Time to set off! By the way, I really love the mangrove sort of trees the designers put in the shallow water areas. The water routes of Hoenn were way too huge and frustrating to fully comb through, but they’ve always been gorgeous.
Okay, diving time!
There’s people, upsidedown, you can find while diving and fight.
(One asks if I know what marine snow is, then upon defeat says that (Marine snow is proof of the ocean’s abundance.) Great job avoiding the fact it’s rotting scraps mixed with poop.)
The addition of my own scuba gear just makes the idea of pokemon battles seem that much more absurd. It’d make more sense for this to function like the sky battles, where only water pokemon could take part. Not sure if this is simply a matter of design teams not talking or if it’s because sky battles were horrible and they learned their lesson. The thing is, though, underwater battles would help give a purpose to the glut of water types we have in the games (I believe there’s fifteen new final evolutions introduced this generation, plus the twenty-some in past generations, many of which can be caught in this one). That’s especially helpful when the way the games are set up, so many water types aren’t accessible until late in the game when your team is generally finalized. I know that’s why I don’t often use them.
Speaking of, I can see pokemon drifting by in the deeper fissures but apparently can’t reach those. It’s really cool to see pokemon just out and about like that, but really frustrating I can’t encounter them.
Ah, okay, so there’s still the seaweed for pokemon capture.
Caught a corsola!
Corsola’s branches glitter very beautifully in seven colors when they catch sunlight. If any branch breaks off, this Pokémon grows it back in just one night.
Corsola is one of those pokemon that really should be a different type combo. There’s a ton of rock/water pokemon already. Maybe bug/rock or plant/rock.
Chinchou!
Chinchou lets loose positive and negative electrical charges from its two antennas to make its prey faint. This Pokémon flashes its electric lights to exchange signals with others.
Lanturn! (So what do I need chinchou for? Well, okay, they’re adorable to see swimming around, so there’s that.)
Lanturn is nicknamed “the deep-sea star” for its illuminated antenna. This Pokemon produces light by causing a chemical reaction between bacteria and its bodily fluids inside the anetnna.
Clamperl!!!
Clamperl’s sturdy shell is not only good for protection–it is also used for clamping and catching prey. A fully grown Clamperl’s shell will be scored with nicks and scratches all over.
I was about to say I needed to catch a second one, to get both evolutions. Then I remembered I have GTS-tradable shiny pokemon, so I could just trade for those. Then I remembered the reason I have GTS-tradable shiny pokemon so I’ll just get the QR codes later.
Well. I head back for healing, then decide to swap to my real team for the actual cavern-entering part.
…And I enter, but it’s as empty as it is pretty. Ah, but going up I find the sub, so I guess I investigate this other cave.
Honest curiosity or some similar thought process I guess, but I’m always a little baffled when you freely use stuff like QR codes to get pokemon you wouldn’t have otherwise while also complaining of the ease of overleveling, when the QR-mons get an exp. boost by being counted as traded. You’d be seeing less of a leveling boost by keeping to what’s presently available and in general I guess I’m just trying to mentally reconcile a willingness to “cheat” (maybe not the best word, but I’m honestly not sure of a better) with complaints about the game being too easy. I mean, it often is too easy, but QR-ing stuff in makes it more so. For something unobtainable like a Mew I get the idea at least. (shrugs) I like your analysis otherwise (even if I don’t always agree with it it still does often provide food for thought) so I usually let it pass without comment, but I am actually curious.
I’ve long wished for more diverse water-dwelling pokemon instead of having everything that you encounter by sea be a water type. Not everything encountered in any other area has to have a type that matches the surroundings, but they just can’t seem to be able to put a non-water-type in the water (I think the only thing you can find by surfing or fishing that doesn’t have water for a type is stunfisk). Instead of having to plan for a sea journey, you just have to grab something with an electric move and spam it without a thought. I was so hopeful for that Dark/Psychic squid thing in X and Y to be found in the water to mix up the types met while surfing, but it’s only found on land. Why is it so hard to throw in a pure Normal fish or something for balance?
While I have little knowledge of Pokemon, I would comment from the general game design perspective.
There are different kinds of difficulty, some of them good while others just frustrating.
Generally speaking, difficulty that comes from challenging the player – be it a challenge of reflexes or intellect – is good while difficulty relying on luck or tedious repetition is bad.
A boss you can’t defeat with brute force alone and need to adjust your tactic is good. A clever puzzle you need to use logic in order to solve is good. An area which requires you to move fast and jump just right to avoid obstacles and reach the goal is good, though generally not my cup of tea.
On the other hand, killing easy enemies over and over until one of them drops the right loot is bad.
Take Persona 4, for example. I found bosses to be pleasantly challenging without being overwhelming, but there was that one quest where I had to collect ten pieces of special loot that can be obtained only from certain enemies. In Persona, you can’t tell which enemies you are going to fight before the battle starts, so the quest required me to just run around two dungeon floors and fight everyone in sight, then wait for them to respawn and do it again. And it was so damn tedious.
The big problem, I think, was that there was no tension, no doubt about the outcome. I’ve completed the dungeon already and was high-level enough that the enemies couldn’t do much against me. I knew for a fact that as long as I don’t give up, I will reach my goal sooner or later. It was just a matter of the random generator to give me the right enemies and let them drop the loot.
I suspect searching for just the right pokemon can be like that: you know you will succeed sooner or later, it’s just a matter of how much time you are willing to waste on it.
And it’s just a bad design to make boredom the true opponent of the player.
Having to depend on the RNG’s whims to get something is always the worst. There’s always a pokemon or two on each game that depend on that, true.
Another example that comes to mind, since I’ve been playing the game the past few months, are some of the crafts in Fantasy Life. True, the gathering classes also have their tasks of getting rare stuff from their designated spots, but even if it takes forever to get, say, a black onyx, you will have gathered a hefty amount of magic ore in the process, which is also good for crafting.
But the crafting classes always have something that requires a rare item or two to make, and that stuff can only be found from enemy drops that don’t always appear. Worst if it’s from boss monsters. At least the worst of the lot are meant to be end-game or post-game recipes, but still.
Because the game is so easy that the QR Pokemon don’t make any difference, so you might as well get cool ones to play around with. You breeze through with or without them.
I’m personally not big on those kind of exploits, but they really don’t have any effect on the difficulty of the game.
If you look at what pokemon I had on my team, the only QR code one was the lotad, which I’d have to trade for either way. (If I took the time to figure out my secret ID number, I could even have pokemon that don’t have the level boost, otherwise it’d be impossible for pokemon you can’t get in the game) And I barely raised that one, mostly just carting it around while the exp share did the work. I complain about overleveling with my primary pokemon, the one that I actually fight with and isn’t affected by the experience share but still ends up way too strong.
All my QR code stuff has been to make shiny pokemon to give to other people, because shiny pokemon look really cool and it’s a shame that most of them are never seen because the only way to get them legitimately is grinding for hours (and it may be a pokemon that’s got a horrible stat layout, and it won’t have access to egg moves unless you want to grind for weeks trying to do it by breeding.)
Basically, there’s a difference between “cheating” to make the game easier and “cheating” to get access to stuff the designers just don’t want you to have. Having max copies of the fossils didn’t make the game easier, it just let me send people two pokemon at a time.
Fair enough I suppose.
“Positive electrical charges”?
And negative.
I like Corsola’s typing, I can’t think of another Rock/Water, although there many water and many rock types, to bad it’s such a weak pokemon and has so many vulnerabilities.
The fossil pokemon tend to have that typing. In contrast, there’s only one rock/grass and it only shows up a generation after corsola. Second gen had only one rock/bug too, and it was a gimmick pokemon that didn’t do much with the typing. Even now there’s only three bug/rock pokemon total, in contrast to six water/rock (and another five water/ground).
You ninja.
Top of my head it’s mostly the fossil pokemon. Kabuto and omanyte and blue turtle that isn’t archen. And relicanth maybe?
It’s not a common typing, but considering how many dual type pairings straight-up don’t exist there are comparatively a lot of them.