Oak’s Letter Available for Platinum

Ok, so last month, Platinum players were able to use the Wi-Fi download to get the Members Card key item, allowing them to do a subquest allowing them to catch a Darkrai. Well now the next downloadable key item, Oak’s Letter, is being made for download over the Wi-Fi between September 28th to November 8th. At the moment, this date only applies to people with the US version of the game, however since the Member’s Card could be downloaded during the same time frame in both US and Europe, its quite possible that it will be available in Europe as well… we’ll bring you an update when we know for sure.

The Oak’s Letter will change the top end of route 224, the route found via the side cave near the end of victory road. Instead of a large rock, the area turns into a large amout of flowers. Its here that you’ll encounter a Shaymin, you’ll be able to battle/catch it as well. Once caught, you can take it to Floroma Town to get the Gardicia flower (if you haven’t traded a Shaymin and got the item already). The Gardicia will change Shaymin into its Sky Forme during the day (4am-8pm), it will revert back to land forme during the night, if you box it, or if you use it over Wi-Fi battles.

We’ll keep an eye out for a Euro date for this event, so expect an update about that in a couple of days – otherwise, more news when we know it.

Lots of News

It’s been a week since Heart Gold and Soul Silver were released in Japan and we’ve managed to clear up some things about what’s new to the game. A lot of this information is just specifics as to stuff mentioned in the last news post. If you’re interested in any of it, head on over to the Heart Gold Soul Silver section of our forums and ask for explanations in anything you’re interested in.

In other news, the 12th movie has been given an English title. Arceus and the Jewel of Life is the third and final in the Diamond and Pearl movies, following on from The Rise of Darkrai and Giratina and the Sky Warrior. This movie will see Ash and friends in Michina Town which has a long history with the legendary Pokémon. According to legend, after the creation Pokémon gave the townspeople some of its power (the Jewel of Life mentioned in the title), the people then betrayed Arceus. As you can imagine, Arceus isn’t best pleased over this, and its rage sets to destroy the world. With the help of Dialga, Ash and co head back in time to try and undo all mistakes made.

There’s no release date yet on the 12th movie, but like the Arceus reveal itself, this reveal is a few months earlier than it has traditionally been in previous years, leading me to believe that it could be released earlier than the Easter/early spring release the movies usually get.

Speaking of Arceus, the creation Pokémon is the subject of the next TCG set due for release on November 4th. Platinum – Arceus will have over 100 cards, including multiple energy types of the main Pokémon itself.

Back to Heart Gold and Soul Silver, a couple of the things we’ve learned is that a lot of Sinnoh and Hoenn Pokémon show up in the wild. During the bug contest in the National Park, if you try it on a Thursday or a Saturday after you get the national dex, Hoenn and Sinnoh bug types will show up, including Wurmple and Kricketot. Also after getting the national dex, the music channel will play either the Hoenn sound on Wednesday or the Sinnoh sound on Thursday. Played in various areas across Johto and Kanto, these two sounds can make either Hoenn or Sinnoh Pokémon show up in the wild.

Also, if you’ve got a copy of HG or SS, don’t forget to download the special Yellow Forest Pokéwalker course. This course features a lot of Pikachu, some of which may know surf and fly… otherwise impossible moves for a Pikachu to know.

That’s all for the moment, we might update with some more HG/SS news/features/explanations soon. Otherwise, more news when we learn it.

Heart Gold and Soul Silver News/Info

Ok, so today sees the release of Pokémon Heart Gold and Soul Silver in Japan (US and Europe have to wait till spring next year). A lot has changed in Johto since the old Gameboy Colour games, and we’re here to bring you a brief run down of everything known so far. 

Gyms and Gym Leaders: Almost all Gym’s on both sides of Mt. Silver have had a redesign, and a lot of the Gym leaders have had their levels tweaked. Most of them have gone up (the Kanto lot especially), but a couple (including Whitney) have gone down in level. All the Kanto Gym Leaders now hand out TMs when beat

Red has been training up in mount silver since we last saw him, and he’s gotten impressive as well. His Pikachu is up to level 88 now while his Venusaur, Blastoise and Charizard are now at 84 and his Snorlax is now at level 82 (all up 7 levels). He’s also switched out his lowest level 73 Espeon for a level 80 Lapras. And you thought he was tough before.

For those of you hoping that the Leaf Green/Fire Red version of Kanto, prepare to be disappointed. It’s mostly the Gold/Silver/Crystal version. Cinnabar Island volcano still blew (so that’s gone), Mt. Moon is still small and there’s no Safari Zone in Fuchsia. However, Viridian Forest (which was removed in G/S/C) still exists in the game, and in the old Safari Zone’s place is HG/SS version of the Pal Park, so if you still have some Pokémon on GBA games, here’s where you can get them picked up.

Speaking of Safari Zone, it was said that it was moved, we now know where. Remember that strange new area west of Cianwood? Well that’s where the new Safari Zone is located. It mostly works like the other Safari Zones, there are 6 areas and each one has a specific list of Pokémon contained within. The new twist, however, is that you can rearrange the areas in any way you like using a computer in the entrance. This means that if you want to search a certain area for a certain Pokémon, you can shift it to be the entrance area and not waste too many precious steps to get there.

Bizarrely, Johto Pokédex has increased from 251 to 256. The extra 5 Pokémon are Yanmega, Likiliky, Mamoswine, Ambipom and Tangrowth. All these Pokémon evolve from standard Johto Pokédex Pokémon via the learning of moves, which may explain why they were added.

Team Rocket has had a bit of change in leadership. Several admins (all named after real life rockets) have been introduced. Lambda, Athena and Apollo will crop up at various points in the game to fight for Team Rocket’s honour (and to try and take over the world, of course). During the battle of the Goldenrod Radio Tower, you will actually disguise yourself as a member of Team Rocket to sneak in.

Speaking of Bosses of Team Rocket, Giovanni is back in this game. He’ll appear during a special event to do with Celebi, and you’ll get to battle him as well. No idea’s how to activate this event… probably by using a download item like Darkrai and Shaymin in Platinum

Remember those Kimono Girls who all have Eeveelution Pokémon? Remember they’d have an important part in the story? Well one of the things they’ll do is let you be able to find both Ho-Oh and Lugia… which you can’t do until you battle and beat them all. Depending on which version you get, depends on the level of those Pokémon. On Heart Gold, Ho-oh will be level 45, same level as Lugia on Soul Silver. The other legendary will be level 70

Speaking of legendaries, here’s a quick rundown of all the ones in the game: Entei and Raikou roam around the world, while you have to follow Suicune to several places in both Johto and Kanto before being able to fight and catch it on route 25. All dogs are at level 40. Articuno is in the seafoam caves, Zapdos is outside the power plant and Moltres is in Silver Cave. All 3 birds are at level 50. Mewtwo is at level 70 hiding in Cerulean Cave. As described in the previous post, Heart Gold will allow you to get Kyogre while Soul Silver will let you get a Groudon in route 47 after getting the National Pokédex, getting a Kanto starter and picking up a coloured orb. Once you’ve caught one of them, trade to get the other one (must be from a HG/SS game) and show them to Oak, he’ll give you another orb that will let you catch Rayquaza from the same place. Latias and Latios both roam the lands at level 35 each.

After you beat your rival several times across both Johto and Kanto, he’ll end up training around the Dragon’s Den. Head up there and you could end up in a double battle with him against both Clair and Lance.

Any Pokémon you have will follow you. They use the one at the start of your party. If it’s a very large one and you enter a small area, it will re-enter its ball. Also if the Pokémon is shiny, it will be shiny in its over world sprite. While walking around, it does have a chance of picking up items like berries and accessories, like they did in Amity Square

After you’ve beaten Red, all of the gym leaders leave their gyms at certain times/days. If you go meet up with them, they’ll get added to your contact list and they’ll then call you for rematches.

And that’s it for the moment… and while that’s a lot of info and this post is MASSIVE already, here’s a side note. Remember Melee! Pokémon Scramble? Well it’s heading over to the US under the new name of Pokémon Rumble. No release date yet, but it shouldn’t be within the next month or two. Hopefully it will also be released in Europe before the end of the year

And that really is it… for now anyway. More when we have it.

Members Card Available For Platinum pt2

Yeah, this seems like a bit of a repeat – but its true… in the last news post I said that only American players can get the Members Card that allows them to go catch a Darkrai, well Ryan659 has informed me that European players can also access the Wi-Fi and download the members card as well…

I’m sure that I checked the European Platinum website and it had no details on the Members Card event, yet now it has. No idea on the actual end date, so it’s most likely the same as the Aemrican one, September 13th

Bring you more news when we learn it (or when our wonderful members point it out to us)

Members Card Available for Platinum

We’re still experiancing a lot of technical difficulties around the site. We’re still trying to fix them. It’s possible that the site will go down at some point while our hosts do something, this will last no more than a day but unfortunatly will not be at our control so this is the only warning you’ll get about it. Right, on to the actual news.

Good news for American Pokemon Platinum players. The first Wi-Fi downloadable event item is now available to download. Ok, so technically the Secret Key was the first, but that would only get you into a room to access Rotom’s other forms – this Memebers card will help you actually CATCH your own Darkrai… how cool is that?

You can download the card at anytime between now and September 13th, but you’ll have to beat the elite four, got the national dex and seen Crisselia before you can meet Darkrai at New Moon Island.

Also interesting to note, Pokemon.com has just revealed the 493rd Pokemon, Arceus, on their website. This is actually strange as Darkrai and Shaymin were revealed in the later weeks of 2007 and 2008 respectivally. So this is an early reveal for Pokemon.com – The question is why? It could be to match up with the release of Arceus in Japan (which is available to download from Japanese Cinema’s) OR it could be beacuse the next Arceus event will be a lot earlier than the last 2 ‘new’ pokemon events, even being towards the end of this year. Whatever the reason, nothing’s being revealed yet. We’ll let you know when it is.

Thanks to Pikalover1234 on the forums for the heads up on those two peices of news… head on over to our forums now to join in the discussions.

Oh – side note, new Pokemon TCG set, Supreme Victors is released on August 19th.

Regigigas UK Event Dated

Since our news blog is experiancing technical dificulties at the moment, i’m posting new news in here.

Regigigas UK Event
Nintendo of Europe today published the event schedule for the UK for people to download a special Regigigas. Along with being level 100, Regigigas will be in a Cherish Ball (meaning it cannot be traded on the GTS), hold the Custap Berry and know the moves Iron Head, Rock Slide, Icy Wind and Crush Grip.

The Regigigas can be downloaded on any copy of Diamond, Pearl or Platinum, however when on the Platinum version, it will be able to unlock Regirock, Regice, Registeel in areas of Route 228, Mt Coronet and Iron Island respectivally

For details of the tour schedule and how to download regigigas, go here.

On a side note, we’re still experiancing one or two problems around the site as a result of our downtime. The downtime itself is fixed, and the forums work fine – however the addoption scheme has a problem displaying your pokemon on any webpages or forums. You can still click on them, and feed them still. If you discover any problems around the site – please contact me immediatly

Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Explorers of Sky dated

The 3rd Pokemon Mystery Dungeon instalment, Explorers of Sky, has been given  a release date for the United States according to GameStop. Like Platinum is to Diamond and Pearl, Explorers of Sky is a revist to the games of Explorers of Time and Explorers of Darkness and features most of the same game. Improvements and additions to the game include 6 additional starters to chose from, new areas to explorer including Destiny’s Tower and Shaymin village, and then there are additional missions inbetween the main storyline, you’ll be able to play as some Non Playable Characters in special missions to learn more about them.

Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Explorersof Sky will be released on October 1st acording to GameStop. However since this is a thursday, and games in the US are usually released on a tuesday, it could change. Nintendo of Europe recently released their Q3 release schedule (which goes up to the end of September) and the new PMD game isn’t listed, so there’s no date for europe yet.

We’ll bring you more when we find it.

New Pokemon to be revealed?

It’s been a while since we learnt about any new Pokemon, even longer if you don’t count the aditional forms some Pokemon can turn into on Platinum version. However we could be finding out about 3 new Pokemon really soon.

The 12th movie’s official site has updated with info on Arceus and the Pikachu coloured Pichu. It’s also updated with some promotional merchandise for the film, including a range of 14 keychains. Howerver 3 of the keychains are blanked out, with question marks covering them (as shown in the picture bellow) 

Shadow_keychains

Could this be a hint as to three new Pokemon going to be revealed in the new movie? Well yes, revealing new Pokemon for the next generation of games has been a tradition of the Movies since the very first one came out revealing Marill and Snubbull (ok, so it was actually the little Pikachu short that went with the movie, but the point is valid). Alternativly, the keychains could contain new Forme’s for Pokemon to turn into, as apposed to being brand new Pokemon.

As soon as we learn what those three are, we’ll let you know about them.

Heart Gold and Soul Silver dated for Release

The Official site for Pokemon Heart Gold and Soul Silver got a very small update today, but it was with some important information. The release date for the Japanese launch of HG/SS will be September 12th (a Saturday, if your interested). They will be on sale for ¥4800 each. This is around the same time as the past few years when Pokemon games have been released (Diamond/Pearl and Platinum all were released in September in Japan). If the US and European releases follow the same as they have for the past couple of years, the US should see the games around early Spring/Easter time while Europe should see it around late Spring/early Summer. Those are guesses however and as soon as we know the actuall release date’s for those two areas, we’ll let you know.

In other Pokemon news, Pokemon Center stores in Japan are giving away some special Jirachi merchandice in celebration of the Tanabata festival in August. From 21st July to Aug 26th, Showing the special Jirachi knowing Draco Meteor (available for download over Wi-fi on all Japanese Diamond, Pearl and Platinum games between June 19th to July 17) will get you the special Jirachi merchandice. The store will also be selling a special Jirachi Plush Doll on July 1st for ¥980

That’s all we have for now – we’ll bring you more when we learn about it

Pokemon Charity Marathon

As you can see by the lack of news in the last couple of days, there isn’t a lot going on in the Pokemon world… well there is, but nobody’s telling anybody else about it, and until they do we can’t tell you. So for the moment you’ll have to do with the news that ExtraLives.org, a group of high school video game players who do gaming marathon’s for charity, performed a Pokemon experiment in the last couple of days. The group split into two teams, one tasked with playing through Red, Gold and Ruby while the other played through Blue, Silver and Saphire to see who could complete them first. R/B was considered complete after the elite 4, G/S was complete after they beat Red on Mt. Silver while Ru/Sa was classed as complete once the elite 4 had been beat.

While the Red Team managed to win on the Generation one games, it was the Blue Team who won overall, completing both Silver and Sapphire before the other team. All donations that they managed to raise during this marathon went to the charity Child’s Play and the ExtraLives group will be doing a Sonic the Hedgehog marathon in July.