Pokémon Mystery Dungeon Explorers



"Welcome to a grand tale! A tale that spans time... and darkness. It's the dawn of epic exploration!"

- Time/Darkness introduction

The second entry (or rather, entries) in the Roguelike Pokémon spinoff series known as Pokémon Mystery Dungeon, Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Explorers of Darkness and Explorers of Time were released for the Nintendo DS in 2008, followed up by an Updated Rerelease called Explorers Of Sky in 2009.

Similar to the first installment, the player wakes up in a world inhabited solely by Pokémon, this time washing ashore of a small village called Treasure Town after a storm, with no memories of what happened to them or how/why they've been transformed from a human into a Pokemon. They befriend a timid young Pokemon with a mysterious artifact and together join the local Wigglytuff Guild to train as an exploration team, exploring the strange, randomly-generated "mystery dungeons" that have been showing up in various regions lately. Along the way they learn that a mysterious Pokémon has been reported stealing very important artifacts called "Time Gears", and ultimately get swept up in a quest to Save the World before time itself grinds to a halt.

Despite the game being rated "E" for Everyone, the tone of this story becomes much more serious than its predecessor, and has several considerably dark moments in its later chapters.

This installment provides examples of:
""Hmm.. A Crystal, you'll probably touch it and it changes color. Match the colors and something will rise out of the ground.""
 * Adult Fear:, the "extortionist."
 * Affectionate Parody: Wigglytuff's Guild is a send-up of typical large Japanese businesses. Yes, there are manufacturing companies with routine morning cheers. The situation with Wigglytuff and Chatot is also a dead ringer for "ame to muchi" ("sweets and whips"), an unfortunately common way of ensuring employee zeal: Rewards ("ame") for good results, but public castigation and demerits ("muchi") when you fall short. Needless to say, Wigglytuff's the ame, Chatot's the muchi. Now whether Wigglytuff approves, or is even aware, of Chatot's muchi-ness, is a different matter.
 * Amazon Brigade: Team Charm, complete with their own unique Battle Theme Music and Fight Woosh, too!
 * Bad Future: The famous explorer Dusknoir warns that if Grovyle steals all the Time Gears, the entire planet will become "paralyzed" as time itself comes to a stop, and he's telling the truth.
 * Big Damn Heroes:
 * In Amp Plains, Dusknoir shows up at the exact right moment to save the player and partner from almost certain death.
 * In Bidoof's Sub-Episode in Sky, the aforementioned character is beaten down and subsequently cornered by a villainous team. Enter Wigglytuff's Guild...
 * Book Ends: During the opening chapter, the partner met the player while strolling on the beach south of Treasure Town with nearby Krabby blowing bubbles into the air; right before the credits roll, he's strolling down the same beach, and the Krabby blowing bubbles reminds him how this is where they first met.
 * It is also where
 * In a non-beach example, the last cutscene of the post-game story includes a flashback to the first cutscene of the game.
 * Boss in Mook Clothing: "Outlaw" Pokémon have at least three times as much health as a normal enemy Pokémon of that type and level. They have Battle Theme Music to announce their presence, and in Sky, some are specifically fought in Monster Houses, and some are even flanked by minions (usually a lesser evolutionary level of the outlaw, though occasionally a higher one that's still weaker than the fun-size boss) with the normal dungeon floor replaced with a boss-like arena.
 * Broken Pedestal:, is revealed to be a wanted criminal. Though the pedestal may not be completely broken, as  still looks back fondly on those times.
 * And, even though it was just a cover to begin with, the partner has a hard time accepting that.
 * Although Drowzee seems to be a nice guy, it turns out he is a wanted criminal and abducted Azurill.
 * Call Forward: Armaldo on the Crystal Puzzle. Obviously a reference (or Foreshadowing, if you play the Special Episode before the plot) to the Crystal Cave Exploration.


 * Carnivore Confusion: "Team Tasty" is comprised of a Swellow (a large, fully-evolved bird Pokemon) and a Wurmple (a small, unevolved caterpillar Pokemon whom Swellow are said to prey on). Wurmple's greatest fear is the possibility of getting eaten by his friend -- he breaks out in a cold sweat any time his partner even thinks about food (which happens a lot). Swellow, on the other hand, is completely oblivious to this, to the point that when Wurmple finally tells him, he considers himself a poor leader for his teammate to be so uncomfortable around him.
 * Catch Phrase: Each member of the Wigglytuff Guild seems to have one, almost to the point of being a Verbal Tic. Wigglytuff's "YOOM TAH!" is the most prevalent.
 * Bidoof's "Yup yup" and "By golly!"
 * Sunflora's "eek"/"kyaa" and, especially, "Oh my gosh!"
 * Corphish's "Hey hey" (this is a play on his Japanese name Heigani)
 * May or may not be related to the crabs in 'Finding Nemo', who say "Hey" repeatedly at passerby.
 * Wynaut's "Is it not?" and Wobbuffet's "That's right!", which are both a play on their Japanese names. (Wynaut's Japanese name literally means "Is that so?" while Wobbuffet's Japanese name means "That's the way it is".)
 * Everybody in Team Skull has a distinctive Evil Laugh:
 * "Chaw-haw-haw!"
 * "Whoa-ho-ho!"
 * "Heh heh heh!"
 * Croagunk's "Meh-heh-heh", though he's less evil than other examples.
 * Dusknoir: "Ooooh hoo hoo hoo hoo hoo hoo hoo!"
 * The Sableye's "Wheeh!" and "Wheh-heh-heh!."
 * The Grand Master of All Things Bad's "Muah-hahahaha!"
 * Cave Behind the Falls: The Waterfall Cave.
 * Ceiling Cling: The Brine Cave bosses' preferred method of entry.
 * Chekhov's Gun: Bidoof takes a crystal from Crystal Cave around halfway into the main story. Later,
 * also qualifies.
 * Chekhov's Gunman:
 * Torkoal, who
 * There's also He appears again in the post game where he helps the main characters when
 * Chekhov's Skill: The player character's Dimensional Scream ability is first seen fairly early in the game. The usefulness of this ability becomes evident early on, but its true nature is not explained until much later in the plot.
 * Possibly even a Chekhov's Boomerang, in that the player retains this ability even after the main arc is completed.
 * The Chessmaster: The epilogue arc reveals that was secretly behind the events of the main story arc.
 * is an example of a positive chessmaster, manipulating both Team Charm and Team AWD into fighting each other
 * Child Soldiers: Pokémon that hatch from Chansey Day Care immediately ask to join the party's team.
 * The Chosen One: It turns out that . This is possibly a result of, though it's not exactly clear.
 * Colour Coded Timestop: Of the Deliberately Monochrome variety (the Bad Future especially).
 * The Complainer Is Always Wrong: Chatot gets elements of this at certain points. Sometimes, however, he's allowed to be right.
 * Averted with Loudred and everyone else who had doubts about Team Skull.
 * Crouching Moron Hidden Badass: Team Skull discovers the hard way that one does not attempt to harm Guildmaster Wigglytuff. Whether this is Obfuscating Stupidity or not is up for debate.
 * "The Grand Master of All Things Bad", on the other hand, is quite the cunning foe...
 * Chatot, on the other hand, plays this much straighter, particularly with Team Skull. For most of the game he plays the role of Ted Baxter, and even finds himself stupefied to the point of rage that trio of Team Skull actually is a group of Jerkasses.
 * Curb Stomp Battle: Invoked near the end of Bidoof's Wish, after And then it gets flipped around and done again when
 * Cute Shotaro Boy: Azurill manages to pull this off in Time/Darkness despite not actually being human. His older brother Marill kind of counts too.
 * Cutting the Knot: During Wigglytuff's special episode. Armaldo observes and discusses the various puzzles and traps protecting a door on an expedition, only to watch the young Igglybuff smash the door down.
 * Cue the Sun: After returning from the future's eternal night, one of the first things the partner does is take in the awe of a morning sunrise. Explorers of Sky also has
 * Darker and Edgier: The sequel to the family-friendly original. Not in a bad way, but some parts of the story are deeply disturbing.
 * are both surprisingly sinister for a Pokémon game.
 * After the main plot has been completed, Cresselia appears in the player's dreams and tells them that to save the world Turns out that.
 * A Day in The Limelight: The Special Episodes in Sky lets the player control other characters for their duration.
 * Department of Redundancy Department: "I'm Wigglytuff! I'm the guild's Guildmaster!"
 * Deus Ex Machina:
 * See also  below.
 * Did You Just Flip Off Cthulhu? During the fifth special episode,
 * Disappears Into Light:
 * Double Caper: Regarding . See Wham Episode.
 * Earn Your Happy Ending: The epilogue arc. Sure, you may have been told that and , your partner is  and that   ... but hey, something still doesn't feel right. Don't give up, you can still win this!
 * Eureka Moment: Sunflora has one during her Special Episode, after.
 * Even Evil Has Standards: Chatot claims that no criminal, no matter how hardened, would ever dream of stealing a Time Gear. Indeed, even the villainous Team AWD (in Explorers of Sky) acknowledges that it's crossing a line.
 * Everybody Lives:  after the Last Stand.
 * Fan Service: Team Charm is most likely this, considering how popular they are...
 * Word of Dante suggests that the Lopunny species may be inspired by Bunny Girls, so yes.
 * Fight Woosh: Before boss battles.
 * Fighting a Shadow: The boss of Fogbound Lake. (The "Groudon" is just a psychic illusion created by Uxie to ward off intruders.)
 * Final Speech, It Has Been an Honor: After saving Temporal Tower.
 * Fish Out of Temporal Water: Scizor was frozen in ice for decades until the player and partner thaw him. Also, are this in the present,  is this in the future, and.
 * Floating Continent: The Hidden Land.
 * Flunky Boss: wouldn't be much of a threat were you fighting him by himself, but you also have to contend with six Sableye at the same time. See also Wolfpack Boss, because your objective is to take all of them out, not just the leader.
 * Food Porn: The descriptions of the drinks ordered at the Spinda Café.
 * Future Badass: . To a lesser extent,.
 * Game Breaking Bug: In Sky, if a Pokémon evolves into a Pokémon who has a 10 letter name, the game will freeze. This can be worked around by nicknaming the Pokémon beforehand.
 * Gameplay and Story Segregation: At one point, Grovyle blinds several opponents using a "Luminous Orb" to cover for an escape attempt. The item in question does not appear to do this in actual gameplay, and is used instead to reveal the current floor's map.
 * Genki Girl: Sunflora. Eek!
 * Genre Savvy: Armaldo in Igglybuff the Prodigy.
 * Played for Laughs, as he is often easily fooled by the staples he claims to know so much about.
 * Get On the Boat: Or rather, the Lapras, near the end of the main story.
 * Graduate From the Story: After completing the main arc, the player is allowed to graduate from Wigglytuff's Guild, which is the start of the post-arc plot.
 * The Gods Must Be Lazy: Just where was Arceus when  (Especially considering that its entire purpose after the creation of the world is to fix these things.)
 * The general (out of universe) explanation is that the developers didn't want Arceus explicitly playing a role in the plot, considering its status as a then-unreleased event Pokémon in the main series.
 * Goldfish Poop Gang: Team Skull.
 * Good Guy Bar: Spinda's Café.
 * Gosh Dang It to Heck: Sunflora's personal Catch Phrase.
 * Grand Theft Me: In Sky,
 * Hailfire Peaks: Steam Cave contains both water and fire. And it's a cave.
 * Heads I Win Tails You Lose: The battle against  -- even after his defeat, he still seems to have plenty of strength left. Must be Only a Flesh Wound.
 * There's also Grovyle, although the player can either win or lose the battle and Grovyle will just shake it off either way.
 * This happens with quite a few of the scripted battles, honestly; for example, it's technically possible to win Bidoof's Hopeless Boss Fight against Team Rogue (with the right items and good tactics).
 * Hopeless Boss Fight: During Bidoof's special episode in Sky, though it is winnable with the right items.
 * Grovyle is treated this way, as if you lose the fight, the game continues. However, the fight can be won and isn't actually very hard.
 * Human Popsicle: The reason the legendary explorer Scizor never returned from his expedition to Blizzard Island. Once rescued, he is quite surprised to learn that decades have passed since then.
 * Improbable Accessory Effect: Not only are there multicolored bows and ribbons providing various effects, but also a wide range of "exclusive" items dropped by hostile Pokémon including claws, teeth, tails, scales, even tears and sweat of other Pokémon.
 * Incendiary Exponent:
 * Info Dump: Late in the game is a series of cutscenes that explain most of the plot in one go. It's so long, you're asked if you want to save your game halfway through it, and it even flashes back to the scenes immediately prior.
 * Jerk With a Heart of Gold: Chatot and Loudred. The jury's still out on which one's the bigger one, though.
 * Just in Time: Among others, Cresselia's entrance.
 * Knight of Cerebus:  for the main story, and   for the post-credits plot.
 * Law Enforcement Inc: The guild.
 * Last Stand: The final Boss Battle in Special Episode 5 of Sky.
 * The Man Behind the Man: The Big Bad of the epilogue arc:
 * Manipulative Bastard: effortlessly manipulates everyone for most of the main story.
 * Medium Awareness: Armaldo frequently references such things as Stock Puzzles and Dungeon Bosses.
 * Mini Game: Diglett's sentry duty involves guessing Pokémon species by their footprints.
 * The Mole: Two of them. First we have and in Sky we have.
 * My God What Have I Done: Grovyle, when, has this kind of reaction.
 * The Night That Never Ends: The Bad Future is frozen in time where the sun never rises.
 * No Indoor Voice: Dialga and Palkia, although to be fair they are two of the largest Pokémon in the world; it's really just their normal tone of voice.
 * It tends to enter into Narm territory, though.
 * Obstructive Bureaucrat: Chatot, at least early on, to a frustrating degree...
 * One Hundred Eight: Spiritomb declares that he is a fusion of 108 evil spirits, matching the species' description in the main series.
 * One Steve Limit: Thanks to the Species Surname, rarely does the player encounter more than one NPC of a given species. (some exceptions being the Poochyena brothers,, the Shaymin tribe, and so on).
 * Grovyle doesn't make the connection between  until it's specifically pointed out to him by Dusknoir, though he might have not known the name of the latter at that point, and  . Also, after the main story arc, when Teddiursa evolves into an Ursaring, she even comments that it's difficult to tell her apart from the other Ursaring.
 * One Time Dungeon: The dungeons you explore in the future and The Nightmare.
 * Orifice Invasion:
 * Pet the Dog: Late in the game, a defeated Skuntank returns the partner's Relic Fragment, to which his subordinate Zubat chuckles, commenting that maybe his boss "isn't so bad" after all.
 * The Plan:
 * Plot Coupon: The five Time Gears.
 * Point of No Return: Subverted; despite that Temporal Tower is about to collapse (and time itself with it), Lapras is able and willing to return you to Treasure Town if you ask it.
 * Poison Mushroom: Explorers of Sky specifically warns about "Lookalike" items, which have similar names to normal items but entirely different (though not always negative) effects. Like Oren Berries which inflict damage (instead of healing, like Oran Berries do). An interesting inversion comes from the Dough Seed, which is a positive-effect lookalike of the level-decreasing Doom Seed.
 * Police Are Useless: Which probably explains why Officer Magnezone is always requesting help capturing outlaw Pokémon. Hell, even in some postgame jobs where he accompanies you to capture the outlaw, he's only Level 16.
 * Poor Communication Kills
 * The Perfect Apples incident. The partner is never given a chance to explain that it was Team Skull who prevented them from retrieving any Perfect Apples for the Chatot and the Guildmaster. (Then again, considering how Chatot is....)
 * Armaldo actually lampshades the fact that dungeon bosses always seem to be hard of hearing in addition to territorial.
 * Primal Fear: Primal Dialga's madness leaves it afraid of only one thing: Being erased from existence should history be changed.
 * Race Against the Clock: The distortions in time (and its eventual destruction) are caused by the gradual collapsing of Temporal Tower. By the time you reach it for your final mission, it is already starting to physically break apart, although this has absolutely no effect on your climb through it; it's not actually a Timed Mission, so go ahead and Take Your Time.
 * Really Dead Montage: At the end of the Explorers games.
 * Red Eyes Take Warning: The covers depict enemy Mons with red eyes. (To be fair, red eyes are actually a natural color for certain species -- just not the ones used on the covers.)
 * Also, Primal Dialga.
 * Red Sky Take Warning: There are swirling red clouds around Temporal Tower.
 * Ret Gone: Changing the future means that everyone from that future ( disappear from the world forever...
 * Ripple Effect Proof Memory: ...but it doesn't erase their effects on the present day, nor other Pokémon's memories of them.
 * Set Right What Once Went Wrong: The entire plot. The Bad Future was caused by.
 * Ship Tease: Special Episodes 3 and 5 tease and  respectively.
 * Suspiciously Specific Denial: "I don't have any special feelings for him or anything!" (said by )
 * Skeptic No Longer: Happens for Chatot. Fortunately for him, Wigglytuff believes/pretends Chatot's refusal to believe  was just a cover, allowing him to save face.
 * Sliding Scale of Silliness Versus Seriousness: Explorers starts off a bit on the silly side, then takes a little slide towards serious with  then takes a large slide towards serious with the Bad Future (see Wham Episode) and then slides a bit more towards serious with the post-credits plot.
 * Sound Test: Explorers of Sky finally added one of these, with all 141 songs available on the Sky Jukebox. Good thing too, considering the soundtrack is amazing.
 * Spanner in The Works: If, you would never have figured out that the world was already in danger, nor how to save it. It's almost a case of Nice Job Fixing It Villain.
 * It goes further than that: because is needed to reach Temporal Tower,.
 * Scenery Gorn: Any and all shots of the Bad Future.
 * Scenery Porn: A ridiculous amount, especially Fogbound Lake and the Hidden Land.
 * Start X to Stop X: Stop time, to prevent time from stopping -- but It Makes Sense in Context.
 * Stop Drowning and Stand Up: Team Raider "rescues" Dugtrio from the watery nightmare that is getting splashed around by the tide.
 * Surprise Creepy: For starring such cute critters, the Explorers games get uncomfortable fast.
 * Surprisingly Easy Mini Quest: Most of the special missions in Explorers of Sky can be pretty daunting for the most part, but Igglybuff the Prodigy is very easy, thanks in part to Igglybuff already maintaining the Badass status he carries as Guildmaster Wigglytuff. He already has pretty high stats to begin with, and on top of that, being below Level 20, he levels pretty quickly, and each level boosts his stats by ludicrous amounts as well. There are also practically no bosses to speak of in any of the dungeons he explores, either.
 * Tag Team Twins: Although the exact relation between them is never explained, in Explorers of Sky, the outlaw Pokémon called
 * Team Rocket Wins: Team Skull manages to beat the heroes at the end of Apple Woods.
 * Terminator Twosome:  were sent back in time to change history for the better, while   was sent back to stop them.
 * This Is the Final Battle: Spoken by Grovyle during Special Episode 5 in Explorers of Sky, when preparing to take out Primal Dialga.
 * Timey Wimey Ball
 * Delayed Ripple Effect: After repairing Temporal Tower and saving the future,.
 * Tsundere: Loudred and show signs of this.
 * Two Scenes One Dialogue: When Lapras appears at Brine Cave to escort the player to the Hidden Land, while Wigglytuff explains how he met Lapras in the first place. To a lesser extent there is also the player's encounter with a Groudon at Fogbound Lake, with the Guild describing exactly what a Groudon is even as the player's battle is about to begin.
 * Utsuge: Doesn't seem like it at first, but by the end of both the main game and After Game, as well as some of the spinoff stories, this becomes more obvious.
 * Verbal Tic: Loudred likes to EMPHASIZE random WORDS in his SENTENCES!
 * So does SPIRITOMB.
 * Video Game Settings:
 * Death Mountain: The eastern portion of the map.
 * Lethal Lava Land: The upper-left portion of the map, including Giant Volcano and Dark Crater.
 * Shifting Sand Land: The northwest portion of the mainland.
 * Slippy Slidey Ice World: The bottom-left corner of the map, known collectively as Blizzard Island in the present and Frozen Island in the future.
 * Under the Sea: The western portion of the map, along with a few Palmtree Panic dungeons.
 * Villain Exit Stage Left: After being defeated,
 * Villain With Good Publicity:
 * Wake Up Call Boss: Drowzee is the first Outlaw Pokémon you fight; his Psychic-type "Confusion" move hits relatively hard, and his "Forewarn" ability enables him to dodge roughly every other attack you throw at him. On top of that, he's immune to Sleep Seeds as well. Be prepared for a little grinding.
 * We Can Rule Together:  during the epilogue arc.
 * Wham Episode: When the party is thrown into the Bad Future, they suddenly learn that . And that . The first thing they decide to do after returning to the present time?
 * Whole Episode Flashback: One of Sky's Special Episodes retells an important incident in Wigglytuff's childhood. Two other Special Episodes are presented as the featured character reflecting on what happened.
 * World Half Full:
 * World Healing Wave:
 * Wolfpack Boss: Quite a few, and that's not including ones where you specifically fight against another exploration team (like Team Skull). During the main arc there is a pack of eight Luxio, led by a Luxray, in the Amp Plains. (Explorers of Sky replaced them with functionally-equivalent Electrike and Manectric.)
 * There are more during the postgame arc: You battle against  as part of a graduation exam, team up with another exploration team to take down Regigigas and a veritable swarm of Hitmonlee and Bronzong, and the final plot battle as well may be a case of this.
 * Explorers of Sky adds even more, such as during Special Episode 5, or teaming up with a Shaymin and Team Frontier to take out a group of eight Grimer and Muk atop Sky Peak.
 * Wounded Gazelle Gambit: In Sky,  pulls one as part of a con act.
 * Yandere:
 * You Exclamation: Dusknoir, near the beginning of the final Sub-Episode in Sky.
 * Your Princess Is in Another Castle: Happens once in the main arc, then again during the epilogue arc.
 * You Shall Not Pass: Grovyle announces he's "Taking You With Me" when he
 * You Shall Not Pass: Grovyle announces he's "Taking You With Me" when he