Pokémon Let's Go: A Guilty Pleasure · 1:51pm Jan 2nd, 2019
I received Pokémon: Let's Go Eevee for Christmas.
In my personal opinion: I LIKE IT.
But as a hardcore gamer, I find it hard to admit it...
I read the fair review that Flutterpriest did back in November. That, combined with the other reviews I had seen online, I still added it to my Christmas wish list for my family's secret Santa exchange. I fully expected to not get the one thing on the list that was $10 above the gift limit. Color me surprised. I started playing it as soon as I got home from my parents house. And I liked it immediately. I still do.
But the reason I call it a guilty pleasure requires a little context.
Story time.
~ 1996
You see, I never really got into Pokemon when I was a younger. Oh sure, I saw it around in the mid 90's. The card game, on the Game Boy, and the animated series. But it didn't really appeal to me at the time.
Jan 2010
It's a post 9/11 world, and the war on terror is in full swing. Yours Truly was enlisted in the U.S. Air Force. My direct supervisor was a Staff Sargent at the time. His last name started with a J and the rest was a jumbled mess of letters that I never could pronounce right. So we called him Sgt. Jay (or just Sir). He was some kind of Asian. (It's not racist. I just never cared enough to ask about his specific flavor of Asian.) Sgt Jay was a miserable mofo, and the only thing that he was ever remotely passionate about was Pokemon.
March 2011
In a bid to try to gain some favor, I tried to give the game a chance. Pokemon Black and White was about to come out soon on the Nintendo DS. I asked him which one he was getting. When he asked why, I told him that I would get the other so we could trade. (I understood the concept of version exclusives.) The offer seemed to please him. We went to GameStop together and we each got our (pre-ordered) games. Less than a month later, we were deployed to Afghanistan.
A lot of people ask me what it's like in Afghanistan. I tell them, the first thing you notice when you step off the plane, is the heat. The average daytime temperature is between 90 and 110 degrees F. The next thing you notice, is the smell. The whole place smells like shit. Like... literal shit. The base doesn't have plumbing. So there are rows of Porta-crappers. And when those get full, they pour it out onto big tarps and let it dry. (Sometimes it's downwind, but the wind is always changing there). Then they burn the dried shit with diesel fuel. Lovely. Each day the prospect of dying from insurgents, or a random mortar attack become more and more trivial.
Anyway, when you're deployed, you're on duty 12 hours a day, 7 days a week. For four months. Unless you do a double rotation, which is 8 months. But you want that work. You want that occupation of your time. It makes the days and weeks blur together until before you know it, it's time to leave. But you get downtime, to eat, to exercise, to sleep, and whatever leisure you brought with you.
Some people brought books, or journals. There was always one moron who would bring an acrostic guitar in hopes of learning to play while they are there and then they give up after a week. Me, I brought 4 things.
My hammock in a pouch (way more comfortable than the cots), my harmonica (which nobody wanted to listen to) my cheap notebook laptop, and my Nintendo D.S.
When I wasn't working on duty, eating, or sleeping, I was in my hammock, catching them all. I was training and battling. I was trading with Sgt. Jay, who was refreshingly passionate about teaching me everything he knew about Pokemon. The man was a walking encyclopedia of Pokemon information. He knew every Pokemon, every type match-up, every move set, every item, every stat, nature... everything! It was all we talked about. I would lay there in my hammock and grind for hours and hours leveling up my Pokemon. It did the job. It made the time go by.
We went to Afghanistan twice. The second time, I finished my tour after four months and came home. He stayed on to do a double. Long story short, he didn't come back. I mean, he did, but, you know, in a box. I have no idea what happened to his D.S. I assume they sent his stuff to his family, if he had any. (He never mentioned them).
Creepy-pasta side note: Before I left, he traded me a Pokemon I had named SgtJay at the time, it was my housekeeping way of tracking traded Pokemon. My copy of Pokemon White still has a Gengar (ghost type) named SgtJay.
ANYWAYS, tragic story aside, I stopped playing Pokemon after that. What was the point? He and I were the only ones in the squad that played it. And I was bored of the grinding way of catching and leveling Pokemon through repetitious battles.
July 2016
Just over a year after I left the service, Pokemon GO hits. Everyone was playing. Including me. I loved it. It had me walking even more than when I was deployed. I met so many people in my town and made a bunch of friends. But as Game of Thrones warned us, winter came. It's hard to catch them all when it's freezing cold out. The next summer was nothing like that first one. Where there were dozens of people playing on every street corner, now there few barely a handful. I still played, occasionally, if I thought about it. But most of my free time was spent writing by that point.
Other Pokemon games had come out since Black and White, but I ignored them. I had even gotten Fire Red with an emulator on my phone. Between that and GO, I had a really good handle on the 151 Gen 1 Pokemon. But I never even finished the main game for that. It just felt like too much of a grind for no reason other than to kill time. And I had so little to spare now.
March 2017
Zelda Breath of the Wild comes out on the Nintendo Switch. My friend gets it and I play it at her house. I immediately love it and get the game for myself. As I play, I wonder if Nintendo will ever make an open-world Pokemon game that worked like Pokemon GO, when you could spot Pokemon and catch them without constantly battling them.
I guess the Nintendo mind-reading van had been passing by my house at that moment.
November 2018
Pokemon Let's Go
It's not the 'Breath' open world I was hoping for. But a Go-esq remake of Pokemon Yellow was exactly what I could sink my teeth into. Faster catching. Faster leveling. Less grind. Yes please. I could plainly see that a lot had been cut out of the game, mechanics-wise. No eggs, or held items, for example. But I felt like this was a good thing.
You see, back in the early 90's, I played the collectible card game, Magic the Gathering. I quit around 7th edition because each edition, they would add more and more crap to try and keep you buying the new cards, but while maintaining balance and avoiding power creep. The latter two they were not so good at. I saw a similar problem with the Pokemon games. Every game brought a hundred new Pokemon, new types, new moves, new evolutions. Eggs, held items, evolution stones, candies, mega evolutions, alolan versions and more! It was enough to make a new player's head spin. By the time they added the Gen2 Pokemon to GO I was ready to stop.
But with Pokemon Let's Go, it was a simple, beautiful, and yes, admittedly casual remake of Yellow. And that's okay! That was what I wanted. The internet is full of hardcore gamers complaining about all the missing features, plaguing the game with negative reviews. But I don't agree with them now.
Because I used to be a hardcore gamer.
I used to want more.
I used to have time for that.
But I don't have time for that. Not anymore. I'm a grown up. I have responsibilities. I have a job, and my own house to take care of. I don't have endless hours in my parents' basement or the barracks to kill grinding over and over. I have so little free time. I just want to have fun.
Remember fun?
Maybe some people have fun grinding for hours in Pokemon, Elite Dangerous, or World of Warcraft. Some people like playing Dark Souls 3 and have that masochistic tendency where they can only get hard when a game is beating their ass into hamburger with a meat tenderizing mallet.
And that's fine.
But that's not me. I just want to have fun relaxing. The same way I enjoy ponies. It's cute, light, and carefree. And Eevee is weapons-grade cute. I just want to get home from work, kick off my boots, and look at my cute Eevee kicking ass in her new outfit for an hour or so, and then get back to writing.
I can feel a strange sense of pride when she succeeds, and dread when she's in danger. It's simple enough that you don't have to over-think it. It's is a game that makes you feel more than think.
Because Let's Go isn't a game for the head... it's a game for the heart.
And now that I've said it out loud, I don't feel so guilty for finding pleasure in it.
Finally! Someone put it into words! People asked me why I play Let's Go when it's not a hardcore competitive pokemon game and I tell them, "I'm not playing it for competition. I'm playing it to have fun!"
Very well said. As a person who works 12 hour shifts in a factory this game is very good for me in many of the same ways.
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Not to mention that it has given me a legitimate reason to get back into playing Pokemon GO. Any excuse to get people exercising is a good thing. The point that Flutterpriest made about Meltan is very true. (Definitely a dick move on GameFreak's part.) But it's a matter of walking Meltan exclusively to farm the candies while playing GO normally around it. Meltan takes 20km for just one candy, the highest tier that the game has.
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I even went out and got the book and Pokeball Plus. Because I thought, why just dip my toe into the game when I can let it consume my whole life instead? I'm walking my Eevee right now while I work. Like a less irritating Tamagotchi. It's small, for a game controller. But it's certainly more immersive and it makes playing GO a lot easier than pulling out my phone every five minutes.
Though it's a dick move to charge people who only want to get Mew.
My only gripe with "Let's Go" is musical.
I love how continuity-heavy it is now, I love the bonus features. I love almost all of the music. The game disappointed me because I wanted to hate it, and it couldn't let me do that, and I love it to death.
But damn it, they didn't include the Gen 3 bridge in the Hall of Fame theme, and they didn't include Red's battle theme. Literally unplayable, 0/10.
This is a really well put together post, Shakes, and while I'm the kind of terrible person who can only enjoy randomiser nuzlocke runs now and Let's Go has zero appeal to me, I definitely appreciate that it has a place and I'm just not the target audience. I only hope it doesn't leak too much into the main series given how hand-holdy Sun and Moon already were. Hopefully, it'll go the other way, and they'll use the casual game to skim off the more casual parts of the main series.
What a truly fascinating and inspiring story there Shakes. I'm glad to have finally met you in person, and gotten to know you a bit. And I know about what you are saying, living with parents with no responsibilities was nice, but now I've got a family, a job, am responsible for other human beings. So, I do tend to spend my limited free time when I'm not working or spending time with family, writing. I love writing my stories. Thank you for sharing and have a great day.
I don't have anything inherently eaningful to add, but have a plus one:
+1
I... thought this would be about you fucking a pokemon that then turned out to be your half-sister.
A legit blog, though? Structured and all that?
Shakes is evolving.
(Taking the piss. A good blog with an even better thesis)
4989996
Yeah, maaaaan.
We have had a proper Pokemon game in... slowly raises fingers one by one... four years now?
Blargh. I'm tempted to charge the Gameboy Advanced.
Eventually, every state will adopt a Pokemon the same way they do birds. And it will be glorious.
4990051
Rapidash. Duh!
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I haven't played. I kinda want to now. I kinda miss fun in some games. I do play Dark Souls 3 and take pleasure in killing everything around the location and sitting atop a building or rock being alone among the dead until I get bored and bring them all back to kill again, but that's only so fulfilling.
4990133 The interactions with your starter will melt your heart. Every once in a while, an icon will pop up indicating for you to shake your controller, and that puts you into interaction mode. And it will tell you that your Eevee (or Pikachu) is feeling scared, or excited, or curious. They will accompany you as you walk around and find treasures for you. If you have a high level of affection, they will do special moves during battle to keep from fainting because "they don't want you to feel sad" or they will get a critical hit because "they are seeking praise". You can pet them and style their hair and give them outfits and feed them treats.
My female Eevee gives me paternal flashbacks to having a daughter in the Skyrim's Heathfire DLC.
media.comicbook.com/2018/07/female-eevee-header-1122346-1280x0.jpeg
4990141
That sounds simply wonderful. If it really did remind you of Hearthfires I need this. That was one of the big heights of my TES experience. Actually forming a family and coming home to someone other than a housecarl, giving me reason to stick aroud the citi and make myself busy so I don’t leave just quite yet
They removed abilities, held items, breeding, and wild pokemon and people panned it despite being a spin-oof/reboot. Despite being a some-what uninspired spin-off in an IP full of very creative and fun spin-offs it just comes off strange to me that people are treating it so strangely. I pretty much grew up with pokemon but in gens 1-5 held items and abilities felt a lot like gimmicks (well in gen 5 they actually started getting really strong but not anything you'd find in a casual playthrough) and wild pokemon battles are tedious. Supposedly they made it for a new generation of players but it feels like the same pokemon to me, just with wild battles removed.
Plus if I want to go play meta mons and be "hardcore" looking up movesets and stuff there's always pokemon showdown, the free game. That also has categories with user-made mons. Pokemon isn't dying people need to chill lol.
4990200
Use Repel.
STOP KINKSHAMING ME
But seriously this review actually makes me want to play something other than Monster Hunter and Smash on my Switch for the first time in many moons.
Also I've been following you for years and feel like I've never seen that you were in the military.
Thank you for your service!
I'm glad you're enjoying it! I didn't think I would honestly but it's fantastic. I'm normally the kinda person who breeds constantly to get the perfect IV and nature with multi generational babies in order to secure the right movesets but this game doesn't ask for any of that and it's refreshing.
memegenerator.net/img/instances/70691076/back-in-my-day-there-were-only-151-pokemon.jpg
......ah, I'm sad now
Plus, we didn't have the Internet to help us out, so we had to find other people and and share information we had gathered from our experiences like some damn wannabe secret society for social pariahs
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4990430
Perfection.
Ive been wanting to get Lets Go Eevee for since it started its previews. Eevee is by far my favorite pokemon, because of its "weapon-grade cuteness" (i absolutely love that description. I damn near did a spit take lmao) and this reveiw makes me want it even more now.
I'm not very familiar with Pokemon, but after watching the series with my (now not-so-little) brother, we (especially him) had been wanting to play the game. We bought a Switch less than a year ago, and he got very excited when Let's Go was announced.
And after reading the review, I think I know exactly what to get him for his birthday
Let's Go seems nice... Not 60 dollars nice though. I'd be more hyped for the next-gen game coming out in 2019, but it's looking like it'll just be the Yellow equivalent to S&M(probably finally using that Pokemon Stars trademark they mad a while back).
It's fine if you like it but... I want a new region damn it! I got the itch, and I can only replay old games a nuzlockes so many times.
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(in-game footage)
I'm still waiting for Pokemon Gen 8, personally. I hardly ever do PvP in any version of Pokemon, but regardless I still like all the new complexities and gameplay possibilities that each successive gen adds. As such, LGPE's deliberate and heavy reduction in complexity left me disinterested.
But hey, it's not like LGPE is actually replacing anything, so I find very little reason to complain. I'll continue biding my time until Gen 8 comes out, and those of us who like LGPE should continue having all sorts of fun. ^_^
4990586
They already had the "Yellow Version" for Gen 7. It was called Ultra Sun and Ultra Moon.
4990655
Fine, I will!
But not because you told me to!
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4990656
Never change, Shakey. ^_^
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OH MY SQUEE THATS BUCKING CUTE!!!! I cant wait to get that game.
I love it. I just hit 152 on the Dex about a month ago
4991267
Any shinies yet?
4991278
Nope! Purposely waiting until I'm done with red :)
4991280 Likewise. Waiting to get that shiny charm.
4991280 Finished the dex. Melmetal and all. Lots of mystery boxes and pinap berries x2 during the Valentine's event of double candy x2. (12 candy per catch!) Traded with the free trial of the online service.
As of this posting, I have shiny
magicarp > Gyrados
2 Pigiotos (one soon to be pigot)
Carterpie > Metapod > Butterfree
Haven't gone after Red yet.
Eevee is level ~80