The wind was taken out of the sails of the announcement of Pokémon Sun and Pokémon Moon when a trademark was filed yesterday for both games, but now we have official confirmation of the beginning of Generation 7 thanks to a Nintendo Direct broadcast.
During the rather short Nintendo Direct, CEO and President of The Pokémon Company, Tsunekazu Ishihara, looked back on the old games before showing the logos of Pokémon Sun and Pokémon Moon. He went on to explain that the two new games will officially release worldwide in late 2016, with options for many languages including the addition of traditional and simplified Chinese.
Nintendo also announced that the Virtual Console versions of Pokémon Red/Blue/Yellow will be compatible with Pokémon Bank, thus enabling players to transfer Pokémon from the old Gameboy titles to the current generations for the first time. The Virtual Console titles will be available from tomorrow, though no prices were detailed.
As for any details on the brand new game: There were none. The Nintendo Direct lasted mere minutes, only name checking the games and stating that many languages will be supported at launch. No doubt we’ll see more later in the year before its Late 2016 launch date.
Kennykazey
Someone brought to my attention how lame the English logos are. The Japanese and Chinese logos change the colour of the font to fit with the theme. Not only do we get a super 90s font (which would be cool if they went all the way with it, instead of mixing it with more fancy stuff) but they don’t even lose the white fill in the gaps…
neuroticnugg
You raise a great point. I for one have greatly preferred the Japanese logo for as long as I can remember. Same icon as the English language counterpart for each game, but the script is far cooler, and each game they do something slightly different to it – turning it 3D aspect for the first truly 3D ‘X/Y’ was probably my favourite ‘small touch’.
The bit that really gets me about it though, it the use of a single Pokéball that has evolved its way in. The first character – looks sort of like a T with legs, has an O shape in it’s top right corner, which from Ruby/Sapphire/Emerald onwards was morphed into a Pokéball.
Needless to say there’s a /r all about it…from which I found this awesome comparison image http://i3.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/original/000/478/644/d79.jpg – really does show how lame ours are.
Kennykazey
That’s a funny comparison. Although it would have been more accurate with the version-titles in English as well.
hazelam
thanks for the recap, i blinked a few times during the video and i think i missed half of it. ^_^