Continuing on with the pre-Generation 5’s chronicles, there are a lot of things to cover, especially in regards to the Pokémon, before we got to the climax of the pre-Generation 5 era. Certainly, there were a number of fake information, which is to be expected, but I won’t go into those here. Luckily, the internet aren’t fooled for too long, even though there were times when we were fooled for a time.
If you want to go ahead with this topic, please read on.
Introducing the New Stars of Isshu
Perhaps the biggest new amount of information for a long time at that time came with the July 2010 Corocoro issue. In that issue, we had seven never-before-seen Pokémon. Among these exciting Pokémon, we have Chillarmy (Minccino), Munna, Gear (Klink), Mamepato (Pidove), Hihidaruma (Darmanitan), Shimama (Blitzle) and Meguroco (Sandile). Why did I use the Japanese names, you ask? Well, that’s what they were known as, because, remember the Japanese versions were the first to be known before the other regions.
These Pokémon might not seem very exciting to you now, but back then, they were something. Remember, at that time, we only knew seven Pokémon (starters, Zorua, Zoroark, Reshiram and Zoroark), so knowing more is a real treat. Quite interestingly, fans made the connection that Munna was referenced in the Generation 1 games, where an NPC described Munna. It’s probable that Munna was planned, but wasn’t used until then.
Each Pokémon also introduced a new element that were mostly exciting. Sandile’s Moxie (known as Overconfidence) was an ability that garnered excitement from the competitive crowd since its advantage is quite clear, and amazingly, it managed to be very useful. On the other hand, Pidove’s Big Pecks (known as Pigeon Heart then) was not quite as exciting since its prevention effect does not easily come into play.
Pokémon weren’t the only thing that was introduced. We were introduced to Araragi (Juniper), the first female professor. We also got a good look at Isshu as a whole, which is the region of Generation 5. Lots of places were mysterious, such as the desert in the middle.
Isshu was what we referred to the region as, because at that point, the region names were the same in all languages, so we thought it would be Isshu all this while. Imagine the surprise when even Isshu was renamed to Unova, to maintain the region name’s meaning. Of course, other languages are renamed to match the intended meaning of unity.
Oh, and there were other stuff mentioned, including how to obtain Zorua and Zoroark, though those aren’t as important as the new things since those were things we didn’t know about.
The Barrage of New Pokémon
Before a month passed since that Corocoro issue, we were shown other Pokémon we didn’t know about and weren’t mentioned in the aforementioned issue. It was advertised on TV, and most of them looked fully-evolved.
The new Pokémon were Cofagrigus, Galvantula, Excadrill, Haxorus, Reuniclus, Gigalith, Gothitelle and Drilbur. We only knew the first four as their Japanese names. Naturally, speculation was under way with those mysterious Pokémon. For example, Cofagrigus’ front was unseen, so we couldn’t see its slasher smile. People also thought that all of those Pokémon (except Drilbur) would be dual-typed. Haxorus, for example, was thought to be Bug/Dragon, and Cofagrigus was thought to be Rock/Ghost. Some guesses were correct, however, namely Excadrill (Ground/Steel) and Galvantula (Bug/Electric).
Even on the anime’s leaked character sheet, some new Pokémon were spotted, which we now know as Servine, Dewott, Woobat and Axew. A few of the mentioned Pokémon would go on to be shown in the August 2010 Corocoro issue (Reuniclus, Gothitelle, Axew and Woobat), with new additions that include Braviary, Patrat and Musharna.
The following issue of Corocoro had shown us so much more new Pokémon. Previously we known Gigalith and Drilbur, and through some earlier reveals, Sewaddle, Watchog, Swanna, Alomomola, Deerling and Victini. Therefore, that issue mainly shown us the Pokémon in more detail.
That was a lot to cover in terms of the new Pokémon, so not all the new Pokémon were mentioned. Emolga’s reveal wasn’t mentioned here, but it was mentioned on the Pokémon Sunday show. In short, Generation 5’s road to release was scattered with new Pokémon, and that was very exciting. If you compare the revealed Pokémon we have now and the number of Unova Pokémon we ended up having, you would see that they were merely fulfilling our excitement. After all, Unova’s going to be the region with all-new Pokémon.
Diversity of Cast
We couldn’t talk about the pre-release of Pokémon without acknowledging that there are human characters as well. We got to know the rivals in one issue, with Cheren, Bel (Bianca) and N. Initially we thought that N was the main rival since previous games gave us one rival, and there are two playable characters, so the starters would be spread out accordingly. To our surprise, Cheren and Bianca would take the remaning starters that the player didn’t take.
Ash would be travelling with two new characters. We were introduced to Iris and Dento (Cilan). Both choices were a huge change, because previously in the anime, Brock was always around as Ash’s partner while the female partner was always the female playable character. Iris was not a playable character and Cilan was a new male character, which seemed like a fresh change at that time. We returned to female playable characters in the anime, but Brock never returned at all, implying that at that point on, we will have new male characters.
We also have Gym Leaders, and they were quite unique. The first Gym Leaders shown were Dento and Aloe (Lenora). The former’s status as a Gym Leader elevated his popularity somewhat, since he’s going to star in the anime too. Lenora, however, was met with complaints due to her dark skin. It didn’t help that she was dressed that way. Thinking about it now, Grant’s dark skin was not quite as badly met as Lenora’s.
We also had Team Plasma. It was a surprise that they were dressed as knights. That name seemed to inspire something more organic or scientific, so to see them dressed them like that seemed inconsistent. I do like their medieval get-up, but I can see how some people thought how ridiculous they looked.
Finally, there’s Makomo (Fennel). With another female professor, that was quite an interesting turn of events. I don’t remember much about opinions on Fennel, so there’s not much to comment on that.
Miscellaneous Coverage
There were other new things revealed. Musicals was one of those. It looked interesting because of the dancing Pokémon. Expectations were rather high on this event, ranging from being able to play your own music to being an essential part of the anime much like contests were. In retrospect, this was just to expand on the potential of moving Pokémon sprites.
Seasons was another thing we were introduced to when Deerling was introduced. That Pokémon was created to showcase the seasons. It was a neat idea to be able to experience the different sceneries in the Pokémon world, for every season has something to adore. The different encounter rates of Pokémon was also a nice touch.
Triple battles was also introduced. Having three Pokémon on the battle field at once seemed like too much, but the more dynamic camera of the battle field made it possible. Being that we were introduced to Doubles in Generation 3, it was a joke that Generation 7 would have Quad battles. The thought that positioning mattered made for some interesting ideas. While it isn’t as popular as Doubles, it’s still a fun type of battle.
Whew! That was a lot to cover that I am exhausted at what I just covered. I didn’t include everything that was revealed, but the idea is that there were too many new things that it’s impossible to cover them all.
In the last part of the reminiscing, I will cover the moments when the wait of Generation 5 is coming to a close. I hope you enjoyed reading this as much as I have writing it.
Thanks for reading.
