The Complicated Relationship Between Nintendo and Pokemon

The business relationship between Nintendo and Pokemon is very complicated, and from time to time we've wondered what would happen if The Pokemon Company flexed its muscles and said it wants to take steps to make the franchise even bigger beyond Nintendo's hardware. #pokemon #nintendo

[_Just_Another_Guy]

That diagram chart is so useful, I wish more people were aware of it.

Also Kit has fantastic hair in this episode!

[Rallosz]

I don’t ever see it happening. Nintendo, while not the majority, still owns a significant amount of the Pokémon company. On top of that, Japanese companies usually take business partnerships and loyalty very seriously.

[Nintenguy]

That won't ever happen because even though Nintendo doesn't make a whole lot of decisions with this franchise, they still play a big role here especially considering Nintendo owns the trademarks for pretty much anything with this franchise therefore this could never break apart.

[TheDreadedZero]

That last part really makes it seem like people who ask questions are getting in over their head

[azimulhoque]

Guys, Nintendo owns the trademark over every character and Pokémon. These are all their characters completely.

What are we talking about 😂

[WingedSupernova]

If they can't make a game that looks great and runs well on Nintendo hardware, the gap they'd have to bridge to make the game look good on PlayStation or PC is gargantuan.

[ColinUTD]

Either way we need a new dev team on Pokémon, Game Freak have had enough chances now, I don't believe they can change for the better.

[soullesscurve]

I don’t think they could go multiplat since Nintendo still has a controlling stake and owns the trademarks and copyrights. They also own the publisher rights. Just seems like TPC couldn’t get away with that

[ZeldaTimeline]

Imagine if the next set of Pokémon games were:

Pokémon: Nintendo Red Version
Pokémon: PlayStation Blue Version
Pokémon: Xbox Green Version

And you needed all three consoles to own them all. 😂
(I know they wouldn’t actually do that, but this is how I entertain myself on my lunch break 🙃)

[Howitchewstofeelgum]

They could not, in fact, do that, because Nintendo owns all the trademarks. They are also the most powerful controlling force in TPC, Moon Channel made a great video about this topic.

[andreslb]

They CAN'T say they're not exclusive anymore. Firstly because Nintendo owns 1) The Pokemon trademark 2) More than one third of the Pokemon franchise...
The worst part is you've worked for them!

[NaviWolf]

Niantic/Google got too greedy with Go and ruined it.

[MasterStacona]

More simple:
Nintendo, Creatures INC, and GameFreak own Pokemon.
GameFreak owns the Pokemon Company.
Pokemon Company is there to handle the business side of things for Pokemon.

[DylanKatt]

It would be REALLY weird if Pokémon wasn't apart of Nintendo. 😕

[alphamarigi]

How much of creatures does Nintendo own?

[mellow]

omg that's the most japanese workplace answer...

[mikedrzi]

After watching Xenoblade X DE trailer I have to say that Pokemon Legends Z-A is pushing Switch hardware to it's limit

[Owen_]

Imagine game freak trying to make games for hardware that isn’t the switch

[eeskaatt]

wait how so? isn’t nintendo 1/3 of TPCi?

[link-kun]

I'm just saying if Pokemon get out of Nintendo and still producing poor looking game like most of them did on Switch again, ppl will realised that it's not Nintendo's hardware that was the problem all along.