This is something that’s been running rampant on my mind for a couple years now so ima share it with yall here since it’s about one of my favorite hyperfixations. So let’s talk about
Pokémon Legends Arceus — misinterpreting art direction
By Bri/gobbo
Pokémon legends arceus or PLA for short, came out two years ago (almost now) of January 2022 to much anticipation of long time fans. Many of which being artists (like me) with a compelling premise and enticing story and worldbuilding the game was a hit if you ignore complaints of non fans and snobs.
So… what’s the deal?
Unfortunately as demand and quota rises the need to produce and release content gets worse and worse for the industry as with harsh deadlines, the long time need for quality is cut off by the need for deadlines. Which is why I am at ease to know that we were given the announcement from gamefreak and the Pokémon company that the next game would take two years instead of the short one year delay for the next installment to the main game or side game lines. But I’m not just saying this to fill this with words, my point is to stress the toxic work environment that many people in the industry go through but given this news is an opportunity to look forward to the wellbeing of both the people behind this franchise and game as well as the attention to detail that goes into each release.
Pt II — graphics
My second and main gripe I’ve held is to the complaints of how the game looks. Which I don’t get, it might be because I had only recently taken art history while in college (which I would highly recommend taking because it will change the way you see the world!) or could be wearing “toxic nostalgic lenses” that cloud judgement. This won’t change the fact that I don’t see any story or visual issues with the *look* of the game.
Backgrounds:
From close observation into the textures of the plants and trees in PLA I could tell off the bat that it was meant to resemble or what I theorize to be based on traditional ink painting or Sumi-e. The distinct weight of the leaves and bark may just be standard textures but through a stringent lense you can see the dilution and bleed of line. A lot of landscapes are often a meditation through each stroke of the brush the piece reveals a serene whimsy view.
The Pokémon
“Oh the pokedex should’ve had more style and traditional pieces!” —a exaggeration and summary of what I’ve heard on YouTube who’ve discussed the visuals of PLA
I think in terms of one of the main missions and plot line of PLA is to create the first pokedex! and for something so important to the safety of humans who are coming to settle in Hisui/Sinnoh they need to have access to a book with images as soon as possible with enough for everyone. It makes sense for the Pokémon to look “flat” as there’s one traditional art form that has made the spread of Japanese art possible; woodblock prints or as it’s called:
“Ukiyo-e”
But outside of the pokedex the models of the pokemon are just as good with the same inky look that the backgrounds and game has already!
Also shiny hunting… but I’m getting ahead of myself!
My point for this is simply to not judge and criticize a work without getting a proper understanding of the culture and art history that might’ve gone into the piece!
And it’s also why I’ve been going absolutely feral for PLZA because WERE GETTING KALOS DURING MY FAVORITE PERIOD OF ART AND WRITING HISTORY!!!!
Romantic period and realism!
Which means…
THE OUTFITS ARE GONNA BE GOOOOOD!!!!!
Also hisuian lilligant is based on a figure skater…
Woah mama,,,,, /pos i love this guy a lot i need more gothitelle in my life
Thank you! This is Romare he’s a country Gothitelle
(Sorry this post got long cause I started gobbo spergin about science in fantasy and a topic that if not for frog dissection day in middle school, would be studying biology or being a veterinarian XD so I’ll leave a lil thing to make this shorter lol)
I’ve been playing around with how I’d apply the same type of sexual dimorphism seen in birds and insects (or the general animal kingdom) with Pokémon!
Since I’ve done it before with the ralts line I thought playing with the concept for a majority of the human shaped pokemon would be fun!
And there’s a lot of human shaped ones for psychic pokemon so to make them more alien I’ve been mixing today bird and moth type shtuff and spicing it up with ideas for hybridization traits from other pokemon species which are present in Romare here!
With hybrid designs I keep to mind the in-game/in universe rules to Pokémon genetics: baby is the same as the mom with little to no traits from dad if the dad isn’t a different species but same egg group of Pokémon.
Romare’s mama was of course a Gothitelle but also a cross between Gothitelle and Grimsnarl. As bizarre as it may seem, but given the properties I headcannon for the reason the Pokémon who have “clothes” have them being made from what I can only describe as similar to moth scales, gossamer and cobweb but it’s a Pokémon specific variant of keratin (think nails and hair).
While the ralts line favor brighter vibrant colors and abundant chest plumage (the bleeding heart); the Gothita line favor males with (I forgot my own notes ohnu) either the longest/most or the shortest/least “skirt” tiers.
Also I just realized I might’ve pulled this one tumblr original gem of a meme out when I was coming up with designs for Romare so uh, thank you 1984 goth anime legs uncle XD
I really need to get some shtuff out for the added “Bonnie’s day out!!”worldbuilding/lore and the general “pokémadhouse” flesh-out/rewriting!
I’ll have to add sketches of the species notes later! I got two animations to work on and some Bonnie pages to get done XD
I’m real sick of Lily’s hollow nothingburger ranting nitpick of a “retrospective” of Pokémon…
So let me sperg about these games in a constructive way that highlights the parts of the game that Lily neglected to mention
This is:
Gobbo’s Semi-Complete Pokémon Retrospective!
I’ve been a fan of Pokémon since I could remember; roughly four years old give or take, my introduction began through the merchandise like cards, toys and book. I wouldn’t start my journey until I was 7 with soul silver with my female chikorita as a starter. I would then go on to play (ordered by region introduction): fire red, ORAS, soul silver & heart gold, platinum/BDSP, white, X&Y, sun & moon (and the ultra games), sword & shield, PLA, and scarlet & violet (including the dlcs and epilogue).
Going forward note that the games that are italicized are the main games I played myself in. Just thought I’d make that clear. So I can’t fully explain some of the games than others but I may mention points others I’ve seen talk about the games say that have provided good insight towards.
Gen 1 & 2
(Grouping these together as I have more to say and knowledge of the gen two game mostly from HGSS)
Gen 1: many peoples first taste and introduction to the world of Pokémon. With a variety of creatures, a straightforward goal and towns and cities to explore Kanto opened the floodgates to what would be a long running series. It started with a premise of catching cool beasts and creatures and traveling the world and fighting an evil organization with the help of your newly acquired friends through strategy and planning you’d prove yourself against the best of the best of trainers and a rivalry that would form into a friendship as they got older. At first, the games only had one option for gender being a boy, you could chose your own name or presets of other options one of which being Red who is a protagonist in the manga, but he’s not ash (as ash would be playable with pokemon Yellow and somewhat in the let’s go games). You also get to name your rival either through the realms of your imagination and witty humor or the presets: this is Blue your rival. (In the anime he would be changed personality wise slightly for American audiences watching the anime, Gary)
I didn’t get far in my first playthrough of FireRed as a kid, I’ll admit. I got stuck in cerulean city and was trying to grind my Pokémon’s levels which took too long. You could probably tell that I had charmander as my starter, well I will flex by saying I had a female charmander first time playing it! So meh! I named her Flare. When it game to this generation there was many things that were cut or added, beta designs, unused mechanics or sprites and even the concept of buying pokemon in the marts which would probably be added via the coin shop of the game place. Of course this is my assumption so feel free to correct me in replies!!
Now I might be biased with what I’m about to talk about with Gen two, but this is my retrospective and I get to do what I want! XD
Gen II: ah Johto my fictional home away from home! I LOVE THESE GAMES! My brother and I would play pokemon as kids and he’d always be ahead of me in the story so I’d have many times where I’d ask him to help me figure something out! Like that god damn stupid farfetch’d quest… grumble grumble… he helped me twice! Soul silver was the first game I played and my starter was a female chikorita whose name sadly escapes me. The last place I left off in that game was cerulean city before my game was unplayable due in part to “kids being dumb” antics (I put a magnet near my ds and we had to ship it to Nintendo to fix it). So I got heart gold and replayed it! This time with another female starter, totodile! Who I named Fergie which is short for fergalicous. The gen two remakes was jam packed with everything from new pokemon, new region, new types, and a sort of epilogue if you will to the previous games through the story of team rocket! Being that after you defeat the boss he vanishes and his grunts are trying everything to contact him. This time you get to be a boy or a girl!
These games added more to the worldbuilding there was in Pokémon with the origin of the legendary beasts who had been resurrected by a much stronger legendary more so than the bird trio of Kanto. This pokemon would make their appearance in the very first episode of the anime, the rainbow bird: Ho-oh.
If I may also sprinkle in my other fixation that is mythology the legendaries of Johto are most definitely based or pull inspiration from the divine beasts of Japanese mythology. It’s no secret that the people at gamefreak value and put in the love and care they hold for culture and upbringing.
This is something that I will make note of for a brief tangent: the fact that in many of the games there’s a special building or place where players can enter to find GameFreak themselves in their office. They have unique dialogue and even reward players with exclusive items or certificates for completing the Pokédex! In the gen two remakes they give you a special item that lets you go back and forth from having the updated soundtrack or the gameboy soundtrack, I personally love the gameboy sound as it wasn’t overstimulating which is just a personal thing not to diminish the ost.
There was many things added to the games such as a day/night cycle and as mentioned earlier, new pokemon types! Steel and dark. Initially they planned to make one eeveelution (fandom term) a poison type later changing it to dark type but forgetting to fix the dex entry, this of course is umbreon! In a leak for the beta sprites there were many designs or complete pokemon who were cut or replaced, an early concept for leafeon was one of these designs that would be brought to gen four!
One misconception of Gen two from what I’ve seen is that Kanto is the postgame, this is false. The real postgame is facing Red who after the first game vanished just like Giovanni. When you travel through Kanto after getting the first eight gym badges you are given bits and pieces of information of this mysterious character who as you progress learn was the previous champion before vanishing. At the top of mount silver he waits for an opponent who can beat him. I’m still grinding to beat him!!! Of course with Maxwell by my side!
Before we wrap up I want to add in a few things the remakes added:
Pokeatholon
Bug catching tournament
Safari zone (where you can design your safari zone which will affect the Pokémon that appear)
Suicune quest
Steven stone
Celebi
Sinjoh
Ruins of alph
Radio
And Voltorb Flip
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Gen III
The remakes are better I’m sorry ok if you take mega evolution out of the games it’s still cool in how you can ride latias high above Hoenn to move around the region with ease and the approriate more characteristically fitting designs of Maxie and Archie. To sum up in a way to point out how pro-corporate and rainbow capitalist Lily orchard is the whole plot and motive of team magma is literally to make more land for real-estate. Archie just wants Pokémon to have more rule of the world and make a sort of waterworld type landscape. Kyrogre and groudon are based on leviathan and behemoth being two sworn enemies who will bring catastrophic effects should they awaken and fight the other, only when the sky is summoned does the land and sea cease their feud.
The games are cool with having bike mechanics which involve the usage of two types of bikes to traverse different terrain: BMX bby!!!
But contests were introduced too!
The inclusion of a puzzle that requires some knowledge of braille to access the regis was also a fascinating element of these games.
Oh and the fact our trainer has a dad who’s a gym leader was neat too.
Oh and my starter was a male treecko I named Trevor for alpha sapphire.
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Gen IV
I never had diamond or pearl so for a while my own understanding and knowledge came from playing the third game that added onto the story and gameplay of the previous games. I had a female piplup I named Pearl.
Gen four was meant to be the last game installment of the Pokémon series. Given the story and stakes at play with team galactic and their cultish mindset to restart the world by taking control of the embodiments of time space and for platinums sake, antimatter it made sense. But it wouldn’t stay like this given the reception the games had. Like the first two games there were many unique features and even side quests you could take part in!
The under ground
Contests (and poffin making/ball capsules)
Ranmas (I know I spelled it wrong stop!) park (the park with a bias to pokemon based on appearance lol)
Personality ribbons
The old mansion
Gts (with the lil parade thing)
Two new eeveelutions!
And badge cleaning (nothing is more satisfying than cleaning the badges)
So why is platinum better? Let me list it for yall now:
The opening is different where you run into Cyrus first instead of Rowan
Looker
Fatima’s gym challenge was a maze with lights and puzzle solving rather than math equations
More Pokémon
The distortion world
Looker
Battle frontier
AND THE FACT THAT YOU GOT TO HAVE A LUXURY HOME AT THE AGE YOUR TRAINER IS THAT YOU GOT TO DECORATE!!!
Also this was a playground rumor when I was growing up now: if you beat the elite four and league a certain number of times in a row, you would get to meet your trainer character’s dad.
Now did I believe this rumor? Yes.
Can you guess how many times I beat the league?
1
2-3
4-5
6-7
8
9-10
Voting ended onDec 9, 2024
The answer will shock you!
I also use to and still believe that Looker is the trainers dad and nothing with change that for me!!!
Ok I will have to separate this into two parts! Stay tuned for gen 5–9
The previous post wasn’t able to save the rest of the draft that contained the layout of Gen five and so I will be continuing my retrospective starting with Gen five, here! Please know this is based primarily on personal experience as well as some bits of bias but I’ll try to not let my word take away from experiencing these games from you! With new advancements of technology it’s now possible to enjoy if not through a not entirely exact structure and gameplay of the originals to replay these older games without a DS or cartridge via emulators! So if you can I highly suggest trying them out! Alright let’s get to it!
Heads up this will be quite long of a read so take breaks if need be
Gen V (halfway there!!)
My memories of this game is very limited as this was a very sad time where my brother and i’s pokemon journey would end after the 3ds came out. But I will share what I do remember and then go over some interesting findings of this game!
My mom usually took both of us to GameStop to get the newest pokemon games only this time when black and white came out, my mom took me to get the game I wanted (I personally wish I goth pokemon black because I personally loved the design of reshiram more and its symbolism/ties to daoism representing Yin) on our way home my mother kept reminding me to not let my brother see me playing the game to which I followed! Up until my brother saw me playing while I was chilling in my parents room to which he gasped and exclaimed no fair before racing downstairs yelling for our mom to take him to GameStop, I all wide eyed would race to advance further in the game before he got back only to lose the race! XD I had made it to the third or second town from the starting town when he caught me! Oh and my starter was a female oshawott I named Shelly! I also had a massive crush on N. And didn’t need to fight him four times to get further in the game.
Now for the trivia part:
The biggest addition that sadly didn’t make it out of Gen five was the changing seasons that would change whenever you next opened the game if my memory is correct? This was also a sort of reintroduction of the pokemon franchise! The small roster of new pokemon shaked things up for long time fans especially with the exclusion of older pokemon but in post as well as the sequels you could still get some of your favorites without having to hack them in like a certain ralts enthusiast has done to paint a biased narrative. LILY.
Unova being the first region not based on a specific area of Japan like the first four games were, unova took place in a ingame version of the Empire State, New York, NY! In an interview the unique meaning behind the region’s Japanese name truly illustrated the very common experience one has to traveling to a new country.
The Japanese name roughly translates to: “From afar there is one” if we take this in the context of the region’s real world inspiration and the perspective of someone who’s never left their home country and is travelling to a country they’ve only had a very limited understanding or experience with only going by caricatures or stereotypes. From afar they believe where they’re traveling has only one type of people but as they get closer they learn and realize that there is a much broader and diverse picture of a multitude of combinations of people of many different backgrounds and ethnicities!
New York cities Ellis island was the birth place and port that welcomed many different families of many different backgrounds that would disperse across the city and the states.
It’s no wonder that in gen five we are given not the standard eight gym leaders instead we have ten! Each one being a representation if not stand in for the different kinds of people you meet in NYC. And outside of trainers and characters the Pokémon themselves even reflect the diversity found in NYC and the states as a whole. From elgyem and beehyeem being the greys and flatwoods monster, the Gothitelle line being based on well goths but also Lolita-goth fashion, braviary being the national bird the bald eagle (and a continuous scientific paradoxical mystery that rattles my mind to this day XD), several exotic pets that get brought to the states, and something very interesting I learned given new information that I find is an example of GameFreaks’ attention to detail when it comes to making new regions:
Golett and Golurk
As I’m sure we are all aware of, these Pokémon are suppose to be the golem from ancient Jewish mythology. For those unfamiliar: the golem was a humanoid creature made of a special clay adorn with special ornament and prayers. The golem would only move when given a task that would be written on a scroll or parchment that would then be placed in its mouth, once active the golem would then fulfill this task and once complete return to a dormant state awaiting its next task.
But something that stood out to me has always been the arm bands and head spike golurk seemed to have apart of its design. When talking with someone who has given me insight of his culture I learned of a prayer that stood out in how familiar the concept was! This (below) is a
Tefillin. The way the belt on the arm is wrapped can mean a multitude of things when in prayer the box on the forehead also holds different prayers as well!
Keep in mind I’m just speculating this but the implied detail of this in a pokemon that debuted in a game based on New York City which has been a starting for many Jewish families who immigrated to the US while still looking for refuge in thousands of years of exile. Sorry I got sidetracked on the cultural history!
Please remember that I in no means intend to discuss or promote a political stance on my page and this is all I’m going to say on the matter, my only intent is to share information and insight into the making of these games and elements of the story and concept process.
Back to Pokémon! Outside of cultures that were brought into the use there’s a lot of native or indigenous influence as well!
But Unova has more than just the Pokémon and influences in design, there’s the mechanics and worldbuilding still left to address!
From the subway battles to the musicals and even the studio in the sequels there’s the secret world that varies based on game exclusives. But out of all of this there was a new battle mechanic that gets overlooked, I’m of course talking about rotation battles which involved three of your pokemon out in the battle where you could rotate and decide not only what move to use but which of your pokemon attacks first as the your opponent could easily rotate their pokemon to easily avoid or minimize damage from the move type. Essentially it was a triple battle with finesse!
Of course the story continues after the first games in the sequels unfortunately I wouldn’t get a chance to play them as my brother would end his journey one fateful day when his friend was over, taking all his ds games and ds lite into the garage and to my childish horror smashed all of them with a hammer beyond repair! I had no time but only to cry out “no not twiggy!!” Twiggy being the name of my brother’s starter in Gen four, turtwig. It would be after this where I began buying both games to keep the spirit of our tradition alive. We can now move on to…
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Gen VI
Yes this is the generation where my oc Ripley came from as well as the backstory for Brid.
I also love Gen six however one gripe I had with the game was the exclusion of contests which if you remember the anime, was a thing for one of the characters and in universe something Diantha had done too! I’m still bitter about it but my enthusiasm and anticipation for PLZA is tenfold as now we get to see the possible era of French history known as the rebuild of France! Which lines up with some of the most impactful artistic historic movements in art, writing, science and fashion! I’m getting ahead of myself as this game is almost out! And this’ll have to this post into the second part of probably three or four.
Kalos is gorgeous with how bright and vibrant the world is with delicate touches of detail. Being the first of three games to be on the newest console that had the gimmick of being 3d, it also brought some controversy in regards to the transition from the top down 2d sprites to the jarring switch to 3d models. Of course the way the game opened was a way to transition that change from a restricting aerial or birdseye camera angle to a freeing and semi limited 360° camera movement. I chose fennekin as my starter and was sad when I didn’t get a girl but I didn’t let that stop me.
I nearly forgot to mention the big pull that Gen six brought to the battle mechanics of the competitive scene: Mega Evolution, the next step and true show of synchrony between a Pokémon and their trainer. And no Lily it’s not a sexual thing, we know what you wrote.
We also got introduced to what has to be one of my favorite types on a conceptual level: Fairy types!
It made more sense to add this type especially in a region based in Europe as many countries there have many variations of faeries or fey. And the added bonus of its type advantage being a reference to many children’s fairytales while the disadvantages being a call back to the Gaelic or Celtic origins of the faerie world! I.e. the weakness to iron which was used to protect children from being stolen by the fey. I also as of writing this had an epiphany as to where the poison weakness came from: the poison apple from Snow White or many other Grimm fairytales involving the use of poison! I just realized that!
This would be the last region where we would get a new eevee evolution that would not come back since the release of X and Y.
The fact these games are so heavily intertwined with such a rich usage of mythos and legends of Europe fills such a warmth for world building inside my heart. From the Nordic mythology the legendary trio of this region have ties to, to the dark ages of sickness and pain the black plague brought to even Arthurian mythology! With my personal thoughts of legends arceus’s art already set my excitement as of now calmed radiates as we get closer to the release of the legends ZA game’s art direction!
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For now I think I’ll end here and continue when I’m more awake to finish off with the last three generations! Let’s hope I can get through the three games in one last post but I can already tell I’m gonna be going on about Gen nine so that’ll be fun!
Hey! I gots a question for yall who see my shtuff
What Would you guys like me to post about/what peaks your curiosity the most that you’d want to learn more about?
First part of Leagues and Ribbons
Lite Life lore
Bell in the woods (a story I keep forgetting about 👀💦)
My Story&Concept points/tips/knowledge/perspective
My online sona, gobbo
Bwion (my sweet angel son! Who’s birthday is coming up on the 28th of October)
My hyper fixations〜✨
Generally sperging
Other (feel free to send asks!)
Voting ended onSep 14, 2024
Anyways I’m probably going to be sharing mostly traditional art and little digital stuff due to “recent events”
rest in piss my sweet, but dastardly bastard of an iPad! They aren’t gone just… won’t let me use any app now for more than 10-30 seconds… the urge and desire to draw in procreate keeps burning my mind even though it won’t work…
I’m not fine… I ain’t holding up well, it’s like checking the fridge for something to eat while fully aware that there isn’t anything to eat inside…
Ima go… do some abdominal workouts to ABBA… it’s Friday:
ABBA-dominal Friday!
Make sure yo unshrimp your posture every once in a while when drawing or doing ya craft folks!
