In the original Pokémon games, Pocket Monsters Red and Green, the developers inserted a small easter egg. When the game is turned on, the rival’s name is initialized to いしはら—“Ishihara,” named after Pokémon developer Tsunekazu Ishihara. (Mr. Ishihara is now president of the Pokémon Company, which did not exist at the time.) In addition, the player’s name is set to やまぐち—“Yamaguchi,” named after Wataru Yamaguchi, who is listed under “Special Thanks” in the game credits.
The special edition Pocket Monsters Blue had some changes: the hidden player’s name was changed to ゲーフリ, an abbreviation of Game Freak—the producers of the Pokémon video games. The rival’s name became クリチャ, a reference to Creatures, Inc., which owns part of the Pokémon copyright and distributes the toys and games.
Pocket Monsters Yellow later used ゲーフリ1 for the player, adding only a single digit to the end of Blue’s default name. The rival name was unchanged.
This in‐joke was even included in the English versions of the game, with a major difference. The player’s name became Ninten, while the rival’s became Sony! This is obviously a tongue‐in‐cheek reference to Sony’s PlayStation system, which competed with Nintendo’s major game console of the time, the Nintendo 64.
Written 2008‒10‒13
©2008–2010 IIMarckus. Released under a Creative Commons Zero license.