Discussion
Do real animals exist in pokemon or not?
Look from the pokemon anime, some scenes depict animals as seen above. Emphasis on Animals, not pokémon - ANIMALS. Like real non-pokemon fish, a mongoose and a giraffe. No it doesn't look like a Girafarig, just a plain giraffe. Heck, you can see ash wore a cow costume. It wasn't a miltank, just a depiction of a classic black and white cow. Heck, in the older cards, they'd have normal animals in the background. In the form of birds, bugs or even a worm. So what gives, these can't be fake creatures since they look exactly like real life animals. Are they're actual normal animals-but they're extremely rare?
Originally, it was obviously intended that Pokémon coexisted and dominated animals, but as the series became more and more popular, you can tell it leaned more into the Pokémon aspect until animals were outright retconned to no longer exist in this world.
Splendid! Let’s take a loo…..oh…it’s just a shitty Tyrannosaurus fossil. This is why you’ll be nothing more than an intern! Next time, make sure you have something of real scientific value before interrupting me!
This was unironically the planned plot of the third Pokemon movie (what happened to "real" animals, with the main antagonist being a rampaging T Rex), before it became about Entei.
yeah! takeshi shudo talked about it in an interview
i think it might've been the same one where he said that lugia was created for pokemon 2000 and then added to the games (which is why it's not in the 97 spaceworld demo)
I imagine when Arceus created the world they intentionally added a unique gene to animals that would gradually evolve into Pokémon attributes. So they're not extinct but moreso a unique genetic mutation of them.
Even Cutiefly are humongous compared to Earth bugs, as the thing weighs 0.4 lbs / 0.2 kg (about 6.4 oz, which is over twice the size of the largest adults of weta and beetles). Combee and Ribombee are even heavier, they weigh 12.1 lb (5.5 kg) and 1.1 lbs (0.5 kg), respectively. How are bugs that size supposed to pollinate tiny flowers?
They should make a spinoff game with all new pokemon which are all bug types and proportioned to actual bugs, base it off of beetle fights, like pokemon was originally inspired from. Just explain they’re too tiny to fight normal size pokemon. A lvl 5 Ribombee would be like a boss battle
What i imagine is that "pokemon-ness" is a concept that exists that is able to "take over" anything and infinitely adapt to anything, except humans (so far). This theory really only works during the first few gens, but think about it from this angle (I know all of this only exists this way because its a game and its not trying to imitate real life, but its fun):
In the first game, we are told about the mysterious creatures almost like its a relatively new concept, and are asked to help study them. In the second game, we suddenly discover a whole lot of new ones. Later on, pokemon from one region migrate to another and adapt and take over. We can also infer that its supposed to be the real world still by mentions of South america and wars. Pokedex entries compare known pokemon to similar real world animals they resemble.
Then, as new pokemon emerge and take over the niches of regular animals, these regular animals are outcompeted and die out. So what are pokemon? Not animals, thats for sure, similar, but not. I like to think that at this point its some eldritch DNA based set of entities that just takes over whatever it sees, it saw a dog and made growlithe, it saw a bull and made Tauros, it saw a rock and made geodude, it saw magnets and made magnemite, it saw a pokeball, a concept that could not have existed before pokemon themselves, and made voltorb (and later foongus). Its why mew has every other pokemons DNA, i think mew was intended to be this eldritch being in its "original" or pure form. Copying it always leads to disaster, see mewtwo and ditto.
If you look at the lore this way, it could almost be a horror game. You just watch as some eldritch cosmic entity starts replacing everything you know with live versions of itself, killing away all regular earth animals, plants, etc. Ingraining itself into every aspect of society, always evolving and adapting new things so you can never really ever get rid of it.
I think hitmochan or Mr mime are two quick examples of pokimonification affecting humans. But I think spontaneous pokimonification occurs from more like general concepts. Like hitmonchan is a personification of the "element" that is Boxing
This doesn't really account for the existence of fossil Pokémon, which are stated to be 100s of millions of years old. Pokémon have to be an ancient thing even in the original games for the fossils to exist.
Honestly, that would make the most sense. given how the first Pokémon are described as being similar to real-life animals. And then afterwards, it’s just no longer a thing
I prefer Pokemon to being the only flora and fauna of that universe rather than adjacent. It’s weird to imagine that there would be any use for standard Dairy cows for example when a miltank could accomplish the tasks AND be ready for self-defense. The animals and plants of our world only exist because they compete and succeed at gathering resources and reproducing. How can a regular fish compete against say a Goldeen let alone a Gyrados?
It wasn't really a problem as there was very little emphasis on this (at least in the games) until Gen 8. Then they went hard on this being a thing and it is really weird.
Honestly I want it to be heavily retconned by a later game.
Is it weird? Personally, I think it makes the world feel more alive and realistic. It’s kind of obvious that Pokemon prey on each other (and people too). There’s even an official Pokemon book titled Pokecology which contains a lot of references of Pokemon preying on other Pokemon.
I get it, Pokemon are cute and it’s weird to think about them being eaten by other Pokemon and people, but how is that different from a real life cute creature being eaten by another?
And back then we had significantly less than the amount of Pokémon now to aptly fill a world full of diversity and interactions between the existing Pokémon.
There's some proof of a pokemon war pre-gen 1 (demonstrated by Lt Surge dialog in Red/Blue) but the war was never fully addressed. As the series went on, the war got push more and more to the background, but there's still some evidence from time to time. If you've got some free time you should look up Pokemon Wars on YouTube
Originally the Pokemon games (or at least RGBY) were meant to be set in the real world, with references to the moon landing, South America and Surge being an American. It’s likely that the war he talks about was the gulf war, or possibly Vietnam depending on his age.
I do find it a bit hilarious that South America canonically exists according to gen 3, but no one has mentioned Japan despite existing in 3-4 regions of it.
I rewatched parts of the original anime a while ago and noticed that they referenced a mystical place called France. There's also that one scene with Misty trying to scare away a Gastly by pointing a cross at it.
As u/Meatarrhea says, "dinosaurs" is very likely referring to dinosaur pokemon, rather than the irl type of dinosaurs. Bug pokemon are still called bugs, for instance.
They eat pokémon. Pokémon eat each other as well. It's stated in the pokedex. There's also a few dishes in the newest games that show some specific parts of the pokémon body like "Klawf al ajillo"
In an old japanese guide, pokemon is only a recent discovery in the 16th century. So regular animals still exist alongside pokemon.
The early anime keep the same concept as there is only 151 pokemon at that time and is hard to fill the world without regular animals. The third movie original plot is about answer what happened to the regular animals, specifically it involves them finding a trex fossil.
As more pokemon get release, this is retcon to only pokemon exist and there is no animals
I will always find it hilarious that they wrote into a kids story the idea of recently discovering a new form of life that resembles common animals, but is clearly of higher intelligence - and then immediately started capturing them and fighting them against one another.
Landed on survey planet 87392-C, habitable ocean (70% coverage) planet orbiting main phase yellow star. Identified local advanced sub-space faring species.
Survey crew encountered a group of juveniles that exchanged a large number of metallic currency units to watch Navigator Maxin punch Technician Kynzar repeatedly.
Kynzar filed a procedural complaint (ignored) and logged level 1 superficial injuries (hilarious). Kynzar encouraged to mature rapidly and stop making larval noises.
Maxin disciplined for consuming toxic ethanol-based beverage with local juveniles and misplacing a ZR-37c Plasma Rifle. Weapon was not recovered.
Well part of that is that it isn’t a kids story necessarily. It’s a franchise designed for everyone, and kids happen to be included in that and are the primary audience in the west. They definitely target just kids with some material, and even just adults with other material. The earlier stuff was definitely less kid friendly than it is now
A specific example of this retcon is Raichu’s dex entry originally mentioning an Indian elephant, since there wasn’t an elephant pokemon at the time, but in later games it mentions Copperajah instead.
So if any of these scenes happened later in the show Ash would be wearing a Miltank costume or Ekans would be fighting a Zangoose. This is making me realize thought that there’s still no mosquito pokemon.
Ah omg thank you! I've been really into the pre retcon lore (idk if gen 2 has it all the way or halfway, but I think it's gens 1 and 2 that have it) and I've been wondering about an exact date. I think the phrasing I initially saw put it as "they (pokemon) just showed up one day" (from someone explaining it, not like an official text) and I think I took it too literally, like I was like "wait, the stuff from Johto is really old... They must of kinda started making it more in line with modern lore already, so maybe gen 1 is the only pure game with just this world building" but then I was like "wait didn't prof oak say he spent his life researching pokemon? And like agatha was training pokemon all her life?? So clearly they aren't THAT new!" I was kinda suspecting like late 1800s because I didn't wanna make a huge leap without significant evidence, but even with that, the Johto stuff felt weird.
But 1600s is like perfect, they are clearly new enough for the profs actually having work to do, but old enough for em to be established in the world, even ancient in some places. Ngl, I really prefer this version. Like the modern one is fine and all, but it's just kinda "it's like the real world but not and animals are replaced with magical things" and like idk, something about the older way feels more real. Like I never once thought much of team rocket using pokemon to fight and steal, and even like selling them or parts of their bodies, like the slowpoke tail thing is kinda hardcore, but it feels like decent cartoon villain shit. But like thinking about it with the old lore, like imagining Giovanni look at these powerful monsters rubbing his grubby hands together to make them fight people and rob them and like selling them in the game corner, idk it feels a little more real to me.
Maybe it's just that the stronger connection to irl history makes everything feel like 1 or 2 steps less removed from the real life, if that makes sense
There's a novelization of the anime that went up to Lt. Surge, I believe. It had covered some stuff in more detail, or earlier than the other materials did, and it kind of implied that pokemon were slowly replacing the normal species. It also included the wonderful line (perhaps somewhat paraphrased) "Aristotle didn't know anything about Pokemon."
Other fun details it included were pokemon shrinking down naturally (that's how pokemon go in balls, confirmed in Z-A), pokemon in any container can be transferred electronically (a kid accidentally faxes their pokemon to their dad's work), pokemon professors all mysteriously seem to stop doing research shortly after becoming professors, and it's common for boys to chase dreams of being pokemon masters so girls have to do all the real jobs.
Also, pokemon gyms are allocated based off population, so large cities would have multiple gyms, and if a gym leader loses a certain number of matches in a row the gym is shut down.
This was back when Pokémon was brand new. Back then, they were still building the Pokémon universe. Originally, the anime featured regular animals, and the games mentioned them. But they eventually changed it so that animals no longer existed in the Pokémon universe.
The classic example in the games is Raichu and Gastly's Pokédex entries explicitly mentioning they could knock out an Indian elephant. Took them all the way until Gen 8 with Copperajah to give that elephant an in-universe equivalent.
While there are less explicit depictions/mentions of animals and the intention might indeed be to suggest they do not exist, there are still quite a few animals even in the games. Most notably invertebrates such as bugs, fish and corals (these can even be seen in the WiWa trailer). But also, humans.
I always wondered as a kid. Pokedex would say "Pikachu. The MOUSE pokemon" but how would they know what a mouse even is if they don't exist in their universe.
There are over a dozen "Mouse Pokemon" in the pokedex, so I think the in universe explanation is that "Mouse" is just the word used to describe these Pokemon with shared characteristics.
According to Shudō, real animals went extinct in the Pokémon world years ago and no longer exist. He claimed that instances of real-world animals appearing in earlier episodes were due to the animation staff not paying attention.
In the anime and early games animals were a thing but were eventually reconned. HOWRVER, there are examples even recently of simple animals still existing in Pokémon like mussels as seen in the resturant food from Scarlet and Violet
Since there's a lot of confusion in the comments: Animals did in fact use to exists in the Pokemon world...in gen 1, maybe up to 2, when the developers and people in charge of shaping up the world were still figuring out how they wanted to handle it. Point is, especially in gen 1, the idea behind the Pokemon world was that of a sort of real world, where Pokémons were a recent discovery and born of some weird magical evolutions of animals, plants and objects, not a completely different fantasy world like it is now ( you can see that with all the references to real animals and real places being slowly removed as years passed ), it's a simple case of retcon. If you want to know more I recommend checking out some videos about the book Pokédex from 1996, which explained a lot of how they envisioned the world building in the early stage of gen 1.
It also pictured a very different kind of Pokemon world, where there were actual effort from scientists of many real nations to study Pokémons and people seemed a lot more ok with just using Pokémons in questionable ways ( I think it says people threw Geodudes at each other, which is kinda funny ), not to mention it explains how pokeballs worked according to them at the time
One of my favorite retcons in all of media. Pokémon feels so much better as its own world, having parallels to our world but not feeling obligated to be set in an alternate world to ours.
You'll not that all of these screen shots are from episodes that aired like 25+ years ago. They're much more stringent about not including non-Pokemon animals, now.
That being said, there's still references to them that hevent been scrubbed out. Like Pikachu being "The Mouse Pokémon," or the existence of the move "Crab Hammer."
Well, species still exist. Since there are multiple Pokémon based on the same real life animals, those animals should still be used. Like rabbits, mice, dogs, cats and birds
Also Pokémon didn’t know that they were gona be this big. They thought it would be a one off game. The series was supposed to end at Gen 2. So the lore wasn’t as locked down back then. Now they have made lots of retcons. Like the elephant in Raichu’s pokedex being made into a copperajah. Or South America being removed from anything to do with where Mew was found
The series ending at Gen II is a myth. At that point they were already planning on several sequels. Gen III was already in early pre-production. The myth stems from the original director of Pokemon Gold and Silver saying he was done with Pokemon after Gen II.
In my headcanon,normal animal exist but less exposure. Why show cow ranch when you can show off miltank ranch? Pokemon in most people heart is companion,while animal is just food. Why have normal dog when you can have arcanine? So animal that doesn't produce something or aesthetically nice looking would be abandoned and ignored.
They def changed the lores since the start of the series. I went to the museum with the Pokemon exhibits and it stated our worlds animals do not exists in the Pokemon world. O:
i see you went to the pokemon fossil exhibit!!! Absolutely loved the fact that they adapted real archaeologists into the exhibit with art from the omega ruby/ x y era. Did you get the tiny safari pikachu from the gift shop?
I think its like what reverend said, not enough filler pokemon exsisted yet so now these would be girafarig/basculein/barbaroach/miltank/wishiwashi/yungoos/other genera fish
I see a lot of people saying Pokémon only exist and that animals were retconned later on so that leaves me with another question.. where do they get the meat
It’s kinda been long-established, but only ever mentioned in passing to avoid problems, that Pokemon are eaten, but they kinda make it vague on purpose. Any time an edible Pokémon item is in the game, they kinda have an excuse lined up, like “Klawf’s Claws just kinda fall off sometimes and they grow new ones, so we only use the ones that fall off” or “Slowpoke Tails fall off naturally and they grow a new one” or “Acremie’s cream and Chansey’s eggs grow back and are given willingly.”
Then when you read Pokédex entries, they just kinda act like Pokemon eating Pokemon is just nature doing it’s thing, like Cherubis always trying not to be eaten by other Pokemon, but apparently being sweet and delicious.
The point is, Pokemon CAN be eaten, but they don’t explicitly talk about it unless they have an excuse lined up for why it’s not monstrous to do so to please concerned parents.
Short Modern Answer: No, real animals do not exist in the Pokemon setting.
Involved Historical Answer: It's a case of vestigial elements from Pokemon's early days. When the games were first released, Pokemon was just a quirky novelty and never imagined to become the mega-franchise it is today, so the anime was just as tossed-together without concern for the future. Old anime fans know how countless random-ass shows were made for a single season or OVA, then tossed aside without care, leading to mountains of obscure anime that never saw mass distribution or translation. Pokemon, at the time, was likely presumed to be just another one-off before it ended up exploding in popularity.
The early anime had no idea what it even wanted to be and was a mix between a shonen action adventure and a gag comedy. It also didn't know how its own world worked, resulting in a weird mish-mash of hard game mechanics (like Pokemon having numerical levels and learning moves/evolving based on mathematical values like in the GameBoy games) and wacky anime nonsense (like Pikachu being able to ignore elemental type immunity because of shonen action twists). The anime spent a lot of its time making up whatever shit it pleased.
Like with the games, it also featured real world concepts - there were frequent appearances of normal animals alongside Pokemon, pop culture references in both the original JP and translated localizations, and even overt references to real world religions like Shintoism and Christianity. As the Pokemon franchise went on and the anime especially became its own thing, all these elements were phased out with a completely unique history being given to the setting, making it its own world.
"When the games were first released, Pokemon was just a quirky novelty and never imagined to become the mega-franchise it is today, so the anime was just as tossed-together without concern for the future."
There's a lot of series/franchises that started this way, but I feel a lot of people just assume everything was planned ahead. I see so many aspiring creators needing to make one humongous lore bible, thinking about sequels and expanded universes, and ultimately losing sight in telling a fun short story/concept.
Yeah, it's an issue that's become really prominent due to online dissections/lore explorations on YouTube and social media. A lot of people have the misconception that any given franchise or series was some kind of intentional design from before it ever hit the scene and that everything has. or needs, a planned meaning.
When, in truth, these things are very organic and there's a lot of quirks that come from early development growing pains, especially back in the day when these sort of things were new and treading untested ground in media. Or, as the case may be, it was just really never meant to be taken all that seriously and was just there for a laugh. Dragon Ball's fandom has a big problem with it.
There really wasn’t an established world or set of rules in the first season of the anime, and Pokemon were originally supposed to be alongside regular animals. The writers and animators had to go along the best they could with the information they had. As the show grew, so did world around it, and it was established that Pokemon were the animals of the world.
The way Pokemon at present seems to work is incredibly simple animals like coral, small insects, and such still exist but actually complex ones like birds, cows, etc are replaced entirely by Pokemon
The reason the early anime had signs of actual animals is because the series around that time was still establishing its foundation and at that moment the idea was that Pokemon was actually in a parallel version of real life
This obviously didnt stick around and around Hoenn the world transitioned to being parallel but unique, so no more complex animals
The most basic answer to that is, "Not anymore." And I mean that on a meta level. During Gen 1 and 2 Pokémon were a new organism confined only to 2 regions in Japan while the rest of the normal earth existed. This was backed up with Dex entries referencing real countries and animals.
From Gen 3 onwards the shift to Pokemon being the normal animals of the world began and dex entries were the first to get rewritten to be more vague or reference Pokemon or other established regions.
As for what you see in the anime, please keep in mind that early Pokemon anime as pictured came out during Gen 1 and this was during the time where normal animals existed along side Pokemon. If there were to redo it, those real world animals would be replaced with Pokemon.
Pokemon ofc, but some of them have ethical sources like Slowpoke tails regrow, and if your not abusing them like Team Rocket was you could realistically farm them.
Ash was terrified when he caught Krabby that Prof Oak was gonna eat it implying people eat Krabbys.
In the Pokemon Sleep app you cook meals for Snorlax and theres no meat dishes, they have stuff like bean ham
They were far more loose with it in the original anime, and they still use Dex descriptors like “loyal dog pokemon” or “fox-like pokemon” and other stuff like that
In my headcanon, yes. My arguement? Buneary is The Rabbit Pokemon. They're not a rabbit, they're the Rabbit Pokemon, thus, there must be a reference within the Pokemon world for a standard rabbit. Pokemon aren't animals, they're monsters. That's my take anyway.
So, once upon a time real animals existed in the Pokemon anime and kinda existed in the games as shown by references such as Pikachu the Mouse Pokemon.
This happened because the series hadn't fully figured out what it wanted to be nor had enough Pokemon variety to fully replace the animal kingdom.
They eventually retconned it so that real animals never existed by just quietly ignoring them and only using Pokemon instead.
In the original lore (Gen 1 to 3), Pokémon just came into existence and started slowly making the animal kingdom (barring humans) go extinct. In Gen 4 onward, they retconned those details so that the World of Pokémon is fundamentally different from the real world.
Common argument I've seen is that post gen 2 most references to real animals and stuff like that kinda got phased out, so in gen 1-2 they were kinda still figuring stuff out and then from there on out referencing real world animals barely happens anymore whether it's the anime or games besides the occasional pokedex mention of course
I read somewhere that before Pokemon made it big that the original plan was for the world to take place after most animals went extinct, and that the fossil reviving thing was supposed to play into that
it used to be that pokemon were newly discovered creatures in our normal world. there were normal birds, fish, cows, etc. that's why some pokemon are classified as "bird", "mouse", "lizard", etc. because those were real animals that existed. pikachu was a 'mouse' pokemon because it is basically a mouse with electric powers. Pidgeotto is a "bird" pokemon because it is basically just a bird.
pokemon are monsters, it's right in their name; pocket monsters. and websters dictionary defines 'monster' as: "an animal of strange or terrifying shape." "an animal or plant of abnormal form or structure" "a threatening force". which definitions fit 'pokemon' really well. but you can't have a "animal of strange or terrifying shape" without a base animal to compare it too.
we know pokemon eat other pokemon. and humans too. but that can't be the only source of food in the world. normal animals have to exist to be able to sustain the number of pokemon in the wild.
there are a ton of filter feeder pokemon, like Krabby/Kingler, Relicanth, Wailmer/Wailord, Shellder/Cloyster to name a few, that feed on microscopic organisms. we can't expect those microscopic organisms to all be pokemon, having microscopic fire/ice/psychic powers of their own and having microscopic battles.
there is lots of early media that depicts normal animals in the pokemon world early on in the franchise. but what happened is with so many pokemon now, a lot of those animals can be replaced with more franchise friendly and recognisable pokemon instead. all those fish shown in your images? would be replaced by like Wishiwashi, Finneon, tynamo, or Basculin now. the giraffes would now be farigiraf. that giant fish kabutops statue is attacking would be Relicanth or a Carracosta, etc etc.
TLDR: real animals still exist, they just don't get seen or shown anymore because of the simple brand recognition point. with so many pokemon now why show a regular dog or fish, when you can show a fidough, or a Wishiwashi?
I'm fairly certain that in generation 1, the Pokemon games were intended to take place in the real world, and Pokemon were a somewhat new discovery. My main evidence for this is that while every Pokemon region is based on a real region of the world, the Kanto region is the only one that is straight up a real place. Alola is based on Hawaii, for example, while Kanto is based on..... Kanto. There have also been references to real-world animals and locations as late as generation 7.
Sabrina being a literal Pyschic type implies yes lol.
Ash has done some inhuman feats (such as throwing a three to four hundred pount log).
Ash has been transformed into Pokémon before and he's been turned into a literal ghost type for an episode.
And Kadabra...the boy who turned into one. That implies either people mistook an Abra as a human somehow, or a human boy one day evolved into it.
There's also that disturbing entry in one of the games where humans used to marry Pokémon, which implies...I don't even know lol. Do humans share egg groups with some? Someone needs to get Kujou from FF7 on the case.
Am i the only one who as a kid actively pretended I didnt see or hear any mention of "regular" animals?? 😅 I weirdly wanted the Pokémon verse to be strictly Pokémon. Early escapism I guess lol??
I kind of wish they'd go back to their being animals in the Pokemon world. It just makes more sense.
Pokemon seem semi-intelligent. At the very least, they can understand human speech better than real animals. Some, of course, are even more intelligent than that. It's a little icky to think about people eating such creatures.
Also, life on Earth requires tiny organisms. Decomposers and such. Are there tiny arthropod or invertebrate Pokemon to eat decaying matter? Are their microscopic mite Pokemon that live on the faces of people, eating their dead skin? What about tiny crustacean Pokemon to feed Wailord and Dondozo?
Guys stop using the anime as Canon. The enemies highly inconsistent especially the first run, for obvious reasons.
It's the way the information is presented now both in the anime and in the games, with the games being Canon, animals do not exist just pokémon and pokémon like life. Now what does that mean for microorganisms, small insects? Who knows.
Okay then. Then how does the pokedex, in game, describe pokemon by their animal counterparts if animals do not exist in the world? Like ponyta being the horse pokemon as a small example?
Pokemon are an invasive species that came to this planet, and quickly replaced all stratas of ecology. Explains why there are even humanoid pokemon as they attempted to replace people.
Which would also explain Jenny and Joy, and gow they all not only look the same, but occupy the same profession.
Pokemon, once they evolved to fit a role, can only fit that role. They can specialize, but across the lot of em, arent the most adaptable, unlike actual humans.
My theory is that in the pokémon world everything will eventually become a pokémon. Animals, objects, even abstract concepts are slowly being personified into creatures and soon the whole world will be nothing but humans and pokémon. The Pokéfication of the universe
Well what if Pokemon itself is originally an infection or virus…Pokerus if you will, that slowly infects real life objects, animals and people, until they soon become Pokemon themselves?
I mean, in meta, that's exactly what is happening? The early games and series did not have enough pokemon to cover some of the quips they were making, so they had to use real animals. they couldn't just willynilly add a new pokemon because they needed a giraf or a weasel in a scene. of a variaty of fish. they were restricted to the pokmeon they had and filled in the gaps with real animals.
In later series the amount of animals without a pokemon equivalent became less so they would replace those scenes with pokemon instead. Were those scenes remade today, they would replace all the animals with pokemon equivalents.
As for objects, the same can be said. a common lore bit is that certain items were actually modelled after a pokemon of that shape. This is not unlike real life where we also often mimic some mechanic or shape because of an animal.
They don't really take canon seriously and just have fun with the universe without any special attention to it making sense. The world of Mario is similar, one day he's fighting to save princess Peach from Bowser and the next they're all playing tennis and karting together.
It may be a Japan thing? Focusing more on the fun than making total sense about things.
Yes. Animals still exist. Coral are animals and still shown in the world. Animals are still used to describe Pokémon (ie Pikachu is still known as the mouse Pokemon). Characters still reference real animals. There is a line in Scarlet and Violet about having "butterflies in my stomach".
I just think it comes down to game design choices. There is no need to add animals to the game. We're not playing a monster collecting game to see real life animals.
The original intent of the Gen 1 games was that Pokémon coexisted with regular animals and were a fairly recent discovery, but that sense started dying out as the years went by.
It's just a case of early series weirdness, now they use pokemon the same way they used to use real pokemon. Raichu used to be able to take down an African Elephant but now it's a Copperajah.
In one of the season 1 episodes (according to google its Dig that Diglett) someone makes a comment about Ekans greatest enemy being a Mongoose. This bit made me think about Animals in the Pokemon world and how they must exist in some form or another.
I think it's the second pic down on the right hand side in your image actually?
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u/ProfessionalMilk5780 2d ago
Originally, it was obviously intended that Pokémon coexisted and dominated animals, but as the series became more and more popular, you can tell it leaned more into the Pokémon aspect until animals were outright retconned to no longer exist in this world.