Pokemon has been a Golden Goose for Nintendo for a long long time. Created by Game Freak and co-developed by Creatures Inc, Pokemon started as an ambitious project, that became a Global Phenomenon in the 90's and early-2000's.
I myself am a fan of this franchise. So today, I'll be listing off a bunch of Facts about the franchise.
Note - This will NOT be a List of Every fact, just the ones that I know. Plus, this list will Only focus on the Games, not the various Animes or Mangas.
The Beginnings - Game Freak's Ambition.
Development of Pokemon began as far back as Mid-Late 1990! Just 1 year After the Game Boy's release and on the Same Year as the release of the Super Famicom. Only, it wasn't called Pokemon, it was called Capsule Monsters.
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To round up enough Yen for their project, Game Freak worked several odd-jobs for Nintendo, they also did a few for Sega too, one of which was Pulseman for the Sega Genesis. When they finally gained enough money in 1994, they were able to go full speed ahead with their Capsule Monster project.
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Hiroshi Yamouchi, Nintendo of Japan's President at the time, had little faith in Game Freak's concept, considering it as game that wouldn't catch on. Shigiru Miyamoto (Mr. Nintendo), however, was interested and agreed to help Tajiri and Co. any way that he could. In time, Yamouchi would reconsider his earlier opinion on Pokemon and embrace it as the Cash Cow that it was.
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Generation 0 - Capsule Monsters/Capumon
Most of the Monsters were loosely based on Kaiju. And the concept for Capumon/Pokemon came from Ultraman's Capsule Kaiju. They also came from Gashapon Machines, which are a part of Japanese Pop Culture.
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In-game trading came about when Satoshi Tajiri and Ken Sugimori were chatting about Dragon Quest and Tajiri was upset that Sugimori had 2 rare items (the mad caps), while he managed to get none. So from that they came up with the Link-to-Link trading.
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It wasn't just Pokemon that would've been traded, but Items too. However, that was dropped early on.
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Also, Trading would've cost in-game currency, kinda like a paid service. Another idea tossed around was that instead of a trade, Players can Buy Monsters from other Players, and that each Monster had their own price value assigned to them. The rarer the monster, the more expensive they would be. These concepts were dropped, as well.
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Players would've also been able to trade multiple Pokemon at once.
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Instead of PokeDollars, the in-game currency would've been Gold, which the player would win via Trainer Battles or by finding them in Dungeons..
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There originally gonna be 30+ monsters due to the lack cart space, but Shigiru Miyamoto stepped in and gave Game Freak larger size carts to work with So the 30+ Monsters became 200,which was cut down to 190.
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Trainers had to catch their first Pokemon on their own by taming them via a whip. This was scrapped very late during this stage of development.
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There was planned for a Charisma stat for the player, the higher the stat, the easier it would be to tame and catch the Monster. This idea was scrapped late during the "Capsule Monster" Era.
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There were initially 4 types of Monsters -
Normal Ones, which were the run-of-the-mill monsters that Players could always catch.
Mirage Monsters, which were Ultra Rare Monsters that appear randomly in Dungeons, which may take Days to find and were extremely difficult to catch.
Power Kings, which were very rare, very powerful, and very tough to catch
Then there were the Uncatchable Monsters, which included Boss Monsters and Monsters from Other Trainers. This idea was scrapped during the final days of this Era.
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The Capsule Monster World was pretty different from the Kanto we know. 1. It had a slightly different shape. 2. It had areas not seen in the final game, such as a Graveyard, a Lake, a Desert, and even a Military Base. There was also a TV Tower, which was based on Tokyo Tower. These locals would later be used in future games.
This version of the Map also had many, many dungeons.
A 2nd version of this Map would be designed near the end of this era . This one resembling the final Kanto Map, but with an extra Island, which I'll talk about later.
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Many of the Monsters had slightly different designs. ex. Blastoise had no cannons in the 1st Draft Concept Art, but was given them in the 2nd draft. Archanine was a Kirin and not a Dog. Gyarados looked like a Giant Worm with sharp teeth.
Rhydon lacked his iconic Drill Horn. And Scyther was a Dragon with Insect-like features, instead of an Insect with Dragon-like features.
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There were also a few Monsters from the drafts that were cut, such as the Godzilla-esque Gaoon and the MechaGodzilla-like Omega. More on the scrapped Mon later.
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Some Monsters were designed with specific tasks in mind. Mon such as Rhyhorn, Lapras, Archanine, and Spearow (who was bigger) were meant to be used for transportation, in addition to battling.
While Mon like Clefairy and the Nidoran were also meant to be pets.
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In addition to catching Monsters, Players had the opportunity to Buy them at Shops. Kinda like a Pet Shop. These were scrapped in the final game, but the Game Corner Prize Shop and the Magikarp Salesmen are remnants of this idea.
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In addition to a Male Trainer, there was also a Female Trainer, as well. No clue if she was to be playable or just a Concept Character. A Female trainer,Leaf, would be playable in the Gen 1 Remakes.
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A piece of Concept art shows Monsters hatching from Eggs This wouldn't be a thing until Generation 2
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Another Concept that was thrown out was a Tower Dungeon called "The Tomb of the Mythical Beasts". This idea was repurposed into the Lavender Town Pokemon Tower.
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Trainers carried Whips, including the Player. This was scrapped for being too cruel, though some trainers still carry whips in the final game, like Sabrina.
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Speaking of Whips, instead of Gym Badges, the player would earn Dojo Belts. These belts would signify a Trainer's Rank. And each belt would double as a whip. The Ranking System was scrapped later down the line.
Oh, and Pokemon Gyms were known as Dojos during this point in development.
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During this era of development, there were no Types, No Evolutions, and
No Starter Pokemon. Or no Pikachu, for that matter. Those would be
added in later.
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200 Monsters were planned, before Game Freak decided to cut 10 near the beginning of the next development era. But after realizing that their deadline was coming up and they were running out of cart space, they were forced to cut the Monsters down to 150.
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There would've been special battles where the Trainer fought alongside their Pokemon. This was scrapped early in the era.
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The HP bar was implemented at the very end of this development era. Instead, damage was indicated by simple text. After finding it too boring, Game Freak implemented an HP bar.
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Generation 1 - Alpha Kanto.
Game Freak had issues trademarking the name "Capsule Monsters", so
they shortened it to "Capumon". But, not too long after renamed the games
to "Pocket Monsters" instead.
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Initially, Game Freak had no intention on adding Link-to-Link Battles, but Nintendo wanted it, so it was implemented late in development.
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Battles and Dungeon crawling was gonna be Mega Annoying, with not only, Monsters attacking the Player every 3 steps, but also Trainers challenging you to battle every time they saw you...even If you've beaten them.
Thankfully this line of thinking was scrapped during development.
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Initially, there were gonna be 65,000+ versions of a single Pokemon
game, with each game having randomized dungeons, unique to that game..
This was beyond complicated, so Shigiru Miyamoto advised them to scrap
the idea and go with 2 different Versions, each with their own exclusive
Pokemon. Satoshi Tajiri liked the idea and went with it.
Though, Tajiri wanted the game to be 7 Colors - Red, Blue, Green, Yellow, Pink, Violet, and Indigo. However, after realizing that development resources and manufacturing redundancy would be a factor, he decided to limit the versions to just 2 colors.
Every color, with the exception of Pink and Indigo, were eventually used. Though a Pokemon Pink WAS considered as a counterpart to Yellow.
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Red and Blue were gonna be the colors initially, but after deciding that Venusaur looked better than Blastoise, so a Green version was paired with Red. Though, a Blue Version was made later.
Red and Blue would eventually be paired up for the West.
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Pikachu started out as a "Yuki Usagi" (a daifuku baked in the shape of a rabbit), but with electric abilities. Atsuko Nishida came up with the design and the name. Unsatisfied, Game Freak told Nishida to rework the design. So she did, into a Squirrel. Not too long after Pikachu was tweaked into the design we all know and love.
Pikachu's black-tipped ears were already part of the original Daifuku design.
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Early in this Development Era, a couple of Popularity Polls were held at Game Freak. There were over 200 Monster designs and the rejected ones were cut. One such Monster was a Mecha-Gojira-esque Dino known as Omega.
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As mentioned earlier the Games originally had 190 Pokemon, but due to time, budget, and cart space limitations, 39 Pokemon had to be cut. These Pokemon include - Gyaoon, a Dinosaur Pokemon inspired by Godzilla and later redesigned into Tyranitar for Gen 2.
A Monsterous Cactus,A Wide-Eyed Crocodile,a Pokemon that was a cross between a Moose and a Caribou. As well as a basic Balloon Pokemon.
There was Also a Cut Evolution for Raichu called Gorochu, whom had fangs and a Powerful Horn. Wartortle had a different Evolution, before Blastoise was eventually made it's final form. Blastoise was part of a 2-Stage Turtle Pokemon family that never was.
The Squirtle Line and the Scrapped Turtle Line were combined, due to Game Freak feeling that having 2 similar Turtle Families would be redundant. So the Blastoise Pre-Evolution and the Original Wartortle Evolution were scrapped.
And that's just the tip of the iceberg. I'll chat more about Cut Pokemon at a later time.
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Trainers, called Dealers in this stage of development, were gonna Take The Players Pokemon if they won against them. But the Game Freak staff thought it would be too cruel to lose a beloved Pokemon that you've trained, so they scrapped the idea.
This was similar to an old Japanese Card Game, a name which I forgot, but was implemented as part of the Pokemon Trading Card Game, which came out a Year after the release of Red and Green.
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Inns were part of the plan and they would've acted like the Inns in a typical RPG. There was also Pokemon Shops, in addition to the regular Item Shops.
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At One Point the player was allowed to Rename entire species of Pokemon. But, Game Freak thought that this would become confusing,so they scrapped it.
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There was a City below Celadon City on the Alpha Map that was scrapped. It was the only place where That Infamous Truck could be found, before it was moved to the docks outside of Vermilion City
Speaking of, Celadon City was a Port City, while Vermilion had the Department Store. And Route 19 had a Beach House. Also, Prof. Oak's lab (which was a school at that point) was in Viridian City.
Victory Road was just a normal outside path and the Indigo Plateau was a Cave. It wasn't even called Victory Road yet.
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Viridian Gym was gonna be the 1st Gym (then Dojo) and it was gonna have a a 13-year-old Boy (Yuuchiro) as the Gym leader, leaving Brock as the 2nd. Blane was a Military Man, who was changed into a Scientist to disconnect him with Lt. Surge.
Erika was a Ghost-Type Leader and Sabrina was the Final Leader (makes sense, since Psychic-Types were the most powerful type in Gen 1) Also, Giovanni wasn't a Gym-Leader yet.
All of this was carried over to the Early-Mid Beta Stage of development.
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Pokemon Generation 1 - Beta Kanto.
Sometime during this stage of development the 190 Pokemon were cut to just 150 (151 later). Those 39 Pokemon became Missingno (more on that later).
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Belts became Badges Very Early in this Stage of development. And Dojos became Gyms. And Dealers were re-titled as Trainers.
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The Seafoam Islands never existed in the early Beta, Instead,there was a Lighthouse. This Lighthouse was only around during the Early-Mid Beta Stage of develpoment, before being replaced by the Seafoam Islands.
The Sevii islands were gonna be implemented, but were scrapped due to limited cart space. These Islands would later be added to the Gen 1 Remakes, Fire Red and Leaf Green.
Victory Road was implemented during the Mid-Beta Stage of development.
Oh, and the Pokemon Tower was bigger.
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Link Cable Battles were a Very, Very Late addition to the Games. This feature was added at Nintendo's request.
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Now we talk about The Silph Challenge and the Indigo Plateau. The Silph Challenge was an optional "Quest" the player can do, likely in the Post-Game.
There, the Player would battle one of each Trainer Type, as well as have a rematch with each Gym Leader. Green/Blue,the Rival, would've also been fought as the final trainer. After all of that, the Player would get the chance to battle and catch Mewtwo on the final floor.
Note that at THIS Point in development, Mewtwo was just a Powerful Legendary and nothing more. It's Backstory wouldn't be developed until much later.
The Silph Challenge was scrapped Late development and Mewtwo was moved to the Cerulean Cave aka The Unknown Dungeon.
The Indigo Plateau was an actual Dungeon Tower, with each floor representing previous Dungeons like Mt. Moon and the St. Anne.
Once the player has completed all of that, they would fight the Elite 4 and Champion (Green/Blue) in a Gauntlet. .
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The original Bird placement was as follows - Articuno was located in a scrapped area within the Seafoam Islands, before it was moved to another part of the Dungeon.
Moltres had his own Dungeon located somewhere. That area was scrapped and Moltres was moved to Victory Road.
And Zapdos was originally the Legendary Pokemon located in Cerulean Cave/The Unknown Dungeon It was moved to the Power Plant late in development. In fact, the Unknown Dungeon Wasn't a post game area. As the player was able to go there after winning all 8 badges.
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The Bird Type was a scrapped type that represented the Bird Pokemon. However, Game Freak had the Foresight that not Every Flying Pokemon would be Birds, so they replaced it to the Flying-Type.
Funnily enough, the Bird Type remained in the Final builds of the Game, but remained unused...for Actual Pokemon,at least!!!
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Late in this stage of development, Game Freak was debating whether to add Multiple Save Files or Nicknaming The Pokemon. They were running out of Cart Space, so they had to choose one. They chose the option of Nicknaming the Player's Pokemon.
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At This stage, Giovanni was an Unofficial Gym Leader,having one withing Rocket HQ. He was also a Flying Type Master. What he'd give you for beating him is unknown.
Game Freak liked the idea of the Big Bad being a Gym Leader so much, they decided to make Giovanni an Official Gym Leader, as sort of a plot twist. So, They decided to scrap Yuuchiro (the original viridian gym leader) and replace him with Giovanni. And to prevent the twist from being pointless, Game Freak made the Viridian Gym the Last one.
One thing to note is that despite the move, Giovanni was Still a Flying Type Master. This is why the Green Badge/Earth Badge resembles a feather. He was changed to a Ground Type Specialist very late in this stage of development.
And instead of changing the badge, Game Freak just recolored it to Green.
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The Silph Co. President was meant to be battled in the Safari Zone. His roster is unknown, but he has the Sprite that Blaine would eventually be given. As for Blaine? Well, he was originally a Military Man.
Blaine was changed for 2 reasons - 1, To separate him from Lt. Surge. and 2, To give him a closer connection to Cinnabar Labs, as the Silph President looked like a Scientist.
The Silph President battle being cut and the changes made to to Blaine were made late into this stage of development.
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Scrapped mid-stage during this point in development was Jack, the Robot Trainer. Yes. A Robotic Pokemon Trainer. He was likely a product of Silph Co. and had Porygon as his signature Pokemon.
Jack was scrapped for unknown reasons.
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Due to lack of Ghost-Types,Erika, who was originally a Ghost Pokemon Mistress, was made into a Grass-Type Leader instead.
Thanks to Giovanni and the Plot Twist of him being the Viridian Gym Leader, Sabrina went from the 8th gym leader to the 6th.
Also, Agatha of The Elite 4 had a roster of Touros and the 3 Eeveelutions, but was made a Ghost Trainer instead.
All of these changes were done late in this development stage.
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Green/Blue once had a Younger Brother. He was scrapped early in this stage of development.
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Arcanine was once planned to be a Legendary Pokemon, but due to Arcanine not fitting in with the Birds, this plan was scrapped Late in development and was made the Evolution of Growlith instead.
Dratini, Dragonair, and Dragonite were Also planned to be Legendaries, but that idea was scrapped, as well.
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A history of Mew - Satoshi Tajiri conceived Mew as a hidden Pokémon
inspired by a hidden/unused F4 phantom fighter ship in Xevious.
In
the world of arcade machines in general, "facts" like these were
sometimes reported as misinformation in related print media, similar to
the "Pokégod" rumors which emerged on old Geocities sites. Mew's elusive
existence is also what inspired its status as the first Mythical
Pokémon. There were no true resources available for datamining video
games at the time, so confermation of their existence was impossible.
There
were also various glitches (which were misinterpeted as rumors or
secrets) were discovered in the games to actually obtain Mew without a
cheat device or a distribution event.
Tajiri was a huge arcade fan and was not just interested in the games themselves, but how they internally functioned.
Other
than its initial conception by Tajiri,Shigeki Morimoto created
everything there is about Mew, writing its Pokédex entry, choosing its
cry, and even drawing its sprite. When the game was just about to
officially finish development, once the debug features were removed, he
used what little space had been freed up to insert Mew.
Ken
Sugimori was originally asked to make Mew, but since the development of
the games were so close to completion, there was no time left to design
it himself, leaving Shigeki Morimoto to do it himself. Mew's sprite is
also only 40×40 pixels because this was ideal for saving space.
Game
Freak wanted a Pokémon that would serve as the origin of Mewtwo other
than the indirect references in the Pokémon Mansion (in fact, Mewtwo was
actually programmed and designed into the game first). The debugging
process of Red and Green was the most expensive in Nintendo's history,
and despite strict orders for Red and Green not to be edited after the
debugging features were removed, Shigeki Morimoto did it anyway.
To
do so, he namely overwrote the first empty index slot he found,
resulting in Mew being found early in the internal index. It was only
later that Mew was discovered, and Morimoto was quite surprised to find
out that this was the case, with Mew instantly becoming the source for
many playground rumors.
Mewtwo was originally conceived without
Mew, with the latter actually being designed after the former. It then
becomes clear that Mew was originally just a being that was never to be
seen, its name only mentioned in the Pokémon Mansion journals. When it
comes to the canon, the two were later reworked into a "perfect original
being and imperfect clone" duo.
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Pokemon Gen 1 - Final Kanto
Pikachu wasn't supposed to be the Mascot, instead it was Clefairy.
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Professor Oak was meant to be a Post-Game Super Boss. With a very high level team and the best A.I. out of all of the Trainers in the game. This fight was scrapped for unknown reasons.
Oak's roster would've had a Gyarados, an Exeggutor, an Arcanine, a Tauros, and the Fully Evolved Starter that neither the Player, not the Rival had chosen.
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Missingno is a Glitch that is, in reality, junk data of the deleted Pokemon.
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The Link Trade sequence was gonna have it's own unique song. This was scrapped for time.
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Our Pokemon Red and Blue is just Japan's Pokemon Red and Green with the Japanese Blue's Sprites. So, in a way, Our games are kinda unique.
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There was once a Pokemon Pink planned, which would've had Clefairy as it's main Pokemon and would've been the counterpart to Pokemon Yellow.
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In Pokemon Yellow, Giovanni was gonna have his own theme. This was scrapped for time.
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Here's another Pokemon Yellow fact.- The Player gets to manipulate which Eeveelution Blue/Green/Gary will get. If the Player beats him in Oak's Lab and then on Route 22, Blue/Green/Gary will evolve his Eevee into a Jolteon.
If the Player beat him in the Oak's Lab, but loses to him on Route 22, he'll evolve his Eevee into a Flareon. And In an act of Super Arrogance, he'll evolve Eevee into a Vaporeon if the Player loses to him both in Oak's Lab and on Route 22.
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Here's another Yellow exclusive factoid - All 151 Pokemon were gonna have their Anime Cries, not just Pikachu. But, due to the poor quality of the cries And the fact that Nintendo would've needed to change most of the cries for each region,this idea was scrapped.
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Pokémon Yellow contains an unused encounter type For this type, attempting to fight, access the item menu, or switch Pokémon triggers the unique message "Hurry, get away!" The player has no choice but to run. Escaping from this encounter type is 100%.
Because this encounter type only exists in Yellow, it may be that players would once have had the option to obtain their own Pikachu beyond the walls of Pallet Town, rather than being forcibly gifted one by Professor Oak before leaving. In this scenario, an encounter mode in which players were forced to escape if their party was empty would be essential for preventing the player from sending out an invalid Pokémon
And That's the end of the Generation 1 facts that I know. Stay tuned for Part 2, where I spit out some of the best factoids of Generation 2 (my favorite pokemon generation).
