Pokemon Heart Gold / Soul Silver

[BakaTanuki]

So, who went out and bought Pokemon? Any pre-orders? I got my pre-order this morning, but haven't played the game yet. I got Soul Silver and my mother got Heart Gold. Between us, our shelf gets to display both of the included figures of Ho-oh and Lugia.

For my starter, I am choosing Totodile. However, I do not plan to use it. I intend to use a more unusual set of Pokemon and focus on training the more obscure ones, at least at first.

I messed up and forgot to wear my 3rd grade Pikachu hat that I _always_ wear to go buy Pokemon games.

A photo of my boxes + figures
http://i43.tinypic.com/i297on.jpg

[Reverend]

I ordered mine from Gamestop.com, so I should get it sometime this week -_-

I'll be recreating my experience with Gold and pick Chikorita. It's week against the first 5 Gym Leaders. At least I can pick up a Ghastly in Sprout Tower and trade for that kid's Onyx.

As far as the preorder gifts go, some people at gamestop gave me Arceus. When I asked how to get it, they had no clue and just handed the display one to me. I also found the Lugia at a goodwill for $1. In the end, I'll have all three, plus the Giratina from Platinum.

[Incognito D]

Where I live it's out on the 26th so I still have a couple of weeks to wait

I'm not sure if I should pre-order from Gamestation (£35) and get the Ho-oh figure or buy from Amazon (£30) and not get a figurine.
I'll probably just go down the Amazon route since I'm not sure I want to pay £5 extra, even though it's always nice to receive the little extras...

[MrHealthy]

Pre ordered a while back and asked for the bonus then. They also gave me the bonus when I picked it up today so I now have two Ho-oh figures. I'm gonna keep one sealed unless I can trade it for an Arceus figure. My sister has the Lugia one.

[Ramatut4001]

I pre-ordered from Amazon. This will be my first Pokemon game. I also got the guide. As a first-timer, will I just be able to dive in and figure out what's going on or what?

[emwearz]

I highly doubt you will need a guide for it, though I doubt I will have the patience to every sit through and play the remakes I have to say, I am surprised they can keep the series going for so long.

It's ironic a series the revolves around evolving, never does.

[MrHealthy]

I pre-ordered from Amazon. This will be my first Pokemon game. I also got the guide. As a first-timer, will I just be able to dive in and figure out what's going on or what?

The way pokemon is designed its very very easy for newcomers to jump in. But old timers like me who don't get as much enjoyment out of the simpler stuff anymore can use the hidden depth to make an awesome game. Don't worry about the not getting it though, the single player doesn't require any knowledge of the more advanced information.

I highly doubt you will need a guide for it, though I doubt I will have the patience to every sit through and play the remakes I have to say, I am surprised they can keep the series going for so long.

It's ironic a series the revolves around evolving, never does.

But it has evolved, just in many more subtle ways. Most notably the battle mechanics have been refined with each game release to the point that they are almost perfect for the style of gameplay. Gamefreak is just good at hiding these changes under the hood so that its still easy for young or new players to enter the series while still allowing experienced players to have something new and exciting.

[dedalusdedalus]

I highly doubt you will need a guide for it, though I doubt I will have the patience to every sit through and play the remakes I have to say, I am surprised they can keep the series going for so long.

It's ironic a series the revolves around evolving, never does.

But it has evolved, just in many more subtle ways. Most notably the battle mechanics have been refined with each game release to the point that they are almost perfect for the style of gameplay. Gamefreak is just good at hiding these changes under the hood so that its still easy for young or new players to enter the series while still allowing experienced players to have something new and exciting.

What MrHealthy said is true. With every successive generation, GameFreak does considerable rebalancing that changes the face of competitive battling. The AI is so weak, though, that a casual gamer can play through the core game without even appreciating how drastic the revisions really are. However, it's a different story when you're battling against other humans: then you have to use every single change to your advantage.

For example, these are what I deem to be the changes that have most revolutionized the face of competitive battling:

a) Gold/Silver
i. Introduced use of equippable items on your pokemon.
ii. Rebalancing of types - Psychic nerfed, Poison and Bug buffed.
iii. "Heal Bell" introduced as counter to status effects strategy.

b) Ruby/Crystal
i. Innate abilities introduced.
ii. Weather effects introduced.

c) Diamond/Pearl
i. Special/Physical split.
ii. "Stealth rock" strategy introduced.

Competitive battling is the true soul of Pokemon, and it's actually an extremely deep game if you ever get serious about competitive battling. That said, I'm probably sitting this revision out though.

[Yukima]

I COULD have gotten it today, and pre-ordered it to get it today... if it wasn't for the fact that today is Sunday and stores close at 6 pm and I had too many things to do, and that GameStop closed 30 MINUTES EARLIER that it should have!!!

*rawr*

So yeah... I am NOT a very happy person right now.

[Niode]

For the people in the UK, it's probably cheaper to get both games from ebay.com with combined shipping. This is what I did for Diamond and Pearl. I paid £30~ in total including shipping. Prices may have fluctuated recently but I know you can get both for more or less than same price as 1 in the UK, even after shipping. I got them cheaper AND before they got released over here.

NEVER buy DS games from the UK. It is always cheaper to buy a bunch of games at once from a seller that has cheap combined shipping. I always do this for all my DS games. Plus NTSC boxes are 10000x nicer than our PAL monstrosities, why did they make our boxes so damn ugly?