Twitch Plays Pokémon (TPP) is a series of social experiments in which commands representing buttons on an original Nintendo DS (up, down, left, right, A, B, X, Y, L, R, start, and select) and touchscreen coordinates are entered into a chat on Twitch, and then translated into a game of Pokémon via an IRC bot. In short, hundreds of people are fighting over a controller. Throughout its life, Twitch Plays Pokémon has spawned hilarious characters, memorable moments, and even a few religions.
Twitch Plays Pokémon White 2 is the third run of Season 4, which began on on June 3rd, 2017, and ended on June 20th, 2017. It is the fifth randomized run overall, meaning Pokémon, movesets, abilities, Trainer classes, and non-plot-related items are shuffled around; on top of that, Trainer names are drawn from the Top 300 players of the last Twitch Plays Pokémon: Arena leaderboard, similar to how Trainers in Twitch Plays Pokémon Chatty Yellow were named after players from the chat. Randomized evolution also return from Alpha Sapphire and Randomized Platinum, although in a manner that prevents them from skipping evolution stages (e.g. Turtwig can evolve into Charmander or Charmeleon, but not into Charizard).
The protagonist for this run is named AAAALK', often interpreted as "Dr. Alk" or "Dr. Alek" due to the "Trainer" clas being randomized into the "Doctor" class. The shuffling or Trainer classes also caused members of many other organizations to appear alognside Team Plasma throughout the game, namely Team Rocket, Team Magma, Team Skull, Team Snagem, Team Fusion, and Team Valor; several major characters also appear to have joined said organizations, with the "Gym Leader" class turning into "Burglar", "Elite Four" into "Snagem Heads", and "Subway Boss" into "Rocket Grunt". As a result of those class changes, two recurrent plot points in the run's lore involved Unova falling victim to both a mutagen epidemic and a criminal turf war.
See also here
for the archived status of the run, or here for live updates, which have been archived here.
Twitch Plays Pokémon White 2 contains examples of:
- A House Divided: An argument broke out between the Voices during Day 4 regarding what to do with the current team, specifically whether or not to use the PC to deposit some of its members, and which Pokémon to give mail to hold beforehand (if any).FaithfulForce: Faction 1: Kill everything. Faction 2: Keep everything. Faction 3: Keep Floatzel and deposit the rest Faction 4: Keep Floatzel Typhlosion Jynx, deposit the rest. HOW AM I SUPPOSED TO COMPROMISE BETWEEN THAT.
- Canon Immigrant:
- The randomization of Trainer Classes caused several organizations from non-main series games to appear in the game, namely multiple classes related to Team Snagem from the Pokémon Colosseum and Pokémon XD spin-offs, Team Valor from the mobile game Pokémon GO, and more surprisingly, Team Fusion from the previously-featured fangame Pokémon Blazed Glazed.
- In a more minor example, Trainer classes from the Pokémon Battle Revolution spin-off also made their main game debut here, namely Cute Maniac, New Star, and Steel Spirit.
- Face–Heel Turn: Due to the class randomization, a lot of major characters ended up becoming villains. The Gym Leaders all became Burglars, the Elite 4 members turned out to be Snagem Heads, and Ingo and Emmet went from Subway Bosses to Rocket Grunts. Iris might possibly count as well, as her class was randomized into Spy.
- Gameplay and Story Segregation:
- One early Trainer talked to AAAALK' about his Patrat, only to send out a Slugma instead.Live Updater: The Patrat melted
- The Roughneck class was randomized into "Jolteon User". Unsurprisingly, none of them used Jolteon.
- One early Trainer talked to AAAALK' about his Patrat, only to send out a Slugma instead.
- Gentleman Thief: The Gym Leaders, due to having been randomized into "Burglars", can be seen as this. Most have a clear sense of style and class, and seem to appreciate being challenged by a Worthy Opponent such as AAAALK'. Many of them are also burglars in spite of running succesful business activities, which also fits the definition.
- Nerf: Because Skyla's Gym is pretty much close to impossible for TPP to deal with, the way the fans work has been altered. Instead of sending the player back every few seconds, the delay between each gust of strong wind gets progressively longer over time, leaving them much more manageable after a few minutes.
- Non-Indicative Name: Randomized evolutions combined with the nicknaming system of Generation V caused a several Pokémon to retain a nickname that did not reflect their final evolution's species. Notable examples include Cottone.♪' the Jynx, VigorothQY the Kyogre, and Dragonairy the Cresselia.
- For a more complete list, less notable Pokémon from this run included Pupitaryyq the Keldeo, ArchenQY the Rapidash, Flaaffygg the Torterra, Lairone w the Zapdos, EelektrikO the Tentacruel, MinccinoAA the Chimecho, Pansag the Leafeon, NidorinaQ the Zoroark, Houndour:. the Mantine, Growlitheq the Suicune, MagmarLOLC the Rapidash, MunchlaxUV the Keldeo, MurkrowOMK the Venusaur, Kirlia♪% the Rhydon, SkorupiNN4 the Eelektross, and Rhyhornbb the Uxie.
- One-Letter Name: The rival for this run is simply named "r".
- Previous Player-Character Cameo: The Pokémon World Tournament was modified to be include four different TPP-themed tournaments, each featuring Hosts from previous runs:
- "TPP Anniversary Challenge" features RED, AIIIAAB, EVAN, and ×ᴹɴ(?.
- "Randomizer Roundup" features A, aoooo, !!!0999 qq, and PP.
- "Unova Champion's Challenge" features GMYC (original team from 2014), GMYC (revisit team from 2017), and CL Y .,.
- "The Battle of the Hacks!" features AAtatat, Paul, Cyan, and AHUNIgg.
- Put on a Bus: On Day 5, Typhlosion, Jynx, Pidgeot, Masquerain and Mightyena were all deposited, leaving only Floatzel on the team. None of them were ever retrieved again.
- Series Continuity Error: Wingull9xx the Jellicent is male in the "Randomizer Roundup" tournament, even though it was female in Twitch Plays Pokémon Alpha Sapphire.
- Shout-Out: The existence of the "Neighbor" Trainer Class was confirmed by one of the developpers to be a deliberate reference to the opening of Mister Rogers' Neighborhood.
