As of right about now I’ve been playing Pokemon for 20 years. Out of the 809 Pokemon currently available in a Pokemon game at the time of writing, these are my 20 personal favourites (with another 20 honourable mentions for good measure). The list can and will change, but it’s been coming long enough, it’s easy to understand, it’s Pokemon hype season, let’s go.
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20. Tentacruel
There are all kinds of reasons why a Pokemon might make anyone’s personal list and I’m no exception. As someone who started with the first generation in the late 1990s, when I was all over the games, trading cards and anime, Tentacruel didn’t really stand out for me initially. Evolving from the extremely annoying, common-as-salt Tentacool, its only moment in the spotlight came in that one anime episode where Team Rocket forced a gigantic one to appear and wreak havoc.
But fast-forward a decade to my period of highest engagement with the main series Pokemon games, when I would put in literally hundreds of hours breeding, training and battling Pokemon teams with my friends across Pokemon Black, White, Black 2 and White 2, and Tentacruel started to become a real staple on my roster. In just about any competitive game or sport my default strategy is to slow down the game and play defensively, controlling the pace where I can, and Tentacruel used to absolutely excel in that role. Throwing down some Toxic Spikes, burning attacking threats with Scald, and healing off damage in wet weather with the Rain Dish ability and some Black Sludge was never not satisfying for me. I’m sure my friends hated it though.
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19. Lycanroc
A recent addition, Lycanroc was always going to have a decent chance at standing out from the Sun and Moon crowd thanks to its heavy presence in the marketing and its three amazing form designs – one of which served as a promo for the two Ultra games – but its refreshing niche as one of the only properly quick Rock-type Pokemon around makes it a lot of fun to use in battle.
I rarely double up on Pokemon between playthroughs unless I have a good reason, but after putting nearly 50 hours into Sun‘s Battle Tree alongside a Midday Form Lycanroc, grinding for Battle Points and trying to beat the secret boss Red, I didn’t hesitate in adding the Dusk Form Lycanroc to my Ultra Sun team a year later. That +1 priority Accelerock move is too rad.
Vagrant Rant 