Pokemon Merchandise thread

[Pikachu315111]

Ditto retaining the goofy smile reminds me of Meowth and Purrloin becoming bipedal by default, or even more akin to that particular Meowth gaining the ability to speak. Not sure if the bipedalism is a thing among Cat Pokemon, though.

Well Team Rocket's Meowth speaking human has remained a unique thing to him, however you're right that it's been retcon that walking on their hind legs is something the Meowth species can just do (and seemingly prefer to do over walking bipedal) even though TR's Meowth struggled to do so (and hindered him). And that's not even mentioning it's a default thing for the Regional Variants (and Meowth's Gigantamax). In comparison they do show Purrloin on all fours thanks to its default art (like if you look through the TCG art you'll sometimes see Purrloin quad while Meowth always biped after the early sets).

As for other cat Pokemon, let's see...

• Sneasel (if you count it as a cat) look completely biped.
• At first Skitty looks completely quad, but it does look like at times Skitty can stand on its hind legs as May's Skitty sometimes did using the Move Assist in the anime. That said, it could just be a momentary rearing up rather than learning how to stand balanced let alone walk on its hind legs.
• Glameow is an interesting case. Initially, while I thought it possibly could stand due to having similar proportions to Purrloin, I thought it has only ever been depicted as quad. BUT Bulbapedia just so happened to have two images that shows it somewhat bipedal. First is from the Adventures Manga, Johanna is doing stretch exercises and her Glameow is following along. Second isn't as concrete, it's from the anime, during one of Zoey's battles her Glameow goes into a bipedal pose while in midair (otherwise when on the ground it's quad).
• Trubbish looks completely biped (what? It was for some reason included in an image of cat Pokemon).
• Espurr looks completely biped.
• Litten & Sprigatito are quad, but doesn't stay like that for long to people's annoyance with quad-to-biped final Starter evos.

 

[R_N]

Ditto retaining the goofy smile reminds me of Meowth and Purrloin becoming bipedal by default, or even more akin to that particular Meowth gaining the ability to speak. Not sure if the bipedalism is a thing among Cat Pokemon, though.

Purrloin's weird because media immediately outside of BW1 committed instantly to being bipedal. The TCG had bipedal purrloin from literally the day the games launched, for example, so this likely wasn't a case of the anime making something up and then running with it. It's just very jarring in terms of design.


Honestly Meowth's also kind of shown bipedal from the jump. The original sprite -and thus the OG sugimori art- was on two legs and while it took some time to be shown having proper legs they always liked the battle sprites being upright. And not always as "cat rearing up" type deal. There's always been stuff showing it on 4, but it also always felt downplayed.

 

[Mova]

Both Sneasel are literally my mom's civets, not weasels at all (more like cat-weasels, like Zangoose being called a cat-ferret). However, Trubbish is an object creature that kinda vaguely looks like a cat. I find it weird it was included among the kitties. Must be a pretty spicy kitten.

 

[PsychicAcademic]

Not only that, but they also announced the next life-size Pokemon. Or rather, life-size Pokemon... as in, plural:

It's Eevee & the Eeveelutions!

(Kotaku article) (Pokemon Center)

Eevee isn't so bad, at 16 inches it's being sold for $50. However the other Eeveelutions, which (right now) vary between 25 to 32 inches, look like they're going to be $400 each (which means for all of them it'll be $3,250, before tax & delivery)!

Pokemon Center announced that 2025 was "Year of Eevee" so it probably shouldn't be a surprise. Also, as you can see in the bottom image, they're not releasing them all at once but in batches. Right now Eevee, Vapor, Jolt, and Flare are available (Kotaku article mentions they'll be available (in Japan) until May 19th). Not sure where they got that date, but I can imagine these selling out fast *side glances at Vaporeon* so if you want one it's now or never. Espy and Umbra are coming in a few months for the Summer. Leaf, Glace, and Sylve will be for the Fall.

As you can imagine, many are taking all this as a possible hint Z-A will release a new Eeveelution. *Sigh*

They're preorder. The second batch (Espe&Umbre) is just released yesterday (it appears that PokéCen US opens it earlier than JP), to be shipped on January for this second batch.

Well, at least there's no such thing as running out like TCG (I heard about just how bad limited item scalpers are), although it's true that scalping after they're shipped long after the preorder period is still a problem, if less because it's theoretically no running out.

To note, they're 44000 Y (including tax) in PokéCen JP. PokéCen US's 400$ price tag is quite steep, a friend who aims to get them all says it's around 25% markup, no doubt thanks to latest uncertainty in US. This is also, disregarding the tax, a double price from the previous standing version in uh, 2017(?) which was like 21600Y, inflation sighs. And looks like it's more accurately designed.
Vap has its neck frill modeled closer to how it should be and smaller smile like in the games. Espe's head gem is no longer flat, as is its cheek tufts.


And yeah, this was definitely my worry when they called that Eevee Year thing.... That I'll have to open wallet irresponsibly for them....

 

[Pikachu315111]

So a few quick discoveries I thought to share.

Gache Catch Em' LEGO:
First, for LEGO Pokemon. No, no information about the sets of any sneak peek images, but rather something another new set has done which many are suggesting could be seen with the collab. So LEGO has this feature called LEGO IDEAS where fans can submit an idea for a set (and they need to build the set with available pieces (though allow limited custom parts where appropriate)) and go through several rounds of public voting and official judgement in hopes of approval to become an official LEGO set (after having LEGO Master Builders go over and refine/redesign the set, usually so they can add in new specially made parts). It's not easy, while I think anyone can submit an entry you got to be pretty creative and skilled to grab people's attention. And even then, original ideas often get overshadowed by suggestions of sets based on popular franchises that usually get disqualified by the judges at some point (I would like to think LEGO does at least try to reach out to the other company, though I can imagine many companies either saying no or having a high license fee). Still, some ideas do get through and a recent one is the Minifig Vending Machine:

"... What does any of this have to do with Pokemon?"

Well, as vending machine it needs capsules to dispense the minifigures. The thing is, these capsules are completely new LEGO parts. You can see in the image, when altogether they're a sphere which two halves are connected via technic pins. You can see where I'm going with this: there have been suggestions these capsules could see a re-use in the Pokemon sets as the basis for Poke Balls. Now the capsules used for the vending machine are small, barely able to hold all the pieces for a minifigure and some accessories, so if they do use these capsules either they'll be an additional decorative inclusion or, if they want them to function, could make bigger versions of the capsules.

2 Rock & A Megaton Pokemon-All-In-One:
Going to the Pokemon Center site proper, there's a new plush for Geodude, Graveler, and Golem.

The catch: It's all a single plush!

"Kill us, please kill us!"

Called the Changing Cave Dwellers, it's a three-in-one plush where it can be either Geodude, Graveler, or Golem. How it works is that the outer coverings of the three Pokemon are sewn together and you use the two you aren't actively displaying as the stuffing; you just push them into the back of the one you want and each have a zipper you zip up to complete the transformation. Now reversible plushies aren't a new idea, Pokemon have done it before, though I don't think I've ever seen it done with three. And if I'm understanding things correctly, it's pretty clever how they did it, you'll notice that Graveler has 2 zippers instead of 1; you may also notice that in the "transitional phase form" that Graveler is top-down while the other two are bottom-up. I think that's because Graveler shares a zipper with both Geodude and Golem, stuffing them on either side of it, while Geodude and Golem you can just shove the other two in their back and contained all by one zipper.

(Also Geodude's and Golem's zipper close at the top while both of Graveler's close at the bottom)

It's 90 dollars (before tax, shipping & handling) and is nearly 9 inches high & 16 inches wide; it's your call whether the size plus the reversible gimmick is worth the price tag. Another thing to note is that the site says this is part of the "Home Sweet Cave" collection, except so far this looks to be the only piece in the collection. So that's something to keep an eye out for, guessing it's merch based on cave dwelling Pokemon (and maybe notable cave locations throughout the franchise)? Also I'm wondering if we may see more of these 3-in-1 reversible plushies in the future; 2-stage Pokemon are easy enough to do so it's neat they came up with a way to do 3-stage families (curious if this could work for Pokemon with split evos or have different forms that bring them up to 4 individuals or more).

 

[Pikachu315111]

And here I was thinking a certain new announcement was the most cursed thing I would see today

Oh come now, the SV Track Suits don't look that bad... at least not the Violet one (sorry Scarlet players, I don't know what GF was thinking)...

Joke note

Just so it's clear, this is a joke. I'm going to presume you're actually talking about a certain dragon getting a new form?