Pokémon (Franchise)

Pokémon is the name of the franchise, and originally, a series of video games, TV shows and more developed by the company Game Freak and published by Nintendo. The actual name "Pokémon" means Pocket Monster or known as ポケットモンスター (Pokettomonsutā) in Japan. Although several spinoffs for other Nintendo systems have been released, the main series games are exclusive to Nintendo's hand-held platform, for which 14 games have been released, as well as 4 remakes. Pokémon was created by Satoshi Tajiri, who still has a hand in production of the games. Pokémon was created in 1995.

Gameplay
The main Pokémon games all center around the strategic manipulation of creatures called Pokémon, from which the series takes its name. In the games, the player takes the role of a male or female human who has just received a license to catch Pokémon. The player usually goes to the local Pokémon Lab to receive a Starter Pokémon. In every main series game, the player is given a choice of three Pokémon; a Grass-type, a Fire-type, or a Water-type. A person possessing a Pokémon that trains it is called a Pokémon Trainer.

Using their first Pokémon, players are now usually free to set off on their own adventure, in which they will collect Badges by defeating Gym Leaders. Once the player has collected eight badges, they can battle theElite Four; four representatives of the Pokémon League that are considered the best Trainers in their respective region.

Another goal of the game is to try to catch every Pokémon available; in the first Generation, there were 151 Pokémon available, but with every new Generation the number of Pokémon increases. Currently, there are 649 known Pokémon, and five regions/generations, with the possibility of more being introduced in every newGeneration.

Pokémon can be caught by weakening them with other Pokémon, and then capturing them in a Poké Ball, where they can be stored for future use, to battle and help capture more Pokémon. Each Pokémon has a health gauge, and whomever gauge runs out first loses; however, a trainer can have several Pokémon, so if one Pokémon's gauge reaches zero (called "Fainting"), they can send out another Pokémon. Each trainer can carry a maximum of 6 Pokémon, although many more can be caught and stored in a PC. In order to try to knock out the opposing Pokémon, Pokémon attack each other. Pokémon can learn up to four attacks, although there are many more attacks that they are capable of learning. When all of a Trainer's Pokémon have fainted, the trainer must depart to a Pokémon Center and hands an amount of money.

History
Pokémon was the brainchild of a Japanese man named Satoshi Tajiri, born August 28, 1965. As a child, Tajiri was fascinated with insects, and loved to hunt and collect different species of them, as well as devise new methods to attract them. The franchise was originally made for young women and teenagers, but developed male fans instead.

Eventually, whilst Tajiri was in his early teens, most of the areas where Tajiri liked to hunt for bugs were replaced with modern establishments or demolished. No longer having the opportunity to collect insects, Tajiri created a fantasy in his mind about his adventures, his thoughts eventually evolving into a complicated idea. During the same time, Tajiri gained an interest in video games.

In 1982, Tajiri formed a magazine with a few of his friends dedicated to video games. The name of this magazine was Game Freak. Over the years, Game Freak's focous changed from covering gaming news into creating games — they officially announced themselves as a video game developer in 1989, and released their first game, Mario & Yoshi, in 1991, for both the Game Boy and the NES.

They subsequently released several other games, but in 1995 they struck gold; they, along with the help of Creatures and Nintendo, released Pocket Monsters Akai and Pocket Monsters Midori in Japan. The games were both a hit, with Akai doing best, and Nintendo decided to translate the games to English and release them in North America and Europe. Before this, they remade the games with the improved Pocket Monsters Blue, and thus incorporated the improvements into the two games to be released in North America. Since Pocket Monsters was already trademarked by another company in the United States, they needed to change the name – so, they just combined the words to form Pokémon. Since Midori did not sell well, they decided to change some aspects of it for the American release — including changing the name from the translated Green to Blue(although a "Blue" version was also released in Japan earlier, which improved on the original games). Pokémon Red and Pokémon Blue were both very successful in North America, and a series was born. The past English-language catchphrase was: "Gotta Catch `em all!"

Game Releases
The games are generally released in pairs. For example, two games will be immediately released that are basically the same, except with several minor changes, and later, another improvement upon the last two games will be released. After this, work will begin on a new pair, which will have a vastly different story and various game play improvements. Examples of this are Pokémon Red and Blue, which are generally the same game, except certain Pokémon can only be obtained in either one. Shortly after the release of Pokémon Redand Blue, an improvement on these games was released; Pokémon Yellow, which featured improved color, and the addition of a Pikachu which followed the main character.

List of Games
The following lists all of the games in the Pokémon franchise.

Game Boy

 * Pokémon Red and Green (Japan)
 * Pokémon Blue (Japan)
 * Pokémon Red & Blue (International)
 * Pokémon Yellow (Also known as Pokemon Pikachu in Japan)

Game Boy Color

 * Pokémon Gold and Silver
 * Pokémon Crystal

Game Boy Advance

 * Pokémon Ruby & Sapphire
 * Pokémon FireRed & LeafGreen
 * Pokémon Emerald

Nintendo DS

 * Pokémon Diamond & Pearl
 * Pokémon Platinum
 * Pokémon HeartGold & SoulSilver
 * Pokémon Black & White
 * Pokémon Black 2 & White 2

Nintendo 3DS

 * Pokemon X & Y

Game Boy

 * Pokémon Pinball
 * Pokémon Trading Card Game

Game Boy Color

 * Pokémon Puzzle Challenge

Game Boy Advance

 * Pokémon Pinball Ruby and Sapphire
 * Pokémon Mystery Dungeon Red Rescue Team

Nintendo DS

 * Pokémon Dash
 * Pokémon Mystery Dungeon: Red Rescue Team & Blue Rescue Team
 * Pokémon Mystery Dungeon: Explorers of Time & Explorers of Darkness
 * Pokémon Mystery Dungeon: Explorers of Sky
 * Pokémon Trozei!
 * Pokémon Ranger
 * Pokémon Ranger: Shadows of Almia
 * Pokémon Ranger: Guardian Signs
 * Pokémon Typing Adventure
 * Pokémon Conquest

Nintendo 3DS

 * Pokédex 3D
 * Pokémon Rumble Blast
 * Pokémon Dream Radar

Nintendo 64

 * Hey You, Pikachu!
 * Pokémon Snap
 * Pokémon Puzzle League
 * Pokémon Stadium
 * Pokémon Stadium 2

Game Cube

 * Pokémon Colosseum
 * Pokémon XD: Gale of Darkness
 * Pokémon Box Ruby and Sapphire
 * Pokémon Channel

Wii

 * Pokémon Battle Revolution
 * My Pokémon Ranch
 * PokéPark Wii: Pikachu's Adventure
 * Pokémon Mystery Dungeon: Stormy, Blazing, and Light Adventure Squads
 * Pokémon Rumble

Upcoming Games

 * Pokémon Omega Ruby & Alpha Sapphire
 * Untitled Pokémon Detective Game

Trivia

 * The main symbol of the Pokémon as a whole is the Poké Ball.
 * The second symbol of Pokémon is Pikachu (mainly anime).
 * There are 151 (if you count Mew) original Pokémon.
 * Mewtwo comes before Mew in the National and Kanto Pokédex.