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| Sigilyph as seen in TCG. |
There's weird and there's
weird, and today's Pokémon - whose name is apparently fucking hard to spell, because I keep typing its goddamn name wrong - falls into the latter category for sure. Sigilyph looks like some kind of totem pole made by an ancient civilization, which is backed by its Pokédex entries and the fact that it is found in the Desert Resort, an area in Unova with a lot of historical significance. The area - which, despite its name, is hardly a resort - is devided into two sections, the entrance and the desert itself, and Sigilyph can be found exclusively in the latter section at an encounter rate of only 5%. Aside from Zen Mode Darmanitan, who is a static encounter anyway, Sigilyph is the only Pokémon that can be found exclusively in the desert section of the Desert Resort. Of course, there's no historical importance to the likes of Sandile, Darumaka, Maractus, Dwebble and Scraggy, but it goes to show how rare Sigilyph actually is. In fact, Sigilyph seems to be thousands of years old and once guarded (and patrolled the boundaries of) an ancient city, and due to it retaining steadfast memories from that, it apparently flies along the same route it used to fly along back in the day while keeping watch for invaders. This is probably also why Sigilyph uses its psychic powers to attack anyone who dares invade its territory, which in turn suggests that all Sigilyph are primitive and habitual creatures in nature, doing only what they are told or programmed to do. If not man-made, Sigilyph is definitely alien, and its special relationship with the people from the ancient past - whether it has a long lifespan, telepathically passes on its memories to its kin or doesn't age at all; you could keep speculating about that - makes it a very interesting Pokémon.
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Sigilyph and Natu. Both are avian creatures with the
psychic/flying type combination and Native American
origins. |
It's not often that a surge of sudden originality rushes through the hallways of Game Freak's headquarters. Sigilyph seems to be mostly based on the Nazca Lines, a group of very large geoglyphs formed by depressions or shallow incisions made in the soil of the Nazca Desert in southern Peru, allegedly created for religious purposes between 1500 and 2500 years ago and hugely varying in shape and complexity. Hundreds of them are just simple lines and geometric shapes, but more than 70 are zoomorphic designs of animals such as a monkey, spider, condor, whale, heron, pelican and even a hummingbird, the latter of which was the obvious inspiration for Sigilyph's design judging by the elongated feathers and the two black three-toed 'forks' at the side of its spherical body. However, Sigilyph is actually so colorful and richly decorated that I don't think the Nazca Lines were the only inspiration for its design. Immediately, the other psychic/flying birds - Natu and Xatu - come to mind, and like them, Sigilyph may be based on
kachina dolls. These are based on spirit beings in the religious beliefs of Native American cultures located in the southwestern part of the United States called the Pueblo people and often symbolize personifications of things in the real world. Due to Xatu and Sigilyph sharing the exact same type combination and pretty much the same origins as well, Sigilyph could be seen as a rehash of Xatu, but it is so drastically different from the latter in both design and flavor text that I am more than willing to let it slide.
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Sigilyph chillin' with Unown in the ruins of Relic Castle, standing smack-dab in the
middle of Desert Resort. |
In fact, this Pokémon bears some uncanny resemblances to another Gen. II Pokémon called Unown. Quite a few of Sigilyph's foreign names go the generic way with the inclusion of the word 'symbol' one way or another - although its Japanese name Symboler (シンボラー) refers to the bora, a northern to north-eastern katabatic wind (a wind that carries high-density air from a higher elevation down a slope under the force of gravity) in the Adriatic Sea, or even Ra, the ancient Egyptian deity of the sun - but its English and French names are a lot more clear-cut, with Cryptéro being derived from 'cryptogram', a symbol or figure with secret or occult significance. Additionally, a sigil is an inscribed or painted symbol held to have occult power in astrology or magic, referring to Sigilyph's psychic type, while a glyph is an elemental symbol within an agreed set of symbols, intended to represent a readable character for the purposes of writing and considered to be a unique mark that adds up to the spelling of a word or contributes to a specific meaning of what is written. Similarly, the term 'typography' is applied to the style, arrangement and appearance of the letters, numbers and other symbols created by the process of arranging type to make written language legible, readable and appealing when displayed. That's why Sigilyph bears so many similarities to Unown, who are based on the 26 letters of the Latin alphabet - as well as the exclamation mark and the question mark - and can be arranged in such ways that they spell words.
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Sigilyph depicted as a statue of some kind of ancient
deity. |
But while Unown are great Pokémon conceptually, their stats vary from really mediocre to downright terrible. Sigilyph, on the other hand, is reasonably fast and pretty offensive on the special side of the spectrum, while also being moderately bulky. It's not exactly a tank by any definition of the word, but it can live a few hits and definitely dish out a few hits as well. Combine Sigilyph's good special attack with a Timid nature and the fact that it doesn't take any passive damage - think of Stealth Rock damage, poison/burn damage, weather damage and Life Orb recoil - because it has access to one of the best abilities in the game, Magic Guard, and you'll have an amazing competitive Pokémon on your hands. On top of that, Sigilyph has an incredibly wide offensive movepool consisting of Psychic, Air Slash, Shadow Ball, Energy Ball, Heat Wave, Ice Beam, Flash Cannon, Dark Pulse, Dazzling Gleam, Signal Beam and even Ancient Power, and you could choose whatever suits your needs. Roost and Calm Mind definitely will, because they allow Sigilyph to heal half of its maximum HP while losing its flying type for the remainder of the turn or raise its special stats by one stage each every time it's used. This Pokémon is speedy and bulky enough to rock some other support moves as well, though. Magic Guard honestly makes Sigilyph the best Pokémon out there to use Psycho Shift; just let it hold a Flame Orb or Toxic Orb so it gets burned or badly poisoned, respectively, and transfer the status condition onto the opposing Pokémon - a burn can be crippling, especially to physical attackers. Reflect and Light Screen can be used to raise your entire team's defenses, Thunder Wave and Hypnosis will definitely limit your opponent's movements, and Trick Room completely reverses the move order within each priority bracket so that slower Pokémon move first and faster Pokémon move last for a couple of turns. You'll have to take a more defensive approach in order to use these support moves effectively, but just throw Cosmic Power into the mix and your Sigilyph will be able to take more than just a few hits.
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| A shiny Sigilyph encounter in Ultra Space. Admittedly, it's a pretty good shiny. |
I absolutely love creepy and bizarre Pokémon, especially intentionally bizarre Pokémon like Sigilyph. It looks like it has three eyes, but the eye on the head-shaped stalk seems to be its one true eye - again, just like Unown - as demonstrated by its in-game sprites, especially in Pokémon-Amie and Pokémon Refresh, as it's the only one that is animated to blink. It's true that Sigilyph borrows some elements that made similar Pokémon like Xatu and Unown so interesting in the first place, but it still maintains a good amount of originality. Its design and flavor are executed in a much better way than Xatu's, for example, and it's definitely much more useful in competitive than Unown. Game Freak took the origins of Xatu and the mystery surrounding Unown and greatly improved on them, making Sigilyph a relevant Pokémon on its own merits by giving it historical significance within the Unova lore.
P.S.: Now that we're talking about creepy and bizarre Pokemon... just wait until you meet the next ones on the list.
Rating: 5/5
