Friday, June 22, 2012

BW2 info - The second day

Just like yesterday, everything's after the jump! And speaking of yesterday, I updated my post a couple times, so if you missed anything you might want to go back and read it.

- Random thought: I wonder if Iris' Aggron uses physical moves? Yes, I went there. (Probably Rock Head Head Smash, though.)

- Most news today are about the World Fanservice Tournament. There seems to be a kajillion different modes that can be unlocked, featuring gym leaders of all regions. The first non-Kanto, non-Unova leader to be confirmed today was Roxanne. Good thing I missed the SIGN OF REMAKES speculation, huh? This grinds my Klinklangs like you wouldn't believe. Anyway, the info on Serebii's front page is a mess right now, so I'll wait until he makes a special page about it before I start saying false stuff.

- The ultimate mode in the tournament is the very same tournament of champions Cynthia brought up in BW1 in one of her random dialogues during the summer. I don't know if they intended to make something like that back then, but there it is.

- The new genie forms' English names were made public, and they are the Therian forms. The word "therian" is related to shapeshifting, which makes sense.

- White Forest and Black City have a new area, the White Woodlands and the Black Skyscraper, where you battle a gauntlet of trainers, including Alder's... grandson. Sorry, still can't get over that.

- Unconfirmed as of yet, but the stat spreads for the Kyurem forms are apparently this:
    - Black Kyurem: 125 HP, 170 Atk, 100 Def, 120 SA, 90 SD, 95 Spd
    - White Kyurem: 125 HP, 120 Atk, 90 Def, 170 SA, 100 SD, 95 Spd
  If true, wow, that's some crazy attack power there. These BSTs are 700 by the way, higher than anything but Arceus. Even previous uber mascots. (Edit 12:35: Confirmed as accurate!)

- According to Nintendo Direct, Homika's English name is Roxie. Rock + Toxic. You know what? I like it. For some reason I find it not as blatant and in your face as other gym leader puns.

- Therian genies' stats:
   - Tornadus-T: 79 HP, 100 Atk, 80 Def, 110 SA, 90 SD, 121 Spd
   - Thundurus-T: 79 HP, 105 Atk, 70 Def, 145 SA, 80 SD, 101 Spd
   - Landorus-T: 89 HP, 145 Atk, 90 Def, 105 SA, 80 SD, 91 Spd
  So once again, Tornadus seems to have gotten the shaft big time. Bleh. Thundurus-T and Landorus-T seem like they have potential, but the loss of Prankster and Sand Force really hurts.

- Proof that they were really lazy with Keldeo's Resolution form: it has the exact same stats as the regular form. So unless there's a new ability, it's utterly pointless.

- Four DW Pokémon appear to be available in game from what we know so far. Serene Grace Sawsbuck, which is vastly inferior to Chlorophyll and even Sap Sipper? Pass. Skill Link Cinccino is a slight upgrade from Technician, so that's okay. Regenerator Amoonguss is a massive improvement compared to Effect Spore, good call on that one. Damp Jellicent is LOLzy in singles, so it's exclusively a doubles/triples thing. Stick with Water Absorb.

- Huge news: one of the Plasma Sages fights you on the Driftveil Drawbridge! This is good, as I've always complained about how useless they were in the first game.

- Fusion Flare and Fusion Bolt can be slapped on any form of Kyurem, since they're level-up moves for the White and Black forms respectively. This means they can be used as hand-me-downs on vanilla Kyurem, which might break into OU now that it has somewhat of a movepool.

- The airport and planes in Mistralton now serve a purpose! At one point Skyla takes you to an area near Undella and Black City / White Forest by plane. Yet another thing from BW1 that was there for nothing now finds a use, which is thrilling!

- A lot of the old Pokémon that appear in the new Unova Dex had their level-up movepools rearranged so that they learn their best moves before the 70s. Great news for those who want to use them!

- Northeastern Unova is part of the main game now (visited between gyms 6 and 7), and the musketeers are found there as well. I thought it was going to be a post-game thing again, but turns out I was wrong.

- After the dissapointment that was the gym and E4 lineups, we can add the rival, who has a starter, an elemental monkey, Unfezant and nothing else after the sixth gym. It seems like they really pulled out all the stops in some areas, then gave no thought to the simple spreadsheet stuff (an area that already requires little thought as is).

- Two brand new items have been found (don't know if they were actually obtained or just datamined), and you won't believe what they do: one increases the odds of finding a shiny, and another one increases fertility (takes less long to make an egg at the daycare). I guess the latter was going to be done at some point, but I did NOT expect the former.

- Judging by Roxanne's battle sprite (seen on a screenshot), it's pretty clear that the only character to have aged at all in this game is Iris (I guess you could count Caitlin if you count her DPP to BW1 transition though), cementing the World Fanservice Tournament as nothing more than... fanservice.

- One thing that was previously known was that while the Unova Dex had 300 Pokémon, the genie trio was #198, #199 and #200 instead of the traditional legendary gauntlet at the end of the Pokédex. More details on this: the musketeer trio is #225, #226 and #227. So if anyone had worries about the 300-mon Dex being borderline false advertisement, well, that's not the case.

- List of move tutor compatibility, right here. It'll take a while to dissect, but the one thing I did notice: no Ice Punch for Kyurem! This is a major blow for both the vanilla and Black forms, as they'll be stuck using Ice Beam or Blizzard no matter what... unless you want to take a chance with Freeze Shock? Either way, is it possible that we could see a Pokémon with no drawback ability and a mammoth BST of SEVEN HUNDRED in OU?

- Another tutor I really looked forward to was Drill Run, which could potentially be given to Pokémon that didn't have Earthquake. So, who falls in that category? Beedrill, Rapidash, Dewgong and Lapras. So much for being this gen's Heat Wave, huh?

- A theory that I had back when HGSS came out was that Gamefreak systematically denied OUs and ubers not named Mew the Super Fang tutor. So, did any old Pokémon who didn't get it then get it now? Well, no. What DOES invalidate my theory, though, is the fact that Scrafty, which is currently OU, does get Super Fang. Other new users include Swoobat and Eelektross.

13 comments:

  1. I'm still hoping for a modification on Freeze Shock and Ice Burn, because no matter how high are both of Kyurem's forms' stats, it would be pretty sad if their own signatures moves were downright unusable, even in-game.

    Even with a recharge turn like for Hyper Beam would already be a small improvement for in-game purposes, even if it wouldn't change a thing competitively.

    (And then Slowflake will reply that it's just fine as it is, because you can simply make them hold a Power Herb to be able to use a powerful stabbed attack of a good attacking type at least once. I know you want to.)

    I see what you did there about the World Tournament, but I still think it's a good idea.... x)
    (I'm talking about the idea of the tournament itself of course)

    Don't you dare mocking the Special Sweeping Aggron of DOOM ! D:<

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    1. Power Herb sizzucks bizzalls, yo. You were completely right there.

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  2. I'm not too fond of Roxie's name - it's just a shortened version of a previous Gym Leader (Roxanne). I would've preferred Brittney.

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    1. Because of Britney Spears' "Toxic", right? That would've been clever enough to go over a lot of people's heads.

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    2. Yep, because I don't think many people like Britney Spears. I don't like her, but I think people would've preferred Brittney (note the mispelling of Britney) to Roxie.

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  3. Sorry for commenting again, but wow. Tornadus-T supposed to focus on bulk ? What a joke. Not only the visual design was disappointing but they messed up the stat spread as well... *Facepalm*

    I really wanted to try to like Tornadus, but it seems Game Freak had other plans.

    About the Gym Leaders, at least they changed the puzzles, but I admit I would have preferred more varied teams...

    I completely forgot to ask you yesterday and this morning, but oh well... What do you think about the few Gen 5 Pokemon with their Dreamworld Ability we will be able to find in-game ?
    (Except maybe for Jellicent... xD )

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    1. Oops, forgot to bring that up in the update. I'll add that right now.

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  4. At least the sages actually DO SOMETHING this time around. Which is more than can be said with Charon in Platinum.

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  5. so strap a choice scarf on white kyurem, put it under the sun, and watch your enemy get obliterated? I know it not as simple as that but still....

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    1. Thank God Fusion Flare isn't STABbed, huh? Draco Meteor is going to sting like hell too...

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  6. This comment has been removed by the author.

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  7. I'm guessing datamining - they'll be event items I'd imagine! Or... we're getting extremely lucky with Nintendo. DESE GAMES I cannot WAIT.

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  8. Theria is the Greek word for beast; I assumed a "more-or-less literal" stance on translation there.

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