Hoothoot (1999)
“It marks time precisely. Some countries consider it to be a wise friend, versed in the world’s ways.”
Johto was home to Hoothoot, the cute tiny owl Pokemon that got a whole lot more powerful when it evolved into Noctowl. The second generation version of Pidgey was a pretty huge change up, not only in terms of its looks, but also in some of its noticeable and frustrating gameplay traits.
Though it’s listed as a Flying and Normal-type Pokemon, Hoothoot’s moves also focus quite heavily on Psychic. Hoothoot has an encounter rate of 33.3%, matching that of the ultimate Pokemon pest itself.
“Its eyes are specially adapted. They concentrate even faint light and enable it to see in the dark.”
Party of what made Hoothoot so frustrating was the fact it was nocturnal, meaning if you did actually want one, you’d need to wait until the evening in real-life before you’d have a chance of spotting one. That also meant, however, that if you were trying to catch another Pokemon at night, your encounters would be plagued with the beady-eyed owl.
To make things worse, if it got in the first attack, it’d just use Hypnosis and send your Pokemon to sleep. In terms of how annoying it was to encounter, Hoothoot is most definitely an evolution of the original Pidgey.
It was worth catching, however, with Noctowl having quite the mix of Psychic, Flying, and Normal-type moves. It’d take until level 20 for you to finally get a Noctowl, but then you can rest easy, as that’s the final evolution.
