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What's the most embarrassing thing you used to believe about the Pokémon games?

I really love reading this thread. In this current era where you can look up actual reliable information on the games, and rumors get squashed immediately, I feel like outlandish stuff like this has become pretty much non-existent. It's definitely a good thing that there's less misinformation out there now, but I feel like there was something kinda magical about just how many people were convinced stuff like Mewthree and Pokegods were real back in the day based on imagination alone.

As for me, I believed a lot of weird stuff when I was younger, but I think the most embarrassing one is that I had gotten this idea in my head that Absol was extraordinarily rare and hard to find. When I found one in the wild in Emerald I immediately used my Master Ball on it thinking I'd never see another one. I still have it to this day as a monument to how dumb that was. :confused:

Also, wow, I can't believe how widespread the "GOTCHA!" thing was back in DPPt days. I thought that was just me but I've heard from countless other people the exact same thing. What was up with that??
 
I used to believe that Thunder Punch was the only Electric-type move that could damage Ground-types simply because of the punch aspect. Luckily, this belief of mine didn't last long because I actually tested out my theory as soon as I obtained an Electric-type that could learn Thunder Punch.
 
Lol, I believed this, too - I think what made it sound credible compared to the myths of the previous titles was that the number never stopped ticking up. Outside of the day/night cycles and the fact that it tracked the day of the week, GS never really had a mechanic that suggested it was actually counting time, and so the relative novelty of such a feature in RSE meant that it had be tied in with something, right?
That makes sense.
But we're all young and naive back then. Now we're old and experienced.
 
I thought ice was super effective against water as a kid. Got my first ice type (Glaceon) and tried using ice beam on a water type. I think I thought ice resisted water too. That ended well.
 
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I thought ice was super effective against water as a kid. Got my first ice type (Glaceon) and tried using ice beam on a water type. I think I thought ice resisted water too. That ended well.
Don't feel bad, I didn't comprehend type matchups early on either. When Pikachu's Thundershock didn't affect Brock's Onix, my solution was to...keep using it and hope for a different result.
 
That Golurk was a Steel type.

I mean, can you blame me with its color scheme.

I never thought about it before, but yeah, it does look a lot like aged copper.
 
I used to think Gamefreakhad an end point in mind for the games but clearly that isn't the case since they keep making new games with gimmicky features tacked on just to make more money. I also used to believe that many older Pokemon would receive new evolutions in the Gen 5 games... yeah.
 
When I played Ruby for the first time, I thought my Root Fossil would turn into Kyogre because the description read, "A fossil of an ancient, seafloor-dwelling Pokémon." I assumed that the fossils were a way of getting the legendary Pokemon from the opposite version (bearing in mind that this was at a time when legendaries had never been version-exclusive before).

It was a bit anticlimatic when I got a Lileep instead.
 
Really stupid, but as a young kid I thought stat-lowering moves didn't do anything, since that Level 2 Pidgey's Tackle basically did the same damage before and after my Bulbasaur's Growl. For a long time, my partner's movesets consisted of outright damaging or non-stat related status moves.

Then I learned about stat stages the hard way courtesy of Winona and her Dragon Dance.
 
I remember thinking that Sudowoodo was a Grass type when I first encountered it, so I was extremely confuse when my Quilava's Fire type moves weren't effective on it. Similarly, I thought that Rock types weren't affected by Electric attacks for the longest time. This was mainly due to how the anime often said Pikachu's Electric attack wouldn't be affected by Rock type Pokemon, particularly in the original series, instead of saying Ground type.

I also did the whole pressing buttons to improve the chances of catching Pokemon for at least the first couple of generations. I don't think I stopped doing that until D/P, if only because I was so used to doing it by that point.

I also remember being so stuck at the eighth Gym in Silver not because of Claire's team, but because I couldn't figure out how to gain access to it. I kept getting messages about Team Rocket taking over the Goldenrod City Radio Tower, but I ignored them because I wanted to get to the last Gym. This was a rental copy of the game from Blockbusters, so I didn't figure out that I needed to stop Team Rocket before getting the last badge until I did another playthrough.

I'm not sure if I believed any of the more famous rumors like getting Mew under the truck or somehow gaining Togepi or Maril in Pokemon Yellow. I think I might have tried the whole use Strength to move the truck for the heck of it, but I'm not as sure about that. I do remember hearing about most of them though. It is pretty amazing how there were so many similar rumors rolling around in playgrounds back then. Those kind of rumors just can't happen now with the Internet. That's ultimately a good thing so that people aren't given false information, but there is some charm to kids being so sure about tricks to get Mew or Pikablu in the games.
 
I assumed Glalie was part Dark type for a long time. I also assumed Azurill was Water type for a long time, but I think I can excuse myself for that one. It also was an embarrassing number of years before I even realised a burn will reduce your attack stat.... I don't know why I missed that important nugget.

In Gen 1 there's a sign with misinformation on Guard Spec. (It says it lowers damage from Special Attacks) I never really knew what any of that stuff referred to when I was first playing Blue anyway though. Like Alola I had this assumption that stat moves were just turns being wasted by the opponent....
 
Really stupid, but as a young kid I thought stat-lowering moves didn't do anything, since that Level 2 Pidgey's Tackle basically did the same damage before and after my Bulbasaur's Growl. For a long time, my partner's movesets consisted of outright damaging or non-stat related status moves.

Then I learned about stat stages the hard way courtesy of Winona and her Dragon Dance.

To be fair, it take a lot of Growling to make a difference in the early game - if anything, the games are actually quite bad at demonstrating the value of stat-changing moves, because early gameplay effectively teaches the player not to use them when Tackle is legitimately the best choice for 99% of situations.
 
To be fair, it take a lot of Growling to make a difference in the early game - if anything, the games are actually quite bad at demonstrating the value of stat-changing moves, because early gameplay effectively teaches the player not to use them when Tackle is legitimately the best choice for 99% of situations.
Which is exactly why I thought that way as a child who didn't know better - Tackle got results whereas Growl or Tail Whip did not, at that time. I was more concerned with explicit aspects such as doing damage or seeing my Pokémon be impaired from status.

Maybe as to your point, that might be why there has been an increase in moves with secondary effects that lower or raise stats - to better convey the effectiveness to players. Take Power-Up Punch for example.
 
Here's an unconventional one: beating all the trainers made every wild Pokemon shiny.

One of my friends in like, third grade, had hacked his copy of Pokemon Diamond with an Action Replay to make every wild Pokemon shiny. When I asked him how he did it, he told me that he beat every trainer in the game. My gullible ass then combed through my Prima Official Diamond and Pearl guide for every trainer, and beat them. I had been duped.

To this day I don't complete a Pokemon game without beating every single trainer in the main game first.
 
Please note: The thread is from 2 years ago.
Please take the age of this thread into consideration in writing your reply. Depending on what exactly you wanted to say, you may want to consider if it would be better to post a new thread instead.
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