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Fans React To Massive Pokemon Leak’s Rejected Designs

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Fans React To Massive Pokemon Leak’s Rejected Designs






Scary face of Pikachu
The Pokemon Company

Game Freak, the company behind the beloved “Pokémon” games, was the victim of a massive hack over the weekend, leading to what some are already referring to as a “mega leak.” In total, the hacker has dumped around a terabyte of Game Freak’s internal files onto the internet. The leak has quickly gained a lot of momentum on social media, with fans and archivists sharing various tidbits of information left and right. After reviewing the data, fans have discovered that the company has (or had) preliminary plans for re-releases of older games, a theatrical animated film and live-action “Detective Pikachu” sequels, and even and all whispers of the Gen 10 debut of the Nintendo Switch’s successor (which, it turns out, has the odd internal codename of “Ounce”). While some of these leaks sound like a dream come true, the more interesting leaks are more like nightmares.

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Perhaps more than anything else here, players have been drawn to the plethora of rejected Pokemon designs that make up a large portion of the leaked data. While there are naturally plenty of early sprites for Pokemon that were redesigned before their official debut, there are also a number of truly weird designs for Pokemon that never made it past the prototype stage. And frankly, some of these designs are absolutely terrifying. As one X fan said, “THESE BETA DESIGNS FOR SOME OF THESE POKEMON ARE NOT KID FRIENDLY. (Game Freak) made legit TOROR creatures for their games.”

Leaked Pokemon are pure nightmare fuel

Thanks to several lengthy threads from @CentroLeaks on X, fans have been able to get a closer look at a number of Pokemon left on the cutting room floor, and many of them are downright disturbing. For example, a creature that appears to be an early vision of Rayquaza has a sickly flesh-like color palette and razor-sharp teeth, while Cacturne’s original concept art looks like something that would stalk the foggy streets of ” Silent Hill”. – a far cry from the spiky but cute Pokemon we eventually got.

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Other designs include a steel spider-crab hybrid with glowing black eyes and visible joints, as well as a deformed rock monster covered in debris that resemble the second-generation Unown. The former has proven to be so disturbing that one commenter simply said, “How bruh??? That’s NOT a Pokemon.”

One of the more disturbing creations is what appears to be an Electric-type dog Pokemon, featuring a forked tongue, gassy midsection, and basically an exposed nervous system for legs. For some, the strange design of the limbs and torso of this creature has brought back memories of the classic (and controversial) series of books “Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark”.

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It remains to be seen how many rejected Pokémon will be among the leaked files, but one thing’s for sure: Game Freak’s design team has been turning off its darker impulses for decades at this point. These designs already have fans begging The Pokémon Company and Nintendo to release a full horror title. Meanwhile, Game Freak seems to be trying to put the genie back in the bottle as quickly as they can.

Game Freak is on the case


Detective Pikachu searches
Pictures from Warner Bros

Many fans anticipated that Nintendo and Game Freak might try to sweep this incident under the rug or ignore it entirely, presumably in the hope that fans might think the leaked documents were fake, the developer behind the “Pokémon” game franchise it was really in front. of the news In a statement to employees released on October 10 (translation via Nintendo Everything), the company wrote: “Game Freak Inc… has discovered that the personal information of employees and others was leaked in regarding unauthorized access to our server by a third party in August 2024. We apologize for the inconvenience and concern caused to all involved.”

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It’s unclear how Game Freak and Nintendo intend to combat this leak, but fans online already suspect that the perpetrator of this attack is in big trouble. After all, Nintendo has a well-documented history of suing anyone who threatens its intellectual property, and the last couple of years have seen hackers get stiff prison sentences for manipulating game companies.


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