#121 Starmie

Starmie is feeling down

Starmie is a criminally underrated Pokemon. It’s pretty great in battle, and it’s got an interesting design. That same yellow thing all over Staryu is now much more uniform in shape, and the round gem has been updated to a brilliantly cut jewel. A Psychic typing was superglued on top of all that and now we have Starmie.

Now, let me make one thing clear. I like Starmie, but it creeps me out. It’s a tenacious like. I can’t help it. I like the purple color and the whole two starfishes stacked on top of each other thing, but I don’t like how the bottom one moves around.

Pidgeotto has had enough of your mess Starmie!

See, when I look at Starmie all I can see is two Starfish stacked on top of each other. It looks like they’d move in tandem and all that, but they don’t. Starmie is able to move the top or bottom starfish separately of the other, and it looks super creepy. Sometimes it stands on the front star while the back one spins around, and sometimes it’s reversed.

And I’m talking full spins here, not just like they have a little bit of freedom. These are moving like they’re not attached to anything except for a drill.

Don’t mind me! Just haunting your dreams!

Then that raises all kinds of questions. How well attached are Starmie’s two halves? Do they grind up against each other and make a horrible sound that is just edited out of the games and show? Or do they make no sound? Do they have to be well-oiled to make no sound? Are they cutting out scenes of Misty spraying some WD-40 between the two halves so Starmie doesn’t make squeaky sounds?

More than anything else though, this just makes me think that Starmie has it all wrong. While it’s busy shooting water, ice, or psychic energy at opponents it’s missing on the best possible way for it to attack.

By aiming for the teeth with the gem!

That method, of course, is spinning. I know I said last time that Staryu could probably spin and do some damage pretty well, and for the unitiated it may seem like Starmie would be less effective at it. After all, two blades with some space inbetween shouldn’t work, should it? I actually don’t know…

…if they’re spinning in the same direction. Thanks to Starmie’s unique ability to control them individually, it can, theoretically, spin the two in opposite directions. And that, I know for a fact, is more effective than a single spinning blade.

Or so I’ve been told. Years ago there was this show called Pitchmen on the Discovery channel starring the late great Billy Mays and Anthony Sullivan. In one of the episodes they showed off a man who’d invented what was basically a handheld saw with two blades placed close together that spun in opposite directions. He then proceeded to cut a car in half with is miniature saw.

All I’m saying is imagine Starmie making use of that incredible destructive power and just like, flying straight through a Snorlax or something. That’d be horrifying, but also educational for everyone.

DID YOU KNOW?

One thing that’s always frustrating to hear is someone trying to determine what a Pokemon is based off of. Like, it’s obvious that Staryu is a starfish, but what about Starmie? To me that answer is obvious too, it’s not based off anything in particular. They took their already stylized Starfish Pokemon, and added onto it to make it look cool and unique.

Some people don’t like that answer though, and look for other solutions.

Starmie! Circa 500 BC or so

Way back in the ancient times of Mesopotamia there was a lot of Gods and Goddesses being worshiped.  Among those was a Goddess of Heaven, known as Inanna (Or Ishtar, as she may have also been known? I’m not 100% there’s a lot of info here to take in at once)

Anyway, as cool as it would be to have a Pokemon based off of an ancient Goddess, she doesn’t hold much relevance to this story. However, way back then, because people didn’t have the modern niceties of things like telescopes, Venus was thought to be two stars in the night sky. The morning star, and the evening star. These were supposedly Inanna in her celestial form, and basically became a symbol to represent her. Two stars laid on top of each other, with a circle in the center. The star of Ishtar. It does bear a pretty interesting resemblance to Starmie.

Unfortunately, as much as I’d love to believe this was intentional, I don’t think it was. If anyone out there can provide any more supporting evidence I’d love to think that GameFreak did something that cool, but for now I’m just going to assume that it was a cool, unintentional reference.

And a sweet shirt design too!

USING STARMIE IN BATTLE

stats via pokemondb

Starmie is actually pretty solid in battle. It’s lost a bit of usefulness as of Generation 6 thanks to the Dark type’s buffs and the continued weakening of the Psychic type, but it still can surprise you if used carefully!

Anyway, Starmie’s got two main things it can pull off, just like Staryu. An offensive set that utilizes a choice item and a less offensive set that utilizes Rapid Spin. If you’re going to be a Rapid Spinner, then you’ll of course want Rapid Spin in your arsenal, along with Scald, Recover, and Ice Beam / Thunderbolt / Psychic. Since Eviolite no longer works Leftovers will have to suffice, and you’ll need to pump EV’s into HP and Speed, while Natural Cure is the best defensive ability you get.

The Choice set is mildly more interesting though. Basically pick from a Choice Scarf or Choice Specs, and make sure Analytic is the ability this time. Hydro Pump over Scald again, and Thunderbolt is also a must. However, you’ll also want Trick, so you can force that Scarf or Specs onto someone at whim, and cripple them with the burden of a Choice item they weren’t expecting! After that you’ll really just want to pick between Ice Beam or Dazzling Gleam for your last move. Ice Beam offers greater coverage, but Dazzling Gleam gives you a solid weapon against Dark types that will try to stop you.

Either way, Starmie is pretty solid, and a Pokemon I’d definitely try out if you haven’t yet.

ARBITRARY SCORES

APPEARANCES: 5/5
Two stars. Purple. And a big light-up gem in the center! Starmie is pretty and cool all at once.

DESIGN: 4/5
I like the simplicty behind just adding a second star behind the first, even if it is a little lazy. The updated gem is a great touch too.

BATTLE: 4/5
Another solid contender. I love Starmie in battle and hope it gets another surge of popularity soon. maybe in the form of a mega!

REST IN PEACE: BILLY/MAYS
I don’t care if anyone else doesn’t care. I was a big fan of the show Pitchmen, and to see it end so soon due to Billy Mays’s untimely passing makes me sad ;_;

OVERALL: 4.3/5

Coming soon to a jugular near you!

 

#120 Staryu

I can’t let you do that, Dave.

Staryu is a starfish. It’s brown, and has a big fancy jewel in the middle of it. Staryu is kind of underrated in my opinion, as far as cool Pokemon go.

Maybe that’s because it’s wearing some kind of weird harness. The kind that you’d normally see in black, instead of the full yellow of Staryu. The big yellow piece of its body with a jewel set in the middle has “straps” that go around each bit of the star except one. Normally I’d say that this bit without a yellow wrapping around it is the head, but it’s always depicted as somewhere along the sides. Typically the left, or right from its point of view, but not always.

Staryu answers the call to action!

I’ve always liked Staryu for its practical applications, and hated it for what it actually did. See, when you look at a Staryu, there’s probably a few interesting ways you can come up with for it to attack, and they all involve spinning. Five sharp points and the ability to fly and spin are all Staryu needs to be a fearsome battle, as it can spin its body like a buzzsaw and scare everything away.

“But Professor Swadloon!” I can hear you say. “What about the inevitable Rock or Steel typed opponents! How can Staryu make use of its Water typing to attack those kinds of enemies?”

Easy. You see that big orb in the center of Staryu? It’s perfect for that kind of thing. Just have it blast water out of it or something. That’s the easy, obvious thing, isn’t it?

“We have no idea what we’re doing.” – Everyone who works on the anime

Nope. Apparently the top point of a Staryu is where the people who animated the anime unanimously decided a Staryu should fire water from. It raises all kinds of disgusting questions, like is there a horrible hole at the top of a Staryu filled with pressurized liquids that it can fire? Why doesn’t it use the gem?

Well, the gem thing seems like it’d be solved actually. Contrary to other forms of media constantly using gems to harness lasers and such, Pokemon wants to use its gems realistically. The gem can’t, and won’t fire horrible streams of water at everything that moves.

Stars though? Stars are okay.

That all goes out the window when Staryu needs to use Swift though. Suddenly that gem can create and fire projectiles perfectly fine.

Everyone who works on the anime clearly had no idea what sort of continuity they should try and establish for the starfish. Not even with his cries! While most Pokemon will say their name in some shape or form, Staryu is different. Instead, like some kind of crazy karate master it’ll just shout, “HI-YA!” every time it does anything. There has never been and will never be an explanation for this.

So in my own personal head canon, Staryu is also a black belt in addition to being a starfish. It’s the only way anything makes sense.

ALSO IT CAN SUMMON THE DRAGON BALLS

DID YOU KNOW?

Aside from legendaries, most Pokemon have a gender. Most, that is. Staryu and Starmie are one of the very few species of non-legendary Pokemon that are genderless.

HOWEVER! It seems that the starfish Pokemon may have been intended to have a gender at some point.

And maybe a shuriken too!

In Pokemon Gold and Silver, the games to introduce breeding, Staryu is actually programmed to be able to learn some egg moves. Just in case you’re uninitiated, a genderless Pokemon can ONLY breed with Ditto, and because the only move Ditto can learn is Transform, there’s no way to pass on egg moves to a baby formed by a Genderless Pokemon + Ditto.

Aurora Beam, Barrier, and Supersonic were all programmed to be passed on to a baby Staryu. In addition, in Generation 2 only, Staryu and Starmie both were able to learn the move Attract. As the move implies, Attract will make your opponent fall in love with you if they’re the opposite gender, and lessen the chance of them attacking you.

Unfortunately, a genderless Pokemon learning Attract doesn’t mean it’ll be able to attract everything. Instead, it does the opposite, and is able to attract nothing. Not even other Genderless Pokemon.

So there’s your bit of a history lesson. Now go forth artists, and make horrible pictures of what male and female Staryu and Starmie would look like!

USING STARYU IN BATTLE
Little Cup only!

stats via pokemondb

Staryu has two main roles it can do in Pokemon battles. First, it has access to the relatively-rare move Rapid Spin, so it can be used to clear hazards on your side of the field. Secondly, it can just be used as a typical fast Special sweeper thanks to its solid 85 Speed and 70 Special Attack stats.

If you’re going to be a spinner, you’ll want to hold Eviolite, and, of course, give it Rapid Spin. Since you’ll want to be focusing on survivability, Scald is the best STAB option for that nice 30% Burn chance. Ice Beam, Psychic, or Thunderbolt are all good options for that coveted third slot, so you’ll need to pick one because your last slot is picked for you. Recover. It’s still probably the best healing move available to anyone since it has no drawbacks whatsoever. Staryu also has excellent abilities in the form of Analytic and Natural Cure. While Analytic’s free 30% boost may sound tantalizing, it depends on moving second to activate, and Staryu’s decent speed makes it a non option. Natural Cure, on the other hand, will heal any status effect placed on Staryu if it switches out, and thanks to Eviolite and Recover, it’s likely to be a thorn in your opponent’s side for some time.

If, however, you want to run a more offensive version. Give Staryu a Life Orb, and replace Scald with Hydro Pump. Psychic, Ice Beam, and Thunderbolt all offer pretty solid coverage, and are bolstered by the Life Orb bonus.

Between the two I’d definitely go for the bulky Rapid Spin option, but because that option sounds better on paper you can frequently catch people off guard if you go for a more offensive version.

ARBITRARY SCORES

APPEARANCES: 4/5
I’m a big fan of Staryu’s design. Perfectly recognizable as a starfish, but also changed up enough thanks to the addition of a big red jewel in the center. That yellow bit is kinda weird and unsettling though.

DESIGN: 3/5
Staryu is kinda boring in terms of design though. I think I can vaguely see where they were going with the jewel to make it kinda look like a gem set into a ring. Sort of. Staryu’s overall shape though doesn’t really add anything to it and just makes it look weird.

BATTLE: 4/5
Relatively low defenses are patched up decently by Eviolite. If Staryu had better base defenses it would be absolutely amazing in battle.

HI-YAH!: HI-YAH!/HI-YAH!

OVERALL: 3.6/5

Just doin’ some calisthenics!

#119 Seaking

This guy was angrier the last time I saw him.

There’s a lot of boring, generic fish Pokemon. In Generation 1, Seaking is easily the worst of the group, because it’s an evolution. Goldeen set the template, and instead of evolving in any meaningful way, Seaking just gets a different coloration, slightly different shape, and a bigger horn. It’s just… boring.

And yet, it somehow became a meme.

Because there’s nothing else to talk about with Seaking!

I just wanted to get out of the way because there’s nothing to Seaking.It’s boring. A (now-ancient) meme from 2007 is the most traction this thing has ever had with anyone, and they had to draw angry eyebrows onto the fish to add to it.

I’ve been staring at this page for hours because after bringing that up I can’t find anything new to talk about. Like, nothing. I only have a series of thoughts that I can’t really form into proper statements. So, I’m going to go ahead and do that. For the rest of this first section, enjoy my first ever stream of consciousness about Seaking.

This is what you get for being so boring!

Seaking is a darker shade of orange than Goldeen. Seaking’s fins have dark spots. The back of Seaking looks like a Butterfree’s wings. Seaking’s horn is commonly depicted as spinning, much like Rhydon’s horn in the Pokemon Stadium games. Seaking is fat. Seaking has Goldeen’s lips. Seaking has two sharp fangs. I wonder if Seaking is secretly a vampire. I bet if Seaking was a vampire it’d be cooler. What could they add to Seaking to make it more vampiric?

First it has to stop jobbing to Poliwrath.

Vampires are cool. Vampires are also immortal. Like, real immortal. Not that fake immortal, like a lot of people like to claim. I think Hitler said he was immortal at some point. That obviously wasn’t true. I think. Maybe the plot of Wolfenstein has some basis in reality though, and Hitler is still alive out there. Would it sitll be considered living if he’s in a robot suit? Or is that a form of death. I think he had some voice clips in 3D.

He was speaking English though. Maybe it was just a lookalike. A stand-in. What if that wasn’t actually a robot suit, and was just power armor. That would’ve been insane. It’s a good thing BJ Blazkowicz saved the day on that one. What if Hitler was a vampire? What could have stopped him then?

A lot of things, probably.

How do we really know that Hitler wasn’t a vampire anyway. There’s so many ridiculous versions of vampires that have cropped up through the annals of history that I sometimes wonder if there are real vampires. Just like, immune to sunlight. And don’t need to drink blood.

Like, what if everything we know about vampires is wrong? What if all of us are vampires? What if the only non-vampires are the people who can’t handle sunlight, and have to drink blood to survive?

What if Seaking was a vampire?

And what if Mozart was still alive?

DID YOU KNOW?

Once again displaying a staggering amount of laziness, Seaking is just a couple more goldfish put together to make a new one. I know that might sound like a weirdly specific thing to complain about, but a lot of future fish Pokemon are basically variations on their animal. Aside from the horn that isn’t even that big, Seaking is not.

Fancy!

Unlike Goldeen’s basis, the stuff that Seaking comes from is unfortunately significantly less pretty. This time the species of fish that Seaking’s body is based off of is called the Azuma Nishiki. They’re a type of Veil Tailed Goldfish, just like the Tosakin that Goldeen is based on. Unfortunately, they don’t look much like Seaking, aside from their shape.

That’s because their coloring is likely based off of a second fish. The Shubunkin.

I can see the resemblance from here!

And then there was a horn. And some sharp teeth. It’s still got that fluttery wispy tail though, making me think it’d be difficult for it to attain any sort of real speed and actually do well in a fight.

Seaking is useless. Don’t use it if you can help it. There’s so, so many better Water types. Go find a real Goldfish, and play Pokemon with that instead. It won’t affect you in battle, and it looks cooler!

USING SEAKING IN BATTLE

stats via pokemondb

I literally just said don’t use Seaking. What are you doing reading this? Stop!

If you’re just skimming though, I’ll go ahead and tell you how to use Seaking, should you want to. Seaking still has the wonderful ability Lightning Rod, and an okay-ish amount of bulk. It’s no longer got access to Eviolite, thanks to being fully evolved though, so you’ll want to attach a Life Orb to it for extra power. Generally, the sames moves as before work too. Aqua Tail or Waterfall for STAB, Megahorn, Knock Off, and Drill Run are good options for attacks. If you want to sacrifice coverage for power, Drill Run can be removed in exchange for Return, but I’d rather have Drill run myself. Throw EV’s into Attack and Speed to do the best you can with what little you have at your disposal.

In normal, singles battles, Seaking is phenomenally useless. It has a very low Attack Stat, so its decent-ish coverage combined with Lightning Rod will no longer make it worth considering. I will say though, that it has managed to find some use in Doubles, and the VGC meta in years past. I don’t know much anymore, but thanks to Lightning Rod it can neutralize Electric attacks from your opponents, or even absorb them from your own side for Special Attack boosts to fuel Surf or Ice Beam. In addition, things like Soak, and Horn Drill are nice little wrinkles to its moveset that are completely useless in singles battles.

I don’t know how well it still holds up today, but I can say this much. Don’t use Seaking in singles.

ARBITRARY SCORES

APPEARANCES: 1/5
Dumb. Generic. These are some words that come to mind when discussing Seaking.

DESIGN: 1/5
Awul. Boring. These are some more words that come to mind when discussing Seaking.

BATTLE: 1/5
Seriously. Stats people. A little lesson in minmaxing could have saved Seaking.

WHAT HAS SEAKING: DONE/TO YOU?
I don’t know but I hope it goes away and never returns.

OVERALL: 1/5

Male Seaking still have a slightly larger horn!

#118 Goldeen

The superior orange and white fish

Goldeen is a butterface. Everything on Goldeen is nice and pretty, but the face… The face just kinda ruins it. A fish with eyelids is kinda weird, but the green eyes are pretty. The weird part is the big sharp horn, and the weird pink lips. Because it makes Goldeen look very feminine, but, well, you should know how that winds up when Goldeen evolves.

It doesn’t. I don’t quite know what Seaking translates to in Japanese, but it doesn’t really matter. Because it loses all of that too.

And it gets a lot smaller too!

I think my problem with all of it is that Goldeen evolves into Seaking. If Seaking and Goldeen were two sides of the same coin, separate but equal it’d be cool. But if Goldeen, a super feminine Pokemon with a tail that looks like a nice frilly… thing. It’s not quite a dress? In the anime Misty wore a swimsuit styled after a Goldeen and it really drove home just how feminine this thing looks.

But then Seaking is a big ugly thing. Is it trying to tell us a lesson that nothing lasts forever, especially beauty? Or… what. It’s also got weird pink lips. I don’t know if these are just supposed to be fish lips or if they’re supposed to be visually reminiscent of a woman wearing lipstick.

Like what you see big boy?

I mean I’m no genius when it comes to recognizing things that the artist may have intended when making a Pokemon, but I’d like to think that I can tell with a design as deliberate as Goldeen’s. It’s referred to as the Goldfish Pokemon, despite not being yellow, or Golden colored at all.

You know what else I love? Being proven wrong. Sometimes some people have huge egos and don’t like when they’re proven to be incorrect about something, but I kind of love it. Because it means I’ve actually learned something. And I’m saying that because I totally did. See, when I began this I was criticizing Goldeen for not looking like a goldfish. And why was that? Because this is the only mental image that would pop up when I searched my brain for goldfish.

meep

Small. Golden. Bug eyed.

Turns out there’s several species of the things. And that’s when I get annoyed. Goldeen has an absolutely atrocious name in Japanese. It’s Tosakinto, which is only 2 letters off of the name of a species of goldfish, the Tosakin. And what does a Tosakin goldfish look like?

OH MY GOD SUDDENLY THIS IS SO MUCH LAZIER

Yup. I started writing this knowing one thing, and now I’ve been proven wrong. IN MY OWN ARTICLE. But, rather than rewrite the entire first half of this, I figured I’d let you all know that you’re probably wrong too. Also Tosakin aren’t the only goldfish that Goldeen seems to resemble. There’s also a touch of what may be veiltail in there too maybe. I don’t know. I’m not a fish person. Ask a fish person.

It’s pretty though!

DID YOU KNOW?

This one is undoubtedly obvious to a lot of people, but I’m going to go forward with it anyway.

Goldeen has been in all 4 Super Smash Bros. games, and hasn’t been playable in any of them. It shares this rare distinction with only two other Pokemon, Snorlax and Mew!

In Smash Bros for N64, Goldeen was a horrible jpeg that would promptly use splash by flopping around uselessly. If it was lucky it would fall off an edge and into the infinite abyss below. If it was unlucky then it would just keep flopping around on land until the lack of water made the poor thing explode in a puff of fishy vapor.

In Melee, Goldeen was upgraded to having an actual 3D model now. When it came out of a Pokeball it would use Splash, but, this time, if it was on a stage that had water on the outside, it would swim int he water and go offscreen if it managed to flop off and land in the water.

There wasn’t much of a change going from Melee to Brawl unfortunately. The model might have been sharpened up a tiny bit, had its animations tweaked, and maybe got an updated sound effect. It’s essentially the same Goldeen though. Still comes out and uses Splash until it expires.

And finally, in the recently released Smash 4, Goldeen makes another appearance. Once again it uses Splash, but this time it’s got a really nice new HD model and texture. Goldeen has never looked better!

Fun fact: Goldeen can’t learn Splash in any Pokemon game.

USING GOLDEEN IN BATTLE
Little Cup only!

stats via pokemondb

Not much to look at here. Goldeen is remarkably average for an LC Pokemon across the board. However, it is saved by access to a pretty snazzy ability. Or, at least, it’s good on a Water type like Goldeen.

Lightning Rod! Yes, Goldeen gets access to Lightning Rod, which not only removes one of its 2 weaknesses, it also gives Goldeen a boost to its Special Attack stat when it’s hit by an Electric move. Unfortunately, Goldeen has a terrible Special Attack stat, so it’ll mainly be there as a fantastic pairing with Eviolite in adding to Goldeen’s survivability.

Anyway, Goldeen’s movepool is relatively shallow, but it does give it a pretty wide amount of coverage. Aqua Tail is a good Water typed STAB, meaning you’ve got 3 slots left for coverage. Luckily, Goldeen’s shallow movepool includes the great options Megahorn, Drill Run, and Knock Off! If you don’t want to use one of those, well, too bad. The only other option worth considering is Poison Jab, but those 4 moves are significantly better coverage options than Poison Jab. However, if you’re having a hard time with Fairies, then by all means, feel free to remove anything but Aqua Tail for it.

Add EV’s to Attack and Speed, and your Goldeen will be good to go! Just make sure you have Lightning Rod as an ability, because removing a weakness entirely is absolutely amazing.

ARBITRARY SCORES

APPEARANCES: 3/5
A really pretty fish with a frilly wavy tail fin pattern thing. Shame about that face though.

DESIGN: 1/5
This would have scored higher had I not learned that goldfish come in more than one variety. This is laziness.

BATTLE: 3/5
Middling stats prevent it from achieving greatness, but a fantastic ability and pretty decent coverage despite the shallow movepool make it worth considering.

****: YEAH/SEAKING
You’re a day early. I’ll be covering that tomorrow.

OVERALL: 2.3/5

Male Goldeen have a bigger horn than female!

#117 Seadra

Now do it again, but angrier! And sharper!

It’s been 10 long days since I did Horsea. Sometimes life likes to grab you by the cheeks and throw you around for awhile, so you can’t spare the time required to write dumb, mildly amusing articles about Pokemon. But now I’m back, and I’m going to make a goal for myself here and now. Within 30 days of this being posted, I will be done with Generation 1, and be on Generation 2! In addition, I’ll make up for my 10 days of absence by doing an extra feature. Another review, but this time, of a fan game. A fan game I am not a fan of. Stay tuned!

Horsea has gone through some growing pains and become the much more intimidating Seadra. Or, at least Seadra is pretty much as intimidating as you can get a seahorse to look without strapping real weapons onto it. All the nice smooth curves are gone and have been replaced with innumerable sharp edges, and a scaly belly.

It’s still just a seahorse though. A three foot eleven seahorse, but it completely lacks any sort of teeth to make it scary.

BOO ON THAT AWFUL PUN

I mentioned it last time but I do like how Seadra’s eyes are black now. it’s a subtle thing to make it look more intimidating for reasons I can’t properly explain. Why are black eyes intimidating? I don’t know, and neither do you, so don’t even lie and say you do.

Unless you’re like, an actual expert on visual arts and such. Then go ahead, and please explain. I’d like to know! I find that sort of thing fascinating.

Unlike Seadra, who’s just kind of… there.

Don’t say it in front of the Seadra!

I mentioned it ages ago but I’ll mention it again here. Generation 1 was actually intended to have 190 Pokemon initially, instead of the 151 we got. Included in the 39 that were cut was Horsea’s second evolution, Kingdra. Seadra was probably never intended to be released as a fully evolved Pokemon, and it definitely does have a mid-tier look to it compared to most of the other Pokemon in Generation 1.

But do you know what really bothers me? Horsea and Seadra are the first Pokemon numerically that absolutely can not function outside of the water. I suppose an argument can be made for Tentacuel and Tentacruel, but we don’t know how strong those tentacles are. We do know that their bodies are primarily water, so they’re not exactly bulky.

This is a whole other level though.

Seadra’s body ends in a cute little curly tail thing. It can’t uncurl that, and have a makeshift leg to stand on, and, given its shape, there’s no way that it can even attempt to work on land.

But you know what? I’m glad that Seadra has this distinction. Because there is absolutely nothing to talk about with Seadra. While Seadra may be the first one numerically, it’s definitely not the only Pokemon that can’t work on land, as the very next line is Goldeen, and soon after that we have Magikarp. So, let’s all give a thanks to Seadra, for being in the right place at the right time, and saving me from writer’s block.

DID YOU KNOW?

 Evolution! It’s what Pokemon do when whatever their personal random requirements to do so are fulfilled. It’s rather different from real life evolution, and a few scholarly individuals have pointed out that “evolution” in Pokemon is something more akin to metamorphosis.

IGNORE THE FACT THAT SEADRA IS STANDING OUT OF WATER

However, whether you believe in evolution or not, Seadra’s Pokedex entries actually make reference to the real life version. Ahem, and I quote, from Pokemon HeartGold.

An examination of its cell revealed the presence of a gene not found in Horsea. It became a hot topic.

Awful clothing stores aside, this is an interesting reference to real life evolution, where, well, exactly that happens. Genes not found in the older species will pop up in the newer ones, giving them different traits, even if not visible. Of course, in context, it also makes sense as it’s referencing Seadra’s affinity to the Dragon type, and how it’ll evolve if traded holding a scale.

And, yeah. That’s it. Seadra is boring. I don’t know what you expected. If you want more, wait about 4 years for me to get to Generation 6 when I’ll talk about Dragalge and complain about how they based 2 different Pokemon off of Seahorses. Although I suppose Dragalge is more of a leafy green sea dragon than a regular sea horse.

Legitimately thought this was dead at first.

USING SEADRA IN BATTLE

stats via pokemondb

Look at those stats. Absolutely disgusting.

Eviolite, Substitute, Disable. You’re basically Gengar, but not nearly as fast, and not nearly as great offensively. Eviolite is a huge boon though, and can help you tank hits assuming you invest in some HP.

After that? There’s not much else Seadra can do. Hydro Pump is a nice strong STAB, but with 95 Base Special Attack, you might just be better off using Scald instead and fishing for burns.

GET IT? FISHING! BECAUSE-

Anyway, as for your last move, you’ll want to probably stick Ice Beam onto the set. Ice is always a fantastic coverage type, and the only other real attack worth considering that Seadra has access too is Dragon Pulse. Unfortunately, despite the name, Seadra is not a Dragon type yet, and Dragon is a terrible type for attack coverage. Doubly so since the only thing it hits Super Effectively, itself, is also hit SE by Ice.

Seadra is not an exceptional Pokemon by any means. You should definitely only be using it in situations where terrible Pokemon are allowed to flourish.

ARBITRARY SCORES

APPEARANCES: 3/5
I guess this is as intimidating as a Seahorse can get. I definitely would be more afraid of a Seadra than a Kingdra, I can tell you that much.

DESIGN: 2/5
Lazy. Add spikes and sharp edges to the nicely curved Horsea, and you get a Seadra. Still looks kinda cool, I guess.

BATTLE: 2/5
At least it has a gimmick!

10 DAYS: AND YOU COME BACK/WITH THIS?
I’m sorry! I really am. But I want to be over and done with Generation 1, and I fully intend to do that within the next month. I also want to write that review I mentioned, and I’ll be contributing a piece to another blog soon. When that’s done I’ll make sure to link it from here!

OVERALL: 2.3/5

Keep flapping those fins. They won’t do any good on land.

#116 Horsea

Everything about this is cute.

It’s been awhile since I had to do a Pokemon that was just designed from the very beginning to be cute. Horsea’s got itself a cute little swirly for a tail, and a big peashooter for a mouth. And then there’s those huge eyes. They’re red, to let you know that even if it’s a sea Pokemon, the salt water hurts its eyes too.

I typed that last sentence as a joke, but I got genuinely curious about that, so I did some good old fashioned fact checking. And, yup, it turns out that Horsea’s eyes are no longer red upon evolution. I don’t think it’s because Horsea is supposed to have red, irritated eyes from being a newborn, but I get the feeling that someone out there is going to take it as a serious statement and make a new theory out of it.

WHAT HAVE I DONE?!

Quick! Intercept with an entirely different theory!

So everyone likes to point out that Horsea is very obviously based on a seahorse, right. And then it can shoot ink. But seahorses can’t shoot ink! So, obviously, another sea animal came into play, that being Squids, or Octopi. Why? Because they shoot ink. Horsea is a seahorse that shoots ink. It all makes sense.

However, consider the following.

What if Horsea’s roots are much more sinister? What if that’s not ink it’s spraying out, but poison. Horrible terrible poison. And now look at that picture. Horsea from the front, with those big spikes coming off of its head. Then it’s got a tendency to shoot black liquid. Are you following me yet? Do you know where I’m going with this?

OH GOD. OH GOD. OH GOD. I WANT TO GO HOME.

That’s right. I propose that Horsea is instead based off of a Dilophosaurus. I mean, if we ignore minor things like how the dinosaur lived on land while Horsea lives in the sea, or how their bodies aren’t really similar at all, then they’re pretty much the same thing.

They’ve both got big flashy heads, and they spew black things from their mouth. If you just drape a cloth over Horsea’s head then you’ve basically got a Dilophosaurus’s frill. Now, I’m not saying that Junichi Masuda or Satoshi Tajiri ripped it off, but I am saying this.

Jurassic Park was released in 1993. The first versions of Pokemon were released in Japan in 1996. Horsea’s index number being 92 is a pretty good indicator that it was added fairly late into the game too, further supporting my theory.

It’s raining Nedry! Just wipe it off!

And that’s how awful theories get started. You bring up any objectionable points that would disprove the theory yourself, and then brush them off as being unimportant. Then, you load up your viewer with evidence. It doesn’t matter if it’s circumstantial or real, just so long as you can keep listing things to make your supporting argument look big, and complicated.

The more you know.

OH GOD MAYBE IT REALLY IS BASED ON A DILOPHOSAURUS

DID YOU KNOW?

This is another one of those minor things, but Horsea actually used to have two fins, instead of just the single backfin that it has now. It’s very obvious in Horsea’s original art.

They’re also at the sides, not the back

The position of them is different too, which makes me wonder if they were gonna be used differently. The single fin on the back nowadays looks more like it’s supposed to serve as a rotor, so Horsea can steer and make quick turns if it needs to. The original design looks more to me like the fins were basically intended to be hand-analogues. If you wanted to shake Horsea’s hand, it would raise a fin and you’d shake it! That’s only an assumption though, so who knows.

However, what makes this a little more interesting than other ancient retcons is that Horsea was actually depicted like this in other works for awhile. Sort of. Even in the game it looks like Horsea has a single fin, but…

Or maybe the manga’s just wrong.

In at least one of the manga, Horsea was depicted with that twin-fin design! This picture is from Magical Pokemon Journey, which had a few major changes from other versions of Pokemon. The most notable one is that all Pokemon can speak the same language as humans.

The second most notable? Horsea’s double fins of course!

USING HORSEA IN BATTLE
Little Cup only!

stats via pokemondb

Horsea is not great. That 70 in Defense and Special Attack is pretty decent for a Little Cup Pokemon, but it falls short in every other area and is just  all around a sub par Pokemon.

First things first though, don’t even bother with Horsea unless you’re using a Rain team. While Horsea evolutions may be able to make use of the Sniper ability, the best that Horsea itself can do is Swift Swim. With doubled Speed in rain, Horsea can use a STAB boosted Hydro Pump to smash apart a pretty decent number of things that would try to stop it. Ice Beam is always a fantastic option for coverage, and for a third moveslot you’ll probably want Substitute. If you’d prefer to play safe though, Substitute can be swapped out for Rain Dance.

You know, I’m just realizing that it’s been a long time since I’ve written about a Pokemon that has 4 moveslot syndrome. For those unaware, 4 moveslot syndrome is just the fan nickname for a Pokemon that is filled to bursting with good options for attacks, and would be insanely better if it had an extra moveslot availble.

Bringing that up because a lot of things recently have been a strugle to come up with a good fourth move. Horsea is one of them, with Hidden Power pretty much being the only good option. Seriously. The only other move it gets access to that isn’t Water or Ice typed is Flash Cannon, and Steel is a terrible type offensively. Anyway, for Hidden Power you’ll want either Grass, or Ground. Then just add a Life Orb on top for a boost in power.
ARBITRARY SCORESAPPEARANCES: 5/5
Horsea is absolutely adorable. Even its cry is cute.DESIGN: 5/5
Making use of a seahorse’s weird trumpet mouth to shoot ink is a pretty great idea in terms of design. Alternatively, Dilophosauruses man!BATTLE: 2/5
Not great. There’s better Pokemon to consider for your rain team.OVERALL: 4/5

We were sailing along on moonlight bay~

#099 Kingler

*Spongebob Squarepants reference*

Good lord I kept trying to find it in me to write this but it simply wasn’t happening. So I’m forcing it because a week off was nice but also too much wasted time.

Some people might try and say that Kingler is no better than Krabby. Because “it just gets bigger” and it’s still “just a cartoon crab, except now it’s a fiddler crab.”

I don’t think this is necessarily true though. At first glance, yes, Kingler is just a bigger version of Krabby with a BIG, MEATY, CLAW. But there’s a little more to it. Kingler’s big spikes on its head are now a little reminiscent of a crown. The kind of crown that, say, a king would wear.

Interesting!

I also find it interesting that Kingler has the exact same name in both English and Japanese. It’s not like I’m just digging too deeply into Kingler’s appearance looking for dots to connect! The names both have King, and ler. So, the real question is, what’s a ler? (Answered in section 2!)

Really though, if I’m being honest, I’m a big fan of Kingler. A common trope in, well, anything, is the oversized weapon. A weapon that is colossal, and probably unwieldy as all get out, but that the person holding it uses like a pro. I don’t like when it’s too silly, like Cloud’s Buster Sword in Final Fantasy 7, but I love it when it’s still got at least a tiny tinge of reality to it, like Ike’s Rangnell in Fire Emblem.

INTERCEPTED!

Kingler doesn’t achieve the perfect balance, though. It gets points for that MASSIVE claw being completely organic, and part of its body, but, well, Kingler just doesn’t look like a very tough Pokemon aside from that. It’s got thin, spindly legs that odn’t look at all suitable for transporting that huge mass of claw around. Also, there’s the fact that its Pokedex entries say as much. Repeatedly.

In this space I was going to just quote Pokedex entries that talk about Kingler’s claw being an unwieldy, but powerful piece of hardware. It turns out though, that every single Pokedex entry from Kingler’s inception until today makes those exact claims. I do find it unusual that the power in Kingler’s claw is measured in horsepower (10,000 to be exact) as opposed to a measurement system that would probably be more relevant, like maybe pounds per square inch.

Oh hey it’s just King-OHMYGOD

Random aside before I move on, holy CRAP Kingler is HUGE. Look at that massive thing! Imagine that giant piece of hard shell and powerful claw just scuttling along the beach! How awful would that be?! It’s because of this and many, many other reasons that I have to assume that the Pokemon world is not a very pleasant to be. Sure, there’s all kinds of nice and friendly Water types, but I can’t help but imagine front-page news stories talking about a Kingler that killed dozens of people.

Kingler is not the kind of thing to take lightly.

DID YOU KNOW?

Now, when I first saw Kingler I thought it was being referenced as like a pistol shrimp or something, because those guys will basically fire water bullets by snipping their claws together super hard. But, no. Turns out that Kingler is based off of the Fiddler crab, which is also where it got the last part of its name. King + Fiddler = Kingler. Wow, words are fun!

You can just taste the sarcasm

Yup. Kingler is absolutely based on a real crab. Fiddler’s are kinda crazy. Males use that giant monster horrible claw there to fight off other males in a battle for dominance. Since they’re crabs, and crabs are hardcore, I can only assume that the loser gets their claw ripped off or something.

Something interesting I read about while doing the research basically said that if, for whatever reason, the fiddler were to lose that giant claw, its other arm would grow into a massive huge claw the next time it sheds its shell. So they’re kinda, ambidextrous, I think? Surprisingly, Wikipedia did not devote a space for the all-time best fiddler combatants, and whether or not the switching after losing a claw affected their ability to wield it.

Female fiddler’s will also choose their mate based off of both how large their claw is, and how good they are at waving it around. I could make some allusions here to male genitalia and come to the conclusion that maybe we’re not all that different from these crabs, but I’ll let you connect those dots yourself.

USING KINGLER IN BATTLE

stats via pokemondb

75 Speed is not great. It’s not great enough to make it so it’s hard to justify running a Choice Scarf set. I know that other Pokemon with comparable Speed could also run a scarf, like Heatran, but, well, those Pokemon tend to have better overall stats than Kingler.

Kingler does one thing well and only one thing. Having a nice, fat, 130 Attack stat. Throw a Choice Band onto Kingler, and load it up with Knock Off, Superpower, X-Scissor, and then choose between Crabhammer and Waterfall. Your best option is really to be a hit and run attacker thanks to that fragile Special Defense stat and low HP.  Those four moves are really pretty much your only good options (Before the Knock Off buff, most Kingler’s would actually resort to Return for that last slot, or try for a boosting set)

Kingler is as one note as you can get. A mono water type with high Attack and only a small handful of moves to abuse it with. Kingler’s power can certainly put a dent in just about anything, but don’t expect it to do too much for you thanks to that limited coverage and poor Speed.

ARBITRARY SCORES

APPEARANCES: 3/5
I don’t like crabs. I do like how fake crabs taste though.

DESIGN: 3/5
Literally a cartoon fiddler crab. However, at least it’s a specific kind of crab, and has a giant huge claw for coolness factor. Kingler’s at least better than Krabby. Also it has a crown. Like a real king.

BATTLE: 2/5
Great Attack stat, shame about the everything else.

WOW I WAITED: A WEEK/FOR THIS?
Sorry! I’m doing a lot for Christmas. I may do something for this blog, too! I’m not sure what quite yet though.

OVERALL: 2.6/5

Kingler holds that claw like it’s a gun and it’s an unstable individual.

#098 Krabby

Creative!

Someone at GameFreak said, “Draw a cartoon crab!”

And now we have Krabby.

What’s that, you say? I’m just making things up? Well, you’re right. I don’t have any direct evidence linking this claim to reality, but I do have some anecdotal evidence. First off, just, I mean, just look at it! It’s literally a cartoon crab! Secondly, Krabby’s name. It’s just crabby with a K instead of a C. That’s it. And don’t even get me started on its Japanese name.

Or do. It’s Crab. Literally crab. You can’t make this up people! Or, well, I suppose you can, but I’m not!

Here’s Krabby enjoying a [JELLY DONUT]

I’m finding it very difficult to write about Krabby, much in the same way that I’d find it difficult to write about a real crab. Except Krabby is worse. Were this an article about a real crab I could go on about how crunchy crabs are if you step on them, or how I’ve never eaten a crab. I’ve eaten fake crab though, like in crab cakes and such. Like I’ve said before, I live nowhere near a coast so chances are that most of the seafood I’ve ever experienced has been processed. Like fish sticks. Fish sticks are great.

“I THOUGHT THIS ARTICLE WAS GOING TO BE ABOUT ME.”

Fake crab meat is actually made out of a finely pulverized white fish meat that is then shaped to resemble a crab’s legs. There’s like 10 more steps to the process, but they’re not particularly important, I just thought you should all know that they’re still made of fish, even if they’re not really crab.

I’ve only ever had it in crab salad though. I really want to expand my horizons in seafood and crab-based cuisines, but the opportunities for that don’t really exist here. At least, not in a way I’m all that interested. I’m sure I could find myself a nice seafood dinner somewhere in town if I really wanted, but it’d probably come at a premium price, and I’m not all about that. I’d rather just walk to my grocery store, pick up some fake crab meat, and throw it into stuff. It’s still pretty good (At least to me) even if it’s not real.

THIS IS SUPPOSED TO BE ABOUT ME!

I’ve never even had clam chowder, which literally everyone in the history of humanity tells me is a delicious thing. I’ve been meaning to try some sometime, but I never have. The only reasonably fresh seafood I think I’ve ever had is shrimp, which I love. I was going to go on about how I love to just pop whole shrimps into my mouth and pretend like I’m a big scary shark or something, but then I remembered that popcorn shrimp exists. As much as I love regular shrimp, I still vastly prefer the deep-fried and not-at-all like the original tasting version.

Man. Writing about seafood has made me really hungry. Who wants to come to Long John Silver’s© (REMEMBER WHEN I SAID I’M NOWHERE NEAR THE COAST?) with me?.

TIME TO GET THAT FREE MONEY!

DID YOU KNOW?

The last bit of that was a joke, by the way. I know I shouldn’t have to say it, because the thought of Long John Silver’s advertising on an extremely obscure Pokemon blog of all places is laughable at best and the single most desperate attempt to stay relevant at worst. But I feel the need to say it just in case there’s any conspiracy nuts out there who despise being advertised to with every fiber of their being.

“I don’t like where this is going.”

I do have to wonder about the people like that, though. I mean, advertising is literally everywhere. Hell, I’m pretty sure this blog has ads on it. I don’t make any money off of them, but I imagine that WordPress somehow gets a little bit of money from what I’m doing in order to continually offer this (terrible) service for free. But how does someone who is violently opposed to all forms of supposed to get by on a day to day basis? I can’t imagine you’d be able to watch TV, because that’s riddled with ads. If you buy all your TV via DVD or BluRay they even come with ads at the beginning! I guess if you go to like, Netflix exclusively or something an argument can be made.

Anyway, I got a little off track there for awhile. The point is, lighten up a little people. I don’t make any money off of this, so when I make a joke about the delicious 8-piece fried Shrimp combo available now at Long John Silver’s© for only $7.29! What a deal!

Oh, also Krabby says “cookie” in the anime instead of its name. It’s silly, but it wasn’t enough to write a full section on.

USING KRABBY IN BATTLE
Little Cup only!

stats via pokemondb

Look at that Attack stat. I think that’s the highest Attack stat for Little Cup that I’ve covered so far. It may be the highest Attack stat for Little Cup period, but don’t quote me on that.

50 Speed isn’t the best, but it’s certainly workable. Give Krabby Agility, and oh my goodness if you can pull off that Agility you’ll have yourself a team wrecking machine. If you think you can pull off a second turn of boosting then Swords Dance is a great secondary move, otherwise you’ll want three attacks to use. Crabhammer is the obvious favorite, being a fantastic Water-typed STAB with only 90% Accuracy as its drawback. After that, Return, and Knock Off are also excellent contenders. Rock Slide, X-Scissor, and Brick Break are just about Krabby’s only other options for coverage though. Superpower is swappable with Brick Break if you want a much weaker version without the obvious downside of having your attack lowered after using it. Hyper Cutter is the best option for an ability, and either Berry Juice or Eviolite will increase Krabby’s survivability.

Krabby is extremely frail on the Special Defense front though, so use it cautiously.

ARBITRARY SCORES

APPEARANCES: 1/5
It’s literally a cartoon crab.

DESIGN: 1/5
It’s literally a cartoon crab.

BATTLE: 4/5
Hilarious Attack, solid Defense, and terrible everything else. Made less terrible thanks to Little Cup though.

I LEARNED A LOT: ABOUT KRABBY/TODAY
You’re welcome.

OVERALL: 2/5
Everyday I’m scuttlin’

#091 Cloyster

Now this is a face I can trust!

First things first: A correction! Like I said yesterday, I don’t know much about the coasts cause I live in an area completely secluded from that. It turns out that a giant tongue sticking out of a clam isn’t all that weird. Be warned, this is a little gross.

In addition, they’re a bit more mobile than I gave them credit for, as seen here:

Anyway, let’s talk about Cloyster. It’s got a creepy face on a black sphere, and its shell has gotten way more hardcore since its days of being a Shellder. There’s a bunch of spikes everywhere, and Cloyster as a whole looks a lot less like a Pokemon that I’d want to meet in a dark alley.

W-Why’s it glowin’ red man?

If there’s one thing I really like about Cloyster though, it’s that smirk. I don’t know if I’ve mentioned it here before, but if there’s one thing I don’t like it’s apathy. A smirk isn’t exactly the opposite of apathy, but it shows confidence, and you aren’t confident if you’re apathetic! What makes Cloyster so cocky? Maybe it’s the fact that it’s encased in an incredibly hard shell. How hard? Well, Cloyster has the highest Defense stat of any Generation 1 Pokemon.

What? Is that not impressive enough for you? Well, how about this. In the nearly 20 years and five additional generations since Pokemon became a thing, there have only been four Pokemon with a higher Defense stat than Cloyster. And one of those is only higher by a measly four points.

Cloyster walks up to your Psyduck and pinches its ass, what do you do?

Unfortunately, the biggest thing bringing Cloyster down is its typing. While it’s got enough Defense to tank literally anything coming its way for days, it’s been burdened with the Ice type. Now, I don’t mean this to be offensive to anyone who likes Ice types, because, well, I’m one of those people. I loved the thought of exploding a Dragonite with a single Ice Beam, and the like. Unfortunately, Ice is probably the worst type to go defensive with because of its many common weaknesses. On the offensive side, Ice remains fantastic, but many of its best moves are also available to the many Water types out there, leaving you little reason to actually burden yourself with an Ice type weakness.

Leading the charge is Cloyster. A Pokemon that would excel above all others and be known as an incredible threat to all is made only a medium-sized threat because of its many weaknesses. And that’s it. That’s all that is stopping Cloyster from sweeping the entire game and being the best Pokemon there ever was and ever will be.

I may be exaggerating just a little.

At least, that’s what Cloyster’s face tells me. Look at that cocky son-of-a-gun. I want to just punch his stupid face in, but I also can’t help but wonder if my fist would just go right through his head? What if Cloyster isn’t solid at all, aside from the shell, and is just a gaseous being. I think I remember hearing a theory about that somewhere…

I couldn’t think of a way to fit this in, but I adore this image of Cloyster using Shell Smash, so take it for free. Click for source.

DID YOU KNOW?

I know that I’ve shown my disdain for Pokemon theories in the past. There’s a good reason for that. A solid 90-95% of them are the dumbest things you’ve ever heard, or completely falsified. It’s the worst having to deal with the people who subscribe to these theories, and listen to their horrible conversations about Pokemon. Today’s theory falls into that 90-95%.

I love how presumptuous that first sentence is.

That’s right. A popular theory is around that Cloyster is either a shell possessed by a Gastly, or that a Gastly is a Cloyster who’s died. Now, let’s look at why these people believe this could be true.

1. Cloyster and Gastly both have a round body with similarly shaped faces.
2. They’re next to each other in the Pokedex.
3. ???
4. WASN’T TWO ENOUGH FOR YOU?!

Anyway, Gastly possessing a shell is easy to disprove because, well, Cloyster evolves from Shellder. That’s the only way to get one. Some people will try to claim that Shellder is also a shell possessed by a Gastly, but Shellder is different enough for that thought to be silly. As for dead Cloysters becoming Gastly, well, that’s harder to disprove. Because I can’t, really.

Except logically. See, the whole point of a theory like this is to try and determine what the creators may have intended, but kept secret from everyone. The only thing I can see when I read a theory like this is someone sitting in the dark desperately trying to make connections where none were intended. The thought that “This is what the developers intended” is what makes certain Pokemon theories gain so much traction that people take them as fact exclusively. For a good example of this, go try reading about the Cubone -> Kangaskhan theory, and the Ditto -> Mew theory. I’ll get to those in due time, but trust me, I don’t have anything nice to say about them.

So, with that all out of the way, there’s still the fact that Cloyster looks an awful lot like a Gastly to address. If I’m making the argument that it wasn’t intended, then why do they look so similar? Simple. Cloyster’s body is a real, honest to goodness black pearl. Which, yes, are real. This explains Cloyster’s body shape, and its similarity to Gastly’s gaseous body.

Not just the villains in a Disney movie!

USING CLOYSTER IN BATTLE

stats via pokemondb

Remember what I said yesterday? Do that again. Shell Smash + Icicle Spear + Rock Blast. Cloyster also gets access to Spike Cannon, which also works with Skill Link, but I wouldn’t use it because Normal type coverage is a coverage almost nobody needs. Ice Shard is a good priority move if you’re fighting against priority yourself, or Razor Shell / Hydro Pump are good STAB options if you want a solid Water typed move for use. A Focus Sash will make it so your Cloyster can’t get exploded in one shot, and will guarantee you get a Shell Smash off. If you’d like more power instead, a Life Orb will make Cloyster deadly.

Or you can go with the hilarious third option for an item. A King’s Rock. King’s Rock gives all of your moves a 10% chance of flinching your opponent. Normally, it’s rather useless. However, because Skill Link makes things hit 5 times, this raises your chance to a beautiful 50% chance of flinching. And since Cloyster’s Speed is at +2 from a Shell Smash, it’s likely you’re going to go first and keep your opponent flinchlocked. It’s fantastic.

Cloyster does have another option though, thanks to its amazing defense. It can run a bit of a supporting role, by littering your opponent’s side of the field with Spikes or Toxic Spikes, and carrying Rapid Spin in order to remove any unwanted debris on your side of the field. Explosion finds its way into Cloyster’s moveset as well, and will do a good job of making anyone who has to eat the move feel terrible about it afterward.

In short, Cloyster is fantastic. It’s fallen out of use a bit as Priority has neutered fast attackers a bit, but its stellar Defense will ensure it can still survive almost anything thrown at it. At least on the Physical side. Even Cloyster will tremble at the sight of any Special attackers.

ARBITRARY SCORES

APPEARANCES: 3/5
Look at that shell. I don’t wanna be near anything that looks like that and can learn a move called Spike Cannon.

DESIGN: 4/5
I love Cloyster’s design. The shell isn’t just a regular shell anymore, it’s a crazy terrifying super spiky shell of death. It’s also got a black pearl for a face! It’s also a euphemism for a lady’s parts, but I don’t want to link to anything pornographic here, so I’ll just leave it at that.

BATTLE: 5/5
Sure it’s not as good as it once was, but it’s still a terrifying threat to behold that can sweep entire teams if they’re unprepared.

BUT POKEMON: THEORIES ARE/SO COOL
Creativity is cool, as is looking at things in newer, more interesting ways. However there’s a limit to this and we crossed it a long time ago.

OVERALL: 4/5

Hey kid. Come a little closer.

#090 Shellder

I don’t know how this works anatomically

Whew. I started this two days ago but my internet was acting up and I couldn’t upload any files to wordpress. I considered doing this without pictures, but it was really strange, so I decided to put it off. Then yesterday there’s power outages and I’m again unable to do this. I did spend some time going back and correcting little errors I noticed here and there on previous entries. If you notice anymore, please comment so I can know about them and correct them.

Anyway, now that things are all cleared up and I’m now able to write! So, here we have Shellder. Shellder is a bivalve clam with two giant eyes and a big tongue sticking out. It’s… weird. It also feels like a hundred different euphemisms are being shoved in my face all at once. But only if the people working over at GameFreak have terrifying visions of the female anatomy.

Of course its tongue sticks out even when it’s resting!

I would go more into that whole euphemism thing, but, uh, Cloyster is somehow even worse about it, so I’ll leave that for tomorrow. For now, let’s just focus on this wet clam. I really don’t even know what they were going for with the tongue. it’s not really cute, and it doesn’t really add a whole lot to the whole clam aspect. I do like the eyes in the dark though. Because who hasn’t wondered what’s really inside of a clam from time to time?

The answer is this… apparently.

A quick poll among those I know confirms that wondering what’s inside a clam is just me. I live in a place far away from any sort of coast, so fresh seafood is an impossibility. I’ve never had a clam, and after seeing that image I’m not sure if the food really interests me. So the mystery has been solved. That is what’s inside of a clam!

As for Shellder? Well, we can only go by what we know. Which is literally nothing. It’s gotten to the point where people just assume that there isn’t anything secret in Shellder’s clam at all. The inky blackness housing a pair of eyes? Everyone now just assumes that that’s Shellder’s body. A black ball wrapped up in a harder-than-diamonds shell, because if there’s one thing the Pokedex was never lacking, it’s subtlety.

HEY WAIT A SECOND

In case you were wondering, further study hasn’t lead me to any sort of information about how Shellder changes form when it creates a Slowbro. A theory I think I mentioned back then was that the Shellder itself also evolved to create the big hermit-crab like shell it becomes. While this has its own set of problems, I did recently find out another one. Apparently, in the anime, Shellder has been shown continuing to say its name even when attached to a Slowpoke. So there goes that theory, if I hadn’t already debunked it.

Really. I don’t know. I don’t want to check either. I’m busy. Leave me alone!

TAAAAAAKE THIS! ICICLE SPEAR!

DID YOU KNOW?

Let’s talk about Pokemon Snap.

#only90skids

Way back in Pokemon’s heyday someone had some kind of crazy fever dream about a new Pokemon spinoff. The gimmick? It would be a rail shooter, except instead of guns, you’d be armed with a camera. Then you’d take your camera and take interesting pictures of Pokemon while playing as that loser Todd from the anime and sitting in some ridiculous yellow car.

Surprisingly, it wasn’t that bad. There were plenty of ways to interact with the Pokemon for the purposes of getting even better shots of them. There’s a few strange things about the game though, and one of them is Shellder.

IGNORE US!

Shellder will pop out of the water, do a little floaty routine, and then drop back into the water. It kind of reminds me of basic enemy patterns from sidescrolling shooters, but, uh, well. It’s weird. Very weird. Clams are the exact kind of animal that is almost completely immobile. A clam popping out of the water and flying around is so far into the realm of fantasy that it’s a little off-putting, if I’m being completely honest.

Of course, there’s also the fact that Shellder has never been shown to fly anywhere else. Ever. No other Shellder appearance has made it float around the sky, or do anything but just sit there, and maybe bounce around because it has to move somehow.

More importantly though, we need another Pokemon snap game. Both the 3DS and the WiiU have input methods that would do the game justice. This is important!

USING SHELLDER IN BATTLE
Little Cup only!

stats via pokemondb

Wow! Look at that Defense stat! Normally when a Pokemon like this pops up you think, “Give it Eviolite and have fun tanking attacks all day!”

Well, that would be a colossal waste of Shellder’s true potential. See, Shellder gets access to a rare ability called Skill Link. Skill Link will force every move with “Hits 2-5 times” in its description to hit the full five times. Shellder gets access to both Icicle Shard and Rock Blast, both of which will hit for five times with Skill Link. So, to use Shellder, you must give it Skill Link. If you’re worried about being outsped and destroyed, you can run a Choice Scarf and get to work smacking opponents immediately, or you can run Shell Smash, which Shellder also gets access to and is hands down one of the best boosting moves in the entire game, if not the best. Shell Smash will double your Attack, your Special Attack, and your Speed stats, at the cost of halving your Defense and Special Defense stats.

Skill Link and Shell Smash are a deadly combo. That leaves you with a move slot left, so you can opt for Ice Shard, if you need some priority to finish off an opponent who may have priority of its own, or you can run Razor Shell as a STAB that’ll only hit once. If you run Shell Smash, you’ll also want Eviolite, just to try and take any Special hits better, or just tank regular Attacks more effectively.

Shell Smash Shellder only needs one turn to become a game-ending threat, so you absolutely need to be careful when fighting one, or pick your Shell Smash opportunities carefully when using one.

ARBITRARY SCORES

APPEARANCES: 2/5
A tongue sticking out of a shell and some eyes. I don’t even.

DESIGN: 2/5
A clam with a tongue. Why not a foot? Clams have feet, right? At least, that’s the scientific part, I believe. I could be wrong and I really don’t care enough to double check.

BATTLE: 5/5
Shellder stronk.

WHAT: ABOUT/THAT THEORY
I’ll get to that tomorrow, just hold onto your butt.

OVERALL: 3/5

That gyrating tongue is the absolute worst.