RUMOR: Final Starter Evolutions Leaked?

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We CANNOT confirm these images and we also encourage readers to assume things are fake until proven otherwise but I’m sharing these because it is reminiscent of the anime leaks which occurred in Gen V, but then again it also looks like fan art.

There are no names listed for the Pokémon (just Owl 3, Tiger 3, …) but there are some details about each (including color palette):

Rowlet  evolution:

  • Stores arrows in its wings (orange tips), uses the vines from its bow as the string
  • “Hood” closes around its face when it is unhappy

Litten evolution:

  • New attack or fighting style “tiger swing”
  • Fire attacks come from belt

Popplio evolution:

  • Attack seems to be listed but too hard to read

You be the judge:

image

Thanks Crystal Creatures for the heads up.

<3 PJ

ps- this was Noivern’s reference art for the anime in Gen V for comparison

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405 thoughts on “RUMOR: Final Starter Evolutions Leaked?”

  2. If those are real then I’m not using any of them. Wasn’t gonna pick Rowlet or Popplio anyway. Litten has so much potential that making it bipedal and fire/fighting is the worst decision ever. I’ll be PISSED. Can someone check if the Japanese used is correct?

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  5. I actually like all of these designs, just not for Pokemon. They all feel a tad too Digimon/Ben 10 for me.
    Rowlet’s has the best design overall. Something about it is just…cool, and the colours for it look like legit for Pokemon
    Litten’s is interesting. It looks…fearsome? It’s very humanoid with is slightly odd but I’m sure it would look more normal in an official style of artwork? (I mean at least have one drawing of it on all 4s)
    Popplio’s grows on me the more I look at it, but I like it the least out of the 3. Something about the colour scheme just puts me off slightly and I really don’t like the tail + the weird pink spines coming out of it

    Who knows whether these are real or not? Gotta wait and find out

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  6. I don’t like them. Because they are too human-like. That was also the problem with Gen 6 final evos(Greninja was fine). These are not what I have in my mind when I think of Pokemon. I mean we have a cute owl with grass features in the beginning, why is it turning into something like human superhero. More animal, less human please.

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      • I agree. What if the ultimate weapon was the inspiration to make Magearna and that’s how Kalos and Alola are linked? (would be fitting to link all 20 years of Pokemon in one game somehow, especially if these cloud legendary Pokemon are also another clue)

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  8. Would be cool if these are true and the final types ended up Grass/Flying, Fire/Fighting and Water/Ice, which seem feasible from the pictures.

    That way there would be a reverse type match-up! Grass starter could beat Fire with its flying moves, Fire starter could be water with its fighting moves, and the Water starter would gain 4x effectiveness against Grass with its ice moves!

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  9. Oh wow, these actually look incredibly legit.

    I’m absolutely in love with Rowlett’s amazing Robin-Hood esque evo (though the fact it’s not gone the ground type route saddens me)… All those little bells and whistles added just melt in perfectly into the excellent overall design. It gets five stars from me.

    The others are horrendous though. Their design is well thought out in a GF-esque fashion, but they’d have to grow on me.

    I’m not a big fan of feminine designs in general, and in this case I feel this is especially uncalled for. turning the cute but silly-looking circusy Popplio into an elegant poodle-like mermaid just removes all the clumsy, clowny charm of the original. And it’s not a direction I agree enough with to justify losing any additional capitalisation on it being an otary.

    As for Litten, though I can accept it’s pokémon-like enough it looks like it could belong in any kid’s cartoon, and that’s not usually a good sign. I also can’t fathom why, if it’s real, they’d go for the absolutely overdone and uninteresting bipedal fire/fighting route. At this point it invariably has less flavour than a quadrupedal alternative, instead just making a, hunky, bipedal, generic bore of a poseable action hero. HOW IS THIS BIPDEAL FURBAIT IN ANY WAY BETTER THAN A QUADRUPEDAL BEAST!!!! WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU GAME FREAK???
    What has basically become a noxious design fetish (or general pattern, depending on point of view haha) really needs to stop. Someone needs to tell them this is not the way to go.

    So overall I’m completely torn between my undying love for this Rowlett evo, and how much the two others are a waste of an evolution line to my eyes.

    I’m gonna go team neutral, leaning on fake until proven otherwise because apart from the undeniable quality of these fakes, no concrete evidence backs them up. There’s also that type business on the official site which could be random error but I think has some merit, at least as much if not more than this.
    Only time will tell.

    A big part of me hopes these, and any further leaks we get, are just fakes though, because I’m sick of being spoiled way too much. I want us to have a lot to discover when the games come out.

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  10. Ok, here are my 2 cents. I have to say, if these are real, and I’m gonna get a lot of flack for this, they look really solid.
    If Rowlet’s final evolution is this, and its Grass/Ground type, I can’t complain too much, I just wished they kept it Grass/Flying tbh. Design I LOVE IT. As an archer myself, I love the whole robin hood motif it’s getting, and it seems that if true, GameFreak is bringing back the classic RPG classes with Rowlet being the Archer class. I sure hope it get’s a signature Grass attack dedicated to arrows, but that would put the icing on the cake for me.
    Now, I know, Fire/Fighting is over used, but tbh I like it. I tend to use Fighting types and Fire types on most of my teams, so having a 2 in 1 is nice. And if this is Litten’s final evolution, let me just say, WOW I like it. It’s seems to be a very funny Pokemon in the likes of Pangoro, and can dish out some serious damage. I see it as a brute in an RPG so that would be nice, and the best of all, it looks like my favorite alien from Ben 10, Rath the Tiger, HOLY I’m gonna have fun with him, I know it!
    Poppplio’s final evo seems to be pure water type, and takes inspirations from a Pop Idol. With the rising popularity of Pop star Idols (Come on now, we all know things like Love Live! or Idolmasters are getting a LOT of popularity, especially with Tokyo Mirage Sessions #FE based on it) I see this as a big possibility why GameFreak would go that route. And to be frank, I hope its more so a special tank with special attack to boot (like Milotic), as maybe GameFreak intended it to be a healer of the team of sorts. However its design seems to be one sided for gender, kinda like how Chickorita’s line was to me. But is does bring me hope that MAYBE we will have gender differences in our starters for once! Too add just kinda wished it was part fairy as moves like Dazzling Gleam would make sense on it. Hopefully it’ll have a epic signature move to boost it self too!
    In all, it not sure to be real or fake, but if real, I like them, and I hope y’all don’t mind this text wall. Cheers!

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  11. I have to say these all look very very well made
    Honestly anyone of these beasties would make a formidable ally

    Bowinowl’s sleek forest Hunter vibe graceful swooping tree to tree without a single ounce of sound uttered

    Heatigre’s macho and intimidating presence strikes fear and guarantees all contenders are in for a superheated smack down

    Zaluring’s bewitching beauty and grace can transform a torrential battle into a aquatic spectacle

    And I got to get this off my chest, the moment I say Popplio’s it immediately reminded of that Chubby Mermaid animation that has like 34M views

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  14. The problem with Popplio’s is that this looks too feminine while the starters are probably goint to be 75% male like the other generations. Thats my reason for thinking this is fake

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      • Braixen and Delphox honestly aren’t that feminine looking though. I can still imagine them being male and not feel awkward but with with this Popplios evolution art it just feels really awkward to imagine this as male.

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        • Still works as either if you ask me, it’s not really much harder to imagine than a male Gardevoir or Gothitelle. Or, y’know, the Litten evo as a female. Sure it’s more likely to be male, but still. And who knows, maybe they’ll even have some dimorphism, like a male one might not have the long eyelashes for example.

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  15. Absolutely love these, gonna say 99% real, and if not, probably the best fakes I’ve ever seen. Sure having another bipedal Fire/Fighting starter is a bit disappointing but it’s still a really good design.

    Also, something I haven’t seen anyone point out: Assuming these ARE real, they seem to also leak Ash’s new traveling companion. Doesn’t look like any of the characters we know so far, so she might be a new gym leader, maybe?

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      • It’s in the Litten evo picture, Ash and a girl with a flower in her hair is sitting next to the sleeping one, heating a kettle on its belt

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          • Probably. Of course they might have more traveling companions that aren’t seen in this picture though, so maybe a third person could get one. But either way it seems all three starters will be part of the group at least.

  19. Interesting. Don’t much care for the Fire starter who will be the starter for my main game but I actually want them to be real because I do like the other two very much.

    On the fence though as to whether or not they are.

    They seem very Pokémon in general to me, and even seem to continue the theme of being based on classes/jobs in fantasy RPGs that Gen 6 had being ranger, berserker, and maybe bard (mermaid = siren = sang to draw people to their deaths = bard?).

    The last point could be a point against them though as it could just be a fan hoping they continue that trend of the starters being akin to RPG classes/jobs in their final evolutions.

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    • Tying them to RPG classes seems like a stretch if you ask me. Rowlet’s evo, sure, but not the other two. They’re just a wrestler and a mermaid.

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  21. Okay on the one hand, another Fire/Fighting possibility has me terrified, but the Heel angle really makes me hope it’s just Fire/Dark with a ton of Fighting moves (A sort of inverse Toxicroak, a Fighting type with a ton of Dark moves)

    On the other hand, IT’S TIGER MASK.

    Rowlbin Hood is curious but it does possible include the ‘ancient’ aspect of grass starters, since it’s got crude ‘hand wings’ with it’s feathers, and it has the general build of Ornimegalonyx, a prehistoric owl who was notably long legged. I can safely say it would enforce Rowlett as my pick, barring another Grass type to tempt me away, since it is legit awesome and archers are the best.

    The Little Popplio…I think sub-type will decide exactly how much I like it, the possibility of Water/Psychic and Water/Fairy interests me, and it’s a unique design, and way to bring ‘mermaids’ moreso into Pokemon.

    As for whether they’re real or not and how I feel on that…the creative new angles for the starters (Mermaid for Popplio? Wrestler for Litten? Archer for Rowlett? Who could guess those?) and especially having the balls to even IMPLY with an attempt at seriousness that Litten becomes something that looks like a Fighting type makes me fall into my suspicions of the Black/White starter leaks, that it’s too hard to believe them, so they probably are legit.

    However I’m not going to jump the gun, that’s a good way to get shot. If these are legit, awesome (please still be Fire/Dark in that situation Litten plllleeeeaaassseee), if not, then kudos to the faker, this is some really creative work and very cool ideas.

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  22. Well, I always thought that Solgaleo looked like something from an 80s kids TV show, and if Litten ends up turning into that thing, Pokemon is basically going to become Thundercats.

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  24. Difference in quality and these “leaks” have written text instead of typed text. Not to mention they’re way too crowded. This not good design for a reference sheet.

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  25. Def fake. Good impressions, but I doubt game freak would make a fire/fighting again. The owl is too technical of a Pokemon especially for a starter in that last form. And the final water type looks feminine compared to its male first form. No starter Pokemon is a repeat type.

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