4. A Pokédex for Everyone
And there are a lot more new ways to play with the Pokémon AR Markers.
Yes. We worked hard on making them so you can stick them on the wall.
With AR Cards until now, when you stuck them on the wall, they popped up at the wrong angle.
Yes. It was always like you were looking from overhead.
But this time, we made it so that when you put them on the wall, they come out facing you.
How does that work?
We used the motion sensor.
Oh, I see. The relation between the location of the card and the orientation of the Nintendo 3DS system itself allows it to sense whether the card is on the wall or on the floor.
That’s right.
Why did you want it to detect that a card is on the wall?
We originally wanted to make posters.
For example, it would be great if there were a Pokémon AR Marker poster on the wall someplace like a Pokémon Center and a giant Pokémon came jumping out.
Or like lots of Pokémon AR Markers on a wall.
If you just put it on the wall like normal, the Pokémon will come out facing forward, but if you put it up facing right, it will pop out facing right, or if you put it up facing left, it will come out facing left.
How about upside-down?
You see it from behind. (laughs)
Oh, okay. (laughs)
In the real world, you can, for example, make a sort of 3D maze, putting up Pokémon AR Markers on the walls here and there, holding up the Nintendo 3DS system, and going in the indicated directions until you reach the goal. I hope people will play in ways like that, too.
Yes! (laughs)
We hope people will use it to say, “The exit is this way!”
There are all kinds of ways to play this time. For example, you can take two Pokémon AR Markers, place one in front and one further back like they’re facing each other, then take a photo with a digital camera rather than with the cameras on the Nintendo 3DS system. Then show that on a computer screen and look at it with your Nintendo 3DS system. The resulting picture will have depth.
Oh, I see.
You can take pictures like that with them facing as if they’re battling, so it looks how it would when they’re battling on the Nintendo 3DS system. I hope people will devise all sorts of interesting ways to enjoy playing.
I see. Players can enjoy Pokédex 3D in all manner of ways. How do you hope to see it take off from now on?
First, I want every Nintendo 3DS system to have Pokédex 3D on it.
That’s right. You did say that you wanted to pre-install it on the Nintendo 3DS system. (laughs)
Yes. (laughs) Of course, you can enjoy looking at the animations even if you don’t know the Pokémon, but I hope that at least people who have Pokémon Black Version and Pokémon White Version will enjoy using Pokédex 3D. A lot of new Pokémon appeared in those games, so...
And it just came out last year, so the full array of new Pokémon isn’t firmly established in everyone’s heads yet.
I think even if you collect Pokémon in your Pokédex 3D little-by-little, your knowledge will rapidly deepen. But as you collect them, lots of questions arise, like, “What about Pikachu?” and, “Am I ever going to see that one Pokémon?”
So what about Pikachu? (laughs)
We’re considering how best to present him so everyone is happy. And the only ones that appear in Pokédex 3D are the new Pokémon that appeared in Pokémon Black Version and Pokémon White Version, but it’s my ambition to expand the Pokédex for the entire Pokémon series.
But making it would be hard. The scale of a version for the entire Pokémon series would be...
Yes. The number of Pokémon would be staggering, but we put as many features as we could into Pokédex 3D.
I can tell by looking at it that it encourages players to do all kinds of new things. You can use SpotPass so new Pokémon come in day after day, share Pokémon in your Pokédex 3D with each other, and draw your own Pokémon AR Markers. It’s full of new stuff, so within Nintendo, some people said, “This has so much in it, but why is it available free of charge?”
Yes. I feel as if we have fully drawn out the capabilities of the Nintendo 3DS system down to the minutest aspects.
If people who own a Nintendo 3DS system simply connect to the Internet, they can get it easily, so I hope they’ll try it out.
Yes, absolutely. I want lots of people to download it.
Your ambition is that everyone will have it?
Yes. I want everyone with a Nintendo 3DS system to download it.
Thank you. Continuing on, I’d like to ask about the Super Pokémon Scramble11 game, which is coming out exclusively for Nintendo 3DS system. My apologies, Ishihara-san, but if you could stay a little longer... 11Super Pokémon Scramble: An action game for Nintendo 3DS that was released in Japan on August 11th, 2001. This title is named Super Pokémon Rumble in Europe and was released on December 2nd, 2011.
Okay. Oh... right. We’ve decided that we would like to offer something extra as an incentive for early purchases12 of Super Pokémon Rumble. 12This incentive was only available to Japanese customers .
Right.
We talked about having the bonus be a collection of all the Pokémon AR Markers we mentioned earlier, but it wouldn’t be very exciting if all the Pokémon AR Markers were printed from the start.
You want players to draw their own.
Yes. We decided to make the bonus be Pokémon AR Markers with check marks where you should fill in the boxes.
Like a colouring AR Marker.
That’s right! Like a colouring book! (laughs) About 10 are already filled in. We want early purchasers to fill in the rest themselves to have the Pokémon appear.
Even if you fill them in roughly like Ishihara-san showed us earlier, Pokémon will appear.
Yes. They’ll show up just fine.
It’s quite pleasing to have a Pokémon come out of what you yourself have drawn.
Players will be surprised. And we’re thinking about yet another bonus...
Let’s talk about that next time. (laughs)
Oh, right.
Thank you, everyone.
Thank you!