Chalkey's Escape From Pallet Take 2, Part 4

It's comforting to know that something that was once really difficult is now relatively easy. When my last run failed, I decided to take on a few areas just for one before I restarted the file. The Fighting Dojo annihilated my entire team at this point - an injustice that was rectified by Pidgeot alone this time around. Pidgeot and I laughed as we crushed every pokemon in the entire dojo - the whole time breaking the "No shoes in the dojo" rule that was apparently strictly enforced.

After this, I felt confident enough to face Blue and head up Victory Road. Again, as a point of pride I had to prove to myself that my Pidgeot was superior to his for nostalgic rivalry, though all the training in the dojo kept this in the bag. His Alakazam gave me a lot of trouble and required a sacrificial kill from Snorlax to get the job done. Rest in peace, you fatass.

In my last patch of grass, I found a Primape. After a critical hit almost killed my Jolteon, however, I instinctively ran from it out of self preservation. Better to lose a chance of catching than to lose a hard trained pokemon at this stage of the game - with Snorlax gone, my fighting team is down to three.

When I get more time to play, there will be lots of grinding involved.

Captain's Log:
Time: 7:30 (seven hours, thirty minutes)
Pokédex: 16
Badges: 8
Lineup:
-Fat Blasta the Blastoise, level 51
-JBlox the Pidgeot, level 43
-Jeps the Jolteon, level 42
-Liz the Doduo, level 24

Casualties:
-Dick Eater the Spearow
-Mr. Nido the Nidoran M (in-game trade)
-Steph the Pidgey
-Ari the Diglett
-Shannon the Pidgey
-Joey the Snorlax
Total dead for the cause: 6

Chalkey's Escape from Pallet Take 2, Part 3

Short entry, as Nathan's about to go to bed. But I met my aforementioned goal - eight badges in under eight hours!

With Silph Co. going by so quickly, I decided to power through the Saffron and Viridian City gyms - which reached my goal but ultimately screwed me over. Blastoise overpowered just about everyone, but at the cost of having but one Pokémon to stand up to Blue right before Victory Road. I'll need to go back to some places I skipped if I want to not lose anyone at this point - I'm already down to three fighters.

Maybe I'll try the Saffron Dojo tomorrow.

Captain's Log:
Time: 6:41 (six hours, forty minutes)
Pokédex: 16
Badges: 8
Lineup:
-Fat Blasta the Blastoise, level 51
-JBlox the Pidgeot, level 43
-Jeps the Jolteon, level 42
-Mikey the Snorlax, level 30
-Liz the Doduo, level 24

Casualties:
-Dick Eater the Spearow
-Mr. Nido the Nidoran M (in-game trade)
-Steph the Pidgey
-Ari the Diglett
-Shannon the Pidgey
Total dead for the cause: 5

Chalkey's Escape from Pallet Take 2, Part 2

There comes advantages and disadvantages to attempting the Nuzlocke with FireRed/Leafgreen, most of which come from assuming you know everything just because you played RBY. Aforementioned advantages come from when you're right in this assumption, and disadvantages come from the opposite. But, so it goes.

I skipped Saffron City initially because I couldn't for the life of me remember how to get inside; in RBY, you just had to buy a lemonade, soda or freshwater for the guards, but in FRLG you have to actually find Tea somewhere. I had no recollection of this, and spent forever trying to cram the damn fresh water down the thirsty guard's throat.

I also forgot entirely that, exclusive to FRLG, Bill the Pokémaniac kidnaps you and takes you to the Sevii Islands. I might have had an option to skip this, but I was skimming through the text pretty fast in the interest of time. When I was young, I was a big fan of Pojo, which chronicled a guy playing Gold for the first time with a rate of eight badges in eight days. My goal for every game since then has always been eight badges in eight days, or eight hours if I've played that version before. Sometimes, like in this case, my goal is its own worst enemy, as I skipped right over whatever option I had to skip this detour to the first three Sevii Islands. I didn't catch anything there, but I did kill a lot of Fearow and Raticates.

But it wasn't all bad. My prior knowledge came in handy as I pulled off finishing Silph Co's Rocket bust in a personal record of seven minutes total. I also took it as a moment of personal pride to annihilate Blue's Pidgeot with my own Pidgeot (part of my nostalgic pet projects at work - this was always very important to me as a kid). I completely ignored the guy that gives me Lapras, knowing that I could only take one of either Hitmonlee, Hitmonchan or Lapras under Nuzlocke rules (as all of Saffron City counts as one area). I'll just decide later, I guess.

Captain's Log:
Time: 6:21 (six hours, twenty one minutes)
Pokédex: 16
Badges: 6
Lineup:
-Fat Blasta the Blastoise, level 43
-JBlox the Pidgeot, level 40
-Jeps the Jolteon, level 40
-Mikey the Snorlax, level 30
-Liz the Doduo, level 24

Casualties:
-Dick Eater the Spearow
-Mr. Nido the Nidoran M (in-game trade)
-Steph the Pidgey
-Ari the Diglett
-Shannon the Pidgey
Total dead for the cause: 5

Chalkey's Escape from Pallet Take 2, Part 1

For brevity, I'm skipping the trashy teen emo ranting style of my last session of posts.

Well, my first run failed miserably after my entire team was wiped out trying to catch Snorlax. I had already missed my chance to get the first one as I had already caught a Doduo in that route, so I didn't want to mess this one up. And when my Farfetch'd died, I thought "Well, I'm a man down. Now I have to go for it." This infinite regress of a thought led to the eventual wiping out of my entire team.

So I started a new game. Same version: LeafGreen. And, as last time, I'm nicknaming all of my pokémon after old friends and ex girlfriends (named in chronological order of having met/dated them respectively). Originally, this was meant to add sentiment and incentive not to kill various characters, although I was surprisingly unsympathetic when certain female pokémon died. I also don't actually release like the Nuzlocke demands, but rather put them in a PC box by themselves that's labeled "DEAD." It gets hard seeing that box fill up.

RBY days are given a bit more of a challenge with Dark and Steel movesets and trainers being more bitchtastic. It also strikes me as far more hax-induced during my Nuzlocke challenge, but maybe that's just bad luck; in both my first run and this one, Weedle was the most feared enemy of the entire game. Weedle's Poison Sting plagued my entire team, at a very compromising point - the very center of the forest. And, with so little HP early on, running backwards to the Pokécenter was a high risk high reward endeavor. At one point I made the judgement call that it may be faster to run forwards, leaving me with a very close call of 2 HP on my starter come Pewter City. You would think I'd learn to carry Antidotes, but not so much.

I've made a bit of progress the last few days, though. This time, I didn't spend two hours getting lost in Rock Tunnel, which sped my catchup a bit. Koga was a royal pain in the ass - two self-destructing Koffing and a Muk and Weezing that were higher levels than all of my characters. All of them spammed Toxic and Minimize, while Koga kept them alive with Hyper Potions and Full Heals. I had to sacrifice the Diglett I named after Ari for a free switch to pull off the win.

I could have trained my Eevee more, but when I found the EXP Share it came at the cost of a pokédex of 50. Since Nuzlocke's randomness is not very conducive to pokédex expansion, I reached this point with a pokédex number of 9. Fuck you, Professor Oak's Aide.

Captain's Log:
Time: 5:00 (five hours) [edited from previously logged as 6:00 - this was incorrect]
Pokédex: 16
Badges: 6
Lineup:
-Fat Blasta the Blastoise, level 40
-JBlox the Pidgeot, level 37
-Jeps the Jolteon, level 38
-Mikey the Snorlax, level 30
-Liz the Doduo, level 24

Casualties:
-Dick Eater the Spearow
-Mr. Nido the Nidoran M (in-game trade)
-Steph the Pidgey
-Ari the Diglett
-Shannon the Pidgey
Total dead for the cause: 5