We don't always like being nonplussed

Saturday, October 30, 2010

Retro Pokemon Weekends: Pokemon Green Flailthrough Day 12

Yeah, slap some wings on this Venonat and you've got Butterfree.
Remember the picture of Butterfree? Look at Venonat. Mm hmm... That's really the entire point of putting that picture up. Moving on.

... Did... did my Gyarados just shoot fire? Um... I thought he was... well, not a water type, but still... weird. Oh well, it murdered the pants off of whatever Pokemon I was using it against, so it's all good.

I seems that it's my fate to enter yet another cave. I hate caves, I've NEVER wanted to be a spelunker, and now I seem destined to spend half the game in them. Dude... if they'd just throw off the shackles of the PokeMafia, and fire those lazy jerks in the waystations, then we wouldn't have to keep running around underground like a bunch of retarded moles, and we could walk in the sun once more!

There's a new game coming out called Michael Jackson: The Experience. That idea troubles me.
I also seem to have been accosted by every ten year-old boy's worst nightmare... Michael Jackson. See boys and girls, he's not dead! He's just hanging out in a dark cave, trying to sneak up on little boys, drawing them in with promises of tiny furry murderers. Let's just hope that I beat him... because I don't think I want to know what he's got planned for me, and I DAMN sure don't want his nose to fall off on me.

Yeah, I'm glad they changed this sprite. Poor Cubone.
This... this is apparently what he has in store for me, though I didn't have to lose to him first. Anyway, Cubone really LOOKS like a baby here, and that kinda makes it a bit sadder. The next in his Pokestable is a Slowpoke, so... well, the derp is strong here. Either way, I take them down fairly quickly (not in the yucky way), and go on with my life, bagging a Machop on the way.

This cave is freaking BRUTAL! It's not random encounters, it's all the freaking trainers. My Balls and my Pigeotto are dead, (and that's an awesome statement right there) and my other Pokemon aren't in too great a shape, except for Gyarados and Alakazam, who are like unto tiny gods apparently. What I need right now is an escape rope... or at the very least a freaking repel. Shame I don't read Japanese so I can buy them. Well, you know, having some revives would be rather nice too. I swear, if this is the cave that Green's waiting at the end of, then I'm just going to cry... or more likely put the game in a chipper shredder, which I would have to go out and steal first, because we don't have one. And that's a DEDICATED kind of mad there, that's willing to deal with grand larceny just to destroy a game.

I think at this point, I should mention that my lowest level Pokemon is level 25... and the average level of the trainers' Pokemon is about 20 or 21. I HATE rock types!!!! Speakinig of, take a good look at this booger... and I don't mean that as just a substitute for 'thing', I mean he looks like a booger.

Yeah, the green tint doesn't help Graveler one bit. -Ed.
I HATE HATE HATE HATE HATE HATE HATE HATE HATE HATE HATE HATE HATE SELF DESTRUCT!!!!!!! That is the WORST, most TROLL move in ALL of Pokemon! Herp derp, I'mma lose, so I'll just take you with me, so neither of us get any experience, tee hee. SCREW YOU Geodude evolutions!!!!!! And don't even get me started on the trainers! How can you pretend to love your Pokemon if you make them use a move that kills them? AND you still have to pay the other person, because they have more Pokemon than you, and win by default! It just goes to show you... What I don't know, but I'm going to go with the hypocrisy and cruelty to animals inherent in the system? Yeah, that sounds about right. Anyway, moving on.

I have NEVER been so happy to see Lavender Town in my LIFE! Hello you spooky town of weird shit, gimme the PokeCenter! I wander around, and I don't really think I can do anything here yet. I probably have to go on to another town and collect the shiny purplinkle bafmodad or something stupid like that. So I just stock up on whatever the new Pokeball is, and a couple things with parenthesis in the front that I think are super potions, since they heal me. Upward and onward, I suppose.

Well I headed onto the new route, and ran into a Lass with two Clefairies, this is pretty unremarkable, except for the fact that one of them hit me FIVE TIMES with Doubleslap! This move is called DOUBLEslap, DOUBLE implies that it hits TWICE, this is in fact the definition of double, two of something. Shit, even Jessie and James from the Pokemon cartoon know that! TWO hits, it should only hit TWICE. Cocks to the lot of them.

What the FUCK is that?! Is that... is that man wearing a bathrobe? What the FUCK is in his hand?! Not his right one, that's clearly a slinky, but what the hell is in his left hand? It looks like freaking Halloween ghost is balancing on his wrist. Good gods... I don't like the look on his face either... He's kind of... leering at me... Am I... am I gon' get raped here?

The nurse on duty will catch hell for this once Grandpa gets back to the home. I mean the Pokehome of course. AHEM.
His first Pokemon is a Growlithe, and we all know how to take care of that bitch. That's right, I beat him with my Balls (BEST accidental naming EVER!)... which apparently has gained the ability to shoot stars? I don't know what's going on anymore, but my Balls shoot stars. Fuck yeah?

His second Pokemon is this:

Vulpix must be short for 'Vulpine Chicken.'
Much like with Sandshrew, I have consistantly played the games where Vulpix is the exclusive fire type because 1) I like foxes, and 2) ... well, I don't really like the colors that Growlithe was the exclusive fire type... except Sapphire, I just got railroaded into playing Ruby. Anyway, my point is, THIS IS NOT CUTE! It looks like someone crossed a freaking chicken with a vaguely vulpine quadruped... and then they later went on to just do a fire chicken, which I wonder if they didn't get the idea from this misery... (though I agree with That Guy, you shouldn't cross an animal, like a chicken, with its natual enemy, the barbecue... or would that be the rotisserie?) I WILL say this though, Vulpix here is NOT trying to get you to look him straight in the brown eye (look at his sprite in HeartGold and SoulSilver, you know this to be true!) and that IS an improvement.

In any case, Meowth beats the abomination unto Nuggan until money falls out, and I beat the creepy old man... who then gives me ALOT of money... and since I've established that the amount of money is directly proportional to how much the trainer wants in your pants... this scares me, boys and girls, this scares me a lot. I'm just... gonna get on my bike, and uh... RIDE LIKE THE WIND!!!!

The next trainer, a lowly and unimportant Pokedork, has stroke!Grimer, and then this asshole:

Muk would be flashing some kind of Poke-gang sign if his fingers would just stop dripping off.
I know he looks kinda standard, but... after seeing Grimederp, this is a bit of a surprise. And I don't know what it is, but his hand kinda scares me... maybe it's the odd finger spacing... or the missing fingers... I don't know, but no sir, I don't like it.

I run into another of those creepy ghost-handed men, and this one apparently calls me a bicycle (it looked like same katakana) and then he threw out this:

Poliwag is not amused. Possibly also high.
He uh... looks pretty stoned. Dude, he's been rocking the ganj pretty freaking hard, and we all know what that means... he's probably hungry. You know, I'd like to put him and Towelie from South Park in a room together and see what happens. A water type and a super absorbant, intelligent towel, both of whom are horrible, horrible stoners? It could only end in hilarity... and problably a contact high for everyone in a fifty mile radius.

His last Pokemon is... well, this:

Meanwhile, Poliwhirl is catatonic.
See boys and girls? This is what you grow up into when you do drugs. A doughie, wall-eyed frog monster. Let this be a lesson to you. Pot's bad, and it kills your brain cells. Avoid the derp, stay away from drugs. This public service announcement has been brought to you by a raging fever and dehydration. Let's get back to the game.

The route to the next town still seemed to be in the iron-grip of the Pokemafia, so I have to traipse off underground again, and hope I'm not eaten by a grue in the dark... or possibly mindflayers... or drow, but I really don't think it's QUITE that far underground.

I escape the tunnels with no harm, and come to a new city! I talk first... to what is either a Team Rocket Grunt, or a policeman. Either way, he yells boxes at me, and then I wander off to check out the PokeCenter. Well, so far it seems everyone is yelling at me, but some guy in a diner gave me something. I also found this woman:

They say pet owners start to look like their pets. I think Rodney Dangerfield must have owned a Jigglypuff.
She kinda looks like an Abra, don't you think? Anyway, the other thing about this place is this:

Why hello, unoccupied but unoccupiable space.See? Nothing here? But WAIT! Look AGAIN!

Invisible computer! I'm sure there's a lolcat for that.
That's right... that's an invisible computer. How awesome is that? I can store stuff, and Pokemon INVISIBLY! Alright, that might not seem cool to you, because you probably already knew about it, but I didn't. That Guy wanted to see if it was in Green too, and obviously it is. Shut up.

ANYWAY, I think I'm in Celadon City. Why do I think that? Because there's a ridiculous tree-filled route to get to the gym, and this place is freaking huge. Also, I'm pretty sure I saw the giant department store. I REALLY appreciate that the katakana for 'shop' seems to be 'SHOP'. Isn't that freaking convienent?

Well, that's it for today goys and birls! Tomorrow I shall flail wildly as I try to figure out what the hell I'm buying, and I might even hit up the casino and see how much money I can lose! Until then remember... Drugs turn you into frogs... unless you're wearing a ribbon. See you tomorrow!

Friday, October 29, 2010

Pokemon Black - Day 20 (I... I think think they want me to catch Jesus.)

As I exit the city to go on to the next town, Godzilla comes up to talk to me about something.


Yes, diff'rent from the rest of us is Belle. Our butts fit though doors without trouble.
Her name is Belle, by the way, though I don't intend to call her that most of the time. I've never been a fan of the "cute but stupid" anime friend meme, and I don't think that's going to change because of some girl that totally destroyed my room. As I had been expecting, she wants to fight me. I really do dislike this girl, though not even because of her personality. It's because in combat, she'll just keep using healing items over and over again, so most of the time your only option is a one hit knock out.

Anyway, once the battle is over I'm pleased to see that she's given me HM 02, which seems to contain Fly. I'm glad that I don't seem to have missed any HMs along the way, but also glad that I raised up a bird Pokemon just for this reason. I'm not sure if I can even use fly yet, but I'll check now.

Yes. Yes I can.

I decide to go back to the first town to get my Pokedex evaluated, and to my surprised she gives me a TM for the work I've done. I like that, you should get rewards for doing that work for the Professors, and Bladdernut here is setting a good example. And holy crap, they just gave me another one! Awesome!

Anyway, it's back to Route 6 to continue our Pokemon journey!


Kaburumo, the Stag Beetle in a Snuggie Pokemon.
Caught this guy along the way, he's called Kaburumo, or as I'm going to call him, Bugly. Why? Because nearly as I can tell, he has no alibi. Yes, that's right, I just went all third grade up in this walkthrough.

Then there's this little lady... fella... does it really matter? It's like an elf. Male or female, they look exactly the same.

Shikijika, the... I dunno, but it looks like a Pokemon Dr. Seuss would draw.
I think I just caught Bambi... Well, that name works as well as any other, like Shikijika... I hope the last one I killed wasn't it's mother. Talk about an awkward relationship between Pokemon and trainer.

So it's over the river and through the woods, but I see no grandmother's house...


Well, it's a house. In Pokemon Black. What else is there to say?
Or I may very well be wrong about that. That would be somewhat amusing to me, if only because that nursery rhyme is always on repeat somewhere in the back of my mind, slowly driving me to madness.


Aha! It is a house of SCIENCE! Pokescience, no doubt.
Unless Grandma has some really, really strange habits that I don't know about, like gene splicing, I don't think this is her place. Anyway, the man on the left of the room seems to want some sort of Pokemon from me, but I don't know what it is, so I'll have to come back to that later on when I have fifty years to try to trade him each Pokemon individually... Ok, probably not then. I make my way back outside to wander around the grass area for a moment to see if I missed anything, and the answer there is pretty quick.

Kurumayu, the this must be the day for Pokemon in Snuggies Pokemon.
This guy is Kurumayu, the evolution of Kurumiru. I already have his preevolution, but I'll keep him anyway, and call him Blank, short for Blanket.

And then there's this guy...

Tamagetake, the Desk Lamp Mushroom Pokemon.
I wonder at this natural camouflage... What would the point be? "Make yourself look like a Pokeball so trainers will think you've already been caught"? Tamagetake is it's name, but I'm going to have to call it Shroo, short for Shroom. No, it's not a drug reference, it's just what I call mushrooms... Yes, really... That's my story and I'm sticking to it.

Which brings us to another interesting thing. Over a short bridge a little bit to the left of the house here, there's a field. In the field there are what looks like Pokeballs in the grass, but when you attempt to pick them it turns out they're the mushroom Pokemon again. Directly north of this is a house with three people in it, the child gives you a Shiny Stone, and the mother will heal you for free. I approve of this, and believe that everyone should give me free things, and let me sleep in their house whenever I want.

I should add that next to the house is a field with quite a lot of high level and double encounters, so this is a perfect area to raise your Pokemon. I recommend level 40 at least.


The electric web is super-effective at catching Flying types.
To the north of the house is some sort of cave, with a neon spiderweb in front of it. I can only assume that this is the dwelling of a very flamboyant spider, and we all know that those are the worst kind. I head up and examine it, and the cowboy/White Shaft from the previous town comes up and talks to me about something, possibly Popsicles, and then sends out his Meguroku to take down the web, for as we all know, alligators and spiders are natural enemies. He also gives me a TM for some reason, but I'm ok with that because I'm a pretty cool dude.

This all accomplished, it's time to head inside!

Next week. Till then, keep your Pokeballs ready!

Thursday, October 28, 2010

Pokemon Black - Day 19 (Ellalator go down the hole, Pilgrim.)

There's only what, nine or ten of them? Tex there will be fine.
So, this looks like it could be trouble. Any by that, I mean it looks like it could be trouble for those guys. I'll be fucked if I'm getting involved with that. I am a ten or twelve year old kid, and I should not be stopping international criminal organizations... Not till at least fourteen.

Thankfully, someone simply made the screen wash, and when it came back they were all gone, and the person I'm pretty sure is the gym leader is standing in front of me, as he should. Can I just fight you now? Really, I don't need to go through whatever demented puzzle you have set up inside. We can just fight here, in this nice open parking lot! No! Wait! don't go inside! SONOFABITCH! *sigh* Well, let's see what ridiculous shit he had set up inside.

One day I'll be a Pokemon Gym Leader so I too can live in a gold-plated McDonalds.
And the answer to that question is elevators, or at least that's how it looks so far.

Now I'm wondering if there's a Muzak version of the Pokemon theme.
I'm really starting to hate these guys...

Well, I was starting to guess by all of the people in mining helmets that this was a rock/ground gym, but the first pokemon I'm encountering, a Gamararu, is a Water/Ground... I guess that could still count. Though his next is a ground type, Moguryuu which is more fitting with the theme.

I have to say, the guy in the business suit in the middle of all of the miners really throws off the motif.

If there is, clearly you can dance to it.
And I kind of like that about him. He just doesn't belong, like a Charmander in a cabbage patch, his existence here will only lead to pain... Don't ask me how, I'm not Mr.Wizard.

I cannot describe the convoluted path you have to take through this gym in order to get to the leader without sounding like a madman who has watched Labyrinth far too many times for my own good, but it isn't nearly as complicated as it looks. Just keep following the paths and taking the elevators to get to the one that has little walls around it, and you'll end up here.

I always knew it'd be John Wayne who killed Superman.
This guy is my hero, and so are the people that designed this part of his gym.

And now, I must kill John Wayne... I fear the fifty pounds of beef in his colon, really I do.

Yacon. Or possibly 'Yerkon,' I dunno.
Honestly his pokemon aren't too hard, his Moguryuu is a bit of a pain but it wasn't... WHAT THE HELL IS THAT?!

Doryuzu, the Pokemon that pierces the heavens.
The answer is apparently Death, Destroyer of Worlds. Keep your eyes open for this guy, because the game suddenly turned into me trying to keep my four level higher water pokemon alive for one turn in order to use a water attack on him, and it wasn't easy. That makes me want to track down/evolve one of these guys for my party, but due to how easily he was killing a pokemon his attacks were weak against, I suspect computer cheatery.

Though I acheive this from that fight .


Gamageroge, the Frog With Tron Tumors Pokemon.
Yay!... I think. Gamageroge sure is ugly, and yes that is his name. I'm told that means something along the lines of George the Frog... Sure, why not?

Anyway, the important bit is over!

Quake Badge! I think it gives you the ability to break peoples' flash drives in half.Hooray!... Hmm... Now, call me crazy, but he said something that had disappointed looking punctuation, and then said something with the number six in it... I think he might be trying to give me a pokemon. I'm going to go deposit one and find out.

Nope... Damn. Oh well, but at least we got badge number five down!

That's it for today, time for more power leveling, and more tomorrow!

Wednesday, October 27, 2010

Pokemon Black - Day 18 (Ice, Ice baby!)

Look at this guy.


Yabukuron, the Trash Bag Pokemon. Terrified of Zigzagoon.
His name is Yabukuron, but I'm going to call him Trash, since it fits perfectly in the five character name slot. I'm going to have to raise him up at some point, but it'll probably after I've beaten the Elite 4, and am trying to fill out my 'dex. I really can't stress how neat I find this idea, since it's obviously the idea of a Pokemon evolving to fit in with his environment... Of course, it would also mean I wore plate armor when I went to take out the trash at night, but I digress.

I also caught one of these guys, so I don't have to bother leveling up Choroneko later on.

Something about Lepardas is just weird.
Holy shit, another wild double encounter!

Chillarmy looks kinda Tezuka.
I want that Koala thing, and I want it badly... Which obviously means that I killed it in one hit with my weakest attack, damn it.

I only stopped to mention it because that's only the second double encounter in the wild that I've had for the entire game, and wouldn't mind more of them. They would be great for leveling two Pokemon instead of one... Probably the reason they were added in, now that I think about it. You really do have to do a lot more leveling in this than any other Pokemon game I've played.


Gochimu, the... Gothic Lolita Pokemon!?
Jeebus that thing is freaky. It's called Gochimu, but... I guess I'll call it Bowie, because it looks like it steals babies. I guess it's supposed to be some sort of goth Pokemon, because of the name, and the colors... Ok, yeah, I've been to my fair number of goth clubs, and you do see things that look sort of like that crawling around the edges of the dance floor some nights.

HA! Finally caught one of these little bastards!

Chillarmy, the Kimba the White Chinchilla Pokemon.
He's called a Chillarmy, and I like that name so I think I'll just call the little dude Chill for short. He's probably a bastard, because I've never met a Chinchilla that wasn't... Then again, I won't hold to that judgment, because it could just be the smell of cats on me that makes them assume I'm going to eat them. I'd never do that, though... Too small.

It looks like this is good for a lot of double battles, which means this area is turning out to be awesome for power leveling. Sweet deal, I hope.

This area is turning out to be way too hard to level up in, so I'm moving on across the massive bridge... Yes, I know I said it looked good for power leveling back there, but I was wrong. Don't make me turn this review around!

So Pokemon attack you on the bridge... Or at least one Pokemon attacks you on the bridge.

Koaruhi, the blue duck Pokemon and the least weird one today.
I has a blue ducky... who I will call Daffy, since Donald won't fit. Koaruhii is its real name, and it seems to be the only thing you encounter. Well, not quite. There are little shadows that appear on the bridge from time to time, and they either give you these odd looking feathers, which I don't know what they're for, or an encounter with the duck man there. After I catch the duck I head over the bridge and find myself on a small island with another bridge on the other side. Once I'm sure there are no hidden items, I move on to the other bridge where I run into Librarian, or Cheren as I'm informed is his real name...

Cheren meets Elvis
Wow, that's almost four weeks that it took me to give in and ask someone, I'm kind of impressed. Anyway, he seems to be talking to Elvis, or possibly Smokey of Smokey and the Bandit fame, but I see no bandits in in the area... I am not ignoring the chance that they're ninja bandits, but I'm moving on. They talk for a moment and then wander off, and I'm left to explore this strange new town. There's a pretty big indoor market here, and a few of the people give me items which is always nice, and I think that I've found the gym here.

(A side note: Smokey and the Ninja Bandits would be an awesome movie.)

I used to call this part of an RPG 'Find the Trigger.' -Ed.
Well there's a problem. Someone is standing in front of the door, and we all know that means that either the gym leader is out, or I've got to find/do/activate some sort of magic McGuffin that he will somehow hear about and return in order to fight me... Well, let's go McGuffin hunting. For those of you that don't know, a McGuffin was defined by Alfred Hitchcock as "the things the spies in the movie are looking for, but the audience doesn't care".

To the south there's a warehouse district, which I explore, noting that there are quite a large number of trainers, as well as a reasonable sized grassy area. It's while I'm walking through it that I run into this thing...

Banipucchi, the Ice Cream Pokemon. And blue ducks are looking DAMNED normal now, thank you.
Is it an ice cream cone? Is it a pile of dry poopie? Who knows, but it's names is Banipucchi, but I'm going to call him Vanil. Why? Because he's Ice, Ice Baby. Yes that's right, I went there.

Anyway, I head down to the bottom of the area, which is a dead end from the look of it, but I decide to look around anyway. Cheren comes runs down out of nowhere and starts talking to me about something, possibly the deficit... Then stands there, and I assume he wants me to go into the warehouse, since the door to it is right by us. I move inside and sure enough he follows, but from the mist in the air it's starting to look like this place may be on fire. That can't be good.

Actually, it's the opposite of fire, it's ice. This is a large ice warehouse, and I think I'm supposed to go through it for some reason. Well, onward and upward as they say.

Ahh, sliding puzzles, how I have not missed you. Thankfully they all seem pretty simple, and the trainers spread throughout the area all have pretty low level Pokemon compared to me... Though this thing is just a freak of nature.

Dotekkotsu, the crazy-ass-thing-holding-a-girder Pokemon.
At least this place has given me a chance to level up a few of my Pokemon.

Well it seems the object of this place was to get to an open shipping container in the upper left corner, at which point Cheren comes up to me and asks "......?" which I think is something we would all like to know. We go into the container, and we're met with roughly eight Plasma Knights, all surrounding some helpless goober who seems to be, for some reason, a bit nervous.

But I don't have enough lunch money for eight people!
That was actually pretty challenging, as I was forced to fight four Plasma Knights in a row before the cavalry arrived.

So he's more Smokey than the Bandit.

No clue who that guy really is, but he's stealing my thunder, and I resent that.

They run at the Plasma goons and then haul them off, likely, or at least hopefully, to prison. That would be nice, because I don't think that has ever happened in the history of a Pokemon game, though I'm sure I'm wrong, and someone will tell me where.

So I guess it's a trip to the Pokemon center, and tomorrow we'll see if we can't tackle that gym!

Keep reading guys, I promise I try to keep things interesting.

Tuesday, October 26, 2010

Pokemon Black - Day 17 (A bridge too far. Or, our hero dates a cave dweller.)

I wander my way around town, looking for some sort of clue, and I spot a man with a backpack in front of the Ferris wheel... I have no idea what he's asking me, but sure, I'll agree with what you say crazy man spinning in circles. It looks like what he wanted out of me was a battle and I think it's a bit cheap that he's as high a level as the local gym leader. Weren't gym leaders supposed to be expert trainers or something? Well, no matter...


Gantoru: The I-would-be-a-boss-monster-in-any-other-game Pokemon.

That is one freaky Pokemon. It's no big deal though, and my Pigno makes short work of him, but...


You should have at LEAST been nicer to Yuffie.

Why am I now going on a date with this guy? Will someone please get me off of the romantic ride with the creepy pedophile? Pretty please? I don't want to be locked in a small space with a Hiker, they're fat and smelly, and spend WAY too much time alone in the mountains, if you catch my drift.

Anyway, after a quick scouring of the town, I decide that I'll head out of the town on the left hand side. Why? Because I'm right handed, so my first instinct is to go to the right, and I feel like being contrary today. I seem to have picked the right route, because as soon as I take two steps out of the gate Librarian is there to speak to me. Yes, it's time for a Pokemon battle.

Looks like he's sporting the upgrade of Choroneko, who is now, Lepardas. Cute little guy, eh?

Lepardas!
Shame I have to send him off to his burning death, but it's worth it because that takes my Chaobuu to level 36, which may evolve him at the end of combat. It's turning out to be a bit tougher fight than I thought, because this guy,

Futachimaru: The otter in sweatpants Pokemon.

is one tough tough little cookie, and I'm weak to him on top of it. So, I send out my Yanakki to leaf him to death. You have to watch out for those leaves, trust me. Fall is a bloodbath. Next he sends out his fire monkey, an unevolved Boappu, and my plant monkey still takes him out in a single hit... probably a crit. A Hatooboo is next, and he says something that looks like it's pretty smug when he sends him out, but it's still dead in two round. Seriously, what's with all of the damn monkeys?

What? Yes! We have evolution!

Pigno is now an Enbuo!
Say what you want, I think this guy kicks major ass. He might not be as cool as Charmander or even Blastoise, but back in the day I remember a lot of kids thinking they looked pretty dumb too... Right up until someone kicked them in the balls for insulting their favorite Pokemon.

After I beat Librarian, (maybe I should bother looking up his name some time) the electric gym leader comes up and starts to talk to the two of us. She starts to lead us away, when a man... let's call him Fire Gym Leader, stops us to talk.

Fire Gym Leader seems to be talking about a Festival... -Ed.

See why I'm making that guess? Yeah, pretty obvious.

He speaks to us for a bit, then brings over two children to fight us. Classy guy, that Fire Gym Leader, making kids do all of the hard work, or possibly using them to watch us fight to gain the advantage. They send out a pair of Haderia, and they last maybe four rounds since Librarian doesn't seem to know what he's doing in a team Pokemon battle. Fire Gym Leader then yells at the children and says something to us, likely that I'm awesome. After everyone is done talking the electric gym leader wanders off, and Fire Gym Leader just sort of stands there like a doof. Well done Sport, you fail at being a teacher.

I step over to talk to a cook, thinking I might be able to buy some interesting Pokemon items from them or something, when I find that they're actually another random trainer.

She's adorable! ...but she seems to have baked her Pokemon?
The most delicious trainer I've ever met.

'And now I'm gonna play a song about the time a trainer set my Yanappu on fire.'
And this is just the silliest trainer I've ever met.

I follow the road a bit more and run into Librarian and electric gym leader who seem to be standing and staring off into the distance, doing nothing in particular. There's some sort of check in station that they walk up to... then this.

Aw, I already used the Roger Rabbit quote.
The worst picture I've taken to date, and the biggest damn bridge I've ever seen... wow, I'm seeing a lot of stuff I've never seen before in video games. Anyway, she gets them to lower the bridge for us so we can continue, and that's just groovy of her.

Ok, time to do some more power leveling, and tomorrow we cross the bridge!