Pokémon: the trade that’s lasted thirty years. A report from California

San Francisco. A father points out a statue of Charizard to his son as if introducing him to an old friend. The boy, however, responds by enthusiastically showing him a Pokémon card that didn’t even exist in 1996. This is what Pokémon have become thirty years after their inception: not just a commercial success or a childhood memory, but a shared language that spans generations who grew up in different worlds and eras. In the beginning, that entire universe was contained within a black-and-white Game Boy: 151 creatures, two cartridges, a cable to connect to a friend’s console, a great adventure and the premise that, to complete the game, sooner or later, you’d have to ‘trade’ with someone else. Although the cable has now disappeared, that idea remains. Cards, video games, cosplay, figurines, toys, even baseball matches played under Pikachu’s banner. Introducing Pokémon XP: the first major official convention entirely dedicated to the fandom, organised in San Francisco alongside the World Championships.

“We are delighted to welcome here in San Francisco fifty thousand fans and two thousand seven hundred players from all over the world for the World Championships,” Chris Brown, Director of Global Esports & Events at The Pokémon Company International, tells Il Foglio. But the true measure of this phenomenon lies above all in its diversity. Filling the convention halls are thirty-somethings who first discovered this world through the Red and Blue video games in 1996, others who became passionate about the anime series, those who were drawn in by trading cards swapped in the school playground, and those drawn in by the most sought-after collector’s items. And then there are children who started with Pokémon GO and truly fierce competitive players. Because whilst many pop culture phenomena survive by becoming nostalgia, what becomes clear from Pokémon XP is how this universe has achieved an extremely rare state in global culture: continuity.

Adding and bringing together generations, expanding print editions, merchandise and collaborations (in 2027, there will also be a new stop-motion series produced with Aardman Animations, the studio behind Wallace & Gromit), growing and changing over the years, yet remaining almost unchanged in its emotional core. Thus, while each generation has its own new characters, those who discovered that universe as children can still recognise it as adults, never feeling left out. While the franchise has now surpassed 500 million video games distributed and 85 billion cards produced (truly staggering figures), even if an adult might not feel that the latest legendary Pokémon is ‘theirs’ and a young fan might never even have held a Game Boy in their hands, both experience the endless activities in the exhibition halls with the same enthusiasm. Both know full well what it means to choose a Pokémon as a companion on this narrative journey. Perhaps this is why Pokémon has stood the test of time better than so many other phenomena that emerged in the same era: rather than asking adults to become children again, it allows them to remember that they once were, while watching someone else embark on the same journey. At Pokémon XP, then, it takes just a moment to realise that the true Pokémon experience isn’t so much about a world final or an ultra-rare card, but also, quite simply, about a parent explaining to their child why that Charmander means so much to them… and vice versa. Even thirty years on, the defining moment is not capturing a creature by throwing a Poké Ball, but passing something else from hand to hand: a card, a console, a story, a memory, a passion. The true, great ‘exchange’ of the Pokémon world, in the end, is precisely this.