Game Theory - Pokemon GO's TRAGIC END!

Episode Date: March 12, 2024

Join Game Theory Host MatPat as he explains what Pokemon GO means for the larger Pokemon Universe...

Hello Matt Pat. I am available to analyze your balls if you wish. Whoa, that's the tiniest balls I've ever seen. Hey Matt Pat, you want me to check out your mom's butt? Yeah, overall, your mom's butt is pretty decent. Hi, Matt Pat, let's take a look at your ego, shall we? Your ego is gigantic, the largest I've ever seen. I really gotta take my Pokemon naming more seriously. No internet. Welcome to Game Theory, where I just threw back from Japan, and boy are my arms.

Tired. Get it? Because I had to carry my luggage and it was all really heavy. But while I was there, I also made sure to work on one other thing, my Pokedex. Yep, after months of lying dormant, I fired up Pokemon Go again. Remember the four weeks earlier this year when that was still a thing? Anyway, between me wandering around Shibuya looking for region-specific far-fetched, the announcement that Gen 2 will be added to the game in December,

and the fact that two new Pokemon games literally just released, I figured it was a great time to revisit the small little moment that caused the US to walk an extra 144 billion steps this summer. And while the game continues to do good work around the world, literally spawning laparice and tsunami damage Japanese communities in order to jumpstart their economies, today we're covering the lore of this game. That's right, I said the lore. Because when you look at the evidence, Pokemon Go, whether intentionally or not,

may just hold the key to answering one of Pokemon's longest-held mysteries. One that has lingered in chat rooms, Reddit Post, and many a YouTube theory video since the very first game. No joke. Warm up those pokey thumbs because today we're going back into the world of Pokemon Go. So obviously Pokemon Go is a bit rudimentary. You can't weaken Pokemon to catch them, you can't battle to level up. Heck, there isn't even a complete batch of 150 Pokemon in the game. But what if I told you that all of that is intentional? That it's because Go is the first game in the Pokemon timeline. This is actually an idea that was first created by a Japanese Twitter user named at Inc. underscore virtue, and once I started to dig a bit deeper, puzzle pieces all started to fit together First, although there may not be 150 available right now, let's look at the Pokemon that you can catch in the game The ones that are alive and well and walking about the world around you

You can see all the usual suspects your typical ratitas Pidgees and so many So many damn needorans Hovering around awkwardly in augmented reality land just waiting around for your capture ball But then you have Pokemon like over Luminite and Omistar, Kabuto and Kabootops. Pokemon that, by Generation 1, are all extinct. Only able to be added to your Pocodex by reviving ancient fossils.

And yet in Goh, they're just wandering around, alive and well. If we assume that Go does possess a lore that ties in with a larger Pokeiverse, that would mean that Go is set before Gen 1. So that's pretty weird, but it gets even better. Who isn't in the game from the original set of 151? Are Takuno, Zaptos, Maltrez, Mew, and Mutu, obviously. But they're all legendary, so no big surprises there. But that still leaves one curious gap in the Pokedex. Ditto Because I looked into it and for all the recent rumors that he's region specific to Africa and all that

It simply isn't true based on the evidence that I can tell. All the images that have been posted online have been largely debunked as Photoshopped So then that begs the question why out of all the Pokemon is Ditto missing from the roster? He's the only one the only one who's not a legendary well can Consider the following. A popular theory circulating the internet a few years ago was that the Pokemon Ditto was created in attempts to clone Mew. Come to think of it, why did I never cover that one? Curse, you missed opportunities!

Well, since I've never fully covered it, let me just run through some of the major evidence right now in a quick mini theory. Let's call it a theory light. No, no, better. Diet theory. So both Ditto and Mew weigh 8.8 pounds or 4 kilograms. It's an odd coincidence, right? Well, otter still is that they're both

genderless and the fact that they have the same ability, learning transform naturally at level zero. People around that time also said that their coloring is similar, but it's definitely not one of the stronger points to the theory. What is a strong point of evidence though is that in Pokemon Yellow, there are two places where Ditto can be caught, the Pokemon Mansion and Cerulean Cave. The first is the location where Mew2 was cloned from Mew. The second is where Mew2 actually lives. So obviously we see that Ditto and Mew two share an odd connection, something that takes on even even greater meaning when noting that Mew 2 is always described as quote the only successful

clone of Mew, i.e. that there were several other failed attempts. Could those failed attempts be Ditto? Well honestly, if I were to assess this theory, yeah, probably. Just think about their abilities. Ditto can copy any Pokemon and perform their moves. Mew just so happens to have the DNA of all Pokemon within it and can learn any move. But hey, that's just a theory. A diet theory! Thanks for listening to the brief summary of the evidence. So now let's go back to the main theory about Pokemon Go. The fact that Ditto isn't in the game points to the idea that this is a game happening before the cloning experiment goes awry. In fact,

Mew2 being absent from the game supports it as well. He's not in the game because he doesn't exist yet. Just like the Omnites and Caboodo's not being extinct yet, go takes place at a time before Mew was attempted to be cloned, hence the reason both Muto and Ditto are absent. Boom! Mind blown! All right, so the The available roster of Pokemon seems to line up, but that's not all. The rudimentary gameplay also factors in quite nicely. You hurl balls to catch Pokemon that you stumble across in the wild. Just happen to hope that skill in tossing is enough to lock in that polywag you've been eager for.

There's no battling to weaken them. Maybe you use a raspberry to help your odds, but that's about it. Does that remind you of anything? I don't know about you, but to me, I immediately think of the Safari zones. Parks built as nature preserves, protecting the earlier days of Pokemon catching, where again, trainers are restitution. to just throwing balls and not actually engaging in battle. They even have step limits. Could they be a potential callback to a simpler time when learning to be a trainer wasn't so formalized?

I.e. the period of Pokemon Go? And speaking of training, all of this would also explain why you can't teach your Pokemon new moves. TMs and HMs just aren't a thing. They haven't been created yet. The lack of formal trainers is also why the gym structure is so rudimentary and why there are no badges. It's still a new concept in development. But perhaps most interestingly of all, is the leveling system. In the game you don't battle to gain levels, you do it by feeding your Pokemon candy. Shove enough bit of honeys down your squirtles, gullet, and you're gonna get a war-tortle come hell or high water.

Sounds a lot like rare candy from the main games, no? We're giving your Pokemon a candy causes them to level up. But one thing we've never stopped to consider is the actual name of that item. Rare candy. It's a very specific word choice. What made them rare in the first place? If it's such a useful thing for trainers, why not mass produce the stuff? Well, think about what the candies mean? made out of other Pokemon. It's a joke everyone's made. When you transfer your hundredth ratita to create candy, I mean, let's face it, that ratita's going to the professor's meat grinder. I mean, the candies are species specific in everything. So what if what made them rare was a movement among the people of the Pokemon world protesting the inhumanity of this practice? Sure it was a fast way to gain levels, but it was

deemed too cruel, and so candies started to disappear, leading them to become, say it with me now, rare. That would also explain why rare candy isn't sold in stores in the main series games. It always has to be found lying on the ground somewhere. You know that someone would want to make a profit off of those things? And some markets somewhere would sell them. But nope, no store owner touches them. Meaning that there must be some sort of ban against selling these sorts of things. That's why I don't think it's a more common explanation like overuse causing the supply to plummet. Even if they were overused, they would still be sold in stores. So anyway, if Pokemon Go were the origin story,

we see the beginnings of candy and then by the time the main series rolls around, it's become outlawed and is thus rare. And if you think me analyzing the declining supply of an in-game item is thinking too far into all this, well think again. We can actually see it happen with the other major item from Pokemon Go Raspberrys. So in Pokemon Go, once you cross level 8, you get access to this special item at Pocostops. And they drop fairly regularly. They're not rare by any means. And across Gen 3 and gen 4, they're still around, but now fast forward to Generation 5 and 6, which are confirmed as the latest dates in the Pokemon timeline. Now, all of a sudden, the item descriptions talk about how rare these items are. Interesting, no? Even the items in these games maintain a sense of lore, and that lore points to Pokemon Go being the predecessor to everything that we've played since. But if the list of Pokemon available, evolutions in gameplay, and decline of items isn't enough to convince you,

here's the kicker. The first person that we meet in Pokemon Go is Professor Willow, our guide through all things Pokemon. If this is indeed the first game in the series, with series ties to the main franchise, then presumably we should see this guy again, right? Well, what if I told you that we do? In Pokemon gold, silver, and crystal, he's none other than Jim Leader Price. Now that may initially seem like a stretch, but stay with me here. First, look at their posture and hair color. Both are holding their pokeballs in a very similar way, and both have white hair. But price is old and has gray hair. I hear you saying, and yeah, you're right. That's absolutely correct. That could very well be the explanation. But also someone with white hair who grows.

goes old would also keep his white hair into old age. You can't just rule it out. They also both have a fondness for an outer coat with a popped collar. So the design shares similarities, sure, but obviously that's all circumstantial evidence. We need something more solid. Well, in heart gold and sole silver when his last Pokemon is in critical condition, price will say the following. Quote, Willow is my middle name. Willow is flexible and not easily broken. I'm not giving up yet. End quote. What a weird Detail. If you call him later in the game, he also brings it up again in phone calls. Is it a coincidence that these two share not only a similar pose, but also the same name? And it's not just any name, mind you, it's a tree name. Which means a whole heck of a lot when you consider that, to my knowledge, anyone with a tree name in the Pocaverse is, or at least has been a professor. It's kind of like the expectation that anyone named Jeeves is eventually gonna become a butler. Obviously the exception to this rule is Ash, but that's the anime and the anime has question canonical canonicity and it's not like he grows older anyway, who knows he might grow up to become a professor, etc, etc, etc. To me, at least, I like the story that this theory creates. But at the beginning of the episode, I mentioned that if this is indeed true, then Goh might answer one of Pokemon's longest-held mysteries. And that, my friends, is the origin of the great Pokemon War. Ever since Generation 1, the internet has speculated about a mysterious Pokemon War

alluded to by Lieutenant Surge during your gym battle with him. I propose to you that this war, is one caused by disagreements between Team Mystic, Team Valor, and Team Instinct about the proper role and use of Pokemon. Get this! We know that the war has to take place in Lieutenant Surge's lifetime, so it's within 40 years of Generation 1. This guy is no AZ living for 3,000 years or anything. That also means it has to come after the creation of the first Pokeballs. As, according to the game's lore, modern Pokeballs were first developed back in 1925 by Professor Westwood.

And what do we have in Pokemon Go? Well, for all the rudimentary game mechanics, we do have one modern idea, and that is balls. Modern balls. And yet, by the start of Generation 1, Team Mystic, valor, and instinct are no more. No one even mentions them. Also, we see and go that Willow is in his late 20s, early 30s-ish, which would place him around Price's age by the time the events of silver and gold would roll around. Price even mentions having to go through hardships in his life. In the anime, that's losing his pilo swine, but in the games, he's older than Surge,

Meaning he must have gone through the same war that Surge did. But most of all, look at the Pokemon created prior to the start of Generation 1. First, Pori-Gon and then Mutu. It's actually confirmed by the official Bulbapedia timeline that Pori-Gon came first, and then years later, Mutu showed up. Both are artificial Pokemon, created via programming, in Pori-Gon's case, or cloning in Mutu's. Decisions that I guarantee are gonna be pretty controversial to people. Artificially creating life?

Nuh, that's gonna make some people very, very upset. And in Pokemon Go we have a Pori-gon, but not a ditto or a Mutu, meaning that this slots right in that sweet spot from the timeline where one exists and the other one doesn't. Thus, I propose that Pokemon Go not only connects to the main franchise games, but tells the story of the start of Lieutenant Surge's mysterious Pokemon War. One fought between valor, mystic, and instinct over the creation and use of man-made Pokemon, A war that was either prompted by the creation of Mew2 or ended by the creation of Mew2. In the end, Mystic and Instinct team up to win against Valor,

hence having a society dominated by professors studying Pokemon in the wild, and battling being relegated to formal competitions regulated by the Pokemon League by the time Gen 1 rolls around. Is it a stretch? Am I overthinking a really simple mobile app that was created by people who didn't fully understand the mechanics of the game? Yeah, probably. But personally, I like this one a lot. Because it fits together a lot of pieces for a mystery I think the creators of the Pocaverse forgot a long time ago. But hey, that's just a theory. A game theory! Thanks for watching!