Pokémon Creator Didn’t Originally Want You To Catch Em’ All

The second somebody says Pokémon, I just can’t help myself. Come on, join in: Gotta catch em’ all, it’s true. Our courage will PULL US THROUGH. Anyone else? Right, moving swiftly on.

The point is, we all know that to extend our arsenal of Pokémon, you’ve got to venture out into the wilds to catch them. It’s almost a gaming right of passage and shout out to my folks who remember the iconic summer of 2016 when everyone was obsessed with Pokémon Go. Strangely, Pokémon’s creator didn’t originally want players to catch ‘em all though. He wanted you to buy em’ all.

If you haven’t already, check out the incredible new trailer for Pokémon Scarlet & Violet, which features the internet’s newest obsession: Lechonk.

According to an investigation by Did You Know Gaming, Pokémon creator Satoshi Tajiri originally wanted Pokémon to have an in-game currency. Each Pokémon would’ve had a monetary value and players would’ve been able to purchase, sell and trade their Pokémon.

During an interview in the early 2000s, Taijiri said, “In Pokémon’s early development, you could buy Pokémon with money - but that resulted in the player focusing on saving money to buy them, and less motivation to struggle to catch them in the wild.”

“We also thought about making one player pay money in addition to their trade when there was an obvious difference in the value of two Pokémon being traded, but implementing Pokémon monetary values was beyond the limits of our programming,” Tajiri added. “Transferring money in the game is very different from wiring money in real life, and there were difficulties getting it to work on Game Boy - there were just too many obstacles to overcome to make it happen.” Personally, I’m glad this couldn’t happen. Saving up pennies just simply isn’t as fun as stumbling across a Snorlax.