Darth Wiki / Knight Pokemon University

Knight Pokemon University was a Role Playing Game on the Bulbagarden Forums that was active from December of 2009 to February 2012.

Where trainers and scholarly pursuits meet, there is the Knight Pokemon University. Trainers and Pokemon come to hone their skills under the tutelage of professionals and expand their horizons in an atmosphere of culture and understanding.

… is probably what was intended. Maybe. But in actuality KPU is filled to brim with students that come from disturbed, depressing, and downright weird backgrounds. And the professors are hardly any better. Clones, robots, aliens, secret order leaders, inventors, former thieves, heartbroken maids, singers, and the occasional normal person all call this place a kind of home. Somehow, they manage to find some sort of common understanding amongst their fellow traumatized students as they all try to work out their various flaws and psychosis in everyday life. Or dramatically clash in a soup of drama and angst. (It’s like, you know, 50/50.)

And learning of some sort happens occasionally. We presume.

But it appears that the University is more than simply a place for learning and unofficial therapy. Dark forces are at work behind the scenes and will (probably) draw the mentally unsuited students into their machinations. (Because, I mean… come on.)

This game provided examples of:

• Adults Are Useless: The teachers generally didn't do much apart from teaching and refereeing friendly battles, despite generally being leagues ahead of the students in skill. While the teachers sat around and deliberated, it was left to the students to deal with most crises that arose.
  • Including a teacher (who was from a Crossover from another Pokemon Roleplay), being kidnapped and having to be rescued by a team of under-prepared students. Although whether or not he actually was kidnapped, or if something altogether more sinister was going on is still in doubt.
  • It didn't help that the head Tactics Professor (who had the most powerful Pokemon at the entire school) didn't seem to care all that much about what happened, aided by the fact that he didn't find out about crises until they were announced publicly over the loudspeakers (and once they were, he was typically too tired or hung over to do much of anything about them).
• Apathetic Teacher: Unlike most apathetic teachers that have been beaten down by years of student abuse, it took exactly one class for James Dalton to lose all hope in his students. This is because they were acting more like grade school students than college freshmen. But that still isn't an excuse for him to have stopped caring already and leaving crises to his students when he is far more qualified to deal with them.
• Badass Teacher: His apathy towards his students aside, James is still incredibly accomplished for a teacher. A top athletic prospect during his college years, he would have had a future as a professional athlete if it wasn't for an untimely knee injury. After said injury, instead of giving up and going back to being Idle Rich, he became a Champion battler in less than five years.
• Berserk Button: Naturally, several characters had their own.
• Beware the Nice Ones: Melissa Tyler is supposedly known for being a very kind human being. However, when her Gabite and Venonat begin to annoy her while they're lost in the woods, she mercilessly beats them over the head with a map, causing Cranial Eruptions to appear on their heads.
• Breaking the Fourth Wall / Medium Awareness: Several characters acknowledged the fact that this was a Role Playing Game, and were known to argue with their "narrators" from time to time.
• Can't Have Sex, Ever: As it is uncertain what would become of any potential offspring, Colin's stepfather forbids him to attempt reproduction. Not to mention the excitement of non-reproductive sex would probably kill him.
• The Casanova: In less than a week at the school, Jonny has already been on dates with one girl (Melissa) and has another girl rooming with him (Joanie). Although the rooming situation between Jonny and Joanie was assigned by the school, the school certainly didn't plan on them sharing the bed.
• Changing of the Guard: This has happened multiple times with the leadership of the entire RP itself. The first leader and the founder of the RP, AiedailEclipsed, took a long break from the site as a whole, handing the RP over to his chosen successor, Hide in Plain Sight. However, said chosen successor simply didn't have time for the RP when he took over as the head of Bulbagarden's entire RP section. So he handed the RP off once more to the last leader, Glitchipedia, who has since shut down the game due to player inactivity.
• Chuck Cunningham Syndrome: Roleplayers came and went, so their characters simply faded away unless they returned to the game.
• Cool Shades: Jonny is rarely seen without his amber Ray-Ban aviators, and always seems to be flicking them on and off because he thinks it's attractive. To be fair, it usually works.
• Corporal Punishment: The resident android professor, ALISA, electrocuted anyone who was tardy to her class.
• Crossover: With Star Trek, of all things; one of the students was a Vulcan.
  • As well as an NPC teacher from another Pokemon Roleplay.
  • Colin's stepfather was set to appear in another Bulbagarden RPG, Evolution to Destiny. Said RPG died before it even got started.
• Dark and Troubled Past: With the students having severe anger problems, typical android problems, coming from Orre, being an orphan and losing all faith in being good, parent and self esteem problems, KPU should probably have invested in a psychiatrist.
• Development Hell: The YouTube series has been discussed at length, but a team to make it happen has yet to be assembled. The forthcoming reboot of the RPG is being delayed by debates over how to make it work.
• Dysfunction Junction: Speaking of which (though they never completely fell apart).
• Fainting:
  • Ciel, type Emotional
  • Colin, type Anemic
• Fantasy-Forbidding Father: Colin's adoptive father may qualify, denying Colin many of the everyday pleasures enjoyed by natural-born humans in an effort to protect him. Probably justified in several cases. No one's really sure what made the old man agree to let Colin become a trainer.

• Foreshadowing: There have been hints that the University wasn't all it seemed to be.
  • Given the results of three students attempting to rescue a teacher that may or may not actually have been there, the University seemed to have a rather abnormal ghost infestation in the basements. Where this was going is anyone's guess.
• Gentleman Snarker: Jonny is well off, having been sent to Eton by his father to learn to be a proper gentleman, he can speak French and Italian fluently... really he has all the makings of a high society young man - except for the fact that he just doesn't care. He'd much rather surf, pick up girls and work out.
• Global Currency Exception: The traditional Pokémon dollars seemed to work fine for buying lunch, but if you wanted the necessary equipment for capturing and training Pokémon, the local campus shop only accepted campus credits. Fridge Logic ensued when you had to use campus credits to buy an apartment off-campus.
• Gratuitous Japanese: Akuji Amara's father is obsessed with his slight Japanese heritage, something that annoys Akuji to no end.
• Greek Chorus: Joanie, Collie, Annie and Bella. In the YouTube version, they are set to be joined by, of all people, Bennie and the Jets.
• Grey-and-Gray Morality: Lampshaded word-for-word.
• Happily Adopted: While Colin does disagree with his adoptive father's parenting technique on a few counts, they overall have a good father/son dynamic.
• Hilarious in Hindsight: The use of ghosts to kidnap and remove a character from the story is especially funny given that ghosts appeared to be behind (or at least a major player in) the kidnapping of a teacher in the story proper.
• Iron Butt Monkey: Jack Snow's first appearance on campus involves him falling from the sky, smacking his face on a lamp post, and landing upside down in a rubbish bin.

• Lovable Rogue: Jonny isn't the best at following rules or getting to class on time, but his likable charm makes it so no one can really stay mad at him for long.
• Mary-Sue Hunter: Characters were virtually killed for treading into Mary Sue terrirory, a majority of them by not-quite NPC Pit Beaker.
• Meaningful Name:
  • Jonny is named after Johnnie Walker (the scotch). His creator was brainstorming names for the character and happened to look at the empty bottle above his desk. The rest, as they say, is history.
  • "Jim Gai" is a pun on "gym guy".
• Non-Idle Rich: James comes from one of the richest families in Hoenn and could have spent his life lounging by the pool, but instead he became the Champion of the Hoenn region and a teacher.
• No Social Skills: Traveling with barely any human contact for years on end has not helped Nick’s social skills. He has a vague idea of what's proper and what's not, but it often confuses him.
• Oh, My Gods!: Colin is known to take Arceus' name in vain frequently.
• One-Hit-Point Wonder: Repeated tampering with Colin's brain before his "birth" had the side effect of making his nervous system hypersensitive. All of his senses are amplified, meaning normal sensory input is annoying to him and high levels are potentially lethal.
• Overly Long Name: Colin's full name is Colin Francis Harry Pierino Sonan.
• Parental Abandonment:
  • Joanie's father left when he found out her mother was pregnant. The day before Joanie turned ten (which also happened to be Christmas Eve), her mother was mugged and beaten to death.
  • Collie's real parents were criminals who got themselves arrested when she was three years old. She was subsequently adopted by a couple of drug addicts who shared their addiction with her. Then they overdosed. And she got all the drugs to herself.
  • Bella had parents at one point. She doesn't remember them. Nobody does.
• Put on a Bus: Roleplayers who break the rules excessively were usually punished by having their characters disappear without much explanation.
• Recycled: The Series: An animated YouTube adaptation is underway.
• Ridiculously Human Robots: Two of them. The better example was one of the teachers, while the other was a student who was getting used to the "human" part.
• Scars Are Forever: The scars on James' left knee are from an operation due to a sports related injury. Important to the plot because the injury drove him to succeed at Pokemon battling, thus setting the events that led to him becoming a teacher in motion.
• Shout-Out:
  • Joanie's talking, singing Bellsprout, Audrey II.
  • This being an internet game, that was merely the most present one. In game shoutouts ranged from CSI: Miami to Castlevania.
• Sophisticated as Hell: Annie's Porygon-Z could well use "Analyzing," and "Okay, that is not normal!" in the same sentence.
  Porygon-Z: Explorer.exe has encountered a problem and needs to close.
  Average Joe: Say what now?
  Porygon-Z: I'm having a stroke, you idiot.
• Summon Backup Dancers: Collie, Annie and Bella often showed up out of thin air for musical numbers.
• A Tragedy of Impulsiveness: Joanie knowingly allows her lust to get the best of her and ends up creating a love triangle between herself, Jonny Walker and Melissa Tyler. On one hand, she doesn't particularly want to give Jonny up, but on the other hand, neither does she want to hurt Melissa.
• Vitriolic Best Buds: Joanie and her Bellsprout bicker constantly, yet seem to bear no actual malice toward one another.
• Webcomic Time: Went for a few years and some change, and about five and a half days went by. Given that it was a forum-based RP, this is standard fare.
• We Named the Monkey "Jack": Jack Snow is named after his mother's deceased Poochyena.

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