Dan's Blogvent Calendar - December 8th

I found myself once more returning to Pokémon Y today. One of my friends got a 3DS for his birthday, so I justified this most recent relapse with the excuse that it would be cool to check out his Friend Safari and see if I could grab anything new to add to my slowly-filling National Pokédex. Fast-forward an hour and I was once again camping on the outskirts of Camphrier Town, riding back and forth outside the Daycare in the hopes of hatching yet another egg.

Despite all the time I've spent with Pokémon this year, I hadn't put too many hours into the whole breeding meta-game. My experience with it didn't really stretch beyond sticking a hapless Ditto in the Daycare in SoulSilver and watching as it whored itself out to whatever I happened to put in there with it. It was a handy way to pick up pre-evolutions and baby Pokémon in an effort to fill out the Pokédex and not a lot else. I did spend a little bit of time attempting to breed a Charmander with a beneficial nature for EV training, but apart from that, you could say my interest in Pokémon breeding was purely scientific.

Then Pokémon Y came along, and everything changed. Maybe it's because of the addition of Super Training, which makes the previously laborious process of EV training much less of a grind, but I've found myself a lot more invested in breeding than I've ever been before. Simply breeding a Trevenant to obtain that elusive Phantump is no longer enough - I'm grabbing and hatching multiple eggs, five at a time, in search of favourable Natures and Abilities. I even spent one afternoon teetering on the edge of the wormhole that is breeding for 'egg moves', a way to breed Pokémon resulting in them being born with moves that they simply couldn't learn otherwise. Thankfully some invisible force pulled me back from the brink of that abyss, but does it really matter how far away the ground is when you're already free-falling?

This afternoon I spent over an hour in Santalune Forest, just to hunt down a Pikachu holding a Light Ball. I haven't yet embarked on the crazy breeding adventure this item invites, the end result of which will hopefully be a favourably-Natured Pichu born knowing the powerful-but-elusive move Volt Tackle. Should it materialise, I'll no doubt EV train it and evolve it into a Pikachu. From there I'm not sure if I'd evolve it further to Raichu, or leave it as-is and make it hold the Light Ball. Either way, I'll have to decide on a moveset for it, one that takes full advantage of its strengths and attempts to account for its weaknesses, and...

...you see how simply it starts, and how quickly it escalates?

Will all of this result in me attempting to build a team for competitive battling? I can't say for certain, although between this compulsion and my desire to hunt down every one of the game's one-hundred TMs, the seeds have definitely been sown. If nothing else, I'd like to have a well-trained, well-balanced squad of critters to place in my Battle Box, so I can fall back on them if any random Passersby should challenge me to a battle. Anyway, thanks for reading guys. Take care and I'll see you around. In the meantime, I'm going to try and find something else to do, if only so my Ditto can catch a much-needed break...

Dan

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Currently playing - Pokémon White (DS)