Game Freak hit with another hack, info leaking

[Pikachu315111]

Flying-type Eeveelution:

Huh... Wonder where this would've shown up if it had made it. Kahili's ace, maybe?

What an odd thing to consider for the game. Sylveon was an outlier in XY but it was one that made sense: a new eevee to really show off the first new typing in years.
This would just be....a flying type evolution? On its own? Kind of a random one to do, especially as the only cross-gen of an existing type.

I kind of wonder if it was meant as an Alolan Eevee but that'd be even weirder since it would assuredly not evolve and if you're going to do that we're getting alolan pikachu.

Pretty funny note though. "You'd need the budget of a main character designer to make this stand out so dont bother"

Flying-type Eevee would have especially been notable as it would have been the first Eeveelution based on a "Physical" Type before the Type Split (technically "Fairy" is the first Eeveelution Type that had no prior designation, though let's be honest, we all know it would have been Special). Double-notable is that Dragon is the only "Special" Type that yet had an Eeveelution. So a few thoughts:

1. Dragon and Flying tend to go hand-in-hand, so maybe there was also an unmentioned Dragon-type Eeveelution in the work as a way to both finish the "Special" Eeveelutions and harken the "Physical" Eeveelutions. Though with them scrapping the Flying one any other ones paired with it went to the scrap heap with it.
   
   
2. As R_N suggested, maybe they felt in order to start doing the Physical Eeveelutions they needed to make an Eevee variant (that way Eevee isn't a freak with 17+ different evolutions, it'll only be a freak with two forms each with 8+ different evolutions). Though not sure they would have named it "Alolan Eevee" as that would restrict it to Alola, maybe a possibility of why they scrapped it.

Anyway, it is concerningly funny that the Flying Eeveelution was scrapped because the original was too close to a fan design and they would actually have to spend a considerable amount of money to designing a unique one. Though it's concerning in two ways:

1. That just a fan design being close to what they envisioned is enough to get a Pokemon scrapped. I get it, the professional game creators don't want to be accused of copying a fan design, BUT at the same time this does mean when it comes to Pokemon like the Eeveelutions this puts a further limit on a design they already had limits on. Like for the Flying-type, there's really not a lot of places they can go with the design. Just looking on Google for "Flying Eeveelution" I've mainly found 3 designs: Just give it wings, turn its ear to wings (and make it bird-like, usually a hawk), or make it into a cloud (and of course a combination of those three). And, yeah, those are the most obvious designs for a Flying-type Eeveelutions, so if they want a unique design NO ONE has ever thought of they would need to get a design team together for it. And this just doesn't apply to Eeveelutions, also applies to any animal that hasn't been made into an official Pokemon yet but likely has a dozen fan designs. And no, this isn't a knack against fan designs, I love fanmade Pokemon, but now we know GF is concerned about accidentally copying a fan design. Or rather, probably being accused of it; because they don't need to copy, they have a whole team of monster designers, but people on the internet would see the slightest resemblance to an already existing fan design and start pointing fingers yelling "plagiarism", even though it was just GF and the fan artist had the same idea.
   
   
2. And just to design a more "unique" Flying Eeveelution is so costly it's not worth it unless it's a mascot of a game. And I believe them it would be costly, Eevee is one of Pokemon's most recognizable mascot famous for its multiple evolution gimmicks which all have their own fans. If they're going to make even one new Eeveelution it's going to have to be a 10/10 design out of the gate. And unless the monster maker given the job can create a design that does that (likely still needs to go through committee and get some design changes, but overall it has the basic idea down), it's going to involve more work as you'd now have to get a whole batch of designers to make a whole batch of different Flying Eeveelutions to figure out which one (or "ones" to combine) you'd want to go with. And it's a shame to just get a new Eeveelution or two now this is the process they have to go through.

In any event, looks like we are getting some never-before-seen concept art, including real Mimikyu just being kind of a bump or something?

That's been confirmed fake. They just took the existing known Mimikyu Art Sheet and added the blobs.

And Hala's profile apparently mentions regional Snorlax, so my guess is it was probably going to be a sumo wrestler or something and someone asked why not just use Hariyama.

Might as well take a look at it.

• When it mentions his partner it says "Snorlax's Regional Form/Coconut Crab 2", so either that meant both of them were his partner (wouldn't be surprising if they wanted most if not most Type specialist to have both a Regional Variant and native mon as dual aces, sorta like some Galarian Gym Leaders and all the Paldean Gym Leaders) or were thinking of an Alolan Snorlax but if they didn't go through with it had Crabominable as a back-up. I could see Alolan Snorlax being a sumo wrestler (Hawaiian has a few native born professional sumo, which Hala is likely based on), though I think it would also need some kind of geological factor to not only explain the change (as that's how most Alolan Pokemon are) but also give it another Type. It changing from Normal to Fighting isn't all that interesting, as you said it's essentially Hariyama at that point.
  
  
• Hala is described knowing more about Pokemon than an average Professor, which I guess is why he was made the Starter Giver even if that idea wasn't fully kept.
  
  
• Mentions Hala likes innovative things like hi-tech gadget and home appliances and has a hobby of looking at flyers of electrical appliances; looking forward to seeing the future of the developing and changing Alola. Strange thing to include (and I don't think it was a kept personality trait), unless maybe they were trying to include an aspect of Tapu Koko's primary Type into his personality. Don't know unless can read the other Kahuna's character sheets.
  
  
• A little note about Kukui, Hala knew him since he was a child and had assigned him to being the 7th (Trial) Captain (that is an interesting point. Surely when Kukui was a kid Hapu's grandfather was still alive, thus it would be his duty to assign the Poni Island Captain (though I suppose Hala could have requested the position for Kukui). Unless that aspect of the Island Trial wasn't hammered out yet, or maybe the order of Trail Captains originally could be mixed up? While on the subject, does that mean Mina was selected by Hapu's grandfather before he died? We know how he died but not how long ago it was. Unless, if the current Kahuna is dead, the Kahuna(s?) of the other islands could agree to assign a Captain). This would also explain Kukui's alter ego as the Masked Royal, inspired by Hala though doing a different form of wrestling. That said, I don't recall if in the games its mentioned if Hala and Kukui have this mentor/pupil relation... THOUGH we do know Kukui had this relation with Guzma. Did they swap out Kukui's and Guzma's relation to Hala, yet kept the wrestler alter ego for Kukui even though the planned inspiration is now gone? Once again, maybe Kukui's character sheet would have these answers.
  
  
• Even though the Hala we know has a sumo wrestler build, says here he doesn't have that physique but got famous for tossing sumo wrestlers bigger than him. So was Hala intended to be thinner (maybe more muscle-toned) or are sumo wrestlers generally bigger than Hala's build (I'd believe either).
  
  
• "The proof of the tradition is a handprint, so large it sticks out of a passport, like a sumo wrestler's handprint". Instead of a the Trail Stamp being put in your Trainer Passport, did each Kahuna originally have a unique "proof of tradition", Hala's being a sumo wrestler handprint?
  
  
• Finally his clothing matches what they did except for one thing. It mentions a "sacred object made from something semi-legendary, proof of the bestower". Hala doesn't really have anything like that (he does have a handfan he keeps folded tucked in his belt, but it looks fairly modern), though were originally each Kahuna supposed to have a "sacred object" given to them by their Tapu?

forget the official confirmation of why mega jynx was cut, klefki's design being changed because they were worried the vatican would sue is freaking hilarious

Klefki: Huh, odd the reason for the face change was specifically because it just so happened the Vatican uses a crossed key symbol (even though typing "crossed keys" in Google comes up with plenty of logos and insignia that look like it). Feels like there was a little bit of misunderstanding and a little bit of overcautious-ness. Then again, considering Pokemon's early history with the Church... also hilarious that directly underneath this is Mega Houndoom, aka the hellhound Pokemon which gets skeletal armor and bone devil horns, lol!

Mega Houndoom: So originally it had a red-tipped, triangle devil tail but changed "corrected" to a two-prong pitchfork because it looked like it was dipped in blood... you mean that wasn't on purpose? And I say red-tipped, but not exactly, it's an uneven red splash pattern, you know, like it just slashed you with its tail and that's the blood stain left on it. Come on now. Also, you made the hellhound Pokemon look even more hellish, and it's the implied BLOOD that was a step too far (which you then replaced with something to further enforce the devil appearance)? Also you missed the blood-stained claws.

Mega Jynx: They cut Mega Jynx because they were afraid overseas audience would relate it to a negative racial stereotype... Did you guys forget you changed her face to purple to resolve that issue over a DECADE ago? They're really still worried about Jynx being looked as a "black face" character, after all these years of it having a purple face? Is that why Jynx never got a normal evolution despite originally being a trio with Electabuzz and Magmar? Poor Jynx.

So looks like since the very start AZ was pinned a main antagonist, wonder when that was changed?

Lysandre was once envisioned with a cape? Settle down there, emperor, people might think you think too highly of yourself.

Xerosic didn't really change much from his final design.

So judging by hair and eyepiece, I think from left to right is Bryony (green), Celosia (purple), Aliana (orange), and Mable (blue). Really went out of their way to make them look distinct, only for their final designs to make them more look uniform (which would make sense with Team Flare's corporate vibe). Here's these concept art & final designs side-by-side speaks for itself:

Looks like they took bits of each of the concept clothes and mixed-and-matched them for the final design. Only their hair styles and eyepieces remained truly unique and similar to their Concept (though Mable's slotted glasses were changed to be two-lens goggles).
Final Bryony & Celosia wear the (shrunken) closed collar and shirt of Concept Bryony; Final Aliana & Mable wear the popped collar and shirt of Concept Aliana.
Final Celosia & Mable wear shoulder pads similar to Concept Celosia's shoulder decoration (and maybe a bit of Concept Aliana). Final Bryony & Aliana's shoulders are uncovered like Concept Bryony.
Final Bryony & Aliana wear full gloves similar to Concept Aliana; Final Celosia & Mable just wear cuffs like Concept Bryony.
All Final wear belts similar to Concept Aliana & Mable.
Final Aliana & Mable uses Concept Aliana's dress (though Aliana loses the underskirt and Mable instead wears skirt shorts); Final Bryony & Celosia wear new shorts.
Final Bryony & Mable wear knee high boots similar to Concept Bryony (with some details from Concept Mable's boots), also having the bare thighs of Concept Aliana; Final Aliana & Celosia wear knee high stockings & ankle high boots similar to Concept Aliana.

Peanuts - resemblance to an undisclosed company mascot

... What? Like, it has to be a peanut company, right? Though I looked for both "peanut company mascot" and "Japanese peanut company mascot" (and also put "dinosaur" at the end of both) and found none which resembled those Jimame/Mameju (wait did they just swap the first and last parts of their names?). The only two I could really find is Mr. Peanut and a Japanese one named P-Man (who looks like a generic superhero with a peanut for a head).

From the SM character sheets, we know Hala’s ace was originally an Alolan Snorlax (which we knew “existed”, but more confirmation is nice), Ilima’s ace was “Chicken 2” (no chickens in Alola), and Kiawe’s ace was “Turtle 3” (implying Turtonator was a 3 stage line)

Is there a place where the SM character sheets are? After reading Hala's I'm interested to see what the others may say.

Mikon was cut a 3rd fucking time… what a cursed Pokémon. And that’s with Huntail and Sharpedo having their rich developmental history spawning multiple gens lol

Sadly I think it's last chance was Gen III. If you look at all the Gen IV Baby Pokemon they're from Pokemon with high enough BST they could make a reasonable lower stage. With Vulpix's stats already being 38/41/40/50/65/65//299, it would have probably a BST either close to or under 200. Like I think it's even a "miracle" Azurill got the greenlight during Gen III. Sadly I think "Mikon" would at this point just work better as some kind of variant of Vulpix (heck, instead of a prevo, give it's Ninetales an evolution with 12 tails; Twelvox).

Ending it here for right now, yes I know I'm two pages behind. So to add something that hasn't been posted:

Concept Art of Zinnia

(And finally, official artwork showing Aster (which is indeed the woman we saw with Child Zinnia in the Generations short))

Kahuna Z-Rings were going to be personalized

(... At least they finally let us customize our Rotom Phones...)

Scrapped Ride Pokemon

(Now what special thing would Arbok have done... lifted you over cliffs?)

 

[Yung Dramps]

Now that we've gotten the inner workings of what kinds of changes they do to avoid controversy (e.g. the Klefki redesign) I'm now more curious than ever as to how the heck the Passimian episode of SM reached completion

 

[Esserise]

Kahuna Z-Rings were going to be personalized

(... At least they finally let us customize our Rotom Phones...)

This is in the final product. Each of the kahunas wears a Z-Ring exactly like these. And indeed, any other characters that wear a Z-Ring wear the one that corresponds to their island’s kahuna.

 

[AztecCroc]

This is in the final product. Each of the kahunas wears a Z-Ring exactly like these. And indeed, any other characters that wear a Z-Ring wear the one that corresponds to their island’s kahuna.

I've seen this happen multiple times now, where people have seen something in specifically the SM concept art and thought it was scrapped when it was something in the game.

 

[Yung Dramps]

I've seen this happen multiple times now, where people have seen something in specifically the SM concept art and thought it was scrapped when it was something in the game.

Southern Kalos really screwed up some peoples' whole outlook priming them for the worst with Alola when actually they pretty much got everything they wanted done anyway and what little they didn't was mostly conceptual phase rejects

 

[Pikachu315111]

So one thing that I didn't expect to see was localization documents, for all games up to HGSS!!!

(...)

Pokemon:

- If you've ever wondered what the "gol" in golbat is supposed to be, it makes it sound more kaijuu like, apparently. go figure
- same goes for nidoran - the ran part is supposed to be to make it kaijuu like; the nido is just needle - "cnido" is apparently coincidence
- golduck is, bizarrely, from gold; they even say that "oh it's not actually gold-colored but gold gives off luxury / high level vibes"
- mankey is absolutely not what I thought it was... for the longest time I thought it was a portmanteau of monkey and yankee (like the japanese delinquent - which makes sense since it sees pretty frequent use by the skinheads in rg) - but it's actually "man" and "key" because it's supposed to be the missing link to humans (literally the key to man)... gamefreak naming sense makes no sense but after seeing "yeah lati@s are named after people in plato's works" I will accept even the dumbest explanation if it's from the horse's mouth :(
- farfetch'd is called farfetch'd apparently because they went around the office (I assume NOA or wherever the hell this was translated) and asked people what the thing in its mouth was, to which people apparently responded that it looked like a stick. hence, "fetch" in the name
(potentially influenced name of the item until retcon to leek or whatever later on)
- cloyster apparently from "cluster" and "oyster", all others fortuitous
- electr"ode" because "ode sounds like globe" is the reason given (????????)
- hitmons are from "we wanted to make it hitman (because they're fearsome or whatever) but since it's a pokemon and not a person we made it hitmon"
- the don in rhydon is to make it sound more kaijuu like and they also note the fortuitous similarity to "ride on"
- goldeen is not supposed to be queen but, of all things, they say it's supposed to be a feminine sounding name and list "eileen" as one example (?_?)
- starmie and staryu are left unexplained beyond the final english translation (i.e. turning it into me and you); japanese staryu (hitodeman) has long been my "why did they name it this" Pokemon top 5, up there with golduck, golbat, and gyarados
- magmar is somewhat boringly just "magma but we wanted it to sound strong so we made the last sound r to drag it out"
- dragonair is in fact from dragon and debonair

Now I never assumed the names, especially for Gen I Pokemon, were complicated. Not surprised some are made from a whimsey decision. But jeez, for a few of these I thought they'd put in a little bit more thought.

• Golbat: Guessing the "Go(l)" could bring to mind Gojira/Godzilla, though "Gojbat" sounds a bit weird so switches the "j" with an "l" for smoother pronouncing.
• Nidoran & Rhydon: There is a few kaiju whose name ends with "-an" and "-on", most notably Rodan, Gigan, Varan, Baragon & Megalon, so I get it.
• Golduck: I guess they wanted to associate it with "high value" because of the gem on its forehead? Oddly "Gold" has been associated with the Psychic-type, such as Sabrina giving the "Gold Badge" and in Mystery Dungeon the "Gold Gummi" is most liked by Psychic-types. Maybe even GF realized how powerful the Psychic-type was in Gen I?
• Mankey: ... Okay... personally thought it was a combination of "monkey" and "angry".
• Farfetch'd: You know I'm beginning to sus some of these. Because "Farfetch'd" sounds like "farfetched", which goes along with its Japanese name "Kamonegi" which roughly translate to a pun with one meaning both "easy target" & "golden opportunity". As in, you being offered seemingly a rare Pokemon for a common Pokemon seems both farfetched but a golden opportunity, only to learn this "rare" Pokemon sucks in battle while you gave away a Pokemon decent in battle, thus you were an easy target. Like, if anything, the "fetch" part would be the coincidence.
• Cloyster: "Cluster". I guess maybe they thought it was a synonym for "close" or "shut"? Or maybe even "cramp" or "compact"?
• Electrode: I sorta get it. I imagine it went like this: We have a second round electric-type and we named its prevo volt+orb. We need another "round" word, maybe one that's bigger than "orb". Checks synonyms for "orb". Oh, "globe". An electric globe. Hey, isn't "electrode" a thing? Why, yes it is! Let's go with that then. And hey, it also sounds like "electric explode", which is what they do.
• Hitmons: Being they were then named after famous martial artists (yes, boxing is a martial art) who could seriously hurt, if not kill, someone with their skill, I could see them having wanted to use "hitman" as strange as it sounds.
• Goldeen & Magmar: Sure I guess.
• Gyarados: Kurona answered the reason for Staryu family, and looking up Gyarados on Bulbapedia reveals an explanation from Ken Sugimori: No specific origin, was chosen merely for its "force". Now Bulbapedia lists a whole batch of similar sounding Japanese words which do sound pretty "forceful", so knowing those words I can see where it came from.
• Dragonair: Oh hey, one that's pretty clever!

Characters:

Nothing super interesting here, but there were thoughts about naming the Gym Leaders plant names at some point, just like in Japanese. Misty was Lilly, Brock was Cypress... and Sabrina was Zinnia!

I wonder if one of Misty's sister being named Lily is coincidence or reference. Sabrina possibly being Zinnia is funny, wonder if they did what would they have called Zinnia, maybe something matching her Japanese name more closely. Or master to contrast is with Aster a celestial name that starts with "Z"... Zelia (which means "zealous, ardent"... and is also a genus of flies, which depending on how you feel about Zinnia...).

Aww man the Deoxys concept stuff said they were thinking of doing even more forms. (Apparently the ones we have so far were partly based on the lifecycle of a star, from nebula to current stable state, they wanted to do red giant, black hole and even Big Bang based Deoxys forms.)

Huh, and here I thought the only direction they could go for new forms was one for Physical (50/180/160/20/40/150//600) and one for Special (50/20/40/180/160/150//600).

But let's work with this. Forming is Speed, heating is Power, cooling is Defense, and stabilizing is Normal.

• Red Giant is a star that has grown massive as it's burning through the last of its hydrogen. So maybe have it be the one with equal stats: 50/110/110/110/110/110//600.

Honestly, both Black Hole and Big Bang sound like they would be super form counterparts, so I'm going to make them Megas.

• Big Bang/Deoxsite A. The creation of everything, from a single subatomic particle a universe exploded outward at power and speed unimaginable. Ability: Mold Breaker. 50/120/120/120/120/170//700
• Black Hole/Deoxsite Z. Pure destruction, an immovable anomaly of unimaginable density which draws everything toward itself and their end. Ability: Sheer Force. 50/200/100/200/100/50.

Eh, it's a start.

It also seems like they were planning a fossil pair, Mimikyu was going to have two version-exclusive forms

Fossils for Alola would be interesting as, since Hawaii is a "recent" formation (oldest island is about 28 million years old, the big islands are even younger), they don't really have dinosaurs nor large land vertebrates. Instead their fossils are of extinct birds and marine life such as coral and mollusks. Though, since Alola isn't just animals found in Hawaii, they could stretch belief if they included a Fossil of a flying Pokemon and a marine Pokemon. Or do two marine Pokemon but make one of them like Dragon-type. I still stand by that a Megalodon (Rock/Water) and Mesasaur (Rock/Dragon) would have been cool.

And interesting Mimikyu was going to have two additional forms. Like I thought if they ever had another Pokemon for Mimikyu to copy it would be Eevee. But what would the third be? Meowth? Clefairy?

Psyduck! No, that would just be silly.

And it’s possible, that after some time, that they realized the potential backlash and accusation of wasted opportunity if fans discover that Alolan Scyther and Rhydon cannot evolve were they released

Rhydon yes, but Scyther, remember Scyther and Scizor has the same BST, so an Alolan Scyther would be no "weaker" than Scizor. Though, just like theorized Rhydon's Rock/Electric was reworked into Alolan Geodude family, I wonder if the design of Alolan Scyther could have been reworked into the Fomantis family?

 

[misterdarvus]

Some of scrapped balance change for generation 7 that are not implemented in the final game (translation source from reddit}

Spoiler

Canceled Changes:

- Will-o-wisp: doesn't effect Ghost types (Dev note: Will-O-Wisp Weakened)
- Poison: If a poisoned Pokémon is poisoned again, it becomes Badly poisoned. Damage starts at 1/8 (Dev note: Poison strengthened)
- Intimidate: Dark type Pokémon are immune to intimidate. Bisharp is under consideration (Dev note: Intimidate weakened, dark type relief) (Personal note: Bisharp and Pawniard were the only Dark types with Defiant at the time, which is likely why they considered it when deciding on this change)
- Dark Void: Accuracy changed from 80 to 60. Made ineffective against Dark and Ghost types (Dev note: Dark Void weakened) (Personal note: it says Implemented, but has 50 accuracy and hits Dark and Ghost types in the final)
- Dark Void: Makes it ineffective against Ghost types (Dev note: Dark Void weakened)
- Posion: If a Poison type is drained, damage will be taken (Dev note: Poison type relief) (Personal note: This one was hard to translate, but I'm assuming they wanted all Poison types to have a passive Liquid Ooze effect?)
- Grass: If there is harsh sunlight, Grass type damage increases by 1.5 (Dev note: Grass type relief)
- Dragon Killer: New Ability, doubles damage against Dragon types (Dev note: Dragon type countermeasure)
- Fairy Light/Shine: New Move, changes target's type to Fairy (Dev note: Dragon type countermeasure)
- Toxic: 100% Accurate even if used by Bug types (Dev note: Bug type relief)
- Sticky Web: Now effects Flying types and Levitate (Dev note: Bug type relief)
- Gravity: Priority moves no longer have priority (Dev note: Prankster and Gale Wings countermeasure) (Personal note: Likely canceled since they introduced Psychic Terrain the same gen to nerf priority)
- Icy Wind: Speed of Ice types does not decrease (Dev note: Ice type relief)
- Noble Roar: Change effect from lowering Physical Attack and Special Attack by 1 stage each to lowering Special Attack by 2 stages (No notes)
- Electrify: Doesn't effect Lightning Rod (No notes)
- Fairy Lock: Effect changed to last 2 turns (No notes)

Other:

- Crafty Shield: Continuous use OK (It could already be used consecutively without failing) (No notes)
- Forest's Curse: (No description) (No notes)

implemented changes

- Paralysis: Speed changed from 1/4 to 1/2, Thunder Wave accuracy changed to 90% (Dev note: Paralysis Weakening)
- Burn: Burn damage changed from 1/8 to 1/16 (Dev note: Will-O-Wisp Weakening)
- Confusion: 2-5 turns changed to 2-4, chance of attacking self is reduced to 1/3 (Dev note: Confusion Weakening) (Personal note: Confusion turn count was not changed)
- Gale Wings: Can only activate when HP is full (Dev note: Talonflame countermeasure)
- Prankster: Status moves effected by Prankster are ineffective against Dark type Pokémon (Dev note: Prankster weakened, Dark type relief)
- Wide Guard: Will now block status moves that hit multiple targets like Dark Void and Growl (Dev note: Dark Void weakened)
- Swagger: Accuracy changed from 90 to 85 (Dev note: Prankster + Swagger weakened)
- Sucker Punch: Power changed from 80 to 70 (Dev note: weakened Sucker Punch)
- Mega Evolution: Speed calculation on the turn Mega Evolution occurs will be done based on the Pokémon's speed after Mega Evolving (no notes)
- Ally Switch: Priority increased from +1 to +2 (No notes)
- Parental Bond: Change second attack to deal 1/4 damage. (Dev note: Kangaskhan countermeasure)
- Fell Stinger: Power changed to 50, attack increased to 3 stages (Dev note: Bug relief)
- Stance Change: Form change cannot occur when unable to use moves due to status effects or confusion (Dev note: weakened)
- Sheer Cold: When used by a non-Ice type, accuracy becomes 20. Does not work on Ice types (Dev note: weakened)
- Water Shuriken: Changed from Physical to Special (No notes)
- Mystical Fire: Power changed from 65 to 75 (No notes)

- Parabolic Charge: Power changed from 50 to 65 (No notes)

- Flying Press: Power Changed from 80 to 100 (No notes)

edit: I forgot to clarify that this is for gen 7, in case someone asked

 

[R_N]

Dragon Killer is such an on the nose thing to have considered. They really wanted to take dragon down a peg.

I think the poison 'liquid ooze' effect would've been pretty neat but I suppose would be pretty niche and reliant on having a poison to switch into most drain moves.

 

[Ironmage]

Dragon Killer is such an on the nose thing to have considered. They really wanted to take dragon down a peg.

I think the poison 'liquid ooze' effect would've been pretty neat but I suppose would be pretty niche and reliant on having a poison to switch into most drain moves.

As well, there's some awkwardness when it comes to resolution. Poison already resists most prevalent draining attacks (drain punch, draining kiss, various Grass moves), so it's already sensible to switch them in. That resistance also reduces the ooze damage since it's based on amount healed which itself scales with damage. It'd hammer Strength Sap/Leech Seed users (and Yveltal I guess) pretty hard, but that's a niche within a niche.

Interesting that they were considering adding another field effect boost to Grass damage on top of its terrain.

 

[Bakugames]

Now that we've gotten the inner workings of what kinds of changes they do to avoid controversy (e.g. the Klefki redesign) I'm now more curious than ever as to how the heck the Passimian episode of SM reached completion

my thinking is that from the phrasing of jynx, they still see it as a "western controversy" than a racist problem. obviously, they will avoid any controversy for pokemon games as those are universal, but the anime can probably go by "if it doesnt touch sensibilities in the west we'll censor it there" once or twice. the passimian episode was filler so i wouldnt be surprised if they do try to make important episodes as uncontrovesial as possible, but filler gets a little more leeway

 

[R_N]

my thinking is that from the phrasing of jynx, they still see it as a "western controversy" than a racist problem. obviously, they will avoid any controversy for pokemon games as those are universal, but the anime can probably go by "if it doesnt touch sensibilities in the west we'll censor it there" once or twice. the passimian episode was filler so i wouldnt be surprised if they do try to make important episodes as uncontrovesial as possible, but filler gets a little more leeway

Also the anime probably just has different people overlooking everything compared to the game people, so it's not surprising that things slip through the cracks in that regard. Especially can see them going "he's just impersonating a monkey pokemon [rather than a humanshape pokemon], and he's not in full blackface" and only when the western arm saw ash literally with a face painted black did anyone step in and go "the optics are kinda bad here"

 

[Samtendo09]

As well, there's some awkwardness when it comes to resolution. Poison already resists most prevalent draining attacks (drain punch, draining kiss, various Grass moves), so it's already sensible to switch them in. That resistance also reduces the ooze damage since it's based on amount healed which itself scales with damage. It'd hammer Strength Sap/Leech Seed users (and Yveltal I guess) pretty hard, but that's a niche within a niche.

Interesting that they were considering adding another field effect boost to Grass damage on top of its terrain.

Honestly for the best that Grass type moves doesn’t have power boosted by the Sun now that Grassy Surge is a thing.

Rillaboom might end up getting the boot at Gen 8 Smogon OU and possibly Gen 9 with 1.5x from Sun and 1.3x from Grassy Terrain into account, as it will spam Wood Hammer and Grassy Glide more liberally more than it would now.

 

[Blanca Weiss]

Dragon Killer is such an on the nose thing to have considered. They really wanted to take dragon down a peg.

I think the poison 'liquid ooze' effect would've been pretty neat but I suppose would be pretty niche and reliant on having a poison to switch into most drain moves.

Even weirder is that both of the lines with liquid ooze are poison type anyway and no other mons get that ability since then.

 

[Sonikku A]

Honestly for the best that Grass type moves doesn’t have power boosted by the Sun now that Grassy Surge is a thing.

Rillaboom might end up getting the boot at Gen 8 Smogon OU and possibly Gen 9 with 1.5x from Sun and 1.3x from Grassy Terrain into account, as it will spam Wood Hammer and Grassy Glide more liberally more than it would now.

Yeah, but it'd be funny

But real talk, the fact they wanted to buff ghost more makes me realize...Ghost became Gen 4/5 Dragon 2.0 effectively

And that's ignoring Fairy being almost as oppressive, if not more

 

[Yung Dramps]

I'm just wondering what Pokemon would've even had Dragon Killer if it had made it off the cutting room floor. I have a hard time thinking of anything in the final Alola dex or even some of the scrapped concepts we know of having it. A knight Pokemon like Gallade maybe?

 

[Sonikku A]

I'm just wondering what Pokemon would've even had Dragon Killer if it had made it off the cutting room floor. I have a hard time thinking of anything in the final Alola dex or even some of the scrapped concepts we know of having it. A knight Pokemon like Gallade maybe?

 

[R_N]

I suspect Silvally was always designed around the type change gimmick so I dunno if they'd give it to them.

Possible they hadn't decided who'd get it at this point, and the name was just a placeholder. Maybe even contributed to why they didn't go through with it.

 

[Pikachu315111]

Also didn’t see this posted here, but early Unova gym leader designs:


View attachment 683386

Plus descriptions:

Spoiler

View attachment 683387

Surprised at how young the triplets and Elesa were supposed to be originally. also find it interesting that Drayden was always meant to have a grandson

Better image of beta BW Gym Leaders:

Striaton Trio: Neat they tried to differ up their appearance to match their personality: Chili's hair is the most unkept, vest is unbuttoned, rolled up his pants, and is wearing the most sporty sneakers. Cilan and Cress look formal though only Cress has it all together, Cilan's pants are baggy and he's still wearing sneakers. Also both Chili and Cilan's pants are off color (at least compared to their black vest), Chili is dark grey and Cilan is blue. I could actually still see these designs still being used as their "early days" working at their restaurant: Cress (the calm one) taking it the most serious though looks to be shy, Chili (the zealous one) refuses to wear uncomfortable clothes and initially doesn't care what others think of his looks, and Cilan (the free-spirited one) going with the flow while being a tad lazy. While neat to see these personality traits, I think it was a good choice to age them up and imply development.

Lenora: I kind of prefer this Lenora over the one we got, lol. Not sure how old final Lenora is meant to be, though this Lenora doesn't look to be 35. If anything final Lenora looks to be 35 while his Lenora looks to be in her 20s. This is a Lenora who is still in college and if she has met Hawes yet they would still be dating.

Burgh: Um, where's Burgh? Interesting they included his father in this group shot (though he just had to wear his green disco suit to try to look cool), but this is about the Gym Leaders not their family. Joking aside, yeah, Burgh is looking a bit rough there. Don't think there's a way to have Burgh grow into this, though could be reused for Burgh's father.

Elesa: Doesn't look much changed... which makes it hard to buy she's 15. Yes, I know it's possible, and she's not meant to be your average 15 year old teenager, but still. Like, I'd buy 17... I say this as if they kept her age for the final version. So, yeah, guess they like the design to keep it (though gave her some tights cause girl gotta be cold), the age was the only problem.

Clay: Sorta looks to be drawn in a different art style. Like with Burgh, don't see this design for the man himself, but maybe a relative? If not his father than an uncle, or grey his hair and I'd buy that's his grandfather. Older gentleman in his family having that more distinct Japanese facial structure, while the younger men look like final Clay and Lian (oh man, now I really want see early concept art of the Legends: Arceus cast).

Skyla: And there she is, Latina Skyla; don't look that up without safe search on. Joking aside, I do honestly think it's a shame they didn't keep her Hispanic (though I agree with the change of hairstyle). And like above, I wouldn't completely toss out this design, make it her mom. Sure Skyla is light skin but that could be from her dad who is white, if Lenora can be half African/half British than Skyla can be half Hispanic/half White (or if they want another ethnicity, Skyla is a red haired white girl, make her part Irish).

Brycen, Drayden & Iris: Yeah, that's basically them aside from some clothing and hair adjustments. Feel if Brycen wanted to hide his identity than swapping the mouth cover for a eye mask is the better call. And they REALLY wanted to make those dragon suspenders work for Drayden. Actually, the most surprising thing is something I just realized: Iris hair here isn't huge; it's long, but that's at least more realistic than the 10 pounds of bundled hair final Iris has.

And we even have some additional character descriptions:

• Is Steven Stone supposed to be there? I notice they accidentally called Drayden "Alder", so is this also a mistake?
• Huh, Alder is based on Oni-wan Kenobi; I can see it. Older gentleman, wise but jovial, his last partner died and he replaced it with another one that's related to the last one.
• Yeah it does look like they pulled Marshal from Street Fighter. Wait, 27 years old, really?
• Shauntel is writing a love story... between people and Pokemon... GF I gave you a pass for the Sinnoh stuff because you were pulling from real world mythology, but you got no excuse here. Unless that's meant to be a joke on fanfics and/or YA novels.
• So Grimsley originally had a more direct gambling connection being a card dealer. Between this and changing him to having been from a fallen rich family and developed a gambling addition, considering how he's dressed I say just have him (or his family) be a former casino owner that fell onto hard times.

>13 years between rby & bw... hilda & hilbert are getting attacked by ghetsis while red & blue are trying to get a mortgage. crazy to think about.

Blue is related to Professor Oak, his family has money if not a family mansion. Only monthly payments he's making is what streaming services he has on his mobile phone at the time.

Red I think is just a vagabond, he has no home, he's always on the move. How else is he to master the Kyio no Hado Pokemon.

On another note, apparently Sun & Moon really were planned to have a postgame feature where Alola gets a set of Gyms, with Ryuki taking point as the character running the program and tasking the player with scouting suitable Leaders. Makes me wonder if those empty construction lots across Alola really were meant for that… and if so, it makes what USUM did with them all the more disappointing.

Link to Centro post about it.

Reading the post, I feel just like with Southern Kalos that GF casted their scope too big. Sounds like not only would there be the normal cast of SM characters, but they were going to also have a whole batch of new characters show up. This could also be why SM has a Type Specialist for each Type, a relic for when many of the characters were going to be likely candidates for Gym Leaders.

Alola Type Specialist Rundown

Normal - Ilima
Fighting - Hala (Part of Elite Four)
Flying - Kahili (Part of Elite Four)
Poison - Plumeria
Ground - Hapu
Rock - Olivia (Part of Elite Four)
Bug - Guzma
Ghost - Acerola (Part of Elite Four)
Steel - Molayne
Fire - Kiawe
Water - Lana
Grass - Mallow
Electric - Sophocles
Psychic - Faba, Dexio
Ice - Sina
Dragon - Ryuki
Dark - Nanu
Fairy - Mina

I guess one reason they didn't go through with it is like, why would you choose anyone else but the Captains? With Ilima, Mallow, Lana, Kiawe, Sophocles, & Mina that's already 6. And I feel Guzma and Plumeria would then be the last two being they have nothing else to do after disbanding Team Skull.

Would be interesting to see what they had planned for Badges. Was there just a Badge (or few you got to pick) for each Type? Would each character have their own idea for a Badge (or few and you helped them select)? Would they allow you make the Badges No, that's a terrible idea... all the phalluses and genitalia...

Though a game where you're establishing a Pokemon League from scratch with a plethora of candidates isn't a bad idea for a setting, though I more imagine it being like a Mobile Phone game so that way you can share your League with others. Pokemon League Builder.

STOP THE PRESSES!! PIKACHU TAKING SHIT WAS NEARLY CANON. WE WERE ROBBED

I don't take shit, I give ya shit, so back off!

(Sorry, couldn't resist, I was going to skip this comment but noticed you forgot the "a" between "taking shit")

Now that we've gotten the inner workings of what kinds of changes they do to avoid controversy (e.g. the Klefki redesign) I'm now more curious than ever as to how the heck the Passimian episode of SM reached completion

Easy, GF doesn't work on the anime. OLM also probably thought it was "okay" because Ash wasn't doing "black face", he was dressing up as a Passimian and only had the center of his face painted. OLM is a Japanese animation studio who very likely don't know the full extent of America's black racial stereotyping and depiction, like they may not know there was a racist depiction which compared black people to primates... yeah...

 

[Sonikku A]

I do find it funny most of the scrapped alolan forms effectively got reused in final or later

Electric Dark Raichu just became Morpeko Gen 8

Alolan Snorlax became Bewear

Bug Fairy Scyther split to be Ribombee (typing), Lurantis (Fairy looking mantis)

Electric Rock just got shifted to Alolan Golem

 

[R_N]

I think Fairy Light might've been considered for Shiinotic specifically. While Fairy has a few light-focused attacks its entire shtick is that it lights up; it even gets fellow-new-move Spotlight and Illuminate.
Like Trick or Treat, Magic Powder & Forest's Curse I suspect this would've been a signature move unlike Spotlight (which went to a few even if it was meant as the "primary" user)

 

[DrPumpkinz]

Blue is related to Professor Oak, his family has money if not a family mansion. Only monthly payments he's making is what streaming services he has on his mobile phone at the time.

Red I think is just a vagabond, he has no home, he's always on the move. How else is he to master the Kyio no Hado Pokemon.

wow they really are just Ken and Ryu huh

 

[Samtendo09]

Yeah, but it'd be funny

But real talk, the fact they wanted to buff ghost more makes me realize...Ghost became Gen 4/5 Dragon 2.0 effectively

And that's ignoring Fairy being almost as oppressive, if not more

An awful intentional double standard if you ask me.

Like, I dunno how could they see Ghost as balanced nowadays despite the complaints from a lot of players in Gen 8 + Gen 9, while also having an apparant favoritism to Fairy given that:

• Fairy Pokémon is available as early as possible despite being one of the best types around, while they did their best to avoid that to Dragon and (back then) Steel when possible; that would work if the early Fairy Pokémon are the Clefairy line, Jigglypuff line and Ralts line, but there are far more Fairy Pokémon available for early game than I wish.
• No emergency nerfs related to the type itself despite the dominance to that type.
• Moonblast’s Base Power not being lowered to 90 despite 30% SpA reducement and being perfectly accurate.

Not to say that Dragon was sidelined… if anything it got overrepresented on special high BST and Pseudo-Legendary Pokémon ever since Gen 7, to the point Dragon-type becomes less special, paradoxically, at least regarding those Pokémon.

 

[Ironmage]

An awful intentional double standard if you ask me.

Like, I dunno how could they see Ghost as balanced nowadays despite the complaints from a lot of players in Gen 8 + Gen 9, while also having an apparant favoritism to Fairy given that:

• Fairy Pokémon is available as early as possible despite being one of the best types around, while they did their best to avoid that to Dragon and (back then) Steel when possible; that would work if the early Fairy Pokémon are the Clefairy line, Jigglypuff line and Ralts line, but there are far more Fairy Pokémon available for early game than I wish.
• No emergency nerfs related to the type itself despite the dominance to that type.
• Moonblast’s Base Power not being lowered to 90 despite 30% SpA reducement and being perfectly accurate.

Not to say that Dragon was sidelined… if anything it got overrepresented on special high BST and Pseudo-Legendary Pokémon ever since Gen 7, to the point Dragon-type becomes less special, paradoxically, at least regarding those Pokémon.

I'm still a little frustrated that Salt Cure doesn't deal extra damage to Fairies. It's an amazing move concept: compensate for the poor matchups of a defensive Rock by letting it easily wear down the top defensive types in a way that makes narrative sense for all of them. It just only hits two of the three top defensive types despite having the lore for all three.

 

[Samtendo09]

I'm still a little frustrated that Salt Cure doesn't deal extra damage to Fairies. It's an amazing move concept: compensate for the poor matchups of a defensive Rock by letting it easily wear down the top defensive types in a way that makes narrative sense for all of them. It just only hits two of the three top defensive types despite having the lore for all three.

It’s because of the fact that Fairy isn’t Super Effective against Rock (thankfully) whereas Water and Steel do deal Super Effective damage to Rock.

But with how strong Salt Rock turned out to be in practice (heck, even on non-Water and Steel mons it deals a good amount of passive damage) that would end up making Garganacl even more obnoxious to face against. Beating broke with broke ain’t the solution.

 

[Ironmage]

It’s because of the fact that Fairy isn’t Super Effective against Rock (thankfully) whereas Water and Steel do deal Super Effective damage to Rock.

But with how strong Salt Rock turned out to be in practice (heck, even on non-Water and Steel mons it deals a good amount of passive damage) that would end up making Garganacl even more obnoxious to face against. Beating broke with broke ain’t the solution.

I'll admit that my experience with it comes exclusively from monotype formats, where it's good but not amazing.