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.
The suspense is building... One more day until the university I want to go tells me if I have been accepted or rejected. How appropriate is it that I will find out on the LAST day possible (probably the last hour, too)? I always seem to have such bad luck with everything. :p Even though there is nothing I can do now to change the past, I am still doing every good-luck ritual I can think of, even though there is no doubt it means anything.
Listen up, kids! You better do well in high school and you better not slack off! Even though it is four years long, those four years could determine whether you will go to a college that makes your life easy or easier. This website officially opened the summer before my freshman year, and now I am a senior waiting to receive his acceptance or rejection to his number one college choice. If I tried just minutely harder on a couple of items in high school, I probably would have easily been admitted to the places I wanted to go, but I threw some opportunities out the window and ruined my grades a few times during a few semesters (Math, Spanish - grrr). If you do not ever want to go through the stress I am going through right now, work hard in high school, and set into motion habits that will improve your education (studying, doing homework at certain times of the day, completing homework a day ahead, etc.). Also, have fun while doing it - my fun is / was Pokemon throughout high school, and it was a retreat from the chaos of school. I sacrificed any possible social life for this website and school, but whatever - I enjoyed doing it, and it helped me to survive high school (actually, I choose not to have a large social life because most people I know lack morals, and I only like to have a couple of "good" friends rather than 3,000 - saves a lot of drama :p). If tomorrow I get in to where I want to go, I will be overjoyed, but if not, I will live. If you want to go to a certain college, do not procrastinate, slack off, or ever not try your hardest (I know this is a little cliché, but it is the truth). Do your best, and always remember that you will make it through all of it eventually, even if you fail at certain points (unless a comet smashes into Earth and everyone dies).
I am off to bed! My future arrives in my inbox tomorrow! :D I will hopefully have an update for POKEMON (and not me :D) tomorrow or Sunday. This website is starting to feel like a blog... We'll see how things turn out...
This is just an "I'm alive" message. The amount of schoolwork I have received this week has been monumental - every week I find myself saying, "This has been the hardest week ever!" only to find myself saying the same exact phrase the following week. Unfortunately, it will not become any easier, with AP/IB testing coming up soon (and I know some of you have to take your AP tests as well, so you better study during Easter/Spring Break!). Right now, I am waiting to see if I was admitted to my first college choice, and it is extremely nerve racking. There are only two more days until they stop sending out acceptance letters, and they have been doing it for a whole month, so this is not so much of a "good" sign. We'll just have to see... If I am admitted to that college, it will only mean great things for me and this website, but if not, then I guess, "Life will go on."
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!
Another quick update (well, not really)!
Site Plans - Over the past two or three weeks, myself and my mods (of the forum) have been talking about how we are going to improve PokeBeach between now and the end of the summer (we have been tossing around ideas back and forth). Our first step in the plan is to fix what I have broken (and no, I don't mean laptops). Our Strategist program has died because I have not posted any articles that the Strategists have painstakingly written, and there must be at least a dozen articles by now in line. The simple truth is I have not posted them because I do not have the time to HTMLize them and edit them anymore. So, what could we do to fix this? Simple! If you feel you have HTML capabilities, and are at least proficient with spelling and grammar (hopefully you are AWESOME at it!), we want you to help us out! Right now, we are looking for a person to permanently hold the position of "Head Strategist" at PokeBeach, which means that the person will not only HTMLize articles they receive (which is boring), but you will be in charge of the entire Strategist program (which is fun because you get to slash your whip at everyone and do stuff). So, if you feel you know your HTML, spelling, grammar, and can handle a huge program and everyone in it, send an e-mail to wpm@pokebeach.com, with the subject line "Head Strategist," and explain what you can do and anything else you want to brag about. Note that you also must have many RECENT (as in, the past 2 years) accomplishments in the Pokemon TCG, and we don't mean winning pre-releases. :p
Another thing we want to do is finish off the scans here. As you all know, we have probably 95% of all Pokemon TCG scans in existence, but we still are missing a few, especially with promos (although we do have a lot of those - they are just not up yet). Shakespeare, our master card scanner, has posted here what we need to be scanned, so if you want to help out, just follow his instructions and you will be credited if your scans are used (remember, they have to be EXCELLENT quality, which means don't use that $50 scanner you have if you are going to take the time to scan some of these :p). If you are to scan anything, make sure you post in the thread above so that multiple people are not scanning the same thing.
With us looking at what we are going to improve, I have enlisted the help of Meowth346 to actually re-code our entire Card-dex. I spent several hours on Sunday with him, basically describing to him what it should do, and he has already produced a beta version for me. It's not finished yet, but it will be by the end of this week, so look forward to a much better Modified Card-dex (hopefully by Saturday)! Other features for PokeBeach will be coming soon as well!
Also, if you feel the need to comment on any of the above, or even to make a PokeBeach suggestion, feel free to drop by this thread!
