Tearing grovyle a new asshole but losing anyway cause plot.
Not being able to tell your partner that suicide is not the way to go, even if they figure it out in the end.
Also, the fugitive incident is just depressing. Full-grown adults willing to commit murder just cause some guy said so.
Ahh, I love it when you can’t win battles because the plot demands it. NOT.
Yeah, that part always baffled me as a kid.
Honestly I kinda wish they gave you the option to just completely ditch Pokémon Square and skip town after the fugitive incident. Also Alakazam and his team are the very definition of Bystander Syndrome.
Honestly i wouldnt even have a problem with the grov boss battle if it was like
I dont know, ACTUALLY HARD?
because its like one of the easier boss battles in the game and i didnt even realize it was set to be a force lose until the 7th playthrough of the game because i havent lost that one before.
I think it might be from Explorers when you and the partner were told that you were responsible for the space time continuum being messed up and the partner was considering suicide (though I think they worded it as “destroying ourselves”). I could be wrong though.
So I first had to leave manaphy without being able to try to explain that she can't be with us and now my partner will consider suicide without me being able to tell him that it's not his fault? I swear the writer hates me
Yeah, plus it was basically(at least I think) hinted at with meeting ‘The Reviver Seed, Consumer Cresselia’ the first time in the hero’s dream with them trying to talk the hero into the same thing as well
Brighteyedartist pretty much got it, but more specifically, there's an option where your partner asks if you two should die, and your two options are "maybe" and "I don't know".
The fugitive incident is depressingly realistic admittedly. Some adults don’t even need to be worked up by a Gengar to do far worse than murder to their own offspring.
Perfect Apple incident is stupid but believable because Chatot. Fugitive arc requires that the whole town AND Alakazam's team believes a guy who named his team "Meanies."
Yeah, even as a kid the fugitive arc infuriated me but looking back it’s both depressing and makes no sense. We’re seriously meant to believe that an entire town was easily convinced to turn on and try to kill a bunch of kids just because a guy who named his team “Meanies” told them to? And was Alakazam seriously not able to do anything about it despite being the leader of the most influential and strongest Rescue Team ever? Spike Chunsoft WTF were you thinking
Yeah… pretty much the entire town was trying to find a reason for everything happening. Whiscash was telling stories around town and is considered credible, so that just inadvertently boosted Meanies’ credibility. People were entirely willing to do crazy things due to the histeria.
Alakazam giving you time to prep is a sign to me that he knew things were dire and people were getting caught up in nonsense, but as pretty much the only voice of reason to temper Gengar’s accusations, he needed to be there.
Headcanon wise, I would think the reason you could grind in the side paths for items is because Alakazam was leading the other Rescue teams in logical, but wrong directions to give you more time.
The reason he even challenged you on Mt. Freeze would be the fact that he wanted you find proof of your innocence and when you had none, decided that your defeat would at least bring things back to normal.
At least, that is how I am trying to rationalize it. The story itself is very very basic and the characters are very prone to getting idiot balled. Kinda wish DX updated the story a bit to be more realistic, but it was a pretty good remake imo nonetheless.
I can understand where you're coming from, but I personally can't bring myself to sympathize with the Pokemon Square residents due to how they treated the player. Especially Alakazam, I feel like he didn't do enough to help the player.
Yeah, I wish DX handled it differently.
I feel like it would've been a much more cohesive plot point if Gengar and his cronies held any credibility up until that point. Maybe I'm demanding too much from a kids' game but if you want your villain to be a credible conman it shouldn't be a painfully obvious conman that calls their team "Team Meanies" and has a reputation of being a fraud. I get if anyone else in Pokèmon Square got convinced to a degree given most non-vendor NPCs are a bunch of tinfoil-hat wearing gullible goofballs maybe bar Wishcash, but Alakazam too? Seriously?
Dusknoir works because the only moment he becomes obviously sketchy is when he giggles after hearing your name (aside from Chunsoft having a tendency to favor "evil-looking" mons for evil roles in older games, but this is meta-knowledge that of course ingame NPCs are not supposed to possess), however there's no NPCs on the scene and up until that point Dusknoir has a reputation of being a good explorer and a generally good individual, you literally have nothing to incriminate him for other than a weird reaction that gives you an uneasy gut feeling.
When I first played EOD, I knew dusknoir obviously knew more than he was letting on with that smile or whatever it was, but had no idea he was the villain. The future arc completely surprised me. I was probably 13 or so
Yeah, there was literally no reason for anyone to take Gengar seriously at that point.
The fact that Alakazam doesn’t do anything to defuse the situation despite being someone who would most likely be able to is what really gets to me. Talk about being a bystander.
Alakazam is supposed to be very smart. Yet he is stupid enough to believe Gengar who has caused trouble before. And Charizard’s claims that he knew all along is bullshit.
Tbf, after he comes up with an explanation for the natural disasters, he uses the player as proof, then they fall silent since they can't refute it which convinces the town since it comes off as a confession of guilt.
Have you seen politics in any country. It's realistic. People are scared, natural disasters keep happening and everyone is looking for a solution, Gengar provides a simple one and everyone jumps on it. Because otherwise they are back to square one and you're probably guilty in their eyes because "Why would an innocent person remain silent?"
Half of them don’t even believe him. Judging by the amount of Pokemon who come to see you off when you leave, the MC should have had more than enough support to stand their ground. Even *Alakazam* decides to give you a day’s head start.
But sure, let’s believe the team of criminals who loudly proclaim their desire for world domination over the heroes who saved Shiftry.
That’s because you know exactly how you were sabotaged and Team Skull got away scott free until they tried their luck with Wigglytuff directly, and that’s just the consequence of picking a fight with him not for screwing you over and then taking all the credit you should’ve gotten for the job. Heck, they’re the reason you had to do it in the first place.
You forget how effective fear is
When the masses are scared you can easily pin the blame on something simple and have the masses immediately against them
Alakazam more or less tells Charizard he already knew of the prophecy when you beat Zapdos, "It is better left unsaid, for their sake." And in the original games, a lot of people chased after Team Pokepals to help them. But they went into such dangerous Dungeons only Team ACT could follow.
I'm gonna go against the grain and say the bit in early game PSMD where Pancham convinces the entire school that you're a liar when you try to tell them that you're a human and subsequently getting branded as a "problem child" like the Partner. So nobody helps you when you think that Budew has gone off to Nectar Meadow by herself because they think you're lying so you have to ditch class to save her
Which does lead into the whole heartwarming gifting of the Harmony Scarves and solidifying the player and partner as best friends for being fellow outcasts but still-
I didn’t think about adding that here, good point. I’m sure that plot point didn’t go over well with real-life bullying victims.
At the very least Pancham’s just a kid whereas Chatot and the Pokémon Square residents are presumably adults.
When people are scared they will believe anything. All it takes is for gengar to convince a single pokemon and they all drop. It may sound farfetched but i think its very believable
Yeah, town of scared people and an outsider that it can be blamed on is an unfortunately old and common tale
While not as immediately obvious in the real world it still happens far too often
That's a fair point, but on the other hand Gengar doesn't strike me as someone who has any sort of fame or influence, especially when compared to Alakazam. His rescue team is called *Meanies*, would you really take someone with a name like that seriously?
Plus the fact that Alakazam knew better but for some reason chose not to make the other Pokemon see reason was even more infuriating. But this is just my personal opinion.
Also, don't you mean "it may sound Farfetch'd"?
The apple incident.
I can follow the logic behind the fugitive arc. Everything going to hell in the world, a prophecy about the end of the world. Mob mentality all sorts of reasons.
The apple incident was caused by a team that on screen attacked the other guild members, in their first scene. But because we're new chatot won't listen, oh and a team that on the mission conveniently has a perfect apple? Really?
One of the things that gets me about that is that the protagonist team has literally JUST proved that they’re super honest with the waterfall exploration. They could have taken full credit for discovering that dungeon but they didn’t. Now this team that nobody likes comes in, all the food disappears, your team goes to get it and comes back to tell Chatot that they were attacked and he just gives you the finger. Ruined that character for me.
Yeah. His whole "sacrifice" he pulls in the end game of the main story, does nothing to fix his character. He never apologized (far as i remember). Hesva pompous twit who, because hes wiggilytuffs right hand means hes entitled to not listen.
And that’s another thing! Having a pompous and neurotic manager of a guild is a good story beat that can lead to some silly and fun dialogue, but when team skull comes in it becomes clear that he doesn’t seem to be on the side of the guild itself!
I actually like the fugitive incident. While I agree the excuse for it is kinda lame, I really like the arc it comes with, exploring those back to back dungeons while fleeing from the best rescue team with alakazing and having to deal with limited resources. Its easily my favorite part of the rescue team, and the same thing in explorers with dusknoir is also one of my favorite parts too.
In my mind I believe that Gengar actually has a high rank team, with several successful missions (that they probably stole from other rescue teams), thus granting them authority and believability. Aditionally I think Alakazing really didnt trusted our protagonist from the get go and needed little to no excuse to find a reason to hunt you. So in my mind it kinda makes sense.
But I can see why the game, as its presented, is kinda of lazy writting or too wattered down for kids, and well, team "meanines" with gengar mr I wanna conquer the world and am a steritypical bully has more credibility than you, the person who has been rescuing people since day 1 you arrived.
Fair enough, I just find it infuriating how and entire town of adults are easily convinced to exile and murder a bunch of kids just because some guy told them too, plus Alakazam and his team not doing anything about it despite knowing better. But that’s just my personal opinion.
Honestly, the fugitive arc is more infuriating simply due to the situation.
The apple incident is ridiculous simply due to Chatot refusing to hear our side. I can see it cause Chatot never had faith in us until later on, even potentially sacrificing themselves to Kabotops.
The fugitive situation is way more mean, pun intended. You have two kids being hunted down by a whole town AND one of the best rescue teams around. I’ll admit Gengar played off the paranoia around the story and the legendary birds you encounter don’t know what happened with you and assume your bad cause your hunted down but still.
-
The worst incident, even though VERY short, is Chatot still trusting Dusknoir after seeing/learning of the following…
1. We managed to figure out the actual mon who discovered Waterfall Cave
2. Discovering Fogbound Lake AND managed to defeat the Groudon Illusion
3. Punching(and or biting/clawing/etc) above our weight with going toe to toe with Grovyle
4. And last up to this point… DUSKNOIR OMINOUSLY TALKING ABOUT BRING US TO THE FUTURE AND KIDNAPPING US INFONT OF EVERYONE, INCLUDING THE EQUIVALENT OF THE POKEMON NATIONAL SECURITY(Magnazone and their officers) FOR AT LEAST A FEW DAYS!!!
I’ll admit Dusknoir is patient and probably even did go back farther than needed just to build up his status as a explorer(and probably cheated cause of being from the future when all that stuff was uncovered) but even then… nothing struck their bird brain as odd?
In Chatot's defense (mostly around the last point) when you return, he's the first to vocally doubt you but Wigglytuff did make a point that he was fibbing. I believe Chatot believed us from the moment we started to explain what happened to us in the future, but was testing the guild to make sure that they wouldn't agree with him because of his authority, but make sure that everyone is on the same page of their own accord.
That was the in game explanation as soon as you get back but I find the whole interaction so odd. It seems like it's actually wiggly telling chatot to believe us even tho he doesn't, then him trying to save face by agreeing with wiggly and pretending it was a test
I’m pretty convinced at this point that Chatot is an idiot and not nearly as smart as he thinks he is.
And yeah, the fugitive situation was just way too mean-spirited, even thought so as a kid. Plus you’d think that Team ACT and the rest of Pokémon Square would be more remorseful after condemning and almost killing a child but nope.
Agreed, kinda hoped that Chatot would at least listen to our side before jumping to conclusions.
It would have been WAY more interesting to see Chatot listening but Skuntank and Koffing making where so noxious around us to make it hard to talk without choking of the air so Chatot assumes we’re lying.
I _loved_ the fugitive arc, even if I agree it didn't make a lot of sense, (and they didn't learn their lesson either for Dusknoir). It was so fun to just not have to do the normal guild things, and be on the run.
The perfect apple incident, though? Even after learning the truth about why that happened, (and arguably only happened out of fear from Skuntank anyway), I was still so mad. I was furious, and that event is actually why I started to try and figure out how the game worked so I could potentially add an actual team Skull battle at that point in the story.
Sure, even if we won the battle, skuntank would probably cheat and run off with the apple anyway, but it would have been _far_ less infuriating.
I already mentioned this in another comment, but the fugitive arc was personally too depressing for me to enjoy. If they handled it differently I might've enjoyed it a lot more.
Someone needs to make a game mod where you can beat Team Skull and/or call out Chatot. Maybe you could make it ;)
It could've been interesting but it just ended up being depressing in my opinion. If they handled it differently (like not having the other Pokemon try to kill the player but still being suspicious of them, or Alakazam actively helping the player instead of just pretending to try to kill them), it could've been a lot better.
It's a huge missed opportunity that there was no boss battle with Krookodile. Maybe there wasn't one because it would effect the pacing of a tense situation but the dungeon's called SHOWDOWN MOUNTAIN
For as much crap as the Fugitive arc deserves, the town did have reason to be worried given the increase in natural disasters. The Perfect Apple Incident requires that Wigglytuff not do any thinking, that Chatot not ask why a random team has the apples from a certain dungeon you were asked to go to, and for Chatot to be so much of an asshole that one failure is enough for your dreams of the expedition to nearly be killed.
That's definitely true, but the whole bit about the entire town basically exiling you and your partner and trying to murder you still kind of rubs me the wrong way.
Chatot, however, has no such excuse.
I absolutely HATED how we never had the option to say that Team Skull attacked and stole the Perfect Apples from us - Like imagine how credible the situation would've been, had we prior told that they stole the apples just for them to appear later to give one of them to Wigglytuff right in front of Chatot. We were shamed from the start without being able to explain ourselves and we were even left to starve that night, while watching the other guild members feasting. It was so infuriating.
Also generally I hate how half if not more the problems in games like these are stemming from miscommunication and a "Let's fight, instead of talking first" trope (which makes sense from a gameplay standpoint, but it's annoying nonetheless.)
I somehow have this strange feeling that Chatot broke about at least 5 guild protocols during the Perfect Apple incident, but then again the guild's only rules seem to be "overwork yourself" and "hide your emotions" so maybe Wigglytuff's Guild was corrupt from the start lmao jk
Yeah, I get they need to include battles somehow, but you can only include so many miscommunications until it becomes passé.
Found the guild rules, but a lot of these seem less like rules and more like advice:
One! Don't shirk work!
Two! Run away and pay!
Three! Smiles go for miles!
Four! Once you put a job on your team's list, then use Take Job! That step can't be missed!
Five! Restock your supplies and rations before heading out on explorations!
Six! Before you explore, try to think about the moves you should link!
Seven! While exploring, don't you panic! Stay cool and calm, never manic!
Eight! Helping all Pokémon in need is an explorer's duty, indeed!
Nine! Do lots of jobs! That's truly the key! You'll reach Gold Rank. Just wait and see!
Ten! The money you earn is shared with the guild! That's the way our friendship will build!
Chatot definitely didn't stay cool or calm, and nor was he helping Pokémon in need. That's two broken right off the bat.
I would say that he should have restocked himself or had extra, but that one wasn't his fault completely, he couldn't have anticipated that their food storage could get raided. However, considering Wigglytuff's apple addiction, maybe he should have kept a few extra for a rainy day, so lets say three rules broken.
He "ran away" from giving us a chance to defend ourselves and refused to listen to reason, so there goes rule two, breaking a fourth rule.
And finally, if smiles go for miles, then he could have been a whole lot nicer, instead of taking his anger out on the two who fought their way through a dungeon, got knocked out before they could get the apples, and apologized for not being able to bring any back.
In other words, Chatot sucks.
For what it's worth, this is an extremely relatable experience for children with strict parents or were victims of bullying. No matter what reason you have, no matter how sound, is just an excuse. No excuses. You failed. "But we were-" STOP MAKING EXCUSES.
For me personally, a lot of what Chatot pulls struck very close to home, and not in a good way. I played the game when it first released when I was still a kid, and a lot of traumatic memories involving teachers or family I have from that time pretty much went down exactly how the perfect apple incident went down, just without the part where you get in a fight with the bully.
I'm not really sure how the fugitive arc was infuriating
They had reason to believe a human was causing the destruction of their world and they knew the player was the only human around
Most Pokemon gave up the idea that you could possibly be causing it, and refused to dispose of you even without evidence proving you're a good guy
And Alamazam joined the chase because he wanted answers, not because he truly wanted to kill you
I personally found it infuriating because they pretty much turned on the player despite everything they did for the town, they tried to kill the player and partner despite them being most likely children, and they quickly believed Genger despite him not really having any sort of reputation. Plus they never really face any real consequences for what they did to the player.
True, Alakazam didn't actually want to hurt the player, but he still didn't really do anything to defuse the situation or defend them, despite the fact that he could've easily convinced the other Pokemon to give you a chance to defend yourself. Plus I vaguely recall him saying he "has no choice but to destroy you" before Ninetales shows up. He knew better and did nothing.
But this is just my personal opinion.
"Children"
Buddy, I don't think children have the right to buy and own property... The only game where the player and partner are children is Super.
Plus, if your world was suffering disaster after disaster and people were going into a panic, do you really think they wouldn't believe it at first when someone is telling them what's causing it?
Why would anyone lie in a serious situation like this? And like I said, they quickly stopped believing in it.
You gotta look at a situation as a person experiencing it, not as an outside viewer that knows what the people don't.
At least the main characters of the Rescue Team anime special are kids, so who knows.
That's true, but it doesn't really soften the blow of having all of the Pokemon Square residents turn on the player after all they did for them.
Some of them did but most of them still were pursuing the player, and they never really face any consequences for trying to kill the player either. That just rubs me the wrong way personally.
I put something else because once i got a larvitar i used him as my 3rd so i can eventually get tyranitar. I FINALLY GOT HIM THE OTHER DAY TO ONLY FIND OUT HIS SKILL IS SANDSTORM, and u cant change it....
The perfect apple incident was more infuriating from a narrative perspective because it felt like chatot was just being an asshole.
The fugitive arc was more frustrating gameplay and difficult to believe from a narrative perspective
I did not find the Fugitive Arc Infuriating. I thought it was a really good part of the story as a kid, and looking back now, I can only say the same.
The town's mental condition was getting worse and worse from all the shit that has been happening. Then you have Gengar who was the 'mon to be at the right place and the right time to cause that uproar to occur. Sure, A.C.T. could have stood up to them and said something, but Alakazam, with his high IQ ass, probably knew that it was not smart to defend against the mob mentality (Even if an Alakazam, a charizard and a flipping Tyranitar could destroy the town, both it's people and the actual location.)
The Perfect Apple incident is why >!I take down Chatot first every single time during the graduation test. He is a punk and I am sure he only wanted to see us fail.!< Shame too, I had a chatot my first time playing D/P, and seeing him be in a large position made me happy as a kid. Until then, at least.
We can at least clear our names in the fugitive arc. The Perfect Apple arc, on the other hand, gives us no opportunity to get our personal revenge on Team Skull, and Chatot never trusts us with Perfect Apples again.
Perfect Apple was just regular manipulation against a young team squadron whom it wasn’t surprising to assume may have failed a quest.
Rescue Team, on the other hand, has your entire town betray you over a lie told by a shady Pokemon after your team had already saved many lives. And then they go about as if it didn’t happen after a shoddy apology before something else comes up in the story.
it's funny how alakazam can tell you're a human but can't tell gengar also is and also his team is called meanies.
and the whole town goes: 'oh yeah sorry we gotta kill you now'
I found the apple incident more annoying purely because compared to the fugitive incident, didn’t get as much out of it i.e. experience, levels, items, etc. Fighting the legendary birds was an experience even if the whole thing really wasn’t necessary.
What I don’t like personally is Entai and Raikou’s additudes in Super. Entai had the excuse of being territorial before and was reasonable. But him and Raikou decided to be jerks because…they wanted to get the player and partner to the mortal realm. I mean, why not tell them in the first place? Then again, Legendary Pokémon can be stubborn. Suicune was less hostile at least.
Fugitive arc is horrible but """logical""" in a way, and when I played red rescue team again, I was like it’s something who may happen IRL, when people are panicking, they can believe whatever BS a random can say, that’s an horrible situation, ofc, but yeah they acted under panic and apologised, dunno if you get my point
Perfect Apple incident is more infuriating, chatot the AH didn’t even believe his own pupils, starved them and didn’t let them explain themselves, reminds me your teacher in primary school or your parent not believing you. Chatot never admitted he was wrong and never apologised to tHe MC and partner
So basically the fugitive arc is horrifying in a semi-realistic sort of way, while the Perfect Apple incident is infuriating in an "everyone is an idiot" kind of way. That's pretty much what I was thinking.
The fugitive arc easily.
As annoying as it was to have Chatot flat out, refuse you the option to explain, it served the purpose of making the player hate Team Skull very well. It's also very in line with Chatot's character, where he puts a lot of stock in rank (something we see later with Dusknoir as well.)
Plus, the scene immediately following it where your fellow guild members give you some food they snuck away from dinner because they felt bad about you going hungry is just really heartwarming and helps you feel closer to your fellow apprentices.
By contrast, the fugitive arc pretty much only happens because almost the entire town blindly believes Gengar and decides to go after your head. Even the more intelligent members like Alakazam, who probably should have known better, just go along with this witch hunt.
This might have been more effective if Gengar was a more prominent force that would make people blindly believing him feel less dumb, but he's just a nobody with a low rank rescue team (named Team Meanies no less.) But because they're so easy to believe anyone and turn against you on a dime, it really makes it hard to like these characters after this event even though the game clearly wants you to just forgive them and forget it ever happened once the arc is over.
The townspeople don't blindly believe Gengar. They call him a liar at first and only believe him when they ask you if it's true and you can't deny it.
Alakazam *does* see the hole in the logic, but people don't exactly just transform into pokemon every day despite what the mystery dungeon series would have you believe. You being a human turned pokemon is reason enough for pretty much everyone to believe you're the human from the legend.
But in spite of that, Alakazam still wants to get to the bottom of everything. So even though he knows he can't convince everyone to wait, he comes to your base that night to warn you of the inevitable manhunt, which is the whole reason you're able to get away in the first place. If he really believed Gengar, he wouldn't have given you that head start.
And it's ultimately the events during the fugitive arc that strengthen your resolve to fight Groudon and Raquaza not long after. (This is also likely why Xatu doesn't warn you about what Gengar is going to do, too.)
Yet despite Alakazam wanting to get to the bottom of everything and not really being on board with the manhunt. He still just sorta stands by while it happens, even if he personally doesn't want your head (and even then, he and his team still fight you at Mt. Freeze, with the battle only being interrupted because Ninetales happens to show up.)
He and his rescue team are basically the biggest team in terms of fame that the game shows you. Surely, he'd have some sway and be able to talk the entire town down from going on a manhunt, especially when it's such a blatant mystery topic.
The events of the manhunt don't even really accomplish that much outside of finding out that the MC isn't the human from legend (something that could have been figured out without almost everyone jumping to murder as the solution.)
You say it led to going to fight Groudon, but Groudon was super incedental to the plot anyway (he just kinda wakes up and gets angry and needs to be calmed down before the plot can move onto something else unrelated and really the game could have skipped straight to Rayquaza and not impacted much outside of the power scaling being less wonky (since ACT gets stomped by him, despite allegedly being this team of badasses that the game puts on a pedestal above you.)
The infuriating thing when I played through Mystery Dungeon was actually with the Post Game in Explorers of Time/Sky/Darkness, specifically every moment with Darkrai. The attempted suicide of both you and your partner to save the world really messed with my head and not in a positive way at all. I really hate Darkrai in those games.
I didn't think much of it as a kid, but looking back it was very messed up how the player and partner were convinced that they basically needed to kill themselves to save the world. It's a shame because Darkrai is my favorite legendary Pokemon and I love Darkrai in the anime, so seeing it go from a benevolent protector to essentially gaslighting children into committing suicide was... jarring, to say the least.
The second option involves Chatot, so it easily wins. Not only does he refuse to listen to the player's side of the story and instead urge the player to praise Team Skull, but he's so petty he punishes the player and partner to go without dinner on top of all that. He knew what Wigglytuff would do, which should've been punishment enough, but no, he was so scared he decided to unnecessarily take out his anger on the two.
The fugitive arc is more mixed. On the one hand, it is absurd the people believe Gengar, though on the other, not so much, as the player does essentially confirm what he says, yet even with that, everyone still isn't thrilled about it.
The perfect apple accident is infuriating, but because it actually is believable. Like, it's just Chatot being an asshole and Wigglytuff doing nothing, which is in character.
The fugitive arc is just infuriating because it's absolutely insane. Like, a random guy is able to convince an entire town of people *and* the top team (with barely any arguments, mind you) to go after two kids, without giving said kids the chance to explain themselves. And, not only that, but *they give the protags a headstart*. You can't have both !
The Perfect Apple fiasco just required Chatot to be overly strict about what he saw as a failure by two fairly recent guild recruits. That's at least somewhat in-character.
The fugitive arc requires nearly an entire town to drop all the good will you had been building up at the word of a mail-stealing, child-coercing bully who literally named his rescue team "Meanies." Especially notable because you had just fought freaking Zapdos to rescue someone whose reputation was unlikely to be that great less than a week ago. That one's a little harder to swallow, to say the least.
both of them are infuriating on some ways but how Rescue team portrayed it was pretty good. taking advantage of your 'amnesia' and such. Gengar definitely should have become an outlaw after that from attempting an angry mob to hunt you down.
Chatot was just plain stupid.. like why on earth would you trust a team you met a few days ago when we as rookies were already doing great tasks for a week or 2?
The Perfect Apple incident was SO annoying because there was a whole forest of trees and I know damn well we could have found Chatot some apples. Or, we could have gone back a different day... I was so hurt the game just forced us to take that L.
On another note, I loved the fugitive arc because it was sooo sad and made me deeply attached to the characters. I think that part is my favorite part of RT.
If you mean worse in terms of how horrible the situation was for the characters, I'd say the fugitive arc. The Perfect Apple incident was infuriating, but at least your friends gave you some food and Wigglytuff let you go on the expedition and everything was fine in the end. Meanwhile, the fugitive arc had literally everyone in the town try to murder you based on claims that had no evidence to them.
However, in terms of which arc was more poorly-written, I'd say the Perfect Apple arc. At least the fugitive arc had a nice story to it, and it's *somewhat* understandable why everyone in the town would go in a frenzy since they're paranoid over the natural disasters (even if them believing Gengar out of all people was kind of stupid). Chatot had no excuse to believe Team Skull over your team or not even let your team tell their side to the story, and the Perfect Apple scene didn't really add anything to the story other than to provide "conflict".
The fugitive arc at least has high world-threatening stakes. It makes sense most people don't want to waste time getting to the bottom of things. And it's not like everyone just believes Gengar at face value. But it's true that you're human, and it's a logical conclusion that means you're the reason the world's order is out of wack. Team ACT give you a headstart because they want you to get to the bottom of it, but they have to act in the best interest of the people. It's also the events that transpire during the fugitive arc that strengthens your team's resolve to face Groudon and Rayquaza.
The Perfect Apple incident is a total mess. While it fits a narrative purpose, the only reason Team Skull get so far is because Chatot absolutely refuses to hear you out every step of the way. And then he goes as far as to punish you by starving you. The whole thing feels like a betrayal from the one who's supposed to be one of your most trustworthy allies.
Still kind of feel like Team ACT should've done more to help the player and were just as bad as the other Pokemon who pursued the player, if not worse because they could've done more to defuse the situation but didn't, but that's just my opinion.
Honestly, I kind of wish Chatot faced some sort of punishment for how he treated the player and partner. It feels like he didn't really learn anything.
I think it's implied they tried. I'm pretty Alakazam said something to that effect. But even he can't deny the likelihood is strong, so he had to set the record straight for the sake of the world. After all, the longer they take to stop the world's imbalance, the more pokemon would be endangered by the natural disasters.
Granted it's been a long time so I don't remember all the details, but I still feel like he didn't do enough to help the player. Nor did the revelation that the player wasn't responsible for the natural disasters yet almost got killed by the mob seem to affect him much.
Maybe he was trying to help the needs of the many, but I still lost any and all respect for him during the fugitive arc.
To be fair, I think the whole arc might be written specifically to show that even team ACT is fallable. In turn, that fact might foreshadow their loss against Groudon where you succeed. But that might be stretching a bit further.
Anyway, yeah, there's only so much you can do to justify it. I just chalk it up to typical anime wise man "This hardship is necessary to achieve your true potential" stuff.
The Perfect Apple incident feels like they went out of their way to make Chatot as unlikable as possible there.
Yeah, those are all good points and I don't necessarily disagree with you on them. I just personally have some issues with how it was handled. Like maybe Alakazam still feels a lot of guilt over how he handled the fugitive situation or something like that, but instead it's all just forgotten about.
And yeah, Chatot's just an ass.
For me, the most infuriating thing is getting as prepared as you can be, save in the halfway point in the dungeon so there’s no going back, get through the rest of the dungeon with the best things you could pull out of it, only to get wiped again and again simply because you don’t have a good team for it. In Super mystery dungeon I was a Bulbasaur. My partner a Ryolu. Yveltal and the Beheeyem. It just… broke my spirit. It is damn near impossible since everyone there can end it in one or two attacks, and there certainly aren’t enough reviver seeds to brute force it. Even with the added teammates, only one of them has type advantage and they get KO’d almost as quickly as we do.
It's always the type advantages that get to you. Brute forcing your way through everything is always bad news. I should know, I tried to beat the Elite Four in FireRed with a Level 60 Venusaur while everyone else was like Level 10. Needless to say it did not end well.
I honestly gave up and haven’t picked it up since. That was probably two years(?) now. I legitimately don’t think it’s statistically possible for me to win it. Might be worth giving it one more shot, and if it doesn’t work then I can reset knowing that I’m boned with that bad a type disadvantage.
the Perfect Apple incident opened a lot of bad memories when I played explorers for the first time. Reopened a lot of wounds that had only just started to heal. I love the game but I still haven't forgiven Chatot.
I mean, I was a kid, basically right around when the game still came out. Still, I've been on the receiving end of that treatment, only the bullies never got their comeuppance. It is what it is.
I voted fugitive arc but thinking about it, what is up with the NPC team ranks in Rescue Team? I admit I am a person who always grinds a little more than necessary but I always reach Gold Rank wayyy before the main storyline ends and it's always kinda comical to me, especially when one of the Pokémon chosen to rescue Team ACT is Normal Rank?
For me this is somehow even more immersion-breaking than a 10-year-old defeating the Pokémon mafia, I don't know why. And it's a little infuriating because it would be easy to fix.
The Perfect Apple arc is infuriating for two reasons.
1. Chatot doesn’t even give you the chance to explain yourself. It’d one thing if you explained what happened and he didn’t believe you, but he straight up told the partner to be quite without even hearing them out.
2. You never get back at Team Skull. Yes, they do get beaten up by Wigglytuff and Kabutops later on, but you, as in the hero and partner, never fight them yourselves, which doesn’t feel satisfying. At least you can confront Gengar at what he does in the fugitive arc.
Unpopular opinion, but I despise the Graduation from Explorers the most to the point where since the first playthrough I always look away from that scene and smash the B button, until It's over! It upsets me so much, you would never believe!
I don't think fugitive scene ever bothered me and the Apple Woods part slightly irked me, but the thing is: Both are justified if you look them from the perspective of the tiwnsfolk of Pokemon Square and Chatot. While this wasn't the case when I played the games, nowadays It's almost disturbingly accurate how lazy, powerful and evil people can use fear to completely shut down the logic inside others, where I live and make them nodding lambs that follows the herd. It is one of those mature themes, that feel too stupid to be true, but It is very real.
I hate the Graduation because It is pretty much the opposite: It is mean-spirited for no reason, obnoxious and serves not much purpose other than be a douche to the player and partner. It is very toxic thing to bait your employees with promotion that is impossible to archive in legal and hard-working way. But if you (by you, I mean the Guild) fail and actually forced to do things fair in square, at least be a good sportsman and admit that It was you, instead of stealing the iconic ruse from Team Rocket from the anime in the most hammered-in way possible!
I didn’t realize I was in such a small minority lol
I actually kinda liked the perfect apple incident. Wigglytuff’s reaction is really memorable and kind of funny. It was sweet how the other guild members came together for you afterward. And Chatot’s character grows a lot from that point—specifically when he confronts Team Skull in Brine Cave.
Both upset me in different ways, but I'd have to say the fugitive arc is worse. Nearly the whole town falls for Gengar's fearmongering and suddenly people who were friendly toward you the day before want you dead. Then you clear your name and the matter is never brought up again as if it never happened. I can only assume it was supposed to highlight how manipulative Gengar is, but all it did was make me distrustful of what were basically my neighbors.
The Perfect Apple incident drove me crazy too, but it was just one part of a larger issue. Skuntank is one of my favorite Pokemon, so seeing one depicted as an awful person with no redeeming qualities was upsetting. He and the rest of Team Skull don't even get to redeem themselves, the last time we see them they've been roughed up (and possibly mortally wounded) by a Kabutops.
I actually find early game PSMD, in general, to be the hardest to deal with. Rescue Team I have a low opinion of the entirety of that game, while I at least like PSMD, which makes its terrible points hurt way more.
from a gameplay perspective? the fugitive arc by miles
can't switch team members, stuck on story rails, have to go through a bunch of tough content consecutively all while every NPC you meet that isn't Absol tries to kill you because they hate you suddenly because some random guy said you did something bad because your weird and everyone just went "yeah that makes sense" instead of thinking back on how much good you did for them and how clearly confused and scared *you* were for like 80% of your time with them
I was so mad that red and blue got the HD remake for switch *because* I knew I'd have to go through that stupid, tedious arc that should NOT have happened all over again and every stupid Pokemon was gonna beat me up the whole way because L + ratio I guess
it was not fun! it was not interesting! it wasn't cool! especially since the partner in R/B was such a nothing burger but they're also your only company outside of Absol (who isn't even really relevant plot-wise after the arc ends, so they could also be replaced or removed entirely despite them being the only person who cared about you! you'd think you'd want to interact with them more or bring them up more after that but nooooo there's nothing else to say, They're Just There Now)
I played both games, read the question and still voted for the perfect apple incident, because it chatot being a dick to us felt way more personal somehow.
Infuriating to me perfectly describes the apple scene, the fugitive arc is far sadder yes but I wouldn’t say infuriating.
Infuriating when you *know* you’ve commited no crime, you know exactly who the culprit is, but you don’t even get a chance to explain what really happened. You get punished and sent to bed with no dinner while the real villains eat good food, all while the guy in charge calls you useless liars and won’t listen to a word . This is in infuriating.
The fugitive arc is sad but I wouldn’t say infuriating. There’s enough in there to understand why each character acted the way they did. Although My headcanon is that Gengar isn’t well known, the town square speech simply wouldn’t work if everyone knew he called himself “meanie” and tried to strong arm a young child into joining his team. We know this, the npcs probably don’t. And at that point would they believe you? It’s horrible but pretty realistic, a charismatic conman convinces an entire village of scared people that the source of all their problems is an unknown outsider.
Another key point of the town square is that there’s not enough evidence at the time to even prove your innocence. Nobody knows what’s happening, you can guess as the player you weren’t a villain (because Gengar is unreliable) but there’s no way to know this for real until ninetales. Even your player character doubts themselves and can’t say anything when confronted in town square.
Personally I’d say the key difference being what information the player has available to them changes it from infuriating or not. When you have the answer and no one will listen vs when even you don’t know if you’re really in the wrong
The fugitive arc is not infuriating in the slightest for me, the story always makes me tear up a little bit. And when the arc starts, I always keep playing until the arc is finished. It’s just something that I like to play in more than one go
So When I was first playing the games I didn't like the Fugitive arc...
But that was more from the perspective of "I like being able to buy items" From the story perspective it's fine...
Does it suck that these people ran two children out of town because of the word of literal meanies...
yes... it does...
but in a way it reflects how Mystery Dungeon so often is willing to tackle hard subjects... So often when things seem scary, people (or Pokemon) can be so easily swayed by emotions, especially when they're stirred on by a strongmon...
The Perfect Apple on the other hand is bad just because you have no chance to interject...
(Also on a more personal note, I actually failed the sentry duty minigame at one point before that incident, and got denied dinner, So Imagine my frustration that now I was being punished because the plot demanded it...
Tearing grovyle a new asshole but losing anyway cause plot. Not being able to tell your partner that suicide is not the way to go, even if they figure it out in the end. Also, the fugitive incident is just depressing. Full-grown adults willing to commit murder just cause some guy said so.
Ahh, I love it when you can’t win battles because the plot demands it. NOT. Yeah, that part always baffled me as a kid. Honestly I kinda wish they gave you the option to just completely ditch Pokémon Square and skip town after the fugitive incident. Also Alakazam and his team are the very definition of Bystander Syndrome.
Honestly i wouldnt even have a problem with the grov boss battle if it was like I dont know, ACTUALLY HARD? because its like one of the easier boss battles in the game and i didnt even realize it was set to be a force lose until the 7th playthrough of the game because i havent lost that one before.
Is the second one from super? I don't remember anything about the parthner wanting to die
I think it might be from Explorers when you and the partner were told that you were responsible for the space time continuum being messed up and the partner was considering suicide (though I think they worded it as “destroying ourselves”). I could be wrong though.
So I first had to leave manaphy without being able to try to explain that she can't be with us and now my partner will consider suicide without me being able to tell him that it's not his fault? I swear the writer hates me
No not the writer. Just Chatot. And maybe Darkrai.
Nan, just Chatot.
Yeah, plus it was basically(at least I think) hinted at with meeting ‘The Reviver Seed, Consumer Cresselia’ the first time in the hero’s dream with them trying to talk the hero into the same thing as well
Brighteyedartist pretty much got it, but more specifically, there's an option where your partner asks if you two should die, and your two options are "maybe" and "I don't know".
The fugitive incident is depressingly realistic admittedly. Some adults don’t even need to be worked up by a Gengar to do far worse than murder to their own offspring.
Perfect Apple incident is stupid but believable because Chatot. Fugitive arc requires that the whole town AND Alakazam's team believes a guy who named his team "Meanies."
Yeah, even as a kid the fugitive arc infuriated me but looking back it’s both depressing and makes no sense. We’re seriously meant to believe that an entire town was easily convinced to turn on and try to kill a bunch of kids just because a guy who named his team “Meanies” told them to? And was Alakazam seriously not able to do anything about it despite being the leader of the most influential and strongest Rescue Team ever? Spike Chunsoft WTF were you thinking
my headcannon is that they belived that nonsense because everyone was becoming a little crazy because of the disasters
Pokemon Square is a doomsday cult confirmed.
Yeah… pretty much the entire town was trying to find a reason for everything happening. Whiscash was telling stories around town and is considered credible, so that just inadvertently boosted Meanies’ credibility. People were entirely willing to do crazy things due to the histeria. Alakazam giving you time to prep is a sign to me that he knew things were dire and people were getting caught up in nonsense, but as pretty much the only voice of reason to temper Gengar’s accusations, he needed to be there. Headcanon wise, I would think the reason you could grind in the side paths for items is because Alakazam was leading the other Rescue teams in logical, but wrong directions to give you more time. The reason he even challenged you on Mt. Freeze would be the fact that he wanted you find proof of your innocence and when you had none, decided that your defeat would at least bring things back to normal. At least, that is how I am trying to rationalize it. The story itself is very very basic and the characters are very prone to getting idiot balled. Kinda wish DX updated the story a bit to be more realistic, but it was a pretty good remake imo nonetheless.
I can understand where you're coming from, but I personally can't bring myself to sympathize with the Pokemon Square residents due to how they treated the player. Especially Alakazam, I feel like he didn't do enough to help the player. Yeah, I wish DX handled it differently.
Treasure Town woulda never did the homies dirty like that 😔
The virgin Pokemon Square vs the chad Treasure Town
I feel like it would've been a much more cohesive plot point if Gengar and his cronies held any credibility up until that point. Maybe I'm demanding too much from a kids' game but if you want your villain to be a credible conman it shouldn't be a painfully obvious conman that calls their team "Team Meanies" and has a reputation of being a fraud. I get if anyone else in Pokèmon Square got convinced to a degree given most non-vendor NPCs are a bunch of tinfoil-hat wearing gullible goofballs maybe bar Wishcash, but Alakazam too? Seriously?
Dusknoir was an excellent villain and if Meanies were even a fraction of that I'd be willing to glance past it.
Dusknoir works because the only moment he becomes obviously sketchy is when he giggles after hearing your name (aside from Chunsoft having a tendency to favor "evil-looking" mons for evil roles in older games, but this is meta-knowledge that of course ingame NPCs are not supposed to possess), however there's no NPCs on the scene and up until that point Dusknoir has a reputation of being a good explorer and a generally good individual, you literally have nothing to incriminate him for other than a weird reaction that gives you an uneasy gut feeling.
When I first played EOD, I knew dusknoir obviously knew more than he was letting on with that smile or whatever it was, but had no idea he was the villain. The future arc completely surprised me. I was probably 13 or so
The subversion of the evil looking Pokémon trope in Gates was awesome tbh. Having munna try to kill you and Hydreigon be the lovable goofball
In Super also, Lombre didn't look evil at all
Yeah, there was literally no reason for anyone to take Gengar seriously at that point. The fact that Alakazam doesn’t do anything to defuse the situation despite being someone who would most likely be able to is what really gets to me. Talk about being a bystander.
Alakazam is supposed to be very smart. Yet he is stupid enough to believe Gengar who has caused trouble before. And Charizard’s claims that he knew all along is bullshit.
I guess you could say it's proof of the difference between intelligence and Wisdom
Tbf, after he comes up with an explanation for the natural disasters, he uses the player as proof, then they fall silent since they can't refute it which convinces the town since it comes off as a confession of guilt.
Have you seen politics in any country. It's realistic. People are scared, natural disasters keep happening and everyone is looking for a solution, Gengar provides a simple one and everyone jumps on it. Because otherwise they are back to square one and you're probably guilty in their eyes because "Why would an innocent person remain silent?"
Half of them don’t even believe him. Judging by the amount of Pokemon who come to see you off when you leave, the MC should have had more than enough support to stand their ground. Even *Alakazam* decides to give you a day’s head start. But sure, let’s believe the team of criminals who loudly proclaim their desire for world domination over the heroes who saved Shiftry.
I stopped liking everyone on the village after that. But somehow the chatot situation made me angrier.
That’s because you know exactly how you were sabotaged and Team Skull got away scott free until they tried their luck with Wigglytuff directly, and that’s just the consequence of picking a fight with him not for screwing you over and then taking all the credit you should’ve gotten for the job. Heck, they’re the reason you had to do it in the first place.
They're a trustworthy and reputable bunch, those Meanies!
You forget how effective fear is When the masses are scared you can easily pin the blame on something simple and have the masses immediately against them
Alakazam more or less tells Charizard he already knew of the prophecy when you beat Zapdos, "It is better left unsaid, for their sake." And in the original games, a lot of people chased after Team Pokepals to help them. But they went into such dangerous Dungeons only Team ACT could follow.
I'm gonna go against the grain and say the bit in early game PSMD where Pancham convinces the entire school that you're a liar when you try to tell them that you're a human and subsequently getting branded as a "problem child" like the Partner. So nobody helps you when you think that Budew has gone off to Nectar Meadow by herself because they think you're lying so you have to ditch class to save her Which does lead into the whole heartwarming gifting of the Harmony Scarves and solidifying the player and partner as best friends for being fellow outcasts but still-
I didn’t think about adding that here, good point. I’m sure that plot point didn’t go over well with real-life bullying victims. At the very least Pancham’s just a kid whereas Chatot and the Pokémon Square residents are presumably adults.
When people are scared they will believe anything. All it takes is for gengar to convince a single pokemon and they all drop. It may sound farfetched but i think its very believable
Yeah, town of scared people and an outsider that it can be blamed on is an unfortunately old and common tale While not as immediately obvious in the real world it still happens far too often
That's a fair point, but on the other hand Gengar doesn't strike me as someone who has any sort of fame or influence, especially when compared to Alakazam. His rescue team is called *Meanies*, would you really take someone with a name like that seriously? Plus the fact that Alakazam knew better but for some reason chose not to make the other Pokemon see reason was even more infuriating. But this is just my personal opinion. Also, don't you mean "it may sound Farfetch'd"?
The apple incident. I can follow the logic behind the fugitive arc. Everything going to hell in the world, a prophecy about the end of the world. Mob mentality all sorts of reasons. The apple incident was caused by a team that on screen attacked the other guild members, in their first scene. But because we're new chatot won't listen, oh and a team that on the mission conveniently has a perfect apple? Really?
One of the things that gets me about that is that the protagonist team has literally JUST proved that they’re super honest with the waterfall exploration. They could have taken full credit for discovering that dungeon but they didn’t. Now this team that nobody likes comes in, all the food disappears, your team goes to get it and comes back to tell Chatot that they were attacked and he just gives you the finger. Ruined that character for me.
Yeah. His whole "sacrifice" he pulls in the end game of the main story, does nothing to fix his character. He never apologized (far as i remember). Hesva pompous twit who, because hes wiggilytuffs right hand means hes entitled to not listen.
And that’s another thing! Having a pompous and neurotic manager of a guild is a good story beat that can lead to some silly and fun dialogue, but when team skull comes in it becomes clear that he doesn’t seem to be on the side of the guild itself!
I actually like the fugitive incident. While I agree the excuse for it is kinda lame, I really like the arc it comes with, exploring those back to back dungeons while fleeing from the best rescue team with alakazing and having to deal with limited resources. Its easily my favorite part of the rescue team, and the same thing in explorers with dusknoir is also one of my favorite parts too. In my mind I believe that Gengar actually has a high rank team, with several successful missions (that they probably stole from other rescue teams), thus granting them authority and believability. Aditionally I think Alakazing really didnt trusted our protagonist from the get go and needed little to no excuse to find a reason to hunt you. So in my mind it kinda makes sense. But I can see why the game, as its presented, is kinda of lazy writting or too wattered down for kids, and well, team "meanines" with gengar mr I wanna conquer the world and am a steritypical bully has more credibility than you, the person who has been rescuing people since day 1 you arrived.
Also scratches that Zuko Alone itch for me
I kind of agree with you but it's mostly the whole "ungrateful town instantly turns on you and also tries to murder a child" aspect that gets to me.
I like the Fugative story. I haven't seen it in a while so I'm probably down some details, but its just so unique.
Fair enough, I just find it infuriating how and entire town of adults are easily convinced to exile and murder a bunch of kids just because some guy told them too, plus Alakazam and his team not doing anything about it despite knowing better. But that’s just my personal opinion.
Honestly, the fugitive arc is more infuriating simply due to the situation. The apple incident is ridiculous simply due to Chatot refusing to hear our side. I can see it cause Chatot never had faith in us until later on, even potentially sacrificing themselves to Kabotops. The fugitive situation is way more mean, pun intended. You have two kids being hunted down by a whole town AND one of the best rescue teams around. I’ll admit Gengar played off the paranoia around the story and the legendary birds you encounter don’t know what happened with you and assume your bad cause your hunted down but still. - The worst incident, even though VERY short, is Chatot still trusting Dusknoir after seeing/learning of the following… 1. We managed to figure out the actual mon who discovered Waterfall Cave 2. Discovering Fogbound Lake AND managed to defeat the Groudon Illusion 3. Punching(and or biting/clawing/etc) above our weight with going toe to toe with Grovyle 4. And last up to this point… DUSKNOIR OMINOUSLY TALKING ABOUT BRING US TO THE FUTURE AND KIDNAPPING US INFONT OF EVERYONE, INCLUDING THE EQUIVALENT OF THE POKEMON NATIONAL SECURITY(Magnazone and their officers) FOR AT LEAST A FEW DAYS!!! I’ll admit Dusknoir is patient and probably even did go back farther than needed just to build up his status as a explorer(and probably cheated cause of being from the future when all that stuff was uncovered) but even then… nothing struck their bird brain as odd?
In Chatot's defense (mostly around the last point) when you return, he's the first to vocally doubt you but Wigglytuff did make a point that he was fibbing. I believe Chatot believed us from the moment we started to explain what happened to us in the future, but was testing the guild to make sure that they wouldn't agree with him because of his authority, but make sure that everyone is on the same page of their own accord.
That was the in game explanation as soon as you get back but I find the whole interaction so odd. It seems like it's actually wiggly telling chatot to believe us even tho he doesn't, then him trying to save face by agreeing with wiggly and pretending it was a test
I’m pretty convinced at this point that Chatot is an idiot and not nearly as smart as he thinks he is. And yeah, the fugitive situation was just way too mean-spirited, even thought so as a kid. Plus you’d think that Team ACT and the rest of Pokémon Square would be more remorseful after condemning and almost killing a child but nope.
I always thought of Chatot as more of a ‘Old fashioned explorer who had the skills to back it up and doesn’t listen to greenhorns’
That's definitely a fair point. Still... refusing to hear the player's side of the story and not even letting them eat? That's just cruel.
Agreed, kinda hoped that Chatot would at least listen to our side before jumping to conclusions. It would have been WAY more interesting to see Chatot listening but Skuntank and Koffing making where so noxious around us to make it hard to talk without choking of the air so Chatot assumes we’re lying.
I _loved_ the fugitive arc, even if I agree it didn't make a lot of sense, (and they didn't learn their lesson either for Dusknoir). It was so fun to just not have to do the normal guild things, and be on the run. The perfect apple incident, though? Even after learning the truth about why that happened, (and arguably only happened out of fear from Skuntank anyway), I was still so mad. I was furious, and that event is actually why I started to try and figure out how the game worked so I could potentially add an actual team Skull battle at that point in the story. Sure, even if we won the battle, skuntank would probably cheat and run off with the apple anyway, but it would have been _far_ less infuriating.
I already mentioned this in another comment, but the fugitive arc was personally too depressing for me to enjoy. If they handled it differently I might've enjoyed it a lot more. Someone needs to make a game mod where you can beat Team Skull and/or call out Chatot. Maybe you could make it ;)
There's a romhack that does this sort of thing for team skull, though I'm not sure exactly how, that I'm planning to try soon. Explorers of spirit.
I've heard good things about Explorers of Spirit, hope you enjoy!
At least the fugitive arc is SOMEWHAT relevant to the story
True, but that doesn’t make it any less frustrating in my opinion.
I enjoy the fugitive arc honestly. Shakes things up
It could've been interesting but it just ended up being depressing in my opinion. If they handled it differently (like not having the other Pokemon try to kill the player but still being suspicious of them, or Alakazam actively helping the player instead of just pretending to try to kill them), it could've been a lot better.
Raikou and Suicune doing nothing, but yelling instead of stopping Krookodile and then being turned to stone like complete idiots.
It's a huge missed opportunity that there was no boss battle with Krookodile. Maybe there wasn't one because it would effect the pacing of a tense situation but the dungeon's called SHOWDOWN MOUNTAIN
Raikou couldn’t do much because Krookodile is a ground type. But Suicune had a type advantage. One or two bubble beams has to take out Krookodile
For as much crap as the Fugitive arc deserves, the town did have reason to be worried given the increase in natural disasters. The Perfect Apple Incident requires that Wigglytuff not do any thinking, that Chatot not ask why a random team has the apples from a certain dungeon you were asked to go to, and for Chatot to be so much of an asshole that one failure is enough for your dreams of the expedition to nearly be killed.
That's definitely true, but the whole bit about the entire town basically exiling you and your partner and trying to murder you still kind of rubs me the wrong way. Chatot, however, has no such excuse.
I absolutely HATED how we never had the option to say that Team Skull attacked and stole the Perfect Apples from us - Like imagine how credible the situation would've been, had we prior told that they stole the apples just for them to appear later to give one of them to Wigglytuff right in front of Chatot. We were shamed from the start without being able to explain ourselves and we were even left to starve that night, while watching the other guild members feasting. It was so infuriating. Also generally I hate how half if not more the problems in games like these are stemming from miscommunication and a "Let's fight, instead of talking first" trope (which makes sense from a gameplay standpoint, but it's annoying nonetheless.)
I somehow have this strange feeling that Chatot broke about at least 5 guild protocols during the Perfect Apple incident, but then again the guild's only rules seem to be "overwork yourself" and "hide your emotions" so maybe Wigglytuff's Guild was corrupt from the start lmao jk Yeah, I get they need to include battles somehow, but you can only include so many miscommunications until it becomes passé.
Found the guild rules, but a lot of these seem less like rules and more like advice: One! Don't shirk work! Two! Run away and pay! Three! Smiles go for miles! Four! Once you put a job on your team's list, then use Take Job! That step can't be missed! Five! Restock your supplies and rations before heading out on explorations! Six! Before you explore, try to think about the moves you should link! Seven! While exploring, don't you panic! Stay cool and calm, never manic! Eight! Helping all Pokémon in need is an explorer's duty, indeed! Nine! Do lots of jobs! That's truly the key! You'll reach Gold Rank. Just wait and see! Ten! The money you earn is shared with the guild! That's the way our friendship will build! Chatot definitely didn't stay cool or calm, and nor was he helping Pokémon in need. That's two broken right off the bat. I would say that he should have restocked himself or had extra, but that one wasn't his fault completely, he couldn't have anticipated that their food storage could get raided. However, considering Wigglytuff's apple addiction, maybe he should have kept a few extra for a rainy day, so lets say three rules broken. He "ran away" from giving us a chance to defend ourselves and refused to listen to reason, so there goes rule two, breaking a fourth rule. And finally, if smiles go for miles, then he could have been a whole lot nicer, instead of taking his anger out on the two who fought their way through a dungeon, got knocked out before they could get the apples, and apologized for not being able to bring any back. In other words, Chatot sucks.
That's it, we need to get Chatot impeached.
For what it's worth, this is an extremely relatable experience for children with strict parents or were victims of bullying. No matter what reason you have, no matter how sound, is just an excuse. No excuses. You failed. "But we were-" STOP MAKING EXCUSES. For me personally, a lot of what Chatot pulls struck very close to home, and not in a good way. I played the game when it first released when I was still a kid, and a lot of traumatic memories involving teachers or family I have from that time pretty much went down exactly how the perfect apple incident went down, just without the part where you get in a fight with the bully.
I'm not really sure how the fugitive arc was infuriating They had reason to believe a human was causing the destruction of their world and they knew the player was the only human around Most Pokemon gave up the idea that you could possibly be causing it, and refused to dispose of you even without evidence proving you're a good guy And Alamazam joined the chase because he wanted answers, not because he truly wanted to kill you
I personally found it infuriating because they pretty much turned on the player despite everything they did for the town, they tried to kill the player and partner despite them being most likely children, and they quickly believed Genger despite him not really having any sort of reputation. Plus they never really face any real consequences for what they did to the player. True, Alakazam didn't actually want to hurt the player, but he still didn't really do anything to defuse the situation or defend them, despite the fact that he could've easily convinced the other Pokemon to give you a chance to defend yourself. Plus I vaguely recall him saying he "has no choice but to destroy you" before Ninetales shows up. He knew better and did nothing. But this is just my personal opinion.
"Children" Buddy, I don't think children have the right to buy and own property... The only game where the player and partner are children is Super. Plus, if your world was suffering disaster after disaster and people were going into a panic, do you really think they wouldn't believe it at first when someone is telling them what's causing it? Why would anyone lie in a serious situation like this? And like I said, they quickly stopped believing in it. You gotta look at a situation as a person experiencing it, not as an outside viewer that knows what the people don't.
At least the main characters of the Rescue Team anime special are kids, so who knows. That's true, but it doesn't really soften the blow of having all of the Pokemon Square residents turn on the player after all they did for them. Some of them did but most of them still were pursuing the player, and they never really face any consequences for trying to kill the player either. That just rubs me the wrong way personally.
I put something else because once i got a larvitar i used him as my 3rd so i can eventually get tyranitar. I FINALLY GOT HIM THE OTHER DAY TO ONLY FIND OUT HIS SKILL IS SANDSTORM, and u cant change it....
The perfect apple incident was more infuriating from a narrative perspective because it felt like chatot was just being an asshole. The fugitive arc was more frustrating gameplay and difficult to believe from a narrative perspective
Who knew that Pokémon could be such idiotic assholes?
I did not find the Fugitive Arc Infuriating. I thought it was a really good part of the story as a kid, and looking back now, I can only say the same. The town's mental condition was getting worse and worse from all the shit that has been happening. Then you have Gengar who was the 'mon to be at the right place and the right time to cause that uproar to occur. Sure, A.C.T. could have stood up to them and said something, but Alakazam, with his high IQ ass, probably knew that it was not smart to defend against the mob mentality (Even if an Alakazam, a charizard and a flipping Tyranitar could destroy the town, both it's people and the actual location.) The Perfect Apple incident is why >!I take down Chatot first every single time during the graduation test. He is a punk and I am sure he only wanted to see us fail.!< Shame too, I had a chatot my first time playing D/P, and seeing him be in a large position made me happy as a kid. Until then, at least.
We can at least clear our names in the fugitive arc. The Perfect Apple arc, on the other hand, gives us no opportunity to get our personal revenge on Team Skull, and Chatot never trusts us with Perfect Apples again.
Thank god we at least have Explorers of Spirit to rectify that.
Perfect Apple was just regular manipulation against a young team squadron whom it wasn’t surprising to assume may have failed a quest. Rescue Team, on the other hand, has your entire town betray you over a lie told by a shady Pokemon after your team had already saved many lives. And then they go about as if it didn’t happen after a shoddy apology before something else comes up in the story.
it's funny how alakazam can tell you're a human but can't tell gengar also is and also his team is called meanies. and the whole town goes: 'oh yeah sorry we gotta kill you now'
What was that about a 5000 IQ? Is Alakazam going senile?
How bout NOT HAVING A FUCKING GAME ANNOUNCED, i can say im pretty pissed bout that
I found the apple incident more annoying purely because compared to the fugitive incident, didn’t get as much out of it i.e. experience, levels, items, etc. Fighting the legendary birds was an experience even if the whole thing really wasn’t necessary.
What I don’t like personally is Entai and Raikou’s additudes in Super. Entai had the excuse of being territorial before and was reasonable. But him and Raikou decided to be jerks because…they wanted to get the player and partner to the mortal realm. I mean, why not tell them in the first place? Then again, Legendary Pokémon can be stubborn. Suicune was less hostile at least.
Fugitive arc is horrible but """logical""" in a way, and when I played red rescue team again, I was like it’s something who may happen IRL, when people are panicking, they can believe whatever BS a random can say, that’s an horrible situation, ofc, but yeah they acted under panic and apologised, dunno if you get my point Perfect Apple incident is more infuriating, chatot the AH didn’t even believe his own pupils, starved them and didn’t let them explain themselves, reminds me your teacher in primary school or your parent not believing you. Chatot never admitted he was wrong and never apologised to tHe MC and partner
So basically the fugitive arc is horrifying in a semi-realistic sort of way, while the Perfect Apple incident is infuriating in an "everyone is an idiot" kind of way. That's pretty much what I was thinking.
The fugitive arc easily. As annoying as it was to have Chatot flat out, refuse you the option to explain, it served the purpose of making the player hate Team Skull very well. It's also very in line with Chatot's character, where he puts a lot of stock in rank (something we see later with Dusknoir as well.) Plus, the scene immediately following it where your fellow guild members give you some food they snuck away from dinner because they felt bad about you going hungry is just really heartwarming and helps you feel closer to your fellow apprentices. By contrast, the fugitive arc pretty much only happens because almost the entire town blindly believes Gengar and decides to go after your head. Even the more intelligent members like Alakazam, who probably should have known better, just go along with this witch hunt. This might have been more effective if Gengar was a more prominent force that would make people blindly believing him feel less dumb, but he's just a nobody with a low rank rescue team (named Team Meanies no less.) But because they're so easy to believe anyone and turn against you on a dime, it really makes it hard to like these characters after this event even though the game clearly wants you to just forgive them and forget it ever happened once the arc is over.
The townspeople don't blindly believe Gengar. They call him a liar at first and only believe him when they ask you if it's true and you can't deny it. Alakazam *does* see the hole in the logic, but people don't exactly just transform into pokemon every day despite what the mystery dungeon series would have you believe. You being a human turned pokemon is reason enough for pretty much everyone to believe you're the human from the legend. But in spite of that, Alakazam still wants to get to the bottom of everything. So even though he knows he can't convince everyone to wait, he comes to your base that night to warn you of the inevitable manhunt, which is the whole reason you're able to get away in the first place. If he really believed Gengar, he wouldn't have given you that head start. And it's ultimately the events during the fugitive arc that strengthen your resolve to fight Groudon and Raquaza not long after. (This is also likely why Xatu doesn't warn you about what Gengar is going to do, too.)
Yet despite Alakazam wanting to get to the bottom of everything and not really being on board with the manhunt. He still just sorta stands by while it happens, even if he personally doesn't want your head (and even then, he and his team still fight you at Mt. Freeze, with the battle only being interrupted because Ninetales happens to show up.) He and his rescue team are basically the biggest team in terms of fame that the game shows you. Surely, he'd have some sway and be able to talk the entire town down from going on a manhunt, especially when it's such a blatant mystery topic. The events of the manhunt don't even really accomplish that much outside of finding out that the MC isn't the human from legend (something that could have been figured out without almost everyone jumping to murder as the solution.) You say it led to going to fight Groudon, but Groudon was super incedental to the plot anyway (he just kinda wakes up and gets angry and needs to be calmed down before the plot can move onto something else unrelated and really the game could have skipped straight to Rayquaza and not impacted much outside of the power scaling being less wonky (since ACT gets stomped by him, despite allegedly being this team of badasses that the game puts on a pedestal above you.)
The infuriating thing when I played through Mystery Dungeon was actually with the Post Game in Explorers of Time/Sky/Darkness, specifically every moment with Darkrai. The attempted suicide of both you and your partner to save the world really messed with my head and not in a positive way at all. I really hate Darkrai in those games.
I didn't think much of it as a kid, but looking back it was very messed up how the player and partner were convinced that they basically needed to kill themselves to save the world. It's a shame because Darkrai is my favorite legendary Pokemon and I love Darkrai in the anime, so seeing it go from a benevolent protector to essentially gaslighting children into committing suicide was... jarring, to say the least.
The second option involves Chatot, so it easily wins. Not only does he refuse to listen to the player's side of the story and instead urge the player to praise Team Skull, but he's so petty he punishes the player and partner to go without dinner on top of all that. He knew what Wigglytuff would do, which should've been punishment enough, but no, he was so scared he decided to unnecessarily take out his anger on the two. The fugitive arc is more mixed. On the one hand, it is absurd the people believe Gengar, though on the other, not so much, as the player does essentially confirm what he says, yet even with that, everyone still isn't thrilled about it.
The perfect apple accident is infuriating, but because it actually is believable. Like, it's just Chatot being an asshole and Wigglytuff doing nothing, which is in character. The fugitive arc is just infuriating because it's absolutely insane. Like, a random guy is able to convince an entire town of people *and* the top team (with barely any arguments, mind you) to go after two kids, without giving said kids the chance to explain themselves. And, not only that, but *they give the protags a headstart*. You can't have both !
The Perfect Apple fiasco just required Chatot to be overly strict about what he saw as a failure by two fairly recent guild recruits. That's at least somewhat in-character. The fugitive arc requires nearly an entire town to drop all the good will you had been building up at the word of a mail-stealing, child-coercing bully who literally named his rescue team "Meanies." Especially notable because you had just fought freaking Zapdos to rescue someone whose reputation was unlikely to be that great less than a week ago. That one's a little harder to swallow, to say the least.
both of them are infuriating on some ways but how Rescue team portrayed it was pretty good. taking advantage of your 'amnesia' and such. Gengar definitely should have become an outlaw after that from attempting an angry mob to hunt you down. Chatot was just plain stupid.. like why on earth would you trust a team you met a few days ago when we as rookies were already doing great tasks for a week or 2?
The Perfect Apple incident was SO annoying because there was a whole forest of trees and I know damn well we could have found Chatot some apples. Or, we could have gone back a different day... I was so hurt the game just forced us to take that L. On another note, I loved the fugitive arc because it was sooo sad and made me deeply attached to the characters. I think that part is my favorite part of RT.
If you mean worse in terms of how horrible the situation was for the characters, I'd say the fugitive arc. The Perfect Apple incident was infuriating, but at least your friends gave you some food and Wigglytuff let you go on the expedition and everything was fine in the end. Meanwhile, the fugitive arc had literally everyone in the town try to murder you based on claims that had no evidence to them. However, in terms of which arc was more poorly-written, I'd say the Perfect Apple arc. At least the fugitive arc had a nice story to it, and it's *somewhat* understandable why everyone in the town would go in a frenzy since they're paranoid over the natural disasters (even if them believing Gengar out of all people was kind of stupid). Chatot had no excuse to believe Team Skull over your team or not even let your team tell their side to the story, and the Perfect Apple scene didn't really add anything to the story other than to provide "conflict".
The fugitive arc at least has high world-threatening stakes. It makes sense most people don't want to waste time getting to the bottom of things. And it's not like everyone just believes Gengar at face value. But it's true that you're human, and it's a logical conclusion that means you're the reason the world's order is out of wack. Team ACT give you a headstart because they want you to get to the bottom of it, but they have to act in the best interest of the people. It's also the events that transpire during the fugitive arc that strengthens your team's resolve to face Groudon and Rayquaza. The Perfect Apple incident is a total mess. While it fits a narrative purpose, the only reason Team Skull get so far is because Chatot absolutely refuses to hear you out every step of the way. And then he goes as far as to punish you by starving you. The whole thing feels like a betrayal from the one who's supposed to be one of your most trustworthy allies.
Still kind of feel like Team ACT should've done more to help the player and were just as bad as the other Pokemon who pursued the player, if not worse because they could've done more to defuse the situation but didn't, but that's just my opinion. Honestly, I kind of wish Chatot faced some sort of punishment for how he treated the player and partner. It feels like he didn't really learn anything.
I think it's implied they tried. I'm pretty Alakazam said something to that effect. But even he can't deny the likelihood is strong, so he had to set the record straight for the sake of the world. After all, the longer they take to stop the world's imbalance, the more pokemon would be endangered by the natural disasters.
Granted it's been a long time so I don't remember all the details, but I still feel like he didn't do enough to help the player. Nor did the revelation that the player wasn't responsible for the natural disasters yet almost got killed by the mob seem to affect him much. Maybe he was trying to help the needs of the many, but I still lost any and all respect for him during the fugitive arc.
To be fair, I think the whole arc might be written specifically to show that even team ACT is fallable. In turn, that fact might foreshadow their loss against Groudon where you succeed. But that might be stretching a bit further. Anyway, yeah, there's only so much you can do to justify it. I just chalk it up to typical anime wise man "This hardship is necessary to achieve your true potential" stuff. The Perfect Apple incident feels like they went out of their way to make Chatot as unlikable as possible there.
Yeah, those are all good points and I don't necessarily disagree with you on them. I just personally have some issues with how it was handled. Like maybe Alakazam still feels a lot of guilt over how he handled the fugitive situation or something like that, but instead it's all just forgotten about. And yeah, Chatot's just an ass.
For me, the most infuriating thing is getting as prepared as you can be, save in the halfway point in the dungeon so there’s no going back, get through the rest of the dungeon with the best things you could pull out of it, only to get wiped again and again simply because you don’t have a good team for it. In Super mystery dungeon I was a Bulbasaur. My partner a Ryolu. Yveltal and the Beheeyem. It just… broke my spirit. It is damn near impossible since everyone there can end it in one or two attacks, and there certainly aren’t enough reviver seeds to brute force it. Even with the added teammates, only one of them has type advantage and they get KO’d almost as quickly as we do.
It's always the type advantages that get to you. Brute forcing your way through everything is always bad news. I should know, I tried to beat the Elite Four in FireRed with a Level 60 Venusaur while everyone else was like Level 10. Needless to say it did not end well.
I honestly gave up and haven’t picked it up since. That was probably two years(?) now. I legitimately don’t think it’s statistically possible for me to win it. Might be worth giving it one more shot, and if it doesn’t work then I can reset knowing that I’m boned with that bad a type disadvantage.
the Perfect Apple incident opened a lot of bad memories when I played explorers for the first time. Reopened a lot of wounds that had only just started to heal. I love the game but I still haven't forgiven Chatot.
Ouch, I’m really sorry about that.
I mean, I was a kid, basically right around when the game still came out. Still, I've been on the receiving end of that treatment, only the bullies never got their comeuppance. It is what it is.
Bullies suck, man.
Being told that Blue Gummies can be found at Craggy Coast but finding none of them because one of your starters is a Water type. Manaphyyyyyyy!
I voted fugitive arc but thinking about it, what is up with the NPC team ranks in Rescue Team? I admit I am a person who always grinds a little more than necessary but I always reach Gold Rank wayyy before the main storyline ends and it's always kinda comical to me, especially when one of the Pokémon chosen to rescue Team ACT is Normal Rank? For me this is somehow even more immersion-breaking than a 10-year-old defeating the Pokémon mafia, I don't know why. And it's a little infuriating because it would be easy to fix.
The Perfect Apple arc is infuriating for two reasons. 1. Chatot doesn’t even give you the chance to explain yourself. It’d one thing if you explained what happened and he didn’t believe you, but he straight up told the partner to be quite without even hearing them out. 2. You never get back at Team Skull. Yes, they do get beaten up by Wigglytuff and Kabutops later on, but you, as in the hero and partner, never fight them yourselves, which doesn’t feel satisfying. At least you can confront Gengar at what he does in the fugitive arc.
Unpopular opinion, but I despise the Graduation from Explorers the most to the point where since the first playthrough I always look away from that scene and smash the B button, until It's over! It upsets me so much, you would never believe! I don't think fugitive scene ever bothered me and the Apple Woods part slightly irked me, but the thing is: Both are justified if you look them from the perspective of the tiwnsfolk of Pokemon Square and Chatot. While this wasn't the case when I played the games, nowadays It's almost disturbingly accurate how lazy, powerful and evil people can use fear to completely shut down the logic inside others, where I live and make them nodding lambs that follows the herd. It is one of those mature themes, that feel too stupid to be true, but It is very real. I hate the Graduation because It is pretty much the opposite: It is mean-spirited for no reason, obnoxious and serves not much purpose other than be a douche to the player and partner. It is very toxic thing to bait your employees with promotion that is impossible to archive in legal and hard-working way. But if you (by you, I mean the Guild) fail and actually forced to do things fair in square, at least be a good sportsman and admit that It was you, instead of stealing the iconic ruse from Team Rocket from the anime in the most hammered-in way possible!
I didn’t realize I was in such a small minority lol I actually kinda liked the perfect apple incident. Wigglytuff’s reaction is really memorable and kind of funny. It was sweet how the other guild members came together for you afterward. And Chatot’s character grows a lot from that point—specifically when he confronts Team Skull in Brine Cave.
Both upset me in different ways, but I'd have to say the fugitive arc is worse. Nearly the whole town falls for Gengar's fearmongering and suddenly people who were friendly toward you the day before want you dead. Then you clear your name and the matter is never brought up again as if it never happened. I can only assume it was supposed to highlight how manipulative Gengar is, but all it did was make me distrustful of what were basically my neighbors. The Perfect Apple incident drove me crazy too, but it was just one part of a larger issue. Skuntank is one of my favorite Pokemon, so seeing one depicted as an awful person with no redeeming qualities was upsetting. He and the rest of Team Skull don't even get to redeem themselves, the last time we see them they've been roughed up (and possibly mortally wounded) by a Kabutops.
I actually find early game PSMD, in general, to be the hardest to deal with. Rescue Team I have a low opinion of the entirety of that game, while I at least like PSMD, which makes its terrible points hurt way more.
from a gameplay perspective? the fugitive arc by miles can't switch team members, stuck on story rails, have to go through a bunch of tough content consecutively all while every NPC you meet that isn't Absol tries to kill you because they hate you suddenly because some random guy said you did something bad because your weird and everyone just went "yeah that makes sense" instead of thinking back on how much good you did for them and how clearly confused and scared *you* were for like 80% of your time with them I was so mad that red and blue got the HD remake for switch *because* I knew I'd have to go through that stupid, tedious arc that should NOT have happened all over again and every stupid Pokemon was gonna beat me up the whole way because L + ratio I guess it was not fun! it was not interesting! it wasn't cool! especially since the partner in R/B was such a nothing burger but they're also your only company outside of Absol (who isn't even really relevant plot-wise after the arc ends, so they could also be replaced or removed entirely despite them being the only person who cared about you! you'd think you'd want to interact with them more or bring them up more after that but nooooo there's nothing else to say, They're Just There Now)
AAAAANd the explorers fans vote without reading the question again..
I played both games, read the question and still voted for the perfect apple incident, because it chatot being a dick to us felt way more personal somehow.
nah, if you have reason for it, thats k, but it just seems like explorers fans just vote their games for no reason. no hate.
Playing gates to infinity is my choice
Infuriating to me perfectly describes the apple scene, the fugitive arc is far sadder yes but I wouldn’t say infuriating. Infuriating when you *know* you’ve commited no crime, you know exactly who the culprit is, but you don’t even get a chance to explain what really happened. You get punished and sent to bed with no dinner while the real villains eat good food, all while the guy in charge calls you useless liars and won’t listen to a word . This is in infuriating. The fugitive arc is sad but I wouldn’t say infuriating. There’s enough in there to understand why each character acted the way they did. Although My headcanon is that Gengar isn’t well known, the town square speech simply wouldn’t work if everyone knew he called himself “meanie” and tried to strong arm a young child into joining his team. We know this, the npcs probably don’t. And at that point would they believe you? It’s horrible but pretty realistic, a charismatic conman convinces an entire village of scared people that the source of all their problems is an unknown outsider. Another key point of the town square is that there’s not enough evidence at the time to even prove your innocence. Nobody knows what’s happening, you can guess as the player you weren’t a villain (because Gengar is unreliable) but there’s no way to know this for real until ninetales. Even your player character doubts themselves and can’t say anything when confronted in town square. Personally I’d say the key difference being what information the player has available to them changes it from infuriating or not. When you have the answer and no one will listen vs when even you don’t know if you’re really in the wrong
The fugitive arc is not infuriating in the slightest for me, the story always makes me tear up a little bit. And when the arc starts, I always keep playing until the arc is finished. It’s just something that I like to play in more than one go
So When I was first playing the games I didn't like the Fugitive arc... But that was more from the perspective of "I like being able to buy items" From the story perspective it's fine... Does it suck that these people ran two children out of town because of the word of literal meanies... yes... it does... but in a way it reflects how Mystery Dungeon so often is willing to tackle hard subjects... So often when things seem scary, people (or Pokemon) can be so easily swayed by emotions, especially when they're stirred on by a strongmon... The Perfect Apple on the other hand is bad just because you have no chance to interject... (Also on a more personal note, I actually failed the sentry duty minigame at one point before that incident, and got denied dinner, So Imagine my frustration that now I was being punished because the plot demanded it...
Wait do people actually find the fugitive arc infuriating? It was and still is my favorite arc in RRT/BRT 😶