Part 36: Steeling and Stealing (HGSS)

Update 28.5: Steeling and Stealing

Olivine City



Oh boy, sixth Gym. Should be a blast with my fire slug.

Pokemon Gym



Well at least he knows what he's talking about this time.



A trainer?! Man, they've really upped the difficulty of these games.



: Thank you for helping the Gym leader, but battle is a separate matter. Go for it!

Ah, uh, okay. The Gym is the exact same, but we have a few words of encouragement from two Lighthouse trainers.



: I know how capable you are from the Lighthouse. It's time you showed that side of yourself to Jasmine! Good luck!



: But this is different. Please allow me to introduce myself. I am Jasmine, a Gym Leader. I use the...clang! Steel type! ...Do you know about the Steel type? They are very hard, cold, sharp, and really strong! Um... I'm not lying.

Gym Leader Battle








Well this is looking mighty familiar. Like with Whitney, Jasmine's team has practically stayed the same. Especially the damn Magnemite. But it shouldn't be too difficult to take down, right?



Ehhhhhhhh.



Alright, let's move onto the big guns. The only difference in moveset is Sandstorm instead of Sunny Day and I'm wondering if that was a necessary change. Sure, Sunny Day boosted Fire type moves, but it also weakened Water type moves. Steelix doesn't actually benefit from Sandstorm increasing its Special Defense as it's no longer a Rock type, so all the weather does is do some chip damage and makes it weak to Water again.



So yeah, one Surf puts it into Sitrus Berry range, which is impressive considering Croconaw's Special Attack.



Admittedly a resisted Iron Tail still does a ton, but what worked in Gen 2 will work here. It's pretty weak on the special side and you can use your starters freely as they all do just fine against the solid snake. Though if depends if you want your Quilava getting hit by an unboosted Rock Throw.



Overall, an alright battle with just a little bit of challe-



Oh yeah, she still has one of these left.



Oh just go down already.

Pokemon Gym



: In accordance with League rules, I confer upon you this Badge.



: With that Badge, all Pokémon, including traded Pokémon up to Lv.70, will obey you without question. Um... Please take this, too...



: Your Pokémon will hit the target with its hard tail, occasionally lowering the target's Defense... Uh... I don't know how to say this, but good luck...



: The Steel type, huh? That was one heated battle you had!



While I forgot to show off my shiny new badge, we at least have some STAB for SolidSnake. Iron Tail isn't the most accurate move, but it'll do just fine.

Route 42



Following the same route as the LP, it's time to say hi to water dog again.



So majestic... and reminds me of that weirdo we keep meeting. I wonder where he is?

Eusine's Theme



: How refreshing it is! How beautiful it is! And how quickly it moves! Kotone! You seem to be around where SUICUNE would appear. Well, that's OK. My desire to search for SUICUNE is far beyond yours... My grandpa was...quite into myths. I've heard so many stories about SUICUNE from him.



: I won't stop following you until I've found out what you're after... You hear me!





Roaming Entei



SPEAKING OF DOGGIES HERE'S ONE NOW LITERALLY AFTER I STOPPED RECORDING



You can find Entei and Raikou around the Johto region after Burned Tower and I should have expected to find Entei here. For the past... three, four playthroughs I've encountered Entei on the water on my first visit to Route 42. It's weird. We're nowhere near ready to try and catch these things, so I'll do some damage and let it flee. What's cool is that each beast has their own encounter music.



It's easy enough to track them, though not as easy as the Marking Map in DPP. Still, at least it's better than the Gen 2 method... oh won't that be a fun update.

Mahogany Town



...mahogany.



: You hear wind blowing into this room? That is...just me whistling. Enough about that. Why don't you buy something?

We can't buy Slowpoketail anymore... my quest for food continues.



Gimme some sugar!



The Cake of Rage is still around, but now it's a Key item, since it's not coded into DPP. We'll find a use for this... muuuuuuch later down the road.



: I happened to have none in stock then. That person left rather upset. I felt kind of sorry for that. I don't want to upset you after buying one from me, but... Buying a RageCandyBar has nothing to do with whether I'd allow you to pass through here. ...Johto has many places to visit, such as the Lighthouse at Olivine and the Pharmacy at Cianwood. Why don't you slow down and enjoy sightseeing?

HINT HINT

Route 43



Bah.



Well this cheers me up. One of the benefits of choosing either Totodile or Chikorita is that they get to their final forms fairly quickly. Cyndaquil havers gotta wait.



And we're here at the Lake of Rage! It's changed slightly in a cool way, but first, let's see the main attraction.



Gyarados still shiny. Still catching it.



Now the cool thing about the Lake of Rage is that it's raining here on six days of the week, flooding the tree maze and lets us get some cool items.



Uh, well, almost.



Unlike Gen 2, we can easily head back to the main lake, which has a pretty sweet item for us. I'm liking that you get a competitive freebie, saves some BP much later down the line. You can also reach the Hidden Power house as well.



Now then, when you visit the lake on a Wednesday, the rain has stopped and there's more to explore.



Well, it's more like the Lake of Rage of old, but this is how you find Wesley. And that's about it, onto the hidden lair!

Team Rocket HQ



Alright, there's gonna be some more statues and rockets and passwords. All the good stuff.




Like before, I'll be fighting all the Rockets, mainly to keep my five team members up in levels, since there's not much experience to go around. We should be fine.



It's the Trap Floor. And it's different! How you say? Well I'll show you!!!!!!!



There's less encounters allowing you to go across the floor without fighting anything. Though how you would know about this first time around is a bit suspect. Maybe that's the trap?



Buuuuuuuuut yeeeeeeeeeeeah, down we go.



Batman! Passwords!



Oh. I was not expecting this.



: It is me, Giovanni. The majestic Giovanni himself! Wahahaha!



: ...Huh? I don't sound anything like Giovanni? I don't even look like Giovanni? How come? I've worked so hard to mimic him!



: You must be trying to sneak into the radio-transmitter room. Well, that's not going to happen. That room is protected with a special password. The password is "Hail Giovanni." Surprised to hear it from me? Knowing the password won't help you though. The door won't open unless I say the password. It only reacts to my voice.




(Petrel is a British sounding rocket, ones that are launched full of instruments for science during sub-orbital flight. The first Petrel rocket was launched June 8th 1967. Whereas Lambda is a Japanese series of rockets, one of which, Lambda 4, launched the first Japanese satellite on February 11th 1970.)

It's another Executive! It's been a while, but his team hasn't changed from Gen 2, so I won't be showing it like I did for Proton. I will be going over the last fight we have with them, however, but right now, yaaaaaaawn.



: Wow, strong!

"been missing."

: But we're certain he's been waiting for the right time for our revival... Wahahaha! Losing to you won't change the fact that you are unable to get in the radio-transmitter room! You need my voice to unlock it!



Well now I'm completely stuck and the game is unbeatable.



And now I'm not.



One annoying thing is that the bird will constantly lead you back and keep interrupting you. At this rate the game should've just teleported you instead of hand holding, but whatever.




You know, maybe the bird is Batman. Batbird? Crowman? Whatever, in we go.



Oh boy, here comes another Executive.



: It'll hurt Team Rocket's pride over and over again. Making it lessen, you see. ...So, it's time to finish you. However strong you may be, if you two of us fight at the same time, you'll have no chance of winning. Don't you agree? Hee hee hee! Sorry, baby. Now, get ready to be thrashed.



Hey other Batman. I'm about to fight in a double battle.



: Typical of Team Rocket to be so sneaky. Allow me to join the battle!

(I don't think he's ever been to Hoenn.)

: What? You had an accomplice? Where is your sense of dignity? As interim boss in place of Giovanni, I'll show you how wrong it is to meddle with Team Rocket!

"Team Rocket Grunt!"


(From Ariane, a series of European civilian expendable launch vehicles that carry payloads into space and are only used once. Their components are not recovered after launch after they're discarded one by one as the vehicle gains altitude and speed. Ariane 1 was first launched December 24th 1979. Athena, meanwhile, is another expendable launch system developed by the Lockheed Corporation, later merged with Martin Marietta Corporation to create the Lockheed Martin Launch Vehicle. It was then renamed again to Athena and launched August 15th 1995.)



So this is an interesting Tag Battle with Lance on our side and that random Rocket Grunt on the other. It seems a bit weighted in our favour, so Lance and the Grunt cancel each other out as Lance usually targets him. Ariana hasn't changed, so let's see what else the Grunt is packing.



A'ight, cool.

"and Team Rocket Grunt!"

: Tch, you really are strong. It's too bad. If you were to join Team Rocket, you could become an Executive.



Man of many words.



: We have much bigger plans. You'll come to appreciate Team Rocket's true power soon enough. Enjoy yourself while you can... Hee hee hee...



And same old same old. The only difference is that Whirlpool is HM05, instead of HM06, as Flash is a TM. Yay.



And next time, we'll do some Battle Towering, cause I don't wanna see Team Rocket for an update or two. Later!