Tuesday, May 10, 2016

New Pokemon Starter Fun Facts! + Hello again!

It's been a while.

At first, I wanted to do more Jurassic World: the Game. I had a nice list of my favorites...but they added more, and the list changed.

So, what brought me back? Sun and Moon starters. Yes, Pokemon is my drug, at least in part due to its creature designs. Although the creativity off Gen VI was severely lacking (the Starters were way too repetitive for my tastes), the news of Gen VII's starters and Legends merits an entry of its own.

I don't have much to say on the Grass-Type owl, except "it's about darn time." Hoothoot and Noctowl have been the only owls in the Pokemon world for a long time. Owls spend a decent amount of time in trees, so Grass/Flying? Why not? Kinda wish more Pokemon used logic like that.

Source: Serebii.net. Official art. 

Now, things get interesting with Litten. For the unaware, there's been a theory that all the Fire-Type Starter Pokemon follow the theme of Chinese zodiac animals. So far, in order, we have a dragon (Charmander), monotreme "mouse" (Cyndaquil), chicken/rooster (Torchic), monkey (Chimchar), pig (Tepig), and...canine (Fennekin). While the Chinese zodiac does have a cat in its lore (as anyone into Fruits Basket knows), Litten is almost certainly our tiger as well.

I sense nitpicking. After all, not all striped cats are tigers, regardless of what the cats themselves have to say on the matter. Who's to say that this isn't a normal tabby cat, right?

The designers. No, really, there's a sneaky design hint that we're looking at a tiger in the making rather than your average tabby cat. You probably didn't even notice it unless you're from Asia already, or really into cats. You ready? Look at the mark on Litten's forehead.

Just look at it.

You done? Okay.

While we may think of both tigers and tabbies as striped cats, one of the least noticeable ways in which they are different involves the marking on their foreheads. A tabby cat has a distinct "M," which monotheistic religions usually cite as some type of divine blessing. A tiger has the symbol for "king." Have I mentioned before that the tiger is the king of beasts in China? While we could argue that the marking is still incomplete, the horizontal stripes versus the zig-zagging M is uncanny.

Source: NPS.gov 

This isn't the only thing that fans missed. A lot of people glossed over that Popplio is not a seal - it is a sea lion. Despite having a Pokemon named "Sealeo" and Seel having flippers similar to those of a sea lion, we never had a sea lion Pokemon until this point. In a nutshell, seals are more marine (barely able to move on land, no ear flaps) while sea lions are more amphibious. The pinnipeds you see balancing balls are usually sea lions, not seals! What a clever idea for an amphibious Water-Type!

The lunar bat for Moon is awesome. Looks like the world's largest microbat - the kind of bat that has huge ears and uses echolocation. At the same time, I'd love a flying fox. I'd like every species on the planet to get its own Pokemon. Still a gorgeous, if impractical, design.

Source: KPBS.org 

Finally, yes, white lions exist. Though rare, they can be found in the Kruger and Timbavati reserves in South Africa. You can go squee about Kimba being real, now.