Pokédex Categories Make No Sense

Looking up the Pokedex category of a Pokemon can teach you more about it and its origins. But what if we specifically compare the differences between the English and Japanese Pokedex categories?

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Chapters:
00:00 English VS Japanese Pokedex
04:50 NYXI Hyperion 2
05:57 More Pokedex Category Differences
12:34 Pokemon is Educational
14:32 EVEN More Pokedex Differences

This video looks into the differences between the English and Japanese Pokedex Categories of the following Pokemon:
Meowth
Persian
Slowpoke
Vaporeon
Froakie
Frogadier
Xatu
Galarian Slowking
Cufant
Copperajah
Charcadet
Marinie
Toxapex
Wobbuffet
Shelgon
Slakoth
Trapinch
Zangoose
Corphish
Crawdaunt
Cradily
Duskull
Snorunt
Chimchar
Spiritomb
Munchlax
Magnezone
Togekiss
Arceus
Unfezant
Darumaka
Dwebble
Sigiliph
Gothitelle
Elgyem
Golurk
Emolga
Boufallant
Reshiram
Zekrom
Fletchling
Slurpuff
Clawitzer
Tyrantrum
Stonjourner
Sylveon
Togedemaru
Wimpod
Golisopod
Solgaleo
Lunala
Guzzlord
Skwovet
Applin
Dreepy
Kubfu
Urshifu
Overqwil
Pawmot
Veluza
Paradox Pokemon

Gnoggin, hosted by its creator Lockstin, is a show delving into the mysteries of Pokemon! (and other games sometimes too). Explaining everything there is to explain! Why is each Pokemon given the type it has? What are their origins? What is the lore of the Pokemon world and the design inspirations? And what does it all have to do with alchemy? Let's Go find out!

[blivveries]

I like to think the Paradox Pokémon's names are what their categories _would_ be if they had normal Pokémon names instead. As in: it's classified as the Scream Tail Pokémon in the Pokédex, but its real name is... Gigglyscruff, or somesuch.

[roboninjasaur]

Scratch is slang for money, it’s such a clever title for meowth to be the “Scratch Cat” Pokémon

[kumonoameai]

10:24 It's a pun. The pokemon lives "in" a "rock", the "inn" is an old timey word for a dwelling, and " rock inn" if said fast enough sounds like "rockin' ", like rock n' roll. Dwebble dwells in a rockin' rock inn.

[deadlydingus]

10:20 An inn is a place you stay temporarily. Dwebble’s White entry says that it will remain in its rock until it finds a new one. Also, it’s “inn” a rock.

[ArendAlphaEagle]

11:22 - 11:30 I'm pretty sure this, and several other weird changes, are made due to *character limitations.* For instance, Pachirisu's Japanese category translates to "Electric Squirrel" Pokémon, but in English it's "EleSquirrel" Pokémon. And I guess that "SkySquirrel" made more sense to them than "FlySquirrel" as Emolga doesn't look like a fly.

[DipshitKyle]

13:50
Japan: we'll help our kids learn with our game by giving them new words.
America: kids are stupid.

[Crimson_Dragon]

3:58 Slight correction on Charcadet. You showed the English word "spark" in Katakana スパーク (supaaku), but it's ひのこ (hinoko - spark) in the Japanese Pokédex. In kanji, this would be written as 火の粉, the pun being the "ko" part can also mean "child" if written with the 子 character. 火の粉 - spark; 火の子 - fire child

[LeandroIsCool]

I like that Koraidon's and Miraidon's paradox names are implied to be Winged King and Iron Serpent respectively based on their dex entries and that it could also be their categories as well if all the paradox pokemon weren't just categorized as "paradox pokemon"

Koraidon, the Winged King pokemon sounds too perfect for that not to be the case. The iron bundle pokemon, the brute bonnet pokemon, the iron thorns pokemon, the scream tail pokemon are absolutely valid sounding pokemon categories

[dovestormcat]

15:33
When I think of "roly poly", my brain goes to a kids show I used to watch called "Roly Poly Oly" (or Ollie, I don't remember how the main character's name was spelt), which had most characters in it being made of spheres. So I associate "roly poly" with "round" or "ball-shaped" thanks to that cartoon.
Whomever gave Togedemaru that category name might have been thinking of that association.

[Impulse]

14:03 ...so they're ok with a kid asking what a Howitzer is, but not with Megalith?

[Super_Top_Secret_Area]

According to Nob Ogasawara (Pokémon localizer during Gens 1-4), the category "Poison Pin" is a mistranslation that exists because of character limits. He suggested it should be "Poison Needle" instead, but it hasn't been changed yet.

[MagnezoneSH]

In French the attack "Perish Song" is actually called "Requiem"!

[Syiepherze]

6:37 "Cat ferret" is actually a calque of one of the Japanese words for mongoose, 猫鼬 nekoitachi (which is used in the category). I guess they went with the literal translation to make it sound more exotic lol

Corphish and Crawdaunt's Japanese categories (ごろつき gorotsuki and ならず者 narazumono) have more or less the same meaning. You could even spell them the same, 破落戸
There is a slight nuance in that a gorotsuki (literally "rumbling", a racket) is a literal rogue (as in a vagrant/bandit) while a narazumono (meaning something like ne'er-do-well) is a thug

7:42 In Japanese, "kasa" (as in the category Yukikasa) can mean umbrella (傘) or a conical hat (笠)

8:30 For Munchlax's Japanese category, Oogui (大食い) literally means "big-eating" (for example, mukbang ! could also refer to competitive eating). Though it is similar to the word 大食 taishoku (gluttony)

I guess 磁場 jiba (the term for magnetic field) _does_ mean "magnet place" if you break it down. But Magnet Area sounds so uncool in English...

10:18 Dwebble's does mean "Stone Inn", 石宿 Ishiyado (yado as in 宿借り yadokari, hermit crab or literally "inn-borrower")

11:20 Maybe there's a character limit? Idk

15:18 "Circle Ball" sounds a bit awkward. 丸まり Marumari just means curling up, or rolling into a ball. So "Roly-Poly" works!

16:41 I guess allotriophage is one way to translate 悪食 Akujiki (eating forbidden/unusual foods, literally "bad eating")

[goldfencer]

The “Magnet Area” Pokémon? Like some kind of… Magnet… zone?

[TheEmraldz]

4:06 Mareanie and Toxapex's English categories are puns too! Brittle Star - Brutal Star

[clemente]

7:21

Fun(?) Fact:
Requiem is the French name of the move Perish Song. So we, Frrnch players, already had some kind of idea of what the word is/means.

[CoolPorygon]

"they change the category because they don't want to expose kids to confusing new words (megalith), but also they change the category to expose kids to confusing new words (howitzer)"

[golisobro]

13:06 Its category of Megalith might have been changed because its so similar to Gigaliths name. The only difference between them is that one uses mega and the other uses giga which means very similar things anyway

[rahuhe]

8:10 A Misconception! Phylogenetic Cladistics (Animal Classifications) says you can't grow out of your ancestry. So all dogs are canines, all snakes are reptiles, and all apes are monkeys!

Infernape has a tail, though, so it shouldn't be an ape.

[KnightsofGaming]

9:37 as a Christian who plays Pokemon, this line got me 😂. I'm not from the US and was born after the satanic panic era of the US but I always facepalm myself whenever I'm reminded of it