Thoughts on Sword and Shield

Pokémon Sword and Shield. I don't even know how to begin penning down my thoughts on this pair of games, because I feel that they have so much context that contributes to their beings even before they launched, and as such, make them very difficult to objectively judge based on their merits and shortcomings alone. Therefore, I'm here moreso to write about my expectations and experience with Pokémon Sword more than writing an informative review on it. I will try to remain as spoiler free as I can in the process, but I do want to analyse some of the mechanics of the new features in the game in greater detail, so if you consider this spoiler material, you have been warned.

Pokémon Sword and Shield are the first pair of mainline games to head to Nintendo's lightning in a bottle system, the Nintendo Switch, not counting Pokémon Let's Go Pikachu and Eevee, because... urgh, those "games". Let's just leave it at that, shall we? Easily the biggest news since the reveal of these games is cut content: specifically, some 450 of about 800 Pokémon from the previous seven generations of Pokémon games were to be excluded from Sword and Shield, and hoo boy, if you weren't a "gamer" that's familiar with the internet, I don't even know how to aptly describe the anger and backlash of the internet at the news. There were petitions, polls, crying, whining, and straight up death threats to the director of the series, Masuda Junichi, so much so that the launch event for the games had to be cancelled in Japan; the first time in the series' 23 year history.

I bring this up not to insult your intelligence; because if you're even remotely interested in video games and Pokémon in general, backlash of this magnitude is impossible to miss. I bring it up because I believe that a lot of the general critique of the game stems from a deep seeded desire to hate the game, and thus most widespread criticism feel to me like excuses to feed the hatred, rather than genuine complaints. A tree's texture looking bad in the overworld? Boycott! The all new options to adjust sound volume for the background music, sound effects, and Pokémon cries are unlocked only after you get a Key Item early on in the game? Worst game of the year! So, just keep in mind that the general reception to these games aren't that favourable as we delve into the nitty gritty of the game.

I mean, seriously, who the fuck plays Pokémon for photorealistic, cutting edge graphics? Fucking morons, seriously. This tree looks fine!

Me personally, I welcomed the change, even though it does mean that I do suffer the loss of some of my favourite Pokémon I've come to know, love, and adventure with over several years. As a (somewhat) competitive player, I've always felt like the series has been needing a serious reset button, a slate wiped clean. With 23 years of evolution also comes 23 years of mistakes and bullshit, ones which never go away because Pokémon has made a serious commitment to inclusion ever since a similar debacle in the transition from Generation 2 to 3. This also means that the series has never had any serious innovation, any serious change to the formulae ever since the launch of Ruby and Sapphire all the way back in 2003. That's right: the basic way to calculate what stats your Pokémon have, how much they increase and decrease with modifiers in battle, etc., remains unchanged to this day. Because Ruby and Sapphire wiped the slate clean, they were able to expand on a familiar concept. They were able to introduce game changing elements such as abilities and hold items. They were able to introduce Double Battles. They even had some wizardry in Hidden Power, a move that could be of any type based on... things. All of these HUGE features continue to be a cornerstone of Pokémon, be it casual or competitive, so much so that the series struggles to break away from them. And with the fundamentals so firmly set in stone, the series has taken what I deem to be the cheap way out into making more enticing Pokémon in later generations: power creep. With each generation, the Pokémon they introduced and updated got more and more ridiculous in terms of power, and one needs only to look at Smogon's banlist for standard play over the generations to realise just how apeshit insane and fundamentally unbalanced the game is. Used to be that banlists were as simple as, "no cover legendaries". Then it was that and "no Garchomp and Salamence". Then it was "no Speed Boost, no Soul Dew, no Swift Swim + Drizzle". Then it was "no these Mega Evolutions, no Baton Passing speed, no..." you get the point. It was at such a clusterfuck that it was affecting the enjoyment I could get out of the games, but also how difficult it must've been for newcomers to adapt and learn the ropes, to absorb some 15 years of evolution and its assorted BS that it was inextricably packaged with. And the old formulae and systems that governed the game were visibly struggling to keep up with all the craziness. For example, almost all Pokémon who can change form or do what they advertise on the tin do so via their Ability, and to ensure these Pokémon can always perform as advertised, these abilities are immune to neutralisation with stuff like Worry Seed, Skill Swap, etc.. You thought you were super clever in trying to prevent an Aegislash from flip flopping between its two forms with Worry Seed? TOO BAD! U DED. Or how about the fact that you couldn't have Hidden Power Fairy, the new type introduced in Gen 6, because it would require rewriting how Hidden Power types are determined, and break every Pokémon carrying the move in the process?

So when Generation 8 seemed to wipe the slate cleaned again, I was actually excited for some Ruby and Sapphire levels of mind fuckery and innovation. Unfortunately, it wasn't quite that. In fact, it was exactly more of the same, except now with less Pokémon to play with. Not that that's necessarily a bad thing, because culling the cancerous of the breed is still a plus in my book. It's just that it doesn't bring much new to the table, aside from the obligatory new species of Pokémon. Yes, Dynamaxing and Gigantamaxing is/ are the shiny new feature(s) to Gen 8 (they're basically the same thing let's be real), but they seem more to me like the combination of the Mega Evolution and Z-moves that were cut from the series rather than something entirely new. I still have no way to explain to my casual player cousins and friends why the hell Psychic hits Poison super effectively, or why Bug resists fighting. The game and its mechanics I feel are still no easier to learn from previous generations for newcomers, the same games that emphasise a rock paper scissors style of gameplay, the fire water grass thing, the chuck a rock at a bird and it will die sort of intuitive gameplay. In fact, some of the most bullshit, infuriating mechanics I had hoped with all of my heart to be cut from the series were in fact, still proudly shown off as selling points in the game pre-launch: confusion and infatuation. Yes, Double Team and Minimise are still in the game and are unchanged in function. Yes, bullshit, luck dependent items that can totally destroy a skilled player in the hands of a filthy casual like Bright Powder and Quick Claw are still present and unchanged. Yes, you can still get Quick Claw Horn Drilled in the Battle Tower, or miss a perfectly accurate move with no counter play or foreshadowing.

But, you know what, my favourite Pokémon, Glaceon, finally got Freeze Dry, so I guess I can't be too too ma- ARRRGH *gets hit with a Quick Claw Fissure out of nowhere after I miss an Ice Beam*

All that competitive nerd speak aside, how does Sword and Shield hold up as a single player RPG? I feel it's... okay. Like, it's serviceable, but not amazing, yet at the same time, not awful. It's a very traditionally safe, fit for general consumption, kid friendly product Pokémon tries to be, and there just isn't much else to say aside from that. I think that so many people gravitate towards Generation 2 and its Johto region is because it was so chock full of personality that so closely parallels its real world inspiration; Kyoto of Japan. The Galar region of Generation 8 is, interestingly enough, based off of England, but I never feel like I'm in some exotic, foreign land with its own mystique, customs, and way of life, even if the setting does look the part. I've never been to England before myself, so I can't speak with any expertise on the matter, but the whole "we're in ENGLAND dayo!" feel is only conveyed via the grating overuse of the word, "mate", by the super annoying childish rival you have in the game, and the occasional mentions of tea you'll never have. There's never much distinction between each town and city in Galar, aside from maybe a few aesthetic differences. There's no back story, there are no unique customs or culture to each area, and the towns themselves, while each impressively wide and sprawling beyond what could've been reasonably expected of Pokémon games even just one generation ago, are mostly empty spaces with little to do and see in between. Remember Lumiose City in XY? Mauville City in ORAS? Now imagine cities of that massive scope, but applied to every urban town in the game instead of just one. It's a technological marvel to be sure, but mostly hollow and skin deep in essence, which I find a crying shame. If anything, it just makes traversing between landmarks in any given city longer than it needs to be. Instead of intriguing, memorable locales, towns in Sword and Shield can be boiled down to, "arrive, bop the local gym, leave".

Strange as it may sound, the first thing that comes to my mind when talking about British culture and flavour is their snark sarcasm, which I imagine is difficult to fit into a family friendly game, and impossible to express in text alone. Speaking of impossible, that conveniently brings me to the plot of Sword and Shield. The overall plot of Sword and Shield feels cobbled together from the broken dreams of XY, just like how the Z-moves of Sun and Moon feel cobbled together from the broken dreams of XY. Here however, what's rather disjointing is that, for the vast majority of the game, there IS no villainous team or person threatening the status quo; the villainous entity just shows up, pulls a legendary Pokémon out of his ass - sorry, arse, and leaves just as abruptly with as much resolution and satisfaction as a depleted toilet roll in a time of need. Rather, the plot is focused on the character development of the two or so characters you'll constantly bump into over the course of your adventure, which I don't find issue with; in fact, I find it an intriguing change, but I felt that more emphasis was due on the villianous entity, and I feel like that was the price to pay for the rather well done plot centering around the individual characters.

In fact, I daresay that Sword and Shield are the first Pokémon games that sets a firm first impression for me on a character, only to slowly erode away and change that expectation it has sowed in me. I know it sounds incredibly basic, but this is still mind blowing to me, in the context of a plot in a Pokémon game, as they usually have one character/ agenda and stick with it regardless of what happens over the course of the game. Blue is always going to be a jackass. Team Rocket will always be evil for the sake of it. Team Aqua and Magma are ass clowns. Cyrus is... weird. N is by far and away the best character in a Pokémon game and I am still waiting for someone else to come along and challenge him for that title. The Team Flare boss whose name I don't even remember is in an unfinished game and is as compelling as a math textbook sawn in half. Team Skull is... uh... there, I guess? But the rival in Sword and Shield, and his journey, is something I actually feel compassion and interest in, and dare I say, emotionally invested in, which is more than the, "you're in the fucking way and I need to clobber you to advance the plot" type of fights as is with previous games and their characters. Now, the reason why I bring up the plot right after I mention, "impossible to pull off", is because... well... how do you write a compelling plot around an invincible, all conquering powerhouse of a person, devoid of any character? That character being you, the player? In my opinion, you can't. And I find it such a shame that, no matter how beautiful a garden the plot is tending, I will be asked to trample all over it, cheapening and disregarding all of the hard work. I feel bad for the other characters. I relate to some of their struggles. But at the same time, it's so hard to sympathise with the plight of someone else when they ask you for a battle and you 6-0 them in five turns flat, you know? I've personally felt like there were some really good moments during the plot of Sword and Shield, ruined by the fact that I need to destroy all the weight and atmosphere of the moment by pulverising someone in a battle. Maybe if I ever felt mildly threatened in every in-game battle, the plot would have worked. But the simple fact of the matter is that, as a competitive player familiar with the mechanics of the game, who makes sure he fully explores what he can before confronting a boss, that difficulty is just never going to be there. And if it were, it would be unfairly hard for a more casual player. I know it's an insane ask to balance gameplay between these two very different groups of players, and I'm not asking for a change, but moreso lamenting my... uh... cold, power hungry heart that has given up on seeing Pokémon as individual living creatures, but more just easily editable code to beat the shit out of others.

With all my criticism about the battle mechanics and the plot, it's safe to say that the vast majority of the enjoyment I get out of this game comes from the... uh... gameplay, of the game... Bah, you come up with a better term for it after I'm done describing it if you're so smart. One of the new gameplay features proudly shown off before launch was Pokémon Camp: a mini-game akin to that of Poké Amie of XY where you touch your Pokémon and play with them to gain their affection. Yes, it's about as enticing as it sounds on paper. However, Pokémon Camp isn't a replacement to Amie, but rather, adapts the gameplay of Amie and integrates it into its own unique feature. Yes, you still get to touch your sweet lil' Pikachu all over its body in 3D and play with balls. Yes heart shapes still float out their arse when they hang on for dear life in battle wishing for praise you can never give them. Yes they still do the stupid head turn and hop and spawn cheesy text that only serves to waste time in every battle. But what I love about Pokémon Camp is that it serves as a less expensive and more entertaining way to heal your Pokémon mid journey between towns: cooking a pot of curry at camp, if done well, is akin to a visit to the Pokémon Centre because it fully heals your party, and ingredients for cooking can be found respawning in the overworld, which makes them more economical than spraying a Hyper Potion into the eyes of your Pokémon. Yes, okay, maybe with Fly, it's actually more time consuming than actually visiting a Pokémon Centre. But Camp I find is a nice distraction, a way to punctuate the monotony of kicking NPC ass and getting whittled down in the process, by letting you have a more involved and entertaining way to heal your Pokémon other than mashing the A button in the PokéCentre for the millionth time. There is a curry dex to fill up as you experiment with different ingredients to further incentivise cooking, but the curry dex is, sadly, a rather shallow and meaningless list only meant for the obsessive, compulsive completionist with no real reward (as far as I can tell, anyway. I mean, what the hell are golden utensils good for?)

I think what is easily Sword and Shield's strongest feature is the Wild Area, a huge, expansive, all encompassing area that you get access to early game, and remains relevant AND enticing all the way into the post game. Heck, it's so good that the vast majority of my hundred hours of gameplay thus far is spent there, and it makes me genuinely wonder why the hell wasn't the entire game just one huge Wild Area. To understand why the Wild Area is so bloody amazing, it really helps to have played Zelda Breath of the Wild before, because I feel that this game borrows quite heavily from BoTW, and it's most apparent in the Wild Area. The Wild Area is a huge break from tradition from Pokémon games, in that it gives you free reign and free roam over a seemingly boundless area, instead of forcing you to go from A, to B, to C, in that order, preventing you from accessing what the game doesn't want you to access via arbitrary roadblocks. In the Wild Area, that shackled linear experience is (mostly) thrown out the window. Hell, it's so open that on my first playthrough, I was so beWILDered (aha aha aha aha...) by the sheer freedom that was suddenly thrust onto me, that, while I knew WHAT my next destination was, I didn't know WHERE it was. And, you know what, while that might sound like a complaint, it's actually praise, coming from me, because I LOVE the freedom, I LOVE the ambiguity (as long as I'm not rushing to save my family being burned at the stake whilst I'm lost). It has been so long, too long, since I've felt genuine wonder at the world I find myself in. It has been so long, too long, since I've felt like a kid, excited for life and what it brings. It has been eons (well, ever since BoTW anyway) that I have felt such a strong compulsion to explore the world and the limits that govern it, which I feel is something only an interactive medium like games can pull off, yet is so criminally under utilised. Yes, with that freedom also comes with the first sense of threat I've lamented for being generally lacking in the game's storyline, because once the game stops holding your hand, you have every right, every power, and every possibility of wandering into the wrong neighbourhood, to butt heads with strong Pokémon you have no way of handling at any given stage of the game. You always have to be cognizant and observant, and that very welcome sense of threat only adds to and enriches the sense of adventure and wonder to the world I found sorely lacking anywhere else. Yet, at the same time, the obstacles in the way, in this case those strong Pokémon, aren't absolute like a boulder you can't push with your Machamp or a sea you can't cross with your Lapras in previous games; these Pokémon are obscenely overlevelled relative to where you are in the game, but they are still mortal, they still have their weaknesses, and they can still be defeated in theory. And I cannot tell you how insanely satisfying it is when I took down a Rock/ Ground type Onix twice the level of my Water type Sobble with a STAB x4 Super Effective move in the rain, and the Experience Points I got from bopping something twice my level. The roadblocks are essentially enticing challenges rather than to impede your progress, which I feel is an approach more, if not ALL games should adopt. And if Pokémon of all the kid friendly, hand holdy games can pull it off, I have very, VERY high hopes and expectations for the series going forward. Yes, I want the entire game to just be a Wild Area, and I will not accept anything less. I want to be able to sneak my way into and get decimated by the Champion with my Level 5 starter Pokémon, a la Breath of the Wild speedruns. The bar has been set and I frankly see no excuse as to why it couldn't, or shouldn't, be done.

Strangely enough, the Wild Area, perhaps as a testament to how good a concept it is, is the only area in the game where you get to partake in Max Raid battles, a prominent feature shown off pre release that sees you teaming up with three other trainers to battle and capture Dynamaxed Wild Pokémon. This feature is... urgh. I like the concept, but I feel that it could've been done way, WAY better. I find nothing but bullshit and fault with these battles, because it's all so arbitrary and unfair, both adjectives you should never find yourself describing a game with, let alone used together. Max Raid battles are, by no counts exaggerating, sheer, unadulterated, unapologetic, pure bullshit. The basic premise of these Max Raid battles is that you have a turn limit of 10 turns, and a KO limit of 4 on your side of the field, averaging to each player's Pokémon fainting once. So, time is of the essence, and so is surviving. The logical, fair parts end here. Wild Pokémon here can launch multiple attacks in a row. Why? Because. Wild Pokémon can use their regular moves in addition to the Max moves Dynamaxed Pokémon are restricted to. Why? Because. Wild Pokémon here have way more than 4 moves to work with. Why? Because. Wild Pokémon here have their HP bars divided into 2 or 3 in the higher difficulty Raids, and no matter how strong your Pokémon are, you cannot deal damage that eats into the next HP bar. Why? Because. When wild Pokémon hits this invisible cap on their HP bar, they employ a "mysterious barrier" to protect themselves. Why? Because. This mysterious barrier takes only 1HP damage of possibly SEVEN I've seen with any attack, regardless of effectiveness or strength. Why? Because. Multi hit moves like Icicle Spear only takes 1 shield HP per turn instead of working as advertised. Why? Because. The mysterious barrier, if left intact at the end of the turn, fully heals all non volatile status conditions like sleep and paralysis, yet not volatile ones like confusion and infatuation, completely throwing strategy out the window. Why? Because. The shield blocks all stat drops and status effects while it's active. Why? Because. The shield prevents Max moves from triggering their secondary effects, like preventing Max Geyser's rain even if it successfully inflicts damage, but doesn't prevent normal moves' secondary effects like Flame Charge's speed boost. Why? Because. Wild Pokémon here can just decide to reset your stat changes and nullify abilities on your side of the field at no cost whatsoever, further cementing that you really shouldn't bother to do anything but attack. Why? Because. Ally Pokémon that faint and contribute to the KO count revive after one turn. Why? Just so they can add to the KO count again and get you kicked out.

Now that all the cards are on the table, please allow me the pleasure of sharing the absolute worst experience I've had with Max Raid battles: It was against a 5 star Obstagoon, the evolution of Galarian Linoone, and of a Dark/ Normal type. Being a 5 star Pokémon, its HP bar is divided into three thirds, calling in a shield to protect it when switching over to its next HP bar. For some dog shit reason I can't fathom, its shield has SEVEN HP, requiring seven hits to break, or, in the best case scenario, 2 Max hits and 3 regular attacks in 2 turns. It has the Defiant Ability, which raises its attack stat 2 stages each time it receives a stat drop, adding 100% to its attack. Oh, by the way, the shield breaking harshly lowers its Defence and Special Defence, which instantly gives it +4 Attack due to Defiant, or 3x its Attack stat. It has a signature move in Obstruct, which functions as a protect that harshly lowers the Defence of any Pokémon that makes contact with it while Obstruct is in effect. As a protecting move, it has +4 priority. As a Max Raid opponent, it can use several moves in a row. So imagine this: it's using priority Obstruct that protects it for the whole turn, and can use 2 or 3 moves immediately after, effectively making all its moves +4 priority while it's completely fucking invincible with a 10 turn limit. Now, protecting moves usually have a severe chance of failing if used in succession, but because it follows up Obstruct with other moves, it can protect itself at no risk and no cost EACH. AND. EVERY. TURN. I'm sorry, but what the fuck is this bullshit, and how am I supposed to beat it?

If you've been paying attention to my nerdy rant thus far, you might be wondering, "well, if there's no point in crippling the opponent with status, and if there's no point in setting up buffs for myself, then what else am I to do but attack?", and you'd be exactly right in that thought. Max Raid battles in essence boil down to: sit here and click attacks until the battle ends one way or another. A huge disservice to the sheer complexity and strategy focused gameplay of Pokémon. About the only non damaging move you might even remotely want to consider are Reflect, Light Screen, Aurora Veil, and... Attract. What I find extremely infuriating is that, if you're the kid that nobody wants to play with in school, if you're the nerd that's into hobbies nobody else is into, then you're shit out of luck with Max Raid battles that involve 4 players. That's not to say you CAN'T play Max Raid single player, but what I'm trying to say is... you can't play Max Raid single player. See, if playing alone, the game assigns three other NPCs to "help" you fight the opponent, but most of the time, they do absolutely nothing but die, contribute to the KO count, revive, and die again. Most of the time they're woefully underlevelled for the monstrosities you're trying to face, and deal negligible damage, if even at all. They are also pulled randomly from a preset pool of trainers, without regard for typing, so you can very well get an ass clown who brings a Fire/ Poison type in Salazzle to face off against a Gigantamax Water/ Rock Dreadnaw. Oh, and by the way, NONE OF THESE AI FREAKS CAN DYNAMAX. These ass clowns are so infuriating that it's no stretch to say that you'd be better off alone, even with how bullshit Max Raid battles already are. It makes me want to stab them in front of their Pokémon each and every time we cross paths.

It's unfortunate, but given how bullshit single player Max Raid battles are, it makes online Max Raid battles seem... evil, just by proxy. That's because online play on the Switch is now a paid for service, in contrast to online play on the Nintendo DS and 3DS, both of which were absolutely free of charge. Now, I'm not saying that paid online services are evil, but in the context of Max Raid battles, it can be easily viewed as the player being forced to pay to win these Max Raid battles, which I am strongly against in any game, with any context. I used up my free 7 Day Nintendo Online trial on this game, and even then, I can't say I'm impressed one bit: the servers were overloaded at launch and had to undergo emergency maintenance OVER THE WEEKEND. Maybe the bean counters over at Nintendo actually took the boycott threats seriously, HA! Even with functioning online play though, the experience is... retarded. To illustrate, here, take a screenshot with your Switch. Doesn't have to be of anything specific, doesn't even have to be with Sword and Shield. Just a screenshot you can identify will do. Now try to export that screenshot onto your computer. Go on, give it a try. I'll wait the full seven years for you to figure it out.

......

Done? I take it that you've had the customary experience of screaming at your Switch and wondering why the hell no one at Nintendo can design an easy to understand menu. The same carries over to Sword and Shield. I swear, even with the shoddy early release "guides" on the internet, I could not for the life of me figure out how in the HELL to join others when they're seeking partners for Max Raid battles. And that goes a LONG way in explaining why no one ever joins me when I host a Max Raid open invitation, because I imagine no one even saw the damn thing. Each invitation lasts only for three minutes, and it takes about 30 seconds to join and select an appropriate Pokémon for the opponent at each instance. The problem is that the system that lists these open invites refreshes like, what, once every three minutes? Instead of every three SECONDS for a system like this to function well. That means you need to know exactly when the list will refresh, and send an invite just before the list will refresh for everyone, and from there you can only sit there and stare at a lobby screen for three minutes, unable to do anything else, with no guarantee of finding anyone (competent). Scintillating. If you want to join others, it's also much of the same story. Annoyingly and ironically I'm aware, lobbies other host, especially of extremely rare and high value targets, get filled in SECONDS. If you want to join someone hosting a Five Star Ditto or an extremely rare Gigantamax Pokémon, you will literally, not exaggerating, need to sit in the menu screen and hit refresh rapidly until the list ACTUALLY refreshes. You'll then need to quickly sift through all that's present on the list, and join the lobby with the Pokémon you want to catch. Even when doing this, there's still no guarantee you'll make it into the lobby before it fills, in which case you're stuck looking at lobbies you can't join for another solid three minutes. This system is fucking appalling, and it's genuinely baffling how you can take a game with SUCH a wide player base; enough to give your servers grief, and do such a piss poor job at bringing them together. A fucking blender would've done a better job at this, and I'm not even sure how sarcastic I'm being with this sentence.

Oh, and by the way, you want to know how rare are these "high value" targets I mentioned earlier? You can only get Gigantamax Pokémon in these Max Raid battles. Gigantamax Pokémon have special forms when they Dynamax - or in their case, Gigantamax, and have a special G-Max move only Gigantamaxed Pokémon in their Gigantamaxed forms can use. No other Pokémon, even of the same species, can Gigantamax, and there's no way to "teach" or otherwise impart the ability to Gigantamax to a Pokémon that cannot do so. Gigantamax Pokémon cannot breed AT ALL, even if they have genders, so you can't mass produce them once you've been lucky enough to catch one. I will say this again because it bears repeating: you can only get Gigantamax Pokémon from Max Raid battles, so you're stuck having to deal with all the assorted bullshit it comes packaged with. How rare are these Gigantamax Pokémon? Well, when you come across a "Den" in the overworld, there is a 10% chance of the den pulling from its unique list of "rare" encounters. In the post game, "rare" encounters range from three to five stars, with five having 4 guaranteed max IVs and are almost always the fully evolved forms of their evolutionary lines, and quite a decent shot at having their Hidden Ability as well. Gigantamax Pokémon are all five star encounters, and even within the list of possible 5 star encounters, they have... wait for it... a 5% chance of appearing.

So, to quickly crunch the numbers with my sawn-off math textbook, the probability of you using a paid for Wishing Piece to initiate a Max Raid battle are:

Rare Den: 1 in 10 chance, *0.1
Five Stars Encounter, 1 in 3 chance, *~0.33
G-Max Encounter, 1 in 20 chance, *0.05

0.1*0.33*0.05
=~0.00166%

To put it in English, you have a less than 1 percent chance of encountering a Gigantamax Pokémon each time you initiate a Max Raid battle. You have a one in SIX HUNDRED chance of-... okay I'll stop trying to sound smart, because I have no idea how the hell to calculate probability. Oh, and each Wishing Piece costs in game currency, so in effect, you're gambling for a CHANCE to catch a rare Pokémon. No, you don't get to soft reset for the mon you want, because one: Sword and Shield HAS NO SOFT RESET WHAT BLASPHEMY IS THIS, and two, the game mandates saving with each Wishing Piece use. Like, hello, they don't even mandate saving in the FUCKING BATTLE TOWER anymore, and THIS is what they mandate saving over instead. Oh, and you know how regular Max Raid battles have ridiculously high rates, considering you have to fully defeat the Pokémon you're trying to catch? Yeah, well, G-Max mons DON'T GIVE A SHIT EVEN IF THEY'RE DEAD, and will happily break out of any ball you chuck at it, even Dusk Balls, which I'm not even sure have their 4x catch rate in these dens. So, you spend all the money gambling, you spend all the time in trying to get this damned thing to show up, you carry your AI partners better than Noah's Ark on four heavy lift choppers, you wade through all the bullshit of a Max Raid battle and you kill the damn thing, aaaaand... your ball doesn't even rock once before the Pokémon gives you the finger and flees. Yes, you only get ONE SHOT at catching it. ONE.

I'm sorry, but I'm supposed to find this fun?! For real?

I don't know. I'm so legitimately confused. I seem to dislike and find underwhelming most of the things in Sword and Shield, and yet, I find them to be the most enjoyable in the series to date. Maybe it's because I've long since outgrown Pokémon, but I struggle to see why even a casual player would be inclined to stick around for long. I don't understand why so many people are heartbroken that their friends for ten years can't join them in Sword and Shield, and I wish I could share in that sentiment. All I see is competitive Pokémon, and even that is in fucking shambles, with Dynamax being so broken of a mechanic that Smogon, the only largest unofficial governing body over competitive Pokémon, are having discussions about banning Dynamaxing entirely from standard play. In game battle spot singles are still 3 on 3, chosen from a list of 6 each, and in the context of a 3 turn Dynamax, I find utterly ridiculous. Battle Tower even now allows legendaries to take part in, allowing anyone of any skill level to utterly decimate the Battle Tower, especially now that you can sof- I mean, hard reset for a streak if you're so inclined. Opponents in the Tower so rarely Dynamax that I think I've only seen the non-boss AI do it twice in my streak of 70 thus far. The boss will always Dynamax the same Pokémon like it's their dedicated Mega Evolution, so alls you need to do is to set up Stealth Rock and forget the battle ever existed.

In spite of all this, I really enjoyed it for the first obsessive week I've played it, but... I don't understand why.

Maybe it's the cute Lass. She's so hot I think of destroying her in bed every time she does this angry pout when she loses and I actually can't handle it.

puh12092019: Leavynn

Dear Diary,

Dear Me,

I've been hit by a very severe loss as of late. I've lost someone who meant so much to me that I don't know if I'll ever be able to put all these overwhelming emotions into black and white.

My therapist told me that she should probably stop seeing me as I've gotten too comfortable with therapy. At least, that's her take on it. I think she might have misinterpreted something I said to her, that made her think that I might be starting to prolong my treatment on purpose just so I get to see her, but that's not true at all. There's so much I want to tell her. I'm comfortable, but not too comfortable yet. But, as I'm rapidly starting to rediscover, I don't deal well with being misunderstood and left alone at all, and my desperation, depression insane voice is already telling me that she doesn't want to see me because I'm creepy, or that I'm a waste of time.

Ever since she told me that, everything's like they're back to square one. Like everything we've worked on together the past year and a half has just upped and vanished, just like how I envision her now. My temper has been the shortest it's ever been, sometimes not even requiring a trigger to set me off. I've given up on everything I said I wanted to do. I attempted suicide again. And by god, I cried buckets and rivers. I cried non stop in that session, I cried in my van immediately after, I cried the day after while driving on the expressway, I cried when I reached the parking lot. Even when I'm not physically crying, it never felt like I've ever stopped crying mentally on the inside. I don't think I've ever suffered a loss that made me so outwardly upset before. Then again, I've never opened up to any woman the way I have - before, so I guess the proportions make sense.

I've never been so bewildered by a loss before. I've always known she meant a lot to me, but exactly how much, I never knew, until she told me she would stop seeing me. I've always known I've relied on her heavily, but... you know what. Maybe this all makes sense when put into unfeeling words. But I've always sucked at making sense, especially of my own feelings. I'm so lost, so confused, so sad, almost betrayed. It just so happened that Friday was my first sucky day at this job, and I felt a lot of anger, a lot of frustration, a lot of sadness, a lot of violent impulses. And you know what, maybe they're all warranted. Maybe they're all normal, healthy, even. But it scares me. Those thoughts scare me. I'm just terrified and lost without -. What if I really am not sick anymore? What if I don't have to "solve" these feelings? What if not every feeling even needs to be solved? Am I going to feel this way forever? Am I going to behave this way forever? Am I going to have to fight all these feelings forever? Am I really normal? Is this really normal? Growing up, I've never had much distinction between "healthy" anger and "normal" sadness from the "you need help" anger and "you should probably find someone to talk this out with" sadness. I've just been constantly miserable. I've always needed help. I've always needed someone to talk to. I've always needed someone by my side I can count on. I've always needed someone I can believe in. I've always needed that space and time where I could be vulnerable. I've always needed someone to cheer me on. I've always needed a voice of sanity and reason to guide me, to rationalise this insane world for me.

I've always been needy.

And for the past one and a half year, I had all that and more. Sure, she could only see me for one hour every fortnight at best, but I had it nonetheless. I was thrown into psychotherapy by my psychiatrist, not knowing what even is going on, only that I desperately needed the pain and anger to go away, and would try anything to make it disappear. I didn't know what therapy was. I didn't know what therapy should be. No one talked me through the rules and etiquette of therapy. No one taught me the boundaries until it was too late and I went and developed feelings for -. I didn't know or even expect that erotic transference was so common. These feelings of admiration, reliance, and... happiness. I didn't know. I didn't know.

I had all I needed in limited quantity for a while. I started to feel better and better.

The worst part of this all is, feeling this shitty just from her even suggesting we should stop seeing each other, shedding all these tears, going through all these episodes, being in this slump, just goes to prove that I'm over reliant on her. And that just makes these feelings ten times worse than they already are, because it just seems to be a pattern in my life, wherein I am a needy person with something awfully wrong with me, I find someone who genuinely cares for me, I get over reliant on them, something breaks under all the stress of the weight of my bullshit, and they leave. And I'm left let down and broken. It makes me feel pathetic. It makes me feel like I could never open myself up to anyone, because what's in me, what I yearn to share with a woman, romantically, is almost exclusively bullshit, from the looks of it. Do I have some nice things to share? Sure. But when, aside from when with -, were they ever appreciated?

I think it's starting to become common knowledge that one should love themselves first before loving others. That love and romance shouldn't, ideally anyway, be meant to fill gaping holes in the hearts of each other. Then again, I've never been in a romantic relationship; the hell would I know? I think this whole debacle with - has illustrated that for me beyond any doubt or argument. I hate myself, I really do. Of all the people I know, I hate myself the most. My time with - made me so, so happy. So much so that I would want to make her my wife and spend the rest of my life with her if at all possible. She is someone I could never bear to let go. She means so much, too much, to me. Again, I have pinned so much hope on her. Without knowing it, she has become a staple of my life, and every thought, every plan and worry of the future my over active head comes up with has her in it. Logically speaking, I knew. I knew that therapy isn't for life. I knew that the goal of therapy was to stop seeing her. I knew she may want to consider other career paths. I knew. I knew it all. But those rational thoughts just never seemed to occur to me at all. Maybe that's because I still need her so much, for so much.

Don't get me wrong. I'm happy for her. Like a typical "good" loser I've been relegated to become my whole fucking life, I'm happy for the woman that is leaving me for dead. In the one and a half month of procrastination and avoidance of writing this post, I've gotten to see her again. She explains to me that she is indeed quitting her current job this coming January. And I'm happy for her. I'm happy that she doesn't feel obligated to a useless sack of shit that is me. I'm happy that she isn't the type to rest on her laurels and stay stale in a comfort zone. I'm happy that she wants to explore more, for herself. I'm relieved that she actually thinks of herself every once in a while, Ms. Wear a Face Mask to Work Because I'm Not Bedridden and Dying and My Clients Need Me. I'm glad she's actually taking care of herself. I'm... glad, I got to know more about her, in spite of therapy boundaries.

It's just... where does this leave me? Now moreso than ever, I am confused. What becomes of me now? What am I supposed to do? The immediate thought that comes to mind is, "find someone to talk it out with, like a therapist!" But that just sounds stupid for once, doesn't it? What, am I supposed to find another therapist and repeat this entire cycle again? I'm not entirely sure I'm even ready to trust and rely on someone else. My depression voice is telling me to go back to my old self, to never speak up or trust anyone ever again. To live with these feelings forever, because even those don't have me feeling as worthless and confused as watching the one beacon of hope in the stormy sea of shit that is life do a 180 and leave me for dead. I get that - leaving me is nothing malicious, or of any ill will. It's just that... being abandoned stirs up so much complex and intense emotions all at once, past and present, my brain jams and goes into panic mode, and I begin to say all these weird and angry things. I am angry. I am sad. I am confused. I am happy. I am all that and more. It's just too much to process. Too impossible to rationalise. Too ridiculous to put into words.

If I have to love myself first before loving someone else, and if I have to do this on my own... I don't know if I can. I don't know if I can do this alone. I don't know if I should get more help. I don't know if I will ever love myself, or enjoy life. 

OCT2019

Dear Diary,

It's October. October 9th to be exact, and already things have started to go south for me. October is a month of curses for me, the otherwise scientific person, I swear.

October 2nd, I was fined for disobeying a red light. Did I really do it? Consciously? Was I in a rush? A bad mood? A bad judgment call? Hell, I don't know the answers to any of that. I drive so much as a delivery driver, so when the admin of the company asked if I remembered disobeying a red on the 7th, I really couldn't even recall a thing about it. It's like asking what you had for breakfast a week ago. Who remembers that crap? It's a 400 dollar fine and 12 demerit points for me, and... I'm an overly sensitive person already under a lot of stress, most of which financial, so the news hadn't been kind to me, and I contemplated suicide again for being such a useless imbecile. Yeah, that'll show those stupid government mules!

October 1st, I got a pay cut. The boss of the small company has been saying since day one how awful the economy has been, and as a result, how slow business has been. Prior to October, I had worked full time for 1.5k/mth for two months and change. It's not like business had suddenly taken a nosedive just because it's October; but rather, it was an ongoing thing. Now, you may be thinking, "wait, why is he hiring new employees in spite of how bad business and profits have been? Especially a new employee who's not going to bring in any new sales?" Yeah, I kinda thought that too, but I decided not to question it back then. After all, I've my hands full trying to fix my own shitty life, and of course, dealing with the sudden blow to me that - is leaving me. It's his company, let him run it however he wants. But the fact that he comes to me on September the 30th citing preexisting reasons to halve my working hours and pay just reeks of a scheme to me. Again, overly sensitive person, and overly obligated to protect myself, so this whole deal just didn't sit well with me at all. In fact, it made my attitude on the job go a full 180.

Now, more than ever, I have a hair trigger temper. I for the first time felt disinterested in the job, often letting laziness dictate how I do the job rather than customer satisfaction or what would be best for the company. Hell, just yesterday in fact, I got so mad at a bottle cap somehow managing to roll off my van twice that I yelled, in public, "WHAT THE FUCK IS WRONG WITH YOU?!" No job is ever easy, but it's only now that the inconveniences and the pain in the ass parts make me consider quitting. I mean, "I don't get paid enough to deal with this shit", is what I keep thinking to myself every day. If you thought 1.5k was peanuts, especially in the insane society that is Singapore, just imagine halving that crap. I at this point won't even be able to provide for myself, let alone save up for a future.

I've yet to quit for a few reasons, chief of which is because my father's company lorry has now been sold off due to the poor economy blah blah what even is an economy. So right now, I'm the only one in the family that "has" a vehicle to ferry us around. And thus, the duty of "driver" has since fallen onto my shoulders, and they aren't exactly shy about making the most of that. I can't say I'm thrilled to ferry them around either, especially given how exhausted physically I am and drained mentally on the weekends; I just want to be a hermit at home. The fact that my mother especially, would demand I drive her out, and then throw a tantrum and pull the "unfilial son" card, then leave a trail of passive aggression "oh poor me" in the wake of my refusal just exacerbates what I hate about my family, and my own belief that no one really cares about how I feel, not even my own fucking family.

The second reason, well... I love this job. I love driving. And even though I as of now am working at a net loss financially, it's at least a job, you know? It's at least something where there used to be nothing. It at least gives me something for my brain to gnaw on, instead of feeding on my crippling doubts, fears, and insecurities (though you can make the argument that actually having a job and being out in society makes those doubts, fears, and insecurities much, much worse but blah let's just stick with the positive spin on things for now). I want to try to count my blessings and appreciate what I have, since I am often accused of being an ingrate. I have a van to myself in my off hours. I have mental and physical exercise at a job. I have an anchor, a structure to my sleep cycle because I have a job. And now that my mornings are free, I can really go for a swim twice, or even thrice a week on weekdays to try and lose some goddamned fat. Being out and about means I actually eat cheaper and (somewhat) healthier, instead of defaulting on fast food near my house if I'm to be at home all day, every day.

I'm just extremely saddened and disappointed in my boss and the one other employee in the company, his ex-wife, whom he evidently still cares for. I work my ass off for two months. I was (almost) always the first to work and last to leave. I never complained about my job. I took all the industry renowned abuse of my short tempered and unreasonable boss without lashing back. I had heart to heart talks with the admin regarding family, mental health, work, etc.. I thought I was helping them. I thought we had a good thing going. I thought we had trust, you know? But as the stunt evidently shows, I was just a fucking idiot, a pawn, a fool, to be played at the lowest cost possible. There was never going to be trust. Trust that I feel I have tried my hardest to earn. And it would seem that my efforts the past two months had not changed their financial centric minds.

Sounds awfully familiar, huh?

Call me naive. Call me stupid. Call me whatever you want, but I stand by my actions and my beliefs. I believe that, regardless of what industry you're in, what work you perform, or what kind of a company you work for, that trust and hard work are the bare fundamentals of any office, or any setting where human beings have to work together. Without either of the two, there simply cannot be any quality work done. The whole point of me working for this sinking kayak of a company was because I didn't want to deal with politics. I didn't want to deal with the games people play when they have a corporate ladder to climb, or simply to hang onto a job they have. I find it so, so stupid, that people would do this to their fellow human beings. I find it such an unnecessary and asinine waste of effort and a wasteful toll on the mind at work. Maybe it's because I never had a childhood I expected to have, but I really wish that one day I'll find a company, an office, that shares my same values and beliefs, where I can feel appreciated and belong in. Yes, this is the very definition of wishful thinking, but what the hell else am I to do? Be the monster I see around me every day? Be a fucking asshole? I don't think I'm capable of that, nor do I really want to try and be like that. I don't want to be a slave to fear and finances for the rest of my life, for most of my waking hours. I could not bring myself to hurt someone else intentionally, because I know just how deep that ocean goes. And perhaps I'm a fucking idiot for being so empathetic and kind. Or maybe empathy and kindness are just nicer sounding excuses for me to refuse to change for the better. Who knows?

I am a fucking hypocrite. Or at least, I'm just now starting to find out I'm one, as of these past nine days in October. Without realising or wanting it, I am becoming that monster I see in everyone and I hate. I am becoming motivated only by money and not the job. I mean, that's the whole point of a job, right? You perform a service and get paid for it. Maybe it's because I feel like I'm getting played and unappreciated for what I do, for the trust I put into others. But who else have I to blame for that but myself? They didn't ask for that trust. - didn't ask for that trust. I knowingly and willingly invest in others, and I get hurt when they don't reciprocate. I am a fucking dumbass who refuses to change.

And I hate myself immensely for it. For all the times I think and say I'll kill myself after each and every time something sets my overly sensitive ass off, I don't have the balls to actually kill myself. And I hate myself immensely for it. It feels as if I can't even take my own words and my own feelings seriously anymore. And if I can't, how should others? I am a goddamned joke. A goddamned toy, to be played by others, to be pointed to and laughed at.

Chinese Finger Trap

Man, I am NOT looking forward to this.

Over the past few weeks, I've had enough running through my mind to fill out about 2 or 3 blog posts, but, of course, I really dread writing as of late. It's... weird. I've always been a miserable person, but I've never been so afraid to dive into my own mind and explore my true thoughts and feelings before. If anything, it used to be cathartic. Now, facing reality almost drives me into a state of panic and overwhelming feelings. Overwhelming feelings that drive me to think and do stupid things.

At this point, it's only an odd sense of duty, a tradition, a labour of love, that keeps me writing at least a post a month.

I promised my therapist two sessions ago that I'd try to seek out some social event, some type of community, some sort of group, to participate in, because part time jobs are apparently pushing me so far out of my comfort zone that I've sailed right past the learning zone straight into panic and paralysis zones. I've always wanted to pick up Iaido, but over the course of trying to find part time jobs, no showing for part time jobs, trying to find less stressful communities and being unable to act... I think I found the root cause for me being so socially withdrawn. In spite of all the crap I went through as a teen, I actually think I can handle myself okay in a social situation now. Nothing spectacular, just okay. It's just that I seem to be terribly ashamed of myself physically.

I've always been fat. To use a less subjective term, I've been overweight for as long as I can remember. My eating habits and preferences are one thing, but I think my mental health as been compounding the issue to extreme levels, especially over the last two or so years. Eating brings me a slight recluse of joy and comfort, and it stops me from thinking too much. It's also relatively cheap and convenient to other forms of stress relief. I also think it's been a trend in my life where, the more miserable I was, the fatter I became. And, well... I'm the fattest I've ever been my entire life, even prior to enlisting in slavery. In spite of having been through slavery.

It's to a point now where there are only about 2 sets of tops and bottoms that still fit me, which are the same 2 I'll always wear to see my therapist. And, see, it's not just that I'm worried about how I'll come across to others; it's also the self consciousness that's really killing me when I'm outside. It's all the little, self conscious things I think and do that make being out and about so much more tiresome than it already is. I think I stand with a weird arc on my back to make my man boobs stand out less. My mind races when a clothing item stretches or reveals a part of me. And all the sweating I do... I don't even know if it's cold or hot sweat anymore, given how nervous and hyper vigilant I am, along with how inhumane the weather here has been this entire year, which only adds onto the self image panic. Do I smell? Do I look revolting? Is this normal? etc..

It's not just the self image thing my body troubles me for, either. I mentioned my back hurts after a while outside. Is it really my posture, or have I gotten so fat that it's straining my back? I don't know. My eczema issues are easily the worst it's been my entire life, with me getting outbreaks on my waist, the bottom of my fat stomach, and even my back from sitting on a chair using a computer at home. I'm so weak right now that spending two minutes in the sun makes me dizzy and gives me a headache. And, almost like a chicken and egg cycle, that really hurts my self confidence as well. "Can I even be a taxi driver like this?", "am I just doomed to a life of being in an air conditioned office?", etc..

God I feel awful already just writing all that. I really hate myself, and writing just forces me to focus on all the self loathing and issues I don't know how to fix.

My therapist seemingly pulled this analogy out her ass when talking to me last session; it was the most at a loss I've seen her yet, though it's nothing suuuuper obvious, because she's a hardened vet in the battlefield of psychology and being under pressure... okay I know where I pulled that analogy out of. ANYWAY, she asked me, "have you heard of something called the Chinese Finger Trap?" I hadn't, so she explains that a Chinese Finger Trap is where you stick both index fingers into both ends of the trap, which I'm assuming looks something like a gigantic drinking straw. To get both fingers out, instead of pulling both fingers away from each other, which tightens the trap, you instead relax and push both fingers inwards to loosen the trap, thereby allowing you to remove your fingers. She theorises that I've been trying so hard to escape, or "solve" my own problems that it's having the trap tightening effect and causing me ill effects. And thus, to my puzzlement, my homework for this fortnight was to... try to relax.

I really don't get it, even though I asked her what she wanted me to do in the two weeks that we won't see each other. She didn't even dodge the question, either, but answered me straight, but holy shit am I forgetful. She even tells me (I think...) to find ways to relax and play, such as reading books, taking walks, etc.. It's funny, because anyone, myself included, would think that I've been resting ever since my last full time job over a year ago, yet I never feel rested, maybe because of the voice in my head constantly beating myself up, maybe because of all the voices outside my head pressuring me to get a job, or maybe I've just been spinning my wheels at a standstill the entire time trying to escape something from somewhere I don't know.

It's a hell of a weird notion, because it goes against everything we've been taught our entire lives, doesn't it? We're always told to study hard in school for a better future for ourselves, to train and fight hard in slavery to protect ourselves, and at work, to work hard to deliver the best service and get paid the most. Suddenly having someone I look up to immensely tell me to try to relax is as logically twisted to me as a scientist asking me to fall upwards. Then again, I don't suppose it's anyone else's responsibility but our own to know when to take breaks, how to take breaks, and for how long. Yet it's also precisely because no one tells us to relax that I don't seem to know how to do it... does any of that make sense? I'm sorry, my head's a mess, as usual.

Over the past week or so, I've been thinking about what she meant, and how I'm to achieve it. And it's having quite the opposite of the intended effect because I feel it's making me angry and feel stupid that I don't know how to relax, because I'm trying too hard to relax. Perhaps why it's so difficult for me to find rest is because... I'm so afraid of letting things be. It's like being told to leave my house be when it's on fire. How? Every instinct, every fibre of my body is conditioned and hard wired to panic and try any and everything to put out the fire, because this is the only house I've got, and I'm stuck in it. This is the only life and body I've got, and it might as well be on fire with how wrong everything is both inside and out. I have to fix it. I have to try. I have to put in the effort. I have to put in the time. This is my life, mine and mine alone. No one else can fix this for me. I know this much. And if I'm not damn near killing myself, I'm not trying hard enough.

But, of course, clearly, whatever it is I'm doing hasn't been working, so it's time for a change.

Ever since cutting off JK and Cypy from my life (yeap, I had to find a way to squeeze that in!), I think my life has been about learning to let go of certain things, be it principles, friends, and standards I hold others and myself to. Um... now that I said that, I'm not sure how it ties into what I want to say... but sometimes, it's an essential life skill to know when to and when not to care, you know? It's a weird thing, but I try to not care how I look when I go to the community pool to get some form of exercise. Yeah I'm fat and unsightly. All the more reason I need the pool to exercise, right? Yes, I'm sweaty as all hell. That's because I walked for about 45 minutes to reach the damn pool instead of taking the train. Yes, I can hardly swim. Yes, I'm power walking across the pool. Pfft. As long as I feel the burn and the strain, right? If battling from depression and anxiety has taught me anything, it's that no one's life as easy as they might appear, and, applying that logic to my crippling self critiquing habit, I've learned to just treat being at the pool to be a moral victory, screw everything else. It's hard enough to win the war in my head to get my ass out of my house door. And, in treating "just being there" as a moral victory and achievement, I don't even need to damn near kill myself at the pool to feel like I've accomplished something, to prove to myself and others that I'm... worthy of sharing the pool? It's a weird sensation I can't quite describe, but it's like I can't even take myself seriously until I've pushed myself that hard, to leave no cards on the table and no room for doubt, to know that I've tried everything I can. It sounds wonderful on paper; admirable, even. But I just don't find it to be sustainable or even healthy at this point of my life.

So, um... I guess you can say that, in learning how to relax, I somehow learned to get more done. DON'T ASK ME HOW THAT WORKS I DON'T KNOW.

Competitive Look at Let's Go

Well, I'm just as surprised as you are that I'm writing about a Pokémon game on this day.

In a rather puzzling move, Nintendo just released a Demo Version of Pokémon: Let's Go, Pikachu/ Eevee on the Nintendo eShop about a day ago. It's puzzling because the full games have been out for, what, 3 months now? Don't publishers usually release demos for games before their release, not after?

Can't help but to think that the sales figures for the games aren't as hot as Nintendo had wanted them to be, in spite of how fast they were selling at launch. One thing that has always irked me about sales figures and bean counters is that they take sales figures at launch to determine the success of a sequel, when, really, who the hell is to say how good a sequel is until you buy the damn thing and try it?

Quick background information: I just turned 25. I was a "90s kid" who'd try to catch an episode of Pokémon every Saturday morning on Kid's Central. Hell, at one point I even wanted to cosplay Ash Ketchum, going so far as to even buying that boxy first gen PokéDex to complete the look.

My first Pokémon game was Fire Red on a GBA SP, and I've played at least two mainline games of every generation since. Like so many old men kids my age, Pokémon had been an uncannily big part of my upbringing. It taught me way too many things to list down here, and maybe even more I'm not consciously aware of yet, but what I will say is this: Pokémon has taught me to always look beyond the surface level of things. Pokémon, while looking like a kid friendly game, while being a kid friendly game, has done something I daresay no other game franchise aside from Smash has done, or even thought to do; that is, using the warm welcome and gentle learning curve of a kid's game as an entry point to something way deeper and more complex. It gets you to fall in love with the cartoonish characters and cutesey monsters, and it's only when you're invested that you feel compelled to learn how to bring the best out of them.

That's... how I got into competitive Pokémon. I'm no amazing player by any stretch of the imagination, but I do know how to breed for and engineer out a perfect fighting machine, devoid of any of its personality in the name of competitive viability.

So why did I bore you half to death with that lengthy prologue?

See, LGPE is a very divisive title in the lineage of Pokémon games. Set to take advantage of brand new hardware that is the Nintendo Switch, many were anticipating a whole new generation of Pokémon on Nintendo's second best selling console in its history. That would mean hundreds of new Pokémon to catch, train and battle, a whole new region to explore, new mechanics stapled onto an old formula to keep things fresh, and, of course, a brand new coat of paint over it all. Yet when the time came, all we ended up getting was... Generation 1, again. All we ended up getting was LGPE.

"O-okay", the inner fanboy in me bargains. "A remake set in Kanto would be kickass! CD Quality music, full 3D overworlds, updated stats, egg moves, breeding mechanics, hidden abilities, physical special split, Mega Evolution, Z-moves in Kanto? Hey, I don't mind! Hell, even the remake, Fire Red and Leaf Green, are more than 10 years old by now, lots have changed!" And, you know, maybe I wouldn't have been so flabbergasted by LGPE if it were as cookie cutter as that - just the same old shit with a fresh coat of paint over it.

But no.

We would be denied even that.

A fresh coat of paint was just about all we got from all the things I listed out above. We got the 3D environments. We got the CD Quality music. Everything else, I kid you not, was stripped away from the game. No abilities. No held items. No Z-moves. NO BREEDING. ONLY the original 151 species of Pokémon were in the game, meaning I couldn't even kidnap an Eevee and force ice cubs down its throat until it became my favourite Pokémon, Glaceon. Quite frankly I'm surprised they even kept the physical/ special split introduced in Gen 4. Sure, they have Mega Evolutions, but with how intrinsically Megas are tied to their abilities in order to function, they almost seem pointless. Oh, what's that, Mega Charizard X? You can't learn Dragon Dance because every Pokémon in the entirety of Kanto has been neutered? Well, doesn't it suck to be you?! Enjoy charging up your Solar Beam like a normal mortal, MegaZard Y. Oh, what's that, your Body Slam only hits once now, Mega Kangaskhan? Oh you poor thing! I think I'll just stick to my Tauros, thank you.

See, much like the monsters themselves, Pokémon as a series has evolved with player feedback and grown with us as we grew up. Gen 1 was an absolutely broken mess of a game, if it can even be called that. I was only 2 when the original games, Red and Blue, released, so I couldn't tell you how the hell they started the multi-million global phenomenon that is the Pokémon franchise. Even if the game worked correctly, I can't believe anyone found it fun. Psychic types were the most overpowered type in a game focused around a rock-paper-scissors mechanic, and the elusive Dragon type had ONE move to its name, a move that dealt a laughable 40HP damage to anything it hit. Almost all Rock types were Ground types as well, and almost all Grass types were Poison. Why the hell bother with a Golem or an Onix when you could have a Rhydon? Why bother with a Vileplume or Victreebel when a Venusaur trumps them all when doing the same thing?

Pokémon has evolved a lot since those days. Now anyone and their mother could be a Dragon type just by filling out an application form. Not that being a Dragon type is really anything to be proud of, considering how mandatory the newly introduced Fairy and Steel types are in any team structure, custom made to counterbalance how overpowered Dragon types have become. Psychic types are now among the hardest to use correctly, because of the aforementioned Steel types, and how Pursuit trapping has become so omnipresent.

Even off the battlefield, Pokémon is a series that has never stood still. WE CAN RUN IN BUILDINGS NOW, SUCH LUXURY, MUCH WOW. No more dumb gantries that force us off our bikes in between routes and towns! Oh wait, bikes? What's that? We ride Pokémon now! We don't even need to waste a third of our party to dedicate to HM slaves to clear obstacles! We aren't limited to walking in four directions anymore! We can move freely like a normal human being! We don't have to look like identical clones of each other anymore now that we can have different hair, eye, and skin colours, and put on different clothes!

And, what, you throw it all away all the evolution of the series just for a cheap nostalgia pop?

Now, don't get me wrong, LGPE doesn't force upon you decade old problems like requiring HMs and forcing you to walk to a nurse in a hospital when your Pokémon is poisoned on its last legs. But what I'm saying is... the hell's the point? If you want to remake Pokémon Yellow, then keep everything the series has earned itself in the game, it shouldn't be that hard, right? Hell, internal data of new games always have leftovers of previous generation games, so it's hard to imagine they're not copy and paste jobs with a new coat of paint over them. I mean, data for Heat Wave hitting both opponents in a Double Battle is retained, for example, and displayed in the... what, 3 Double Battles you'll have in the whole game? Why go through all the effort to take away everything we've come to know and love, when evidently that data is still there, just hidden from us?

The only way I can rationalise it is that LGPE is a "back to basics" game for a new generation of fans to support the series over its next twenty years - the Red and Blue equivalent for today's 4 year old kids, to have the same effect on them that Red and Blue had on my generation of kids. But... I mean, even then I find issue with it. Why the heck are we fighting Team Rocket again? Didn't Red make Giovanni disband TR after the latter's defeat at the Viridian Gym? Why the hell are we staying at Red's house? Didn't Gold travel back in time and witness Giovanni commit suicide? Why is he back in Kanto again, trying the exact same plans that were foiled by Red? The chicken shit rival who's more kid friendly because brash Blue has gone out of style as a rival, who almost pees himself at the sight of yet another Marowak ghost, always trailing behind the protagonist, suddenly leapfrogs us and becomes the Champion ahead of us... how? Without first beating Red, the previous champion? Oh, so there's just another Mewtwo now, waiting at the exact same spot, huh. Wait, Green is suddenly a thing now? (I'm... not... c-complaining about Green or anything... I'll be her Growlithe... and lick her... if she wants me to...)

No Johto? Oh come on. Wasn't most of Johto's Pokémon planned to be in the original Red and Blue? No sign of the magnet railway in Saffron? Where in the timeline does this game take place? No, scratch that. In which fucking universe is this farce allowed to happen?

And like, what the hell? What do you do after beating the game and becoming Champion? No competitive battle facility, not even a post game episode? Jesus Christ.

Still, I have to admit that, for a few years now I've been thinking that the franchise has needed a reset button, because for as much as I rave about how much the series has evolved, I'm beginning to think that, perhaps it's evolved... too much. Back in the day, things were easy. Water beats Fire, Fire beats Grass, Grass beats water. A walking coconut tree is going to destroy a nondescript crab with giant pincers, and a turtle is going to douse a unicorn on fire. It's very rudimentary lessons any kid can pick up from the household around them; plants absorb water to grow, forest fires destroys trees, and, well, water extinguishes fires. Now it's like... Bug and Poison resists Fighting, but... why? Steel hits Fairy Super Effective? What the hell is even a Fairy? How the hell does something that's visibly flying like a Mega Charizard X and a Jirachi get hit by an Earthquake, yet a Rotom doesn't, even when the game tells you Earthquake hits it Super Effectively? Back then when you saw an Onix, you instantly knew what it was. Giant rock snake thing, pour water on it and watch it die. Now I use Gust on a Flabébé and I'm like "WHY ISN'T THIS HITTING SUPER EFFECTIVE IS THAT THING NOT A GODDAMNED PLANT WHAT THE HELL COLONEL ARE YOU HIDING SOMETHING FROM ME?!" You see a Beheeyem and it's like... the hell even are you?

See, I know all this crap, because I've been playing Pokémon since its beginnings. I've had time to learn the basics, and when I got familiar with the basics, the new stuff comes in and it makes sense to me, making it easy to learn. When I introduce my friends and family to Pokémon now and we battle, when I'm asked why a Mega Charizard gets hit with an Earthquake, I struggle to come up with an answer that's easy to digest. Sometimes they ask me things like, "why is Dark weak to Bug?", and I just... don't have an answer. A lot of things in the game don't make much logical sense, but as a kid I just went with it, so much so it became second nature. But it's exactly this complexity that no Pokémon player can escape from, no matter how casual you may want to be, which destroys the whole "easy entry point" appeal I mentioned earlier. And hence why a reset button on the franchise might not be such a bad thing.

This is where my argument falls into shambles and becomes personal opinion, but I feel that Nintendo ruined the "Reset Button Game" even before they even planned for a "Reset Button Game" to be developed. Starting from Generation 6, I've always had this nagging feeling I can't shake that the developers were in some hot water with the bean counters of their company. X and Y were undeniably incomplete games at launch, with big areas shown but inaccessible, and even save file problems that prevented the game from loading correctly and had to be band-aid fixed with a hasty patch. The plot, after the new heights and expectations Black and White had set up for it, fell flat on its face, hardly sufficing even as a cookie cutter experience. Not to mention that feeling of being pandered to was pervasive throughout the whole campaign, to me. I get two starters? One of which being a Gen 1 starter? Oh, beautiful, a Snorlax blocking an important path to be awoken with a Poké Flute again. Oh my, I get to catch the utterly garbage Articuno, Zapdos, and Moltres again? And I get to catch Mewtwo with no backstory or explanation? Okay... I guess...

What really irked me about Generation 6 was how they handled the competitive scene; the Generation 1 Pokémon, the ones that were the most outdated and silly, got the most Mega Evolutions, most of which were game breakingly, obscenely strong, to the point where several of them were quickly banned in Smogon rules, the only largest unofficial governing body of the competitive metagame. Mega Gengar immediately traps your Pokémon so you can't switch, which is like asking you to breathe without ever exhaling. Mega Kangaskhan has a free Choice Band boost to all its attacks with none of the drawbacks, and essentially two chances to paralyse you with Body Slam/ confuse you with Dizzy Punch, and if you're one of the three types that don't mind taking Normal Type moves, it's got Earthquake and Sucker Punch to deal with that. And don't even get me started on Charizard. The damn thing's got TWO Mega Evolutions, and you don't get to find out which until you've lost a Pokémon to a wrong guess.

It's like they can't even make a compelling single player adventure any more, instead having to gift you power by the boatload to make you feel like a hero and keep you interested. Sure, it may work in the short term, but I can't help but to worry about the sustainability of such practices. At what point do you say, "enough is enough"? At what point do you stop moving the slider of a Pokémon's stats up before thinking, "yeah, this is kinda crazy and stupid"? Gen 7 somewhat continued this trend of power creep with Z-moves, but I feel that the single player game was a huge step up, and Z-moves by themselves have never been so disruptively overpowered that they were banned. Still, I couldn't shake the feeling that things have come too far. The game was a fucking mess, and the developers kept having to resort to band aid fixes like introducing Fairy types, or nerfing Dark Void's accuracy and useability. But with every band aid they slap on, they keep adding more stupid things to the game like obscenely powerful Pokémon that will just require further band aids in the future and I'm like... fucking... stop.

I've always been good at whining, but never at giving solutions. If I were given free reign over the series, I honestly wouldn't know what the hell I'd do with it. I was adamant about not buying LGPE because... well, it's a stupid game that panders to its players with even more power out of the otherwise useless Eevee and Pikachu that can't even evolve. But, what I will say is, LGPE is the prime starting point for anyone who's been thinking about getting into the series, but has been intimidated by its complexity, because trust me, it isn't that hard to hurl rocks at birds and watching them drop. And that's the way I've chosen to rationalise LGPE; that it's a game for casuals. And as someone who thinks he's a competitive player because of his own Overconfidence Bias, it just doesn't appeal to me one bit. I've been to Kanto before, you know. Twice. When I buy a new game I want new stuff. It's not that hard to comprehend, is it?

Still, it's a free demo, so why not? Some things just never get old, and, to me, carrying around a perfectly balanced team of 6 to grow stronger together through challenges, getting to know others, helping them, is that something that never gets old for me. I keep telling myself, "it's a stupid game that panders to its audience", and I have every right and reason to believe that, yet when I was confronted by my first Rattata in the demo I chucked a ball at it as though it was blinking; I hadn't even realised that I had done it until I had caught it, and I'm like, "Jesus I don't want this rat what the hell what will its family think when Jimmy doesn't come home for dinner? And what the hell am I going to do with 20 damn rats?!"

While it might seem like several steps backwards for the series, LGPE's main selling point is its capture system, a la Pokémon Go, which is another "game" I'm incredibly salty about. Still, having wild Pokémon visibly roam the overworld has been described by reviewers as making the world feel more "lived in", and I've also read that, after having a system like this, that they don't EVER want another Pokémon game wherein there are random, unseen encounters in the wild, both of which I'm heavily inclined to agree with. Not to mention, to me personally, having to manually aim and throw Poké Balls at wild Pokémon, while undeniably a chore when I just want to relax, is a very refreshing and engaging way to catch wild Pokémon; so much so that, two or three captures later, I began to realise just how disconnected I am in the previous games where I had my own Pokémon do the fighting for me, and... um... how much I was... actually... enjoying it.

God damnit why can't you just let me hate a game in peace Nintendo. I have mad respect for the creative minds at Game Freak, for presumably being told to cater to cheap and proven nostalgia, yet somehow managing to pull something this good out their ass even when their butt cheeks are squeezed so tightly shut- OKAY what the hell kind of analogy is that and where did I get it from.

My Eevee. I got it from my Eevee. His asshole, more specifically. After I took off all its clothing.

CNY

An introvert's thoughts during Lunar New Year:

People: Happy Lunar New Year!
Me: Happy prosperous new year! (sorry who are you again how did you know my name why are you giving me money seriously stop looking at me I don't even want your money if it means you leave me alone)

I've always hated the Chinese New Year (CNY) period. All the stores close and I can't get anything to eat aside from McDonald's, I'm forced to spend money I don't have to buy new clothes I don't want, I'm made to do spring cleaning to usher in wealth no one ends up having, and the worst part is, I have to go to visit people I'm told are related to me, that I don't know nor care about. I mean, yeah, sure, I get red packets with money in it for free, but it never felt right to me to take money from strangers for doing nothing, in spite of how I'm a jobless 25 year old good for nothing who's still living off his parents.

The worst part, though, by far, has to be all the freaking people I'm forced to be in close proximity with. I find holidays and events like these so puke inducingly pretentious. You pretend to know me. You pretend to care about my well being. You claim we're family and yet, I don't even know you. And we won't even see each other for the rest of the year, so why even bother with all this crap? Yes, this is my second bowl of noodles. Do you have a fucking problem with it? Will me eating more than you cause the stocks you've invested in to depreciate in value? No? Then stop looking at me and fuck off. Have you never seen someone eat noodles before. Have you never seen a fat man before? How narrow minded are you if you think someone who weighs a hundred kilos to be the fattest thing alive? There's the internet these days. You might want to look more into that. I'm hardly the best specimen for a museum piece, so STOP FUCKING LOOKING AT ME. And don't you fucking touch me. Filth. Slime. Scum.

I hate it all. It's so stupid. You pretend to be all friendly and family and all, yet right after you're done wishing me a happy year ahead you turn right the fuck around and condescendingly ask about my job, my marital status, and flat out mock me about my body size. I hate how people, under the pretence of family, think it's okay to mock other people, when they would not treat strangers half as bad as they're treating me. They think that, just because we're "close", that it's okay to mock and joke. That it's okay to stop and stare. That it's okay to even touch and toy around with me. But I don't even know you, and you sure as hell don't even know me, so explain to me again why the fuck is this okay, is this acceptable. Explain to me what's the difference to you, between me and a stranger, and why you'd do this to me and not a stranger.

Yes, I get it. I'm fat. I'm not stupid. I see this body every day. I have issues. I'm learning how to work through and live with them. No, it's not easy, and no, I don't need your sass to help me. If I wanted your opinion, if I wanted this negativity in my life, you wouldn't be giving me money to mock me; I would walk up to your house, the factory of negativity, and I will pay YOU for that negativity.

You know what else sucks? I can't figure out what hurts more: that strangers who know nothing about you mock you for things that are beyond your control, or those that are in theory the closest to you, that know you're struggling, and still feel the need to lift my shirt up to see my enormous, rash ridden belly. To still feel the need to judge from afar my bald head. That know you're introverted and still want to drag you into conversations. That your parents know you're within earshot and talk crap about you and start comparing behaviour, grades and careers, like we're chess pieces, prizes to be displayed on a mantle. It makes me fucking sick.

I don't get it. What do those people even take away from all this nonsense? The married ones lose money to handing out red packets, and the time and money in transportation as well. Do they willingly come and take pleasure in the judging and nocking of others? What else could you take away from partaking in this charade, other than all the CNY snacks people always claim are sinful, yet gorge on them anyway?

It's a shit fest. I loathe it. This is fucking stupid. I wouldn't even wipe my ass with your filthy money; I have never felt so insulted receiving money before. But hey, don't take anything I say seriously; after all, I'm the crazy one going to a mental institution. I'm the crazy one who always overreacts, so my feelings and opinions aren't valid. I just need to be less petty, that's all, right?