Hidden Details: Stupid Shit I Used To Do In Pokémon #1 (Patreon)

Hey everyone, welcome to another Hidden Details blog! Won't be a long one this week, since I didn't hide that much stuff in this week's comic. Mostly nostalgic first-gen Pokémon stuff. Let's dive right in!

#1: Blue (or the player's rival, whatever you choose to call him), is standing in the background with his starter, Squirtle, looking all badass. I think the player choosing Charmander and the rival choosing Squirtle is the most common and "classic" option. Squirtle also looks like one of the Squirtle in the Squirtle Squad from that one anime episode.

#2: And of course, that means poor Bulbasaur is left alone on the table in Professor Oak's lab. I actually felt bad for the guy back in the day. Especially when I returned to the lab after 100+ hours of adventuring and he was STILL lying there, on the table, untouched. I'm happy the recent Pokémon games all introduce another rival that would pick the leftover starter.

#3: I'd like to point out I spent a lot of time making the background in the first frame look legit. I copied the colors directly from a screenshot from Pokémon FireRed and LeafGreen and I even drew the books so they matched the 4-pixel books in the actual game.

#4: In the nickname screen, you can see "me" making the typo. The cursor is positioned at the D, just a moment before writing "charmadner".

#5: Blue and his Squirtle, now a Blastoise, return in the final panel. This is a reference to your rival being the first league champion and surprise challenger after defeating Lance. It's also accurate that he has a super annoying Blastoise at this point in the game. I remember getting extremely stressed out by that stupid turtle as a kid.

#6: Blue's appearance, by the way, is based on his original art by Ken Sugimori. In the final battle, his sprite depicts him with a very cool jacket (and a slightly different hairstyle), but I've never found any "official" art showing that same jacket, which I think is a shame, because it looks totally rad. Luckily, my job allows me to draw these kind of things myself!

#7: Also, Charizard/Charmadner having 233 isn't random. It's very possible for a level 58 Charizard in Red/Blue having 233 HP, but it depends on its EV's/IV's! Yes, I did my research!

And that's it! As I said, this week's blog is a short one. But you shouldn't mind, because the weather is beautiful over here in the Netherlands. I'm going to enjoy being outside now. Have a wonderful weekend and I'll see you all next week!

Cheers!

- Abel