Pokémon makes resurgence

talontimesonline — Tue, 18 May 2010 14:52:33 +0000

Pokémon Soul Silver just recently became the best selling handheld videogames of all time, beating out its predecessor, Pokémon Yellow version. Heart Gold also out sold Yellow, but fell short of the mark set by Soul Silver. The new games are remakes of previously released Pokémon games, Silver and Gold versions, but several changes and additions have been added including dual screen functionality, the fact that your starting Pokémon follows you on the screen, and the new PokéWalker, which allows trainers to carry around their Pokémon in a pedometer so that it grows faster in the game.
Pokémon first caught the world’s attention in 1996. Since its creation, the franchise has turned into a multi-billion dollar industry by putting out 21 video games, a TV show that has been on for almost 13 seasons, over a dozen movies, a card game, action figures, and its own Manga series. There are 493 Pokémon currently, with another generation being released in 2011.
With so many media outlets, it is no wonder that students in high school today still manage to pick up their Gameboys in order to play the game they grew up with. A resurgence of Pokémon players has taken place in Lakes, with several students walking around with DS’s and PokéWalkers in their pockets.
Senior Jason Reuse is one of the people who has dived back into the Poke-Universe. Jason bought his first Pokémon game, Blue Version, back when it was released in 1996.
“I actually never really beat it as a kid,” said Jason. “I beat it for the first time a few weeks ago.”
Jason has been racing to beat the game with a few of his friends and currently has a Gyrados, Zapdos, Moltres, Articuno, Charizard, and Mewtwo in his party. For those of you who don’t know, that’s pretty good.
When asked why Jason started playing Pokémon again, he replied, “It’s just boss.”
Junior Danny McGrath is another Lakes student who has dived right back into Pokémon. He bought the new Heart Gold version and carries his PokéWalker with him during school. Even within a few months of the games release, he has been able to catch two of the rarest Pokémon in the game and beat the elite four, the game’s final bosses.
“It’s just such a great game, and it’s really easy to pick up and play,” said Danny.
Two new versions of Pokémon, Pokémon Black and White, are expected to be released as early as this fall, and they will contain another generation of new Pokémon, making it just that harder to catch them all.

By Paul Twarowski