As I continue on my quest of covering all the gym leaders of Pokemon, I arrive in Fuschia City. For those interested, I take the bike path to get there. Less trainers, less wild encounters. Anyway.

Like many of the other Kanto gym leaders, Koga is very memorable. His ninja theme stands out and his gym puzzle with the invisible walls is iconic. He's also one of the few Kanto gym leaders to gain an interesting role over the course of the series.

Koga is a poison type specialist, focusing on bulky Pokemon that can take hits and spread poison across your team in some war of attrition. Earthquake isn't available at this point in the game, so Dig and Psybeam are your best friends. Those who defeat him are granted the Soul Badge.

Pokemon Red, Blue, Fire Red, Leaf Green

Koga has a pretty simple team in the original Kanto games and their remakes. He uses a team of 2 Koffing, a Muk, and a Weezing as his signature Pokemon. He spams poison moves, accuracy dropping or evasion boosting moves, and is overall a menace. If you're lucky he'll explode his Weezing and you won't have to deal with it anymore.

Pokemon Yellow

I want to highlight his Yellow team because it is quite peculiar. Yellow tries to follow the anime, and as such they decided to give Koga a Venomoth. Sounds fair right? Now he'll have a more diverse tea- wait a minute. The man literally uses 3 Venonats and a Venomoth. Where are all his other Pokemon? He doesn't even have the Golbat he does in the anime. Weird design choice, but an easy gym fight. He does have that Golbat, alongside Venomoth, Muk, and Weezing in the Let's Go games I suppose.

Pokemon Gold, Silver, Crystal, Heart Gold, Soul Silver

Koga hasn't been sat around doing nothing for the two years after the events of the generation 1 games. In fact, he's about the only one that's done something of note among all the Kanto gym leaders. When you arrive in Fuschia City, the gym is still there. Still poison type. Except... Koga isn't here? You see, my main man Koga decided being a gym leader was nice and all, but not his goal in life. This man is ambitious. That's why when Lance called, he answered. Yes, Koga actually got a full on promotion, and acts as the second Elite Four member in the generation 2 games and their remakes. He left his Poison gym in charge of Janine, his daughter and ninja pupil, and took his squad of Poison friends to the Indigo Plateau.

As an Elite Four member, Koga mainly utilizes similar tactics he did as a gym leader. Spreading Poison, confusion, sleep, and evasion manipulation.

He took his Muk (and Venomoth) with him, and added a few Johto Pokemon to diversify his roster. Welcome Ariados, Forretress, and Crobat. I honestly really like his team, even if it's not the greatest when it comes to type diversity. His Muk has given me issues before, being hard to kill and setting up Minimize to become even worse to fight against.

I think it's really neat that we actually see something like a Gym Leader becoming an Elite Four member, it makes the world of Pokemon feel a bit less static I suppose.

Pokemon Black 2, White 2

Koga, unlike most of the other gym leaders, actually does not return in Black 2 and White 2 for the World Tournament. Instead his daughter Janine is there to represent the Fuschia Gym. Thought this was an interesting fact. I suppose being an Elite Four has its perks after all.

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And that's Koga in a nutshell! Really fascinating guy, I love his aesthetic and he seems to be a doting father for Janine. In the manga he was working with Team Rocket, but I'll ignore that minor fact for now and continue to hold a high opinion of the guy.