Over the years we’ve all been collecting Pokemon Plushies but sadly many just sit in the corner of my bed or lay on shelves never to see the light of day. I was searching the Apple store one day when I found this really cool new app called “Rate My Poke Plush”. It’s from the makers of InupGames and it seems they’ve really hit a home run on this one. Basically you can take photos, upload your collection and have everyone rate your plushie. Finally someone has made an app with the collector in mind. I’ve even been reading that they are going to make the app free and will be running some free contests for the top rated image of the month. I don’t know about you but I’m going to win this month so I can add more to my collection!
Since having escalated in popularity worldwide, the Pokemon franchaise has been able to produce many different sorts of products. From games, to shows, to cards, and even toys, there are all different kinds of items that can be sought and collected as a hobby. Apart from one of the more obvious collectables (being Pokemon cards), Pokemon figurines are another easily collectable item, the majority of which are produced by a company called ‘Tomy’. However like any collectable there are always guidelines that should be followed, in order to make the process easy to follow.
First of all, devise a method for how you decide to go about purchasing the figurines. It’s one thing to decide that you want to collect them all, but with over 500 different Pokemon out there, it makes the entire collecting process a bit overwhelming. Try breaking the collection into chunks, such as collection according to region (perhaps start on the first 151 Pokemon first, then work on the Johto Pokemon next, then Hoenn, etc.). This will make it easier to track progress. Another key thing to do before getting started is to make a list of all the Pokemon you’re going to collect, and update it regularly. This will help to prevent picking up doubles of a Pokemon figurine by mistake. You also need to determine which ‘generation’ of figures you want to collect, as the original set of Pokemon produced by Tomy are of higher quality, yet are on the pricy side (online they can sometimes go for $4-6 a piece if still in packaging). The more recently produced figures are easily more affordable to a beginner, yet are not of the best quality. It’s up to the collector to decide which they want to go for.
Depending on where you end up buying the figurines from may affect how easy or hard the challenge of collecting can be. Some toy stores only carry the most recent figures from the fifth generation, making the Pokemon from earlier games a bit more difficult to find. If you’re lucky you may live near a store dedicated to everything anime and manga as I do, where individual figures can be purchased for fairly cheap (at $0.75 Canadian apiece for the new non-fifth-gen figures). When purchasing online however it is buyer beware, but because the new Tomy figures are produced in China, the red flag of buying in China and Hong Kong is not as big of a deal versus something like plushies, and is normally the more affordable way to go. If you do decide to purchase from somewhere like eBay, make sure to do this prior to buying in a store, as many sellers offer lots of multiple assorted figures. By buying these lots first to start your set, you can reduce the chances of obtaining doubles of any figures. Sometimes a quick browse on online local ads or yard sales can reveal some of the older, harder to find figurines.
To add to the fun, try collection Pokemon figures with a friend. This way you can work together with them to complete your sets, and both trade and discuss new figures and good finds.
Fuchsia City’s Safari Zone is the focal point of the city, being the home to many rare and exotic Pokemon that cannot be found outside of its boundaries, making it a stop that must be checked out by all trainers. However unlike the outside world, the Safari Zone has a few rules of its own. First of all, you have a time limit to how long you can stay in the Safari Zone, which in the first generation is determined by the number of steps are taken within its boundaries. The player is only given thirty special Pokeballs, and cannot fight traditionally against the Pokemon inside. Rather, they must use a combination of bait and rocks to make the Pokemon easier to capture, and even then the success rate is all by chance. It is because of limits like these that make that add to the challenge of the game. However there is normally a way around such things and the Safari Zone is no exception. In Pokemon Red and Blue versions, it is actually possible to enable the ability to capture the Pokemon of the first Safari Zone due to an oversight in coding.
Before entering the Safari Zone, make sure that you have a Pokemon with Fly and Surf handy. Enter into the Safar Zone as normal, paying the fee as you normally would. But as soon as you enter in, walk out of the Safari Zone, and out of the gate and into Fuchsia City. Without taking a single step away from the gateway entrance, open up your list of Pokemon, and fly directly to Cinnabar City. For those familiar with the Old Man glitch, this should be rather familiar, as the next step is to walk toward the eastern shore of the island, and proceed to surf up and down the coast line until a battle is imitated. So long as you don’t leave the coastline and go into another route, you will always be able to access Safari Zone Pokemon here.
The reason that this and the Old Man trick can occur is due to another oversight in coding. Every city in the game has a preset list of Pokemon that can occur within it, even if there is no grass or water or any other place for wild Pokemon battles to occur. The only exception to this is Cinnabar Island, which does not have such a list. Also, whenever a player travels from one location to another, the list of Pokemon that can be encountered is updated with the new area’s list. As the player leaves the Safari Zone and goes to Cinnabar Island, the list is not updated, because there is no new data to update the list with. So until new data is present, Cinnabar Island will use the data of the last location visited. In the case of the Old Man glitch, the player’s name has to be stored somewhere else temporarily so that the demonstration shows the ‘Old Man’ attempting to capture. In order to save space, the programmers used the list of Pokemon that could be encountered to store the player’s name, which would be reset upon traveling to a new location. However when going to Cinnabar again, this list is not updated, and upon encountering a wild Pokemon, the game attempts to pull data from this list. Instead all it finds is the name of the player (which is invalid for this purpose), so instead it uses a placeholder Pokemon, Missingno.
A very lonely place in the Pokemon world. A mere mirror of the world. Nobody inhabits this place except for Giratina. Anything could happen in the Distortion World quite literally. In some cases, you’ll find yourself surfing on the ceiling. Or walking on the ceiling, or sideways! Who knows what could happen? Apparently the boss of Team Galactic had no idea that he can’t create his perfect world without another world to mirror it! Cyrus got sucked into the Distortion World by Giratina when he was summoning Palkia and Dialga at the Spear Pillar.
You fight Cyrus venturing in the depths of the Distortion World. Giratina thinks you to be worthy and challenges you to a battle. He is strong, you can fight him or capture him, whatever you prefer. In Giratina and the Sky Warrior, there is one person who inhabits the Distortion World. His name is Newton Graceland. He studies the Distortion World and knows how to use the lack of gravity to his advantage and teaches others how to do so. He was Zero’s mentor. Zero apparently became obsessed with Giratina’s powers and wishes to capture Giratina and use his powers to freely enter from the world to the Distortion World. Got a little off topic there. Poison clouds appear occasionally in the Distortion World. People think that this is some form of pollution.
When Dialga and Palkia collided, the Distortion World got polluted a lot, so Giratina wants to destroy Dialga for poisoning his world. Shaymin thinks Giratina wants to eat him or her, I don’t know Shaymin’s gender. Seeing that Giratina always picked Shaymin up in his mouth, it is something you would think. And plus Shaymin is a small, cute, grassy hedgehog while Giratina is a big dragon with a ton of powers that can suck people into the Distortion World when angered. Giratina is strong, thats why Zero became obsesses with those powers. Giratina is the third member of the creation trio who controls antimatter and rules the Distortion World. The Distortion World is a great place, well, not really, or is it? I personally think its very unique! What about you?
The Pokemon Centers in Japan have released 3 new Pokemon canvas plush toys. Minccino, Darumaka and Audino are the first Pokemon canvas plushies to be released in 2012. After taking a long break from making the Pokemon canvas toys, the Pokemon Centers have released 18 different ones in a matter of 2 months.
The Tympole is about 3.25″ tall and 6″ long. It has nice stitching on the eyes. Very soft and cuddly.
Audino is about 4.5″ tall. Although it will not stand up by itself, its very cute. Its fur is very soft and has very nice stitching on its eyes.
Darumaka is about 4″ tall. Its round like a bowling ball. It stands up by itself. Very cute.
Minccino stands about 5″ tall. It won’t stand up by itself, but its very cool. Its eyes are adorable.
All 3 of these canvas plushies have the new folding tag that started in late 2011.
