Tsunekazu Ishihara, president and CEO of the Pokemon Company, waves as he arrives to demonstrate on... [+]
In an interesting interview with Tsunekazu Ishihara, the CEO of The Pokémon Company, he talks about his surprise at the popularity of Pikachu and that he’s a big fan of the updated Exeggutor in Pokémon Sun and Moon.
In a new interview over at The Wall Street Journal, Ishihara is quite up front about his surprise regarding Pikachu’s ongoing popularity, “None of us really thought Pikachu was particularly special.”
However, the updated Alolan variant of Exeggutor is something Ishihara is rather enthusiastic about, “My dream is finally a reality. I’m glad to see what Exeggutor has become”.
With Pokémon Sun and Moon being big new forthcoming releases, I am glad to see that Ishihara is fan of the new Alolan variants.
Talking of all the new Pokémon in that game, a very nice looking strategy guide and journal pack has been announced for release on December 9th. So at least fans will be able to keep track of all the new Pokémon in the game.
Overall, it’s an interesting interview though and covers some good ground. What with the recent release of Pokémon GO, the Pokémon series as a whole is very visible yet again.
Despite the massive success of Pokémon GO, the chances of the mainline games coming to mobile seem unlikely, this is because Ishihara is wary of cross platform releases, as he explains, “The chance of finding success in taking a product made for one platform and bringing it over to another is quite low”.
To be honest, Ishihara is correct to be concerned. While Pokémon GO may be somewhat flagging in the mobile charts at present, it cannot be denied that the game was built around the functionality of modern smart devices.
Likewise, the mainline games have been built from the ground up specifically for gaming handhelds, as the series originated on the GameBoy after all.
In any case, fans of Pokémon should give this interview a read prior to Sun and Moon's release this coming November.
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