Nintendo announced the next (and 6th) generation of Pokemon games yesterday. Pokemon X and Y comes in October for the Nintendo 3DS system, a first in the main series. X and Y continues the success of the multibillion dollar franchise that began as a low-budget sleeper hit in 1996 on the original Game Boy. However, possibly the biggest feature is not the 3D, but the fact that for the first time, a Pokemon main series game is being released worldwide on the same day. Why is this so significant? The games usually are released in Japan almost 6 months before they hit North America or Europe. With international wireless trading and battling being the norm in today’s Pokemon game, it created an unfair advantage for Japanese gamers, as they had far more powerful Pokemon to trade and battle with before anybody else had a chance. Now, for the first time, people all over the world are going to be trading and battling each other on equal ground from day one.

Based on the footage from the trailer below (you may have to scroll down a bit, HTML is causing us problems and our web team is working on it), Pokemon is receiving its most significant overhaul ever. The perspective is different, the battles are more epic. The gameplay looks amazing. I am very excited, and if you do not have a Nintendo 3DS, this game may be your reason to buy one.