I spend all of my Pokémon time cooing "BABIES!" at the screen

[spindizzy]

POKÉMON SHIELD HAS ALL OF THE CUTE POKÉMON AND I WANT THEM, wah! I'm not doing any of the weird challenge modes, but Lex is doing his usual "No catching Pokémon, only use Pokémon that other people give you/that you can buy" run. (It's apparently GREAT for money, by the way, because at least in the earlier gens, all of the money that you don't spend on Pokéballs gets converted into that ridiculously expensive Magikarp in Veridian.) I know the internet has been joking about Shield/Sword being set in the UK for a while, but I didn't realise that this was going to take the form of having a telly in your room and the best friend character yelling MATE NO whenever you try to go into the long grass without a Pokémon. Also: sheep. Welcome to the UK, enjoy the sheep.

(It also made me laugh because I've been in living rooms that are the spitting image of the one in your character's house, and it comments about your character's mum buying a fancy red microwave, which my ACTUAL REAL LIFE MUM did for me when Lex and I first moved in together!)

This is weird and interesting for me, because I think we've hit the stage where there are VERY FEW Pokémon I recognise in any of the games! Like, I'm not one of the people going "Ugh, I can't play this game if it doesn't have an Onix" or whatever old people on the internet were yelling at clouds about, I'm genuinely excited about this. I have NO IDEA WHAT ANYTHING IS! That's kind of exciting! Like, if I NEED to figure something out, there's always bulbapedia, but also... I can just go "Nah, mate, I'm picking my party by how cute the Pokémon are and damn the torpedoes."

... I assume at some point I'm going to have to update my gymsona with all the new cuties, because I'm at LEAST three gens behind. Original gymsona: ALL NORMAL TYPES ALL THE TIME! Then they changed half of my favourite Pokémon to Fairy types, so I had to choose between my soft pastel aesthetic and being a beast with a level 100 ratatta.

I don't know much about the setting either, beyond "Possibly based on the UK, probably has an updated Team Rocket stand-in," so I'm not sure what to expect. It all looks very commercialised? Maybe? Not necessarily the having Pokémon bit, but the gym circuit does. See also: Champion Leon has sponsorship logos on his CLOAK. Which checks out, I guess, I too have seen Tiger & Bunny, but also... Wut. And the shorts and leggings combo is throwing me off a bit. Then again, considering that I would genuinely wear the protagonist's outfit, maybe I shouldn't judge anyone else's fashion sense.

ANYWAY, my accidental avoidance of memorising the map and new Pokémon to one side! I took the grass starter this time! It was a genuine dilemma, because Sobble was really cute! But also what if I make the Sobble cry? Then I will cry in real life and that's terrible. So I've taken a Grookey, and at some point in the future I will have a GIANT MONKEY WITH A DRUM. My naming theme for this playthough is plants rather than cities, so I'm going to have to start collecting plant names that are short enough to fit in the text box, whoops. (My Grookey is called Greylia and my Meowth is called Mint, because I'm HILARIOUS.

... But seriously, I want a Wooloo and the lightning corgi, and once I have those I will be SET.

Comments

[lokifan]

Heeee this is fun to read! I know nothing of Pokemon but a BFF has been filling our groupchat with the best It's Set In The UK moments.