1. Introduction
Since the creation of the first pocket monster in 1996, Pokemon’s business growth has been more exponential than any other entertainment-based franchise in the world. Now, with trading cards, a huge anime, and over 1000 new Pokemon introduced into the franchise Pokemon seems unbeatable. It feels like every 9-year-old had a Pokemon phase and 2016 saw over 200 million players a month in 2016. But now, many long-time fans are criticizing the Pokemon franchise for ‘falling off’ and many people are sure that the end of the franchise is upon us.
In this article, we will be looking at the main arguments against Niantic, GameFreak, and Creatures (the three corporations that own the Pokemon Franchise) and why these arguments are false. Keep in mind, however, that these organizations are multi-million dollar companies and each one has many people behind each marketing idea. Any big change in any half-decent organization will have to go through at least 20 people before it reaches you, the consumer. This is something I have learned through extensive research on not only Pokemon but other franchises that people frequently hate on, that almost every single decision has some psychological or business advantage that helps the organization reach its final goal. Getting money.
This is no different in the entertainment industry. I am 100% sure that the Pokemon company has many people in marketing who are staring at the analytics of each of their products to make necessary changes.
So what are the complaints that people are making? Well, the new Pokemon anime series brought about an uproar of anger from many long-time fans of Pokemon as the company decided to remove the original main character Ash Ketchum who has been adventuring with these fans since 1997, and produced a terribly written script focused more on teaching kids lessons then being entertaining. These are 2 reasons that have made many believe that Pokemon is throwing its potential at being the best entertainment franchise in history. Here is why those people are wrong.
2. Removal of Ash
It is understandable that some of the older fans of the franchise are irritated that the company removed a character that has been a staple of the franchise for years but those fans need to understand that Pokemon does not work for them. Pokemon, like any company, works for money. Statistics might have shown that Ash Ketchum was making them money back then, but now, if Pokemon viewing time is taking a dive, they aren’t scared to start over and create some new characters to appeal to the kids who are making them money.
The new characters in question (Liko and Roy) are carefully created by extremely skilled designers who work for Pokemon to have similar features as Ash. Though they might be unnoticeable at first, the marketing team at GameFreak is trying their hardest to make these characters close enough to Ash to keep the same signature vibe that the company has stuck to for decades but different enough to not seem like the same character with a different name.
3. The Anime is Cringe
The next main concern for Pokemon fans is the story development in the anime. With the first 12 episodes being released already, fans are complaining about how much education and moral learning are being pushed towards them. The amount of lessons and morals that the anime is trying to teach the kids feels overwhelming to the older fanbase and when it gets in the way of the story, it can be annoying to just continue watching. So why does Pokemon still do this?
To put it lightly, Pokemon does not care about you. This might sound harsh but it is the truth. GameFreak wants money and its main source of income is from kids aged under 10. Or at least it wants it to be. In reality, most of Pokemon’s current audience is above 10, many being above 18 because more people watch it for nostalgia rather than what they used to watch it for. Pokemon doesn’t want its income to run on nostalgia because not only is it a very unstable income source, it cannot sustainably interact with its community in the way it wants. So their solution is to begin marketing extremely towards younger audiences to try to win back the peak that they rightfully deserved way back when.
4. Conclusion
In conclusion, Pokemon has not fallen off. It’s just trying to allocate its resources to the target market it actually wants. Pokemon wants to stabilize its future and make sure that it doesn’t die anytime soon. In reality, Niantic and GameFreak are very good at responding to consumer dissatisfaction and will probably post an official reply to the complaints very soon. From a business perspective, I hope you can now see the real reasons why Pokemon does not appeal to you anymore and I hope that you can respect the minds behind the marketing of this amazing franchise.
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