As the evolved form of one of Pokémon Ruby and Sapphire's starter Pokémon, Blaziken has become one of the most well known creatures since the franchise's creation. Apparently, however, long-time Pokémon artist Ken Sugimori designed Blaziken specifically to push the envelope and test whether audiences would accept a more humanoid looking Pokémon.
According to YouTube channel Did You Know Gaming, Blaziken was the very first Pokémon designed for Ruby and Sapphire's Hoenn region, with Sugimori using its design as a test for players to see whether they would keep it in their party or simply shove it in a PC box. In a translated interview with Sugimori from a 2003 issue of 'Nintendo Dream' magazine, he states:
"I thought about how wide the variety of Pokémon could be and wanted to push the envelope of what would be accepted. So the first one I made was Blaziken. I wondered if people would go for such a humanoid Pokémon, I was intentionally testing the waters. Over the years we've developed an image of what a Pokémon looks like, but this time we decided to push those boundaries and weaken the idea of what can't be a Pokémon. Ruby and Sapphire was [about] taking on new inspirations for Pokémon unlike anything we used before."
Did You Know Gaming goes on to say that Torchic's design was finalised after Blaziken's and was actually based on the phenomenon of 'painted chicks', which were sold frequently to children much in the same way that a goldfish would be. Apparently, once the painted chick grows up and either loses its coloured plumage or its natural cute looks, children would grow bored and throw them out (pretty horrid notion, if you ask us).
Sugimori states that this mentality towards painted chicks is what inspired Torchic and Blaziken, in that Torchic "starts out cute then grows into something fierce and hard to look at". In a sense, he was looking to potential replicate the feeling that an owner of a painted chick would feel once it grows up and is no longer deemed cute.
So the question is, did you keep Blaziken in your Pokémon party, or did you ditch it in a PC box for the rest of time? Based on Sugimori's commentary on the matter, we imagine a few of you might be feeling an overwhelming sense of shame right about now...
[source youtube.com]
Comments 54
Personally I quite like all the fire-fighting fully evolved pokemon, even Emboar.
I think Blaziken is cool. I think I picked Mudkip at the time but I actually think Blaziken is the best looking of the Torchic line. So no if I did pick Torchic I would not have put it in the PC box.
Litten, or rather, Incineroar, on the other hand....
They expected people to ditch Blaziken out of disappointment once it evolved, but somehow out of the three starters in that generation, it's the coolest/least ugly final evolution.
I always go grass type so I couldn't say. I think there is probably a degree of this to all started pokemom though, not like any of them retain the same cuteness of their starter form as they evolve.
First sentence after quote has typo and says Torch’s instead of Torchic’s.
I mean Gen 1 had a Pokemon that was basically just a grey dude in underwear, I don't really think Blaziken is that boundary pushing.
I didn't play those games, but I am sure I would have kept the Pokemon in my team. At least until I beat the game. It looks really cool like a superhero Pokemon. Keeping my starter Pokemon is something, that I almost always do, except for Legends Arceus.
To be honest I prefer it, if a Pokemon keeps the feel of an innocent animal. It is weird, when they start to talk. If it is just the looks I can live with that.
Blaziken probably won't be winning any cuteness contests, but I love the awkward ol' kick chicken. It's got a cool factor that is kind of underappreciated.
I mean, it worked on me. When I saw Blaziken for the very first time, I absolutely despised it. However, as the years have gone on, it's probably one of my favourite Fire starters we've ever gotten from both a design and competitive standpoint (Speed Boost is busted and it's only when you give it to the offensive juggernaut that people start to realise). I still prefer the other two from Hoenn's lineup but Blaziken's pretty awesome for the PC Box fodder
It's my second favorite Pokemon after Flygon
Blaziken is my favorite Pokémon and my team leader since Alpha Sapphire.
They didn’t make any good starter final evolutions between Gold/Silver and Black/White.
One of my least favorite Pokemon. The bizarre design being on purpose makes me feel a tad silly, but doesn't change my opinion. On top of that, I HATE chickens (thank you, Chicken from when I was 5), and I hate Fire/Fighting types. I am sick to the back teeth of them and hope we never see one again. Even the sneaky ones like Incineroar. Mumbles Fire/Dark my ass...
Never used it back then and I won't use it now. I just don't like Blaziken that much.
So we have Blaziken to blame for the "anthropomorphism" of starter Pokemon. While Blaziken itself is not a bad design, I do feel it has weakened the potential of latter Gen starter Pokemon. Gen 7 & 8 were especially egregious in this regard.
One of the best designed Pokémon in one of the best designed gen.
I've never ever had an issue with inanimate object-mons and humanoid-mons though.
Love all of em, Blaziken prob in top 50 for me.
If they wanted to see players throwing it in a box they shouldn't have made it so dang useful. I couldn't care less what it looked like when I got a fire/fighting sweeper.
I mean, I didn't like Blaziken's design at first, but it became "cool" to a lot of players due to how strong it is.
Also, every starter from the very first gen till the last one starts cute and ends monstrous. Bulbasaur is my favorite, but look at Venusaur and tell me Blaziken was the first ugly last stage evolution
@Axecon this was the EXACT thought I had reading the quote.
Now we havv be e things like Tsareena and Lopunny that I find truly disturbing.
Loads of happy memories associated with Gen 3 for myself. I remember when Combusken evolved into Blaziken and was just stunned at how awesome they looked. That happened pretty consistently in my first couple of playthroughs, being blown away by a cool new Pokemon and hearing their weird, often creepy cry for the first time. I still play the games but it's not quite the same as it was back then since spoilers are so hard to avoid...
@PuppyToucher Also under that in the same paragraph, “much in the same *way that a goldfish would be” @Olliemar28
That would explain a lot, considering Blaziken was used in the Johto league in the anime. It was definitely a good hook back then to get me excited for Ruby and Sapphire.
Interesting considering I never liked the design of Blaziken. Like, I freaking love Swampert and Sceptile but Blaziken always dragged down the overall quality of the Gen 3 starters for me
This hurts my feelings. Blaziken is one of my all-time favorites. I remember getting an issue of Nintendo Power with a poster of the whole Hoenn Dex and deciding I wanted the game just by how cool some of the new designs were.
It's kind of weird how Blaziken has such a polarized reception. I honestly didn't have any real emotion from him, there are weirder ones out there and Fire/Fighting combo wasn't all that overdone til later.
I remember when it was first revealed...yeah, I definitely thought it was ugly. There was a lot of sentiment around the time that Pokemon had started looking like Digimon.
But it grew on me when I finally played the game. It helps that Blaziken is quite the badass and is far and away the best fire type in Hoenn.
Still not a fan of the overly humanoid designs of the last few gens though.
There are other Pokemon that really crossed the Border of what is acceptable.
Gen 3 had many Pokemon that i just don't like, was hard to play through.
Can we talk about how much rounder the design of Pokémon got in the latter generations? With a few exceptions, most Pokémon lack the sharpness and aggressive design like Scyther for example. Everything feels way safer, friendlier, rounder and easier to make into plushies.
Gen 3 probably has my favorite final forms of the 3 starters.
Although I went with Mudkip/Swampert (yes, I liek Mudkipz), the Gen 3 starters and their evolutions are among my favorites.
Lol, he was afraid people weren't going to like humanoid pokemon? Guess he never heard of "furries" before.
@Eel Wrong. Sceptile is cooler.
@Pat_trick Yeah, I don't see it. People act like Pokémon nowadays are overdesigned, but now they're rounder and easier to make into plushies?
Are you kidding me? Blaziken is and forever will be my favorite Pokémon
I actually think he looks pretty good.
I'd consider Sceptile to be just as humanoid, so it's quite odd for them to go from hesitant to confident enough to have 2 humanoid starters. Either way, they're both awesome designs.
@Dinglehopper Furries weren't really rampantly common until later. Looking at some Pokémon, I can see why they became common.
I remember not liking it at all. It is such an odd transition from Combusken. Never liked it very much and was very confused when it got a resurgence in popularity after ORAS.
@Lanmanna Legendaries are overdesigned. The ones in the new game are hot mess and it's hard to even understand what they are, like Digimon.
I think most Pokémon nowadays are actually underdesigned. But they've done over 900 of them. At a certain point it's hard to come up with new ideas.
✅️Torchic was my Hoenn Starter so Blaziken stayed with me and helped me beat the Elite Four.
However, after using each of the Hoenn Starters, I much prefer Swampert.
I remember having mixed feelings about Blaziken, but the design grew on me one time I decided to break away from always using Water starters. As I understand it paved the way for fan favorites like Lucario or Cinderace.
Firstly the painted chicks thing is awful.
Secondly I always found Blaziken too humanoid, it went in the box.
Thirdly does Sugimori not count Mr Mime as a humanoid?
And finally, no more humanoid starters PLEASE!
I always liked it. Usually I take a Fire Starter, so I remember Blaziken very well. I think it was part of my end-game team. I rarely kick out my starter Pokémon
And then they released a literal trash bag.
I loved Blaziken, BUT there are too many humanoid starters.
This guy is full of crap. Machop, Machoke, Machamp, Hitmonlee, Hitmonchan, and Mewtwo are six off the top of my head from Gen one that are humanoid designed. Get out of here with this lol.
@Vegeta937 I think the implication was that they were talking about a humanoid starter Pokémon specifically.
Blaziken is basically the Captain Falcon of the Pokémon Kingdom, is a really cool Pokémon to have.
Remember when Pokken was released on the Switch and one of the angry amazon review comments was someone talking about Blaziken's crotch?
@Takosuke This is why I will do my darnedest to stay as spoiler-free with Scarlet/Violet as possible!! I really want to recreate the magic of discovery. Without trying to, I was able to go into Super Mario Odyssey relatively blind, and was blown away by everything I discovered for the first time while playing. It felt just like the magic of old times, and that's when I realized that the key is somehow to manage to go into a game blind despite today's age of constant media exposure.
I chose Torchick as my starter each time I played Ruby/ Sapphire (even the remakes) and each time I get to the end of the game Blaziken is the FIRST Pokémon I send out (even in Emerald all these years later). I'm still searching for a Blaziken plushie to put next to my Pikachu.
Are you kidding? Blaziken was my most powerful Pokemon back when i first played Emerald (ironically on a hacked PSP) and i've always absolutely loved the creature. It just looks so cool with the whole 'fire martial artist superhero' vibe. Torchic was really cute but Combusken was like the awkward teen phase, then puberty hits it like a truck, now it looks like it came straight out of Street Fighter.
P.S. Mega Blaziken took everything cool about the original and dialed it to 11.
Who the heck stuffs their starter in a box?
@EarthboundBenjy I see. Still, one could argue Charizard easily....
@Lizuka ?
@Daniel36 You're talking Trubbish, there.
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