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.