How long will the Pokemon franchise last?

The long wait for an official announcement for Pokemon Z has got me thinking about the future of the franchise, and how long it will go on for. Will we be seeing new Pokemon installments say, 30 years from now? And will Game Freak be able to retain the level of quality that we've all come to expect from the franchise? I'm sure there are many ideas left untapped for future Pokemon, but those ideas will no doubt dwindle with time and the franchise could suffer as a result. Can Nintendo and Game Freak continue the pace that has been set with the franchise for many years to come, with new generations, regions and remakes every few years? Will we see them make larger gaps between generations, with fewer pokemon in each generation? Or will there be larger gaps in between game releases? Could Pokemon survive on a Zelda main-series release schedule? I shudder at the thought, but the series will probably end at some point. I just wonder when that will be.
 

Codraroll

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It will continue for as long as it keeps making money. That's the short answer.

The long answer... well, honestly, I don't know if there's more to say than that, but I find the topic interesting nonetheless. I think a better question will be "How long will the Pokémon franchise last in its current form?", to which the answer - the way I see it - is roughly "two more generations, tops".

Pokémon has been dependent on dedicated hardware in the form of handheld consoles for its entire life span. However, the handheld gaming world is undergoing a shift onto phone or tablet platforms, severely cutting into the need and demand for dedicated hardware. Handheld consoles will always have the advantage of a superior input interface (buttons and control sticks, held in such a way that your hands won't block the screen) over smartphones and tablets, but they will not retain the advantage of computing power and graphics forever. That gap is closing really fast. They have also lost the advantage of practicality. Sure, you can put a DS in your pocket if you have large pockets, but most people are likely to have their phone in that pocket already. You can carry your handheld console around in the same fashion you can carry a tablet, but the tablet can do most of the things the console can, save for playing a few exclusive games. The selection of games on mobile platforms are also rapidly expanding, meaning that fewer independent developers are going to bother developing games for the handheld consoles, and that kids won't need a dedicated console to fulfill their handheld gaming needs any more. Unless you're really into Nintendo games, why bother to buy a 3DS?

Simply put, mobile devices like smartphones and tablets are making handheld consoles obsolete. The consoles might retain a few selling points - exclusive games, better interface, and for the time being better graphics - but it's far from certain that those will be enough for people to bother investing a couple hundred dollars in a console (and a few dozen more dollars on games, which come in the form of unwieldy cartridges). Especially when the devices they already own have a vastly larger game selection costing way, way less.

Tying that back to Pokémon, I think it's likely that the franchise will migrate to mobile platforms at some point in the next few years. This is likely to include changes to other aspects of Pokémon too, which are hard to predict at the time being. We might see a cloud system not unlike Pokémon Bank (heck, it might even be Pokémon Bank in a new form) allowing you to access and play your Pokémon adventures from several devices and keep your progress in the event of losing or replacing your phone/tablet.


However, I think the core points of the franchise will remain with us for decades. The concept of catching and training colourful monsters, and battling with them. The protagonist's journey from a small, sleep town through a varied region, culminating in becoming the Pokémon Champion. Evil teams (*sigh*). Legendary Pokémon. A friendly Pokémon professor. As evident by sales numbers, these ingredients are successful enough to make up for a fun and beloved game experience, which Game Freak and Nintendo will keep providing us in the future.
 
The long wait for an official announcement for Pokemon Z has got me thinking about the future of the franchise, and how long it will go on for. Will we be seeing new Pokemon installments say, 30 years from now? And will Game Freak be able to retain the level of quality that we've all come to expect from the franchise? I'm sure there are many ideas left untapped for future Pokemon, but those ideas will no doubt dwindle with time and the franchise could suffer as a result. Can Nintendo and Game Freak continue the pace that has been set with the franchise for many years to come, with new generations, regions and remakes every few years? Will we see them make larger gaps between generations, with fewer pokemon in each generation? Or will there be larger gaps in between game releases? Could Pokemon survive on a Zelda main-series release schedule? I shudder at the thought, but the series will probably end at some point. I just wonder when that will be.
I reckon they end up remaking ALL the games, including the DS games at some point.
 
It will continue for as long as it keeps making money. That's the short answer.

The long answer... well, honestly, I don't know if there's more to say than that, but I find the topic interesting nonetheless. I think a better question will be "How long will the Pokémon franchise last in its current form?", to which the answer - the way I see it - is roughly "two more generations, tops".

Pokémon has been dependent on dedicated hardware in the form of handheld consoles for its entire life span. However, the handheld gaming world is undergoing a shift onto phone or tablet platforms, severely cutting into the need and demand for dedicated hardware. Handheld consoles will always have the advantage of a superior input interface (buttons and control sticks, held in such a way that your hands won't block the screen) over smartphones and tablets, but they will not retain the advantage of computing power and graphics forever. That gap is closing really fast. They have also lost the advantage of practicality. Sure, you can put a DS in your pocket if you have large pockets, but most people are likely to have their phone in that pocket already. You can carry your handheld console around in the same fashion you can carry a tablet, but the tablet can do most of the things the console can, save for playing a few exclusive games. The selection of games on mobile platforms are also rapidly expanding, meaning that fewer independent developers are going to bother developing games for the handheld consoles, and that kids won't need a dedicated console to fulfill their handheld gaming needs any more. Unless you're really into Nintendo games, why bother to buy a 3DS?

Simply put, mobile devices like smartphones and tablets are making handheld consoles obsolete. The consoles might retain a few selling points - exclusive games, better interface, and for the time being better graphics - but it's far from certain that those will be enough for people to bother investing a couple hundred dollars in a console (and a few dozen more dollars on games, which come in the form of unwieldy cartridges). Especially when the devices they already own have a vastly larger game selection costing way, way less.

Tying that back to Pokémon, I think it's likely that the franchise will migrate to mobile platforms at some point in the next few years. This is likely to include changes to other aspects of Pokémon too, which are hard to predict at the time being. We might see a cloud system not unlike Pokémon Bank (heck, it might even be Pokémon Bank in a new form) allowing you to access and play your Pokémon adventures from several devices and keep your progress in the event of losing or replacing your phone/tablet.


However, I think the core points of the franchise will remain with us for decades. The concept of catching and training colourful monsters, and battling with them. The protagonist's journey from a small, sleep town through a varied region, culminating in becoming the Pokémon Champion. Evil teams (*sigh*). Legendary Pokémon. A friendly Pokémon professor. As evident by sales numbers, these ingredients are successful enough to make up for a fun and beloved game experience, which Game Freak and Nintendo will keep providing us in the future.
Good points but the fact of the matter is Pokémon is the driving force in handheld hardware development. As long as sales continue, Nintendo is motivated to continue on the platform.

The new arrival of monster hunter, iterations of smash, and possible connectivity between handheld systems and home consoles lead me to believe there won't be a real shift to mobile gaming for a lot longer than it would seem.
 
At least for many years to come. I think around Generation 8-10 the games will start to feel... I don't know, rushed. Unloved. Just throw a happy face on some object and give it a name and then repeat several dozen times. I'm a little worried Pokemon will become like other franchises even more with just a yearly release, and that's it. Hopefully all the games before Z/X2Y2 will be remade, but I'm unsure about the new regions. Pokemon will probably go on for another decade or so, but I don't think it will manage to stay a good game series for that long.
 

ScraftyIsTheBest

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First of all, Codraroll is absolutely right in that Pokemon will last until they no longer make money. As for how long it will take to bring down the franchise as a whole, it'll take a while, much more than a decade. Quality wise, it may not be able to hold on for much longer, and the Pokemon games might devolve into shit someday. But even once that happens, Pokemon will continue to live for years. Even if the games stop becoming good, they will still sell very well simply because of the brand name. The brand name of Pokemon will be enough for the franchise's future games to move plenty of units. Just look at Call of Duty for instance. That franchise continues to give us the same shit over and over every fucking year, yet every game, no matter how stale the franchise has gotten, still sells well because it's fucking Call of Duty. Even when Call of Duty becomes genuine shit, it'll still sell because it's Call of Duty. The same would apply to Pokemon. Like CoD, Pokemon's brand name is so huge that even when the games start becoming shit, they'll still garner momentum for a while. Only once the people begin to truly realize how bad the franchise has become at that point of time will the Pokemon franchise start to die. Repeated failures over several years will be what it takes to bring Pokemon down as a whole.

Well honestly, that's kind of a basic thing, but looking at it now, how long Pokemon will last is much more complicated on that. Pokemon's survival is also somewhat dependent on one thing: how long Nintendo manages to survive. Pokemon is in a way one of Nintendo's iconic franchises, and Pokemon's survival will depend on how long Nintendo can afford to make hardware in the future. At this rate, Nintendo is sitting on mountains of cash, but their hardware sales are at the lowest they've ever been so far (the Wii U's sales aren't that bad but it's overall underperforming in sales and is their lowest selling console to date, and the 3DS, though technically a success, is far from garnering the same traction, attention, and fame that the DS or the Game Boy had: it's their lowest selling handheld to date), which means unless Nintendo can do a complete 180 from here, they may fall faster than Pokemon would on its own. If Nintendo falls, that will ultimately accelerate Pokemon's own downfall unless Game Freak can still make good Pokemon games (Sega isn't exactly making much good stuff with Sonic so..., but Sega has always been historically run by idiots anyways...).

That being said, I'm not sure how long Pokemon will live in its current form. Codraroll brings up a good point in that the smartphone/tablet gaming market is slowly eating away at the dedicated handheld market, which means Pokemon may not have handhelds to live on in the future. However, Nintendo is currently developing the NX, which gives an interesting twist as to where Pokemon may be headed. From what we do know, Nintendo's next console is actually a hybrid. It's both a TV console and a portable one too (two different units but ultimately both are the same console). If we assume Nintendo follows this pattern for the future, it's possible unified platforms will become a prominent thing in the near future, meaning dedicated handhelds basically merge with dedicated consoles. If we assume this possibility, Pokemon could possibly move over to unified platforms like the upcoming NX. Based on that assumption, the Nintendo NX could be the very platform that lays home to Gen 7 (aka next gen of Pokemon) of Pokemon. If the concept of a unified platform that can be played both on TV and on the go becomes the primary form of game consoles, then Pokemon can probably still hang in there and not yet migrate to smartphones/tablets and find its place on unified platforms like the NX for a while. Bottom line is, the handheld gaming market where Pokemon thrives could wind up shifting over to unified platforms like this ever so speculated Nintendo NX, and if unified platforms like NX become common, then Pokemon could still retain it current form as the handhelds it thrives on would technically become one with television consoles (one overall unit), and I'm sure dedicated consoles will still be rather popular for a while (PS4 is selling like crazy so this proves consoles are still a thing!!! Wii U and Xbox One also still have some traction).

If this NX manages to gain sizable traction (hopefully it does, just looking at the small details we know about it, namely the hybrid concept, it sounds awesome, not to mention it will have all the Nintendo goodies), then Pokemon's downfall would definitely take a long time to truly occur. From the pattern handheld gaming devices like 3DS/Vita are headed so far, and what we know of Nintendo's next platform, the NX, handhelds might not truly die, but may instead merge with the good ol' consoles that you plug into a TV and play. Overall what I am trying to say is that handhelds won't truly become obsolete just yet: so Pokemon will likely hold on to its current form for a while, maybe past two generations. With the circumstances I just said, I don't imagine Pokemon will lose its current form anytime soon, and may still find itself on dedicated hardware for a while. This is all assuming though that they even think about putting Pokemon's seventh generation on the NX: though I honestly think they should, I don't know for sure if they will (though from what we know, it seems likely).

Of course, with all that said, when you consider how popular smartphones and tablets are, I do imagine that they will still have to at least acknowledge that market too (they already kinda are with Pokemon Shuffle Mobile and Pokemon GO), but as for whether the core series will find its way onto smartphones and tablets seems rather shaky. Of course, I think it'll take a long time for Pokemon to truly become shit considering the stuff that's been integral to it for many years has continued to be an enjoyable experience, and it still is, so...). The question remains though, as to how many more Pokemon they can afford to make...how many regions...how many box mascots...how many more regions...and ultimately, how many more names for this kind of stuff.

Geez I wrote an awful lot. But this is just some of my tentative thoughts on the matter, I had a lot to say anyways...
 
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Codraroll

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Good points but the fact of the matter is Pokémon is the driving force in handheld hardware development. As long as sales continue, Nintendo is motivated to continue on the platform.
Question is, then, "what for?". Could Pokémon alone sell well enough to justify the development of a dedicated console for itself and a handful of other games? And would consumers remain interested?

As the market for handheld consoles shrinks, so does the incentive for game developers to make games for the console. That results in fewer games being made for the console, which reduces its market potential. It's a vicious cycle. Creating a console is expensive, and Nintendo are dependant on it to sell well to make money. I heard somewhere that the actual profits made from the DS and 3DS are minuscule, as the console is sold as cheaply as possible - even at a loss - to reduce the initial cost for consumers, who have to buy both a console and a game just to be able to play anything. The games themselves make the actual profits. In the long term, the CEOs are bound to ask themselves: "Why bother with the console at all?".

Meanwhile, it's also risky for a game studio to make games for a console in the first place. I'll refer you to ExtraCredits' excellent video on why the PS Vita failed. For people who don't want to watch the video, I can sum it up: The handheld consoles have a smaller market than the larger ones, making it much more of a gamble to develop a game for them. The Vita has good graphics and otherwise excellent specs, but utilizing those specs require a big production budget and warrant a high end price for the final product. Selling a more-than-averagely-expensive game to a console with few customers is risky. Unless a large share of the console owners buy the game, you won't earn your money back. The gamble, in the end, is not worth it for larger studios, and outside the capabilities of many smaller ones. A lack of games for the console means a lack of interest with the buyers, and a lack of buyers means fewer games are made.


Also, I'll make the case that the Pokémon games absolutely don't require a dedicated console. They would translate very well to a touch screen without compromising quality, maybe aside for some control inputs (which is less of a deal for such a turn-based game). Many of the other bells and whistles of the 3DS are also done just as well by smartphones by now. Cameras, gyroscopes, connectivity, touch screens... there isn't much that the 3DS does that smartphones don't, actually I dare say the 3DS would have failed just as hard as the Vita without the gimmick of 3D.

True, the specs of mobile phones aren't quite up to par with the dedicated consoles just yet, but they are catching up fast. Just look at the state-of-the-art mobile games of today and compare to those two years ago. We'll probably see Nintendo make one more console (the NX), but before long consoles will lose their last advantages. Add to that the potential of a much larger player base (virtually everyone has a smart phone, contrast to the ~50 million 3DS owners), the independence of game cartridges (reducing production costs and shipping delays) and Pokémon already being well suited to be played solely on a touch screen, and I think we'll see Pokémon eagerly migrating to mobile once Nintendo decide they'll stop paying for the development of both software and hardware.
 

Karxrida

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I've heard that the handheld market is still strong in Japan right now and Nintendo seems to know how to market the 3DS to more casual customers, so there's hope for at least few more years. It helps that X and Y are among the bestselling 3DS titles.
 
People here are forgetting how hard it is to kill a franchise once it's been around long enough. Many franchises wouldn't have survived a game as terrible as Sonic Boom but it doesn't look like the blue hedgehog is going anywhere. Square Enix are really pushing their luck trying to sell their Final Fantasy VII remake in an episodic format which will end up costing far more than the conventional $60 but people will still buy it in their millions. There hasn't been a Metroid game in ages but I doubt anyone seriously believes that Nintendo is done with Samus. Hell, even Banjo-Kazooie is being resurrected, albeit under a different name, despite the gradual disintegration of Rareware.

Given these precedents, I don't think a popular series, that has been around for twenty years and hasn't had any flops yet, from a developer in decent health, is in any great danger.
 
Codraroll to be honest I actually think that handheld gaming devices, in the long run, have a batter chance of surviving than home consoles.

My thesis is this: A video gaming system comprises three parts: input (controller), processor (console), and output (screen). For home consoles, these three parts are separate machines connected to one another, but for the 3DS and similar systems all three functions are part of one inseparable device. Computers, and increasingly phones, do the "processor" part fine, increasingly as well as or better than dedicated devices, and so for the home console set-up they can just fit in seamlessly. But for handheld devices, the fact that the 3DS and the Vita actually have buttons makes them qualitatively different from a phone, even though they may not have the power or versatility of those devices, they are still better at the specific job of video games. One could argue that someone might make a "gaming phone" device, but... remember the N-Gage? Didn't do so well, did it?

The other thing handhelds have going for them is young kids. Parents may not trust their children with a phone where they can be exposed to all kinds of things, but might trust them with what is essentially a glorified toy. I think this is what Nintendo were thinking with the 2DS. Make it cheaper and harder to break, and it's ideal for that market.

The final thing about the "phones render consoles obsolete" argument is: PCs never managed it. PCs have been ubiquitous since about 2000, maybe even before. Consoles are still doing okay though. Why should phones be different?
 
I think it's probably gonna last five more years at the minimum and ten more years at the maximum, at least if Yo-Kai Watch doesn't suddenly explode into popularity like Pokemon did here in the west.
 

Cresselia~~

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I think it's probably gonna last five more years at the minimum and ten more years at the maximum, at least if Yo-Kai Watch doesn't suddenly explode into popularity like Pokemon did here in the west.
Nah. Yo-kai Watch will never explode into such popularity in the west. It will be popular, but not that popular.
YW is still very Eastern, and people may not get the puns or the jokes. Some jokes maybe considered too mean for a Western audience too.

Besides, I think YW actually saves Nintendo.
Some surveys several years ago suggest that people only buy Nintendo consoles because of Mario and Pokemon, and that they don't consider buying if they don't release these games.
But YW is now the best selling Nintendo game (at least in 2015) in Japan, so it gives people one more reason to buy Nintendo consoles.
It's just healthier for a console making company to have 1 more franchise to boost sales.

Pokemon is still pretty dependent on Nintendo consoles right now, so Yo-kai Watch actually helps Pokemon indirectly.

I don't think Pokemon is necessarily in competition with YW, because YW targets way younger children-- around kindergarten age, whilst Pokemon targets elementary school age.
 
I think we're asking the wrong questions here, because while I think the series itself is as safe as Mario, Zelda, or any big line Nintendo title, there are three factors we're all thinking about:

1. How many more new monsters can the franchise maintain without getting bloated or sacrificing old ones? It's hard to say, but I seriously doubt we will ever see another Black/White "all new 200+" again. And Gamefreak seems to know this, since the Mega Evolutions are a way to revitalize old monsters while breathing in new content. Quite devious.

2. Will the main series remain on a 3DS or Nintendo Handheld console much longer? I'd give it another generation maybe, after that it will depend on what angle Nintendo decides to take the next console, and turn the collective video game market takes. But to be fair, this is a question for all console only video games at the moment, not just Pokemon.

3. Will the current "main series" format stay the same? I've played Yo-kai Watch and it seemed more like Ni no Kuni, Puzzle & Dragons, and Megaman Battle Network than Pokemon, only sharing the collecting monsters premise. But it does show that the format can be redressed and changed. Now as for pokemon itself, I think there are some cracks beginning to split the monster collecting from the competitive battling sides, and each generation just widens the fissure. While Gen 6 started to correct this, the gulf between in-game and competitive is still really really huge and beginning to be separate concepts entirely. What could this mean for the future? Somewhere between probably nothing and definitely something.

:p

Plus there's been a lot of concepts fans have demanded from Pokemon games in recent years, like deeper storytelling or a steady challenge curve, things that might not come to pass without a mechanics shift.

4. Will Missingno ever be officially recognized? Dream on, dream until your dreams come true.
 
I think this is a really interesting topic that I have thought quite a lot about actually. Bear in mind that when I post this I will ignore the future of the handheld console debate that some of you have mentioned, and purely focus on the games themselves.

One of the things I really liked about X and Y, was how they showed that they could make a new generation and only include ~70 new Pokemon, and still make it a great game. If they continune on this track, and don't create like 150 new Pokemon for each generation, I think the problem with amount of Pokemon is covered for 3 generations at least, which is roughly 10 years or so. After that though, they will need to rebuild their formula for making new generations. Tbh I think at that point it will all be a bunch of remakes for a handheld console that almost can't get better.

The thing I really didn't like about X and Y, which I have thought a lot of, especially when ORAS came, is mega evolution. Throughout my childhood I have watched stuff like Beyblade, and Bakugan, and all that sort of stuff which made 10-year old boys like me go nuts. Although I don't want to compare Pokemon too much to these, since those were TV series toys (ty for the correction Codraroll) and Pokemon started out as a video game, there are certainly similarities. And in terms of Bakugan, you probably haven't seen a lot of it lately, have you? Well Bakugan fell apart when it got even fancier with new battle gear and whatever shit I can't remember every new season, which made it really stupid in the end, since everything was so messy and everything was so powerful and all that stuff. Although this will go way slower with Pokemon, I feel like mega evolution was the beginning of this path to the death for Pokemon. Adding primals really didn't help at all. While it isn't really a big problem to keep up with all the new megas right now, that was also what happend in season 2 of Bakugan. Some stuff got more powerful, some new stuff came, but we kept track of all of it. Then, skip 2 seasons more ahead, and idk what I even was watching when Bakugan came on. Basically I think that by gen 8 we will have way too many megas, or something else on top of it. Then it will all just be a mess of broken stuff (much like vgc 16 already is tbh) in competitive play, and fans will start to lose their interest. However, I think Pokemon will exist for at least 15 more years regardless of how shit it will be in 2030, just because it has such a huge fanbase and has been going on for so long.
 
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Codraroll

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Although I don't want to compare Pokemon too much to these, since those were TV series and Pokemon started out as a video game, there are certainly similarities.
Actually, as far as I can remember, both Bakugan and Beyblade started out as toy series. Like so many other toy lines, an animated TV series was made to advertise them.

I'll make a reply to the "content pile-up" aspect later, when I have time.
 

Cresselia~~

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Actually, as far as I can remember, both Bakugan and Beyblade started out as toy series. Like so many other toy lines, an animated TV series was made to advertise them.

I'll make a reply to the "content pile-up" aspect later, when I have time.
Yu Gi Oh started as a light novel that covers various games like card games, board games and much more.
One day, a trading card company found potential of the monsters in that light novel, and decided to make a card game.
That's why the anime only focused on the cards.

Back then I thought it was weird how you can call yourself "King of Games" by just playing card games.
 
Actually, as far as I can remember, both Bakugan and Beyblade started out as toy series. Like so many other toy lines, an animated TV series was made to advertise them.

I'll make a reply to the "content pile-up" aspect later, when I have time.
I actually have several Bakugan toys scattered around, so I can say the toys sucked.

Yay, throw a ball! Whoa, the magnet made it open up! Now it's a vaguely monster-shaped thing! Woohooooo!

I believe they were meant to be a card battling game though, and the toys as a collectors thing and something to just make it more interesting.
 
I think taking Sonic as precedent, pokemon will be around long long after its used by date and long after the games are bad and sell poorly. Purely because it's pokemon
 

Codraroll

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As promised, let's talk about content pile-up. I believe this to be one of the more serious challenges the designers will have to face in the long run.

I'll start on the technical side. Speaking only about the data, there's no reason to worry. Computing power keeps increasing, and the games will continue to comfortably contain all the Pokémon you could ever throw at them. What worries me more is the fact that updating the graphics between generations will become an increasingly larger pain in the butt. We've already got some eight hundred monsters to model, texturise and animate. Somebody has to painstakingly colour every nail, horn, foot sole, tooth, and a myriad of other body parts on hundreds of models. Thousands of eyes have to be made to blink every now and then. The sheer bother of this has previously led to the Pokémon Company reusing models and animation from Stadium all the way up to Pokémon Battle Revolution. And it's only going to get worse for every generation. I wouldn't be surprised if at least some of the Pokémon models made for X and Y will remain in use, unaltered, for a decade or more. We can live with that, though. XY's models are decent enough. Game design-wise is where the real issues lie.

For every upcoming generation of games, new content will comprise a smaller and smaller percentage of the content in the game. We'll soon hit the milestone of having ten existing Pokémon for every new one presented by the new generation, and I believe we're almost there with moves too. The new content might be interesting enough, but when the backlog of monsters is ten times bigger than the list of new ones, there's a risk that the new ones will be overshadowed. Some of the new ones might stand out, but if they don't hold up to old fan favourites, players might opt out of the new content entirely. I think Game Freak are well aware of this issue, and they have shown us two approaches to this problem already.

In Black and White, they went for a "soft reboot" approach, deciding to only use new Pokémon in the main story. The option of using old Pokémon was effectively removed from the games, and I believe the games suffered for it. New monsters had to be made to fit in roles well filled by existing Pokémon, leading to an overuse of "reused designs". When the entire back catalog of old monsters was made available to players at once post Elite Four, it felt kind of overwhelming.

X and Y solved it differently, and I believe this is the way of the future. Embrace all the content, but give the new content just enough prominence to always be present. New Pokémon somewhere in all the routes, all Gym Leaders and Elite Four members using at least one new Pokémon, but letting old Pokémon make up most of the game's content. It leads to great variety, withouth the new content taking a back seat. With relatively few new Pokémon, they feel novel enough to check out, and there are few enough of them that you can give most of them a try (or at least there are few enough that they'll all be memorable).

It also seems they've managed to steer clear of the power creep trap, at least for now. As Ksh13 mentioned above, it's a trap many franchises fall into, it looks like Bakugan went all in for it. Power creep means that new monsters and moves are deliberately made stronger than old ones, so players will be inclined to use the new stuff in favour of the old. In Pokémon, though, old content is buffed alongside new content, meaning that the group of the "best" Pokémon at any time is consisting of 'mons from all generations. The relative power level is creeping up, though, so it might be that Pokémon will have to adjust for it at some point. At least it seems like they've stopped the ridiculous tendencies of having more and more "important" legendaries for every generation. Once the "god treshold" was crossed in Gen IV, it wasn't any place to take them further, so they stepped down a little.

There is possibly some more to say about this, but I don't think I'm able to write it all out right now.
 
As promised, let's talk about content pile-up. I believe this to be one of the more serious challenges the designers will have to face in the long run.

I'll start on the technical side. Speaking only about the data, there's no reason to worry. Computing power keeps increasing, and the games will continue to comfortably contain all the Pokémon you could ever throw at them. What worries me more is the fact that updating the graphics between generations will become an increasingly larger pain in the butt. We've already got some eight hundred monsters to model, texturise and animate. Somebody has to painstakingly colour every nail, horn, foot sole, tooth, and a myriad of other body parts on hundreds of models. Thousands of eyes have to be made to blink every now and then. The sheer bother of this has previously led to the Pokémon Company reusing models and animation from Stadium all the way up to Pokémon Battle Revolution. And it's only going to get worse for every generation. I wouldn't be surprised if at least some of the Pokémon models made for X and Y will remain in use, unaltered, for a decade or more. We can live with that, though. XY's models are decent enough. Game design-wise is where the real issues lie.

For every upcoming generation of games, new content will comprise a smaller and smaller percentage of the content in the game. We'll soon hit the milestone of having ten existing Pokémon for every new one presented by the new generation, and I believe we're almost there with moves too. The new content might be interesting enough, but when the backlog of monsters is ten times bigger than the list of new ones, there's a risk that the new ones will be overshadowed. Some of the new ones might stand out, but if they don't hold up to old fan favourites, players might opt out of the new content entirely. I think Game Freak are well aware of this issue, and they have shown us two approaches to this problem already.
The only issue I have with technical limitations is that they are all relative to the size of the studio and the amount of money that they are willing/ capable of investing. For an indie developer animating that many sprites is a challenge almost to great to over come. But for one of the largest and most profitable and highest selling game developers in the world, I really don't feel that the "technical limitations" argument flies. There is literally a glut and oversupply of game developers and students graduating every year, the gaming industry is one of the fastest growing and largest growing industries in the world. When you look at the sheer manpower and developing teams for other iconic games such as cod and gta it's staggering to believe that Nintendo would ever use technical or manpower limitations as an excuse. This is part of the reason I was so disappointed in the superbowl ad in the other thread- as one of the largest game developers in the world it simply isn't an excuse in this day and age. (And also why they have no excuse to not have riveting story lines. Seriously Game Freak, higher any rpg writer from any other franchise on the planet and pokemon would be vastly, vastly improved, and probably sell better. This also addresses the "improving the games without introducing a glut of new pokemon" issue.)
 
Hopefully nowhere in the next 10 years. I've always loved Pokemon, no matter what people thought of it. I plan to stick to my favorite video game. Forever. (unless they fuck up badly)
 
Flamedood The issue isn't technical limitations, it's cost effectiveness. At least in the AAA space, video games are getting more expensive to produce but the market is somewhat saturated and hence boosting sales is difficult. Video games are starting to become difficult to make money from even at a retail price of $60 which is why we are seeing so much DLC, season passes, microtransactions and all the other industry bullshit.

Pokemon has always been relatively cheap to make - but with more and more content in every successive game, and the effort of fully animating all those models, presumably at ever-higher resolutions, it's not as cheap as it used to be, and that trend will continue.

And on the story issue: just go and play Undertale for the tenth time if you want a compelling story. But seriously, Pokemon has never been about the story, not really - the mostly blank slate allows players to make their own story if they want to (vividly illustrated by Twitch Plays Pokemon).
 
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Flamedood The issue isn't technical limitations, it's cost effectiveness. At least in the AAA space, video games are getting more expensive to produce but the market is somewhat saturated and hence boosting sales is difficult. Video games are starting to become difficult to make money from even at a retail price of $60 which is why we are seeing so much DLC, season passes, microtransactions and all the other industry bullshit.

Pokemon has always been relatively cheap to make - but with more and more content in every successive game, and the effort of fully animating all those models, presumably at ever-higher resolutions, it's not as cheap as it used to be, and that trend will continue.

And on the story issue: just go and play Undertale for the tenth time if you want a compelling story. But seriously, Pokemon has never been about the story, not really - the mostly blank slate allows players to make their own story if they want to (vividly illustrated by Twitch Plays Pokemon).
But isn't this thread about how long pokemon will last and it's sustainable quality? I don't think it's outrageous for fans who have been with the franchise for many years to expect greater quality from their games. And pokemon is unique in the handheld industry in its extreme profitability- as a flag ship title for handhelds (and a strong reason for their continued existence) greater financial outlay for improved graphics and story line seems extremely reasonable to ensure retaining their audience, captivating new audiences, and competing with the mobile market.

Pokemon will most certainly continue as a company and a franchise for decades to come, the brand is one of the most recognisable in contemporary culture. But pokemon doesn't exist in a vacuum- "new" and "fresh" titles such as Yokai Watch are providing competition in their own backyard on top of the mobile market and unless pokemon adapts to the shifting landscape the profits will begin to dry up and the series will start to fall into decline.
 
I think taking Sonic as precedent, pokemon will be around long long after its used by date and long after the games are bad and sell poorly. Purely because it's pokemon
Also, i think it's possible pokemon may have to transfer to a non-nintendo created console or maybe IOS i don't know.

I think we're asking the wrong questions here, because while I think the series itself is as safe as Mario, Zelda, or any big line Nintendo title, there are three factors we're all thinking about:

4. Will Missingno ever be officially recognized? Dream on, dream until your dreams come true.
Missingno is officially recognised.
 

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