Part 11: I Heard That Trainer Was Hop's Rival
Update 11: I Heard That Trainer Was Hop's RivalTurffield - Pokémon Sword and Shield
Welcome to Turffield, an idyllic place of yellow fields and JESUS CHRIST
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Is that a beard or a cancerous growth? You tell me! Do you remember when Meowth was a petty criminal with an inexplicable Brooklyn accent? Im not sure I do, this abomination wiped my memories of that character in the anime and replaced it with nightmares. When I beat this trainer, he assures me his Pokémon are in top condition. Maybe he should take them to a specialist first
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But speaking of the anime!
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Im betting the vast majority of you already know the basics of the anime-game relationship, but Im betting a few you dont and I like the sound of my own writing. The Pokémon anime introduced the idea of Pokémon only saying their own names; before that, they just made appropriate elemental or animal sounds. The anime proved enormously popular, so much so it led to the release of Pokémon Yellow, which packed in a few improvements to the original
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Excuse me, I have to take this.
Anyway, it tightened up some issues with the previous versions, Red and Blue, plus adding a feature where Pikachu, the animes mascot, could follow you around on the overworld. Yellow set the pattern for future Generations; two (roughly) simultaneous releases followed by an improved version a ways later. Most Pokémon dont do the name thing in the games, but as a consequence of its prominence in the anime, Pikachu still does. Hilariously, when Pikachu Dynamaxes (well, does a special equivalent Ill cover later), its voice track changes and instead of saying its name, it says the first syllable long and slow, like its about to take a Dynamax-sized leak on the audience and wants everyone to know it.
Fun facts: my dictation software recognizes the word Pokémon and spells it correctly; not too shocking, given the franchises popularity. Same with Pikachu, to a lesser extent. But Charizard? Pokédex? Helps me write this stuff out, though.
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About halfway between the cave exit and the town itself, we get involved in the Pokémon equivalent of a car accident.
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The Wooloo makes its agreement known and they wander off together.
By the way, as we make our way through the area, I would like to point out that the Route 3 theme is (I believe) partially a remix of the Pallet Town theme from Gen 1; as it was your characters hometown and the first place you walked around in, its burned into a lot of Genwunner skulls (Ill talk about the meaning of that word probably in another update). Nice to hear it just outside the very first gym.
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And out of nowhere, Sonias Yamper shows up to guide us up the hill. Who am I to defy a dog? You know how the thread's been joking about how this directional handholding in-universe probably stems from people dealing with Leon? Im not sure whether the fact that Sonias pet leads us around just as invasively as the MC employee earlier did proves or disapproves that.
Sonia's Theme - Pokémon Sword and Shield OST
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(I wont be going into this because its not going to come up in the narrative, as I doctored it, but in the original, Sonias revelations are lackluster. Lets just say they dont reflect the sort of intellectual effort youd expect out of somebody who presumably at least has some scientific qualifications. She comes across as an airhead who got in on nepotism sometimes, and I wont be borrowing that.)
You were standing 5 feet away the whole time, random tourist. What do you think of the geoglyph?
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Turffield - Pokémon Sword and Shield
Anyway, Turffield isnt actually based on a real town or city, but on Stonehenge or, more accurately, Stonehenge and the variety of smaller ancient ruins and landmarks scattered throughout the southern part of England. That geoglyph up there? The tourism pamphlet doesnt mention it, but theres a very good chance its based on English hill figures. Why is all this stuff laid out around the town? So they can put Stonehenge in the game.
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Pretty place, though.
Lets hit the gym.
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Gym Lobby - Pokémon Sword and Shield
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Here we encounter the first instance of one of many peoples favorite features in the game; people recognize your progress and the progress of your rivals as you go through the game. More on this later
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Because we have an old friend to greet!
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They give us a Pokéball that raises a wild Pokémons affections that the moment you catch it. Well talk about affection Probably the next time we hit the Wild Area. Did you know that, canonically, Ball Guy has no gender? The original Japanese name is gender neutral and that no point did they use any kind of identifying language. As such, 70% of Ball Guy cosplay (and theres plenty of it) consists of attractive women in ultra-feminine clothing wearing the head, while 70% of Ball Guy fanart (and theres plenty of it) features shirtless, extremely muscular men wearing the head. I have no idea how to decode that.
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While were in the gym lobby, we have access to a special shop that sells Type-themed uniforms. Unfortunately, you cant wear them out on the field: instead, youre expected to wear them as ordinary clothing, which sucks. I bought the Fighting uniform anyway.
But enough faffing about! We have a gym to challenge!
Gym - Pokémon Sword and Shield
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Gyms have always been a major feature of the Pokémon franchise, showing up in every generation except Gen 7 (which still had an equivalent playing a prominent part). There are always eight Gyms in a region and each Gym always has a small group of Trainers lining a path that leads to the Leader, all of whom share their gyms elemental theme. After the first few Gyms, the games introduce puzzles and gimmicks reflecting the gym theme, often making use of recently-obtained HMs (i.e. one HM, called Strength, could be used to push boulders around, so you can probably imagine the boulder-pushing puzzles that ensued). Just after the first season of the anime finished airing in the US, they released a series of Pokémon novels about good ol Ash Ketchum traveling to a Hawaiian-themed archipelago called the Orange Islands, which had Gym Leader-equivalents that challenged Trainers to competitions (like rockclimbing or sailing) instead of battles. Decades later, Generation 7 took place in a Hawaiian-themed archipelago called Alola, which had the local Gym Leader equivalents complete various challenges (like glorified scavenger hunts) before facing them. Coincidence? Actually, yeah, probably, those books never came out in Japan and theres no reason to think the developers had even heard of them. E: Im an idiot, those are based off filler made for the anime, but they genuinely seem not to have any connection other than thematic similarity. Still made me do a double take when I realized the parallel, though.
Gen 8 split the difference. Like most generations, Gen 8 has Gym Challenges take place in an enclosed space with Trainers to face along the way. Like in Gen 7, each gym as a gimmick challenge you have to work your way through before facing the Gym Leader themselves.
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Since Milos gimmick is being really into sheep, his Gym has us herd 20 Wooloos through a series of checkpoints (each of which has a Trainer overseeing it). Each checkpoint has a twist, first a Yamper that chases the Wooloos around like the worlds saddest sheepdog, then some hedges to complicate geometry, then adding another sheepcorgi to the mix. Its honestly not that impressive, though it does look nice. I do love how every Gym Trainers like, Youll never get past me! before throwing out one Pokémon five levels lower than the one in the front of my party. Its adorable.
Eventually I push my way through the last checkpoint and
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Complete the challenge.
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E: Originally, my treatment of this fight was very flippant and dismissive. The thread didnt like that and when they explained why, they brought up some good points that I am probably should address especially since they'll be coming into play for the rest of the LP.
First of all, one of Gen 8s defining elements is the spectacle of its Gym Battles. While most mainline Pokémon games portray them as scaled up ordinary fights, Galars Gym Battles are massive spectacles that cross football matches with light shows. The problem is Well, only some Gyms ever live up to that concept (some of the later Gyms host some of the most interesting and challenging fights in the game; Im especially looking forward to/dreading Melony. But I find the early Gyms so underwhelming I struggle to take them seriously. Milos is especially bad; I find the Wooloo herding puzzle really basic (and this is as someone who often struggles with puzzles) and the battle with Milo disappointing.
I havent been grinding for a while now; I havent even used any of the XP candies I got earlier. All Ive done is fight every Trainer along the way, and thats as much to get money for clothes as anything else. In spite of that, I won this battle so fast I didnt end up getting more than a couple screenshots. It took me three rounds to beat both his Pokémon, which is as long as Dynamaxing lasts in non-Raid battles. Its hard to respect something thats over in under a minute. Thisll change, though. Nessas Gym, for instance, features one of my favorite puzzles in the game, and though her fight isnt much harder, it has enough substance to deserve real commentary). Its not like theres anything wrong with the gym on its most basic level, I just don't care about it.
Second of all I really dont like Milo. Hes my least favorite Gym Leader. I mean, hes a fine character, but I hate writing for him. You may have noticed I like intellectual banter, but while Milos perfectly intelligent, I dont enjoy trying to mesh his canonical voice with my writing style. Thats what made me burn out on my last writing project. I was unconsciously trying to move past him as fast as possible so I wouldnt have to risk wading into that, and thats due to my weaknesses as a writer and unwillingness to try and force it. The fact that I wasnt fully aware of that doesnt make my writing on the topic any better.
Im treating Milos Gym more harshly than it deserves, definitely. Thats on me. But I will be handling the next Gyms and Leaders better.
Anyway, back to commentary.
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Gym Lobby - Pokémon Sword and Shield
And there we are! Milo accosts us on the way out to tell us that we should head out to the next town where the map was already pointing us. This is getting a little aggravating I think I could go indefinitely without it driving me off the game, but I really wish the game would let up. Itd be a lot worse if the directions were preventing me from going anywhere interesting, but
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Off we go anyway.