The Game Freak Thread: Pokémon, New IP Etc. [Update: Nintendo Survey]

So Champions is the first fruit of the new studio in partnership with ILCA. Looks interesting so far, and a worthy successor to the Stadium titles.
 
Finally, the world has a second...no...third! Third chance to admire Chikorita's greatness!
Won't talk too much about my gameplay opinions but I did like it overall, definitely feels like they're taking a lot of big swings again like they did with the first Legends. I guess my main concern would just be that the gameplay we saw looked a bit...stiff? Moving around in Arceus felt amazing and if they can't capture that quite as well here then I'll be really disappointed.
Sales-wise, I'm still on the 20M+ train. People are familiar with Legends, it's got a holiday season to itself and it's had extra time in the oven. Feels like all the pieces are in place for another smash.
 
Think it's odd thar they didn't show a single new Mega,though that'll probably be the meat of the drip feed marketing leading up to release.
 
For the first part, the mainline games wouldn't be replaced at all because those games are built on the single player adventure. It is also quite idiotic of them to even believe the mainline games could continue to host the competitive battling scene or be the hub because the mainline can't support every poke species. Development would be insane. What about all the gimmicks in the past? The mainline games can't support that either. Champions and Home are the only software on Switch that supports All species of Pokemon. Thats what they are meant for, to be the new hub for all of Pokemon instead of asking the mainline games to be.
no one has said it would replace the main games for VGC. we just don't know. and it's not like having all the pokemon and gimmicks even matter. SS becoming the second best selling Pokemon game shows that Dexit didn't matter. and this past weekend, we had the largest ever pokemon tournament. so people don't need all the gimmicks to be into competitive.

but the main games still being the VGC format is still a thing that could be done. again, way too little info to know what they'll do

Part 2 I thought the giga leak revealed ZA was Switch only but Gen 10 was crossgen?
the leaker came back and said they found folders for "super ikkaku", similar to "super gaia". so there may be a switch 2 version or it could be testing
 
no one has said it would replace the main games for VGC. we just don't know. and it's not like having all the pokemon and gimmicks even matter. SS becoming the second best selling Pokemon game shows that Dexit didn't matter. and this past weekend, we had the largest ever pokemon tournament. so people don't need all the gimmicks to be into competitive.

but the main games still being the VGC format is still a thing that could be done. again, way too little info to know what they'll do


the leaker came back and said they found folders for "super ikkaku", similar to "super gaia". so there may be a switch 2 version or it could be testing
This is of course my speculation but I'm surprised how you are even debating this. Of course we don't NEED everything but why would a fan or the Pokemon Company not WANT everything in the competitive scene? I mean what could possibly be the point of releasing this? Its looking free to play (its a mobile game) and its based around battling with your favorite mons you got via playing the mainline games. Why move them to battle in Champions, when you can just battle in the mainline games? It made sure to show us it supports Pokemon Home and not the games directly. That hints towards its meant to support all species because Home supports All species.The trailer even showed us it possibly supports gigantimaxing and mega evoultion. Every mainline game can't support all the pokemon and the gimmicks. This could absolutely take the place of that, I don't need them to tell me something so obvious. The mainline games could absolutely keep the format but it would be dumb and consumers would absolutely view with Champions as superior. What is the down side? You notice the trailer blatantly showing us that Home is the hub for everything Pokemon to be exchanged including showing us Scarlet and Violet moving pokemon through home instead of directly to Champions. Home is the hub and the other software connect to it for whatever you want to do with your favorite mon.

As for the last part, that's good to here. Pokemon ZA will be a great crossgen game and now I think that Mario Kart or a 3D Mario will be announced to launch the console. Metroid is definitely cross gen and we will see again soon. Switch 2 is looking good for this year now along with Switch getting some releases all throughout the year. Late June launch with 3D Mario, September with Metroid 4 as cross gen, Pokemon ZA in the holidays crossgen. Sprinkle in some other first party (smaller) releases and 3rd party support and Switch 2 is looking good. Mario Kart 9 in spring 2026 with the Mario movie. Or flip 3D Mario and Mario Kart. I can only imagine the type of explosion Switch 2 could have if it had GTA 6 too but Mario, Pokemon ZA, and some AAA 3rd party support will do the job.
 
I don't really have any expectations for games other than PLZA.

My wishes/yearly disappointments:
- Pokémon Virtual Console (at least gen 1-3)
- Pokémon Conquest (Remake or new game)
- Pokémon Colosseum/XD Remasters
- Spinda fix for HOME/BDSP (and/or appearing in PLZA)

My hopes for SV distributions:
- Mythical Pokémon (Celebi (not shiny), Deoxys, Magearna (not original color), Zeraora (not shiny), ...)
- Gimmighoul (Roaming Form)
- Vivillon (Poké Ball Pattern; will likely be in PLZA)

My hopes for Pokémon appearing in PLZA:
- All of Gen 6
- Chespin/Fennekin/Froakie as first partner Pokémon and they finally get Mega Evolutions
- Furfrou with all forms and keeping the form when transferred to HOME
- Patrat + Watchdog + Elemental Monkeys
- of course new Pokémon, new regional forms, new Mega Evolutions
I'm disappointed in the SV distributions/raids but at least they confirmed Furfrou and Patrat.
Assuming Poké Ball Pattern Vivillon and all Furfrou forms will be available my LivingFormDex with Switch-Pokémon will only miss 18 Pokémon/forms at the end of the year (currently 31).

Having two first partner Pokémon from Gen 2 is weird but I'm willing to give Chikorita or Tepig a chance. Hopefully they'll give you the Kalos first partner Pokémon similar to the Kanto trio in XY.

Also surprised by how much they've changed the battle system. The moving around part looks a bit off but maybe it'll look and feel better at release and when actually playing.
(RIP False Swipe. At least for PLZA.)

Next year/Pokémon Day will be interesting. The battle systems from PLA, PLZA and the other mainline games are very different.
I was hoping the traditional mainline games would be influenced by the Legends style but at this point I'm expecting GF to experiment/try out their ideas in Legends without changing the other games too much.
 
This is of course my speculation but I'm surprised how you are even debating this. Of course we don't NEED everything but why would a fan or the Pokemon Company not WANT everything in the competitive scene? I mean what could possibly be the point of releasing this? Its looking free to play (its a mobile game) and its based around battling with your favorite mons you got via playing the mainline games. Why move them to battle in Champions, when you can just battle in the mainline games? It made sure to show us it supports Pokemon Home and not the games directly. That hints towards its meant to support all species because Home supports All species.The trailer even showed us it possibly supports gigantimaxing and mega evoultion. Every mainline game can't support all the pokemon and the gimmicks. This could absolutely take the place of that, I don't need them to tell me something so obvious. The mainline games could absolutely keep the format but it would be dumb and consumers would absolutely view with Champions as superior. What is the down side? You notice the trailer blatantly showing us that Home is the hub for everything Pokemon to be exchanged including showing us Scarlet and Violet moving pokemon through home instead of directly to Champions. Home is the hub and the other software connect to it for whatever you want to do with your favorite mon.
ok, now I think we're talking past each other. you're saying everything I already believe. I don't disagree with literally everything you're stating. I am just unsure how they'll handle what game will be on the stage at the tournaments
 
ok, now I think we're talking past each other. you're saying everything I already believe. I don't disagree with literally everything you're stating. I am just unsure how they'll handle what game will be on the stage at the tournaments
What do you mean on the stage? I think this is why we are because I'm not understanding. I feel kinda dumb lol.

Edit: I assume the game that host the event? The VGC is the championship and this game is called Champions. I'm pretty confident this will take over and its meant to keep everything from the past as part of the meta game instead of each mainline game removing certain things because the mainline game doesn't support the old gimmicks or removed pokemon. Champions solves all of this!

@Koni Yep precisely except technically collecting is in the mainline games and storage is what Home is for. Pokemon mainline games and Go are the ways to collect and experience pokemon. Home is the storage/trading and is already monetized lol. Champions is for the battling.
 
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The future of Pokémon’s gonna be split into three, one for each core tenet of the franchise:

- Mainline games for exploration and discovery
- Pokémon Home for collecting and trading
- Pokémon Champions for battling

With how big Pokémon has become and how modern it needs to be while still maintaining its schedule for the entire franchise, Game Freak simply can’t handle all the aspects in a single game anymore. This is ultimately why Dexit is and will continue to be a thing - it just took a while to solve and GF didn’t explain things well.

I think it’s a very good direction for the future of the franchise. Having specialized teams being able to focus on core aspects of the series allows for each team to make improvements concerning those aspects. Pokémon’s success on mobile is also a boon, as Champions looks to further serve as another way for GO players to hop into the main series - you don’t need to buy a Switch to officially participate in Pokémon battles anymore.

There’s potential downsides to this, obviously, some of which were mentioned above, but I do think that this can very much work overall in the long-term and the franchise would be better for it.
 
I'm honestly surprised Masters EX is still getting support, I hardly ever see anyone discussing that game at all. And ORAS content now of all times also seems very odd.
 
Champions and Home are the only software on Switch that supports All species of Pokemon.
But Champions won't support them at all, at least not at launch:

[1]Limitations apply. At the time of release, only select Pokémon will be available for use in Pokémon Champions—not all Pokémon available in Pokémon HOME will appear in Pokémon Champions. The Pokémon you can send to Pokémon Champions via Pokémon HOME are limited to Pokémon that appear in Pokémon Champions.

(from the press release).

Of course, there's little doubt all Pokémon will end up there eventually, but considering this is most likely to be F2P, they'll want to milk it for all it's worth and so it might (or might not) take a while.
 
I speculated that they should try for a crossplay mobile/Switch (2) battle simulator, where they wouldn't be bound by the mechanics/rulesets/Pokedex of whatever the current mainline format is. But I didn't think the first trailer for it would be so up-front about the concept that they'd literally show a mega evolution battling a terastalised Pokemon!
 
But Champions won't support them at all, at least not at launch:



(from the press release).

Of course, there's little doubt all Pokémon will end up there eventually, but considering this is most likely to be F2P, they'll want to milk it for all it's worth and so it might (or might not) take a while.
That's a good catch, I wonder if that is development related. That would definitely put a wrinkle in the current speculation. The Pokemon Stadium games for example had Pokemon with all types of different animations making development more challenging. That could be at work here, all the different species come with different animations for taking damage and moves, balancing such an ambitious project could will take time. Guess we will see.
 
Was there anything in the leak about HOME? Any changes or updates to its functionality and options?
nothing that that I can recall

But Champions won't support them at all, at least not at launch:



(from the press release).

Of course, there's little doubt all Pokémon will end up there eventually, but considering this is most likely to be F2P, they'll want to milk it for all it's worth and so it might (or might not) take a while.
considering home support came some months after SV launched, a repeat could be in the cards since there was nothing stopping them from supporting it day one. VGC should be moving over to Gen 10 almost immediately following launch, at least before the European Internationals. of course, they could decide to do things differently again



6+ hours later, some youtube numbers

NA Presents - 1.8M
PLZA Trailer - 166K
PLZA Extended Trailer - 313K

JP Presents - 2.4M
PLZA Extended Trailer - 231K
 
I'm honestly surprised Masters EX is still getting support, I hardly ever see anyone discussing that game at all. And ORAS content now of all times also seems very odd.

It made a grim $1.7m last November and $1.8m last December. Now that DeNA has other very obvious priorities, I do wonder if it might be shelved.

But then again, Unite has made less than Sleep despite releasing 2 years prior & it's still getting plenty of development & marketing. Who knows.
 
It made a grim $1.7m last November and $1.8m last December. Now that DeNA has other very obvious priorities, I do wonder if it might be shelved.

But then again, Unite has made less than Sleep despite releasing 2 years prior & it's still getting plenty of development & marketing. Who knows.
tbf Unite has Switch revenue too (and it even launched there first)
 
I think reception’s been pretty positive this time around? Apart from Reddit, it seems.
I think the overall internet is more positive. There are sites and forums like reddit that seem down on it, but that is to be expect it lol.

Since this is a GF overall thread, Matt Piscatella shared this on Bluesky.



Pokemon had an amazing 2024 and was the #1 best-selling toy property of the year.
And let's be honest, none of this would be possible without Squirtle.

In a year with no mainline or spinoff, I guess TCG Pocket was released, that is wild.
 
Only just saw mobile revenue tidbits buried in a PocketGamer article from yesterday.

So Pocket already went above $600m (last update was at $500m earlier in the month).

TU3tYlL.png


Masters:
This time last year [Masters] was the series’ second most lucrative mobile game, but having made 'just' $43.3m since last Pokémon Day.

Unite:
Its global earnings have fallen by just 1% this past year to $25m.

Sleep:
The sleep-tracking app has earned $74.1m this past year, over 50% more than the older gacha game [Masters].

Cafe Remix:
The casual puzzle game made $3m of those earnings in the past year.

Go:
Since the last Pokémon Day on February 27th, 2024, Go has generated $723.2m.
 
Only just saw mobile revenue tidbits buried in a PocketGamer article from yesterday.

So Pocket already went above $600m (last update was at $500m earlier in the month).

TU3tYlL.png


Masters:


Unite:


Sleep:


Cafe Remix:


Go:
It’s why I think Unite will stay around for a while from these numbers. If they can improve the game in a number of facets it can do way better.
 
I am honestly just realizing this but it actually does make sense for Pokemon Champions to require NSO. Think about it, if our speculation is right about this taking over VGC, then wouldn't that be making Pokemon battling online free if this is a free to play game? The mainline games required NSO to battle online. Champions battling online would make that free.

It's the reason why Pokemon Home doesn't allow trading in the Switch app and is on the mobile app only. If Pokemon Home allowed us to trade via the Switch, then Nintendo would require NSO like the mainline games. Pokemon Champions app will likely be free to download on Switch and mobile like Mario Kart Live but require NSO just like Mario Kart Live still requires us to purchase the remote control Kart but the game be free to download.

Or @ILikeFeet is right and this isn't meant to take VGC away from the mainline games but instead be a more casual battle simulator for the general audience not interested in consuming consoles or console games. This would fit well with Pokemon Go offering a way to consume Pokemon content without a console. Pokemon Pocket also does this, Champions would be just another Pokemon smartphone game. Pokemon might be too big of an ip to be limited by a gaming console's market reach.
 
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25.5 hours later

Youtube

NA Presents - 3.2M
Champions - 250K
PLZA - 361K
PLZA Extended -892K

JP Presents - 3.3M
Champions - 172K
PLZA Extended -1M

Twitter

NA
PLZA - 8.5M
Champions - 495.7K

JP
PLZA - 6.8M
Champions - 2M

PokeTimes (no video)
PLZA - 9.6M
Champions - 4.1M
 
Pokemon Tops US Toy Sales In 2024, Becomes The Only Brand To Surpass $1 Billion

While the stats shared by Piscatella are limited to the US, the Pokemon franchise continues to be a massive success across the globe. A few months ago, on December 23, 2024, entertainment marketing firm GEM Partners released the results of a comprehensive survey measuring the reach of entertainment brands across seven media formats, including video, books, and music. For the 2024 annual ranking, the Pokemon brand secured the top position with an impressive 65,578 points.

Some quality information regarding the state of Pokémon as a brand, in short? its unbelievably strong.
 
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Feels like Pokemons brand synergy is only increasing with the rise of TCGP and the potential of Champions (especially since that also links to Go and the mainline games). Pokemon has its own entire ecosystem of products.
 
Only just saw mobile revenue tidbits buried in a PocketGamer article from yesterday.

So Pocket already went above $600m (last update was at $500m earlier in the month).

TU3tYlL.png
Thank you, I was wondering if Masters was still making money. It's in third place, but losing to the megahits of GO and Pocket is nothing to be ashamed of.
 
Only just saw mobile revenue tidbits buried in a PocketGamer article from yesterday.

So Pocket already went above $600m (last update was at $500m earlier in the month).

TU3tYlL.png


Masters:


Unite:


Sleep:


Cafe Remix:


Go:
Pokémon Go remains a monster damn.

We also just learned that TGC Pocket crossed 100M Downloads.

 
The Pokemon Company is the best brand management company right now. Really impressed by AZ (aside from some poor texture work and the city looking empty) and will definitely give it a try. The long development time is showing some great improvements.

For champions still not sure about its implications. quite a strange play. is it to broaden the Esport reach on a global stage. I can see it being used in emerging markets to build communities and get people into the franchise. Or maybe it is the warzone for Pokemon. looking forward to hearing more.
 
There's a cool article from VGC (the media one lol) on the recent Pokémon event


Basically they are building these events for the competitive side but are also offering things to do for anyone else.

The meet and greet with the TCG artists was a fantastic initiative, legends like Komiya, Kanda, Kusube etc have a massive "cult" following.
 
Next Pokémon Presents should be this August, right before the Worlds.

I wouldn't be surprised if Pokémon Champions is somehow playable during the Worlds this year.

At the very least, it should get a big announcement around that time.
I find the prospect of an official Pokémon battle simulator to be interesting, but there are a lot of important details that haven't been revealed yet. Exactly which mons will be available? Will this have singleplayer content like Stadium/Battle Revolution did? How will the generational gimmicks work (like, can you have both a Mega and a Tera or do you have to pick one?)
 
I find the prospect of an official Pokémon battle simulator to be interesting, but there are a lot of important details that haven't been revealed yet.
From the looks of it:
Exactly which mons will be available?
A subset at launch which will define the initial meta. Pokemon should be added as more games get releases and devs have also more time to import them to Champions.
Will this have singleplayer content like Stadium/Battle Revolution did?
They are talking about multiple modes. Anything is possible at this point and although Stadium had a robust SP and local MP, Battle Revolution was lacking.
How will the generational gimmicks work (like, can you have both a Mega and a Tera or do you have to pick one?)
As per the trailer, you could have Mega and Tera at the same time.

My guess is that you will have "Ranked Play" and "Casual Play" with the former having a rotating ruleset while the latter will be unrestricted.
 
If Pokemon Champions is F2P then it could act like the "Call of Duty Warzone" of Pokemon. Definitely has strong potential here.
 
I'll have to disagree here, the only gen where pokemon didn't stand among the better looking games on a system was the Switch. C'mon, Ruby/Saphire/Emerald on the GBA looked immaculate and Crystal on GBC looked almost a gen ahead. Even Black and White had superb sprite animation and some very well done effects overall.

I just did a quick Google search and most of the "best looking games on x platform" lists included a Pokemon title for all Nintendo portables.




One may say "oh, that's just a couple outlets... it doesn't reflect the consensus"... but honestly, can you imagine even a single individual publication doing a list like those for the switch and even considering a mainline Pokemon title to include? That's the difference here.

So yeah, the narrative that Pokemon games were always behind technically and (especially) artistically like they clearly are today is a bit of historical revisionism.

Having said that, enough with the derail I guess... as this is pretty much an unrelated topic to the thread so I'll end my participation in the matter with this post.
You said "top of the line graphics". There's a difference between that and good looking sprites or artdirection or the like. The DS games had 2D sprites where many other DS games used 3D models already, similar to DQVII on the PS1. Those were definitely behind technically.
They can look good but still be graphically behind.

I haven't played the GBA Pokémon games, but looking at various screenshots and comparing it to games like The Minish Cap, Golden Sun or Super Mario Advance Ruby looks almost basic, with much less detail in many of the sprites like trees than in the other games I mentioned. Emerald seems to look a bit prettier than Ruby.

Crystal does look good, but the Oracle Zelda games look better with a more vibrant color palette and stronger contrasts. Idk how it looks almost like a GBA game.

And they were never highly polished. They were not as broken as SV, but they always had issues. There are entire lists of glitches in the first gen alone like this one:
Most of them affect the gameplay in some way.
 
Pokemon is a very interesting franchise, given that it is an AA franchise at most when it comes to budgets, but an AA franchise that became a mega franchise. Other game series usually needed to become AAA franchises to become popular, while Pokemon has been able to continue to be lower budget AA games with high end AAA selling potential, no matter the generation of hardware it releases on.
 
Pokemon is a very interesting franchise, given that it is an AA franchise at most when it comes to budgets, but an AA franchise that became a mega franchise. Other game series usually needed to become AAA franchises to become popular, while Pokemon has been able to continue to be lower budget AA games with high end AAA selling potential, no matter the generation of hardware it releases on.
it's something we've seen replicated elsewhere. a lot of the most popular games right now aren't the most graphically intensive or aren't anymore. "looks good" is all people want from their visuals and that's not exclusive to 100K triangle characters with 4096^2 textures
 
Personal opinion here:

I feel like a lot of people expected Pokemon to take this massive leap when it moved from handheld to console. When that didn't happen and instead we got what looked to be more of the same with Sword and Shield along with the Dexit controversy, the series suffered from a lot of backlash that still exists to this day. Yet in hindsight, when you take all of Pokemon's constraints into account (running one of the biggest franchises in the world, time and manpower alloted, etc.) this sort of shift was always going to be more gradual and prolonged than a lot of people were hoping. We talk about how graphics aren't everything in gaming and there's really no better example of this than Pokemon on Switch. Hardcore gamers constantly mock the series for it's dated graphics and presentation, yet it's experienced a major boom with over a hundred million copies of software sold on the system sold in total. (Legends ZA really won't be any different there.)

Some people in hardcore gaming forums have taken this to mean that the series won't change at all because there's no any real (read: financial) incentive to change and as such Gamefreak doesn't care. Except that really hasnt been the case for like 4 years now. Let's disregard the fact that Gamefreak took an extra year this go around. When you really look back at the bigger picture, Pokemon now looks extremely different than Pokemon in 2017, when the series left the 3DS. The series has gone open world. Wild Pokemon simply don't jump out at you anymore - they can be seen all over the overworld. There's a whole new, more active way to catch Pokemon. ZA's even doing away with the series's turn based battling in terms of a simplified Xenoblade-style approach. These are HUGE risks to the series's core catching and battling that GameFreak financially has no reason to take. Sure, they're not implemented in the series's mainline games proper, but the fact that they're doing it at all is notable.

...and even then, they might?

I don't think it's a coincidence that Pokemon Champions is a thing. It is extremely hard to alter the traditional turn-based gameplay because of Pokemon's massive and ever-growing competitive scene that was built off of this format. At best they could only add gimmicks to make things interesting from gen to gen. But if Pokemon Champions becomes the hub for Pokemon battles across generations like how Pokemon HOME is for storing Pokemon, then like I said earlier, that allows for the teams that develop the core games to experiment more and perhaps live up to the expectations people had and still have of them. With Dexit, Game Freak could develop Sword and Shield without having to worry about creating or adjusting animations for moves and Pokemon that the casual audience would never see. Now with Champions, Game Freak could continue experimenting with new, more immersive ways to catch and battle and interact with Pokemon.

Even still, despite everything that's happening, one can argue that Pokemon as a franchise is bigger than ever. There may be a lot of people dissatisfied with how ZA looks (personally I think it technically looks and run better than Arceus and SV, though I'm not a fan of the SV artstyle), but there's also people excited for the game in general. Fanart's been drawn, discussions are being had over who to pick as a starter and whatnot, etc. Honestly, I think Pokemon is in a better place than many people think it is - it's just that when your fanbase is that massive, any minority that's loud enough can sound deafening.
 
It is extremely hard to alter the traditional turn-based gameplay because of Pokemon's massive and ever-growing competitive scene that was built off of this format.
I disagree with this. Mainly because we only seen GF attempt to stretch this format a handful of times. The most interesting take, triple battles, they just one-and-done it without any more exploration. Same with hordes and calling for support. Only a few times they realize that they can make "impossible" pokemon that shakes up the strategies: PokeStar Studios; and raid battles, where pokemon have 5 moves, shields, and nullifiers; and boss battles that give permanent boosts. They don't even explore proper hard modes. Blueberry academy shows they can make a challenging single player that utilizes competitive compositions. And that's not counting extra challenges like applying VGC rules to single player (normalized levels, same number of mons as opponents, no items). Normally, you have to artificially apply that yourself. All of these things are cool and underexplored. As such, I don't think Gen 10 will offer a radically different combat system because of a separate battle sim app
 
since GF is working on Gen 10 and Champions at the same time, I suspect any balance changes will happen in both games. maybe even EV/IV/Natures are customized in Gen 10? who knows. Pokemon has a ton of toggles which even allows for the competitive scene. the problem GF had was attempting to expose them to people without it being an overwhelming sweatfest. fully custom rentals in Champions will just turn it into Showdown, and as someone on Smogon mentioned, will incur the same issue as fighting games do: get wrecked 6 ways from sunday if you attempt to climb rank


random aside: if Champions is used in VGC, will ipads be used or switch 2s? 🤔
 
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