Pokemon Fever
The little monsters are coming back with two new games so I decided that since this is happening we look over the past of Pokemon. But first to the new games.
This November in Japan, Ruby and Sapphire (will they ever run out of colors?) will be released. What I know so far is that there will be around 100 new Pokemon and a re-approach for the battle system. Also there will be a female trainer availble so let’s see who gets the limelight! It’s not known if the game will relate to the television series or if they will start a whole new thing. If they do it will finally be time to say “See Ya” to Ash and “Hello” to the new female trainer. And we hope to have a preview of both games in the near future.
With that out of the way let’s have a look at the past of our Pokemon friends.
Merchandise of the years for Pokemon has been a big hit and I’ve compiled some (well maybe not) that have the Pika of approval.
Some products are the Pika-Cam, Pikachu Match Em Catch Em Game, Sorry, Pokemon Powerball, Cock-A-Squirtle-Doo, Pokemon Savings Box, Pika-Chew, Electronic Stuffed Pokemon, Pokemon Rolling Stamps, Pokemon Action Bank, Pokemon Matchup, Pokemon Beach Towel, Pokemon Yo-Yo, Pikachu Dinner Set, Pokemon Lunch Kit, Pokemon Bed Set, and I must say that there’s a lot of Pika products and some of the names are very original!
Some of the products may not of been named correctly but of them are. You should be able to get all of the above from any Japanese Toy Store.
Now let’s go back to the beginning-
(1996 in Japan) It started as an everyday role playing game on the GameBoy. You play as a ten year old boy named Ash who dreams to become the best Pokemon master in the world. Throughout the games you collect Pokemon, train them and then defeat the gym leaders in each town. Now I’m sure everyone else knows the rest of the story from the games, the television series and the movies.
Now we all know the main characters Ash, Brook, and Misty and most kids television stations show the trio daily and if not new episodes, episodes that have been played too many times to be a surprise of any fun for kids. The first episode is very similar to the beginning of the first GameBoy game. The trio if you never knew keep running into Team Rocket’s Jessie and James (both 17 years old) and their Pokemon Meowth. Of course the goodies win and Team Rocket’s mastermind, Giovanni is not very pleased with their work as he nevers get any Pokemon from Jessie or James.
Enough with the television and to the games on the handhelds.
The basic games, Red, Blue and Yellow all start of with the same house visit to Professor Oak but something changes in this scene in the Gold and Silver games. Instead of the classic Bulbasaur, Squirtle and Charmander, you can choose the next series Pokemon of Totodile, Chikorita and cyndaquil. You will also notice in Gold and Silver that some things are the same but most aren’t.
Green is a totally different version of Pokemon that was never released in some countries (including Australia) so I don’t know much about the game except that it was released around the time Pokemon Yellow was in Aus.
Of course there is one or two more but we won’t go into those but they are like the above and let’s hope for some change in the upcoming Ruby and Sapphire releasing soon in Japan.