The Parasocial Gen 4 Pokémon Feature That Nobody Unlocked
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- Опубликовано: 7 фев 2025
- I missed something BIG last time, it turns out there's more undocumented dialogue within the Battle Hall! Similar to my previous Hall video, I couldn't find any info on this online. Outside of the celebrity fans like Professor Oak, Jasmine, and Whitney, you have a super fan named Winston or Serena. It turns out these super fans have WAY more dialogue than I expected and it's unlocked in a separate way from the celebrity fans.
All footage captured on my Nintendo DS with authentic Pokemon Platinum and SoulSilver cartridges.
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Whitney edit by / yogcavey
crazy how this completing this feature requires a freaking Livingdex
or coming back regularly as you evolve new pokemon :p
@@OatmealTheCrazy The minimum level of entry is 30, you have to actively hold back pokemon from evolving so you can enter with them in the facility.
there is no way anyone has ever legitimately done this challenge. A full living dex plus a 20+ hour super repetitive grind.
in a generation where there are just barely less pokemon than there are slots in the pc too. good luck storing much more than your team in a gen 4 save with a livedex
@@mateusrp1994 damn
By Arceus, by Arceus, by Arceus! It's the Grand Champion! I can't believe it's you! Standing here! Next to me!
I do not need these two following me armed with only torches and a creepy smile!
_Isn't there a trollclip of him getting _*_FocusPunched_*_ from a cliff?_
you sonovabtch...im in
Golly you’re the best!
You're my star, star, star...
Arceus' Star
Nintendo: Unlocking the Azure Flute would be too tedious and complicated for players.
Also Nintendo:
@@toumabyakuya But both are in the same game lmao
@@toumabyakuya retard alert
@@ThePe5e However, this was programmed first, meaning that they hadn't thought of cutting the event yet.
@@toumabyakuya Say that to Munchlax and female Combee!
They just made a lame excuse let’s be real, they just changed their mind on what the planned to do
I just like the idea that since nobody saw these, these characters try to engage in conversation with their idol and just get ignored.
Just like real super fans!
Or maybe what they said was true. There was no "dazzling trainer" to see and be parasocial about. The Battle Hall "got boring".
Just like me fr
They screamed into the void and nothing came back
Maybe the reason this exists is just "why not?". After all, they already had the variable with the number of different Pokémon you've used to beat it and it was used for nothing, so why not play around it with it.
I think the more prompt question is why they decided to make it so convoluted and tedious to accomplish?
@@ninja3212 I don't think there's anything convoluted about it, you have an NPC that tells you how many pokémon you have records with right there, and as a gamer why not make number go up? As for how tedious it is to accomplish, well, there's an NPC that tells you how many pokémon you have records with right there, and if anybody _did_ take the time to grind out the maximum number, they would be pretty disappointed if nothing happened for it, so... why not?
@@Blutzen yeah I support this logic lol. Not like writing a dozen more dialog lines is that hard.
agreed, after all it literally only takes a few minutes in order to implement all of this into the game
I’ve realized that Pokémon games weren’t just designed like games. They were whole little worlds. Extra bits of “realism” like this are just there because that’s how things work, not because it’s some game to be won. This is probably also the logic behind things like berry farming and arbitrary stuff like that.
10:38. We need to remember that Gen IV was in the late 2000s, the late stages of the "Why? Because I can." school of console game development where developers stuffed games full of content simply because it was the first time they really didn't have to worry about filesizes when it comes to small stuff like dialogues. "Fuck it, let's toss in those 7 kb of text and see whether a mad lad will find it;" would be my reasoning for why they did it.
I actually discovered a small bit of this dialog when I was a kid! I was absolutely obsessed with the Battle Frontier and would spend hours messing around in it. 9y/o brains just hit different back in 2009 lol
Eyyyyyy same
It's crazy how things can take 15 years to be documented and found. Thanks so much for finding out new things in the gen 4 games and also releasing it out to the world
I think out of everything, THIS is the wildest part out of this entire recorded bit of insanity. You'd think this would have been discovered and documented after a couple of years of the games' release.
He keeps mentioning it's undocumented but just trying to search this on google brings up old gamefaqs threads from around when these games came out with people mentioning the fans and how to change their dialogue. There's also posts about this specific video with people mentioning it's in the players guide for these games.
Almost like it's fake or something, waiting for eager watchers to add it to wikis and then have them be blamed when they're proven wrong
@@inconemay1441Are you really implying this is fake?
0 Etchy videos: It’s about RUclips…it hasn’t excited me lately…
1 Etchy Video: I watched your video. It made me nostalgic and exited about the things I have yet to experience in Pokémon games.
3 Etchy videos: What cool Pokémon stuff am I gonna learn from Etchy next? I don’t lose sleep thinking about it, but I do look forward to it!
5 Etchy videos: It’s fantastic! The amount of research and time that goes into these videos…it must take extraordinary effort.
Lool
I've just realised I've watched all five. I thought I was just seeing the specific ones that interested me, but then I realised that was all of them haha
0 Etchy videos: just browsing front page
1 Etchy video: like
3 Etchy videos: subscribe
5 Etchy videos: hears ping at 3AM and rushes to computer
475 Etchy videos:
@@doughboywhine Cue super obsessive person who worships the ground Etchy walks on
This feature is so cool, I wish Parasocial People were real
They are real lol. Streamers have a lot of them these days.
I love you for making this funny comment. Are we friends now?
@@ColdComradeno shit
@@ColdComrade
Nice observation, genius
You should meet the McElroy Fandom!
Stuff like this is what made the DS era of Pokemon so special. There was so much content put in that stuff like this could be completely missed
Black 2 and White 2: A celebrity slowly gets closer to the (future) champion of Unova, starting with an act of kindness
HeartGold, SoulSilver and Platinum: Parasocial NPC gets obsessed with the champion who just wanted to battle with different Pokémon
*Heart Gold, Soul Silver, and Platinum
@@epicphantom589 Fuck how did I mess that up
Fixing it now
Whos is the celeb? Elesia?
@@nuraby_9228 There’s this girl Yancy you can meet through a semi-obscure Xtranciever sidequest. Or if you’re a girl it’s a guy names Curtis.
@@nuraby_9228Yancy / Curtis from the dropped item in Nimbasa city.
you know the fact they had "milestones" like this is cool but also completely deranged to expect players would subject to doing this for fun
Gamefreak: Our Target Audience are Children
Also Gamefreak: Lets integrate that tedious niche feature no one will ever register probably hahah
But the Azure Flute was too hard to comprehend guys, don’t forget
I mean if anyone is going to 100% it would probably be a child with a lot of free time on their hands
Tbf, there are a lot of children who would replay the same part of the game over and over bc they had nothing else to do
@@partlypinkie1751 They just changed their minds.
@@verkhvo School bus gaming!
I have put about 5k estimated hours give or take in to gen 4 ( main series games). I still didn’t know about 90+ % of the things mentioned in the videos. Just goes to show how much content was packed into these games.
Sad how a ds game can be filled with more content and heart than a modern switch pokemon game
I mean, it's like 10 lines of dialogue and one obscure mechanic in a place that 90% of the player base didn't bother with because there was a chasm of difficulty and a lack of reason to be invested.
It isn't exactly "packed with content", but given what it is, yes, it is rather impressive how much Gen 3, 4 and 5 had in terms of content that very, very few people have any kind of knowledge about.
@@andrei4617 Oh, you meant a game that has nowhere close to the same amount of content a Switch game has (data-wise)? Yeah, I also ponder why. Is not like they had space limitations or anything, right?
@@toumabyakuya done with that excuse… this has been the fourth generation of 3d games being mainline and fans have been excusing how poor the games have been optimized to the hardware. Lets not mention how much money this franchise generates, shit is unacceptable
@@andrei4617 *"this has been the fourth generation of 3d games"*
4th Generation? It has only been the second. "3DS" 3D and "Switch" 3D are totally different and require different skills to pull.
*"and fans have been excusing how poor the games have been optimized to the hardware."*
They aren't that poorly optimized, stop exaggerating.
*"Lets not mention how much money this franchise generates,"*
Money doesn't solve everything.
Saving a lot of data :) Please don't turn off the power :) Almost done :) Saved!
Oh you just won? Hold on, we gotta save again :)
lmfao that kills me
“You’re the first of a kind for me as Trainers go” I mean you literally are.
I remember getting the message "What Pokemon are you going to be using this time?" Or whatever one you mentioned but not thinking much else about it 😂
growing up my brother and I would grind the battle frontier every day after school so I knew about the fan interactions but I never knew you were supposed to use basically the entire pokedex to see all their dialogue
What on earth…how many features have remained secrets after all these years?!
Now that the games' source code leaked, start searching. /s
A blonde trainer named Serena that's obsessed with the main character... What did they mean by this?
Either someone at GF has a type, or someone at GF has a girlfriend/wife that's just like that. It's pretty common for game developers to put characters based on their SOs in games.
I'm gonna go with the SO theory, I could definitely see a GF dev getting with a parasocial American or European pokémon fan and putting her in the game.
More likely it's just a coincidence. Further research on what Serena's and Serena's Japanese names are may help or hinder this theory.
There are characters with the same names as protagonist but obviously difrent people in game
@@polarknight5376 well I know Kalos Serena's Japanese name is Serena
@@serenlink3888 Cool. Anyone willing to play through HeartGold or SoulSilver in Japanese to figure out her Japanese name?
@@jakariashafin8685gen IV Battle Tower also has an NPC named Cyrus. A jogger, I think.
10:40 "we might never know for sure" well we got the SVN dump so we can actually verify if anyone tried to add more
As it turns out, they're right. You are "the first trainer ever who's done that"
"Why did they put this feature in the game"
Because it's funny, probably.
Serena/Winston: “Why don't you answer my... chats in your chat box? I'm- I have the sub badge, 12 months. You never acknowledged me, not even once. And I came here to have fun with you! I'm your biggest fan! I've been with you since day one! I got first badge, I was your first subscriber! And you don't pay attention to me! I was with you through your Magikarp run, I was with you through your Kakuna run, I cheered for every run with Happiny, I was there when you completed it all with Prinplup, and yet you won't acknowledge me! You still, just leave me in the dust every single day!
Professor Oak: “Dear Bird Jesus, parasocial! You need to log off! By Arceus! Why on earth would you do that?"
Jasmine: “Yeah, man, this is kind of really unhealthy. Set your boundaries, dude.”
Whitney: “I-I-I-I-I-I-I'm Whitn-e-e-e-e-ey! Fuck you, fuck you, fuck you!”
that dub is probably the best obe lmao
The Knuckles quote 😭😂
The dust?!
Whitney making up a little tune to dunk on Serena/Winston is great
Wake up babe new parasocial copypasta just dropped
The pokemon nerd in me loves you.
The completionist in me on the other hand...
Willst du damit sagen du machst das wirklich in deinem 100% Spielstand?
@@Nikita_1912 Ja.
At first I thought "Oh, it's Yancy and Kurtis and the way you kinda start a relationship with them, finding all the Xtransceiver spots was so cryptic"
Then I remembered they were in gen 5.
They brought back the feature in Gen 8 with the people in the gym lobbies changing dialogue throughout the game
imagine going in with a level 30 happiny like...
"Is something wrong? Are they okay? Does this count as high octane battles when the trainer Garchomp fighting ice types and winning happened not too long ago?"
I don't understand why people think Serena's dialogue is creepy. It's cute, she's clearly normally a shy reserved type, and she's getting hyped and enthused and loud, and embarrassed at the same time that someone can make her act in such a way.
Come on, my socially anxious people, there's gotta be something or someone in your life that makes you absolutely gush, and then cringe once you realize you've been blabbing at high speeds for several minutes straight.
Just because she says "I love you" doesn't mean she has romantic inclinations and she's a stalker. You never see her outside of the arena, so clearly that love is in context of how you perform at this sport/show she enjoys so much. It's all obviously meant to be a massive show offy exhibition anyways.
socially anxious person here, i didn't really read her that way. i read her as a stereotypical fangirl getting blushy over the protag. some of the boy's dialogue feels more creepy, though. while none of it was quite as bad as i was anticipating, it's still weird. especially the staying up at night thing.
being parasocial is being this overbearing towards a celebrity and thinking you mean something to them, thinking that a relationship is there where none exists, and being heavily emotionally moved by them due to this.
there is something [not some*one*, thankfully] i feel this way about in my life, and it's not really normal at all. i don't want to call it unhealthy, because i have some degree of reality-checking control over it, but it's not something i'm happy about at times.
@@oatmeal3013 Yeah the girl sounded more of an inspired fan than a obsessed one, since the protag's success was motivation to become a trainer herself. I wish they gave the same vibe to her male counterpart.
@@oatmeal3013I feel the thing is they tried to give the guy similar enthusiasm as the girl but they wrote the girls dialogue first and didn’t really pay attention to how it actually sounded from the other gender
It’s not the worst in the world, but eh
What? Why can't the same thing be said for Winston's dialogue?! He's literally a little boy wtf
“I brag about you to my friends” is… a little much lol
Serena and Winston walked, so Yancy and Curtis could run.
I would wager a guess to being just a determined group being assigned to design the facility.
It would explain why it seems super overengineered and why none of the other battle facilities have such a feature.
The superfans are honestly adorable, it's a shame it's locked behind such a niche and grindy part of the game.
Compared to the other one, Winston feels more like a supportive hype man than anything else. Serena reel that love in a bit though...
I think this might have been the predecessor to the Lost Xtransceiver sidequest. Both involve having to do tedious stuff to increase a counter so a character gets closer to ours and both end in a sort of relationship.
The Yancy/Curtis one isn't too horrible with a guide though, and has actual tangible reward of Pokemon that in G5 are mostly hard to get, most of which weren't made available with Hidden Abilities at the time
@@Dukstless Eh, the precisse locations were the calls could be triggered weren't precissely intuitive. And I have always said that if a puzzle requires a guide to be completed, then said puzzle was badly planned.
@@toumabyakuyaTbf some of the places are places that you'd visit anyway, like the tile in route 7 or the one in mistralton. Other ones are just dumb like the one in route 14. Also the rewards are pretty nice so I'd say it's worth the effort. Also what Yancy / Curtis lost is a Xtransciever and not a C-Gear
@@txtzx Still, my problem remains. Puzzles shouldn't depend on outside sources to be beaten.
@@toumabyakuya I would agree with your point about how puzzles shouldn't need a guide, except...if it didn't make sense, who would be able to write the guide?
I think puzzles having to be intuitive is better, but still a bit subjective
Obscure interactions like these made older Pokemon entries feel alive with the way the world around the player changes and responds to the player's actions. Except maybe not require the player to use the entire Pokedex roster to unlock dialogue. Other than that I think this was an exceptional idea that could've used some tuning down.
i like to believe this is gen 6 Serena before becoming a trainer lol
Go through all that just to get 1 obsessed, stalker... _Thanks, Game Freak. I feel so acconplished._
Man, I wish I could have a parasocial super fan to make me feel important
I listen to your playlist every day, Christian. I think about you all the time. Sometimes I get so lost in thinking about you I lose sleep...oh well! I guess that means I'll be all sleepy while listening today.
/j i am not stalking
That felt weird, nevermind!
@@christianboustani8284 have a nice day sir!
Taught our boy a lesson real quick. lol
@@SlothfulTurtle I'm normal i swear
Appreciate you documenting this cuz I've always wondered about this (have also spent time digging through the text files of the game). The Hall slander at the end was uncalled for though
Pretty major since considering they are the only npcs to retroactively acknowledge your progress in real time, not even the champion, and prof do this after the credits, which really stunts the immersion. When this becomes the norm for Pokemon games, the names of these two should be included to honor them. Bc this is a reall REALLY under appreciated feature.
Now I am curious of what the Japanese text is for all of them.
3:19 Me! Dying!
R.I.P you
"Oh that's gore of my comfort character..."
If the requirements were scaled down, like capping at 100 different pokemon, this would've been a rare but pretty cool achievement. I guess it wouldn't be as special as battling with every eligible pokemon in the game, but it would actually have a chance of being seen by a few dedicated fans.
1:02 important timestamp
B U T
No B U U T !
Interesting how Winston doesn't seem to have a catchphrase, like the "Um... excuse me?" thing. And has an overall different personality from Serena. I wonder if the reason for that is to distinguish between fanboy and fangirl cultures?
You continue to be the GOAT for Gen four content
It's fitting that you have to be unhealthily obsessed with a meaningless pursuit to unlock dialogue of someone reciprocating that same unhealthy obsession.
this is so strange i can’t believe they added something that required a full living dex used in a random battle facility for dialogue
I find it absolutely facinating that there are still features and stuff with rewards to be found in the old games. You'd think the fanbase had enough time and crazy people (affectionate) for everything to be discovered at this point. But nope.
I think this feature exists not for every player but the like 5-10% who enjoy this sort of grind. In the end there's always been different kinds of pokemon players: those who only want to get through the story, the dex completionists, the shiny hunters, the post game lovers, the side quest hunters, the online battlers etc. This is I think simply one feature that might not klick with everyone, but that's the great thing about pokemon: almost everyone can find something in these games to enjoy.
I can never get through white2 because I like the pokestars studios so much I get stuck everytime doing every movie.
encouraging a living dex of trained and battle ready pokemon, is actualy a neat or novel Idea, I probably ever entered with 10-20 mons max into the Hall,
but doing all in the dex, aside even getting all on a singular cartridge, very doubtful anybody seen the 51+ unique species ever.
Kinda reminds me of the fan in the gyms in Sword/Shield. She starts rooting for you after you get your first badge, and becomes a bigger fan the more you get. Also, she starts out with a Blipbug next to her, and a few gyms in, it's evolved to a Dottler, then by the end, it's an Orbeetle. I always thought that was a cute little feature.
Incredible effort unlocking that dialogue - very interesting stuff!
And here I though Yancy in BW2 was the most parasocial thing pokemon did.
Bro giga impacted a kricketot 20 levels down with regigigas 💀💀💀
Just like last time, this video is going to be a big help in my current soulsilver playthrough. I'm definitely looking forward to any new videos you post.
The funniest thing about this is that, to my knowledge, this is the only time anyone outright declares they love you in the series.
You need to win a battle with every legal pokemon made up to that point in the series _just_ for someone to tell you they love you.
deam not even your mom that so sad 😭😭
I kinda feel bad for liking how obsessed they are. Would be nice to have a fan like that.
It's not all it's cracked up to be, frust me. It's all fun and games until you hear someone behind you shout "By Azura by Azyra by Azura!"
It's the kind of scenario that only sounds good in your head. I agree that it would be a nice ego boost to have someone so fascinated by you, but in real life it would quickly get very creepy and stressful.
Gosh, this makes me want to pour another two hundred, nay, thousand hours into gen 4 again.
You've become one of my favorote channels. Love these vids!
Spare a thought for the QA engineer responsible for testing this feature who probably had to go through this grind multiple times *shudder*
If someone did QA it, clearly their desperate pleas to make the requirements halfway sane were ignored.
My guess is that they didn't QA it very carefully. It was just a small fun thing to add, at most they probably programmatically set winstreaks with Pokémon instead of actually winning
if they tested it they probably used debug features to change their total... at least i hope so
damn. that was a mystery that didn't really need solving, but i'll be damned if it didn't get solved. Major props for your dedication. 10/10
Thank you, reminds me of the “romantic” dialogue in Black and White on the Ferris wheel!
Hurray, hurray, Etchy! Go, Pokemon, go!
Now, i have more reasons to go back to some of these games.
I've been looking for more "side content" in these games thank you
Wait, HGSS has a Battle Frontier? And here I was thinking I'd seen everything the game had to offer...
oh huh, I got the 51 milestone for this just by playing it. I thought it was a fun facility but I wasn't very good at it so I just kept trying with different pokemon.
they added this feature, because if gamefreak devs don't get to add at least one overly convoluted mechanic that less than 10% of people will engage with, the wizard's spell that lets that company endure TPC's unrealistic release cycle will fizzle.
Appreciate the find and grind!
Personally I really enjoyed the Battle Hall. I love all of the strategizing and moveset tinkering needed to try to see if your pokemon can be the best and run the gauntlet!
The Pokeathlon also has some crazy requirements that most people probably missed. Like medalist pokemon who won every medal. Obtaining all of the trophies. Winning like 100 events. There are also npcs who become your fan as you progress in the pokeathlon. I remember grinding a lot just to reach the final room, just to find out I wasn't even close to completing the pokeathlon with the final achievements.
Now I'm curious about what their lines are in other languages, Pokemon's naturally had a fair bit of localization and I wouldn't be surprised if these lines are localized too. I don't know how to read text from DS roms, though...
I love how many little post game things that almost no one would interact with the old gens had. It makes them feel so warm and alive.
I need to 100% HGSS and Pt now lmao I love these small details the developers put in!
I really liked the battle scene as a kid! I remember getting to the first bossfight and losing because I only did the easy type matchups (infernape losing to tentacruel), I kinda want to see my old scores now but that'll wait tomorow
71 victory with 5 different pokemon (49 of wich are infernape's)
God, I had a ton of fun in this place. Got a good streak, only to lose it to Shedinja (firsf time ecountering it)
cool stuff,thank you for going through all that HELL for us,so we could see the results.liked,and subbed :)
You're doing the great work! Keep it up
I love how this video gives clear instructions on how to achieve this despite knowing it's insanely mind numbing as a grind.
But I also can't help but watch, 15 years undocumented until now! That's amazing! You are a true dedicated pokemon fan! You wouldn't mind if I subscribed, right?
the old pokemon games have so much details and love put into them. Its crazy
"I managed to run into a Surskit"
Don't say it don't say it--
a
This was WAY less dialogue than I expected from the description.
I was duped, maybe even bamboozled by the thumbnail. No yuri...
my bad
why is no one mentioning the fact that winston literally says he "check[s] you out" in the 31 dialogue
battle hall was the only battle frontier thing I bothered playing regularly and even I didn't know this happened
OH are their names winston and serena cause you Win and they Serenade you
I remember doing this long time ago. Took me forever to complete it trying to 100% everything.
So there’s this one streamer… and I’m parasocial with him…
😳
Lets go another great vid from the GOAT!
Here's a like and comment for your hard work, I was surprisingly entertained.
Crazy how they were secrets everywhere in old Pokémon games and now they can’t even finish to dev the texture of the game like wtf
Winston is the tierno before we witness tierno's dance moves.
jeez. thats a lot of hours of work! thanks for your hard work.
[serena voice] Um... excuse me.
I never knew these. I got all the colored/Gold prints of all facilities in Platinum aside from Factory but I never noticed that NPC getting parasocial. 😅
I'm parasocial for YOU, Etchy
Fun fact : if you drink each time you hear "dialogue", you can meet Mew under your fridge
dead rat X
Mew O
Wow, massive props again for discovering this - love your videos man. I have to wonder though what on earth were they thinking having dialogue only unlock after using every possible pokemon 🤣
dude, the battle hall was something i fucking loved as a kid
I remember distinctly going into it with Articuno one summer and absolutely loving the game
Kinda reminds me of the ungodly amount of optional/miss-able dialogue in Earthbound.