Pokémon Mystery Dungeon



""Introducing the newest Pokémon ... YOU!""

- Tagline, Pokémon Mystery Dungeon: Red/Blue Rescue Team

A Pokémon-themed entry in Chunsoft's Mystery Dungeon (Fushigi no Dungeon) Roguelike franchise. The games center around a world populated exclusively by Pokémon (with no humans to be seen), who live in towns and cities, run shops, and go on adventures in randomly-generated dungeons.

Pokémon Mystery Dungeon as a whole is notable from the main series for two reasons, one being that it's the first entries in the entire Pokémon franchise to place special emphasis on Character Development and a compelling Story Arc (as opposed to the series's usual quest To Be a Master and to catch 'em all), typically involving a human who awakens in the Pokémon's world to discover that they've somehow been transformed into a Pokémon themselves. They become best friends with another Pokémon, form an adventure team, and go on a Quest for Identity over the course of many adventures, as clues about their Mysterious Past reveal that their ultimate destiny is nothing less than Saving the World from an imminent destruction.

The second reason this spinoff series is notable? Because it's the first time we get to hear exactly what the Pokémon are saying underneath all the Pokémon-Speak we've come to expect.

The gameplay is what you would expect from a Roguelike, except with battle mechanics loosely resembling those of the main Pokémon series: All 400-plus individual species (which you can "recruit" to become members of your team), all 17 elemental types, moves, abilities, and Standard Status Effects from the main series show up in a manner better suited to the different nature of gameplay. The Pokémon themselves are represented faithfully with 8-directional walking and attacking sprites and dialogue portraits (an impressive feat in and of itself!).

The series comprises these installments:
 * Red and Blue Rescue Team were released for the Game Boy Advance and DS in 2005. Like the main series, there were a few minor differences between the Red and Blue versions, but both were required for true One Hundred Percent Completion.
 * Explorers of Time and Darkness, another pair of games with minor differences between them, released in 2008 and featuring Pokémon from the fourth generation, a tighter Story Arc, and many tweaks to the underlying gameplay. An Updated Rerelease, Explorers of Sky, was released in 2009 with additional features, including bonus chapters focusing on side characters. The Explorers games have become somewhat notorious for the sheer amount of frightening situations that managed to sneak past the radar.
 * Adventure Squad: A third installment released only in Japan for Wii Ware in 2009, comprising three versions with elementally-themed starter Pokémon (Fire, Water, and Electric), with entirely 3D graphics, and a Lighter and Softer story involving Arceus. These games do not have a page here at the moment, which is why the external link is given.
 * Gates to Infinity was released in 2012 for the Nintendo 3DS. After a mysterious dream, the player becomes a pokemon and meets several pokemon, including a very ambitious one who wants to make a "Pokemon Paradise." But a dangerous threat threatens that world and its to the player and his best friend/business partner to get to the bottom of it.
 * Super Mystery Dungeon, released for the Nintendo 3DS in 2015. The player becomes a pokemon and will go on a journey to find his true identity and solve a mystery of a new danger.

The first two installments also received their own manga adaptations and a few anime episodes based on them (see The Anime of the Game).

"Armaldo: [The boss of a dungeon] probably won't listen to what you have to say. You'll likely be attacked often. Igglybuff: Dungeon bosses don't have much patience, do they?"
 * Adventure Guild: Explicitly so with Wigglytuff's Guild in Explorers.
 * Ambidextrous Sprite: Averted; Pokémon with asymmetrical designs have different sprites for all eight directions.
 * The Anime of the Game: In the form of a few one-off specials - Go-Getters out of the Gate!, Explorers of Time and Darkness, and Explorers of Sky: Beyond Time and Darkness.
 * Anti-Grinding: The experience points needed for each level-up grow about linearly, as opposed to quadratic or faster as in most other games. Joy Seeds are also relatively easy to get.
 * On the other hand, if you stay on a floor for too long (to fight the never-ending supply of Pokémon), an unseen force will kick you out of the dungeon, counting as a loss.
 * Arbitrary Headcount Limit: Four, sometimes less depending on exactly who's on the active team.
 * Artificial Stupidity
 * If you run our of PP for a move, the game prevents you from selecting or using it; but if an AI Pokémon (partner, recruits, and opponents alike) run out of PP, they may continue attempting to use that move, wasting their turn. The "PP Checker" skill prevents this, but the Rescue Team games don't equip it by default (it must be learned).
 * Disabling the "Course Checker" IQ skill can result in death by friendly fire. (But unlike "PP Checker", this one is equipped by default.)
 * If for some reason your partner is separated from you, they'll happily wander off elsewhere in the dungeon, engaging other Pokémon in combat, level discrepancies or Elemental Rock-Paper-Scissors being considered irrelevant.
 * The Atoner: in Red/Blue,  in Time/Darkness/Sky.
 * Auto Revive: Reviver Seeds. It is not necessary to even equip them; if they're present in the team inventory, they will be used automatically on the first Pokémon to be knocked out. As always, beware the lookalike item.
 * Bag of Sharing: All team members have access to the same inventory regardless of their location on the floor; in Sky, items and money placed in storage can even be exchanged to and from the optional "special episodes".
 * Baleful Polymorph: The Ninetales legend in Red/Blue predicted the cursed human would be reborn as a Pokémon..
 * Played with in that this is part of the characters' backstory, and not an in-game status effect.
 * In-game, the "Transfer Orb" transforms an enemy Pokémon into a different species, though there is no guarantee that the new species will be any easier (or harder) to defeat. And the "Decoy Orb" transforms an opponent into a Poké-doll that other enemy Pokémon attack.
 * And the "Itemizer Orb" turns a Pokémon into an item. Sometimes, one you can eat.
 * Finally, note that Adventure Squad doesn't use the same backstory as the other games. The orbs are still there, though.
 * Battle Theme Music: There is one for standard Boss Battles, a second for Climax Bosses (and other legendary Pokémon), a third for Monster Houses. Explorers adds another for encountering Outlaw Pokémon, plus themes for the main antagonists.
 * Blessed with Suck: Pokémon with the Illuminate ability (like Staryu, Chinchou, or Volbeat) will "blink" if they take damage during a turn, causing a hostile Pokémon to spawn somewhere on the floor. This includes damage from hostile weather or Standard Status Effects.
 * Bloodless Carnage: And how!
 * Brutal Bonus Level: A surprisingly high number of them for the games' length.
 * But Thou Must!: In textbook fashion, most prompts for player input will result in only slightly altered dialogue leading to the same outcome, or require the player to go back and select the "correct" choice again.
 * In Red/Blue, there is at least one point where the player's only options are (literally) Visible Silence.
 * Near the end of Explorers of Sky, while trying to explain that something feels wrong about the mysterious dreams, you're given a choice between "Something seems strange..." and "Something seems weird..."
 * Taken to an extreme in Bidoof's Wish where Jirachi offers Bidoof a wish, and the player is given a slew of possible options (even World Domination), all leading to the same result -- Bidoof doesn't want to wish for it any more, and wishes for something else.
 * Chimecho provides a Lampshade Hanging in Sky: "Even if you select a "No," you eventually have to select the "Yes," so it always ends up the same anyway..."
 * Late in the Explorers games, during a major plot point a selection dialog pops up ... and there's ONLY ONE OPTION to pick from!
 * Cloudcuckoolander: The Wigglytuff in both games. They're separate Wigglytuff, for those of you who are wondering.
 * The Cuckoolander Was Right
 * Climbing Climax: Both games end with a tower climb; the first one is the Sky Tower, the second is.
 * Continuing Is Painful: Defeat means losing approximately half the items (randomly selected) in your active inventory and all of your money on hand. When the game tells you to use the bank and item storage before setting out, it isn't kidding.
 * In Sky, the penalty was lessened to half of your money on hand, although losing half of your items still applies.
 * Contractual Boss Immunity: Orb items explicitly cannot be used in boss battles due to "a strange power", though Seeds and Standard Status Effects still generally can.
 * Convection, Schmonvection
 * Crap Saccharine World: Sure the world looks pretty and colorful but what about the natural disasters/distortions time that are turning mons against each other or what about
 * Critical Existence Failure: The end of both Red/Blue and Explorers.
 * Curb Stomp Battle: Boss battles can range from very easy to very difficult depending on the player's strategy and (for some cases) the boss's own AI Roulette; for example, combining a Standard Status Effect such as Confusion with Elemental Rock-Paper-Scissors For Massive Damage can result in defeating the boss without giving it a chance to even fight back.
 * Cursed with Awesome: Your character is a human turned into a Pokémon. Why become a human when you can do things like shooting fire from your HANDS?
 * Somewhat averted in the first game though. . The player agreed to both but shows no problems with being a Pokémon. The player can choose whether or not he/she wants to become a human again. Of course
 * Played straight in the next game where . On the other hand, the player is never particularly bothered by whether or not he/she can ever become human again.
 * Defeat Means Friendship: How you recruit new team members most of the time.
 * Demonic Spider: Pokémon with multi-hit moves in general. Octillery is probably the best individual example of the trope--it packs Bullet Seed, which hits multiple times from a distance, among other things.
 * Diagonal Speed Boost
 * Did You Just Knock Out A Legendary Pokémon?? (Especially Dialga, the master of time itself.)
 * Difficulty Spike: Explorers is pretty easy up until you . Afterwards, it can get downright cruel.
 * in Red/Blue Rescue Team can be pretty rough going, too. Stupid ghost-types and their dumb attacking through walls on earlier floors, Idiotic Aerodactyl and their moronic Supersonics and Agilities further up... and let's not get into the post-game dungeons.
 * Disappears Into Light: after completing the main arc in either game, albeit for slightly different reasons.
 * Easily Angered Shopkeeper: Kecleon in the Dungeon Shop. Woe unto you if you attempt to take Kecleon's items off his Dungeon Shop mat without paying for them first.
 * Anything with the potential to destroy items (such as an Explosion trap) can also offend him if it damages his wares. Otherwise, you can KO wild Pokémon right in front of him and he won't even notice.
 * The in-game description of the Trawl Orb explicitly warns that if there's a Kecleon shop on the current floor, using the Orb will brand the player a thief (as it pulls all items to the player's location).
 * Elemental Rock-Paper-Scissors: More or less similar to the main series during gameplay. It is specifically hinted at during Sunflora's special mission in Sky, where she is warned that Spring Cave is likely to contain Fire-type Pokémon, and her type disadvantage against the outlaw Haunter
 * Escort Mission: A frequent form other missions can take, not helped in any way by the client's low level or the inability to give them tactical commands in case they get separated.
 * Fake Difficulty: In the first game, after a certain point the enemies in the dungeons just won't be able to damage your characters enough (since you can raise your stats with gummies very fast), so the game fills the dungeons with traps and present enemies that instead of going for direct damage, will try to use OHKO moves or poison you so you'll have to rush to the stairs.
 * The second one just runs wild with it. In the ultimate challenges, you're reduced to Lv. 1, have all your IQ skills removed, cannot bring items, and the dungeons are 99 floors long with the highest trap density, and the latter floors are covered with enemies that can kill you indirectly with ease. Add this to the fact that there are only a handful of Pokémon that are effectively useable while at Lv. 1, and you'll realize that not only you won't be able to use your favorites in those challenges as those are effectively luck based missions.
 * Fantasy World Map
 * Fire-Breathing Diner: Blast Seeds, if eaten. They can alternatively be thrown, causing them to explode on impact.
 * Fish Out of Temporal Water: The player. Well, not temporal water, Averted in the WiiWare games.
 * Fixed Damage Attack: Quite a few attacks, even more than those of the main series (Dragon Rage, Night Shade, etc.).
 * Geo Pebbles and Gravelerocks inflict a fixed 10 or 20 points damage, while throwing or knocking enemy Pokémon around inflicts a fixed 4 points.
 * Selfdestruct and Explosion inflict a fixed 40 or 80 points on hostile Pokémon.
 * Friendly Fireproof: Many (but not all) moves that target an entire room will conveniently damage only opposing Pokémon. On the other hand, moves that inflict damage on a "straight line of sight" will damage the first thing they hit, friend or foe alike.
 * Funny Animal: Any bipedal mon could count.
 * Get Back Here Boss: Certain outlaws will freak out when they see your exploration team. One slightly notable example is Abra, whose response is to use the one move he knows, Teleport, making you have to search for him first. Thankfully, he won't Teleport again when you do find him.
 * Glass Cannon: The Com Mons tends to be like this.
 * Greed: Some of the characters seem quite obsessed with treasure.
 * Grievous Harm with a Body: Hurl Orbs, Strength and Fling pick up one hostile Pokémon and toss it towards another, inflicting damage on both.
 * Guide Dang It: 99% of the items are found randomly in the dungeons, so it's kinda hard to figure out where you can get what as the item might just not spawn whatsoever. For instance, a certain evolutionary item is found only in a certain dungeon, and ONLY in a Kecleon Shop, wich might or might not appear in the dungeon. And even then, the Kecleon Shop may not have the item.
 * The games' introductory quiz assigns the player a specific starter based on whichever personality type it declares as a result. If you want your player to be a specific Pokémon, the fastest way is to consult a guide for how each question affects your quiz results, and pick answers accordingly. (On the other hand, you can pick your partner's species directly.)
 * The sheer number of possible personality types and questions means that even answering optimally, it may be impossible to get the Pokémon you want if you get the wrong quiz loadout!
 * Hate Plague: According to the characters it is the natural disasters/distortions in time that are turning mons hostile.
 * Heal Thyself: Oran Berries, available from the start of the game, heal the user by 100 HP, despite healing by only 10 HP in the main series. Oren Berries, on the other hand, cause you to lose 10 HP.
 * Heel Face Turn: in Red/Blue, and  in Sky.
 * Also,
 * Hero Antagonist: in Red/Blue.
 * In Time/Darkness/Sky,
 * Hello, Insert Name Here: The player and partner, and to a lesser extent the "nicknames" of recruited Pokémon.
 * Heroic Mime: Played with. The player can read the protagonist's thoughts, but when he or she actually speaks to the other characters, all that occurs is a Hyperactive Sprite and Parrot Exposition from the other Pokémon.
 * Explorers averts it precisely once after completing the main story arc:
 * In Red/Blue, it's averted several times, actually: the hero speaks during the dream sequences,, and after a level-up. (Though the dream sequences may be a borderline example.)
 * Heroic Sacrifice / Taking the Bullet
 * The Ninetales legend in the Rescue Team games, where a Gardevoir took the Ninetales's curse herself to save her human trainer.
 * Explorers of Time/Darkness has no less than three, with one of the Special Episodes in Sky adding a fourth.
 * Hub Level: Pokémon Square, Treasure Town, and soforth.
 * Heterosexual Life Partners: Officially, the player and partner are merely friends who work together on the same team. This doesn't stop the Shipping fandom from numerous pairings of Ho Yay, Les Yay, (etc.) between them, but that aside....
 * That or ensure that their player and partner are opposite genders.
 * Les Yay is much less common than Ho Yay or straight pairings (for female player characters, anyway), given how most of the available partners are male by default.
 * Hit Points
 * Idle Animation: A variety of Pokémon. Poochyena's animation, for example, depicts the Pokémon barking, and Alakazam's is to levitate in place.
 * Hyperactive Sprite: A variety of other Pokémon don't have a distinct Idle Animation.
 * Inner Monologue: All of the player's lines are either this or Parrot Exposition from other characters, save for a few scenes where they actually talk directly -- which is usually reserved for dreams and other places where no other Pokémon are around.
 * It's All Upstairs From Here: Most of the outdoor dungeons, and the towers.
 * Knockback: Blowback Orbs (and the moves Roar and Whirlwind) specifically send a foe flying across the room, causing them to take damage if they hit a wall or opposing Pokémon.
 * Lampshade Hanging: Happens with some frequency. To give one example:


 * Large Ham: Dugtrio, Palkia, and Spiritomb probably all count.
 * Laser-Guided Amnesia: The main character in both games, wakes up knowing absolutely nothing beyond their name, and the fact that they used to be a human.
 * In Red/Blue, this is revealed to be because.
 * Also in Red/Blue, the final postgame mission involves rescuing Gardevoir, who requests Laser-Guided Amnesia so she won't have to remember her human trainer.
 * Likewise, Uxie in Time/Darkness/Sky has power over memories, so the player assumes Uxie might have something to do with their forgotten memories.
 * Level Drain: Doom Seeds cause you to lose one level.
 * Lighter and Softer: In 'Time/Darkness/Sky, the main plot is to . In Adventure Squad, the main plot is finding some cookies in a dungeon so your town will stop fighting over a piece of chocolate.
 * The Load: Almost any Pokémon in an escort mission. They're typically underleveled (escorts in Rescue Team especially are always Level 1, even if they want to explore a high-level dungeon), with bad stats and moves, suicidally aggressive AI, and won't hesitate to waste every single one of your Reviver Seeds if given the chance. It's probably the number one reason many players AVOID escort missions entirely.
 * Luck-Based Mission: The Lv.1/0 IQ/No items dungeons, especially in Time/Darkness/Sky. The game might not spawn enough HP/PP recovery items, you might start in a trap-filled room, you may start in a Monster House, some enemies in the late floors are nigh unkillable... really, skill is required but if the luck isn't on your side, you WON'T complete those dungeons.
 * Made of Iron: Aside from the Bloodless Carnage, every single character seems capable of Taking the Bullet with little more than short-term unconsciousness as a result.
 * Marathon Level: The 50- and 99- floor dungeons.
 * Mood Whiplash: Especially in Explorers.
 * Mushroom Samba: X-Eye Seeds.
 * Never Say "Die": Pokémon don't "kill" other Pokémon, they "get rid of" them. (Sometimes "for good"....)
 * No Hero Discount: Even after, Kecleon still doesn't give discounts.
 * One Game for the Price of Two: Just like the main series, there are only subtle differences in item and Pokémon appearance rates. (Additionally, the Rescue Team games are on differing systems, which means there are a few touchscreen features in Blue that aren't in Red, and Pokémon can be traded between them with just one system.)
 * Interestingly, Sky actually includes all the Pokémon from both Time/Darkness, along with all its other bonus features, averting the main series' trend of the third version strategically omitting enough Pokémon to 'force' trading with past versions.
 * One Steve Limit: Thanks to the Species Surname, rarely does the player encounter more than one NPC of a given species.
 * One Mon Army: A single character is able to plow through dozens of enemies especially if they are a lower level than him/her.
 * Playable Epilogue: Just like the main series, the game isn't over after the credits roll; there are still more missions and new dungeons (even some more story progression) waiting for the player to wrap up. And, of course, the quest to recruit 'em all truly begins at that point.
 * Player Personality Quiz: The player's Pokémon species is assigned as the result of a simple personality quiz, while they can select their partner's species directly.
 * Plot Hole: It is never explained how the Mons know what a "human" is when there aren't any humans around.  (Though the Ruins friend zone in the Rescue Team; games seems to hint at a case of Humanity's Wake.)
 * Purely Aesthetic Gender: The player's species and/or gender has no meaningful impact in the events of Story Arc whatsoever. In actual gameplay, it has no effect beyond whether gender-based moves and abilities (Attract, Rivalry, etc.) will work on a given Mon, as only a few species (like the Nidoran) have any notable differences between their males and females.
 * Quest for Identity: The player in both games.
 * Rage Quit: Yes. Yes you will. Especially when you are playing the Mt. Bristle and *shudder* Apple Woods dungeons for the first time in Explorers of Time/Darkness/Sky. By the way, ragequitting counts as a loss, so you'll lose your items anyway.
 * Random Encounters: While the dungeons generally rely on wandering opponents inside dungeons, later dungeons occasionally toss in "monster houses" where a swarm of Pokémon drop in on the player for a surprise attack. Oh Crap indeed.
 * Rank Inflation: Most missions (and outlaw Pokémon) are ranked from E to A (and S) for difficulty, but the scale extends even farther with missions rated *1 through *9.
 * Rare Candy: Joy Seeds. There are also the same vitamins as the main series, and Sitrus Berries can increase a Mon's maximum HP if taken at full health. Ultra-rare Golden Seeds boost you up five levels!
 * Regenerating Health: Team members gradually regenerate HP as you move around the dungeons. Holding A+B at the same time causes your HP to regenerate faster, if only by standing in place and fast-forwarding time. Poisoning disables this, and certain IQ skills can increase the rate.
 * Required Party Member: The player and partner, at least until after completing the main arc and watching the credits roll. Afterwards...
 * In Red/Blue, the partner discusses letting their recruits take on rescue missions by themselves, effectively lifting the restriction and allowing the player to compose their team any way they see fit.
 * In Explorers, this is Chimecho's bonus for passing the Guild's graduation exam, although the player and partner are still the characters used to travel around the Hub Level and for most of the post-game story missions.
 * Roguelike: To cater to the younger demographic, though, it's actually a fair bit easier than most Roguelikes. At least, until the end credits roll, then the kid-gloves come off.
 * Save Point: "Kangaskhan Rocks" found during some of the longer expeditions. Some even allow access to the player's item storage, and they also double as a checkpoint if the player is defeated.
 * The ones found outside dungeons are usually the ones with item storage access; the ones used as dungeon checkpoints don't.
 * Scratch Damage: Most commonly seen when revisiting low-level dungeons on optional missions.
 * Sequel Difficulty Spike: In a variety of ways, but notably with regard to Monster Houses: The first Monster Houses in the Rescue Team games would be seen in late-game dungeons like Uproar Forest or the Magma Cavern, but in the Explorers games they can occur as early as Amp Plains halfway through the Story Arc. In Sky, you can even encounter one in Special Episode 1, unlocked VERY early on.
 * Sliding Scale of Idealism Versus Cynicism: They're for kids, so of course they're idealistic.
 * Species Surname: Most NPCs are named after their respective Pokémon species (only the player and partner, plus recruited Mons, are assigned actual names).
 * Standard Status Effects: In addition to the ones from the main series (poison, burn, paralysis, sleep, freeze, confusion, etc.), there is also "fear" (Pokémon flees battle), "petrify" (full paralysis until struck by an enemy attack), "slow", "cringe" (lose one turn), and so on.
 * Stop Helping Me!: AI teammates often embrace this trope with both hands, especially with low IQ stats. Reviving an entire room of petrified enemies with an ill-timed Growl attack, for example.
 * Suspiciously Specific Denial: Rumored about Kecleon, one of the merchants: "He wouldn't get free items in dungeons and sell them at a higher price..."
 * Suspicious Videogame Generosity: If you see more than one or two items in the same room, it's likely to be either a Kecleon Shop (good) or a Monster House (very bad).
 * Take Your Time: Indeed, although if the player is defeated in a boss battle, both the partner and boss will acknowledge that the player is back "again" for a rematch.
 * Talking Animal: Invoked by the player at the start of the game when they realize the first voice talking to them belongs to a Pokémon instead of a human. See Translation Convention for the rest.
 * Tech Points: Eating Gummis increases the user's "IQ" allowing them to learn and equip new (mostly passive) skills, such as healing quicker from status problems or walking on water/lava.
 * Trapped in Another World: And in another body, too!
 * Universal Poison: As in the main series.
 * Useless Useful Spell: Like the main series, most Standard Status Effects are equally effective against enemy Mons (and even bosses) as they are against you. Unlike the main series, there are numerous other skills that qualify....
 * "False Swipe"'s ability to deal damage while never KO'ing the target was useful in the main series where Mons had to be captured alive. Not so much here, where you must KO a Pokémon to have a chance of recruiting it to your party.
 * Item-grabbing moves such as "Thief" or "Covet" are rarely worthwhile since enemies rarely ever carry items, and even then only one at a time, and then they just drop it when KO'ed anyway. On the other hand, your inventory is much larger, and enemies can steal any item from it. Fortunately, defeating the enemy allows you to recover the item unless it was used up, like with "Pluck" or "Bug Bite".
 * "Sleep" is a generally effective status effect early on, but becomes less so in the late game due to moves (like Uproar) or IQ skills ("Nonsleeper") that prevent it.
 * "Transform" doesn't copy the opponent's moveset, so the user must resort to using Struggle, which has a low attack power and generates recoil damage.
 * "Worry Seed" gives the target "Sleepless" status. In the main series, this suppressed the target's normal Ability, but here it is just an added (not to mention positive) status effect -- in other words, you should be using it on your team members, not enemy Mons. Ironically, this doesn't stop the AI from attempting to "attack" you with it.
 * Inverted with "Selfdestruct" and "Explosion", which inflict fixed damage on hostile Pokémon and 50 percent damage on the player's team, regardless of whether it is used by the player or a hostile Pokémon. Meaning that a hostile Pokémon will suffer a KO after one or two uses, while the player can use it almost indefinitely (thanks to Regenerating Health and Reviver Seeds).
 * Vendor Trash: Gold Ribbons and Lost Loot exist to be sold for massive money (and if you do this in a Dungeon Shop, you can steal it back again for free, save for the Easily Angered Shopkeeper).
 * Viewers Are Goldfish: Prepare for a lot of flashbacks whenever the player character recalls a previous event, even if the flashback was just from the previous cutscene.
 * Happens more often in Explorers than Rescue Team, oddly.
 * Vile Villain Saccharine Show: Averted in the first game, due to it not having a villain, but played straight in the second.
 * Violence Is the Only Option: Expect to hear something like "he's not listening to reason" any time you reach the final floor of the latest dungeon.
 * Wallet of Holding: Your inventory space may be limited, but your money stash (not counting the bank) sure is not.
 * We Buy Anything
 * We Cannot Go on Without You: If either the player or their partner Mon are knocked out in a dungeon, the mission is immediately over. (After the credits roll, this is reduced to whomever the player designates as the party leader.)
 * Walking on Water: All Water-type Pokémon can cross bodies of water during dungeon crawls. Other species have (or can learn) this ability as well.
 * A similar rule applies to Fire-type Pokémon crossing lava.
 * An then it takes it to its logical extreme, with the IQ ability Absolute Mover, it not only allows any typed Pokémon to cross any terrain type normally not cross able unless you're a flying, fire or water type it also allows you to move through the walls.
 * Any Flying-Type or any Pokémon with the ability Levitate can cross lava and water as well.
 * What Do You Mean It's for Kids?: The very existence of this page.
 * What Measure Is a Non-Cute?
 * Wizard Needs Food Badly: The Belly meter.
 * World of Funny Animals: Unlike in other Pokémon games, this game series takes place in a world populated entirely by Pokémon and no humans, though the main character was originally a human him/herself.
 * Would Hurt a Child: Like the main series, there is no gameplay distinction between "baby" Pokémon (like Caterpie or Azurill) and adults when it comes to fighting. You're free to knock 'em all out.
 * You All Look Familiar: Somewhat lessened by a One Species Limit, but still shows up occasionally.