Shortly after arriving in Oreburgh City, you’ll be greeted by a Youngster who will show you to where the Pokémon Gym in town is, with your Rival, Barry, standing outside of it. Talk to him and he’ll tell you that the Gym Leader isn’t there right now and is instead in the Oreburgh Mine. That’ll be your next destination to progress through the game, but there’s still more to check out in town first, as well as an optional area.
Western Apartment Buildings
In the upper floor of the first apartment building in the city (the one immediately after the stairs near the entrance), talk to the girl on the left and she’ll give you a Dusk Ball, which is a fantastic item to catch Pokémon with at night or in dark areas like caves—it has 3.5x the catch rate of ordinary Poké Balls! You can’t buy them normally for awhile, so you may want to hold onto this one for something super rare or hard to catch until they’re available, although remember they only gain the bonus at nighttime or in caves.
In the first floor of the second apartment building, there’s a girl that will offer to trade you her Abra for your Machop. This is a pretty good trade, because Abra have an annoying tendency of teleporting away on the first turn in battle. Machop can be found on Route 207 to the northwest of town, which is an optional detour. However, consider that Machop is a better bet against the upcoming Gym, since it’s a Fighting-type Pokémon and thus super effective against Rock-type Pokémon—because of that, you might want to go ahead and catch two Machop so you’ll have one for trade!
[info title=”Traded Pokémon Grow Faster, But…”]Pokémon that you get in a trade, whether they’re from in-game NPCs or other players, are considered traded Pokémon (also called “outsider Pokémon” in certain official materials). By default, they gain a bonus 50% EXP anytime they earn EXP, meaning they will level up much faster. That’s fantastic!
However, this comes at a cost: traded Pokémon might disobey you in battle and not execute the move you instruct them to use, instead using something else, slacking off, or doing some other action. That’s not good, now, is it? No, not at all! The number of Gym Badges you have determines the maximum level that traded Pokémon will obey without any problem.
By default, Pokémon in Diamond and Pearl will obey up to level 10, and after that they won’t obey 100% of the time until after getting your 2nd Gym Badge, the Forest Badge, after which they’ll obey up to level 30. Every two Badges in these games increases the limit by 20, and after earning all 8 Badges, disobedience won’t be a problem.
Thankfully, after getting your 2nd Gym Badge, unless you are overleveling your traded Pokémon (i.e., raising its level much more than expected for a certain point in the game), you’re usually going to be fine as most Trainers and even Gym Leaders stay under that limit, but until you reach that point, it might be a bit rough.
Because of that, this traded Abra, as well as any other traded Pokémon you get, might be a bit of trouble until after getting your 2nd Gym Badge, so just keep that in mind! However, after that point, you’ll find them leveling up very quickly by comparison and will have no other negative side effects, aside from being unable to change their nickname, of course.[/info]
Her Abra is named Kazza and comes with an Oran Berry equipped. It’s also a Quiet nature, which isn’t too bad for Abra, although it lacks any attacking moves. If you still have TM10 Hidden Power, that’s a good move to teach it, but again you might want to keep in mind that it will disobey after a bit.
Additionally, on the second floor of that building, there’s a man on the right that will want you to show him a Zubat. If you do so, he’ll give you an ITEM.
Poké Mart
Further right of the apartment buildings is the Poké Mart. It has the usual items, as well as a second clerk that sells something new.
[shoptable title=”Right-hand Clerk”]
[shopitem n=”Poké Ball” i=”poke-ball” c=200 desc=”Standard catch rate. Used for catching Pokémon.”]
[shopitem n=”Potion” i=”potion” c=300 desc=”Heals 20 HP.”]
[shopitem n=”Antidote” i=”antidote” c=100 desc=”Cures Poison.”]
[shopitem n=”Parlyz Heal” i=”parlyz-heal” c=200 desc=”Cures Paralysis.”]
[/shoptable]
[shoptable title=”Left-hand Clerk”]
[shopitem i=”tunnel-mail” n=”Tunnel Mail” c=50 new=true desc=”Write a message to another Trainer. Not useful.”]
[shopitem i=”heal-ball” n=”Heal Ball” c=300 desc=”Same catch rate as a Poké Ball. Heals the caught Pokémon if it is added to your party.”]
[shopitem i=”net-ball” n=”Net Ball” c=1000 new=true desc=”Has 3x the catch rate as a Poké Ball when used against Bug- or Water-type Pokémon.”]
[/shoptable]
The only potentially useful new item is the Net Ball, which works much better against Bug- or Water-type Pokémon, however it is a costly [pd]1,000, and most of these Pokémon you’re likely to run into at this point should be very easy to catch even with ordinary Poké Balls, so it’s not really worth buying them, at least not at this point.
Pokémon Center
The Pokémon Center is a bit to the southeast of the Poké Mart or directly east of the Gym. Definitely heal up your Pokémon since they’re probably a bit weakened from their recent trips.
There’s also a person in the Pokémon Center that asks which kind of Trainer you would like to be. What does this mean? What is it for? It is used to determine which character sprite you will use when in the Union Room or GTS with other players. It doesn’t really matter for much other than that, though, but that’s what it’s for.
You’ll also find that the basement to the Pokémon Center is now open. Go down there and you’ll be given a Pal Pad and an introduction to the Pokémon Center Wi-Fi Club. System-wide Friend Codes weren’t introduced until the Nintendo 3DS, so the Pal Pad was used in these days to register Friend Codes in the Pal Pad and connect with players online.
Sadly, the Nintendo WFC servers have been shut down for the Nintendo DS and Wii, so the Pal Pad is essentially useless nowadays during normal gameplay.
Oreburgh Mining Museum
To the north of the Pokémon Center is the Oreburgh Mining Museum. It’s free to enter (thankfully) and has a few exhibits you can interact with.
The man with the glasses at the counter isn’t helpful just yet, but you can come back to him later on and he will be able to turn old Fossils into Pokémon. Very helpful indeed! Remember to come back to him if you run across a Skull Fossil or a Shield Fossil in the Underground.
More Apartments
There’s another apartment building to the south of the Oreburgh Mining Museum. Talk to the Youngster upstairs and he’ll give you a free Great Ball, which has 1.5x the catch rate of an ordinary Poké Ball, making it fairly useful for catching Pokémon. You can’t buy these just yet, so it’s nice to get one a bit early.
Route 207 to the North
Although it’s absolutely optional and there’s not much for you there other than a few items and a patch of grass for some new wild Pokémon, it’s definitely worthwhile checking out, not to mention it’s a decent spot to grind for some EXP. It’s to the north of the Oreburgh Mining Museum and the Pokémon Center.
[link to Route 207]
The Exterior of Oreburgh Mine
South of the Pokémon Center is a rather large portion of the city, although there are few buildings here, and it’s instead taking the coal out from the mine further south. If you head all the way to the south, you’ll find the actual entrance to the mine down some steps, but there are a few more things to pick up beforehand.
To the west of the entrance to the mine, and then up to the north (behind the gate) you’ll find a pile of dirty sand called the slag heap. In the bottom-left corner of that heap (right up against the wall), press A to find a hidden Stardust, which sells for some pretty good money.
On the southeast portion of this area, there’s a man wearing a hardhat near a Machop. Talk to him and he’ll give you a Super Potion, which is a stronger version of the Potion that heals 50 HP instead of a mere 20 HP. Potions are usually fine for now, but this could come in handy while fighting against the Gym Leader, so you’ll probably want to save it until then, especially as you can’t buy them just yet.
Alright, that should be it for now, so whenever you’re ready, head into the Oreburgh Mine to fetch the Gym Leader from it!
[link to Oreburgh Mine]