Who conceived the Pokémon video game concept?

Satoshi Tajiri conceived the Pokémon video game concept.

Tajiri grew up collecting insects, and that childhood interest helped inspire Pokémon’s central idea: finding, collecting, raising, and trading creatures. He proposed the concept to Nintendo after noticing the Game Boy’s link cable could allow players to exchange game data.

Tajiri founded Game Freak and served as director of the original Pokémon games. Ken Sugimori, one of Game Freak’s earliest collaborators, created much of the franchise’s visual artwork and finalized the designs, but he was not the person who conceived the overall game idea.

The project took years to complete because Game Freak was a small studio and the Game Boy hardware imposed technical limits. Pokémon Red and Green eventually appeared in Japan in 1996, turning Tajiri’s collecting concept into one of the most influential video game franchises in history.