# Pokémon Red and Green *Pocket Monsters Aka / Midori; released in the West as Red and Blue* - Work: Japanese RPG - Date: 1996 (Japan); 1998 (North America); 1999 (Europe) - Made by: Satoshi Tajiri (Director & creator); Shigeru Miyamoto (Producer) - Houses: Game Freak, Nintendo - Platforms: Game Boy - Canonical: https://www.lanternhall.org/works/pokemon-red-and-green/ > Satoshi Tajiri turned a childhood of insect collecting into a Game Boy RPG about catching and trading 151 monsters, and the 1996 release became the seed of the most lucrative franchise in entertainment. **Why it matters:** Pokémon Red and Green created the monster-collecting RPG, made the link cable a social engine, revived the aging Game Boy, and launched a franchise of games, anime and trading cards that reached every corner of the world. ## Quick answers **When was Pokémon Red and Green first released?** Pokémon Red and Green was first released in 1996 (Japan); 1998 (North America); 1999 (Europe). **Who created Pokémon Red and Green?** Pokémon Red and Green was made by Satoshi Tajiri (director & creator) and Shigeru Miyamoto (producer). **Who published or developed Pokémon Red and Green?** Game Freak and Nintendo. **What kind of work is Pokémon Red and Green?** Pokémon Red and Green is a Japanese RPG in the Monster-Collecting RPGs and Japanese RPGs (JRPG) tradition, released for Game Boy. **Why is Pokémon Red and Green important?** Pokémon Red and Green created the monster-collecting RPG, made the link cable a social engine, revived the aging Game Boy, and launched a franchise of games, anime and trading cards that reached every corner of the world. ## Overview A boy leaves his house in Pallet Town, is stopped at the edge of the tall grass by Professor Oak, and is handed one of three creatures in the professor's lab. From that moment, the goal of *Pocket Monsters Red* and *Green*, released for Nintendo's Game Boy in Japan on February 27, 1996, is stated plainly on the box: catch them all. Across the Kanto region there are 151 species to find, fight, raise and trade, eight Gym Leaders to defeat, and a rival who always seems to be one step ahead. Built by a small studio, [Game Freak](https://www.lanternhall.org/houses/game-freak/), for a handheld that many considered near the end of its life, the game became a global phenomenon and the founding work of the [monster-collecting RPG](https://www.lanternhall.org/atlas/monster-collecting-rpg/). ## Origins [Satoshi Tajiri](https://www.lanternhall.org/makers/satoshi-tajiri/) grew up catching insects in the fields and ponds around his suburban Tokyo home, and watched them vanish under development. Game Freak began as his video-game fanzine before becoming a developer, and when he saw the Game Boy's Game Link Cable, he imagined insects crawling from one screen to the other. He pitched the idea to [Nintendo](https://www.lanternhall.org/houses/nintendo/) in 1990. The company was skeptical until [Shigeru Miyamoto](https://www.lanternhall.org/makers/shigeru-miyamoto/) backed the project and served as its producer. Tajiri also had a design grievance to answer: in [*Dragon Quest II*](https://www.lanternhall.org/works/dragon-quest/) he had been unable to obtain a rare item, and he wanted a game in which what one player lacked another could give. Development stretched to about six years, with Game Freak working on other projects to stay afloat. Ken Sugimori drew the creatures and art, and Junichi Masuda wrote the music and sound engine. The decision to sell the game in two versions, with some species exclusive to each, made trading essential rather than optional. Late in production, programmer Shigeki Morimoto secretly slipped a 151st creature, Mew, into the leftover space, as a prank for the team; Nintendo later turned it into a promotion, distributing Mew to players at events and through *CoroCoro Comic*, which also offered a mail-order *Blue* edition from October 1996 with refined graphics and code. ## How it plays *Pokémon* borrows the structure of a [Japanese RPG](https://www.lanternhall.org/atlas/japanese-rpg/): towns, routes, caves, a party of up to six, and [turn-based battles](https://www.lanternhall.org/lexicon/turn-based-combat/). What it changes is where the party comes from. Wild Pokémon are weakened and captured in thrown Poké Balls, then trained, evolved and taught moves. Every creature and attack has a type, fire, water, grass, electric, psychic and so on, arranged in a web of strengths and weaknesses deep enough for competitive play yet simple enough for children. The Pokédex, an in-game encyclopedia, turns completion into a visible goal, and the two versions guarantee that no single player can fill it alone. The quest runs from Pallet Town through eight Gyms to the Elite Four and a final showdown with the rival, and along the way the player dismantles Team Rocket, a gang that exploits Pokémon for profit. Link-cable battles between friends turned a single-player adventure into a playground game. ## Reception & impact The games were a slow-building sensation in Japan, where Red, Green and Blue sold 10.23 million copies. The anime series premiered on TV Tokyo on April 1, 1997, and a trading card game had arrived in October 1996. North America received *Red* and *Blue*, built on the Japanese *Blue* engine, on September 28, 1998, weeks after the anime debuted in U.S. syndication, backed by a reported $13 million marketing push; they became the fastest-selling Game Boy titles, with 200,000 copies in two weeks. Europe followed in 1999, as did the English-language card game from [Wizards of the Coast](https://www.lanternhall.org/houses/wizards-of-the-coast/), whose success with [*Magic: The Gathering*](https://www.lanternhall.org/works/magic-the-gathering/) had prepared the ground. "Pokémania" filled playgrounds, toy aisles and news bulletins. Across all versions, the original games sold more than 31 million copies. ## Legacy *Pokémon Red and Green* gave the Game Boy, launched in 1989, a second life and launched a franchise that now spans hundreds of games, films, cards and toys; the core series has added generation after generation of species while keeping the same loop of catch, train, trade and battle. The games were remade as *FireRed* and *LeafGreen* in 2004 and reimagined as *Let's Go, Pikachu!* and *Let's Go, Eevee!* in 2018, and returned on the 3DS Virtual Console on the twentieth anniversary of the Japanese release. In 2017 they entered the World Video Game Hall of Fame at The Strong National Museum of Play. Their idea, that a roleplaying party could be collected rather than recruited, echoes through the [monster-collecting](https://www.lanternhall.org/atlas/monster-collecting-rpg/) genre and into the [gacha](https://www.lanternhall.org/atlas/gacha-rpg/) games that monetize the same urge to complete a set. ## Facts - Satoshi Tajiri based the idea on his childhood hobby of collecting insects around suburban Tokyo. - The trading mechanic grew from Tajiri's frustration at items he could not obtain in Dragon Quest II. - Mew, the 151st Pokémon, was slipped in late by programmer Shigeki Morimoto as an internal prank, not meant for players. - Development took about six years, from 1990 to 1996. - Western Red and Blue were built on the engine of Japan's later Blue edition, a CoroCoro Comic mail-order special from October 1996. - Nintendo spent a reported $13 million marketing the North American launch. - In 2017 Guinness named the games the best-selling video game excluding bundled copies, and they entered the World Video Game Hall of Fame. ## Sources and further reading - [Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pok%C3%A9mon_Red,_Blue,_and_Yellow) --- From The Lantern Hall (https://www.lanternhall.org/), a museum of fantasy literature and roleplaying games.