Pokemon Black & White, aka Gen 5. Coming to Japan in Fall 2010.

[borracho]

I always thought that would be a neat idea for certain pokemon. My thought was always a Gyarados and Milotic hybrid that could produce the crappiest hardest to level up pokemon ever that doesn't evolve until somthing like lvl 90 but then becomes a beast of slaking proportions without the crappy ability drawback.

I also think that tauros should be the next normal/flying type.

 

[deluge]

I don't see them introducing a general hybridization mechanism.
What I could see happening is more special cases where two Pokemon breed to produce one that evolves into neither.
Indeed, Manaphy already does that in producing Phione.
There could be certain species that can only be obtained by breeding two Pokemon of the right species possibly holding a special item to override the usual mechanics.

 

[T-major]

Given the way the industry's going, I could see a Pokemon Box-like app for DSiWare being made available around the time of the game's release for about 500pts and a download code being made available as a preorder bonus.

The 4th gen games could be set up to have deposit rights only, while the 5th gen games could allow for withdrawing after a certain point (perhaps once you get the National Dex).

That would probably be the fastest way to handle the mass migration and make it realistic to catch 'em all if they still care about that sort of thing.

that would screw over everyone who doesn't have a DSi, which is a significant amount of people. I know I won't buy a DSi just to transfer Pokemon easier. unless they have another way to transfer easily without the app normally, and the app just makes it even easier, because that would be acceptable.

I'm pretty sure Psyduck is actually a platypus, not a duck (Farfetch'd takes that role).

more than one Pokemon can be based off the same animal, you know...

I also think that tauros should be the next normal/flying type.

that could be cool, I mea... wait, Tauros? as in the Bull like Pokemon? Flying?!... WAT!?

 

[d2m]

that could be cool, I mea... wait, Tauros? as in the Bull like Pokemon? Flying?!... WAT!?

He drank Red Bull.

 

[T-major]

He drank Red Bull.

if he was making a buffalo wings joke I'm going to destroy him.

anyways, this Hybrid Pokemon business is silly. if only one Pokemon could be made using this method, it would be fine but really, we don't need these ridiculous combinations of Pokemon that look like they're strait out of fanfics.

 

[Aminar]

I'll bet there will be afew hybrid pokemon. 3 or 4. It'll allow for some interesting designs if nothing else. And There will likely be sprites for a variety of specific breeding combos to let you know what egg moves a given Pokemon might know.

 

[Nintenfreak]

if he was making a buffalo wings joke I'm going to destroy him.

anyways, this Hybrid Pokemon business is silly. if only one Pokemon could be made using this method, it would be fine but really, we don't need these ridiculous combinations of Pokemon that look like they're strait out of fanfics.

What makes you think they'd necessarily resemble their parents? They could be diversely different looking (at least some of them).

 

[T-major]

I'll bet there will be afew hybrid pokemon. 3 or 4. It'll allow for some interesting designs if nothing else.

Your acting like it's confirmed they're going to implement hybrids, trying to guess how many there will be. I highly doubt they will do this, since it's not only unnecessary, but the only successful way it could be implemented is as a way of getting certain Pokemon. only certain Pokemon would be able to be hybridized anyways, seeing as ~400 Pokemon being able to combine with each other would be way to much coding and space. choosing what Pokemon to allow hybridizing would be hard unless they chose them specifically to combine to make a certain Pokemon, which can only be acquired through hybridization. and if it's going to look completely different from the two parents anyways, why even bother doing the hybrid? just make it a regular Pokemon.

And There will likely be sprites for a variety of specific breeding combos to let you know what egg moves a given Pokemon might know.

I vote for different egg sprites for different egg groups. I found it odd that I didn't do this in gen 4.

 

[Aminar]

It just seems a natural step for a diversified method to obtain pokemon. Phione is decent evidence for the idea in general. Just expand on the idea.

(I'm really hoping any Hybrids with Ditto don't end up with Ditto Face. that would bug me)

 

[Bologo]

It makes sense that there would be certain hybrids. Ie. Miltank and Tauros breeding together would create a baby that only they could have. I'm actually not too sure why they haven't done something to relate those two pokemon yet anyway.

@below poster: Of course they're related...one is the bull pokemon and one is the cow pokemon. :/ Normally in the bovine family, the cow is the female, and the bull is the male. That's how it is with these two as well, and it's fairly obvious that Tauros had to be born into the world in some way other than Ditto.

 

[CCM30]

It makes sense that there would be certain hybrids. Ie. Miltank and Tauros breeding together would create a baby that only they could have. I'm actually not too sure why they haven't done something to relate those two pokemon yet anyway.

I dunno why that would be done since that doesn't even happen in the real world.

In reality, you can only breed something that is relatively similar (I think it goes by genus or family, not sure). That's why dog breeds are usually mixed because they are still all dogs.

Likewise, Miltank and Tauros, for example, are in no way related other than typing and, thus, it wouldn't make sense for them to be bred together.

 

[cantab]

I agree Poison should be super effective against Water.

Water dilutes Poison.
To me the obvious thing for Poison to be SE against is Normal. Normal creatures are susceptible to being poisoned. But that defeats the point of Normal. It would also directly contradict Snorlax's Pokedex entries.

I agree with adding more powerful Pokemon after the Elite Four. That was done in DPPt and was a success in how in increased replay value, compared to the lack of high-leveled post-E4 Pokemon in RSE. Gamefreak has likely taken note of this, and will continue with it. What I'm hoping for is a very long dungeon with high-leveled wild Pokemon and a generally insane difficulty level, since a lot of postgame quests in Pokemon haven't been especially difficult.

I see a conceptual problem though, in that the Elite 4 are supposed to be the best of the best. It doesn't make sense for there to be random Joe trainers with stronger Pokemon. It's dubious there being stronger wild Pokemon - since why haven't the Elite 4 caught them for their teams?
The post-E4 stuff being in a different region, as it is in all games thus far, does help somewhat with that issue. But still, how does one explain that NPCs stronger than the Eliter 4 aren't in the E4 themselves, no matter what region they come from?

Likewise, Miltank and Tauros, for example, are in no way related other than typing and, thus, it wouldn't make sense for them to be bred together.

They're both cows.

And anyway, based on the ability to interbreed most Pokemon 'species' are in fact subspecies - the number of species in the biological sense is the number of groups that cannot interbreed. Since some Pokemon are in multiple egg groups, said number may well be one. EDIT: All the Egg Groups except Ditto and No Eggs 'link up', meaning most Pokemon are one biological species. (Even ignoring Ditto, since the idea with Ditto is it transforms into the other Pokemon to breed with it.) The anime and Pokemon Snap indicate at least some legendaries can reproduce, so it seems reasonable to assume most legendaries are not biologically incapable of reproduction, but merely will not breed in the Daycare.

 

[Wichu]

Water dilutes Poison.
To me the obvious thing for Poison to be SE against is Normal. Normal creatures are susceptible to being poisoned. But that defeats the point of Normal. It would also directly contradict Snorlax's Pokedex entries.

Water is susceptible to pollution? Also, Poison should be SE against Bug like it was in R/B/Y. Although it might make Bug-types a bit weaker, the boost for Poisons would more than offset that.

I see a conceptual problem though, in that the Elite 4 are supposed to be the best of the best. It doesn't make sense for there to be random Joe trainers with stronger Pokemon. It's dubious there being stronger wild Pokemon - since why haven't the Elite 4 caught them for their teams?
The post-E4 stuff being in a different region, as it is in all games thus far, does help somewhat with that issue. But still, how does one explain that NPCs stronger than the Eliter 4 aren't in the E4 themselves, no matter what region they come from?

Maybe they were offered the chance, but refused? Perhaps only trainers with certain qualifications can become E4 members?
High-level wild Pokémon could still lurk in unexplored and remote areas (e.g. Mt. Silver or Cerulean Cave).

 

[Aminar]

I would ignore our(scientific) definition of species for pokemon. They aren't all subspecies. Being Pokemon different rules apply-specifically that all so far there have been no hybrids. Personally if they add hybrids it should be for similar pokemon like Ekans/Seviper except that they are different types.

Also-pandas are legendary pokemon(won't breed in captivity)

 

[CCM30]

I would ignore our(scientific) definition of species for pokemon. They aren't all subspecies. Being Pokemon different rules apply-specifically that all so far there have been no hybrids. Personally if they add hybrids it should be for similar pokemon like Ekans/Seviper except that they are different types.

Also-pandas are legendary pokemon(won't breed in captivity)

Well, at least the same types, maybe. Just stretching these "rules" just to have hybrids seems a bit wasteful in time and resources, if you ask me.

 

[Bologo]

Water dilutes Poison.
To me the obvious thing for Poison to be SE against is Normal. Normal creatures are susceptible to being poisoned. But that defeats the point of Normal. It would also directly contradict Snorlax's Pokedex entries.

I'd say the more obvious thing for Poison to be SE against is Bug. In fact, it was SE against them in RBY, but for some reason the weakness was removed. It makes sense because bug spray is a common bug killer. EDIT: beaten

 

[Aminar]

Well, at least the same types, maybe. Just stretching these "rules" just to have hybrids seems a bit wasteful in time and resources, if you ask me.

It seems a good way to get some interesting type combos. Rock poison fromn Onix/Arbok combo could be pretty interesting.

 

[Naxte]

Water is susceptible to pollution? Also, Poison should be SE against Bug like it was in R/B/Y. Although it might make Bug-types a bit weaker, the boost for Poisons would more than offset that.

The organisms in water are susceptible to pollution (just as the ones that live inside of rocks, ground, ice, air, etc are). The water itself could care less--it's still water, just with a whole bunch of poison in it now as well (same with the actual rocks, ground, ice, and air themselves). Water itself is just a compound, which is why it isn't hit for super-effective. Things like Grass and Bug represent actual organisms though, and not just elements, which is why they are (or in the case of Bug, were) hit for super-effective: unlike water, they are embodiments of things that are vulnerable to poison.

Under the other kind of logic, Poison would be hitting all types, aside from Steel, Poison itself, and perhaps Ghost, Poison would be, for super-effective damage, as they're all susceptible to Poison. Obviously though, that's no good, so Game Freak didn't go down that road. Instead, they made all of those types equally susceptible and vulnerable to the Poison-status (except in special cases, like Snorlax and Zangoose) to compensate for the fact that living-things can be poisoned, and had the actual moves themselves just be neutral, or whatever.

 

[Aminar]

A large number of water pokemon are amphibious. Amphibians are particularily sensetive to poisons. Fish and Reptiles that live in water are too. That leaves very few water types that have a reason to not be extra susceptible to poison. Granted I doubt they will make the change. but you never know.

 

[Naxte]

Eh, that doesn't really change anything of what I said though. By large and far, most aquatic organisms are things that would be called fish/amphibious mammals (you can't just go by what has been made so far when talking about Game Mechanics--you've got to keep the future in mind). These are no more susceptible to the variety of poisons and toxins overall than any variety of animal, at least not to my knowledge. In our world, they are particularly at risk due to things like pesticides and fertilizers winding up in the seas, but that's just where the stuff winds up. If other animals (like... the pests and such the pesticides are made for in the first place) ingest it in the same proportions to their body-weight, they'd be just as affected as anything else.

That's why Game Freak doesn't go for that logic. If you don't simply leave Water-types as being the embodiment of the Water-element, and consider water to be "the organisms that live in water" in this sense, you have to apply the same standard to everything else, and you'd wind up with all organically-based organisms being susceptible to, and thus being hit super-effective by, Poison-typed attacks. That doesn't work, so that's why it doesn't happen. With Grass and Bug it's fine, since those are actual organisms, but outside of them, trying to use that logic would ultimately lead you to having Poison be the most broken type ever.

tl;dr--Amphibians are not all Water-Pokemon, but merely a subset of them. Them being particularly vulnerable to poisons is no reason to make the whole of Water particularly susceptible to it.

 

[Seiryu1169]

I believe that the way to fix Poison's offensive problems is simply getting rid of "Normal Poison" altogether. Each one of the 24685 moves that have poison as a side effect now cause Toxic instead. Toxic Fang gains a bit of power and a flinching effect to go with the elemental fangs, and somebody else could figure out what to do with Toxic Spikes... :(



On another topic, one thing I'd like to see in Pokémon games is a little less linearity. The broken bridge trope has gotten too old already. I mean, a tall ledge blocking your way is somewhat acceptable, but three frigging Psyducks blocking the road is just stupid. Think the PS1 Final Fantasies, where the plot is linear, but you still have some travelling freedom from time to time, and the reason you can't just go around the world from the beginning is explained.

Also, how cool would it be if instead of just starting off in Beginner's Town and choose X pokémon from this region's Professor Oak, you had different "backgrounds" (or characters?) to choose from (think Dragon Age, just a lot simpler), and things like your starter and your rival were defined by that. Maybe even the starting point and reasons for journeying could differ...

Oh. And the legendary "trio" this time needs to be a quartet: A Salamander, a Mermaid, a Gryphon, and a Dryad.

 

[-Mind-]

pfft everything will be so hard to wall..

 

[cantab]

I would ignore our(scientific) definition of species for pokemon. They aren't all subspecies. Being Pokemon different rules apply-specifically that all so far there have been no hybrids. Personally if they add hybrids it should be for similar pokemon like Ekans/Seviper except that they are different types.

I know that I probably shouldn't try and apply real-world biology to Pokemon, but...

In a sense there already ARE hybrids. Pokemon which know egg moves. In Pokemon, we observe that (except when Ditto or the Nidos are involved), the morphology (physical shape) is always that of the mother. However, certain instinctive behaviours (egg moves) are inherited from the father. This must mean that in the Pokemon reproductive process, the genes that control morphology - which is probably the majority - are always inherited from the mother, while the genes that control instinctive behaviour are inherited from the father.

Pokemon thus probably wouldn't have paired chromosomes like most real animals. Assuming Pokemon have chromosomes in the first, I think they'd be a combination of haploid and diploid. p haploid chromosomes from the mother determine morphology, q haploid from the father determine egg moves, and r diploid chromosomes determine IVs. In reproduction, the female gamete contains none of the 'q' chromosomes, while the male gamete contains none of the 'p', and the 'r' chromosomes are probably recombined like in mammalian meiosis.

Maybe I'm building castles in the sky here...but hey, I for one find it interesting.

To try and pull back on topic - the postulated behaviour leads to an interesting possibility for gen 5 - egg moves that skip generations. A move could be unusable by a Pokemon, but it could still have the 'gene' for that move, and (if male) pass it on. That could be used as a route to get previously impossible egg move combinations. It would however require an overhaul of the data structure. It might fit in with the idea of having Pokemon know all their moves, but take four into battle - being able to change which four between battles. The 'generation skipping' egg moves would then simply have a bit set to hide them, but come into play in the breeding.

EDIT:Another thing that the hypothesis genetics is in accord with is the fact that tutor moves are not inherited, but TM moves are. A tutor merely teaches a Pokemon the move, but a TM could actually affect the Pokemon's genes.
I'm still not sure how the fact that level up moves are only inherited if both parents know them can be figured out though.

 

[CCM30]

Well, you are assuming that a Pokemon's moves come from its genes, when that may not be necessarily true in all cases.

While egg moves would, indeed, make sense to come from genes, anything from leveling up or really anything else may not have to do with genetics, but from just simply learning the moves.

As to why they wouldn't just learn all of the moves they can, maybe it is because of the ecosystem they naturally live in, their typing and how that effects them naturally or their mental capacity to do so.

 

[Miscellaneous]

I'm not sure why all threads like this (not just on smogon) are fulled with (insert what you want to see) (insert what you think is cool) (insert how you would make the game) (insert stupid rumour). Because seriously almost no posts in this thread are linked to evidence or discussion on what we know.

Because of this, apart from just checking the Op, which hopefully mods will update frequently, it's very hard to follow and discuss in a thread like this.

So it helps a lot if the specuation can be kept to a minimum, and more relavent discussions more frequent. I know it's impossible to stop, but it will help the thread's content if you consider this