As we’re 8 days away from the new Pokémon Scarlet and Violet games, I thought I’d look back at some of the commercials for each generation. The video above is a rarity—the first ever commercial for Pokémon Red and Green in Japan. Despite Pokémon’s reputation for being a child’s game (hah!), most of the people in this commercial are adults and it’s full of Japanese cultural unorthodoxy (for want of a better phrase). We start with a kawaii girl talking to a group of older men on a park bench, swinging a link cable that’s connected to her red Game Boy, followed by clips of random Japanese people playing the game together and a few seconds of gameplay footage. Check out those OG sprites!
