Finally caught'em all! ...the ones that mattered, at least.

I never played Ruby and Sapphire, or Diamond, Pearl, Peridot, Aquamarine, Topaz, Y, X, or even X-2, when they introduced Paine.

"Lead, follow, or watch the Let's Play."

I didn't have much desire to do so, either. A co-worker (whose name shall remain secr- Paul... it's Paul), on the other hand, talked fondly about Ruby and Sapphire for introducing double battles, natures, abilities, and a handful of other neat features, including secret bases, which is what Paul was most interested in experiencing with the remakes, Alpha and Omega. Sadly, his dreams of owning both were put on hold as his shitmobile crapped out repeatedly in a diarrhea of fecally breakdowns. There was poo everywhere. Well, the Christmas spirit welled within me, and I bought both games for him. After staring at them like some baconish treat placed in front of a dog's shnoot, he grabbed Omega, but left Alpha with me. He clings to the idea that he'll eventually buy the second game himself, though I highly doubt it. As a result, I've succumbed to another temporary hoarding addiction, somewhat greater than the six-month hiatus I experienced while trying to capture and breed all the available critters in Heartgold. I would like to thank The Online for that.

Unlike Heartgold, this one wasn't a vamped retread for me, so I found myself lost numerous times, mainly because I was too lazy to check the map. In addition to looping around and accepting rematches from NPC trainers, I found myself trying to level up my search function for individual Pokémon. Took a little while to realize that I could click on the portraits to summon a specific Pokémon to try and capture it again. I also learned that this allowed for chaining, gradually increasing the likelihood of a critter possessing an egg move, a hidden ability, and/or higher stats, but it doesn't hang around as long, and letting it get away breaks the streak. It even locates Pokémon that normally require rock smash, fishing rods, or the dive ability to draw out of hiding. This, along with "soaring", helps to rid players of having a HM slave wasting space in their party, but slightly increases the annoyance level of secret bases with restrictive entrances (like mine) that will leave some flag hunters wishing they had brought along that Crawdaunt to help clear the way.

Feel free to visit... if I'm still playing the game.

Bases initially appear as glory holes found in walls, rocks, trees, and bushes all over Hoenn. Having one of your Pokémon stick its Secret Power into these holes will unlock numerous bases with a fair variety of shapes and sizes to choose from. While a popular idea for a secret base may be to create one's own gym, most are content to just toss in whatever decorations they've got on hand to recreate their favorite episode of Hoarding: Buried Alive. I've explored a few well-designed obstacle courses that made me work for their flag, but I've also been completely stopped by many others who have blatantly blocked themselves off for no better reason than to be obnoxious. As for me, I admit that my layout isn't exactly friendly, as I do try to make it somewhat challenging, but you can reach me, and you can reach my flag. I would never deny another player of that no matter how much I might hate him, his obsession with shiny Pokémon, his teams of OU/Uber cookie-cutter builds, his love for Dragon-types (Many prefer to be called "Dragon tamers"), and his strong desire to tell everyone to check out his profile, so that they read the response about his personal secret: "I actually have a girlfriend."

An actual quote found on one of the blackboards I read while visiting a trainer's secret base: noshiny=noob.

Despite the gentler tone of the Pokémon universe (minus a few exceptions here, there, and through strange entries found in the Pokédex), it's still the internet, and people are still assholes for absolutely no justifiable reason. Feel free to apply this warning to every future iteration of Pokémon online as well, because I highly doubt it will change for the better.

Omega and Alpha offers nearly all the bells, whistles, and metaphorical blow jobs a young teenager/socially-inept '00s manchild could ask for outside of a cosplaying Gardevoir...

I'm sure somebody appreciates this, but I don't really care to know who.

Along with the usual experience grinds involving the Elite Four and trainer rematches, collecting flags from secret bases comes with the added perk of battling its leader whose team will consist of the first three critters in his party, ranging from levels 1 through 50, unless they have a Level Release device set up, then that's even better! Yeah... I don't bother. The added experience is nice, but most people are going to have event legendary Pokémon on their team. It's more hassle than it's worth, and there are plenty of other bases, with plenty of other flags to collect. Hell, even if you did visit all of them, then you can just go online and it'll present you with a mailbox update to change out the bases for more people to leech experience from. If that's not enough, there's also the secret pals in your own base to milk, and they are a viable option for battling with the release on, because you already know what they're going to use. Lastly, there's Audino on a couple of mirage spots. That worthless bitch has a high experience yield, appears constantly, and was provided with a mega evolution to further aggravate players as it becomes even more time-consuming to murder during a doubles or triples match, but that has nothing to do with leveling your team. It simply encourages the player to continue doling out punishment upon their kind.

Still more tolerable than a para-flinching Jirachi or anything with the Prankster ability.
Would it be in bad taste to add a dildo in Audino's hand?

Breeding is easier thanks to a second daycare facility run by children (makes sense to me), especially because it is near an ace trainer with the ability to gauge the strengths and weaknesses of each new life brought into the world. Now, players can learn right away whether or not the baby is worth keeping. If not, there's an abortion clinic known as Wonder Trade (or Wurmple Trade) on the PSS menu screen that will efficiently dispose of the nuisance in exchange for a Japanese Ralts, or maybe a Zigzagoon named "Fuke You". The possibilities are endlessly limited (and unrewarding).

Among the positive changes I experienced from playing a "new" Pokémon game, such as mirage spots, mega evolutions, 3D animation, and the super training regimens that effectively control a critter's base stats, the most welcomed (for me, at least) was the introduction of store-bought specialty balls. No longer was I obligated to collect apricots, chose only one type per day, and support Kurt's opium addiction in exchange for his services. In fact, with the money I saved not buying large quantities of poppies from a winged monkey, I was now able to purchase hundreds of Timer and Dusk balls in a reasonable amount of time, and that meant I no longer had to piss away a perfectly good hour of my boring, worthless life clicking the A button to throw 200+ ineffective, unattractive Hyper/Ultra/Lambda/Whatever balls at a paralyzed legendary who will inevitably kill itself struggling, but not before vehemently waving it's junk in my partner's face and constantly laughing at the growing pile of broken mini-prisons lying next to it that cost me $1200 apiece.

While I appreciate many of the added features found with the Pokénav Plus, especially the, uh, little tidbits about each trainer you can have rematches with, I find the Buzznav feature to be relatively pointless. It allows the player to learn about others through StreetPass with various TV shows that focus on what others name their Pokémon, what TMs they've used/ignored, how many times they've searched for hidden items, what they've successfully or failed to capture, what they've recently bought at the store, how quickly they captured a flag, what sort of garbage is being offered on Wonder Trade, and a bunch of other pieces of shit not even worth the effort to pick up and fling back at the dumbasses who thought it was a nifty feature to add to the game in the first place.

Occasionally, one of the commentators will beg for mercy, but I typically change to the PSS menu once the crying begins.

"I wish I could collect some flags."

Oh, and there's this lazy prick on The Great Flag Hunter program. Using the same icon as the Name Rater (possibly the same guy), he sits there with that obnoxious smile, telling the audience he wants to join in the hunt, but won't get off his ass actually to do it. That's all he says, too. Twice. The other commentator featured with him does all the real talking. "I wish I could collec..." THEN FUCKING DO IT! Yeah, it'll be a real shame to lose such a key member of the Pokénews Crew, but I think we'll manage... you worthless shitbag.

As of finishing this long-awaited disappointment of a blog entry, I've managed to encounter 718 Pokémon, with Manaphy being the only exception (Hoopa and Volcanion are still legally unavailable), and I have captured every non-event Pokémon necessary to earn my diploma, along with the Shiny Charm to increase the likelihood of encountering and breeding shiny Pokémon. Because I find most shiny variations to be hideous, I really don't care about trying to obtain one myself. The ones I do have were obtained during TheKingNappy Wonder Trade Wednesday event, which takes place nearly every Wednesday night at 8PM, and is streamed live on Youtube. If you want something decent from Wonder Trade, that's the time to get it. As for me, I might breed a bunch of something weak (even with perfect stats) and hand them out during a WTW event, if only to remind other trainers of those poor creatures commonly forgotten, because they are neither overpowered, nor dragons. I am so fucking sick of dragons.

Finally, I would like to take a moment to proudly type that every single Pokémon I have ever captured and bred in AS has been given a unique name. I'm sure many nicknames have been shared by other trainers at one time or another, but in regard to what I have obtained over the last five months of playing Nintendo's newest cash grab, no names have been recycled. This means the 75 Farfetch'd and 75 Heatmor that I bred for WTW did, in fact, include 150 different names that I freely gave away to people who have mostly likely tossed right back into the pool of Wonder Trade, hoping to obtain some hacked legendary, because their level 4 sentrets stored in the GTS have yet to be taken in exchange for a 6IV shiny Celebi with Timid nature that they shameless demand. If you wish to use GTS effectively, provide something of breeding value, and ask for something reasonable in return. Please. That seems obvious, right? I originally thought so, too.

Now, without further ado, and in no particular order, I would like to honour those who have fought valian... obediently by my side:

Sonrisa - Gastrodon
Dorkwing Dux - Farfetch'd
Codyl - Magcargo
La Bagocrapo - Hawlucha
Jeeves - Beheeyem
Sugarfoot - Lopunny
Furby - Furfrou
IComeInPeace - Gyarados (originally as a HM mule)
Eleclamb - Ampharos
Boomer - Exploud
Big In Japan - Omastar
Karn - Regigigas
Wallflower - Florges
Texas - Entei
Ticklish - Tentacruel
Reinhard - Eelektross
Armstrong - Machamp
Dial-Up - Carracosta
Bert - Cobalion
Forkbow - Sigilyph
RitaBeepulsa - Vespiquen
Disco Stu - Bouffalant
Elizabeth - Pelipper
Fleabag - Mightyena
Mac Tonight - Lunatone
B-I-N-G-O! - Cinccino
NyQuil - Rampardos (Originally owned by a trainer named "Ricky")
Bount - Landorus
Yobich - Gardevoir
Lo Phat - Mienshao
Krillin - Medicham
Super Morio - Heatmor (the only Pokémon I've bred with 6IV stats)
Marjorie - Magmortar
Yay, Billy! - Venusaur

and, of course, everyone's new favorite fairy-type, Maximus.

You best GTFO!