05/29/10 Black/White Stuff
Okay, fine, I am getting off my lazy butt and writing about some news. No images here because I can't be bothered; seriously, just go to Serebii/Pokébeach/Bulbanews if you haven't seen them already for some reason.
Fast forward! We have the fifth-generation starters, Grass-type Tsutaaja, Fire-type Pokabu and Water-type Mijumaru. General consensus seems to favor Tsutaaja with Pokabu coming fast on its heels, while poor Mijumaru gets left out in the cold. I'm pretty much with the general consensus here because my opinions tend to be so awfully unoriginal (I mean, hey; my favorite Pokémon is Charizard, after all), but I feel kind of sorry for Mijumaru even though I don't personally like it; it doesn't deserve quite that much hate. I'm personally betting/hoping that Tsutaaja's final evolution is a Grass/Dragon-type, or at least not the Grass/Poison some people are projecting from just the fact it's a venomous snake. Grass/Poison is so horribly boring and uninteresting. Some are speculating that Pokabu will become a flying pig, but I'm a little skeptical, not to mention that Fire/Flying just isn't a very good typing (poor Charizard). Mijumaru could become pretty much anything.
Zoroark was revealed to have the ability Illusion, which was later explained to mean it basically takes on the appearance and name of another Pokémon (how that Pokémon is selected, we don't know) until revealed for its true self, likely by being hit with a super-effective attack or something of the like, as it keeps its Dark typing even when transformed (I totally called it). Oh, and speaking of Zoroark, apparently zoroark.com now redirects to pokemon.com, which can be considered a pretty good sign that Zoroark is going to be kept as its English name.
We also have new battle videos, showing that Pokémon are fully, smoothly animated during battle, both when idle and attacking. This is definitely the most surprising development about Black and White so far; personally, I'd have been perfectly ready to believe it if somebody had told me it was in practice impossible or at least impractical to create several individual animation frames for both the front and back sprites for what will likely be something like six hundred Pokémon, but what do you know. In any case, I'm thinking this pretty much confirms my earlier speculation that the reasoning for the full, pixelated back sprites is because the Pokémon will actually be moving across the battlefield.
Oh, and the camera apparently zooms a bit in and out during battle too, but that's not very remarkable or interesting, though I suppose it makes the battles look a little more dynamic.
The B/W trainers have been revealed and are apparently a few years older than the kid protagonists of the previous games. The girl has seriously strange hair. And the region is called Isshu. Blah blah boring stuff.
In a more recent development, the box legendaries for Black and White have been revealed - simultaneously on both the Japanese and American official sites, no less. They are the white Reshiram as the mascot for Black and the black Zekrom as the mascot for White (no, not the other way around; white on a black background and vice versa, after all, look a lot more stylish and interesting than white on white or black on black). Both of them have some odd similarities to Palkia, or maybe I'm just imagining it in Reshiram's case but I don't think there's any room for argument concerning Zekrom. Regardless, I rather like both of them and am looking forward to seeing their role in the games; they are very yin-yangish in concept (both the white-on-black/black-on-white and the fact that Reshiram has blue eyes but some red in the lighting, while Zekrom has red eyes and blue in the lighting), and it'll be fun to see if that comes into their portrayal in the games. It helps that supposedly there is meant to be a big version difference in addition to the Pokémon version exclusives; technically it could just be something lame like the evil team split in Ruby and Sapphire, but I'm hoping for something more substantial in the storyline. (Before somebody suggests "Maybe you can join the evil team in Black!", yin and yang are not good and evil.)
At least the release date is apparently spring 2011 for both Europe and America, so yay. And September in Japan.
There. I wrote about it.
Comments
(Comments are closed.)
Chaos16
As cool as moving sprites are going to be, I'm a little bummed that Game Freak (going by screenshots) did away with the whole "Your Pokémon follow you around!" thing from HG/SS. I thought it was trivial before I bought HG, but I was surprised by how ammusing it was to interact with my team. Oh well.
Back on topic, its nice to see that I'm not the only one who noticed that Reshiram and Zekrom look a lot like Palkia, even if they are supposed to be Dragon-types. Reshiram completely stole Palkia's feet, Skarmory's neck and general shape, and Darkrai's white wispy thing. They look epic, but it almost seems like Game Freak sort of copied and pasted old Pokémon together. It'll be interesting to see what else they come up with before September.
Equinoxe
The sprites look like they don't have frames per se; more like a limb-based system where the hands, legs etc are defined. That kind of system makes simple movement possible without forcing the spriters do 46128347 frames for each 'mon.
It's pretty simple if you think about it.
Oh-Paching
Don't forget that the animated battles with the dynamic camera go faster than before, too.
And I agree that the new legendaries are somewhat familiar-looking. BUT when I first saw them, I must admit they looked NOTHING like Pokemon. I mean, come on!
Oh, and Tsutaaja is automatically my favorite. Maybe cuz I always like the grass starter for some reason, but whatever. It looks so fancy!
ShinyRedGlaceon
The new legendarys are digimon 101(not that i have anything against digimon but pokemon arn't supposed to look like them.)
Leafpool
Have anything else to complain about?
Zroxa the Mystic Fiddler
Hey you.
Yeah you.
ShinyRedGlaceon.
Can you back up your complaints? Give us some real reasons as to why Gen V is gonna suck, as you claim?
Or will I have to brand you as a troll?
Oh-Paching
ShinyRedGlaceon wasn't complaining. I personally think the legends look like digimon too.
Ferasquilee
I just love the battle videos, just the fact that the pokémon move even while idle alone makes B/W worth buying.
Also, am I the only one who likes Mijumaru and Reshiram?
Jahu
@ Ferasquilee: Nope. ^^
And...Oh-Paching's right. SRG hasn't really done anything wrong... :/
~Jahu
Chatot Lightnin'
I personally really don't like Pokabu. The expression really sort of scares me.
Oh-Paching
I'll settle this. THEY'RE ALL ADORABLE AND AWESOME. Except the new ones like Denchura. But Desukan is kinda hilarious.
Maecenas
I must say, I'm as intrigued by the starters as anyone else, even more so than in past generations. My thoughts on each:
-Tsutaaja: I generally tend to favor the grass-types for some reason, but bipedial starters get less attention from me than the quadrupeds. T'j, though, sort of seems to be doing Treecko's general concept of a hip-looking Grass lizard one better. It looks really neat, although I have no idea where its evolutions will be going (with first starters it's usually quite hard to tell). On either Smogon or Pokebeach, I forget which, someone has an avatar of Tsutaaja in a top hat. That's how I usually picture him now.
Pokabu: Being an underdog as I am, I've always kind of wanted the power, command and plain old glitz a Fire starter offers. But I like Blastoise and Venusaur way too much to go for a Charizard, I've never played any Gen II but love all three starters equally, and neat as Blaziken may be it just can't compare to Swampert, my favorite Pokemon of all time (I liek'd Mudkipz before it was in style). And...don't get me started on the Chimchar line.
This is the first truly quadrupedal Fire starter we've ever had, and as I've said before I really like quadruped starters for some reason. So far, Pokabu is my favorite, and I can only imagine all of the bacon-related nicknames that are possible. Again, we'll have to see about evolutions (but really, you can't go wrong with a big ol' magma boar, can you?)
Mijimaru: Honestly, this is one of the most conflicting things about the Internet: you can know so much about something without actually experienced it. In the case of "The Last Airbender" that property has saved me six bucks and some mental scarring, but in the case of my favorite Pokemon type's latest Starter iteration, it's not such a good thing by half.
I remember first encountering the three Isshu starters and looking at Mijimaru. "Cute, really," I thought. "The little seashell on the chest is a nice touch--they do seem to be sticking to the Piplup mold a bit too closely, but I suppose that's not such a bad thing."
Honestly, what is it about that poor little critter that has instilled such dislike on the Net? And that just gives me more sympathy and urge to defend the grand tradition of Water starters. Really, it's just so cute! No reason to gang up on the little fellow. Personally, I welcome him to the growing ranks of Pocket Monsters, more than I ever did with Chimchar.
Overall, the three starters all seem pretty good so far and fit together well, but as always the big evolution question remains. We shall have to wait and see....
My money's still on Pokabu. But you didn't hear me say that.
As to the other new species, I have no comment so far except for the vague thought that the Fire one looks like the bizarre love-child of Zack and Wiki with Viva Pinata.
Maecenas out.
Chatot Lightnin'
After looking at the new Arkeis pictures of the Isshu starters, I can honestly say that Mijimaru is definitely my favorite. I've always sort of gone for the underdog, but now I know that Miji is based off an otter! We've never had an otter before. Otters are so CUTE!
Frostagin
the new legendaries do look like Digimon.Believe me, i playDigimon.But there's nothing wrong with that, so long as Pokemon dosent start evolving like Digimon do.I don't want my Charmander Pokevolving(Digimon evolutions are called Digivolutions) into Charmeleon after it gets x amount of attack.
WARNING
I like the Water starter, but, halfway through the game I'm going to quit and rechoose the Grass starter. Yeah, I'm too lazy to spell the Japanese names right. I'm American, what do you expect!? I did the same thing in Gen IV, but I discovered my talent with bipedal starters (don't know why) in Gen II, when I got my Typholsion to the highest level any of my starters have been. 84. Now, I know it's pathetic, but I tend to use pseudo-legends, like Dragonite, and stuff like that. I just won't use the Gabite family. I won't. I hate them. I don't know why, probably because dragon/ground is so BORING. I know I put a lot of words into this, but I have no one to talk to at school about Pokemon (I'm a full 14, I was supposed to like Modern Warfare 2 and FPS back in the 3rd grade. I grew up on Pokemon, and I'm not giving it up). I'm simultaneously trying to put all my feelings into this post and FAILING. I'm calling that the water starter will become a pseudo-legendary pure-water type with 600 Sp. Attack, and 400 DEF. How's that? Since nobody likes it, Nintendo tends to make it stronger.
ShadScy
New bug type <3
About the name
You should change it to the CoSD, or cave of speculating dragonflies.
koopa120
I am SO gonna get Pokemon White. I've seen the pokemon differences on Serebii.
In Pokemon Black, you get-
-A goth
-A diaper wearing vulture
-Some guy called Reshiram
In Pokemon White, you get-
-A retard
-An eagle
-Some guy called Zekrom
Problem is, however, I still haven't beaten Pearl...
Poekwoowi
The differences are that in Black, the world is more technological, and you get access to the special area "Black City". In White, the world is more natural, and you get access to the special area "White Forest".
ShinyRedEevee
I'm getting White, I love forests <3