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How did your favourite Pokemon become your favourite?
- Thread starter Bayleef030
- Start date
I definitely don’t think Shaymin is a flawed Pokémon by any means, but for the purpose of this post, things are a little bit different. I’m not talking about Shaymin on my behalf today, but rather on behalf of a close friend of mine whose birthday is today. Said friend is known to suffer from pretty severe anxiety, so for their sake I won’t disclose any details about this person.
That being said, Shaymin has more or less become a symbol synonymous with this friend’s birthday over the years, in a similar notion to how August 7th is emblematic of a certain Psychic-Type feline for me. I believe this story started back when my friend was much younger, and got some various Pokémon merchandise as a birthday gift. Among the gifts was a Shaymin trading card my friend must have really liked for whatever reason. My best guess is that Shaymin’s classification as the Gratitude Pokémon felt very fitting given my friend’s rising interest in Pokémon at the time and because of what day it was.
At some point, a number of strange coincidences started happening during the early parts of July that happened to involve Shaymin in some capacity. I can think of two from recent memory. Just recently, a Shaymin-themed Pokémon Café Remix event was announced for early July, and before that, there was the Poké Fair Scout of Rosa (Special Costume) & Shaymin in Pokémon Masters EX. The latter is notable not only because of the time the scout went live, but also because my friend’s first main series Pokémon game they ever played was White 2. It’s tiny things like these that help me to appreciate these games more because of the small but significant memories they can leave behind.
Oh, how I love my foreshadowing. Eagle-eyed users have noticed that a singular post on this thread mysteriously vanished a couple weeks ago. The truth of the situation is, I was a bit dis-satisfied with my original Espeon post from a few years back and wanted to give it a well-deserved remake.
The since-discontinued Pokémon Rumble series was never really one of the franchise’s more prominent spin-offs, and would rarely catch anyone’s attention as much as other series like Mystery Dungeon, the GameCube saga, or the Ranger trilogy to name a few. Only the first two Rumble games ever received any sort of critical acclaim, with the original WiiWare game still having a few people that like to look for Shinies and 2011’s Pokémon Rumble Blast being the only game in in the series to sell over a million copies. There’s just one problem- only the original WiiWare game had random Shiny Pokémon in it, and the two 3DS Rumble games instead had an ultra-rare special trait your Pokémon could make use of.
Saying that encountering an Epic Trait boss Pokémon at the end of a stage in Pokémon Rumble World is next to impossible is an understatement. The entire process takes not only patience, but even a slight degree of skill and strategy not usually seen with Shiny hunting. But August 7th, 2019 would be a day that would go down in history. Four years ago today was the day that after over three and a half years of collecting, I would find arguably the single rarest encounter I’ve ever come across in a video game. An Epic Espeon boss in itself was already quite the accomplishment after 19 “regular” Epic Pokémon were found on this save file in that time span, but this was more than that. Just before the encounter took place, I correctly made a very specific prediction on what I would later discover to be 1 in 120 million odds of success. At this point in my time as a Pokémon fan, I was losing faith in the franchise’s direction by virtue of several major changes happening in my personal life alongside the controversies brought about during the early Nintendo Switch era. Without going into further details, I needed any sort of sign to tell me it was my time and effort to keep going. An argument can be made that a toy Espeon from a spin-off game is the sole reason I’m still a Pokémon fan to this day.
The original reasons are lost to me now, but I know my Flygon-favoritism started with Pokémon Emerald, in the desert route. Quite annoyed with where to go, being marred in the sand, and encountering cacturne for the hundredth time, I trudged on, making sure to battle every trainer along the way. In between one of those battles, a little orange fella suddenly clasped its maw around my ankle. *Crunch!* "Oww you little-"..."hmmm wonder what you evolve into....get in the pokeball!"
Eventually the orange, dotted-eyed little freak evolved into a meakbug ground/dragon....thing, with wings and a penchant for vibration. I used it to little effect, most often it would get knocked out before it could do anything meaningful in battle. But mama didn't raise a quitter, nor would I allow Vibrava to quit.
I used TM Earthquake which made a huge difference. Miraculously it could score KOs on its own and soon after leveled up enough experience to evolve into Flygon, and I was in love.
520 BST, average distributed stats all around, and a Swiss army knife to boot, Flygon always ends up in RU or NU, but I think that's the reason I like it; it's a bit of an underdog, and everyone likes a good underdog story. I picked up competitive formats late into Gen 6, and then mainly 7 and 8, spamming Scarf Flygon on the ladder. You could imagine my disappointment when the artist for its potential mega evolution in ORAS couldn't pass the design stage, but all they needed to do was give it an extra set of wings, Tinted Lens, Bug/Dragon typing, and nice dump into special attack and speed, and voila you'd have your mega.
Sadly, that didn't happen and I guess for the better at this point because theres no need to improve upon perfection. I've come to accept my favorite for just being itself!
thx for reading...
Eventually the orange, dotted-eyed little freak evolved into a meak
I used TM Earthquake which made a huge difference. Miraculously it could score KOs on its own and soon after leveled up enough experience to evolve into Flygon, and I was in love.
520 BST, average distributed stats all around, and a Swiss army knife to boot, Flygon always ends up in RU or NU, but I think that's the reason I like it; it's a bit of an underdog, and everyone likes a good underdog story. I picked up competitive formats late into Gen 6, and then mainly 7 and 8, spamming Scarf Flygon on the ladder. You could imagine my disappointment when the artist for its potential mega evolution in ORAS couldn't pass the design stage, but all they needed to do was give it an extra set of wings, Tinted Lens, Bug/Dragon typing, and nice dump into special attack and speed, and voila you'd have your mega.
Sadly, that didn't happen and I guess for the better at this point because theres no need to improve upon perfection. I've come to accept my favorite for just being itself!
thx for reading...
Reminder that this tool exists to help people who still don't know/can't decide. It had to be done by process of elimination for me, and even when picking the final one, I still had to open the windows capture tool and manually cross out the ones that I felt less than the others. Ultimately, in the end, narrowly beating Goodra-Hisui (whom I call Snoodra) and Quagsire, my favorite Pokémon is Flygon.
Back in 2007, I was 10 and didn't really use the Internet much. I had a fair amount of experience with Pokemon, having played Yellow, Sapphire, and FireRed on my brother's GBA, but I wasn't up to date with the latest news about any upcoming games. I don't think I even knew that Pokemon Emerald existed. One day, I stumbled across Serebii after Googling "Top 100 Pokemon" and, while scrolling down the list, saw some Pokemon I didn't recognise. One in particular that really caught my eye was called Empoleon. Its Water/Steel typing fascinated me; back then, the Steel type wasn't as notoriously powerful as it is now, but it was very rare. Seeing it on a Pokemon that I quickly discovered was the final evolution of a starter was intriguing, to say the least. At that point, DP had been out for a few months worldwide, but it wasn't until Christmas that year that I got a DS and a copy of Pokemon Diamond (choosing Piplup as my starter, of course).
Empoleon's been my favourite Pokemon ever since. My fondness for it has grown and matured as I have: when I was a kid it felt like this unstoppable force, with immense power and innumerable resistances, but as I've gotten older I've come to understand its flaws and appreciate it all the more for having them. In general, I like tanky Pokemon with clear strengths and shortcomings. Sweeping through teams with a Pokemon that has the power, coverage, and speed to mow down everything in front of it is much less interesting to me than developing a strategy (even a very basic one) to compensate for each team member's weaknesses.
Empoleon hasn't gotten a ton of attention or new toys in the generations since its debut, but it's always had enough going for it to have its moments. At the very least, it's never been strictly outclassed, as its dual typing is still unique to this day. Roost, Competitive, and Flip Turn are exciting developments for it in the competitive scene, but I was always going to find a way to make it work even if it never got any stronger. I made a point of including Empoleon on my BDSP Battle Tower team, conquering the Masters mode with my childhood favourite, and whenever Empoleon is available in any fangame I will always use it.
It's also what kicked off my love for the Steel type in general :)
Empoleon's been my favourite Pokemon ever since. My fondness for it has grown and matured as I have: when I was a kid it felt like this unstoppable force, with immense power and innumerable resistances, but as I've gotten older I've come to understand its flaws and appreciate it all the more for having them. In general, I like tanky Pokemon with clear strengths and shortcomings. Sweeping through teams with a Pokemon that has the power, coverage, and speed to mow down everything in front of it is much less interesting to me than developing a strategy (even a very basic one) to compensate for each team member's weaknesses.
Empoleon hasn't gotten a ton of attention or new toys in the generations since its debut, but it's always had enough going for it to have its moments. At the very least, it's never been strictly outclassed, as its dual typing is still unique to this day. Roost, Competitive, and Flip Turn are exciting developments for it in the competitive scene, but I was always going to find a way to make it work even if it never got any stronger. I made a point of including Empoleon on my BDSP Battle Tower team, conquering the Masters mode with my childhood favourite, and whenever Empoleon is available in any fangame I will always use it.
It's also what kicked off my love for the Steel type in general :)
Well, let me introduce you to my new favorite Pokemon:
Ursaluna has become my favourite Pokemon since really not long ago (by that, I mean a short moment after the first DLC for SV came out). I got interested into Pokemon inspirations for several years, and since then, I pay more and more attention to the symbolism behind each creature (this is probably also due to growing up and appreciate a Pokemon for something else than "it looks cool" btw). Hence why I started to love Pokemon where deep concepts and inspirations are hidden behind them, and that's exactly what Ursaluna have, as well as many others Hisuian Pokemon. I've always appreciated Ursaluna per se, but I never really noticed it before that moment. When I look at its design and all the small details in it, I can say "This is a Pokemon GF took time to conceive."; plus, it got an awesome alternative form in the DLC. Also, it's a great Pokemon in competitive: it hits like a truck and if you want, you can use it with Swords Dance. Its Bloodmoon for is not left with Calm Mind sets. Exactly the kind of Pokemon I love to use. They created this as an evolution to a Pokemon that is both pretty bland concept-wise and not great competitively.
Anyone else with an Hisuian Pokemon as their favorite one ? That'd be lovely to hear.
Ursaluna has become my favourite Pokemon since really not long ago (by that, I mean a short moment after the first DLC for SV came out). I got interested into Pokemon inspirations for several years, and since then, I pay more and more attention to the symbolism behind each creature (this is probably also due to growing up and appreciate a Pokemon for something else than "it looks cool" btw). Hence why I started to love Pokemon where deep concepts and inspirations are hidden behind them, and that's exactly what Ursaluna have, as well as many others Hisuian Pokemon. I've always appreciated Ursaluna per se, but I never really noticed it before that moment. When I look at its design and all the small details in it, I can say "This is a Pokemon GF took time to conceive."; plus, it got an awesome alternative form in the DLC. Also, it's a great Pokemon in competitive: it hits like a truck and if you want, you can use it with Swords Dance. Its Bloodmoon for is not left with Calm Mind sets. Exactly the kind of Pokemon I love to use. They created this as an evolution to a Pokemon that is both pretty bland concept-wise and not great competitively.
Anyone else with an Hisuian Pokemon as their favorite one ? That'd be lovely to hear.
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I had a very long Slither Wing post but if I could give a recent runner-up, Sneasler ranks pretty highly for me, since I think it goes hard enough on the "this is ridiculously humanoid" criticism I normally have with Pokemon to the point of crossing the line a 2nd time into liking it again. Also I like its playstyle in PvP (whether competitive or just friendlies-you-try-in)