A very quick update!
New "Dialga vs. Palka vs. Darkrai" Trailer - The official Japanese Pokemon movie website has updated with a new trailer for the 10th Pokemon movie, Dialga vs. Palkia vs. Darkrai. The entire first half of the trailer contains scenes from the first trailer, but there are now new scenes featuring Darkrai, the characters of the movie, and Ash riding a Pidgeot (hmmm...). To view the trailer page, you can click here.
Pokemon D/P Airs Tonight - Cartoon Network will be airing the first three episodes of Diamond and Pearl tonight at 8:00 PM, where we will finally hear Dawn's dub voice and watch Diamond and Pearl in America for the first time! If I have not fallen asleep after coming home from school, I will record the episodes and post them later for a temporary time to view, in case anyone misses them. Remember, Diamond and Pearl for the Nintendo DS come out on Sunday, and if you buy them, be sure to check out PokeBeach's Wi-Fi League, where you can arrange trades, battles, and tournaments for Diamond and Pearl!
The "education facility of torture and doom" is keeping me busy this week, as usual (but I am happy to report my laptop was dropped only once this week with no damage when I put it in its case and forgot to zip the other side of it closed, then started running with it to my next class and it slipped out :p). I will try to update tomorrow, however (and if not, Friday night)! I have finished all of the D/P transparent Ken Sugimori pictures, but I still have to touch up some of them, so I will hopefully have those up in the next update (and then later, the shiny forms). Diamond and Pearl come out Sunday!
Ahh! Friday the 13th! Expect something bad to happen, unless you perform some good-luck ritual to prevent it! I have been working on transparent Ken Sugimori Diamond and Pearl Pokemon images, so I will probably have them up sometime next week.
PokeBeach Wi-Fi League - Diamond and Pearl are not even out, yet the Wi-Fi League here is already booming! If you are going to buy Diamond and Pearl, or have Pokemon from your Gameboy games that you are going to transfer to D/P and then trade to other people, what are you waiting for? Read this thread on our forums to get started, and if you have not actually joined our forums yet, register here! People in our league are already arranging to trade Shaymin, Darkrai (from the glitch in D/P), Manaphy, R/S Pokemon, shiny Pokemon, and everything else possible (except Arceus, since it's not available yet), and both battles and tournaments will soon follow, once players establish well-rounded teams! Get a head start and join our Wi-Fi League - it takes literally under two minutes to make your "My Player" thread, and the entire process is not complicated at all (I even label the steps!). You never know if that shiny Pokemon you want is available here from someone, and it is traded to someone else (yes, that is the guilt factor to make you join).
IGN Reviews D/P - IGN has obtained English versions of Diamond and Pearl, and has already posted videos, screenshots, and information from the games. To view their opening article on Pokemon Pearl, which contains links at the end of it for media from the games, click here.
HEY! Let everyone else hear! - It's bad enough that people are constantly coming to me at school and complaining about everything under the sun, but now it's happening online - a lot, and it seriously feels like I am spending hours talking to people everyday just about problems with Pokemon (just one more reason why I have a limited social life outside of the computer). For the past week, I have been getting more IMs than usual, with people expressing genuine concerns about Pokemon, especially the TCG and organized play, and I have found myself saying more and more to several people "Hey, why don't you write an article about it?"
This is where the fandom comes in! Do YOU have a concern, opinion, or problem with Pokemon, such as how things are run, how things are organized, or how things just generally are? Do you think there is a slight possibility that others feel the same, and that if many people share the same opinion, you might be able to raise attention about the certain issue and maybe get something fixed or improved? Well, guess what? You can do something productive with your complaint! If you are passionate enough about your belief (and I don't mean psycho passionate where you will kill to get your way or never give up even when chances of getting your problems fixed are 0%), open Microsoft Word, type up a well-constructed article using spell check and the green underlines, and e-mail it to wpmpb [at] pokebeach.com with the subject title of your article. I will post it on the main page for everyone to read if it is appropriate, and will even make a forum thread where people can discuss your issue. We'll call it an "opinion column," only it won't be a column, and your article will be available on the main page. How's that? So, instead of complaining to me on AIM, making me sit through conversations all the time where I am not interested and have to keep repeating "lol," "haha," "cool," and other fillers in various sequences a bot could do, now others who are interested in what you have to say can read about it and take action! ^_^
EX Power Keepers Scans - Shakespeare has sent me new, "digitally mastered for superior picture and sound," scans of EX Power Keepers. You can view them by [clicking here]. We only have a few more holes to fill until Shakespeare has edited almost every single English card in existence (Yes, that includes promos. He already edited those, but I have not put them up yet since we are going to change the coding behind the displaying of scans). Look forward to it!
The right menu's dates have been updated to be completely accurate now. I have also changed the menu header images. :D
Diamond and Pearl Wi-Fi League - PokeBeach now has a Diamond and Pearl Wi-Fi League, and we are probably one of the first Pokemon websites to start one! If you have Diamond and Pearl, or are going to get Diamond and Pearl in eleven days, you should definitely check this out. With our Wi-Fi league, you can organize battles with other players, participate in tournaments on PokeBeach (after D/P come out), battle PokeBeach Gym Leaders (which will be picked after D/P come out), and trade Pokemon and items from D/P through our forum. The advantage with participating in a Wi-Fi league is that you can find people through the forum to battle instantly, specify how you want to battle, search through players' "My Player" threads to look for Pokemon you want to trade for, put up your own Pokemon for trade in your own thread, and specify the stats of the Pokemon you are looking for (such as nature, level, attacks, etc). To read more about the PokeBeach D/P Wi-Fi league, even if you do not have Diamond and Pearl yet (which most of us do not), you can read this thread on our forums, and begin from there (if you need to register on our forums as a member, which you need to do to make your own "My Player" thread, click here; it takes less than 30 seconds to register). If you do not have Diamond and Pearl, you can still get a head start on this and make your "My Player" thread, since most of us have Pokemon from previous Gameboy games that we will eventually trade over to Diamond and Pearl and make available for trade, and since many of us know what Pokemon we will want when D/P come out (such as Palkia if you only get Pokemon Diamond). Then when you get D/P, you will know where to go when you want to make a trade with someone or when you need to battle someone. Did I forget to mention that winning battles and tournaments in this Wi-Fi league earns you points toward goodies in the future? So check it out!
UPDATE: Due to people asking for a Wi-Fi League for other games, such as Mario Kart DS and Diddy Kong DS, we have also made a forum where people can organize races with each other (or whatever, depending on the game). To read more about this forum and how it works, click here.
Pokemon Battrio - Famitsu.com has revealed a new Pokemon arcade game that will be released in Japan soon (and probably nowhere else). The game features cell-shaded Pokemon in 3D, similar to Battle Revolution, but one can battle Pokemon 3-on-3, hence Battrio. Apparently, players interact with pogs on a real battlefield, and the battle plays out on a television screen, although details on how this actually works are vague. This game will be an arcade game only, so it is unknown if the game will ever leave Japan or move to another system, such as the Wii. To view pictures of the arcade game, you can view Famitsu's Pokemon Battrio page by clicking here.
More "Prettiful" Scans - Shakespeare has now scanned in new, enhanced, high-quality scans for [EX Crystal Guardians]. Currently, we are only missing about a dozen scans of any English Pokemon card EVER, so if you have any of the scans listed in this post and a high-quality scanner, please respond to the thread with what you can send in. Thank you!
I hope everyone had a great Easter yesterday! I have not made an update this large in a while (especially one that takes me three hours to write)! I wish it could be like this every day, but today a huge amount of news came my way. It makes up for the lack of news lately. Tomorrow, I will update the left and right menus of this site, since I realize some of the information related to the dates of certain items are outdated and incorrect now (and I forgot some links in the left menu related to sets).
Next Japanese TCG Set - As we reported almost a month ago, the next Japanese TCG set would feature Darkrai, and would be themed around the 10th Pokemon movie, Dialga vs. Palkia vs. Darkrai. Thanks to Vincent, we now have more exclusive information on the set. We now know the set's name is Shining Darkness, and as we posted a while ago, it will be released on July 5th in Japan, with the pre-constructed theme decks featuring Dialga Lv.X and Palkia Lv.X. It will also contain many legendary Pokemon, including Entei, Suicune, Raikou, Lugia, Ho-Oh, and Mew, as well as the Charizard, Blastoise, and Venusaur evolutionary lines. More information should be coming in soon, so stay tuned to PokeBeach! Since this set is themed around the 10th movie, and Darkrai's role is not yet known in terms of whether it is "good" or "bad," it probably would not be too farfetched to assume that Darkrai may be a "good" Pokemon, referring to the title of the set, shining darkness (the darkness being Darkrai). Putting positive light on a darkness Pokemon may be a reference to Darkrai's role in the movie, since TCG sets have before predicted certain aspects of the movies. We'll see...
Diamond and Pearl Dub Preview - Toonami Jetstream has posted a three-minute clip of the second English episode of Diamond and Pearl, showcasing Ash, Brock, Starly, and a few other characters. You can view the clip by clicking here. If you do not live in America, in which case Toonami Jetstream will not let you view the clip, you can also watch it on YouTube by clicking here. The first three episodes of the Diamond and Pearl season will air on April 20th at 7:00 PM (on Cartoon Network), and the Diamond and Pearl season (the 10th season) will begin airing on Monday, June 4th. Dawn's voice is still yet to be heard, but at this point, we do know that Sarah Natochenny, the new voice of Ash, will not be voicing her, as some rumors previously held. She recently posted on her MySpace:
Hey guys,
Let this be my official statement:
I am not the voice of Dawn in the upcoming "Diamond and Pearl" season of "Pokemon." I don't know how this rumour started, but I was alerted to a news story on me at voicechasers.com that cited Pokemon USA as its source. Maybe it was a mistake...that spread rather quickly. Anyway, it's not me. I will continue as Ash, other small roles and a few Pokemon. See if you can guess which they are when the show starts airing! It should start airing in a few weeks; I don't know when exactly.
Thanks for watching! Hope you enjoy it!
Love,
Sarah Natochenny
Japanese Metagame Update - The Japanese Battle Road tournaments just ended, and apparently, there were three main decks that absolutely dominated each of the tournaments. Nimonosandesu, one of our Japanese translators, reported that one of the most used decks was Scizor ex from EX Unseen Forces, a deck that gets out Scizor quickly and attacks by the second turn (details were vague on how this deck actually worked). Another deck used was one that featured Electivire from the first [Diamond and Pearl set], in combination with [Dragonite (d)] from EX Delta Species, a deck that constantly delivers 120 damage every turn (I want to play this deck myself!). If one was to read both cards, the strategy behind how the deck works becomes obvious. LBS, a deck that many of us know to feature Lugia, Blastoise, and Steelix ex was the third most used deck, but unfortunately for America and most countries, the deck is no longer legal, since our format is EX Deoxys on. The Steelix ex deck is legal right now, and the Electivire / Dragonite (d) deck will become legal when the Diamond and Pearl TCG set is released in stores on May 23rd.
Speaking of Battle Road tournaments, America's own Battle Roads will begin in May, although not the same type of event as the Japanese ones (they just share the same name - the Japanese Battle Roads are HUGE events, while the American Battle Roads are supposed to be smaller tournaments, similar to City Championships). Thanks to Pokemon.no, we now know that if you come in 1st place at a Battle Road tournament, you will receive a "Victory Medal" card, as pictured to the right.
Tired of reading yet? :D
Pokemon 10 Anniversary CD Preview - If you purchase Pokemon Ranger and the Temple of the Sea from Target, your DVD will come with a preview selection of the Pokemon 10 Anniversary CD, featuring five tracks: Pokemon: Original Series Theme, the original PokeRap, Together Forever, I Want to Be a Hero (the Pokemon Advanced theme), and a very interesting remix track, Hoenn PokeRap. The Hoenn PokeRap originally aired once on Kids WB a few years ago, and now it has been released in a remixed form on this Target CD (and the future 10th anniversary CD). Since many people are interested in hearing the song, I have uploaded it here for download. I chose this song to upload because, in my opinion, it has to be one of the worst songs ever released for Pokemon - ever, EVER, EVER (plus, many people asked me to upload it). The beat was terrible, many of the Ruby and Sapphire Pokemon names were mispronounced, the names were said mostly in order of the PokeDex entries, and at some points, the names were said so rapidly that many of them did not even register in my head. Since I own all of the songs on the CD, spare the Hoenn PokeRap, I seriously was considering throwing this CD away after I bought the DVD because of how bad it was. But this is all just my opinion! Now you can judge the song! Remember, you can buy Pokemon Ranger and the Temple of the Sea with this bonus CD at Target for $16.99, and remember, the CD comes with four other great tracks as well! Click the CD's picture below to play the song, or right click the image and save the song's link to your computer!
New Set Scans - Our master card scanner, Shakespeare, has been sweating over a hot scanner for several weeks, attempting to scan in the sets from which we only have scans from pre-releases (in other words, scanning in "new, fresh, and PRETTIFUL" scans to replace the "ugly" scans). As of today, [EX Holon Phantoms] and [EX Dragon Frontiers] have had most of their "ugly" scans replaced, although several "ugly" scans still remain. If you own a good-quality scanner and the cards that we still need to be re-scanned, please visit this thread on our forums and tell us what you can scan! New EX Power Keepers scans should be up sometime later this week, and hopefully the Modified Card-Dex as well.
Want to know something funny? When leaving school today, my book bag's strap broke and everything flew out of my bag. Want to know something even funnier? My barely one month old laptop was one of the items that flew out and slammed into the ground several feet away from where I stood. Want to know something that is even better? I broke the keyboard, put a gash on the protective covering I JUST put on the cover of the laptop yesterday, and managed to cause part of the CD drive to pop off. This third laptop has a good future ahead in my protective hands! You know, when I was in an interview today for a project, I wasn't kidding when I said I think ghosts follow me.
This is just a notification - something I must post so that I keep the promise to myself to study. I am taking my AP and IB exams two or three after Easter Vacation, and Easter Vacation starts Friday. I have worked for four years to get where I am, and these final exams will determine whether I get my IB Diploma and extra college credits. Therefore, it is imperative that I study during the days I am off, which means I will have limited time to make updates here. I may try to finish the Card-Dex soon, but I am going to focus on school foremost, so forgive me if I do not update very often between now and the month of May. I am sure I will update at a reasonable pace, but I am just giving a notice in case I go into periods where updates are scarce. I hope everyone understands! The plus side of this is that when mid-May comes, IB, AP, and all of these crazy honor classes will finally be over, which means I will have virtually all the free time in the world to make up for what I missed in the previous month. After that remaining month of school between May and June, summer will come, where I will rush to get this site where I want it to be in time for college, and then after that, it will be time to go to college. This school year is ending fast...
Oh, and there has been almost zero Pokemon news. Seriously. What a better time to not have news than now?
I was accepted to my number one university choice! :D Quick update for today!
Anime News - The Pokemon Ranger DVD was released today, and the aspect ratio of the film was kept in widescreen, like its original Japanese release (and its airing on Cartoon Network). It seems as if there will be no more cropped, defaced full screen American Pokemon DVDs anymore (unless they were originally drawn in full screen, like all Pokemon episodes)! The DVD also contained a Diamond and Pearl anime commercial, revealing that the first Diamond and Pearl season will begin airing Monday, June 4th, on Cartoon Network. Look forward to it!
[April Fools Proof Shield] Remember how I said that with my luck, the university I want to go to will tell me on the last hour of the last day whether I was accepted or not? It has been almost an entire day since they were supposed to tell me at the latest. I hope they are not playing an April Fools joke on me like I did to all of you! [/shield]
Two April Fools Jokes Revealed - If you read the news story below, you would have seen the secret message I encoded into the second paragraph from the Thursday, March 29th news story - "WPM WILL FOOL U." No one figured out that I slipped a secret message into that paragraph because (a) no one was looking for it, and (b) the paragraph was contradicting the secret message. I am surprised that no one even thought to look for a secret message, considering how choppy the structure of the paragraph was and our past history with April Fools jokes. Anyway, here are the pranks that were pulled:
Forums - Towards the end of last summer, our forums were compromised by Turkish hackers. As I stated in several of my news stories this past week, school was extremely busy for me, with major assignments due all week. When I was working on my Armenian Genocide internal assessment for IB, I came across an Armenian website hacked by Turkish people, which reminded me of our own hacking, and thus, the idea for creating a fake hacking for our own forums. So, I made it appear that all of the mods were banned, placed a "hacked" message on the top of the forums (you had to scroll down to see the real forums, which some people did not even realize), and I told all of the moderators not to respond to any threads. The results? People were freaking out. Some even went to other forums in the Pokemon community and voiced their concerns. It was quite hilarious to see how some people reacted - I received 19 e-mails and several PMs.
Press Release about Worlds - This one was not as obvious of an April Fools prank because (a) it was believable, and (b) it was written to sound like a press release. PokePop contacted me on Saturday with the idea of both of us posting a fake press release to get everyone in the TCG community to believe that it was real, and I was excited with the idea and went along with it. He wrote the original press release and created the idea behind it, and then I heavily edited it to sound more realistic. I received so many instant messages about this press release that I had to block the entire TCG group on my buddy list at certain times in the day due to the massive amounts of messages bombarding me. Even the most experienced players were contacting me, astonished with the idea of Worlds ending in a type of "pre-release draft." I bet no one expected two websites posting the same fake press release, and that is why there was merit behind it and not as many people doubting its origins. :D
Until next year!
With April 1st coming up, please do not be fooled by websites playing tricks on you. People will surely try to present something fake with Pokemon in general. Most importantly, do not become fooled by new Pokemon! We all know that D/P is out now, so there surely cannot be any new Pokemon coming out anytime soon. If there is a new Pokemon to be revealed anytime soon, it will probably be in two to three years. Let's not go posting on forums and websites "Oh my gosh, a new Pokemon was revealed today in ____," because it will not be true, guaranteed, 100%, cross my heart, hope to die, stick a needle in my eye. Lies will most likely be the only aspect of anything "suspicious" you find on April 1st, and I am sure many webmasters will have to sort it all out once it is over (not that I am guilty of making any April Fools jokes once or twice in the past, but seriously, it's old now). For now, PokeBeach will focus on the site plans I posted the other day. Our main objective is to finish the scans and the Modified Card-Dex between this weekend and the beginning of next week. Once those are done, we will move on to other items on the agenda. Let's hope that I can actually finish most of the site projects I promised this time! Unless I am bombarded with a project every night for the remaining two weeks, I should be able to get a few things done around here!
...or "did," now... x2. Details later.
The university I want to go to has not updated my status yet! XD Quick update for now!
World Championship 2007 Info - PUSA has just sent out a press release for Worlds 2007! You can read it below:
WORLDS TO KICK OFF NEW POKEMON TCG FORMAT
BELLEVUE, Wash.-March 30th, 2007-Pokémon USA, Inc., a worldwide leader in the trading card game industry, announced today that their brand-new Diamond & Pearl expansion will evolve the Pokémon Trading Card Game like never before! With a new generation of Pokémon in the Trading Card Game for the first time in four years, the annual World Championship tournament will celebrate this monumental milestone in a way like never before! Competitors from all over the world will compete in the tournament for the coveted title of Pokémon TCG World Champion in a tournament that will surely test the skills of all players involved!
To celebrate this Pokémon milestone, the World Championship will run in a special format showcasing the new gameplay of Diamond & Pearl! For the first half of the tournament, players will compete with decks constructed beforehand from their own cards. Players who are able to outplay the competition will then be given a special sealed box of Diamond & Pearl, from which they will build a customized 30-card deck for the final competition on Sunday. Only those who can discover the power of the Diamond & Pearl expansion and use their deck-building skills to create the perfect deck will surpass all competitors and be declared World Champion of the Pokémon Trading Card Game!
The Pokémon TCG World Championship will take place on August 10-12, 2007, in Kona, Hawaii. For more information, visit www.op.pokemon-tcg.com.
About Pokémon USA, Inc.
Pokémon USA, Inc., a subsidiary of The Pokémon Company in Japan, publishes the Pokémon Trading Card Game outside of Japan and manages the property outside of Asia which includes licensing, marketing and publishing activities, an animated TV series, movies, the official Pokémon website and the online retail site www.pokemoncenter.com. Celebrating its 10th worldwide anniversary in 2006, Pokémon was launched in Japan in 1996 for play on Nintendo's Game Boy® and has since evolved into a global cultural phenomenon. Pokémon was introduced in North America in September 1998 and today is one of the most popular toy and entertainment properties in the world. For more information, visit www.pokemon.com.
