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Pokémon Pokopia is Omega Force’s swing at a cute and cozy Pokémon life sim in the vein of Animal Crossing or Stardew Valley. You play as a Ditto that transforms into a human and helps cultivate a new home for the local Pokémon wildlife, and though it’s a little unnerving seeing the beady-eyed human running around, it seems like a fun enough premise to support Pokopia’s life-sim gameplay. However, the more we see of the game, the more it seems like there might be a dark truth lurking beneath the surface, and fans are running wild with theories.
Though it’s unclear how the Pokémon world may have gotten to this point, the prevailing theory is that the world of Pokopia may take place in some kind of post-apocalyptic timeline where humans and Pokémon have been separated for many years after some kind of disaster. There are clues hinting at this possibility dating as far back as the original reveal trailer from September. Ditto is shown escaping its Poké Ball in a cave that looks like it was, at one point, occupied by its trainer. The ‘mon looks at a Pokédex on the ground that is covered in dirt, and transforms into the trainer seen in a photo on the device. The fact that the dex has clearly been exposed to the elements for some time is concerning on its own, but there are more hints that something is amiss in Pokopia’s world than that.
Yesterday, Nintendo released an extended Pokopia trailer that revealed a few new Pokémon variants, all of which seem to reflect the passage of time and lack of human interaction. A Snorlax is shown covered in moss, as if having slept long enough for nature to have overgrown its massive body. A Smeargle in the game is covered in paint, as if it has been painting without stopping or cleaning itself up. Then, there’s the biggest surprise: a white Pikachu named Peakychu who seems to be sickly, or even ghost-like. Could she be a specter of a long-dead Pikachu? Perhaps.
The most explicit confirmation we get that humanity has been gone for a while is in Professor Tangrowth. This vine-covered Pokémon appears to be greying a bit and wears a broken TM machine like a doctor’s head mirror, as if it scavenged it in the rubble. In the trailer, we see Tangrowth tell Ditto that humans and Pokémon once lived in this place, but now that its buildings are destroyed and plants withered, he hasn’t seen anyone else in “quite some time.” He says this as he’s literally rummaging through the remains of what looks like a Pokémon Center that is now crumbled and covered in overgrowth. Whatever happened here that drove people and Pokémon away happened a long time ago. Some fans point out that what we see of the town’s layout looks similar to that of Fuchsia City from Red and Blue, and given that Pokopia seems to take place near a collection of islands, it’s not out of the question that this is a post-disaster version of the coastal city.
Whatever is going on, it’s clear that something terrible happened to this place that we’ll be sprucing up in Pokopia. Pokémon loves to delve into dark, life-or-death situations from time to time; I’m just surprised it might be doing so in its foray into the genre that’s supposed to be about feel-good vibes. We’ll know more when the game comes to Switch 2 on March 5.
