Pokemon Fossil Museum Offers Virtual Tour

You can now explore the Pokemon Fossil Museum exhibit at the Japanese National Science Museum from the comfort of your own home. Earlier this week, the Japanese National Science Museum published a new website that allows players to check out a virtual version of the Pokemon Fossil Museum exhibit. The website is accessible via VR, smartphone, or via web browser, and gives Pokemon fans a chance to check out the collaborative exhibit that explains how Pokemon and Pokemon fossils were inspired by real-life dinosaurs. Anyone can check out the exhibit, although you'll need to be able to read Japanese in order to enjoy the full displays. 

The Pokemon Fossil Museum is a touring exhibit that originally opened in 2021. The exhibit has made stops at several museums around Japan, using the Pokemon franchise to explain the importance of fossils and what they can tell scientists about ancient times. The Pokemon franchise has always had a special interest in fossils, with Pokemon Sword and Shield going so far as to parody the inaccurate displays of dinosaurs at London's Crystal Palace by making a group of "mix and match" prehistoric Pokemon. So far, the exhibit has only been announced for Japanese museums and is scheduled to close in 2023, so this virtual tour might be your best bet to see the exhibit without traveling to Japan. 

It remains to be seen how Pokemon Scarlet and Violet will incorporate fossils into their game. The new Pokemon games seem to have a past vs. present theme, which seems to lend itself to fossils. That could mean that we'll get more new fossil Pokemon or if we'll somehow be able to travel back to time to when prehistoric Pokemon roamed the Earth. We likely won't find out until Pokemon Scarlet and Violet is released on November 18th.