The following Pokemon received their nicknames because they were the first thing I thought of and I don't have much else to say: Gorb, Gemini, Peep, Viner, Sprouts, Codex, Poblano, Rory, Sasha, Maroon, Pinkman, Visions, Charger, Crunch, Champ, Ralph, Pammy, Felix, Manix, Munch, Omelette, Frances, Coconut, Bellows.
SYNC III (Typhlosion)
My first Typhlosion was named "Sync", so naturally,
the second and third Cyndaquils I gained on two separate attempts to do a complete playthrough of this game took inspiration from that.
The Typhlosion from my 2019 run was named "2SYNC", but other than "it sounded cooler", I can't fathom why I chose that over "Sync Jr." or "Sync II".
The exact reasoning for why I chose "Sync" in the first place is lost to time,
but the word was likely picked up from the Windows Media Player button/tab for putting music onto MP3 players and chosen because it sounded cool.
"Lost to time" still applies because I can't be sure that this was actually why I chose it.
Given the additional context, I think the "Sync" nickname is equal parts stupid and cool,
which isn't bad for a nickname that a nine-year-old me chose.
I've seen the nicknames in the box of my 2010 save.
I have no fucking clue what was going on there, but I probably didn't know much more about what I had been doing as I was doing it all those years ago.
RAMELIA (Raticate)
Only real comment here is that it was the second thing I thought of instead of the first thing.
This is probably a vague portmanteau of "Rat" and "Amelia".
SUPER! (Quagsire)
Super! It rhymes with Wooper!
That was pretty much the thought process! I still like the name for him, so I guess it wasn't a bad idea after all!
The exclamation mark was probably unnecessary! Don't think I would add that again!
ZUMA (Zubat)
Very loosely taken from the game of the same name.
I don't think I've even played that game, or if I have, it was at least ten years ago.
INDIA (Unown)
The Unown I caught was a letter "i", so I just nicknamed it based on the NATO phonetic alphabet.
YARS (Caterpie)
Caterpies eventually evolve into Butterfrees, so this nickname was targeted more towards that. "Yars" is referring to Yars' Revenge for the Atari 2600.
TUEBOR (Stantler)
Translated from latin, "Tuebor" means "I will defend".
This is written on the shield of Michigan's coat of arms, with an elk and a moose on either side of it.
Michigan has a "seal-on-blue" flag as of current, but there has been talk of getting a redesigned flag in the works.
I am going to lose my goddamn mind if that happens and the final result is my state replacing its generic flag with a shitty flag,
especially if said shitty flag is also generic but in a different way.
SOULWEAVER (Lugia)
I wanted something that had "soul" in it, but wasn't "SoulSilver", despite the fact that it would be amusing to do so.
Soulweaver was what I came up with.
HELLION (Skarmory)
The name comes from the first track on the Judas Priest album Screaming for Vengeance, which has album art featuring a giant metal bird.
AMBER (Pineco)
This name was very loosely based on the name of a UNSC ship most notably featured in Halo 2, that being "In Amber Clad".
JABETTE (Parasect)
This may actually be the most complicated one.
I got the idea to catch a Parasect and have it know Spore and False Swipe from Lyra Made a Website's video series on getting a Living Dex in Generation 2.
The name given to Lyra's parasect was "Sir Ender".
Not wanting mine to have exactly the same name, I somehow connected the name to a jungle song made in the MOD format named "Surrender" (stylized as "SuRReNDeR").
The song was made by Jabi, who I know nothing about other than this one song being made by whoever Jabi is.
Not wanting the name to be a direct copy, I adapted "Jabi" into a very similar sounding "Jabette", which was then given to my Parasect.
PRETZEL (Giratina)
I wanted to give this god-status-in-the-lore Pokemon a really silly name because it would be funny.
I don't know how I came up with "Pretzel", but as soon as I did, I knew that was the nickname I was going to go with.
Watermelon (Kyogre)
Aar asked me what I wanted it to be nicknamed and I chose Watermelon as a reference to the melonDS emulator,
which may have been used on occasion during parts of this playthrough.
FLUFFY (Rayquaza)
Aar suggested this for a goofy nickname to give to Giratina.
I had already decided on "Pretzel" for that, so "Fluffy" was given to Rayquaza instead.
MISTIFIER (Staryu)
Very loosely refers to Misty, as her signature Pokemon in this game, previous games, and in the anime was a Starmie.
She also had Staryus and it wouldn't surprise me if her Starmie had been caught by her before it evolved.
SLAM (Onix)
Named after the song Slam by Onyx.
As an added bonus to this part, there are a few names of days/chapters that got their names from something else.
- Barnstorming: Very loosely referring to the Activision game of the same name for the Atari 2600.
- When Worlds Collide: Reader's choice as to whether this is a reference to the Powerman 5000 song or the song from the B.C. special episode of Spongebob.
- Am I Only Dreaming?: This is just the name of a Gears of War 2 achievement.
- Rampage: Mostly referring to my plowing through most of Kanto in one day, but also a nod to the arcade game of the same name.
A Paperboy/Rampage GBA cartridge was actually the first game I got for my DS Lite.
I didn't have an original model DS or any Game Boy prior to that.
- King of the Mountain: A reference to the Midnight Oil song of the same name.
An apt choice, seeing as this was the part where I somewhat legitimately defeated Red.
- Around the World: This is just the name of a Gears of War (the first one) achievement.