Sunday, October 27, 2013

Please, Gamefreak, don't ever do this again.

FUCK LUMIOSE CITY.

Yep, I finally get to get this out of my system. Lumiose City is terrible. I know, I'm not stupid, I know what Gamefreak was going for. "Ooooooh look at the pretty graphics." Unfortunately, this is one of those cases where gameplay really suffers. The camera angles, or should I say angle, is absolutely horrendous when it comes to figuring out where you are. Every area of the North and South Boulevard looks the same, all the plazas look the same, all the avenues look the same. There's simply no way to easily figure out where you are. Well, to be fair, there is one... there's a mini-map that appears when you change area so you have a little idea of where you are. Still, two major complaints: one, you didn't need to resort to that in Castelia, and two, it's still no guarantee of finding out where you want to go (again, unlike Castelia, mostly due to its size being much more reasonable). There's so much shit going on in this city that you WILL need a detailed map if you want to find anything that's not called the gym. Fortunately, such a thing exists, thanks to someone with far more time to waste than me. Castelia wasn't the best at cutting out the fat, sure, but did we need SIXTEEN FUCKING CAFÉS, few of which actually do anything? What is this, New York with a Starbucks at every street corner?

Then there's the annoying style system, which would be much more occult than it is had it not been for the official strategy guide. Well, that's what I'd like to say, but I'm told this strategy guide goes to extremes Smogon wouldn't even dare reach with Pokémon available early and recommends FARFETCH'D as a potential team member. Seriously, how can you have such in-depth data on this style bullshit, then proceed to sing the praises of one of the all-time worst Pokémon? But I'm rambling on now. You unlock more stuff by wasting your time and money doing asinine stuff, and this culminates in the ability to buy the Kanto starters' Mega Stones for prices ranging from a million to 10000 depending on your style, and to obtain the Hatching Power from Mr. Bonding (who doesn't ever hold out on O-Powers, except for this one specific power with this one specific mechanic). Look, if I want some clothes, a specific haircut or Furfrou trim, I shouldn't have to run all over the place, just give it to me. Did Gamefreak somehow think this was interesting? I LOST MY JOIN AVENUE FOR THIS? (I would also like to point out that talking to Alexa is what gives you the most style. I want to hear the game designers' reasoning for this.)

Most of what this game does is great, but Lumiose City is a resounding miss, and I can now join my voices to the legions of players who don't want to see this in any future generations. At least Gamefreak is clearly listening to us, as I've said before, so my hopes are high that we'll see more Castelia and less Lumiose in the future. Ever wanted to know why video game towns are so much smaller than in real life? There's your answer.

Edit: I totally forgot to mention... Lumiose's layout is practically identical to that of FF8's Deling City, and that too was plagued with horrible angles that left you in the dark as to where you were. It still was kind enough to cut out the fat and have many many MANY less streets, though, and the game designers acknowledged that they screwed up enough to make the buses free. Lumiose? Nope. Gotta pay every single time you want to go somewhere, or go on foot.

Edit 2: I'm told in the comments that buying balls one by one at the specialty Pokéball shop is the best way to max out your style quickly... about 100 should do, apparently. I recommend either Premier Balls because they're the cheapest and most cost-effective, or Dusk Balls because of their overall usefulness.

20 comments:

  1. Slow, where are you at right now in terms of the game?

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  2. What, no mention of the (patched) save glitch?

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    1. No, this piece is about poor design that was actually intentional.

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    1. I'm not going to pony up the cost of four Pokéballs every single time I want to go to a specific building.

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  4. Yeah, playing through Y, the only thing that I thought was a complete miss was this place.

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  5. I didn't particularly like Castelia...but yeah, Lumiose was indeed worse. I have found another trick AROUND the style system. Poké Ball Emporium. Premier Balls. Buy one at a time. I read that about 100 is enough to max out your style. Hey, you'll have to spend money there anyway unless you do know Alexa gives out the most style...I guess because of the anime? I dunno...

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    1. Do Dusk Balls have the same effect per unit, I wonder?

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    2. Probably, but let me tell you: You can buy Premier Balls without buying 10 Poke Balls in the Emporium. I said Premier because they are the cheapest at $200 each...

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    3. Not that it matters to you. For actually using them, 100 Dusk Balls are infinitely more useful than 100 Premier Balls...

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  6. At least Lumiose was the worst part of the game...Well, other than pursuing the bird...Articuno in your case...to the Azure Bay...

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  7. I had already done things in Lumiose, and at that point, I only cared for getting into the Boutique (no Charmander in the game until December 27 since I really have few friends, let alone many who play Pokemon that can get X and Y, and I am not using Blastoise. Really, Y Charizard will probably fill Abomasnow's main role of canceling out the more deadly weather of the enemy and nothing more seeing as how it HAS to have the Charizardite Y. Yeeeeah. I'm not getting the Stones until I feel like it, which will probably not be until I get the transferring done, modify the move sets, and properly EV train the Pokemon that need it. Torchic is first since the non-hacked Event one is obviously already in Y. That will probably be the next thing I do)...

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  8. You know a place is terrible when the fact that it's the cause of a game-breaking glitch doesn't even make my top 5 reasons for hating it.

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  9. Try doing it if you're blind, and rely on the grid movement to get around, the camera makes this nearly impossible. Thankfully with the help of several kind gamefaqs users (yes, such things do indeed exist) I was able to get literal step by step directions to important areas of that god forsaken city.

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  10. Yup, I've only been to the South Boulevard so far, and I absolutely hate it. The controls are awful in that area, so much so that I'm constantly entering buildings I don't want to enter when I'm just trying to read the signs outside. I also hate when RPGs have NPCs standing around that you can't talk to. Finally, everything just reeks of useless features, like the Furfrou trimming and cafes full of NPCs that have nothing interesting to say. Castelia was kind of similar in everything but the camera and controls, but it was also a reasonable size, at least.

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  11. After exploring the entire city I kinda just learned where everything was in relation to each other so I never had a getting lost problem but everything else everybody is saying yeah I agree this is the worst thing in the whole game. That and the games having almost no post game are my only complaints with X and Y.

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    1. Unlike Gen 1, there's a bit more than catching Mewtwo to do in the post-game...

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    2. Yeah, there's Zygarde, the Looker sidequest, the Friend Safari... besides, the fact that the post-game is a bit more diminutive than in gens 4 and 5 is made up for by the fact that the main game is so much longer than anything we've seen to date.

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