Pokémon is a big hit because it is collaborative

When Pokémon Launched 25 years ago, it has done so twice in a row.

Pokémon Red and Green (made later Blue for its Western release) are almost identical, but each has some exclusive monsters. The fire puppet Growlithe is only available in Red, for example, while those looking for a Venus fly-trap Bellsprout should pick up Green. Players can also trade with a friend who has the opposite version. What started as a fairly inexpensive trick to encourage investors to buy the game twice or to pressure their friends to pick it up has since become a cornerstone of the whole Pokémon franchise: it is meant to be shared.

In addition to trading, players could also wage battles between the Pokémon they captured and practiced in their games. These two features have changed the otherwise single-player role-playing games in ways that will be repeated over and over as the core games are continued on sequel. But even before the release of the second set, Pokémon Gold and Silver, the spin-offs increasingly focused on multiplayer aspects. For example, Pokémon Stadium, released just two years later Red and Green, brought battles to the fore. This allowed players to “rent” Pokémon from an in-game library, allowing friends to fight friends without first catching and training them alone.

stadium also added a handful of competitive mini-games. Where battle and commerce required some understanding of the core mechanics of the franchise, it applied cute and easily recognizable pokémon as a decorative skin for all known concepts. Players may have to chase through Rattata through obstacle courses or play with Ekans, for example. Released in the same year as Mario Party, Nintendo has started marrying its existing properties with something accessible and family-oriented, which has opened them up to much wider audiences.

Along with this expansion to casual play came other forms of media, and before long, the franchise brought an entire generation into the fray. Children would re-record the anime on the playground, reinforcing the themes of friendship and teamwork (and rivalry). The trading card game was necessarily common, although it was banned in many schools. Spinoff games still crossed genres and brought different kinds of fans from the match-3 Pokémon Puzzle League released in 2000 until the upcoming MOBA Pokémon united. A positive feedback loop has begun. Pokémon was meant to be shared – and increasingly everyone was someone you could share it with.

No matter how much it became a worldwide phenomenon, selling duplicate copies of the core games was a habit that Nintendo refused to shake. But while it may have started a relatively transparent cash grab as technology improved, it became less important to buy both games or to recruit a friend to get the opposite version. (That being said, every friendship group in which I announced a new series carefully discussed who would get it; it’s an ingrained behavior.) With the franchise’s 10-year existence, pure online trading was possible. Diamond and Pearl introduced the Global Trade Station, which allows players to exchange, search and host exchanges with strangers from around the world. They could also participate in fights, mini-games and voice chat.

And although it was initially driven by a profit motive, Red and Green predicted (or perhaps hoped) this kind of free and easy barter. Throughout the universe, it has always been possible to upload your Pokémon to a computer and send it from there around the world. Unplayable characters encourage acting as a collaborative, collaborative act. And as technology has improved, Nintendo has followed suit, making it all the easier to complete the pokédex or at least get the companions you like best. (Although online efforts do not always run smoothly, a paid Nintendo Switch Online subscription is also required since 2018.)

Even once easy online trading was established, Nintendo continued with the formula. Pokémon X and Y brought the Wonder Trade, which allows players to upload a random pokémon and receive it in return. Of course, there are many trades about bin Pidgey and Bidoof, but there are always stories of extraordinary generosity, with legendary pokémon, battle monsters with perfect stats and specially colored shinies all making their way to an unsuspecting receiver. Community-coordinated events have also seen experienced players release waves of Pokémon on Christmas Day that hold expensive items to surprise children for the first time. The latest entries, Sword and Shield, introduced Max Raid Pokémon, giant monsters that needed cooperation with others to take down, and campsites that friends could visit to hang out.

And where Wonder Trade and Max Raid features tend toward the collaboration encouraged from the earliest days of the franchise, Pokémon Go sell it as a core concept. The original announcement picture showed families playing together, solo players gathering to trade and big group fights. Many of these features were not even in the initial release of the game, or were so bald that it did not exist – but it did not matter. Reviews always agreed: the game was objectively not particularly good, but everyone had a good time. The mechanics were ultimately unnecessary to create an astonishing social experience. Before the pandemic, festivals in person gathered tens or even hundreds of thousands of players to catch and trade.

Over time, it became clear that this was not the case. Pokémon was a phenomenon among an entire generation. The Harry Potter game Wizards unite, which was released three years later by the same developers, had the same if not more cultural weight. But it never took. According to mobile analytics firm Sensor Tower, it earned just $ 23 million in 2019, compared to Pokémon Gonearly $ 900 million in the same year. In fact, it was an increase Pokémon Go‘s launch in 2016, indicating longevity.

The most important thing that Pokémon has it Harry Potter is not two and a half decades of community building. Harry potter certainly has a fandom, a group of the most dedicated enthusiasts, but the book and film formats are solo activities. To connect Pokémon is to share. Of the trade enforced by Red and Green to the family-friendly mini-games of stadium exchanging with strangers via Wonder Trade has consistently encouraged collaboration and bonding.

Twenty-five years later, that’s still what makes it a phenomenon.