Draco: This is still not my "one more addendum"; I'm still working out the kinks for getting Hisuian notes into modern-day Sinnoh. (And I haven't even seen the new guy myself yet, so my notes aren't complete.) But this one IS going to be spoilery regarding endgame and postgame developments in Legends: Arceus, so don't read this if you haven't played the whole game yet. I'm gonna go out on a limb and say that the instruction of "have all 18 Plates" won't spoil you, but will indicate when you're home free. #YouHaveBeenWarned

I'm not dropping my "what in Hisui is canon" summary here, but I AM going to offer my first impressions as recorded throughout my first couple playthroughs.

Pokémon and all related properties © Nintendo.


Sendoff Spring, Sinnoh

"Fishing for Pokémon on Antimatter's doorstep? Pretty ballsy."

Lucas reeled in his line with a chuckle, glancing back to find Cynthia standing there. "Says the Champion who raced up to Spear Pillar without telling anyone when Distortion literally started breaking loose."

Cynthia shrugged. "Fair enough."

The line was cast back out before Lucas spoke up again. "Professor Rowan actually wanted me to test a theory about the whole 'Distortion's doorstep' thing. Will Pokémon actually swim in the waters in front of the Distortion World? With how foggy it is around here, fishing seemed like the easiest way to test it."

"Fair point," Cynthia admitted. "Any luck?"

"I'm not a great fisherman-" Lucas was cut off as his line abruptly jumped forward. "...but I'm not having zero luck!"

He pulled back on the line, and a scaled blue figure burst out of the water, giving a roar that echoed around the spring. Cynthia's smirk vanished when the Gyarados looked towards the shore; she could swear it looked at her before roaring again, more pointedly this time. Lucas didn't seem to notice, reaching for his belt and throwing a Ball up at his side as he regarded his catch.

An Alakazam appeared, spoons at the ready.

Lucas shook his head. "I think I'll pass," he mused. "Knock him out!"

The Gyarados lunged forward with its mouth open, but Alakazam unleashed a Psychic pulse that ripped up around the Water-type with nearly enough force to rip it out of the water. The Atrocious Pokémon recovered was nearly out already as it tried to recover, and Alakazam followed through with an Energy Ball to knock it out, leaving it sinking back into the water.

Lucas propped his rod over his shoulder, smiling at Alakazam. "Nice shot."

Cynthia lowered her guard, turning to him. "No Ranger rescues today?"

"Dawn's hanging out with them in the Battle Zone," Lucas admitted, turning back to the water. "She thinks spending time with them will... do her... some..." He trailed off in mid-cast. "Do you see that?"

"Hm?" Cynthia followed his gaze; there was something gleaming in the water on the opposite shore. "What is that?"

Alakazam was already floating over the water before Lucas could prompt ask him to, collecting the source with his telekinesis and bringing it back to them. Lucas was baffled when he realized it was a pair of water-worn - but decidedly red-and-white - spheres. "Poké Balls?"

"They're almost rusted through," Cynthia observed. She grabbed one as Alakazam got near, and when his power released it, she recognized the weight. "There's Pokémon in these." A Trainer was never expected to lift a 460kg Snorlax, but Poké Balls were, by design, noticeably heavier when they were full compared to when they were empty.

"Who would throw out their Poké Balls with the Pokémon still inside?" Lucas wondered, taking the other three.

The Champion looked over the ball she had taken. "The mechanism looks like it'll break if the Ball is thrown," she observed. "These have been here a while." She turned to Lucas, grabbing another one so they each had two. "We might as well release the Pokémon inside." The two turned away from the spring and tossed the Balls forward. As they hit the ground, there was a distinctive crack of the Poké Balls shattering amidst the burst of the Pokémon being released.

A Houndoom, Honchkrow, Crobat, and Weavile were standing there when the light faded, looking baffled at their surroundings.

"What a sinister crew," Lucas mused.

Cynthia started. "You're...!"

+x+x+x+

How long had he been in this place, surrounded by dead emptiness?

How far had he walked, letting his legs carry him nowhere?

...What meaning did such questions even have, in a world where the rules are broken?

Cyrus had deliberately turned his back on escape from the Distortion World, after seeing Dawn quell Giratina's rage by refusing to battle it. When he had returned to that precipice later on, he had found the gate she had departed through absent. He was trapped here now - imprisoned in Distortion, with Antimatter as his warden. A vaster prison than he might have found himself in, if he were taken in by police in the material world... but he had no freedom here all the same.

Antimatter had confronted him, once, since he had arrived here. Giratina had struck the Poké Balls from his belt, casting them into the abyss, and then departed, leaving him defenseless. But since, he had been alone - and it was for this reason he was grateful that he had never made friends of his Pokémon, as other Trainers had.

It seemed true, what the Champion had said - time didn't flow, here, and space wasn't stable. The water flowing in arbitrary falls seemed unfit for drinking, yet he never felt parched of thirst to drive him to try. The trees, if they could be called that, were dead, empty towers that bore nothing to eat, yet he never starved enough to wish they did. But his legs would still tire, if he walked for long enough - or perhaps the fatigue was simply in his mind, after too many experiences when the pursuit of his goals had blocked out hunger but not exhaustion. Now, he approached another surface, standing at 90 degrees to that on which he stood, from which empty trees extended - and one such tree was positioned nearly in contact with the ground, offering him a place to sit down.

Cyrus folded his hands before him and closed his eyes, listening to the emptiness of Distortion.

"Hey there."

...Did even Antimatter possess a spirit? Was even Distortion's warden prone to such idleness as taunting those it opposed?

"Hey, there."

Footsteps approached him from towards the base of the tree... but Giratina did not possess feet on which to step, in this world.

"Nice to see another face."

Cyrus turned towards the voice. His position, and the path his gaze followed, meant he saw the feet first - a pair of golden sandals, not the modern variety of light footwear for beachgoing but resembling the form of a boot while leaving the skin exposed to air. Dark leggings that stopped short of his footwear's highest cuff, with strange golden sparks connected to his waist, reaching back and then jutting forth. A white top that resembled a toga, with golden bracelets around his arms and a platinum charm hanging from his neck. And a face... with golden hair, hanging over one eye.

"You're..."

A bitter smirk appeared on the newcomer's face. "What, too much contrast for you?" The voice was not the one he thought it was, and on closer inspection, his hair was much shorter than Cyrus had assumed; it was styled upward in a strange wave, but if it had hung loose it wouldn't reach his waist.

"...Never mind," Cyrus insisted, turning away.

The man beckoned to the tree at his side. "Is this seat taken?"

"Begone," Cyrus scolded. "I have no need of company."

"Well, you've got the commanding personality down pat." The man's snark implied Cyrus was not the only one who assumed he had seen a familiar face. "Don't tell me you're one of those Pokémon Trainers that Ingo was always talking about."

Cyrus was a firm believer that confusion was a product of the mind's failure to comprehend, not an emotion borne of the spirit, and so was readily able to admit he was confused by the man's remark. It sounded as though Pokémon Trainers were a foreign concept to this man. Had Distortion opened a portal to a region where Rangers captured Pokémon for aid rather than catching them for companions? Or to a region where Warriors took up arms and fought one another as their Pokémon did?

The man took a seat before Cyrus could object again. "Not like it makes a difference," he insisted. "If you're in here, you're probably like me."

"How so?" Cyrus demanded.

"Giratina only knows how to hold a grudge." The man surprised Cyrus by how unhesitatingly he spoke Antimatter's name, as though he were more familiar than merely by the legend. "His violence got him cast into Distortion, and he spent so long wanting nothing more than to just tear down the Hall of Origin." He shook his head. "Then he has one bad encounter with a human, and does a complete turnaround. Now he wants nothing more than to make Pokémon Wielders like us suffer."

"Pokémon... Wielders?"

The second word hadn't left Cyrus' mouth before a familiar cry echoed through the Distortion World around him. As he turned, a black silhouette descended just past the ledge; the man in bright garb scowled, getting to his feet. "Oh, what?!" he demanded. "You gonna barge in on us? Two men having a conversation, and you got a problem with that? You gonna play Arceus and give me a hard time?"

That golden mask crested the ridge, and Antimatter regarded them, tendrils raised.

"What are you going to do?" the man scoffed. "Kill me?"

Silence for a long moment... and the darkness shrouded the air around Giratina, into which it vanished instantly.

"Yeah, run, you ungrateful coward."

The man sat back down with a sigh. After a moment, he turned to Cyrus. "So, what are you in for?"

That statement, so typical of criminals behind bars, only asserted Cyrus' sensation that he was imprisoned here. "For wanting a world without spirit."

"Huh?"

"The spirit of living beings is a weakness," Cyrus proclaimed. "And humans delude themselves into thinking it pleases them. I wanted a world without spirit, and I poured over ancient texts and written myth to find a way to make it a reality. I forged Red Chains from the bodies of the legendary Pokémon of Sinnoh's three lakes, and used them to bring forth the dragons of Time and Space, that I could unmake the world and create it anew.

"But... Antimatter had other ideas. The Red Chains shattered in my hands when Distortion opened. Time and Space were returned to whence they came, and I was dragged here. Followed by a Pokémon Trainer who wanted nothing more than to crush the last dregs of hope. She defeated my Pokémon, advanced to face Antimatter... and was allowed to depart freely." He shook his head. "I refused to be imprisoned in that world, and now I am imprisoned here."

The man in bright garb huffed. "So even Giratina can have a one-track mind."

"You speak of that dragon with an unusual familiarity," Cyrus accused.

"Well, I'm not so different from you," the man replied. "I wanted a new world of my own. A world where I was never going to suffer. And I partnered with Giratina - who was cast out for his violence, and wanted revenge. Together, we tore open a hole in reality, driving Time and Space mad - and the nobles of Hisui, while we were at it. But the legendary Pokémon of the lakes gave someone a Red Chain to bind one, and quell the other. Long before Arceus ever showed itself."

"R-K-S?" Cyrus echoed.

The man turned to him. "To someone who calls Giratina 'Antimatter', maybe 'The Original One' sounds more familiar?"

Cyrus started. "What...?"

"Devotion doesn't get you anywhere with that son of a bitch," the man muttered. "And Giratina cowered away from the opportunity to finally take revenge on it. He returned to this place peacefully, and started playing by Arceus' rules, turning into a guardian on the other side of our world. Preserving the world as it's meant to be." He spat into the emptiness. "And when I finally came here, he made me suffer for it - just like he's making you."

"What do you mean, 'finally'?" Cyrus asked.

"Normally, when a person dies, their soul separates from their body," the man insisted. "Giratina drags them here, to Distortion, and from here they move on to the next world." He shook his head. "But I was bound in my bones, and chained to this place. A dead prisoner serving an eternal sentence, in a prison that can never be broken out of. Even if a gate opens to the material world, I'll never be able to walk through it. Because Antimatter is a coward."

A cry echoed through the emptiness again.

"You heard me!" the man yelled, getting to his feet again. "You took one loss, and you turned tail and ran! All your grandstanding about wanting to tear down the Hall of Origin, wanting to strike Arceus down, and you were scared away by a human! An outsider! You can't accept that you were better when you were bloodthirsty! You're just another victim of a garbage conscience, eating your wings to make you tame!"

The world around them darkened, and Cyrus saw a flash of gold and crimson pass through the shadows.

When it faded, he was sitting alone once again - left with nothing but the thoughts that the Pokémon Wielder had stirred inside him.


Draco: I mentioned that Lucas goes full Gym-challenger for the Manaphy Egg after the events of Platinum have already unfolded, but I never really laid out where the rest of the Ranger gifts arrive. On one of my runs of Platinum before Generation V happened, I sent in the Manaphy Egg for the start, had my team equal to Shaymin at roughly Veilstone, and caught up to Heatran sometime before Sunnyshore. Let's send in the Almians at Veilstone and the Oblivians at Sunnyshore; that's still most of a journey that he started with a Monferno, a Kadabra, and a Clefairy, so it's safe to say the other two got evolved before he was finished. (We're going to quietly ignore his post-credits BDSP team because for some reason he doesn't have an Alakazam on there.)

I knew Legends: Arceus was going to be huge enough that I would never be able to remember my first impressions after the fact, so I recorded my first impressions as I had them.
-Introduced to the world by the Alpha itself? I'm usually uncomfortable around fourth-wall-break introductions, but I think I can forgive the Original One for being aware of the nature of its world.
-When this game was revealed to be ancient Sinnoh, I was expecting something Assassin's Creed-style. A protagonist with a smartphone ending up in Hisui feels more like Sengoku Otome.
-You'd think the name would clue me in, but I was deadass preparing for "Cyllene" to have gone the other way and taken the name "Cyrus" before the Captain was addressed as "ma'am".
-Maybe it's just the hair colour, but Commander Kamado reminds me of Nobunaga. I was kind of dreading a Ransei reference, but that raises an entirely separate brand of implications that I'm much more fond of. PRE-SUBMIT EDIT: Apparently that's supposed to be Rowan, not Nobunaga. It's definitely just the hair colour. Now there's yet another brand of implications. END PRE-SUBMIT EDIT
-This game has the perfect combination of the Let's Go "catch wild Pokémon without a fight" and the core series "battle wild Pokémon for experience" mechanics.
-The requests and ranking system give me the most wonderful Ranger flashbacks.
-There is fall damage, and there are direct attacks from wild Pokémon if you don't send yours out. This is an exhilarating game.
-The Zelda-style #VoiceGrunting is nice, though I'd prefer if it got the full treatment rather than just in action.
-Anyone who catches a Wurmple specifically wanting one of its evolved forms is basically BEGGING to get the other. I guarantee you that Beauregard is gonna end up with a Dustox. PRE-SUBMIT EDIT: Called it! Well, he got a Cascoon, I don't know if we see him get a Dustox, but same result! END PRE-SUBMIT EDIT
-Pikachu and Eevee have their pre-GenVI cries back! I could not be happier.
-The battle system is very... FFX-esque. The different 'styles' of using moves, and the fact that the individual's turn comes up rather than each combatant getting one action at a time, makes for a much more tactical battle.
-Frickin' Alpha, the Noble Pokémon are treated like Zelda bosses. Nintendo just made one of my dawn-of-GenV fangame writings a reality.
-"All lives touch other lives to create something anew and alive." I was low-key frustrated by the fact that that had no plot relevance in Sinnoh. Glad to see it has meaning in Hisui.
-Regional variants will never cease to baffle me at first blush. I was straight-up blindsided by Hisuian Liligant, I almost thought I'd gotten her mixed up with Leavanny.
-The fact that wild Pokémon - and wardens' Pokémon - can appear in groups, yet you're only allowed to send out one at a time, is pleasantly reminiscent of Gen VI horde battles.
-They gave regional variants to your starter Pokémon's final evolutions? Holy frickin' Mulch. At least I don't feel bad about all the starters being part of my quote-unquote "canon" teams for their original regions.
-People who doubt a protagonist's ability to do something after they've already done something amazing will never cease to irritate me.
-Another temporal stranger! Arrived before the protagonist! Practically acclimated to the time period! I swear to Distortion, I wrote Ancient Ruination before I knew anything about Legends! Hell, I was halfway through writing it when Legends was ANNOUNCED, and I dodged spoilers like my sanity depended on it!
-Magikarp that are affected by empowering phenomena will never not be funny.
-Little bit disappointed that the old Snowpoint Temple didn't make reference to Regieleki and Regidrago, but I may or may not be developing headcanons about that.
-I've never been a Pokédex completionist... but I've gotta say, not being able to update my Pokédex is frustrating. Or maybe it's just the plot developments surrounding the period where I'm not allowed to update my Pokédex.
-Azelf's trial was inspired by NieR credit rolls, I swear.
-This game just straight-up manifested one of my most ludicrous fantasies regarding the Pokémon series, with its subtle choose-your-battle mechanic for the endgame and every Pokémon being acquirable without trading (but requiring MUCH more work in exchange).
-Holy unfounded ego, Crobat. I thought Avery was unjustly proud of himself, but Melli puts him to shame. I hope he still gets the shut-up treatment on the Diamond Clan route. PRE-SUBMIT EDIT: Yes, he did get the shut-up treatment on the Diamond Clan route. Though I feel like the biggest reason Adaman just turned to the subject at hand instead of giving him a tremendous frick-you-and-a-half is because there's less potential for a sweet comeback than there was on the Pearl Clan route. END PRE-SUBMIT EDIT
-What sort of Tauros Mulch is this post-credits endgame that you fight three separate battles with no healing and no OPPORTUNITY to heal in between, and if you're defeated you have to start over from the first battle again? If it was something like a predecessor to the Elite Four, I'd get it, but a big climactic battle? When Ghetsis pit Kyurem on you and then immediately sent out his team, N patched you up in between!
-Catch-'em-all completionism, I do wish you would be an end and not a means. "Seek out all Pokémon" could have easily been describing a see-'em-all state of Pokédex like Sinnoh has.
-I'll admit, I'm a little bit baffled at the fact that Rei gets a Survey Corps hat and Akari gets a Survey Corps hairstyle. The way she wears that bandana, and the physics that are applied to it, I feel like it could have easily been made a normal piece of headwear.
-The Origin Forme for Palkia is one of those things that seems a bit questionable second-hand (i.e. via the Pokédex image), but is way more impressive when you actually see it proper (i.e. in battle at the Temple of Sinnoh).