Pokémon TCG2: Doduo Adventures - Book One: TCG Island

[Tango]

Chapters 15, 16, 17, and 18!

Yeah!!

Damn, the UBI-giving oracle really has a strong idea of what good and bad jobs are, huh. Little judgmental on the part of the all-knowing powers that be.

Huh. That's actually pretty fitting, so I see no problem there!

I don't know why but "the oracle even stated it would pay for their airfare" was hilarious to me in how passive aggressive it is.

I hadn't considered that, but it actually fits pretty well!

🤔 Very odd. Like they don't even try?

Not don't try.

Can't try. 💀

Wow! Okay, now this I did not see coming! So they literally really do all look the same! Which raises all sorts of horrifying questions about who is cloning people for the purpose of having them do low-status jobs TCG Islanders want!

Yep!

So the Neo Islanders are apparently constitutionally incapable of understanding Pokemon battling. And also really quick to fawn when anyone's mad at them, which is... pretty sad. I don't know if they've been taught that or if they've been genetically engineered to do so, but it's brutal either way. I guess Rick must have noticed as well because he knelt down right away.

Yeah, poor Neo Islanders. They have it rough.

The rotation of the image to suggest her lying down is

Normally there isn't much I can do with art, but figuring this out made me giggle!

Rick, you were skeevy and weird throughout this whole interaction 😭 seek therapy

Yeah... Rick is something else.

You used 'ripped' in the chapter with Amy as well. I'd recommend a different word - "tore"?

I have no idea how you picked up such an obscure thing like that!

No skin off my back. I switched it. Thanks!

He still doesn't get it! He never needed to become champion - he only needed to be honest with Nikki!

Very true.

He still thinks his value is in winning, although I guess it's a step forward that he realizes that he probably trained more than necessary.

Baby steps.

Either way, it's probably everything he learned on the way to become champion that allowed him to create an all-common deck that won.

Very true.

The power of the TCG is such that Pokemon that are normally not impressive such as Mr. Mime and Porygon become these big threats. It really challenges your pre-existing associations with each species!

Yeah, it's really interesting how that works!

Hmm, so the clone appears to be the mother of one of the boys... I wonder if he's the one who has no distinguishing features?

No one with distinguishing features has Neo Island parents. Huh, I guess even though I haven't stated this in the fic, it is my headcanon that Neo Islanders never get in romantic relationships with those from other islands and they don't have kids with them either.

A touching conversation with Gene! I'm glad that our protagonist has come to understand that, weird as he is, Rick has been there for him throughout the story. I mean, he was both his wingman and his anti-wingman (though he did the most there...).

Indeed.

I hope our protag will also come to recognize that Tango, the Doduo formerly known as Gotan, has also been there with him too. He underestimates Doduo, but we the audience know better. :)

Yep!

These chapters have also had some very interesting developments. The relations between Neo Island and TCG Island have become more important, as has the Oracle. Why is everyone from Neo Island a clone? Are there even people left there? I notice that Neo Island aesthetics are associated with more traditional styles of clothing as well.

And yet deeper still the rabbit hole will go...

 

[Slayerofthewind]

*Knock, knock* I have returned with a multi-chapter review!! Excited to continue with this!

Spoiler: Chapter 2 reactions

Had I been wearing a hat, (not that I would be caught dead in one) it might have blown away!

Omg why is he so adamantly against hats LMAO Give me the hat lore!!

It was the girls of this club that had wanted to 'date the champion'

Actually very curious how he would know this because hasn't he been Champion for only a short amount of time? Or is it more of a "they want to date whoever the Champion is, and it's always been that way" kind of thing.

They all flirted quite well too... But underneath, I could sense it. They only wanted prestige. No-doubt if I ever lost the title of 'champion', these 'amazing girls' would drop me like a bad card from their decks...

...One might even say they were... shallow.

HAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!

Or even trying to reel in a big fish.

Twin sister of the other girl member of the club, Sara. I believed they were both age twenty.

I should hope they're both the same age if they're twin sisters!!

I'm so sorry, this is an unintentional sentence structure nitpick -- like I know what you were intending to mean by this, but the way it was structured technically implies this -- but I'm pointing it out because I found it funny and think it's really funny if your character actually does think like this and didn't realize them being twins meant they obviously were the same age.

Ok if this is Amanda, are they identical twins or fraternal twins? Because the art is reading to me as fraternal twins.

Just then, the last of the terrible trio arrived!

The club leader, Amy!

How many people are in the clubs generally? As a world building thing I mean. Like is it just these three girls and one guy? Because you do say that Joshua is the only guy in the club.

I had the same question with the Grass club too. Because you mentioned advertisement for them being not needed due to how big it was, these clubs being essentially the heart of the whole island, and TCG being the world's favorite thing, so I'm more so curious why membership seems low? Or is this just a game-specific thing I don't get?

When the others weren't looking I could see Joshua's eye twitching.

Why is he staying as a club member if it's literally the worst experience for him tho? Because he really seems impervious to their charms and sees through it, so why is he putting up with them?

One does not feel bad for beating away a hungry crocodile with a shovel...

LMAO

A random Doduo also trotted along behind him. It appeared to be attempting to mimic Imakuni's dance moves throwing its feathers about everywhere as it danced!

This is my favorite character now This drawing of him is perfect. Absolutely perfect. Idk really who you are beyond this intro yet, Imakuni, but I don't have to -- I'm sold.

He looks like he's gonna jump out of an alleyway and uncomfortably ask middle-aged women to buy cell-phone plans or, like, insurance, as a very misguided corporate stunt to attempt to be "more relatable by creating a mascot character," but all it amounts to is an uncomfortable situation for everyone involved. It's perfect.

He looks like his best friend would be a magic 8 ball. He would consult this magic 8 ball for all important decisions such as curating his stock portfolio. "Should I buy stock in Apple?" *shakes ball* "Signs point to yes."

Also, he also has mad Tamagotchi-character energy if you know what I mean.

Also, pop off Doduo!!

I turned to my left and noticed that his Doduo was just standing there.

...Menacingly.

It wasn't going to follow him? Rather odd. As I went to leave, I noticed the sounds of an extra pair of feet as I walked.

I paused. The feet stopped.

I started walking again. The feet resumed.

I then turned around and found the Doduo was following me! No matter. These birds were known to follow people on occasion... Perhaps it didn't even know Imakuni. Little did I know, that Doduo was going to follow me the entire way home!

Love the idea that Doduo didn't know magical incredible Imakuni and was just reeled in by his sheer aura to become his flash dance partner.

Imakuni?! is a joke duelist the game included with a weird battle track for any duels. In the original game, he is one of the weakest duelists and plays badly but his deck was substantially improved for the sequel. He travels around the various clubs and fortresses, so it can be hard to find him. In the original, he gave four booster packs instead of the normal maximum of two for most duelists!

Love!! I was hoping he was real. Best character, 10/10, no notes. Appeared out of nowhere, said literally nothing, danced, then peaced out. Immaculate vibes.

Spoiler: Chapter 3 reactions

It looked at me. Its eyes were vacant and its faces wore rather dull expressions.

"We've been trying to reach you about your car's extended warranty..."

There were few other ways to explain the sheer volume of feathers I was seeing... A fat, lazy, and dumb bird...

With how many feathers are about, I'm surprised Doduo isn't looking a bit sparse himself, damn.

Doduo looked at me with both heads wide-eyed and... eager?

"Gotan!" I smiled while crossing my arms proudly.

Gotan's heads tilted as its eyes seemed to squint for a moment with a flash of... bewilderment? -or at least I thought he might have, perhaps it was my imagination?

Awww poor Gotan doesn't seem to vibe with the name.

Obviously I was NOT this bird's owner, but with him following me around everywhere, who would believe me?

The Doduo distribution system has chosen you. Be honored

"...but what could I use for testing this? Our stock ran out just yesterday... If only we had some Doduo feathers laying about... They are getting so hard to come by these days... Another shipment of Doduo went out to Neo just last week... I thought they hated those birds..."

Looks like this might end up working out for MC in the end haha!!

Rick always was an odd one. More interested in science than the Pokemon TCG.

The idea that "Pokemon TCG" is normie culture is SO FUNNY

Rick grinned. "I shall come with you back to your house and gather the feathers myself! I have a method of procurement that ensures quality and freshness."

I meaaaaan they've already been procured from Doduo. But if he cares how "fresh" the feather is from off of the lawn, go off lol. Hopefully he has a special way to pick up feathers off the ground

Rick smiled broadly. "Excellent! Do you have a spare bedroom?"

Inviting himself over already haha.

Rick rolled his eyes. "Well I'll need a place to crash for the night! Also, being around Gotan will give me the opportunity I need to collect the most fresh feather specimens! I do hate manual labor, but I can tolerate it... if you have some beer."

Lol you're the one asking for the favor and inviting yourself over here, Rick I don't really think you're in the position here to be complaining about the work you willingly took on of your own design.

Rick looked me in the eye. "Not bad, but do you have enough... for two?"

Ah, Rick is the type to invite more people over lmao... or he could be talking about Gotan, but let's hope he's not.

Spoiler: Chapter 4 reactions

After poking around in the lawn for over an hour, Rick finally swung the door open, tossed a couple feathers he was holding into the air and sucked them up with his Feathermaster 5,000.

Essentially, a vacuum cleaner lol

I leaned back with my mouth hanging open. "She wanted to date me and you know what I did?"

Ok, but why does everyone want to date him?? Tbh "being Champion" doesn't work in ever situation, especially here. Also tbh this is pretty unprofessional on her part, potentially even going to get her in trouble with the university depending on rules, and you've made her seem like a very professional and put-together person thus far, so what is happening here exactly with her with this to motivate this?

"Just because she's your sister doesn't make her bad for others..."

Rick nodded as if he had just learned something profound. "Dude... your right! It's like when you look through a kaleidoscope or something!"

LOL as a sister to two brothers myself, I can tell you that the real answer you'd give to "Just because he's your brother doesn't make him bad for others..." (which, for real, I have actually heard variations of this before) is:

"Ew, no."
"You're an idiot."
"He's an idiot."
"Really?? That *brother name*?? Ew, why?"
"Literally how."
And so on haha!

Rick started laughing again too before regaining some semblance of composure. "DUDE SHE DIDN'T WANT TO MARRY HIM! She settled for him, man. But she was all upset she couldn't catch up to you! Isaac had a crush on her for years too. It's not like anyone else was knocking, man, so she opened the door, man, she OPENED THE DOOR!"

Ehhh, to be honest, this on her as well given she didn't speak up or make a move herself. I also think this is really shallow of her too to just pick someone that was there if she didn't also have feelings for him. Doesn't exactly paint her to be a good person either -- it makes her seem like she's taking advantage of Isaac's feelings for the convenience of marriage. Instead of feeling bad for Nikki and MC, I feel bad for Isaac.

I really hope this is more so the relationship being incorrectly filtered through the lens of someone not in the relationship. Not that I need the Nikki and Isaac marriage to be happy, but you've essentially painted Nikki as a wonderful sweet girl who could do no wrong, and this is a really terrible and manipulative thing to do that's being entirely brushed off.

My tears still weren't letting up. "THEN WHY DOES SHE STAY?!"

"Dude. Nikki's always been traditional n crap, man. Ever since she was little, she said she would never divorce. She ain't going nowhere, man... Sorry, dude..."

Rick stumbled over from the recliner and plopped down next to me on the couch while putting his arm on my shoulder. "You know, dude? You're alright. You did all that to try to make Nikki happy. Ima be your wing-man ok? I need more feathers from that crazy bird of yours, so Ima just follow you around and pick up feathers, but if there's a chick you dig, I use some science or crap to get her to notice you..."

Don't love that Rick, her brother, and the MC, who supposedly loves her's first thought is "let's break up their family," and doesn't even consider the fact that Nikki might be happy at this point in life, that maybe she did move on, and maybe she loves her daughter and husband?? It's very "I am more important than them, and my wants and feelings are more important," and not at all considering what the reality may or may not be or even somewhat taking into account what Nikki might want. Breaking up a family is a very big deal, especially if you don't know the reality of what that marriage is. It really seems like Nikki and MC only had crushes years ago that never evolved into a relationship, and being unable to understand why a married woman with a kid would probably not leave her family for a crush she had years ago that never even lead to a date is really odd.

Also, don't love how Nikki's brother is reducing his sister to just a very simplistic stereotype. Women can be traditional, and there's nothing wrong with that, but when it's your brother and they're describing your marriage and the only thing they can think of to say about you has nothing to do with your feelings, personality, wants, or desires, but is just "she's traditional" makes it seem like Rick is a terrible brother and/or Nikki doesn't have wants/feelings/personality/etc beyond "traditional," which is why I say it feels like a stereotype in this instance. Because there's no second note to her at all so far yet. Rick doesn't say, "Nikki isn't happy," he says, "Years ago, she picked another guy and is traditional." It really makes me think that Rick doesn't know or care about his sister at all, and is only able to say things about her relationship that may have been true and occurred years ago at the start of her marriage. It's just odd that he can only mention things that were surface level and applicable in time years ago -- it makes it feel like he doesn't know her.

Additionally, I'll also say that the MC when describing her and his feelings for her even all the way back in the chapter we first meet her in the Grass club, really appears to be that the thing he loves about her is that she's "traditional," which is really shallow on his part too if that's the main reason why he loves her, not anything else about her. Because of that, I don't really believe MC's feelings for her, and more so think he just likes the idea of her.

I really hope Nikki's not this 1-dimensional and that there's more to her we get later.

Also, I recognize they were drunk, but how MC is talking about and thinking about Nikki in this scene is essentially identical to how he talks about her when he's not drunk.

Totally realize I went off on a little bit of a rant here LOL, but take it with the only best intentions please!!

We spent the rest of the day watching movies and relaxing. We even ordered delivery pizza.

Omg they even ordered pizza I do really enjoy how they've suddenly become domesticated living with each other friends.

...But also didn't Rick have an important thing to do and had no time to waste which was why he insisted on coming over ASAP in the first place? A little confused why that's changed. I get they're hung over, but that doesn't stop scheduled events from happening or deadlines lol. Also, Rick really doesn't seem the type to lounge around all day watching movies given how frantic he usually is.

Gotan was taking attacks by Erik's Pokemon cards! The crazy bird loved it!

Interesting. I commented on this before in my last review, but I'm curious as to why this "Doduo is linked to the cards and takes damage" phenomena is happening Hopefully this is something the fic will eventually address.

Since it takes a while to get out to the Science Club, I decided it was ok to just have one duel for the day. I returned to the house with both Gotan and Rick tagging along.

I know this is not *quite* the case, but I do kind of like the mental image of MC's two companions being Gotan and just a guy named Rick that both decided to stick themselves to MC and follow him around at all times.

Overall, this was a very fun continuation!! I think the humor lands a lot more in these next few chapters, and I can tell you're getting into the swing of things by how the writing flows a lot more naturally in these chapters. My lack of TCG knowledge and game-lore is definitely leading to questions I know are just built in things I don't understand, but I felt that there were a lot less of those questions this time!

Dodou is finally introduced, and he is wonderful!! The sprite art of his vacant stare is absolutely perfect, and I love how he's just a silly little guy with complexity we'll hopefully slowly get into. You've done a great job at the characterization of Gotan, and I actually enjoy how he's written the most! Outside of Imakuni, who even if he never shows up again will be very hard to dethrone as the best character, Gotan is my favorite character! I'm interested to see how his lore and character will build out as well as watching Gotan and MC's relationship develop.

OH YEAH! I wanted to ask -- Does the MC have a name?? Because I haven't spotted one yet, and I've been wondering if this was intentional or not.

I have two main points of critique! The first is that it feels like there’s a difference in scale being emphasized a lot that creates conflicting world building and leaves me with questions. Like if this island is emphasized as a TCG major hub with a university and everyone is just deeply into TCG, why is it that there are only like 4 people in a famous renown club that apparently advertises? And in the case of the Grass club, why are those members essentially all children? That’s just one example, but this discrepancy in scale actually happens a lot and beyond just the clubs. You'll do something that makes the world seem very large, and then the next bit of world building makes the world seem very small in a way that contradicts the previous world building. It's fine if you want the world to be small or big, but you can't have both at the same time when addressing the same beat.

The second point being that your female characters are very one note, which makes them come off as stereotypes, some scenes feeling rather misogynistic because of that, and the way male characters talk about/interact with/describe female characters is often very reductional. Additionally, it's fair of me to point out that all of the female characters thus far fall into one of two camps: 1. are literal children, or 2. want to date MC and that appears to serve as one of their main character motivations. Doctor Wem was the exception to this... aaaaaand then it dropped in chapter 4 that no, she was not the exception to this, she did want to date him, and it's somewhat implied that she only favored and taught the MC because she wanted to date him. The same goes for Nikki (I talked about her a lot above already haha).

There's absolutely nothing wrong with having your MC be a desired figure, but the problem is only that there isn't anything else of major note being given to these women for characterization (Dr. Wem does have her TCG knowledge and career, but the reveal in chapter 4 honestly undercut and went directly against that characterization because of how big of a deal a professor dating a student really is, which makes her seem way less professional and caring about her work/career than she'd been depicted as so far) and that all women seemingly fall at his feet. I'd really love to see some more depth and complexity to them!!

ALSO, to be clear -- that's not to say you can't have shallow women/gold diggers/etc!! You can, and they can be great characters! Not every female (or male) character has to have depth and complexity. But right now, it's all of the women in this fic, not one or two or a few of the female characters, which is why I'm wanting to point this out. To put it another way, this fic would not pass the Bechdel Test right now lolol. It's definitely something that could be improved upon!

As a whole, really great job!! I'll be sure to continue reading later!!

 

[Tango]

Heya, it took a little bit, but popping in for this as part of our review exchange that I was hoping to chip away at over the course of Blitz, taking us right into…

Chapter 1

Awesome! I've been looking forward to the next review from you, Spiteful!

Spoiler: Line-by-Line

I’ll admit that I wasn’t expecting to hear ending music right off the bat in this chapter.

Neither did I, but darn it if it doesn't fit! Also, he recently became Champion, so this is sort of like a really really extended epilogue for him in a way.

Well, clearly not completely terribly since this would be a short story otherwise.

A fine guess!

Huh. Is that sprite custom? But it’s certainly a nice touch there either way.

It is custom. I had it commissioned. Credits for that are in the intro post!

Also, I’m pretty sure that this is a sign for you to play fewer card games and go on more dates, buddy.

N-no! No! He has no idea what you are talking about.

I mean, considering how this setting works, you might as well try getting into a bunch of battles with girls at this rate and see if you can somehow trigger love at first (card) fight.

I mean, it's got to give him better chances than moping about in his house, right?

Oh, so that’s what his grandpa looks like. I wonder given the image name if we’ll actually see him in the story later on.

Unless I add a flashback of some sort, the answer to that is essentially no.

I’ll admit that I did a double-take at the scene breaks here, especially since the whole “after a leisurely breakfast” part doesn’t really feel like it’s a scene on its own. It might have made sense to just merge it with the scene beginning at “The brisk morning air”.

How do these things completely escape my notice? It looks obvious now that you pointed it out. I fixed it. Thanks!

A part of me wonders if it’d have made sense to lampshade that the diary entries would get more elaborate / multi-scened with something to the effect of Jack(?) writing that he’s been having busy days lately and expects to be writing in his diary at different intervals of the day instead of all at the end to ensure that he doesn’t lose his thoughts / memories of what happened in order to look back for card strategies, but maybe I’m overthinking things.

My headcanon is that he usually writes in his diary at home late at night.

So what’s so proper about these trees that weren’t proper about the ones in the new neighborhood again? I kinda wonder if there should’ve been more at least passing mention of what said trees were like. Especially if the trees in the new neighborhood stood out from the natural surroundings like a sore thumb.

I mean, it kind of states it. Small trees are lame. Big trees are nice.

You’re missing a word here in this section.

Would Jack(?) know this from a one-off travel down the trail if he hasn’t been here in the past? It might have been worth changing the framing to something more along the lines of “so (once again) there was nobody else on the trail today” with the paren text added or dropped depending on the protag’s level of familiarity with this place.

I switched around the wording a bit. Should be a little more apparent now.

Ah yes, he’s getting close to joining the plot, I see…

Nah, this was just a random wild Doduo here. He won't meet the real star until chapter 2.

I think that you can potentially get a bit lampshad-ey about glossing over “those details aren’t important, so I’m not putting them in you, diary”. Since while I as a reader would’ve liked to have a bit more detail regarding what the Grass Club looks like, it does make sense that in an in-setting diary that “bruh, it’s a 7-11 clubhouse, they all look about the same” would lead to that getting omitted.

I switched it around a little to help it make more sense for the lack of detail. Thanks.

Swanky art is swanky there. Did you draw that? Though either way, you clearly went all-out with the multimedia component of this fic this time around.

I had it commissioned. First time it was used was in the intro where I have the credit to the artist listed below. Since I re-use commissioned art in some places, I'm not going to put the credit below every time I do because I don't want it cluttering my fic.

Neat music is neat there. A part of me wonders if you should’ve potholed specific words in your prose to look visually neater, but I suppose the way you did things makes it easier to get the BGM playing at the moment.

I honestly have no idea what you are talking about with the prose here. I mean, I could just refrain from commenting on this bit or smile and nod, but I really just don't know... 😅

I do wonder if given that this is written as a diary entry where the protagonist is recalling things after the fact, if this is a bit too ‘live-time’ at the moment. Unless if the protagonist is very deliberately scribbling little bits and pieces into his diary throughout the day, in which case, that should be mentioned in passing somewhere.

Ah, I mean to have everything written in past tense, so if you see me slip up somewhere, please feel free to call my attention to it like you did here. Thanks! (I fixed it)

Small typo there.

I feel like your two small paragraphs before Brittany’s portrait feel like they could be merged. And they likely would be merged as part of a diary entry that someone was writing out.

When you are right, you are right. And you're right, so I fixed it.

Protag: “Which was just a wee bit more difficult for me this time given that I basically started from scratch.” ^^;

For sure. It really is a huge handicap.

Wow, I didn’t know that people made fanart of the PTCG games. I have to wonder how the artist reacted when you asked them if you could pothole their doodle.

That's because they don't. I had this commissioned specifically for use in my fic.

Probably wild ones too given how Isaac looks like he’d get up to some dumb and stupid and yet thrilling antics. :V

This is technically all true.

Huh. That actually makes me wonder why they did have shared music for the Grass and Lightning Clubs. I wonder if that was a technical limitation.

Not sure, but it makes the leaders of the club being married to each other make a tiny bit more sense than it would otherwise, so I'm not complaining.

Priorities!™

Should’ve kept chasing after Nikki, bro.

Truth.

I looked this up on BP and apparently these two are actually club masters in the first PTCG game. That’s some impressive attention to detail there. Though does that mean that one day we’ll get a novelized PTCG 1 Let’s Play?

This lets play is kind of intended as that for both games since the 2nd game is mostly just a better first game. The only thing the 2nd game didn't have that the first game did was the story.

Sudden Trails in the Sky music jumpscare. I wasn’t expecting that one.

I enjoy that series and when there is a good opportunity to inject music from it, I will. Nice to see you using the soundtrack, though! And just so you know, I consider the soundtrack to get better as the fic goes but I try to use fitting tracks everywhere in it.

And yeah, should’ve been chasing after Nikki there, buddy.

He really should have. He screwed that up badly.

Which, uh… given your current money troubles, is highly debatable as to if that was worth it or not.

Oof! Insult to his injury! True though.

Okay, not that the protag going into his backstory isn’t informative, but I do wonder if it’d have made sense to provide a bit more framing about what suddenly put this on his mind and encouraged him to put it into his diary entry for the day at the start of the scene. For instance, is he killing time while waiting on his next card battle?

What encouraged him as pointed out in the narrative, was seeing Heather. Heather is Nikki's daughter. Heather looks just like Nikki did when Nikki was Heather's age. MC knew Nikki the most when Nikki was a kid. That is where the bulk of his interaction with Nikki came from. Seeing Heather takes him back.

Just saying, I don’t think this is going to get you any closer to getting a girlfriend than last time.

Still better than sitting around his house, though.

Well, I mean, they’re not wrong. But I suppose it’s on our protagonist to actually give them hope that this isn’t going to be a curbstomp, huh?

That it is.

So just how many butterflies are in our protag’s stomach with a smile like that on his face anyways?

Depends. Sometimes its to mask negativity. Sometimes its genuine.

You have a small typo here.

Yes, he loves to set those!

This once again feels a bit too “live-time” relative to the diary format that this story is rendered in.

Oh, so do they also force you to battle in the PTCG games every time that happens, too? ^^;

Nah, you have to walk up and talk to start battles in the PTCG.

Though I do feel like it would make a bit more sense to play up the whole “Oh. Nikki’s here too”-ness, since I’m sure that the protag had some feelings seeing her again.

Indeed he did but more of that will come later.

Which again, should be giving you quite a bit of pause as to how successfully you’re going to be able to leverage climbing to the top again for being able to get a girlfriend, buddy.

Oh, so that’s what the ‘forever alone’ face looks like in the PTCG games. /s

Maaaybe.

I’ll admit, I wasn’t expecting a guy in as nice of duds as our protagonist to just sit on the floor, but I suppose that it wouldn’t be the weirdest thing about these islands and the world that they’re in.

Yeah. Kind of like my reaction to realizing that these psychopaths have no duel tables in the vast majority of places that duels take place in.

Yeah, see the comment about not being the weirdest thing about these islands.

And things are only going to get weirder as it goes. I look forward to your theories and reactions to stuff.

Wait, is this an actual thing that happens in the PTCG games? I’ll admit that I wouldn’t have expected it, since you’d think that professional card gaming would rapidly get uncomfortable without a nice table to sit on.

It's heavily implied. How else would they duel without tables and duel disks?

Just filing that one away as a thing that’s part of the in-setting culture there.

Just remember. The game did it, not me!

Wait, it does? I’m not sure how being on the floor would directly correlate to using a stall deck or not.

Really? A stallout deck stalls. It makes games take forever. The longer it takes the more uncomfortable it would be to keep sitting on the floor. Faster games mean less sitting.

Whelp, time for our impending curbstomp.

Indeed. 🧐

Huh. I wonder if we’re going to get an actual honest-to-goodness war story for the card battles this time around, since I remember that being something that I wished was present in the v1 of the story.

Well, I can promise you it will work way better than what you saw in the original, at least.

Hm. Looks like we won’t be getting a full blow-by-blow, though I suppose that makes sense even in a diary-formatted story, since I would not expect a diary-writer to document every single turn used for setup in a card game.

I don't want to bog it down too much, but I do add way more details than I used to.

I wonder if it’d have made sense to include some sort of turn tracker in spoilers or something like that. Assuming you didn’t do it at the very end as part of an action log or something like that.

Turn tracker? Why? What difference does it make what turn it is from a reader perspective?

I do wonder if the card list of what’s getting played / in the hands of the different characters would work better differentiated from the surrounding text a bit more. Some food for thought, anyways.

You might be on to something here! Could you elaborate more on this or perhaps provide examples?

Girl, this guy is a one-time champion. You sure you want to get this confident right now?

😅

Oh, so we are getting card battle war stories this go around. Neat.

😁

A shame that you didn’t have stills from the emulator when writing this out, since I feel that might’ve helped a lot for visualizing these different card plays that were happening.

The problem with that is that they don't really give a good indication of things from one screen. You usually have to go into different menus to get the full picture of how the duel is progressing. They sound good on paper, but probably not in practice.

Ah, I see that someone prefers to play conservatively here.

Only when prudent to do so.

I can already see Brittany’s

face from across the tarp, since boy is her luck crashing and burning in live-time right now.

I warned you about getting confident there, Brittany.

Yep. She should have listened. Oh well.

I feel like the “concealed” doesn’t quite work there. And once again, it is probably worth doing something to differentiate the text of these ‘card list’ parts from the rest of the narration.

Nice idea! I applied it.

Protag:

“I just said that I was playing a deck with only commons. Nothing about going easy with it.”

RNG can be a dick like that. Even if usually it’s not in the player’s favor like this.

It really can! It's a menace.

Not that our protagonist isn’t immediately familiar with the different cards and what they’d do, I kinda wonder if it’d be worth elaborating on what the attributes of these cards are in some capacity. Whether by inserting it into the narration, or something more meta like hovertexting explanations over the different cards the first time they pop up in the story or something like that.

I don't want to bog down the narration with cards I already listed in the prologue as part of the deck, but I guess you are talking about opponent cards. It's true that I didn't provide pictures for those. Hovertexting might be a good compromise. I've never used that before, though. Would you be willing to explain how to use it?

Now that’s more along the lines of the RNG that I was expecting there.

I'm glad she was able to get a good hit in when I played her in the game. Spiced things up a bit!

Ah, alas. Though funny that the very first battle in this story is going to be such a fraught affair.

Luck be like that sometimes. The narrative is still bound by the lets-play skeleton that frames it.

Um… protag? Your confidence is starting to scare me right now, since usually things don’t end well in stories when you assume you’ve won in advance.

Nah, when he gets confident, the opponent should be trembling. When he is worried, the reader should be for him too. He is extremely good at understanding the game state. Especially compared to the other duelists in the world.

If our protag was less of a gentleman, I could already see him busting out the popcorn right about now.

Yeah!

Alas, I couldn’t find a good rip of the 4-second victory jingle, so just imagine that’s playing in the background.

It has been imagined!

Protag: “Er… no? This was more of a thing that I was doing since I needed to rebuild my savings account.” ^^;

Yep! 😅

Oh, so she’s still cranky about this at the end, huh? Since losing to an all-common deck has got to sting one’s pride in a society where card games are the end-all-be-all of everything.

Indeed. Refusing to duel someone with that handicap essentially screams to the world that their deck is extremely weak. Duelists have too much pride to run and hide from it.

Ah yes, one step closer to making those money issues a thing of the past.

Yeah! She is sure. Why do you ask?

Ah, so I see that we’re not getting full war stories for each battle. Though I suppose that makes sense from the protag’s perspective, since describing his deck nuking his opponents from orbit in detail sounds like it’d get repetitive after a while.

Yes it would. Also, not every reader wants to read all the duels. It was about finding a balance which I think I've achieved. (hopefully)

Heather, don’t make me bust out that Bender gif again.

Which would explain a thing or two about why we’re not getting a proper war story for it. ^^;

Even if I do hope that we at least get those regularly for the more important battles in this story.

The important battles have duel details and even some of the unimportant ones do too.

Protag: “You certainly did!” ^.^

Protag: “(Also, I kinda need to pay my mortgage, so I’ll just be taking those booster packs, please…)” ^^;

Is our protag going to be able to convince everyone on the island to try battling him? Since you’d think that word would get around that the ex-Champ is now going around and stomping everyone with a deck of common cards.

It doesn't matter. It's a common deck. Anyone who beats him gets to say they beat him in a duel. (A feat that rarely almost never happened when he was using his unrestricted deck.) Everyone has too much pride to run from it.

Not convinced that things are really going to be that easy, but duly noted there.

That, and I’m pretty sure that the protag isn’t ready to navigate all those ‘coulda, shoulda, woulda’s regarding his once-fling with Nikki right here and now. ^^

Correct!

Alright, I’ll be leaving things here for now given the wall time. Though once again, I have to commend you for doing a story built around the TCG games. It’s a really unique premise in general and by and large it’s been executed quite well from what I’ve seen of this story so far.

That feedback means a lot to me. Thank you!

I also thought that the diary format was a lot more engaging to read than the one that you used for the v1 of the story, and it basically gives you a convenient out for when things go into detail and when things reel said detail in as needed. I can’t tell how much of that is deliberate or a happy accident, but I did notice it.

Yes!! I'm very happy to hear this!

Also, once again, your multimedia game is on point, since the embedded images and audio added a lot to the reading experience.

That's what I was really hoping!

Originally I added those things as crutches to help supplement my lack of writing experience, but there is no reason to take them away just because my writing improved, either!

On the more critical end of things, I did find myself wondering if a few sections of the chapter were going a bit far out on a limb relative to what one would write in a diary, especially the ones that read more like entries from a liveblog. I feel that there’s a few things that you can do to smooth them over and make them still fit your format (see: the throwaway suggestion of adding a note in passing that the protag would be making multiple entries during the day for the diary entries that start getting into multiscene territory).

At least this seems like a minor grip rather than a major one. 🤔

A part of me also wonders if things would’ve been better for the story to include a few emulator screencaps showing the state of play for these different games, since it was admittedly a bit hard for me to visualize the state of the protag and his opponents’ decks sometimes.

I'm not too sure what to do to help with that... I don't think screencaps would work as well as you imagine.

I also think it would’ve potentially been worth it to include some meta explanation of what the cards are and what they do, whether in the narration, or by blunter methods such as hovertext notes.

I think adding it to the narration would be a bit too clunky for most readers. Hovertext would probably be better, but I don't know how to implement those. If you would be willing to explain how, I'd appreciate it.

Also, I thought it’d have been worth having more differentiation between the text for the card listings and the text format used for the rest of the story, since as it stands, they kinda blend together a bit visually.

I think for this, I'm going to need examples and specific ideas. If I implement something and you don't like it, it makes it kind of pointless since you are the one with the idea for it. If I'm going to implement something, ideally, I would prefer it to be something you like.

But altogether, I had fun with this chapter.

YES!!

I’m not really sure why things are clicking for me so much more this time around, but I really do feel that it boils down to the subtle but important change in how the story is currently framed compared to your v1.

Book One is a big step up from the original fic. I'm so glad it shines through to your overall enjoyment!

I hope that the feedback was helpful for you, @Tango ,

I might need a little more explanation to put it to best use. I like some of the ideas you have and I think they would be good to implement but the how/what aspects of it are a little lost on me, currently.

and I’ll be looking forward to chipping away a bit more at our review exchange in the not-too-distant future.

I'm trying to work my way back around to Fledglings too, but this blitz has been rather crazy so far. If it gets a bit lopsided in the short term, I'll catch up on it later. Hopefully my overall reputation speaks for me on that.

But this was a great review!! As I have come to anticipate from you.

 

[Tango]

*Knock, knock* I have returned with a multi-chapter review!! Excited to continue with this!

Ooo! I'm excited to have you back!

(Even with that sick roasting you gave me later on! It's fine, keep em coming! )

Spoiler: Chapter 2 reactions

Omg why is he so adamantly against hats LMAO Give me the hat lore!!

You have asked and I have delivered. Updated my chapter for the bit below!

The sky was partly cloudy, but there was still plenty of opportunities for the sun to beam down. The water of the lake glistened in the light. A hearty breeze was blowing today. Had I been wearing a hat, (not that I would be caught dead in one) it might have blown away!​

​

Hats. A means of concealing a perfectly wonderful head of natural hair! One did not visit the finest barber on TCG Island to merely cover up their work with some plebeian head covering!​

​

Ridding my mind of the infernal head-cages as I strolled, I took notice of the occasional fisherman angling for some fresh-water fish, which were quite the rarity. Fishing was greatly limited on the lake to preserve the species of fish in it. If one was skilled, they could make a healthy living that way. Fishing may be enjoyable as a novelty, but doing it all day as an occupation did not appeal to me..​

Actually very curious how he would know this because hasn't he been Champion for only a short amount of time? Or is it more of a "they want to date whoever the Champion is, and it's always been that way" kind of thing.

A good point! I've updated it to the following:

It was the girls of this club that had wanted to 'date the Champion'. Naturally that extended to those speculated to become Champion, of which I was the prime target... Each of them had amazing figures.​

...One might even say they were... shallow.

HAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!

Or even trying to reel in a big fish.

Nice ones!

I should hope they're both the same age if they're twin sisters!!

I'm so sorry, this is an unintentional sentence structure nitpick -- like I know what you were intending to mean by this, but the way it was structured technically implies this -- but I'm pointing it out because I found it funny and think it's really funny if your character actually does think like this and didn't realize them being twins meant they obviously were the same age.

This is great! I'm leaving it in and this is now my official interpretation!

Ok if this is Amanda, are they identical twins or fraternal twins? Because the art is reading to me as fraternal twins.

Identical that use different hair dye. Or at least that's what I'm going with. The art does make them seem a bit different maybe, but it's funnier if they are identical, so that's what I'm sticking with.

How many people are in the clubs generally? As a world building thing I mean. Like is it just these three girls and one guy? Because you do say that Joshua is the only guy in the club.

Well, I copied the game for it. In the game there are generally 4 people in a club. Three members and one Master.

I had the same question with the Grass club too. Because you mentioned advertisement for them being not needed due to how big it was, these clubs being essentially the heart of the whole island, and TCG being the world's favorite thing, so I'm more so curious why membership seems low? Or is this just a game-specific thing I don't get?

Ok, so you brought up a question no one asked yet. I've given it some thought and I think it makes sense to explain/make it like this:

Most people on the island don't play the game as well as club members and Club Masters. Club members and masters are still way less skilled than Mister Gentleman. So he is playing against the best of the best even though their best isn't very impressive.

Most TCG games that take place on their island happen at duel tables in the lounge of most clubs or at peoples homes. That's where the duel tables are. Remember from Chapter 1 that beginners tend to play at tables. This limits the number of people that play in the main rooms of the clubs to those who are either testing the waters or are very confident in their TCG skills.

Why is he staying as a club member if it's literally the worst experience for him tho? Because he really seems impervious to their charms and sees through it, so why is he putting up with them?

Being a club member is a prestigious position even though it seems weak. That's why he stays.

LMAO

This is my favorite character now This drawing of him is perfect. Absolutely perfect. Idk really who you are beyond this intro yet, Imakuni, but I don't have to -- I'm sold.

I knew it! I knew you would be an Imakuni fan! I could sense it!

He looks like he's gonna jump out of an alleyway and uncomfortably ask middle-aged women to buy cell-phone plans or, like, insurance, as a very misguided corporate stunt to attempt to be "more relatable by creating a mascot character," but all it amounts to is an uncomfortable situation for everyone involved. It's perfect.

There is also a red Imakuni from GR Island. In the big tournament arc I have planned, they will start their match in a card duel but it will devolve (or evolve?) into a dance off. They are both going to be wearing antigrav boots and dance away into the sunset sky to determine who wins. This will disqualify them from the tournament, but they(the Imakuni's) will consider it a casualty of war. (I'm not kidding. I'm 95% sure that will become canon)

This reminds me of what they think of each other:

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=np1TwAMBdrU

He looks like his best friend would be a magic 8 ball. He would consult this magic 8 ball for all important decisions such as curating his stock portfolio. "Should I buy stock in Apple?" *shakes ball* "Signs point to yes."

Wow, this bit... this is some comedic gold! I might do that with him later!

Also, he also has mad Tamagotchi-character energy if you know what I mean.

He's got something that's for sure!

...Menacingly.

Natuarally.

Love the idea that Doduo didn't know magical incredible Imakuni and was just reeled in by his sheer aura to become his flash dance partner.

You know... I'm pretty sure that's what actually happened there!

Love!! I was hoping he was real. Best character, 10/10, no notes. Appeared out of nowhere, said literally nothing, danced, then peaced out. Immaculate vibes.

Certainly the most random thing I've had in my fic that I can think of lol

Spoiler: Chapter 3 reactions

"We've been trying to reach you about your car's extended warranty..."

With how many feathers are about, I'm surprised Doduo isn't looking a bit sparse himself, damn.

Actually, the reason for that is because they potentially grow back super fast. Like insanely fast. Way faster than should be possible for any living being to do. And no, I'm not kidding. It's a real feature of the Doduo in their world. That is not based on the game, that's lore I invented.

Awww poor Gotan doesn't seem to vibe with the name.

Heck no. Would you if someone got your name backwards?

The Doduo distribution system has chosen you. Be honored

Either way, he aint getting out of it!

The idea that "Pokemon TCG" is normie culture is SO FUNNY

It is in that world anyway!

I meaaaaan they've already been procured from Doduo. But if he cares how "fresh" the feather is from off of the lawn, go off lol. Hopefully he has a special way to pick up feathers off the ground

He does. It's his glorified self-invented vacuum cleaner, the Feathermaster 5,000!

Lol you're the one asking for the favor and inviting yourself over here, Rick I don't really think you're in the position here to be complaining about the work you willingly took on of your own design.

Ah, Rick is the type to invite more people over lmao... or he could be talking about Gotan, but let's hope he's not.

Nah, he just wants Mister Gentleman to drink with him.

Spoiler: Chapter 4 reactions

Essentially, a vacuum cleaner lol

Yep! I love it!

Ok, but why does everyone want to date him??

It's like he is a famous celebrity. Tons of people want to date him. But keep in mind most of the people that are wanting to date him are very into the Pokemon TCG.

Tbh "being Champion" doesn't work in ever situation, especially here.

True, because he wasn't the Champion at that point.

Also tbh this is pretty unprofessional on her part, potentially even going to get her in trouble with the university depending on rules, and you've made her seem like a very professional and put-together person thus far, so what is happening here exactly with her with this to motivate this?

What's motivating her? Fine, I shall explain with only a manigible level of spoilers.

She spent a lot of time around him and trained him to be the best duelist in the world to the point where he could duel her and win. No one else in their world was able to do that. Due to that and the time she spent around him, she developed feelings for him. She wasn't intending or wanting to form those feelings nor did she realze she would develop them. She asked him out not in the hopes he would say yes, but because she knew he would reject him. She knew that not from intuition, but because she has the power of foresight. Doctor Wem is secretly a psychic. She needed that rejection for some closure because she knew she needed to part ways with him after his training was complete. Psycic powers are a thing in their world if you remember from the prologue. In fact, the reason she became an instructor was 100% for his benefit even though she taught others too. That's why she began there not long before his arrival to the university and is why she left not long after he graduated. She knew she needed to train him. As for why, those are answers for later.

LOL as a sister to two brothers myself, I can tell you that the real answer you'd give to "Just because he's your brother doesn't make him bad for others..." (which, for real, I have actually heard variations of this before) is:

"Ew, no."
"You're an idiot."
"He's an idiot."
"Really?? That *brother name*?? Ew, why?"
"Literally how."
And so on haha!

Interesting. You are the first person to comment on this aspect, I think. He did start with a reply like one of the ones above. He is just good at seeing things from the perspective of others.

Ehhh, to be honest, this on her as well given she didn't speak up or make a move herself.

Valid!

I also think this is really shallow of her too to just pick someone that was there if she didn't also have feelings for him.

Ah you are making an assumption there. Also, you seem to cause me to reveal spoilers in order to defend my writing... (That does seem like some karma coming back to bite me. I have no one to blame but myself lol...) Not everything needs to be explained right away! But to attempt to satisfy you, the answer is below.

In fact, she had feelings for them both. Rick incorrectly assumed she settled for him because she was unhappy after, but the real cause of her greif is that she considered it a betrayal of Mister Gentleman, especially after he became Champion since that was the condition she set when they were all young to determine which of them she would marry. (she already had crushes on both of them by that point)

Later chapters delve into this more but I prefer to hold some of this back for now. Hopefully that helps! 😅

Doesn't exactly paint her to be a good person either -- it makes her seem like she's taking advantage of Isaac's feelings for the convenience of marriage. Instead of feeling bad for Nikki and MC, I feel bad for Isaac.

See explaination above.

I really hope this is more so the relationship being incorrectly filtered through the lens of someone not in the relationship.

Indeed it is.

Not that I need the Nikki and Isaac marriage to be happy, but you've essentially painted Nikki as a wonderful sweet girl who could do no wrong, and this is a really terrible and manipulative thing to do that's being entirely brushed off.

Brushed off? Even if that were the case, what are they supposed to do about it?

Don't love that Rick, her brother, and the MC, who supposedly loves her's first thought is "let's break up their family,"

WOAH! Hold on there!

That is absolutely not what I wrote! 😅
I think I'm going to need to reword it, because you are not the first person to somehow get this bizarre interpretation!

Two things happening here:
1. He is happy that MC tried to get better at the TCG as a way of making Nikki happy.
2. Since he missed the boat with Nikki, if there is a chick (aka not specifically Nikki as he would not refer to her as "a chick" and would just use her name) he is interested in, he will help make a good impression for him (whatever that is supposed to entail)

But the fact that you aren't the first person to view it this way means this isn't a coincidence and is instead a problem with my wording being too open to interpret it that way.

I've reworded to the following with bold being the change:

"You know, dude? You're alright. You did all that to try to make Nikki happy. Ima be your wing-man ok? I need more feathers from that crazy bird of yours, so Ima just follow you around and pick up feathers, but if there's some other chick you dig, I use some science or crap to get her to notice you..."​

Thank you for pointing that out! I don't want people getting the wrong idea here! 😅

and doesn't even consider the fact that Nikki might be happy at this point in life, that maybe she did move on, and maybe she loves her daughter and husband??

Nikki is very much not happy and Rick can tell.

It really seems like Nikki and MC only had crushes years ago that never evolved into a relationship, and being unable to understand why a married woman with a kid would probably not leave her family for a crush she had years ago that never even lead to a date is really odd.

MC doesn't want Nikki to leave her kids. He just believes she is unhappy and doesn't understand why she would marry and stay with someone who (from his currently incorrect perspective, seems to be someone she didn't really love to begin with)

I think the misunderstanding about what Rick was conveying played pretty heavily into this, so I'm guessing that is probably ok now, but feel free to comment again if not.

Also, don't love how Nikki's brother is reducing his sister to just a very simplistic stereotype.

Yeah... this be some karma, I think. Look, I'll be more careful in reviewing your characters later ok? Just stop roasting me please!

But to give an actual reply, he didn't mean she is traditional in the sense that it defines her as a person, just that she takes marriage as something that is supposed to be for life and that stance is a traditional one. Thus, she is 'traditional' in that sense. Does that help?

Women can be traditional, and there's nothing wrong with that, but when it's your brother and they're describing your marriage and the only thing they can think of to say about you has nothing to do with your feelings, personality, wants, or desires, but is just "she's traditional" makes it seem like Rick is a terrible brother and/or Nikki doesn't have wants/feelings/personality/etc beyond "traditional," which is why I say it feels like a stereotype in this instance.

See reply above.

Because there's no second note to her at all so far yet.

But she hasn't even had dialogue yet!

Down tiger, DOWN! No! I need my leg, stop chewing it! AAAAAHHHHHH!!!!

Rick doesn't say, "Nikki isn't happy," he says, "Years ago, she picked another guy and is traditional." It really makes me think that Rick doesn't know or care about his sister at all, and is only able to say things about her relationship that may have been true and occurred years ago at the start of her marriage.

Well, at least you feel comfortable enough to roast me. I can appreciate it for that. 😅

But to give an actual answer, It's very much the opposite for Rick. He cares about her quite a bit and knows her as well as a brother does but doesn't know the whole story because she is bad at opening up to people.

I think our different ways of thinking causes some friction, but it's also kind of exciting!

It's just odd that he can only mention things that were surface level and applicable in time years ago -- it makes it feel like he doesn't know her.

But he is drunk. He isn't exactly super profound at the moment! 😅

Additionally, I'll also say that the MC when describing her and his feelings for her even all the way back in the chapter we first meet her in the Grass club, really appears to be that the thing he loves about her is that she's "traditional,"

Is it? I went back and re-read the relevant bits of chapter one. He didn't explain why he had a crush on her. He only speculated her shyness might be part of it. He likes how she appears to keep her club orderly and speculated that she takes care of her family with the same diligence and attention. Are there things he could have added in that section to expand on things more? Sure. Does the fact that he did not go into more depth in that section mean that he sees her as a stereotype? No!

which is really shallow on his part too if that's the main reason why he loves her, not anything else about her. Because of that, I don't really believe MC's feelings for her, and more so think he just likes the idea of her.

He had a crush on her when he was young. Once he met her he spent his time with her and Isaac playing cards with them. He was there to spend time with both of them. Nikki mentioned she would marry whoever of the two of them became the Champion.(She was serious about it at the time.) This lit a fire in his heart and he dedicated his life to the pursuit of that goal. When they were young teens they stopped hanging out due to drama that occurred. He kept pursuing the goal to be with her. She didn't wait for him and started dating Isaac. He pursued ahead anyway since he was always into the TCG anyway.

You don't find anything romantic at all about him trying to prove himself in her eyes and dedicating his life to it? Nothing that suggests a genuine desire from him to be with her?

I really hope Nikki's not this 1-dimensional and that there's more to her we get later.

Nope. That's all there is. The stuff from one chapter about a character defines their entire existence. There is nothing else that can possibly add to it!

I think the issue here is that I don't explain everything about every character up front. I reward patience and additional reading with depth and additional nuance for my characters. I treat my characters as mysteries for the reader to uncover and speculate on. I reveal things about characters in stages. I guess this makes them seem one dimensional early on, but there is more to them than that.

Also, I recognize they were drunk, but how MC is talking about and thinking about Nikki in this scene is essentially identical to how he talks about her when he's not drunk.

He didn't go very far in depth when he was at the club because he was there to duel not sit an day dream all day and when he is drunk he isn't going much in depth either.

Totally realize I went off on a little bit of a rant here LOL,

Yes, and my left leg is chewed and sitting in the corner. You left some meat on it by the way...

but take it with the only best intentions please!!

Ok. But only because you asked nicely. 😉

Omg they even ordered pizza I do really enjoy how they've suddenly become domesticated living with each other friends.

He has the feathers and Rick provides the lawn service. It was inevitable.

...But also didn't Rick have an important thing to do and had no time to waste which was why he insisted on coming over ASAP in the first place?

Or so he said...

A little confused why that's changed.

Pretense.

I get they're hung over, but that doesn't stop scheduled events from happening or deadlines lol.

Nah, but he has his club members to handle those things for him. Also, he does occasionally go home to take care of crap.

Also, Rick really doesn't seem the type to lounge around all day watching movies given how frantic he usually is.

Sometimes he is frantic, sometimes he is not. Welcome to Rick.

Interesting. I commented on this before in my last review, but I'm curious as to why this "Doduo is linked to the cards and takes damage" phenomena is happening Hopefully this is something the fic will eventually address.

I try to address all the weird things in my fic at some point or another. This has a real in-fic explanation which will be addressed.

I know this is not *quite* the case, but I do kind of like the mental image of MC's two companions being Gotan and just a guy named Rick that both decided to stick themselves to MC and follow him around at all times.

It's close enough to that for you to hold onto that mental image, because things are just getting started! 🤩

Overall, this was a very fun continuation!!

What was that? I can't hear you over the sewing machine I'm using to close the wound from my missing leg!

I think the humor lands a lot more in these next few chapters, and I can tell you're getting into the swing of things by how the writing flows a lot more naturally in these chapters. My lack of TCG knowledge and game-lore is definitely leading to questions I know are just built in things I don't understand, but I felt that there were a lot less of those questions this time!

That and it can be hard to distinguish between game insanity and my own crafted insanity. 😅

But it's great you are settling in well!

Dodou is finally introduced, and he is wonderful!!

Best birdo he is!

The sprite art of his vacant stare is absolutely perfect, and I love how he's just a silly little guy with complexity we'll hopefully slowly get into.

Gotan is quite complex as you will find...

You've done a great job at the characterization of Gotan, and I actually enjoy how he's written the most!

I think you will enjoy his antics and the revelations about him as the journey continues.

Outside of Imakuni, who even if he never shows up again will be very hard to dethrone as the best character,

It's a bit of a tall order to fill. I guess we will have to wait and see if any other does it for you that good!

Gotan is my favorite character! I'm interested to see how his lore and character will build out as well as watching Gotan and MC's relationship develop.

MC is very not good at recognizing certain signs...

OH YEAH! I wanted to ask -- Does the MC have a name??

He does not. Yet. Getting one is a major plot point for him later. Not even joking. 😅

Because I haven't spotted one yet, and I've been wondering if this was intentional or not.

1000% intentional.

I have two main points of critique!

Back for the other leg, huh? Can I at least keep half of it this time?

The first is that it feels like there’s a difference in scale being emphasized a lot that creates conflicting world building and leaves me with questions. Like if this island is emphasized as a TCG major hub with a university and everyone is just deeply into TCG, why is it that there are only like 4 people in a famous renown club that apparently advertises?

Oh good I answered this one already! That was close!

And in the case of the Grass club, why are those members essentially all children?

Well, the meta reason is because that's what the game did.

As for the story reason, it's because kids are allowed to work in TCG Clubs as members or masters. They have to fit it into their schooling schedule. Also, most adults are no better at the game than kids, but adults are better at learning adult jobs than kids are. This causes there to be more kid members of clubs than adults. Also, kids they get older tend to leave when they realize they aren't good enough to become the next Club Master.
Does that help?

That’s just one example, but this discrepancy in scale actually happens a lot and beyond just the clubs. You'll do something that makes the world seem very large, and then the next bit of world building makes the world seem very small in a way that contradicts the previous world building. It's fine if you want the world to be small or big, but you can't have both at the same time when addressing the same beat.

Feel free to point out more examples of this. I need to at least have a working headcanon to explain them.

The second point being that your female characters are very one note,

So, you might not have noticed this, but I don't currently have any female main characters. (Which is actually pretty funny, because my series as a whole is planned to have MANY female main characters! Way more than male, actually! And that was planned before I started writing Book One.)

Female characters are not one note because they are female. If any character in the series has less substance to them, it is because they haven't had as much screentime for me to try to add more to them.

There are more than 32 characters from TCG Island alone. Adding all the characters from GR Island too puts it I think at about 100 characters. Because this fic is built on a lets-play skeleton, I am required to use all of these characters. If I devoted the level of depth you seem to be suggesting into every character, my fic would become diluted and the main characters would get lost in the sea of side-character depth.

I also want to point out that many of the club members are simply not going to have a lot of depth to them. Club Masters have a bit more depth in many cases.

which makes them come off as stereotypes, some scenes feeling rather misogynistic because of that,

see explaination above.

and the way male characters talk about/interact with/describe female characters is often very reductional.

see explanation above.

Additionally, it's fair of me to point out that all of the female characters thus far fall into one of two camps: 1. are literal children,

see explanation above.

or 2. want to date MC and that appears to serve as one of their main character motivations.

Ok, but the Water Club was like that to be funny. The other females are kids(the grass club members). Nikki is an exception and Wem is an exception.

You act like I've introduced 50 female characters already!

Doctor Wem was the exception to this... aaaaaand then it dropped in chapter 4 that no, she was not the exception to this, she did want to date him, and it's somewhat implied that she only favored and taught the MC because she wanted to date him. The same goes for Nikki (I talked about her a lot above already haha).

see explanation above.

There's absolutely nothing wrong with having your MC be a desired figure, but the problem is only that there isn't anything else of major note being given to these women for characterization

Yet. Keyword is yet. Also see explanation above.

(Dr. Wem does have her TCG knowledge and career, but the reveal in chapter 4 honestly undercut and went directly against that characterization because of how big of a deal a professor dating a student really is, which makes her seem way less professional and caring about her work/career than she'd been depicted as so far)

That's because she didn't care about her career. She was only there for MC to begin with. Oh and if you are wondering, Wem had MANY things going on outside of the MC. Even during her university tenure.

and that all women seemingly fall at his feet.

See explaination a while back.

I'd really love to see some more depth and complexity to them!!

Well, if you are patient, maybe you will get some!

Can I have my other leg back now?

ALSO, to be clear -- that's not to say you can't have shallow women/gold diggers/etc!! You can,

I can?!

and they can be great characters! Not every female (or male) character has to have depth and complexity. But right now, it's all of the women in this fic, not one or two or a few of the female characters, which is why I'm wanting to point this out.

Fine, but at least let me keep my leg as a stump at the knee. I want to look cool with a pegleg!

Also, see explanation a while back.

To put it another way, this fic would not pass the Bechdel Test right now lolol. It's definitely something that could be improved upon!

Well, my series as a whole definitely would. So I wouldn't worry about it.

As a whole, really great job!!

Thanks!

I'll be sure to continue reading later!!

All joking aside, thanks a bunch for the review! Feel free to reply to my reply here or PM me or discuss on discord! All options are valid.

 

[Nekodatta]

Spoiler: Chapter 30

Isaac was crying hard into his arm, while holding Nikki with the other as she cried on him

Aww, it's cute that he's still crying for him after all

Rick approached me as he spoke. "Mister Gentleman, I'm going to stand beside you. That way you have someone with you at the end."

Awwww RICK.

glanced towards him. "You get enough feathers?"

"Six."

Rick smiled. "Had enough ages ago..."

AWWWW OMG I CAN'T

There was screaming in the distance. Nikki? I opened my eyes, but instead of Mew's Solarbeam, there was a white lab coat... RICK!

RICK NOOOOO NOT MY BOY RICK

Suddenly, a mass of feathers was there too! TANGO!

He looked at me part-excited, but far more afraid...

The beam connected as I witnessed the life drain from Tango's eyes.

Tango NOOOO
I also really liked the detail that he was kind of afraid, and using the recolored images!

He then put his hands into the ashes and pulled out an object. It looked like a big black rock like a volcanic rock or meteor.

Interesting...

Mew levitated on her side like she was about to take a nap. Her hands were used a makeshift pillow. "The core of a Doduo is that through which its essence flows and allows them to regenerate. There are only two known ways to destroy one. The first is by an Aeroblast attack. The other is a Sacred Fire attack."

It's not quite reincarnation like my theory but maybe there's still something else behind it, because this feels... Extremely specific. I also wonder if there's a reason behind those two attacks in particular...
Oh wait.
They are the two signature moves of Lugia and Ho-oh!!
It took me a moment because I always forget that Aeroblast is a signature move, compared to "Sacred Fire" it doesn't feel quite as unique oops.
That has to mean something...

Mew threw her hands up in the air. "So what? You don't want to know why all this went down? Perhaps you want to stand? Doesn't matter to me since I can just float, but I thought you might prefer the comfy chair!"

Isaac stared at her. I imagined he was squinting behind his sunglasses. He then slowly started walking towards the chairs glaring at Mew the entire way.

Ok I'm not sure why by this made me laugh, the mental image of Isaac glaring at her behind his sunglasses.

This chapter was crazy!! So something is up with Doduo since they are apparently... immortal?
They regenerate and since no one has found remains of a Doduo I assume that every Doduo can do it, but there's still his way too human behaviour like the pizza thing that is... Suspicious.
And I wasn't expecting Mew to *be* the Oracle, that's interesting... So there actually is no AI at all? Or did she make the Oracle?

Spoiler: Chapter 31

Mew crossed her arms. "No! ...Yes? Not exactly. I play the role faithfully! But... yeah I don't need any help from psychics. I gain answers with my ability to see the future and pretend to calculate it.

RIP Murray's self-esteem, nobody tell the poor guy lol

Rick brought a hand to his chin. "Recalling my own words, I asked you to make Nikki happy again no matter what it took. It seems you took that quite literally... The Oracle helped Isaac understand he was wrong and reforged the friendship he had with Mister Gentleman, but trying to make up for lost time required more than that."

Isaac frowned. "It's true... he entered the first game as a way to save me even though walking away would have let him be with Nikki... I'll never doubt him again. He's my friend for life."

Ooooh wait so this was all Mew's way of satisfying his request??? Oh snap

Suddenly I was envious of Isaac and Rick for having glasses to obscure tears.

Rick's glasses are clear, so I like to think they do the anime shining thing like in his character portrait.

Rick closed his eyes as he smiled awkwardly. "Uh... well... It was a snap decision... I didn't want to see you die! I realized how dumb it was immediately after... Too late by that point..."

Poor guy lol

Mew bit her thumb. "But I didn't kill anyone! Tango doesn't mind being hurt! Everything is better now!"

"Also, pretty sure Tango enjoyed it"

Mews eyes were wide. "I don't understand it! When I try to use my psychic power to directly modify or erase part of my own philosophy... it MOVES!"

It does WHAT, that doesn't sound healthy

Mew yawned. "This one is old news. I figured it out centuries ago... Somewhere in the ocean is an invisible line. This line separates the area around Neo Island from the rest of the world. Passing that line transforms people into identical clones of each other. Returning back transforms them back into their original bodies. Ergo, Neo natives for us are clones, but when we go to Neo... we become clones ourselves."

OK WHAT. I THINK THIS IS THE BIGGEST LORE DROP IN THESE PAST CHAPTERS.
That's insane, but most importantly, they become clones of WHO? the same persons people from Neo Island look like? Or someone else?

Mew's eyes widened in fear as her whole body glowed. She spoke in our minds with panic! "Madness! Paradox! The taste of blue... The sound of red... The texture of green. Bright sound! Too many examples to count and ALL of them at once! Never again will I attempt to peer inside one with my power... I nearly went irreversibly insane from just a few seconds of it!"

Rick dropped his pen and pad with his mouth open.

Doduo are Cthulhu, got it.

Mew held a finger to her lips. "It's a secret, but I'll tell you a little about it. It will open your mind to new possibilities and grant you the ability to overcome your weakness."

Rick tilted his head. "A bit vague, but fine."

Mew nodded and floated over to Rick. She then placed her hands on Rick's shoulders and pressed her forehead to his forehead. A light purple glow enveloped them both. Within seconds the glow dimmed from around Mew and lingered on Rick. Mew let go and floated back a few feet. Within a few more seconds the glow faded around Rick.

Oh!!! She "upgraded" him, or anyway removed his weird mental block!!
(I ship them already help, I smell disaster duo incoming and it's no secret how much I love those lol
They also give me Okabe and Kurisu vibes except Rick is actually a mad scientist)

OK SO this chapter had some pretty huge lore drops, my opinion on Mew shifted a bit from what I said a couple chapters ago!! Can't wait to see how her relationship with Rick is going to go!!
The info from Neo Island is interesting because when Gentleman inevitably goes there it will be a completely fresh start, with all new cards to use, so that will be fun.
But I'm still really curious as for the in universe reason for that...

 

[Tango]

Spoiler: Chapter 30

Aww, it's cute that he's still crying for him after all

Well yeah. Mister Gentleman is his best friend. Isaac would probably do just about anything for him at this point.

Awwww RICK.

Awesome bro to the bitter end.

AWWWW OMG I CAN'T

Yep. He didn't even need the feathers for a long time. It was just a pretense to be there! 🥰

RICK NOOOOO NOT MY BOY RICK

It was nice knowing him. ()

Tango NOOOO
I also really liked the detail that he was kind of afraid, and using the recolored images!

Yeah, I usually don't do much with art, but I could do something simple like that!

It's not quite reincarnation like my theory but maybe there's still something else behind it, because this feels... Extremely specific.

Correct, there is something else behind it.

I also wonder if there's a reason behind those two attacks in particular...
Oh wait.
They are the two signature moves of Lugia and Ho-oh!!
It took me a moment because I always forget that Aeroblast is a signature move, compared to "Sacred Fire" it doesn't feel quite as unique oops.
That has to mean something...

Indeed it does.

Ok I'm not sure why by this made me laugh, the mental image of Isaac glaring at her behind his sunglasses.

This chapter was crazy!! So something is up with Doduo since they are apparently... immortal?

Apparently so...

They regenerate and since no one has found remains of a Doduo I assume that every Doduo can do it,

Indeed. They all can.

but there's still his way too human behaviour like the pizza thing that is... Suspicious.

Yes, it is!

And I wasn't expecting Mew to *be* the Oracle, that's interesting... So there actually is no AI at all? Or did she make the Oracle?

There is no AI. Mew pretends to be an AI in her role as The Oracle.

Spoiler: Chapter 31

RIP Murray's self-esteem, nobody tell the poor guy lol

Poor Murray. A life of lies. First the spoon and then this!

Ooooh wait so this was all Mew's way of satisfying his request??? Oh snap

YES!

Rick's glasses are clear, so I like to think they do the anime shining thing like in his character portrait.

Yup! That be what they do.

Poor guy lol

Yeah, his emotions got the best of him there.

"Also, pretty sure Tango enjoyed it"

The sensation, yes. The possibility of actually dying? Absolutely not. Tango was very afraid.

It does WHAT, that doesn't sound healthy

That's because it's very much not and it's completely out of Mew's control.

OK WHAT. I THINK THIS IS THE BIGGEST LORE DROP IN THESE PAST CHAPTERS.
That's insane, but most importantly, they become clones of WHO? the same persons people from Neo Island look like? Or someone else?

Standard clones. Their DNA would match the DNA that Neo Islanders do when they come to TCG Island. Females are all the same and males are all the same. And anyone from TCG Island or GR Island who goes to Neo becomes unable to duel by this affect too.

Doduo are Cthulhu, got it.

Probably as good a theory as any at this point!

Oh!!! She "upgraded" him, or anyway removed his weird mental block!!

Ooo!!! You actually guessed it! I was going to leave that a surprise for Book Four where I planned for Rick to make his grand return to the story. He is going to be learning how to play the TCG for real now with Mew helping him. He will have a Champion-level deck when he makes his grand return. But he has been and will continue to work on more than just that...

And by the way, Rick had absolutely no important roles in the fic prior to me writing Book One. I absolutely LOVE his unplanned addition to the series!

(I ship them already help,

Ooo! I was hoping someone would be of that opinion! (I ship them too and am strongly considering establishing them as an official romantic couple later!)

I smell disaster duo incoming and it's no secret how much I love those lol

Even if I don't put them in a relationship, I'll be having them spend a ton of time together and they will essentially be glued at the hip regardless going forward!

They also give me Okabe and Kurisu vibes except Rick is actually a mad scientist)

Indeed!

OK SO this chapter had some pretty huge lore drops, my opinion on Mew shifted a bit from what I said a couple chapters ago!!

Fantastic! It's ok if readers dislike Mew during the whole climax of the book, but I was hoping that would turn around for this part!

Can't wait to see how her relationship with Rick is going to go!!

Me too!

The info from Neo Island is interesting because when Gentleman inevitably goes there it will be a completely fresh start, with all new cards to use, so that will be fun.

Correct, it will be a fresh start for whoever the protagonist there will be. But regarding becoming a clone, there is a way to avoid becoming a temporary clone. The protagonist of Book Five: Neo Island will be able to avoid that condition but they will still need to use only Neo Island cards.

But I'm still really curious as for the in universe reason for that...

Oh trust me, there will be one. Also, Neo Island is geographically identical to TCG Island.

 

[Spiteful Murkrow]

Heya, I saw that your story was up for Review Tag onsite at the moment, so I figured it was as good an opportunity as any to get another chapter of this story under my belt for our review exchange:

Chapter 2

Spoiler: Line-by-Line

May 5th - Afternoon

Ah yes, the dawn of a new day, I see. I wonder if that’ll be the case for the different chapters in general this time around or if some days will stretch across multiple chapters.

(12)

​

Departing from the Grass Club, a short walk brought me to the light rail public transit. I rode it to the stop near the Water Club and would stroll the rest of the way.

Huh, wasn’t expecting the HGSS music, but it’s definitely chill and feels at place with a “watery” place.

The water club bordered the great forest of our island on the southeastern coast. Surrounding the Water Club on all sides was one of the only lakes in our world! As I learned in my time at the academy, the only other lake was on Neo Island. There was a natural bridge that connected out to the Water Club. It had a long concrete path complete with rails on the sides. Every so often, a pier would jut out.

Boy, the way that people in this setting talk about distances and scale in this world must be such a trip given that the entire known world would fit into the contours of a more spread-out metropolitan area.

The light rail had a stop next to the bridge. From there, it was only about a ten minute walk to the Water Club. Had the water club been in the middle of the lake, the walk likely would have taken thirty minutes, instead.

… Actually, where do they make all this machinery anyways given that TCG Island thus far hasn’t really vibed as being super populated up to this point?

Yes, yes, I know I’m overthinking it, but it’s still an interesting thought exercise to think of how a world that would fit snugly into the LA Basin if not a smaller area would operate.

The sky was partly cloudy, but there were still plenty of opportunities for the sun to beam down. The water of the lake glistened in the light. A hearty breeze was blowing today. Had I been wearing a hat, (not that I would be caught dead in one) it might have blown away!

Small typo there. I also feel like the underlined feels a bit too “liveblog” in framing for a diary entry that’s written a couple hours after the fact unless you’re very deliberately playing the angle that Jack is scribbling entries throughout the day.

Hats. A means of concealing a perfectly wonderful head of natural hair! One did not visit the finest barber on TCG Island to merely cover up their work with some plebeian head covering!

Jack: “Also because that would require an entire different set of custom sprites and my author’s not made of money.” ^^;

Ridding my mind of the infernal head-cages as I strolled, I took notice of the occasional fisherman angling for some fresh-water fish, which were quite the rarity. Fishing was greatly limited on the lake to preserve the species of fish in it. If one was skilled, they could make a healthy living that way. Fishing may be enjoyable as a novelty, but doing it all day as an occupation did not appeal to me…

Huh. So there’s only one species of Pokémon in this setting, but there’s normal fish akin to the early seasons of the anime. Bit of a strange dynamic there, but duly noted.

I soon found myself entering the water club.

(13)

The lobby was just as I remembered. Polished teal porcelain square tiles adorned the floors and fish tanks with coral lined the walls. The fish leisurely swam about. They certainly did know how to set up an atmosphere in there.

Must be really chill considering the music that you teed up. Also, I dunno how much how much of it was consciously planned or a happy accident, but “oh yeah, this place, it was just like it was the last time I was here” is a pretty convenient meta out for not having to get too deep into description.

I still do wonder if it’d have made sense to highlight one or two specific things that were standout about the place from Jack’s perspective beyond the tiles and fish tanks, but that’s likely just my stylistic preferences as an author speaking.

As with all club layouts, the lounge would be to the left with the main room of the club directly ahead.

I proceeded to the main room.

No surprises there. Even if I’m curious just how well a deck built around Fire-types is going to fare against a Water club.

I still marveled at how they had a full indoor beach and wave pool in here. The glass dome roof let all kinds of natural sunlight in as well. They even had palm trees and beach chairs!

It was the girls of this club that had wanted to 'date the Champion'. Naturally that extended to those speculated to become Champion, of which I was the prime target... Each of them had amazing figures. Their swimsuits made that quite easy to see... For that reason alone, I imagined most men would be ecstatic to date any of them. They all flirted quite well too... But underneath, I could sense it. They only wanted prestige. No-doubt if I ever lost the title of 'champion', these 'amazing girls' would drop me like a bad card from their decks…

I’m a little torn on the underlined as to if it’s a bit too “live-time” or not, even if I feel the overall direction is fine. It might have been worth framing this more along the lines of something like “As usual, I didn’t pay them any mind. Underneath the smiles and charms, I could already tell they were after the same thing that all too many of my past flirts since becoming champion: prestige.” or something like that.

Was it bad that I often found myself confused at which girl was who? I suppose it wasn't totally bad seeing as two of the club members were twin sisters…

Oh, so the NPC sprites in the PTCG games get a bit samey-looking, huh? :V

A grim thought entered my mind. I had the mental fortitude to hold off their flirtatious advances for now, but what if that fortitude eroded over the years? Would I let one of these prestige-diggers attach themselves to me? But that was a concern for another time... I still had much of my life ahead of me after all! And despite what certain imps might say... I was only twenty-eight and NOT forty-five!

Kinda on the fence as to if this part feels too “live-bloggy” or not for a diary entry. Though I suppose when in doubt, you can just handwave it as “that’s what happened to me back then”.

I cast my gaze to the various members:

Amanda,
View attachment 19684

Twin sister of the other girl member of the club, Sara. I believed they were both age twenty. Amanda was wearing her white swim cap with her usual green one-piece bathing suit with her goggles resting on her forehead. The moment she caught sight of me, her expression changed to excitement as she leapt from her reclined beach chair and ran over to greet me.

Aaaaaand there’s our first card battle of the chapter, I can already tell.

(14)

Ah yes, surprise Tales music has entered the chat. Though it makes me wonder what other series we’ll see represented here in this story.

View attachment 19685

Why must these women be such eye-candy?! I found myself rather transfixed as she approached with bouncing features…

Sara: “Um. Mister? My face is up here.” :|

"Mister Gentleman! Hi!" Amanda hopped as she greeted me to throw me further off balance.

She immediately grabbed my left arm with both of hers. "Did you come back here just to see little ~ ol ~ me?"

Jack: “... I’m sorry. When did we meet again?” ^^;

I was never great at handling these kinds of situations. What DOES someone do about this anyway?!

My eyes were closed as I smiled and rubbed the back of my head with my other hand. "Ah, Amanda I had contruct-"

Small typo there in the underlined.

Amanda made a shocked face. "Mr gentleman! I'm not Amanda, I'm S-A-R-A! Remember? I can't believe you forgot my name!"

View attachment 19686

Not good!

Jack: “Look, in my defense, you two literally look the same as each other.” >_>;

[ ]

"Ah! Sara! Please don't be upset! You know I have a hard time telling you and Amanda apart!"

She sobbed. "I suppose you WANT me to be Amanda, don't you?!"

What on earth was happening...

Well, things sure took a soap opera turn there. Even if I kinda wonder if Jack’s moment of awkwardness after all this would’ve stuck out enough in his mind to record it in his diary.

View attachment 20487

"Wait, no, that's not it!"

Just then the REAL Amanda approached.

Great, now BOTH my arms would be disabled!

Sure enough, Amanda was now clinging to my other arm!

Boy, Jack sure has some incredible talents™ with women given how he’s managed to fail at getting consistent dates in spite of having a fangirl club.

View attachment 19687

[ ]


"Oh my, Mister Gentleman, you always have such discerning taste when it comes to women. Look at these firm arms and hands of yours! The way you hold your cards is so stable and manly..."

I didn't remember them being this pushy... What did they do, rehearse this?!

Another spot where I feel like you skipped over a moment that likely would’ve stuck with Jack enough for him to talk about it in his diary there. Even if it was an “Oh yeah, they did that. Again” sort of lampshading to move things along quickly.

View attachment 19686

Am-SARA was pouting. [ ] "Aaaaamaaaandaaa! That's not fair! I was here first! I get dibs!"

I feel that this moment would be a bit funnier from a combination of expanding what Jack remembers of Sara’s reaction and outright striking out the beginning of “Amanda” to mimic him correcting his diary entry as he’s writing it.

[ ] Just then, the last of the terrible trio arrived!

The club leader, Amy!

She was wearing her typical purple one-piece bathing suit and I believe she was twenty-four years old.

View attachment 19688

"Enough you two! Go on and get off his arms! Have you no shame!?"

Another spot where it probably makes sense to get a bit more into Jack’s head a bit in his diary, though I’m going to take it that Amy isn’t exactly going to be Ms. Doll-eyes with Jack unlike the twins.

Amanda and Sara reluctantly let go as Amy took my left hand in both of hers. [ ]

"Mr Gentleman, I'm so sorry for the way my club members have harassed you, is there any way I can make it up to you?"

She looked up at me with big doe eyes.

Ok I would say that confirmed that they rehearsed thi-

She grabbed my right arm. "Oh I know! Why don't you come over to one of our recliner chairs in the back, I can give you a personal massage..."

… Maybe I spoke a bit too soon there. I do feel like these moments where Jack is interrupting the narration like this don’t quite work in a diary format in most cases, since this feels more like how Jack would’ve reacted as things were happening as opposed to how he would’ve recalled things at least a couple hours after everything happened.

View attachment 19689

There was no way I could take much more of that. I had to act FAST while I still COULD!

I held my deck up in the air. "Duels! I am here for duels! I am testing an all-common deck that has FIRE types in it! I bet it would be SOOO weak against your water decks!"

Well, that’s one way to break up a flirt-fest there. Though I have to wonder just how much these three realize this is schmuck bait at the moment.

All three simultaneously turned to look at me with various playfully mischievous expressions.

View attachment 19685
View attachment 19687
View attachment 19689

All three then called out a name at the same time: Joshua~!

“Not very much”, apparently. Even if I wonder who this ‘Joshua’ i-?

(15)

Joshua was the only guy in the club. He was younger than them, barely eighteen with a small stature, waxed for extra mobility in the water, and clean-shaven. I imagine he thought the idea of this place was quite nice for a young guy like himself. The poor fool...

View attachment 19690

"Yes ladies!?" He froze on the diving board having been caught before he could make his escape.

Oh, well. That answers that question. Even if I have to wonder how the girls in this club view him given that he doesn’t have his own club member trying to woo him at the moment.

Amanda grinned at him from across the room. "~Joshua, we have a new opponent for you!~"

His only way out thwarted, he dismounted the diving board. Clearly, he was wondering just what the three were about to get him into THIS time…

Ah yes, he’s their cannon fodder scout for challengers, I see.

Sara called out next.

"~Joshua dear, you are always such a good little assistant!~"

He cringed as he spoke. "Wh-what can I help with this time? I just gave you a full-body massage ten minutes ago and I got all seven of the drinks you wanted!"

Whelp, I suppose that answers how the other club members view him. Even if I kinda wonder if the past two blocks were another section where we kinda glossed over Jack’s thought process more than what we should’ve for a diary entry. Since in a diary entry, recording one’s perspective is often as big of a part of it as recording the actual events that happened.

View attachment 19690

Amy spoke next. [ ]

"Joshua, what are we going to do with you? You need to be polite at all times, we ARE ladies you know! The better you treat us, the more we like you. You DO want us to like you... right?" She gave him a mischievous smile.

Amy pointed towards me as the others turned towards me.

"We would like you to duel Mister Gentleman here."

Joshua looked mortified. I supposed he remembered the LAST time they threw him under the bus to duel me to scope out my deck.

Well, that was a fast confirmation of how Josh is basically the club cannon fodder scout. I do wonder if the “Amy spoke next” would’ve had any other details that Jack would’ve remembered about this moment that would’ve logically made it into a diary entry of his or not.

"The champion?! You can't be seriou-"

Amy crossed her arms and gave him a rather ominous look.
View attachment 19688

"I-I mean of COURSE I would like to duel him for you!"
View attachment 19690

I’m a little torn about this moment, since while it feels a bit too “live-time” for a diary, it’s genuinely funny to watch play out. I suppose I’ll count it as a wash here.

Amy smiled again.
View attachment 19689

"That's our Joshua! You are so cute and dependable!~"

When the others weren't looking I could see Joshua's eye twitching. I gave him a small nod to acknowledge his predicament.

The only real question is if we’re going to get a war story this time or-

Joshua was unable to claim a single prize against me. My deck DID have fire in it, but I neglected to mention the other half was lightning! My Voltorb ripped his mon to shreds in mere turns. I think maybe he had a Golduck and a Poliwag or something. They got KOed so fast that I hardly noticed them.

View attachment 19690

"I-I did my best!" Joshua looked up afraid to meet Amy's gaze.

Well, damn. Guess that’s one way to tell that this battle was a curbstomp.

View attachment 19689
"Yes you did, my little Joshie-poo! You did very well! You can go swim now!" Amy waved her hand dismissively.

Joshua bolted pretending to be excited and happy to swim. The giggling of the girls was a dead give away that they saw right through everything he tried... The poor fool...

(16)

Not sure what the Youtube link here originally was to, but it’s dead now.

Amy redirected her gaze to me with a mischievous smile on her face again. "Well! That sure was interesting. I've never seen someone win with an all-common deck before! Are you planning to take on the Club Masters with it?"

I spoke as I picked up my cards. "Well, it's largely untested, I am dueling the club members first to see if it's plausible."

Jack: “So, uh… you were going to challenge me, right?” ^^;

Amy nodded and sauntered towards her reclined beach chair in the back. Making calculated use of her curves as she walked, she called out to the others as she waved a hand dismissively. "You girls duel him and tell me how it goes. I'm going to go catch some rays..."

Lol. I should be a lot less surprised with the way they all threw Joshua under the bus that Amy would do the same to her less senior members.

I wasn't about to fall prey to more tactics, so I demanded the two flip a coin to determine which one dueled me first. It was Amanda! (The actual Amanda this time. It certainly didn't help matters that the two often swapped hair dye with each other!)

View attachment 19687

---

(16.5)

The duel commenced with four prizes. My hand was:
Gambler
Gambler
Electric Energy
Energy Search
Pokemon Trader
Ponyta
Voltorb

See the recommendation for handling the card listings differently from my last review. Though I’ll admit that I was a bit surprised to see a hard scene break here given that it feels like this would’ve logically come right after drawing Amanda as an opponent.

If you opt to stick with the break, it might have made sense to set up the framing to be something like Jack hurriedly jotting this down while waiting on Amanda to kick off their battle or something like that, with the war story being written after the fact at a still-later date.

I already had an idea of what I would do. First, I would have Voltorb as active and I would keep Ponyta back in my hand. I would then trade it with Pokemon Trader for another Voltorb from my deck. I would play the Voltorb and attach Lightning Energy to it. The first turn would be the most dangerous since I wouldn't be able to use Group Spark until attaching a second energy. Once I would play all the cards in my hand, I'd try my luck with Gambler.

Huh. Interesting that Amanda in particular is getting an actual card battle war story. I suppose that’s a sign that this one is actually going to give Jack something of a challenge.

I played Voltorb as my active mon and completed setup without playing Ponyta to my bench. Amanda played a Krabby in active and Tentacool to her bench.

She won the opening coin-flip and attached Water Energy to Krabby before attacking with Bubble for 10 damage. She won the coin-flip for the potential paralysis effect. I would be unable to attack her on my next turn due to that...

View attachment 19687

She smiled at me confidently.

A minor annoyance. Nothing more.

Well that’s certainly confident there. I mean, I’m not expecting Jack to exactly flame out since there’s quite a bit of story still ahead of this point, but it does make me question if this is going to be a harder battle than anticipated.

Attacking meant her turn was over so I drew my card to start my turn:
Switch

Something something, see last review about suggestions for changing formatting and adding hovertext, something something.

Perfect! Now all I had to do was play it and the paralysis would be undone! However... looking at her Krabby, I noticed it couldn't play its strongest attack until two more colorless energy were attached. She could use any color for it but since she could only play one energy per turn, it meant I was safe. I doubted her deck was advanced enough to run Double-Colorless Energy, so I reasoned there should be nothing to fear. Rather than undo the paralysis, I swapped Ponyta for another Voltorb, played it, and attached energy to the new one. I then passed my turn.

Amanda attached a Water Energy to Tentacool, benched a Shelder, and evolved Krabby to Kingler with 80 HP. It would not save her. Group Spark started at 30 damage and went up by 10 for every additional Voltorb I had in play. This meant it would be 40 damage. Doubling the damage due to weakness would make it 80. Amanda used Salt Water attack to potentially gather and attach three Water Energy from her deck to Kingler, but failed the coin-flip to make it work.

How can I get some of Jack’s RNG for getting the game to actually help me like this anyways?

Clearly, she had no idea what I was planning... It was even all laid out right there in front of her!

I drew my card:
Gust of Wind

Potentially useful for later. I played Energy Search to get a Lightning Energy and attached it to the Voltorb on my bench bringing it to two energy. But as I gazed upon the field of play, I realized that Kingler could not attack with only one energy. Even if it got energy from the deck, it would have to survive for a turn before it could use its four-energy attack, Double-Edged Claw for 80 damage. That meant Kingler was no longer a threat. Instead, her Tentacool with one energy was the better target! I played Gust of Wind to drag it out, retreated my weakened Voltorb for free with its free retreat cost before slamming into her Tentacool for 80 damage with Group Spark, KOing it almost three times over.

[ ] I then claimed my prize:
Fire Energy

I kinda wonder if it’d have been worth noting how shocked (or not) Amanda was from the turnabout here with Gust of Wind, since it feels a bit glossed-over at the moment.

View attachment 19691

Amanda cried profusely. "Oh Mister Gentleman! Why do you treat me so roughly?! It's only turn TWO and you are hitting me for 80 damage!" She then stopped crying and looked at me with big eyes. "But if that's what you like... I'll take it for you! Hit me more!"

Jack: “I’m… just going to pretend that that didn’t have worrisome undertones about what you find attractive and play my next move.”

All things considered, what she was doing was probably the best strategy she could attempt against me as it made attacking her feel very awkward... but it still wasn't going to work!

I shook my head as I grinned. "Cry and beg all you like. My tactics will not change for you or anyone else!"

View attachment 19691

Amanda pouted. "Don't be so mean! Don't you care about my feelings at ALL?!"

Jack:

“I hate to see a girl cry, but not enough to throw a card battle, just saying.”

One does not feel bad for beating away a hungry crocodile with a shovel…

I feel like there’s probably some commentary to be had about what would’ve made Jack uneasy about making Amanda cry, since he clearly does not see her in the same light as the players from the Grass Club last chapter.

Amanda attached Water Energy to Shellder. Notably, she did not try to attach Water Energy again. Clever. She must have realized adding energy would only result in more energy going to discard that would need to be discarded when I KOed Kingler. She then passed her turn.

Would suggest a small wording tweak here.

I drew my card:
Gust of Wind

I smiled. "Let's have a repeat of last turn, shall we?"

Amanda's eyes widened. "Wait! Don-"

So just how much of Amanda’s normal card battling strategy boils down to using her charms to get her opponent’s guard down anyways? Since I’m kinda getting the vibe that she’s not used to opponents just zeroing in on her like this.

I played Gust of Wind to drag out Shellder and ripped through its 50 HP with another 80 damage Group Spark attack. I drew my prize:
Dark Rapidash

View attachment 19691

Amanda sobbed. "Why!?"

Jack: “Because me going easy on you while at a disadvantage would be an insult to you and I have a mortgage to pay?” ^^;

She then played Energy Retrieval to discard a card from her hand and get back two energy from her discard. She then passed her turn.

This 'turn' was entirely useless to her. There was no point in playing Energy Retrieval. She didn't even try to attach an energy to Kingler, not that it would help. [ ]

I tilted my head as I squinted. "Amanda, what exactly were you looking to accomplish with that turn?"

I kinda wonder if it makes sense to record more of Jack’s thought process here in this section, especially if he could already think of something she could’ve done better.

She looked at me and blinked. "Uh... I just wanted to play something."

After a short awkward silence, I drew my card without looking at it and Group Sparked her again for 80 damage causing her to run out of benched mon and lose the game.

View attachment 19691

What I suspected were crocodile tears streamed down Amanda's face. "Oh, Mister Gentleman, you meanie! I can't believe you would crush a young girls' heart so mercilessly! Now SARA is going to win and keep you ALL to herself!"

Sara: “That sounds like a skill issue to me-”
Amanda: “Nobody asked you!”

[ ]

What on earth were these women talking about?! I was not a prize to win! Though... it was nice they saw me as a prize I suppose... UGH what was I thinking! The sooner I got out of there the better!

This feels like another section where things are a bit too “live-time” and like we missed out on a bit of Jack’s thought process after the fact.

Sara sat promptly down with a smile. "I know what you are doing, Mister Gentleman. You must have dueled hard to win so far because you wanted to lose to me, right? You must have decided to date me!"

Jack:

Sara: “Ooh, playing hard to get, are you? Well, don’t worry, I’ll pull those true feelings out of you yet!”

The weapons these women wielded were sharper than a Doduo's talons!

I coughed loudly. "I don't recall saying anything of that nature! I am simply here to duel!"

View attachment 19684

Sara gave me a knowing glance. "Well, we ALL know how good you are at the Pokemon TCG, so if you lose, a girl can only assume one thing..."

Cue the curbstomp two minutes later.

Yet another laughably simple duel. She only had a Squirtle out and I ended it with Voltorb on turn two.

View attachment 19686

Sara also deployed tears of dubious credibility. "Oh, I'm SO sad, Mister Gentleman! You don't know how long my heart has YEARNED for you! I guess you must be after AMY then! Of course you would with her being the Club Master! AAAAAMMMYYY!! You better treat him right once he dates you!"

Yeah, I figured.

Amanda: “Just saying, at least I got a proper entry in his diary, Sara.”

View attachment 20487

I put both my hands on my head. "No one has agreed to date ANYONE!"

All three girls started to giggle.

I started to wonder how Joshua had survived here for so long... Then again, he was only a water club member. Probably not influential enough to catch the interest of these girls…

Simple, he’s a simp for them.

(17)

Just then, I started hearing... music? It sounded like it might be from a boom box or something. The music was slowly growing louder. The rest of the ones in the club room started to hear it too. Suddenly a black carpet unrolled from somewhere in the lobby and reached all the way out to where I was standing!

I then saw... the super musical star Imakuni?!

View attachment 20487

What was someone like HIM doing here? Wait... how old was he? He defied categorization! There was no way I could get a read on him! The music was coming from a speaker embedded in his black fuzzy suit! He looked like an animal character at an amusement park. His suit opened up to reveal only his face and hands.

View attachment 19692

A random Doduo also trotted along behind him. It appeared to be attempting to mimic Imakuni's dance moves throwing its feathers about everywhere as it danced!

Ah yes, I see that our story’s co-star has entered the chat. I do wonder if there logically would’ve been a bit more reflection of the “wait, wut”-ness of this whole encounter from Jack’s end in his diary entry, though.

After Imakuni had finished singing and dancing he challenged me to a duel!

His Hungry Snorlax was a fearsome foe with high HP. It built up power for its Rollout attack with Eat attack while adding energy over multiple turns. To bring it down, I had Porygon convert weakness to lightning. I then used Voltorb to rip through it with Group Spark! I zapped his smaller mon away with Voltorb too and it wasn't long until the game was mine!

I… am admittedly not really feeling the abrupt scene change here since this once again feels like a natural outgrowth of Imakuni’s arrival. I feel that it makes sense either to make this one scene but put in more transition, or else to frame the last scene as being an entry that ends shortly before the actual battle of “whelp, time to fight this guy”

Once my duel with him was complete, he began to dance his way out, picking up the throw rug as he went.

(18)

I turned to my left and noticed that his Doduo was just standing there.

Another spot where I kinda feel like there should be a bit more commentary from Jack about the “well, that was a thing”-ness about everything. Especially since most of your readers will be very in the dark about who Imakuni is.

Ah yes, he’s here.

It wasn't going to follow him? Rather odd. As I went to leave, I noticed the sounds of an extra pair of feet as I walked.

I paused. The feet stopped.

I started walking again. The feet resumed.

Given the after-the-fact nature of diary entries in general, I kinda wonder if there should’ve been a bit more of a hint that at the time that Jack wrote this section of his May 5th entry that he had his hands full with his new buddy in the background and have that color his narration a bit.

Jack: “Stop that, will you? It’s annoying.” >:|

I then turned around and found the Doduo was following me! No matter. These birds were known to follow people on occasion... Perhaps it didn't even know Imakuni. I didn’t think much of it and kept walking, but little did I know, that Doduo was going to follow me the entire way home!

I think that a tweak along the lines of the above better sells the vibe that this is part of a diary entry that’s written after the fact for this story.

As I approached the door to my house, Doduo simply stood outside. It wasn't going to attempt to follow me into my house? Having had enough for one day, I didn't think too hard about it and left it outside. I was sure it would just go find someone else to follow.

Back in my house, I decided to bathe. Though I usually prefer to shower, today I decided to relax in my jetted tub. I hadn't tried it out yet, and found it to be quite nice.

Jack: “I’m sure the Doduo will move on. Even if it’s still weird that he left Imakuni to follow me in particular.”

The day had been taxing in several ways despite the duels themselves being simple, so I decided to take the next day off. Though I needed money in the long run, things in the short term could be flexible.

I kinda wonder if the whole “most recent entry of my diary” thing if it’d have made sense to frame this more in terms of “I just did this and expect this to happen tomorrow”.

Imakuni?! is a joke duelist the game included with a weird battle track for any duels. In the original game, he is one of the weakest duelists and plays badly but his deck was substantially improved for the sequel. He travels around the various clubs and fortresses, so it can be hard to find him. In the original, he gave four booster packs instead of the normal maximum of two for most duelists!

Oh, so that’s who he is. I do wonder if there should’ve been some of this detail worked into Jack’s actual diary entry since you’d think that he’d be hearing “cha-ching” noises after seeing Imakuni show up and getting past the initial weirdness precisely because he expected that he’d be able to pick up four booster packs without much effort.

Alright, I’ll be leaving things off here since admittedly I expect tonight to be a bit tighter on time for me than normal. Once again, you seemed to do pretty well with an offbeat premise and a good dose of humor, especially now that the Doduo behind this being ‘Doduo Adventures’ has entered the chat. I also liked the exploration of how Jack apparently regards opponents from different card clubs differently since the way the Water Club played out was very different from the Grass Club last time, and once again, the multimedia component added a lot to the reading experience (just check and make sure your music links are all still live).

On the more critical end, I’ll focus more on stuff that’s not repeated from prior chapters since I assume you won’t be making changes to this story until after Review Blitz. I did feel that there were a couple spots in the chapter that kinda strayed a bit noticeably from a diary format into something that felt a bit more live-time than what someone would’ve written based on the memory of things happening earlier in the day (see: the spots where Jack records interrupted dialogue and the two abrupt scene transitions). I also felt there were a couple points where you kinda passed up chances to get into Jack’s head a bit that felt like it’d have been something that someone rambling to themselves in their journal might have done. Lastly, I feel there were a couple points where you could’ve more organically worked in information about Imakuni and his significance in his setting in a way such that you wouldn’t have needed to entirely rely on author’s notes, but some of that may be authorial preferences speaking.

But altogether, even if I thought you had some room to tighten things up, this was a pretty fun and breezy read. Hope the feedback was helpful @Tango , and I’ll be looking forward to coming back for more of our review exchange sometime soon.

 

[Starlight Aurate]

Hey there! Back for another review! :D

Chapter 3

OMG, starting off with Doduo point of view! How cute!

I work as a scientist in real life, so of course I am biased towards the Science Club! Though it seems like they focus on chemistry and physics (I'm a biologist), so maybe not 100% up my alley hehe. And the cryptic Mew-like tile on the ground! I personally didn't think it looked like Mew at first, but it is interesting that they have it there.

And Rick talking about the possibility of Ho-Oh, Lugia, and Mew appearing was super cool! Makes me wonder if we'll get to see these Pokemon appear at all in this fic. I’m definitely curious as to where the next chapter will go, and just what exactly Rick intends to do with the Doduo feathers and the beer that the protagonist is giving him!

I like Rick's brief explanation of anti-gravity and that it's being used for blimps, along with the little explanation of how the tiles remain indestructible. Fun little tidbits that explain how things work in-universe gives flavour to the story!

And a few line-by-lines:

The feather rapidly dissolved with a hiss and some light smoke as Rick turned to face me.

Very different style of image for Rick here! Just out of curiosity, why is that the case?

"I do hate manual labor, but I can tolerate it... if you have some beer."

LOL I know many people who operate the same way, Rick :P

Rick looked me in the eye. "Not bad, but do you have enough... for two?"

Ohoho? Why do you need drinks for TWO, Rick? Do you drink enough for two people? Or do you intend for Gotan to drink, as well?

Chapter 4

I really like the start of this chapter! It's sweet that, instead of a duel, or of the main character just focused on winning duels, he has some time with Rick and they talk about the past (if drunkenly). And OOF, finding out that Nikki was in love with him all along! And she "settled" for Isaac because he was the only one who spoke up and asked for her hand... I totally get the fear of being alone for the rest of your life; and having an eligible suitor make an offer for marriage and children would be hard to say "no" to when the main love of your life shows absolutely no interest! Poor Nikki, she was so insecure about not being good enough at TCG for the protagonist, and it turns out that his desperation to be the best that he could made him oblivious to her feelings and kept him too distracted from noticing that.

This was a sweet chapter, for the reason I mentioned above. Too bad that they had to get drunk to have an open and honest conversation like that, but hey, at least it happened! Of course, I don't WANT Nikki to leave Isaac and her daughter for someone else, but at least there's some closure now. And it was funny and all too relatable that, in the midst of their hangovers, they just want to stay at home and get pizza and watch TV.

I also like the tidbits of Gotan that we get in this and in the previous chapter! I admi that it's strange that he seems to enjoy having his feathers yanked out and the pain he gets from the Pokemon battles... But at least we see bits of his character. And OOF, the mention of him being without a trainer for a long time! Poor guy, I wish I could give him a hug :( Also, is the name Gotan canon, or did you come up with it? Reminds me of Goku/Gohan/Goten from Dragonball Z/GT, hehe.

Looking forward to see where this goes! Lastly, a few line-by-line reactions:

After poking around in the lawn for over an hour, Rick finally swung the door open, tossed a couple feathers he was holding into the air and sucked them up with his Feathermaster 5,000.

WOAH! That is VERY different art for Rick and his Feathermaster 5,000!

Ah, so Rick was drunk when he made his vacuum joke? I totally thought he just had a dad-sense of humour!

"NO! It breaks the scale! Shatters it to little pieces. What you THINK breaks the scale it breaks EVEN HARDER! I want to chomp it! NOW!"

Haha, I Love this. Twenty-eight years old but still acts like a twelve-year-old when it comes to talking about how good his professor's sandwiches were :P

I covered my face with my hands. "Yeah... then I wouldn't have to be single..."

Hey, single life is fun! You have so much freedom! Also, a teacher-student dating relationship?!?!?!

Rick nodded as if he had just learned something profound. "Dude... your right! It's like when you look through a kaleidoscope or something!"

AHAHAHahaha Rick, what????

I don't really what I'm doing either... I just research crap.

I think you're missing a word in here. Maybe "know"?

Oh man. I love this friendship between Rick and the protagonist!

In the waking world, I realized to my horror that I was NOT spooning Nikki in bed... but RICK on my couch!

HAHAHAHAHAHAHA

 

[Tango]

Heya, I saw that your story was up for Review Tag onsite at the moment, so I figured it was as good an opportunity as any to get another chapter of this story under my belt for our review exchange:

Chapter 2

Nice to see you back so soon, Spite!

I wanted to do more reviewing today, but am feeling a bit burnt out so I figured I'd reply to you review here while I recharge.

Spoiler: Line-by-Line

Ah yes, the dawn of a new day, I see. I wonder if that’ll be the case for the different chapters in general this time around or if some days will stretch across multiple chapters.

Depends on the chapters and what is going on.

Huh, wasn’t expecting the HGSS music, but it’s definitely chill and feels at place with a “watery” place.

Thanks!

Boy, the way that people in this setting talk about distances and scale in this world must be such a trip given that the entire known world would fit into the contours of a more spread-out metropolitan area.

It's definitely a small world. The land mass of the various islands put together is probably smaller than the size of Texas. (Probably quite a bit smaller, actually.)

… Actually, where do they make all this machinery anyways given that TCG Island thus far hasn’t really vibed as being super populated up to this point?

Ooo! Good question! I think I'm going to have it all done on Neo Island. That place is going to be like one large city with all kinds of factories. Although... I might make the industrial center GR Island instead. I'm not super sure yet. It's not TCG Island though. That much I am sure about.

Yes, yes, I know I’m overthinking it, but it’s still an interesting thought exercise to think of how a world that would fit snugly into the LA Basin if not a smaller area would operate.

Honestly I'm not sure if I can make everything make perfect sense. I'm just not well versed in supplies and resource procurement and management on a country-wide scale. I'll do what I can, though!

Small typo there. I also feel like the underlined feels a bit too “liveblog” in framing for a diary entry that’s written a couple hours after the fact unless you’re very deliberately playing the angle that Jack is scribbling entries throughout the day.

Ok, so I want to mention two things here.

1. Mister Gentleman's name is not Jack. Jack was the name of his Grandfather. Mister Gentleman is not named in Book One. This is a deliberate plot point for later in the series.

2. The Prologue was more like an actual Diary. The rest of the chapters are kind of diary entries, but written as though they were not if that makes sense. There is no plot reason for this. I just didn't want to commit to writing them exactly as if they were diary entries because I thought I could do a better job with the narrative if I wasn't fixated on that. Essentially, feel free to ignore that they don't confirm to a diary ascetic for future commentary. However, there are cases where I wright in present tense. Those are errors and would be helpful to me to point out. The whole thing should be written in past tense. Granted, this might open things up to critique of a different form... It is what it is, I guess. No way to have my cake and eat it too, it seems...

Jack: “Also because that would require an entire different set of custom sprites and my author’s not made of money.” ^^;

So true.

Huh. So there’s only one species of Pokémon in this setting, but there’s normal fish akin to the early seasons of the anime. Bit of a strange dynamic there, but duly noted.

Yeah it's odd but just how it is.

Must be really chill considering the music that you teed up. Also, I dunno how much how much of it was consciously planned or a happy accident, but “oh yeah, this place, it was just like it was the last time I was here” is a pretty convenient meta out for not having to get too deep into description.

Yeah, the lobby of the place is chill.

I still do wonder if it’d have made sense to highlight one or two specific things that were standout about the place from Jack’s perspective beyond the tiles and fish tanks, but that’s likely just my stylistic preferences as an author speaking.

Also, I added a bit of foreshadowing narrative to this section about him being on edge before entering the main room.

No surprises there. Even if I’m curious just how well a deck built around Fire-types is going to fare against a Water club.

If fire was all it had, he'd be in trouble.

I’m a little torn on the underlined as to if it’s a bit too “live-time” or not, even if I feel the overall direction is fine. It might have been worth framing this more along the lines of something like “As usual, I didn’t pay them any mind. Underneath the smiles and charms, I could already tell they were after the same thing that all too many of my past flirts since becoming champion: prestige.” or something like that.

I played around with this bit some. Thanks!

Oh, so the NPC sprites in the PTCG games get a bit samey-looking, huh? :V

Well, kind of. But even more pertinent is the fact that these two are twins in the official lore of the game!

Kinda on the fence as to if this part feels too “live-bloggy” or not for a diary entry. Though I suppose when in doubt, you can just handwave it as “that’s what happened to me back then”.

I played around with this bit too. Thanks!

Aaaaaand there’s our first card battle of the chapter, I can already tell.

3rd in this case, actually!

Ah yes, surprise Tales music has entered the chat. Though it makes me wonder what other series we’ll see represented here in this story.

I don't branch out too terribly much. I tend to go for lots of RPG tracks when I do branch.

Sara: “Um. Mister? My face is up here.” :|

Nah, she wants him distracted. Easier to manipulate that way.

Jack: “... I’m sorry. When did we meet again?” ^^;

The last time he was at the club. Part of how he became Champion was going around dueling the members and masters of all the clubs back when he was still using his unrestricted deck. As such, he is familiar with all the clubs and their staff.

Small typo there in the underlined.

Jack: “Look, in my defense, you two literally look the same as each other.” >_>;

Boy, Jack sure has some incredible talents™ with women given how he’s managed to fail at getting consistent dates in spite of having a fangirl club.

Ah yes, but what he wants is genuine love, not the superficial and unfairly conditional variety.

I feel that this moment would be a bit funnier from a combination of expanding what Jack remembers of Sara’s reaction and outright striking out the beginning of “Amanda” to mimic him correcting his diary entry as he’s writing it.

I did think this was funny, so I implemented it!

Another spot where it probably makes sense to get a bit more into Jack’s head a bit in his diary, though I’m going to take it that Amy isn’t exactly going to be Ms. Doll-eyes with Jack unlike the twins.

One would think that, wouldn't they?

… Maybe I spoke a bit too soon there. I do feel like these moments where Jack is interrupting the narration like this don’t quite work in a diary format in most cases, since this feels more like how Jack would’ve reacted as things were happening as opposed to how he would’ve recalled things at least a couple hours after everything happened.

Yeah... I kind of agree with you there. Sort of. Most of the time. I went back and changed it in this case.

Well, that’s one way to break up a flirt-fest there. Though I have to wonder just how much these three realize this is schmuck bait at the moment.

They don't need to notice. That's what Joshua is for.

Oh, well. That answers that question. Even if I have to wonder how the girls in this club view him given that he doesn’t have his own club member trying to woo him at the moment.

Dude joined the club hoping to get some action. What actually happened was very different.

Ah yes, he’s their cannon fodder scout for challengers, I see.

Yep!

I’m a little torn about this moment, since while it feels a bit too “live-time” for a diary, it’s genuinely funny to watch play out. I suppose I’ll count it as a wash here.

Stuff like that is part of why I'm not a big fan of completely committing to making it seem like a real typical diary. It would break some things to fix others... Also it would be a lot of work trying to edit everything for it.

Well, damn. Guess that’s one way to tell that this battle was a curbstomp.

Not sure what the Youtube link here originally was to, but it’s dead now.

Nothing special. Just FireRed Cerulean city. I fixed the link though. Thanks!

Jack: “So, uh… you were going to challenge me, right?” ^^;

Nah, he is just looking to duel the members right now. Masters don't approach others for duels. They let the challengers come to them.

Lol. I should be a lot less surprised with the way they all threw Joshua under the bus that Amy would do the same to her less senior members.

See the recommendation for handling the card listings differently from my last review.

Yeah, I'm not going to get a chance to implement those changes until after blitz, but I do plan to implement them fic-wide even though it will take a while.

Though I’ll admit that I was a bit surprised to see a hard scene break here given that it feels like this would’ve logically come right after drawing Amanda as an opponent.

Yeah I seem to implement these a bit too often. It does look like it can just be removed, so I did.

Huh. Interesting that Amanda in particular is getting an actual card battle war story. I suppose that’s a sign that this one is actually going to give Jack something of a challenge.

Oh wait, you're serious.

Grass and water get totally wrecked by him. That's why he challenges those first.

Well that’s certainly confident there. I mean, I’m not expecting Jack to exactly flame out since there’s quite a bit of story still ahead of this point, but it does make me question if this is going to be a harder battle than anticipated.

Imakuni was probably the hardest opponent in this club for him lol

Something something, see last review about suggestions for changing formatting and adding hovertext, something something.

Yeah, I need to get that implemented too. I'll be looking to do that when I do the card list formatting for the duels.

How can I get some of Jack’s RNG for getting the game to actually help me like this anyways?

Play a bunch of games. Some of them are bound to go like this. 🤪

I kinda wonder if it’d have been worth noting how shocked (or not) Amanda was from the turnabout here with Gust of Wind, since it feels a bit glossed-over at the moment.

She does give a reaction, but it's just slightly farther in the text.

Jack: “I’m… just going to pretend that that didn’t have worrisome undertones about what you find attractive and play my next move.”

Just her latest manipulation tactic. Nothing new here.

Jack:

“I hate to see a girl cry, but not enough to throw a card battle, just saying.”

I feel like there’s probably some commentary to be had about what would’ve made Jack uneasy about making Amanda cry, since he clearly does not see her in the same light as the players from the Grass Club last chapter.

He does have one weakness. Heather's younger sibling and Nikki's second daughter. Jennifer from the Lightning Club. She is too cute even for him.

Would suggest a small wording tweak here.

So just how much of Amanda’s normal card battling strategy boils down to using her charms to get her opponent’s guard down anyways? Since I’m kinda getting the vibe that she’s not used to opponents just zeroing in on her like this.

Probably over half of it at least. If it weren't for Amy pulling the same stuff it probably would have allowed her to be the Club Master. But since it mostly only works on men, it's not the most reliable way to win duels.

Jack: “Because me going easy on you while at a disadvantage would be an insult to you and I have a mortgage to pay?” ^^;

She doesn't view it as an insult as long as she wins.

Sara: “That sounds like a skill issue to me-”
Amanda: “Nobody asked you!”

🤣

Jack:

Sara: “Ooh, playing hard to get, are you? Well, don’t worry, I’ll pull those true feelings out of you yet!”

🤣

Yeah! You get it!

Cue the curbstomp two minutes later.

Yeah, I figured.

Amanda: “Just saying, at least I got a proper entry in his diary, Sara.”

I love the after the fact meta commentary!

Simple, he’s a simp for them.

What?! Say it isn't SO!!

He is the super musical star Imakuni?! Duh.

He travels the world asking kids "Who's cuter, Pikachu or me?" He would also like you to play him as a basic Pokemon, but you can't.

Ah yes, I see that our story’s co-star has entered the chat.

Indeed!

I… am admittedly not really feeling the abrupt scene change here since this once again feels like a natural outgrowth of Imakuni’s arrival. I feel that it makes sense either to make this one scene but put in more transition, or else to frame the last scene as being an entry that ends shortly before the actual battle of “whelp, time to fight this guy”

Huh. Yeah, I'm with you on this. I took the scene break out. I probably need to do an editing run to take some of those out. I think I got a bit break-happy when writing it lol...

Another spot where I kinda feel like there should be a bit more commentary from Jack about the “well, that was a thing”-ness about everything. Especially since most of your readers will be very in the dark about who Imakuni is.

Eh, that's what the authors note is for. I don't use very many authors notes, so I think the occasional one is acceptable.

Ah yes, he’s here.

And this bird is here to stay.

Given the after-the-fact nature of diary entries in general, I kinda wonder if there should’ve been a bit more of a hint that at the time that Jack wrote this section of his May 5th entry that he had his hands full with his new buddy in the background and have that color his narration a bit.

Jack: “Stop that, will you? It’s annoying.” >:|

That would be a great detail to include if I was trying for it that way.

I think that a tweak along the lines of the above better sells the vibe that this is part of a diary entry that’s written after the fact for this story.

Jack: “I’m sure the Doduo will move on. Even if it’s still weird that he left Imakuni to follow me in particular.”

Ok this was too funny not to add! I didn't make it dialogue, but I baked it into the narrative!

Oh, so that’s who he is. I do wonder if there should’ve been some of this detail worked into Jack’s actual diary entry since you’d think that he’d be hearing “cha-ching” noises after seeing Imakuni show up and getting past the initial weirdness precisely because he expected that he’d be able to pick up four booster packs without much effort.

Ah, by the original, I meant the original game. This fic is based off the 2nd game where Imakuni only gives 2 booster packs instead of 4. In retrospect, it was probably a good choice, because card farming in the original boiled down to chasing Imakuni around everywhere to beat him up for cards. Wasn't the funnest grind in the world... 😅

Alright, I’ll be leaving things off here since admittedly I expect tonight to be a bit tighter on time for me than normal. Once again, you seemed to do pretty well with an offbeat premise and a good dose of humor, especially now that the Doduo behind this being ‘Doduo Adventures’ has entered the chat.

Yush! The mascot of the series has arrived!

I also liked the exploration of how Jack apparently regards opponents from different card clubs differently since the way the Water Club played out was very different from the Grass Club last time,

Admittedly, you won't see that level of contrast in all the clubs, but I think I did a respctable job with each of them to help them feel distinct.

and once again, the multimedia component added a lot to the reading experience (just check and make sure your music links are all still live).

I expect the vast majority of them should be working. I doubt you will find another broken one, but if you do, please tell!

On the more critical end, I’ll focus more on stuff that’s not repeated from prior chapters since I assume you won’t be making changes to this story until after Review Blitz.

Correct.

But altogether, even if I thought you had some room to tighten things up, this was a pretty fun and breezy read.

Great! As long as it made for a good read, that is the most important aspect to me.

Hope the feedback was helpful @Tango , and I’ll be looking forward to coming back for more of our review exchange sometime soon.

Thanks! I look forward to your next review. Apologies in advance if I don't get a chance to edit the duel format before you do.

 

[Tango]

Hey there! Back for another review! :D

Ok, you're awesome!

Chapter 3

OMG, starting off with Doduo point of view! How cute!

I work as a scientist in real life, so of course I am biased towards the Science Club!

Yeah! Science rocks!

Though it seems like they focus on chemistry and physics (I'm a biologist), so maybe not 100% up my alley hehe.

Ooo! Your job honestly sounds really cool!

And the cryptic Mew-like tile on the ground! I personally didn't think it looked like Mew at first, but it is interesting that they have it there.

Yeah, I wasn't quite sure what to make of it, myself.

And Rick talking about the possibility of Ho-Oh, Lugia, and Mew appearing was super cool! Makes me wonder if we'll get to see these Pokemon appear at all in this fic.

Where there is lore, there is always hope.

I’m definitely curious as to where the next chapter will go, and just what exactly Rick intends to do with the Doduo feathers and the beer that the protagonist is giving him!

The use of the beer is obvious. The use of the feathers won't be seen for a very long time...

I like Rick's brief explanation of anti-gravity and that it's being used for blimps, along with the little explanation of how the tiles remain indestructible. Fun little tidbits that explain how things work in-universe gives flavour to the story!

And those are just the beginning.

Very different style of image for Rick here! Just out of curiosity, why is that the case?

Because the game had in-game pixel art and outside of game regular art for the guide book or something. Basically, it exists and therefore I wanted it.

I'm not too crazy over the style being different, but since it brings a new expression to the table I am all for it. I can't get artists to commission everything, you know!

LOL I know many people who operate the same way, Rick :P

Ohoho? Why do you need drinks for TWO, Rick? Do you drink enough for two people? Or do you intend for Gotan to drink, as well?

No point in having Gotan drink. Rick want's a drinking buddy!

Chapter 4

I really like the start of this chapter! It's sweet that, instead of a duel, or of the main character just focused on winning duels, he has some time with Rick and they talk about the past (if drunkenly).

I had a lot of fun writing the drinking scene. Loved the humor in it!

And OOF, finding out that Nikki was in love with him all along! And she "settled" for Isaac because he was the only one who spoke up and asked for her hand... I totally get the fear of being alone for the rest of your life; and having an eligible suitor make an offer for marriage and children would be hard to say "no" to when the main love of your life shows absolutely no interest!

Yeah... Not an ideal situation for Nikki. But as you will find out way later, its a bit more complicated than that...

Poor Nikki, she was so insecure about not being good enough at TCG for the protagonist, and it turns out that his desperation to be the best that he could made him oblivious to her feelings and kept him too distracted from noticing that.

Not to mention, the reason he went so hard on it was because she told him when she was still a kid that she would marry whichever the two of them became Champion. (This will be revealed later in the fic) So if she hadn't said that, maybe he would have felt confident enough to tell her how he felt and the whole thing could have been avoided. Then later on, Nikki didn't wait on him and dated and later married Isaac.

This was a sweet chapter, for the reason I mentioned above. Too bad that they had to get drunk to have an open and honest conversation like that, but hey, at least it happened!

Well, drunk was probably the only believable way it would have happened so early. Mister Gentleman doesn't open up about that sort of stuff very easily.

Of course, I don't WANT Nikki to leave Isaac and her daughter for someone else, but at least there's some closure now.

Some, but not enough.

But I agree with your reasoning. We don't want Nikki breaking apart her family and her kids being dragged into it.

And it was funny and all too relatable that, in the midst of their hangovers, they just want to stay at home and get pizza and watch TV.

Yeah!

I also like the tidbits of Gotan that we get in this and in the previous chapter! I admi that it's strange that he seems to enjoy having his feathers yanked out and the pain he gets from the Pokemon battles...

Honestly if you didn't think that was strange I'd be pretty surprised.

But at least we see bits of his character. And OOF, the mention of him being without a trainer for a long time!

Not quite a trainer. There are no trainers in their world. Not in the traditional sense, anyway. Nor are there any Pokeballs or Pokemon Centers. But his owner? Yes, he has been without his prior owner for a very very long time judging from the rust on his dogtags.

Poor guy, I wish I could give him a hug :(

Yeah... that bird has been through far more than anyone would know...

Also, is the name Gotan canon, or did you come up with it?

Gotan is absolutely not canon. In fact, in the card game there are no Doduo running around. That was a special insanity I crafted for the fic!

Reminds me of Goku/Gohan/Goten from Dragonball Z/GT, hehe.

I assure you, it is 100% coincidence! 🤣 But yeah, I noticed that too about it.

Looking forward to see where this goes!

Lastly, a few line-by-line reactions:

WOAH! That is VERY different art for Rick and his Feathermaster 5,000!

Yep! I had it comissioned for my fic!

Ah, so Rick was drunk when he made his vacuum joke? I totally thought he just had a dad-sense of humour!

Yes, he was drunk, but he might not be completely opposed to jokes that that when he is sober... hmm...

Haha, I Love this. Twenty-eight years old but still acts like a twelve-year-old when it comes to talking about how good his professor's sandwiches were :P

To be fair, he IS drunk

Hey, single life is fun! You have so much freedom!

True. It does have its perks but it takes a special mindset to properly enjoy.

Also, a teacher-student dating relationship?!?!?!

Indeed. And yes it should raise eyebrows. Why would his instructor be ok with such a thing?? There is a plot reason for this later, actually.

As for Mister Gentleman, he did reject her, but would have gone for her anyway if he knew how lonely things were going to be for him.

AHAHAHahaha Rick, what????

Sometimes the dude is a little too good at understanding the perspectives of others! (To be clear, he has absolutely no inclinations to his sister. I hope that would be obvious, but I wanted to state it anyway just to make extra sure you don't misunderstand.)

I think you're missing a word in here. Maybe "know"?

Ooo! Yeah! THANKS!! I fixed it.

Oh man. I love this friendship between Rick and the protagonist!

In that case, I think you will very much enjoy this Book!

HAHAHAHAHAHAHA

Yeah... NOT what he wanted to wake up to!

 

[Neon]

Hello! Dropping in for my CatNip review! TCG isn't an area I'm most familiar with, so I really appreciate all the explanations for beginners! I've made it up to chapter 3 and even though some of the battles are skimmed because of how repetitive they can get, I really enjoy reading the battles and the dynamics we see throughout them. I think my favouite chapter may be the Prolouge actually. Even if it's mainly used to explain, really well by the way, what kind of world this is and what we can expect from it, I enjoyed the dynamic between Billy and the MC! It reminds me of the older mentor being followed by a menace to society and I always think this dynamic is underutilizied. Even if the MC is kinda too young for the role haha, sorry man, you do dress like a very sophiscated 45 year old, can't even blame Billy too much on that one.

Because she looked so much like Nikki from long ago, it stirred many feelings in me; adoration, nostalgia, hope... and deep regret.

But this section talking about Heather and comparing her with Nikki. I like what you did here. I love how him being a Champion so young actually affected his relationships. At this point in the story, it doesn't seem like the MC has any truly close friends. All the characters call him 'Mister' or 'Gentlemen' or something along those lines, which yes could be a nod to the games but it's also telling how that hasn't changed. And he goes to test his new decks out at the various clubs, which isn't a bad thing, but he's only doing it to test this new deck, almost like he doesn't have anyone he can experiment ideas with.

Brittany was upset after the duel. "So I lost to a deck of all commons?! Are you here just to make fun of me?!"

This gives such good insight into how the other characters probably all feel to some degree. They lost to an easy deck. It doesn't really matter that it's the Champion playing it, he's not using the good cards.

Polished teal porcelain square tiles adorned the floors and fish tanks with coral lined the walls. The fish leisurely swam about.

I think your descriptions of the Water Club is some of the best so far. You can really visualize everything that's going on really well, and I think that's such a strength of your writing.

Why must these women be such eye-candy?! I found myself rather transfixed as she approached with bouncing features...

I gotta admit though, I didn't really like that second sentence. It's fine that all the girls here are eye candy and take full advantage of it- I even like how you addressed that the MC knows that if he dates any one of them and then loses his Champion status, they would leave, I just don't like this particular description I'm sorry.

I paused. The feet stopped.

I started walking again. The feet resumed.

MC: It's just standing there.
MC: Menancingly!!

I love the Doduo. It has been here for five paragraphs and I would hurt everyone if anything bad happens to it. I love all the lore it has so far. The only Pokemon in this world and it's completely normalized and accomadated for and it can't evolve? Fascinating! I'm definitely planning on reading more because it's a good story and I love Doduo, but yeah, this is a good story so far! I can't wait to read more!

 

[Tango]

Hello! Dropping in for my CatNip review!

I love getting new readers in! Welcome, Neon!

TCG isn't an area I'm most familiar with, so I really appreciate all the explanations for beginners!

No problem! I expect any new reader to be unfamiliar, so I've tried hard to make it approachable for a wide audience.

I've made it up to chapter 3 and even though some of the battles are skimmed because of how repetitive they can get, I really enjoy reading the battles and the dynamics we see throughout them.

Considering you weren't even familiar with the TCG, this is fantastic to hear! Thank you!!

I think my favouite chapter may be the Prolouge actually.

I have to admit, I was not expecting that. I didn't think there would be anyone that would name that as their favorite, so I'm glad to see some people like it that much!

Even if it's mainly used to explain, really well by the way, what kind of world this is and what we can expect from it, I enjoyed the dynamic between Billy and the MC! It reminds me of the older mentor being followed by a menace to society and I always think this dynamic is underutilizied. Even if the MC is kinda too young for the role haha, sorry man, you do dress like a very sophiscated 45 year old, can't even blame Billy too much on that one.

I'm glad you liked it. I tried to include as much humor as I could in there too.

But this section talking about Heather and comparing her with Nikki. I like what you did here. I love how him being a Champion so young actually affected his relationships. At this point in the story, it doesn't seem like the MC has any truly close friends. All the characters call him 'Mister' or 'Gentlemen' or something along those lines, which yes could be a nod to the games but it's also telling how that hasn't changed.

So, a secret hidden in plain sight is that Mister Gentleman has no name. That is a title he came up with for himself, but as for a name, he has none. There is a story reason for this that will be explained in a later book in the series, but I wanted to point it out now. It isn't the kind of thing I wanted to bring up in the fic itself, because it's not something that anyone thinks to mention. There is a story reason for that as well.

So feel free to call him, MC, Protagonist, Gent, Mister Gentleman, POV, or whatever you want!

And he goes to test his new decks out at the various clubs, which isn't a bad thing, but he's only doing it to test this new deck, almost like he doesn't have anyone he can experiment ideas with.

Well, he does have one friend he could test it against, but his friend is the former Champion Ronald, and he doesn't feel confident enough to play him with it yet.

This gives such good insight into how the other characters probably all feel to some degree. They lost to an easy deck. It doesn't really matter that it's the Champion playing it, he's not using the good cards.

Very true. It's such a weak deck that no one will refuse to duel him with it. His plan is working perfectly and he is STILL managing to win somehow!

I think your descriptions of the Water Club is some of the best so far. You can really visualize everything that's going on really well, and I think that's such a strength of your writing.

Interesting. I usually consider my descriptions of things to be one of my weaker points, but perhaps I'm not the best at evaluating my writing. Very glad to hear you enjoyed it!

I gotta admit though, I didn't really like that second sentence. It's fine that all the girls here are eye candy and take full advantage of it- I even like how you addressed that the MC knows that if he dates any one of them and then loses his Champion status, they would leave, I just don't like this particular description I'm sorry.

No worries and thanks for mentioning it. He is a guy and these girls are trying to catch his eye in this way very much on purpose. If it helps, the series has extremely little content like this in it.

MC: It's just standing there.
MC: Menancingly!!

I love the Doduo. It has been here for five paragraphs and I would hurt everyone if anything bad happens to it.

Yeah! I love it when people are into Doduo!

I love all the lore it has so far.

Woah really?? I'm a big fan of the lore, myself so it's always exciting to see readers that love it!

The only Pokemon in this world and it's completely normalized and accomadated for and it can't evolve? Fascinating!

Glad you like it. Also, there are real story reasons later for this which will be explained. Just keep in mind that not all answers are delivered in Book One.

I'm definitely planning on reading more because it's a good story and I love Doduo, but yeah, this is a good story so far! I can't wait to read more!

Oh wow! I'd love it if you read and reviewed more! Please come back again and thanks for the awesome review!

 

[Flyg0n]

Spoiler: Grass: 21 & 22

It was time for the face-off with Nikki.

The time has finally come... I wonder how gentleman will fare. If he wins, which I feel he will, thats great but also means that his psychically predited loss might be against Isaac?

Rick had recorded to his phone the discussion the two of us had regarding the plan to put on an act. He explained it was in order to properly explain to Nikki later that it was all just an act. Good thing too, because I didn't want poor Nikki permanently thinking I had no trouble harming her to get to Isaac!

We stood in the lobby, poised to enter the main room of the Grass Club.

Oh thats a smart move. Man i sympathize though, it still feels kind of yucky to have to do all these and stoop to this though.

Acting as though I had threatened litigation far beyond the lifespan of a normal human being, Rick made a show of slowing me down. "PLEASE Mister Gentleman! Don't take it out on my sister, I beg you!"

lol, nice acting Rick. I'm alost a little surprised he doesn't feel more bad about pulling one over on his sister but I guess he's more a practical man of science than wanting to only side with his sister.

Tango stepped gingerly towards the corner and hid behind a bush. Since there was no way he was in on our act, being the dumb bird that he is, I reasoned that confrontation upset and scared him. Kind of like a dog... poor bird.

Right. Dumb bird.

Nikki was usually so shy. It didn't take very much to have her doubt herself. I could see the hesitation made manifest in her expression.

I felt like the bad guy... What's the point in winning if it meant treating her like that?!

Ooof yeah. In action it really sucks and does kind of beg the question how right one is for doing the wrong thing for the right reasons. Its still kind of a manipulation tactic...

Nikki glared at me. "I don't know when you became a bully with your cards, but that's NOTHING like the gentleman I used to know!"

I mean that part isn't exactlllyyyy bullying.... Not exactly gonna go easy on you even if I was being nice...

I held my hands up in mock-fear. "Oh NO! What are you going to do? Beat me with your flowers?!"

Okay yeah thats pretty mean

The card she played was Pokemon Breeder. Her Bulbasaur was now a 80/100HP Venusaur with a four energy cost Solarbeam attack for 60 damage! She attached a second energy and passed her turn.

No Energy Removal in my hand... No significant draw cards... Not drawing any more mon... And it STILL had 80HP even AFTER a perfect hit?! In all my years I had never seen a grass deck do what she just did there... Was I going to lose a duel? To a GRASS DECK?!

Oh boy

I started powering Voltorb up while I attempted to attack again with Doduo. One heads for 10 damage... Not good!

Ahhh but your coinflips are jilted hmmm

Nikki's expression was calm. She took a card from her hand and revealed it.

Grass Energy.

She attached it and closed her eyes a moment. Suddenly she opened her eyes as she declared her attack

I enjoy how very dramatic everyone is with these. Extremely anime hah

She used Venusaur's power, Energy Trans, to move all grass energy off of it to Caterpie!! She then played the now-dreaded Pokemon Center to completely restore all of Venusaur's HP! She then used Energy Trans again to move all three energy back and attached ANOTHER from hand!

Ohhh whoa this is a super cool strategy. idk her entire deck but the fact that she couldn't pull this off often does suggest to me though that maybe a couple small tweaks to her deck could really make this work. Maybe more card draw.

Nikki was silent as she stared at the floor. Tears flowed down her face.

:((

I spoke through the pillow. "I can't BELIEVE I treated her that way! Now she will hate me forever! It's a good thing I left, because seeing her cry almost made ME break down in tears too!"

I assumed Rick rolled his eyes since I couldn't see him. "What is with you and Isaac anyway! Both of you are FAR too dramatic! As long as the plan goes well, you won't have to worry about it!"

I groaned through the pillow. "I still wish I didn't have to be so mean..."

Yeaahhh that was really rough.

So, here I was in another one of my dreams. Just me, little Nikki. Age nine instead of twenty-eight like I was supposed to be...

Oooo Nikki POV!!

But I felt terrible.

You maybe should. just a tad kek.

Thinking back to when I really was nine, I had been conflicted. Picking one meant betrayal of the other. Both options felt wrong because they left the other behind...

Well.... no. it shouldn't have to. I understand this can be what happens but if y'all were smarter and more mature lol you could stll be friends... romance doesn't mean you're more important... but then its pretty tricky when everyone is so desperate to be romantically entangled lol.

Sir Pounce relied on me to carry him like a baby rather than jump off of me.

Extremely Cat behaviour lol. My cat is the exact same, she never wants to get off.

Nothing worked!

(111)

Eventually, I decided there must have been something wrong with me... I was broken in some way that just couldn't be fixed. Even the Oracle couldn't fix me... That's how broken I was...

Oh dear :(. I also wonder how or through what methods the Oracle tried to help her improve? Can the Oracle train her like Gentlemen got training? I wonder if she ever tried to enroll in the academy, can't recall if it was said

I guess I managed to find my bed. I must have been hot or couldn't find my night gown since I woke up nude. Mister Gentleman must have walked home or called a cab since I was there alone.

Even so, I thought I had dreamed he kissed my forehead... It was such a sweet kiss.

Oh... oh dear she think it wasnt real? uh oh

If I dated him, my kids would not have been born. Was I so selfish that I would undo their births if it meant giving him a chance? How could I be? No... I had made my choice. I had to live with it for better or worse.

Well... I have some uh... interesting news for you Nikki lol. Perhaos your kids are not what you think. On that front though if her kids are a few years apart this means that one is Isaac's and one is Gentlemans...

Dedication to my family was most of my remaining self-worth. That's why I try so hard to take care of everyone! If I were to divorce, I would feel like there was nothing of me left...

Girl no thats a terrible idea. Such a bad mindset she's fallen into. its kind if ironic because by trying to dump all your stat points into this pursuit you quite often ensure that you make things worse for your spouse/kids long term. oof. You unintentionally are modeing an unhealthy/unbalanced mindset.

I wish Isaac was able to feel better about himself. I tried to cheer him up whenever I could, but it's like he just wouldn't let me in. In turn, my own needs got ignored too...

Girl NO! There's nothing wrong with trying to cheer him up or be kind but you also can't become a doormat. Man Nikki's equally messed up...

Which is great, I do love me some delusional gals or misguided gals, kek.

Isaac really tries with the kids too.

Does he though??? Does he???

But Isaac was my husband! I should support him...

No girl, NO. You support him when he's right. Not blindly! Friendship and lovr isn't about blindly supporting your partners and best friends. Love actually means standing against them if they are wrong.

could he really be a 'bully' if he was just trying to defend his title? I

ahah im glad she brought this back up, heh

I was weak.

no you're not weak for not having a strong tcg deck... But you are weak for not being able to stand upfor your convictions and values and what you believe in. Buuutt hey, room for growth.

Maybe I could talk Mister Gentleman down if he won?

Perhaps more than you know.

These were some really fun chapters. The use of dual POV here pulls massive weight for the story and I love it (ignoring the bit that I guess everyone in this world keeps incredibly detailed diaries/journals?? heh). Seeing first Gentleman trying to enact his plans and his own reactions to it, then swithcing to Nikki for the first time to show us her POV on everything thats been happening. Now that we have a chapter from each Isaac and Nikki things are real spicy.

I have a lot of strong opinions about love triangles and the 'two guys like one girl' trope. It can easily be pretty frustrating but giving us POV's from everyone helps a lot. Usually many of my qualms with stories involve a few things: the girl's issues never being addressed and her not growing as a character, one guy being obviously Bad and the other Good, and a lack of convincingly written chemistry or reasons to like the guy. Also very often the girls desires in a triangle end up treated ultimately as passive while its about two guys bickering for her and being jealous (which ca be unattractive lol).

That said so far this is pretty different, especially for being set in the aftermath of a love triangle situation where the 'wrong' choice was made (wrong here mainly because she did not love Isaac and couldn't bear to tell him).

Its clear that Nikki is equally messed up in her own way. She tormented herself, couldn't decided what path to choose, and then essentially went with a wrong option... one that is going to affect her for years now and possibly her children. She fell into so strongly too that she's based all her perceptions of self worth on trying to fufill this role she's placed on herself, only making everything worse in the long run anyway.
She's equally to blame in a different way for placing Isaac in a loveless marriage where she's still pining for another man. Isaac is still abominable and a huge jerk but she's also wrong. She tried to take the decision out of her hands which was just entirely unfair to both of them as her friends. It was a hard choice/situation I feel a little sympathy for but also I can't give her a free pass, its a cowards move. By trying to please everyone you have pleased no one Nikki! To truly love is to be willing to have the temporary pain of telling Isaac you dont love him, not by choosing him anyway.

Alas. alack. Still, Nikki is far from a bad person either. She's loyal and possesses strong convictions and cares deeply about those around her, even to her own detriment, and thats also very admirable. Now if she can just learn to balance these. Even good traits like care and selflessness can end up hurting others when intentioned for good. Perhaps if she'd told Isaac up front things could have gone better...

That said don't take this as me not liking it but rather I am very invested in the drama.

Spoiler: 23

June 3rd

It all came down to this.

We're finally here... and yet only halfway through in terms of chapters

As for Nikki, she used to say she was going to marry the Champion. What she said really stuck with me. I'm not sure why, but I believed her. An adult might not take the promise of a kid seriously, but a kid doesn't even entertain the notion that a promise would be broken. Or, at least I didn't...

:( Knowing now why she said it makes this harder.

To make it worse, she had no clue I loved her. As I traveled and honed my deck and dueling skills, her and Isaac never stopped spending time together. It was an ideal situation for a couple.

Oh but she does

Perhaps his previous owner played it with him? Maybe I'd give a try later... If I got out of that mess...

YES hello you should. cmon gentleman

I played another Energy Removal on his Doduo and used Gust of Wind to bring out his weakened Electabuzz. I COULD have KOed it, but then he could bring out another mon and finish me off, so instead, I passed my turn.

As for the ploy: opponents don't like to attach energy once their mon is weak past a certain point. Everyone except myself and Doctor Wem seemed to view attaching energy at that point as a 100% waste with no way of it ever being useful in any situation!

ooo psycological warfare, I like this.

It made no sense! Both of them had MORE than enough raw intelligence

Ah but its not about intelligence its about emotions.

Was a less severe version of that happening with Nikki and Isaac?! Just what was going ON?! But that was not the time for speculation. Everything was riding on my games...

Or... or its trap? hm.. Not sure, it could be part of a ploy but i dont know if Isaac thought that that far ahead. But he does have plans to use GR2 so...

Victory was mine.

VICTORRRYYYYY!!!!!

Bill's Teleporter failed. Gambler failed.

I cant imagine why . thanks stephanie lol

Also I guess this is the loss the psychic predicted...

He was getting too confident. Quickly, I thought of a way to keep the upper hand.

Oohohho more mind games. I do enjoy this.

The final duel played out the same as the second initially, except this time Gambler came through for me! It was all I needed to get things moving. As the turns progressed my field became more and more powerful as I kept him locked down. By the end, I didn't just win against him, I turned it from a hopeless game to one that I completely dominated him in.

Stephanie again perhaps, when it counts? or just random chance.... curious

The one to reforge my childhood friendship with Nikki.

ohoho I enjoy this. the "now the real fight begins" but its about emotional stakes

I lost the match against Mister Gentleman!

!!! Oh!!! Pov Switch??

What had I done? I even threw little Jennifer's feelings at him!

Well FINALLY im glad you at least started to realize that you were wrong

Why had I been so cold to her all these years? Nikki was a wonderful wife! She always had been! I was angry with myself. I couldn't live up to my dream and it never felt like I deserved her...

Hello YES. For all her flaws her flaw is trying to hard not being bad to you.

. He was still trying to steal her from me.

[sigh] shes a PERSON Isaac, she can't be STOLEN. If she wanted to choose that would be her choice
(but dont get me wrong this is realistic to how people talk).

"Attention, if you please. I'm not sure how you all imagined this conversation would be going, but toss all those notions out the window. I'm going to mediate this discussion, and I will NOT be taking 'no' for an answer."

Holy frick I did NOT see this curveball coming what the

I love it. This is so cool I love it I love Rock you TELL EM BOY

I suddenly felt like I couldn't breathe. Just how bad WAS this day going to get?!

Well well well if it isnt the consequences of your actions.

its aboutta so much worse for you buddy.

I would have tried to escape the room, but Mister Gentleman's Doduo appeared to be napping directly in the only exit of the room!

Concidentally im sure

smack

Suddenly I was looking in a different direction with my sunglasses flying across the room. My face, stinging.

You know, usually I don't like the girl swapping the guy trope but here its quite justified lol.

I couldn't believe Rick actually did that to me. So much for being pals, I guessed...

You should be grateful, real pals call other plas out on their crap

But it was Rick who spoke up next! "I'm not done yet. What you just saw, Nikki, is a result of all the things that have been festering in Isaac's mind. I'm not looking to deal with the symptoms of this problem, I'm going to rip out this weed by the roots."

THANK YOU YAASSSS. Finally someone with some SENSE. I love Rick.

But he is trying to make her divorce me! He is trying to MAKE her single! Even all this must be part of his plan!"

Dude cmon

"AH HA! But you don't deny that you would be with her if she DID divorce me! To pretend not to cause it and THEN to have her!

Which would ALSO be her choice my guy. Marriage is two people. TWO choosing to be together. I mean its true people can try to manipulate other people but to insist so about Nikki is to claim you're super smart and aware and she's a dumb desk lamp who can be stolen.

but eheh this is on brand for Isaac to say to justify himself.

I was determined to show them how messed up Mister Gentleman was.

Yes please lol. delulu as some would say

"Ah! In that case, why don't you have a listen to the conversation Mister Gentleman had with me on the drive over to see you last time, Isaac!"

What was he talking about?

*gasp*. Man Rick has been plotting all this from the get go! in a good way

What was all that? Was it real?

Well yes-

..NO.

[facepalm]

A meeting with the Oracle. MY meeting with the Oracle! You bunch of thick-headed... JERKWADS!"

GET EM RICK

Fat chance of that...

Oh you are about to be SO SO wrong...

Rick has shot up severely in all my estimations. I love him so much, what a brilliant guy. This is actually really cool to see. All of Rock's carefully laid plans coming to fruition so he can spring his own trap to try and get these two to reconcile. I love how all these seemingly innocuous moments are now coming to fruition and and paying off. Even that seemingly random bit Nikki mentions about the visit to the "oracle" is about to coming full circle.

What now then I wonder? If we convince Isaac finally about how wrong he is, get Nikki to see her errors and repair things... there's still the issue of GR2. Something tells me even if Isaac has a change of heart we can't trust that GR2 will be so keep to drop his mission now that its begun. Perhaps a battle against him is in the future.

I also wonder what the Oracle will be like... after all the references to it I'm veerryyyy curious.

The psycological elements to the battle here were especially neat and I hope future tough battles use something like this. I think it adds a lot more layers, rather like chess, as opposed to simplying odds and coin flips. Which is fine but the "know your opponent" trick adds a really genuine skill element. Studying combat patterns and tendencies and cards and favored actions. Cool stuff.

Spoiler: The Oracle and Aftermath

So why not get the Oracle to help? I'd have to get my visit scheduled soon. No more being lonely!

Nah I wouldn't I feel you owe it more to yourself to do it yourself.

That's exactly it. They obviously know how to run a prosperous society... In fact, they are such an advanced AI, that we can ask them just about any question on any topic and get highly relevant information and advice! They are smarter than anyone! Why would they not implement such a low-hanging improvement?!"

Oooorrr they're secretly very controlling and arrogant and dont want to compete with another AI hmm.....
and the oracle granting only one visit is interesting.
Somethin is off about the AI imo, idk I just still never trust benevolent AI's

"And nor will they... As the Oracle once said; 'Creating advanced AI was an extremely stupid idea and we got lucky they developed to be benevolent.' That's why they instituted a world-wide ban on developing another. Can you imagine what a society ran by a malevolent advanced AI would be like?"

Terminator

Nearby was a large dog-bed with an engraved "Tango" on it.

At least someone thought of Tango

Heather giggled. "Aww Murray. You are so cute! I love having you around. I look forward to the day when you can finally bend that spoon!"

Okay now you're stringing this man along

My goal here is to restore my precious sister's happiness."

Rickis such a good brother yay

Isaac slowly nodded. "Yes, I will."

You better

Finally, Isaac turned my way. "Mister Gentleman... I have wronged you."

He then took his glasses off once more as tears fell from his eyes. "I was WRONG!... I'M SO SORRY!"

FINALLLYYYY

What?! We had never hugged each other before in our lives! We were guys! We didn't do su-

Ugghhh you idiots this is the problem. You SHOULD hug maybe you'd be less jealous and sad, good grief.

Our hug finally subsided and Isaac went back to his chair. The tension I had before the hug had totally vanished! I didn't think I ever felt as close to Isaac as I did after that hug...

Finally. More guys need to accept that there's nothing wrong with hugging lol.

Isaac tilted his head. "Wait, what? You love us the SAME?!"

Hm. Huh. Interesting revelation, makes sense in its own way i guess.

Heather held her face in her hands as she gazed at Murray swinging her feet at the edge of the chair. "Absolutely! I have Murray wrapped around my little finger! There is nothing he wouldn't do for me. I have his complete devotion. I had a whole group of psychics confirm it for me."

Okay i get the implication is meant that Murray would never lie for Oracle but this actually sounds a lot more like Murray is so devoted to oracle he would. Now, I don't actually believe he is or anything but I thought I should mention that it absolutely sounds kind of like its plausible to claimMurray would lie for the Oracle.

Maybe Murray confirming he has no affiliation to her...? Not sure. Not a huge deal.

Well, then! As for you two, NO getting drunk around each other!"

[sweats] yeah.... no more getting drunk...

"Nikki, I owe you an apology too. I've blamed you for having feelings and treated you coldly. I can't go back and undo it, but I want to make it up to you from now on. Do you want to kiss him?"

I do really like that he apologized here.

But I will be taking this kiss!"

Ouh.... wha. why

This crazy Oracle... But there was no way I could complain... Nikki was keeping me far too occupied for that...

Heather resumed her now trademarked giggling. "Oh WOW! That was the BEST! Ten out of Ten! Woot!"

Yucky

"Mister Gentleman, you can spend time with the kids too

You mean his kids ahahah

As for the Oracle, she was also gone!

The screens went black.

Whoa wait what

As my eyes adjusted, I could tell it was... MEW!

OH BOY. I had a strong feeling Mew itself would actually show up but ooo boy. Strapping in. Also very sus how she chose to appear "get rid" of the oracle...

Mew's face remained the same. "Mmm, unlike psychic powers in humans, there are several things I can do with MY psychic powers..

Whatever the plot demands, eh Mew

"I'll kill you where you stand."

....I see we are in the mischief god mew timeline. oh dear.

Suitably horrifying

Mew crossed her arms. "Really? You mortals really suck at properly passing down history... GR Island does a good job, but not here on TCG Island. I suppose your Oracle is to blame. Always spoon-feeding you like a bunch of babies...

Okay see I still subtly felt the Oracle was at least a little... Not so perfect is it i guess.... intriguing.

ew looked off in the distance. "A talented scientist who went by... Professor Cypress."

I see even here the Tree Name Professors are

What do I look like, Mewtwo?

lol this reference was funny

I'm not sure! If I had to guess, I'd say it had something to do with the Nexus or The Watchers."

The what or the what???

"Engagement ring, pay off parents' mortgage, cure my sister's blindness, and enough funds to quit my job!! I would ask how you knew all this, but that's really BESIDE the point!"

so I guess the oracle couldn't handle all this heh

Tango remained hiding under his bed as he had done the entire time...

Dang there goes my Tango is mew theory...

New theory time!!! Tango is Lugia. Or Phantom Lugia. Somehow.

Yeah... I don't trust it. Pizza? It's like some corporate ploy to avoid paying higher wages to employees by placating them with food... But for you, the goal isn't money. It's something else... What do you want?"

lol ahahahha

It's true. You have all tried hard. But effort can only get you so far... Talent is far more important..."

hmmm.... is it though

Refuse the duel and I will kill Isaac right here in front of you all. Agree to duel and win? Isaac lives. If you lose?" Mew's eyes glowed. "I will kill both Isaac AND Nikki."

Holy smokes. Jeez louise....
Talk about a horrific decision...

"It WAS miserable! But it's going to be BETTER! And what kind of a wife would I be if I left Isaac!? And I would never forgive Mister Gentleman if he let Isaac die like that! I would NEVER marry him if he did!"

awww I really like Nikki standing up for Isaac here

"Irrelevant! I can just erase your memory of it, Nikki. Then, you certainly WOULD marry him! If you both just accept it, I can make both you and Mister Gentleman very happy. Isaac sucks. Mister Gentleman is way better for you. Oh! If you are worried about what others will think, I can erase Rick's memory too!"

what a lovely nice thing for mew to do.

not.

Mister Gentleman, if it guarantees Nikki's safety, you can walk away! I won't let her down any more!"

Awwww as terrifying as this is I appreciate too that he was willing to make this sacrifice.

Wow there's a lot to talk about. I'll start with the Oracle bits since thats the next line.

I think its quite interesting to set up such an invovled character conflict between these three characters, built up over these past twenty chapters or so. Thanks in particular to Isaac's stubbornness there's no easy way out either. Even when presented with irrefutable facts and logic he didn;t want to admit he was wrong. Normally I'd lament such a quick and ultimately pretty simple payoff via the hand of god kind of thing, where you can just go "here's the Truth". But this fic gets a pass hah. First, the setting is wacky and weird Like That.

Second the methods via which the "absolute truths" are revealed is elements foreshadowed and set up already in the fic, and done through characters actions and choices.I do appreciate that the oracle bit is considered a one time deal as well, feels too OP if not and I enjoy that it sort of "cost" Rick something at least hypothetically. Rick is such a good friend and a good brother btw.

Also Rick is the ONLY sane guy here. Not even you, Gentleman lol.

So yeah i give a pass on basically making the crux of the past 20 chapters of emotional turbulence basically be solved by deific entity going "heres the truth now shut up" and the characters accepting that and basically all being able to forgive each other completely and move on.

And uh, speaking of moving on, yucky lol. I guess Nikki needed to get it out of her system but the entire kiss bit gave me the ick. This isn't a criticism btw, since thats a character based choice. And its preference based. I just don't like physical stuff already and then this very passionate kiss even though Nikki is already with Isaac made me cringe. Even if Oracle hand of god confirmed she wouldn't cheat and loved them the same it felt. Weird. It sort of is cheating but heyo.

Sorry hah, I'll stop harping on that, thats entirely probably on me since I dont care abt romo.

Anyways onto the big reveals after...

holy mew.

That was an absolute deranged and slightly disturbing yet cool ride. Mew is an absolute menace and terrifying. I had really hoped they might show up and they do not disappoint. I have to say, I do enjoy a capricious interpretation of Mew. As the embodient of the creation of life its not hard to believe or see a version where they'd be about all of life, as they said. Their philosophy is exactly what I'd expect in a fic like this.
Also what a huge jerk .

Now the stakes are higher than ever. Threatening to kill Isaac and wipe everyone memories and just treat everyone like playthings. Yikeeesssss.

What was I thinking about again

.... oh no oh dear. Is Mew meddling with his memories?

It felt like he was about to realize something too. Did Mew maybe base it off something Gentleman himself studied...? Did Wem figure something out? I hope there's no secret cards Mew slipped in too.

Spoiler: HELOOOO????????????

For some reason, my head was cloudy... I attached Fire Energy to Growlithe. My hand was now out of energy... I needed more.

I had a computer search in my hand. What did I want to do with it?

Oh gosh she's meddling with his mind! Mr Gentleman go back and reread your journal!!

unstakill so kazam ant save it

Yeah he's officially lost it

I LOST!!

,,, oohh,,,,, oh no.

Pokemon Card Elite University

I will have you know that it was at this EXACT literally moment my brain did that calculation meme and I was like

Spoiler: are you KIDDING ME

DR WEM. DR MEW???? ARE YOU FOR SO REAL

It was RIGHT THERE. Tango isnt Mew, it was DR FReAKIN MEw. screaming. This is the first time in a long time I can remember a fic getting me so good with a twist in such a satisfying way. Kudos.

Wem told us that she was from Neo Island, but she was obviously no clone

..... Mew made all the Neo clones didn't she I bet...

Also, I don't think I ever heard of her losing a duel to anyone other than me...

Is she toying with him? And if she kept winning did she really win because she was good?
On one hand, her tutoring made Gentleman good... but... but hold on...

I won't kill Isaac or Nikki... in exchange for your life.

.... oh....

OKAY HOLD ON.

Spoiler: Hold on hold on

if Dr Wem is Mew but Mew is cheating... did Dr Wem actually win back in the university???

Okay so. This brings up so many very interesting implications. Because if she cheated to win then that means... most of Mister Gentlemans wins are from his actual own skill? I mean it always was his skill and hardwork but moreso than he realizes because Mew can't take any credit. Winning by cheating is low skill.

ALSO on top of that this brings back the Neo Island clone thing back up. If they're genetically identical then maybe Mew just... made the whole island to amuse herself but couldn't give intelligence maybe. Did Mew come back because she actually really wanted to duel mister Gentleman>??? Is he the one who possibly could give her a real battle? But then why cheat.... hmmm

WOOOWWW Mew is such a jerk and psycotic. Cheating?? Get good scrub!!

I need to read more.

Spoiler: The Final Fight

Admittedly I uh... barely or only slightly paid attention too the battle here. I was so wrapped up in everything else wow.

I had Professor Oak in hand that I perhaps could have used to look for Growlithe, but it would have been a waste to play it considering I still had seven other cards in hand.

Okay phew, I'm glad that this line of thinking indicates he's back to his usual strategizing.

Stop thinking them. Not my problem."

Not how that works, Mew. Rude.

Shall I threaten to alter the deal to kill more people then?"

"Pray i do not alter it further" meme

Also i mean more deaths wont really affect him if he's too dead right.... although there is all that stuff about the Great Beyond....

Well. At least I had tried...

You're nicer than me... Thats very nice though, very telling of Gentleman.

Doctor Wem, would have been like...

Oh silly gentleman you are SO dense. I cant blame him tho ehehhe

Losing someone that important multiple times? I couldn't bring myself to hate her...

Skill Issue, I can. Give me the gun I'll kill her lol. Unless she's playacting at being a psycotic god.

Thanks, ████, I've enjoyed our time together. I'm sorry I blocked that bit out from your mind. I said it, but I can't let you know it. Even so, I'm in love with you.

.... hm.... why black out his name? I wonder....
NEW THEORY, GENTLEMAN IS Ho-Oh. (look idk at this point lol). It does make me think though there's so much more to this... actually him being Ho-Oh would make sense. I mean not really but sort of ahahah. Fire deck and all that.

Also wow Mew really does love him... so is this all her lashing out because he rejected her? Did she make an island of clones to deal with her grief over always losing friends?

"Don't worry about it. I'm not letting them form memories of this moment here... this is just for us

Skeevy but ok

Mew then transformed.

Okay "Wem" looks super cool

It was done

.... Man...

Now what

I need to read more.

Spoiler: Aftermath

You get enough feathers?"

oh wait wait oh no-

The beam connected as I witnessed the life drain from Tango's eyes.

NNNOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

There are only two known ways to destroy one. The first is by an Aeroblast attack. The other is a Sacred Fire attack."

.... you mean Ho-Oh and Lugia's signature moves? Okay see that part of my theory is right

ALSO PHEW.. I was about to be SO distraught.

Ugh! Wem is just Mew BACKWARDS... How could I miss such an obvious clue!?

ahahahah i figured it out before you hahah. Not that long before but still hey

Mew nodded. "Indeed. Oh, and I'm also the Oracle."

AH HAH!!! I had sort of suspected this one

This isn't so much as a brain blast as Mew, this is more like "a HAH" this explains everything about why I thought the AI was weird.

Okay this is getting les utopian by the moment heheheh

Mew interlaced her fingers and rested her hands on the table. "I've seen futures with AI and all of them end badly for humans. No living being would win if it were invented."

She's so right about this lol. She saw the Terminator movies and all the rest of the AI movies hah

The Oracle helped Isaac understand he was wrong and reforged the friendship he had with Mister Gentleman, but trying to make up for lost time required more than that."

... oh. OH. I know what she's going to say.

Ah, ████... It's going to be ok!! You won't be alone forever. There is someone you will meet... Until then, chin up

Oh? I wonder who that will be.... Glad to hear it, though I still propose gentleman needs to find joy in friendships more

Rick closed his eyes as he smiled awkwardly. "Uh... well... It was a snap decision... I didn't want to see you die! I realized how dumb it was immediately after... Too late by that point..."

< 3 Rick is such a good friend augh

Ah, but Mew must have foreseen Tango's attempt to help and knew he would revive from it. I'll bet that was her plan!"

... okay but like you still were horrible

Rick frowned. "Yeah, and I'm not done yet. I guess everyone is just happy that no one died, but I'm not that easy... You lied to us, threatened us, and essentially took us hostage. Do you honestly believe your ends justified the means? Just how much of this did you look into the future for?"

Rick is the only guy here genre aware lol. Thank you man.

Rick held up his index finger. "First, I want a free extra Oracle audience for everyone here. And free counseling to any of us who want it."

I love Rick, he's so nice

Mew bit the edge of the nail on her thumb. "This doesn't make any sense! I always thought I was just sure of myself... but that isn't it! ...This philosophy is something I can never change or remove! I can't even feel remorse from what it leads me to do... What am I?"

... Huh.... so... her free will itself is limited? Fascinating

I prefer a contrast. A horrible place for every good one.

So is there a Grimdark island .

Less than human

:(

you are compelled to do

This is...a lot to wrestle with wow. Interesting...

This one is old news. I figured it out centuries ago..

. im sorry WHAT....?? A clone line? WHat. I did not see that explanation coming at ALL. Hm....

Knowing you though this might actually come into play somehow.

Madness! Paradox! The taste of blue... The sound of red... The texture of green. Bright sound! Too many examples to count and ALL of them at once! Never again will I attempt to peer inside one with my power... I nearly went irreversibly insane from just a few seconds of it!"

Okay Doduo spawn from Ho-Oh, Lugia and Celebi.

Be my friend."

.... awwwwwwwwwww

Rick is a good bean wow. Nicer than me too but I love it. I support them

I can't wait to see what you do with it!"

Wait what was the gift!!!!??

Holy smokes wow. Once I got started there were so many big revelations I couldn't stop.

I think I'll call a break here though at 31. Seems like we've wrapped up some big stuff.. That set of chapters was an absolute rollercoaster ride of twists and turns and ups and downs. I'm still reeling just a little. It was super fun, honestly and pretty satisfying. All the little details and setups sprinkled throughout the story that seemed like a simple thing or random detail paid off and it was great to read.

Mew herself is also a huge conundrum. Who made her? What about all the weird stuff she mentioned? What about her very own nature, morals and philosophy. Its fascinating. Also as I understand... despite all the threats she's... not murderous or psycotic I guess. That was all part of the act to enable Isaac to make up and everyone to come together. Although she has done a lot of other incredibly sketchy stuff. Messing with peoples minds and memories and stuff.

All I really have to say is that I love Rick. I really enjoy how he came to the forefront of the story near the end, and really came onto his own. He spent a lot of the first half in the background but now I can see Rick is the master chess player... hm. A good fit for mew actually lol. He was biding his time, waiting in the eaves of the narrative to make his moves. And he's a genuinely great friend.

The many questions I had were answered as well, except for what ricks gift is!! >:{. I wanna know now lol. Also this bit about Doduo cores sure explains a lot... about why there are no bodies. But not about Tango himself. Mew claims she knows what Murray knew so I wonder if there's some more mysteries yet to untangle about him. Also what the heck is that mystery line between the islands??? So my "Mew made herself a clone island" is not accurate. Hm.

At any rate, this makes me curious and excited about the final 7 chapters. I am hoping there's going to be some epilogue type stuff. I peeked ahead and saw that the next chapter is from Isaac's point of view so I expect we'll get some nice windown. There is still the matter of GR2 and Stephanie and all that, so hopefully Isaac is able to call the guy off. I won't be surprised any more though if there's more secrets to be revealed yet.! And perhaps any last danger...

I do definitely feel there's perhaps something about the Gentleman also yet to be unveiled... guess I'll find out when I finish this fic sometime soon-ish!

.....

I Lied. I had to read one more. Gotta make it a multiple of three...

Spoiler: A Bedtime Story

As for me, It was time I got back to my kids. I had a lot of explaining to do... No more delusions. It was time my kids had the dad they'd always deserved. For Nikki, I'd practically worship the ground she walked on from now on. She just didn't know it yet. That was where the biggest difference would be. She'd given me a second chance, and there was no way I would blow it.

YESSS we love to see it. Glad everyone basically learned a good lesson here.

Living near the lightning club... It had been selfish. It left Nikki having to drive far to work every day... All because I wanted to live farther from Mister Gentleman... That was something to fix. But I wasn't moving back there for Mister Gentleman. I could, but this time, Nikki would be my reason.

Love to see genuine change and fixing things, this is a sweet little detail.

For the kids, I'd decided to walk them through everything as a bedtime story. A story of my past. A story of friendship, hardship, false betrayal, and love.

Cute!

Acting quickly, I held Jenny against my chest. "Woah! Jenny, hold on! There is something big in this story I need to tell you. Mister Gentleman is not bad! Daddy thought he was, but Daddy was mistaken. And, Jenny? Daddy's going to take you to the park tomorrow!"

Jenny sniffed as she looked up at me with glistening eyes. Her Pikachu face paint was ok since we got her the water-resistant kind. "Really, Daddy?"

I'm glad he's telling them everything

Heather's jaw dropped. "Wait, WHAT!?"

AhAHAHAHAH this was funny

Heather looked down, deep in thought. "I've always thought he was a nice person. I didn't understand why you hated him so much, Dad. I'm glad you are going to be friends with him again. Dad, when he is around me... I feel loved. It's like when I'm around you. I can't explain it, but I'd like to be around him."

ahahah oh... I could tell you, sweet child

"GR2 hates it when their meditation is disturbed.

... meditation?? If Mew had a GR thing is GR2... Mewtwo!?!?! (at this point anything seems plasubile lol. Especially the clone line...

"It's no skin off my back to annul the contract, but a refund is out of the question... I have a GR blimp with a full staff ready for the operation. The costs of securing all this equipment and staff are substantial. I could have been doing other things..."

I have a feeling this wont be cleaned up so simple... also yikes this guy was well connected, a whole blimp?

Nothing to grab my interest..."

oh no. I have a bad feeling...

 

[Tango]

Ok wow. Amazing set of reviews!! Took me a while even just to reply to but so SO worth it!

Both you and Neko are so close to the end of the book! I'm excited!

Spoiler: Grass: 21 & 22

The time has finally come... I wonder how gentleman will fare. If he wins, which I feel he will, thats great but also means that his psychically predited loss might be against Isaac?

Perhaps.

Oh thats a smart move. Man i sympathize though, it still feels kind of yucky to have to do all these and stoop to this though.

So does he.

lol, nice acting Rick. I'm alost a little surprised he doesn't feel more bad about pulling one over on his sister but I guess he's more a practical man of science than wanting to only side with his sister.

Funny thing is, he IS ultimately on her side by doing this.

Right. Dumb bird.

Absolutely.

Ooof yeah. In action it really sucks and does kind of beg the question how right one is for doing the wrong thing for the right reasons. Its still kind of a manipulation tactic...

Hence why he feels bad about it.

I mean that part isn't exactlllyyyy bullying.... Not exactly gonna go easy on you even if I was being nice...

True.

Okay yeah thats pretty mean

Yeah! 😅

I enjoy how very dramatic everyone is with these. Extremely anime hah

I tried. Glad you enjoy it!

Ohhh whoa this is a super cool strategy. idk her entire deck but the fact that she couldn't pull this off often does suggest to me though that maybe a couple small tweaks to her deck could really make this work. Maybe more card draw.

Her deck could absolutely be made way better.

Oooo Nikki POV!!

Yep! There was too much going on for me not to show her side of things too.

You maybe should. just a tad kek.

Well.... no. it shouldn't have to. I understand this can be what happens but if y'all were smarter and more mature lol you could stll be friends... romance doesn't mean you're more important... but then its pretty tricky when everyone is so desperate to be romantically entangled lol.

Yep.

Extremely Cat behaviour lol. My cat is the exact same, she never wants to get off.

Oh dear :(. I also wonder how or through what methods the Oracle tried to help her improve? Can the Oracle train her like Gentlemen got training? I wonder if she ever tried to enroll in the academy, can't recall if it was said

The truth is that there was only one way the Oracle could have helped her and she chose not to utilize it.

Oh... oh dear she think it wasnt real? uh oh

Yep. She has no idea he stayed the night or that he kissed her.

Well... I have some uh... interesting news for you Nikki lol. Perhaos your kids are not what you think. On that front though if her kids are a few years apart this means that one is Isaac's and one is Gentlemans...

Correct. The only one who might be Mister Gentleman's daughter is Heather from the Grass Club!

Girl no thats a terrible idea. Such a bad mindset she's fallen into. its kind if ironic because by trying to dump all your stat points into this pursuit you quite often ensure that you make things worse for your spouse/kids long term. oof. You unintentionally are modeing an unhealthy/unbalanced mindset.

Indeed.

Girl NO! There's nothing wrong with trying to cheer him up or be kind but you also can't become a doormat. Man Nikki's equally messed up...

Yep!

Which is great, I do love me some delusional gals or misguided gals, kek.

Does he though??? Does he???

Well, she didn't know the truth about what happened with Jennifer at this point... 😅

No girl, NO. You support him when he's right. Not blindly! Friendship and lovr isn't about blindly supporting your partners and best friends. Love actually means standing against them if they are wrong.

True, but not something she understands.

no you're not weak for not having a strong tcg deck...

Considering how much their world values skill in the TCG, that is less true than one might think.

But you are weak for not being able to stand upfor your convictions and values and what you believe in. Buuutt hey, room for growth.

Valid.

These were some really fun chapters. The use of dual POV here pulls massive weight for the story and I love it

I'm so glad it paid off! I thought these chapters went well too!

(ignoring the bit that I guess everyone in this world keeps incredibly detailed diaries/journals?? heh).

...yyyeahhh... ignoring that. I'm not even going to try to pretend it's a plot point because it's not. It just makes for a better story that way, darn it!

Seeing first Gentleman trying to enact his plans and his own reactions to it, then swithcing to Nikki for the first time to show us her POV on everything thats been happening. Now that we have a chapter from each Isaac and Nikki things are real spicy.

Yeah!

I have a lot of strong opinions about love triangles and the 'two guys like one girl' trope. It can easily be pretty frustrating but giving us POV's from everyone helps a lot. Usually many of my qualms with stories involve a few things: the girl's issues never being addressed and her not growing as a character, one guy being obviously Bad and the other Good, and a lack of convincingly written chemistry or reasons to like the guy. Also very often the girls desires in a triangle end up treated ultimately as passive while its about two guys bickering for her and being jealous (which ca be unattractive lol).

That said so far this is pretty different, especially for being set in the aftermath of a love triangle situation where the 'wrong' choice was made (wrong here mainly because she did not love Isaac and couldn't bear to tell him).

Funny you should say that...

Its clear that Nikki is equally messed up in her own way. She tormented herself, couldn't decided what path to choose, and then essentially went with a wrong option... one that is going to affect her for years now and possibly her children. She fell into so strongly too that she's based all her perceptions of self worth on trying to fufill this role she's placed on herself, only making everything worse in the long run anyway.
She's equally to blame in a different way for placing Isaac in a loveless marriage where she's still pining for another man. Isaac is still abominable and a huge jerk but she's also wrong. She tried to take the decision out of her hands which was just entirely unfair to both of them as her friends. It was a hard choice/situation I feel a little sympathy for but also I can't give her a free pass, its a cowards move. By trying to please everyone you have pleased no one Nikki! To truly love is to be willing to have the temporary pain of telling Isaac you dont love him, not by choosing him anyway.

Ooo! I like the way you pick apart motivations and analyze!

Alas. alack. Still, Nikki is far from a bad person either. She's loyal and possesses strong convictions and cares deeply about those around her, even to her own detriment, and thats also very admirable. Now if she can just learn to balance these. Even good traits like care and selflessness can end up hurting others when intentioned for good. Perhaps if she'd told Isaac up front things could have gone better...

The fact is, she was going to feel bad no matter which one she went for. (Regardless of how she SHOULD have felt about it)

That said don't take this as me not liking it but rather I am very invested in the drama.

I didn't take it as dislike. I enjoyed every bit of reaction, speculation, and analysis!

Spoiler: 23

We're finally here... and yet only halfway through in terms of chapters

Crazy huh? I invested a TON into the main plot resolution of this book.

:( Knowing now why she said it makes this harder.

Yeah

YES hello you should. cmon gentleman

So, I'm going to write this at some point. Here is how it will go:

He goes to play fetch and throws a stick or something. Tango looks over at the stick and then at him. He is like "Go get it!" and then Tango trots up to him and he is like "No not me, the stick! go get the stick!" he then tilts his heads and then with ninja-like skills, shoves a beak into one of Mister Gentleman's pockets and takes out his car keys. Tango then tosses his car keys out into the lawn while Mister Gentlemen is like "WHAT? NOO!!!" and then Tango trots along with him. Before he can pick up the keys, Tango dives in and throws them again. This goes on for some time...

And that is how he plays 'fetch' with Tango.

ooo psycological warfare, I like this.

Yeah!

Ah but its not about intelligence its about emotions.

In truth, it is about neither.

Or... or its trap? hm.. Not sure, it could be part of a ploy but i dont know if Isaac thought that that far ahead. But he does have plans to use GR2 so...

It is not a trap.

I cant imagine why . thanks stephanie lol

Nah, she isn't screwing anything up. Both of them are paying her to do the opposite things so she just does nothing at all and collects money from both of them! Oh and she is 11 years old.

Also I guess this is the loss the psychic predicted...

All the prediction was is that not all games would end in victory. A match is a series of games.

Oohohho more mind games. I do enjoy this.

Yep!

Stephanie again perhaps, when it counts? or just random chance.... curious

Nah, Stephanie isn't doing jack.

ohoho I enjoy this. the "now the real fight begins" but its about emotional stakes

YES!!

!!! Oh!!! Pov Switch??

Yep. We pretty much already know what to expect from Mister Gentleman, so it was way more interesting to see it from Isaac's POV.

Well FINALLY im glad you at least started to realize that you were wrong

Started. Yes.

Hello YES. For all her flaws her flaw is trying to hard not being bad to you.

He has it super good being married to Nikki.

[sigh] shes a PERSON Isaac, she can't be STOLEN. If she wanted to choose that would be her choice
(but dont get me wrong this is realistic to how people talk).

Correct. Also correct that is how he talks.

Holy frick I did NOT see this curveball coming what the

Oh yes, Rick has lingered in the shadows long enough!

I love it. This is so cool I love it I love Rock you TELL EM BOY

Oh, he will. 😎

Well well well if it isnt the consequences of your actions.

Funny how that works!

its aboutta so much worse for you buddy.

So true.

You know, usually I don't like the girl swapping the guy trope but here its quite justified lol.

Yeah, he had it coming and THEN some!

You should be grateful, real pals call other plas out on their crap

Hard for him to see that in the moment, but yes.

THANK YOU YAASSSS. Finally someone with some SENSE. I love Rick.

And to think, Rick wasn't in my original fic at all. He was also an entirely UNPLANNED character! But once I started stuff with him, I just couldn't stop!

Dude cmon

Yeah, Isaac is one tough nut to crack. 😬

Which would ALSO be her choice my guy. Marriage is two people. TWO choosing to be together. I mean its true people can try to manipulate other people but to insist so about Nikki is to claim you're super smart and aware and she's a dumb desk lamp who can be stolen.

Very true!

but eheh this is on brand for Isaac to say to justify himself.

Indeed.

Yes please lol. delulu as some would say

For sure!

*gasp*. Man Rick has been plotting all this from the get go! in a good way

Yep!

Well yes-

[facepalm]

The dude just won't freaking listen!

GET EM RICK

Oh you are about to be SO SO wrong...

Oh yes will he ever be!

Rick has shot up severely in all my estimations. I love him so much, what a brilliant guy. This is actually really cool to see. All of Rock's carefully laid plans coming to fruition so he can spring his own trap to try and get these two to reconcile. I love how all these seemingly innocuous moments are now coming to fruition and and paying off. Even that seemingly random bit Nikki mentions about the visit to the "oracle" is about to coming full circle.

Yes, yes, YES!! This is how I like to write my fics. Many threads and subplots that come together for the end of a book in some spectacular ways! Kind of like a firework show!

Oh and regarding Rick, you haven't even seen all there is for him, but I'll touch more on that later.

What now then I wonder? If we convince Isaac finally about how wrong he is, get Nikki to see her errors and repair things... there's still the issue of GR2. Something tells me even if Isaac has a change of heart we can't trust that GR2 will be so keep to drop his mission now that its begun. Perhaps a battle against him is in the future.

You are absolutely correct that GR2 will not be dropping their mission. Especially considering their motivation is far beyond Isaac's money at this point. In fact, no amount of money would dissuade GR2 from continuing at this point.

I also wonder what the Oracle will be like... after all the references to it I'm veerryyyy curious.

Well, you're in luck!

The psycological elements to the battle here were especially neat and I hope future tough battles use something like this. I think it adds a lot more layers, rather like chess, as opposed to simplying odds and coin flips. Which is fine but the "know your opponent" trick adds a really genuine skill element. Studying combat patterns and tendencies and cards and favored actions. Cool stuff.

Most of them will not use psychological aspects as that was part of what I wanted to do to spice up the end of the book, but who knows? Maybe I'll do more like that in Book Two.

Spoiler: The Oracle and Aftermath

Nah I wouldn't I feel you owe it more to yourself to do it yourself.

Luckily, he won't need to rely on the Oracle for that!

Oooorrr they're secretly very controlling and arrogant and dont want to compete with another AI hmm.....
and the oracle granting only one visit is interesting.
Somethin is off about the AI imo, idk I just still never trust benevolent AI's

You are correct. Something IS off.

Terminator

At least someone thought of Tango

Okay now you're stringing this man along

Poor, poor Murray... his life is a lie. 😅

Rickis such a good brother yay

😎

FINALLLYYYY

Ugghhh you idiots this is the problem. You SHOULD hug maybe you'd be less jealous and sad, good grief.

Finally. More guys need to accept that there's nothing wrong with hugging lol.

Guys are going to be guys, but at least THESE guys are able to understand.

Hm. Huh. Interesting revelation, makes sense in its own way i guess.

Yep. The twist was she loved them both equally!

Okay i get the implication is meant that Murray would never lie for Oracle but this actually sounds a lot more like Murray is so devoted to oracle he would. Now, I don't actually believe he is or anything but I thought I should mention that it absolutely sounds kind of like its plausible to claimMurray would lie for the Oracle.

Maybe Murray confirming he has no affiliation to her...? Not sure. Not a huge deal.

Murray is loyal and can be trusted. This is one thing you don't need to question.

[sweats] yeah.... no more getting drunk...

😬

I do really like that he apologized here.

Yeah. He now realizes what a massive prick he has been and wants to do all he can to make it right.

Ouh.... wha. why

Partly out of frustration for all she has been having to deal with. Partly to punish Isaac.(dude is seriously lucky to not be divorced at this point.) And partly because she wants it.

Yucky

This part is interesting. Essentially, it seems to boil down to if the reader enjoys romance or not. If they do enjoy it, this scene is enjoyable. If they don't, this scene is icky. Your opinion is entirely valid.

You mean his kids ahahah

Or 'kid', rather.

Whoa wait what

Hahaha! You didn't really think the ride was OVER did you?

OH BOY. I had a strong feeling Mew itself would actually show up but ooo boy. Strapping in. Also very sus how she chose to appear "get rid" of the oracle...

Indeed!

Whatever the plot demands, eh Mew

Pretty much.

....I see we are in the mischief god mew timeline. oh dear.

Oh yes.

Suitably horrifying

Very true.

Okay see I still subtly felt the Oracle was at least a little... Not so perfect is it i guess.... intriguing.

There is a reason for that...

I see even here the Tree Name Professors are

Yep! Because why not?

lol this reference was funny

Glad it landed well!

The what or the what???

Oh nothing, just some extremely important bits of lore that won't be explained for a long time.

so I guess the oracle couldn't handle all this heh

Dang there goes my Tango is mew theory...

Don't worry, you can always come up with a new one! (Though the Mew theory was not bad at all!)

New theory time!!! Tango is Lugia. Or Phantom Lugia. Somehow.

It's always interesting to see how close or far reader theories land...

lol ahahahha

Yeah, Isaac isn't going to be fooled by pizza.

hmmm.... is it though

Actually, yes.

Holy smokes. Jeez louise....
Talk about a horrific decision...

NOW there be some proper stakes!

awww I really like Nikki standing up for Isaac here

Yeah. Nikki is great.

what a lovely nice thing for mew to do.

not.

Yeah, it's a tad rude...

Awwww as terrifying as this is I appreciate too that he was willing to make this sacrifice.

Excatly. That was part of the point. How else would he offer such a thing?

Wow there's a lot to talk about. I'll start with the Oracle bits since thats the next line.

I think its quite interesting to set up such an invovled character conflict between these three characters, built up over these past twenty chapters or so. Thanks in particular to Isaac's stubbornness there's no easy way out either. Even when presented with irrefutable facts and logic he didn;t want to admit he was wrong. Normally I'd lament such a quick and ultimately pretty simple payoff via the hand of god kind of thing, where you can just go "here's the Truth". But this fic gets a pass hah.

I'm so glad the ease of the resolution wasn't preventing it from being satisfying!

In truth, this had to be wrapped up in this book because of what happens in the next.

First, the setting is wacky and weird Like That.

Second the methods via which the "absolute truths" are revealed is elements foreshadowed and set up already in the fic, and done through characters actions and choices.I do appreciate that the oracle bit is considered a one time deal as well, feels too OP if not and I enjoy that it sort of "cost" Rick something at least hypothetically.

Yeah, I tried very hard to make all the peices work. It wasn't easy!

Rick is such a good friend and a good brother btw.

Heck yeah he is. 😎

Also Rick is the ONLY sane guy here. Not even you, Gentleman lol.

A fair assessment.

So yeah i give a pass on basically making the crux of the past 20 chapters of emotional turbulence basically be solved by deific entity going "heres the truth now shut up" and the characters accepting that and basically all being able to forgive each other completely and move on.

Always a good thing to have a pass on.

And uh, speaking of moving on, yucky lol. I guess Nikki needed to get it out of her system but the entire kiss bit gave me the ick.

Yeah. You are correct. Totally valid for it to be ick. Its the kind of thing some readers will enjoy and others will not.

This isn't a criticism btw, since thats a character based choice. And its preference based. I just don't like physical stuff already and then this very passionate kiss even though Nikki is already with Isaac made me cringe.

Totally fair. I was really on the fence about it too. One of the things I was most worried about for the book, but ultimately it is one event among many and it doesn't seem to cost me readers for it to be included, so it seems ok to keep... probably.

Even if Oracle hand of god confirmed she wouldn't cheat and loved them the same it felt. Weird. It sort of is cheating but heyo.

Yeah it can totally be looked at as cheating. I don't blame anyone for not being on board with it even with all the circumstances around it.

Sorry hah, I'll stop harping on that, thats entirely probably on me since I dont care abt romo.

Totaly fair and thank you for voicing your thoughts on it.

Anyways onto the big reveals after...

holy mew.

That was an absolute deranged and slightly disturbing yet cool ride. Mew is an absolute menace and terrifying.

Yep! That was the point. 😎

I had really hoped they might show up and they do not disappoint. I have to say, I do enjoy a capricious interpretation of Mew. As the embodient of the creation of life its not hard to believe or see a version where they'd be about all of life, as they said. Their philosophy is exactly what I'd expect in a fic like this.
Also what a huge jerk .

Mew is all the things I set out to have them be.

Now the stakes are higher than ever. Threatening to kill Isaac and wipe everyone memories and just treat everyone like playthings. Yikeeesssss.

It's the climax of the book. Go big or go home. 😎

.... oh no oh dear. Is Mew meddling with his memories?

Yep!

It felt like he was about to realize something too. Did Mew maybe base it off something Gentleman himself studied...? Did Wem figure something out? I hope there's no secret cards Mew slipped in too.

Spoiler: HELOOOO????????????

Oh gosh she's meddling with his mind! Mr Gentleman go back and reread your journal!!

Even if he wanted to, he would just 'forget' what he was tyring to do!

Yeah he's officially lost it

indeed.

,,, oohh,,,,, oh no.

I will have you know that it was at this EXACT literally moment my brain did that calculation meme and I was like

Spoiler: are you KIDDING ME

DR WEM. DR MEW???? ARE YOU FOR SO REAL

🤣

It was RIGHT THERE. Tango isnt Mew, it was DR FReAKIN MEw. screaming. This is the first time in a long time I can remember a fic getting me so good with a twist in such a satisfying way. Kudos.

If you think that one was good, you should see what else I have in store for the series!

..... Mew made all the Neo clones didn't she I bet...

Not quite...

Is she toying with him?

Absolutely.

And if she kept winning did she really win because she was good?

Actually, yes. She also could have cheated.

On one hand, her tutoring made Gentleman good... but... but hold on...

.... oh....

OKAY HOLD ON.

Oh?

Spoiler: Hold on hold on

if Dr Wem is Mew but Mew is cheating... did Dr Wem actually win back in the university???

Mew is cheating, but she never did as Wem.

Okay so. This brings up so many very interesting implications. Because if she cheated to win then that means... most of Mister Gentlemans wins are from his actual own skill? I mean it always was his skill and hardwork but moreso than he realizes because Mew can't take any credit. Winning by cheating is low skill.

ALSO on top of that this brings back the Neo Island clone thing back up. If they're genetically identical then maybe Mew just... made the whole island to amuse herself but couldn't give intelligence maybe. Did Mew come back because she actually really wanted to duel mister Gentleman>??? Is he the one who possibly could give her a real battle? But then why cheat.... hmmm

She is cheating here to fine-tune her control over the events to lead to her final desired outcome.

WOOOWWW Mew is such a jerk and psycotic. Cheating?? Get good scrub!!

Yeah, but she doesn't need to cheat to win. She is cheating to get the specific future she selected.

I need to read more.

Spoiler: The Final Fight

Admittedly I uh... barely or only slightly paid attention too the battle here. I was so wrapped up in everything else wow.

No problem at all! I personally find the battle to be almost an afterthought compared to the rest of it, and it's even a pretty epic battle!

Okay phew, I'm glad that this line of thinking indicates he's back to his usual strategizing.

Indeed. Mew is letting him think clearly now.

Not how that works, Mew. Rude.

Little does he know, it doesn't even matter if Mew reads his thoughts or not.

Also i mean more deaths wont really affect him if he's too dead right.... although there is all that stuff about the Great Beyond....

Yes, the Great Beyond. A very important peice of lore to be expanded on far later...

You're nicer than me... Thats very nice though, very telling of Gentleman.

Oh silly gentleman you are SO dense. I cant blame him tho ehehhe

Skill Issue, I can. Give me the gun I'll kill her lol. Unless she's playacting at being a psycotic god.

Funny you should say that... 😅

.... hm.... why black out his name? I wonder....

Considering she can see the future, she has a very good reason not to say it.

NEW THEORY, GENTLEMAN IS Ho-Oh. (look idk at this point lol). It does make me think though there's so much more to this... actually him being Ho-Oh would make sense. I mean not really but sort of ahahah. Fire deck and all that.

It's not the worst theory for sure. But the truth eludes you. Unfortunately, this might not be one you will be able to guess for a while. That's because it relies on some meta knowledge of the game. If someone else wrote my fic and I was reading it blind, I might be able to peice it together by this point, but many readers will not. Not to worry, though. It will be revealed in time.

Also wow Mew really does love him...

Indeed she does. She had not intended to. It was not part of her plan. But she doesn't read the future for her relationships or feelings, so she didn't see it coming.

so is this all her lashing out because he rejected her?

She doesn't mind if he thinks it is.

Did she make an island of clones to deal with her grief over always losing friends?

Not a bad guess but the truth is weirder than that.

Skeevy but ok

Eh, sort of, but she isn't harming them. It's just to give them some privacy.

Okay "Wem" looks super cool

I need to read more.

Yes!!!

Spoiler: Aftermath

oh wait wait oh no-

NNNOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

Yep. Surprise TIMES TWO!!

.... you mean Ho-Oh and Lugia's signature moves? Okay see that part of my theory is right

And their moves increases the likelyhood that they are real mon that exist in their world.

ALSO PHEW.. I was about to be SO distraught.

There will be no grief there that day. Mew made sure of that.

ahahahah i figured it out before you hahah. Not that long before but still hey

AH HAH!!! I had sort of suspected this one

Wait, really?

Huh.

This isn't so much as a brain blast as Mew, this is more like "a HAH" this explains everything about why I thought the AI was weird.

Wait, what? But I thought it would be the other way around!

Okay this is getting les utopian by the moment heheheh

She's so right about this lol. She saw the Terminator movies and all the rest of the AI movies hah

She really is.

...man I hope I can complete my series in time for you to read it all. I'm super curious what you would think of the end of the series.

... oh. OH. I know what she's going to say.

Yep. This whole song and dance was to ultimately set things as right as they could be.

Oh? I wonder who that will be.... Glad to hear it, though I still propose gentleman needs to find joy in friendships more

It is a character I eagerly anticipate beyond this book.

< 3 Rick is such a good friend augh

The very best.

... okay but like you still were horrible

Indeed.

Rick is the only guy here genre aware lol. Thank you man.

Rick is a man of many talents.

I love Rick, he's so nice

... Huh.... so... her free will itself is limited? Fascinating

Indeed.

So is there a Grimdark island .

Hah! You essentially guessed it. A dystopian nightmare dressed up to look the opposite. Neo Island.

:(

Yeah, Mew has it rough. In responsibilities and companionship.

This is...a lot to wrestle with wow. Interesting...

Yep, and forced to do things she recognizes as bad. And the compulsion doesn't even let her feel bad about it. Makes her feel good about it instead.

. im sorry WHAT....?? A clone line? WHat. I did not see that explanation coming at ALL. Hm....

Knowing you though this might actually come into play somehow.

Well, yeah. Book Five of the series will take place on Neo Island. It will continue to have a lets play skeleton and it will feature only the cards from the Neo romhack. The protagonist will be a familiar one.

Okay Doduo spawn from Ho-Oh, Lugia and Celebi.

I love hearing various theories about this.

.... awwwwwwwwwww

Yeah. Good ol Rick.

Rick is a good bean wow. Nicer than me too but I love it. I support them

As do I. And this will not be the last we see of them, either.

Wait what was the gift!!!!??

What indeed. But don't worry, it will be revealed later and you might like Rick even more when it is.

Holy smokes wow. Once I got started there were so many big revelations I couldn't stop.

I think I'll call a break here though at 31. Seems like we've wrapped up some big stuff..

Yeah, it's not a bad place to break. Another good spot will at the end of 33.

That set of chapters was an absolute rollercoaster ride of twists and turns and ups and downs.

Excellent. I believe I have succeeded then.

I'm still reeling just a little. It was super fun, honestly and pretty satisfying. All the little details and setups sprinkled throughout the story that seemed like a simple thing or random detail paid off and it was great to read.

Yep! I reward readers greatly for careful attention and patience.

Mew herself is also a huge conundrum. Who made her?

Potentially the Watchers.

What about all the weird stuff she mentioned? What about her very own nature, morals and philosophy. Its fascinating.

Yes, it is quite odd.

Also as I understand... despite all the threats she's... not murderous or psycotic I guess.

Not to the people of TCG Island, anyway...

That was all part of the act to enable Isaac to make up and everyone to come together.

Correct!

Although she has done a lot of other incredibly sketchy stuff. Messing with peoples minds and memories and stuff.

Eh, just for some privacy for one point. Messing with Mister Gentleman's mind was only to help control the outcome and was only used for that purpose. But yes, it was still kind of messed up.

All I really have to say is that I love Rick.

I really enjoy how he came to the forefront of the story near the end, and really came onto his own. He spent a lot of the first half in the background but now I can see Rick is the master chess player... hm. A good fit for mew actually lol.

Hence why I have paired them up.

He was biding his time, waiting in the eaves of the narrative to make his moves. And he's a genuinely great friend.

All true!

The many questions I had were answered as well, except for what ricks gift is!! >:{. I wanna know now lol.

Hmm... Ok if you really want to know, I'll give you the option:

Spoiler: Rick's Gift

Rick was given the ability to grow at the TCG in the same way Mister Gentleman can. With training, he can potentially rise to his level of skill.

Also this bit about Doduo cores sure explains a lot... about why there are no bodies.

Indeed.

But not about Tango himself. Mew claims she knows what Murray knew so I wonder if there's some more mysteries yet to untangle about him.

There is.

Also what the heck is that mystery line between the islands??? So my "Mew made herself a clone island" is not accurate. Hm.

That is an explanation for another book.

At any rate, this makes me curious and excited about the final 7 chapters.

The next two are some very feel-good chapters. I think you will enjoy them.

I am hoping there's going to be some epilogue type stuff.

Essentially, but keep in mind this is a book series. Book Two will be a direct sequel to this one.

I peeked ahead and saw that the next chapter is from Isaac's point of view so I expect we'll get some nice windown.

Indeed. Between that and chapter 33.

There is still the matter of GR2 and Stephanie

Indeed.

and all that, so hopefully Isaac is able to call the guy off.

Oh he can certainly try...

I won't be surprised any more though if there's more secrets to be revealed yet.!

I think you will find the final chapter quite enticing...

And perhaps any last danger...

I do definitely feel there's perhaps something about the Gentleman also yet to be unveiled...

Indeed. At the very least, there is what Mew was calling him.

guess I'll find out when I finish this fic sometime soon-ish!

I'd love to see you pop back in. If you get ahead by more, just know that I'll be making good on our exchange and that I'll be catching up prior to working on my Book Two.

.....

I Lied. I had to read one more. Gotta make it a multiple of three...

OH! You DID do 32! I'm not sure why I missed that initially...

Spoiler: A Bedtime Story

YESSS we love to see it. Glad everyone basically learned a good lesson here.

Yeah!

Love to see genuine change and fixing things, this is a sweet little detail.

It's a sweet chapter.

I'm glad he's telling them everything

Yeah, hes coming clean from here on out. Such a weight taken off of him.

AhAHAHAHAH this was funny

ahahah oh... I could tell you, sweet child

... meditation?? If Mew had a GR thing is GR2... Mewtwo!?!?! (at this point anything seems plasubile lol. Especially the clone line...

True. It is unknown if GR2 is even human. But just because Mew exists in their world doesn't mean Mewtwo also would.

I have a feeling this wont be cleaned up so simple... also yikes this guy was well connected, a whole blimp?

And the blimp isn't even his true connections.

oh no. I have a bad feeling...

 

[Flyg0n]

Spoiler: 33

As for the attractions, my favorite was a brand-new 'Scyther VR' game. It was so fun flying around and battling other players! PVP mode was optional. Nikki was scary good at it. By the end, she had beaten fifty other players in battle!

This sounds so fun omg. Wish this was real. Also I love that not just gentleman but the whole world really must love Scyther, hah

Rick goofed around the whole time looking for glitches. Eventually he found one that launched him so high that he hit the sky ceiling

Rick would do this lol

Using her mysterious power, Clefairy helped herself and the riders avoid the authorities' blockade by levitating the bikes so they could fly like magic through the air.

Smh you should have played the ET soundtrack for this section

I do love how cute this ride is though, very clever and fun and good 'pokemonified' reference

daughter of my own

every time man,,, Wonder if he'll ever learn the truth.

Rick's favorite ride was... 'The Diglett'. One should NOT let the unassuming name fool them! This ride was in a large two-hundred feet tower. The premise? You get strapped into a vertical roller coaster that shoots up at a truly staggering speed.

oh now THIS ride sounds like my vibe

That left Heather and I together in the back. I think I must have grown on her, because she clung to my arm. Midway through, she moved my arm to go around her so she could snuggle against my chest. I held her with my arm instead of just having it limp around her or pulling it away. We enjoyed each other's company on the gentle ride.

Awwww thats sweet

The sun was starting to set, but our time together wasn't quite done. I bought all of us dinner at my favorite seafood restaurant, the Cerulean Cave. It was built to look like the inside of a watery cave complete with bridges, stalagmites, flowing steams, and ponds. They even had live fish swimming about! The whole place was lit from multi-colored crystals embedded in the 'cave' walls.

This sounds ssoooooo pretty. Did you make this up or is it based on the games??

Jennifer delighted in a kids' lobster mac and cheese. Nikki indulged in the herb-grilled salmon with rice pilaf. Isaac tore into a large lobster. Rick sampled a large variety of sushi on a platter, prepared Neo-Island style. I enjoyed a large bucket of snow crab legs. After seeing my choice, Heather got a kids' order of them too. She mentioned it was her first time trying them.

I NEED TO GO HERE
This sounds like a dream, wow. Mmmm seafoood

Nikki tilted her head as she looked at me carefully before whispering. "Mister Gentleman... The way you kissed her felt very familiar...

I know its meant to be tender but I guess it sort of felt a tad awkward to compare the two kisses? might be just me tho.

And I'm glad to know that kiss from you was real..."

Im glad she finally found out! Now never get drunk like that again lol

Which I assumed would be never.

it BETTER not

So... With iron resolve, a deck full of commons, and a fat lazy bird, one could prevail even without coin-flips fixed in one's favor!

I love this "end" here so much. Also hahaha im glad he realizes he doesn't need coinflips.

Spoiler: GR Shenanigans

these crazy GR Island folk! Did they not have DOORS on their island

[facepalm] its called breaking and entering. How is this your first assumption

I rubbed my temple with my fingers. "GR2... You are new to our island, so I'll cut you some slack. We have doors on our island. We don't typically enter our homes through windows..."

cut him slack!? Oh gentleman... intelligence is not one of your strong suits

GR2 was still. Must have been deep in thought, the poor fellow.

No I'm pretty sure he's flabbergasted at your naivety and stupidity

Hanging!? A bit extreme, but at least they were willing to fix my window... But a servant? Was I about to gain... A BUTLER!? I had always wanted a butler!

I like that he's apparently mostly unbothered by capital punishment via hanging still being a thing and is excited about a butler. priorities.

they didn't realize

.... [sigh]

Sounds fine to me

dude NO

I made a mental note to visit a card shop again soon to reconstruct my old deck at the next opportunity...

You really should have done that immediately. alas

Could it be the bird was going to protect me

When will you learn that Tango is a good bird. c'mon, he DIED for you

Where is Tango

Thankfully at least these priorities are in order

They pulled down their hood revealing a head of pretty, medium-length blond hair before turning back around.

"There. Happy now?"

... MEW??
Oh I guess not?

Interesting, wonder what the connection is....

Yeah... I think I'm just going to go get a snack..."

no no, you're going to explain yourself

Victoria held her fists near her chest as she swayed back and forth from one leg to the other. "I'm so sorry I took so long! Do you forgive me?"

Despite the situation, I felt I could trust her. Besides, it wasn't like I had any better ideas...

I nodded. "I believe you."

I did find it odd she asks 'do you forgive me' and he says 'I believe you'. Typo maybe? I would think both would either say believe or forgive, depending on your desire.

Victoria... Don't you think that's a BIT much

Yeah I agree lol

. "No food

Okay but wouldn't he die? Or does he just mean they won't give him food to start and he finds his own? If its anything like TCG island it'll take maybe a week at least to be the Fortresses right? Surely they gotta feed him if they want him alive to duel?

confidently crossed her arms. "We will have a series of duels! First you will duel me to get me 'on your side'

Why bother with the pretense here? Seems like she should just say this is so, unless there's cameras watching?

The left side of the call contained

*hall?

"Yes, my opening hand could have beaten you, but I wanted to do more than simply win. Now things will be fun."

Little did GR1 know that I was only a hair away from losing

Oohhho I like this

Let's all try our best to beat that smug boss of ours

I find it amusing they all apparently hate GR2

Bill's Teleporter failed! NO!!

literally always when its most most important

GR2s card draw was flying past mine!

Ngl I do wonder if he is rigging the coinflips freal lol

.. must have been... a tranquil...iz...er.

Im laughing at this, so what did he dramatically write this after the fact to emphasize passing out? Or was he frantically scribbling in his journal as he was being tranquilized.

He is nothing compared to the one I truly serve.

supreme being were interrupted

Oh boy this is getting big...

With prophecy working for us, the Third Eye disbanded, and the Ghostmasters sealed, the time is ripe!

Oh man there's a ton of info packed in these last few paragraphs here. Seems things are gonna get much bigger in scale quite quick!

Spoiler: The 'End' - Concrit

Okay so I've witheld any serious concrit up until the end, but now that I have finished book 1 I think I owe you thoughts, since you've clearly worked so hard.

I am putting this seperate from my main thoughts since its a touch nitpicky. Feel free to ignore if you think you're pretty happy with Book 1's overall end.

I am honestly a bit torn on the actual "end" here. Chapter 33 with the theme park is definitely the tonal and emotional end of the fic. A perfect final epilogue to followup the end where Isaac tells the true story and shows his change. I like it. And it ends on a pretty funny note too, with the last sentence. There's enough of a tease that we know Book 2 will have things in store for us, and any astute reader will guess GR2 is not finished yet, and there's more mysteries to come.

It is... awkward to read the following chapters. They're not bad mind you. I just don't know if I feel they actually belong here. On one hand, they're a fun tease and segue into the next book. But on the other hand, even though they draw on the GR2 subplot they feel disconnected from everything set up in Book 1.

In full truth, as interested as I was about the mysteries of TCG verse, I struggled a lot to get invested in these chapters because they were not tied to the things that got me truly invested in Book 1 and kept me around. I was surprised they weren't tied to the previous elements of book 1. The Gentleman, Tango, and the myriad of emotional problems around him and Nikki and Isaac and all that drama. Also all of Gentleman's character and goals. Instead I was reading 5 chapters of setup for something that essentially didn't involve any of those elements.

It felt like a lot of chapters to devote to what is for future stuff. But like, numbers of chapters. Which actually, I know you're allergic to long chapters :P, but if you want to keep this here you'd be much better serviced in my opinion by making it one or two long chapters! In that case you'd have two chunky 6k chapters as a tease. Having several gives the impression there's some kind of epilogue or additional story threads of Book 1 left to be resolved but thats not it.

Possibly another reason why it felt so dragged on was because throughout this story each chapter generally felt like it served a distinct purpose within the grand scheme of the Book and the delineations between chapters generally made sense. Here though, its 5 chapters that basically cover him meeting GR2, getting kidnapped, escaping and dueling and failing. Which is sort of one big event, you know? Especially to essentially end in a failure.

At any rate, its your choice at the end of the day, and by no means is this a "oh this was bad" but rather this is out of place, imo. If you moved it to the beginning of book 2 it'd feel perfectly fine.
Take as you will!

Overall thoughts:

Spoiler

Man its such a delight to read a completed fic from beginning to end.

You should be extremely proud for having finished an entire story! 110k, thats a finished novel and then some! And it's a good one too. I always like to give a whole fic retrospective in the rare cases I’m able to finish a fic.

What I am a teeny bit torn on: (These are not negatives, they are just observations you can do with as you please)

• The diary format being used through the entire fic
• Some of the romance

I do enjoy the gimmick and it does work for Gentleman. I'm also definitely willing to overlook it for the story's sake... but I also don't feel convinced the entire fic needed to use it. I think there's a strong arguement to be made that the fic could be told in part through Diary entries and in part through regular storytelling convention. Now mind you, I know you've already finished book 1 so I certainly wouldn't suggest rewriting the entire thing! Just thoughts for future books that you might consider.

Another option is that you can lean harder into it by acknowledging, maybe it was a weird mandate or law that everyone keeps a journal or digital recordings of their thoughts? Idk lol. This is a bit of crack played straight, so its not hugely detrimental. It is very fun in certain places to see dates alongside POV switches, and it does make it a little comedic at times how dedicated Gentleman is to writing it all down.

You already know I'm not a romance person so I won't harp, just that on a personal level the emotionality of the romance bits didn't captivate me. I did think the actual events of the drama was good though, if that makes sense. It was a bit like watching a soap where I don't personally connect emotionally but I do want to see how it all plays out. Like I buy that Gentleman likes Nikki and Isaac does, but I don't feel like I'd ship them or care about them as a couple. The chemistry didn't hit for me. (But I must stress this isn't a negative unless your goal is to convince people to ship em). I felt more chemsitry for Rick and Mew actually, heh.

One other thing - a funny effect of several short chapters is that it feels like it takes awhile to really get going in chapter count. I can easily see some people missing out on the truly fun bits (Gentleman and character drama) since they don't start fully coming to fruition until close to chapter 20 or so (around 18 i think?). Tbf my personal pace is slowed by reviewing but it was just something I found myself thinking about that most of my favorite elements are realized fully in the back half. Which again this isn't a negative, just my observation.

Not that this is bad! Every chapter did feel relevant generally speaking (if anything the water club is the least relevant but thats not a huge problem). And they're short, so it makes for easy reading. Generally well paced for a proper complete story, given its like... 10 chapters setup, 10 middle, and 13 to peak and epilogue. Thats solid imo.

What I personally would enjoy more of:
(this is all my subjective vibes, you don't have to pay this any mind, just thoughts for future stuff)

• Keep up the nice guy-friendship with Rick, I really enjoyed these moments
• More Tango! He was a strong presence but I look forward to seeing the relationship between him and Gentleman develop more
• Continue plot drama with characters, I think that played out well
• A female who isn't a kid or love interest (or mew lol) . I know its a LP so possibly this is due to the source material but I'd love to see some interesting prominent female side characters, whether they be villains or good guy allies. Nikki is nice here but we've got like, Rick, Isaac, GR, the Stone Master, Murray, the fighting club guy, the fire club leader, etc, who all feel more standout. Meanwhile for gals its Nikki (Love interest), her two children, GR4/Victoria (a child), Dr. Wem, showed mostly in flashback/ Mew and not much else in standout presences. Water club girls are for comedy. Stephanie is also a child.
• Psycological elements of TCG. I think this highlights skill and training really well and makes the game more interesting when its about bluffs and counterbluffs instead of pure math and chance

Where I think this fic shines:

• Committment to the bit
• Effective foreshadowing
• Character drama
• Domino effect payoff
• Completeness
• Tango
• Rick

I really appreciate when a fic isn't afraid to take something wild in a setting, especially wacky spinoffs, and just take it all almost at face value. I haven't played the TCG games but I admire the gumption and sincerity here to explore the world entirely as is. The setups and drama between characters, and the quadrangle of Rick, Isaac, Nikki and Gentleman was great. I felt like everyone's motivation was made clear by the end, and Rick is just the coolest of them all by a long shot.

The buildups, reveals and slow trickle of information work great, if your intention is for a story that seems like a casual tongue in cheek let's play that begins to slowly unfold into craziness and then domino reveal a bunch of crazy twists. In that aspect I think you shine. Stuff like Doctor Wem slips right under the radar cause the world is so wacky. The payoff is absolutely great in that aspect, with a good mix of surprises and teases that you can figure some of it out if you're astute or suspicious.

Ch 1 - 33 also feels like a great completed story that left me very satisfied for having read it. I do think that anyone willing to buy into the premise and take it for what it is would find themselves enjoying this. It might be niche but I do think it executes this niche very well.

Also generally speaking, I did like the duels and strategies. A couple I found myself speed reading if I wanted to get back to my character plot drama but the rest I could followed pretty well. Perhaps its due to my pre-existing knowledge of TCG but I think you generally comunicate pretty well even in a layman way what strategies the Gentleman employs.

Overall an absolutely great fic that manages to effectively tell its tale in 110k, a tricky thing for sure not to be swallowed by scope creep. I loved Rick and Tango the absolute most out of everyone. Even though things got crazy at the end, it was really cool to see Gentleman actually achieve his goals and beat everyone with a common deck!

Good fic!! You should be proud!

If you have any questions you know where to find me!

 

[Tango]

Spoiler: 33

This sounds so fun omg. Wish this was real. Also I love that not just gentleman but the whole world really must love Scyther, hah

At least enough to make a VR game in a theme park lol

Rick would do this lol

Smh you should have played the ET soundtrack for this section

Nice! You recognized the reference!

I do love how cute this ride is though, very clever and fun and good 'pokemonified' reference

I'm glad the rides worked well for you!

every time man,,, Wonder if he'll ever learn the truth.

Perhaps he will one day?

oh now THIS ride sounds like my vibe

Yeah it's great fun for the right person!

Awwww thats sweet

This sounds ssoooooo pretty. Did you make this up or is it based on the games??

It's partly inspired from a restaurant in Islands of Adventure in Florida: Mythos Restaurant. Pictures below. For the fic, I swapped regular lights for multi-color, played up the running water aspect, and made it seafood because water. And what cave has water in it? Cerulean was a good pick and sounds fancy.

Spoiler: Mythos pictures

I NEED TO GO HERE
This sounds like a dream, wow. Mmmm seafoood

Yeah, I love seafood!

I know its meant to be tender but I guess it sort of felt a tad awkward to compare the two kisses? might be just me tho.

Hmm... maybe but it helps trigger the closure conversation so... I'll probably keep it unless it seems to bother others. Thanks for the input.

Im glad she finally found out! Now never get drunk like that again lol

Don't worry, they won't.

it BETTER not

It won't! 😅 I'm done doing that now, promise!

I love this "end" here so much. Also hahaha im glad he realizes he doesn't need coinflips.

Funny thing about this line is that it was in the original. I just modified it some!

Spoiler: GR Shenanigans

[facepalm] its called breaking and entering. How is this your first assumption

cut him slack!? Oh gentleman... intelligence is not one of your strong suits

They don't learn very much about the other islands on TCG Island. And hey, if another island allows poverty to exist, who knows just how many other basic things they are lacking?!

No I'm pretty sure he's flabbergasted at your naivety and stupidity

Definitely that

I like that he's apparently mostly unbothered by capital punishment via hanging still being a thing and is excited about a butler. priorities.

Well the capital punishment can be avoided, so the only thing left to sort out is the prospect of a butler!

.... [sigh]

dude NO

If only he had Rick with him lol...

You really should have done that immediately. alas

Yeah. He got complacent.

When will you learn that Tango is a good bird. c'mon, he DIED for you

Yeah... going through an entire book makes it a bit hard to drag that out for an entire other book after so I might need to rework his relationship with Tango during the rewrite some.

Thankfully at least these priorities are in order

... MEW??
Oh I guess not?

Interesting, wonder what the connection is....

No connection. Mew just thought it would be amusing to terrorize everyone while looking cute.

I did find it odd she asks 'do you forgive me' and he says 'I believe you'. Typo maybe? I would think both would either say believe or forgive, depending on your desire.

Oh! Yeah, I agree. I swapped it. Thanks!

Yeah I agree lol

Victoria trusts trustworthy people easily since she can read their feelings. Since she is an orphan with no adopted parents she is starved for love. She can also read the feelings of other people and has seen a ton of fake smiles and false empathy.

Okay but wouldn't he die? Or does he just mean they won't give him food to start and he finds his own? If its anything like TCG island it'll take maybe a week at least to be the Fortresses right? Surely they gotta feed him if they want him alive to duel?

So the original fic had him travel around all in one day. I don't think I'll make it that short in the new one, but I think I'll give him a way to get around that will speed up travel compared to walking.

Why bother with the pretense here? Seems like she should just say this is so, unless there's cameras watching?

You make an excellent point so I added in that she wants to lose a duel so she can provide believable details if the others question her about it later.

*hall?

Oohhho I like this

Yeah, you really like the mental aspect of it. I think it's cool too. I'll try and see if I can merge some more of that into Book Two as I write it.

I find it amusing they all apparently hate GR2

Yeah! He bosses them all around and is all smug.

literally always when its most most important

I was pretty upset. I kind of wanted to win that duel, but I guess the narrative worked better losing it...

Ngl I do wonder if he is rigging the coinflips freal lol

So this all happened in the duel I played against him lol I was pretty peeved.

As for in-fic: nope. No coin fixing in his favor. Though I'm sure he would if he had a reliable way of doing so.

Im laughing at this, so what did he dramatically write this after the fact to emphasize passing out? Or was he frantically scribbling in his journal as he was being tranquilized.

I'm just going to go with dramatically writing it after the fact...

Oh boy this is getting big...

This last chapter was part of the reason I wanted to end the book the way I did. I didn't want readers feeling like it was ok to drop the series.

Oh man there's a ton of info packed in these last few paragraphs here. Seems things are gonna get much bigger in scale quite quick!

It will still take some time, but yes, a storm approaches.

Spoiler: The 'End' - Concrit

Okay so I've witheld any serious concrit up until the end, but now that I have finished book 1 I think I owe you thoughts, since you've clearly worked so hard.

I am putting this seperate from my main thoughts since its a touch nitpicky. Feel free to ignore if you think you're pretty happy with Book 1's overall end.

I am honestly a bit torn on the actual "end" here. Chapter 33 with the theme park is definitely the tonal and emotional end of the fic. A perfect final epilogue to followup the end where Isaac tells the true story and shows his change. I like it. And it ends on a pretty funny note too, with the last sentence. There's enough of a tease that we know Book 2 will have things in store for us, and any astute reader will guess GR2 is not finished yet, and there's more mysteries to come.

It is... awkward to read the following chapters. They're not bad mind you. I just don't know if I feel they actually belong here. On one hand, they're a fun tease and segue into the next book. But on the other hand, even though they draw on the GR2 subplot they feel disconnected from everything set up in Book 1.

In full truth, as interested as I was about the mysteries of TCG verse, I struggled a lot to get invested in these chapters because they were not tied to the things that got me truly invested in Book 1 and kept me around. I was surprised they weren't tied to the previous elements of book 1. The Gentleman, Tango, and the myriad of emotional problems around him and Nikki and Isaac and all that drama. Also all of Gentleman's character and goals. Instead I was reading 5 chapters of setup for something that essentially didn't involve any of those elements.

It felt like a lot of chapters to devote to what is for future stuff. But like, numbers of chapters. Which actually, I know you're allergic to long chapters :P, but if you want to keep this here you'd be much better serviced in my opinion by making it one or two long chapters! In that case you'd have two chunky 6k chapters as a tease. Having several gives the impression there's some kind of epilogue or additional story threads of Book 1 left to be resolved but thats not it.

Possibly another reason why it felt so dragged on was because throughout this story each chapter generally felt like it served a distinct purpose within the grand scheme of the Book and the delineations between chapters generally made sense. Here though, its 5 chapters that basically cover him meeting GR2, getting kidnapped, escaping and dueling and failing. Which is sort of one big event, you know? Especially to essentially end in a failure.

At any rate, its your choice at the end of the day, and by no means is this a "oh this was bad" but rather this is out of place, imo. If you moved it to the beginning of book 2 it'd feel perfectly fine.
Take as you will!

I think you make a pretty good case here for my to move all the chapters past 33 to Book Two as the opening to that book. Honestly I was kind of on the fence about placement of them and I think you are correct. I'll be thinking about it and when I go to write Book Two, I think at that point I'll move these chapters in there instead.

Overall thoughts:

Wow thanks so much for including a bit in here like this!!

Spoiler

Man its such a delight to read a completed fic from beginning to end.

Well, it's just one of multiple books for the series...

But considering the length, it also feels valid to call it a fic. I enjoy reading fics cover to cover too!

You should be extremely proud for having finished an entire story! 110k, thats a finished novel and then some!

Aww thanks!! I did the same thing with the original, but this was written considerably better and I'm really happy how it turned out!

And it's a good one too. I always like to give a whole fic retrospective in the rare cases I’m able to finish a fic.

I think I'll do the same thing going forward too. It really is a special treat for the author!

What I am a teeny bit torn on: (These are not negatives, they are just observations you can do with as you please)

• The diary format being used through the entire fic

I have reasons to keep the diary format.

• Some of the romance

I get it on the romance stuff. I will say that I don't plan to have any more of that between MC and Nikki.

I do enjoy the gimmick and it does work for Gentleman. I'm also definitely willing to overlook it for the story's sake... but I also don't feel convinced the entire fic needed to use it. I think there's a strong arguement to be made that the fic could be told in part through Diary entries and in part through regular storytelling convention. Now mind you, I know you've already finished book 1 so I certainly wouldn't suggest rewriting the entire thing! Just thoughts for future books that you might consider.

I have reasons for the story being in a diary format.

Another option is that you can lean harder into it by acknowledging, maybe it was a weird mandate or law that everyone keeps a journal or digital recordings of their thoughts? Idk lol. This is a bit of crack played straight, so its not hugely detrimental. It is very fun in certain places to see dates alongside POV switches, and it does make it a little comedic at times how dedicated Gentleman is to writing it all down.

I might do something to make it seem more normal for their world.

You already know I'm not a romance person so I won't harp, just that on a personal level the emotionality of the romance bits didn't captivate me.

One of my big goals in Book Two will be to do a romance that works. I'll try my best and hopefully Timeslip will give me enough inspiration to make it work!

I did think the actual events of the drama was good though, if that makes sense. It was a bit like watching a soap where I don't personally connect emotionally but I do want to see how it all plays out. Like I buy that Gentleman likes Nikki and Isaac does, but I don't feel like I'd ship them or care about them as a couple.

That's fine since I'm not having them get together anyway. But for anyone who did ship them, those bits are kind of for them. Though, I will admit I toyed with the idea of shipping them when writing Book One, but ultimately decided against it.

The chemistry didn't hit for me. (But I must stress this isn't a negative unless your goal is to convince people to ship em). I felt more chemsitry for Rick and Mew actually, heh.

I don't mind you feeling more chemistry for Rick and Mew because I might ship those two later. I'm taking a wait and see approach for now.

One other thing - a funny effect of several short chapters is that it feels like it takes awhile to really get going in chapter count. I can easily see some people missing out on the truly fun bits (Gentleman and character drama) since they don't start fully coming to fruition until close to chapter 20 or so (around 18 i think?). Tbf my personal pace is slowed by reviewing but it was just something I found myself thinking about that most of my favorite elements are realized fully in the back half. Which again this isn't a negative, just my observation.

Things take time to build up and I was committed to the LP structure underneath it. I noticed the same thing, though. The fic really starts to take off once it gets to around 18.

Not that this is bad! Every chapter did feel relevant generally speaking (if anything the water club is the least relevant but thats not a huge problem).

The water club didn't need to be relevant. It just needed to be funny.

And they're short, so it makes for easy reading. Generally well paced for a proper complete story, given its like... 10 chapters setup, 10 middle, and 13 to peak and epilogue. Thats solid imo.

I'm glad the overall structure seems to work. Thanks for the input on it!

What I personally would enjoy more of:
(this is all my subjective vibes, you don't have to pay this any mind, just thoughts for future stuff)

• Keep up the nice guy-friendship with Rick, I really enjoyed these moments

I certainly will, but Rick will be absent for much of Book Two and maybe even the entire book. Early Book Two will focus on MC and Tango while the rest will introduce a new character to travel with MC.

• More Tango! He was a strong presence but I look forward to seeing the relationship between him and Gentleman develop more

Yep. Tango will be prominent in Book Two! Though there will be some times when he is less prominent.

• Continue plot drama with characters, I think that played out well

I'm not sure how well I can do this in Book Two, but the new travel companion should certainly help.

• A female who isn't a kid or love interest (or mew lol) . I know its a LP so possibly this is due to the source material

Its entirely due to the source material. There are NOT many non-kids in the game and non-kid females are even rarer! However, there are going to be some, so I think that will help. (seriously, I'm at the mercy of the source material here, it's not me, I swear!)

• but I'd love to see some interesting prominent female side characters, whether they be villains or good guy allies.

Don't worry, there will be!

• Nikki is nice here but we've got like, Rick, Isaac, GR, the Stone Master, Murray, the fighting club guy, the fire club leader, etc, who all feel more standout. Meanwhile for gals its Nikki (Love interest), her two children, GR4/Victoria (a child)

A teen, but your point stands.

• , Dr. Wem, showed mostly in flashback/ Mew and not much else in standout presences. Water club girls are for comedy. Stephanie is also a child.

Exactly. There was NO ROOM for anyone like that! And Stephanie being a kid was hilarious so I wanted to go that way with it.

• Psycological elements of TCG. I think this highlights skill and training really well and makes the game more interesting when its about bluffs and counterbluffs instead of pure math and chance

I'll see what I can do to add more of these...

Where I think this fic shines:

• Committment to the bit
• Effective foreshadowing
• Character drama
• Domino effect payoff
• Completeness
• Tango
• Rick

I really appreciate when a fic isn't afraid to take something wild in a setting, especially wacky spinoffs, and just take it all almost at face value. I haven't played the TCG games but I admire the gumption and sincerity here to explore the world entirely as is. The setups and drama between characters, and the quadrangle of Rick, Isaac, Nikki and Gentleman was great. I felt like everyone's motivation was made clear by the end, and Rick is just the coolest of them all by a long shot.

Yay!!

Yeah, I really do love how Rick turned out. He will make a big return in Book Four at the very least.

The buildups, reveals and slow trickle of information work great, if your intention is for a story that seems like a casual tongue in cheek let's play that begins to slowly unfold into craziness and then domino reveal a bunch of crazy twists. In that aspect I think you shine.

I absolutely LOVE plot twists and crazy lore. And I enjoy making something seem frivolous because that way when it gets more serious no one expects it and just makes it that much more awesome!

Stuff like Doctor Wem slips right under the radar cause the world is so wacky. The payoff is absolutely great in that aspect, with a good mix of surprises and teases that you can figure some of it out if you're astute or suspicious.

Yeah! I love giving those kinds of pay offs so that way my readers try to figure things out as they go.

Ch 1 - 33 also feels like a great completed story that left me very satisfied for having read it. I do think that anyone willing to buy into the premise and take it for what it is would find themselves enjoying this. It might be niche but I do think it executes this niche very well.

That's all I can really ask for with it. And considering you are not a big fan of romance, the fact that you still enjoyed it so much is very encouraging! 🥰

Also generally speaking, I did like the duels and strategies. A couple I found myself speed reading if I wanted to get back to my character plot drama but the rest I could followed pretty well.

Fair.

Perhaps its due to my pre-existing knowledge of TCG but I think you generally comunicate pretty well even in a layman way what strategies the Gentleman employs.

That was important to me, so I'm glad you think so!

Overall an absolutely great fic that manages to effectively tell its tale in 110k, a tricky thing for sure not to be swallowed by scope creep.

Well... you say that but it spawned out of the 2nd half of my original 10k prologue lol 😅

But thank you so much for the vote of overall confidence!!

I loved Rick and Tango the absolute most out of everyone.

That's good because if you didn't like Tango, it would be a pretty sad Doduo Adventures fic.

But Rick totally came out of left feild for me. It was like I started writing and he was like "Yo! You DO know you are going to write me? RIGHT?" 😂

Even though things got crazy at the end, it was really cool to see Gentleman actually achieve his goals and beat everyone with a common deck!

Well, now he needs to beat everyone on GR Island with the deck too! (IF he can...)

Good fic!! You should be proud!

*starts dancing*

If you have any questions you know where to find me!

😎

 

[Axihdio]

Hey there Tango! I'm here to write that review of the prologue of your story that I told you I'd do on Discord.

First of all, I really dig the Diary of a Wimpy Kid like writing of this fic. It really stands out compared to most other fanfics on this site. I also thought that setting the story after the events of the game was a genius choice as it allowed you to get more creative with the story later on.

Now, onto the tutoring part. It makes sense that the main character would have to do some gigs in order to get money because he doesn't get paid a salary. To that I say, what were they thinking? Why would the champion not get a salary? Did the government of the island go, "Yeah let's NOT pay the Champion a salary." It'd be like if you studied 6 years in Harvard to become a doctor and they go : "It's great that you graduated from Harvard but you've got to start as an unpaid intern for 3 years." How are you supposed to manage that? Granted your fic is a work of fiction but I find it quite absurd that the main character worked so hard in order to become Champion only to not get paid a salary. However, he still does win booster packs which he would be able to sell.

Anyways, I enjoyed the tutoring session with Billy due to how absurd and funny it was. Him constantly referencing Yu-Gi-Oh! was quite fitting due to the similarities between the Yu-Gi-Oh! world and the pokemon TCG world. Also with how much Billy talks about holograms, I think that he might a hologramaholic (addicted to holograms). Besides that, Billy does make a good point about new cards being added into the TCG game but he is quickly shot down by the mc. This makes sense because the game that this fic is based on was a game that was released on the Game Boy Colour during Generation 2 in the late 90's and early 2000's. Back then, updating and adding new things into already existing games wasn't as common or mainstream as it is nowadays.

Furthermore, The main character's solution to his problem of being unable to find any willing challengers was very ingenious. Him only using common cards also helps elevate the stakes of his future battles since he is intentionally handicapping himself which means that he would have to rely on his skills as the TCG Champion much more than ever before. It would also indirectly solve the issue of him being too powerful (In TCG) early on which would eliminate the tension in his duels.

Overall, I enjoyed the prologue of your fic and I look forward to reviewing the other chapters of this book. Happy writing, Tango!

 

[Tango]

Hey there Tango! I'm here to write that review of the prologue of your story that I told you I'd do on Discord.

Nice to have you! Thanks!!

First of all, I really dig the Diary of a Wimpy Kid like writing of this fic. It really stands out compared to most other fanfics on this site.

I'm not sure how many others you have read, but I've heard similar things from other reviewers too. Thanks!

I also thought that setting the story after the events of the game was a genius choice as it allowed you to get more creative with the story later on.

Sort of. So the events of the first game boy color game happened a little differently than how it happened in the past for my fic, but the bit about the MC doing the stuff to become the champion is the same, so it's pretty much ok for the most part to consider the prior events to be the first 'game'.

Now, onto the tutoring part. It makes sense that the main character would have to do some gigs in order to get money because he doesn't get paid a salary. To that I say, what were they thinking? Why would the champion not get a salary? Did the government of the island go, "Yeah let's NOT pay the Champion a salary." It'd be like if you studied 6 years in Harvard to become a doctor and they go : "It's great that you graduated from Harvard but you've got to start as an unpaid intern for 3 years." How are you supposed to manage that? Granted your fic is a work of fiction but I find it quite absurd that the main character worked so hard in order to become Champion only to not get paid a salary. However, he still does win booster packs which he would be able to sell.

Exactly, he can still get booster packs. Granted, he thought he could just keep dueling people and farming the booster packs, but alas! Also, I needed SOMETHING to motivate this guy to do his common deck challenge and this seemed to be the best I could come up with.

Anyways, I enjoyed the tutoring session with Billy due to how absurd and funny it was.

Thanks! I tried to make it funny.

Him constantly referencing Yu-Gi-Oh! was quite fitting due to the similarities between the Yu-Gi-Oh! world and the pokemon TCG world.

Yeah, I figured I might as well grab the bull by the horns on that one since if I didn't reference it, my reviewers most certainly all would.

Also with how much Billy talks about holograms, I think that he might a hologramaholic (addicted to holograms).

I think you're right! 🤣

Besides that, Billy does make a good point about new cards being added into the TCG game but he is quickly shot down by the mc. This makes sense because the game that this fic is based on was a game that was released on the Game Boy Colour during Generation 2 in the late 90's and early 2000's. Back then, updating and adding new things into already existing games wasn't as common or mainstream as it is nowadays.

Precisely! But updating and adding wasn't just less common. It was unheard of! Once a game released, that was IT. There were no patches, updates, DLC, or anything! MAYBE you would get an expansion to an existing game, but that would be a separate purchase and usually you would get sequels instead of expansions. (I did my homework on that!)

Furthermore, The main character's solution to his problem of being unable to find any willing challengers was very ingenious. Him only using common cards also helps elevate the stakes of his future battles since he is intentionally handicapping himself which means that he would have to rely on his skills as the TCG Champion much more than ever before. It would also indirectly solve the issue of him being too powerful (In TCG) early on which would eliminate the tension in his duels.

Exactly! Makes for an entertaining in-game challenge and as it turned out, it made a nice premise for a fic too!

Overall, I enjoyed the prologue of your fic and I look forward to reviewing the other chapters of this book.

Music to my ears. Thanks Axi!

Happy writing, Tango!

To you as well!

 

[Sinderella]

Hi Tango! Here for our long-overdue review! In conjunction with our trade, I this will cover the prologue to chapter 4--I will do my best to come back before blitz end, but worst case, we can do more reviews in the future now that my time has freed up!

I'll begin by saying that I've never heard of this game--not even in a PMD sort of way, where I've played bits and pieces but don't know much about it--just straight up never heard of it! But I do know a bit about TCG from playing Pocket TCG...however, my apprehension was all for naught because you provide so much background information, I'm actually thoroughly impressed. So, thank you for that.

That leads me to my first point--I found this fic, so far, to be an excellent example of "write what you know." It's very clear to me, from the way you've formatted this, and the art you've had made for this, and the detail you go into to make sure your readers have all the background information that you care very deeply about this game and building out the world around it. As an all around newbie to Pokemon TCG, I actually learned a bit while reading! (Especially in regard to deck building, that skillset still largely evades me)

I am also fascinated by this world you've started to build; I know you have a foundation, and because I am unfamiliar with the game, I don't have much to go off, but just from what I've read, it's quite interesting. TCG being the main sport "staple" instead of actual Pokemon? Doduo being the lone Pokemon that seems to exist in the world? The world presumably only being made up of 3 islands, one of which apparently has a harsh travel restriction? I have to say, that last point feels extremely bleak...but in a sort of Attack on Titan way, where the people on these islands believe their islands are the only ones who exist and will eventually find out there is a WHOOOOOLE world out there full of the "continents" that the little boy gushed on and on about (it seemed like some prettyyyyyy cool foreshadowing to me...), and it's just a fascinating concept, if I happen to be right. I have Mystery Writer™️ brain, so please pardon me if I'm off base LOL

Also enjoyed the (not so) subtle YuGiOh drop LOL. Is this just a world of card games running the show? That would actually be so neat if that's where you're going...

I like the Gentleman as a character. He definitely is just that--a gentleman. You do a good job of capturing that in the way he refers to himself with kind of an arrogant air while also being kind and cordial with everyone he meets. You've nailed down that characterization very well, and I THOROUGHLY enjoy the sprites of him! It adds so much character to the story; like I'm playing a game (which I'm sure was your intention). I do hope that bro finds a girlfriend, though. I was cringing (in an "oh no poor dude") way in chapter 4 when Rick was detailing how Nikki also had feelings for him, but neither of them acted on it, and she settled.........like, woof bro. That is "the one who got away" in the worst possible way. I don't WANT Mister Gentleman to be a homewrecker, especially because it seems like Nikki has made a decent life with Isaac (kids n' shit, they probably have assets that would be meeeeeessssyyyyy to split in a divorce) but..........I can root for them a little if there's a particular reason Nikki isn't happy in the marriage. Just a little bit.

Also, I've never looked twice at doduo as a Pokemon, but this fic might change that--the sprites of Gotan are SO DAMN CUTE. I love his stupid little dumb stare, it's soooooo adorable--not a thought behind those eyes...or is there???? I hope we get more insight on this silly little dude (and maybe more Pokemon in the future, mayhaps??? I feel like I'm seeing a lot of setup for a BIIIIIG revelation that other Pokemon exist, especially as of Chapter 4...but again, Mystery Writer™️ brain at work!)

I definitely enjoy how you write out the battles. It's very easy for me to follow and keep up with the play-by-plays and what the Gentleman is thinking of as he's going through the motions. I also really REALLY like that you haven't written out every single battle. You do a great job of deciding when it's absolutely necessary to play out a battle and when it's okay to just summarize it, and as somebody who can easily get lost in the sauce of too many back to back battles, even in fics with actual Pokemon doing the battling, I really appreciate that. It's important to know when to keep things concise, and you one hundo percento have that down pat!

I know you said you'd prefer that reviewers keep concrit to a minimal, so I'll try to keep this section short--and please let me make it clear that if I say anything that makes you feel some type of way, or if you need clarification on anything, do not hesitate to reach out! I am happy to talk things through with you if anything I say came off wrong or rubbed you in a negative way.

Spoiler: ConCrit Section

So the first thing I noticed, majorly, is the way you structure your dialogue. I was an aspiring playwright before I pivoted into novel writing, so dialogue is my BIG thing. Every line of dialogue you have follows the same format where it's Action. "Dialogue." This is not me saying that this is the wrong way to structure dialogue, but rather, it would serve your story very well to vary it. When you have a repetition of the same dialogue structure, the prose can start to feel exactly that--repetitive.

Like for example, I noticed it the most in the prologue:

I snapped out of it and grinned. "That's the spirit! So, you know how I said the game is played with cards?"

Billy crossed his arms and raised an eyebrow. "You mean not-holograms?"

Well, at least holograms weren't grandpa...

I rolled my eyes. "Yes, not-holograms! That's the same thing as cards."

He raised his nose and closed his eyes. "What about it?"

I snapped my fingers. "There is one species of Pokemon that lives in our world with us as a creature instead of just as cards!"

In this example, you could maybe do something like:

I snapped out of it and grinned. "That's the spirit! So, you know how I said the game is played with cards?"

"You mean not-holograms?" Billy asked, raising his brow as he crossed his arms.

I rolled my eyes. Well, at least holograms weren't grandpa...

"Yes, not-holograms! That's the same thing as cards."

"What about it?"

"There is one species of Pokemon," I snapped for emphasis, "that lives in our world with us as a creature instead of just as cards!"

Just to give you an idea about how you can go about changing things up.

Additionally, regarding the Gentleman's history with Nikki, I think that needs to come up a lot sooner. Like, while he's in his big house, all by his lonesome, have him dream of the life he could have had with her. As he's gearing up to head to the Grass Club, I do think he should be nervous about getting there--he hasn't seen her in years, I presume based on what was written? To me, he should be sweating buckets. Maybe he doesn't want to go to the Grass Club first, but decides he needs to get it out of the way so he isn't anxious about it the entire time he's battling. Maybe he fumbles during his battle with the members because he feels Nikki watching him. There's a lot you can do to raise those uncomfy stakes there that can make his grief feel more visceral.

Same with when he goes to the Science Club to see Rick; I think he should be on edge about it. Like, what does he think Rick thinks about him? Is he worried about that? What else can be going through his head as they're talking?

The last thing I'll get at is much smaller, and happened mostly in the Grass Club duels--I noticed you used a lot of the dialogue to kind of info dump what was happening, and while that can happen in moderation, that can sometimes cause dialogue to feel forced and almost robotic. Like the characters are programmed to explain to a reader what is going on, when all you really need to do is write that exposition in maybe a thought process, or in an action a character does. It's important to trust that your reader can figure it out without you needing to spell it out for them.

This is much less intense concrit and more just small line edits I noticed:

"Don't think you can scare me with all those cards! You can still only attach one energy per turn and you can't evolve any mon the first turn they are placed! Also, you can only attack once per round!"

"Darn it! That puts me back to zero energy again and now you get to claim a prize!"

This is what I mean by info dumping in dialogue--trust that your reader can figure it out through just you writing out what they're doing in standard prose!

There would be no way for Brittany to win. I retreated Voltorb and KOed her Scyther, earning me my third prize:

Did you mean "the"?

The lobby was just as I remembered. Polished teal porcelain square tiles adorned the floors and fish tanks with coral lined the walls. The fish leisurely swam about. They certainly did know how to set up an atmosphere in there.

I approached one of the tanks and lingered a minute, taking in the tranquility of the fish leisurely swimming about. I needed to ground myself against the imminent chaos. For beyond this peaceful veneer lurked many predators, and I was the prey...

Some prose repetition here that can be simplified

"Mr gentleman! I

"We would like you to duel Mister Gentleman here."

I see it written as Mr. Gentleman in one place (with a dropped capital G) and Mister Gentleman in another. Just make sure it's consistent across the board.

dead give away

giveaway is one word

The sooner I got out of there the better!

Comma between "there" and "better"

Then again, he was only a water club member.

Water Clubcapitalization?

the science club.

The rest of the club names were capitalized, so this one should be too, I think?

"Dude... your right!

you're

"What... are you talking about."

Question mark here

Nikki's always been traditional n crap,

n' crap

Ima be your wing-man ok?

I'ma

All in all, I had fun with this! Thanks for sharing this (finished!!!!!!!!) fic, and I look forward to more trades with you in the future <3 Happy Blitz!

 

[Goolix]

Hello! I'm here for Chapters 19 and 20! :D

I tilted my head. "If something were to happen? Do you KNOW something I don't?"

She smiled. "Of course I do. I know several things you don't. I AM a psychic after all... Don't worry. You and I have this agreement going, so it's in my best interest to help you, right?"

sus. Very sus.

Stephanie laughed. "So suspicious! But all I've done is help! Besides, you might not even die-" Her eyes then went wide. "O-oh! Got to go! I'm late for that... that thing I'm supposed to do! See you later!"

You can't just drop that on someone's head without even thinking about the consequences, Stephanie!! Sloppy work!

From the left, I passed by the same small alley I did earlier. In my peripheral vision, I noticed a figure of a person standing there!

Just "figure" is fine. Figure by itself implies a humanoid person. If the figure was of something else, like a Pokemon or an animal, then it would make more sense.

The figure spoke the moment I came into view. "Are you the TCG Island champion?"

Creative use of font to show the voice modification software!

Tango went wide-eyed for a moment before finding a nearby trashcan to pluck in for Mew knew what! The bird made considerably less noise in the trashcan than I would have figured...

Noooo Tango recognizes this type of person for sure. Too bad our protagonist is too disconnected from him to read the signs 😩

A red "G", a white "2", and a red "R".

When listing nouns like this, separate them with a comma - it makes it easier to read.

The figure then leaned closer holding their hands together. "Splendid! I've been looking everywhere for you! In this suit, I go by GR2, but I am not a tourist. I am a talent scout on a mission for the King of GR Island! I've heard of your exploits with your all-common deck! Is it true you defeated club leaders with it?"

Ah, it was about time I got some recognition abroad! And one could not find more concentrated talent than yours truly!

This reminds me of the scams where they try to get you to be into something by flattering you and saying "you're just soooo talented, I'm here looking for talent, and I think you're definitely one of them." And of course, even though he is the champion, Mister Gentleman craves recognition...

GR2 grabbed a handle on a nearby rope that was dangling over the roof down next to them. Suddenly they were pulled up by some unknown mechanism over the roof and out of sight!

I suppose I could have tried to chase after them from the ground, but they had obviously put a lot of thought and effort into their departure spectacle. Who was I to ruin a good moment for them?

A true appreciator of the art of theatre! Well, he cares about aesthetics, and we know game recognizes game.

That was NOT what I had in mind when I succeeded in getting all the other clubs not to duel Mister Gentleman...

The idea was for him to run out of money and hopefully force him to pick up some low-class job in a struggle to make ends meet... Him relying on UBI would also be acceptable since it would be the very bottom of our society. There he could live out his life in abject obscurity, fading from the minds of everyone.

Isaac!! This is deranged behavior!
How did he get them to agree? I'm guessing he put on an act like "well, none of us stand a chance since he's so strong!" since that's what the protagonist says in the early chapters. But yeesh!

It angers me that they put up such a pathetic fight. Even my own daughter...

No, it wasn't enough that he dragged me through the mud all those years ago... Now he had to drag Jennifer through the mud too! She was too innocent to know when she was being messed with. Watching that made me want to strangle him...

The way he's calling his daughter pathetic... :(
And then he quickly corrects himself and says that it wasn't his daughter, but Mister Gentleman's fault for "dragging her through the mud." But you can see that he's upset that she didn't win. Even though she's, you know, eight.

Going back on my agreement to take Jennifer to the park wasn't fun, but she needed to know what a Doduo cloaca-wipe Mister Gentleman really was.

Respect the commitment to anatomically accurate Doduo 🫡

As for his reputation, I'd done what I could getting Stephanie to write that tabloid about him. It cost me a month's salary, but was worth EVERY cent! She had quite the active imagination...

The tabloid was Stephanie's doing?? Got to say, she's very entertaining. She could really make a living writing gossip columns if she wasn't getting a cut from everyone's winnings.

I did have to pay a finder's fee to Stephanie, but what other choice was there? GR2's fee, however, was quite steep. I had to max out the credit cards and take out a personal loan for it... But they were worth their price, and I needed the job done right.

It's interesting how important money is in this fic - Mister Gentleman is on the brink of losing his fancy lifestyle and now Isaac is pushing himself to the edge of bankruptcy... but Isaac is acting out of pride and resentment. Mister Gentleman isn't actually trying to steal Nikki. But whatever Nikki felt for Mister Gentleman clearly hasn't gone away, and obviously he's really upset about it. On some level, Isaac feels like he's second-best even though he got to marry the woman of his dreams. And it's sad, because although we're obviously seeing Mister Gentleman's point of view, Isaac is also clearly suffering. Nikki is caught up in all this as well. One wonders if Isaac could have moved on from Nikki if Mister Gentleman had gotten together with her; that way he would not feel that he was just the backup for her.

Chapter 20 was a real bombshell! Seeing things from Isaac's perspective really shows how far gone he is in his jealousy. And of course, we are interested in knowing what's the deal with the GR2 fellas. The plot thickens...