Pokémon fans in the US may have several hours of 2025 left, but 2026 has already arrived in Japan and the official Pokémon account started the new year with a teaser for the franchise’s 30th anniversary! The first games, Pokémon Red and Pokémon Green, were first released on February 27, 1996, in Japan and there are sure to be celebrations throughout the year to commemorate three decades of Pokémon games, media and merchandise.
Joe Merrick of Serebii compiled the different versions of Pikachu seen in the video into a collage which we’ve included below.
It’s fun to see the different appearances of Pikachu throughout the game generations — personally, I definitely miss the original, more rotund design that was used when the games were first released.
I hope we get a lot of homage to early Pokémon artwork and designs as part of the 30th anniversary celebrations. Uniqlo recently announced new clothing featuring some of the early Ken Sugimori artwork of Generation I Pokémon.
Let us know if you have any particular hopes for the 30th anniversary or share your favorite Pikachu from the collage above! Don’t forget to join our Pokémon forums and Discord server as well!
