The Pokémon franchise is separated by “generations”. What starts a new “generation” is the release of a new game (not a remake or other form of re-release) that contains a lot of new Pokémon (say, at least 50). The games that start a new generation tend to follow an overall structure: a young protagonist leaves the house, gets a starter Pokémon, travels the country, catches wild Pokémon, battles gym leaders in some towns and cities, defeats an evil organization, and becomes the Champion of the Pokémon League. All this way, the protagonist meets a rival several times. Later games shake up this sequence, but the overall structure is still there.
By this definition, the games that start each generation are the following:
- Pokémon Red and Pokémon Blue (or Pokémon Red and Pokémon Green in Japan)
- Pokémon Gold and Pokémon Silver
- Pokémon Ruby and Pokémon Sapphire
- Pokémon Diamond and Pokémon Pearl
- Pokémon Black and Pokémon White
- Pokémon X and Pokémon Y
- Pokémon Sun and Pokémon Moon
- Pokémon Sword and Pokémon Shield
However, there are a lot of concepts that appeared during development but did not appear in the final releases. Because I want to explore and even recover abandoned concepts, I am going to refer to these “lost ideas” frequently. Considering organization, I decided that defining several “provisional generations” is in order. These “provisional generations” encompass any unused or altered concepts that appeared around the time of a certain work.
- “Generation 0” is centered around the Capsule Monsters pitch.
- “Generation 0.5” is centered around the Pocket Monsters prototype.
- “Generation 1.5” is centered around the “Space World” prototype.
