Text Play: Pokémon Xenoverse #17

Hello, and welcome back to the Eldiw region! This is entry number #17 of my Text Play through Pokémon Xenoverse!

Before we begin, I would like to warn you all that I will be spoiling this game.

As such, I recommend that you play the game for yourself before reading this. You can download the game here. And with that out of the way, let's do this!

Last time, we learned the origin of this version of the Pokémon universe thanks to Abraham, the grandfather of Queen Nuphar. This also revealed to us the origins of the Xenoverse and the X Pokémon that inhabited it. We traveled to the Xenoverse itself, battled our counterpart, and obtained the power of Xenoversal Evolution, which temporarily made Trishout go nuts. With that accomplished, we returned to Ishtar City, and Queen Nuphar invited us to her Gym (which is a giant pyramid, and that's awesome) to face her for our 4th badge. And now we're here.

I did look into the Gym a bit in the last entry, but I realized I'm going to need a special team of Pokemon to take her on. Nuphar is a Water-type specialist, so I put together a team of Electric, Grass, and Sound to counter her. From my regular team, I kept my Phantump (Grass/Ghost) and Harrowk (Electric/Flying). The rest of my team comprises of Hystearic (Grass/Sound), Sewaddle (Bug/Grass), Bremand (Electric/Sound), and Mareep (Electric). I'm pretty confident that this bunch can handle the Queen of Ishtar City and her Wave Brigade. 

Thing is, most of these Pokémon desperately need to be leveled up. Which means yep, time to do some grinding!

It's not so bad. As I said in the last entry, all your Pokémon in a team get experience after a battle. I did most of my grinding on Route 7, and I already managed to get my non-regular team Pokémon into their twenties power level-wise after a couple hours. A couple funny things did happen to me when I was grinding on Route 7. First, I have to explain something. My lead Pokémon here is Phantump (I've really grown to like using Phantump thanks to this game as well as Sun and Moon), which has the ability Frisk. That ability allows the player to instantly know what item the opposing Pokémon has, if it is carrying one. And on Route 7, you can find wild Papaqueno and Kadabra.

There's a point to this, I promise! Anyway, I got a couple of interesting items during my grinding sessions. From a Papaqueno, I got a Fire Stone. And from a Kadabra, I got an item called a Psi Update. What is a Psi Update? Well, a Psi Update is an evolution item. It allows one to evolve a Kadabra into an Alakazam when you use something called the Pokémon Transfer. I have no idea what that is. You can also fight Bibarel and Koinkoin on this route. Bibarels can provide Oran or Sitrus Berries, and Koinkoin can provide Pearl Strings. You can sell Pearl Strings at stores if you need a little extra money. So, a little helpful info there for you all.

After doing quite a bit of grinding, I was ready to face Queen Nuphar at the Ishtar Gym. And appropriate for her, it's a giant pyramid.

You know, I'll give it to the old Queenie. Her having an Ancient Egyptian-style pyramid for a gym is pretty darn awesome. 

We recount to her our little misadventure with her grandfather. She is thrilled that we unlocked Xenoversal Evolution, and she wants to see it for herself. 

With this new power, as far as she's concerned, we've got the canyon problem handled. But first, she wants to challenge us and see this new power for herself. I'm afraid she's going to be a bit disappointed. Remember, Trishout is a Fire-type, and she's a Water-type specialist. As such, he won't be on my team when I face her. Hey, I want her badge. I'm taking every advantage I can get. We did go into the gym a little bit in the last entry, but we didn't really explore it, if I remember correctly. When we get inside, the first chamber has a jar.

Inside the jar is a Hyper Potion. Which is always handy. The Ishtar Gym has challenges that are based on games their ancestors used to play. Basically, puzzles. Well, I like puzzles, so let's do this. 

The first puzzle is "Walk on the Grass". We pass through the door and find ourselves on a path. 

It's not really much of a puzzle, sadly. As you can see, the path has tiles that have drawings of Pokémon on them done in the style of Egyptian hieroglyphs. The "puzzle" is not really a puzzle. What you have to do is walk down the path. So what does "Walk the Grass" mean? Well, there is a safe way to walk the path. You have to walk on tiles that have Grass-type Pokémon on them. The thing is, it can be hard to tell which tiles to walk on. On this path, you have to walk on the tiles that depict Leafeon and Pansage. 

And I'm afraid that's where we're going to have to end for this month. I know, I do apologize. Real life has been taking up much of my time this month, and I wasn't able to work on the game as much as I wanted to. Not to mention much of the time was eaten up by grinding. And I wanted to maintain my regular deadline up putting up these Text Plays on the last day of the month, so...yeah. Hopefully next month, we'll get to take on Nuphar herself. Wish me luck!

Thanks for reading this entry! If you liked it, show it off! Take care of yourselves and each other! Stay safe, stay healthy, stay home, wash your hands often, wear a mask, and get your vaccine/booster! See you next time!

Pokemon Obtained:
(Route 7)
- Ampharos (evolved from Flaffy)