Pokemon Red and Green Almost Had 65,000 Different Versions Instead of Two

At one point, Game Freak considered having a lot more variations of the original Pokemon games. Earlier this week, Did You Know Gaming released a new video about the original Pokemon games, digging into some obscure interviews with the original Game Freak development team to reveal some forgotten facts about the Pokemon franchise. One of the more interesting segments of the video is the reveal that Game Freak originally wanted the Pokemon games to have 65,000 different variations, each of which would feature minor differences such as the shape of forests and which Pokemon would appear in the game. The concept was ultimately dropped after speaking with Nintendo president Shigeru Miyamoto, who suggested making two different versions based on different colors instead. 

The information comes from a 1996 book called PokeDex, where Game Freak programmer Takenori Oota states that a player's Trainer ID number was originally meant to determine what Pokemon appeared in a game."We also considered having each game generate a random ID number the first time it was booted up and that number would determine which Pokémon appeared in the game," Oota said. 

In a different book, Pokemon franchise creator Satoshi Tajiri elaborated on the plans. "With the cartridge ID's randomly determined, Pokémon caught in those games would all carry that ID number, so long as someone wasn't trading with 65,000 different people, the odds of trading with someone with the same ID were unlikely," Tajiri said. 

However, when explaining the concept to Miyamoto, the concept was eventually revised.  "I talked to Miyamoto about how we'd make players understand that every cartridge is different when they buy one, and he told me the system sounded interesting, but it was a bit difficult to grasp," Tajiri said. "He said if players can't tell just by looking at it, then it won't work out and it would be better if the games' colour or appearance were different."

Trainer IDs remained in the Pokemon games and were eventually used in the formula that the games use to determine whether or not a Pokemon is Shiny. 

You can check out the full video here.