The game starts with the typical "welcome to the world of Pokemon" spiel from Professor Birch. Nothing much to note from the outset.


Damb, not even gonna phrase it as a matter of pronouns or style. I thought you were better than this, Birch.


I can't fit Caliburn within the seven-character limit here, so I'll be making do with the name Callie.


They added in this little section to give a basic summary of Inclement Emerald, which I already provided y'all with. I'll be skipping over that part.


Aha, here we go! This is where the other rules of my challenge come into play! I'm going to be playing on Challenge Mode, the hardest difficulty available to me! This means a few things:

1. I can't use items in battle. That means no healing and no stat-boosting.
   
2. Battle style is locked to Set Mode. That means that, when I take out an opposing trainer's Pokemon, I won't get a free switch to another of my own mons.
   
3. Enemy trainers will have stronger teams. Pretty self-explanatory.
   

Call me sadistic, but yeah, I'd say that sounds appealing to me. Now, let the adventure begin!


...Hey so I know everyone and their mom has joked about this but why am I in the back of a moving van


No seriously mom why did I have to ride with all the boxes and junk, what's up with that


Oh cool we have giant sloths unpacking our shit


I go upstairs to set the clock, and when I come back down, dad's on TV! But I miss it, alas. You know, I just noticed that there's this ten-second music loop that plays during this scene that doesn't seem to come up anywhere else in the game. What's up with that?


Now I gotta visit my next-door neighbor, Brendan.


Honestly, dude, I dunno what I am. All I can tell you is that I'm not a guy.


Depending on how I answer this question, the starters I can pick from will change. You'll see what region I went with in a sec, don't worry.


After all that, I can finally save this grown-ass man from a small raccoon and claim my first Pokemon in the process! And that Pokemon shall be...


...the worst one I could've possibly picked!
Actually, not quite. While Chikorita's notorious as being the worst starter Pokemon, Inclement Emerald has given most Pokemon some minor buffs that make even the worst ones worth using! As such, Chikorita's got some tricks up its sleeve that I'd like to try out.


The fight with the Zigzagoon was so short that it wasn't worth screenshotting.


Aplomb. I love that word. Wish the remakes kept it in, but unfortunately, they retranslated some of the dialogue, and we lost aplomb in the process. For shame.


Unfortunately, my game crashed and I had to completely redo that opening portion, but whatever! I'm just as fine off with Narcissus as I was with my original Chikorita. The nature could use some work, though. (A red stat means it's boosted, while a blue stat means it's weaker; Chikorita is a bulky special attacker, so this is really lackluster.)


I make my way up to Oldale Town, and here we see a pretty interesting change: Poke Marts now hold equippable items for battle, rather than Poke Balls and healing items. Those are instead sold within Pokemon Centers. Speaking of which...


Another cool addition this game has is the Poke Vial! It's like a one-use Pokemon Center that you can use whenever you want!


Narcissus got a level-up on my way to meet (and fight) Brendan on Route 103. Didn't realize Chikorita got Poison Powder this early. That's gonna be fun to play around with.


Brendan still only uses one of the Hoenn starters, regardless of what region you picked your starter from. Time to stall his Torchic out and hope it doesn't know Ember yet!


Well, that wasn't too bad. Now it's back to the lab again so I can grab some Poke Balls and really get this nuzlocke started!


Oh okay thanks Brendan that's actually really kickass


Since this hack lets you run from the get-go, mom gives you the Old Rod instead of the Running Shoes. This'll be very useful for when I want to catch a Magikarp (unironically).


My first encounter on the first route is... a Zigzagoon. Dammit, I could've gotten a Zorua...


Well, at least he's got Pickup! Now I can farm items to my heart's content, just as long as I don't get Ratatosk killed while doing so.


My encounter for Route 103 is a Shinx! Bit of a shame that he came with Rivalry rather than Intimidate (Intimidate lets me start off a battle with an Attack debuff on the opponent, whereas Rivalry... doesn't), but still, I appreciate whatever early-game Electric-types I can come across.

My encounter for Route 102 is a

son of a BITCH


...Actually, with that nature and that ability, I can't be mad forever. I mean, sure, I would've preferred a Ralts or a Lotad, but Bidoof can be fun to use too.
Also, I haven't said this outright yet, but I have a mythology-based naming scheme going on with my Pokemon. Narcissus is an obvious one, but Ratatosk is the messenger squirrel who traversed Yggdrasil in Norse mythology, and Indra is a Vedic deity of storms. As for Doober?

He's Doober.

With that, I think I'll call it a wrap for this installment of my journey through Hoenn. It wasn't terribly eventful, but it was a start. Maybe there'll be some bloodshed in the next chapter! I mean, I hope not, but who knows?