“Leave Farla alone, St Elmo’s Fire. You’re disgusting.”
Creatura FabellaA response to your review at https://www.fanfiction.net/r/12420176/ Thanks for that, dialogue is something I have never been quite certain about, and I’m not really sure how to put in the horizontal lines, how do you do it?
You have to do it through the in-site editor. After you upload something, you can edit it by clicking it in the document manager. This will open a RichText editor where one of the top buttons will insert a horizontal line.Ok great, thanks for all the advice. It is greatly appreciated.
Ginge19A response to your review at https://www.fanfiction.net/r/12424862/ I mistyped the title I realize that now. And the team members question is for ash’s team.
They changed the title after this… to “Pokemon Aveger”.
thank you for your review. i know my punctuation isn’t the best, and i’m trying to work on it. but i am only in my sophomore year of high school. i do thank you for your critical review as i would love to fix all my mistakes unlike some who just want to be negative. on another note how’s my story so far?Apr 1
about the team members it honestly can go either way i would love to get some oc’s for team rocket. as well as the last to team slot openings. and again thank you for your help on errors. unlike most authors my age i want to fix it, and i need the help if i’m going to publish book’s in the future
This is the same guy. Not sure if they confused me with someone else or what.
Apr 2
A response to your review at https://www.fanfiction.net/r/12305578/
How many times am I going to have to say that I don’t give a damn about getting reviews? Because I just hate repeating myself, and for the record, mostly everyone just PM’s me about their OC’s actions anyways, so it’s not really giving me any extra reviews. The only real reasons why I allow the readers to have a say what their OC does is so they can feel like they are a part of the story, and so they can make their OC do something that’d they actually do, because I’m not always going to choose correctly and I’d rather not have any issues with it. It also gives them a chance to expand upon their OCs. Also, I’m pretty sure I’ve told you this before but, the times when I allow for input will be far and few between, and it’ll just be an OPTION and not a REQUIREMENT. If you choose to not participate then I go and choose for you, no hard feelings. About 90% of the time, the stuff I ask input for doesn’t affect the story at all, maybe they’ll be times where they do but it’ll be quite rare as I’d rather be the one that chooses that kind of stuff. If you’ve been paying attention, I’ve asked only twice this entire story, so no, this story isn’t really much of an interactive table top rpg. Plus, I’m not the only author that has done this before and his story has been doing fine, no one has complained to him about it. You’re the first person I’ve seen complaining about this. I just don’t get why you’re getting so flustered about it, it’s not even your story, so let me write my the story the way I intended to please.
Apr 2[I’m not the only author that has done this before and his story has been doing fine]
I have no clue what you’re talking about, and I follow Pokemon SYOC stories quite avidly. I’m not aware of any other SYOC story that operates like this. It is generally agreed that the author has total control of the character and will only ask for input on an individual basis.
[How many times am I going to have to say that I don’t give a damn about getting reviews?]
Whether your intentions, the effect of your policy is still review racketing, which is still exploitative.
[The only real reasons why I allow the readers to have a say what their OC does is so they can feel like they are a part of the story, and so they can make their OC do something that’d they actually do, because I’m not always going to choose correctly and I’d rather not have any issues with it. Also, I’m pretty sure I’ve told you this before but, the times when I allow for input will be far and few between, and it’ll just be an OPTION and not a REQUIREMENT. If you choose to not participate then I go and choose for you, no hard feelings.]
That is a lie. You punished people who didn’t take this totally optional option, and threw a fit about it in the A/N afterwards. It is blindingly obvious this was about you and not the readers.
[I’ve asked only twice this entire story, so no, this story isn’t really much of an interactive table top rpg]
Right, you only asked it for an incredibly important climactic battle and gave it out as a blanket request, that’s not at all like a tabletop RPG.
[let me write my the story the way I intended to please]
Oh for God’s sake. Leaving you to your own devices is exactly what I WANTED to do. You are the one who demanded readers write your battle scene for you.
I am also tired of repeating myself, so I will say it once more: Your readers do not owe you anything. *They* are doing *you* a favor by providing characters and information at your request. You should not need constant response and validation to be sure that people are still reading your story. For some people, reviewing and constant engagement simply isn’t their style or what they want, and you should respect that.
Apr 2
Check out 16Doobop13’s story, Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: The Last Legend, don’t know how you missed that one when you saw his newer story. He rolls a D20 for outcomes, asks for input like I do in this story, and he’s a better author than I am so I’m not in influenced by a bad writer. Also, he’s a friend of mine, so don’t think I’m stealing his ideas or anything and he’ll back me up on that.
[That is a lie. You punished people who didn’t take this totally optional option, and threw a fit about it in the A/N afterwards. It is blindingly obvious this was about you and not the readers.]
I regret doing that, but I can’t just bring them back to life, what’s done is done. I wasn’t really throwing a fit(though it did seem like I was), I was just giving reasons why the OCs died so early on in the story. Also, I didn’t purposely kill them, if you remember correctly, I did say I was rolling a D20 for outcomes, and the rolls were just not in their favors, and since I felt that certain readers weren’t actually reading I was more willing to put their OCs’ lives at risk, rather than the other OCs. That’s as far as punishment was in that situation.
[I am also tired of repeating myself, so I will say it once more: Your readers do not owe you anything. *They* are doing *you* a favor by providing characters and information at your request. You should not need constant response and validation to be sure that people are still reading your story. For some people, reviewing and constant engagement simply isn’t their style or what they want, and you should respect that.]
Which is exactly why I made it optional to give me input, which I stated in the newest chapter. If you wish to participate then do so, if you don’t, your OC’s survival chances are still the same as every other OC. I will respect people’s style, and I won’t force anyone’s hand.
Sounds like they actually did learn something. I doubt I’ll be submitting anything else to them, though.
Choclate1203A response to your review at https://www.fanfiction.net/r/12383496/ Thank You for your help.
KarrioHello,First off, I would like to thank you for reading the story and for writing the review you did. Alot of reviewers tends to just say “good job,” or “awesome chapter” etc but rarely state a way you can fix your writing/grammar.I do have a few notes.1) I agree. My title could be different, could be more original but frankly, titles are one thing I am pretty bad at. If you will notice my other pieces, I am getting better very slowly though.
2) Titling my chapters is my style. It’s neither correct or incorrect but a personal style choice. I am not sure what you even brought that up.
3) Capitalization. Reading that thread that you posted, it seems like alot of the people are on the fence about how to capitalize pokemon. In the earlier games, they always went with capitals for the names of pokemon. Some of the official productions have also capitalized the P (or the first letter in a pokemon’s name) but I do see where you are coming from. It seems like there is no right or wrong way, reading from the link you sent me, and from other forums out there. It seems to come down to personal style. I will take your advice though for the reminder of the series.
4) Starting your story with your character waking up is indeed common and overdone, but in the terms of Pokemon World (anime and the games, not sure about the manga), it’s basically the normal. You set up your story with your character getting their first pokemon. There’s not really alot of room to play around. Step 1: Character wakes up Step 2: Goes to the lab (in whatever region). Step 3: Adventure begins.
5) I am pretty sure my dialogue has been done correctly grammer wise. My punctuation, from reading it back, is spot on. “Dialogue here,”. That is one of my strong suits. Maybe I am misreading your point though.
6) Badge quest can be plot. I mean, take a look at the show and games. Main plot is battling gym leaders, battling the Pokemon League (Excluding Sun and Moon). Now, since this is the first chapter, I haven’t set up much. There is a plot but my intention was for Kyle to start on his journey immediately. Once he leaves Pallet Town, that’s when the plot starts.
7) This is my first Pokemon fanfic, so yes. I will make mistakes on some of the grammar/punctuation etc. It’ll be a learning experience. So please bear with me.
Again, I do thank you for your review and your constructive criticism and I will keep them in mind as I continue this story.
secs ago[I am not sure what you even brought that up.]
It’s redundant with the dropdown menu, and the menu encroaches on the story area, which wrecks centered text in the top rows. It always ends up looking really off to me.
[Starting your story with your character waking up is indeed common and overdone, but in the terms of Pokemon World (anime and the games, not sure about the manga), it’s basically the normal. You set up your story with your character getting their first pokemon. There’s not really alot of room to play around. Step 1: Character wakes up Step 2: Goes to the lab (in whatever region). Step 3: Adventure begins.]
…You do realize you’re not required to copy canon to the letter, right? Just because the games’ stories are structured a certain way doesn’t mean you have to do the same. In fact, you’ll stand out more if you do something different than what everyone’s already familiar with, right? I would recommend reading these threads for more discussion on original trainer stories:
https://www.fanfiction.net/topic/11834/143219856/1/Actually-Writing-an-OT-Fic-Part-1
https://www.fanfiction.net/topic/11834/143106745/1/Things-to-Consider-in-OT-Fic
https://www.fanfiction.net/topic/11834/143363660/1/Actually-Writing-an-OT-Fic-Part-2
https://www.fanfiction.net/topic/11834/143662066/1/Actually-Writing-an-OT-Fic-Part-3
https://www.fanfiction.net/topic/11834/142411850/1/First-Chapters
[I am pretty sure my dialogue has been done correctly grammer wise. My punctuation, from reading it back, is spot on. “Dialogue here,”. That is one of my strong suits. Maybe I am misreading your point though.]
Check the section I quoted — you said someone smiled a line of dialogue, which doesn’t make sense. When you have a character making a non-speaking action after dialogue, it’s a separate action from the dialogue and thus a separate sentence. As a general rule of thumb, you should be able to remove the quotes and still have it make sense — [Hello, he said] makes sense, while [Hello, he smiled] is a comma splice. [Hello. He smiled.] makes sense.
[Badge quest can be plot. I mean, take a look at the show and games.]
The badge quest isn’t their plot. The badge quest is the obligatory gameplay challenges that a lot of players complain about for encroaching on the real plot, which has to do with everything else.
Keep in mind that games, as well as episodic shows, can have very different focuses than a story. The games don’t need a plot, because simply showing off gameplay mechanics through a string of battles is enough to be entertaining to a player. But reading a novel doesn’t work the same way. I’d recommend reading this:
https://www.fanfiction.net/topic/11834/143300790/1/Battles-Are-Boring
5m ago
May I point out that this is your opinion, and not a fact. You even said it yourself. It looks off to you. So my point does stand, as it’s a personal style choice. If you don’t like it, that’s fine. Not everyone will like what people write. But please don’t make it a fact when it’s your personal opinion.
[…You do realize you’re not required to copy canon to the letter, right? Just because the games’ stories are structured a certain way doesn’t mean you have to do the same. In fact, you’ll stand out more if you do something different than what everyone’s already familiar with, right? I would recommend reading these threads for more discussion on original trainer stories:]
Thank you for the links. I have read them and gained some knowledge. Writing OCs are hard and takes alot of work. Not just in the Pokemon Universe but in any original writing. As I have told some people I am currently talking with, Kyle’s journey is a mirror of my journey into writing for the Pokemon fandom. I start of with a simple goal (Badge Quest) and gradually add in the main plot as I get more comfortable, seeing as this is my first Pokemon fanfic. It will be a learning curve no doubt but I am up for the task.
[Check the section I quoted — you said someone smiled a line of dialogue, which doesn’t make sense. When you have a character making a non-speaking action after dialogue, it’s a separate action from the dialogue and thus a separate sentence. As a general rule of thumb, you should be able to remove the quotes and still have it make sense — [Hello, he said] makes sense, while [Hello, he smiled] is a comma splice. [Hello. He smiled.] makes sense.]
Re reading it, I have missed a word. Sometimes brain works faster then fingers. Moral of this lesson: Always double check, then check before posting. Thank you for pointing it out.
[The badge quest isn’t their plot. The badge quest is the obligatory gameplay challenges that a lot of players complain about for encroaching on the real plot, which has to do with everything else.
Keep in mind that games, as well as episodic shows, can have very different focuses than a story. The games don’t need a plot, because simply showing off gameplay mechanics through a string of battles is enough to be entertaining to a player. But reading a novel doesn’t work the same way. I’d recommend reading this:]
Actually, in the anime it was the plot. At least for the first season. Ash’s dream (though it hasn’t changed but it has shifted) is to become a Pokemon Master. Mind you, it has never been revealed on how exactly you obtain that goal, so perhaps the show showed one path. Either way, it was the overall plot in season one. In the later seasons, however the plot has changed so you are right as well. Again, Kyle’s journey mirrors mine as a new writer in this fandom. Start off simple and let the story grow from there.
secs ago[May I point out that this is your opinion, and not a fact.]
…I never implied otherwise?
3m ago
I apologize.
Grey Gear CoperationA response to your review at https://www.fanfiction.net/r/12434521/ Sorry about that, I don’t know how to make them single spaced. I would appreciate if you tell me how because even I have a problem with it.
52m agoA response to your review at https://www.fanfiction.net/r/12434521/
Also, if there is something you don’t understand so far in the story or ploth8les then let me know.
secs ago(You can continue the same PM chain by viewing the message in your outbox, for future reference.)
You likely had a file format issue when you imported your story to the document manager. What word processor do you use? .doc, .odt, and .txt files tend to work, but there can be hiccups, especially if you’re using the newer version of Word that automatically adds lots of fanciness like the spacing. I’d recommend disabling line spacing in Word (it should be under the Paragraph tab), or making a text file in LibreOffice or an older version of Word that’s a bit plainer, and then uploading it and seeing if that fixes it. Regardless, you should always preview your story with the “view/edit” button so you can catch these things before you post.
Super Salty EdgelordA response to your review at https://www.fanfiction.net/r/12435710/ Hey, welcome back! How was your trip up Farla’s rancid cunt? :)
Aw, c’mon, is insult by association really the best you can do? I guess I’m just too perfect.I don’t care to indulge you. Since your reviews are all the same mindless drivel copied directly from Farla, so shall be my insults. That being said, enjoy Farla’s rancid cunt. :)GenerationJhotoA response to your review at https://www.fanfiction.net/r/12435276/ Hey there and thank you for all the feedback. I’m still a bit knew to this so I really appreciate the help. I’ll be taking a look at those articles and you linked me and I’ll educate myself a bit moreally before I post. I actually wanted to start in a later area, but I suppose I could summarize the events that took place before that moment?Thank you again!
St Elmo’s Fire,
A new review has been posted to your story.
Story: Blood is Thicker than Water
Chapter: 1. Chapter 1
From: u are a STALKER (Guest)
——————-
u are a STALKER:Leave Farla alone, St Elmo’s Fire. You’re disgusting.
——————-
??????
St Elmo’s Fire,
A new review has been posted to your story.
Story: Blood is Thicker than Water
Chapter: 1. Chapter 1
From: Guest
——————-
:”This belongs in the Anime world. Find your story under “Manage Stories” and select it from the dropdown menu that says “World: Any” in the “Category” section.”
Why don’t you do the same with the dropdown menu with the characters? Hau is among them, by the way.
——————-
Oh, SuMo characters have finally been added! Thanks, anonfriend.
St Elmo’s Fire,
A new review has been posted to your story.
Story: Blood is Thicker than Water
Chapter: 1. Chapter 1
From: Guest
——————-
:why is moon added in a character if she isnt in the story? label it right
——————-
There’s not really alot of room to play around.
For months after leaving home, Vivian hadn’t talked to her parents. She hadn’t intended to go so long without calling, but caught up in the unexpected thrill of an adventure she had embarked on just so she’d no longer have to help with her mother’s research, it just kind of happened. So it came as a huge surprise when she got a phone call from her father, informing her that her mother wanted her to return to Ecruteak City. Vivian had asked him why her mother didn’t call her herself and he explained the request came in a letter sent on the wings of her xatu from the field , but it didn’t explain precisely why her mother wanted her to return, only that it was urgent.
All Vivian knew was that, no matter what it was, it was sure to be a hassle. And it was probably meant to be Valerie’s hassle, most likely, but she disappeared to God knows where on her own journey. So the task fell on Vivian instead. She just sighed and climbed onto the back of Noctowl spread her large crimson wings, wondering what misadventure awaited her back home.
And that took me nine minutes to write and minutes to edit and write this entire post (which is actually pretty speedy compared to the amount of time I usually take writing the longer posts I make to this blog). How did I do?
I tried to cover a few other bases (like capitalization- I almost wrote “city” instead of “City” which would’ve been embarrassing, an important mother, and using the word “god”- which I just noticed I almost failed to capitalize because I assumed whatever god she was talking about wasn’t the Capital-G Judeo-Christian God, even though the use was still as a name!), but I think I failed in others (I swear I made a mistake with the tense somewhere but I can’t find it for the life of me, and her attitude towards her mother and sister feels a bit too antagonistic for what I intended- just that her mother is going to want her to do something bothersome because she has a history of misadventure, and because the sister more likely to have been the first choice to bring on this next one is gone, that task falls upon poor Vivian) and I’m not very satisfied with some parts (“why her mother didn’t call her herself”), though I did just solve one yet again. Jeez, I found more errors writing this post-script than I did writing that bit of story.Oh, and I didn’t get to do any proper dialogue formatting. What a bummer.
Incidentally, while writing the last part, is there really any good way to explain the effect badges have on pokemon listening to a trainer or using HMs out of battle, or is there no real good way to stop someone from flying straight to the top of Mt. Silver the moment they get a big enough pokemon to fly on? That must be one of the really bothersome things about writing pokemon fanfiction, isn’t it?
And it took me nine minutes to write and a total of fifty minutes to edit and write this entire post
Because of course I would only remember that I forgot to go back and finish this sentence immediately before hitting the post button until immediately after hitting the post button and I can’t just edit my previous post. Whoops, sorry guys.
Anyway, Mini-Farla, hit me with your worse! But also tell me what you liked about it because my ego is fragile. That’s how this arrangement is generally assumed to work on The Pit, isn’t it?
She just sighed and climbed onto the back of Noctowl spread her large crimson wings
This bit’s still weird.
That’s because it’s only half-edited and in between what I originally wrote and what I wanted to write. Whoops! I must’ve gotten distracted mid-edit. That happened a few times. This is why it takes me so long to write these large posts. I can’t edit them, so I want to make sure I get them perfect.
I think it was originally something like “She just sighed and climbed onto Noctowl’s back as she spread her large crimson wings”, which just makes it sound like they were the trainer’s wings and not the pokemon’s (and even though the context makes it obvious that’s not the case, I still didn’t like it). Now… what did I have planned to fix that?
“She just sighed as Noctowl spread her large crimson wings, and climbed onto the pokemon’s back, wondering what misadventures awaited her at home”? That works a bit better, now doesn’t it?
Maybe straight-up say Vivian’s name at the beginning of the sentence. It’s easier in most cases when there is only a pronoun in one half of the sentence, imo.
You’ve got a bit of a penchant for long sentences, hm? A lot of them seem to have three or more clauses. I might consider dividing the sentence into two, like:
“As Noctowl spread her large crimson wings, Vivian just sighed. Climbing onto the pokemon’s back, she wondered what misadventures awaited her at home.”
This is just me being opinionated here, but when a character is doing some kind of listless action like sighing, you want it to come after the strong action of spreading crimson wings. It should feel subordinate, especially when you’re saying “just sighed” for that extra wimpiness. Then, when Vivian is making an actual action moving forward, climbing onto Noctowl’s back, you connect it with wondering, which is also a way of moving forward.
But I am both 1) old and 2) out of practice, so if this doesn’t even make sense, please disregard.
Yeah, looking at it, using the name is probably the simplest way to go about it, but dividing the sentence also works. I definitely prefer longer sentences with multiple clauses to many short choppier-sounding sentences.
You’ve got a bit of a penchant for long sentences
It’s funny, but I would’ve guessed that most of the regular commenters here would’ve long since figured out that my favourite (common) punctuation is the comma (or possibly the parentheses, but that depends on your definition of “common”, I suppose). My sentences are long whether I’m just talking or writing prose. I just have to compulsively ram clauses into every single sentence, whether they be at the beginning (like in your suggested split), the middle (like what I did), or the end (even without checking, I’m sure there are a few in there).
(I had way too much fun writing the parenthetical clauses in that.)
This is just me being opinionated here
It totally is, but I totally get your point. Because the point was to challenge the “there’s not really a lot of room to play around” response Mini-Farla got, I wrote that up really quick without really thinking much about the choice and position of words so long as they made grammatical sense, but if I was writing this seriously enough to get an editor (for whatever strange reason that’d happen) and that suggestion was made, I’d include it (though I’d take out the “just” if I was dividing the sentence how you suggested). That’s why I didn’t worry too much about the implication (but because of the kind of person I am, I felt the need to mention what my intent was anyway). The other common problems Mini-Farla has that I addressed were addressed mostly because that’s just the kind of narratives I enjoy writing so what I vomited out just kind of ended up covering them (which is why Vivian’s got a twin sister instead of a twin brother).
And if anyone wants to count the number of clauses in this post, relative to the number of sentences, by all means go ahead. It should be pretty funny.
It’s funny, but I would’ve guessed that most of the regular commenters here would’ve long since figured out
I can only speak for myself, but I don’t pay attention to things like that unless I’m specifically asked to.
(though I’d take out the “just” if I was dividing the sentence how you suggested)
That would be good for further tuning, yes.
I like the two-clause sentence. It comes from my deep-seated need to qualify everything I say without actually explaining further. Subordinate clauses are just delightful for that. You’ll notice my suggested edit chopped your sentence up into two two-clause sentences, because that’s me.
I don’t pay attention to things like that
To be fair, I assumed it would be sort of a “oh my god, plese stop sticking complete sentences in the middle of your sentences, and hyphens are not to be used inside parentheses the way single quotes are used inside double quotes” sort of situation.
I like the two clause sentence
I think I just like drifting around topics. It’s a horrible rambling habit brought on by years of petty gossip and long-winded rants about RPGs.
This is great and I want to read the sequel. The only thing that stands out to me are that some of the sentences are a little awkward, as Roarke said, and it seems odd to me that she’d name her noctowl “Noctowl”.
Eh, that’s not bad for something I wrote up in ten minutes and spent a half hour forcing into language that actually made sense outside my head, though it is a bit worrying that that seems like a more glowing review than anything I’ve ever seen you give while reviewing pokemon fanfiction on FFN (even if it is barely a premise). It sure seems like it, but you don’t review literally every pokemon fanfiction uploaded, do you? There’s got to be at least a few decent ones you don’t have to copypasta at that I’m just not privy to, right?
I wouldn’t hold your breath on a sequel, however. As much as I have a problem with overloading sentences with clauses (and I personally feel I have a very repetitive sentence structure), I have way more of a problem with not introducing a plot into my narrative.
If you want cute girls doing cute things, though, I’m your man.
I went without assigning a nickname to the noctowl solely to include the capitalization issue you have with a lot of stories (which is why her mother’s xatu is described as her mother’s xatu in the lower case rather than with a personal name) but the two of us should avoid the topic of pokemon sociality because it’s fucking dorky as hell because it would go on for literally forever.
I don’t even like the idea of pokemon communication being more advanced than their cries from the video games, let alone intelligent enough to argue they’re people. Vivian’s noctowl, in my mind, hoots. There is no noctowl language of higher communication. The debate would go on until the end of time or administrative intervention. I’ve made grognards on /tg/ sick of debating some pointless RPG topic before.
But Exalted 3e is terrible so I must continue.
Unfortunately, in Black/White there is a zoroark who talks while pretending to be human. Plus the totem mimikyu in SuMo and Meowth from the anime. They do, canonically, talk. Of course this just makes the whole thing more of a disaster but that’s Game Freak for you.
But in this case, I was more thinking from the trainer’s perspective — you don’t call your dog “Dog”, you know?
Oh and no, I don’t review every single fic. That’s Farla’s special kind of madness.
Like I’ve said before, I’ve only ever really played the first three generations and I think B/W is the one Gen that I know absolutely nothing about. See, the real problem with arguing this is, even if you are (based on the facts presented) correct, I feel that you shouldn’t be. It’s just kinda dumb, you know? Meowth talking in the anime is, like, whatever. It’s in a show for ten year olds and all. They wanted more cartoony characters. Fine. I don’t like it, but I get why they did it.
You’ve seriously never met any dogs named Dog, Doggie, or anything like that?
You’ve seriously never met any dogs named Dog, Doggie, or anything like that?
I have not.
To be fair, dogs named Dog and the like is a semi-common writing choice, but usually it’s used to say something about the character doing it: either they’re very unimaginative and literal-minded or goshdarn aw shucks kid type characters or they’re supposed to be “ironic.”
That is to say, someone who named their dog Dog is generally meant to stand out and be acknowledged as not the norm, and the device is used to support and emphasize specific characterization.
In the context of Pokemon fandom, however, it’s probably not the best decision to just drop it into a story without comment. The connotations are diluted by people doing it out of laziness, so it doesn’t really say anything meaningful to the audience.
Really? When I think of dogs named Doggie, I think of King of the Hill.
But either way, I still only decided to have her noctowl be called Noctowl just to make a point of having one pokemon name that was correctly capitalized. And her noctowl is a shiny pokemon for no reason other than I prefer the shiny colouration of noctowl (maybe its because Ash’s noctowl from the anime, the most prominantly seen noctowl, was shiny). I’m kind of disappointed no one pointed out that she just casually had a shiny pokemon like that. :(
I didn’t exactly think too deeply about the character’s personality or reasons for naming (or not naming) her pokemon when writing two paragraphs at 3 AM to show how easy it was to break the video game’s established pattern of story beginnings. I just wrote something featuring a person clearly some ways along on their adventure (as evidenced by owning a noctowl that knows Fly), from a town halfway along the progression path of Gen 2 (is it common for people writing OT fanfiction to think they absolutely have to have their character come from the starting town? I kind of assumed it was) and threw in a few plot hooks (what her mother wants and where her sister wandered off to) without thinking about the answers to those questions.
Funny enough, the one pitfall I totally fell into was having something that seems like a very strong start, but plotting out absolutely nothing in advanced and having absolutely zero direction on where to go from there.
you don’t call your dog “Dog”, you know?
I call Pip “Little Dog” a lot (and Comet “Nonsense Dog,” but that’s neither here nor there).
Then again I also call them things like “Fluffynuts,” “Buttery Hound,” and “Mr. Flops,” so I may not be a great yardstick.
I… may or may not call my cat ‘kitty’ most of the time. He has a real name… But…
“Doglett” and “Dorky Dog” are common nicknames for my dog that we use fairly interchangably with his name. That said, if I were to write about my dog I’d use his name properly in narration and the silly nicknames in dialogue or similar situations like character thoughts.
We called one of our cats Kitty for a long time because she resisted being named, but then we hit upon “Whitey”, which was perfect, because she was a disagreeable and wonderful beast and an extremely mild racial slur was perfect. CATS.
Are you certain your dog knows what its actual name is or does it just respond whenever you direct words at it?
I’m pretty sure it’s canon that pokemon intelligence differs from species to species (and has been since the first generation – Dragonite’s entry was about it having human intelligence, suggesting that this is something special to bring up rather than universal). This is why I can get the problem with “pokemon and people” since it’s lumping all pokemon together as the same but still can see pokemon as having a spectrum of animal to human intelligence. Something like the zorua line is implied by the games and anime alike to be more capable of speech and the complex thought associated with humans than your typical pidove or rhyhorn.
I will note that the region with the most talking pokemon is Alola, where the pokegods are most active. I’d love to see something exploring whether there’s a coorelation that’s not just coincidental there. But at the same time it’s worth noting that most talking pokemon in Alola are either mimicking what the humans nearby are chattering about or making some variant of their name’s sounds. “Me curse you…” for the mimikyu in the Aether House, “Ma-champion” by the machamp near the the League… and that could be like the parrots of our own world. Even then, the stufful scattered around everywhere mostly make growling noises.
My point is whether a zoroark or totem pokemon talks isn’t necessairally indicitive of whether a noctowl can do the same, if that makes sense. The same way apes can use sign language but not all animals can understand it.
It’s useful to look at different facets of human intelligence when you’re setting out to write non-human or alien characters. As writers and internet weirdos we tend to be people who are fairly intelligent and self-reflecting (sometimes detrimentally self-reflecting) and it can be difficult to imagine people who don’t, in fact, obsessively plan ahead or ruminate over things until we literally make ourselves sick.
Pokemon are canonically smarter than animals, at least– it takes hours and hours of training to teach a dog to respond to voice commands, and in the pokemon world a friggin’ lobster can do it right out of the ball, regardless of what language you speak. (So all pokemon are necessarily a little telepathic.) But that doesn’t mean that they’re as intelligent as humans– we can communicate, but pokemon may have different capabilities to plan ahead, resist impulses, for self-reflection, to feel empathy or to act on it, to alter behavior in response to social stimuli, etc.
Alakazam are apparently more intelligent than humans, although I suspect that pokedex entry was penned by an 11-year-old, and it’s interesting to think about what that might mean, given that the pokemon world doesn’t seem to be run by psychic-types– possibly this means that they have incredible ability to solve logic puzzles and to do mental math, but stuff like socially organizing to overthrow humanity might be beyond them.
Pokemon might not actually communicate in words, too, but the whole trading-telepathic-images thing is exhausting for me to think about writing.
Prequel memes are trending, so I’ll leave you with this one:
“Are you brainless!?”
“I spek!!!”
That’s actually a pretty good point. It also seems like a zoroark is capable of human speech only when its using illusions to become a human, which seems like its merely lifting the trait from kitsune mythology, rather than being something that would actually make sense when you think about it.
Though, interestingly, I’m watching the Sun and Moon anime (which I will ramble about if anyone is halfway interested) a little bit, and it seems like pokemon across the board sound a lot more like animals than earlier anime. Pikachu still sounds the same as always, but Professor Kukui’s rockruff makes a little yapping puppy noise that’s halfway between a puppy’s growl-bark and saying “rockruff” and Tapu Koko makes this weird cooing noise (but also definitely says its name underneath it). I very much approve.
I’m not sure where you’re getting the “regardless of what language you speak” part. Sure, in the real world, pokemon understand characters speaking whatever language the dub is, but the pokemon world itself seems to be linguistically unified.
To help your alakazam idea, I think it might help to imagine them as lone wizards in their towers, like a PC from the RPG Ars Magica. They’re all the top 1% of intelligent characters in the setting but are so detached from social behaviour that they’re basically shut-ins who have to send gofers out to do something as simple as fetching an ingredient they need to do their magic.
Maybe an alakazam wants nothing more than to be left alone in a dark quiet room with its thoughts, like the kaldanes from Edgar Rice Burroughs’s Chessmen of Mars, who as a species have decided that their ultimate goal is to become nothing but pure thought without any capability to interact with the outside world.
the pokemon world itself seems to be linguistically unified.
Nope, actually! Begining in Platinum version, a character is introduced who is part of the Interpol. In Platinum (the Sinnoh region, based on part of Japan) he speaks broken “English” or whatever language the game is in to indicate that he’s foreign. He continues to do this in Black and White when he reappears for a post-game quest (the Unova region being based on New York). However, he speaks perfect “English” in the France-based Kalos region, implied to be his home region.
Additionally in Unova there are some NPCs who hang out in the skyscrapers of Castelia City that speak a variety of languages and in the Kalos post-game quest (yet again involving the Interpol guy) one of the plot points involves using a psychic pokemon’s abilities to translate a Japanese speaking client’s eyewitness report to the player and the Interpol guy.
SPOILERS AHEAD! The Interpol guy shows up in Alola’s post game as well, using different languages to say “it’s a disaster” in different ways over a few occasions.
Man, every time I make a generalization on pokemon, the rebuttal is always from gen 5. Did that game turn absolutely everything on its head or something?
Still, that doesn’t actually prove that pokemon are omnilingual. A dog in France responds to french commands but not english ones. So this french trainer’s pokemon responds to his commands regardless of what part of the world he’s in.
I still seriously think that this is just a translation convention because the target demographic isn’t a polyglot.
I think what Keleri’s referring to is that a pokemon traded from anywhere follows commands just as easily as one you caught yourself (given the proper badges/trials), although I see that as more of the games making it so players aren’t punished for trading rather than an in-universe standard. Exceptions being the psychic pokemon that can translate languages when the humans have a language barrier like in the aforementioned Kalos postgame quest. That said, I may be missing some other thing that suggests otherwise. Maybe the special language trades in gen 4? Like, I remember there was a special “English Pikachu” that Lt. Surge can trade you (French in English speaking versions of the game) to show off dex entries being able to show other languages and it has no problem understanding the player’s commands… but that still feels like it’s due to game mechanic limitations to me.
That said, the fact that they make other languages within the pokemon world A Thing is pretty evident that it’s intended to be a multicultural, multilingual world; otherwise they’d have just done what they did through the earlier games and not use other languages at all (or just keep it to the dex instead of having attention drawn to it elsewhere in the games).
Yeah, all that really just sounds like they want to promote the fact you can now select one of I believe six languages on any game cart.
You couldn’t actually select the language you played in until gen 6 (X and Y). Gens 4-5 where alt. languages were properly introduced still had the limit of only being able to play the language the game came in when it was localized. It was the beginning of being able to trade via the internet instead of having to be in close proximity to whoever you were connecting to, so that kinda points to your idea, but it’s as much an in-universe thing as pokeballs.
…
In fact, even the 1st gen games had other languages present. The rival (Blue) says “Bonjour” when he greets you on the SS Anne – and this is referenced in Kalos by some NPC who says Oak’s grandson picked up “hello” easily but always said “smell you later” instead of goodbye.
Gen 2 had a Rocket grunt speaking broken “english” as well, who reappears in Unova to speak it perfectly, explaining that he’d returned home to Unova after Team Rocket broke up in Kanto and Johto.
So, yeah, now that I think about it multilingualism has been present in the games since before any method of international trading was possible.
(Sorry if I’m rambling too much. The point is either pokemon can pick up on any language despite being traded wherever because they have some sort of telepathy or it’s game convenience that they can, but it remains true that any pokemon you use in game can at least understand your commands right away.)
Generation 1 also had a reference to the historical moon landing. I think you’re giving their worldbuilding waaaaaaaaay to much credit, and I still have no clue why you’re leaping on telepathy as a possible explanation.
I’m only mentioning telepathy because it was in the post by Keleri that began this sub-conversation about language in the pokemon world???
At any rate, I’m curious as to why a plot point about an espurr needing to psychically translate what characters are saying to each other doesn’t “count.”
Because two human characters communicating with each other (still probably as part of the game’s way of showing that it can now handle multiple language options rather than organic worldbuilding) has absolutely no bearing on whether or not pokemon are able to understand commands regardless of the language?
If I trade a pokemon from a french language cartridge of the region based on France to a Japanese language cartridge of a region based on Japan, its not going to continue rendering the command options in French instead of Japanese, because that’s atrocious game design.
Characters who have moved between two regions based on different countries (usually from Kanto, for some reason) such as the protagonist of the Sun and Moon games seem to have no problem communicating in their new region by default (the S/M protagonist has no trouble talking in not-Hawaii despite coming from Not-Tokyo), because foreign languages are used only to give a character a bit of foreigner flair, not as a result of linguistic diversity in the world or any thoughtful worldbuilding.
As for the pokemon understanding commands half of this argument, I myself said that pokemon understanding is likely due to the constraints of game mechanics unless other information I missed suggested telepathy in more than just psychics.
In the case of the psychic pokemon translator, the pokemon doesn’t necessairly understand the language so much as is able to translate the intent in a way the humans can use to understand each other. This is actually a plot point because the pokemon uses what it learned from being in touch with Looker’s mind to inform the player of other information he’d kept secret, so the espurr understands what humans thoughts mean regardless of whether it knows the language. It’s just whether this only applies to certain psychic types or if any pokemon can do this that is up for debate and left in question whether its “canon” or just a matter of game design.
As for the player characters moving and understanding the language, people can learn different languages. Countries other than the US tend to have language classes available at young ages, especially in places like Europe. The protag’s region of origin is never specified in Kalos so them understanding French and whatever their native language presumably is (if it isn’t also French since that’s spoken elsewhere as well) but not Japanese is completely within the logical constraints of worldbuilding in game.
A multilingual world is game-verse canon. Whether pokemon actually instantly understand any human or if that’s just for gameplay reasons is the thing that’s not confirmed.
My apologies for anything that is hostile or unclear. I’m probably really bad at communicating what I’m trying to get across.
But the thing is, multilingual characters never have that second language come up unless it’s as part of a gimmick. Nothing implies the S/M protagonist isn’t speaking their native language, and the language spoken between them and their mother from Kanto is the same language they speak with the people from Alola. And the Japanese school system’s method of english education is pretty weak, and based primarily on rote memorization, which is just about the worst way to learn a language. Many Japanese english teachers literally don’t even speak english.
The first foreign character featured in the series is from America, which apparently exists in the world of pokemon and still managed to go to the moon in 1969. Except for how it really doesn’t.
Foreign languages are used primarily in Pokemon for flavour, not as part of worldbuilding, and the sudden change in Gen 5 and 6 is most likely due to the technical limitations increasing and nothing more. The pokemon world is an incredibly poorly thought out world and the spontaneous appearance of French is part of that.
Why is the existance of multiple languages being executed clumsily the equivilent of it not being canon when they actually make it a plot point?
I’m not saying it’s not canon, but the only reason it’s canon is because it’s said to be canon, because of some gameplay design and not actual worldbuilding and is better off ignored when discussing the setting’s worldbuilding, much like the existence of of real world countries. The pokemon world isn’t actually shown to be multicultural, it’s shown to have Foreign People who come from Foreigner Land and do Foreigner Things sometimes. The setting doesn’t even have names for their countries of origin.
Except alakazam can only come into existence through trading. You can posit that there is a natural equivalent of trade-evolution and there are wild ones hiding out in hermit caves somewhere, but all canon gives us is that all known alakazam are inextricably tied to humanity. Not very compatible with hermit wizards.
The pokemon world isn’t actually shown to be multicultural, it’s shown to have Foreign People who come from Foreigner Land and do Foreigner Things sometimes. The setting doesn’t even have names for their countries of origin.
Except for where it is. Unova, again, has a movie minigame where directors come from all over the world to make movies and that’s why their titles are in many languages. Alola is entirely about the Alola region having an Alolan culture that’s different from the badge quest of the other games (handled like it’s dying out, but still). Johto’s building architecture significantly differs from Unova’s and has a more Japanese design.
You can’t really say the pokemon world isn’t actually intended to have multiple cultures within it without completely disregarding canon, however well executed it may or may not be.
Come on, now, that’s like saying members of the Elite 4 don’t actually have stupid hobbies like golfing just because their “flavour” mentions it (other than being fictional, of course) and that because we didn’t see golfers until Alola means golf only tangentially exists in universe but we shouldn’t consider it when we look at whether the pokemon world has sports other than battling pokemon.
I meant in terms of mentality and outlook, not that there are actually hermit alakazam out there in wilderness caves somewhere. Trade evolutions don’t really make much sense when looked as anything but a game mechanic (and not even a particularly well thought out game mechanic in the first place).
Alola’s overall culture is still basically the same as Kanto’s, though. Their specific traditions might be a bit different but that’s like saying California is a different culture from New Jersey because they put avocado on absolutely everything. They’re still (theoretically) American. The way you get Achivement Tokens and the form those Achivement Tokens take is different, but its still the same basic structure of Achivement Token Collecting, because the game needs to have the same basic structure as all the other games.
Johto’s architecture is different from Unova’s because Johto is based on the Kansai region, which is geographically contiguous with the Kanto region, which it has very similar architecture to. But even then, it’s not really that different. Skyscrapers pretty much all look alike; Johto just has a few more pagodas and oldy-time buildings.
Also, I’m starting to notice that literally all these examples are from the first mainline game region based on a non-Japanese place. I think they were just jamming as much LOOK IT’S NOT JAPAN in as they could without really thinking about actually incorporating it into the world.
I am much more willing to believe a character seen for the length of time it takes to battle them once might have a hobby outside of that specific five minute nugget of their life than a supposedly foreign character whose only difference from the domestic character throughout the entire game is “sometimes peppers their speech with french”. None of the Europeans I talk to regularly use their native language in english, not even the one who is actually French, but all of them are pretty easy to spot as non-Americans (even before the Danish guy starts ranting about how much he loves giving 65% of his paycheck to the government when anything vaguely related to socialism is mentioned I am not joking I really know someone who does this).
Culture is slightly more important to a character’s characterization than a single hobby. Part of the reason pretty much every foreign-themed gym leader’s personality is “foreigner” is because they have to cram as much indication that they’re foreign into three or four dialogue boxes before and after your gym battle and they don’t have the time to actually show that the character’s culture is at all different from the local one.
Okay, but why would something that only comes into existence through contact with humans be so aggressively asocial by nature? Regardless, even if your theory is correct, training alakazam is still abuse, because trainers are subjecting these extremely intelligent creatures to pressures they don’t want.
Their specific traditions might be a bit different but that’s like saying California is a different culture from New Jersey because they put avocado on absolutely everything.
Uh, California actually does have an extremely different culture from New Jersey. America is huge and does not actually have a single unified cultural identity.
I’m honestly not sure why you’re resisting this concept so strongly. The regions in Pokemon are very transparently based on real-world regions and cultures, right down to the geography. It seems like far more of a stretch to assume the Pokeworld doesn’t have varied cultures similar to Earth.
I don’t know, you’d have to ask the person who came up with the idea of a creature that could only come to existence by having ownership of it traded between two humans in the first place. Pokemon natures seem pretty detached from the means in which they arise in the first place in general, though.
But Californian and New Jerseyian culture are still both recognizably American cultures, which in turn is part of the larger western culture group. The differences that do exist are not significantly large enough for them to actually be recognized as two distinct cultures in the same way New Jersey and Kyoto or London and Cairo would be. There is still an overarching American cultural identity that binds the two places together, especially when in an international scope.
The ability of two Americans on opposite sides of the country being able to debate about which side of the country is better but still agree that even the worse side of the country is better than not being America is something that my Italian friend from the Emilia-Romagna region of northern Italy can not comprehend.
Italian Unification was basically forced by the political pressures of the day in order for the various Italian states to compete with rising powers in France and Germany. He can’t even conceive, as a Romagnan, of banding together with an Emilian, let alone a Sicilian or a greater concept of Italian-ness. This ability to internally unify against foreign pressure is one of the major causes of American exceptionalism. California might be fucking California, but it’s still America.
You can go to McDonald’s in America and Japan and France. Skyscrapers look pretty similar in Tokyo and New York. People all over the globe work Jobs to earn tokens of accomphishment in the form of Money to trade for goods and services. Does that make the earth monocultural with languages being basically a gimmick? I mean, this could turn into a larger discussion of globalization or Westernization pretty easily, but it would be highly innacurate to claim Japan is basically France in culture.
The pokemon world has been very much purpously based on the real world from day one. The fact that generation five brought in the first non-Japanese region didn’t make it suddenly new then. I don’t get why you’re insisting that it’s suddenly haphazard at the point you become less familiar with the games when it has been clearly purpousful from the start.
At any rate, this has gotten pretty far from the original topic of pokemon and their ability to understand humans who speak different languages…
The ability to buy the same kind of hamburger and other hallmarks of western cultural imperialism aside (and resisting the urge to ramble about how traditional Japanese building techniques have been an inspiration for modern earthquake resistant building techniques), the values of the various cultures of the world are still very different. For example, there’s the value that East Asian cultures place on the group and the importance Western culture places on the individual, but anyone who. Even aesthetically (which is a form of value), they’re very different. The concept of the French formal garden is almost totally at odds with that of the traditional Japanese garden.
Pokemon has an essentially uniform set of values. Everyone lives in harmony with pokemon and respects nature and fair play, and tends to be very open and generous, and willing to share their daily life experiences with others. At their core, although the actual form their specific traditions and visual aesthetic might differ somewhat, the underlying reason for those specific traditions, the values, and morals of the culture are practically identical.
While pokemon uses the trappings of foreign cultures to create a more international air, it really is a pretty homogenous culture when you strip it down to its bare bones.
The intent is clearly to create a multicultural pokemon world, though. Where it fails is where anything writen with limited knowledge of other cultures can get close but can’t completely shake the culture of the writer(s).
There are enough differences that you can easily tell that Johto is different culturally from Sinnoh, and those are both based on areas of Japan (likely with more cues that don’t translate well or reflect a cultural knowledge that people who live in Japan would get instantly but foreigeners wouldn’t in the Japanese versions, such as the use of Kansai dialect).
You wouldn’t claim that because people all over the world can pick up the games and relate just as easily to the world created that all the players are monocultural.
(Also, just for fact-checking’s sake, it’s not typically presented as a foreigner only indicated by speech “peppered” with another language. Looker just plain uses broken “English” until Kalos where he speaks fluently. The people in Unova who speak other languages pretty much just say full sentences in their language, with only BW2 also providing translation. Looker only picks up the saying “it’s a disaster” in different languages each time in gen 7, which speaks more to shoddy characterization quirks than worldbuilding ones).
Intent doesn’t equal result, though. The book Graceling, reviewed here on this site, was intended to be very pro-feminist, but what was actually written was that the only actual sexist in the story was the female main character, and was reviewed as such.
Johto is culturally different from Sinnoh
I’m going to assume you mean Kanto here?
use of the Kansai dialect
Funny enough, I suspect that the case is actually the opposite, and it’s used far less than you might expect from a game based on the Kansai region. Since most things are written in standard Japanese, which is based on the dialect of Tokyo, most things are written in standard Tokyo dialect. Kansai characters, very often, are written with just enough markers of Kansai dialect to indicate them as speakers of such, laid on very thickly, and that’s it. More than that, and it’d be difficult for the character to be understood, if the author even knows enough about the dialect to do so. For example, The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya is set in Kobe, and everyone speaks perfect standard Japanese, despite basically being set in the author’s backyard. Hell, Nintendo is a Kyoto-based company and its first three presidents (accounting for 113 years of Nintendo’s 127 year long existence) are from Kyoto, and all of its games are in standard Japanese (though it actually makes me believe it’s likely Pokemon avoids this stereotypical use of Kansai).
I’m struggling to make a comparison with english, where our dialects (at least in the Anglophone world and excluding dialects based on mixing with other languages like Hawaiian Pidgin English) are marked far more by accent change than grammatical or vocabulary change (though of course that’s not to say vocabularly doesn’t vary widely throughout english dialects, as any American who has listened to a Brit talk can attest to. It just isn’t as drastic as accent.)
The best I could come up with was characters in medieval England speaking Ye Olde English to distinguish them as linguistically different from time travellers from the modern day, but I’m not at all satisfied with that comparison. Kansai-ben isn’t used that stereotypically (except for Takarada from Kill la Kill, whose Osakan accent becomes some truly hilarious dialogue in the english dub).
But speaking of Osaka, Kansai dialects that do feature are most likely to be the Osakan one, which seems to be the most easily accessed by non-speakers (probably due to Osaka’s status as a very metropolitian city, perhaps in part due to its international airport and business focus). In fact, the fact that I immediately default to “Kyotoite” rather than “Osakan” would be extremely unsual in Japan, where “Kansai-ben” and “Osaka-ben” are largeley considered synonymous outside of the Kansai region, despite the fact that “Kansai dialect” is really more of a group of dialects than a single dialect in itself, and Osakan has many traits that Kobe-ben, Kyoto-ben, et al. lack.
Whitney, the gym leader of Goldenrod City (based on Osaka), and the programmers of the pokemon world (such as Bill) all speak with the Osakan dialect. In fact, searching “kansai” on bulbapedia only gives people who speak Osaka-ben (including Casey, an anime character clearly inspired by the Hanshin Tigers, a popular baseball team in the region whose fans are known for hyper-fanaticism, sorta like Red Sox fans at Yankees games, except at all games).
As far as the Kyoto dialect is concerned… There are many stories, easily found on the internet, about people studying Japanese in college, and then flying to Japan, proud of their ability to interact with the country in its native language and understand all the street signs and ask for any assistance they might need from strangers off the street… and then they went to Kyoto.
The Kyoto dialect has actually been slowly dying due to the encroachment of standard Japanese, despite the best attempts of the Kyotoites (proud of their status as the imperial capital of Japan for a thousand years and continued status as the seat of traditional Japanese culture). Kyoto-ben is very polite language and almost no one talks with a full Kyoto dialect on a daily basis except for maiko and geisha.
Even on Kansai-ben, a website dedicated to the differences between Kansai and standard japanese, most of their interview clips are rated between one (accent only) to three (some basic structure and accent involved), on a scale of five (if you understand this, you must be a native). Even in Japanese media, Kyoto dialect is rare for anyone outside of the ojou archetype (as Kyoto-ben is seen as very high class and feminine).
Does Pokemon have any high class and elegant ladies associated with Johto? Searching bulbapedia for “Kyoto” only turns up some info on Ecruteak City and Kyotoite voice actors.
(Sorry, you activated my trap card. I love Kyoto the way most otaku love Akihabara. The short fic I posted in the first comment of this post features a character from Ecruteak City solely because Ecruteak City is the Pokemon World’s Kyoto. She’s probably friends with the Kimono Girls- who are almost certainly the members of a kyo-mai traditional dance hall if not outright maiko- or something. Unless she’s friends with Whitney because the Osaka/Kyoto contrast would amuse me. Or something. I have a problem when it comes to Kyoto.)
I’m going to assume you mean Kanto here?
No. I was using two Japanese-based regions, Sinnoh and Johto, to mention that they have different cultures that you wouldn’t easily mistake for each other. I decided to compare them because both appeared in the 4th generation of games so differences would have less to do with game mechanics and limitations and more with intentional differences. Notibly, Johto is the most “traditionally Japanese” themed of any region a so has a very unique astetic that causes it to be visually distinguishable at a glance.
More towards why I picked these two: the people in the regions have a very different relationship with their local legendary pokemon with Johto respecting active gods (and in some cases like Lugia’s and Ho-Oh’s, fearing the wrath thereof). Shrines are commonplace. The Kimono Girls in particular are focused on preserving Johto’s cukture. Sinnoh tends to be more reverent of distant gods in general with the actual interation with legends that takes place in the plot being unusual. Shrines are notably fewer, but a western-style church stands in Hearthome City. In the Japanese version of the game this is referred to as the Foreign Culture Building.
To be honest, I’m worried that my communication skills have made the point we’re actually arguing become unclear. So to backtrack: this began by discussing whether pokemon could understand humans who use different languages. You questioned whether the pokemon world even had other languages so I cited evidence from gen 5 and 6 games, the latter of which uses it as a plot point rather than merely flavor. You responded by suggesting they didn’t count because it was to show off language as a feature rather than establish different cultures, so I cited evidence of alternate languages being referenced earlier. This apparently also didn’t count because you disbelieved they intended to build the pokemon world as multicultural because the gameplay reflects the same values no matter I region, a point I disagree with.
However, since you don’t seem to count non-Japanese regions because you don’t feel like the differences there matter because they’re only trying to say they have another culture because they’re trying to show off how not-Japan it is, I decided to use two Japanese regions to indicate that in-game different regions are shown with different cultural values.
I could demonstrate how Alola’s people’s interactions with the tapu are siginificantly different from any other region’s relationship with their legendaries or differences between Unova or Kalos and other regions, but I’m not sure you would count evidence taken from foreign regions as evidence of foreign cultures existing.
tl;dr? I’m trying to argue that it’s canon in-game that the pokemon world is multicultural. I’m not entirely sure if we’re still arguing about the same point or if it’s become more of a question of how well we see this as having been done.
(also for some reason it has taken me a few attempts now to post this. I ended up having to remove links to Bulbapedia’s sections on Johto and Sinnoh and the foreign culture building in hearthome)
So while I was washing my hands after dinner, a totally unbidden and unconnected thought popped into my head. Her mother is a researcher from Ecruteak who does a lot of field work. The two big concepts Gen 2 introduced were pokemon breeding and wandering pokemon. Professor Elm is the authority on pokemon breeding. Gen 2’s three wandering pokemon are located in Ecruteak before a game event triggers their wandering status.
Her mother has to study wandering pokemon.
I still wouldn’t hold your breath for a sequel, but its at least theoretically possible I could do something other than a cute girl playing with cute pokemon with this concept. You’ll just have to hope someone you review in the future claims their hands are tied by the plot of the games and the formula that the fandom feels its original narratives have to be locked into, and that I feel like I could easily write something shattering this argument in an hour at 3 AM in the morning. And it doesn’t involve giving the protagonist a raikou.
That’s what happened last time, at least.
I think I’ve cracked open a door that, once opened, can’t be closed. I merely have the choice as to how much further I open it.
Yeah. You’ve probably even been to her house, you creep.
Get out of here, STALKER.
I can’t be the only person who immediately thought of that.