Before you say anything—I know. Pokémon isn’t meant to be
played for the story. The point of any Pokémon game is the Pokémon
themselves—catching them, (EV) training them, and making the best team you can
put together. The goal is always to beat the Elite Four, and then the Champion.
It is to be the very best, like no one ever was (yes, I went there).
In case you don’t know, Gamer Drama is the name for my
collection of video game reviews. In these reviews, I typically focus on the
story-telling aspects of the game—setting, plot, characters. Obviously, this is
why the Pokémon Y edition of Gamer Drama will be shorter—the setting and main
characters are nearly indistinguishable from edition to edition. Sure, you go
to different regions, but they all look fairly similar. There are different
Pokémon and different gyms, but the story experience of playing the game
doesn’t really change significantly from game to game. This is why I’m only
going to focus on the storyline.
In Pokémon Y, your character (and four of your friends)
receive starter Pokémon from Professor Sycamore. The ladies’ man prof is more
laid back than previous professors, and encourages each of you to pursue your
own Poké path. Shortly after meeting the professor in the Kalos region’s
central city, Lumiose, he introduces you to Lysandre. This man is Kalos’s
wealthiest citizen, and a genius inventor. However, he seems a little
downtrodden, and he bemoans the state of the world. It’s obvious that something’s
up with him.
But that’s not your concern at the moment. You continue to
make your way through the Kalos region by completing quests, catching more
Pokémon, and defeating gym leaders. You begin to clash with the flamboyant
members of Team Flare—who make vague references to the end of the world, and
assert that they’ll be safe. While you and your rival are willing to fight Team
Flare members when they pop up, you’re only mildly curious about what’s going
on.
After the seventh gym, though, you receive a message on your
Holocaster. Lo and behold, Lysandre announces that he and Team Flare are going
to kill almost everyone (and every Pokémon) in the world.
Sure, there are hints of what’s going on, but they remain at
the same level throughout the game. It’s only after getting seven gym badges
that you’re suddenly contacted by Lysandre and the main conflict of the game
crashes over your head. In Pokémon Black, the conflict between your character
and Team Plasma evolved over the entire game. It almost seems like they
completely forgot about making a storyline for Pokémon Y, though, and just
tacked one on at the end.
The only thing that shows the developer had plans for this
storyline is the integration of the legendary Pokémon, Yveltal. Yveltal awakens
every few centuries to rain death upon the world, and he powers the machine
(originally created by a mysterious giant man). The only opportunity for you to
catch the legendary Pokémon comes when you try to stop Lysandre’s genocide.
The mysterious giant, I think, is the single worst part of
the storyline. You see this guy once while wandering the “wilderness” of the
Kalos region. The next time you see him, he’s locked up in Lysandre Labs. You
witness him telling the story of an ancient war, in which he lost his beloved
Pokémon. Unable to deal with its death, he builds a machine to resurrect his
Flabébé. In order to do this, though, the machine kills a bunch of other people
and Pokémon. Tortured by guilt, the giant’s Pokémon abandons him, and he begins
to wander the wilderness for hundreds of years with the goal of finding the
Pokémon again. After defeating the Elite Four, you battle the giant—the ancient
King of Kalos—and in doing so, the example of your love for your Pokémon redeems
him. His Flabébé floats down from the sky and rejoins him.
The entire plotline could have worked without this character
and his story. Sure, Lysandre is using his ancient machine to kill everyone,
but Lysandre could have built a machine himself. He’s a genius, after all. If
the main conflict was sudden, the importance of the giant is completely out of
left field. It just emphasizes the lack of effort that was put into the plot of
the game.
