No. 387: Turtwig

Kickin' the 4th Generation off with a bang, here's another turtle Starter!

But he's quite different from Squirtle. For one thing, he's a Grass-type. Also, Turtwig goes on all fours, which makes his silhouette immediately different. But the tiny sapling growing out of his head doesn't hurt, either.

He's pretty cute, and I like his color scheme. Green, yellow, browns, they all flow together and make sense.

Turtwig isn't nearly as unique or cool as some of the earlier starters, but he's still acceptable. My personal favorite for this Generation.


Overall: 7/10

The worst Gen 3 Pokemon

I know I just said yesterday that this gen had some great Pokes, but hoo boy, did it also have some bad ones. In fact, there were so many 1/10's, I'm expanding my list to the bottom 10. Suck it, Gen 3.

10. Gulpin
9. Huntail
8. Seviper
7. Minun
6. Cascoon
5. Sceptile
4. Azurill
3. Luvdisc
2. Wynaut
1. Feebass

Let's see, 3 useless redundant Water-types, 2 overdesigned eyesores, 2 annoying blue pieces of shit, 2 shameless rehashes, and a disgusting emoticon-faced gallbladder. Jesus Chrysler, no wonder people hate on the 3rd Gen. Special shout-out to Sceptile for disappointing me so thoroughly on my first playthrough, and Feebass for putting the "ass" in "I am a big fat ass of a Pokemon and my name is Feebass".


anyway, what Hoenn Pokemon do you (no doubt sexy and intelligent) men or women hate?

The best Gen 3 Pokemon

Though a lot of people claim Pokemon started to suck after Gold and Silver, they obviously don't know about the awesome Pokemon that came out of this gen. Check it out, the top 10 from the 3rd Gen:

1. Blazekin
2. Cacturne
3. Metagross
4. Shiftry
5. Deoxys
6. Shedinja
7. Duskull
8. Sableye
9. Sharpedo
10. Gardevoir

However, let's look at the cumulative ranking of my very favorites:

1. Haunter
2. Heracross
3. Scyther
4. Machamp
5. Blazekin
6. Pinsir
7. Cacturne
8. Typhlosion
9. Blastoise
10. Metagross

I'll be honest, you guys, I don't see that top 3 changing any time soon. Especially not with the fourth generation up next...

Anyway, how about you dudes/ladies? Who are you favorites from the 3rd Generation?

3rd Gen Summary

Three generations reviewed, two more to go. Hopefully I will be able to update like I have been recently, instead of the ridiculously slow pace of earlier this year.

At any rate, you're here to find out how the 3rd Generation rated, right? Well, it averages out to a surprisingly high 6.1 / 10. For comparison, gen 1 got 6.2, and gen 2 got 5.8. I know, I'm a little surprised, too.

But I guess, despite all the lame water-types, and the stupid rehashed bugs, there were a lot of stars, this gen. All the Dark sub-type dudes, and then the Legendaries were of generally above-average quality.

As for the games themselves, I know that they are better mechanically than the GBC games, but all that surfing is a little annoying. Couldn't there have been some giant bridges? Some good things were added, like diving, but some things were lost, like the (sorely underutilized) day/night system. I'm looking forward to the eventual remake.


Anyway, that means that so far, all the Pokemon average to an even 6.0/10, which doesn't make much sense actually, because for a 0-10 scale to work, the average quality should be 5/10. So I don't know what this means. Some Best/Worst Pokemon coming up, and then I'll start on the 4th Generation early next week.

No. 386: Deoxys

GATTACA was a good movie

I think Deoxys might be one of my favorite legendaries ever. I love his simple color scheme, and the way his arms are double-helixes. Also, he comes from the stars, which further cements the theory of "Pokemon are from space".

Also, this Formal Form (which I refuse to write "forme" because I'm not Eurotrash) can make his tentacles into solid arms, so that they can punch things and hold babies and stuff. Cool.


The Attack Form is even more Speed and Attack-oriented, with paper-thin defenses. I like how it turned all pointy, to represent the offensive focus. Also, charging up an energy attack in the middle, and then throwing it will all 4 arms is badass.


Defense Form looks like it sounds: slow, with great Defense. The arms got flat, and can be used as shields, and the head now resembled the Juggernaut's helmet, bitch.


Now, the Speed Form is pointless. Sure, it looks fast, and super slimmed down, but what's the point? Attack Form is already fast enough, and stronger, too. Speed Form is redundant, and messes up the Defense Normal Attack (DNA) theme.

Finally, let me say how much I love the Destiny Deoxys movie: I love it a lot. A lot.


Overall: 10/10

No. 385: Jirachi

When you wish / upon a star...

Mew is cute and tiny, and is awesome. Celebi tried to be cute and tiny, and failed. Now it's Jirachi's turn. Does it succeed?

Well, it does have a striking design. Head shaped like a star, trailing bits, and 3 tags on its points. Reminds me of a Japanese shrine maiden, a little bit. The typing, Steel/Psychic, seems a little random, but I'm not complaining. Then there's the fact that it has a signature move called Doom Desire, which is more than a little threatening.

Maybe that's what Jirachi does, it lures you in, and then

OH GOD WHAT IS THAT

IT HAS AN EYE ON ITS CHEST HOLY SHIT WHO WOULD EVEN PUT THAT THERE

ONLY THE DEAD CAN KNOW PEACE FROM THIS EVIL


Overall: 7/10

No. 384: Rayquaza

Ray "The only good Ruby/Sapphire Legendary" Quaza

Well, that's a little harsh. Some of the others manage to be above average. But none of them have the same fierce swagger as Rayquaza. I don't even have to tell you how awesome his shiny sprite is, because you already know it. And if you don't, then you don't deserve to know. I'm not gonna tell you.

But why does Rayquaza kick ass? Again, it should be pretty obvious: he's a frikken' flying snake dragon. The carvings that look a bit out of place on Groudon and Kyogre work fine on his Aztec-inspired design. Also, the dude's habitat is the entire freaking stratosphere, and he gets pissed when anyone messes with it. Even Deoxys gets his shit handed to him by Rayquaza, as we saw in one of the movies.

Now, when I went to capture the big green, I got extremely lucky. How lucky, you ask? Glalie uses Ice Beam as an opening move. I just want to deal big damage, before whittling the hp away. I get a critical, leaving Rayquaza with like 2% health. And then, miracle of miracles, he gets frozen as well. Holy piss, did I throw the hell out of those few ultra balls.


Overall: 10/10

No. 383: Groudon

one heavy mother - watch your mouth!

The main mascot of Ruby version, Groudon's design is busy as shit. Spikes everywhere, plated armor, a tail that looks like heavy farming machinery, and 4 head crests.

Now, I like spikes. Spikes are good. And plate armor is cool, too. But I think maybe, just maybe, there's too much of it all going on? In any case, if Groudon was a tiny little plastic toy, he'd hurt like hell to step on in the dark.

Also, I want to take this opportunity to comment on Team Magma and Team Aqua: they are both idiots. I don't see how Magma thinks that drying up ALL THE WATER IN THE WORLD would be even remotely a good idea, or why Aqua thinks that flooding the world will let them survive at all. Granted, it's been a while since I played the games, so maybe their positions were better explained, but I suspect they were always a bunch of bullshit.


Overall: 5/10

No. 382: Kyogre

I used to pronounce it "ky-roge", because why the hell would a sea beast have "ogre" in its name.

So, confession time. You know how I earlier shat all over people who use legendaries? well...

When I was a young lad, on my very first play through of Sapphire, this is what my team to beat the Elite 4 was: Torkoal (for fire), Hariyama (for fighting), Sableye (for dark), Shedinja (because wonder guard yeah), Castform (for ice), and Kyogre (for water).

Now, aside from using unevolved forms, I don't think it's possible to make a team more ill-suited to actually getting anything frigging done. And my levels were all averaging 40. Hell, Castform was only 35, because grinding is tough, and I just wanted to get it over with.

As you might guess, it ended up being the Kyogre Power Hour, taking out 80% of the Elite 4's Pokemon with Ice Beam and Surf. By the time I beat it, Kyogre had gotten to level 60, while the rest of my team shriveled on the vine. ugh, it's a painful memory.


Anyway, Kyogre. Despite being sort of like a legendary killer whale sea beast, it somehow manages to end up lame. At least with its mouth closed. I think its the hand/wing/flippers, why does it have those? Shouldn't it be more streamlined? It isn't really horrible, just kind of underwhelming.


Overall: 4/10

No. 381: Latios

blue streak speeds by / too fast for the naked eye

And now here's the cool older brother. He has the same good design as Latias, except he's blue, and bigger! And like I said last time, I have zero problems with a pair of sibling legendaries. Actually, wait, I just thought of something. They couldn't do it back then, but now that there's gender differences in Pokemon?

How about if there was just one species, let's use Latios, and Ruby has the female one, and sapphire has the male one, and the gender difference is in the color. It's an extreme difference, as opposed to just "longer tusks" and the like, but wouldn't that be kind of cool? And if you trade and breed them, you get a purple little baby dude! Except then maybe it would be better framed as "legendary lovers", rather than "siblings", because otherwise that would be super-gross.

I've digressed quite a bit, but I guess I'm saying that Latios is cool, and some sort of star-crossed lovers legendaries would be neat for the future.

Overall: 7/10