A Second Try Can't Hurt - Part 1

Hello friends, family, strangers, co-workers, Poké-fans, and sometimes random streams of Eurasian readers to my second attempt at the Nuzlocke Challenge.

Welcome back for some and congratulations for others on seeing this for the first time.

Let's give all of you a round of applause. 

Many of you who are reading this know exactly what a "Nuzlocke Challenge" actually entails, so I will give them a little bit of information that can speed them to the end of this post. For those who understand this is the game I will be attempting for the challenge.

So now that that is out of the way for those of you experienced in the ways of the Nuzlocke, you can scroll down a ways to see the new-ish rules that I am implementing, right under the big red book of rules. 

For those of you who don't know what a "Nuzlocke Challenge" is or even worse a Pokémon, I'll give ya the skinny.

Let's start with the basics of basics.

Pokémon is a videogame, television show, movie franchise, trading card game, manga/comic book series and more.

The universe of Pokémon take place on different continents which have different Pokémon. Pokémon are like animals, but with special abilities. Some can breathe fire, put people to sleep by singing or even zap people with thunderbolts from their cheeks. They are varied and many (there are actually 719, but don't remember that number, because it doesn't apply to this challenge) and people in this universe capture these creatures for battling one another, showing them off, breeding them, or to say that they have captured every single one. Most people however capture them to make a team of strong Pokémon to battle with and to become the champion. 

The people above are the champions throughout the game series to beat. Each one is in a different game. I will be playing Pokémon Black. Which means my ultimate goal is to beat this guy...

His name is Alder and he is the Pokémon Champion in Pokémon Black.

Ultimately that is not the only goal one person wants while playing this game, but for the challenge he is the only thing that matters. 

I will go around the continent of Unova...

... collecting Pokémon and training them to be the very best. 

Why is this such a big deal? Well, I'm making it harder on myself.

Normally when you go to an area there are many Pokémon to catch, but I will be limiting myself to the amount of Pokémon I can catch. Also when you fight a Pokémon can faint and you can heal it back to consciousness. Not in this challenge. If it faints, I am to treat it as if it has died and can never use it again. That is the basis of what the Nuzlocke Challenge is. 

Why, is it called the Nuzlocke Challenge?

It all started from an online comic in where they wondered if there was a way to make playing the game of Pokémon more difficult. The creator started off with the rules that I mentioned above and gave it a whirl. The name Nuzlocke is what he called it and from what we can tell it is a mixture of a Pokémon called Nuzleaf...

... and the character from the television show Lost, named John Locke (not the philosopher).

If you ask why, all that I can tell you was that the character that the creator of the comic used this strange combination of two things as a running gag in the comic and it must have stuck. 

So after all that mumbo-jumbo, let's get down to brass tax.

The following are my rules for my personal Nuzlocke Challenge.

THE RULES:

1. I can only capture the first Pokémonin each area. No more than one. This includes Pokémon that I receive as a gift from NPCs (non-playable characters). If the Pokémon faints when I am trying to capture it, tough luck. That counts as it dying and being the first Pokémon I ran into. I can no longer capture something from that area.
2. If it faints, it dies. I must release it immediately.
3. If I run out of Pokémon in my party it is considered GAME OVER. I can no longer continue the challenge under that save file. Last Nuzlocke I was lenient and allowed myself a sort of... continue if I had Pokémon in stock. Not this time. I am buckling down.
4. No healing items during battle. But held items are okay.
5. All Pokémon need nicknames.
6. Cannot use legendary Pokémon.
7. No trading, in-game or out. Unless I need it to evolve a Pokémon, this is mainly because I can get stronger Pokémon at a faster rate.
8. No Exp. Share. 
9. All choices that are needed to be made in the game are to be randomized, usually with a dice roll.
10. My personal rule. If I come across a shiny, I will catch it. I will not use it, but I will catch it.
    
    Other than that everything else is fair game. 

For Pokémon Black there are less choices. There are less Pokémon to catch as well, so the great variety that I had the first time is going to be a little more difficult to gain. I will struggle, more than likely, especially since I know this game pretty poorly. The other games in the series I have played multiple times, but this one I have only done twice. 

It will be tough. There will be tears. I failed the first time in the penultimate moment. But I'm not planning on losing this time.

Keep an eye out for the next part, which will be arriving shortly.