With the excellent Pokemon Legends Arceus marking what looks to be the start of a whole new era for the franchise, this felt like as great a time as any to stop and take stock of the state of the franchise as it stands at the present moment in time. And so, we decided to go ahead and rank the Pokemon games. To be clear, we didn’t rank all of them – that would be insane, and also redundant, since so many games in the series are just slight variations of each other. 

Instead, what we did was take the best representative for each campaign and used it as a stand in for all other games that are also based on the same campaign. Put simply, this list doesn’t rank Pokemon Red/Blue, Yellow, FireRed/LeafGreen, and Let’s Go separately – it just takes what we think is the best one out of those, and ranks that one. (As for which one the best one is, you’re going to have to find that out for yourself now, won’t you?).

Is that clear? Great. Then let’s get started.

10. POKEMON X/Y

Pokemon X/Y was probably the first game in the series that caused wide scale disappointment among the fans – everyone had some complaint or the other with it. It makes sense – the game, which marked the series’ long awaited jump to 3D, was definitely a letdown on many fronts. The story was baffling and banal (even by Pokemon standards), the difficulty level was ramped down to such absurd levels that you could very literally finish the game without even paying attention to what was happening on screen, the region was extremely linear (and lacking in dungeons to a severe degree), there was nothing in the way of a post game, it pandered far too much to the first generation of Pokemon games, and it introduced the smallest roster of new Pokemon to date.

But there was also a lot to like about it – the Player Search System it introduced remains the single best online suite in any Pokemon game to date, and really, one the best multiplayer suites out there, player character customization was a hugely beloved feature that went on to become a series mainstay, it took the first steps towards making Pokemon training and team composition easier and more transparent by giving players direct control over the growth of their Pokemon, it added a brand new type that upended the meta game almost entirely, the Mega Evolutions battle gimmick was really fun, the design of the new Pokemon was uniformly excellent, and it looked charming as all heck with its chibi style 3D graphics. In hindsight, X/Y have become the most inessential Pokemon entries, because almost everything they did well went on to be appropriated by future games in the series, who would do it much better – and its shortcomings never got the chance to be fixed by an expansion or re-release, as would happen for so many other games in the series. But in spite of that, they’re very fun games, and probably exemplify the sentiment that even a “bad” Pokemon game remains an extremely well made, charming, and satisfying game to play through.

9. POKEMON BLACK 2/WHITE 2

The fifth generation of Pokemon was a wild time for the franchise, rife with experimentation and all sorts of new things the series had never dared attempt until then. One of those was a direct sequel – the first and only direct sequel to a game taking place in the same region the series has seen to date.

It made sense, though – the excellent Pokémon Black/White (which we’ll get to later on in the list) left a lot of sequel hooks in their story, and Unova was an amazing setting that clearly had more to offer. Pokémon Black 2 and White 2 deliver on that, but the adventure we get is decidedly inferior to the original games. While these are still excellent games, and essential for anyone who enjoyed the original Black/White, the campaign eschews a lot of the boldness and novelty that made the original games stand out so much, squandering the narrative opportunities hinted at by the originals (and in some cases it outright undermines them), and mechanically don’t really expand on the original games enough to really stand out on their own. They do offer a meaty, hefty post-game, and a frankly absurd amount of content – and all of it is absolutely great. But when you play through all Pokemon games, these ones tend to stand out less than the others – because very honestly, most of what they do was already done better by the original Black/White just one year prior, and they don’t really bring enough unique stuff of their own to the table to make up for that.

8. POKEMON ULTRA SUN/ULTRA MOON

Pokemon Sun/Moon were extremely interesting games – bold and ambitious, willing to experiment with the structure of the franchise, doubling down on a pointed narrative and storytelling focus, and giving us the most fleshed out and believable look at the world of Pokemon to date. They offered a lot of excellent stuff – Alola is a great region with a lot of personality and a distinct aesthetic, the new Pokemon designs are amazing and contextualized in extremely believable ways as part of a larger ecology and even the story and characters were interesting. But Sun/Moon were extremely flawed games, with their story falling apart towards the final act, extreme linearity and railroading making for the least player driven Pokemon game to date, an overabundance of cutscenes with trite and repetitive dialog that you could not ever skip, an online suite that was a shocking regression on the excellent X/Y, and, yet again, an acute lack of post-game content.

Ultra Sun/Ultra Moon… well, they don’t really fix Sun/Moon, but they patch them up to a level that they are no longer the worst games in the series (if Ultra Sun/Ultra Moon didn’t exist, yes, I would have absolutely placed the original Sun/Moon at the bottom of this list). They tweak the story and characters to be less bizarre towards the end, the cutscenes spacing and story pacing is improved, areas get bigger, allowing for more exploration (though overall progression remains extremely rigidly linear), the post game gets a hefty chunk of new content to sink teeth into, and they add an absurd amount of content to the original game as well. They are also among the most difficult games in the series, with a certain specific fight near the end being legendary for how brutal it is.

Sun/Moon, much like most other games in the series in the 3DS era, are flawed and a tale of missed opportunity – but Ultra Sun/Ultra Moon existing at least makes that missed potential slightly easier to swallow, if only because it hints at what might have been had developers Game Freak taken the time to properly flesh things out with their games.

7. POKEMON SWORD/SHIELD

The single most controversial entry in the franchise, Pokemon Sword/Shield became flashpoints for controversy. There were loads of reasons for this – a decade of resentment building over repeated disappointing entries, poor communication by the developers and publishers for taking away a lot of content that players expect from these games, and extremely poor graphical quality, even considering Pokemon has never been a technical showpiece, all became easy latching on points for the backlash these games generated.

I would argue that to a very large degree, the backlash was not undeserved. Pokemon Sword and Shield are not bad games at all, but they are very clearly products of a rushed and troubled development cycle. The new region they introduced was visually distinct and hints at lush beauty and interesting lore, but the games never get around to it. There was, at launch, a total paucity of post game content again. The games forced further mechanics that trivialized the difficulty even further, making for the easiest games in the series at the time of release. The Wild Area concept, a mini open world region for players to explore and catch Pokemon in, was conceptually sound, but fumbled in execution. The online functionality was a baffling step back from the 3DS era. They cut down almost half of the roster of Pokemon.

But in spite of that laundry list of complaints, the core campaign was extremely compelling and fun, and knew to get out of the players’ way to let them enjoy the adventure at their own pace (something the Alola games had categorically failed at); new mechanics such as Max Raids were excellent, and giving players full control over how their Pokemon grow was game changing. The characters are excellent. And while the Wild Area was underdeveloped, and the story never fleshed out, both managed to stumble upon some rather unforgettable moments nevertheless, with a certain late game story development still ranking as one of my favorite story moments in the series. And all of this is before we consider the excellent expansions, which actually addressed a lot of the complaints players had with the base games – they added in another couple hundred of the missing Pokemon back in, they delivered fully fleshed out open world areas that properly leveraged 3D space and delivered a believable patchwork of biomes and ecosystems that rewarded player exploration, and they offered some actual meaningfully difficult battles as well; plus, given that they are meant to be post-game content, they naturally address the absence of post-game in the base titles too.

Even with the expansions, Sword and Shield are an unfortunate tale of missed potential (I’m sure you’re picking up on this being a running theme) – but in spite of what their troubled reputation might suggest, they are very good games, and absolutely worth playing regardless of their many stumbles. What they do well, they do really well, and ultimately, their take on the core Pokemon formula, while finally beginning to strain at the seams by this point, still delivered a compelling, engaging, and fun adventure.

6. POKEMON EMERALD

This is likely to be the most controversial entry on this list, because Pokemon Emerald is beloved by a army of Pokemon fans. You can see why – Emerald, building upon the good but flawed Ruby/Sapphire, is arguably the apex of Pokemon games in almost every regard. The campaign was long and challenging; there was a ridiculous amount of side and optional content; the Hoenn region in Emerald is extremely memorable, with some standout locations, excellent dungeons, and fantastic level design; the story and characters were the best the series had seen at the time Emerald came out; the post-game was meaty and over-delivered, marking the debut of the fan favorite Battle Frontier (the absence of which in every new game in the series is lamented to this day).

Pokemon Emerald was absolutely amazing, and honestly I have nothing bad to say about it. Why, then, is it ranked so relatively low on the list? The answer is simple, we have now gotten to the part of the list where every single game is an amazing, excellent title and could justify placement at the top, depending on how you choose to classify and rank things. Basically, we’re now looking at six, amazing, excellent games, and trying to rank them is a bit like splitting hairs – no matter what you do, you’re still left with six amazing games. Emerald ranks lower than the others in this bunch because I feel the ones higher on this list than it did everything better for my liking. But that doesn’t take away from how incredible Pokemon Emerald is. It’s an amazing game, and legitimately one of the best RPGs of all time – everyone owes it to themselves to check it out.

5. POKEMON BLACK/WHITE

Pokémon Black/White marked the fourth new Pokemon entry on the DS, an at the time unprecedented volume of mainline games on a single system. Game Freak knew that to make these games stand out, they would have to work hard to give them their own identity. And they decided to do just that, in the process delivering among the best, and probably still among the most ambitious, games in the series to date.

Everything about Pokémon Black/White was so incredible – Unova as a region, basing itself on the urban aesthetic of continental United States, was a breath of fresh air after four regions based on Japan; a massive roster of new Pokemon (the single largest new batch to date, in fact) headlined these games, with Pokémon Black/White making the bold decision to only have new Pokemon in the game for the duration of the campaign – you’d be able to bring in your older pals, but they’d be limited to post-game content, meaning every new encounter was fresh and exciting in a way it hadn’t been for over a decade by the time Black/White came out.

And speaking of post-game, the post-game was fleshed out and meaty (the last time a new generation would deliver on this front). As good as that post-game was, it paled next to the campaign, a blisteringly fast story driven adventure (yes) that actually raised troubling ethical questions about the concept of catching and battling Pokemon (yes), with some legitimately well written characters and antagonists (yes), pulling in and recontextualizing the regular “win badges and beat The Pokemon League” conceit into the framework of a broader story (yes), delivering some legitimately surprising story developments and twists (yes), and culminating in an incredibly epic final act and a hell of a conclusion (yes).

All this, and I still haven’t talked about how this game marked the first time the series did away with the annoying HMs as a progression mechanic, the new experience curve mechanics that worked so much better for game balance than the EXP All that the games would force on the players in future entries, how much optional content there was, how excellent the region and dungeon design was, the new battle styles the games introduced (Rotation and Triple battles, I miss you…), how it simultaneously managed to represent the series’ first forays into 3D spaces, while delivering eye catching and attractive sprite art that remains arguably the best aesthetic the series has had to date… honestly, I can gush about these games forever, they were utterly excellent, thoroughly compelling, and so perfect, so great, so ambitious, that at the time they painted a bright picture for the future of the franchise.

The decade that would follow would not deliver on their promise – in part because Black/White remain the lowest selling mainline entries in the series to date, I assume. And that really sucks, because until very recently, Pokémon Black/White was the last time the series managed to deliver a truly great game. If you can, I urge you to track these down and play them – they are amazing, not just at being Pokemon games, just at delivering incredible RPGs.

4. POKEMON FIRERED/LEAFGREEN

Pokemon Red/Blue were borderline perfect – which is a terrible burden for games launching a series developed by a small, boutique development house that clearly was unprepared for how big their passion project would become. But let’s put aside that broader context for a second and just talk about Pokemon Red/Blue as games assessed on their own merits. To this day, those titles hold up. Oh sure, their primitive and rudimentary graphics are a bit of an adjustment, and they are so buggy that they would make a Bethesda game blush. But holy crap, did they nail the game design side of things perfectly. They took players on an amazing adventure, simultaneously breezy and challenging in just the right amounts, with a great campaign, amazing and memorable creature designs, wonderful lock and key progression, and a lot of optional content for players who went off the beaten path.

Pokemon FireRed/LeafGreen, which remade Red/Blue, are all of that but better. Modernizing the original games to bring them to the standard of the then-current third generation of Pokemon, they polish away the bugs, modernize the graphics, add even more optional content, introduce a lot of QoL and UX functionality the original titles were missing, add a ridiculously hefty chunk of post-game content (the one area the originals were, understandably, lacking in), flesh out their world and region even more, and do so all while remaining incredibly faithful to games that were played and beloved by 40 million players worldwide. They also started off the series’ now longstanding tradition of revisiting older titles via enhanced remakes, and they set the bar incredibly high, delivering the definitive take on the Kanto saga, a take so definitive that even the more modern Pokemon Let’s Go games, which are also remakes of the original generation, did not supplant them.

FireRed/LeafGreen are perfect. As I mentioned earlier, we’re splitting hairs at this point.

3. POKEMON LEGENDS: ARCEUS

Ten years of constant disappointment and unfulfilled promises, mismanagement and rushed development cycles, ten years of consistently managing to lower the bar, and still not meeting it. There’s no wonder that people had no confidence coming into Pokemon Legends: Arceus, because the last decade has been a difficult one for Pokemon fans.

But Game Freak finally threw off the shackles of 25 years of tradition and reinvented Pokemon in a bold new format – and managed to nail it, hitting the ball out of the park on their very first go. A lot like the original Pokemon Red/Blue, amusingly enough. 

Pokemon Legends is such an incredible game. The open world design lends itself beautifully well to the Pokemon franchise, The Pokemon themselves are recontextualized as dangerous, lethal wildlife, the world is harsh and unforgiving and requires the player’s wit and ingenuity to traverse, the maps beckon and invite player exploration and discovery, the Pokemon are delightfully well realized as living and breathing flesh and blood members of a larger ecosystem, the changes to the battle mechanics work well for the game, the new additions such as crafting and Pokedex research all contribute to a self perpetuating, ridiculously addictive gameplay loop, the story is surprisingly fun with some great characters, the action RPG segments actually work surprisingly well, there are several dramatic leaps forward in so many areas (from QoL to mechanics to structure) and there is a ridiculous amount of content thrown in, with, yes, a very hefty post game. It is a shockingly accomplished take on an entirely new formula, and like with Pokemon Red/Blue, Game Freak comes dangerously close to getting it perfect on their first go.

Yes, it has flaws – most notably, it is a bad looking game, with the technical aspects and art style never coming together (somehow, it is still a better performing game than something like Sword/Shield, however), and there are a fair few bugs and glitches here. But ultimately, Legends is a bold new step for the series, and one that it manages to take with a surprising amount of confidence and and dexterity, delivering one of the best games on the Switch, and one of the best games in the series in the process.

2. POKEMON PLATINUM

Sinnoh is very legitimately one of the greatest game maps of all time. It’s a masterpiece of design, with ridiculous amounts of visual and location variety (swamps, mountains, snow, beach and coastal areas, forests, small pastoral villages, big urban cities), and an incredible lock and key design that, while overly reliant on an annoying HM mechanic, leads to the best sense of adventure and discovery the player ever gets in the Pokemon franchise. It’s also backed with some amazing lore and backstory, and massive areas that beg to be explored, tucked away with dozens upon dozens of hidden dungeons and optional quests that you could miss for years without even knowing they exist.

Sinnoh, being the region that Pokemon Platinum is set in, is a huge part of why this game is so great. When you have a map this well designed, and progression through it this well designed, you end up with an unforgettable game. But even beyond that, Platinum was just mind blowingly incredible – it has an excellent campaign, a shocking amount of multiplayer modes, great post game (the Battle Frontier returned!), just the right amount of challenge (people tell horror stories about Cynthia to this day), some great and iconic player designs, major strides forward for the series (including the Physical/Special attack split, as well as the introduction of online play), as well as polishing up the considerable rough edges Diamond/Pearl had – those games suffered majorly from the transition from GBA to DS, and are borderline impossible to go back to because of their bevy of technical issues (including a frame rate so low it’s like walking through treacle). 

Platinum remains the definitive take on Sinnoh to this day (even the recent remakes Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl do not supplant it), and is honestly peak Pokemon. Or at least, it would be, were it not for…

1. POKEMON HEARTGOLD/SOULSILVER

You knew this was coming. There is one thing constant in Pokemon lists and fans – HeartGold/SoulSilver are always at the top. And with good reason – these games are literally, legitimately, perfect, absolutely flawless at every single thing they do, while managing to deliver the biggest and best Pokemon games ever. The original Gold/Silver games were already extremely notable for their massive campaign (set across two regions, 16 gym badges, and two separate Pokemon League challenges) and the introduction of several major and mind blowing mechanics for the franchise, including real time time of day and week impacting in-game events, berry farming, Pokeball crafting, shiny Pokemon, trainer rematches, roaming Legendary Pokemon, held items for Pokemon, weather effects in battles and arenas, and the introduction of Dark and Steel Type Pokemon.

HeartGold/SoulSilver have all of that, plus an additional ridiculous amount of content (mainline, post-game, and optional), gorgeous pixel art graphics that keep these games looking the best ones in the series to this day, almost a decade and a half after their original launch, the availability of every single Pokemon at the time all in one game, plus the inclusion of Platinum‘s Battle Frontier, a brand new Safari Zone, brand new mini games, major QoL and UI enhancements (these games are the only ones that can be played almost entirely via touch screen!), full featured (for the time) local and online multiplayer, and the definitive take on one of the most epic final battles in any game ever. Excellent world and dungeon design, some actual challenging battles, an emphasis on player driven exploration and discovery, a non linear campaign that allows players to break sequence multiple times, and snappy and sharp writing. These games are perfect. There is no flaw to them. They represent among the best games ever made, not just for Pokemon, but in general. 

If you are going to play one Pokemon game, make it this one. 13 years after their initial release, and they still have not been topped. They probably never will be.

Note: The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of, and should not be attributed to, GamingBolt as an organization.

Nintendo’s Pokemon Sun/Moon were already known to be massively successful games- the games had amassed 10 million in shipments before they even launched, and had set records in Europe and North America, while also selling through over 3 million in Japan. However, now we have exact numbers for just how well the games did.

Pokemon Sun/Moon sales are at 14.69 million units as of December 31, 2016– this means that they hit this unnervingly huge sales milestone in 43 days, or just six weeks. This makes Pokemon Sun/Moon the highest selling game of last year (yes, higher selling than Uncharted, Call of Duty, Battlefield, or any other game you could name) on a global basis, as well as the fastest selling games in the series, far outpacing the pace of sales that Pokemon X/Y achieved three years ago.

That’s not all, either- Pokemon X/Y and Pokemon OmegaRuby/AlphaSapphire, the other two 3DS Pokemon games, have continued to sell at an unrelenting pace as well- Pokemon X/Y sales are now at 16.06 million, making them the fourth highest selling mainline games in the series, and far ahead of Pokemon Black/White at 15.6 million. OmegaRuby/AlphaSapphire are at 13.7 million, which makes them the best selling pair of Pokemon remakes ever.

These high Pokemon sales can be attributed in no small part to just how good Sun/Moon are, but also to the revival and resurgence in popularity that the brand experienced thanks to Pokemon GO. Nintendo’s mobile gambit, it seems, paid off, at least as far as Pokemon is concerned.

Nintendo’s hardware may have hit some hard times, especially on the home console front, but their ability to shift software remains unparalleled. How else do you explain the sales of Mario Kart 8, the excellent Wii U exclusive entry in the long running kart racing franchise, which has managed to sell a staggering 8 million units, on a console that has sold less than 14 million? That’s an almost 60% attach rate!

Over on the Nintendo 3DS front, Pokemon remains an extremely strong performer, its sales buoyed no doubt by the success of Pokemon GO. Pokemon X/Y stand at 15.64 million units worldwide, meaning the games have now sold more than Pokemon Black/White, conclusively putting the argument of declining Pokemon franchise sales to rest (as if Pokemon Diamond/Pearl‘s sales, which are far more than Ruby/Sapphire, weren’t enough for that). Pokemon OmegaRuby/AlphaSappire, which have sold 13.18 million units, are also well over the sales for Pokemon HeartGold/SoulSilver, the previous Pokemon remakes, which just gets the point across even more.

You can check out the full list of updated game sales for Nintendo 3DS and Wii U software below, courtesy of Nintendo themselves. Doubtless, this is the kind of software performance Nintendo is hoping for on the upcoming Switch as well.

• Mario Kart 8 – 8.00 million pcs.
• New Super Mario Bros. U – 5.45 million pcs.
• Super Mario 3D World – 5.19 million pcs.
• Nintendo Land – 5.13 million pcs.
• Super Smash Bros. for Wii U – 4.99 million pcs.
• Splatoon – 4.57 million pcs.
• Super Mario Maker – 3.73 million pcs.
• New Super Luigi U – 2.74 million pcs.
• The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker HD – 1.98 million pcs.
• Mario Party 10 – 1.94 million pcs.

• Pokémon X & Pokémon Y – 15.64 million pcs.
• Mario Kart 7 – 13.94 million pcs.
• Pokémon Omega Ruby & Pokémon Alpha Sapphire – 13.18 million pcs.
• Super Mario 3D Land – 10.98 million pcs.
• New Super Mario Bros. 2 – 10.60 million pcs.
• Animal Crossing: New Leaf – 10.34 million pcs.
• Super Smash Bros. – 8.35 million pcs.
• Tomodachi Life – 5.30 million pcs.
• Luigi’s Mansion: Dark Moon – 5.03 million pcs.
• The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time 3D – 4.52 million pcs.

Monster Hunter‘s growth and success in the west continues. The series, which has been famously dominant in Japan, usually did not use to sell a whole lot in Europe and North America- but that’s been changing of late.  After Monster Hunter 4 Ultimate ended up selling over a million units in the west last year, Monster Hunter Generations appears to be off to a flying start, too.

Nintendo is reporting that for the month of July, the just released Monster Hunter Generations was the highest selling game in North America- that’s right, it topped the NPD software charts for the month, selling an estimated 165,000 copies at retail (and of course, with more copies sold digitally). For a series that used to be highly niche, this is a major victory, and it all but guarantees that Monster Hunter shall continue to stick with Nintendo systems going forward.

The true victor in July, however, was another monster franchise- Nintendo’s 3DS Pokemon games saw, like in the rest of the world, increased sales on the back of Pokemon GO‘s massive success. Nintendo reports that Pokemon X/Y and OmegaRuby/AlphaSapphire all saw major growth- OmegaRuby/AlphaSapphire sold 80% more year on year, while X/Y sold a staggering 200% more than they did last year.

Overall, Nintendo saw some major inroads with their software this month: games playable on Nintendo systems claimed five of the top 11 spots on the July best-sellers list. These include Monster Hunter Generations from Capcom at No. 1, Minecraft: Wii U Edition from Microsoft at No. 6, Pokémon OmegaRuby at No. 8, Pokémon AlphaSapphire at No. 10, and Kirby: Planet Robobot at No. 11.

For Nintendo, with the impending launch of Pokemon Sun/Moon later this year, all of this can only be a good thing.

Nintendo’s strategy of using mobile games to attract users to its ecosystem appears to have borne fruit- as a result of the frenzy generated by Pokemon GO, sales of the Nintendo 3DS are up by more than 200% in the UK, retailers are reporting, with the 2DS being up by 222% and the 3DS XL being up by 234% year on year.

The increase in hardware sales comes as more and more people continue to purchase a 3DS to play mainline Pokemon games, as a result of the craze ignited by Pokemon GO‘s success, MCV UK reports, noting that all four 3DS Pokemon games (X, Y, OmegaRuby, and AlphaSapphire) charted in the weekly Top 50 charts, with Nintendo managing to get a staggering 10 games into the Top 50- making them UK’s number games publisher of retail games, in terms of value and revenue, and in terms of total units sold.

Retailers already expect this kind of craze to continue later into the year, feeding into the launch of Pokemon Sun/Moon, which look set to break franchise records when they launch later this year, exclusively on the Nintendo 3DS.

According to the late Nintendo President Satoru Iwata, Nintendo’s plan had always been to use its mobile games to advertise and supplement their console and handheld games, and to gently graduate mass gamers into its core hardware and software products- and it seems that with the wild success of Pokemon GO, we may finally be seeing that strategy bear fruit.

MCV UK is reporting that sales of the Nintendo 3DS system have jumped by over 100% in the UK on the back of Pokemon GO. That’s not all, either- apparently, sales of the 3DS Pokemon games have also seen incredible percentage rises, with some games seeing gains of almost 250% since the free mobile game’s launch. And it doesn’t end there, either: apparently, projections for the upcoming Pokemon Sun/Moon, the new entries in the franchise that are due to launch later this year, have been revised upwards thanks to renewed interest in the Pokemon brand owing to Pokemon GO‘s success, as well, with Pokemon GO now being in the top pre-ordered games in the region.

Retailers are now apparently anticipating a Pokemon Christmas- even though they expect Pokemon GO itself to taper off a bit, they think Pokemon as a brand will benefit in the long run. “Although Pokémon Go will probably tail-off a bit, we do expect the franchise to be one of the most talked about this Christmas,” said the senior buyer of one of the UK’s biggest games outlets.

How big were the gains that Pokemon games saw? Well, MCV UK have provided us a handy chart:

TOP SELLING POKÉMON GAMES FOR WEEK ENDING JULY 16TH (Sales Increase %)

1. Pokémon Alpha Sapphire – 148%

2. Pokémon Omega Ruby – 148%

3. Pokémon X – 238%

4. Pokémon Y – 188%

5. Pokémon Super Mystery Dungeon – 65%

These five games in total –148%

Pokémon Total – 145%

So… yeah, that’s some major bumps all these games, and the 3DS hardware, are seeing. It’ll be interesting to see how well Pokemon Sun/Moon perform now, once they launch this November exclusively on the Nintendo 3DS worldwide.

The Pokemon Company have announced that they will be ending the Pokemon Global Link Service for Pokemon X/Y and OmegaRuby/AlphaSapphire this year in late October. Once the service ends, players will not be able to link these games to the service, although they can still go ahead and link them up now, should they want to.

What does this mean, simply put, for the average player? Well, not much, since the Global Link Service has very little to do with the online modes in these games. It means that players’ PokeMiles that they accrued in these games cannot be carried over into Sun/Moon, and that they will no longer be able to use GameSync. it also means that players won’t be able to maintain a Trading Log for the Global Trading Station (though the Global Trading Station itself will continue to be available), and that they won’t able to participate in Random Matchup Rating Battles.

All of this said, they still can and will be able to enjoy almost all online functionality in these games without issues- this includes Random Matchup Free Battles, the GTS, and Wonder Trades, and of course, any activities with trades and battles with friends.

Pokemon X/Y and OmegaRuby/AlphaSapphire are available exclusively for the Nintendo 3DS. Pokemon Sun/Moon are slated to launch exclusively for the Nintendo 3DS this November.

Nintendo and The Pokemon Company have announced a brand new Pokemon – the creature, not the video game – which will be made available via some form of event next year. Voncanion is a Fire and Water type Pokemon, which uses fire and water to create steam within its body, expelling explosive shock waves and boiling steam from the arms on its back. The power is said to be great enough to blow away an entire mountain, gouging out the earth and changing the shape of the land.

More importantly, I’m not quite sure how the hell a Fire and Water type Pokemon is even supposed to work- what would it be weak against? Would it be weak against anything?

Presumably, Volcanion will be made available for Pokemon X/Y and Pokemon OmegaRuby/AlphaSapphire, both of which are available right now exclusively on the Nintendo 3DS. No new Pokemon game has yet been announced, though Game Freak is widely believed to be working on the seventh entry in the franchise.

New updates and patches are now available for all the Pokemon games on the 3DS. This includes Pokemon X and Y, and Pokemon OmegaRuby and AlphaSapphire.

The patches do not bring with them any major gameplay change or even a visible bug fix- it’s mostly behind the scenes tinkering and some stability work. It can also be assumed that the updates address the multiple new exploits that have begun to crop up in the games that permit players to hack, duplicate, or generate Pokemon illegally, and obtain them without actually encountering or acquiring them in game.

To enforce the new update, it will be needed to play either of the games online any more. it won’t take too much space on your system (or indeed, too much time to download). However, it is a mandatory patch required if you want to take your game online.

Pokemon X/Y and Pokemon OmegaRuby/AlphaSapphire are both available exclusively on the Nintendo 3DS.

Among the new additions include two new Mega Pokemon (based on the similar concept that showed up in the videogames)- Mega Lucario EX and Mega Heracross EX; new Fossil cards for Kalos region fossils; and 18 new Trainer cards (which are one time status effect cards used during gameplay). Also introduced will be new booster packs, new themed decks, and new Holo cards (special edition rare shiny cards).

Pokemon XY: Furious Fists should be the last dedicated set on the Kalos region that we should see; presumably, with the launch of Pokemon OmegaRuby and AlphaSapphire later this year, we will see the TCG return to the Hoenn region as well.