User blog:Netscapenavigaytor/pokepasta shared universe headcanon rambling

putting this as a blog post instead of an article since it seems more like blog material (though if anyone says otherwise i'd be fine with moving it) so--

i've been thinking a lot about many of the traits that non-pokemon world pokepastas share, and i've came up with a sort of headcanon/theory of sorts on a shared universe that might fit most "real world" pokepastas, and perhaps many haunted game creepypastas in general. i hope this'll make sense.

to start: in this universe, the boundary between fiction and reality is VERY thin. fiction, however, is dependant on reality and much of it is very malleable in nature. nothing is quite as malleable as video games, since they have a direct method of interaction with real people and can often also be easily modified by third parties. game worlds are in a dubious state of existence where sometimes they exist when no one is playing and sometimes they don't.

the thing about game worlds, though, is that how "real" they are usually depends on the amount of real world emotion and sentimentality is put into it. there are exceptions - like if someone subconciously influences the nature of a world by believing it to always continue even if they've never played it or a ghost decides to directly control the nature of the world - but a straight example would be Pokemon Dead Channel, where the narrator's investment in Pokemon Channel and BRVR's world made it continue to be "active" without the narrator directly playing, much to BRVR's misery.

more "real" game worlds also lead to the characters being more likely to take on personalities of their own in general, often but not always the personalities players project on them. in fact, for every slaughterhappy overly-attached pokemon, there are several more pokemon who stay in their lane. but nobody's going to notice something odd about the trusted charizard who quietly followed all the rules, the well-adjusted shiny vaporeon who just moved on with their life after getting traded for a legendary, or the friendly pidgeot that maybe snuck in a line or two of encouraging dialogue where it wouldn't be weird. so, often, the only time people think about the nature of "fiction" and "reality" is when things go horribly wrong.

often, things going horribly wrong is directly connected to the game worlds' overreliance on reality. most (but not all) denizens of games do not think things in the terms of "real" and "fake," and often do not even comprehend that their world is just a video game in ours. they just understand that people in reality interact with the world on a different level, and that these people are undeniably important. some understand that they wouldn't exist without the real people, some don't. so, particularly strong personalities are likely to seek out real people and try to be as directly involved as possible, potentially to the point of clinginess. they rarely view real people as gods, and many believe they will continue existing even after all the real world people that knew them are gone.

in the case of those like BRVR and many, many other pokemon negatively affected by being left by the player, there is a sort of "withdrawal" effect that can come when the player leaves them. this withdrawal is usually not the entire problem for those who had clingy personalities or other underlying problems anyway, but together with other circumstances can severely damage one's psyche. withdrawal can be caused not only by the game not being played, but also by being released, being sent away by a person they formed an unhealthy dependence on, being boxed and ignored... etc. withdrawal can usually be shrugged off by pokemon without other underlying problems, however, and sometimes all it takes is regularly thinking about a pokemon to keep it from even getting withdrawal.

the "realer" a game character is, the more likely they are to be capable of directly influencing the real world. there's the common "complete restructuring of their own game" but there are also nore direct examples. with most this sticks to perceptional things - reflections in mirrors, dreams, shadows in the corner of one's eye - but particularly powerful ones can physically affect things. the "realest" ones can physically manifest if need be or even take people from the real world into the game world. this is... typically not something done by game entities who don't already have nothing to lose, because reality is on a higher plane of existence than them and they risk their own destruction whenever they attempt direct interaction. also note that their ability to influence the real world has little to do with their in-universe power: a level 2 HM slave bidoof that has been the recipient of strong emotions of any kind for years would be capable of much more than a level 70 arceus that was caught and then boxed by a collector with no strong feelings on fictional animals.

because of the malleable nature of game worlds, things like cheats and glitches inherently don't make too big of an impact on the world itself. the problem only arises when cheats and glitches are used in such a way that defies the nature of the world. for example, an exp multiplier, while perhaps being seen by some as unscrupulous, would likely not stir up trouble. on the other hand, wild pokemon modifiers and codes to put a specific pokemon in a certain box are risky as the act of just poofing a pokemon into existence can throw things out of whack - even ignoring the existence of unusual, possibly supernatural cheat codes which are purely malicious in nature.

persisting after their data has been deleted or game has been destroyed is actually extremely common. it's usually only the dangerous or clingy ones that make an effort to follow into games they don't belong. others linger as spirits or presences of sorts either in the real world or the game world, eventually moving on and disappearing. yes, i am saying that in the world that most pokepastas take place in, digital pokemon can and usually do have souls.

ghosts, demons, and other entities can ignore almost all the rules due to being a third party and not an entity unique to the game worlds. often, though, these sorts of beings actually possess games specifically BECAUSE of their malleable nature making the games easy to work with. most strange dark cartridges of unknown origin where the pokemon and characters themselves have no agency are the work of other beings and not the denizens of the world itself.

thats all i can think of for now, and this is pretty dang long anyway for something that i'm not sure anyone else really cares about, but i hope at least someone finds this interesting. i may organize this more at some point, i may not.