What was Game Freak’s first published video game?

Game Freak’s first published video game was Quinty.

Quinty was an arcade-style puzzle game developed by the early Game Freak team and published by Namco in 1989. The project helped transform Game Freak from a video-game magazine into a development company.

Satoshi Tajiri and Ken Sugimori had originally worked together on the Game Freak fanzine. As the group expanded, they began making games of their own. Quinty was completed after Junichi Masuda joined the team and contributed the music.

Quinty is sometimes overlooked because Pokémon became Game Freak’s defining success several years later. The studio’s earlier work also included games for other publishers and Nintendo projects. Pokémon’s first games were not Game Freak’s first development effort; they were the project that turned the company into a global name.