Why can't the first clue refer to Geodude?

another clue included unevolved, so i think there's the distinction between unevolved and first evolution

Something I've tried but without success. There's 149 characters if you concatenate each pokemon name. I then used the pokedex entry numbers to retrieve the characters (ended up with pyalaireeeuCdvharfx). I then tried to apply a vigenere cipher using the first letter of each of the pokemon ('them'), which was gtcoewmrsbnrmccbgvn. But it ended up being a string of random letters.

hi

pokemon with "key" in their name - Mankey