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thebrokenarrowsBefore the evening ends I think I should do an entry to commemorate the 20th anniversary of, perhaps, the most important franchise to ever hit my life. [It's technically not the 27th yet here, but it already happened in Japan, so.]
It started in the first semester of third grade, 1999, with a picture of a Caterpie in a Disney Adventures magazine. Eight years old.
I know it was this exact one, because I was given last December a few scattered remaining pages of it that had been found at my grandmother's house, after some long ago trip up there. We used to pick issues of this magazine up at the checkout rack in grocery stores.
That Caterpie was the first Pokemon to really catch my eye. I had no idea the life changing transformation I was about to undergo in the following months and years. The person I would become would be largely shaped by the phenomenon known as Pokemania.
It's hard to know or say what my very first playthrough was like. I have little to no memories of it. What I know is that we [my mother and I, because she was just as into it] first played on rented cartridges and Gameboy Colors from Blockbuster [back when you could do that!], and that we started playing shortly before Yellow hit the shelves, because I remember the hype for Yellow version. I believe that the first game that I ever touched was Blue version [because I've always preferred blue as a color], and my first starter was probably Bulbasaur [because the game tells you it is the easiest choice].
When I started playing Red and Blue, the games had only been out for under a year. I had no particular attachment to the individual Pokemon that I trained in those first temporary playthroughs... maybe because I knew I would have to return the games. I have vivid memories of my mother playing on her rental Game Boy in the bathtub and beating the entire game in the week we had them. I never got past the fourth gym or so back then. [My mother also named EVERY Raichu she used, and she always used one, "POOKA!" with an exclamation mark. Took me a while to realize how hard she hunted for one of those every single playthrough. I often name Pikachu/Raichu with that name to this day in honor of the oldest times.]
Christmas of that year, 1999, was when I finally owned my first ever gaming device, and my first Pokemon games. I got Red, Blue and Yellow all at the same time, and Yellow came with its own special, super cool game boy. Of those three I do distinctly remember that the first one that I owned AND played was Yellow. I booted that one up first because it was brand new and came with the console. So in that way, my first starter was Pikachu, but by then I had played at least 10 games already by renting almost constantly since the fall.
[I still have the gameboy, which I have repaired and made good as new since then, as well as Blue and Yellow.... Red was borrowed and never given back, and sadly, my beloved Yellow version no longer works. I've seriously considered replacing the guts of the cartridge and keeping the cartridge itself. That game is precious to me.]
It quickly became my life. Consumed me. I often say that before Pokemon happened, I wasn't really my own person. I had interests but none that totally consumed me and filtered every aspect of my life before that. It changed me in the best way. I'm sure I was totally obnoxious LOL!! but I didn't care at all.
My ninth birthday the following year was Pokemon themed. The Christmas of 1999 in which I got RBY versions, I had specifically asked my parents to give me entirely Pokemon things, and that they did. It remains one of the most pure joyful memories of my life. The christmas that next year, 2000, was also heavily Pokemon and video game themed - that was the year we got our N64, my first home console, which would lead to me being further changed utterly.
Then, the Gold and Silver hype. I don't remember exactly when I became aware of the games coming out, but it was partially online [shoutouts to Marriland and Serebii for still to this day being online and active in the fandom, omg] and partially hype from Nintendo Power. I remember there being an issue of NP that showed all the Johto Pokemon and their Japanese names. Memorizing those names. I don't think I quite understood the fact that they'd have English names eventually. I remember drawing loads of comics with Johto pokemon in them - especially Meganium, Houndour, Umbreon and Skarmory - with their names just being the Japanese names. [As stylized as possible too even when they were actually plays on english words - Umbreon's Japanese name being "Blacky", but spelled "Burakkii" in Nintendo Power, or Skarmory's name being "Airmored" but spelled "Eamudo". I still intend on catching and naming one that, because "Eamudo" was such a feature in my art back then.]
When Gold and Silver had come out in Japan but hadn't been brought to the west yet, I remember my mother finding online some frankly terrible Gold/Silver ROMs for us to play. Glitchy and badly translated, I distinctly remember every Pokemon uttered its cry twice - to this day I think Sentret's cry sounds better when repeated - chirp-chirp!. We were just that desperate to play them. I also remember my mother finding out that the Silver pokemon's name was "Lugia" and her immediate response was not to tell my father because he'd make loogie jokes forever. [He already called Pikachu "Pick-a-nose] Thankfully I don't remember any of these jokes happening lol.
I remember being in fourth grade in 2000, Gold and Silver's American release impending, being terrible at times tables in school, and my mother telling me that if I didn't learn them, I wouldn't be allowed to get a copy of Gold and Silver when they came out. But Christmas came and so did Gold and Silver, right into my hands, and the obsession just continued, on into 2001 with Crystal.
Things other than the games that rocked my world. The anime, which I watched constantly on kids WB. And especially the movies. The first movie changed my entire life, my art direction, my interests in science and biology, so many parts of me can trace back to there. I still consider it one of my top favorites. The score is utterly beautiful. The scenes of Mew in the beginning, in beautiful, pure, very Japanese nature... The movie's mixture of nature versus artifice... the first flashes in the pan that became Hiraeth.
The second movie was just as good. The sound of Lugia's song, like whalesong, chilled me - still chills me. I had the soundtrack on CD, got it for Christmas, and listened to it endlessly for a couple of years. [Also listened to endlessly: the Majora's Mask soundtrack. I finally replaced that one last year although it isn't the now-rare Nintendo Power version that I had then.]
That's about how the first chapter of Pokemon went for me. I spent the period of the third generation in my "I'm too grown up for video games! Those are for kids!" middle school period, which you can pretty much see how long that lasted LOL. About three or four years maybe. Diamond and Pearl brought me right back into the fold in 2006, and it's been love nonstop ever since. Diamond and Pearl in high school, Black and White in early college [and the first time I ever beat a Pokemon game in its entirety on White version, and wept like a child as the credits rolled]. Fell in love all over again with the beauty of X and Y. I've even caught up with the much maligned Hoenn generation in the era of ORAS.
And now.... the future of Sun and Moon.
In about an hour and a half I'll be purchasing a copy of the Virtual Console games. Haven't decided exactly which one of the three yet. We'll see how it goes. I fully intend to do what I've never truly done before, and catch 'em all. <3
It started in the first semester of third grade, 1999, with a picture of a Caterpie in a Disney Adventures magazine. Eight years old.
I know it was this exact one, because I was given last December a few scattered remaining pages of it that had been found at my grandmother's house, after some long ago trip up there. We used to pick issues of this magazine up at the checkout rack in grocery stores.
That Caterpie was the first Pokemon to really catch my eye. I had no idea the life changing transformation I was about to undergo in the following months and years. The person I would become would be largely shaped by the phenomenon known as Pokemania.
It's hard to know or say what my very first playthrough was like. I have little to no memories of it. What I know is that we [my mother and I, because she was just as into it] first played on rented cartridges and Gameboy Colors from Blockbuster [back when you could do that!], and that we started playing shortly before Yellow hit the shelves, because I remember the hype for Yellow version. I believe that the first game that I ever touched was Blue version [because I've always preferred blue as a color], and my first starter was probably Bulbasaur [because the game tells you it is the easiest choice].
When I started playing Red and Blue, the games had only been out for under a year. I had no particular attachment to the individual Pokemon that I trained in those first temporary playthroughs... maybe because I knew I would have to return the games. I have vivid memories of my mother playing on her rental Game Boy in the bathtub and beating the entire game in the week we had them. I never got past the fourth gym or so back then. [My mother also named EVERY Raichu she used, and she always used one, "POOKA!" with an exclamation mark. Took me a while to realize how hard she hunted for one of those every single playthrough. I often name Pikachu/Raichu with that name to this day in honor of the oldest times.]
Christmas of that year, 1999, was when I finally owned my first ever gaming device, and my first Pokemon games. I got Red, Blue and Yellow all at the same time, and Yellow came with its own special, super cool game boy. Of those three I do distinctly remember that the first one that I owned AND played was Yellow. I booted that one up first because it was brand new and came with the console. So in that way, my first starter was Pikachu, but by then I had played at least 10 games already by renting almost constantly since the fall.
[I still have the gameboy, which I have repaired and made good as new since then, as well as Blue and Yellow.... Red was borrowed and never given back, and sadly, my beloved Yellow version no longer works. I've seriously considered replacing the guts of the cartridge and keeping the cartridge itself. That game is precious to me.]
It quickly became my life. Consumed me. I often say that before Pokemon happened, I wasn't really my own person. I had interests but none that totally consumed me and filtered every aspect of my life before that. It changed me in the best way. I'm sure I was totally obnoxious LOL!! but I didn't care at all.
My ninth birthday the following year was Pokemon themed. The Christmas of 1999 in which I got RBY versions, I had specifically asked my parents to give me entirely Pokemon things, and that they did. It remains one of the most pure joyful memories of my life. The christmas that next year, 2000, was also heavily Pokemon and video game themed - that was the year we got our N64, my first home console, which would lead to me being further changed utterly.
Then, the Gold and Silver hype. I don't remember exactly when I became aware of the games coming out, but it was partially online [shoutouts to Marriland and Serebii for still to this day being online and active in the fandom, omg] and partially hype from Nintendo Power. I remember there being an issue of NP that showed all the Johto Pokemon and their Japanese names. Memorizing those names. I don't think I quite understood the fact that they'd have English names eventually. I remember drawing loads of comics with Johto pokemon in them - especially Meganium, Houndour, Umbreon and Skarmory - with their names just being the Japanese names. [As stylized as possible too even when they were actually plays on english words - Umbreon's Japanese name being "Blacky", but spelled "Burakkii" in Nintendo Power, or Skarmory's name being "Airmored" but spelled "Eamudo". I still intend on catching and naming one that, because "Eamudo" was such a feature in my art back then.]
When Gold and Silver had come out in Japan but hadn't been brought to the west yet, I remember my mother finding online some frankly terrible Gold/Silver ROMs for us to play. Glitchy and badly translated, I distinctly remember every Pokemon uttered its cry twice - to this day I think Sentret's cry sounds better when repeated - chirp-chirp!. We were just that desperate to play them. I also remember my mother finding out that the Silver pokemon's name was "Lugia" and her immediate response was not to tell my father because he'd make loogie jokes forever. [He already called Pikachu "Pick-a-nose] Thankfully I don't remember any of these jokes happening lol.
I remember being in fourth grade in 2000, Gold and Silver's American release impending, being terrible at times tables in school, and my mother telling me that if I didn't learn them, I wouldn't be allowed to get a copy of Gold and Silver when they came out. But Christmas came and so did Gold and Silver, right into my hands, and the obsession just continued, on into 2001 with Crystal.
Things other than the games that rocked my world. The anime, which I watched constantly on kids WB. And especially the movies. The first movie changed my entire life, my art direction, my interests in science and biology, so many parts of me can trace back to there. I still consider it one of my top favorites. The score is utterly beautiful. The scenes of Mew in the beginning, in beautiful, pure, very Japanese nature... The movie's mixture of nature versus artifice... the first flashes in the pan that became Hiraeth.
The second movie was just as good. The sound of Lugia's song, like whalesong, chilled me - still chills me. I had the soundtrack on CD, got it for Christmas, and listened to it endlessly for a couple of years. [Also listened to endlessly: the Majora's Mask soundtrack. I finally replaced that one last year although it isn't the now-rare Nintendo Power version that I had then.]
That's about how the first chapter of Pokemon went for me. I spent the period of the third generation in my "I'm too grown up for video games! Those are for kids!" middle school period, which you can pretty much see how long that lasted LOL. About three or four years maybe. Diamond and Pearl brought me right back into the fold in 2006, and it's been love nonstop ever since. Diamond and Pearl in high school, Black and White in early college [and the first time I ever beat a Pokemon game in its entirety on White version, and wept like a child as the credits rolled]. Fell in love all over again with the beauty of X and Y. I've even caught up with the much maligned Hoenn generation in the era of ORAS.
And now.... the future of Sun and Moon.
In about an hour and a half I'll be purchasing a copy of the Virtual Console games. Haven't decided exactly which one of the three yet. We'll see how it goes. I fully intend to do what I've never truly done before, and catch 'em all. <3
