Pokemon Legends: Arceus, Finale - Reina de Reinas

 

March is the month of "finish things I previously started" and this is no exception. Clearing the slate for whatever the next thing is gonna be.

After defeating the five big Souls bosses, the spacetime rift over the planet seems to get dramatically worse. Even though Kamado sent the protagonist to defeat said five bosses, thinking it'd fix the spacetime rift, he's still gonna go ahead and blame her for things getting worse.

Kamado demands blood! Man, this Galactic Team is turning out to be a real buncha dicks.

He then ousts our hero from the city, and the team.

Cyllene spits some truth while our hero likely wonders why she can't get the benefit of the doubt. The sky is now ominous and apocalyptic, as the spacetime rift threatens to gobble everything up.

At this point you're left to wander the realm to try and solve the issue of this pending apocalypse.

Taking flight, we can see the spacetime rift hovering over... Death Mountain?

A reminder that I still haven't played the last two mainline Zelda games and we've got another one coming up.

At this point you choose either the Diamond Clan or Pearl Clan to work with. I choose the one led by the hot girl with no pants.

This leads to several challenging boss fights, which are thankfully battled the normal way.

AH! JESUS!

Also need to pass the challenges set forward by a trio of ancient Pokemon.

This trial is more of a quiz.

Looks like closing the spacetime rift is a matter of assembling something called the Red Chain, which is a lot like The Matrix. Nobody can be told what the Red Chain is, you have to see it for yourself.

Final Pokedex screen before I go ahead and finish the game.

Another boss fight! None of these are particularly difficult. They aren't multiple-foe trainer fights, after all, they're wild fights.

After passing the trials of the three ancient 'mons, the Red Chain is assembled. Now I just need to climb Death Mountain and seal the rift.

Kamado is, weirdly enough, nowhere to be found, so Cyllene is in charge and reinstates our hero.

Arriving at the mountain, I battle an old lady with a Hitler mustache.

It seems Kamado has ascended the mountain already and thinks he can seal the rift himself somehow.

At the top of the mountain is the Temple of Sinnoh. Technically this is the very center of the Sinnoh region.

Kamado is all decked out in armor now, and functions as the final trainer boss of the game.

Kamado is a formidable foe, but only has four Pokemon and doesn't really compare to any of the other final bosses in this series.

With him out of the way, we can seal the rift with the Red Chain. The only problem is...

Depending on which faction you sided with, either Dialga or Palkia attacks at this point.

In my case it was Palkia, and yes, it can be captured. And you need it, because next up is a super enraged version of the other one.

Here's Dialga, who has a Xenomorph head. Our heroes are forced to retreat until they can forge a ball strong enough to capture an enraged uber-mon.

More fetch quests follow to assemble the ball we need.

This trio shows up yet again for more madness.

After more running around, the Origin Ball is forged. Yeah, at this point I'm summing up quite a bit, just wrapping this up.

This hot lady gives our hero props. Let's see what my final party is gonna look like...

I definitely wanted to bring Scyther along, but unfortunately Bug-types just aren't great endgame party members in this game (or the series in general, I think...could be wrong).

Someone had to get the boot for Palkia and Scyther was the only logical choice.

Decidueye, as the final starter evolution, is perpetually strong. Not as strong as starter final forms usually are in this series, but still good. Staraptor also brings some high-damage moves. Luxray and Rapidash can clean up against opponents weak to electric and fire respectively, plus Luxray has Dark moves so he can really neutralize electricity-using opponents. Machoke is almost like the weak link, being a little weaker than the others, not a final form, and fairly one-dimensional. He can absorb hits while I get others healed, though.

Palkia is pretty much the ultimate 'mon of this game (or Dialga if your choices are different). It can pretty much manhandle most foes that come my way, so the rest of the party doesn't need to be optimal.

Some very strong moves here, and I switch Dragon Pulse in (replacing Power Gem) to have another potent attack. Unfortunately there isn't really anything to use all this power against, since I'm not going into the postgame content.

Volo is doing the creep.

Speaking of creeping, here are Cataluna's sandaled feet.

This is it, the final battle with Enraged Dialga.

He POWERS UP. He doesn't just power up, he POWERS UP.

Annnnnd...it's another Souls Boss. Was hoping it'd be a final boss that really utilized the strength of the party.

Much dodge-rolling and pelting with beanbags later, and Dialga gets locked away with the Origin Ball. That seals it, and the spacetime rift, for good.

The sky returns to normal, and our heroes have learned a valuable lesson about the power of friendship.

So, final thoughts on Arceus? It's an interesting game. Does a lot of new things and definitely changes up the formula. All in all though, I don't think I'll ever run this one again. The research tasks, while fun at first, really turn into busywork after a while. Between that and the vast open spaces, the game feels very padded-out and the world feels empty. I infinitely prefer Pokemon Scarlet/Violet (or Gen 9 if you prefer) in terms of open-world games in this series. I think those games took the best from Arceus and refined it a bit. Probably isn't the popular consensus opinion though.