A Quick Tip by kaelix

Pokémon is a media franchise published and owned by thevideo game company Nintendo and created by Satoshi Tajiri in 1996. Originally released as a pair of interlinkable Game Boy role-playing video games developed by Game Freak, Pokémon has since become the second most successful and lucrative video game-based media franchise in the world, behind only Nintendo's own Mario series. Pokémon properties have since been merchandisedinto anime, manga, trading cards, toys, books, and other media. The franchise celebrated its tenth anniversary in 2006, and as of 28 May 2010, cumulative sales of the video games (including home console versions, such as the "Pikachu" Nintendo 64) have reached more than 200 million copies.

The name Pokémon is the romanized contraction of the Japanese brand Pocket Monsters (ポケットモンスター PokettoMonsutā^?),^[5] as such contractions are quite common in Japan. The term "Pokémon", in addition to referring to the Pokémon franchise itself, also collectively refers to the 649 fictional species that have made appearances in Pokémon media as of the release of the Pokémon role-playing game (RPG) for theNintendo DS, Pokémon Black and White. Like the words deer and sheep, the word "Pokémon" ...