let’s face it:: the best part of pokemon is the toys. and i don’tmean merchandising, i mean the strange technology that humans are inclined to create in a worldfilled with near-magical monsters. case in point: the pokedex. sure, it’s a crucialpoint of one of your earliest fetch quests. but when you get right down to it, who wouldn’twant a device capable of scanning, cataloguing, and dispensing information on whatever strange-lookingcreatures you come upon? there have been imitations before, but we’ve been waiting a long, longtime for the kind of technological marvel that we were promised back in ‘97. ladiesand gentlemen, the wait is over. well, if you’re only concerned with thelatest generation, that is. and given that
nintendo’s current policy for their officialpokemon championships allows only the generation v monsters, it’s the most relevant. also,you don’t start with all the information; everything aside from the starting evolutionsand a few others requires either receiving the data from a friend or just waiting foryour daily entry to be unlocked. even with this application that has no game mechanicswhatsoever, you have to wait for unlocks. but, worst case scenario, a couple monthslater and you have the full roster. so what can you do with them? well, the most obvious idea is to look atthe critters in 3d. and they do look good. you can even animate them with the push ofa button. and just look at all that data.
egg group, abilities, learned attacks, tmableattacks, egg moves... pretty much everything you’d get from one of the major websites.unfortunately, that “pretty much†means you’re not going to get a complete breakdownof base stats (instead you’ll have to settle for a more abstract number of bars) or theability to search by, say, special attack. speaking of moves, they’re all listed here.all of ‘em. all five hundred fifty some. even moves like conversion2, which aren’tactually used by any fifth-gen pokemon. leaving hope that eventually it will be expanded toinclude all 600 and whatever number. these attacks are even sortable by type, base power,or how likely your opponent is to throw his ds at you when you use it. don’t hate me,hate x-scissor.
but the cutest little trick of the pokedex3d involves bringing the little critters into our very own world, by means of black-and-whitemarker codes that you can print out, load onto your phone, or if you feel like havingsome arts and crafts time, draw yourself! just fire up the ar camera, take a look atthe code, and blam, instant pokemon. and yes, this supports the 3d capability of the screen,even if you can’t see it here. the downside is that keeping optimal viewing distance fromthe screen as you pan around a code on a table or something can be a little on the difficultside. but victini catches fire and flies around! that has to be worth something. sure, i can have my complaints; i’d muchprefer this software support the entire history
of pokemon and not just those from black andwhite. because let’s face it, being able to look at a porygon in 3d like this justseems so perfectly in the moment. but the net result is that the pokedex 3d is a usefullittle tool, especially if you need to look up a move on the fly. and the price can’tbe beat: it’s free. gratis. kostenlos. zero dollars. just obtain it, and enjoy lookingforward to receiving a new pokemon each morning.