Upon reaching Accumula Town I quickly headed to the Pokémon Center already knowing it's usefulness in healing tired Pokémon. I'm greeted by Juniper again, as well as Bianca, and the professor reviews the uses of the Pokemon Center. In this game, the Pokémon Center is been expanded to include the Global Trade Center as well as the PokéMart which used to be separate buildings. This change is greatly appreciated and makes the task of preparing for a mission fairly easy as well as mirroring how real-world businesses are becoming more and more multi-purpose.

After healing my Pokémon and having a quick chat with Bianca, I left the Pokémon Center and went to explore the town. My travels were quickly interrupted by a gathering in the middle of the town where the newest crime syndicate – Team Plasma – were staging a rally. The man in charge was a mysterious, cloaked individual named “Ghetsis” and his message was one of liberation. He and Team Plasma as a whole believe that the relationship between humans and Pokémon is one-sided and needs to stop – we take so much from them and command them to do our bidding, but what are they really getting in return? Pokémon should be liberated from their PokéBalls and allowed to roam free without the control and ambitions of their trainers. It's an interesting thought that has surely crossed the minds of fans over the years and it's nice to see them acknowledging it in-game. It will be interesting to see where they go with this – either Team Plasma is "wrong" and our hero will show them that Pokémon do benefit from the partnership of humans… or everyone will agree with Team Plasma and set their Pokémon free. I'm inclined to believe it’s the former.

As soon a Team Plasma's speech was over, the grunts formed a perimeter around Ghetsis and the whole lot of them marched out of town. In their wake a young man that goes by the name "N" introduced himself and claimed that he agrees with Plasma’s message. He then hypocritically challenged me to a battle where I promptly disposed of his single Pokémon – Purrloin. Upon defeat, N rambled on for a bit and then left the scene. His clothing seem to indicate that he's not part of Team Plasma, but his enthusiasm for their cause and general mysterious attitude make me think there&s probably some connection to them. Either way, it&s hard to take him seriously when he keeps his Pokémon in a ball just like everyone else…

I took the opportunity to explore the city and talk to some of the people. Accumula Town is pretty small overall, but I guess that's just how it is this early in the game. One thing I really liked about this city was the music, though not necessarily because of how it sounds. There are two musicians in one of the houses and, if you talk to them, they&ll add their instruments to the town theme. It's a very small detail, but it was nice to be able to influence the game world in a way that wasn&t directly related to battle. I should note that these changes are not permanent though – after leaving the town briefly and then returning the music reverted to it&s previous sound and the two musicians need to be asked again if you want to hear their contributions. It kind of ruins the impact of the feature and I don&t see why they couldn't make the change persistent. Oh well.

After finishing up my tour of the town I headed to Route 2 where I spent the next little while training my Tepig. I caught a Purrloin for my Pokédex, but otherwise this route had the same Pokémon as before and was only useful for level grinding. By this point Wakka was still the only one on my team and his growing level concerned me – if he gets too powerful I wont be able to use him for catching new guys without killing them. I need to find another team member soon…

Adrian's Team So Far