Pokemon Fans Reveal The Weird Origin Of Their Names

Pokemon Fans Reveal The Weird Origin Of Their Names
Images: The Pokemon Company

Written by 

Joseph Kime

Published 

3rd Jan 2022 15:14

Pokemon is, on paper, a pretty bizarre game series, and its litany of creatures are a brilliant example of this. But, just where do those seemingly random names come from? Turns out, it's real life. 

Though the first 151 beasties that the Pokemon series had to offer are incredibly creative, the franchise has taken quite the peculiar turn with a movement from twists on traditional creatures to granting sentience to cogs, ice cream cones, and even keyrings.

It's not just the genetic makeup of 'Mon that makes them so strange - because it seems like they've got some weird naming conventions too.

Reddit Post Exposes Weird Pokemon Names

Sawsbuck Pokemon
Click to enlarge
The Pokemon Company

One post on Reddit has accumulated comments from fans of the Pokemon franchise, explaining the names of Pokemon that we never realised had actual thought and reason behind them.

The thread points out that Elgyem and Beheeyem, the peculiar alien-looking Pokemon, are named as such because they sound like "LGM" and "BEM" respectively - both meaning "little green man" and "bug-eyed man", both descriptors for fictional aliens.

It also turns out that Deino, Zweilous and Hydreigon's names all correspond with the number of heads they have - with eins, zwei, and drei being one, two, and three in German. This is similar to the naming convention of Articuno, Zapdos, and Moltres counting upwards in Spanish.

Another added, "Sawsbuck - the first 4 letters of their name is an acronym for the seasons of the year: Summer, Autumn, Winter, and Spring." A final fan concluded, "Sudowoodo is Pseudo Wood, it looks like a tree, but is a rock type." Another Pokemon fan has been able to prove just how unusual the game's creatures are.

Pokemon Fan Creates AI Pokemon

As further proof that Pokemon designs are so incredibly out-there, one fan of the series has created an AI that develops its own Pokemon, and they all look eerily accurate to the real thing. 

Max Woolf on Twitter has shared images of Pokemon that we'd believe were completely real additions to the franchise if it weren't specified that they were invented by an AI that has looked at every single design in the franchise's history.

It's clear that the designs and names of the Pokemon we know and love are incredibly strange, but really, we wouldn't have them any other way. We can complain about how odd Klefki is, but how much weirder are they from Camerupt... a lava camel?

The games are completely bonkers, and gamers clearly know it. Chances are, though, with the constant progression of the series, it's only going to get weirder from here. To be honest, we're alright with that.

 


Joseph Kime
About the author
Joseph Kime
Joseph Kime is the Senior Trending News Journalist for GGRecon from Devon, UK. Before graduating from MarJon University with a degree in Journalism, he started writing music reviews for his own website before writing for the likes of FANDOM, Zavvi and The Digital Fix. He is host of the Big Screen Book Club podcast, and author of Building A Universe, a book that chronicles the history of superhero movies. His favourite games include DOOM (2016), Celeste and Pokemon Emerald.
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