Pokemon Diamond and Pearl May Have Scrapped Plans for an Alternate Charizard Evolution

A recent leak of Pokemon Diamond and Pearl's raw code suggests that there were once plans for an [...]

By Christian Hoffer

A recent leak of Pokemon Diamond and Pearl's raw code suggests that there were once plans for an alternative evolution to Charizard. Earlier this month, the source code for Pokemon Diamond and Pearl leaked online, the latest dump of data from a massive Nintendo server hack. Fans of the Pokemon series have scoured the code looking for interesting facts about the Pokemon games, and one dataminer believes that they have found proof that Charmeleon nearly had an alternative evolution. The dataminer "Falinks" found a Pokedex file for a Pokemon named Rizaagan that would have had the Pokedex number #503. The Pokemon was categorized as a "Flame" Pokemon and its number suggests that it would have been a Gen 1 evolution similar to Magmortar and Porygon-Z.

Rizaagan's name and category suggests that it might have been a planned alternative evolution to Charizard. Charizard is also categorized as a "Flame" Pokemon, and Rizaa is the Japanese word for lizard. Considering that Charizard's name in Japanese is "Lizardon," it certainly seems plausible that Charmeleon was going to get a branching evolution line before it was eventually scrapped.

Charmander and its evolutionary line are among the most popular Pokemon in the game, and Charizard has had no shortage of alternative forms. The Pokemon is one of two Pokemon to have two Mega Evolutions, and it's currently the only Kanto Starter Pokemon to have a Gigantamax form. While these are all relatively recent developments in the franchise, it seems that the Pokemon Company had plans to set Charizard apart even earlier. Of course, these alleged plans for Charizard won't help the claims that the Pokemon receives unfair favorable treatment compared to the hundreds of other Pokemon species in the game.

You can see Eclipse's original tweets below:

Are you surprised that Charizard may have gotten an alternative evolution? Let us know in the comment section!

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