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Sun/Moon Starters, Region, Boxarts and Release Date confirmed

There was a reason I was hesitant on saying that the new game would be based off hawaii, mainly because of Pokemon Ranger. Pokemon Ranger's region is also based off hawaii. As for the moon mascot, it does look similar to Zubat but I was thinking more Noivern due to the fact it has hands on its wings. And one thing, maybe MooMoo milk could be replaced with coconut milk seeing that this is based off hawaii!
The Hawaii thing was just a joke, I was considering the fact that it could have been something else. And for MooMoo milk being replaced by Coconut Milk... :up:
 
I'm probably going to pick Rowlet as my starter, but not sure which version to pick. Both of the mascots look awesome. And we haven't seen a starter to start off with two types since Bulbasaur in Gen 1. So that's a plus at least. The fire starter does look pretty cool as well.
 
Pupplio_bonus_art.png

A little bonus art for Popplio. Who's picking it?
 
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Green Dragon

Formerly supertrainer300
Yup. Adoraseal for me. Totally getting Sun version, I was unsure before. Who wants to speculate on possible secondary types for Litten and Pupplio? Honestly, I've got nothing.
 
Guys, if you're on team Popplio at least spell it right XD

Now one thing I want to get out of my system is names, where the heck did they get popplio from? Swampert fit it's typing of Ground/Water And Sceptile fit its looks and typing. But Popplio really? And Rowlet sounds better on a rock and flying or a Ground/Flying not Grass/Flying... And Litten... I have no idea how it fits besides that its a cat... Blaziken fit its typing as well as looks but these only fit looks, well all but popplio anyways. If you notice pokemon's names usually fit looks and typing not just looks, for example Articuno pigeons coo and Artic fits its typing, so when you hear Articuno it instantly sounds like and ice bird due to what we are used to hearing. But these new names confuse me, they don't fit there typing at all, Seel and Dewgong fit because Seals are water creatures and we know that Dew is water, so we know that they are water types and know what they look like. But these new names don't really fit...
rOWLet-- Rowlet is an OWL.
POPplio-- It creates bubbles. Come on.
LITTEN-- It's a kitten. And it's LIT XD XD
 
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My oh my, all the starters look amazing to me! I won't truly decide until I see their final forms, but for right now I have to go with Litten. :) The legendaries look pretty good as well, and the region looks splendid! Overall the games are looking good so far!
 
After two long months since the games were first confirmed, we finally have some real information about this year's brand new Pokemon games.
The games will be set in a region called Alola - based on Hawaii as speculated back in February. As expected from a region based on Hawaii, it's very much a volcanic island setting and seems to be actually quite relatively small from the map view we can see - perhaps indicating we'll see more than this one area in the game.

It's apparent from the brief glimpses of gameplay that we've seen that the game has eschewed its top-down look and chibified characters from XY for a full 3D world with full-size proportioned characters, a move that may extend to seeing animated trainer models in all battles at last. We've also seen indications that character customisation - introduced in XY but missing in Omega Ruby/Alpha Sapphire - will return to some degree.
In terms of Pokemon, we were introduced to five new Pokemon in the games - the starters and the main box art legendaries. While we don't know anything more about the legendaries, we do know a fair amount now about the starters:

View attachment 295880
Name: Rowlet
Category: Grass Quill Pokémon
Height: 1 '00 "
Weight: 3.3 lbs.
Type: Grass/Flying
Ability: Overgrow
Starting Move: Leafage

The first of the potential partners is the highly adaptable Grass Quill Pokémon, Rowlet. This Pokémon can fly silently through the skies, sneaking up on its opponent without being noticed. It can attack its opponents using powerful kicks, and it can also attack from a distance using the razor-sharp leaves that form part of its feathers. Rowlet can survey its environment and turn its neck nearly 180 degrees from front to back, so it can see directly behind itself. When in battle, Rowlet turns its head to face its Trainer when waiting for instructions.

View attachment 295881
Name: Litten
Category: Fire Cat Pokémon
Height: 1 '04 "
Weight: 9.5 lbs.
Type: Fire
Ability: Blaze
Starting Move: Ember

The cool-headed Fire Cat Pokémon, Litten, is the next choice for a first-partner Pokémon. Litten’s fur is rich in oils and is immensely flammable. It constantly grooms itself by licking its coat, collecting loose fur into balls. It then ignites these hairballs to create fireball attacks. When the time comes for Litten to molt, it burns off all of its fur in one glorious blaze.

View attachment 295882
Name: Popplio
Category: Sea Lion Pokémon
Height: 1 '04 "
Weight: 16.5 lbs.
Type: Water
Ability: Torrent
Starting Move: Water Gun

The third possibility is the acrobatic Sea Lion Pokémon, Popplio. Popplio can create balloons made of water from its nose and utilize them to create a variety of different strategies and attacks in battle. This Pokémon is better at moving in the water than on land, and can swim at speeds over 25 mph. On land, it uses the elasticity of the balloons it creates to perform jumps and acrobatic stunts.
The release date for Sun and Moon will be the 18th November 2016 in North America, Japan South Korea and Hong Kong/Taiwan, and the 23rd November in the UK and Europe.

Uploaded for Europe and North America, this trailer introduces the new Pokemon, the region and gives us a glimpse of the game and new Legendaries in action:


Meanwhile, Japan got a more inspiring look at the new games, presented through the eyes of a Japanese child moving to Hawaii and connecting to his new classmates via Pokemon, apparently reflecting the journey of the main character in the game:


The official Pokemon website has also updated with the new Sun Moon microsite with even more images and details on the new starters:

http://www.pokemon-sunmoon.com/en-us/ (Pokémon Sun and Pokémon Moon | Pokemon.com/SunMoon)

In the coming months we'll be covering the game even more, and we'll be sorting out our Cryptidex soon to begin cataloguing these new 7th Generation Pokemon. Hopefully this somewhat unexpectedly large burst of news has got you guys as hyped as it has us.
When's this coming out?
 

Linkachu

Hero of Pizza
Staff member
Administrator
Hadn't been able to properly read through all of this information and watch both trailers until just recently. The UK trailer is nice, but that Japanese trailer... Why. Why do you do this to me?

Massive feels aside, I've loving everything that I've seen about these games so far. All three of the starters look great, so my decision of which to choose will likely be based on their evolved forms. Graphically the tweaks we received were also basically what I was expecting. Can't say that I'm disappointed with them one bit. It's gonna be awesome diving into this new region. :D

Now all we need is to see what's new features-wise and the extent of Sun/Moon's trainer customization. I do hope it's just as extensive, if not much moreso, than X/Y's.
 
Now one thing I want to get out of my system is names, where the heck did they get popplio from? Swampert fit it's typing of Ground/Water And Sceptile fit its looks and typing. But Popplio really? And Rowlet sounds better on a rock and flying or a Ground/Flying not Grass/Flying... And Litten... I have no idea how it fits besides that its a cat... Blaziken fit its typing as well as looks but these only fit looks, well all but popplio anyways. If you notice pokemon's names usually fit looks and typing not just looks, for example Articuno pigeons coo and Artic fits its typing, so when you hear Articuno it instantly sounds like and ice bird due to what we are used to hearing. But these new names confuse me, they don't fit there typing at all, Seel and Dewgong fit because Seals are water creatures and we know that Dew is water, so we know that they are water types and know what they look like. But these new names don't really fit...

Haha, Seel and Dewgong are odd choices to hold up as exemplar pokemon names since they're only one or two letters away from just calling the two of them Seal and Dugong rather than being the usual puns or portmanteau names that make up the bulk of today's pokemon.

What names would you choose for the new starters instead?

I'll try to Bulbapedia the names:

Popplio looks like a portmanteau of Pop and Lion (it is a sea lion that pops bubbles as its main attack). The faintly Italian-sounding name reminds me of the opera Pagliacci, and wikipedia is telling me that there's a famous and beloved clown performer from Russia named Popov.

Litten sounds like Lit (past tense of to light) + Kitten and Rowlet... could be anything + Owlet, maybe Round + Owlet. We might know more when it evolves and gets a dapper suit and top hat or such.
 
Here's what I'm going to do: get both Sun and Moon, get 2 different starters, trade 1 over to which ever I decide to focus on, start over on the other game, pick the last starter and repeat the process.

I probably will since I've mostly picked the water starter every time. Here's how I've gone: Squirtle, Chikorita, Mudkip, Piplup, Snivy/Oshawott and Fennekin. Then again, I intend to get all 3 on 1 game. I'll be able to since I have 2 3DS.
 
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Haha, Seel and Dewgong are odd choices to hold up as exemplar pokemon names since they're only one or two letters away from just calling the two of them Seal and Dugong rather than being the usual puns or portmanteau names that make up the bulk of today's pokemon.

What names would you choose for the new starters instead?

I'll try to Bulbapedia the names:

Popplio looks like a portmanteau of Pop and Lion (it is a sea lion that pops bubbles as its main attack). The faintly Italian-sounding name reminds me of the opera Pagliacci, and wikipedia is telling me that there's a famous and beloved clown performer from Russia named Popov.

Litten sounds like Lit (past tense of to light) + Kitten and Rowlet... could be anything + Owlet, maybe Round + Owlet. We might know more when it evolves and gets a dapper suit and top hat or such.
There is only one problem, its main water attack is water gun until it evolves so the poping bubbles as its main attack wouldn't work...
 
So far, Litten seems the most appealing to me, as does the Moon legendary. The water starter looks a little derpy. As for the region, this will be neat. Islands have a great deal of unique species, so I'm psyched.
 

Psycho Monkey

Member of the Literary Elite Four
Those starters are so ferkin derpy! I love them all! Glad to see more love for Popplio here than I did anywhere else. It's too bad the Legendaries weren't new Pokemon, but I guess Mega Pyroar and Mega Noivern are good consolation prizes. :\=|:

The Japanese sure know how to put together a good trailer. The English trailer shows us new features which is great. Japan shows us the power of love, friendship, and how Pokemon surpasses language barriers to bring us all together. Beautiful. :')
 
This is looking pretty stellar so far. It's like my tropical fan region of Korei come to life. Those starters are pretty great, I love their unique animations, especially Popplio's lil proud pose.
 
Just... just wow. I was expecting something new and exciting, and I definitely got what I have been expecting! This looks amazing, just by the minute sneak peeks of in-game footage that we've been given!

It seems they've upped their game immensely, adding many minor details left and right to improve the gameplay, aesthetics, experience, ect., and I am supremely pumped for it! Can't wait to get my hands on these, especially with a brand new 3DS in hand! :love:
 
Omg the Moon Legendary is soooooo beautifulll !!! Def getting that version and I still don't know which starter I want. I just wait till I see the evolution lol but I really liking all of them.
 
this Idea could be farfetch'd but if we get 2 new types then it is possible that they'll be Light and Sound

the pokemon sun legendary is obviously fire but can be fire/light because its the pokemon Sun legendary

the pokemon moon legendary could be flying/sound because its a bat and bats use sound waves to move around in the dark

what do you think?
 
this Idea could be farfetch'd but if we get 2 new types then it is possible that they'll be Light and Sound

the pokemon sun legendary is obviously fire but can be fire/light because its the pokemon Sun legendary

the pokemon moon legendary could be flying/sound because its a bat and bats use sound waves to move around in the dark

what do you think?
That would be sick as hell but I think people who are invested in balancing pokemon types and metagame will tell me it's unlikely. I can dream though.
 
I wonder if you can name your rival.... He has the starter weak to you, so....
Opposite gender rival once again? I'm fine with that as long as they are balanced with the green haired dude. And I'll probably just name him after one of my friends anyways.
 
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