Whatever happened to Pokemon Stars?

Time for a makeover!

You may have noticed my subtle hints over the last few blogs, but I have found myself hopelessly addicted to Pokemon Sword for a good while now. It's gotten to the point where I have beaten the game, finished the Galar Pokedex, filled all the available Galar Pokemon into the National Dex, (Which took a lot longer than it should have) and am currently stockpiling EXP candy for the off-chance of making a split-second trade for any regional variant Pokemon over the GTS. (If any of that went over your head, I promise that's the worst it'll get.) So as you probably imagine I'm slowly building up to writing a review on this title, in order to break my spell for playing it, but I'd prefer to warm with something simpler, like a setting of the stage. (I enjoyed doing that for Assassin's Creed afterall.)

This was a topic that came to me rather by accident, because until Pokemon Sword and Shield I hadn't actually been a fan of this franchise for nigh-on over 10 years. (What do you mean 'Pokemon Emerald' actually came out 16 years ago? I think I'm gonna be sick...) It was only by chance that I happened upon some of the hype surrounding the next Pokemon game and a coincidence that I'd find myself thinking back to that in the months leading upto Sword and Shield. As it stands today I have over 250 hours sunk into Sword (And that's only on my main save. Please don't do the math.) and I'm starting to run into questions like 'How did this game come to be', and that's what I want to cover today.

It all starts with the release of Pokemon Emerald back in 2004. (Actually, one could say that it starts with the original game but no one has time for that.) Up until Emerald, Gamefreak had a genius marketing ploy to attract more sales that they had stuck to religiously, and it had worked wonders for their brand. Whenever a Pokemon game would be released it would accompanied by a partner game which contained all the same data as it's sibling, but in a different configuration. So both games would consist of the same story, world, adventure and pocket monsters for catching, but there would be slight differences to how they were implemented. One game would contain most Pokemon in the game, but there would be some that could only be found in the other title, the same could be said for certain trainers and characters that you meet along the way. This poised a problem for the Pokemon-obsessed children of the time as they would find themselves constantly bombarded with the Pokemon catch phrase "Gotta catch 'em all", despite being hindered to do so by their measly single game. Of course, this conundrum could be overcome by trading Pokemon with your friends using the Gameboy's signature 'link' systems, or simply buying a second game and handheld to gift them to yourself. (Either way, a second sale would need to be made.)

This marketing tactic ended up working wonders for the Pokemon brand and certainly helped to secure Gamefreak's legacy as one of the longest enduring handheld developers of all time. (Perhaps the longest.) It became such a sensation that Gamefreak decided to play it up in future games through their boxart. The original two games, Pokemon Red and Blue, merely featured pictures of the two colour appropriate starters; Charizard and Blastoise, two pokemon that you feasibly receive in both games with some limited trading. The next games, Gold and Silver, would feature that generation's legendaries; Lugia and Ho-oh, in the knowledge that no one is going to trade those without a fight, you'd likely need to buy both games.

By the third Generation of games (my favourite) there had evolved an slightly new dimension to this tradition. First came the games: Pokemon Ruby and Sapphire, which focused on conflicting environmental plotlines, but next would come a bridge game in the form of Pokemon Emerald. This wouldn't just bridge those two storylines into one narrative, but also actually wrapped up the entire conflicting narrative succinctly. In brief, Ruby followed Team Magma's plot to use volcanoes and the legendary Pokemon Groudon to dry out the oceans whilst Sapphire followed Team Aqua's plot to flood all land with the use of the legendary Pokemon Kyogre. Emerald played both teams off each other and had them come to an agreement once they threw the balance of the planet off requiring a mediating presence to calm both sides, enter the legendary mascot of Emerald; Rayquaza. (The best Pokemon and no one can tell me otherwise.)

Gamefreak had already made their sales from selling Ruby and Sapphire simultaneously, Emerald was a way for them to resell roughly the same narrative with one huge boon; the ability to capture both game's legendaries for the first time ever. (With a brand new offering in Rayquaza) This ended up being wildly successful and allowed Gamefreak to make a stupid amount of money for doing very little in the way of new idea generation, everybody was happy. Except apparently not, because the next generation would feature an entirely new way of drawing in fans, remakes of the Gen 2 games. (A good idea, but it still lacked the pizzazz of Emerald. At least for me.)

In truth, Gamefreak only really settled on making Emerald as opposed to a new set of games because they were on the cusp of a new handheld generation and didn't want to dive into the new consoles without securing their fanbase first. Release a game that you know they will love in order to tide them over for the next two years whilst you shift efforts onto developing for the brand new Nintendo DS title. (A smart play.) As such they never needed to do another mash-up game like Emerald again due to the ludicrously long life-span and popularity of the DS which meant they could takes games at their own pace in the knowledge that their fans would follow diligently. Of course, something would have to give eventually.

Around about the time of Generation 7, Nintendo had just finished shipping their biggest console bomb in a long time, The Wii U. (There's a lot of reasons why this console was a failure, but I can't be asked to get into any of them right now.) Gamefreak and the Pokemon Company were riding a sure thing with their newest titles, Pokemon Sun and Moon, but they knew that the Nintendo 3DS was slowly reaching the end of it's rope. In my speculation, I'd imagine that the studio probably also wanted to move away from purely handheld Pokemon titles and diversify themselves, as that had been their entire identity for so long. However the Nintendo Wii U certainly didn't appear to be the game to dedicate their first major leap to consoles, and so they held off.

By the time that the Nintendo Switch was being talked about, Gamefreak were circling themselves and had just released Pokemon Ultra Sun and Ultra Moon, and they knew the time was coming for them to make their jump to home consoles. (Even though the Switch is technically a hybrid, don't get at me.) Around this time Nintendo were well aware how much of a flop the Wii U was and was calling in favours to ensure that the Switch would have the support of all their flagship games as quickly as possible. This meant a mainline Zelda game by day one, a mainline Mario game by Christmas, and a Pokemon game not long after that.

This would put Gamefreak and the Pokemon Company in a position where they had to rush to meet the release schedule of this new console, but not so fast that they couldn't test the waters. They still decided to start with a tactic that they hadn't used since 2004, re-releasing a game that they had made before with enough benefits to draw in fans who had already bought these games. (Twice now, due to the release of the 'Ultra' addendum games.) This began the development life of 'Pokemon Stars', which we have only recently learned wasn't just a meme title, but an actual mash-up game in development for a time. This would have ensured that the first console generation Pokemon game bought in a sure-fire audience and would be a relative success no matter the comparative success of the Switch.

Of course, things didn't end up needing to be that dire, as the Nintendo Switch has been a huge success since it's launch despite being markedly weaker than it's competitors. (Heck, I'm literally playing it right now as I write this.) This success eliminated all the rush for system seller games to hit the console and allowed for the Pokemon team to pull back on development for 'Stars'. As a result, I imagine they took stock of their direction and realised that they could look upon this new console launch as the starting point for their next generation of games, thus was scrapped Pokemon Stars and from that was born Pokemon Sword and Shield.

We can still see the vestiges of Stars in the way that every single Sun and Moon legendary (excluding the one's from the wormholes) could be found in the coding of Sword and Shield from day one. In fact, the launch of Pokemon Home has allowed for the mass migration of these Pokemon, including Alolan region variants and starters, to be ported over with little stress because they were all that well integrated into the core game. So what does this mean for the Sword and Shield, and how did the final game turn out despite being a 're-imagine and replace' job? Find out in my full review which should hopefully be up this Sunday. (Or last Sunday. I'm not too good at schedules)