The Arc Phone: Possible Origins and Your Thoughts on the Device

[Kallyle]

So, it seems Game Freak's and TPC's obsession with smart phones continues in the most unexpected way possible. For some reason, we have an Arceus-themed smartphone (possibly tied to Arceus itself) one in what seems to be the Pokémon equivalent of Meiji-era Japan: the Arc Phone!

Spoiler: The Arc Phone's appearance

Here's the text describing it from the Pokémon Legends: Arceus mini-site:

"Early on in your adventure, you’ll receive a device called the Arc Phone. Its distinctive appearance might lead you to suspect it has some connection to the Mythical Pokémon Arceus. This device appears to contain some sort of strange power, and it seems it will help guide you on your journey."

Due to its anachronistic appearance and function with the rest of the game—even compared to how the wooden Poké Balls work since they at least look asthetically accurate to the time period—one has to wonder how Game Freak is going to explain where it came from and/or how it exists in the first place.

Personally, I've come up with a few possible origins and/or explanations for its existence:

• The Arc Phone is from the future (Dialga can mess with time).
• The Arc Phone is from another dimension with technology ahead of the setting of these games (Palkia can manipulate space and create dimensional rifts).
• God (Arceus) invented smartphones in the Pokémon World with its power, making the Arc Phone a literal Deus ex Machina. Game Freak does love their puns, after all!
• The Arc Phone was created by the Hisui natives, possibly alongside other anachronistic technologies, as a plot twist.
• Something else.

As for how it functions should the first two options not be correct, I think it has two possible power sources:

1. The Unown: Not only are they native to Sinnoh due to the Solaceon Ruins (and by extension, the Hisui region as well), but are also tied to Arceus and the Creation Trio. In addition we know that they can hijack devices utilizing radio waves as demonstrated in the Johto games. Going by all of that logic, having a phone-like device using radio waves that happen to be tied to the Unown doesn't sound all that farfetched.
2. One of the Arceus Plates, most likely the Zap Plate: Not only would this put the Arc Phone more in line with BotW's Sheikah Slate, but it also demonstrates ways that the plates can utilized aside from battling. This would also open up the possibility of more hidden technologies/artifacts for the plates to inhabit, making the Arc Phone and other such devices relevant to the plot as part of the many mysteries of the region.

Anyways, what do you guys think about the Arc Phone? Where do you think it came from and what is its power source? Let me know your thoughts about Game Freak's odd decision to include a smartphone in a game that takes place in the past.

 

[Esserise]

Suppose it'd be appropriate to just copy my post from the other thread:

I mean truth be told, I kinda like the GodPhone. It's an amusing little curveball to throw into the overall aesthetic. No one saw it coming, because it's just such a weird thing to put in a setting like this - but to me that just adds a fun bit of quirkiness to the lore. A small gesture that not everything is necessarily going to fall in line with the typical expectations for what a bygone-era Pokémon game might be like.

I also said somewhere else that to me it feels kind of like an homage to Breath of the Wild's Sheikah Slate.

As for how it came into being, I guess I'd say C, or near enough. Like, I think whoever invented the Rotom Phone (or other similar devices) probably did so through their own ingenuity, and that process probably had nothing to do with the Arc Phone, so it's not as if smartphones as a concept were bestowed unto humanity by Arceus. But I do think Arceus will be said to have created this specific device, or gave someone, a devotee, the knowledge and capabilities to build it.

(And I mean, for all that it looks like a modern smartphone, who's to say that its internal specs and mechanisms are remotely comparable? That "strange power" could be something totally unlike conventional electricity and computer circuits.)

 

[Emmy]

Calling it now, the Arc Phone inspired an engineer to make the Rotom Phone for Rotom to inhabit and help humans.

Anyways, I don't have a problem with the idea of anachronistic tech so long as there's some logic behind it. Though that's even if you can call it "anachronistic" considering technology in the PokéWorld is all over the place - mainly due to Early Instalment Weirdness.

 

[Almonds]

It can tell you what you have to do next so it is from the future.

 

[FinnishPokéFan92]

I think it either came from the future or was somehow created by Arceus.

 

[Articfoxgamez]

I think it was created by Arceus but i also don't think it inspired smartphones at all, just happens to look like them. Like i said in the other thread, its seemingly powered by weird Arceus magic as opposed to electricity or anything, so the inside is probably completely different.

 

[Esiouqrut]

I don't know why they choose "receive a device" instead of the more accurate "stumble upon a device".

Anyway, I'm not too sure, but I'd say close enough to D. As this game is clearly borrowing many elements from BotW, I'd assume Arc Phone is also an ancient technology created by Ancient Hisuian people. Maybe with Arceus' help as well, so a little bit of C too?

I like the idea that it could be powered by Unown. Then they could explain more about their connection with Arceus.

 

[Welkamo]

It can tell you what you have to do next so it is from the future.

It's from a doomed future

 

[TechSkylander1518]

I think it’s just a tool made by Arceus. The design doesn’t really leave much room for other Pokemon’s involvement, at least from an out of universe perspective - like, sure, Dialga or Palkia could have done something to bring it here, but why drag them in for a plot explanation and leave them out of the design? Arceus’ thing is creating, they’re not really needed to justify the phone.

I like the idea of Unown powering it- it’s nice to see that link explored more, and it’s kind of fun to think about a phone filled with sentient letters. (wonder if we could get a 0 and 1 Unown form)

 

[Peppermint Phoenix]

If a fucking smartphone is in the game that kills the whole "no Rotom Mow or Porygon allowed in ancient Japan" argument when it comes to this game having all Pokémon

 

[Peppermint Phoenix]

@takoi know it is but people are still going to call it ancient after the game launches.

 

[Peppermint Phoenix]

@takoyaki I didn't actually say it was ancient I said ancient in quotation marks. Anyways it pretty absurd to have a damn smart phone over 80 years before the jank computer Red used in gen 1 even if they are different parts of the world seeing as people can you know... travel with boats and magical animals. Maybe Pokémon world building was always bad but, it feels like they just wanted to copy the Sheikah slate because Botw was so popular.

 

[TechSkylander1518]

Anyways it pretty absurd to have a damn smart phone over 80 years before the jank computer Red used in gen 1 even if they are different parts of the world seeing as people can you know... travel with boats and magical animals.

It's not like this is a common thing in the world, though? The description on the website makes it seem like it's mysterious and out-of-place, not like this is a society that invented smartphones before PCs.

Early on in your adventure, you’ll receive a device called the Arc Phone. Its distinctive appearance might lead you to suspect it has some connection to the Mythical Pokémon Arceus. This device appears to contain some sort of strange power, and it seems it will help guide you on your journey.

 

[Cute Charm]

My guess, it's still powered by a Rotom but someone figured out they can change the phone case. Notice how we've never really seen the back of the phone. There's still probably a face there.

Also maybe what's happening to the Noble and Alpha pokemon doesn't have anything to do with Arceus at all and has everything to do with some random time disturbance. Maybe there were ultra wormholes or some other wormhole-like portals (Hoopa, Celebi, Distortion World) involved. So the phone could have been separated from some random faller/time traveler/the hiker from Shinjoh Ruins/Cyrus or something.

I don't know. Maybe I'm just trying to reason things out because I really like the idea that Arceus isn't a god, but people made it a god due to it's unexplained powers of creating other pokemon. Making the giant goat a literal divine being that helps guide you on your quest to clean up its mess with a phone made in its image just seems a little too contrived.

 

[Esserise]

I don't know. Maybe I'm just trying to reason things out because I really like the idea that Arceus isn't a god, but people made it a god due to it's unexplained powers of creating other pokemon. Making the giant goat a literal divine being that helps guide you on your quest to clean up its mess with a phone made in its image just seems a little too contrived.

I mean, I don't think Arceus is a literal deity either, but we've seen it create entire Legendary Pokémon from nothing (granted, with some involvement of the Unown). If I can argue that that still doesn't make it a full-on, unambiguous god entity, then I certainly don't think it creating a small, futuristic gadget proves anything.

 

[TechSkylander1518]

I mean, I don't think Arceus is a literal deity either, but we've seen it create entire Legendary Pokémon from nothing (granted, with some involvement of the Unown). If I can argue that that still doesn't make it a full-on, unambiguous god entity, then I certainly don't think it creating a small, futuristic gadget proves anything.

I think Cute Charm’s idea here is that it’d be interesting if that were the extent of its status- just a legendary whose power is creation, but not like a religious/mythological being who interacts with the world on a sapient level and guides people with its plans.

 

[Boss1708]

I don't think the Arc Phone is a "game breaker". But it's certainly an "immersion breaker", for a game set in the past. I think that's undeniable?

 

[TechSkylander1518]

I don't think the Arc Phone is a "game breaker". But it's certainly an "immersion breaker", for a game set in the past. I think that's undeniable?

It’s not like it’s treated as a commonplace item like a smartphone today, it’s described as mysterious and strange. A futuristic device being unusual to people in the past isn’t that immersion-breaking.

 

[Boss1708]

It’s not like it’s treated as a commonplace item like a smartphone today, it’s described as mysterious and strange. A futuristic device being unusual to people in the past isn’t that immersion-breaking.

I disagree. I think a futuristic design set in the past is always an immersion breaker. But if it doesn't bother you, then good for you.

 

[TechSkylander1518]

I disagree. I think a futuristic design set in the past is always an immersion breaker. But if it doesn't bother you, then good for you.

Think about stories where people find futuristic alien technology, or time travel stories where people bring modern things with them to the past. It doesn’t match the setting, but it’s not supposed to, there’s a reason why it’s out of place.