Sun Nuzlocke – Chapter 4 – Totem Trouble

< Chapter 3

Can emos be blond?

Not long after leaving Paniola ranch behind I ran into Hau who was annoying a new character named Gladion. I’m glad it’s not just me that finds Hau’s optimism irritating, even if the other person is a fictional character. Gladion looks like that kid that desperately wants to be emo and got his mum to take him to Hot Topic one time but he’s not allowed to dye his hair yet. He will wear that Hot Topic outfit every day for the rest of his life though, dammit. He’s also got a bit of a chip on his shoulder about… Something… I think it’s about being kind of a contractor henchman for Team Skull, but not a real henchman. Two Team Skull members came up after we fought to tease him about that AND ABOUT BEING HOMELESS?! Damn Team Skull, what the hell? That was harsh, and kind of brave considering he has a freaky-ass dog-fish-lizard Pokémon that is far better than their Ratattas.

I messed up…

After Gladion was done being dramatic and mysterious I got to move on and it wasn’t long until I was in the next area and ready to start the next trial. This was the one trial I could actually remember from my previous, generic playthrough I think because I had struggled a bit with it and been surprised by it. I knew the Totem was a water spider thing but unfortunately I couldn’t remember what level it was (or called), but my team were all about level 20 and I felt confident with that. I also had a pretty heavy electric/bird team so I went in without feeling I had to do too much grinding and was feeling pretty cocky about it overall. I was in for a shock. The Totem was an Araquanid, a creepy spider with a bubble on it’s head. I sent out Chops the Flaaffy to shock it into oblivion but it hit her with Bubble, not normally a threatening move, but in this situation it was. I had to switch once it summoned a Dewpider to help it. Pom pom the Oricorio was sent out but the same thing happened, and with the Dewpider in the mix as well it just wasn’t happening. Same issue with Peeko the Wingull. Then I thought it was time for the big guns and sent out my beloved Squidward the Inkay to deal with them. Squidward is an amazing Pokémon with the Contrary feat, so if you try to lower his stats they just get higher, and some really good moves that have been making a lot of fights very easy. I used Reflect because at this point I was clucthinc at straws hoping maybe Bubble was a physical move (it’s not) and maybe it could at least lower the damage being done but it didn’t help. Then Araquanid used Leech Life… Which one-shot Squidward. I was devastated. I thought Squidward was going to go all the way to the elite 4 with me, he didn’t even get to evolve yet. I had to take a minute to process his death before I could continue the fight. I was also really annoyed at myself because I had completely forgotten that bug type is super effective against psychic type because you know, Urie Geller can’t bend spoons if a fly lands on him I guess.

RIP to my favourite…

At this point I was getting genuinely worried that this would be the end of my challenge, if no one could stand up to Araquanid more were going to start dying, but I had one last hope (and second favourite) : Rudy the Brionne, my starter. I sent him out and had him just use Work Up to raise his Attack and Special Attack for 6 turns so he was beefed up then struck with Icy Wind and BAM the Araquanid was dead. I felt no joy at his defeat though, there was just a hole in my team that no totem defeat, or many new Pokemon could fill…

Magikrap to Magikal

Begrudgingly, I set about catching a Pokemon in the trial area. This could potentially be the Pokemon to replace Squidward so there was a lot riding on it, I didn’t really have anything in the Box that I felt could match him. A ripple in the water, a jerk on the fishing rod and I reeled in my new team mate… Magikarp.

I was disappointed at first, they take so long to level BUT then I realised that it was a level 21, just one level away from evolution and that was a game changer! Neville the Magikarp was added to the party and put under a gruelling training regime until it evolved into a Gyarados. Now we’re talking. In my previous Nuzlocke I managed to get a Gyarados but it was defeated almost instantly so I vowed to be a better trainer for Neville.

Mandatory Battle Royal

Our next stop was the battle royal stadium where you fight three people with the first Pokemon in your party. I walked in and triggered a cutscene with Hau, Gladion and ‘The Masked Royal’/The Professor in a wresting mask (whatever he’s into I guess, no judgment) and they all decided to battle then and there with me and the Pokemon at the front of the team. Realising that Chops the Flaaffy was the Pokemon at the front of my party and also injured, I desperately tried to claw my way out of the building but the cutscene was in full flow and poor Chops was thrown out the safety of her pokeball to fight a Rockruff, Type: Null, and Torracat. I was very scared. I like Chops and the wound from losing Squidward was still sore, I couldn’t lose Chops too. I tried to be as strategic as possible and used thunder wave on Torracat in the first round. Magically, none of the other Pokemon attacked Chops in that round, which was a huge relief. Round 2 I used thunder wave again on Rockruff as Type: Null was burned but Chops took a hit from Torracat that nearly wiped her out. With just 5 hit points left I resigned myself to Chops’s untimely demise, but she was going to go out swinging! She used thundershock on the Rockruff and… it was defeated, therefore ending the battle! I didn’t realise just defeating one would end it or I would have been more aggressive, I thought you had to be the last one standing. Phew. I ran out of there ASAP knowing that I would never return while on this challenge. I do think that in a normal game it’s a fun format though.

Next stop on the journey is the volcano park for a fiery battle!

Sun Nuzlocke – Chapter 3 – Food for thought

< Chapter 2

Anti-Climactic Rivalry

You might remember back in Chapter 1 I said how I was doing this challenge to relieve some boredom from my sofa-bound, injured boyfriend and that after each Kahuna battle we were going to battle each other. Well… That’s not worked out so much. After a week of me looming over his shoulder asking “have you beat the Kahuna yet?” in the most nonchalant way I could muster while desperately wanting to continue my own game, he finally gave me the go ahead to continue and he would ‘catch me up’. This may or may not happen but I’m going to continue the challenge myself either way. A downside to having a non-gamer boyfriend is that when he does play stuff with me he gets really into it for one or two nights then never wants to play again, which leads to a lot of frustration for my inner achievement hunter.

Ride Pokemon appreciation

After the first Kahuna I was given my very own Tauros to ride and rock smash my way through obstacles. The way this game dealt with HMs is THE BEST, It’s one of my favourite things about it. I hate having to sacrifice one of my party to HM servitude but in Alola you are given a Ride Pokemon to do what would normally be an HM move. You also get some funky riding gear that is… a look, but safety first I guess. There’s a Tauros to smash rocks, Stoutland to sniff out hidden objects, a Charizard for fly, Lapras to surf, and more.

Look what you made me do

I retraced my steps smashing through all the rocks I could find and got to a new area ‘Ten Carat Hill’ where I got a Mawile called Nancy, a Pokemon I don’t usually use but I was very curious so added her to the party straight away. Then there was the ‘Farthest Hollow’ where I COULD have got a Roggenrola, which would have been really cool, but Taylor the Ekans had other plans and 1 shot it. Taylor had become my ‘catcher’ Pokemon, what with her ability to paralyse and not hit too hard, but I guess she wanted to prove me wrong and what with this being the second time she had knocked out a potential team mate I retired her from that role with a stern warning.

Arriving in Akala

Smashable rocks exhausted I headed to the beach and surfed a Mantine to the next island, Akala. Little fact here : The only reason I got Ultra Sun and not regular Sun is because of the Mantine surfing, it’s a fun mini game and I’ve always liked surfing/skating mini games. Once we got to Akala I was greeted by the Kahuna Olivia who is VERY different to Melemele’s Hala. I have a bit of a girl crush on her, not going to lie.

Look at this queen

Lillie wanted to go off to a posh hotel for plot reasons, you have to follow her but once you’re there she just goes “yep… this is the hotel all right!” Ok??? Temporarily unburdened by Nintendo’s albino plot device I ran to the nearest patch of grass to get my new Pokemon… An Eevee! Eevees are adorable and I was very happy. I’d found the TM False Swipe and taught it to Nancy (the new catcher of the team) so it was an easy catch and Smoothie the Eevee was mine! (It was just what I was eating at the time, I don’t know, coming up with all these names is hard). I boxed her temporarily as I wanted to plan what I wanted her to evolve into carefully. There might be a particular type that isn’t very common in Alola or my team might be severely lacking something when I get to the next trials.

The realities of food in the Pokemon world

Next stop was the Paniola Ranch so I could expect a farm-like addition to the team, though isn’t that basically just stealing Pokemon from the ranch? Seems sketchy. Anyway, after some interaction with a farmer and his Miltank I had the disturbing realisation that everyone in the Pokemon world drinks milk from Miltanks. I was then informed by my friend that there are only male Tauros and female Miltank and they can breed with each other so… Miltank provides the humans with milk and the Tauros provides them with… Steak??? That must be why they don’t evolve either, they’re primarily a food source. I guess that’s obvious but I had never thought about it and for a second it took me out of the magical world where humans lived on berries. We looked into it a bit more and apparently Slowpoke tails are a snack you suck on and slowly chew, Farfetch’d were hunted to near extinction because they taste good when cooked with their leek and Basculin is ‘remarkably tasty’. So there’s some light horror for y’all.

Any reserves I had about stealing Pokemon from a ranch were now gone (not that I really had any before) and I walked into some nearby grass to see which Pokemon I could save from the food industry and found a Mareep. I honestly did not realise until I started typing this despite all that ‘horrific realisation’ I then went totally absentmindedly went on to name the Mareep ‘Chops’ so… Yeah. Chops was saved from becoming its’ own name sake and we got out of there. Food talks aside, I am glad I got a Mareep as I think Ampharos can be a good Pokemon.

Now that I need to have a think about my Eevee, which is your favourite Eevee evolution? Or which is more useful? I’m also running out of name ideas, drop some ideas in the comments! Any comment on the food situation? What would a Pikachu taste like?

Sun Nuzlocke – Chapter 2 – Lots of firsts

< Chapter 1

Route 2

After my embarrassing performance in on Route 1 I was hoping for a better time on Route 2. A new route means new Pokémon so I set off optimistically. At the first patch of grass I came to, a man told me how when you can see rustling in the grass that means a Pokémon will run up and attack you, so rather than explore the route a bit more and select my grassy patch tactfully my dumb ass stepped right on into that first one, a shape sped towards me and it turned out to be an Ekans. I’ve never been a big Ekans fan but I’ll take it. Taylor joined the team and I sulked about untapped grassy potential a bit until I got to Sandy Cove. I thought it looked like a good place to come back to when I can fish or surf for a water type just as a Zubat threw itself at me. Has anyone ever not had a Zubat in a Nuzlocke? (Genuine question) My team was full at this point though so it went straight to the PC.

My next stop was the cemetery where I got a Driftloon, which I’ve never used before and their Pokédex entry is uh… intense.

I’m sure there are any number of cool characters that steal people’s soul in fiction/fantasy but the only thing that came to mind is that Simpsons episode where Bart trades his soul to Milhouse for some ALF pogs, so Driftloon is called Milhouse.

First death

Milhouse died immediately. My first casualty of the game. I thought being a ghost type it might fare ok against some physical attacks but… It did not. I spent more time thinking of its name than it spent in my party. I just sent it out, watched it get hit and deflate, zooming around in the sky above me making a fart noise before unceremoniously plopping to the ground, a wrinkled shell of a balloon. You know what though? It’s fine, we’re fine, I’m fine. I could have had a Ghastly but no. Whatever. It’s fine.

First Trial

The first trial is playing hide and seek with some Yungoos before taking on the totem Pokémon, a Gumshoos. I wasn’t worried really, I had been smashing through Route 2 with the unexpectedly effective combo of Squidward the Inkay and Taylor the Ekans: Squidward used reflect to lower physical damage done against the team then switched with Taylor who used Glare to paralyse the totem and its’ ally Yungoos, plus Wrap on the totem for some continuous damage, then we switched out again to Squidward to top up Reflect and then just hit them with Foul Play. I probably didn’t need to be so tactful, but I never usually am so I was enjoying feeling clever. We took them out nice and easy. I never thought an Ekans would be one of my favourites but that’s one of the reasons I subject myself to the emotional torture of Nuzlocke challenges; I’ve been playing Pokémon since I can remember yet I never bothered with an Ekans until now.

Bird Up

I wasn’t very worried about the impending Kahuna fight, but then I had been feeling confident about my trial with Llima and we know how that went… I knew that the Kahuna has fighting type Pokémon so I was pleased when a Spearow named Burdy joined the team on Route 3, that is until I saw his stats. His defence was shocking and I nearly lost him in his first battle, so he wasn’t even a viable option, too much of a wild card. Fortunately there was one area left: Melemele Meadows. Kind of unsurprisingly I caught an Oricorio in the meadow named Pom pom who immediately replaced Burdy as chief bird and was so much better. I think that Oricorio is actually a pretty cool Pokémon, at least early in the game. You can pick different flowers in different areas of the world to give it that turn it into a different type, sort of like a bird version of Eevee, at the moment Pom pom is an electric type but going forward hopefully I can adapt it to whatever upcoming fight we have.

First Kahuna

I needn’t have worried really, the Kahuna fight was pretty easy, Pom pom aced it and secured a place as one of my favourites. Rudy the Poplio also evolved (first evolution) into Brionne, who looks a like a clown that wants to be a trapeze artist but isn’t quite confident enough to fully leave the safety of the clowning career yet.

That’s it until next time! Which Pokémon do you not usually use but have been pleasantly surprised by when you have? Any advice for the road to the next trial?

Chapter 3 >

New Challenge! Pokemon Sun Nuzlocke

Hello! It’s been far too long! I’ve been suffering from writers block very badly over lockdown. Most of the games I’ve been playing are simulators (Sims, Animal Crossing, Stardew Valley, etc) and anything I have to say about them has already been said. I’ve really missed writing and the blogging community though and didn’t want to give up completely. Finally, inspiration struck me for a new blog series: Pokemon Sun Nuzlocke!

The idea to start this came about because my boyfriend Dexter has hurt his back and has spent most of the week lying on the sofa, he’s understandably bored and frustrated so to pass the time he has been watching Jaiden Animations play though her Nuzlocke. He mentioned how it would be fun to play one with me where we battle each other after each gym so we would be each other’s ‘rival’. I wanted to do something to help him feel less bored, that and he doesn’t usually play games with me as he’s not a gamer so I got excited and started rifling through our combined Pokemon collection, which is one of the only games he does play. Between us we have quite a few but the only compatible ones were two copies of Sapphire or Ultra Sun and Moon. We settled on Sun/Moon as I have finished Sun but only once and I wasn’t that into it so I felt that a new perspective could change my mind, and he started it but didn’t get very far.

The Rules

As we were playing together, and the Alola region is a bit different to other games (trials and kahuna instead of gyms, ally pokemon, Z powers, etc) we reviewed the rules and came up with the following:

• If a pokemon reaches 0 hp it’s ‘dead’ and must be released
• You can only catch one Pokrmon per route and it must be the first Pokemon you encounter (if ally pokemon are summoned you can only catch the original pokemon)
• The starter Pokemon must be randomised
• A route is whenever the little blue box pops up to say you’re in a new area
• Gift Pokemon and eggs are OK, unless you have already caught a Pokemon on the route it is gifted on in which case you have to release it or put it in the Gift Box on the PC, a thing I made up because gift Pokemon are usually babies and I feel like they wouldn’t last long in the wild, the gift box is a safer place
• If I have a Pokemon that needs to evolve through trading then Dexter must also have one and agree to the trade, he has implied he might just choose not to because you know… He likes to antagonise me
• You can use the Switch Pokemon setting (to be honest, I didn’t know that you could turn this off…)
• No calculating damage before going into fights, this is mainly for Dexter, he loves numbers (nerd) and would do that for fun. I would not.
• You can do some research before big battles to see what you’re up against and what moves they have
• No legendary Pokemon
• You can frontload
• Daycare is not allowed
• Can’t use X items
• Can’t use Pokemon Care (I was upset about this as I like that feature but… fine)

We may add/remove rules as we go as well as we don’t know the game that well so we’ll see.

I Randomly Select You!

To kick everything off we randomised our starters. I was hoping for Rowlet, Dex wanted Poplio, but the reverse happened instead. Nevermind. I have nothing against Poplio I just think he looks like a clown and clowns are creepy. To get around this I named him Rudy after Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer (he’s got a big red nose and will be leading my team!) That endeared me to him a lot more.

My First Catch

The part of the game I was dreading the most was the intro/tutorial. I remembered it taking forever. Unfortunately, this game is determined to have a plot and in depth characters, even if it means we don’t get poke balls for 40 mins. Finally I was able to catch my first wild Pokemon on Route 1… Drumroll… a Grubbin. I wasn’t super happy about that at first as I’d had one in my previous playthrough and it was good but it levels slowly, plus it can’t evolve into its final form until you get to Blush Mountain, and by the time you do that it kind of sucks. Having said that, as Bugsy Malone vice gripped her way to several victories I grew more confident, she’s probably one of the best Pokemon you can get on Route 1 after all. Unfortunately, Dex caught one too so I need to make Bugsy Malone the superior Grubbin.

My True Rival

In the first battle with Hau, his Pichu unexpectedly gave me a bit of trouble. Bugsy Malone was paralysed and the Pichu kept lowering her attack and hitting her with Thunderbolt but we persevered and took it out, his Litten was no trouble after that. Hau is an exhausting character with overwhelming positivity. If someone is that nice in real life they must have something to hide. He opens your first battle with “it doesn’t matter who wins as long as we both have fun!” Outside of the gaming world I wholeheartedly agree with that statement but I was raised with Gary Oak as my OG rival so I want to crush you, and if you don’t care when I do it then it takes the fun out of it for me. I really came to appreciate the idea Dex had had in that moment, my anticipation for our future battle was growing, and while I thought he would best me as I have very little experience with fighting real people in Pokemon, I was looking forward to a competitive fight. Dexter is my true rival in this game.

Getting Schooled

In the game-enforced interest of trying to get to know Lillie better we were basically handcuffed together as she dragged me round town and we ended up at the Trainer’s school where it was decided for me that I should enroll. I fought my way through the students there and was then challenged by the teacher who, in a good twist I think in Pokemon games, fought me with the leftover starter Rowlet. Bugsy took care of it but it was a bit tricky and I had to use a fair amount of potions. Then Dexter fought her in his game where she sent out Litten against his Rowlet and… HE GOT KO’d!!! We both looked at each other, and for a second I was torn between laughing maniacally or offering an out. I offered an out. That is how annoying the intro of this game is. If Dexter had had to restart the game at that point he would have had to go through ANOTHER 2 HOURS to get back to this point and we both knew he wouldn’t do it. Instead we agreed to pretend this never happened but any other KO after this would definitely count.

Despite our agreement I did tease him and acted like I had the moral high ground, but Karma is a bitch. I met Llima in Hau’oli city and was taken out by his ridiculously aggressive Yungoos. It just kept coming at me, and when it wasn’t doing that it was lowering Bugsy/Rudy’s defence. I looked at Dex sheepishly and now it was his (rightful) turn to be smug. As he had been KO’d and I’d let it pass he did the same for me on the same conditions. I do feel guilty but… I can’t do that intro again so soon guys, I can’t, and I’d got too excited about finally having something to write about to give up so we’re doing it, think what you will of me. Guilt and failure aside I thought we had bigger problems. I genuinely did not think that I could beat Llima with my two Pokemon. Neither of us expected this game to be this hard so early on. When we made the rules we had done a bit of research on Reddit and there was some dispute on what is classified as a Route. We decided to use the rule where anything classified as being on Route 1 (i.e. the beach near Kukui’s house, the Trainer school and Hau’oli city) is all one area, we had also put a level cap where you could only be the level of the next big battle’s Pokemon (so right now we were capped at 10). However, in light of the aggressive Yungoos we decided to ditch the level cap (it was getting hard anyway as Rudy was leveling so dang fast), and that you could catch a new Pokemon in any area where the blue box appeared in the bottom of the screen saying where you were. This meant I could go back and get three new Pokemon in the city, the beach and the school.

My Hero

My first catch was a Wingull in the city, who I named Peeko (Sapphire throwback). Not the knight in shining armor I was hoping for. At the trainer school I caught a Meowth called Rocket, which is definitely not the best Pokemon I could have got there but it’s fine, I’m fine, we’re fine. My final hope was the beach near Kukui’s house. I had kind of given up hope at this point and had resigned myself to being a basic bitch trainer BUT Tapu Koko must have been smiling down on me. I caught an Inkay (Squidward). It did not take me long at all to realise that Squidward is KICK ASS. It has the ability Contrary which makes stat changes have the opposite effect and it knew both Reflect and Foul Play, meaning I could lower any physical damage being done to my team, then attack using the enemies’ strength against it (perfect for say… An aggressive Yungoos) AND when the Yungoos would inevitably try to lower Squidward’s defence he would just raise it instead. I sauntered back up to Llima and that is exactly what happened. I know you’re not supposed to have favourites but Squidward is currently top tier, the best, I love him. If anything happens to him I might cry.

A very bad start to my new challenge but we are both having fun so it doesn’t matter, right Hau? Have you ever tried a Nuzlocke in Sun/Moon? How did it go? Also, how are you in general if you were a previous Dragons Tea Party reader? I hope it’s been a good year for you all. Stand by for the next post where we will hopefully complete the first Island challenge!

Chapter 2 >

Video Game Vacation Spots

Dragons Tea Party Travel Agency here! It’s summer holiday time and I have selected a wonderful selection of game-based vacation spots that will appeal to everyone! Take a look, see what takes your fancy. Are you here for a lazy, sunny holiday or an activity packed fitness getaway? We’ve got it all…

The Rook Islands – Far Cry 3

You wanted some sky diving, scuba diving, beach time and a lavish hotel? We’ll do you one better. A truly back to nature experience: hike across the island, see lots of rare and exotic animals, hunt and kill them to make a range of bags and clothing. Become a local hero showing the natives how it’s done as you liberate their homes from scary pirates (no previous fighting experience necessary). Fancy a souvenir? How about a tattoo documenting your adventures and achievements throughout your time on the island? Perfect for the adventurous adult seeking escape and excitement.

Alola – Pokémon Sun and Moon

Whether you want to chill out and relax in a beautiful resort or ‘find yourself’ while backpacking and island hopping, Alola is the place for you. Boasting four beautiful islands, each with varying environments and terrain, you can easily find somewhere that ticks all your boxes. Beautiful weather and islands aside, nowhere has souvenirs quite like Alola: catch a local Pokémon, take some pictures with it, enjoy the local delicacy (Malasada) with it, and of course, teach it to fight mercilessly. Thanks to the miracle of Stockholm Syndrome (though the locals call it “friendship”) it will grow to like you eventually.

Banoi – Dead Island

The perfect escape for a fitness fanatic, this resort has it all: cardio, weapon training, rationed food… Enjoy some therapeutic mediation as you take in the gorgeous scenery while unleashing any pent up anger you may have on the island’s endless supply of zombies. Perhaps you fancy a break from all that running and hitting, take some time to get creative with an eco-friendly arts and crafts workshop creating exotic weaponry from litter found around the island. This intense but fun routine guarantees that you will leave a dress size smaller than when you arrived.

Fun fact: you burn more calories running from zombies than running around the park at home!

Winterhold – Skyrim

Perhaps you are tired of the sun and would like a winter break. We can help you with that too. Winterhold offers one of the finest un-pisted ski resorts in video game history, the numerous chalets you can break into and kill the owners of really add to the skiing vibe. Watch as the local blacksmiths craft fine, handmade skis out of dragon bone especially for you, no messing about with ski lifts, just remember to bring your trusty  gravity defying horse and journey to the highest peaks. From there enjoy the slopes all the way back to the village, or go off piste and discover some ancient ruins. Once you’ve had enough return to your stolen chalet, steal a sweet roll, and put your feet up in front of the fire. Ahhh…

Animal Crossing Pocket Camp

You want to go back to nature but don’t want anything scary, it needs to be active but zombies and pirates aren’t quite your thing… How about Animal Crossing Island? Here we take glamping very seriously and the name of this game is friendship… True friendship… Promise!

As everybody knows, the mutated animals of Animal Crossing Island were part of the nuclear disaster of 2001. Developing humanoid bodies and speech but retaining some animal features they were ridiculed and bullied by most of society, to allow them a fresh start they were moved to a beautiful island so that they could develop their own, peaceful community but some people still travel there to try and fit in with the idyllic lifestyle these mutants have created. While the mutants are peaceful creatures they are also incredibly unforgiving of the human race and slyly appoint the visitors ‘Camp Manager’ upon arrival but really they’re just blissfully ignorant slaves used to create entertainment, fetch them food, and use their own resources to build luxurious campsites that the mutants can lounge around in, napping, chatting, and playing all day while the humans run around catering to their every need, sometimes they just make up errands for the hell of it.

All this so that you can feel like you have friends. You are free to leave whenever you want to of course, but do you really want to make that dog-person cry? You just got matching outfits and now you’re leaving? You monster.

So you got me to catch you fish KNOWING that you couldn’t do anything with them…

Maybe some of them do become your real friends, I for one really don’t mind when friends refuse to come to my house because I haven’t built that merry-go-round they asked me to make yet. Better get cracking and gather up those materials!

Cocoon – Final Fantasy XIII

You’ll never find somewhere quite like Cocoon, this futuristic paradise is a continent hanging over the land of Gran Pulse. The whole continent is hollowed out with its residents living inside its shell in harmony, protected from the dangerous land below. Marvel at the incredible technological advancements that the land has to offer and explore the huge variety of cities; Beach town Bodhum has a spectacular annual fireworks display, the ‘capital of entertainment’ Nautilus is a giant fairground famous for its’ tame Chocobos, and of course there’s Palumpolum where you can shop to your hearts content… There is no end to the fun here, almost anything is possible.

Please note: They’re not too friendly with outsiders, take care no one finds out you’re not local and you’ll be able to avoid being purged. Should your presence be discovered Dragon’s Tea Party Travel Agency will deny all knowledge of you and we take no responsibility should you be intercepted to or from your destination. We also recommend that all trips to Cocoon are taken sooner rather than later as this reduces the risk of your soul being farmed for sacrificial purposes. Travel insurance is not provided.

 

There you go, the finest video game destinations we have to offer! Which vacation spot would you visit? Are there any games you’d like to visit on holiday?

Wizards Unite Has Confounded Me

I’m a Hufflepuff, I’ve seen all the movies, read all the books, won a pub quiz (granted that was a team effort), been to Harry Potter studios (UK version), I really don’t want to know how much money I’ve spent on merch… Basically, I’m a pretty big Harry Potter fan (Not the biggest by any means, but still). I was also a big fan of Pokémon Go when it came out so when Niantic’s latest venture, Wizards Unite, was announced I was pretty excited (obviously I’ll be comparing the two throughout this post). The big day finally arrived and I downloaded the app, very keen to start playing. I’d planned to walk into town (about a 20 minute walk) with the app to start me off and meet some friends for a drink, I set up the game and the chirpy Constance Pickering introduced herself and the game. Then she kept introducing stuff… I need to start walking now, let’s go Constance! This introduction is a bit long for a game where you essentially walk and collect stuff and I missed a bit of plot by getting frustrated and skipping text until I could walk around. Constance basically goes on about Confoundables that have appeared and you need uncounfound them, that’s basically the overall jist of the game.

What are Confoundables then? Well, as far as I can tell (from my skim reading and impatient tapping) Confoundables are some sort of dark magic spells and beasts that have removed ‘Foundables’ (I know, eye roll) aka creatures, students, ministry workers, artifacts, quidditch supplies, etc. and scattered them across the world which, as their insanely creative name indicates, you need to find. As an SOS (Statute of Secrecy) worker you need to find the lost Foundables, unconfound them, and return them to their rightful place by tracing patterns/spells on your phone and overpowering the Confoundable protecting the Foundable. Where do the Confoundables come from? Why are they here? Who created them? We don’t know but as you return more Foundables to their rightful place Constance, Harry and other characters we know and love try to unravel the mystery and have chats about it. This sort of indicates that there’s an end-game and that we’ll eventually discover who’s causing all this…

Back to my walk… Maybe I’m just incredibly impatient or something, I know every game needs a little tutorial but trying to get out on the road was a never ending battle of Constance interrupting me telling me about all these things I was finding and what they did. I can figure it out Constance! Let me move! I didn’t remember Pokémon Go having such a wordy tutorial. In fact, my sister has come to visit for a few weeks and she downloaded Pokémon Go for the first time and was off to a flying start in about half the time I was in Unite. Maybe I should have cleared some time to sit down with it a bit first before trying to immediately set out on my walk but I didn’t think so much would be happening. After about 20 minutes of very slow walking I put my phone in my bag so that I’d actually get to town before the pub closed. To be fair, now that I’ve done most of the stuff there is to do I don’t get interrupted by Constance that much anymore, she still crops up occasionally though, and I guess you need to expect to walk slowly when playing so having a time limit on my first test might not have been the best way to do it. 

In all honesty I expected this app to be a Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find them thing where you collect magical beasts in your Mary Poppins suitcase and maybe collect things they like to kit out the suitcase and make it more homely for them, or certain items that attracts certain beasts to you, maybe you’d have to walk to a certain location to then release it back into its’ habitat, perhaps you can only get certain beasts in certain locations according to the Fantastic Beasts book… Basically a major Pokémon Go rip off with magical extras, maybe that sounds a bit repetitive but I really wouldn’t have minded that. This is a bit more… Everything. Do I want to save a baby hippogriff from a Confoundable whirlwind? Yeah! Of course! Do I want to save a poster from being on fire? Well… Not really, no… Do I want to save Filch and Mrs Norris from being chained up? No, he’s a dick, leave him there. Hogwarts and Ministry people trapped in ice? … I really don’t care. It doesn’t quite give you that “Look at this awesome thing I caught!!!” effect does it?

“What did you catch today?”

“A Slytherin Student!” 

“Nice! Where did you get it?” Not quite the same…

I feel like Wizards Unite have tried to bring everything that could have been released later in updates or events out all at the same time and it’s just a little confusing. There’s just too much going on right now; greenhouses, potion brewing, fortresses, lore, ingredients, energy, a surprisingly RPG-esque skill tree when you level up, and so much more… I want to shout at the app and tell it to chill out for a sec. Even though I own a scarily large amount of Hufflepuff branded clothing and accessories in an attempt to make my life more magical the sad truth is that I’m just a muggle really and I’m struggling to take it all in. Unlike the utter simplicity of Pokémon Go, which made it inclusive for pretty much everyone, Unite is too much to take in for people that don’t know much (or anything) about Harry Potter, newcomers aren’t going to care about all this stuff. It makes me worry about what they’ll bring out when they do release an update with more features. More stuff clogging up my map? More lore?

Speaking of lore, I think we’ve squeezed almost everything we possibly can out of the Harry Potter franchise. What else is there to know other than stuff JK Rowling seemingly dreams up on the fly and announces as canon on Twitter? Much like the god awful Hogwarts Mystery app that came out a while ago, the narrative they’ve tried to make in Unite is weak and in my opinion doesn’t really have a place in a game where you’re meant to be walking around most of the time. The only think that hasn’t been done yet, which I think would be pretty cool, is a TV series or something about the Marauders (feel free to take that idea Netflix, Amazon, anyone…)

My last big beef with this game is that I’ve been playing for a couple of days now and I do my fair share of walking, or rather I used to. If you want to unlock those Portmanteaus (eggs) you better not actually look at the app because you spend so long tapping the large amount of encounters, catching stuff, being told what you got as a reward, placing the image in the designated room (like a sticker book), and then maybe you got a special item and Constance or Harry will pop up to tell you about it, getting more energy to cast spells, growing plants, collecting ingredients… My lunch time walks have actually got much shorter. I’ve had the same 5k Portmanteau unlocking since I got the app and I’m still only up to about 3k. There is just way too much on-the-go admin to be done. I find myself standing around for way longer than I want to. In Pokémon Go you’d catch your Pokémon and tap on the Poké-stops as you went past and that was it. Yeah, maybe you had to stop for a minute or two sometimes to catch more powerful Pokémon but it never took that long. Then you’d get home, or sit down somewhere or whatever, you’d do your candy and achievements admin and voilà. Perhaps I need to manage my time with it better, but even if I did I still feel like I’d be standing around a lot.

Hanging around way too long trying to trap the Dementor, sorry Harry, bye

The one thing I prefer immensely to Pokémon Go however (so far), are the fortresses. Granted, I haven’t played a lot of them yet, and I’ve only played them alone so far (queue the tiny violin.) These are the equivalent of gyms. You can go in alone or with a team and take on the monsters inside the fortresses. Each person plays a role, My profession is a Magizoologist so I’m a tank/healer, the Aurors are basically DPS, and I’m not sure what the Professors do, DPS as well I guess? The goal in a fortress is to take down all the monsters in the room before the timer runs out. This is the first part of the game that I have properly enjoyed, which surprised me as I was never bothered about gyms in the Pokémon era. I was working my way through the levels by myself and having a pretty good time. To be honest, I would enjoy this as its own game. I don’t know if you can join a stranger’s raid if you happen to be near the same fortress at the same time or if you have to be friends, I would assume anyone can join so maybe I need to find a more popular fortress…

In conclusion… It’s not what I hoped, they’re just trying to do way too much all at once. I feel like they need to take some of the ideas of this game (I love the idea of an open wizarding world RPG, for example, there are so many possibilities for that) and put it on a console so that they can properly get their teeth into it and get a much more interesting plot together. When you ask people what they think of the app the response seems to be a pretty non-committal “yeah… I mean It’s OK but…” and most of my friends are Potter nerds so that says something. As bad as I feel saying it as well, it’s kind of made me want to start playing Pokémon Go again instead. I really want to like Unite, and I truly hope it gets an update to give it a big boost but until then I don’t think I’ll keep playing. I want to get my step count back up again.

 

Have you played Wizards Unite? What do you think? Do you agree or disagree with any of my points? Will you keep playing?

The Dragon’s Horde: May edition

Yes it’s midway through June so is it a bit late for a May update? Maybe. It went by so fast though and I lost track of time… Well nevermind. It’s hard to know what month it is from my Dragon Cave rolling around in my horde of video games. May I offer you a cuppa and some scones as we have the monthly rundown and we pretend May just happened?

What I’ve been playing

Pokémon Ultra Sun

I had Pokémon fever after seeing Detective Pikachu (which I really enjoyed by the way and recommend, even if you’re not a big Pokémon fan) and I’d been wanting to buy Pokémon Sun for a while but had been holding off. I finally bought the Ultra version, mainly because there’s Mantine surfing available in that one and I wasn’t going to pass that up. I wasn’t expecting much to be honest but I think it’s actually a really refreshing take on the Pokémon series. It’s not the same story, the gym system is different, everything that has been a little problematic in previous games (the EXP share making you overpowered, clothes and hair styles, HMs…) has been very refined… The only thing I’d say is I haven’t really got a team that I’m particularly enamored with yet… I have some good Pokémon but… meh. I’m not that attached. I think a lot of this was the fact that this has been the first Pokémon game where I haven’t seen a starter I want from the get-go. This one was like: “do I want Emo Owl, Steroid Cat, or Ugly Mermaid?” I don’t really like any of them… I chose by closing my eyes and choosing at random in the end and I got Litten (Steroid Cat), he’s very cute now but it’s a shame he’ll turn into Dwayne ‘The Cat’ Johnson later.

Emo Owl, Ugly Mermaid, and Steroid Cat

That’s my only fault though, other than that I’m having a lot of fun!

 

Spiderman

I was almost converted to digital copies of games until my co-worker lent me Spiderman. You can’t lend people digital copies and now I get to play this for free.

I shoved Batman: Arkham Asylum temporarily to the side so that I could focus on Spiderman to return it faster only to find that it’s basically the same game. The fighting is the same, the gadgets basically achieve very similar results, the sneaking through grates and perching on stuff jutting out from walls, swinging through the city is very similar to flying around in Arkham Knight, that woman in your ear telling you the smart stuff and directing you around… I don’t mind though, it’s a good game and there’s something incredibly therapeutic about swinging around the city.

As it’s borrowed I won’t be as into all the side quests as I usually am so that I can return it faster but if I really like it maybe I’ll get my own copy. Again, much like the Batman games it seems to be blissfully achievable in a short space of time, as long as I don’t get too hung up on the collectibles. I’m about a quarter of the way through now so still a ways to go.

 

My Life as a Video Game

I published a post a while ago about what my life would be like as a video game and The Brink of Gaming has published their own wonderful version!

 I had a great time reading this and seeing someone else’s interpretation. A lot of creativity and imagination has been put into it. I particularly like the coffee boost ability and the Dark Doppelgänger as the antagonist, I think it’s a really cool and quite scary idea for a video game antogonist. Take a look!

 

There you go, there’s my monthly round up. What are you playing this month? Have you seen Detective Pikachu and what did you think of it? Most importantly, have a good rest of June!

My Top 10 Feelgood Games

Wow, so much for posting regularly again! I’ve had a pretty busy month with a fair few holidays, and more recently my other half and I decided to call time on our relationship. I may still be posting a little irregularly as I sort my life out but I’ll be back to normal soon. Needless to say I have been feeling a little weird so I made a list! I don’t know what it is but I like making lists. Sometimes we all need a bit of a pick-me-up. Whether that’s watching a good movie, re-reading the Harry Potter series for the 1,000th time, eating some damn good comfort food… We all have our ways. While I’m prone to all of the above gaming is something else that helps me to relax and feel better too (usually in the company of a Reese’s Pieces Krispy Kreme) in fact I can usually find a game to suit any mood; whether I want to curl up with a hot chocolate and play something slow paced and comforting, or if I had a bad day at work and just want to brutally murder the crap out of everything there is always something there for me. With that in mind I present to you Dragon’s Tea Party’s Top 10 Feelgood Games:

Number 10 – Kirby’s Epic Yarn

First of all, I’ve not actually played this but I really enjoy watching it. I never said they have to be feelgood games you’ve actually played! It’s impossible to feel bad while watching/playing this game. It’s just adorable, everything is lovely and colourful and it’s so imaginative. Maybe it’s because one of my hobbies is sewing but I really love the yarn-based aesthetic as well. If I’m having a particularly bad day at work I like to put on a Let’s Play of it in a cheeky small corner of my screen and it always makes me smile. Also, Kirby’s partner in it is called Prince Fluff and I think that’s adorable.

The only reason it’s so far down the list is that it’s lacking that nostalgia value for me as I always seemed to manage to avoid the Kirby games somehow back in my youth (totally unintentionally, they just never crossed my path). As you’ll see throughout this list nostalgia value plays a big part for me in feelgood stuff.

 

Number 9 – Skyrim

Getting almost as far away as we can from Kirby’s Epic Yarn we have Skyrim next on the list!

Skyrim is notorious for people wandering around for ages after being distracted by something or other, be it a side quest, a dragon, or a cool looking building in the distance. It’s so easy to become totally immersed in the world and time can fly by at a scary pace. It’s also very relaxed in that, due to the size of the world, there is no pressure to actually complete the main quest until you want to. You can do anything you like and the game will just go with it. In all honesty I never actually finished the main quest but even so I clocked up an enormous amount of time on the game, I really don’t want to know how much. If you’re looking for escapism this is the perfect game.

Once I have my PS4 back I’m going to download Horizon: Zero Dawn, which is similar to Skyrim in the escapism, large map, endless quests regard so maybe I could swap these round once I’ve played it.

Skyrim loses points though for having so many damn crypts. “Ooh a cave I wonder what… Ah, Draugr. I don’t know what else I expected.”

I haven’t even played for years but I am pre-emptively sick of fighting this guy already

Number 8 – Dragon Age: Inquisition

Let’s stick with the adventuring theme for a bit here and talk about Dragon Age: Inquisition.

This game was one of the main things that got me through my last year of University and stopped me from going crazy. If you did a course where almost all your grades depend on group project work you’ll know where I’m coming from. Never again. I’d come home after an exhausting day of fighting with my group about something stupid. We’d start off OK with everyone trying to be civil, but then along comes the person with the massive ego and they propose Stupid Idea of the Day. They stubbornly don’t drop Stupid Idea and eventually their egos unfurl to reveal their true Satanic forms: self-centred Harpies with sonar speech, draining the life out of me with every word out of their mouths, like mind vampires but 100 times worse. I’d return home a shell of the woman I’d been when I’d left that morning. I took my anger out on a much more manageable demon army in Inquisition and got a lot more invested in my team there than I ever was in any team I was in at University.

One of the great appeals of Dragon Age is the characters. I am a sucker for games with good character interactions and relationships and I would devote a lot of time to making sure I could do everyone’s side missions and be besties with everyone as much as I could.  I’d chill and eat cookies on the roof with Sera, admire Cassandra’s love of trashy romance novels, and just plain admire Dorian (that sass!) If only socialising IRL was as simple as that.

Number 7 – Spyro: Enter the Dragonfly

I did not realise until I googled it for this post that this game has pretty dire reviews all around but I don’t care. I really, truly loved this game.

This is the first big nostalgic game on this list. I don’t care what the reviews say, to me it was delightfully colourful, extremely fun, and the different levels were just wonderfully varied. I would spend hours trying to beat my previous time on the ice slide at the Monkey Monastery, the platform puzzle in the Thieves Den, or just swimming around Luau Island which was my favourite level because it was a beautiful tropical island where you could play the bongos, and the first time I was able to overcome my fear of in-game swimming. (For more about this weird fear you can have a read about it here.) I think that a lot of my enjoyment came from the childlike wonder at all the pretty colours and different locations available. It was just a nice, relaxed game where you blew bubbles at dragonflies and glided around cartoonish but beautiful scenery.

Looking a bit grainy now but still colourful!

Hardcore Spyro fans may be horrified to discover that Enter the Dragonfly, and A Hero’s Tail (which I didn’t like, although that has much better reviews than Enter the Dragonfly, so goes to show what 9 year old me knew), were the only Spyro games I ever played so while I’m looking forward to the re-mastered games coming out it will be my first time ever playing them! I’m hoping I’ll like them as much as I used to like Enter the Dragonfly.

Number 6: Pokémon Sapphire

Ah, Pokémon. Capturing wild animals and forcing them to fight for money is so serene. In all seriousness though I do find Pokémon relaxing, probably because of the nostalgic value but I also like the mellow plot (you don’t always want something complicated), the niceness of the world in general, and the adorable little creatures you raise to be powerful companions.

Right now the only console I have with me is my Nintendo DS so I’m working my way through Pokémon Y but as a dog-type only playthrough (don’t get me started on Smeargle… I should have done cats instead.)

I picked Sapphire in particular though because it’s the first one I remember seeing in colour, which at the time was absolutely incredible to me. My friend had it and until that moment I had only played Yellow so I didn’t know the joys of having a secret den to decorate, seeing the Pokémon world in such colourful detail, or even having a starter choice other than Pikachu. I was very jealous of my friend and used to play it at hers, if she let me. I eventually got my own version and it is definitely my most played Pokémon game, and possibly my most played game overall ever. I really like what they did with it in Alpha Sapphire too so that was nice.

Look at those graphics! The water ripples!

Number 5 – Dead Island

Back to the action now! Another game linked to a stressful time at University (last time, I promise)… It was second year and that is the year where your grades actually count and people start taking group work more seriously. Always wondered what it would be like to be on The Apprentice? Do an Advertising degree and it’s literally exactly the same but instead of earning a significant of money at the end of it you end up in a significant amount of debt. My group work in my second year was actually miles better than it was in my final year (see Number 9) but it was still enough to annoy me enough to vent my anger on Dead Island after a long hard day of pointless squabbling.

I run the risk of sounding a little psycho-esque here but killing zombies in a gruesome assortment of ways is very therapeutic and when you pick up random items like wires, saw blades, nails, bleach, duct tape… You just can’t help but imagine what weapons you’ll be making at the workstation when you get back to the base. My personal favourite was the electric katana.

As the zombies run towards you, screaming that horrible zombie scream, you think about your day and swing your wire covered baseball bat *Thwack!* “fuck you and your stupid idea but stubborn personality Group Member 1”, *Boom!* “fuck you Group member 2 who obnoxiously designated themselves project manager even though there is not meant to be a project manager, it’s all shared work” *Crack!* “and fuck you Group member 3 who hasn’t actually even showed up yet”. Aah… Now doesn’t that feel better?

I’m sure most hack and slash zombie games could be in this spot but Dead Island was there for me when I needed it the most and I will always be grateful to it for that.

Number 4 – Undertale

There’s no denying that Undertale is an extremely well written game and I really can’t praise it enough (if you are looking for a bit more though here’s a post I wrote about it a while ago). The characters are just wonderful and time after time as I wandered through the monster world I kept wondering if I could just stay there, though I guess that wouldn’t be fair to my monster friends who were all eager to return to the surface.

Why isn’t it just a little higher on the list? Well… It’s emotionally devastating and some of the fights are far from relaxing (looking at you Muffet) so that counts against the more chilled out side of it somewhat. It is such a nice game to wander around in though and every character has something to say, every enemy has some funny quirk, it was just made with so much love and thought and to be honest that knowledge alone is quite relaxing.

Number 3 – GTA

I don’t know what it is about games where you dangerously cruise around a city in a car but I find it very relaxing. Maybe it’s the sudden freedom of being able to drive on the sidewalk to avoid the traffic or just the ability to do almost anything you want. It’s a bit like a modern Skyrim, if horses were cars and dragons were the mafia.

I do find driving games or racing games weirdly relaxing overall, even though I rarely play them, and when you add in those side quests and the occasional murder spree it just makes it really.

I’ve just put the franchise of GTA rather than any specific one because any of them could fit the bill here really. Feel free to mention your favourite in the comments!

Number 2 – Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker

Yes, this is on almost every list I’ve done on this blog so far, if not all of them, but you can’t deny it’s for good reason! I will make an effort to actually expand make a list that it’s not included on one day. Just listen to this start up music though!

Do you feel jaunty yet? Feel like exploring the seas? I do! Let’s go and chill on Outset island where you can chase mini pigs, or we can go see the adorable forest people, or how about sailing, sailing over the bounding waves until you find an unexplored island, have a little look around…

How gorgeous is this?

A recurring theme for the more nostalgic games on this list: it’s so beautiful and colourful! I must have been very attracted to colour as a child. The sea is a beautiful blue, as is the sky and the grass is the greenest shade of green… I mean there’s this big impending apocalypse that Ganon’s wanting to bring about but if you don’t collect all the triforce pieces he’ll never get to that stage, right? Just explore away for ever.

And then of course there’s Link’s expressions…

 

Drumroll please…

 

Number 1 – Stardew Valley

How could it possibly be anything else?

Yes, maybe it’s obvious but there’s just something about this game that is incredibly serene and just lovely. It’s like the game version of The Great British Bake Off. Everyone is generally nice (except maybe Shane at first but he could be a lot worse) and you can help them out and eventually get to learn more about them, some of the stories are surprisingly touching and really look at real world issues like depression, suicide, and PTSD. That part doesn’t seem “feelgood” but then you can help them to find their way out of it, or just help as much as you can and I think it’s very rewarding to see the characters grow.

The way of living in the game is so enviable, everyone sends each other gifts and they all come together at the village fairs and events, the farming is addictive and making your farm look pretty/organised becomes hugely important (or it does for me anyway). Are you bored of farming though? Why don’t you explore the mines for a bit of action instead! Or you could try to catch the legendary fish… You can give yourself a task or a goal and it feels so rewarding when you manage to achieve it, even though it seems so insignificant when you compare it to other game achievements like dragon slaying or getting from A to Z in a specific time. Wow, you robbed the tomb of a lich king and got his staff of ultimate power? That’s cool but I made cranberry jam so who’s the real winner here?

 

So there you have it! What are your feelgood games? Do you agree/disagree with any on the list? Have you got any feelgood recommendations games, movies, or otherwise?

 

Dragon’s Nuzlocke Challenge: Day 14 – The Finale!

←Day 13

The Final Team

• Heather (Dotrio)
• Pointy (Nidoqueen)
• Sleepy ZZZ (Hypno)
• Swirlyo (Poliwag)
• Friglet (Girafarig)
• MyLilPony (Rapidash)

We had been training for a very, very long time. Many Tentacruels and Stantler were killed in an attempt to level the team with no accidental casualties and finally our hard work had paid off. My team were all levelled to their high 30s and everyone, excluding the stubborn MyLilPony, had evolved. I was sure they’d get to their level 40s in Victory Road. Cautiously we approached the cave.

Dragon: “Right team, here’s the plan: we duck in. Have a look around and see what sort of Pokémon there are and then we duck back out and go back to the lady’s house down the road to rest up… Let’s go!”

Cautiously we entered the cave and were immediately assaulted by a Gravler, he was promptly caught and sent to the PC. The last Pokémon I’d ever catch. I quickly realised that Swirlyo had a huge advantage in this cave: he could one-shot almost everything with Surf. We made our way through the cave, constantly going back to the house a bit down the road to rest when anyone took a little too much damage than I was comfortable with. I didn’t have any money left so I had to be careful! Finally we braved going past the front door and down a couple of ladders when my nemesis BLAAAA accosted us. The rival fight? Already? OK…

We easily beat him and he sort of admitted that he might be a bit of a douche canoe. Cool… What’s through this doorway here? Light? We’re on the other side?

Dragon: “WHAT?! I WAS PSYCHING MYSELF UP FOR AGES FOR THAT?!”

Pointy: “Did you want more fights?”

Dragon: “Well… Yeah! I want you guys to level up as much as possible and I want more money for potions!”

Friglet: “Well, there were some ladders we didn’t explore, there’s probably some items in there still.”

Dragons: “Great idea, Friglet!”

It was not a great idea. Half an hour later, while desperately trying to figure out how to get to an item that was tantalisingly close yet so far, Friglet fell to a self-destructing Graveler. Great. Now I only had 5 Pokémon for the Elite Four.

I gave up on the elusive item and we marched to the Elite Four. I must admit that at this point, while I’d never tell the team, I just wanted it over with. I had procrastinated for too long and I was just happy to have gotten this far. I had made a promise though and I intended to go through with it. I took out the newly caught Graveler (Baldur) to replace Friglet and off we went…

Elite Four Battle Number 1 – Will

Unfortunately, battle number 1 was what I’d been training Friglet up for. His dark moves would have been perfect against all of the Psychic types but… Never mind. Will’s Xatu proved to be a huge problem. I had nothing on bird or psychic Pokémon here and after going with what I had hoped would be the most sensible option (Baldur) I realised my mistake. Baldur was immediately taken out, Swirlyo quickly followed suit…

Crossing my fingers I sent out Sleepy ZZZ, he could take the hit from the Psychic moves and he eventually managed to Headbutt the Xatu to death, though it took him a long while, and a lot of potions. He did the same to the next Xatu, with me throwing a potion at him every few turns until that too fell and Will sent out a Slowbro. Ok… Heather could deal with this, bird has advantage over water… Right? Heather joined her fallen team mates…

At this point I was starting to panic. I wasn’t even going to make it past the first guy after all this time?! Sleepy ZZZ faced the Slowbro and took him out after several headbutts and potions. I was optimistic about the next Pokémon: An Exeggcute. MyLilPony had this in the bag.

MyLilPony somehow did not have this in the bag. Poor Sleepy ZZZ was dragged out again…

Dragon: “We’re nearly there Sleepy ZZZ, keep at it!”

Sleepy ZZZ: “… My head is so sore from all this headbutting bro… I don’t know if I can…”

Dragon: “Don’t be ridiculous, you are my second best Pokémon after Pointy and we would never be here without you. This is your moment, this is what we’ve been working for. Take this Ether and show them who’s boss!”

Sleepy ZZZ: “Uuurgh… OK…”

With a final, fatal headbutt the Exeggcute was sent sprawling at Will’s feet. We’d done it. We’d defeated an Elite Four member!

Dragon: “YEEEEEEEES SLEEPY ZZZ YOU EPIC HYPNO, YOU!”

I hugged him and he gave a weak smile. The battle had definitely taken its’ toll, on our fallen team mates mostly of course but on my potions supply and Sleepy ZZZ’s health as well.

Pointy: “I wanted to help…”

Dragon: “You’re a poison type, you would have been at a huge disadvantage against Psychic… You’re the main event in the next battle though. Are you ready?”

Pointy: “… I am. Do you think we’ll win?”

Dragon: “… I want to… But I don’t think so. Do you?”

Pointy: “No… But I want to try. If we fail I can be reunited with Nointy… Do you think our egg will be OK?”

Dragon: “Burd will take care of it.”

Pointy: “I don’t think I could have named a better godfather… Except Hedwig but you know… He’s dead too.”

Sleepy ZZZ: “Whatever happens you guys, I’ve had a great time.”

Dragon: “It’s truly been an honour.”

We had one last group hug, I took a deep breath and kicked open the door to the second Elite 4 member.

Elite Four Battle Number 2 – Koga

Dragon: “You’re going down Koga… Maybe.”

Koga: “You’re taking me on with just two Pokémon? That’s brave… But foolish.”

Dragon: “I have faith in Pointy and Sleepy ZZZ… I also have no choice.”

Koga: “Very well.”

The battle commenced and we had a strong start. Pointy made short work of the Ariados and Venomoth. That was already two Pokémon down! I started to feel a little more confident.

Dragon: “Keep it up Pointy! You’re doing it!”

Pointy: “As if I was going to let a couple of bugs take me down.”

Koga: “They were just the beginning, Go Forretress!”

Pointy: “Pfft. I do’t think so. Ice Punch, Bit-”

Koga: “SELF-DESTRUCT NOW!”

Dragon: “NOOOOO!!!!!”

The Forretress was too fast, it exploded before Pointy could attack, she tried to stand strong against the blast but it was just too much. She fell to the floor with a resounding THUMP. Her death was a punch to my gut, she’d become a fast favourite throughout the journey and while Sleepy ZZZ could hold his own I did not expect he’d be able to do so in what was coming.

Any minuscule remaining hope I’d had of defeating the Elite Four was shattered. Sleepy ZZZ gulped and nodded at me as he stepped up to the plate. A Crobat was sent out to meet him and, while it poisoned Sleepy he managed to take it out.

Here we were… Koga’s last Pokémon: a Muk. A rather high leveled Muk. Exhausted Sleepy ZZZ never stood a chance. Down he went covered in gross poison goop. Our fates intertwined, I too fell to my knees and collapsed…

It was a rainy, winters’ night when Burd, Squidward, Nommy, Smokey and an egg were released from the PC and informed that their trainer had fallen. Nommy and Smokey wasted no time and ran off into the wilderness. They hadn’t been close to the trainer at all. Burd and Squidward however shared a sad look and then at the egg. They knew what they had to do. Together they hatched the egg and raised the baby female Nidoran that came from it. They make a strange family to be sure, a giant squid, a bird and a guinea pig but it works. The Nidoran had a very unique upbringing, it’s rare to find a Nidoran that enjoys swimming and sleeping in nests. Growing up hearing stories about the bravery of her parents and the trainer that had taken her mother all the way to the Elite Four it was a very ambitious Nidoran, determined to find a trainer worthy of her skill to take her on their Elite 4 journey. One thing’s for sure, if it was anything like its’ mother it would go on to do great things. Its’ name? Nurdward.

 

The End…

 

In a parallel Universe Dragon’s still alive, this version of her was sat at work minding her own business when suddenly…

“… DAMMIT! MY POKEMUM WAS SAVING MONEY FOR ME THE WHOLE TIME I COULD HAVE BOUGHT MORE STUFF!!!” and she sulked for the rest of the day.

 

So there we have it everybody! Thank you to everyone that stuck with me throughout my journey and I apologise for the posts being a little sporadic at times. It was a fun journey, if a little stressful at times, hugely rewarding and I learned a lot more about Pokémon! I would consider doing a Nuzlocke again but maybe with some different rules… Not for a long time though! I need to recover from this one first! 

Would you consider taking the Nuzlocke challenge? Have you ever completed one? Which Pokémon game would you take the challenge on?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Dragon’s Nuzlocke Challenge: Day 13 – Getting Ready…

←Day 12

Ah ha! I bet you thought I’d given up on this! Well, I did for a little while to be honest. After beating the 8th gym I needed a little break from Pokémon, I never expected to get past the 4th gym, let alone the 8th! After a couple of weeks I picked it back up and started the journey to the Elite Four…

The Team

• Burd (Fearow)
• Pointy (Nidoqueen)
• Sleepy ZZZ (Hypno)
• Squidward (Tentacruel)
• Burgie (Haunter)
• Fritatta (Exeggcute)

 

Squidward: “No. I won’t do it.”

Dragon: “Come on, I need you to learn Waterfall so we can get to the Elite Four.”

Squidward: “I am sick of being an HM Whore. If you make me learn that too then all of my moves will be HMs and I just won’t stand for that.”

Dragon: “Fine… Fine… I guess I’ll just go and- HIIIYAAAAA!”

I threw the HM disc at Squidward, hitting him in the eye.

Squidward: “NO! I WILL NOT- Wait… I can’t learn it! Woohoo!”

Dragon: “You can learn every other HM move but that one?”

Squidward: “Apparently. Now I can just be a valuable team member instead!”

Dragon: “Into the PC with you Squidward.”

Squidward: “But…”

Dragon: “I know. I wish it wasn’t the case but I need a Pokémon that can learn Waterfall and having two water Pokémon is a bit of a waste… If there’s a computer past the waterfall maybe I’ll get you out then! Goodbye!”

I regarded my new water Pokémon Swirlyo the Poliwhirl, who looked back at me with his big eyes…

Dragon: “Where is your mouth?”

Swirlyo: “…”

Dragon: “Ah well, less dialogue to write!” (yeah, I broke the fourth wall, so what?)

With Swirlyo’s eyes bulging in fear and surprise at the sudden increase of power in his moves we zoomed up the waterfall. Have you ever seen a tadpole climb a waterfall? Have you ever seen a person surf on a tadpole? It’s pretty impressive. I had to maintain my balance on one toe the whole time.

The first Pokémon we encountered was a Doduo, in all honesty I was hoping for something a little more exciting than that in this area but fine. Heather joined the reserves in the PC and I fought my way through some more trainers, all while trying to level up Swirlyo and Fritatta who were both in their early 20s still. We made our way to another new area and suddenly I saw a burst of flame through the grass… Could it be? It was! A Ponyta!

Dragon: “*high pitched squealing* oh my gooood, it’s a pretty pony! I want it! Look at his face he’s so pretty!!!”

Pointy: *filing her claws with a tree trunk* “Pfft, he’s got nothing on me. Stupid dainty horse, I could flick him and he’d fall over.”

Enemy Ponyta: *flicking mane dangerously close to some trees* “What’s that you prehistoric Poké-bitch? Come waddle over on those boulders you call legs and say that to my face!”

Without a word Pointy set down the tree trunk and began sauntering over to the Ponyta, rolling up her imaginary sleeves in the process.

Enemy Ponyta: “Woah, steady on now, when I said boulder I meant boulders of… Of cloud and… Your nails look so good, will you do my hooves like that some day? When you were far away you seemed so much smaller and now… Now that you’re… Right here in front of me… I can see just how magnificent you are… Your breath smells so intoxicating I just… Please don’t kill me.”

Dragon: “Pointy, do NOT touch him! We don’t have any fire Pokémon!”

Pointy rolled her eyes, and turned around. The Ponyta breathed a sigh of relief but then Pointy quickly turned around and growled, making the Ponyta squeal in fear and cower on the ground, his mane spluttering. I sighed and caught him, transferring him to the PC for later.

We travelled a little further when a trainer pounced on us, sending out a Pikachu. We did struggle a little, having no type advantage, but Pointy managed to get rid of it though not without taking significant damage herself. The opposing trainer then sent out a Blastoise. I retaliated with Burd who put up a good fight but got too injured to carry on so Sleepy ZZZ stepped up to the challenge, his health was immediately reduced to the red section… Who else could I send out? Fritatta and Swirlyo wouldn’t last a second, all my “good” Pokémon were badly injured… Except for Burgie. Hesitantly, I him out and he took a hit which was not as bad as others but did over half health damage… Oh no. I needed Burd to recover but to do that I’d have to sacrifice Burgie… Or maybe one of the others… But Burgie was technically my weakest team member…

Burgie: “I know what needs to be done Dragon, I’m ready.”

Dragon: “I can’t do it Burgie… You are my last original team member. You’ve been with me through my whole journey…”

Burgie: “And we had some good times but we both know that I’m not going to be of much use to you in the upcoming battles. There are Pokémon in the PC that would fill this space in the team better. I’m just glad I got this far with you, I’ve been all over the Johto region and licked so many things that I never would have if you hadn’t caught me, and to die on the road to the Elite Four is a good death. I thank you.”

Burd: *Weakly* “Burgie… No… Don’t do it Dragon…”

Dragon: “I… I can’t!”

Burgie smiled sadly and licked my face, for once I wasn’t repulsed, then before I could do anything he used his turn, whipping his tongue into my backpack and grabbing a Hyper Potion, throwing it to Burd who recovered instantly.

Dragon and Burd: “NO!!!”

A jet of water hit Burgie and his ghostly form turned to smoke, drifting away in the wind. The Blastoise smirked, seeing the anguish on the teams’ faces. Burd stepped forward to face him, shaking with anger.

Burd “I have seen too many friends fall on this journey, but I have also seen each of them avenged. Burgie shall be no different, his noble sacrifice will not be in vain.”

With that Burd soared into the air in a graceful arc, then swooped down at a high speed, spearing the Blastoise with his beak and finishing him. We all watched as the last of Burgies’ smokey remains faded into the clouds and then dragged ourselves to a kind lady’s house where we rested.

I decided it was really time to get Fritatta and Swirlyo levelled properly so once everyone had regained their strength we set out to train. As Fritatta prepared for his fight a Doduo appeared, I went to switch out Fritatta but the Doduo used Pursuit finishing Friatta as he zoomed back to his Pokéball. I took a deep breath and sighed. There was no PC anywhere near that I knew of.

We flew back to Johto and I ran into a Pokécentre, there I withdrew MyLilPony, the recently caught Ponyta, and Friglet the Girafarig who had been recommended to me as he can learn dark type moves. I turned off the PC and went to leave but my eyes fell on Burd. I’d been getting worried about him, we had a strong bond and he was one of my most reliable team mates but lately he’d been getting weaker and weaker in comparison to other trainers’ Pokémon. I also couldn’t forget his promise to Hedwig: that he’d take a trip around the world for the both of them. Could I save him by putting him in the PC? That way even if I failed he’d still be able to live out his retirement. I could use my new Doduo, Heather, to fly now (even though that makes no sense as Doduo has no wings). Burd caught me looking at him and smiled.

Burd: “Don’t worry Dragon, my time is nearly up. I can feel it. If Heather fails though, I’ll be here.”

Dragon: “I’ll miss you Burd! You’ve been with me for ages. Remember when you took on the second gym all by yourself?”

Burd: “Good times!”

Sleepy ZZZ: “I’ll see you on the other side bro, take it easy.”

Burd: “You’re Dragon’s oldest Pokémon now Sleepy, keep her and the team safe.”

Sleepy ZZZ: “We’ll be fine bro, don’t stress.”

Old pic of Burd from back in the day when he won us the second badge… They grow up so fast.

They fist-bumped and then the team had a group hug. Everyone had grown to admire and respect Burd, who had become the voice of reason after Hedwig’s unfortunate demise. Pointy had to turn away quickly because she had something in her eye. Finally, Burd was sucked into the PC, waving as he went, and I withdrew Heather. Everyone eyed her doubtfully.

Pointy: “How can she fly… If she has no wings?”

Dragon: “I guess we’ll find out…”

Heather’s right head: “I think we just like… Spin really fast to be honest, there’s no other explanation.”

Heather’s left head: “Uh huh, totally spin fast like a helicopter. You’ll just have to, like, trust us.”

Credit to Zakhero on Deviant Art https://zakhero.deviantart.com/art/Doduo-can-Fly-326087821

Friglet: “I’m sure it will be fine!” *a whisper coming from his rear end* “we’ll plummet to our deaths.”

Swrilyo: *Eyes widen in fear*

MyLilPony: “Death?! No, I don’t do death… Can I go back to the PC?”

Pointy: “You scared, Pony?”

MyLilPony: “… No… I just… Like life.”

Pointy: “Don’t worry, no one’s dying… In flight anyway.”

MyLilPony did a high pitched squeal and cowered on the ground.

Friglet: “Don’t worry, I have faith in Heather!” *whispering* “Life is meaningless.”

Dragon: “… Right… Well we’re off to a good start! We’re just missing some levels… It’s time for some grinding. Cue the montage!”

Join us next time for the final chapter of Dragon’s Nuzlocke Chellenge as the team take on Victory Road and the Elite Four… Will the team succeed? What do you think? Place your bets now!

The Team

• Heather (Doduo)
• Pointy (Nidoqueen)
• Sleepy ZZZ (Hypno)
• Swirlyo (Poliwag)
• Friglet (Girafarig)
• MyLilPony (Ponyta)

RIP

• Burgie (Haunter)
• Fritatta (Exeggcute)

Reserves

• Burd (Fearow)
• Nommy (Slowpoke)
• Smokey (Koffing)
• Squidward (Tentacruel)