After doing a very, very big spreadsheet, I found that almost every Pokemon in Generation 2 had some kind of change at some point in development. The only ones who didn't were ones like Yanma or Larvitar. So, here's a big look at some of the notable changes. If you want to know them all, view my spreadsheet here. Trust me, virtually every Pokemon had some change somewhere, and covering them all would be impossible in a single article, nor would it be particularly interesting. Meganium's Spaceworld Connection
Gold -> Silver Design ChangesHowever, rather than focus on Spaceworld connections, how about some Gold and Silver-specific stuff? I believe there is none more interesting than Magby. Magby's design between Gold and Silver is actually quite different. Namely, the belly pattern in Gold is not only different, but it also mirrors Spaceworld. This implies to me that the Gold sprites were made first, and Silver's later. This could have started around 1998, I think. Crystal then darkened the colors of Silver, but the back sprite across all 3 games still kept the old belly patterns. Lugia is another interesting case to look over. Its Gold sprite features talons, and a parting on the left wing. This meant that that wing...wasn't a hand. Silver would remove both of these aspects and remodel the face, which Crystal would build upon when using Gold's sprite for the animated one in its game. Gold's Lugia design was essentially very different. GS -> Crystal Design Changes
Raikou inspired me to go on this little journey, due to the head and weird cloud-cape colour being completely different. Essentially, this Raikou is a completely different design to the Crystal - and thus modern - one. It's a pretty popular bit to look at in the beta section of the Pokemon community, so covering this is a bit of a cop-out, but hey! So what does this mean?So these are just some of the changes I discovered. But, what does this mean? Well, essentially, Pokemon Gold and Silver may well have been rushed out the door. There are many designs that received significant changes in Crystal, many I didn't cover here (basically, view the spreadsheet).
I can sort-of date the Silver sprite additions through Magby and Lugia: it must have been around Late 1998 to early 1999, mid development, once the art style shift was done, and enough so that the Spaceworld designs were not completely changed (See: Meganium). The art style shift happened in 1998, but no Silver sprites were revealed. You can see that the sprites were not "presentable" until later given that only Pokemon Gold's sprites received any coverage at all (Prerelease TCRF page shows this). Naturally though, it's still very vague. I believe that the game was rushed out of the door due to the time it took for the game to be made at all, and that Poke Fever as it was called was slowly dying off. To maintain the hype, it made sense for the sequels to be forced out. Therefore, we got designs that did not match official artwork. Hell, some Silver sprites were the same as the Gold ones (eg. Sneasel, Spinarak, Ariados, Legendary Beasts), or had very small alterations (eg. Hitmontop, Togetic). Crystal took on a pretty arduous task of fixing all these disparities, and it did damn well. So there you have it, some light shed on one of the more interesting parts of Generation 2. What do you think? Do you see any designs that particularly interest you?
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The mysterious Mew is known for many things: it can learn any TM or Tutor move, it's the first mythical Pokemon, it's a playground myth that turned out to be true, it's been featured in a number of movies, and has quite a bit of lore to it. Oh, and it's also known for having a really ugly original sprite that resulted in Pokemon Green getting the stereotype of having terrible sprites. But, did you all know that Mew has a history of revisions across Generations 1-2, moreso than any other Pokemon? Let's start at the beginning, Pokemon Red and Green. Mew was added over Omega in Index 21 to fill space, and was used for easy TM testing. Mew was kept in for release and later used as a promotional, "mirage" Pokemon. During this time, Mew looked like...this. Indeed, Mew embodied the fetus aspect of its design. This little jerboa embryo is often toted as an abomination, a creature that should have never existed. Me? I think it's hilarious and had a more dark tone. But yeah, this thing is what eventually became Mew's design today. The question is...when did it change, and why? The Red and Green Asset Leak contains a prototype Blue JP sprite for Mew, still featuring the little bump on its head and the creepy eyes. This was from Blue Version 1, I believe, given the file name. Given this is only in black and white, I also took it upon myself to colorize it like I did with Gyopin's back sprite. This version has been increased a bit in size so apologies if the scaling looks off. So really, there are two incarnations of Mew's original design. Despite this though, the official RG artwork for Mew does not show this. The very first time Mew received art had it in its revised design, as Ken Sugimori was redesigning Pokemon at this stage. Given Goldeen's horn change, we can deduce that these RG artworks were where the design changes began. However, RB did not always reflect these changes, as we saw with Goldeen's horn as well. Anyway, despite the odd discrepancies in design, when Pokemon Blue JP did the revised sprites in October 1996, we got the Mew we now know and love. No longer was it an odd fetus, it was now more a cat-jerboa-embryo-thing. But...due to the way Generation 1 handled the sprite changes, we still had the back sprite from Red and Green. It seems that when you commanded Mew yourself, you unleashed the horrible blighter to the international audience's poor eyes. How awful! Pokemon Yellow preserved this change as well, meaning Japan had 2 versions with the old Mew, and two with the new. Remember, Blue JP and Yellow were essentially Red and Green sequels in Japan. The international audiences received Blue JP's Mew, as well as Yellow Mew, meaning we never saw the evil fetus in the west until the internet dredged up Green from the depths of the ROM websites. However, prior to Yellow's release, there was one more Mew sprite. This was at Spaceworld 1997. This Mew featured a similar design to Pokemon Red and Blue's, and was used in the demo and the Mew distribution cartridges over there. The screenshot I have here was on a bilibili video, at 32:23. I had this image for comparison on an old article, but it had the wrong date! I've fixed it though. So overall, there are 5 known Mew sprites from Generation 1, not counting back sprites. The Spaceworld Mew, given its use on Generation 1 Distribution Cartridges, can be considered a Generation 1 sprite. If we consider it Gen 2 and count the ones from there, we have 8 Pre-Gen 3 sprites total, more than any Pokemon from that era.
So, while this was more of an info dump article than any real explanation, what do you think? Do you like the unreleased Mew sprites? Lemme know your thoughts! Gyopin is a curious little blighter who always seems to find its ways into leaks about Generations 1 and 2. However, I have never covered this little thing! Gyopin is a pre-evolution to Goldeen - a Baby Pokemon - whose first recorded appearance is in the Pokemon Red and Green Asset Leak. It was positioned at Index No.156, meaning that if you tried encountering it now you would find a MissingNo. in its place. Yes, this is an unmasked MissingNo.! However, it had no known name from that point in time, but these days we call it Gyopin due to its later appearances. The asset leak was released in February 2019, but held for an undetermined amount of time. We only have a back sprite of this little guy, and only in black and white too. However, I have taken it upon myself to make a speculative back sprite using the final Red and Green Goldeen's palette. This was with Bulbapedia's sprite. As a result, we wind up with this; The then-unnamed fish also had a learnset, but I have yet to translate these. I will however provide what I have;
This unnamed fish would later appear as Gyopin in the Spaceworld 1997 Demo leak that happened in 2018, released by the same person. This time, with far more completion; including a front sprite, a palette to actually look at, and a full learnset. (Credit: The Cutting Room Floor) Gyopin was Pure Water Type, with no stats (as in they were all dummied to 50), and a 50% chance to hold a Berry and a 5% chance to hold the old Mystic Water, the Wet Horn. It evolved more quickly than its Gen 1 counterpart, evolving at Level 16. As for learnset, here we are. Sourcing it from Team Spaceworld's research spreadsheet that I saved a copy of, before it was taken down. I use it for personal research records now. It's essentially Final Goldeen's, with no different moves from there. Levels are a bit different. Demo Goldeen learns moves more slowly by virtue of being a Stage 1 evolution. Gyopin is however a source of confusion for some, due to its design being a bit different to Goldeen. This, is a misconception. Goldeen originally had a spiral horn, which began being changed when Pokemon Yellow was released in September 1998. As a result, considering this fact, Gyopin's design actually makes perfect sense. Pokemon were often proposed in groups, meaning Gyopin was likely intended as a member of the Goldeen line from the very beginning. It just...got removed in the end. (Sprite Credit: The Cutting Room Floor - Gyopin, Bulbapedia - Goldeen) It gets a bit weird though. In all of Goldeen's official artwork from the era - even the Cardass art - I cannot for the life of me find anything showing Goldeen with a spiral horn. In fact, I couldn't find it for Seaking either, despite having the exact same spiral horn trait in Red and Green, and Blue JP. The closest I got to any reference was on some Cardass artwork for Seaking, but it's a bit of a reach. So, what does this mean? The spiral horn sprites for Goldeen and Seaking represent an intermittent design stage, like Gold and Silver's designs for Meganium, Spinarak and the Legendary Beasts being changed for Crystal. I believe that the artwork for Goldeen and Seaking must have been made after their in-game sprites were already finished, thus why their spiral horns were removed in Yellow and later just erased from existence. And, well, I think I can date this as well. I believe it must have happened during - and after - Spaceworld. Pokemon Yellow was released in September 1998, almost a year after Spaceworld. We have sprites showing the spiral horn in the demo, which was changed in the final. I also have a bit of a smoking gun, and that's Seaking's Spaceworld sprites. (Sprite Credit: The Cutting Room Floor) Notice the front sprite's horn: there's no spiral. They were in the middle of the redesign right as Spaceworld was going on. This leads me to believe that perhaps Gyopin and Goldeen have versions of their Spaceworld sprites without the spiral horn being featured as well somewhere, but...that's a reach, I feel. Well, why would they remove such an awesome looking design? I believe the anime must have been using the Red and Green artwork as a basis, as Goldeen had already been shown without a spiral horn. The first appearance was in Pokemon Emergency. In fact, this was its most iconic appearance that even led to Goldeen being featured in Super Smash Bros. doing the exact same thing: flopping on the floor. Thus, they must have changed it for consistency reasons. When did this air? April 8th 1997 in Japan, around the same time as when MicroGroup Game Review Vol.14 was released, doing commentary on the first episode of the anime: there was a lot of promotion going on. I believe Gyopin was removed for several reasons. It would have been extremely weak, and left Goldeen as one of the weakest middle evolutions of all time. Most Baby Pokemon reduce all the older form's stats by around 20, meaning its defenses would have been absolutely pitiful.
So there you have it: Gyopin, the Goldeen line's long lost baby, and part of one of many Generation 1 redesigns. What do you think? Personally, I wish that horn stayed, it adds a lot more personality to this line of Pokemon. Many often call Goldeen and Seaking basic, mundane and/or unimaginative. Personally I absolutely love Seaking, given my love for the more regal kinds of goldfish. Shoutout to Game Freak for giving it Swords Dance again in Sword and Shield after being deprived of it for 2 decades by the way. That was a Gen 2 event move, one of the most unfortunate casualties of the move to Gen 3. Left me super miffed. But anyway, that marks another mystery solved about not just Gyopin, but the entire Goldeen line! Out of all the Pokemon in the Spaceworld 1997 demo, most have their stats either unfinished, dummied out or otherwise. There is one, however, who stands out from the crowd: Rinrin. (Credit: The Cutting Room Floor, fan-made art by RacieBeep) Rinrin, in my opinion, may have been intended to be an alternative evolution to Konya, a scrapped pre-evolution to Meowth. This is because it is right next to Konya, a pre evolution to Meowth. It is the only Pokemon in the demo to have a true defined statline. Rinrin was a female-only Pokemon while Meowth was male, implying that there was an intention for gendered evolution. Konya would evolve at Level 14. Fun fact, Konya was also cut from Gen 1! Unlike most Pokemon in the Spaceworld dex however, Rinrin was finished. All stats but Special Defense were done (as SpD was dummied out universally, the split was still in progress). By using Meowth's Demo BST, we are able to devise what the SpD was. It was...low, but not unlike many Pokemon back then. (Source for these images are my private research sheets) Rinrin had access to Bell Chime, which was the prototype Heal Bell. Same effect, just a different name. This was actually its signature move. It would have been quite a desirable Pokemon given this, although it didn't seem like it would be too bulky, so it's definitely subjective. Access to Lovely and Sweet Kiss is certainly an eye-opener as well. Like every other Spaceworld Pokemon though, Rinrin had no TM learnset due to them still being used for debugging. Rinrin also had an evolution known as Berurun, evolving at Lv.28. This Pokemon would have been essentially a Persian counterpart. No stats are available, and it has largely the same learnset. You could technically replicate the stats through going +20 to each, as this is a common thing done for evolution, but know that it isn't definitive. (Credit: The Cutting Room Floor, fan-made art by RacieBeep) It is thought that the Rinrin line inspired Purrloin and Liepard of Gen 5. I do believe I see the resemblance, especially in regards to the idea of trickery being their forte. They have a lot of disruption-centric moves in their learnsets, so perhaps the concept of a deceptive cat got carried over! Game Freak has never acknowledged the Rinrin line in interviews to my knowledge, but Meowth has received Gigantamax, Alolan and Galarian forms, as well as an alternate evolution in Perrserker if it's Galarian. There's quite a lot of love for this cat, but still no Konya or Rinrin...
Holy crap I have not used this in a while, have I? Well, I wanted to be honest and not simply fill this blog with filler content, nor cover things that have been already covered by Helix Chamber and Dr. Lava. And well, here's some original stuff, eh? I posted on my Twitter fairly recently about finding an old promo disk from 2001, featuring a CD-ROM. This CD-ROM contained promotional content relating to the 2nd generation of Pokemon, and 50.Grind's Gotta Catch Em All Single. If you're a CD maniac, you can find the details of this disk on Discogs here. Before I go into the details of what was on the disk, let me as a brit explain who 50.Grind are. Who were 50.Grind?50.Grind were an English Electronic Rock band ran by Nick Atkinson, under the record label Recognition Records. Weirdly though, outside of Gotta Catch Em All, 50.Grind has virtually no online information. I can't find any albums after Gotta Catch Em All's big splash or...anything. I did my best to track down all the information though, so here's the scoop. 50.Grind were a very "skater kid" kind of band. I mean, look at everything about them. So, it was a very 90s kind of thing, riding on the Pokemon culture that was all over the UK at the time. The anime had reached peak popularity and the 2nd Generation was coming, so it worked like a charm and definitely contributed to the success of the single. 50.Grind gained notoriety after the release of Gotta Catch Em All feat. Pokemon All-Stars, a Nintendo-sanctioned Single. It received positive reception from fans, to the point it reached #57 on the UK Singles Charts and #15 on the Top 2000 on NPO Radio 2 in the Netherlands. It also played on Nickelodeon UK, with a YouTube archive of this being shown here. Although looking into it, I can see some of the Pokemon haters of those days giving some pretty angry reviews. The CD-ROM shows an interview with the band members, with them talking about their favorite Pokemon among other things. One likes Farfetch'd, which is kind of ironic given its evolution didn't make it into the final game. I hope he's happy about Sirfetch'd, though! 50.Grind broke up in 2003. Nick Atkinson would later form Rooster, who would release two albums: Rooster and Circles and Satellites before dissolving in 2007. He would go on to form The Temperance Movement in 2011, a blues rock band, which is active to this day. Their latest album, A Deeper Cut, was released in 2018. The Daily ExpressThe Daily Express is a UK tabloid newspaper owned by Reach PLC and published by Northern and Shell Media. It was founded on the 24th of April 1990 by Sir Arthur Pearson. I find it interesting how Nintendo decided to associate with the Daily Express, as it had recently been sold over to Richard Desmond who owned a porn company and produced OK! Magazine at the time. Regardless, it's an interesting turn of events and definitely goes down in Pokemon's unique history in the UK. These days, the Daily Express is known for its far-right political alignment, support for the Conservatives and controversies. Its most recent controversy was particularly around the European Union and migrants, where they were accused of xenophobic comments. Editor Gary Jones seeks to change the paper's reputation however, with a statement in April 2018 confirming this. I'm here for the Pokemon!Alright, alright! I have found 3 different covers in my online research. There's a CD-ROM, then two CDs. I have the CD-ROM, but not the two CDs, so I won't be able to snag the two variants of the recordings to upload here. The two CDs contained the two different Singles, one edited for promo as Discogs evidences. The CD-ROM contains various advertisements for Pokemon and 50.Grind's content. This includes screensavers, and TV advertisements. There are 4 screensavers. One is 50.Grind's logo, one is Ash and his team from the Johto League series of the anime, then there's two Pokemon Jets. What are Pokemon Jets doing here? What are they? Allow Mama Plague to explain! Pokemon has maintained a partnership with All Nippon Airways since 1996, although since 2016 they've been retired along with all other Boeing 747s. The liveries these used were all retired at the same time in 2006. I did some digging, and the plane matches up with the 1999 Boeing 767-300s that were unveiled in 1999. They were in fact a winning design from a March 1999 competition, which children between the ages of 6 and 12 participated in. The first winner was rolled out in Osaka, and I am assuming this wallpaper is exactly that: the winner, before the design was put on two further planes. The first's registration number is JA8964! I find it kind of funny to see these on a UK disk though...why advertise a Japanese website? It's a mystery! There are also advertisements for Pokemon Stadium 2, Pokemon Crystal and Pokemon 3: The Movie (also known as The Spell of the Unown). These all aired on TV. You can view the Pokemon Stadium 2 ad as I extracted and converted from the disk here. If you convert the game's price with inflation, it would have costed a staggering £81.65. Christ. Given this game was being imported from Japan, there are no differences from the final game, and this remains consistent with the rest. I believe I have seen the Pokemon Crystal ad before somewhere, but the time and place eludes me. It may have been a...Digimon VHS? I'm not sure. It shows Suicune and the Unown from the intro, before a comedic scene about the Unown text, hinting at their lore. £30 actually converts perfectly to £49.99 via inflation, by the way! Lastly, the Pokemon 3: The Movie ad, is the same as the ones on the VHSes of the Indigo League anime. It talks about the Unown being unstoppable and powerful, which frankly made me laugh like a maniac given how they turned out. It's a pretty awesome ad outside of that animation-wise. I remember it being on a "The Little Vampire" VHS at one point. I wanna look at this disk for myself!And you most certainly can! I have uploaded the disk's contents as well as converted media over to Mediafire here.
The videos and wallpapers were converted to mp4 and PNGs respectively for easier file use over the internet, as their file types are...archaic to say the least. The disk contents can be burned to just about any CD-R for use yourself. I would strongly recommend viewing the 50.Grind interview, as it is quite interesting! I did upload the mp4-converted video footage out to YouTube with intent to have it running on this article, but...you can guess what happened. My fault though, I should have known they had the copyright on deck for those ads. |
About meSo I really, really like researching Prototype Pokemon information. That's about it. I also do things on Smogon, I guess. Archives
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