So many combinations, so many combinations!

I am so tired. I guess that's my punishment for playing Pokemon SoulSilver non-stop. Yesterday I played it until 1 AM, and today I played it from the time I woke up until about 15 minutes ago. Even though my eyes are screaming "Why did you make us stare at countless Geodudes and Gravelers for three hours straight? WHY?" I don't regret it. I did a heckuva lot of training. I beat Clair! Yay me! Now I'm on the Kimono Girls, who are evil despite them all having adorable Eeveelutions. Let's bully them like all the popular kids bullied us in middle school! YOU KIMONO GIRLS ARE SOOO WEIRD!

Anyway, so, I'm really tired. Did I say that already? Apparently I did. Today I don't really have anything to talk about, except another Pokemon-related topic: the player characters! The player characters went from being awesome to being dull, ugly, and non-threatening. They're so hard to believe as POKEMON MASTERS BOLD ITALICS!!! and they're also just really uninteresting.

Seriously. Look at the designs for Red and Leaf from FireRed and LeafGreen:

SO. AWESOME. Look at Red. Look at his face. That is the face of a trainer who has no reservations about brutally murdering a level 6 Rattatta by making his Level 50 Charizard use Flamethrower. This is the trainer who loves his Pokemon and no one else's - and that's GOOD. People, hating everyone else's Pokemon doesn't make you evil! It makes you smart. The whole point is to win, and if you're too busy chatting with Picknicker Liz about how cute her Weepinbell is (which, by the way, you would never do because 1. Liz is a brat and 2. Weepinbell is ugly as sin) then you will LOSE. So good on you, Red. And Leaf! Her outfit is just awesome. It's practical and it's fashionable. The hat is a wonderful stylistic choice because it can get really darn sunny out there in Kanto. Good on you, Leaf. Good on you.

Those designs are probably the two best, technically. They're certainly the best PAIR of characters. But to me, the single best player character is Gold (AKA "Ethan") from Gold and Silver.

"Bro, we don't mess. WE. DON'T. MESS."

 This is the new design of Ethan. But when he was Gold, in the original game, man. He was a true player. He was GLARING, guys. He wouldn't take a "No" from anyone. He did what he needed to do and he beat Lance in one go. Gold even beat RED. Obviously, Gold is the one true Pokemon Master. No one else beat Red, did they? (Other than Lyra/Ethan, who basically IS Gold, anyway. I love his design, too. I almost played SoulSilver as a boy because you can just tell that Ethan doesn't play around. But Lyra is cool, too, despite her gigantic hat. Her hair is actually SHAPED LIKE THAT HAT, too. So weird.) 

Also: Gold is just stronger mentally than Red, too. After Red became the Pokemon Master, he got all excited - "Yeah! I beat the Elite Four! I'm so excited to play the post-game now! Maybe I can go to the Orange Islands!" But no. In Red and Blue, there is no post-game. It's incredibly depressing for someone playing the game, but, well, Red has to LIVE IT. After he defeats Lance, he has no purpose in life anymore. Thus, he retreats to Mt. Silver where he fights Geodudes and Sneasels until he has killed every single one of them. He then takes to the top of the mountain where he becomes so emaciated that he and his Level 80 Pikachu, Charizard, etc. can no longer talk or even grunt. But then Gold comes along, super-excited after beating 16 gym leaders in a row AND beating the Elite Four twice (TWICE!) and he happens along this shell of a man, Red. Then they battle. Guess what? Gold wins, easily. He jumps around excitedly, saying, "HECK YEAH! I WON, SON! I'M GOLD, MOFO!" And then he leaves. And he goes and hangs out with all of those cougar fangirls he has (well, no one's perfect) and life goes on. He doesn't have a mental breakdown like Red. That's because Gold eats mental breakdowns for supper.

 

(By the way, there was also Kris, from Crystal, who is really awesome. There she is on the right. Say "Hi, Kris!" Unfortunately she was replaced with Lyra, but Lyra's grown on me.) 

Ahem. Now, after Gold and Silver, things started to get a little...well, weird. I think we're all familiar with May; she's the whiny chick in the crazy tight booty shorts. Has that little brother, Max, who we should all just forget even existed? Yeah. Her male counterpart is Brendan. Brendan has the single strangest design out of any trainer. He has this weird hat with white on top, and for years I thought that was his hair. It's NOT. How is that hair-looking thing not his hair?! Where did he get an ugly hat like that? And in Emerald, his outfit just sucks. He wears shorts over long pants. Yes, that's practical, Brendan! Now if you're hot, you can take your...shorts off? Oh, you. So strange.

 "Yeah, we be trainin'. We be trainin' in our booty shorts and poor color choicez."

Then finally we have Dawn and Lucas, another fashionably (and mentally) deficient pair. Dawn is actually okay. Her skirt is insanely short, yes, and she is definite and obvious pedo-bait. No 10 year old should be wearing a skirt that short! Don't listen to what those freaks on 4Chan say, okay? But Lucas...Lucas has no excuse. Lucas has a scarf and a beret. I can't believe any boy that wears a beret could be the Pokemon Master. Lucas is such a wuss, guys! He's a wuss. I beat him SO easily in Pearl. Whenever he showed up to battle me, I was like, "Hey, 'sup, Lucas? Que pasa?" And he would say, "Oh, why, HULLO there, Allegra! How are you, dahling?" And then we sat for tea and after we were done we would battle. Although this didn't happen often. But playing as Lucas must be lame, too. I can't take anyone seriously named Lucas. I'm sorry. I just can't.

"They see what we wearin'; they hatin'." OF COURSE WE ARE.

The new Pokemon trainers, however, are awesome. The boy especially! The girl is more Dawn-style pedo-bait, but she's older, so it's okay! Girls can be sluts as long as they're of age is what I always say! :D Just another reason to hype up Black and White like crazy.