FGC #304 Pokémon X/Y

I am a heterosexual male, and, for this, I consider myself lucky. To be clear, in this case I’m not talking about being lucky because being a (white) heterosexual male is practically easy mode on a social and biological level; no, I consider myself lucky because I like being a heterosexual male. I’m about 90% straight (10% of me gazes wistfully at pictures of Cillian Murphy), so I’ve never doubted my sexuality, and I’m a man’s man, so I’m totally okay with my boy parts. Mind you, I suppose I have always been terrible at sports (both playing and watching), and my body isn’t so much built for lumberjacking as it seems to be more designed for comfortably filling office chairs, but, regardless, I’ve never thought I wanted to be another gender. I am comfortable in my own skin, and, barring scientific advances that would allow me to graft a tail to my spine, I have no grand desire to change any part of me. I am just as genetics made me, and I’m okay with that.

However, if you were to boot up any save file of mine from a game that allows you to choose your protagonist’s gender… Well… It might appear that I want to be a pretty, pretty princess.

Today’s game is Pokémon X/Y. Starting with Pokémon Crystal (effectively Pokémon 2.5, for anyone not familiar with the odd naming conventions of the franchise), it became possible to choose “the girl” as your digital avatar. Likely because of Crystal being something of a revision/”incremental version” game, this started a simple pattern in my playing habits. When I played the first Pokémon game of a generation (like, say, Pokémon Ruby), I would choose the boy character, and name him Bob. Then, when the inevitable sequel popped up (like Pokémon Emerald), I would choose the girl character, and name her Robin (Bob – Rob – Robin). If any prequel remakes popped up in that time, I’d go with the “kiddy” version of the names in the same pattern, usually something like Bobby followed by Robyn. Generally, I considered this a simple way to trade with myself across multiple Gameboys, as the naming convention would make it easy to see where Pokémon originated. I know that Mewtwo was originally caught by Bobby in Pokémon Fire Red, for instance. Not being certain of such a thing would be intolerable.

But that all changed with Pokémon X (forget Y, X has the better Mega Charizard). At first, I was going to follow my usual pattern, and just wait for the inevitable Pokémon Z (ha!) to break Robin back out of the mothballs. After all, Pokémon X/Y had dramatically expanded online features, and it feels… I don’t know… dishonest to misrepresent your gender online. I’m not saying you shouldn’t do it, I’m just saying that I’ve always been uncomfortable presenting myself as something I’m not while online. I guess I’ve always had this thought in my head that men posing as women online were doing it for the attention, and I’m not nothing if not an attention whore (VISIT GOGGLEBOB.COM FOR MORE INFORMATION). So, as a good child of previews and going into every Pokémon game knowing as much as possible, I decided I was going to stick to my usual “Bob” persona, and play Pokémon as a man, the way God intended.

Except…. Well…

I wouldn’t want to ruin such delightful photo opportunities with crummy male fashion sense, now would I?

I am a man. I have been one all of my life. Yet, likely thanks to a combination of general isolation and too many of my childhood heroes wearing exclusively armor, I have no concept of male fashion. My closet consists of approximately two pairs of jeans, two pairs of pants, a suit, and twelve thousand “witty” t-shirts. Oh, and I own one “presentable” pair of sneakers, and like twenty different kinds of flip flops. I live by the beach! This is allowed! … Though I suppose that kind of rational isn’t going to get me on the cover of any fashion magazines in the near future.

And I’m pretty sure I know the real source of this problem: I’m straight. I’m not claiming there’s some magical queer eye thing going on that my sex has completely missed. I’m just saying that, ultimately, I don’t pay attention to what works for men. As far as my brain (and maybe other parts of my anatomy) cares, other men may as well be featureless blobs, and I literally cannot remember what another male is wearing about ten seconds after I stop looking at the dude. That bubbles over into my own ensembles, and as a direct result of having no “fashion role models”, I dress like… a featureless blob.

But the other side of that coin is that there is an entire wing of my brain dedicated to “checking out chicks”, and that department has been storing information (coincidentally) since I hit puberty. Trust me, I would much rather be able to immediately recall my grandmother’s birthday at any given moment, but, no, my brain would prefer to regurgitate the exact jean style worn by my first crush six billion years back. I don’t want to be casually storing all this information, but I’m pretty sure I understand “what works” on a woman because I’ve been subconsciously studying it much longer than I’ve been worried about what I’m wearing.

Yes, I am absolutely just saying I understand “women’s fashion” because I find women wearing particular things to be more attractive. I’m not claiming to be some kind of women’s fashion guru, I just know what I, and only I, like to see. I’m an egocentric jackass, but I know what I like.

But getting back to our game du jour, I knew about the “fashion factor” of Pokémon X going into the adventure, and I thus decided to go with “Robin” and never look back. And I don’t regret my choice for a moment: the male outfits in this game are pretty lame, but everything on the female side of the changing room is pretty great. And I’m a giant fan of purple, which really doesn’t work for any man save Prince, but works phenomenally on any given pale brunette that winds up being my digital avatar. See also Saint’s Row. See also Splatoon. See also Create-A-Soul in Soulcalibur. See also Dragon Quest 9. See also every game where I can customize a character even the tiniest bit, because I know what I like to see.

Hi, I’m Goggle Bob, I’m a straight male that enjoys looking at pretty women, even if those women are supposed to be “me”. Look, if I’m going to spend 200 hours with a game, I may as well like what I’m looking at.

And at least someone appreciates my choices. Thanks, Pokémon XX.

FGC #304 Pokémon X/Y

• System: Nintendo 3DS. The bottom screen used for Wi-Fi features is pretty marvelous in this game, and should emulated by every WiiU… oh, that system is already dead.
• Number of players: One endless single player experience, but also two player for competitions/trades. Also, technically infinity players for some of the online stuff. More games should be infinity players.
• Isn’t this the generation that introduced Mega Evolutions? Yes, but no one cares about that when there are fashion choices afoot.
• Favorite Pokémon (this generation): Aegislash is a living sword ghost that can control minds and slash smaller Pokémon in half. Living sword monsters hiding in tall grass is clearly further evidence of my Pokémon theory.
• Did you catch ‘em all? Damn straight.
  
  Even had to go to McDonald’s for some damn magic rock creature.
• Did you know? Pokémon X/Y was the first Pokémon game to be released simultaneously worldwide. This is helpful for global training, but also had the fun side effect of the entire Pokédex being hidden until the game was actually released. Oh, and six months of terrible fanart suppositions of evolved forms of Pokémon. Hm, maybe Gamefreak should just release all Pokédata immediately to save us from those horrors.
• Would I play again: Pokémon X is finally the generation where everything seems to “work” 100%, and revisiting the game isn’t a gigantic chore. Unfortunately, it’s also not the most recent Pokémon game, so it’s unlikely to get played again.

What’s next? Random ROB has chosen… Bubble Bobble for the NES! Something something fantastic story. Let us look forward to it!

Even my Megas are gorgeous.