Question Creating a New Generation

Chrswrites

Aspiring Trainer
Member
For years I have wondered how the process of creating a new generation works.

In the beginning I thought they had over 1000 Pokemon in stock and they would release a batch every 3 years. When I heared that Shellos and Gastrodon were supposed to be in Gen 3, I really thought this was true. Also the hinting Munna in Gen 1 confirmed my hypothesis.

But now I don't think this is how it works...
I do not think they created Mega Evolution, Alolan Forms and Ultra Beasts back in 1995.

Can any one tell be how each generation came to existence and how new generations are created. It is such a mystery to me...
 

professorlight

Ice Queen
Member
The process itself is notoriously secretive, as far as I know, so there isn't that much information about it.

But what I can tell you is that they make each generation sort of as they need them. All the time in that process, there will be multiple designs proposed (even for the same pokemon), which might or might not make it; that's how Shellos and Gastrodon ended up skipping the generation they were created for, and why we have things like Eeveelutions introduced in four different generations, or cross-generation evolutions (Scizor, Mismagius, Megas) or pre-evolutions (the babies, mainly), and it also explains the mess the games end up into when they have to introduce things like incenses, rocks, location evolution or even new evolutionary stones to explain how pokemon couldn't evolve in past games. In essence, it's a bloody mess.
For example, we've yet to see how they'll implement the Alola-specific regional forms into subsequent games; at least all the pokemon so far weren't explicitly tied to a region, so you could work around that for the postgame; no such loophole with Alolan pokemon.

So, as far as I know, the design team is comprised of various artists (some are also illustrators for the TGC) and Sugimori as the design head; I imagine they have various meetings to get on the same page about the staples like starters and legends, and from then on, everybody sets out to make what the generation needs or to work and present their own designs, even designs leftover from other generations, as Shellos and Gastrodon prove (it also means that most pokemon's designs can date back to as late as Gen1 and for various reasons, were introduced later), or even inside jokes, like Munna; I doubt they planned munna in gen1, but I do believe someone remembered that dialog and thought it'd be fun to actually make the pokemon (you can tell because Munna is particularly disjointed, design-wise, compared to most other pokemon; it's a psychic type with a pattern of pink flowers); all the designs pass by Sugimori, probably the director and team, and more meetings, where they suggest changes or approve them.
Of course, I imagine the mechanic aspects of each pokemon are also taken in consideration, but I believe it's likely they start with the design and go from there (smogon's existence, if nothing else, proves that pokemon are not usually made with much care into how weak or strong they are, mechanics-wise).

Basically, each new generation is a self-contained group that may (gen 2, 3, 4) or may not (5, 6, 7) relate to the previous ones in terms of connections between the pokemon in it; there's also no way to tell exactly when a pokemon was created, since all we can know is when it was ready enough to be added to a game, but basically, the process is that Sugimori and his team work on the pokemon they need, add new ones, maybe old ones that were never released, and rinse and repeat each new generation.

But again, this is mostly conjecture based on how design work usually is; there's very little we can know about how it happens, and most of what we do know is how it doesn't happen.
 

Chrswrites

Aspiring Trainer
Member
Thank you for this.
It is an important piece of the big puzzle. But it is strange that there is so little information about this. :-(
 

professorlight

Ice Queen
Member
I wouldn't call it strange (after all, not a lot of games show to players their process in detail; movies sort of do, series sometimes, but not games), but definitely disappointing; I doubt a lot of people would be interested in "The Art of Pokemon's X Generation", but I know I'd get them all.
 

Chrswrites

Aspiring Trainer
Member
I would really like to know how a generation is build from idea till complete generation. And how old some Pokemon really are.
I also like mysteries like:
- Pikachu wasn't meant to be the Pokemon mascott
- Butterfree looks more like Venonat and Venomoth more like the caterpie line...
 

professorlight

Ice Queen
Member
That second one probably has more to do with caterpillars undergoing a metamorphosis than anything else; I've heard the fan theories about Butterfree sharing colors and some stylistic aspects of Venonat, but that's probably more of a coincidence than anything else (Jigglypuff and Clefable share stylistic aspects and colors as well, for example), since Tajiri, Sugimori and co. were just starting with their concepts (think back at the graphics of the gameboy games and just how different they are to the stock images of that era; sometimes the pokemon change even after they come out in a game, like Bellossom's colors and Pikachu changing shape over the years like Matthew Perry all through Friends; I'm not even discounting a serious drug addiction for the rat).

Overall, the fact that a caterpillar turns into a cocoon and into a butterfly (which is the predictable pattern for the evolution/metamorphosis) absolutely trumps any circumstantial stylistic coincidences. Same with, say, Clefable and Gengar, or that pesky fan theory about Ditto being some sort of melted Mew. So don't give too much credence to fan theories, nothing good lies that way.
 

Chrswrites

Aspiring Trainer
Member
Thank you, again, for elaborating on this. There is so much written about Pokemon, sometimes it is hard to tell what is true and what is false. When I was reading your text I also thought of the Clefable/Gengar thing before I found out that your already wrote about it. Maybe there should be a Bulbapedia page or something with all the facts and solved mysteries. (I'm also deeply curious why TPCi introduces new Pokemon mid generation and why this has never Happened before. But that doesn't belong in this thread).
 

professorlight

Ice Queen
Member
I wouldn't call them solved mysteries, really. It's more... self-fabricated mysteries? I mean, it's stuff that some random person on the internet made up, probably innocently (hopefully innocently), that then gains a life of its own and goes out of control; such is the nature of the internet. So... there isn't really a solution, because there was no mystery to begin with.

I doubt you'll find them on bulbapedia, though; it seems to be dedicated to official information. But really, I don't know, I find the place hard to navigate. Such an archaic interface.
 

jessalakasam

Floette is love Floette is life
Member
I'm the first Non-elsa here :p

Another thing that was revealed IIRC is that they come up with a number of Pokemon in a region before thinking of any Pokemon in that region (could be remembering that wrong though)

Also, in a recent interview they revealed that New UBs were thrown in to excite and surprise the fanbase
 

Nick Tornell

Haha, art go brrrr
Member
sometimes the pokemon change even after they come out in a game, like Bellossom's colors and Pikachu changing shape over the years
also Smeargle was changed because nobody likes green. My friend and I are making a fan region ourselves. We started with the region itself and are building from there.
 
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professorlight

Ice Queen
Member
I think he has it the other way around. Smeargle was red and a warm beige in gold/silver, and the shiny changed the palette to a green hue. From crystal onwards, though, they inverted them. Green the regular smeargle, red the shiny.
 
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