Pokemon Platinum
I went ahead and caught Pokemon from the routes leading to Veilstone city, then went past and caught a Houndour that I named Midnight, after the one I named Midnight in Pokemon XD. Then he evolved straight away after a rare candy was used, then i did some training, but he still had no good attacks, aside from Bite. I had to beat Maylene without him, because he's under leveled and weak to Fighting type. I then solo'd Maylene's team with Skye (Staraptor), using Aerial Ace on Meditite, two Aerial Aces on Machoke (He brought me down to 1 Health with a crit) and one Close Combat on Lucario.