Starting Out

What’s the first thing you do in a Pokemon game? You choose your avatar. Back in the Yellow days, you could only be a male character, which was simple. Nobody expected gender equality in a Japanese RPG. But you got to name yourself, which was simply badass.

Yellow. Ash. Jack. Two of those names make sense. Yellow is the name of the version, which is in keeping with the theme from the last two games, and the Pokemon Special manga. Ash is the name of the character in the anime, which this game is loosely based off of (very, very loosely). I have no idea where Jack came from, and frankly I’m a little uncomfortable using it. I could use my legitimate name, but…well…this is an epic nostalgia experience. I need a name that will strike fear into my foes, and instill the fiercest loyalty in my friends and partners.

You either get it, or you don’t.

Of course, for every great hero, there is a villain. A nefarious rogue who tries so hard to do whatever he needs to in order to stop you doing whatever it is you’re doing. Wow, can I be more vague?

This is still the funniest thing in Pokemon history. HE’S YOUR FREAKING GRANDSON! HOW DO YOU NOT REMEMBER HIS NAME? Crazy old bastard…

Any-hoo…Blue, Gary, and John just aren’t working for me. While Blue is the standard name for the character, and Gary ties in with that whole anime thing I mentioned earlier, John is another one of those weird, out-of-nowhere names. Seriously GameFreak, what the hell is this? How’s this for a name?

I can’t do it. I want to, but it’s juvenile, and it’s been done so many times before. There has to be something better…

Mwahahahahahahahahahaha! My (not very) secret hatred of U2 has influenced my gaming life, it seems. It must be so!

Evil laughter aside, naming the rival was always the worst part of the introductory sequence. I’m so glad they stopped that.

Honestly, who didn’t know about this? A free potion in your computer. Not that I ever use items, but whatever. There’s something about instinctively knowing that something is going to happen, or that a certain item resides somewhere specific…only from Pokemon.

Then I remembered that you don’t get running shoes until third gen.

Good Lord, what have I gotten myself into?

And It Was Called ‘Yellow’

As a Nintendo 3DS Ambassador, I recently downloaded my 10 free GameBoy Advance games. The selection is beyond amazing, and way better than the 10 free NES games that came out back in September. But that’s a blog post for another day.

Getting these old games again (two of which I spent much of my youth playing: F-Zero Maximum Velocity and Metroid Fusion) rekindled a feeling of nostalgia that made me think farther back then I have in a long, long time. And this then happened:

It’s a screenshot from an emulated copy, not from my actual copy of the game itself. Sadly, my original copy of this game is well loved, and doesn’t work the way it should. And so I now am the proud owner of Pokemon: Yellow Version once again, except this time, I have the internet, and I can reminisce with the world.

Now, true to my Pokenerd self, I immediately started thinking about my ultimate party. Obviously my Pikachu would be the core of my team. How could it not? You only get one Pikachu. And he follows you around. Did someone say epic? No? EPIC!

But who else should join my team? Pidgeot? That was one of my staples back in the day. Because I’ll be playing Yellow Version, I’ll of course have Venusaur, Charizard, and Blastoise. But aside from the four starter Pokemon, what should I do? I distinctly remember blowing through this game way back when with just these four Pokemon. Should I even bother to use anything else?

But that’s all in the past. This is a new man playing this old game. This is a man used to Natures, and Effort Values, and thirty million different types of Poke Ball. This is a simple game, and I’m going to relive it with you all.