Okay then, let's get started.
~Pre fiction plotline/Prologue~
~20 Years ago~
This method of formatting is a little difficult to pull off correctly. I would recommend putting the timeframe in the description, such as "Twenty years ago, torn and belittled..." and go from there. It's easier to do that way.
Also, it's generally recommended that numbers going up to 100 get written out in full instead of being written as digits.
Torn and belittled from his defeat from the trainers Hugh and Hilda, Ghetsis had one last threat he fulfilled in order to create the greatest crisis anywhere had ever known. He wanted the world to know how much he could further his backlash to Unnova. This he fulfilled shortly after Hilda defeated him and Kyurem, winning, freeing a captured Hugh.
He ordered the death of Unnova. This came after he was removed from Unnova by the Shadow Triad.
The obvious one first: it's not "Unnova," it's Unova. Since this error persists, I will only mention it here in order to avoid repetition.
Now, moving on, I rather like the idea presented here. Ghetsis does seem to be the type who would set out on one last plot purely driven out of spite and his own madness. The issue here is, the idea, while good, is presented in a confusing manner.
One of the cardinal rules that's always guided me since I started writing fanfiction is "don't assume your reader knows what you know." As in, to someone who hasn't played Black and White and their sequels, who is Ghetsis? Who are Hugh and Hilda? The Shadow Triad? Who or what is Kyurem? And what is Unova, for that matter? You need to describe these things at least enough so readers who only have a loose grasp on the canon characters and elements you're dealing with can follow along.
Unfortunately, that leads into another problem: you also altered the canon events themselves and didn't explain how or why, leaving someone who
did play the games such as me completely confused. What happened to Hilbert, Nate and Rosa? Why were Hilda and Hugh the ones to defeat Ghetsis and Kyurem? For that matter, how and why was Hugh captured, and by who?
The last remaining faithful to him an extraordinary night, when the wind whipped into a storm with slate clouds, and the rain lashed down as bullets, cold freezing and dead, and the thunder rumbled and the lightning shone down as brilliant white jagged light. On route 6, in the most famous laboratory, devastation began. Team plasma had one last desire, as they slowly in a pre-planned raid silently murdered the staff, until they surrounded six members of no ordinary staff, the six staff who knew the combinations to a virus.
Again, I'm going to only mention something once to avoid repetition - your wording is making this far more difficult to understand than it needs to be. Let me rewrite this passage to serve as an example of how to fix this:
"The last remaining members faithful to him chose an extraordinary night, a windy one with slate-colored storm clouds lashing down rain like bullets, cold, freezing and dead. The thunder rumbled and lightning shined down in the form of brilliant, jagged light. On Route 6, in the most famous laboratory [in Unova/in the world], the devastation began. Team Plasma had one last desire, and in a pre-planned raid, they slowly and silently murdered the lab's staff, until they surrounded the six least ordinary members - the six who knew the [(I don't know what you're trying to say here with 'combinations')] to a particular virus."
"Team Plasma" is the name of an organization, so both words need to be capitalized.
A virus generated that was mutated, used to help with a vaccine programme to help with the winter flu. However this was unfinished, and was dangerous. Forced they hand it over to the sages. Their mutilated bodies are then discovered three days later. Five days after the crime, several bodies of the remaining Team Plasma’s members are discovered. A week later and many people are heading into hospital and doctors with chronic symptoms.
Now see, I like this concept. Maybe it's because I have a weakness for sci-fi movie plots such as these, but the idea of a dying Team Plasma acting out a kamikaze mission on Ghetsis's last orders to release a virus and spite the world is something I can get behind.
The thing, though, is that when you do a virus plot, you have to really put a lot of thought into it. What are the 'chronic symptoms' that the infected victims are exhibiting? What is the progression of an infection? Is it spread through physical contact, bodily fluids, or is it airborne? Also, you left out one of the most vital details: under exactly what circumstances did Team Plasma release the virus?
Yet another thing I'm only going to point out once because it's consistently happening: tense problems. You started with past tense ("torn," "belittled") but suddenly jumped to present ("are then discovered," "are discovered," "are heading into hospital.")
Less than two weeks later and many people are dropping dead from strange virus. Three weeks later and all of the sages are found dead. Soon chaos descends upon Unnova, over the next five years, as the struggle continues and anarachy with not able to control the rapid descend. Hospitals can’t contain the panic of people and the systems break, electric and the gas stop to Unnova, as the economy drops.
This is where you really needed to have more details of the virus's biology and progression established, because you never defined what the symptoms were before simply saying that people were "dropping dead." Another inconsistency is that 'many people' are dying after less than two weeks, but the Seven Sages are implied to have died after three weeks. You need to clearly define if they survived longer than the typical civilian (and if so, why; for example, did Ghetsis give them a temporary vaccine so they could see their victory before death?) or establish if they even died of the virus in the first place, because other scenarios such as ritualistic suicide are not ruled out by the description.
Many people in panic leave Unnova. Food shortages now occur with the few remaining struggling to bring in crops and many people too ill or dead. With this, rioting occurs, killing further people and the police struggling to contain. The media after five years dubbed this ‘Unnova’s death’. Ghetsis had won. Cities now went into pitch black and became littered with gangs and violence.
I really appreciate what you're going for, I really do. You've clearly got some big ideas and I have to respect anyone who's willing to tackle something of the scope you're aiming for.
The problem is, and I'm sorry to be blunt, but the way you're just skimming over these things is robbing them of all their urgency, and there are some large logical holes too.
One thing that blares right out at me immediately: if "many people" fled Unova in a panic, odds would be very high that one of them would be infected and thus spread the virus globally. The only way to prevent this would be to implement quarantine measures on a national level, but that's never mentioned here.
~10 Years ago~
10 years ago, Unnova was announced as the worst place to live, with the only reports of the grip of terror from the gangs within the cities, and the black out from the lack of heating and lighting.
"reports of the grip of terror from the gangs within the cities" is very poor wording. It would be much, much more efficient and clear to simply say "the only reports were those of gang terror within the cities."
A lack of heating doesn't cause a blackout, and stating "lack of lighting" as a cause of a blackout is repetitive because that's what a blackout is. You could save this by rewording it like this: "The lack of electricity caused nationwide blackouts, and few people had heating."
However a few people began to think otherwise. One normal member of Nimbasa City, nothing extravagant or unusual just a survivor from a war, well respected within the community, is murdered in cold blood. Those take revenge upon this person and the killer is found and killed back, causing uproar against the gangs. Much more bloodshed occurs within the city, with reports of at least one body found every week or every other week.
I...I literally can barely understand what you're trying to say here. I get that an ordinary citizen was murdered and it caused backlash against the gangs, but there's just so much confusing about this. What war are you talking about? What did he do to become well respected within the community enough to prompt revenge against the murderers? Who are the "those" that take revenge on the killer?
And most of all... are they not still worried about the virus? What happened to that?
Fear continues to strike into many with fewer people heading outside at night. Nothing much more is to be reported, just the gangs torment and grip continues on the cities, and crime is still up at an astonishing rate with everything. Many people using their pokémon in order to keep themselves safe, or those using weapons should they not own one. Many people breed their pokémon, secretly and begin to sell on these offspring for food or fuel mostly. Money has little value here now.
"gangs' torment" is missing its apostrophe.
Wait, using
weapons? I'm going to have to stop you right there and explain that actual, real weapons - as in, firearms and the like - are rare even in fanfiction of the Pokemon world for a good reason. The simplest way to understand why is to imagine one person robbing another on the street. Person B is being robbed by Person A. Person B is armed with a Pokemon, Person A with a small handgun. When Person A demands Person B's money, Person B goes for the Poke Ball he has. Now, that means he has to reach to his belt or into his pocket, get the ball, open it, make the Pokemon appear and then command it to attack. In all of that time, Person A has simply
taken out his gun and shot Person B. Real weapons are completely illogical in the Pokemon world because they just create countless logical holes that demand filling.
While breeding Pokemon to sell for food and fuel makes some sense, if the option of breeding Pokemon is available, why hasn't someone simply bred a private army of Pokemon and tried to take over an area? With society in shambles to this degree, a sizable number of people would gravitate to someone who could be a strong leader.
Over the next five years, many gangs were found and violence against them was reported. Diseases gripped tighter and tighter almost restricting and keeping the hold over the Unnova. Many people still running scared begin to club together and areas are cleared and people begin to grow their own food, and begin to keep pokémon back for food and transport, driven through hunger, fear and with a sense of nothing to lose.
"the Unova" should either be "Unova" or "the Unova region."
Violence against the gangs was reported to who?
I see that you're finally beginning to touch on quarantine zones and attempts to recover society (as well as breeding Pokemon for food, which is something I was just wondering about) but glossing over those details so quickly is once again harming how well your story gets its points through.
There is still nothing left, a few small rouge people selling drugs, alcohol and packaged food are clinging, giving people hope and something to fill the void of emptiness. Gym leaders and members of the Elite four, and those left, are helping to keep the cities safe, but even many struggle and are left scared by many of gangs running the cities. Slowly though, there is a change in the air, of people sick to death of what Unnova is now, compared to what it once was...
"rogue," not "rouge." Rouge is a type of makeup.
"Elite Four" is a title so it needs to be capitalized, same with "Gym Leaders."
I'm starting to get a little frustrated by how many contradictions you're starting to make. Are the civilians cowering in fear of the gangs, are they making quarantine zones and trying to grow their own food, or...?
~ 5 years ago~
Within the last five years, much has improved, within here, computer systems are now back online, and much more help and assistance has now come back online. Systems within the health system and police has now come back, with new forces now in action, gang members have now slunk back into the shadows, and now for the first time, money is now starting to get back into action. A plan of action is drawn up, and many senior and respected trainers are been asked in advance to begin a tour of Unnova in order to aid and restore the region.
...How does any of this deal with the fact that
Unova's devastation initially came from a virus? Simply restoring services, getting rid of gangs and beginning to heal the economy doesn't change the fact that the virus is still out there. In fact, the entire premise of "many senior and respected trainers" being asked to go there while there could still be infected victims spreading the virus is fatally flawed. You can't just shrug off the virus with "systems within the health system ... have now come back." It was the entire reason Unova fell in the first place.
Children are now no longer scared in attending classes, and plans in drawing up of helping to restore the cities are now in place. Most of the food grown is now able to be sent out to areas within Unnova, and less food is now imported, freshly grown and freshly prepared is now the motto of the food.
None of this makes any sense because
you still haven't addressed how the virus was dealt with. In fact, how does anyone know that the virus didn't mutate and infect the food supply?
Within Kanto, Prof Oak has now officially announced his retirement, citing ill health and poor mobility allying his ability to perform his research effectively. He has asked his grandson, Gareth aka Gary Oaks to step into his shoes and to take over his laboratory and duties in handing out the starter pokémon. Delighted with the offer, he accepts, within the same week, a friend of his, Russell Smith steps into the new role created for gyms as gym apprentice.
"Gary Oak," not "Oaks."
Why is this relevant to what's going on in Unova? Jumping to this so abruptly is very jarring.
Gym apprentice is the same level as gym leader, however with their other duties, gym apprentices may step into the role as gym leader if and when necessary. Gym trainers still must be fought and won on a number of these each different to gyms. This is now put into force with Unnova gyms in order to let gym leaders free up more time in order to help combat issues within the cities and towns.
But I thought most of the issues in the cities and towns were dealt with.
Within the new Unnova, many people from other regions have been deployed to live within Unnova and to manage the new economy and the shipping within the docks. One such family is the Grayson family currently consisting of Willow currently at 11 years old, 14 year old twins Xander and Rory, and their father, his second wife, who is currently expecting her first child, a girl.
I hate to be blunt again, but why should we care about this particular family in a devastated region? In fact, having been sent in from a different region, they seem to have life pretty good.
~2 years ago~
New issues which have arisen with Unnova, is the amount of stronger than average pokémon, no-one is quite sure given the disappearance of five people, one a pokémon researcher, two strong trainers and two communication engineers, although if they have passed it is unknown given the communications systems are still patchy, last reports of them are sighted along Route 6, as they were setting up a communication system and hoping to re-boot that from the laboratory along the route. Much of the structure has now been completed, including a re-vamp of the gyms and new gym leaders and gym apprentices which have now been named. New members of the E4 have also been named.
...Within eighteen years of Route 6 being
ground zero for a region-wide devastating viral outbreak, they're simply trying to rebuild on the land? I'm sorry, but that's another fatal flaw.
Why should the new Gym Leaders matter? This region was literally hell on Earth just a few years earlier. A full recovery like this does not happen that fast.
"E4" is not anywhere near an acceptable way of writing "Elite Four."
The new gym leaders include Cheran, a normal type pokémon trainer with a team of six situated in the southern western part of Unnova, of Aspertia City. Named due to his ability to keep the city and Floccesy Town under control during what is now known as the dark age. His team consists of Patrat; Lillipup; Minccino; Deerling: Teddiursa and Pidove. Each one bred down from a variety of pokémon, he once owned. He is the first pokémon trainer to be challenged. The second is Leanne, daughter of Roxanne the previous gym leader, she unlike her mum doesn’t have a speciality but uses pokémon from her surrounding location and uses local pokémon and has Magby; Snivy; Magnemite; Venipede; Jellicent and Aron.
The third is Lucy, a rather strong teenager, from Willow’s school she specialises with bug and poison type pokémon, she was named from Burgh, who found her to have the same love with bug pokémon as he does and a student from his art classes as well. She has Karrablast; Shelmet; Scolipede; Durant; Beedrill and Ariados. The fourth is Darren, he was named, and also still specialises with electric pokémon, and owns a fashion brand in Nimbasa City, which is also very popular. He has Jolteon; Ampharos; Zebstrika; Eelektrik; Manetric and Electrode. The fifth gym leader, previously known as Clay, he has now retired from his role full time, and is now the manager of his construction company, preferring to keep this role to his role as Gym Leader, now in Driftveil City, his son, now runs the gym, known for having an eye for the ladies, his name is Leeland, he has several strong pokémon including Hippowdon; Excadrill; Krookodile;Seismitoed; Swampert; and a Pupitar.
The sixth gym leader, previously Skyla, who sadly died during the dark ages, a self appointed young trainer who worked with Skyla, who is Celina, she continues to use flying type pokémon, as did her predecessor. Mistralton City is still a city surrounded by mountains, and large forests now, overgrown from the dark ages, she uses Mandibuzz; Unfezant; Archeops; Salamence; Skarmory and Swoobat.
The seventh previously Brycen before his retirement, now, it is closed permantly, given that Twist Mountain is unable to be climbed due to pokémon within the mountain, now abandoned by people, once a rich mining area. Also inaccessible from the other side due to the collapse of the Tubeline Bridge which has rusted and collapsed in many places. The seventh gym is now in the location of Humilau City, previously the eighth gym leader, now the location of the seventh badge. Now the new gym leader Adrian also known as Ady, is now a fire type gym leader, having been officially named, due to a lack of strong trainers within the area, he has Blaziken; Chandelure; Flareon; Magmortar; Simisear and Volcarona. The final gym leader is called Laura, the great grand-daughter of Drayden, and a notable and strong mixed speciality trainer, she has
Gardevoir/Lapras/Dragonite/Emboar/Lilligant/Bastidon.
The new E4 are also named with them either retired, or passed, and with the lack of a tournament of the league, this has become a brand new team, with the expection of Iris and have now been made as Rose, who specialises in Poison types, Hermione who specialises in Ice types, Jacob who specialises in Grass types and the final Lavender who specialises in Dark type pokémon. Each now have six pokémon for the challenge. Rose has Muk; Weezing; Skuntank; Amoongus; Tentacruel and Nidoking. Hermione has Glaceon; Vanilluxe; Beartic; Flosslass; Aurorus and Weavile. Jacob has Meganium; Maractus; Shiftry; Ferrothorn; Sawsbuck and Breloom. Lavender has Umbreon; Absol; Spiritomb; Bisharp; Hydreigon and Honchrow.
"Cheren," not "Cheran." "exception," not "expection."
Absolutely none of this is relevant, and there are multiple issues with how it's presented. All of those semicolons should be commas, the slashes dividing Laura's team members should also be commas, and a number of Pokemon names are misspelled, including Seismitoad, Amoonguss and Froslass.
Luckily the economy is making steady progress and well on the way to recovery, and Unnova is now able to be self reliant on food for Spring/Summer and Autumn, and now able to slowly climb up for stores and for Winter, although importing food over Autumn is still high.
This level of recovery is just not realistic in the least.
Now, news from Kanto circulated, that due to illness, Professor Oak died. The news rocked echoing down into everywhere. Further news rocked Gary Oak’s world, upon discovering he wasn’t the biological father, to his and finance’s child.
This feels like a cheap attempt to create drama, because it's simply not relevant to anything going on.
Within Willow’s world, she was bullied, with three people prosecuted for harassment, assault and immediately expulsed from school. Her brothers were not tried or prosecuted for assault upon these people. After this, bullying stopped luckily, however with such a lack of confidence Willow had decided she may not want to travel, depending on how she would feel after graduation, now been held in Aspertia City, in order for the new Unnova trainers to take full advantages of the revamped areas and new gym leader’s.
This isn't how bullying actually works. In reality, often times the bullies get away with it, and most certainly, her brothers would be prosecuted (saying 'tried and prosecuted' is repetitive) for attacking them, which is a very poorly established fact. You simply refer to it once in passing as if it already happened and thus the reader should already know it.
Is this just setting up a trainer journey story?
~Present day~
The remaining issues with Unnova, that remained included the migration and immigration of non native pokémon. However many of the companies and now shipping companies were using Unnova to and from and around the world. Peace and harmony were resolved.[/i]
A few remaining gangs and groups remained but now by comparison, quiet and most now removed by the newly reformed police force. However much more was much needed. In order to resolve and ally many fears, a few brave, fearless trainers had decided to travel and to capture many strong exotic pokémon. Most of the gyms that had become unusable and now new ones had been built and others revamped. In between many of the cities were beginning to be rebuilt at a high cost of requiring specialist people so jobs are still scarce. Many of areas had now become crumbled, overgrown and filled with many stronger and powerful pokémon that anywhere had ever seen.
But what happened to the virus?
Now called upon, include pokémon researchers, gym leaders and apprentices and those with experience with travelling and within the health care system. Russell Smith has been asked from his employer Paul, the current eighth gym leader of Kanto has been asked to go, as had Hazel Cedargren from Candice, the Shinnoh gym leader at Snowpoint City. Worried about previous events from his mate he has asked Gary Oaks to come out with him, agreeing albeit reluctantly, and pressured by his sister to help him with his depression. Further trainers including Misty and Ash Ketchum have also been asked.
"Sinnoh," not "Shinnoh." And again, "Oak," not "Oaks."
I'm beginning to get a bad feeling that everything interesting you had going was merely a plot device to set up a bunch of famous trainers in the region, nevermind the fact that the region shouldn't be anywhere near completely safe yet.
Other routes now lie within similar ruin. However there is a small group, of the most remarkable and toughened trainers from previous travelling.
A few trainers, willing to put their own mark on this new Unnova, one of which is Willow, having moved to the area, about two years previously. She is now graduating from the Castelia City Trainer School, beautiful new and full of dangerous and deadly memories for her.
...She went from being too afraid to travel because of lack of confidence to being willing to do this? It's just too much. I can't buy it.
Now my assessment overall.
You started out with some great ideas, I have to give you that. Ghetsis ordering Team Plasma on one last spite mission, society collapsing because of a viral outbreak, the recovery... all those things would have made for a substantial and fascinating story.
The problem is that all of those things were merely setup. They were just plot devices, introduced and then discarded within a prologue that served as little more than an info dump of twenty years' worth of events, all just to set up a fairly standard trainer fic. The resolution of a lot of these events was simply not credible, especially the resolution of the virus, which was just about entirely nonexistent. Maybe everything else could have been saved, but with how much information you dumped on me in this prologue, I felt terribly overwhelmed at the end and it wasn't even that long. A large amount of this information is information that could have been better given in later chapters.
I know you said that you have issues with spelling and grammar, but you have to hold yourself to a higher standard than simply doing nothing about it and expecting everyone else to overlook it. It's okay if you cannot resolve those issues on your own. There is something known as a 'beta reader' that you should familiarize yourself with. A beta reader is someone who agrees to help you proofread your writing before you post it and will help you fix problems with it. You should find someone who will agree to help you with that.
Overall, while I think there were definitely some excellent ideas at the start, I'm afraid I just can't say I'm satisfied after reading it all. The things that were interesting were quickly brushed aside and forgotten in favor of subjects that were less involving because of how rushed they were and how much information was dumped on me. There is something good here, though, so I wholeheartedly encourage you to work hard and do the work necessary to make this story great. It will take a lot of work, but you do have some great ideas and I really want to see you realize their potential. Good luck!
