Wrapping Up Castelia City

After you return to the Pokemon Center to heal your team up, be sure to resupply Pokeballs and any other supplies you need, and then you may want to pause for a moment and take a look at its capabilities. If you have been making similar choices to mine, your team will consist of five dual-type Pokemon and one single type, which for me was my Purrloin/Liepard, who is a Dark-type.

After seriously considering this I opted to swap out my Liepard for the Onix that I caught in the Relic Cave, my reasoning for that being that the Onix is a Rock/Ground dual-type, and for some of the battles coming up that can be a useful combination to have. Since my Onix was only Level 18 it was necessary that I level them up, but as I also need to level up the rest of my team to the target level of 38, what I decided to do was rather than interrupt my training schedule to bring Onix to parity, I instead had them hold the Experience Share that we picked up earlier, so that they could passively level while I raised the levels of the rest of the team.

With that decision made, and the Exp Share in Onix's hands, it is time to wrap things up in Castelia City before departing for richer leveling grounds!

Exploring the rest of the City

Assuming that you have obtained one of each type of Pokemon from the Sewers and the two areas that connect off of the Sewers (the Grove and The Relic Passage, though note that you cannot get all of the Relic Passage Pokemon from this side so completing the Habitat List for the Relic Passage will have to wait a bit) now is a good time to finish exploring the northern end of the city - but if you have NOT obtained one of each of those Pokemon, now is the time to head back into the Sewers and do that.

If you open the Pokedex and select Habitat you should see a Pokeball Marker beside each of the following zones:

• Route 19

• Route 20

• Floccesy Ranch

• Castelia City

• Castelia Sewers

The only one that is not marked as complete is The Relic Passage, and as I say that will have to wait until you gain access to the other side of the Relic Passage.

Assuming you have done that, and you have all the Pokemon in your collection that you can have obtained, head north up one of the roads to the Square now and through the Square to the north exit by the vending machines, where you run into that mysterious character we first encountered in the Sewers!

They ask to take a look at your Pokemon – no harm in doing that, and it might earn you a few compliments from them. The stranger introduces themselves as Colress, and says that they are a Scientist doing research to “Bring out the Power of Pokemon.”

They then ask you to battle with them to test their theory – heck yeah! We never turn down a battle! After you say yes they tell you that they will be waiting for you on Route 4, so follow them up the north road but do not enter the gate to exit the town just yet.

Adding a Funfest Mission

After you finish talking to Colress, look to the left and you will see an older trainer dressed in brown who, when you chat him up, will share with you some advice and then unlock a new Funfest Mission: "Train with Martial Artists!" You should be sure to chat with him and add that new Funfest Mission.

In addition to offering you the opportunity to obtain special items, meds, and berries, the Funfest Missions also provide the opportunity for you to enjoy a new style of multi-player cooperative game play, an addition to the Pokemon series that has been a long time in coming and that provides as much or more entertainment as it does the opportunity to collect some free goodies!

The Rest of the City

On your left above is the entrance to a building in which you can obtain an Amulet Coin from the trainer in the lobby on the left, near the counter. The Amulet Coin is a held item that causes you to receive a larger amount of prize money from your Trainer Battles, which can be a very useful thing to have.

There is a TV in the lobby you can watch – if you are working towards the Medal for watching TV you may as well see what there is to watch, right?

On the 11th floor you can talk to three trainers; the Police Officer on the left as you exit the lift makes on observation about missing Pokemon and Team Plasma, the girl Trainer on the bottom of the area asks where her Pokemon went, and the Trainer behind the desk on the right tells you how afraid he is of his girlfriend, heh.

That wraps up all that there is to be done here, so take the lift down and exit the building, then head across the street and through that door to that building where you find a man in black who insists on searching you before you can enter the lift to the 47th floor, where a party is going on.

A trainer gifts you with TM45 Attract, and you chat with a Spanish, German, and Italian trainer, which illustrates that Pokemon is a world-wide phenom!

Head back to the lobby and outside then into the next door on the right and you will find a bloke in a lab coat who, after examining your Pokedex gifts you with an Eviolite – a hold item that when it is held by Pokemon who have a remaining evolutionary form get a boost to their Special Defense and Offense.

The lift will take you to the 47th floor where you will encounter a trainer who will brief you on all of the badges you can earn in the region:

• Basic Badge - up to Level 20 Obey.

• Toxic Badge - up to Level 30 Obey.

• Insect Badge - up to Level 40 Obey.

• Bolt Badge - up to Level 50 Obey.

• Quake Badge - up to Level 60 Obey.

• Jet Badge - up to Level 70 Obey.

• Legend Badge - up to Level 80 Obey.

• Wave Badge - all Pokemon Obey.

On the floor is a Treasure Ball with a Charcoal in it to grab, and then head back down to the lobby and outside again. The gate ahead leads to Route 4, and on the left just before the gate is a vending machine if you need some refreshments for your Pokemon...

Check Out Your Map

Before you step through the gate open your City Map and you will notice that each of the towns that we have visited and explored are marked with blue dots, while the towns we have yet to reach are marked with grey dots... You will also notice that Castelia City is a crossroads that splits into two distinct paths – north will take you to Nimbasa City via Route 4 and Join Avenue, while to the east is the Skyarrow Bridge that will take you to Nacrene City and points east...

It may seem like you have to make a choice here, but actually you do not – the bridge is currently closed so you can only go north, but the thing is if for whatever reason you neglected to visit the bridge Gatehouse earlier when I covered it in the guide, you really want to go ahead and head all the way back to the south side of town and then enter the gate to the east, leading to the bridge, because there is a trainer inside the gate house who will gift you with a Quick Claw, which is a hold item that sometimes allows your Pokemon that is holding it to make the first move in battle even when the enemy they are facing is faster than they are.

The guard at the exit tells you that the bridge is being inspected and you will need to come back later, which is fine, we knew that the route to the east would be blocked until we obtained some more badges anyway...

Be sure to read the news ticker in the gate house just for the fun of it, and then exit back into the city.

If you have Victini

If you happen to possess Victini, having traded it into the game from Black or White, now is a good time to head to the Pokemon Center and temporarily add it to your party, then head to the docks and take the Ferry to Liberty Garden Island.

When you reach the Island, head up the stairs and then down into the basement of the lighthouse, and enter the room in the back of the basement. This is where Victini lived for a long time, and as you will see, she will pop out of her ball and do a bit of reminiscing. You do not gain anything from this, it is more of a special event to sort of celebrate the fact that you had the special Wondercard from the event and you obtained this Legendary (and impossible to get otherwise) Pokemon!

With that done, have a chat with the other people here on the island and then take the Ferry back to the city now.

The Pokemon Global Trade Network

Before we head for that battle with Colress and continue our Adventure, drop by the Pokemon Center and head up the stairs and talk to the counter girl to the far right (nearest the Globe) and she will tell you about the Pokemon Global Trade Network. I mean to tell you about this earlier, but now is as good a time...

The GTN is where you can go to trade for Pokemon you do not have, but there is a rub... The system is part of the Nintendo Wi-Fi Connection service, but it only allows you to post trades for Pokemon that you have actually seen and thus have a partial Dex Entry on. The exception to that rule is when you to negotiated trades with a specific trainer – but most of the trades you will do are the regular type, where you post one of your Pokemon on the network and ask for a specific other Pokemon.

You will see two main options: Deposit Pokemon, and Seek Pokemon.

Deposit Pokemon: This option allows you to select a Pokemon from either your Party or from PC Storage, and then place it in the trade network to seek another specific Pokemon.

Seek Pokemon: You select this option to look for specific Pokemon that other Trainers have put up for trade, in the hopes that you have the Pokemon that they are seeking and can complete the trade.

It will help you to be very specific in level and type in order to narrow down the search due to the large Number of people who for some strange reason will put up regular Pokemon and ask for Legendary or Mythical Pokemon as the trade?! You will likely have more luck putting your own trades up and requesting the Pokemon you want – but hopefully you will not be one of those people who asks for an imbalanced trade.

That nicely wraps up the trade system and unless you have skipped over any of the items in the previous section, this should complete your exploration of the city and you should have everything that you can get here, so it is time to head to the north gate and Route 4, and the battle that awaits you there!