A "Wow, I should have figured that out a lot sooner" thread

[Buzz]

It took me two days to figure out how to go up the Olivine Lighthouse in HeartGold. I thought that the door that you jumped out of was just another window until I finally realized that it looked different than the rest and I decided to walk into it (since I had nothing to lose)

[The REAL Kingdra]

Well, let's just say...
"Pikachu! Aim for the horn!"

[Der_Neuevenmenschen]

It took me two days to figure out how to go up the Olivine Lighthouse in HeartGold. I thought that the door that you jumped out of was just another window until I finally realized that it looked different than the rest and I decided to walk into it (since I had nothing to lose)

It took me 'til after I beat Chuck.

[rbogey]

Trapinch evolves into Vibrava. This may seem a bit obvious, but I had a "guide" (which had the most errors I have ever seen, and it was licensed by Nintendo) that said Trapinch didn't evolve. They don't exactly look similar. Only the Ground typing. This came from the same guide that said Ralts didn't evolve into Kirlia.

[Buzz]

I couldn't beat Chuck so I just decided to beat Jasmine and Pryce and Team Rocket in the Mahogany hide out first. Then I realized that you had to beat Chuck in order to get to the Radio Tower part. So that took a while. And since I love to fight the gym leaders with the same amount of Pokemon, I was using two random Pokemon that were doing horrible. It took me a while to realize "Wait.... Bayleaf can beat Poliwrath!"
A few hours of my life wasted.

[UpbeatFerno]

In Ruby, my first Pokemon game, I accidentally defeated Groudon without catching him, an hour later after i saved my friend told me I could've saved before battling and restarted. I banged my head on a table when he told me that.

[AlexTheRose]

When I just got my first Game Boy (a GBA SP) when I was 7 years old, I got a Sonic game and a few days later it gets stolen by a [what seemed like] drugged day-care lady (my mom worked a lot), so, mom and I go down to Wal-Mart to pick out another game (This was all the way back in 2005, mind you ;]) and I saw Ruby, Sapphire, and Emerald laying in cases; I picked Emerald. When I saw the box art, I grew a quick liking to the Pokémon on it. When I picked my starter, I picked Treecko thinking that it would evolve into Rayquaza, the Pokémon on the box art! Later in the game I was having trouble with the Mossdeep Gym and sure enough, my Grovyle evolved into Sceptile. I was really disappointed T_T. But, back then Pokémon was extremely new to me, too. And now I've gotten so "into" Pokémon that I have 2-3 Action Replays loaded with cheats and a full arsenal of hacking tools that I use a lot—so yes, I've come a long way.

[Fletcher.]

Pearl was my first mainstream game, and I was a giant n00b to Pokemon, so I didn't bother to level anything other than my Torterra.
That might not've been so bad by itself, but I didn't know Ground was weak to Ice when I got to the seventh Gym.

"WHAT THE HECK?! WHY IS TORTERRA TAKING SO MUCH DAMAGE FROM HER ATTACKS?!"

Ten tries until I finally beat Candice.

[That Guy]

Only today did I realise why Espeon is called Espeon and not something like Psychiceon (only more clever)...ESP!!! DUH!!!!

I feel so stupid T.T

[IslandWalker]

It took me two days to figure out how to go up the Olivine Lighthouse in HeartGold. I thought that the door that you jumped out of was just another window until I finally realized that it looked different than the rest and I decided to walk into it (since I had nothing to lose)

This. I had to look it up on the internet.

[Cyber Jet]

i got lost for 3 hours in mount moon in leaf green but then i was still a noob at pokemon back then.

[Assmilk]

Back in yellow I had no idea about type advantages/disadvantages. I wish I had caught a Mankey, it would have made taking on brock easier.

How I defeated Brock? I raised the most random pokemon, Nidoran M and tried Double Kick against Brock. It freaking worked and I finally got a boulder badge.

[Jesse GS the II]

Proof that I still don't know everything about Pokémon:

Just yesterday, I bought a used copy of Sapphire and began a new game. After catching a Wurmple and having it evolve into a Cascoon, I spent a couple of minutes soft-resetting in vain for a Silcoon before I bothered to look up the exact specifics of its so-called "random" evolution. Turns out Wurmple's evolution line is based on personality values and is thus determined before you even capture it. D'oh. That's ten minutes I'd like to have back.

[Cyborger]

In SoulSilver at the moment I've been having a tough time catching certain Pokemon. I later realized that I never trained a "status affecting" Pokemon like Caterpie or Weedle so my capturing technique was to get their HP in the red and just throw Poekballs at them until they're captured.

Also I tried catching Entei and Raikou with Ghastly as soon as he learned Mean Look and then again with a freshly evolved Lv 25 Haunter. I really don't feel like training it for the sake of catching 2 Pokemon :(

[DeliveryExpert]

Back when I was playing my first pokemon game (Red), it took me a while to figure out I could save the game. I just kept turning it off and playing from the beginning a few times