"a" - Surskit

283: Surskit

We already got a second Bug type! This time it's a pond skater! Woohoo! Pond skaters are fun little bugs, and of course, by fun we mean treacherous. The reason Pond skaters can stay afloat is a combination of water-repelling micro-hairs and having a broad legspan that spreads out their already light weight. They hang out on the water to feast on other insects that aren't so great at swimming, and are stuck half-drowned. Surskit is surprisingly sinister!

Though Surskit is a very funny simplification of a pond skater. Just a ball head that has some legs that end on pin-prick feet. You did it, that constitutes a bug! Yet another Pokemon that feels like it'd fit right at home in a Kirby game. It also gets a single antenna on top, which apparently secretes a sweet droplet to tempt predators with and get away. It's like a silly combination of a pond skater and an aphid!

Seething. Malding. Infuriated, even.

284: Masquerain

🧡Masquerain is a Pokemon I used to have a bit of an annoyed outlook on. Bug/Water is such a cool typing on concept that was irritatingly unexplored at the time, but we've now gotten a handful of Bug/Water types, so Masquerain dropping Water for Flying stings a little less.

That said, that's not gonna stop me from pointing this out: Masquerain still COULD be a Bug/Water type. We got plenty of Bug/Flying types by now and will continue getting more, so why skimp out on a new cool type combo? And LOOK right there! There's reference art of it using its "legs" to stand on water too! It's STILL a pond skater! Agh!

Though that isn't necessarily a detriment on the design itself. Masquerain is nice, having big wings with angry eyespots, never a loss in the design department. And it's made extra neat with how the orange marking denoting its face looks a bit like a canid nose for the full effect! Even the big obvious teardrop-shaped head is kinda neat lookin! The wing-legs are nifty, though they look a little awkward as legs. We'd say the only real downside to it is that it doesn't really look like an insect anymore, though in this case it can't be that bad since it looks so much its-own-thing.

Perhaps if it was Water/Bug it'd get 8, maybe even 8.5, but that type change still stings even in a world after Araquanid and Golisopod.