The childhood bug hunt behind Pokémon

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A multi-billion dollar multimedia empire is entirely based on a neurodivergent kid's love for bugs.

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The childhood bug hunt behind Pokémon — STACKY / Games

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A multi-billion dollar multimedia empire is entirely based on a neurodivergent kid's love for bugs. Growing up in rural Japan, Satoshi Tajiri spent all his time obsessively hunting and categorizing insects. When massive urbanization tragically paved over all his favorite hunting grounds, he decided to digitize the experience for modern city kids. Now millions of adults proudly spend hundreds of hours capturing digital critters simply because one guy really missed his local beetles.

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Pokémon once planned for Gold and Silver to be the finale

It’s hard to imagine willingly pulling the plug on a multi-billion dollar money printer. Tsunekazu Ishihara, the president of The Pokémon Company, stated that…

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Pokemon's in-game currency is heavily based on the Japanese Yen, which is why a single bottle of water costs 200 Pokedollars and a bicycle is famously priced at a completely absurd 1 million Pokedollars.

Pokemon's in-game currency is heavily based on the Japanese Yen, which is why a single bottle of water costs 200 Pokedollars and a bicycle is famously priced…

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Original Pokemon Red and Green codebase was so incredibly unoptimized and messy that the late Satoru Iwata had to step in and compress it himself so they could fit the second region into Pokemon Gold and Silver.

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The 40 Pokémon cut from the original games

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Players of the original Pokémon games became obsessed with MissingNo. What was this creature?

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Rhydon was the very first Pokémon ever created by designer Ken Sugimori, long before Pikachu became the globally recognized yellow face of the massive corporate franchise.

Rhydon was the very first Pokémon ever created by designer Ken Sugimori, long before Pikachu became the globally recognized yellow face of the massive…

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The childhood bug hunt behind Pokémon

A closer look

A bigger world.One discoveryat a time.

Keep exploring

Pokémon once planned for Gold and Silver to be the finale

Pokemon's in-game currency is heavily based on the Japanese Yen, which is why a single bottle of water costs 200 Pokedollars and a bicycle is famously priced at a completely absurd 1 million Pokedollars.

Original Pokemon Red and Green codebase was so incredibly unoptimized and messy that the late Satoru Iwata had to step in and compress it himself so they could fit the second region into Pokemon Gold and Silver.

The 40 Pokémon cut from the original games

Players of the original Pokémon games became obsessed with MissingNo. What was this creature?

Rhydon was the very first Pokémon ever created by designer Ken Sugimori, long before Pikachu became the globally recognized yellow face of the massive corporate franchise.

A bigger world.
One discovery
at a time.