Your honest opinnion.

[Koopaul]

Okay this is awfully rotten of me to do. But I'm bringing up another discussion from another forums to you guys. You are pretty keen on legal issues with Nintendo and things that are likely to happen.

So here's this discussion I'm on:

www.spriters-resource.com/community/showthread.php?tid=11814

So apparently Pokemon International is hiring someone for game producing. They need PC and web based game experience.

Now everyone on the forums is assuming that its a Pokemon MMO for the PC. But I doubt it.

When it comes to big time Pokemon games (something like an MMO) I doubt Nintendo would let them put it on the PC.

Right? Nintendo would probably oversee this project and make sure its on a Nintendo system correct? That's why I believe its something minor. Not a real game major game. Perhaps an interactive thing for their website. Makes sense right?

What do you think? Asking the experts here...

[Dances in Undergarments]

There is no way whatsoever that Nintendo would allow anyone to put a proper Pokemon game on the PC. However, there was a bit of Pokemon PC software back in the day. It could just be that, if not something web based like you said.

...this is all if its even a legit call from the Pokemon company at all. Which is a pretty big if.

[Fryguy64]

The fact they're hiring in English for someone with PC game experience leads me to believe they are simply after someone to write Flash games or something similar.

Nintendo could very well license Pokemon for a PC game, but it's unlikely to happen. But not impossible. As DiU said - there has actually been Pokemon software released for the PC, but it wasn't a proper game in the series.

A Pokemon MMO wouldn't be on the PC. Simple as that.

[Shrikeswind]

Especially not now, when the Wii has Internet access. I'd guess this isn't an actual, in-series game, and it could very well be that this is nothing more than a fan-game that TSR has people working on, so they wanted it to look bigger than it is. It's pretty likely, actually. They do have a pretty massive stick up their collective ass over there (individually, of course, is a different story, that all depends on the individual.)

[Deleted]

Spelled "opinion" wrong.

I suppose if there were to be an official Pokemon MMO, the PC would be the only way to go. Nintendo's internet-paranoia is too massive to allow something as free-form as an muhmorpeger. Can you imagine if World of Warcraft required you to enter a twelve-to-sixteen-digit friend code for every person you wanted to raid with? Now, I'm no WoW aficionado, but I know through friends that raiding parties average out at about five people per party. So imagine that: sixteen-digit friend codes for four other people, all while being forced to use the Wiimote to type rather than an actual keypad - and then imagine having to do it more when your raid party starts hitting double-digits. Since your only other option would be to play with anonymous people you could never get in touch with again, a la Brawl's "Brawl with anyone" option, the entire concept of an MMO on the Wii is self-defeating.

And it's not like Nintendo would give the green-light for a Pokemon MMO on the PS3 or the XBox.

So I, too, fall into the "not likely going to happen" camp.

[Johans Nidorino]

Maybe the Wii Speak would help implementing a MMORPG on the Wii. Though there don't seem to be plans for such type of game currently, according to an interview with Masuda last year.

Now about the issue of the addition of friends, I guess it could be done by friend codes, and another method could be by network proximity (friends of added friends, like in social networks).

[Deleted]

Which is still incredibly inconvenient, though, don't you think? That's a very limited social network, leaving you to "hunt and peck" for these friends-of-friends to see if any of them are any good and can help you with whatever it is you need to get done. I mean, yeah, even without limitations like that, finding good party members is a crapshoot, but at least your choices aren't so limited.

[Fryguy64]

Knowing Nintendo, a Pokemon MMO that kept the core RPG mechanics of the main series games wouldn't allow you to team up with more than one other person anyway. The mechanics of 2x2 battles are already crazy when compared to 1x1 battles, providing a whole slew of alternative strategies. Can you imagine a 6x6 or 10x10 battle? It'd be chaos!

And so long as you only teamed up with one other person at a time, that's only one friend code you need to remember.

[8bitretroshit]

Yeah, the mechanics of the main games are too different to turn it into your average dungeon explorin' MMO and I don't know why people want one so badly. (Tho the idea of 20 people having 10 hour raids to get that special, special berry is amusing to me)

Every PKMN MMO idea I've read was either pretty lame or really really stupid.

[Johans Nidorino]

I think if this ever happens, controlling Pokémon instead of Trainers could be a way. They've been toying with that model since Mystery Dungeon 1. Pokémon Rumble is already a multiplayer game with real-time battles, conserving type match-ups and move effects.

A MMO could even be a sequel of such games.

Yes, it would be interesting if you played as a Trainer like in the main games, but I figure playing as Pokémon would make battles quicker.

[Koopaul]

Well glad I'm not alone on this.

But yeah I think some key things would have to be retooled in order to make an MMO to work. Then again remember Gold and Silver how you were blocked by two trainers battling?

[Da Robot]

It's most likely not an MMO/large scale project due to the fact that their hiring only one person. (Unless they have other with them already will PC/web game skills).

I think the most obvious idea may be some sort of small Pokemon social game/app for social networking sites like Facebook.

[BM]

I'm going to go with pretty much everyone else here and say its probably not going to happen. I don't see any reason why Nintendo would give permission for a game on the PC

[Shrikeswind]

I notice a key bit of trouble: Not all MMOs have excessive raid-encouragement. I'll give an example: In RuneScape, you can only perform an actual raid in P2P, and even then you have, what, a handful of raid areas? I can think of 5 off the top of my head, and I'm pretty sure that's it, the King Black Dragon, the Kalphite Queen, the Chaos Elemental, the TzHaar Fight Pits, and the God Wars Dungeon. All but two are in an unsafe areas as it stands (2 in the Wilderness, 1 in the Kharidian Desert,) and one requires being at a particularly high level in a certain stat just to access. And the last one? Costs a specialty money to access, if I remember correctly. All of the paths to the boss are long and crawling with high-level monsters, and many times, you're actually safest with a two-person crew actually fighting the boss. Raids are hard as it stands, but RuneScape goes out of its way to make them high-level affairs. You'll NEVER see a Leeroy Jenkins in RuneScape, because even a top-level fighter can't take on even the stronger generics without some serious health-sapping. If you had a level 70 raiding crew on the Kalphite Queen they'd likely be thinned out to two or three with enough supplies to continue just at the end of the Soldier Area, not even taking into consideration the level-180 generics past them. By the time the "party" got to the level-333 Queen, it'd likely be the one level-80 to survive, and he'd STILL not have the supplies to cut through her first form.

Basically, what I'm saying is that a Pokémon MMO would be possible on the Wii even with trainers and even if you could team with the other guys simply because it'd be possible to discourage organized raids without much trouble, provided a method of easy communication were enabled. And since the entire series focuses on capturing wounded, not unconcious, creatures, raids would likely have more to do with villain teams anyways. I mean, picture how hard it'd be to determine who gets the Gyarados while it's still a threat, especially if your Pokémon are still attacking.

And in a Pokémon-played game, ooh boy. You'd have so many options on which Pokémon to be, for example, just in Kanto's Water-type listings, you could go with Squirtle and end up a defensive impure, Magikarp and have to suffer tough training for beastly offensive melee, Psyduck for offensive ranging, Krabby for defensive melee, list goes on. And that's just with Water in Kanto! I'm not even expanding into other types and regions! You'd be stuck with either whining about being unable to play as your favorite or having altogether too many choices.

In conclusion, a real Pokémon MMO is technically possible, but just not plausible even in this generation. Nintendo might get one up on the PC, but development would have been started in Japan and the only use the other guys would have would be in translation. If this is an English-speaking recruiter, it's seriously unlikely to be real unless it's for translators.