One of the biggest additions to HeartGold and SoulSilver is the PokéWalker - a pedometer bundled with each copy of the game. This allows you to transfer Pokémon from your game to your PokéWalker and then carry it around with you, training it as you walk. The PokéWalker uses it's own "currency" based system of Watts (shortened to w in the game). Every 20 steps taken with the PokéWalker will earn you 1w on the game. When you send your Pokémon back to your game it will earn EXP equal to the steps you have taken. However, the Pokémon can only grow one level per PokéWalker visit (any extra EXP after this will be discarded) and the Pokémon will not learn any extra attacks by growing this level, so you will have to time your trips to the PokéWalker perfectly.

Each PokéWalker area has three types which will influence it to your advantage - whenever a Pokémon of a strong type is transferred into that area, the channel of finding a rarer Pokémon or item will slightly increase, as well as lowering the step count needed for a Pokémon by 25%. For example, sending a Ground type into the Pikachu-filled Yellow Forest will be an advantageous type.

There are two main reasons for collecting watts - the Poké Radar and the Dowsing MCHN features on the PokéWalker both require you to spend watts in order to use them.

Poké Radar

There are two methods of catching Pokémon in the PokéWalker. Rarely, if no Pokémon is present on the PokéWalker a random wild Pokémon will decide to follow you and take the place normally occupied by your Pokémon, effectively catching you a Pokémon for free. The most common method however is to use the Poké Radar. Using the Poké Radar will cost you 10w and presents you with a screen showing 4 patches of grass. An exclamation mark "!" will appear above one of the patches, and you must use the buttons on the PokéWalker to align your cursor with the patch of grass and then push the center button to look in that patch of grass before your short time limit expires. If successful, either a battle will begin or the process will repeat. As you repeat the process, you may start to see more exclamation marks appear, indicating a better "class" of Pokémon, all the way up to three exclamation marks "!!!".

Each Route has six different Pokémon which can be caught - 2 in Group A, 2 in Group B and 2 in Group C. When you send a Pokémon to the PokéWalker, 3 are randomly chosen - one for each group, and these are fixed until the next time you send a Pokémon to the PokéWalker, when they are randomly reassigned. All Pokémon are given random natures - using Synchronize will not effect this.

You can see a list of Pokémon which can be caught on each PokéWalker Course, and a list of all the courses, by clicking here.

The battle mechanics on the PokéWalker have been incredibly watered down. Type advantages play no role at all, and both Pokémon start with 4HP. Three options are available - Attack, Evade and Catch. Attack causes you to perform a basic Tackle attack which removes 1HP from the wild Pokémon (2HP if a Critical Hit occurs). Evading will cause the Opponent's attack to miss - evading successfully will in turn result in attacking the opponent, while both Pokémon evading will result in nothing happening at all, but will increase the likelihood of the wild Pokémon fleeing. The Catch option will throw a Pokénall at the Wild Pokémon. Getting knocked out by the Wild Pokémon will cost you a further 10w. You can only catch up to three Pokémon at a time in a single visit to the PokéWalker - catching another will cause you to choose one of your three to release.

Dowsing MCHN

The Dowsing MCHN will cost you 3w to use, and helps you to find items. Six tufts of grass are shown and you have two attempts to find the item hidden in one of them. If you are unsuccessful in your first attempt you will be told how far away you are from the item. If the item is described as being "close by" then it will be in one of the adjacent tufts of grass. If it is described as being "far away" then the item will be at least two tufts of grass away.

The other options displayed on the PokéWalker menu are fairly self-explanatory. Connect allows you to connect either to a DS to receive or send back a Pokémon (or Connect to another PokéWalker, which will yield an item if both PokéWalkers contain a Pokémon, although this can only be done once a day), Trainer Card which will show you details such as the Trainer Name, the time, the number of steps taken and the current area. Pokémon and Items, believe it or not, displays all the Pokémon and Items you have found in your current session. Lastly, Settings allows you to play around with the sound and shade options for your PokéWalker.

Page written by Typhlosion.

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