Prerelease:Pokémon Red and Blue

This page details prerelease information and/or media for Pokémon Red and Blue.

To do: Prerelease screenshots, development information, concept art: http://www.glitterberri.com/pokemon-red-blue/ http://bulbapedia.bulbagarden.net/wiki/Pokémon_Red_and_Green_beta What appear to be genuine images of a few previously unseen cut Pokémon feature briefly in a special manga based on the life of Satoshi Tajiri, and can be seen here along with their Japanese names: https://www.serebii.net/news/2018/17-May-2018.shtml. These also give glimpses of other differences from the same point in development, such as Gastly evolving straight into Gengar. Some Pokémon which made it to the final game have different numbering, and some have differing names/spellings too. The new Pokémon designs seen here are detailed on this Bulbapedia page: https://bulbapedia.bulbagarden.net/wiki/List_of_unused_Pok%C3%A9mon_and_character_designs - also present are prototype versions of the Weedle/Polywag evolution lines and Dragonair, originating from Game Freak's website circa 1997.

Development Timeline

1990

• Development officially begins on the games.

1995

• Dec. 21st - Original anticipated release date, before getting delayed for mostly-unknown reasons.

1996

• Feb. 27th - Pokémon Red and Green is released in Japan.
• Oct. 15th - Pokémon Blue is released in Japan, though only to subscribers of Corocoro Comic. In the same month, the comic runs a preview of the game which shows earlier sprite designs.

1998

• Sep. 28th - Pokémon Red and Blue is released in North America.
• Oct. 23rd - Pokémon Red and Blue is released in Australia.

1999

• Oct. 5th - Pokémon Red and Blue is released in Europe.
• Oct. 10th - Pokémon Red, Green and Blue are re-released in Japan, with some minor bug fixes.

Pokémon Blue

A preview for the Japanese Pokémon Blue was featured in the November 1996 edition of CoroCoro Comic (published in October). Page 22 of the comic shows a few sprites which differ from the final game.

Pokémon	Prerelease	Final
Raticate
Kadabra
Rhydon
Ditto
Porygon
Dragonair
Mewtwo

English Localization

"The (TRAINER TYPE) wants to fight!"

Prerelease	Final
File:PKMN RB U Brock Beta.png

A prototype screenshot of the trainer fight with Brock is present in the official manual, on Pages 7 and 25. The dialogue has a "The" at the start of the text. Another prerelease screenshot had the player encountering Misty, with the text "The MISTY wants to fight."

"(POKéMON) CUT down a bush!"

Prerelease	Final
File:PKMN RB U Cut Beta.png

In a screenshot on Page 31 of the official player's guide for Pokémon Red and Blue, "(POKéMON) CUT down a bush!" is used instead of the usual message "(POKéMON) hacked away with CUT!" when using Cut on a bush. This was changed because Cut can also be used to chop down tall grass, and the same text string is used for both purposes.