Give me a rundown on Pokemon, please

I've successfully avoided caring or knowing anything about Pokemon all these years (other than the memes, because I'm a rank memelord). Now, I've decided to install Pokemon Go for the lels, and while I could go read the Wikipedia page or watch some episodes of the anime, that would be far less entertaining than getting weebtastic Royals perspectives on the topic.

So, give me your synopsis of Pokemon, Pokemon culture, and Pokemon Go. Tell me what you think I need to know to be Pokemon literate.

 

Step 1: Buy a Gameboy from like 1998
Step 2: Buy Pokémon game (preferably yellow, blue, or red) Silver and gold are kickass too.
Step 3: See you in about a month.

 

Or just get an emulator!

 

PokeMMO is cool

 

Pokemon Snap for N64 is a lot of fun too!

 

1) You should watch all of Pokemon Indigo League (the one that aired when you were in like elementary school) and then watch the Pokemon the First Movie.
2) Cry (it's okay, trust me)
3) People will say start with the old ones, they aren't wrong, but, honestly I'd emulate one of each generation in order: Leafgreen/firered --> Heartgold/soul Silver --> Ruby/Sapphire --> then pick up Diamond/pearl --> Black/White 1&2 --> XY --> Sun/moon

I bolded the ones I liked the most by personal preference from each generation. You can always play the later releases for each, so like crystal for gen 2, etc, doesn't matter. In the end it really doesn't matter where you start out. The perks for starting with earlier generations is you appreciate the QoL in later generations that make them a lot easier (debatable if its QoL).

4) Cry some more because its beautiful and innocent



Edit: Now I'm downloading a bunch of pokemon movies... see you guys tomorrow lol

 

Agreed. Most underrated N64 game.

 

Don't forget Pokemon Stadium for the minigames

 

Aye, but its not underrated. Everyone knows that game is the shit.

 

Also, get ready for so many terrible puns it'll make your head spin. Oh and don't be fooled. They're not eating donuts, they're rice balls. lol

 

Pokemon GO is a pretty poor indication of Pokemon in general. It's kind of a real life meets video game idea. To understand Pokemon, you should understand how the mainstream games work, which is an extension of the anime (or vice versa, I guess.)

The premise of any good story is that there is are protagonist characters with a goal and there are people antagonizing them. In mainstream Pokemon games, you are that protagonist. The games generally push you towards having the goal of being the strongest Pokemon trainer who ever lived - you aim to collect Pokemon from the world and grow them, make them stronger, teach them cool moves and evolve them when possible. Some people collect a few, some people collect only ones that follow a theme, some people try to collect all of them, that choice is yours. The games follow a general progression of defeating successively stronger Pokemon trainers with designations; up until the most recent generation, these trainers were Gym Leaders who inhabited Gym locations around the lands that you're exploring. Each Leader would award you a Badge which unlocks more areas of the game, as well as an artificial "respect" factor that's in place to make sure you don't trade high leveled Pokemon from friends and destroy everyone early game effortlessly. The most recent generation instead has Island Kahunas that award you with permissions and Z-crystals to continue growing as a trainer, which is a little more... spiritual, I suppose. The end goal in every mainstream game is to defeat the Elite Four and become the League Champion, which is accessible to challenge after having defeated all of the region's leader figures.

Also present in every region is an antagonizing criminal organization, for flavor purposes. These organizations generally have motives behind them that are flawed, but nevertheless are led by Leaders who direct the team towards pursuing criminal activities, collection of Pokemon and often endeavor to control powerful legendary Pokemon from the region to which they belong. Some of the true criminal leaders are plot twists, so I won't reveal them for you, but for interest's sake, the motivations of some of the leaders range from simply wanting powerful, rare Pokemon to straight up mass murder as a solution to overpopulation. In hindsight, many of the criminal leaders are just... downright maniacal, but the plotlines they come with tend to be pretty interesting and a decent periodic distraction from the grind of beat-trainer, collect-badge that the game is otherwise.

The above only applies to the mainstream games themselves, however. There are a number of spinoffs that arose from the franchise - Pokemon Puzzle League is one of my favorite Pokemon games of all time, and is a tetris-inspired PvP game originally released for the N64. Pokemon as a theme for the game was largely just flavor and doesn't change anything about gameplay - you can enjoy the game without knowing anything about Pokemon at all, really, so long as you like the style of the game. Additionally, Pokemon Pinball was an older, discontinued spinoff line that existed for a while for pinball fanatics. Pokemon Snap was a game for the N64 that put you directly inside the Pokemon world from a first-person perspective, but you didn't actually capture any Pokemon - not conventionally, anyway, you'd simply take pictures of them by luring them out, completing complicated tasks to see rare Pokemon, that sort of thing. The Pokemon TCG is a card-based battling system where you collect Pokemon cards and create a deck with which to battle other individuals, the goal being to knock out the other player's Pokemon, rewarding you with one or two Prize Cards; once a player has taken six Prize Cards, the other player has no Active Pokemon or has no more cards in their deck to draw from, the player has won the game. Other spinoffs such as Pokemon Ranger exist as well, but admittedly I haven't played all of them to know how they operate - I believe Pokemon Ranger's premise is that you quite literally are a Pokemon, removing humans from the game entirely, and you go around befriending other Pokemon out in the wild to accomplish tasks, defeat bullies, and so forth. Pokemon GO is essentially real-life Pokemon - you explore your own real world, and Pokemon will spawn on the map presented on your phone display. Rather than fighting the Pokemon, you simply chuck Pokeballs at them, or Berries to have added effects, until you've caught them. You receive Candy for a species whenever you catch that species, and Stardust as well; combining the two allows you to power up your Pokemon up to a hard cap that's built into the Pokemon. From there, you can fight other people's Pokemon that have been played in Pokemon Gyms which are generally found at landmarks around the real world (schools, malls, parks, that sort of thing), and collect items from Pokestops (less notable landmarks that can be as big as a monument or as small as a particularly cool graffiti on a wall).

Another important spinoff of the series include more pure battle simulator games, which started with Pokemon Stadium in generation 1, which removed the exploration and capture aspects of the game and simply presented a method of battling Pokemon in a preset fashion. The first generation of Pokemon (Red/Blue/Green/Yellow) released 151 Pokemon into the universe - now there are 802, and some Pokemon with multiple forms depending on in-game choices and region in which they are caught. Each Pokemon came with specific base stats that made them predisposed towards special or physical attacking, special or physical defenses, having a high amount of HP or being able to move before than the opponent each turn due to a higher speed stat. There were originally 15 Pokemon types (elements, essentially) which has now expanded to 18, for balance purposes, and hundreds of different Pokemon moves that some Pokemon will learn, some will not. Typing of Pokemon and moves dictates effectiveness against opposing Pokemon - Fire attacks burn through Grass Pokemon very effectively, but Fire attacks don't hurt Water type Pokemon very much at all. After the second generation, weather effects were added into the game, to create strategies and affect how typing and certain moves would function. The second generation also introduced held items into the game, which broadly expanded strategies and customization to be able to create more interesting combinations. The third generation brought about Pokemon Abilities, which were essentially constant effects that would activate whenever the ability was designed to do so, and could have large effects such as complete immunity to specific types, or small effects such as being able to 100% escape from wild Pokemon battles when desired. Prior to the fourth generation, Pokemon stats were associated with specific type - even an attack called Bite or Crunch, which clearly requires physical contact, would be considered a "Special" attack because of the move's Dark typing. With the fourth generation came what's commonly referred to as the "Physical-Special split" that assigned each Pokemon move a designation based on logic, and allowed for formerly Physical-only typed moves to be based off the Special stat if it was something that logic would dictate, or vice versa. This most strongly affected types like Dragon or Dark - Dragon-type moves were formerly always a special-based attack, even in the case of Dragon Claw, which was clearly a slash, and the former Bite/Crunch examples still apply. The fifth generation of Pokemon introduced very little from a battling standpoint, and was mainly used as a means of balancing what was quickly becoming a very real, thought out competitive metagame. With the sixth generation of Pokemon came Mega Evolution - species-specific Pokemon Stones could be held by that Pokemon and used to unlock a Mega Evolution within battle. Once a Pokemon on your own team has Mega Evolved, no other Pokemon on the same team can do so in the same battle, however the gain that the Pokemon receives from doing so is often a large boost to the Pokemon's base stats and generally access to a special, strong ability. The Pokemon reverts to its standard form upon completion of the battle, however they may Mega Evolve an unlimited number of times through different battles. Finally, the seventh and current generation of Pokemon introduced Z-moves; similar to the concept of Mega Evolution, specific held items on a Pokemon will allow that Pokemon to unleash a full-power attack; if the attack is a damaging attack, it becomes vastly increased in base power so as to do more damage, however if the move was a non-damaging attack with other special effects, these effects would become more significant, or have added effects outside of normal. Of course, only one of your Pokemon may do this Z-move, once per battle, however the moves are unlimited use through different battles. The sheer number of combinations, viability and customization that exists now in Pokemon battles has given rise to a fairly significant competitive scene; learning this metagame is as difficult and time consuming as learning any competitive online game, however based on the official released of Pokemon Stadium, the pursuit for a computer based online simulator that allows full and complete customization of any Pokemon team that a person could wish for was undertaken and resulted in Shoddybattle years ago, which eventually developed into Pokemon Online, and then now Pokemon Showdown.

If you were interested in now immersing yourself in the Pokemon world, start from the basics and move up from there. Play through the generations of games, one game per generation, and learn what types and moves of Pokemon are out there. Start from the old world and move through to the new ones;
Generation 1 - Red/Blue, Green(JP), Yellow (special edition)
Generation 2 - Gold/Silver, Crystal (special edition)
Generation 3 - Ruby/Sapphire, Emerald (special edition), Fire Red/Leaf Green (Generation 1 remakes with added content)
Generation 4 - Diamond/Pearl, Platinum (special edition), Heart Gold/Soul Silver (Generation 2 remakes with added content)
Generation 5 - Black/White, Black2/White2 (B/W and B2/W2 are different games that play through the same region with different storyline)
Generation 6 - X/Y, Omega Ruby/Alpha Sapphire (Generation 3 remakes with added content)
Generation 7 - Sun/Moon, Ultra Sun/Ultra Moon (Ultra versions not yet released)
After you've played through those games, you can choose to expose yourself to secondary games for interest's sake, or additionally expose yourself to the competitive scene. Of course, if you were interested in competitive Pokemon battling, you're not strictly required to have played anything in past, it just makes things easier on you by understanding which Pokemon are out in the world and what they do well from what they don't before you jump into battling other people and trying to make your Shuckle a physical sweeper.

tl;dr: Pokemon's probably one of the biggest and most multi-faceted franchises out there. It may not be for everyone, but it still does have a pretty huge following in the world, and has something for the most casual of people (watching the anime to experience the storylines) all the way up to the most hardcore (Pokemon Showdown gets pretty intense, take it from me.) I've put thousands of hours into Pokemon ever since picking up my first Game Boy Pocket and playing Pokemon Blue when I was about five years old, and I would wholeheartedly say I've never regretted it. I still try to keep up with the competitive metagame and like to have friends to casually battle with, so if anyone ever does want to play, hit up my PM box.

it seems im incapable of making short posts oops

 

Everything you need to know Rissa!

 

TLDR - anime meets abusive cockfighting and all of a sudden everyone is chill with it

 

What have I done?

I kid. Y'all are the best.

 

Too long, didn' read.

 

can i get a tldr? if you had one i couldn't find it within your wall of text

 

u guys suck