Potential Spoilers? Sun and Moon to have PG 13 themes?

[James169]

Wasn't there a battle frontier area that had a board where you could potentially have a good/bad thing forced on you in battle? Tenuous, but anything luck based where there is a potential good outcome can be made into a gambling label.

 

[McStrud3ll]

for the alchahol ref i think it would be the pp restorers
thats a guess though

 

[shadowmoon522]

when have they ever done this for a pokemon game? if you've watched nintendo treehouse, the goal is to make the game accessible to all demographics.

my point exactly.
you know how theres all those songs that have slews of cursing in them, but are changed for the radio without actually changing the song? thats the type of thing i'm referring to and they have done it before

what i'm saying is rather then it be a region to region lock, it will be an age group lock. it will be available to all demographics only parents will be able to lock out the "bad stuff"

 

[Z25]

The statement

"Pokemon is targeted for Little Kids" is not true at all.

yes it's family friendly. That does not make their main focus children though. The game can look different in advertisements then the full game. If pokemon was still geared for little kids, do you honestly think they could get away with stories such as that of XY's A massive war broke out that killed an entire fraction of the Earth's population, we see it happen, we see the gravestones, we get it suggested that literal corspes are being murdered again to fuel the same weapon that massacred so many before.

"But hey it's just for kids! am I right?"

No.

Pokemon has been working towards an older audience. Their core audience is in a 12 + rating. With a main income source being 17 plus kids who grew up with the games. Hence why the initial sun and moon trailer focuses on how the series started and how it's original audience stands today and only grew. The game doesn't need to be child friendly, sure it looks bright and colorful but these new themes wouldn't be surprising. Nostalgia is a big seller for the series, and with the way they've set it up, this seems to be their main attraction.

They don't lose anything by having mature themes. Most kids in a 7-9 range will not even notice these things in the slightest. Young kids don't even read games anymore. And the 12 plus range, mature themes don't matter to them. Now a days, there are a lot of parents who don't really care what their child play or even watch/look into it. That's why so many kids at the age of 12 play COD. Pokemon stepping it up wouldn't be an issue. And for those who think things like mild language would be bad, it wouldn't. There's many times where you an find kids starting at around 5th grade and higher, who will already know about these things and discussing them personally. As someone with a brother in middle school, trust me alcohol and mild language are some of the tamer things you can hear kids say.

It's a new time, and new game. Sun and Moon is meant to capture old fans of the series, not new. Will new ones show? Always, but they will never outnumber the man audience and target. These themes probably would be prominent in the end, and I honestly don't think they'd get complaints. Maybe a discussing or two by game journalists, but not angry parents going after them.

Anyway that's the end of my who spheal!

and @clbgolden The fact sheet does have, but not in normal means. You need to run it through a hex editor for this bit of info to pop up.

 

[HardstyleRaver2]

The statement
Pokemon has been working towards an older audience. Their core audience is in a 12 + rating. With a main income source being 17 plus kids who grew up with the games. Hence why the initial sun and moon trailer focuses on how the series started and how it's original audience stands today and only grew. The game doesn't need to be child friendly, sure it looks bright and colorful but these new themes wouldn't be surprising. Nostalgia is a big seller for the series, and with the way they've set it up, this seems to be their main attraction.

I would like to see a source of that being true because I don't really like assumptions. Is the main income coming from the older audience or is it coming from the younger audience? I always think that it could be coming from the younger audience.

 

[Z25]

I would like to see a source of that being true because I don't really like assumptions. Is the main income coming from the older audience or is it coming from the younger audience? I always think that it could be coming from the younger audience.

Here's the thing, your not going to see this being said by pokemon themselves. but browse the internet. Sites like here, or GameFaQ's( https://www.gamefaqs.com/boards/696959-pokemon-x/67258885), pokejungle, even 4chan's pokemon board. If you were to ask throughout any site where you see people discuss pokemon, and older number usually comes first. Pokemon fans for the majority are older. It's why we have things like Sun and Moon's trailer focus on nostalgia. They even did this for Heart Gold and soul Silver. They focused on the Nostalgia. Which makes sense for the remake, but that's the point. They focus more on their older audience and outsiders think "Oh it's for kids", when in reality it's not really the case.

This topic somewhat delves into this:
https://www.gamefaqs.com/boards/696959-pokemon-x/67258885

Yes the target audience is viewed as for children, but more often then not, it's the older audience that would make the more income. I almost never see young kids play or mention pokemon, as I stated before, games like COD have taken over that demographic. Here's another thing to consider:
https://www.examiner.com/article/pokemon-x-and-pokemon-y-target-audiences-revealed

XY's focus was putting older fans first, but attract newcomers. This is always the case. They know the fanbase well and I'd believe that this would be good enough proof to show they want to cater more to the older ones, as they are found to be the bigger audience. Pokemon will never of course come out and say it, but if you look around it shows. Sure you could say the internet is a small portion, but in most cases the internet has a bigger draw and younger audiences are getting more and more brought into the internet because of it's huge presence in today's world.

 

[OmegaRuby and AlphaSapphire]

The statement

"Pokemon is targeted for Little Kids" is not true at all.

yes it's family friendly. That does not make their main focus children though. The game can look different in advertisements then the full game. If pokemon was still geared for little kids, do you honestly think they could get away with stories such as that of XY's A massive war broke out that killed an entire fraction of the Earth's population, we see it happen, we see the gravestones, we get it suggested that literal corspes are being murdered again to fuel the same weapon that massacred so many before.

"But hey it's just for kids! am I right?"

No.

Pokemon has been working towards an older audience. Their core audience is in a 12 + rating. With a main income source being 17 plus kids who grew up with the games. Hence why the initial sun and moon trailer focuses on how the series started and how it's original audience stands today and only grew. The game doesn't need to be child friendly, sure it looks bright and colorful but these new themes wouldn't be surprising. Nostalgia is a big seller for the series, and with the way they've set it up, this seems to be their main attraction.

They don't lose anything by having mature themes. Most kids in a 7-9 range will not even notice these things in the slightest. Young kids don't even read games anymore. And the 12 plus range, mature themes don't matter to them. Now a days, there are a lot of parents who don't really care what their child play or even watch/look into it. That's why so many kids at the age of 12 play COD. Pokemon stepping it up wouldn't be an issue. And for those who think things like mild language would be bad, it wouldn't. There's many times where you an find kids starting at around 5th grade and higher, who will already know about these things and discussing them personally. As someone with a brother in middle school, trust me alcohol and mild language are some of the tamer things you can hear kids say.

It's a new time, and new game. Sun and Moon is meant to capture old fans of the series, not new. Will new ones show? Always, but they will never outnumber the man audience and target. These themes probably would be prominent in the end, and I honestly don't think they'd get complaints. Maybe a discussing or two by game journalists, but not angry parents going after them.

Anyway that's the end of my who spheal!

and @clbgolden The fact sheet does have, but not in normal means. You need to run it through a hex editor for this bit of info to pop up.

Don't forget all the stuff in the Abandoned Ship and Mauville corp. in OrAs...
I think that Pokemon has become a serious case of...
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/WhatDoYouMeanItsForKids/VideoGames

 

[shadowmoon522]

The statement

"Pokemon is targeted for Little Kids" is not true at all.

yes it's family friendly. That does not make their main focus children though. The game can look different in advertisements then the full game. If pokemon was still geared for little kids, do you honestly think they could get away with stories such as that of XY's A massive war broke out that killed an entire fraction of the Earth's population, we see it happen, we see the gravestones, we get it suggested that literal corspes are being murdered again to fuel the same weapon that massacred so many before.

then theres the pokedex

and lets be honest here, mass genocide is a hell of lot less disturbing then those fairy tale girls

i'd almost feel sorry for any hypno who tried abducting any of these kids.
to put that statement in better perspective, look how things went for Takashi Nasujima at the end of Durarara!!x2 Ketsu Episode 12.
now is the part where you realize takashi is the hypno & haruna is the fairy tale girl in that particular scenario

 

[clbgolden]

I don't really think things like polls are a good way to track the target audience, I doubt that many children below 10 would answer them. All the nostalgia put in games is probably just to keep the older fans coming.

With that said, we always have had dark things in Pokemon (as shown above), but none of it has really affected the rating.

Speaking of which, if this ends up being true I think the highest this game will get is an E10+. Story of Seaons has suggestive scenes and alcohol, yet that still got E10+

 

[Hikamaru]

I don't really think things like polls are a good way to track the target audience, I doubt that many children below 10 would answer them. All the nostalgia put in games is probably just to keep the older fans coming.

With that said, we always have had dark things in Pokemon (as shown above), but none of it has really affected the rating.

Speaking of which, if this ends up being true I think the highest this game will get is an E10+. Story of Seaons has suggestive scenes and alcohol, yet that still got E10+

As he said, E10+ seems like the most likely situation this game will end up in if these themes are enough to suggest a higher rating than the usual E for main series Pokemon games.

 

[OmegaRuby and AlphaSapphire]

Actually doesn't the E10+ rating suggest that Pokémon's target demographic isn't 7-10, but rather...well 10 and older? It's more for pre-teens than kids in that case.

 

[clbgolden]

Actually doesn't the E10+ rating suggest that Pokémon's target demographic isn't 7-10, but rather...well 10 and older? It's more for pre-teens than kids in that case.

Don't really think the potential rating tells us Pokemon's target demographic, it may just be GameFreak taking big leaps.

 

[SaniOKh]

The way I see it is that if that's the rating of the next Pokémon game, then it might mean two things:

1. The Game Corner is back!
2. We might finally get an uncensored Pokémon game.

I'll focus on the latter. Pokémon has always been more or less censored outside of Japan.

There's the stuff shadowmoon522 pointed out. There's the outfits of swimmer trainers in various games (speedos on male Swimmers in Japanese games being "expanded" to become boxers outside of Japan) ; female trainers winking at the player (with Beauties wearing shorter skirts) and Fishermen with cigarettes in their mouths in the Japanese versions of GSC ...

And speaking of alcohol: it has been in Pokémon since day one. I'll just quote TV Tropes here:

We all know about the grumpy old man in Viridian City who won't let you pass until he's had his coffee, and we all know that in the original Japanese, the man is actually drunk as a skunk. What usually isn't noted is in the original Japanese the drunk man is actually still very polite and insists on helping you. It's this drunken friendly demeanor that is the reason Red flees.

Old Man: Uugh...! [hiccups] Hold it right there! Lissen to what I hafta say!
[Red starts to turn back]
Old Man: ...Hey! Don' go, I said!
[talking to his granddaughter while he's lying there]
Old Man's granddaughter: Good grief, Grandpa! Sleeping here of all places! [to Red] It can't be helped. We have to wait until he sobers up...

 

[bwburke94]

Regarding the possibility of E10+, it should be noted that even Pokémon XD got E. (Note that E10+ didn't exist when Colosseum was released.)

 

[Desert Stream~]

Well, look on the bright side. If the target audience gets older we may Finally get a better difficulty in the games.

Since there are 2 ratings though, I think it's just a ratings list.

 

[shadowmoon522]

Well, look on the bright side. If the target audience gets older we may Finally get a better difficulty in the games.

Since there are 2 ratings though, I think it's just a ratings list.

i doubt it, all signs point to masuda dumbing it down again. remember why the azure flute was never released as an event?



and ironically many figured out how to get to it with an AR code & how to get the arceus from that event that never was.
we got fans digging out the pastebins in shuffle & finding every little thing in the coding as soon as they get their hands on it, hence this threads existence.
yet here well have this:

seems like a good idea, more conveienent.
but on the other hand it makes it harder for those who have not learned the type chat to remember it.

 

[Hikamaru]

The way I see it is that if that's the rating of the next Pokémon game, then it might mean two things:

1. The Game Corner is back!
2. We might finally get an uncensored Pokémon game.

I'll focus on the latter. Pokémon has always been more or less censored outside of Japan.

There's the stuff shadowmoon522 pointed out. There's the outfits of swimmer trainers in various games (speedos on male Swimmers in Japanese games being "expanded" to become boxers outside of Japan) ; female trainers winking at the player (with Beauties wearing shorter skirts) and Fishermen with cigarettes in their mouths in the Japanese versions of GSC ...

Like you said, for some games we had trainer sprites edited for non-Japanese versions. I recall the Sailor sprites in 3rd Gen actually got their arm position edited because it originally looked like an offensive arm gesture. HG/SS had the aforementioned male Swimmers' speedos changed to look like shorts, and the other edits from 2nd Gen as you mentioned.

There's always the chance Game Freak could heavily edit the games for non-Japanese audiences again, even if the fact we're in full 3D could make it harder to edit.

Regarding the possibility of E10+, it should be noted that even Pokémon XD got E. (Note that E10+ didn't exist when Colosseum was released.)

I did read on Bulbapedia and you were right on that, because Colosseum and XD were noticeably darker than most Pokemon games yet still got off with only an E rating (because as you said, E10+ wasn't introduced until later). Sun & Moon could become the first Pokemon games to ever get an E10+ rating in the US, assuming if content isn't edited heavily for non-Japanese versions.

 

[Xander Olivieri]

Serebii posted an image of a steel book collectors edition with a PEGI rating of 7 on the book. Is that the ESRB equivalent to E rating?

 

[Z25]

Serebii posted an image of a steel book collectors edition with a PEGI rating of 7 on the book. Is that the ESRB equivalent to E rating?

I don't know. I'll check into it and see if I can find it. I think that pegi 7 can be translated to different ratings across other countries though.

 

[WingsofBliss]

Serebii posted an image of a steel book collectors edition with a PEGI rating of 7 on the book. Is that the ESRB equivalent to E rating?

It seems to be equivelant to an E and/or E10+, according to this guide here:

https://www.pegi.info/en/index/id/33/