The citizens of Pokémon’s various cities and towns love to say the word “Pokémon.” Armed only with mathematics and an urgent desire to answer a ridiculous question, I embarked on a quest to figure out what percentage of Pokémon’s residents do not talk about Pokémon.
I present my findings in this video, “A Conversationalist’s Guide To Pokémon.”
When not repeating the word “Pokémon,” Pokémon’s in-game people discuss Poké Marts and Pokéballs. They reference the names of specific Pocket Monsters. They share tips for accumulating Gym Badges or defeating trainers. As I entered this experiment I hypothesised that almost no one in a Pokémon game talks about anything outside of the video game experience.
Coincidentally, Jason Schreier mentioned this very topic in a post on Kotaku five years ago.
I applied a five-point rating scale to 174 conversations I had as I strolled through a large portion of Pokémon Let’s Go Pikachu’s map. A person using the word “Pokémon” in a sentence earned one star. A person discussing the weather, or touching upon any topic that sketches some facsimile of a real living world, earned five stars.
What criteria defined the other three ratings? What revelations resulted from the extensive calculations? Please watch the video to find out.
As a side note: this past weekend, legendary card magician and entertainment historian Ricky Jay passed away at the age of 72. No other public speaker has had as much of an influence on my affinity for flowery spoken word delivery. Though his influence certainly towers over all of my videos, for this video I attempted my most earnest attempt at imitating his tone. Rest in peace, Ricky.
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