Pokemon News - The Acid Rain Glitch

Yet another quick update - the new hot topic in Competitive Battling in Platinum is the weather glitch being called "acid rain," a field weather effect that causes every weather effect to trigger between turns and doing damage to each Pokemon.

The glitch was discovered in the Japanese release of the game months ago, but has undergone some serious testing since its discovery.

The glitch works like this: after a weather condition has been set up, by attack or automatically through a Pokemon's ability, a player's Pokemon is knocked out by using Pursuit when said Pokemon switches out (ex: Player one brings out Tyranitar against Starmie, triggering Sandstorm with Tyranitar's Sand Stream ability. Starmie's controller switches it out while Tyranitar's controller selects Pursuit as his attack. Starmie goes to switch, causing Pursuit to attack first and knock it out). The knocked out player switches in a new Pokemon and, from that point on, Rain, Sun, Hail and Sand weather conditions trigger (not sure of the order, bro), each causing Pokemon to take damage as though it were Hail or Sand (and causing some Pokemon to recover HP depending on weather condition).

Apparently other field effects, such as Gravity or Trick Room, can also trigger the glitch. A research thread detailing every known aspect of the glitch can be found on Smogon's forums.

One interesting effect of the glitch is that it causes an infinite loop for Weather-transformative Pokemon like Castform, effectively drawing the match as neither player can continue battling.

Research has not shown whether this will have any effect on the 2009 Pokemon Championship Qualifiers, though it is possible Pursuit has no such effect in double battles, the format for the championship.

A video of the glitch showing up in the English Platinum game can be seen here.

Quick update: Wiihab

Dr. Bruce Battles, who still has the coolest name of any researcher I've ever talked to, took some time to talk to me for a feature piece I'm writing. Battles' has finished his first study with "Wiihab," using the Wii to aid in physical rehabilitation and actually, you know, get fit.

Battles let a number of patients at Western Kentucky University's Brain Trauma unit use Wii Sports (he specifically mentioned bowling, but there was no word on whether any other programs were used) to help the injured individuals help regain gross motor and socialization skills. And the final word? It worked.

Battles says that while Wiihab does not replace traditional therapy for trauma patients, it is a good supplement to their regular workouts, making the repetitive tasks involved in regaining motor functions fun. Additionally, the multiplayer aspects of the Wii allow individuals who've had this brain damage to recover social skills lost in their respective accidents, putting (and pitting) patients together in a shared experience on the Nintendo system.

Battles' first study was successful enough to spawn a second spin-off study, this time using the Wii Fit in addition to Wii Sports to test balance and other functions.

The doctor has not yet finished his article on the first study, but says it should be ready in early-to-mid April. If so, he should be the first person to report statistically relevant results with the Wii in rehabilitation.

Really quick post. It's about Platinum. Oh joy.

One major problem I've noticed in-game so far: lag.

In Eterna Forest and Hearthome City, trying to run places causes the game to randomly start dropping in frame rates and slowing down pretty frequently (this is especially true in Hearthome).

I haven't really noticed the effect if you avoid running/increasing your movement frames and the effect isn't too crazy (though this makes leveling in Eterna Forest while walking around with Cheryl much more difficult).

While it's clear Hearthome's new "there are like 800 moving objects on screen at the same time" is detrimental to the frame rate, I'm not sure if Eterna Forest's drop is due to the new "canopy" effect with shadows and breaks for sunlight on the forest floor or if the effect is due to you dragging two bodies around instead of one (coupled with the new visual effects). I guess I'll have an update the next time I'm partnered with another trainer.

Other than that, my progress has stifled in-game due to OCD with completing my Pokedex as well as GRINDAN/power leveling my team between gyms.

Just a heads up for those of you still unsure about buying the game or who've had even less time to play than I have. Kind of mad at myself for not reporting this sooner.

Rockefeller Plaza Poke-Invasion

Saturday, March 21 was quite a day for Rockefeller Center's Nintendo World Store.

Patrons were lined up around the block, most all with DSes in hand, many dressed up as or carrying Pokemon characters, in anticipation of the prerelease of the latest game in the Pokemon series, Pokemon Platinum.

The store opened an hour early, 11 A.M., to a massive crowd. Employees tried to bottle-neck traffic to the store by allowing only ten people at a time to enter to reduce congestion throughout the store, though, to be honest, moving around was a difficult task.

The first floor was decked out, as it always is, with mountains of Pokemon merchandise. The merchandise was then surrounded with Pokemon Platinum related paraphernalia, such as standees of the male and female game protagonists, lots of posters and cut-outs (and masks!) of Giratina, the focal Pokemon of the game and promotional back packs, masks and other items related the game's release.

In addition to the giveaways of promotional items, customers purchasing the game were randomly selected to win copies of the game autographed by Game Producer Junichi Masuda and Game Director Takeshi Kawachimaru to enthusiastic shouts and ringing cowbells.

If the crowd and employees weren't enough excitement, the outdoor set-up was just more icing on the cake.

A play area, including ball pit, carnival games, demo stations of the new game, a live stage where young Pokefans could play games, dance and answer trivia questions and a bean-bag chair area with a screening of the new Pokemon movie "Giratina and the Sky Warrior" for patrons. Mascots of DPP starter Pokemon Piplup and Chimchar were walking around to greet fans and take pictures, while various inflatable Pokemon were spotted throughout the fenced-off courtyard.

Oh, and the game's official release date was only one day later.

The massive fan support is just a very slight sign of Pokemon's still massive popularity for all ages, parents, children and those teens who happened to grow up with the gaming phenomenon.

Platinum Release Party: AVAST!

March 21st, aka this Saturday, at Nintendo World in Rockefeller Plaza, NYC, Noon-4. Get ready. It's a party.

Nintendo's celebrating the overly-anticipated (to me, anyway) release of Pokemon Platinum in style with a release party, with giveaways, signings, costumes and, best of all, selling the newest release in the Pokemon series a day early.

Information is available on Pokemon.com, but the real treat is the fact that I'm going and you get to see me. No, just kidding, it's the Pokemon. You guys can see me fanboy over Pokemon like the ridiculous man-child I am. I will demand battles from everyone. No one is safe.

The lost world of the portable console.

While I was growing up, there was one thing that still had some level of "in vogue" to it before the world of portable gaming became sexy... before anything could really be described as "portable."

Yeah, you had Game Boy Color to play your Kirby, Mario, Tetris and Pokemon on and not long after was the Gameboy Advance.

The real unsung gem of that era, however, was the Sega Nomad, what boiled down to a handheld Sega Genesis system that ran off of wall outlets, 6 AA batteries, a car charger and probably other potential power sources. Ignore for a second that it consumed these batteries en masse like it was some sort of device made to consume batteries (and that rechargable battery technology was nowhere near perfection), it was a system you could play any "Sega" game on anywhere. And when you were, say, at a family friend's shorehouse and didn't have the gual to bring your whole system with you, you could hook the Nomad up to the TV and play on the big boy screen. The box even had a second controller port for second players if you so desired.

More recently (though none too recent), Sony released the PSone, a smaller, white, extremely compact Playstation system*. What's more, the system was prepackaged with a fold-up LCD screen, allowing you to plug the system into wall ports in an airport or use a cigarette charger to power you on the fly for a FF9 (because FF7 and 8 are awful games and you should be ashamed for liking them) speed run on a long family car ride across the country.

Now we have behemoths like the PS3 and Xbox360 (and motion sensitive Wii; good luck playing that in the back of an Oldsmobile). We have the Nintendo DS, PSP and iPhone as compact, pocket size, non-cirgarette lighter-charged systems that are almost on par with (even at times outstripping) PS1 graphics. We also have mods to let you play games like Sonic 3 and Knuckles and FF7 on the fly.

So what happened here? Nomad was poorly marketed and released at a time when the Genesis was ending its lifecycle, but the PSone was around well into the age of the PS2 and other last-gen systems, even offering a lower price tag to keep it competitively priced and well-moved from shelves. One was a potential success marred by timing issues, the other a success despite timing. We cannot get "current gen" specs running on a DS. And while we have laptops, there's a lot to be said for controlling Dante on a touchpad.

We're in an age of behemoths and little gnomes that fit in your pocket, but it seems there's no space open for something in between. I remember the fun, but maybe I'm one of the few who do, when systems like the Nomad only sold 1 million units (total).

*Special note: mine did not have a phone.

I didn't hear anything about a recession.

A TMNG projection says the video games industry will hit $40 billion by the year 2012.

The assessment claims that mobile platform gaming will be bringing major money over to the industry, such as through iPhone apps and the like.

In a statement taken from a Boston Globe article on the analysis:

"The expansion of casual games, simpler user interfaces and the proliferation of innovative business models is broadening the gamer demographic. The timing is ripe for service providers to hedge the business cycle."

In short: casual gaming, particularly through mobile phones or anything that can be played quickly via broadband (be it Peggle or Brawl).

So what does this mean for you? Numbers say ~50% of gamers a girls, most are around 33 years-old and, as I reported way back, mobile gaming's stake in the market is growing. Does this mean "more expensive" platforms like the DS and PSP are going to go out of fashion for iPhone apps store downloads? Probably not. But it does mean that gaming is going to cater less towards sitting down for hours and make way for a more on-the-fly experience.

A video from moviebob (THE GAME OVERTHINKER ZOMG) shows a possible third way for gaming to go, though this seems like more of a "full game" experience rather than the portable craze way. The "idea" posits a game that turns into a movie, similar to the failed Alone in the Dark remake, which allowed you to "skip scenes" and go to whichever level you like.

Casuals who can't beat Dante Must Die mode get their full game "experience," while the hardcore set gets the gaming experience. Yeah, you should just watch the video for this one.