Pokken Devs Wanted Pokemon to Look "Really Realistic"

You may have noticed the Pokemon creatures in upcoming fighting game Pokken Tournament have a more "realistic" look rather than stylized. This was an intentional design decision from co-developer Bandai Namco and one that producer Masaaki Hoshino says he had to push for.

"With this game, one of the things I really wanted to do was represent the Pokemon in a really realistic style," Hoshino, who also worked on the SoulCalibur series, told Kotaku. “A graphical representation that's really realistic. I had to really convince the staff working on the game, as well The Pokemon Company, to go in this direction."

Pokken Tournament goes in a different direction than the mainline games. As GameSpot editor Peter Brown outlines in the video above, you don't capture and raise Pokemon in the traditional sense. Instead, you become characters like Pikachu and Lucario, duking it out for supremacy.

Head to Kotaku to get the full story.

Pokken Tournament launches for Wii U on March 18. It is possible that it will be one of the games that Nintendo discusses tomorrow during its Nintendo Direct event.

In other news, Nintendo has explained why the game is unlikely to come to 3DS.