Pokemon FireRed Hardcore Nuzlocke (No items, No overleveling)

hey everyone my name is flag on hg and this is the video of my attempts to nuzlocke pokemon fire red using hard nuzlocke rules now before i begin you're probably asking a lot of questions what's a nuzlocke what are hard nuzlocke rules why am i watching this if you aren't asking those questions go ahead and skip to the rules of the challenge section but for those of you who are healthy enough to have never tried a pokemon nuzlocke let me explain a pokemon nuzlocke is a playthrough of a pokemon game where the player plays by a set of rules to make the game harder this is because pokemon games in general are stupidly easy so sadistic adults like myself make the game harder for themselves so that they can relive the nostalgia of their youth now there's a lot of variants of nuzlocke run-throughs but the most basic nuzlocke rule set comprises of three rules one if a pokemon ever faints in battle it is considered dead you must immediately release it or perma-box it for the rest of your playthrough this is the main source of difficulty if your starter gets knocked out by a trainer's pokemon you can't rush him over to your local free healthcare clinic and heal him up he's dead gone rest in peace this makes it significantly harder to beat even common enemies but it also makes it far more important to consider gameplay mechanics that you would never think of so it makes the game fun two you can only catch one pokemon from each route of the game and it must be the very first pokemon you find if you knock out the first pokemon you find too bad you can't catch another one on that route this also makes the game a bit harder because it not only limits the overall number of pokemon that you can catch but it also makes you use pokemon that you might never have used in a regular playthrough i have fond memories of strolling up to the elite four in a pokemon fire red playthrough with a bead roll because that's what i got in viridian forest instead of a pikachu or a pidgey forcing certain pokemon on the player requires better strategies and more fun at least theoretically and three you must nickname all your pokemon that way when you watch the light leave the eyes of your sweet little warriors it hurts even more knowing that no one no one will replace the bond that you had with your precious pokemon okay so those are the basic rules of nuzlocking sound fun well it is but after you've done a few nuzlockes with basic rules you get numb if you play enough of them you learn that nuzlockes can be almost as easy as a regular playthrough just by over leveling your pokemon or using items so you can make your nuzlocke playthroughs even harder by adding an additional hard rule set and these rules are based off of a nuzlocker on youtube called pokemon challenges who does nuzlockes for a living dream job he's the best out there so check out his channel if you haven't already but basically the additional hard nuzlocke rule set imposes three additional rules one items cannot be used in battle no potions no x items held items though are allowed two you cannot level any of the pokemon you use past the next gym leader's highest leveled pokemon if a pokemon exceeds that level accidentally it must be boxed until the next gym badge is obtained and in three battle mode must be on set for the whole run meaning you do not get free switches following the defeat of an enemy pokemon all of these rules make the run significantly harder which makes it more fun alright so now you're caught up and with that let's see how i beat pokemon fire rad using hard nuzlocke rules i start my journey by picking bulbasaur as my starter bulbasaur is probably the best starter early game because he's super effective to the first two gym leaders he's also a chunky boy and takes hits well late game i named my bulbasaur booby sore booby sword and i are immediately challenged by my rival butts and his new charmander and this battle goes pretty much as expected i mean as an experienced pokemon trainer we i start my journey by picking bulbasaur as my starter bulbasaur is probably the best starter early game because he's super effective to the first two gym leaders he's also a chunky boy and takes hits well late game i name him bob and decimate my rival butts 2 and his new charmander first try after getting pokeballs i catch my first set of encounters from route 1 i catch a rattata and name her anyone can cook because anyone can cook and that's an important lesson to remember from route 2 i catch a pidgey and name it pudge on route 22 i catch a manky and name it hugh manky and in viridian forest i catch a caterpie and name it doggerpee i'm hilarious before the first gym i train up bob pudge and anyone can cook but bob clean sweeps brock without even breaking a sweat [Music] after that we get a ton more encounters on our way to cerulean city but before that we have this insanely close call where i almost lose pudge to a rap poison sting akins i was incredibly lucky and it was a huge mistake on my part but we survive and move on from route 3 i catch a spiro and name it spear column i go ahead and box spear column in mount moon i catch a zubat and name it patient zero on the other side of mount moon on route 4 i catch an ekans and name it snake unfortunately snake has the ability shed skin instead of intimidate which is one of the best abilities in the game so i box him we have a fight with butts too up next at this point i don't have much for charmander but after some training pudge evolved into pidgeotto bob evolved into ivysaur and anyone can cook evolved into raticate so i'm confident going in pudge goes toe to toe with butt twos pidgeotto i bring bob out for his rattata and do some damage before he switches out to his charmander i switch in anyone can cook tail whip him once to guarantee a hyperfang kill without triggering blaze and then go for the kill abra comes out next so i switch to bob and suck him dry with leech seed to get full health last is rattata who goes down to a vine whip and that's butts too from here we get a couple more encounters north of cerulean city on route 24 i catch an oddish and name him weirdo and on route 25 i catch a widdle and name it peewee trash encounters into the box they both go after some training it's time to take on misty she's a bit scarier than brock starmie is actually kind of threatening or so i thought anyone can cook one shot staryu and then takes a chunk out of starmie i'm dead to a crit here so i switch to bob to be safe and vine whip starmie for the w two badges down on my way to vermilion i catch a meowth on route 5 and i name her cat her pickup ability is relatively useful so i keep her around for cut and free items i also drop patient zero off at the daycare i'm sure nothing bad will come from that in vermilion city i get an old rod and immediately fish up a magikarp named fish and boxim gyarados is disgusting and would actually be a great addition to the team but let's make this a bit more challenging you can actually get a lot of really good guaranteed encounters in this game snorlax lapras any of the eeveelutions and gyarados they're all really really good and they actually make a nuzlocke challenge pretty easy so i'll be skipping them but if you're doing your first nuzlocke those are great encounters to help you out anywho on route 11 i catch my first actual party member in quite some time a drowzee psychic types are really good to have i name him jeffrey in diglett cave i catch you guessed it a diglett i name him nougat and nougat will be key for lieutenant surge but before i do that i need to take on butts 2 on the boat it goes basically the same as the last battle except this time it's on a boat hudge goes wing to wing with pidgeotto i sand attack raticate before switching to bob and taking it out cadabra comes out but jeffrey walls him pretty well and takes him out with a few head butts and last is charmeleon who gets put to sleep by jeffrey and killed by nougat afterward i rub an old man's back and then head off to lieutenant surge's electric type gym the plan is to just dig through his whole team with nougat voltorb and pikachu are both one shots i didn't think that digg would one shot raichu so to avoid multiple double teams going up i just magnitude twice for the w easy now it's time to make my way through rock tunnel i decide to go get the hm for flash even though i can probably just feel my way through rock tunnel without it turns out that would have been the better decision because on our way back from getting flash i accidentally run into one of the scariest things you can see at this point in a nuzlocke a level 29 dug trio not only is a level 29 dugtrio much stronger than all of my pokemon it also has the ability arena trap which prevents all grounded pokemon from fleeing this is really really bad i have jeffrey out who will surely die before he can take out doug trio i was doomed to lose jeffrey or so i thought see duct trio can actually have two abilities arena trap and sandvale and luckily this level 29 monster had sandvale so before jeffrey got hacked to pieces i was able to switch to pudge and hit him with a few sand attacks to make my escape and somehow i made it without any deaths that was incredibly close i could have easily lost a handful of pokemon if i was just a bit more unlucky but after that near encounter with death i had to sell it on city and the fourth gym getting a handful of encounters along the way on route 10 i catch a voltorb and name it bokey paul in rock tunnel i catch a geodude and name him geoguy and on route 8 i catch a growlithe and name him bjork bjork has intimidate which means that bjork is going to be a beast if i can keep him alive until he becomes an arcanine i could evolve him as soon as i get to celadon city by buying a firestone but then he'd miss out on some important level up moves so for now we keep him as a growlithe but he joins the team after some light training where nougat evolves into doug trio and jeffrey evolves into hypno it's time to take on erica but given that we have a fire type a flying type and a psychic type i'm really not too worried about erica's grasp poison pokemon i start with growlithe to lower victory bell's attack and then take him out with two emperors tangela comes out and goes down into embers as well vileplume attempts a stun spore but i have a cherry berry to forward it and after a second stun spore bjork finally takes some damage but by then it's too late erica's plants have been burned to the ground and i get my fourth gym badge i really didn't think that it would be that easy but i did get some lucky misses there after the fourth gym the game becomes somewhat non-linear and the map opens up quite a bit my level cap jumps from 29 all the way to level 43 because both koga and sabrina have one pokemon at level 43 so the plan is to get all the encounters and fight all the trainers all around the map and then take on koga and sabrina back to back before anyone goes over the level cap i start by catching a doduho on route 16 and naming him them bill and ted in celadon city i get the gift evie and name it evie but i put it in the box as well after doing the game corner and the whole team rocket thing i go to lavender town and complete that whole quick side story where i save an old man or whatever nothing exciting here except i do catch a ghastly and name her bollocks in fuchsia city i get a good rod and fish for a golden and name her claire coy after having to google how to spell koi i then move along the east coast of kanto and catch a horsey named kawa a krabby named std and a venonat named peapod they'll go in the box i also circle back to route 6 to fish up a poliwhirl and name him swarley and i do the fighting dojo in saffron city where i'm gifted a hitmonchan that i named jackie they all go into the box as well however i do get one more encounter by fishing for a psyduck in viridian city i name her chicken because i think that's funny and she joins the team replacing anyone can cook who retires to the box for a long life of cooking and watching tick tocks with that i have a full team of six that i'm pretty happy with in certain nuzlocke runs i'll actually rotate pokemon in my team based on the upcoming gem but this game is actually pretty easy so for grinding purposes it's just easier to have a solid six and keep it the same speaking of grinding it's time for a crapload of it at some point during this grind i come to the realization that pudge is weak as all hell he has a timid nature which means his physical normal and flying attacks are weakened and on top of that pidgeotto and pidgeot are just naturally pretty weak they don't even learn drill peck i mean just look at how little damage he does to this farfetch'd so pudge gets the hard boot and i train up bill and ted to replace him unlike pudge bill and ted have an adamant nature so they get plus attack and on top of that dodrio has significantly more natural attack in this grinding session bob evolves into weniesor i give bjork a firestone and he evolves into an arcane and chicken evolves into a gold duck and bill and ted evolve into dodrio once everyone hits level 40 i decide that it's time to take on my rival in silico this rival fight is considered one of the harder ones in the game his starter is level 40 so he can actually do quite a bit of damage but i need to beat him to unlock sabrina's gym before i hit my level cap so it's now or never and here tragedy strikes twofold unfortunately i forgot to hit record during this session so i don't have the footage of our epic battle against butts 2 which is a terrible moment to forget to record because we experienced this run's very first death in a battle that goes relatively smoothly until the very end charizard hits bill and ted with a blaze boosted flamethrower knocking him out from full health bill and ted's tenure was short but it will not be forgotten at this point i need to replace bill and ted i could bring back pudge but pudge sucks he's just so bad so instead i decide to train up speed column as my new flyer he's basically a slightly weaker dodrio spikalum evolves into firo after another grinding session fun fact there's a trainer on the bike route cue ball isaiah who has a mod shop and a ma champ by using the versus seeker you can fight this guy over and over again and each battle he gives you a ton of experience points and also gives you four attack evs making it a great place to train up physical flying types anyways after this grind sesh it's time to take on koga and sabrina we start with koga my main thing i'm concerned about is his wheezing using self-destruct i start with bob to take out his first coughing with strength muk comes out and i just whittle him down with leech seed as he uses minimized strats the second coughing comes out and i set up with leech seed to put him to sleep to get a free switch into jeffrey i take out coughing and out comes wheezing i'm a bit worried that he'll self-destruct here but it turns out that one psychic is enough to knock him out and that's badge number five at this point my pokemon are starting to get very close to the level cap so i head right over to sabrina's psychic type gym i don't have any pokemon that are super effective to her psychic types other than bite from bjork so i'll just have to overpower her unfortunately alakazam is incredibly strong and incredibly fast so this could easily be the hardest battle of the run i start with bjork against her kadabra who one shots it with a bite mr mime comes out so i switch into speed column on the switch mr mime calm minds which is actually really bad i forgot that sabrina likes to use calm mind but fortunately mr mime goes down to a single drill peck pudge couldn't even dream of that next is venomoth who is obviously one shot with a drill peck last is the terrifying alakazam remember literally 10 seconds ago when i was reminded of sabrina's combine strats well i didn't learn my lesson because i switched to jeffrey and sabrina uses combined this is actually pretty bad i decide to go for a hypnosis here which misses and sabrina uses calm mind again her base 135 special attack alakazam is now at plus two special attack and plus two special defense this is really not good she goes for another calm mind as i risk it with another hypnosis thankfully this hypnosis lands so i switch to bjork as sabrina uses a full heal thinking that i will outspeed it i decide to go for a one shot with bite this is stupid for two reasons one alakazam is base 120 speed and a level higher than my base 95 speed arcanine so it's really unlikely i'm going to out speed this and two bite is a special move in this game meaning that i was trying to one shot alakazam at plus three special defense alakazam is frail but it's not that frail so this is by all accounts an idiot move but somehow i'm not punished for it bjork hangs on with one hp and then counters with pitiful damage from bite this is insanely lucky i can't believe he survived this but still things are looking really bad here i decided to switch to jeffrey who loses almost half his health from psychic my only play is to go for a blind hypnosis switch and then hit alakazam with a physical attack before it wakes up fortunately psychic doesn't crit here and hypnosis hits so after that i switch to speed column and alakazam stays asleep on the next turn somehow speed column outspeeds alakazam and drill peck gets the knockout that means that if i had just used drill peck as soon as alakazam came in i would have been completely fine i can't believe how lucky i got bjork is a beast for taking a plus three psychic from a freaking alakazam such a good boy so by the skin of my teeth i get badge six as well as the tm for calm mind two can play at that game sabrina with koga and sabrina defeated i now have access to surf which gives me access to a handful of new encounters i whiff on catching a tangela on route 21 on route 20 i catch a tentacool and name him squillium in the seafoam islands i catch a dugong and name her amy dunn and in the pokemon mansion i catch a goopy grimer and name her gwyneth p i also revive an old amber on cinnabar island to get an aerodactyl who i named pateri after getting the key to the gym from cinnabar mansion which by the way is ridiculous it's blaine's job to be a gym leader but anyways finally it's now time to take on blaine now if you've never played fire red you might not know that blaine is the hardest gym leader in kanto he can devastate teams if you aren't fully prepared for everything that he throws at you fortunately i have an elaborate strategy to beat him i think it's just best to watch it play out in action [Music] after my to the wire battle with blaine my cosplayer friend bill asks me to come to the sevi islands with him i go because i need to train my pokemon before the 8th gym anyway but it's pretty uneventful i catch a machop named manchop and a ponyta named kauta on island 1 but all other possible encounters are repeats so i can't catch them according to the species clause while i'm on one island i also decide to kill the fire chicken hanging out on mount ember because i can anyways after saving a little girl from a hypno jesus christ nintendo i come back to kanto to take on the 8th gym leader in viridian city as the last gym leader of kanto giovanni can be one of the most difficult trainers in the game but it's nothing some clever gameplay can't handle let's take a look [Music] with that it's time to take on the pokemon league but before getting to victory road we have another battle with butts too the last time we met he murdered bill and ted so i do have to be careful here after getting everyone to level 50 and learning some new moves via tms i confronted butts too we start with nougat who hits pidgeot with a rock slide a feather dance means i don't two shot the pidgeot but i do get a nice flinch a third rock slide takes out pidgeot execute comes out and goes down to a drill peck from spikalum next is ryhorn who falls to the blaine giovanni strat from chicken then gyarados comes out and he can actually be kinda scary but bob stalls him to death with leech seed sleep powder and razor leaf i time it to get a relatively free switch into chicken to set him up for the charizard waiting in the back surf does decent damage to charizard but now blaze is active so i switch to bjork even resisting it he takes a good chunk from a flamethrower but extreme speed takes care of charizard and lastly a flamethrower plus extreme speed takes out alakazam before it can get off a calm mind boosted attack butts 2 is done and now all that's left is the elite 4 and the champion the level cap for the elite 4 is a bit tough to pin down because the later trainers have stronger pokemon than the first few i decide on level 60 for a level cap to match lance's dragonite the champion spoiler alert it's butts too we'll have higher leveled pokemon but we'll match everyone in the elite form that seems fair so after several hours of grinding and spending all my money on coins for items tms and vitamins i face the final challenge the indigo plateau lorelai the ice trainer is up first i start with bob against her dugon and set up a leech seed retrospectively this was really dumb because i was dead to an ice beam critical hit i also got frozen but that doesn't actually matter because my plan from here is to switch to jeffrey and set him up remember the fight against sabrina it's time for a calm mind sweep on the switching hypno gets hit by an ice beam and she gets another freeze two freezes in a row has a one percent chance of occurring but fortunately i immediately dethaw and start setting up calm mines as leftovers and leech seed damage keeps me healthy at this point it's pretty much over at plus six special attack and plus six special defense the only thing that lorelai could possibly do is crit and freeze me with a blizzard after dugon goes down lapras comes out and then goes down to one psychic same goes for cloister slobro actually takes a psychic but does pitiful damage in return even with a crit we'd be fine i decided to switch to shadowball to save some pp on psychic and shadowball is a two-hit kill just as a reminder in this game shadowball is physical so my stats aren't actually buffed last is jinx who surprisingly goes down to a single unboosted shadow ball nice next is bruno so i heal up my boys and go to the next room bruno leads with an onyx so i lead with bob who one shots it with razor leaf onyx looks so cool but it is one of the worst pokemon in the game it levels up ridiculously slow it has terrible special defense and alarmingly low attack it's so bad but anyways hitmonchan is next so i put it to sleep and switch to sp column unfortunately hitmonchan wakes up and hits me with a rock tomb which is super effective and lowers my speed with the speed drop i'm likely slower and i don't want to risk a crit so i switch to jeffrey i go for the psychic as he misses a sky uppercut anticipating a heal i calm mind once the next turn i get hit by a sky uppercut as i go for another combine planning on one shotting the machamp in the back after another sky uppercut psychic takes out hitmonchan hitmonlee is next and hits a nasty mega kick before going down to psychic bruno's second onyx comes out and hits a critical hit earthquake to take me down to 43 hp as i kill it with psychic even after leftovers recovery i'm way too low to stay in here hypno is pretty important for agatha so i can't risk him going down to a crit i decide to switch in bjork for an attack drop machine misses a cross chop and then use a scary face as i switch into bob machamp then uses bull cup which could be pretty scary but i hit a leech seed and put him to sleep after some negligible damage from a cross chop from here bob takes him out with a few razor leafs see you bruno third is agatha who would be an absolute cakewalk with nougat if it wasn't for the fact that three of her five poison type pokemon are immune to ground type moves but even so she shouldn't be too much trouble i start with speakalum who is immune to ghost type attacks from gengar i also give speakalum a lumbery in case she tries any hypnosis shenanigans on me two drill picks take out the first gengar as she just tries to double team golbat comes out so i decide to just hit her with return it's enough for a two shot after some damage from air cutter arbot comes in with intimidate so i switched to nougat who frankly has been largely useless since he swept the third gem doug trio is just a little too weak and a little too frail to be that good in nuzlockes watch him almost die to a critical hit but not very effective sludge bomb right here the bastard gets poisoned too i decide to wager that a super effective earthquake is enough to kill arbok and it is leaving nougat with just eight health he lives to fight another day hunter comes in so i switch in speed column knowing that a drill pick will one shot the haunter all that's left is agatha's second stronger gengar it's possible that this thing has thunderbolt or something i don't actually know but i decide to stay in with speedcollum who actually hits a critical drill pack for a one shot replacing pudge was the best decision of this entire run we're down to the fourth and final elite four member lance and his dragons this is kinda scary but chicken has ice beam so i'm not super worried after healing everyone up i put bob in the front and move to the next room lance leads gyarados not a dragon by the way i do the same thing i do with every single gyarados i leech seed sleep powder and razor leaf it down i switch to chicken while gyarados is still asleep and lance uses a full restore as i hit it with ice beam i decide to play it safe and switch back to bob and it's a good thing i do because gyarados hits a nasty hyper beam on the recharge i put it back to sleep and then switch out to the chicken chicken gets in for free and kills gyarados with an ice beam on the next turn dragon air comes out and i hit it with an ice beam which leaves it with just a sliver of health crap dragon air then hits a thunder wave this is actually kind of bad i probably should have given chicken a cherry berry thankfully dragonair misses a hyper beam the next turn and then goes down to a second icebeam lance's second dragonair comes out so i switch to bob dragonair sets up a safeguard which is actually kind of inconvenient because i could have used sleep powder but i decided to brute force this one and hit it with strength as he does decent damage with dragon rage a second strength leaves it with a sliver as i lose more hp from another dragon rage i take it down with a third strength an aerodactyl comes in also not a dragon anticipating wing attack i switch in bjork to lower his attack then anticipating rockslide i switch in nougat i'm almost right aerodactyl uses ancient power and thankfully does not get the boost so i hit it with a rock slide from nougat but aerodactyl outspeeds me and hits a pretty hard wing attack the second rockslide will kill aerodactyl but a critical hit wing attack will kill dugit i decide to risk it as i said before nougat hasn't been that useful and i don't really need him for dragonite or the champion unfortunately aerodactyl uses hyper beam instead of wing attack which kills nougat r.i.p buddy but every cloud has a silver lining thanks to hyper beam i can switch in chicken and get off a surf for free on the recharge i mean unless i get paralyzed fortunately aerodactyl uses a very weak ancient power and goes down the next turn now all that's left is lance's level 60 dragonite he's scary but we have ice beam he outspeeds me thanks to paralysis and hits a disgusting outrage a crit might have killed me my ice beam connects but it leaves him in the red i really can't sack chicken because i need him against my rival's charizard i'm pretty confident that jeffrey can handle outrage even with a crit and i'm right so i outspeed him and hit him with a psychic for the dragonite survives with one health come on man this means lance is most definitely using a full restore so i prepare for that with a calm mind this is a bit risky because it leaves me dead to crit but i don't really know what my other play is the full restore comes out as i set up calm mind i decided to do another calm mind hoping that it would make psychic a two-hit kill dragonite wastes a turn using safeguard so two psychics are enough to take him out and win the battle my final challenge is taking on the champion one more battle with butts two i heal everyone except nougat rip replenish some pp and get ready for the final battle of the run spietcalum faces his most poetic opponent yet a pidgeot the teammate he replaced and to be frank he absolutely destroys him two returns even after a feather dance demolished the garbage bird rydon comes out and i switch to bob bob gets hit with scary face and a pretty terrifying earthquake but takes out right on with a razor leaf alakazan comes out so i switched to geoffrey since our last confrontation with alakazam jeffrey has learned shadowball which absolutely destroys alakazam but i decide to take this opportunity to set up some calm minds alakazam really isn't doing much to me here with psychic and future sight after setting up a bit a single shadow ball takes out alakazam next is gyarados i decide to go for one psychic which just barely takes out half of gyarados's health a second psychic knocks out gyarados and butts two's terrifying level 63 charizard comes out he does dirty damage with aerial lace as i hit a psychic for about half health a citrus berry means that i likely won't ko with another psychic and an aerial ace crit would kill me but i decide to risk it it's the last fight after all aerial ace comes out doesn't crit and psychic just barely manages to take out the charizard last is exeggutor so i switch in bjork who after a few turns of sleep one shots the tree with a flamethrower winning us the battle and the run well that was a ton of fun fire red is incredibly easy even if you avoid the really strong guaranteed encounters like lapras and snorlax many of the gym leaders are easy sweeps if you have one pokemon with the right type and any psychic type with calm mind can devastate most of the elite four actually if you're in leaf green slowbro can almost single-handedly sweep the entire elite four with calm mind psychic surf and ice beam but regardless i had a lot of fun with this this is the first nuzlocke that i fully recorded and made into a video so if you enjoyed watching this please like the video subscribe or comment down below all the youtube stuff i'm hoping to do more of these videos for other nuzlocke challenges and as we go on i'm hoping to try some even harder challenges like nuzlocke's and rom hacks so until then i'm flag on hg and thanks for watching you

Channel: FlygonHG

Views: 430,083

Rating: 4.9379592 out of 5

Keywords: Pokemon, Gaming, Nuzlocke, Pokemon Challenges, Pokemon FireRed

Id: ECCKao_sh3E

Length: 29min 42sec (1782 seconds)

Published: Wed Dec 09 2020