There are well over 1,000 Pokemon now, steadily added in batches of about 100 new creatures every generation. It's easy to wonder if developer Game Freak is going to run out of ideas, but, historically, that didn't seem to be a major concern at the studio. In fact, the devs apparently have so many ideas for new Pokemon that the real challenge is narrowing them down.
As veteran Pokemon art director Ken Sugimori previously explained in an old interview with games™ (a sister publication to Retro Gamer), "The reason why there are about 100 Pokemon added per game is not that we can't come up with the ideas, especially when we have new staff – everyone can come up with unique ideas. The number is set by the duration of the project."
So roughly 100 Pokemon were about as many as the studio felt it could make in a reasonable development cycle, but there was also an added concern: "If you added like 300 or so new monsters, that'd just be too many – we have to think of the balance of battles," Sugimori said.
Balance is also a big part of why only three additional Pokemon Types have been added over the years. "By adding even one more Type, it definitely makes the gameplay more complicated so when we did that, we had to really look into the battle balance," Sugimori said. "With new moves, there's an infinite combination. If we can solve that problem, we can always add more Types – it's not impossible."
In fact, the new Types we have gotten over the years have often specifically addressed balance problems with existing Type matchups. I distinctly remember feeling relieved when Pokemon Gold and Silver introduced Steel and Dark-Type Pokemon, both of which countered Psychic Types, which could previously absolutely destroy the vast majority of opponents. When I recently returned to Pokemon Yellow, I found that a single Alakazam was pretty much carrying me through the game, even.
Balance was tricky even back then, but it's a hundred times harder to get right these days in an era when players are competing online and have access to vast amounts of strategic information across the internet. So it's good to know that Game Freak still has plenty of ideas for new Pokemon – and equally good to hear that the studio isn't keen to dump them all into a single game, especially if it would make the dev cycles even longer.
The Pokemon Winds and Waves starters offer our first look at what the next generation of creatures will have in store.
