Pokemon Has An Amazing Community
A lot of internet groups are toxic, but Pokemon has some incredible communities.
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A couple of weeks ago, I reinstalled Pokemon Sword in anticipation of this month’s long-awaited Brilliant Diamond & Shining Pearl. To my dismay, my old save data was gone – probably because I was using my OLED and no longer have the Switch I originally played on. All that work to complete not only the Galar ‘Dex, but to find every single ‘mon roaming the Isle of Armor and Crown Tundra… Fly-gone. To say I was disheartened would be an understatement.
Nevertheless, I persisted. As of yesterday, I had a whopping 392 ‘mons out of 400 registered in my Galarian Pokedex. The end was in sight, although I quickly hit an insurmountable roadblock: I had no Grookey. Across possibly hundreds of Surprise Trades, I had yet to encounter Gen 8’s mischievous little grass monkey. As for ordinary Link Trades… well, everyone who still bothers with them is just trying to flog hacked and illegal shinies. It’s a bit sad, really.
I was missing a few other ‘mons too – Drampa, for one – although I was able to catch them by searching for Max Raids via the Y-Comm. While these Raids are borderline broken, I did, eventually, emerge victorious from a Drampa Den. Grookey, though? No Dens for that lad. The only way to get one is to trade with a friend – given that Sword & Shield came out two years ago, not many of my friends (read: none of my friends) play them anymore.
And so I did what any self-respecting millennial of the internet age would do when faced with a seemingly unsolvable problem: I posted on Reddit.
“Hey everyone, anyone able to send me a Grookey?” I wrote. “Aside from one or two others, it’s all I need and all my friends have stopped playing. I can give you a Scorbunny with 5 perfect IVs for it.”
I put my phone down and waited to see if any of the people who still frequent the Sword & Shield subreddit two years after launch would be feeling particularly generous today of all days. After about five minutes, a Redditor going by the handle TradeOk9689 told me they “got me.” We were in the money.
Ten minutes later, they private messaged me a code, we traded as per the agreed terms, and they instantly ended it – no messing, no looking for more, just an agreed-upon favour done purely out of them voluntarily being sound. I sent them a nice thank you message and they replied with a handshake emoji. Trying my damndest to be as nice as possible, I said, “Thanks again, hope you have a lovely day!”, to which they simply replied, “U2,” as in Bono’s band U2. It wasn’t deemed as a big deal because, well… it wasn’t one. Still, it’s nice to see communities being benevolent for benevolence’s sake, as opposed to there always being an ulterior motive to something.
I mean, some communities adjacent to Pokemon are pretty bad. When this piece is shared on social media, we’ll inevitably attract some wrong ‘uns in the comments hellbent on being mean for no reason. The aforementioned hackers are also rubbish, although they have no love for Pokemon – they have a love for money, exploitation, and being a colossal prick. In more tailored Pokemon communities, like those on specific subreddits or forums like Serebii, none of this behaviour is tolerated or even present. Any online group filled with people who actually like Pokemon is almost definitely going to be a good one. You know, groups with people like TradeOk9689 – but not Bono. As an Irish person, my warning is to not let the long hair and earrings fool you – he’s an unapologetic tax dodger who hangs out with Tories. The Edge, U2’s guitar player who shares his made-up name with a wrestler, is the cool one.
Anyway! The point of this article is to just put some positivity out there. 25 years after it originally launched, Pokemon still attracts lovely communities. While you might see a load of toxic ones in the darkest corners of the internet, they’re not remotely representative of the people who actually play this series and care about it.
So, if you’re excited for Brilliant Diamond & Shining Pearl later this month, I’d recommend considering a replay of Sword & Shield. Don’t worry about having to start again or forgetting how to do some of the more obscure things – there are plenty of communities out there who are more than happy to help.
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