Pokémon 2000 Adventure, the tie-in game for the film of the same name, is now playable after being hit with a cease-and-desist from Nintendo more than two decades ago.
The news emerged from the latest episode of Did You Know Gaming which covered every cancelled Pokémon game over the course of the series’ history. Pokémon 2000 Adventure is playable here through the Internet Archive thanks to the assistance of Eddie Ruminski, the Did You Know Gaming team and users rufus10 and DoomTay.
From developer Cyberworld International Corporation, Pokémon 2000 Adventure used its proprietary technology to display 2.5D environments in a specialised browser. The player selects their name, their Pokémon team and the difficulty.
Then, they set off on a journey to travel to three islands that are home to Articuno, Moltres and Zapdos to retrieve an Ancient Sphere from each of the locations. The reward is unlocked as long as the player answers a set of trivia questions correctly.
Nintendo originally approved Cyberworld’s pitch as it thought it would be simple compared to Pokémon Snap and Pokémon Stadium, which had launched one year prior. The realisation that Pokémon 2000 Adventure was more complex caused the company to “freak”, said Ruminski.
“They immediately hit us with a cease and desist,” he recalled in the Did You Know Gaming episode, having been a programmer on the game. “It was the greatest compliment. Via cease and desist, saying, ‘Sorry, what you made was too much like a good video game.’”
Previously, it was thought that Pokémon 2000 Adventure would not work any longer owing to the large leaps in technology since its launch. Technical director Neil Marshall theorised that it “wouldn’t run past a specific date (or it was tied to an old version of Internet Explorer and wouldn’t work anymore)”.
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