Striking Gold in the Heart: Let's Nuzlocke Pokemon HeartGold!

Alternatively, "This is my first time, be gentle: A let's play."


Music

There's not really much to be said about Pokemon. I've been playing it since I was about 6 years old with the original Pokemon Blue on the Game Boy Color and have played nearly every game since. One of the few games I happened to skip over though was the entirety of Generation 2. I rented Crystal for a week at Blockbuster and that's my experience with Generation 2. So I decided to play HeartGold as I hear most calling it a better remake of an already classic Pokemon game.

I also have been interested in the idea of a Nuzlocke run for a while now. To those who do not know what the Nuzlocke Challenge is it is a now somewhat infamous self-imposed challenge based off of the webcomic that told the story of the creator's first Nuzlocke run. A Nuzlocke run is a mostly standard run of a Pokemon game with 2 additional rules. First, the player can only catch the first Pokemon they see on a route and will have no other chances on that route. Secondly, if a Pokemon faints they are dead for good.

I felt like I would not be able to trust myself with a Nuzlocke Challenge if I did it by myself so I decided to also make it a Let's Play so I have a reason not to cheat or lie to myself. I will also be adding two more optional rules to my Nuzlocke. First, I must nickname every Pokemon I catch to make it more personal. I will let you guys nickname the starter and any Pokemon I cannot come up with a nickname for. Secondly, the first mandatory rule does not apply until I have Poke Balls.

Now for our first couple choices. I will transcribe the "Welcome to the World of Pokemon" speech and everything else once we have a name.

First off are we a boy or are we a girl?



Secondly what will be our name for this adventure?



Third and most importantly who will our starter be? Now due to this being a Nuzlocke, I'll be doing this a bit differently than normal. If all your Pokemon faint in a Nuzlocke run it is considered a failure and one must play the entire game over again. In that second run, the Pokemon that got second place in the voting will be used. The same applies to a third run if one happens and then if I fail again on the third run, a set of voting will be done to set a new cycle of three.

All of that can be dealt with later, however. For now, let's look at our options.



First we have Chikorita, the Grass Starter. Chikorita is the hardest starter to use effectively in Generation 2 and HeartGold/SoulSilver (hereby referred to as HG/SS) due to some type disadvantage problems. Chikorita isn't really super-effective to any Gym throughout the Johto region and it having more of a tankish build does not help. With the first two Gyms being super-effective on it, Chikorita would make a Nuzlocke run much more complicated.



Next we have Cyndaquil, the Fire Starter. Cyndaquil could be considered the medium difficulty starter or the easy starter due to it being effective until at least the 7th Gym. While its stats are average in most areas it has a very nice special attack stat and a speed of 100 making it at least average if not good. It being super-effective against the second Gym is a huge help in normal and Nuzlocke runs.



Lastly we have Totodile, the Water Starter. Totodile is probably the fan-favorite of the Generation 2 starters and is also pretty strong. He is an effective Pokemon to grind in Victory Road at the end and is considered the Gyrados of its competitive battling tier due to a nice Attack stat and decent stats in most other areas.

We are a girl named Stockings or Skirt (Pants is for boys)

SECRET ADMISSION TIME: When given the choice, I have always named male leads Pants and female leads Panties. This practice predates Talking Time.

THAT SAID: Boy named Shorts. It's only right for a Pokemon LP.

Cyndaquil, because Grass is lame and I've already played with Totodile.

Oh and Chikorita!

Why should this be easy for you?

Obviously you must be a boy named Steve.

And Chikorita if you want a hard time, or Cyndaquil if you'd rather use the obviously best pokemon.

So do I count that as a Chikorita vote or a Cyndaquil vote?

This is a tough decision for me. Except it isn't. Cyndaquil 4ever.

I LPed ShinyGold with a Cyndaquil named Dr. Cox.

In that vein, I propose a Totodile named Dr. Kelso.

Also, a girl named Skirt!

Chikorita. Watching people suffer for others' amusement is fun.

EDIT:

The goal of any LPer is to suffer as much as possible. That said, if this is your first Nuzlocke run, don't take hardmode. To that end I will ease your suffering by one vote and move Chikorita.

What, you thought I'd go Totodile? I don't vote third-party, chief.

...Y'know, something bugs me.
...Uh. The first gym is Flying, silly.

Huh. Thought it was Bugsy. Let me fix that one...

Don't take hardmode...so you vote Chikorita. Thanks, dude.

I vote Cyndaquil, because I don't want him to suffer too much on an already absurd challenge.

I think we should call that Cyndaquil "Nyquil".

Also, we should be a girl named Skirt. So at some point we can use one of my favorite Rocky Horror callouts, "He's got more hurt than you've got skirt!"

I feel like Totodile always gets swept under the rug so there's my vote

Clearly I am messed up in the head somehow. Instead Chikorita, who is terrible in all respects, I wholly intended to vote Cyndaquil.

I want a boy named Sue.

And Cyndaquil.

Girl named Skirt so that I can imagine other people saying things like, "Hey there, Skirt, what's cracking?"

Cyndaquil named Nyquil.

Girl named Skirt, gotta have that Chikorita.

Girl named MiniS and her faithful Chikorita named RIP.

Obviously Totodile, and Cyndaquil are the cooler starters of this group. Back when gold was something I played I usually used the time lag glitch to get both starters, and then beat up my rivals Chikorita with my two pokemon mwahahaha.

Anyway I vote Cyndaquil may favorite of all the starters.

Gen 2 (including the remakes) are the only generation of Pokemon I've never played. I have to admit a big part of that is because I am an avowed grass starter man and... Chikorita.

Currently the results are 7 votes for a Cyndaquil that will be named Nyquil, second place is a Chikorita named RIP (naming suggestions are still open) and third place is Dr. Kelso the Totodile (while I love that name suggestions are still open)

Gender-wise we are with a Girl named Skirt at 7 votes and a Boy named Shorts at 3 (naming suggestions are of course still open).

I will not start taking screenshots until I make my next update to Digimon so there should be about a day or two left for votes or changes on any of those subjects, names included. Names of gender or Pokemon not used in the current run can always be suggested until their run as well.

I'm confused why you use a starter when you don't catch a starter inna root

They're basically a free Pokemon. There is an optional rule stating to get rid of your starter as soon as you catch another Pokemon but I'm not going to be following that one.

That name really needs to be NyQuil. Can you use both upper and lower case letters in the name (in this game)?

Yes, indeed. I will remember that when the run begins.

Things to consider on your Nuzlocke run:

Do you take "freebie" mons given to you? Your starter is the first one, natch, but IIRC you get an egg at some point for a free Togepi. I actually haven't played second-gen games, but I'm thinking of things like the Eevee handed to you in the first game.

Do set encounters count as that route's mon, or are those also freebies? (Sudowoodo, Snorlax) How about Voltorbs pretending to be items?

If you can win mons from the Game Corner, how do you count those?

Do you skip duplicates? If the first mon you fight in an area is a mon you already have, you may want to skip the extra copy. Otherwise your options will be nothing but Geodudes, Zubats, and Tentacools. It'll be a challenging game, but it'll be boring.

Didn't notice we are supposed to vote on a name. Name Cyndaquil, Charmander... kidding :P

Although Nyquil wouldn't be my first choice.

In order of questions asked: Freebies are OK and allowed at least in a Pokemon White comic the Nuzlocke creator did, set encounters would count as that route's mon if I can get there in time or with the help or Repels, the Voltorbs would also count, the Game Corner mons I'll count as freebies because to quote Bulbapedia's Nuzlocke page "As of White: Hard-Mode Episode 3, it is implied that the player can accept Pokémon that are received freely from NPC characters. ". However I will not abuse the Game Center if use it at all.

Lastly there is an optional clause in the Nuzlocke rules saying that you can skip the extra mon and it becomes "the first new Mon you encounter on a route." I'll turn on that rule only if it seems like enough people want it.

Thank you for your questions.