So since a majority of people said they've never raised a Chao before, I was kind of thinking I could do a few posts on raising Chao, even though I'm certainly no expert on the subject, but I know, at least, enough to get by and enough to get the Chao-related Emblems in Sonic Adventure and Sonic Adventure 2. Note that while everything is fundamentally the same in both games, I'll be using Sonic Adventure 2 as my basis as that's the game I spent the most time raising Chao in and the one I'm more familiar with as a whole. But with that said, let's just start with the basics, eh?
What are Chao and how do I find them?
Chao are these small, blue creatures (as pictured above) that act like a virtual pet of sorts. They come in all sorts of colors and forms, but the one shown above is the default look for any young Chao. In Sonic Adventure, you can find them within the 3 Chao Gardens. One is within the left-hand elevator in Station Square's hotel lobby; one is found in a Mystic Ruins cave near Tails' Workshop; and the last is found in the Egg Carrier, after going through the door by the floor tiles (which you have to push down in order to spell out EGGMAN), and can be accessed via teleporters in each garden for quick travel.
In Sonic Adventure 2, you can enter the Chao Garden by breaking a blue Chao Box, grabbing the Chao Key, and making it to the end of the stage without losing the key, which happens if you die. From that point onwards, you can access it from the Stage Select screen, but only with characters you've gotten the Chao Key with (so if only Sonic and Knuckles have entered the Chao World with the Key, only they can be selected from the Stage Select menu).
What's the point of raising a Chao?
For the most part, it's a side activity that you can do to pass time, and if you like games where you can raise a virtual pet in some capacity, then I think you'd like it a lot.
But otherwise, if you're trying to collect every Emblem, then the Chao Garden is a required stop on your journey, as there are 5 Emblems to collect in Sonic Adventure from the Chao Races, and there are a total of 9 Emblems in Sonic Adventure 2 (5 are Chao Races, and the other 4 are Chao Karate, which only applies to Sonic Adventure 2 Battle, or the Battle DLC pack in the 2012 re-release on PSN and XBLA), so if you're trying to get all of those Emblems, you better have some time handy!
How do I raise a Chao?
To be 100% honest, that falls on you, as everyone raises their Chao a little bit differently. Some people try for a specific type of Chao. Some people go for all-S stats for the "perfect" Chao. Some people work for the legendary Chaos Chao (more on that in another part). Some people just raise their Chao with whomever and see what happens. How you raise your Chao and what they become all depend on you.
For starters, by defeating enemies, you can collect animals and Chaos Drives to give to your Chao (Chaos Drives only exist in Sonic Adventure 2, just to note), which in turn will boost one of their 4 main stats: Swim, Fly, Run, and Power. These stats dictate how well a Chao can do in each category, which will be tested in the races you do. For example, a Chao with a high Run stat will outrun most of the other Chao, and a Chao with a high Power stat can climb walls much faster than the rest. Naturally, you're going to want to raise the stats as high as you can.
The 5th stat is Stamina, which is naturally the hardest to raise, as the stat only goes up when you feed your Chao any type of food. In a sense, Stamina helps your Chao evolve faster, as once they reach somewhere around level 10 in Stamina, they evolve, unless you wait it out, but more on that another time.
Do Chao die?
Yes, in time. A Chao's full lifespan is 5 years, which translates to roughly 20-25 hours in real time. Time only passes while you're inside the Chao Garden, mind you. During this time, your Chao will evolve a couple of times as they grow up and gain skills and even change form. When Chao die, one of two things will happen.
If your Chao enters a white cocoon, then your Chao is dying, and will be gone forever. This will only happen if you didn't love your Chao enough, and abused it and hurt it and made it upset. Most likely you won't see this, but it's worth mentioning still. However, if your Chao enters a pink cocoon, it will die, and when the cocoon dissipates, there will be an egg left behind that this same Chao will emerge from. This is reincarnation, and when they reincarnate, Chao start from scratch, with the stat grades being the same (if they die and have an S in Fly, they will still have that S in Fly), and with 10% of their overall stats being kept (So if their Swim stat is 1,000 when they die, they will start off with 100 in their Swim stat upon birth. It probably sounds a little complicated, but it's not too bad once you get the idea.
That's all for the bare basics. Tomorrow we'll get into some stuff with stats and character alignment, so I hope you look forward to that. I'll see you again soon!
Have a nice day!~
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