Famous internet personality did it first!

YouTube comment sections, I swear... So Retsupurae did a bit on Plumbers Don't Wear Ties, and suddenly a bunch of cretins are outraged because AVGN did it first. I honestly don't get the logic behind this. Just because someone does something about something prevents anyone else from doing so? Explain that to me, because throughout my entire body I can't gather enough stupid to understand.

I'm curious, I wonder just how many of these outraged "people" (I use the term loosely here) do crappy Happy Wheels/Minecraft/whatever videos specifically BECAUSE more famous people do them.

Come to think of it, this is yet another reason why you guys are so awesome: you NEVER say anything like that. Well, I got one jerkwad telling me I shouldn't do Pokémon Crystal because Chugga did it... except for the part where I did it BEFORE Chugga (but after a lot of other people, it goes without saying). Guess what happened to him. But that's it! Nothing else but the sweet sound of silence.

I write what I want! You have problem?

So I'm finally done with FF9, right up to and including the optional superboss. Normally this would be the point where I verbally tear it down like I did with FF8, but Square didn't give me all that much material to work with in comparison. So I'm just going to share my opinion on the game (not that you care, but I'm still going to do it because I can). Spoilers are involved, so here's a jump.

I hate it when the internet's wrong.

As mentioned before, I have played FF8 for the first time not long ago and am going through FF9 right now, also for the first time. And between both games, I've found some common misconceptions in most online documentation about these games.

When it comes to FF8, the biggest offender is Triple Triad trade rule degeneration. For most of the game's life, it was thought that natural degeneration went like this: All > Direct > Diff > One. For this reason, most people were terrified of setting the trade rule to All, since it would eventually degenerate into Direct. However, it was discovered in 2010 that this is NOT the case, and All, Direct and Diff degenerate straight into One, meaning it's completely safe to use the All rule, and any "degeneration" into Direct is actually caused by external factors that have nothing to do with natural degeneration. Problem is, just about every guide, walkthrough, name it for FF8 was written long before 2010, so you can see the advice of settling for Diff absolutely everywhere. Utterly confused people who don't know what to believe are legion on forums about the game, and for good reason.

As for FF9, two words: Ragtime Mouse (who looks as much like a mouse as Kuja looks like a guy). As most people who played the game know, you can encounter him four times right off the bat, then six more times after a certain trigger, then six more times after another trigger. Unfortunately, most guides get those triggers completely wrong. The popular belief seems to be that the switch to discs 2 and 3 are these triggers - naturally, that isn't the case, else I wouldn't be talking about it here. Others get the first trigger right (reaching the Outer Continent for the first time), but get the second wrong (they say it's getting the Blue Narciss). Well, after extensive testing, I can confirm something very few people on the internet can tell you: the second trigger is actually getting the Hilda Garde 3, not the Blue Narciss.

Here, I'll repeat it a few more times just to try and fail at drowing out the misinformation:

You can't complete the Ragtime Mouse quest before getting the Hilda Garde 3.
YOU CAN'T COMPLETE THE RAGTIME MOUSE QUEST BEFORE GETTING THE HILDA GARDE 3.
YOU CAN'T COMPLETE THE RAGTIME MOUSE QUEST BEFORE GETTING THE HILDA GARDE 3.
YOU CAN'T COMPLETE THE RAGTIME MOUSE QUEST BEFORE GETTING THE HILDA GARDE 3.

Thank you.

Here's the likely stat spread for Sylveon

This is going off a series of assumptions and damage calculations made through this video, as well as the 95 HP discovery from a few days ago:

95 HP, 110 Atk, 60/65 Def, 60/65 SA, 130 SD, 60/65 Spd

The special defense one seems especially obvious, considering Sylveon barely took more than half damage a Life Orb + rain-boosted Hydro Pump from Politoed. Locating the 110 is a bit more tricky, but the most likely stat for it is attack. Why? Well, Draining Kiss did about a third worth of damage to Politoed, and the Pokébeach leaker claimed it had 60 power. And as it turns out, if Draining Kiss was special it'd be hard-pressed to do that kind of damage through Politoed's superior special defense stat. Besides, it's a kiss move, which means physical contact and everything. Naturally, we can forget Draining Kiss doing that kind of damage off a stat of 60 or 65, regardless of whether it's physical or special. Which leads to this hypothetical stat spread.

And honestly, do you really care which one of the remaining three is 60, as opposed to 65? Thought so.

Sylveon's base HP is 95, starters also figured out?

The reasoning behind this is that it appears that all Pokémon that were used in the demo had fixed IVs, EVs and natures. And it just so happens that a level 100 Mewtwo had 353 HP there, which strongly suggests max IVs but no EVs. Should that be transposed to other species, we can find out that since a level 30 Sylveon had 106 HP, its base HP should be 95, which just so happens to match the typical 60-65-65-95-110-130 scheme Eeveelutions always have.

Working on finding more data to work on, to figure out the base HP of other new species. (I still can't believe NO ONE went to take a look at the other stats in the demo. Aren't they the slightest bit curious?)

Edit: Should this pattern carry over, then this means that Chespin has base 57 HP, Fennekin has base 40 or 41 HP, and Froakie has base 42 HP. For reference purposes, compared to the other starters, this means Chespin is a distant second to Tepig, while Fennekin and Froakie both have very low HP. As for Helioptile, it's either 45 or 46.

Edit 2: Apparently the buttons to see the stats were greyed out. Shame, I was really interested in seeing what those Mega forms had in them.

Decontraction of various names + mega form rumors

According to Pokéexperto, the Spanish version will see many attack and ability names that didn't quite fit be expanded thanks to the extra space added for attack moves in X and Y. In layman's terms, this means that if the same happens in the English version (currently unconfirmed, but likely), Thunderpunch will become Thunder Punch, Poisonpowder will become Poison Powder, and so on. However, what about Pokémon names that didn't quite fit, most notably Victreebel and Feraligatr? Pokéexperto suggests that they'll stay the same, because well, it's morally a bit harder to tamper with Pokémon names than with moves or abilities.

In somewhat related news, I got a hint of a rumor going around involving a list of Pokémon getting mega forms. This is almost definitely fake, for two reasons: it's missing Lucario, Blaziken and Mawile, and there's a mention of one of the Pokéexperto admins confirming Scizor getting one as well. However, a very quick look at Pokéexperto, their Twitter feed and the admin's personal Twitter reveals that no mention of Scizor whatsoever was made since the mega evolution mechanic reveal.

For kicks, here are the Pokémon that are in this list, excluding the ones that are already confirmed: Charizard, Blastoise, Gengar, Jynx, Pinsir, Gyarados, Aerodactyl, Scizor, Heracross, Houndoom, Tyranitar, Gardevoir, Medicham, Aggron, Banette, Latias, Latios and Abomasnow.

Interestingly, ANOTHER probably fake list has emerged, which omits Mewtwo, Absol, Mawile and Kangaskhan, which features six Pokémon from each region: all starters and three others, which are Gengar, Gyarados, Dragonite, Ampharos, Scizor, Tyranitar, Gardevoir, Milotic, Salamence, Staraptor, Garchomp, Lucario, Zoroark, Haxorus and Volcarona. What makes this one especially sketchy is that aside from the confirmed ones and the starters, these guys are almost all OU, to the exception of Staraptor (which is BL), Milotic and Zoroark (which are UU). (Not gonna get into Garchomp's tiering fiasco here, sorry.) Meanwhile, the ones that were omitted are either uber or waaaaaay down the tier list.

I usually don't comment on rumors, especially plain obvious fakes, but I just want to use the occasion to remind you to be wary.

Mainstream sites truly do ruin everything.

A long-time regular of mine, sarcasm and cynicism grandmaster and owner of a time machine (as described a few posts below) NicoCW made up this piece a little while ago to poke fun at desperate Broenns. Of course we can't have nice things on the internet, so it found its way to Pokémemes (Nico didn't post it himself to be fair, some attention-starved failure of humanity did), and, well, the result was to be expected. Jesus Christ people are dumb.

Remember that time when a little snippet of my White 1 LP made it to Memebase's front page? Thank GOD it didn't take off like this thing did (just look at the amount of likes, dislikes and comments, ouch).

Mystery mega evolution condition revealed

Turns out, you simply have to choose the option to transform on the screen where you pick your move. This does NOT use up a turn, which begs the question, why even offer the option NOT to transform? Why isn't this a Giratina type of deal, where you transform as soon as you hold the appropriate held item? The only logical reason would be that there's some sort of drawback, such as certain stats dropping to compensate for others being raised or something. Of course this is speculation, but what we do know is that the transformation comes at no cost other than the held item slot.

Also, Fennekin is revealed to know Psybeam. Suddenly we can be a lot more comfortable in our secondary type pick...

Mindblowing paradox of the day

What would a Space Funeral creepypasta look like?

Panic, panic everywhere.

Ever since the news broke that Lucario, Blaziken and Mewtwo were all getting mega evolutions, many people have been getting into a frenzy, claiming that they would cement the first two's place in ubers for a long time, and propel Mewtwo to the top of the food chain in its home metagame. All off the incredibly small amount of info that we have. We still don't know what triggers the transformation beyond holding the appropriate Mega Stone, we still don't know how much the stats will be boosted, we still don't know if these boosts will be uniform across all mega evolutions (safe money is on no, though), you get the idea. Heck, we have no clue how the new Pokémon, the Fairy type and everything else will impact the metagame. And suddenly, we have vastly experienced veterans of the gen 6 metagame popping up everywhere, claiming it's the end of the world.

You know what this reminds me of? That one time, a few days before D/P's Japanese release, when we found out Magneton, Rhydon and Dusclops were all getting evolutions. The outcry was UNANIMOUS. Even I fell for the hype train back then. And you know what happened? Only Magnezone moved on to have a lengthy, successful career. It's still the premier Steel trapper it's always been, and even at the time Magneton felt like the most deserving of an evolution out of the trio. This was due to the fact that Magneton was absolute dead weight when its job (taking out Skarmory) was done, or had no job to do in the first place because the opponent had no Skarmory. But the other two? Nope nope nope. Dusknoir was low OU for the duration of gen 4, before falling to RU (you heard me) this generation AND being leapfrogged by Dusclops since Dusknoir's existence allowed it to use Eviolite. As for Rhyperior, it's been a fixture of the UU metagame for a long time (and a frustrating joke in Conquest)... so much for being as brutally OP as we thought it would be when we first saw it.

So why the wave of panic, exactly? Because Blaziken is already uber? Doesn't mean a whole lot, we've seen ubers instantly demoted to UU or BL just with a new generation coming out. Not that this is likely to happen to Blaziken, but gen 6's brand new environment could screw over a lot of Pokémon, and Blaziken could well be one of them. Heck, if somehow my prayers are heard and we get a perma-weather nerf, Blaziken would unquestionably suffer a great deal, and that mega form could turn out to be the key element that keeps it great.

Or gen 6 could somehow favor something like Blaziken instead, and its stay in ubers could be lengthened by another four years. Who knows? Apparently everyone but me. Hook me up with these time machines, guys. With the tone you're taking, I know you have them.

Nintendo, your definition of "special" doesn't match mine.

From Bulbagarden:

Taiwanese players of Generation V games will be able to obtain a special event Pikachu between August 15 and August 20, in Hall 1 at the Taipei World Trade Center. The Pikachu is a Level 100 female and knows the moves Thunder, Volt Tackle, Grass Knot and Quick Attack. It has the Event Ribbon, and its held item is the rare Light Ball. The distribution will run each day between the times of 10am and 6pm.

Ergo, there's ABSOLUTELY NOTHING SPECIAL about it. Not just that, why don't they distribute something people might actually want? Why has it ALWAYS got to be a goddamn Pikachu? At least you can go places with an Eevee...

(Quiz question: what's more insulting, an event Pikachu with no special moves, or an event Pikachu with an utterly useless special move?)

All Vamo Alla Flamenco and no Chocographs...

...makes Slowflake kwehkweeehKWEEEEHKWEEEEEH!!!!

WHO THOUGHT THIS SIDEQUEST WAS A GOOD IDEA </rage>

Edit: Seems like venting helps, I found all four Chocographs I wanted within ten minutes of posting this.

Well that's one stupid request we won't see again.

Next one who begs for a Kangaskhan pre-evo after this will be found drowning in his own hyper-realistic blood.

(Not really, but I will rage and cry on the inside.)

So, Fennekin fans.

Is the prospect of a motherfucking SPEED BOOST TORCHIC Wi-Fi event at launch making you reconsider your starter pick?