— Tagline, Pokémon Mystery Dungeon: Red/Blue Rescue Team
A Pokémon-themed entry in Spike Chunsoft's (originally Chunsoft's before the merger with Spike) Mystery Dungeon (Fushigi no Dungeon) Roguelike franchise. The games center around a world populated exclusively by Pokémon (with no humans to be seen), who live in towns and cities, run shops, and go on adventures in randomly-generated dungeons.Pokémon Mystery Dungeon as a whole is notable from the main series for two reasons, one being that it's the first entries in the entire Pokémon franchise to place special emphasis on Character Development and a compelling Story Arc (as opposed to the series's usual quest To Be a Master and to catch 'em all), typically involving a human who awakens in the Pokémon's world to discover that they've somehow been transformed into a Pokémon themselves. They become best friends with another Pokémon, form an adventure team, and go on a Quest for Identity over the course of many adventures, as clues about their Mysterious Past reveal that their ultimate destiny is nothing less than Save The World Climax from an imminent destruction.The second reason this spinoff series is notable? Because it's the first time we get to hear exactly what the Pokémon are saying underneath all the Pokémon Speak we've come to expect.The gameplay is what you would expect from a Roguelike, except with battle mechanics loosely resembling those of the main Pokémon series: All 400-plus individual species (which you can "recruit" to become members of your team), all 17 elemental types, moves, abilities, and Standard Status Effects from the main series show up in a manner better suited to the different nature of gameplay. The Pokémon themselves are represented faithfully with 8-directional walking and attacking sprites and dialogue portraits (an impressive feat in and of itself!).The series comprises these installments:
Explorers of Time and Darkness, another pair of games with minor differences between them, released in 2008 and featuring Pokémon from the fourth generation, a tighter Story Arc, and many tweaks to the underlying gameplay. An Updated Rerelease, Explorers of Sky, was released in 2009 with additional features, including bonus chapters focusing on side characters. The Explorers games have become somewhat notorious for the sheer amount of frightening situations that managed to sneak past the radar.
Adventure Squad: A third installment released only in Japan for WiiWare in 2009, comprising three versions with elementally-themed starter Pokémon (Fire, Water, and Electric), with entirely 3D graphics, and a Lighter and Softer story involving Arceus. These games do not have a page here at the moment, which is why the external link is given.
Gates to Infinity: The fourth installment in the series, released on the Nintendo 3DS, with fully 3D graphics. Unlike previous installments, this game is a standalone title. It makes use of items called Magnagates, which are generated based on Augmented Reality minigames. It was released in Japan on November 23rd, 2012, while North America had their release on March 24, 2013. Europe will get the game on May 17 2013, with Australia getting it a day later, May 18.
The first two installments also received their own manga adaptations and a few anime episodes based on them (see The Anime of the Game); the fourth also received an anime-style two-episode short episode.
The series as a whole provides examples of:
Adventure Guild: Rescue teams, Explorer teams (explicitly so with Wigglytuff's Guild), and aventurer teams.
Ambidextrous Sprite: Averted; Pokémon with asymmetrical designs have different sprites for all eight directions.
The Anime of the Game: In the form of a few one-off specials - Go-Getters out of the Gate!, Explorers of Time and Darkness, and Explorers of Sky: Beyond Time and Darkness.
Also, Ginji's Rescue Team and Blazing Exploration Team, two six-chapter mangas by Makoto Mizobuchi based on the first two games. The latter has not been translated.
Anti-Grinding: The experience points needed for each level-up grow about linearly, as opposed to quadratic or faster as in most other games. Joy Seeds are also relatively easy to get.
On the other hand, if you stay on a floor for too long (to fight the never-ending supply of Pokémon), an unseen force will kick you out of the dungeon, counting as a loss.
Arbitrary Headcount Limit: Four, but some parts of the story will only permit the player and partner. Also, larger Pokémon (such as Onix or Articuno) will reduce your headcount to three due to a size limit.
If you run out of PP for a move, the game prevents you from selecting or using it; but if an AI Pokémon (partner, recruits, and opponents alike) run out of PP, they may continue attempting to use that move, wasting their turn. The "PP Checker" skill prevents this, but the Rescue Team games don't equip it by default (it must be learned).
Disabling the "Course Checker" IQ skill can result in death by friendly fire if you're not careful. (But unlike "PP Checker", this one is equipped by default.)
If for some reason your partner is separated from you, they'll happily wander off elsewhere in the dungeon, engaging other Pokémon in combat, level discrepancies or Elemental Rock-Paper-Scissors being considered irrelevant. You can tell them to "wait there" while you track them down, but you have no way of telling them "wrong way, turn around".
Curiously, the above point also applies to enemies. If you encounter a pair of enemies together in a tunnel and it takes a few turns to dispatch the first, the second one may just turn around and head back the other way instead of waiting in line to fight you.
The Atoner: Gengar in Red/Blue, Drowzee, Armaldo, and, eventually, Dusknoir in Time/Darkness/Sky.
Auto Revive: Reviver Seeds. It is not necessary to even equip them; if they're present in the team inventory, they will be used automatically on the first Pokémon to be knocked out. As always, beware the lookalike item.
Bag of Sharing: All team members have access to the same inventory regardless of their location on the floor; in Sky, items and money placed in storage can even be exchanged to and from the optional "special episodes".
Baleful Polymorph: The Ninetales legend in Red/Blue predicted the cursed human would be reborn as a Pokémon. The "cursed human" is actually Gengar; the player being a Pokémon is simply because they're The Chosen One.
Played with in that this is part of the characters' backstory, and not an in-game status effect.
In-game, the "Transfer Orb" transforms an enemy Pokémon into a different species, though there is no guarantee that the new species will be any easier (or harder) to defeat. And the "Decoy Orb" transforms an opponent into a Poké-doll that other enemy Pokémon attack.
Finally, note that Adventure Squad doesn't use the same backstory as the other games. The orbs are still there, though.
Ballistic Discount: Attacking or stealing from the Keckleon brothers' in-dungeon shops will not only cause the incredibly powerful shopkeeper to attack you, but an infinitely spawning army of them to chase you until you leave the floor.
Battle Theme Music: There is one for standard Boss Battles, a second for Climax Bosses (and other legendary Pokémon), a third for Monster Houses. Explorers adds another for encountering Outlaw Pokémon, plus themes for the main antagonists.
Big Damn Heroes: In Gates to Infinity, when the Pawniard brothers summon two Galvantula and two Venipede to fight you, your partner, Dunsparce and Emolga, a surprise visit from Virizion, Gurdurr and the Timburr brothers initiates to gang up on them.
Also, at Daybreak Ridge after defeating Toxicroak, Gigalith and Chandelure, just as two Excadrill and Salamence are about to gang up on you, Hydreigon swoops in to save your character.
Blessed with Suck: Pokémon with the Illuminate ability (like Staryu, Chinchou, or Volbeat) will "blink" if they take damage during a turn, causing a hostile Pokémon to spawn somewhere on the floor. This includes damage from hostile weather or Standard Status Effects.
Brutal Bonus Level: A surprisingly high number of them for the games' length.
But Thou Must: In textbook fashion, most prompts for player input will result in only slightly altered dialogue leading to the same outcome, or require the player to go back and select the "correct" choice again.
In Red/Blue, there is at least one point where the player's only options are (literally) Visible Silence.
Near the end of Explorers of Sky, while trying to explain that something feels wrong about the mysterious dreams, you're given a choice between "Something seems strange..." and "Something seems weird..."
Taken to an extreme in Bidoof's Wish where Jirachi offers Bidoof a wish, and the player is given a slew of possible options (even World Domination), all leading to the same result — Bidoof doesn't want to wish for it any more, and wishes for something else.
Chimecho provides a Lampshade Hanging in Sky: "Even if you select a "No," you eventually have to select the "Yes," so it always ends up the same anyway..."
Late in the Explorers games, during a major plot point a selection dialog pops up ... and there's ONLY ONE OPTION to pick from!
Character Portrait: In both games, with a surprising amount of different expressions. At least for the player, partner, and plot-important characters, anyway. [1]
Cloudcuckoolander: The Wigglytuff in both games. They're separate Wigglytuff, for those of you who are wondering.
Climbing Climax: Three games end with a tower climb; the first one is the Sky Tower, the second is Temporal Tower, and last, Gates to Infinity ends with Glacier Palace - Great Spire.
Continuing Is Painful: Defeat means losing approximately half the items (randomly selected) in your active inventory and all of your money on hand. When the game tells you to use the bank and item storage before setting out, it isn't kidding.
In Sky, the penalty was lessened to half of your money on hand, although losing half of your items still applies.
Crapsaccharine World: Sure the world looks pretty and colorful but what about the natural disasters/distortions time that are turning mons against each other or what about the embodiment of nightmares who puts children into everlasting nightmares for his own amusement and is attempting to turn the world into a world of darkness?
Ironically, even though "Darkness/Time/Sky" seems fairly kiddish at face value, it is often viewed as the grittiest and darkest Pokemon game ever made.
Same with "Gates to Infinity", except EVEN DARKER.
Cursed with Awesome: Your character is a human turned into a Pokémon. Why become a human when you can do things like shooting fire from your HANDS?
Somewhat averted in the first game though. The Laser-Guided Amnesia was the real curse, not the transformation. The player agreed to both but shows no problems with being a Pokémon. The player can choose whether or not he/she wants to become a human again. Of course your choice is irrelevant at the end of the game. The player Character wisely decides that The Power of Friendship and various other awesome powers, is more valuable than life on the boring human world which he/she has no memory of anyway.
Played straight in the next game where Darkrai's attempt to kill Grovyle led to the PC getting turned into a Pokémon. On the other hand, the player is never particularly bothered by whether or not he/she can ever become human again.
Dark Is Not Evil / Light Is Not Good: Gates to Infinity implies for a while before explicitly stating that the overall plot involves an evil Hydreigon who is first shown chasing an innocent-looking Munna. Later on, it turns out Hydreigon is the friendly and polite Big Good, while Munna is the manipulative servant of the Big Bad.
Demonic Spider: Pokémon with multi-hit moves in general. Octillery is probably the best individual example of the trope—it packs Bullet Seed, which hits multiple times from a distance, among other things.
Difficulty Spike: Explorers is pretty easy up until you make your way to the Hidden Land and Temporal Tower. Afterwards, it can get downright cruel.
Sky Tower in Red/Blue Rescue Team can be pretty rough going, too. Stupid ghost-types and their dumb attacking through walls on earlier floors, Idiotic Aerodactyl and their moronic Supersonics and Agilities further up... and let's not get into the post-game dungeons.
Disappears into Light: the player after completing the main arc in all three (Rescue Team, Explorers, and Gates to Infinity) games, albeit for slightly different reasons.
Easter Egg: In Gates to Infinity, try running around your partner a lot. They get dizzy and fall over.
Elemental Rock-Paper-Scissors: More or less similar to the main series during gameplay. It is specifically hinted at during Sunflora's special mission in Sky, where she is warned that Spring Cave is likely to contain Fire-type Pokémon, and her type disadvantage against the outlaw Haunter (plural).
Escort Mission: A frequent form other missions can take, not helped in any way by the client's lower level or the inability to give them tactical commands in case they get separated.
Fake Difficulty: In the first game, after a certain point the enemies in the dungeons just won't be able to damage your characters enough (since you can raise your stats with gummies very fast), so the game fills the dungeons with traps and present enemies that instead of going for direct damage, will try to use OHKO moves or poison you so you'll have to rush to the stairs.
The second one just runs wild with it. In the ultimate challenges, you're reduced to Lv. 1, have all your IQ skills removed, cannot bring items, and the dungeons are 99 floors long with the highest trap density, and the latter floors are covered with enemies that can kill you indirectly with ease. Add this to the fact that there are only a handful of Pokémon that are effectively useable while at Lv. 1, and you'll realize that not only you won't be able to use your favorites in those challenges as those are effectively luck based missions.
Fantasy World Map: Displayed primarily in conjunction with the dungeon-select menu.
Fire Breathing Diner: Blast Seeds, if eaten. They can alternatively be thrown, causing them to explode on impact.
Fish Out of Temporal Water: The player. Well, not temporal water, in Red/Blue that is. Averted in the WiiWare games.
Fixed Damage Attack: Quite a few attacks, even more than those of the main series (Dragon Rage, Night Shade, etc.).
Geo Pebbles and Gravelerocks inflict a fixed 10 or 20 points damage, while throwing or knocking enemy Pokémon around inflicts a fixed 4 points.
Selfdestruct and Explosion inflict a fixed 40 or 80 points on hostile Pokémon.
Friendly Fireproof: Many (but not all) moves that target an entire room will conveniently damage only opposing Pokémon. On the other hand, moves that inflict damage on a "straight line of sight" will damage the first thing they hit, friend or foe alike.
Funny Animal: Mirroring any examples from the main Pokémon series.
Fun with Acronyms: Gates to Infinity gives us the Helping Adventurous Pokemon Prosper Institute - or "HAPPI" for short.
Get Back Here Boss: Certain outlaws will freak out when they see your exploration team. One slightly notable example is Abra, whose response is to use the one move he knows, Teleport, making you have to search for him first. Thankfully, he won't Teleport again when you do find him.
Getting Crap Past the Radar: The X-Eye seed's effects are described as making one cross-eyed. It's actually a hallucinogen.
Greed: Some of the characters seem quite obsessed with treasure.
Grievous Harm with a Body: Hurl Orbs, Strength and Fling pick up one hostile Pokémon and toss it towards another, inflicting damage on both.
Guide Dang It: 99% of the items are found randomly in the dungeons, so it's kinda hard to figure out where you can get what as the item might just not spawn whatsoever. For instance, a certain evolutionary item is found only in a certain dungeon, and ONLY in a Kecleon Shop, which might or might not appear in the dungeon. And even then, the Kecleon Shop may not have the item.
The games' introductory quiz assigns the player a specific starter based on whichever personality type it declares as a result. If you want your player to be a specific Pokémon, the fastest way is to consult a guide for how each question affects your quiz results, and pick answers accordingly. (On the other hand, you can pick your partner's species directly.)
The sheer number of possible personality types and questions means that even answering optimally, it may be impossible to get the Pokémon you want if you get the wrong quiz loadout!
Hate Plague: According to the characters it is the natural disasters/distortions in time that are turning mons hostile.
Heal Thyself: Oran Berries, available from the start of the game, heal the user by 100 HP, despite healing by only 10 HP in the main series. Oren Berries, on the other hand, cause you to lose 10 HP.
Heel Face Turn: Gengar in Red/Blue, and Dusknoir in Sky.
Also, the Sableye stick with Dusknoir no matter his allegiance.
In Time/Darkness/Sky, Palkia just wants to stop spacial distortions from warping the world. Too bad Darkrai manipulated him into think you were the cause of it.
Hello, Insert Name Here: The player and partner, and to a lesser extent the "nicknames" of recruited Pokémon.
Hello, Nurse!: In Gates To Infinity, this happens when the player sees Virizon for the first time. Yes, she's a frickin' Legendary. But the majority of males in Post Town seem to all have a crush on her, even though she's legendary. 'She's out of your league' INDEED.
Even though every male in Post Town have a crush on Virizon, they all(including Dunsprace) have been rejected. However, Virizon joins the player and his/her partner's team after defeating the two Paniwards and their goons.
Explorers averts it precisely once after completing the main story arc: The player actually gets to say goodbye to his partner right before the changes in history erase him from the timestream.
In Red/Blue, it's averted several times, actually: the hero speaks during the dream sequences, at the end of the main story as well, and after a level-up. (Though the dream sequences may be a borderline example.)
However, in the aftergame, if you are in a dungeon and playing as another character(such as your partner or a recruited Pokémon) and you speak to your player character, the only response is "...".
Gates to Infinity averts this a lot of times as the player does get a few lines of (non-soliloquy) dialogue, though it's mostly just short "what was that?" types of responses whwnever an NPC introduces a new term. Even so, Hyperactive Sprite and Parrot Exposition still apply.
The Ninetales legend in the Rescue Team games, where a Gardevoir took the Ninetales's curse herself to save her human trainer.
Explorers of Time/Darkness has no less than three, with one of the Special Episodes in Sky adding a fourth.
Heterosexual Life Partners: Officially, the player and partner are merely friends who work together on the same team. This doesn't stop the Shipping fandom from numerous pairings of Ho Yay, Les Yay, (etc.) between them, but that aside....
Les Yay is much less common than Ho Yay or straight pairings (for female player characters, anyway), given how most of the available partners are male by default.
Inner Monologue: All of the player's lines are either this or Parrot Exposition from other characters, save for a few scenes where they actually talk directly — which is usually reserved for dreams and other places where no other Pokémon are around.
Averted a lot of times in Gates to Infinity as the player character talks directly much more compared to previous games.
Knockback: Blowback Orbs (and the moves Roar and Whirlwind) specifically send a foe flying across the room, causing them to take damage if they hit a wall or opposing Pokémon.
Lampshade Hanging: Happens with some frequency. To give one example:
Armaldo: [The boss of a dungeon] probably won't listen to what you have to say. You'll likely be attacked often.
Igglybuff: Dungeon bosses don't have much patience, do they?
Large Ham: Dugtrio, Palkia, and Spiritomb probably all count.
The main character in both Rescue Team and Explorers wakes up knowing absolutely nothing beyond their name, and the fact that they used to be a human. In the former, this is revealed to be because the player specifically requested it, to prove to themselves whether they really were The Chosen One.
Also in Red/Blue, the final postgame mission involves rescuing Gardevoir, who requests Laser-Guided Amnesia so she won't have to remember her human trainer.
Likewise, Uxie in Time/Darkness/Sky has power over memories, so the player assumes Uxie might have something to do with their forgotten memories. Nope, but it was worth a shot asking.
Unknown whether this is the case in Gates to Infinity - the player doesn't seem to have amnesia about who they are, they just don't think about their human past at all.
Last Chance Hit Point: As with the main series, the "Endure" technique allows the holder to retain 1 HP if an attack would otherwise KO them. (Curiously, in Rescue Team and Explorers it lasts for several turns, making the user almost invincible until it wears off). In Gates to Infinity, the "Sturdy" skill (a standard feature of some species) allows the user to retain 1 HP after attack if their Life Meter was full before taking a hit, and it's available as a "team skill". There is also the "Tough" team skill which provides a random chance of this at all times.
Level Drain: Doom Seeds cause you to lose one level.
The Load: Almost any Pokémon in an escort mission. They're typically underleveled (escorts in Rescue Team especially are always Level 1, even if they want to explore a high-level dungeon), with bad stats and moves, suicidally aggressive AI, and won't hesitate to waste every single one of your Reviver Seeds (remember, they kick in automatically) if given the chance. It's probably the number one reason many players AVOID escort missions entirely.
Luck-Based Mission: The Lv.1/0 IQ/No items dungeons, especially in Time/Darkness/Sky. The game might not spawn enough HP/PP recovery items, you might start in a trap-filled room (or worse, a Monster House), some enemies in the late floors are nigh unkillable... really, skill is required but if the luck isn't on your side, you WON'T complete those dungeons. On the flipside, not being allowed to take items into a dungeon means you have (literally) nothing to lose for attempting to crawl them.
Never Say "Die": Pokémon don't "kill" other Pokémon, they "get rid of" them. (Sometimes "for good"....)
Also in situations where one would bring up death, they avoid actually mentioning it. Usually with lots of ellipsis and question marks For example "Is he....?"
No Hero Discount: Even after saving the world twice, Kecleon still doesn't give discounts.
One Curse Limit: A variation in Gates to Infinity: The "Prevention" Team Skill means that if one Pokémon on your team gets a status ailment, nobody else on the same team can get afflicted by it at the same time.
One Game for the Price of Two: Just like the main series, there are only subtle differences in item and Pokémon appearance rates. (Additionally, the Rescue Team games are on differing systems, which means there are a few touchscreen features in Blue that aren't in Red, and Pokémon can be traded between them with just one system.)
Interestingly, Sky actually includes all the Pokémon from both Time/Darkness, along with all its other bonus features, averting the main series' trend of the third version strategically omitting enough Pokémon to 'force' trading with past versions.
Adventure Squads makes it One Game For the Price of Three, with each game having 133 Pokémon exclusive to it (or in Stormy's case, 135), and a completely different set of dungeons.
Averted with Gates to Infinity, which has no counterpart. Though there is a surprisingly small amount of recruitable Pokémon (as it's mostly just Unova Pokémon).
One Steve Limit: Thanks to the Species Surname, rarely does the player encounter more than one NPC of a given species. Lampshaded in Explorers after Teddiursa evolves and finds others are having trouble telling them apart from their already evolved buddy.
There are two Timburrs in Gates to Infinity though... and both are addressed the same way.
One Mon Army: A single character is able to plow through dozens of enemies especially if they are a lower level than him/her.
Playable Epilogue: Just like the main series, the game isn't over after the credits roll; there are still more missions and new dungeons (even some more story progression) waiting for the player to wrap up. And, of course, the quest to recruit 'em all truly begins at that point.
Player Personality Quiz: Appears in the first two games. Gender is also a factor; for instance, in the Explorers series, a Brave male becomes Pikachu while a Brave female ends up as Charmander, and certain ones are only availible to one gender.
Adventure Squads averts this by letting the player pick their hero and partner from the starting roster for each squad, with preset genders for each character. The demo for Magnagate also averts this, letting you simply select your character and gender.
Only in the Japanese version. The American version doesn't let you pick genders.
Plot Hole: It is never explained how the Mons know what a "human" is when there aren't any humans around. Or are there? (Though the Ruins friend zone in the Rescue Team; games seems to hint at a case of Humanity's Wake.)
Purely Aesthetic Gender: The player's species and/or gender has no meaningful impact in the events of Story Arc whatsoever. In actual gameplay, it has no effect beyond whether gender-based moves and abilities (Attract, Rivalry, etc.) will work on a given Mon, as only a few species (like the Nidoran) have any notable differences between their males and females.
Rage Quit: Yes. Yes you will. Especially when you are playing the Mt. Bristle and *shudder* Apple Woods dungeons for the first time in Explorers of Time/Darkness/Sky. By the way, ragequitting counts as a loss, so you'll lose your items anyway.
Random Encounters: While the dungeons generally rely on wandering opponents inside dungeons, later dungeons occasionally toss in "monster houses" where a swarm of Pokémon drop in on the player for a surprise attack. Oh Crap indeed.
Randomly Generated Levels: As one would expect from a Roguelike. Gates to Infinity takes it up a notch with "Magnagates" - focus the 3DS's outer camera on a round object and the game will generate an entire dungeon from it.
Rank Inflation: Most missions (and outlaw Pokémon) are ranked from E to A (and S) for difficulty, but the scale extends even farther with missions rated *1 through *9.
Rare Candy: Joy Seeds. There are also the same vitamins as the main series, and Sitrus Berries can increase a Mon's maximum HP if taken at full health. Ultra-rare Golden Seeds boost you up five levels!
Regenerating Health: Team members gradually regenerate HP as you move around the dungeons. Holding A+B at the same time causes your HP to regenerate faster, if only by standing in place and fast-forwarding time. Poisoning (and certain weather conditions) inhibit this, though, and certain IQ skills can increase the rate.
Required Party Member: The player and partner, at least until after completing the main arc and watching the credits roll. Afterwards...
In Red/Blue, the partner discusses letting their recruits take on rescue missions by themselves, effectively lifting the restriction and allowing the player to compose their team any way they see fit.
In Explorers, this is Chimecho's bonus for passing the Guild's graduation exam, although the player and partner are still the characters used to travel around the Hub Level and for most of the post-game story missions.
In Gates to Infinity, the game gives you "Companion Mode", allowing you to play as whoever isn't in the team, completing missions and such. However, you can't go out of the main area of Paradise, and the story doesn't progress in this mode. Only after completing the game does the game allows you to change the leader of the team.
Roguelike: To cater to the younger demographic, though, it's actually a fair bit easier than most Roguelikes. At least, until the end credits roll, then the kid-gloves come off.
Save Point: "Kangaskhan Rocks" found during some of the longer expeditions. Some even allow access to the player's item storage, and they also double as a checkpoint if the player is defeated.
The ones found outside dungeons are usually the ones with item storage access; the ones used as dungeon checkpoints don't.
In Gates To Infinity, Kangaskhan Storages and their mini versions Kangaskhan Rocks were all replaced by "Deposit Boxes", which not only store items, but can also store Poke (the in-game money) AND if one should be in a checkpoint, will allow saving in that checkpoint.
Scratch Damage: Most commonly seen when revisiting low-level dungeons on optional missions.
Sequel Difficulty Spike: In a variety of ways, but notably with regard to Monster Houses: The first Monster Houses in the Rescue Team games would be seen in late-game dungeons like Uproar Forest or the Magma Cavern, but in the Explorers games they can occur as early as Amp Plains halfway through the Story Arc. In Sky, you can even encounter one in Special Episode 1, unlocked VERY early on.
Shoplift and Die: In addition to the town shop, Kecleon also runs a Dungeon Shop. And woe unto you if you attempt to take items off his Dungeon Shop mat without paying for them first.
Note that anything with the potential to destroy items (such as an Explosion trap) can also offend him if it damages his wares. Otherwise, you can KO wild Pokémon right in front of him and he won't even notice.
The in-game description of the Trawl Orb explicitly warns that if there's a Kecleon shop on the current floor, using the Orb will brand the player a thief (as it pulls all items to the player's location).
As of Gates to Infinity, you can no longer defeat angered Kecleon. In other words, you will die if you try to steal something from them.
Species Surname: Most NPCs are named after their respective Pokémon species (only the player and partner, plus recruited Mons, are assigned actual names).
Standard Status Effects: In addition to the ones from the main series (poison, burn, paralysis, sleep, freeze, confusion, etc.), there is also "fear" (Pokémon flees battle), "petrify" (full paralysis until struck by an enemy attack), "slow", "cringe" (lose one turn), and so on.
Stop Helping Me!: AI teammates often embrace this trope with both hands, especially with low IQ stats. Reviving an entire room of petrified enemies with an ill-timed Growl attack, for example.
Suspiciously Specific Denial: Rumored about Kecleon, one of the merchants: "He wouldn't get free items in dungeons and sell them at a higher price..."
Suspicious Videogame Generosity: If you see more than one or two items in the same room from a distance, it's likely to be either a Kecleon Shop (good) or a Monster House (bad or very bad). Luckily for you, Gates to Infinity gives Kecleon Shops a different floor color so you can identify them.
Talking Animal: Invoked by the player at the start of the game when they realize the first voice talking to them belongs to a Pokémon instead of a human. See Translation Convention for the rest.
Take Your Time: Indeed, although if the player is defeated in a boss battle, both the partner and boss will acknowledge that the player is back "again" for a rematch.
Tech Points: Eating Gummis increases the user's "IQ" allowing them to learn and equip new (mostly passive) skills, such as healing quicker from status problems or walking on water/lava.
Universal Poison: As in the main series. It blocks the usual HP regeneration while inflicting damage. It wears off when you find the stairs to the next floor, but whether your Pokémon will survive long enough to get there is another matter.
Useless Useful Spell: Like the main series, most Standard Status Effects are equally effective against enemy Mons (and even bosses) as they are against you. Unlike the main series, there are numerous other skills that qualify....
"False Swipe"'s ability to deal damage while never KO'ing the target was useful in the main series where Mons had to be captured alive. Not so much here, where you must KO a Pokémon to have a chance of recruiting it to your party.
Gates to Infinity fixed this by changing the effect to increasing recruit rate if you KO a Mon with this move
Item-grabbing moves such as "Thief" or "Covet" are rarely worthwhile since enemy Pokémon can only carry one item at a time, and they just drop it when KO'ed anyway. On the other hand, you have a large inventory that enemy Mons can steal from ... but at least they still drop the stolen item when defeated. Except for the moves "Pluck" and "Bug Bite" which not only steal a food item (like Oran Berries and Reviver Seeds) from your inventory but use it up at the same time.
"Sleep" is a generally effective status effect early on, but becomes less so in the late game due to moves (like Uproar) or IQ skills ("Nonsleeper") that prevent it.
"Transform" doesn't copy the opponent's moveset, so the user (e.g. Ditto) must resort to using Struggle, which has a low attack power and generates recoil damage.
"Worry Seed" gives the target "Sleepless" status. In the main series, this suppressed the target's normal Ability, but here it is just an added (not to mention positive) status effect — in other words, you should be using it on your team members, not enemy Mons. Ironically, this doesn't stop the AI from attempting to "attack" you with it.
Inverted with "Selfdestruct" and "Explosion", which inflict fixed damage on hostile Pokémon and 50 percent damage on the player's team, regardless of whether it is used by the player or a hostile Pokémon. Meaning that a hostile Pokémon will suffer a KO after one or two uses, while the player can use it almost indefinitely (thanks to Regenerating Health and Reviver Seeds).
Viewers Are Goldfish: Prepare for a lot of flashbacks whenever the player character recalls a previous event, even if the flashback was just from the previous cutscene. It seems to happen more often in Explorers than Rescue Team.
Violence is the Only Option: Expect to hear something like "he's not listening to reason" any time you reach the final floor of the latest dungeon.
Wallet of Holding: Your inventory space may be limited, but your money stash (not counting the bank) sure is not. Note that as of Gates to Infinity your wallet is limited to 9,999 Pokés, making the Deposit Box a necessity.
We Buy Anything: But the prices you get for resale are extremely low - like 10%(!) of its retail purchase price.
We Cannot Go On Without You: If either the player or their partner Mon are knocked out in a dungeon, the mission is immediately over. (After the credits roll, this is reduced to whomever the player designates as the party leader.)
Walk on Water: All Water-type Pokémon can cross bodies of water during dungeon crawls. Other species have (or can learn) this ability as well (and a similar rule applies to Fire-type Pokémon crossing lava).
An then it takes it to its logical extreme, with the IQ ability Absolute Mover, it not only allows any typed Pokémon to cross any terrain type normally not cross able unless you're a flying, fire or water type it also allows you to move through the walls.
Any Flying-Type or any Pokémon with the ability Levitate can cross lava and water as well.
Although if you cross lava without being protected from burns in some manner...
Wham Line: From "In the Future of Darkness" when Grovyle's spirit is about to be drained away by the pillars as Dusknoir laughs in triumph:
Dusknoir: In the end, you have lost! You've lost because...you trusted me!
Wizard Needs Food Badly: The Belly meter. This was completely removed in Gates to Infinity (save for three post-game dungeons which are clearly labelled "Hunger: Yes"). The familiar Apples saw a return there.
World of Funny Animals: Unlike in other Pokémon games, this game series takes place in a world populated entirely by Pokémon and no humans, though the main character was originally a human him/herself.
Would Hurt a Child: Like the main series, there is no gameplay distinction between "baby" Pokémon (like Caterpie or Azurill) and adults when it comes to fighting. You're free to knock 'em all out.
Color-Coded for Your Convenience: Blazing Squad is comprised of primarily red/orange/yellow/brown pokemon, Stormy Squad is all blue, and Light Squad is all yellow save for the light blue Shinx and Pachirisu.
Fire, Water, Lightning: Blazing Squad, Stormy Squad and Light Squad are comprised primarily of that respective type.
Lighter and Softer: In Time/Darkness/Sky, the main plot is to find the time gears before the Bad Future arrives and the world is put into hell. In Adventure Squad, the main plot is finding some cookies in a dungeon so your town will stop fighting over a piece of chocolate.
Palette Swap: 36 pokemon have Shiny counterparts that can be discovered and recruited. Notably, they have one advantage over their normally colored cousins: their Hunger Meter goes up to 200 instead of the typical 100.
Rule of Three: In addition to there being three versions, each team has three pokemon in the starting roster who aren't the dominant type:
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