The Pokemon Company Does It Again (Derogatory)

So yesterday was the Super Bowl, and it was pretty light on trailers. Universal came out with Disclosure Day and Minions and Monsters, but there were a lot of things missing, especially things coming later in the year like Avengers: Doomsday, The Odyssey, Spider-Man: Brand New Day, and Grand Theft Auto VI.

The only video game developer to actually run an ad during the show was Game Freak, with a likely very expensive ad featuring celebrities like Lady Gaga and Trevor Noah discussing their favorite Pokémon. It makes sense for them to pay the $20 million to run an ad since this is their 30th anniversary, but the ad feels a little strange all things considered. First off, the information hasn't been officially released, but the fact that Generation X is coming this year and will be titled Pokemon Wind and Pokemon Waves is basically an open secret at this point. Everyone who cares, and a lot of people who don't (especially if they're friends with me), know this already. Not only is this known, but the budget for this game at $20 million USD has also leaked.

So yes, The Pokemon Company paid the same amount for the airtime for their 30th anniversary ad, not including production costs, as the 30th anniversary games marking the 10th generation of the series cost to produce.

Taken into consideration the consternation about Pokemon Scarlet and Pokemon Violet, this decision would make sense if you were actually plugging something. If they came out and said "this is what Gen X is going to look like," and it looked great, this would be a great use of money. Even if this was a spot to show off Pokemon Champions and give a release date or a 30 second spot that kind of is a sizzle reel of all the mobile games and the arrival of Pokémon Colosseum and Pokemon XD: Gale of Darkness to Nintendo Classics, with a tease that said to tune in at the end of February for announcements, that would make sense.

Instead, this feels like a reminder the franchise exists more than anything. Just in case you lived under a rock for the last 30 years and managed to forget about the most profitable franchise in the history of video games, here is your reminder. I'm not saying they had to come out and do the announcement of Pokemon Wind and Pokemon Waves yesterday in the middle of the Super Bowl, and had this been a normal year it probably would have been drowned out by the rest of the noise.

The point is if you are going to spend this much money talking about your IP and its storied legacy, at least point out where it's going instead of taking what appears to be a victory lap talking about how much people like your games.