In the year 1999, Pokemon was literally EVERYWHERE. Toys, card games, TV shows, a movie in theatres, TIME magazine's cover, the works. Exasperated parents kept telling themselves "this will fade away with time" and prepared their boxes to store away all the Pokemon memorabilia they spent ungodly amounts of hard earned money on for their kids. Nineteen years later, while not to the same extent as it was in the 90's, Pokemon is STILL huge. What happened?
First we need to analyze WHY people prophecied failure. When it comes to fads, 90's parents had no shortage of experience with crazes that disappear just as quickly as they arrived. Most 90's parents were old enough to remember toy crazes from the 60's to the 80's: Beatles memorabilia, Star Wars toys, hula hoops, pet rocks, Transformers, etc. When these parents looked at Pokemon, they saw what anyone with sensibility would see: yet another addition to the already cluttered memorabilia closet.
Further, pop culture enthusiasts could see in Pokemon a repeat of three very recent fads: pogs, Beanie Babies, and Tamagotchi. Pogs were plastic discs that were INSANELY popular during the years 1994-1995. I recall buying them every chance I could when I was 8, though in my country they were called tazos. Beanie Babies were small plushies one could buy and collect; people legit thought they were an INVESTMENT! Finally, Tamagotchi were digital pets that one could carry around in key chains. They were hot for a while until they woke kids up at 1 AM to clean their poop.
Thing about fads one needs to remember, beside their temporary nature: fads happen because kids want to be accepted and belong to a crowd, generally speaking. Kids in general DON'T want to be loners or to be considered 'freaks' by their peers; that's why peer pressure is as concerning today as it was in the 80's and 90's. Fads start because the object of the fad is new and fascinating, thus causing kids to want it, which then causes MORE kids to want it too.
Most fads start because, to the kids, nothing like it has come before. Smurfs were HUGE in the 80's because there was nothing quite like it before. Transformers were insanely popular specifically because the idea of "cars become robots" had never been done quite like it before. Both of these properties got a significant boost in their popularity thanks to their respective TV shows.
Pokemon seemed no different. To most parents of the time, Pokemon was a TV show and nothing more, with every bit of merchandise simply milking the show for what it was worth. Hell, most parents couldn't even understand WHY the show was such a hit! They saw Pikachu and thought "oh, this is like the Smurfs," wherein a cute main character was the main draw.
Well, most of you know how Pokemania went, but for the new kids, a reminder: http://vidgameanalysis.blogspot.com/2013/11/pokemon-versus-nostalgia.html.
So after Pokemania died, most of those armchair prophets were feeling pretty darn good for themselves. Seemingly as suddenly as it started, the Pokemon fad died away. Kids were looking away from Pokemon and towards the new stuff like Beyblade and Yu-Gi-Oh. But while the fad died, the property lived on. How?
Pokemon was never going to be JUST a cartoon show, because it was a gaming franchise that turned multimedia! The simple Pokemon formula (young child goes on a quest to catch little monsters) allowed for multiple interpretations that could all be varied and seem fresh. If one piece of media became stale, the others would pick up the slack. This is seen in how the anime grew stale sometime around season 4, but the games remained fresh and fun with each installment.
But like ANY fad, Pokemon's fall from relevance has an explanation. Fads die when the new thing comes around, which in turn leads them to realize/think what they previously liked was 'stupid.' He-Man made way to the Ninja Turtles, which in turn made way for the Power Rangers, who in turn were replaced with anime like Sailor Moon and Dragon Ball Z, which in turn made way for Pokemon. What was the hot commodity for kids after Pokemon? Yu-Gi-Oh.
"But Pokemon is still around!" I hear you say. Yes, and here's why.
The first Generation of Pokemon Fans can be divided into two categories: those who dropped the franchise after Pokemania died down, and those who stayed for the games. The latter kept the franchise alive by buying the games, which remained consistently good. Actually, Pokemon is one of those franchises that actively improves with each game released, to the point that the first games are OBJECTIVELY the worst.
Seriously, you need to be blinded by some dark nostalgia goggles to not recognize the many flaws in the Gen 1 games that were massively improved upon in later generations.
So these fans of the games stayed in the boat, even through the low point that was the 2002-2005 era, when the games were at their lowest critical point. But 2006 was the turning point for Pokemon. What happened?
The release of Generation 4 coincided with the first generation of fan's being old enough to be college aged. Many of these old-school fans, who remained fans, sought like-minded people who loved the franchise. Also, thanks to the new online capabilities, players no longer needed to bring link cables to the schoolyard like they used to; they could just get online to trade and battle Pokemon. For the first time ever, Pokemon could REALLY be played by anybody.
Pokemon always had multi-generational appeal: cute designs for the mons themselves, challenging gameplay, etc. But the ability to trade and battle, the very meat of the series, was always limited to who could afford a link cable. Those days ended in 2006, thanks to the Internet.
It was the GAMES that kept the franchise alive, and the way they did it was by remaining high quality, challenging games that differed greatly from one another. In this way, Pokemon differed itself from all other fads: it didn't keep reinventing itself or let itself grow stale, it kept evolving (pun intended)! It kept growing up with the times, adding not just new Pokemon, but new mechanics with each new generation! Any other franchise would have settled for just new characters!
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