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What are your favorite/fondest memories of Unova?

bugfacts

bugfacts

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it’s the 15th Anniversary of Pokémon Black and White and it’s got me feeling hugely nostalgic for Generation V!! I love these games with all my heart! They were the first-ever games I made a concentrated effort to go in totally blind for and the games that defined the majority of my time with the series as a high schooler/older teen. They truly felt magical and like a really special reinvention to me at the time and I’m still extremely fond of them!!

I’ll never ever forget the bustling crowds of Castelia City’s streets! This felt like an absolutely mind-blowing graphical accomplishment to me at the time! Or the haunting introductory sequence about the coronation of N! I was never so intrigued by the opening of a Pokémon game!

So much about these games and their stylistic presentation just enchants me. I love the largely urban focus, I love the plethora of bridges, I love all of the strange and experimental features like the Dream World and the ability to pass into and influence other players’ game worlds via the Entralink!

Something in the art direction and the character and world design of these games just made me feel like the series was fresher and newer than it had ever been and, in some ways, I think it’s still my absolute favorite in this regard.

I’ll never forget seeing a Drilbur for the first time and gasping in the middle of class because we finally had a real mole Pokémon. I’ll never forget the Ferris Wheel ride with N. I’ll never forget the rambunctious, dynamic key art for the Battle Subway. I’ll never forget the spooky atmosphere of Kyurem’s crater. Or my absolute delight at discovering Munna for the first time.

What are some of your fondest memories or experiences in or about Unova? =]
 
I have so many good memories from these games. They are very close to my heart. However, one moment that really struck with me was when N’s castle came out of the ground and I got to experience its epic soundtrack, the gym leaders coming to help fight the bad guys and N defeating every member of the pokemon league. It was just so epic, it felt like I was being a part of something bigger and I’ve been chasing that feeling ever since.

Other things I’d like to mention:
  • Loved the big City vibe from Castelia and Black City, truly epic.
  • Elesa’s gym and many others are just so cool.
  • Serperior :bulbaLove:
  • Love the bridges!
  • The Elite Four rooms are some of the most memorables, love them! Again, it felt grandiose!
  • Really loved Team Plasma trying to challenge the philosophy of pokemon battling (even if it was just an elaborate ruse from Ghetsis)
 
It was my first pokemon game, I actually got it with the special edition console, which I still have today. I was a kid and didn't bother reading the text at the time, and was trapped in a town for months and couldn't proceed and couldn't find out why. I visited every house, talked to every NPC... Lesson learnt, don't skip the text.
There was a gym with a Emolga, and that rat killed most of my team at the time, I had to go back to the grasses to level up. That was the first time I got stuck at a gym, and I was...actually I still am scared of Emolgas.
Yes, the bridges! I spent a long time there too. Cycling and hitting shadows to collect items, and hatching eggs. I got my first shiny Eevee there.
I misunderstood Sigilyph's eyes, and liked them immediately, so you can imagine how shocked and sad I am when I found it out.
 
Unova felt so different from other pokemon games when I first played through Black. The urban environments really stood out to me - so amazing to see pokemon in such a fresh place!
The most memorable parts to me:
  • The seasons! I loved seeing the seasons change in game. A lot of places really look different, too.
  • Riding the ferris wheel with N
  • The way the camera would pan out sometimes so you can see how big the scenes are.
  • The desert resort - it felt so mysterious to explore.
  • Interacting with N in general - I never sympathized with the evil teams much before this. Having N involved made me think a lot more about the evil team's motives.
  • Castelia City, the bridges, all the city elements :bulbaLove:
 
This is gonna disappoint people but all my favorite memories involving Unova involve using DNS exploits in order to get or even make any available Pokémon I wanted, even if it was among the likes of Wonder Guard Arceus or Contrary Slaking, then distributing these types of Pokémon to my friends irl and having battles with them with blatantly hacked Pokémon.

Other than that, really just trading and battle interactions with my friends irl in general, including regular battles, battles involving legendary Pokémon, and me helping to train up some of my friends' Pokémon to level 100.

Also those times I traveled into other friends' universes through the Entralink in Pokémon Black and White. There wasn't much the player could do when traveling to these other universes, which was probably why this feature was removed in Pokémon Black 2 White 2, but the experience felt really cool and magical, like a the aforementioned.

It took a while for me to realize that while Unova was the region I grew up with most as a child, the best parts of my experience there were most heavily dominated by the multi-player aspect of the game, as opposed to the single player.
 
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Mine were catching a Jolly Axew with Mold Breaker on the first encounter in White and raising Reshiram in White 2 to level 100 so that it could learn Blue Flare.
 
The music, the music really sticks with me after all of these years. Gen V probably has one of my favorite soundtracks in the series. (The DS era in general had really good music.)

Also having grown up in the area, a lot of Unova just /feels/ like home to me. One thing in particular was seeing travel trailers parked along side routes in the forest reminded me a lot of camping when I was younger. Obviously Unova is not 1:1 NY/NJ and its definitely not as invested in recreating said inspiration as later gens, but you can still feel a lot of the Northeast US in it.
 
i've been wanting to replay these games and feel all of the nostalgia again, hopefully can do so by the end of the year but we'll see how that turns out. for now, here's a little list of BW things that are very important to me

  • The music in general, most of my favorite tracks in the franchise are from these games
  • Skyarrow Bridge as a whole. it's actually amazing just how important a bridge in a video game is to me, it's mostly because of the music but the scenery itself resonates with me so deeply and i wish to experience something like it in a pokemon game again someday
  • The gym leaders! my favorites are elesa and skyla, but i really like the gen 5 gym leaders in general, even though i have my obvious favorites. additionally, i really like the gym designs/layouts in this gen
  • Castelia City and Nimbasa City. i remember walking around in these cities for hours as a kid pretending i was a resident/tourist lol

there's definitely some others things that i'm blanking on that i'll probably remember when i replay the games but here's a shortlist for now
 
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