Regarding the Pokemon franchise, they’re in a unique position compared to various other game franchises. Why? Their games are predicated on each new mainline entry revealing a new “generation” of Pokemon. It’s not as simple as creating a “new species” for trainers to battle and then moving on. They must create a legion of new pocket monsters to catch, train, battle, breed, etc. When Gen 1 came out nearly 30 years ago, it set the world on fire, and with Gen 9, The Pokemon Company proved it could still make hit titles with their beloved creatures. But how long can they keep it up?
The reason that question is prevalent is that each generation draws into question how many more unique Pokemon, and more specifically, Pokemon designs, can be made. That question was posed to The Pokemon Company COO Takato Utsunomiya, who relayed to Gamespot that he feels his team could keep going for a while:
“As new generations of people come to work on the games and they’ll have new ideas for new creatures, we’re able to continue creating new Pokemon. Right now we’re over 1,000, but if you think about how many living creatures there are in our world, there’s something over hundreds of thousands. I would think we probably still have a long way we can keep going.”
While that’s certainly nice to hear, as it shows he has faith in his team, gamers would likely point out that his views are “optimistic at best.”
If you look at each generation, “bad designs” stick out. If you type in “worst Pokemon designs” in a Google search, you’ll find plenty of pocket monsters people don’t like or can’t stand looking at.
That applies to the most recent titles too. Pokemon Scarlet and Violet were the titles that helped the franchise cross 1000 unique pocket monsters. Their 1000th entry was Gholdengo, who was, to be blunt, a design that very few liked.
That wasn’t the only one of that generation that came under fire, and certain past generations were ripped for their Poke-designs.
Now, on the other hand, it is true that there are plenty of reference creatures in the real world that the team could be inspired by to make new pocket monsters. It took them nine years to make a dolphin in their universe, so there is potential for uniqueness.
But the key thing to remember is that just because something is unique doesn’t mean it’ll be good.
