Nuzlocke Pokemon FireRed (Upscaled) Nuzlocke

Yooooo what's poppin' my guys and gals, welcome back to another episode of Pokémon FireRed Hard Mode Nuzlocke, before you watch this video make sure you like and subscribe and follow me on Twitter and subscribe to my Twitch and add me on Discord and check out my LinkedIn and

...Real talk though, a few days ago I decided I'd start something new. It's not too dissimilar from other ideas I've seen, but there are a few things different between this and some other Nuzlockes I've seen, so I'm going to have a little preface for what all has been changed.

Spoiler: What you might want to know

- I'm going to be doing standard Nuzlocke rules, of course. First Pokémon per area, nickname everything, put something in a dead box once it dies. Simple enough.

- I scaled the trainers' levels up in such a way that makes it so all of the Champion's Pokémon are just barely level 100, which means I multiplied every trainer Pokémon's level by 1.755 times. That may not sound like too much for some people, but for reference, that makes a Level 20 Pokémon about Level 35, and a Pokémon only has to hit Level 57 for it to become Level 100. This is what's going to make this challenge crazy.

- I also did this to most wild Pokémon. The randomizer tool doesn't have the option to do this, so I had to download a ROM hacking tool and manually change the minimum and maximum level you could find every wild Pokémon to its new level. Hopefully this gets the idea across that it was very tedious. I didn't even bother to change some of the water routes' / postgames' wild Pokémon levels because it took a VERY long time for something that didn't matter as much as the main game grass encounters.

- I unfortunately wasn't able to scale up gift Pokémon, so the starter is going to be four levels below the rival in the first battle. Yikes. Thankfully the game won't start until I obtain Poke Balls.

- As a final touch, I randomized the game while keeping it close to a normal Pokémon game. The starters are a part of a 3-stage family, the rival keeps his starter, everything will be fully evolved starting at Level 35, and all Pokémon both in the wild and from trainers have around the BST of the Pokémon they're replacing.

- I'm probably gonna post a Google Drive with the link to this in my next post. I expect most of you to not care, but it takes next to no effort, and if even one person cares then I'd say that's effort put into a good place. Other than that, that's about it though, so let's get started!

Spoiler: Part 1 (WARNING-Large Images Inbound)

This is going to be the same dialogue-wise, so I'm going to skip it all. I haven't fully played through FRLG yet so I don't know all of the differences between it and the originals, but I'm going to do this all assuming you guys have already played it. I'm sure you all have at least played the originals and will know enough to not get confused.



Naming myself Duo because I'm boring.



And I'm naming my rival Soup after a good friend of mine. I would have made the obvious unfunny joke and named him "Imbecile," but that doesn't fit unfortunately.



Always remember to pick up the Potion from the PC in earlier games! I don't know why they removed this past Gen 3.



As of me typing this, I have no idea what's gonna be in here. Can you imagine how great it'd be if I could force my rival to start with Caterpie and I could actually win this fight? It's not gonna matter beyond saving some grinding and money, but still.



As much as I love the Zubat line, the early game is going to be absolutely brutal until it learns Bite or Wing Attack. I'll pass.



Not bad. I like Torchic more than Zubat for a starter choice, but I'd like to see my last option first.



Genuinely cannot remember if I made it so you can evolve things like Seadra that require trade in this game, which means I probably can't. Torchic it is!



HOT CHICKS IN YOUR AREA! Click here to join the #1 dating site for incels and scam hunters worldwide!

If you're wondering, the names are going to be on this level of stupid for the entire run.



...wait a minute.



He took the Zubat, so I can potentially win this. I think at this point he has Leech Life and maybe Supersonic? If so it depends on RNG + how much Scratch can do.



Turns out he has Astonish. I Growled him Turn 1. Let's hope this goes well.



I got flinched 3 out of 4 times by Astonish. That's the damage my Scratch did. What a shame.



I'd like to see you do better when given a Level 5 Pokémon that got flinched 3 out of the 5 turns it was on the field against a Level 9 Pokémon. Smh.



Made it to Route 1, so I'm going to grind a bit. I saw the levels for the Pokémon because I manually put them in, and they'll mostly be around 3 to 7, with a very rare 1% Level 9 encounter. This run is going to be stupid.



See what I mean? This was my first encounter.



Even running from Pokémon has proven very annoying. After every encounter I can't beat, which will be most of them at this point in the game, I'm probably going to have to go heal.

I'll spare you all the details and post my next image after I'm done grinding.



This is after grinding. One level above my rival's starter, just like how games would normally start if you won the first battle. During the grinding session, I encountered Spearow, Pidgey, Whismur, Surskit, Zubat (lol), Nidoran Male, Hoppip, and Wynaut as the rare Level 9 encounter I mentioned earlier. Thankfully they don't know Counter or Mirror Coat until Level 15, so I was fine.

Of the group above, I'd like Nidoran the most, but I only found one of those so it wouldn't surprise me if it was a rare encounter. Surskit would be fun too though.



Turns out I randomized the ground items as well? That Fire Stone may be useful for later.



Got Oak's Parcel for him, which means I now have Poke Balls. This challenge has officially begun. No idea how long it'll go, I may end up dying at the first gym. Who knows?

Anyways, I'll end off this episode here. I'll post another one very soon, so stay tuned!

 

Time for Part 2, starting things off with a few encounters...

Spoiler: Part 2

First encounter (Route 1) is Surskit! I mentioned last post that Surskit would be fun. It's a shame that its evolution has so many weaknesses, but Intimidate is a really cool ability that I love using ingame. Let's hope I can catch it!



First ball. Easy.



The first thing that came to my mind was "Skipper" so I just went with that. Also, just so you know, Torchic is Calm nature (-Attack, +Sp. Def) and Surskit is Careful nature (-Sp. Atk, +Sp. Def). Neither nature is particularly good for the corresponding Pokémon but whatever.



While I was grinding last episode, I lost to a wild Nidoran, so I lost 64 bucks. Still, I was able to buy 10 Poke Balls, like 3 Potions, 1 Antidote and 1 Paralyze Heal. Would've rather bought an extra Potion instead of the Paralyze Heal but it's no big deal.



Encounter time!



I do not like Pidgey.



Hooraaaaaay. I named it "stupid." Hopefully the fact that I kept everything similar to their replacement's BSTs doesn't mean I'm going to be getting a ton of early-game stuff all game.

I forgot to mention, though - I AM doing dupes clause.



This is my first encounter on Route 2. Forgot to take a screenshot of the route itself. I don't think Jigglypuff knows any attacking moves at this point in the game but we'll see if I catch it.



:c

Time to go do some actual battling. I then decided I was going to train Skipper up first so I'm not screwed over by any Water-type I come across, but it was so ridiculously weak that I decided it'd be better to check my Viridian Forest encounter first. For reference, Surskit's STAB, super effective Bubble only 4HKOd a wild Diglett, one of the most fragile Pokémon in the game that also happened to be weak to it. How sad.



Let's hope this is something decent!



Y'know I'd usually be happy to use this, but I highly doubt it has any attacking moves.



Got it! Named it R34, which is unfortunate since it's a male. Side note - I just realized my Torchic is a male as well. Whoops.

Upon closer inspection, the Ralts does not have any attacking moves. Guess I'm stuck with Surskit.



Genuinely no idea what level the trainers' Pokémon will be, but here's what I'm working with. Hopefully Torchic is enough because Surskit only knows Bubble and Quick Attack.



Here goes.



Well I'd rather it not be a Wooper but I guess I can Potion stall it with Surskit if needed. The thing's base Sp. Atk is like 15 and I don't think it has any physical moves so I should be fine.



It had Slam so I had to switch back to Torchic. You know this is going to be a crazy challenge when the first trainer is giving your problems. His next Pokémon was an Azurill that didn't have any attacking moves, so I didn't even bother to screenshot it.

Next trainer had Silcoon, Cascoon, and Igglybuff. Literally incapable of hurting me, but that's good EXP for Torchic.



Nevermind, the Igglybuff had Pound. Sad part? It used Pound once on me, and I used Bubble twice. This Surskit suuuuuuucks



These are the items I've found so far, by the way. Full Restore may prove very useful here if things go south.



This is the third trainer, the same level as the other one. Turns out the Azurills DO have Bubble. Too bad it sucks in this game lol



My team is literally the same levels as this bug catcher's. Oh my god.



This has mostly been easy for Torchic despite the similar levels. It helps that I have a human brain and the AI does not. I'm not posting every little detail because I only have 25 images per post, just the harder ones or the more surprising ones.



Last trainer in Viridian Forest, should be enough for me to evolve given that it's higher leveled than me.



Sure enough, it was!



And with that, I've made it out of Viridian Forest. The Wooper at the beginning was probably the scariest part, I don't understand why it has Slam and Water Gun at Level 11. Compare that to Surskit's current movepool.

Either way, that's where I'll close off the episode. I may post another today, but it won't be for a while if so.

Spoiler: Current Pokémon

Hot Chicks (Combusken), Level 16
Double Kick, Peck, Focus Energy, Ember

Skipper (Surskit), Level 11
Bubble, Quick Attack

Ralts, Pidgey in the PC

 

Welcome to Part 3 of "Duo questions his sanity upon realizing that Misty's Starmie will be Level 37!"

Spoiler: Part 3

Not really much else to do but take on the Gym!



...oh shoot



It put me to sleep but I burned it with Ember just that turn. The other Pokémon was a Level 19 Carvanha, which I correctly assumed would not have any Water moves. It just used bit and died.

The levels in this game are going to jump around a lot, and I think the beginning section will be the most brutal. All of the wild Pokémon are very low-leveled, and there isn't much to explore. The middle sections of this game will likely be the easiest part for that reason.

Time to grind. This may take a while.



Was going to train Skipper up to 20 as well but I realized that it doesn't learn anything. It gets Bubblebeam at 25 when it evolves, and while I have the patience to train a Combusken and a Ralts to Level 20 off of Level 9 Pokémon, I don't with a Surskit that only really knows Bubble.

Brock's Ace is going to be Level 25. What helps is that I don't have good potions because I can only buy regular Potions, kind of worthless at my level. As for the items I got that haven't been shared...



I at first gave the King's Rock to Surskit because it's going to need to be hitting stuff a lot to take them down, but I moved it to Combusken because Double Kick.



Oh boy...



Well that's terrifying. I know Remoraid has a weird level-up movepool with things like Bullet Seed and Aurora Beam though, so maybe he doesn't have a Water move. If he does I doubt it would one shot me without a crit because Remoraid is unevolved.



Lucky me he just used Lock-On twice and died like an idiot.

Alright Brock, what's your next Pokémon?



OUCH.

Well, thankfully, I have Double Team. I should be able to stall him out since it should only have Confusion, Kirlia has decent special bulk and a resistance, and I have just enough Potions.





That was after one Psybeam. It didn't just have Confusion, it had the stronger version of Confusion too. He wasted a few turns using Disable and missing, but I took that time to set up a few Double Teams.

After fighting it for a bit longer, burning out five of my six Potions (he hasn't missed a lot), and using Double Team a total of 6 times, I've found out his full moveset - Disable, Reflect, Psybeam, and Confusion.



Well, I won. In order to do this, I had to use literally every single Potion in my bag. All six regular Potions, the Energy Powder, AND the Full Restore at the end. Unfortunate that I had to beat it this way, since I couldn't get Magical Leaf and it couldn't be an opponent that my Combusken could beat, but whatever. I still made it out without losing anyone!



It's a shame that I only gained half a level from this though.



The TM he gave me was for Secret Power. Surskit and Kirlia can learn it, so I give it to Surskit. That means that it finally has a good move.



Route 4 time.



This Makuhita, right here. It used Sand Attack on me and I missed six Confusions in a row. I didn't die but good riddance to that thing.

Upon fighting some of these trainers, I realized that Secret Power Surskit could actually compete with the Pokémon that are close to it in levels. It can't beat very many of them, but it competes. That's a start.



This Spearow? It was Level 24. It used Leer on me, then almost killed me with Fury Attack. Thankfully it only hit twice. I've already had three super close calls so far (Wooper, Kadabra, and now here).



Well, shoot. I tried using Skipper against this Taillow because I'm super desperate for it to gain levels, and it got OHKOd by a Wing Attack. There goes my first Pokémon.



I really wish this thing had Water Gun. Maybe I would've paid more attention if so, and maybe it wouldn't have died if so. But it didn't, so it's dead. Rest In Peace.



Time for an encounter.



I'LL TAKE IT



Ember burned it, meaning I likely only have one shot...



Just my luck. Needless to say, it died shortly after.



Made it to Mt. Moon, one last thing to do before I end off this part.



I think this can be any Pokémon, according to the way I randomized it. You can't randomize static encounters scaled to BSTs minus starters / keeping non-legendaries non-legendary and vice versa, but that's all I did. It's going to be Level 5 but hopefully it's worthwhile.



...Milotic. I named it Fush. This thing has Water Gun and a decent enough level up learnset (I googled it lol), but it levels up very slowly, so I'll keep it in the PC for now.

That's all for now. Next time I'll be going through Mt. Moon, probably stopping after getting to Cerulean City.

Spoiler: Current Pokémon

Hot Chicks (Combusken), Level 22
Double Kick, Peck, Focus Energy, Ember

R34 (Kirlia), Level 20
Confusion, Growl, Double Team, Teleport

Pidgey, Milotic in the PC

Skipper (Surskit) in the dead box

 

Welcome to Part 4 of "Duo wishes he had scaled the wild Pokemons' levels higher!"

Spoiler: Part 4

Last time, we left off with me getting a Milotic from the karp salesman. Now it's time to immediately get another encounter from Mt. Moon.



I don't think I possibly could have been more disappointed in a potential teammate.



Still upset that I couldn't get that Mudkip from last time. That would be great right now. I name the Slakoth Oaf because he's l"oaf"ing around all the time.

Worst part about this is that I'm starting to find some cool Pokémon here. I found a Spheal and a Vulpix not too far after I found this. Such a shame.



Found this on the floor not far off from where I caught the Slakoth. Combusken is the only teammate that can learn this, but I'm not teaching it. It already has Double Kick for a decent STAB option, and I may be able to give this to something else that could use it permanently later in the run.



I am absolutely teaching this to Kirlia over Teleport.



Found this Scope Lens on the ground too. Giving this to Kirlia because there's really nothing better to give it.



I'm exploring every area of this cave to find all the trainers possible, and upon going down the first ladder I found, I fought a Team Rocket Grunt. He had a Bellsprout and a-



...oh.

Luckily for me, I should be prepared.



I used Confusion on it, it used Mirror Coat and did literally half my health, so I healed up and critted it which would have killed me had it not used Counter. I just wanted to be 100% sure that a +6 Confusion would kill it so I had as little of a chance of dying as possible.



Close Call #4



Immediately after, I found this. This is going to be a GODSEND for grinding, or just gaining experience in general. Thank goodness. I gave this to Kirlia, who is currently two levels below my Combusken.

Admittedly, I don't know if it actually helps to give it to a Pokémon that has participated in a battle. It didn't give the "boosted EXP" message when R34 knocked out its next opponent. I don't know if it's just that the message is missing or if the EXP Share just didn't work like this until Gen 4. Time to Google it.

UPDATE: After testing, it does not boost the EXP if the user participated in battle. That sucks.



Lots of good TMs in this game. Nothing on my team can learn this but it's still bound to be useful at some point. Unless whatever I teach it to dies instantly.



This Team Rocket Grunt had a Diglett that trapped me in and used Dig. Lucky for me, Diglett is very weak, so I didn't end up dying to it. Scary fight though.



Immediately after the disappointment that was that EXP Share, I found a Lucky Egg. Gonna give this to Kirlia because it's still a bit lower-leveled than my Combusken. I also found a Smoke Ball which is less notable, but I still may use later.



None of the Rocket Grunts were really notable, so I'm going to fight this dude now.



He had a Horsea before this that I forgot to screenshot. Lots of strain on Kirlia right now thanks to my lack of Potions.



Last was Elekid, who was unable to take a Double Kick. It doesn't matter very much because it's randomized, but I'll mention here that I took the Helix Fossil because I like Omanyte more.



Now we have these two. Their tutor moves may potentially be very useful for me.



Well, Mega Punch dude taught this, and the second one taught I don't know because neither of my Pokémon could learn it. Oh well.



Got this TM for Torment. Can't really complain about this or the tutors considering I have the TMs for Fire Punch AND Blizzard in my inventory. I also found a Spell Tag which might come up later.



I've made it to Cerulean City, which means I'll stop for now. Next time I'll go up to Bill's house to train for Misty, whos ace is Level 37. Help me.

Spoiler: Current Pokémon

Hot Chicks (Combusken), Level 26
Double Kick, Peck, Focus Energy, Ember

R34 (Kirlia), Level 24
Confusion, Growl, Double Team, Calm Mind

Pidgey, Milotic, Slakoth in the PC

Skipper (Surskit) in the dead box

 

Welcome to Part 5 of "Duo's two Pokémon are probably desperate for more friends!"

Spoiler: Part 5

Last time, we made it to Cerulean City. Before I do anything, though...



LOOK WHAT I CAN BUY.

I immediately take ten.





I also took the opportunity to grind some. Both of these Pokémon are now Level 29, and they both now have some new moves. Replaced Growl and Focus Energy, those moves most likely aren't going to be useful in the future.

And, on top of this...



R34 evolved! I grinded just enough to get this out of the way.



No chance I'm taking on Misty even with my current levels, so it's time to fight Soup.



Not surprised that it's so high leveled. This is why I grinded. I OHKO it easily with Psychic.



It critted me with Wing Attack and confused me, but not that difficult either. Even had worst come to worst I still probably could have potion stalled it. He then has a Skitty and Nidoran who die quickly.

Then he gave me a Fame Checker? I checked it out and it's lame, so who cares.



With that out of the way, time to take on the Nugget Bridge.



They jumped from Level 24 or so to 28 in between the 3rd and 4th trainers. Not much else to say about the first five. The last trainer had a Level 31 Seel.



I don't understand the Nugget Bridge. Is this Grunt always here giving out Nuggets? Is this normally something difficult that not many people win? If so, how are there so many trainers between it and Bill's house? Why is a Grunt giving people Nuggets in the first place? Is there no cheaper way to invite strong trainers to Team Rocket?



First encounter for this route is a Magikarp. Cool, but I just rejected a Pokémon because it took too much EXP. This is bound to be no different.



...at least, it would be cool if I didn't kill it on accident. At least there's another encounter for me to hopefully not kill.



Interesting. Kingler's not very good as a Water-type in the games before the special split, but its Attack stat is stellar even by today's standards.



Not even gonna take my chances here. I name it "Frenchys" after this seafood restaurant that was advertised everywhere in a city I vacationed at. We went there and it was ridiculously busy. Not a huge seafood fan though.

I'm adding it to my team, and also I'm gonna go grind it some.



...Well I was gonna train it to Level 30, but this will do. It's Level 28, current moveset is Stomp, Visegrip, Bubble, and Mud Shot. Thing was really strong even before it evolved, I can only imagine it's MUCH stronger now.

Anyways, time to continue onwards.



Got the TMs for Eruption and Haze. Combusken learns Eruption so I'm teaching it that over Peck.



Really wish I could say more about this route. Kingler just ripped everything apart. There was a Grovyle and a Pikachu that I let Combusken fight, but other than that, the only Pokémon it didn't OHKO were Exeggcute and Sandshrew. It flinched both.



Same old Bill cutscene. Not much to add really.

I'm not quite done with this part yet, but I don't want to fight Misty, so let's go a bit further ahead and fight the Dig Grunt.




Wholly uneventful. Plus, I get another free TM!



Garbage :c



I'm gonna get one last encounter before I end things off.



Cool mon, and it's pretty high-leveled too! I'll gladly take that.



I named him Ball. Won't fit later but it's fine for now.

That's about it for this part. Next time, I'll probably go down to Vermillion City and do some stuff there.

Spoiler: Current Pokémon

Hot Chicks (Combusken), Level 32
Double Kick, Peck, Focus Energy, Ember

R34 (Gardevoir), Level 31
Confusion, Growl, Double Team, Calm Mind

Frenchys (Kingler), Level 33
Bubble, Stomp, Visegrip, Mud Shot

Ball (Gastly), Level 27
idk what moves lol

Pidgey, Milotic, Slakoth in the PC

Skipper (Surskit) in the dead box

 

Welcome to Part 6 of "Duo accidentally made a big prediction with the last tagline!"

Spoiler: Part 6

Last time, we avoided fighting Misty. This time, I'm fighting Misty. I'm close to a few evolutions, so I did some grinding.




Blaziken also learned Blaze Kick upon evolution, and Ball was taught Fire Punch and Blizzard since it gets both of those. Here's what the team looks like...



Excessive grinding? Maybe. I just wanted Ball and Hot Chicks to evolve.

Misty time. The Gym Trainers are now a joke not because of my levels, but because their Pokémon are unevolved. That's going to change soon though, because with the randomizer's settings, I forced it to only give out fully evolved Pokémon after Level 35. The trainer before Misty had a Level 34 Smoochum, so we're close.



Time for Gym 2.



Oh?

Why is the Bulbasaur only Level 31?



Not a big deal for Blaziken. It took 9 damage from the Razor Leaf and OHKOd with Eruption.



.

I don't know how to react to this. Tentacruel is my favorite Pokémon, for those of you who don't know (I'd imagine most of you).



So the level was 1 lower than I expected. The way I scaled levels was by multiplying it by 1.3, and then 1.35. Maybe I did it slightly lower? I have no idea.

This means the wild Pokemons' levels and the trainers' levels aren't going to be perfectly synced up, but that's okay. As I've recognized the hard way, wild Pokémon levels in this game are way lower than trainers', much more so than in newer games at least.



That was after 1 turn, Bubblebeam vs Psychic. No Supersonic or anything to cheese me out means it's an easy win.

Next time I'll not grind as much lol



Uh...cool? Poison Fang kinda sucks but it's a Poison move for Gengar I guess. Much better than Confuse Ray at least.

Before I go south to Vermillion, I recently heard about there being an ingame trade in Cerulean. Those are randomized, so let's see what it is...



...

How did he happen to ask for the exact Pokémon that I caught (and evolved) just in the last part of this???



I mean, Heracross is a really cool mon, but I'd rather have my Gengar if I'm being honest. Sucks that this is useless now thanks to dupes clause.

There's another trade that I know of not far from here, though...





That's a cool trade. I'm gonna have to take note of that one.



Underground Path is boring, I'll go back and check for the hidden items before Part 7. Let's find this encounter, then fight the trainers here.

(side note - it said the file size was too big if you were wondering why i cut off the userbar from the bottom)



This is my encounter. Cool, but since the items are randomized, Moon Stones won't be easy to come across (unless I find one in the Underground Path). If I find one I'd consider adding this to my team, although our team already doesn't do great against Psychic-types.



I clicked Stomp on accident lol rip



Finally, a fully-evolved Pokémon! I have Mud Shot so it isn't a big deal, but I get a lot more EXP than usual here. It did have Iron Tail though, and there was a dude with a Kingdra that gave me a little bit more trouble, even if not much.



Vermillion City! Probably my favorite part about reaching this place is the Old Rod. All of the encounters are going to be ones with lower BSTs similar to Magikarp unfortunately, but you can get encounters here as well as Pallet Town and Viridian City. I didn't change the levels in all of the routes, but I did for all of the cities, even if the Old Rods' encounter tables are only changed to be Level 9.



And here's my first encounter.



Easy enough. I name it Johnson.



I'm probably gonna get my next two encounters then end this part off for now.



I critted the Marill.



...And then immediately after, I get another chance at a Marill I guess? That's a fun coincidence, but I don't care much for it since it isn't that good in this game.

I caught this one (picture limit reached) and name it "REDEMPTION"

I'm probably gonna stop for today. No more new parts until at least tomorrow. Next time I'm gonna go through SS Anne and possibly the route East of Vermillion, although I may do that part offscreen. I dunno.

Spoiler: Current Pokémon

Hot Chicks (Blaziken), Level 36
Double Kick, Eruption, Bulk Up, Ember

R34 (Gardevoir), Level 34
Confusion, Psychic, Double Team, Calm Mind

Frenchys (Kingler), Level 35
Bubble, Stomp, Visegrip, Mud Shot

Ball (Gengar), Level 37
Blizzard, Fire Punch, Night Shade, Poison Fang

Pidgey, Milotic, Slakoth, Caterpie, Marill in the PC

Skipper (Surskit) in the dead box