Let's Play Pokemon Legends Z-A, Part 41: The Scoville Scale

Grinding is bullshit in this game. 

Whoever thought of lengthening Pokemon games by forcing nonsense gimmicky grinding like these donut and time-gated bullshit, or the raid battles in the Galar games, should really not work in Pokemon anymore. I want to play POKEMON, to catch new species or to battle new trainers, not to fucking run around like a headless chicken doing shitty parkour while some arbitrary donut countdown is happening. 

I decide to do a whole bunch more side-quests, mostly because I just really find them infinitely more interesting than the boring, brain-dead 'go into hyperspace hole, do random tasks and fill your box with junk before the time runs out, hope you get good berries'. It's not quite brain dead enough for me to spam while watching a TV show (which is something I could button-mash back in my GBA/DS Elite Four grinding days) but neither is it interesting enough to actually properly grab my attention. 

I have also been going to most of the wild Pokemon rifts I can, and there are a lot of new-to-this-game Pokemon. Treecko, Nacli, Mime Jr, Morpeko, Glimmet, Chingling, Yamask... but you know what? When you just plop random wild Pokemon into a very samey generated map, I just... I just don't have anything to say about them. It's like the Friend Safaris or whatever, but those at least were a no-bullshit fast-to-do way to insert a large number of Pokemon without making new maps. A DLC I paid for... really didn't have an excuse to at least make like thematic maps for me to run around in. 

Good donuts really do make a difference, though, because I ran onto the Mega Chimecho battle again, and using a 3* donut or whatever, it was a cakewalk. Sure, the buffed stats allowed Mega Chimecho to stall out a bit, but it otherwise feels like a regular mega battle from the base game. But damn I hate the donut system. 

Mega Chimecho is neat, though. A bit weird and not my thing, but it actually becomes Psychic/Steel with its gigantic golden frame, and the fight against it would probably be much faster if I knew that. 

Another new, unexpected mega I find in the rifts is... Scovillain! I am both surprised and pleased that we are giving some spotlights to Pokemon that debuted as recently as Paldea. Mega Scovillain is a pleasant one to look at, adding some black collar/jacket to its upper body and expanding its two bell pepper heads to look more draconic with spikes and stuff (which are made out of the pepper seeds). It's also got kind of a forked 'tongue' or 'tie' made up of a giant zigzag chili pepper. It actually doesn't change much of regular Scovillain's design, but it changes enough to feel different, if you know what I mean?

This segues nicely to a sidequest starring Armie, who was an NPC with a Litleo who wanted to have it help me cook or something back in the early parts of the game. He now wants the help of a Scovillain with its signature move Spicy Extract, because he wants to set up a SPICE FIESTA to make Restaurant Le Nah stand out. The Spice Fiesta actually has a large number of customers showing up, and he and his little fandom keeps yelling that it's "by the spice lovers, for the spice lovers, spice fiesta" or something like that. What follows is a rather miserably long side-quest where Scovillain and I have to go around launching Spicy Extract at each table in the restaurant. Which isn't that bad until you realize that there's a cooldown to these moves, making each wait a fair bit annoying. 

Tarragon and Grisham get a cute little cameo here, discussing Canari Bread, but otherwise aren't amusing enough for the sidequest to be anything but annoying. 

A police officer finds a Corvisquire that's running around panicking over an embroidered scarf with the name "Destin" on it. There's a cute little bit where I call Naveen for help, and Naveen lampshades how it's a bit much to expect him to be identify the maker of someone just by a scrap of clothing. He directs me to Asami, the Furisode Girl running the expensive boutique. Asami finds all of this to be extremely exciting and romantic and right out of a novel or whatever, and is able to identify the scarf as being used in some academy in Galar. I go to the Lumiose Académie Étoile, where I find Destin. Destin is reunited with Corvisquire, who he recognizes as a Rookidee that used to be weak and got bullied when he lived in Galar. He's big and strong now!

He challenges me to a fight, and... and his team is kind of low-leveled, while at this point in the DLC the game punishes me for not having level 90-100's to properly interact with the bullshit donuts. Even with carrying around one or two Pokemon to evolve for the dex, I still handily beat so many of these sidequest trainers. It's just bad game balance all around, really; even worse than Paldea because Paldea at least has the levels be a soft guide on a recommended way to explore the open world. These side-quests literally unlock depending on the main story, which also depend on me clearing the higher-leveled hyperspace raids. 

A dude that threw out his back demands the move Octolock to fix his back. Only Octolock can fix his back, and nothing else can. I still haven't found the rift with Clobbopus... but Octolock has appeared in my Malamar's learn list. So I teach it to Malamar, and he strikes the back of that man with Octolock. I... okay. That fixes him right up, and he begins to wax some lyrical about how important health is and how back pain hurts everyone at his age. Man, they do know their current audience! 

Oh, and he actually changes his dialogue, starting to thank Grapploct... before realizing that it's a Malamar that fixed him. That's cute, Gamefreak. 

In the rifts, I do more rematches with the characters based on their faction. Ivor and Gwynn are hanging out in the sewers. Gwynn goes "Stuck with my brother even here. Cursed fate." Korrina is the one that shows out to help me, and we fight them. Again, same team, same mega evolutions. There's a cute bit where Ivor and Gwynn do the same 'strength is power' pose, and they acknowledge that their teamwork isn't quite as perfect despite sharing blood. 

Korrina is all excited about seeing new mega evolutions, and gives Ivor a bit of instruction to actually grow as a trainer instead of just relying on the raw power of mega evolution since the trainer/Pokemon connection is important. Ivor gives both Korrina and myself the Fists of Justice Gi (which comes with actual muscles for the exposed arm!). Korrina finally for the first time acknowledges that she is the Shalour Gym Leader, and notes the multiple titles she has -- gym leader, mega evolution successor, and now Team MZ. She actually notes that she 'dropped her roller skate gimmick'. Oh! So that's what happened to those roller skates! Neat to see this actually acknowledged, even in a side-quest. 

Another fight I do with pairs in Hyperspace is Canari and Tarragon. There's a bit where Tarragon and Canari argue whether this counts as 'precious family time', but then Naveen shows up and notes that while I have a lot of time with Canari, he never actually get a chance. And he decides to prove his worth, challenging DYN4MO to a two on two fight. 

The battle is won, and Canari asks the 'MZ Canatic' what he wants. Naveen finally confesses... that he wants to make an outfit that Canari would wear someday. Canari doesn't mind, under the very simple and reasonable condition that she must like the outfit. That's a cute little moment, and even fits with the 'supporting characters give me their outfits' theme as Canari gives me a copy of her tracksuit to wear, while Naveen gets a... Canari Bread. Which Naveen promises to treasure, but Canari gets mad because you're supposed to eat bread. 

There's also a cute bit where Tarragon wants to wear matching outfits with Canari, but Canari just yells in all caps "NO YOU DON'T". 

Yet another similar fight is Jacinthe and Lebanne, who's hanging out in one of the restaurants. And I promise this isn't even because of my bias against them, but... this fight is just so random, with Lida showing up going 'ey, two on one's not fair' and doing the battle. And very randomly, there isn't any kind of resolution or interaction like Taunie/Corbeau talking about their old debts, or Naveen/Canari talking about fandom, or Korrina instructing Ivor. No, it's Jacinthe randomly being hesitant to learn dancing because she's got a bad sense of rhythm, and Lebanne encouraging her to take dancing lessons with Lida. Wow, Jacinthe, even your sidequest sucks. 

Most importantly out of all these sidequests? I finally do a rematch with Mega Golisopod, actively seeking him out in rifts and coming into the side-quest rifts with as high of a donut power (siiiiigh) as I could. Mega Golisopod is still quite defensive even with the power boost, although it was nowhere as hopeless as before because guess what, I actually have proper time to beat it now. Pretty cool design, Mega Golisopod, and I'm slowly using it and Roserade as part of the rotating party I'm using in the DLC. 

Most importantly, however, is that Mega Golisopod has a type-change... into Bug/Steel! That explains why I found it so hard to beat it before, I was assuming it was Bug/Water still and was spamming Electric moves. Oops! I like the design a lot, and I love that its main claws now look like Wimpods strapped to his arms the way that some other mega evolutions try to take homage from their pre-evolved forms!

Random Notes:

• Yes, Pokemon Wind and Waves are out. I am in love with Pombom, the pomeranian fire starter. I come from the region that this generation is based on, and it's just... surreal to see it actually being represented in the Pokemon franchise as a proper region. Still processing it, to be honest. 
• I hope you enjoy the reviewing-mega-evolutions articles! Obviously, I finished the game before making those monster reviews, but had drafts of the let's play saved elsewhere that I didn't manage to complete before my long trip. 
• More Infinite ZA Fights. I fight Rintaro the chef (he has basically the elemental monkeys and two eevelutions) and Canari again. I also get to fight the Canari fanboy Mani, who wasn't part of the ZA Royale before, and he's got a team of electric-types (Heliolisk, Emolga, Jolteon, and both Kantonian and Alolan Raichu).
• Not surprised that Mani uses Electric-types considering he's a Canari fan, what's more surprising is that he doesn't use an Eelektross!
  
• Slowly doing evolutions for the Pokemon that I capture in the hyperspace rifts as I run through Infinite ZA to grind for money and for the 15 or 20 wins or whatever. Most of them evolve by level up, sure, but some of the weirder evolutions are quite interesting! I figured out that Primeape still evolved by Rage Punching (and it happens 20 times in this game) but I wonder how Galarian Yamask evolves here. 
  
• Even more side-quests:
• A dude that's doing a tapdancing bit with his Mr. Rime challenges me to a battle to show off the move Mimic. I don't even get to see the move he shows off, because my party overlevels his. 
• 
  Another person challenges me to a fight with his defensive Pallosand, and I need to defeat the Pallosand in under 30 seconds. I actually tried to do this properly, and if you don't try, it's actually a bit hard! Mega evolving makes it trivial, but I actually like the challenge. 
• I do a little Assassin's Creed thing with a little Mime Jr. that runs around trying to deliver a post, and I can't be too far or too close from it. Eventually I rescue him from a bully Krokorok. 
• A lady with a Houndour asks me to give her a Feebas. And... that's it. The quest ends like that. There was some dialogue in the beginning comparing Feebas and Magikarp as both Fish Pokemon, but there is no follow up. Just hand over a Feebas, and that's it. That's stupid writing! 
• I do like that the rifts make for a good explanation for regional variants to show up, with all three flavours of Meowth and both flavours of Yamask showing up so far.
• I didn't quite realize it until this point, but at least Slurpuff (and I'm going to assume its counterpart Aromatisse) show up in the hyperspace dimensions. With Slurpuff, Aromatisse and Scizor being the only three trade-exclusive evolutions in this game, I guess technically you could get a complete dex... if you shell out money for the DLC. Boo, Nintendo, boo! 
• A student in Académie Étoile is where I can replay the credits. That's... random!
• Thrown-out-back guy: "You should live life to the fullest and enjoy the time -- and mobility -- you've got!"