Monday, January 20, 2025

Pokemon Pinball

POKEMON PINBALL


Since Pokemon has a small round ball as part of its core concept, naturally a pinball spinoff is easy. There's not much too it, just a standard pinball game with tables based on various locations and Pokemon popping up across the boards in various capacities. Not much else to say, really.

Here's what we've got so far:


Characters:

Red/Pokemon Trainer: Poke Ball, potion, bicycle, fishing rod, HMs, Hey You items

Mark/Roland/TCG Player: card game mechanics and rules

Todd Snap: Zero-One, camera, food, flute, pester ball

All Pokemon (Barring all one to two-movers)


Candidates for possible trainer system idea:

Red

Blue

Mark

Roland

Oak

Brock

Misty

Lt. Surge

Erika

Koga

Sabrina

Blaine

Giovanni

Jessie

James

Team Rocket Grunt

Lorelei

Bruno

Agatha

Lance


Stages:

Pallet Town

Viridian City

Viridian Forest

Pewter City

Mt. Moon

Cerulean City

Lavender Town

Vermilion City

S.S. Anne

Celadon City

Fuschia City

Safari Zone

Saffron City

Seafoam Islands

Cinnabar Island

Indigo Plateau

Pokemon Stadium

Bedroom

Ochre Woods

Springleaf Field

Cobalt Coast

Olivine Lake

TCG Table

Pokemon Island

Pinball Table


Thanks for reading! Next up, Pokemon Stadium 2! Or is it 1? One of those things!

Saturday, January 18, 2025

Pokemon Snap

POKEMON SNAP


Pokemon Snap is a rather unique game in the Pokemon series. You play as Todd Snap, a photographer hired by Professor Oak to explore Pokemon Island and snap pictures of as many Pokemon as possible. In essence, it's a very simple and basic game, where you mostly enjoy the scenery and watch Pokemon interact in their natural habitats. You do have food you can toss, your camera, a ball you can pester the Pokemon with, and a flute to wake up sleeping Pokemon, all in the service of getting a good shot. And then there's your ZERO-ONE vehicle.

Here's what we've got so far:


Characters:

Red/Pokemon Trainer: Poke Ball, potion, bicycle, fishing rod, HMs, Hey You items

Mark/Roland/TCG Player: card game mechanics and rules

Todd Snap: Zero-One, camera, food, flute, pester ball

All Pokemon (Barring all one to two-movers)


Candidates for possible trainer system idea:

Red

Blue

Mark

Roland

Oak

Brock

Misty

Lt. Surge

Erika

Koga

Sabrina

Blaine

Giovanni

Jessie

James

Team Rocket Grunt

Lorelei

Bruno

Agatha

Lance


Stages:

Pallet Town

Viridian City

Viridian Forest

Pewter City

Mt. Moon

Cerulean City

Lavender Town

Vermilion City

S.S. Anne

Celadon City

Fuschia City

Safari Zone

Saffron City

Seafoam Islands

Cinnabar Island

Indigo Plateau

Pokemon Stadium

Bedroom

Ochre Woods

Springleaf Field

Cobalt Coast

Olivine Lake

TCG Table

Pokemon Island


Thanks for reading! Next up, let's play a game of pinball.

Friday, January 17, 2025

Pokemon Trading Card Game

POKEMON TRADING CARD GAME


While the video games were the central focus of the Pokemon series, it rapidly started expanding out into other mediums, including trading card games. Naturally, a video game was released alongside the trading cards, working in tandem with them. The game features a young protagonist named Mark who is given a starting deck by Dr. Mason and sent out to compete in tournaments against Club Masters, Grand Masters, and his rival Roland. Kinda the same setup as the main games, just with cards. From there, he plays the card game mostly the same as you might in real life, with all the basic rules and concepts of the game.

Here's what we've got so far:


Characters:

Red/Pokemon Trainer: Poke Ball, potion, bicycle, fishing rod, HMs, Hey You items

Mark/Roland/TCG Player: card game mechanics and rules

All Pokemon (Barring all one to two-movers)


Candidates for possible trainer system idea:

Red

Blue

Mark

Roland

Oak

Brock

Misty

Lt. Surge

Erika

Koga

Sabrina

Blaine

Giovanni

Jessie

James

Team Rocket Grunt

Lorelei

Bruno

Agatha

Lance


Stages:

Pallet Town

Viridian City

Viridian Forest

Pewter City

Mt. Moon

Cerulean City

Lavender Town

Vermilion City

S.S. Anne

Celadon City

Fuschia City

Safari Zone

Saffron City

Seafoam Islands

Cinnabar Island

Indigo Plateau

Pokemon Stadium

Bedroom

Ochre Woods

Springleaf Field

Cobalt Coast

Olivine Lake

TCG Table


Thanks for reading! Next up, let's go Snap a few pics of the next game.

Thursday, January 16, 2025

Hey You, Pikachu!

HEY YOU PIKACHU!


As Pokemon exploded in popularity, one single Pokemon rose to prominence as the mascot of the series. How do you cash in on that popularity? Toss together a cheap Tamagotchi/Nintendogs type game where you follow Pikachu around and watch it do cute things. That's basically what this game is. You are a kid hired to help Professor Oak train a Pikachu, and you just kinda hang out with it and help it do stuff. You have a selection of areas for Pikachu to play in, including your bedroom, Viridian Forest, Ochre Woods, Springleaf Field, Cobalt Coast, and Olivine Lake, all of which have various Gen I Pokemon for Pikachu to play with. You also have a box to carry various items for Pikachu, including a ball, cupcake, fishing hook, harmonica, lucky hook, megaphone, watering can, watering pail, and a flying acorn. There's not really much else to say.

Here's what we've got so far:


Characters:

Red/Pokemon Trainer: Poke Ball, potion, bicycle, fishing rod, HMs, Hey You items

All Pokemon (Barring all one to two-movers)


Candidates for possible trainer system idea:

Red

Blue

Oak

Brock

Misty

Lt. Surge

Erika

Koga

Sabrina

Blaine

Giovanni

Jessie

James

Team Rocket Grunt

Lorelei

Bruno

Agatha

Lance


Stages:

Pallet Town

Viridian City

Viridian Forest

Pewter City

Mt. Moon

Cerulean City

Lavender Town

Vermilion City

S.S. Anne

Celadon City

Fuschia City

Safari Zone

Saffron City

Seafoam Islands

Cinnabar Island

Indigo Plateau

Pokemon Stadium

Bedroom

Ochre Woods

Springleaf Field

Cobalt Coast

Olivine Lake


Thanks for reading! Next up, who's up for a card game?

Wednesday, January 15, 2025

Pokemon Yellow

POKEMON YELLOW


Pokemon Yellow is the first in a long-standing tradition (that I think has gone away now courtesy of the rise of DLC) of third games that release a short time after the first two, that acts as a sort of combined/finished version of the previous two. Or sequels. It's a whole thing. Pokemon Yellow specifically has the distinction of having had changes made to make it more in line with the anime.

These changes include the protagonist not having the choice of Bulbasaur, Charmander, and Squirtle to start with, instead having him given a Pikachu as his starter, while Blue will take an Eevee as his, while the starter trio can be gained through other means throughout the game. Likewise, two Team Rocket grunts now have the distinct designs of Jesse and James, complete with their Ekans, Koffing, and Meowth partners.

Otherwise, basically the same game. Here's what we've got so far:


Characters:

Red/Pokemon Trainer: Poke Ball, potion, bicycle, fishing rod, HMs

All Pokemon (Barring all one to two-movers)


Candidates for possible trainer system idea:

Red

Blue

Oak

Brock

Misty

Lt. Surge

Erika

Koga

Sabrina

Blaine

Giovanni

Jesse

James

Team Rocket Grunt

Lorelei

Bruno

Agatha

Lance


Stages:

Pallet Town

Viridian City

Viridian Forest

Pewter City

Mt. Moon

Cerulean City

Lavender Town

Vermilion City

S.S. Anne

Celadon City

Fuschia City

Safari Zone

Saffron City

Seafoam Islands

Cinnabar Island

Indigo Plateau

Pokemon Stadium


Thanks for reading! Next up, the first BIG cash-in on Pikachu's burst of popularity.

Tuesday, January 14, 2025

Pocket Monsters Stadium

POCKET MONSTERS STADIUM


Next up, we have the first of the Stadium games, this one only released in Japan. The concept of the stadium games is simple, it basically lets you have full 3D Pokemon battles without all the standard Pokemon game around it. Which is a concept you'd think would have lasted to the modern day, considering how big the competitive Pokemon scene is, but then again, I've never been part of the competitive scene, so I have to assume they're satisfied with whatever medium they do use for battles.

This game technically only has forty playable Pokemon of the original one hundred and fifty-one, the rest at least having 3D models you can view through the game's Pokedex. The game also has a tournament mode with sixteen challengers who are apparently based on the contestants of the Nintendo Cups for 1997 and 1998. I'm . . . probably not going to include them in my trainer system list (unless I decide to include the trainer classes alongside the main characters, I'm still divided on that).

Anyway, that's what we've got so far:


Characters:

Red/Pokemon Trainer: Poke Ball, potion, bicycle, fishing rod, HMs

All Pokemon (Barring all one to two-movers)


Candidates for possible trainer system idea:

Red

Blue

Oak

Brock

Misty

Lt. Surge

Erika

Koga

Sabrina

Blaine

Giovanni

Team Rocket Grunt

Lorelei

Bruno

Agatha

Lance


Stages:

Pallet Town

Viridian City

Viridian Forest

Pewter City

Mt. Moon

Cerulean City

Lavender Town

Vermilion City

S.S. Anne

Celadon City

Fuschia City

Safari Zone

Saffron City

Seafoam Islands

Cinnabar Island

Indigo Plateau

Pokemon Stadium


Thanks for reading! Next up, Pikachu presents his very own Pokemon Yellow!

Monday, January 13, 2025

Pokemon Red, Green, and Blue

POKEMON RED, GREEN, AND BLUE


Ah, Pokemon. A massive beast of a franchise with tons of content, tons of characters, and so much more. Ground rules, right off the bat: I will be covering the games in sections by generation instead of by type. I do not want to do the entire Pokedex in one solid block. That just sounds like a nightmare. So, our first batch will be the main games, plus the first Stadiums, Snap, Hey You Pikachu!, and so on. Secondly, I'll get this right out of the way immediately: EVERY Pokemon is in, except for those who are designed to be limited in their moveset. So, the larva and cocoon Pokemon like Caterpie and Metapod are out, Abra is out, Beldum is out, Unown is out. So on and so forth. Ditto and Smeargle are not out, however, owing to the fact that their "one" move allows them a wide range of subsequent moves. Make sense to everybody? I hope so. Also, I struggled for a bit with characters like Diglett and Dugtrio, considering mobility would be a massive issue, but I've decided to include them, and just leave that part as an issue for the theoretical game designers to solve.

The first games are a bit weird to talk about, seeing as they started out with Pokemon Red and Green in Japan, later released an updated version in Pokemon Blue, then American releases came out later as Pokemon Red and Blue. They're all functionally the same games, just with some version differences, like some Pokemon only being available in one game but not the other, which encourages trade between the two versions.

The plot follows a young player character named Red who is given a starter Pokemon by his neighbor Professor Oak and sent out on a journey to explore the region of Kanto, collecting and training Pokemon and challenging the game's eight gyms. One hundred and fifty-one Pokemon exist in this country, all of which have their own moves and typings that determine how strong they'll be against others. Most of that will be covered later. As for Red himself, his demonstrated abilities include throwing Poke Balls to catch Pokemon, riding a bike, fishing, and using HMs (special moves that Pokemon can use outside of battle): these games include Cut, Fly, Surf, Strength, and Flash.

Other characters of note include Professor Oak, Oak's grandson Blue who acts as a rival to Red, the eight gym leaders: Brock (Rock type), Misty (Water type), Lt. Surge (Electric type), Erika (Grass type), Koga (Poison type), Sabrina (Psychic type), Blaine (Fire type), and Giovanni (Ground type). Giovanni is also the head of Team Rocket, the game's villains more or less based on the Yakuza. After the eight gyms are completed, you take on the Elite Four, including Lorelei (Ice type), Bruno (Fighting type), Agatha (Ghost type), and Lance (Dragon type). Non-trainer NPCs of note include Red's mom, Oak's granddaughter Daisy, and the computer guy Bill.

The entire game takes place in the country of Kanto, which is more or less based on the real world Tokyo and some of the surrounding areas. Places of note include Pallet Town, Viridian City, Viridian Forest, Pewter City, Mt. Moon, Cerulean City, Lavender Town, Vermilion City, the S.S. Anne, Celadon City, Fuschia City, the Safari Zone, Saffron City, the Seafoam Islands, Cinnabar Island, and the Indigo Plateau.

Here's what we've got so far:


Characters:

Red/Pokemon Trainer: Poke Ball, potion, bicycle, fishing rod, HMs

All Pokemon (Barring all one to two-movers)


Candidates for possible trainer system idea:

Red

Blue

Oak

Brock

Misty

Lt. Surge

Erika

Koga

Sabrina

Blaine

Giovanni

Team Rocket Grunt

Lorelei

Bruno

Agatha

Lance


Stages:

Pallet Town

Viridian City

Viridian Forest

Pewter City

Mt. Moon

Cerulean City

Lavender Town

Vermilion City

S.S. Anne

Celadon City

Fuschia City

Safari Zone

Saffron City

Seafoam Islands

Cinnabar Island

Indigo Plateau


Thanks for reading! Next up, technically the first Pokemon Stadium, but not the one we know as Pokemon Stadium 1.