and Earth Powers make his team kind of a joke. Steel honestly isn't anywhere of the defensive bulwark it's supposed to be since Generation II, and the type combination of Steel/Rock and Steel/Ground is a liability more than a strength most of the time. 

Oh, my Skorupi finally evolves into Drapion at this point. I like my giant centaur-scorpion monster! 

After beating Byron, Barry brings me to the library where Professor Rowan and Lucas are there. Rowan has such a minimal presence in the Generation IV games, honestly, that I actually laughed when he talks about 'if you remember, my expertise is Pokemon evolution'. No, professor, you barely have a presence after your initial appearance, and you're so stoic that you don't have any of the goofy quirks that someone like Birch or Elm have. Rowan does give us a well-written speech about the philosophy of evolution, and how it relates to perfection... and if the legendary Pokemon that don't evolve are actually already perfect, if they are already complete as creatures. Interesting theory, professor, but some legendary Pokemon in Alola might disagree with you!

And it's actually a nice little speech that might have some thematic tie-ins with Cyrus's whole desire for a perfect world. It's just that the way that the Generation IV games are written, we get these huge moments of lore-vomit interspaced with long periods of not really meeting the main characters, making it rather difficult for me to be invested in the story the way that the Unova or Alola games grab me. 

Rowan wants us to go and check out the three lakes of Sinnoh, and as the lakes are being doled out (I'm assigned Valor), a huge shaking happens. Which... isn't actually as epic as I thought the remake would make it out to be. 

Everyone rushes out of the library, and I like that the game gives the NPCs some altered dialogue as they react to the massive earthquake. Barry immediately rushes off to Lake Valor, and that's where I'm supposed to go. Professor Rowan and Lucas... just mutters something about not doing anything too un-safe, and bugger off to continue investigating Lake Verity. I guess they don't really care about the huge explosion/earthquake that just happened? Although, not going to lie, completely understandable civilian response. 

But Lake Valor can wait, I'm going to Iron Island first to just rush through a side-quest. And one thing about Iron Island that I can say is that... it's completely boring. It's an okay enough length for a cave-type 'dungeon', but every single Pokemon there are Generation I cave Pokemon -- Onix, Graveler and Golbat -- that aren't even new in this game. Gravelers have been hounding me in all the grass patches around Mt. Coronet! There are items and trainers, I guess, but I just sprayed a ton of repel to go through this. 

Riley's here too, I guess, but he's... he's really got nothing going on to him other than his cool Lucario outfit, yeah? I guess this is supposed to be our big introduction to Generation IV's marketing baby, but Riley's Lucario keeps spamming Screech of all moves. Where are your Aura Spheres, Lucario?

At the end of Iron Island are a couple of Team Galactic members, with the very vague handwave of them 'agitating' Pokemon. Except none of the trainers, or even Riley, explains that this is even a thing that's happening. It would've been a cool little side-quest, but the conflict that Team Galactic is doing anything just feels randomly shoehorned in. It's honestly kind of lame. With Riley giving me the Riolu egg and my bag filled with more loot from Iron Island, I leave and head off to Lake Valor. 

As it was in the original game, Lake Valor is blasted up with all the water completely gone. I'm not sure that's what happens if you detonate a bomb in a lake, but I guess this is a galactic bomb, so what do I know? All the poor Magikarps are just karp-karp-karping all over the place, poor things! A huge school is blocking the upper-left corner, preventing me from exploring all of Lake Valor other than the area directly around Azelf's cave. It is kind of strange that there are ready-made stairs in the lake, though. Anyway, I've always found it cool that even in the Nintendo DS days that they bothered to put in all the effort to temporarily change this location for maybe 20 minutes of gameplay. 15 if you rush through the battles. Meanwhile you've got Sword and Shield who had the massive Dynamax Pokemon rampaging happen completely offscreen. 

And that's what's kind of surprising, for such a cool location you really do breeze through like maybe three grunts that are battling? Not all of them fight me, for sure. Some are just ranting about the power of the Galactic Bomb. In the cave is Commander Saturn, the one with the spiky blue hair, and he gives a bit of a badass boast about how all of Team Galactic's plans are going as they have foreseen and whatnot. The battle against him is rather simple, he sports a Bronzor, Toxicroak and a Kadabra. That's new, I guess, for Team Galactic, even if it's not particularly powerful. After getting beaten, Saturn changes his tune about how 'even' a commander was only briefly delayed. And... yeah, Omega Ruby and Alpha Sapphire really did a great job at giving extra quirks to the Magma and Aqua admins. Actually, HeartGold and SoulSilver did the same as well, giving them models and names. I dunno, even if they didn't quite go as extreme as the ORAS admins, they could've imported some of Mars, Jupiter and Saturn's anime or manga characteristics. Even expanding a bit on their dialogue would've done wonders. 

Saturn and gang somehow escape, because I guess I can't detain them with my Torterra and Gastrodon and Drapion. Despite Saturn and the grunts being quite clear that they've taken the legendary Pokemon to their base in Veilstone, I never bring this up to Rowan or anyone, which really does feel kind of disingenuous, isn't it? By all means, block the path into the Veilstone Galactic HQ until the game wants me to, but at least give an excuse, y'know?

Anyway, I continue to fly off to Lake Verity, which is the second lake that I can access. Rowan is supposed to be fighting a grunt, I think, although just like Generation IV they're just staring at each other. I forge through a bunch of double battles before I finally reach Lucas, who has been beaten by Mars. No double battles here, this isn't Platinum. Mars remembers me from Valley Windworks, gets angry, and fights me again with her team of Golbat, Purugly and Toxicroak. Again... not really a threat, even back in the day when level-scaling wasn't broken. 

Mars then gives a speech about how Azelf being disturbed also ends up causing Mesprit to pop out and try and aid his friend, allowing them to catch Mesprit. Honestly, Team Galactic, with your teams filled with Golbats and Toxicroaks, I am genuinely baffled how you guys are able to catch the Lake Guardians. I guess the grunts with Stunky could do something, but I really felt that the game designers really missed a chance to be thematic here. Heck, a lot of the game script even implies that Team Galactic collects Clefairy for some reason (the kidnapped Clefairy; and some grunts mention getting Clefairies as rewards), that would've been something, y'know? I don't think they really quite 'got' making evil team grunts a bit more interesting until Generation VI, maybe VII. 

Mars leaves, because apparently all of the legendary Pokemon have been transported off-screen. Rowan and Lucas show up and discuss what's going on with the lake guardians, and sends me off to back up Barry in Lake Acuity... all the way up in Snowpoint, which means it's time for another long trek! Which I will do... next time.

Random Notes:

• As I go through the little building outside of Canalave City, one of Rowan's researchers -- who's also Lucas's dad -- shows up and goes on to upgrade my pokedex with the ability to see gender differences, before commenting that my Pokedex actually has already been upgraded. I'm assuming this is something that was an actual upgrade in the original game that they gave us from the get-go in the remakes.
• Who names their child 'Eldritch'? Honestly, maybe it's just my exposure to D&D and the Cthulhu Mythos in general that makes this a common word for me, but it's such an on-the-nose name even for Pokemon. 
  
• Yes, Nintendo/Gamefreak's research to make 'mythology-sounding' material for the Canalave Library was the result of the very unfortunate drafts starring most infamously Typhlosion that was leaked online in the massive Nintendo giga-leak. Which I still haven't covered the prototype Pokemon in. Maybe someday.
• Gastrodon has learned Earth Power, and the animation for Earth Power and the massive lava-encrusted rocks that explode up from the ground is just so cool in this game. 
• Looking at the Platinum trainer line-up, its version of the Canalave gym actually replaces the Onix horde with Magnemites and Bronzors, which makes much more sense for a Steel-type gym. 
• Apparently, the dialogue implies that Barry either forgot he has a Pokedex, or he didn't even receive one at all because he never went back to Rowan? That's actually a totally believable Barry thing to do. 
• Okay, fine, Iron Island is good for catching wild Steelix, which is one of the few times that a trade-evolution Pokemon is available to catch in the wild. But other than that, it's really boring.