Subject: Porygon.
Author:
Posted on: 2014-01-29 09:16:00 UTC

Porygon is a Pokemon made out of computer code. In other words, in the Pokemon world, if you can program a computer, you can make a Pokemon - or a hundred of them, if you want. And then you can let them loose in the ecosystem.

In a world where that is possible, programming is a serious, viable, and easy terrorist weapon. Given the profusion of terrorist groups floating around, it makes perfect sense that it would also be a restricted technology.

And, based on the games, it seems to be. Every region has its own communications-and-information device - but they are all wildly different. There's no way the Pokétch and the PokéNav are both running, say, Java. Looking at just the Pokétch, the picture we're given is of one man coding the programs for it - and, given how frankly rubbish they are, he takes an inordinate amount of time to do so.

My theory is that he's having to program directly in machine code - there are no higher level programming languages in Pokeworld. If there were, digital Pokemon would be creatable on your home PC - no one would go hunting for them, because they could just custom-build their own.

... which leads to one conclusion: if the Pokemon universe ever gets an internet, that internet would very swiftly give birth to a varied race of digital Pokemon.

Or, as we know them, Digimon.

hS

Reply Return to messages