1.04 | The Ballad of Youngster Joey

11/11/2024, 07:30 AM

well um, that isn't right. goes to show that even after we've learned to harness the power of emulation, there's still some things we can't wrangle. case in point, the real time clock. it's currently 7:30 AM on a Monday.

anyways, i went ahead and put Chili in the PC, since we won't be needing her for now. if you've seen the box system in later Pokemon games, this system may look kind of weird, but it's the same general idea. just swap out the GUI of the boxes for a list instead, and you've got the box system pre-gen3. also, this is unrelated, but i've always enjoyed the orange tint they put on the pokemon before you select them. makes me think of those orange LCD displays. augh, i love how they look so much... man, if the original gameboy had gone for orange instead of green, i think we'd all be ahead in society by about 10 years. orange is one of my favorite colors, and i wish it didn't get such a bad rep. same goes for yellow, it's a crime how mean people are to those two.

...oh. i guess the clock is so messed up that it's now night time... at 8 AM. well no matter, i do really like the nighttime palette in this game, i think it's really nice.

oh hey, speaking of which, here's another new mechanic! certain pokemon will only come out at specific times of day, case in point, Spinarak. fun fact about Spinarak, actually, in Gold and Silver its colors are completely different. instead of being green like it is in every other game, it's actually a dark purple. for a long time i thought this was its shiny colors, and they swapped it like they did with Smeargle, but no its shiny colors are the same across all three gen 2 games. it's just a darker purple in Gold and Silver, for some reason. this is a weirdly prevalent thing in gen 2, im assuming because this was when shinies (and pokemon colors in general) were just getting introduced. i mean, there's Spinarak, Smeargle, Sneasel... that's all i can think of, but i'm certain there's more.

aw shit... here's our first example of a status. poison, especially pre gen 5, is really annoying, because in gens 1-4 a poisoned pokemon will take damage as you walk around the overworld. it can get to be a hassle, so make sure to heal em up whenever you get the chance. luckily, we got that PSNCUREBERRY, so we can heal Jano up with that.

hey, it looks like those guys from before are done fighting... and one of em is a sore loser.

HERE'S the guy i was alluding to before. 2012's favorite little man, it's youngster Joey. well guess what? you know his famous line about shorts? yeah, that ain't even his! it's a misnomer, that line is in generation 1, and trainers didn't have names in that game. i'm also pretty sure his line about his top percentage Ratatta is only in HGSS too, so he's pretty unremarkable here. i can't even give him the credit of being our first trainer battle, since we fought Lilac already. (also i know the screenshot in 1.03 said i put her name in as "Lucy," it's just that i was having a hard time deciding on what to name her and forgot to take a second screenshot when i decided on a name. sorry for the inconsistency!) also, Jano got a level up off of this fight. so i guess Joey did have something special for us after all! and while he isn't the first trainer battle, Joey is the first person we can get the phone number of. he'll occasionally call us and ask for a battle, so i guess that's something. unlike the remakes, i believe you can only store up to 10 phone numbers in your PokeGear at once, so we'll need to use our storage sparingly.

lesser known is Joey's rival, youngster Mikey and his level 2 Pidgey. where's our love for this guy, huh?

geez!! too close, man! can't believe i almost died to a Spinarak... im telling you, never doubt the ones people call weak, they strike when you least expect it. i ended up having to use an antidote and two of my precious berries. well, after heading a little further north, we arrive at...

route 31!

this route is notable for being a connection to our first cave, Dark Cave. real creative name there, guys. we'll come back to Dark Cave a little later, so skip it for now. however, what you shouldn't skip is catching a Bellsprout. trust me on this one, it's important. it doesn't need to be a particularly good Bellsprout, just make sure you get one.

alright, moving along and- dude, it's been like 5 minutes since we fought. well i mean... he IS right there, so i guess it wouldn't hurt? sure, let's go give him another fight.

it's the rematch of the century! and i knocked out his Ratatta in one hit. sorry Joey, but i don't think levelling up your rat twice is gonna help against Jano. ain't that right, my lean green killin' machine? while i was in the area, i decided to head back to Cherrygrove to heal, as well as grabbing some potions and antidotes. evidently i need them, going by that one Spinarak encounter.

heading back up to route 31, aw hell yeah it's BITTER BERRY! BERRY's bad boy cousin. this'll heal confusion if i recall. i also fought bug catcher Wade, and... come on Jano, i know attack isn't your strong suit, but you're triple its level! i love you buddy, but you gotta do a little better than that. yeah, i know i said Chikorita isn't that bad overall, but in the early game it can be pretty difficult. at least i got that Bellsprout i was talking about earlier, so that's worth something. i named her Josephine because that was the first thing that came to mind.

well with that, we've FINALLY reached Violet City. took me long enough! we were told that there's a gym here, so i guess we're headed in the right direction. first though, there's some other things i wanna do around town.