Going South seems to have been the right path, as I came across Cinnabar Island, the location of the seventh gym and also a large science laboratory and ruined house. I spent some time exploring the house, then went to the lab and had my fossil and amber studied and converted into pokémon – Kabuto and Aerodactyl. This gave me a couple of well-needed slots in the pokécentre item storage system, but I’m not sure I’ll actually find space for either of the new pokémon in my main team.

I then tried to head to the gym, only to find out that it was locked and the key wasn’t nearby. It was, in fact, nearby – but in the ruins of the Pokémon Mansion, evidently in an area I hadn’t found. I went exploring again, and almost by coincidence I fell off the edge of one of the upper floors and landed in an area that was otherwise inaccessible. Working through the rest of the mansion – with regular attacks by ponyta and other fiery pokémon – meant that Vaporeon was catching up with Dugtrio as being massively overpowered. I got the key, went to the gym, and Vaporeon killed everything with a mixture of surf and bubblebeam. Seven badges!

The route number to go south of Pallet Town was 21, and usually I would then assume I should be following 22 – which is a route West from Vermillion City. However that route is the path to the Elite Four, and there were parts of the map that I hadn’t explored. In particular, the power plant up in the North East corner; and routes 19 and 20 in the water along the South side. Both of these required a surfing pokémon. I decided to fly¹ to Lavender Town first, to visit the power plant.

Unsurprisingly, there were hordes of electric pokémon waiting for me, which would have been scary were it not for Dugtrio, who merrily absorbed attack after attack while digging its way to victory. I collected Raichu here, because my own Pikachu seemed to be taking forever to evolve, as well as a few other electric types. At the end of the power plant I found Zapdos, who took ages to capture; I had to reduce its health slowly using normal attacks, to prevent it fainting, and then I used Weepinbell to send it to sleep to maximise capture chances. Even with a small sliver of health, paralysed and asleep, it still took multiple ultra balls to capture.

A level 50 Zapdos quickly replaced Pikachu in my party, particularly because it could learn fly and as such overcame one of the key weaknesses of electricity (against ground). At its next level, Zapdos learnt thunder, making it invaluable.

I then flew back down to Cinnabar Island, and set off to the East, with Zapdos and Weepinbell faring well against the water-type enemies. I came to the Seafoam Islands, and thought I needed to battle through the cave to get to the next route. Instead I found Articuno, who again put up a significant resistance to the pokéball before finally being caught. I decided not to add Articuno to my team, however, since it significantly overlapped with Vaporeon, and the quick attacks of the latter were useful for capturing.

Two of the legendary birds caught, then, and I’m not sure where I’ll find Moltres – the obvious place would be around Cinnabar Island, but it’s not there. I think my next stop needs to be the mystery eighth gym leader, in the newly reopened Vermillion City.

1. This involved swapping one of my team members out to Fearow, who could learn fly, then swapping them back when I got to my destination. ︎

The start of Pokémon Blue¹ is pretty slow. After the first couple of set-pieces, where you choose a starter and fetch the pokédex, you are left to go forth into the world, with only the route numbers to guide you. The paths are winding and specifically designed to make you walk through long grass, meaning that you will encounter many wild pokémon along the way. Unfortunately for the first hour or so they are all of one of three or four types, and it gets a little dull when the fifteenth caterpie is dispatched with a single hit from Charmander. Trainers along the way offer some variety but they all have similar pokémon, again, and give very little reward. By the time you get to Pewter City, you’re desperate for just a bit of challenge.

Having chosen Charmander at the start, I got it. Brock’s gym is of ground and rock types, and Charmander’s attacks did little. Luckily I had already caught Spearow and Nidoran so I had some variety, but my first attempt at Brock’s underling saw all my team of six (which also included Pidgey, Metapod and another Caterpie) being defeated. Before trying again, I went to the South of the city and wandered around in a patch of grass for around 150 hours, battling hundreds of level 3 and 4 pidgeys, caterpies, and rattatas. The time was not spent in vain, however, as Metapod evolved into Butterfree, with the confusion move, and Spearow and Charmander all jumped up several levels. Of course, this being a Generation 1 pokémon game, there was no EXP Share, so all this levelling had to be done by having Metapod in the first slot of my team and manually changing away from it as the first move.

I also caught a Pikachu, who quickly replaced Caterpie in the party, and I spent some time with him levelling up as well. Pikachu is nowhere near as cute in this first game as he later came to be; he is a little chubby.

With a team of level 15 pokémon, I went to Brock and beat him with health to spare; Butterfree performed admirably. And then I departed Pewter City to travel along Route 3, and on to Mt Moon. In the caves on the way to Cerulean City, I encountered approximately 32,649 zubats, with them appearing every few steps along the way. Each and every one was defeated with Pikachu’s thundershock move, as demonstrated in the header image of this post; occasionally they would get an attack in first which drained a point or two of Pikachu’s health. By the time I made it through the mountain, picking up a fossil and defeating Team Rocket on the way, Pikachu was at level 18 and other members of the party were trailing behind.

I may need to do some more grinding before I go to meet Misty.

1. Before the 3DS store closed I bought a number of games, which I am only just getting around to playing. I have both Blue and Silver lined up, to hopefully complete for the first time. I played Yellow back when that was first released (or close to then) and I believe I got as far as the Elite Four before giving up. ︎