Tabletop, DnD, board games, and minecraft. Also Animal Crossing.
Rules
Had an anime series that ran for 1 or 2 seasons, maybe a handful of merch, and then was just quietly forgotten by the general public.
Considered cult classics by hardcore gamers, that decades later make hours-long video essays with titles like "Pokémon: A Forgotten Classic" and "Why Didn't Pokémon Take Off?".
A small but dedicated fanbase that regularly discuss what a "Pokémon 2" could've looked like had there been a sequel.
Hey, us digimon fans are here and we don't like you appropriating our culture like this! (Kidding)
Also alternative timeline where it took off in Japan but not the west and it is considered a fun and quirky franchise by weebs who wear their pokemon knowledge like a badge of honour.
Also also alternative timeline where Digimon got really big and pokemon didn't do nearly as well and people just see pokemon as a lame digimon clone instead of the other way around.
Funnily enough digimon came to the west a little before pokemon so when I was a kid I did actually treat pokemon as a digimon knockoff
Truly, Digimon (digital warriors) are the CHAMPIONS
Edit: I looked it up and they don't say digital warriors. They just say digital monsters. Embarrasing!
world in which Dragon Quest actually took off in the west, Pokemon became a niche japanese untranslated cult classic and Final Fantasy actually did die after one game
also Digimon is the superior Anime
world in which Dragon Quest actually took off in the west
I'm under the impression it did? I played the first 3 and the next 10 seem pretty popular
I need to continue watching Digimon, I left off at the end of the file island arc, but it's actually kind of dark for a kid's anime. I have a vpet too irl 😲
First run is pretty good, second run is pretty meh but has its moments, third run is pretty good again and has that one furry bait digimon that gets a lot of art drawn of it, if you're into that. I don't know what the later ones are like.
Digimon was great, i remember being so hyped for that movie that made no sense. It left on a massive cliff hanger even though the story was complete nonsense, did they ever make a sequel?
151 was enough ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
holds my beloved Cyndaquil "shh its okay the mean hexbearian can't hurt you"
pokemonflation
I love bulbasaurs red and blue sprite. He looks like a french bulldog
Also they were going to turn it into a baseball game to appeal to westerners. I wonder what that timeline is like
Fuckin Blaseball-ass Pokemon alt universe
Todd Bonzales is a tobacco type Pokemon
Do you have a source on the baseball thing? I've never heard it before except from you and it sounds hilarious, I'd love to share it as a fun fact with friends, but they don't let me use "an owl told me" as a source for things anymore.
Thank you!
but they don't let me use "an owl told me" as a source for things anymore
You have to read that article while listening to this now.
I found a YouTube link in your comment. Here are links to the same video on alternative frontends that protect your privacy:
I can kind of see the baseball thing. traveling to different towns and competing against different gym leaders is kind of like a visiting team playing at different stadiums.
It would have been seen as large failure if the 6 year development had panned out like this.
The real alternative timeline is they would have kept the dark and edgy stuff like the whips and scarier monsters to becone a cult classic similar to how SMT is.
To add onto this, the game spent so much time in dev that they ended up re-doing various areas and Pokés like three or four times, including multiple internal popularity contests for designs. Pokémon was finely honed after so much work. Shit slapped.
ⓘ Remember to enable JPEG-XL support in your browser, even on your phone!
Hello, I'm typing from the universe where Pokemon doesn't exist anymore. We're survivors of what came to be known as the ''Monster Wars'', when various franchises developed paramilitary fanbases. Without Pokemon monopolizing the concept it became a contested idea with the Digimon Collective being among the largest. The Shin Megami Tensei Revolutionary Corps was another notable force, claiming many victories with their Persona Youth Brigade, which consisted of high-schoolers trained in Maoist guerrilla cosplay tactics. One of the most famous skirmishes took place in Shibuya, when newcomers like the Yo-kai Watchers and the Bakugan Battlers engaged in timed card battles that decimated the prefecture. Some smaller orgs dedicated to sabotaging the stronger ones also formed, like the Mon-Hun Corps, which was a small group of saboteurs from the Monster Hunter franchise that felt excluded. After decades of conflict with the fall of the SMTRC due to long term development problems unable to maintain fan support, the entire craze died down. Only one franchise remained, surviving thanks to a dedicated and cozy fanbase who invested in old tech like CD's. After the dust settled, the only mon game that survived was Monster Rancher.
The medabot faction quickly reclused themselves in hi-tech underground vaults.
Isn't it a property that's bigger than Disney now?
Single largest franchise by merchandise sales in the world. I don't think it is bigger than Disney in total, but bigger than any individual Disney property.
Had an anime series that ran for 1 or 2 seasons
Does Berserk get a full adaptation in this universe? lol
I think it was @Redcuban1959@hexbear.net who told me the studio behind the anime also did berserk
Same studio, different team IIRC. But a boy can dream lmao. That 1997 Golden Age adaptation is wonderful.
In that alternate universe, games like TemTem and Cassette Beasts are seen as a nostalgic revival and loom larger in current gamer culture than the original.
Kind of how it felt as a kid playing Dragon Warrior Monsters, wondering what happened to that nifty little monster catching game years later, before learning how fucking gargantuan Dragon Quest has always been. Currently playing the 3DS remake of the original Monsters and it absolutely feels like something from an alternate universe.
Ehem, akshewally it started as Dragon Warrior. I have two of the original NES game. Loved the shit out of that game as a kid.
I could never get into the mainline RPG series, but I seem to love the spinoffs. Monsters, Builders, Rocket Slime, all good shit.