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Developing the original Pokemon games wasn't exactly straightforward, says series boss Tsunekazu Ishihara, but the team at Game Freak remained "confident in the main gameplay elements" since they were all "tied to experiences everyone had as children," and they wanted "many people" to experience them via their RPGs.
In a new video message shared during the New York Game Awards – following Pokemon's win of the Andrew Yoon Legend Award – Ishihara, who served as producer of Pokemon Red and Green, discusses the origins of the iconic RPG series, which turns 30 this year. "Pokemon originated from a small idea from the Game Freak development team: Wouldn't it be fun if you could catch creatures in a game and trade them with your friends? Everything started from that simple concept," he begins.
"The development process, however, was not quite as easy," Ishihara admits. "It took a great deal of trial and error to figure out how to actualize that idea with the limited resources we had available. In the end, it took six years to complete the first games, Pokemon Red and Pokemon Green. Still, we all felt confident in the main gameplay elements that would become the foundation of the Pokemon video game series: catch, raise, trade, and battle."
In retrospect, it's easy to say that the devs definitely right to feel so optimistic that they were onto a winner, but Ishihara explains that it's because of each gameplay mechanic's tie to the devs' childhood experiences – and their determination to let others experience them through their games – that Game Freak was ultimately able to see the RPGs through.
"We felt this way because these elements were tied to experiences everyone had as children when we were out catching bugs and growing plants and raising animals. With a strong desire to let many people experience that fundamental experience more deeply through Pokemon within the game, we were finally able to bring it to completion," he continues.
As they say, the rest is history, and from the immense success of Pokemon Red and Green, the series is still going strong after almost 30 years, nine generations of mainline games, and 1,025 creatures to collect.
Elsewhere in the video, Ishihara goes on to say that when it comes to thinking about "how to produce the next game – and how we can make it even more enjoyable for everyone," for him, a "major driving force" is the belief that "Pokemon has the power to connect the world."
