Which do you most wish made it into the game? ☀ Check out Manta Sleep here: tinyurl.com/4puezprv. Don't forget to use the code 'LOCKSTIN' for 10% off your order!
Psychodog. That thing is the MOST Unique out of all of them. The idea of a 'glass-bodied canine with swirling internal energy' is SO cool. Certainly could have been a better choice for dark/psychic. ...I HATE Malamar, ok? Like, damn!
That blue pokemon ar 15 minutes must be a proto Deino remove the tusk turn that helm into fur and have it go down its neck make the spots red Now slap it in a cave Unsee what ive shown you
3:05 The unown actually spells out "Okutani Jun no design nanodayo" as "nanodayo" is a common expressive sentence ending phrase. It overall translates to "This is Okutani Jun's design!" Also it's commonly theorized that's a visualized version of if MissingNo was a Pokemon.
*Really* surprised that he didn't mention the misingno. Similarities. I think he's into something, and the designer saw missingno as looking sorta like a gecko tail. The colours and vague shape line up for that, at least
I hope they make a MissingNo. based Pokémon, would bring a lot of attention! Notch did regret not adding Herobrine to his game. I hope Game Freak does such
Oh…that psycho dog one… *definitely too cruel.* A lot of these just feel ancient, which feels fitting for Hoenn with all its nature potential discoveries.
NGL I almost cried hearing about how the psycho dog yokai are made. I couldn't imagine torturing a dog like that, then not even letting it rest in death 😭😭😭
Someone actually mentioned how it was reminding them of The Hounds of Tindalos a lovecraftian story by Frank Belknap Long, Jr. Spooky, angular blue dog beasts that crawl out of corners to hunt.
I wonder if the rocky dog-cat-lions were also floated as Rock Eeveelution but they couldn't figure out how to get Eevee to become it. Lockstin pointing out how their stones line up with Meteor Falls, it's like they could've done what they would eventually do with Glaceon & Leafeon, aka "Level up next to this Moss Rock/Ice Rock." like, Eevee could've leveled up inside Meteor Falls' deepest section and that'd be the same.
@@Gnoggini actually remember in my elementary school during a rainy day a bunch of students and i gathered around and discussed whether an Eevee is a dog, cat, or a fox
I think the psycho dog maybe kinda got repurposed into Zygarde 10%, and the blue "generic monster thing" has some aspects that remind me of Dialga. I hadn't noticed the scorpion but now that you mention it, ot really seems like early Metagross.
I've been designing creatures and fakemon for more than 25 years, and I always find so much inspiration from you Lockstin when I'm working on my own fantasy universe. The way you cover these things, and present your ideas, is incredibly cathartic to me. You're amazing, and please don't ever change my dude! 💚💙💜
The fact that the sprites of the psycho dog and its possible pre-evolution (that sprite with a kinder face feels like a pre-evolution to me) were found on Ralts' scratchpad of all places just makes me wonder a lot of things. Like were they at one point thinking of making it Wally's signature Pokemon? If so, then damn!
That dog one looks like if Atlus wanted to confirm the fan theory that Cerberus was actually Koromaru’s evolved Persona and that dog mon was his initial Persona.
I think they were originally just planning to skew Pokemon to an older audience after Pokemania died down, the vast vast majority of cut pokemon dont have art nearly as polished as this so it almost certainly signals a different direction for gen 3.
I do recall an older interview (or something similar) where it was confirmed Gen 3 was originally intended to be a reboot to the franchise, as they were experimenting with more monstrous or humanoid designs The leaked beta concept art does seem to line up with that
That actually makes a lot of sense and explains why we have more concept art in this style than I'd expect for "turn the creep factor up to a hundred for these ideas for this generation's spooky pokemon" or just getting down ideas
Psychodog seems to be partly, to me at least, based on a Lovecraftian creature knows a "Hound of Tandalos". They're interdimentional creatures that live in,and guard the "Angles of time". They'd hunt,kill,and eat dimension hoppers and time travelers. Now,The psychic type is known to be the type with metaphysical or supernatural abilities like time traveling or teleportation. This would explain the partly-there-but-not translucency and confusing appearance as,the hounds where twisted and hard for the human brain to comprehend.
And while the creators didn't have any way of knowing at the time, it would have been great if it existed in the future games were dimensional travelers and time travel are a canon thing...imagine if after the Delta episode, there was a conclusion where one of THOSE things showed up to try and eat Zinnia, and you had to stop it! It would add a lovely horror aspect worthy of the story the Hounds of Tandalos came from.
Fun fact: yugioh has a whole card archetype based on the monster. The Tindangle monsters, tho they are a little more based on math than the hound itself
@akiradkcn I play Yugioh and I tried that archetype for a little bit... didn't work very well but the concept I'd actually pretty interesting. I wish the Hounds Of Tindalos got a bit more attention in media lol
If that were the case I can imagine them being part of game boundary maintenance. If the game twigs the player goes out of bounds, one of these gets sprung on them in an impossible battle so the player resets to the last pokecenter. No idea if that’d be possible for gen 3 but i like the idea a lot.
Concept art in some ways, is in some ways i imagine like writing a pitch for a story. It will often change dramatically when it comes to writing the finished product, but the outline is there which makes it easier to create a canon, based on the outline which was previously written, maybe even years earlier.
As weird as this may sound, that third last one - blue monster speculated to be a super early placeholder for Kyogre - the way it’s positioned, the protrusion on the back of its smooth head, and how he says the cyan pores kinda look like crystals? All makes me think of Gigalith.
The last one's legs more make me think of grasshoppers rather than crabs. I like the idea of it being an early Regi, it could be quite well used as inspiration for a Ghost-Type member of the family; a strange irregular skeletal being marked with archaic scripts that may be animating it's form.
I really do like the edgy artstyle used here. It adds a grimness to Pokémon's fantasy that I actually find quite appealing. Okutani Jun's Rock-Frog is so spooky, yet uses decidedly Pokémon aesthetics, giving an eerie feel by juxtaposing the childlike fantasy of the series with the "Shadow of the Colossus" kind of vibe. I find it _so_ compelling.
Same reason dumb people try to summon demons or vengeful ghosts. They want to play God, want to do something they think is cool or interesting, or they want to see if it's actually real or not. In the case of the people who created the legend and "method" of doing it...I think they just want to fool people and sow chaos or cause hurt I'm the world. Some people are just evil...like whoever tortures an animal like that.
I've long wanted a good Pokémon horror fan game, but all of them seem like creepypasta-based and one was about zombies, which is a pretty boring horror premise, IMO. I can't remember what got me into thinking about this, but like, I want a creepy vibe and story, not something gorey.
5:01 “psycho dog” is one of my faves of the leaks. The potential psychic energy gives off opalescent vibes. Like maybe it could ghost type. And if re-worked or re-done it could be given limbs but they are only framed with the nerve like appendages. 🤷♂️ Reminds me of Zyguard dog form
2:42 My guess is that Okutani Jun might have designed a Runerigus/Cofagrigus for gen 3 but scrapped, they look somewhat similar. Single eye like Runerigus, weird 4 hands that maybe given to Cofagrigus, and it's like a pillar with runes on it(of course in this case the runes are Unowns), maybe the weird pillar thing got scrapped and revisited and instead of using a pillar they changed it into a broken slab.
Those last three when put side by side like that it just screamed early Regirock, Regice, and Registeel. They may have originally been large giant creatures covered in their elemental material rather than being made up of the material as they are in the final product.
I was thinking that. Instead of steel it was probably regisand but because of groudon they wanted to change it to steel to diversify them. That also might explain why we got regilectric before we got a regi of ground or water. Maybe they made a conscious decision not to have the regis compete with the box legendaries
5:10 I'm almost positive that dog is based on the Hounds of Tindalos from the works of HP Lovecraft They're extradimensional beings that phase through reality to to hunt timetravelers, and the way the dog's body seems almost shredded is very much reminicent of how people tend to depict a 3D cross section of a 4D being, as inspired by what a 2D cross section of a 3D being actually looks like
i think the 'beta box legendaries' got reworked into the regis. blue -> ice, groundish guy -> rock, third one looks skelletish, but mightve been combined with the first regi draft to registeel
It would not happen but I'd like to see GameFreak do a poll for what scrapped Pokemon should appear in a future game. Honestly would love to see them just reappear in general.
My theory of the odd blue mon at 15:04 could be super early Dialga. Or rather when the idea was scrapped, perhaps someone looked back at it and was inspired FOR Dialga. The blue colors, the 4 thick legs, the claws and odd crest, they all really LOOK like Dialga if u squint
It would be pretty cool to take these designs and kinda "finish them" and turn these vague monsters into actual pokemon, the way it happened to cacturne
12:45 I would also add that in terms of animals that it could be based on, I immediatly thought of the Mosasaurus/Pliosaurus (big head and jaw and chonky body), but also the Stethacanthus (alqo nicknamed "Anvil shark"), which is a prehistoric shark with this exact protrusion on its back (although a little closer to the head). Overall pretty cool design to reuse for a deep sea Fossil Pokemon maybe.
The openings in a dinosaur’s skull (discounting eye sockets, nasal openings, etc) are called fenestrae (fenestra singular) and they helped reduce the weight of the animal’s skull, essential to growing up BIG!
One interesting idea I’ve heard about the Unown Golem is that it’s an attempt at canonizing Missingno, what with the odd glyphs and the shape resembling Missingos sprite
17:13 So the holes in the skull are called temporal fenestra. They lie behind the eyes and are for muscle attachments. Fun fact: reptiles and birds have two on each side of the skull, while mammals have one!
Those last three designs make me think of the Regis. Regirock especially witht he second one. I can imagine that they started with this element or material based idea and eventually solidified them as more golem like over the course of the design process!
That last one could be the common design 'ancestor' to both the Regis and Relicanth. Thing about it. Its an ancient fish creature with patterns all over its body like Relicanth, but also has the bi-pedal shape the Regis would take on. It also explains why Relicanth was needed in the original Regi quest beyond it just being an old Pokémon like the Regis. It all comes together
Took me about three minutes to realize you were talking into a Hey You! Pikachu microphone. In any case, brilliant examination of the first steps towards Gen 3. Thank you for it!
Last one reminded me of the mixed up fossils. It looks like its head is on upside down or like it's belly up and "crab walking" while looking forward if that makes any sense.
The inugami thing is so strange to me because WHY would you want to make an evil spirit who hates you specifically?! What possible benefit could there be to warrant all that effort even if you are a black magic practitioner with no heart, it just makes no sense to me 😅
From the face and the generation, I'm inclined to believe the last pokemon talked about is some iteration of shedinja. It has the look of an empty carapace/husk pokemon.
A theory I've seen floating around the Unown Rock Gecko thing, is that if you look under it, it seems to have an eye like Unown. So I wonder if it could've been a potential Unown evolution. It'd probably be the same for every form. But the "!" and "?" Unown were introduced gen 3. So possibly there was something to do with them? Like it being a body with a single "tail" does give the exclamation mark silhouette
I can see psychodog also looking a bit like what an imaginative person would think of with necrotized (via the dark black spots) brain synapse nodes along its body, leading to the possible ghost/psychic type.
15:28 That might be a beta design of Gigalith,4 legs spiked head,fangs and rock like appearance, and its colors are kinda similar to the shiny of Gigalith
Saw some interesting discussions on them before. For the dog, a lot of people were mentioning the Hound of Tindalos, which is a freaky extradimensional skeletal time dog from extended Cthulhu mythos.
I think "BadFish" certainly led to Huntail, but it also seems to have Palafin elements. One image is standing up on its tail as if the fins were feet, just like Palafin.
Huntail actually comes from a scrapped eel Pokemon from gen 2 called Gurotesu, It was in the files of the '97 prototype and even made it to '99 before getting replaced with Chinchou a few months before the final release The early designs for Huntail in gen 3 even look much more like Gurotesu than even the final design does, so I doubt Badfish has anything do with Huntail
“psychodog” design wise also reminds me of a thylacine or tasmanian tiger. The yokai inspiration also makes sense here because one of the last known living thylacine was kept in a zoo before dying due to its handler accidentally forgetting to open its shelter at night.
The trio at the end definitely feel like they were intended as the regional trio for Hoenn. The most likely thing I think is they were the prototype ideas for the regis before they pivoted and chose to base them more off of elemental golems instead. You can kinda see they have a similar design ethos as the legendary birds and beasts, so maybe they were angling for some kind of simian or dinosaur design before electing to change up the formula
The fact that psycho dog is a counter design to absol design is crazy, I could imagine absol but this calm and kind character and psycho dog but this character that seems cool and trustworthy but is the one causing harm that absol is trying to warn you about, This would make the dark type being evil thing more complex an am evil because of my typing and more like am evil because of my actionw.
I love that the Game Informer magazine you showed had Legend of Dragoon on the cover, because straight up, that's what a lot of these designs reminded me of.
They could use a lot of these in future generations, they would fit well for a great lakes region. Local lore of the area is filled with ghosts and monsters
I may have seen this somewhere on another video, but I think the ghost dog looking thing may have been a very very early idea that would become Zygarde (10% form at least). Mostly based on the fact it seems very much it's trying to convey something being built anatomically (with the visible nerves and appendages that disappear into nothing). Thought it was a pretty cool theory.
16:54 this is likely a Shedinja concept art. Frontal eye holes are spot on. Limb structure is very similar to its previous evolution Nincada. Skull and bones theme is fit for ghost type. Even body art may be reference to burial imagery, same as halo in final design.
one thing i saw about the concept art in 12:06 is that it looks strikingly similar to a stethacanthus, first of all it just looks like a shark straight up, and second, the "fin" on the back looks strikingly similar to a stethacanthus, idk if that adds anything its just something cool i noticed
I wish they kept that creepy/monster ascetic. As an artist these really do look interesting and creative. Also makes the trade mark Pocket monsters more accurate lol.
I would honestly LOVE if you covered more unused pokemon designs or scrapped pokemon in general, they're such a good window into the designers' design process when making pokemon, and a lot of them have very interesting inspirations of their own
Just to clarify something about the armored scorpion: that image isn't depicting a 3 stage family. The drawing on the lower left is just the same monster on the lower right, but as seen from above. This fits perfectly with the scratchpads found among ORAS files. There we can see some esrly sprites for Metagross and Beldum, but also a very rough sprite of what would eventually become Metang, still lacking many details compared to Metagross (who was essentially finished) and Beldum (who had an earlier, more literal dumbbell design).
Funny thing is, through Akidearest's recommendation, I started reading fan translations of a manga called "Nikubami Honegishimi", and in chapter 5 (the most recent one to be translated), they go into some detail about the rituals done to create inugami...since it's a horror/ghost story manga, I didn't dwell on it much, but I'm actually disgusted to learn that all that was real.
I'm suprised the ancient shark Stethacanthus wasn't brought up in regards to the beta rayquaza? That was the first thing I thought of when I saw the flat dorsal fin
Lockstin, the last three are similar enough that make me think they are the Regi trio, the blue ine is Regice, the rocky one is Regirock, and and the last one is registeel.
In my opinion the lion wolfs with salt or stone are potentially Eevee evolutions, they just have not been pokemonized yet, i think rock type and ground type
I have an idea for a video A pokemon timeline From pokemon who existed before time or outside of time (celebi, arceus etc.) To prehistoric pokemon (fossils, relicanth) Paradox Ancient post human (baltoy, claydol) Legends arceus time(porygon due to rift, hisiuian forms) Modern man made (muk, garbodor, genesect, mewtwo) Future (paradox)
Thank you so much for actually taking the time to properly put concept art in its context before getting into the designs. The way some other people have been discussing them, either looking at them uncritically or complaining about designs that didn't get cut, has had me feeling really gross about the whole situation.
"Bad Fish" looks almost identical to the Stone Fish, the spines down its back and on the front fins really give it that vibe. And it's born from a rock!
Everyone I knew was fawning over the other concept leaks, but these I was so BEYOND excited for. I am an artist that loves horror, and loves animals and monsters. Combining the two is what I do all the time. So seeing these concept artworks were so surreal, and yet they felt like they fit right in. The style is perfect, I love each and everyone one so much
Honestly the last three are my favourite there. Cause I absolutely love when Pokémon have ”non-descript” monsters. Like, not just something based on an animal when you can clea😢tell what it is, but when it looks ambiguously monstrous, with maaaaaybe some clues of there being real life inspiration behind it.
the blue thing at 15:05 looks a lot like an early version of Dialga to me, while the sandy one at 16:05 does have some vague elements of Heatran, along with vigoroth and rhyperior. i feel that some elements from them were definitely kept around as ideas, such as the body shape and general pose being given to vigoroth, the tail and the rocky body being given to rhyperior, and the big rocky fingers and stance is probably parts that influenced heatran
0:35 Oh, that's why I love these designs so much! PS2-era JRPGs (mostly FFXII and Shadow Hearts Covenant) gave me a love for monster design in games. Psychodog is my favorite: love the creepy look and the iridescent colors.
The "Psycho Dog" gives me some serious Hound of Tindalos vibes from how angular and intangible it looks. Could easily work as a Ghost/Psychic or Dark/Psychic type.
The very first time i saw the psycho dog art i thought of Lovecraft's hounds of tindalos, extradimensional dog like creatures that manifest out of the corners of places. The way its body is so ethereal and immaterial and made out of geometric angles immediately brought it to mind. Im pretty sure the hounds of tindalos are also blue on top of that
I feel like the ghost/psychic dog definitely has qualities of a Hound of Tindalos, a Cthulhu mythos monster "the Hounds are said to inhabit the angles of time, while other beings (such as humankind and all common life) descend from curves. " "It is said that they have long, hollow tongues or proboscises to drain victims' body-fluids." "They can materialize through any corner if it is fairly sharp-120° or less. When a Hound is about to manifest, it materializes first as smoke pouring from the corner, and finally the head emerges followed by the body."
The obelisk has a LOT of missingno vibes that i think its crazy NOT to mention. The bottom part being bigger, the mysterious lettering, the chaotic vibe, and so on
Definitely interesting when you take into account that Gen 3 was originally going to be a hard reboot to the franchise before they decided against that
Honestly, PsychoDog looks like it was an early concept for one of Zygarde’s forms. The 25(?)% form to be specific. Especially since it has a snake tongue. I wouldn’t be surprised if they reused and retooled the concept art in gen7.
When first seeing a few of these, it gave the vibe of an old short game franchise that failed to be popular when it came out, but then suddenly becomes really popular modern day with its designs and is basically a "why wasnt this super popular when it came out?" Situation
Which do you most wish made it into the game? ☀ Check out Manta Sleep here: tinyurl.com/4puezprv. Don't forget to use the code 'LOCKSTIN' for 10% off your order!
…Soooo, any of these gonna be in Neo Legends Ghetsis? XD
it's gotta be the OKUTANIJUNODESGNNANODAYO
Psychodog. That thing is the MOST Unique out of all of them. The idea of a 'glass-bodied canine with swirling internal energy' is SO cool. Certainly could have been a better choice for dark/psychic. ...I HATE Malamar, ok? Like, damn!
That blue pokemon ar 15 minutes must be a proto Deino
remove the tusk
turn that helm into fur and have it go down its neck
make the spots red
Now slap it in a cave
Unsee what ive shown you
Manta Sleep is the real deal. I love their products.
I like how this leak has Lockstin set with content to talk about for _at least_ a month- if not more!
Especially nice because of how little official pokemon news we've been getting lately
He's gonna get his bag on this one
Way more than a month imo
Lockstin the leaker confirmed?
there is also the second leak
3:05 The unown actually spells out "Okutani Jun no design nanodayo" as "nanodayo" is a common expressive sentence ending phrase.
It overall translates to "This is Okutani Jun's design!"
Also it's commonly theorized that's a visualized version of if MissingNo was a Pokemon.
*Really* surprised that he didn't mention the misingno. Similarities.
I think he's into something, and the designer saw missingno as looking sorta like a gecko tail. The colours and vague shape line up for that, at least
I hope they make a MissingNo. based Pokémon, would bring a lot of attention!
Notch did regret not adding Herobrine to his game. I hope Game Freak does such
Love this commebnt, thank you very much!
14:50 The last three may be grouped together as Regi trio, the shards one being rock, blue one ice and last one as steel
Or ghost. For super ancient theming.
Regis or the Swords of Justice
Regis, but each with a secondary ghost type?
That's my thoughts. Like they feel too closely resembling each other to not be the trio of sub legendaries for the region
Oh…that psycho dog one… *definitely too cruel.* A lot of these just feel ancient, which feels fitting for Hoenn with all its nature potential discoveries.
Yeah I'm scarred now, kinda glad it didn't make it in the game
NGL I almost cried hearing about how the psycho dog yokai are made. I couldn't imagine torturing a dog like that, then not even letting it rest in death 😭😭😭
Someone actually mentioned how it was reminding them of The Hounds of Tindalos a lovecraftian story by Frank Belknap Long, Jr.
Spooky, angular blue dog beasts that crawl out of corners to hunt.
I wonder if the rocky dog-cat-lions were also floated as Rock Eeveelution but they couldn't figure out how to get Eevee to become it. Lockstin pointing out how their stones line up with Meteor Falls, it's like they could've done what they would eventually do with Glaceon & Leafeon, aka "Level up next to this Moss Rock/Ice Rock." like, Eevee could've leveled up inside Meteor Falls' deepest section and that'd be the same.
Ooo thats a cool idea! That would also explain why they have canine and feline traits, the eeveelutions are all like both almost.
@@Gnoggini actually remember in my elementary school during a rainy day a bunch of students and i gathered around and discussed whether an Eevee is a dog, cat, or a fox
...Sodeon.
@@HappyAxolotl24it's all of them or none of them
We was suppose to get a Flying Eeveelution in gen 7
I think the psycho dog maybe kinda got repurposed into Zygarde 10%, and the blue "generic monster thing" has some aspects that remind me of Dialga. I hadn't noticed the scorpion but now that you mention it, ot really seems like early Metagross.
I've been designing creatures and fakemon for more than 25 years, and I always find so much inspiration from you Lockstin when I'm working on my own fantasy universe. The way you cover these things, and present your ideas, is incredibly cathartic to me. You're amazing, and please don't ever change my dude! 💚💙💜
that sounds SOOOO COOL dude!
The fact that the sprites of the psycho dog and its possible pre-evolution (that sprite with a kinder face feels like a pre-evolution to me) were found on Ralts' scratchpad of all places just makes me wonder a lot of things. Like were they at one point thinking of making it Wally's signature Pokemon? If so, then damn!
That dog one looks like if Atlus wanted to confirm the fan theory that Cerberus was actually Koromaru’s evolved Persona and that dog mon was his initial Persona.
It certainly looks like it belongs in Persona and/or Shin Megami Tensei instead!
It is done in a really smt style
A lot of the beta designs look like stuff out of atlus games, I could see any one of these being a persona in the next game
I think they were originally just planning to skew Pokemon to an older audience after Pokemania died down, the vast vast majority of cut pokemon dont have art nearly as polished as this so it almost certainly signals a different direction for gen 3.
I do recall an older interview (or something similar) where it was confirmed Gen 3 was originally intended to be a reboot to the franchise, as they were experimenting with more monstrous or humanoid designs
The leaked beta concept art does seem to line up with that
@@dylanlawson7129 well this would also explain the psycho dog
That actually makes a lot of sense and explains why we have more concept art in this style than I'd expect for "turn the creep factor up to a hundred for these ideas for this generation's spooky pokemon" or just getting down ideas
Psychodog seems to be partly, to me at least, based on a Lovecraftian creature knows a "Hound of Tandalos". They're interdimentional creatures that live in,and guard the "Angles of time". They'd hunt,kill,and eat dimension hoppers and time travelers. Now,The psychic type is known to be the type with metaphysical or supernatural abilities like time traveling or teleportation. This would explain the partly-there-but-not translucency and confusing appearance as,the hounds where twisted and hard for the human brain to comprehend.
And while the creators didn't have any way of knowing at the time, it would have been great if it existed in the future games were dimensional travelers and time travel are a canon thing...imagine if after the Delta episode, there was a conclusion where one of THOSE things showed up to try and eat Zinnia, and you had to stop it! It would add a lovely horror aspect worthy of the story the Hounds of Tandalos came from.
Fun fact: yugioh has a whole card archetype based on the monster.
The Tindangle monsters, tho they are a little more based on math than the hound itself
@shugoibaka Or if we saw a pack of them come after Rainbow rocket or the protagonist in Arceus!
@akiradkcn I play Yugioh and I tried that archetype for a little bit... didn't work very well but the concept I'd actually pretty interesting. I wish the Hounds Of Tindalos got a bit more attention in media lol
If that were the case I can imagine them being part of game boundary maintenance. If the game twigs the player goes out of bounds, one of these gets sprung on them in an impossible battle so the player resets to the last pokecenter. No idea if that’d be possible for gen 3 but i like the idea a lot.
Concept art in some ways, is in some ways i imagine like writing a pitch for a story. It will often change dramatically when it comes to writing the finished product, but the outline is there which makes it easier to create a canon, based on the outline which was previously written, maybe even years earlier.
As weird as this may sound, that third last one - blue monster speculated to be a super early placeholder for Kyogre - the way it’s positioned, the protrusion on the back of its smooth head, and how he says the cyan pores kinda look like crystals? All makes me think of Gigalith.
To me, those spots look like puddles. So a rock body with holes that are filled with water (like Lombre's dish head).
The last one's legs more make me think of grasshoppers rather than crabs. I like the idea of it being an early Regi, it could be quite well used as inspiration for a Ghost-Type member of the family; a strange irregular skeletal being marked with archaic scripts that may be animating it's form.
I kinda think they took some inspiration from that one for Shedinja's face.
I really do like the edgy artstyle used here. It adds a grimness to Pokémon's fantasy that I actually find quite appealing. Okutani Jun's Rock-Frog is so spooky, yet uses decidedly Pokémon aesthetics, giving an eerie feel by juxtaposing the childlike fantasy of the series with the "Shadow of the Colossus" kind of vibe. I find it _so_ compelling.
Why would someone willingly try to create an inugami? That just sounds like a good way to get yourself cursed or killed by a very pissed off yokai.
People wanting either to play god or just trying to spread chaos
Same reason dumb people try to summon demons or vengeful ghosts. They want to play God, want to do something they think is cool or interesting, or they want to see if it's actually real or not. In the case of the people who created the legend and "method" of doing it...I think they just want to fool people and sow chaos or cause hurt I'm the world. Some people are just evil...like whoever tortures an animal like that.
Honestly a Pokemon horror game would go crazy. I mean, the Pokedex entries are horrifying enough, but actually seeing it would be a whole other thing.
I've long wanted a good Pokémon horror fan game, but all of them seem like creepypasta-based and one was about zombies, which is a pretty boring horror premise, IMO.
I can't remember what got me into thinking about this, but like, I want a creepy vibe and story, not something gorey.
@@mastermarkus5307 There is pokemon nightmare invasion.
I really would love if Lockstin made a second channel just for talking about mythology, folklore, and old legends from different places.
he does have Azoth University for random knowledge in general, but I don't think it's seen a new video in years
Rocks on a dog-looking thing.... with long ears.... and very feline.... It's the ROCK TYPE EEVEE.
5:01 “psycho dog” is one of my faves of the leaks. The potential psychic energy gives off opalescent vibes. Like maybe it could ghost type. And if re-worked or re-done it could be given limbs but they are only framed with the nerve like appendages. 🤷♂️
Reminds me of Zyguard dog form
2:42
My guess is that Okutani Jun might have designed a Runerigus/Cofagrigus for gen 3 but scrapped, they look somewhat similar.
Single eye like Runerigus, weird 4 hands that maybe given to Cofagrigus, and it's like a pillar with runes on it(of course in this case the runes are Unowns), maybe the weird pillar thing got scrapped and revisited and instead of using a pillar they changed it into a broken slab.
Those last three when put side by side like that it just screamed early Regirock, Regice, and Registeel. They may have originally been large giant creatures covered in their elemental material rather than being made up of the material as they are in the final product.
I was thinking that. Instead of steel it was probably regisand but because of groudon they wanted to change it to steel to diversify them. That also might explain why we got regilectric before we got a regi of ground or water. Maybe they made a conscious decision not to have the regis compete with the box legendaries
I think they took some inspiration from the last one for Shedinja's face.
5:10 I'm almost positive that dog is based on the Hounds of Tindalos from the works of HP Lovecraft
They're extradimensional beings that phase through reality to to hunt timetravelers, and the way the dog's body seems almost shredded is very much reminicent of how people tend to depict a 3D cross section of a 4D being, as inspired by what a 2D cross section of a 3D being actually looks like
i think the 'beta box legendaries' got reworked into the regis. blue -> ice, groundish guy -> rock, third one looks skelletish, but mightve been combined with the first regi draft to registeel
It would not happen but I'd like to see GameFreak do a poll for what scrapped Pokemon should appear in a future game. Honestly would love to see them just reappear in general.
I really like the dog looking one. It kinda looks like a dog shark thing? It just looks really cool
My theory of the odd blue mon at 15:04 could be super early Dialga. Or rather when the idea was scrapped, perhaps someone looked back at it and was inspired FOR Dialga. The blue colors, the 4 thick legs, the claws and odd crest, they all really LOOK like Dialga if u squint
i now want to see dialga's origin form in this artstyle
It would be pretty cool to take these designs and kinda "finish them" and turn these vague monsters into actual pokemon, the way it happened to cacturne
12:45 I would also add that in terms of animals that it could be based on, I immediatly thought of the Mosasaurus/Pliosaurus (big head and jaw and chonky body), but also the Stethacanthus (alqo nicknamed "Anvil shark"), which is a prehistoric shark with this exact protrusion on its back (although a little closer to the head). Overall pretty cool design to reuse for a deep sea Fossil Pokemon maybe.
2:15 I was 100% expecting "It's just standing there, menacingly"
The openings in a dinosaur’s skull (discounting eye sockets, nasal openings, etc) are called fenestrae (fenestra singular) and they helped reduce the weight of the animal’s skull, essential to growing up BIG!
3:00 It’s probably “Okutani Jun design nanoda yo”, or “It’s designed by Jun Okutani”.
the name "Esper-Rocket" makes me think of Latias and Latios, as "Esper" is what the Psychic-type is called in Japanese
Looks like Stethacanthus
One interesting idea I’ve heard about the Unown Golem is that it’s an attempt at canonizing Missingno, what with the odd glyphs and the shape resembling Missingos sprite
17:13 So the holes in the skull are called temporal fenestra. They lie behind the eyes and are for muscle attachments. Fun fact: reptiles and birds have two on each side of the skull, while mammals have one!
synaptsid vs diapsid
@ Exactly!
Those last three designs make me think of the Regis. Regirock especially witht he second one. I can imagine that they started with this element or material based idea and eventually solidified them as more golem like over the course of the design process!
That last one could be the common design 'ancestor' to both the Regis and Relicanth.
Thing about it.
Its an ancient fish creature with patterns all over its body like Relicanth, but also has the bi-pedal shape the Regis would take on. It also explains why Relicanth was needed in the original Regi quest beyond it just being an old Pokémon like the Regis.
It all comes together
Maybe, but Relicanth explains itself by also being a treasure map I think
@@Shinntoku designs change.
@@l-x-10 yeah, and?
@@Shinntoku yeah and?
@@l-x-10 I'm asking what point you're trying to make by stating something we all know
Took me about three minutes to realize you were talking into a Hey You! Pikachu microphone.
In any case, brilliant examination of the first steps towards Gen 3. Thank you for it!
Absolutely thrilled you're covering these! Please do not hesitate to go through literally everything in the Teraleak (except ZA lol)
Whoa! I love the Psycho Dog! If we got that I would've named it Nroman. ;)
Upon looking again, the dog thing kinda reminds me of Zygarde
7:08, ah yes my animal cruelty banning technique, i havent used since the heian era
I actually thought of JJK when he said "heian era",nice reference
Last one reminded me of the mixed up fossils. It looks like its head is on upside down or like it's belly up and "crab walking" while looking forward if that makes any sense.
The inugami thing is so strange to me because WHY would you want to make an evil spirit who hates you specifically?! What possible benefit could there be to warrant all that effort even if you are a black magic practitioner with no heart, it just makes no sense to me 😅
From the face and the generation, I'm inclined to believe the last pokemon talked about is some iteration of shedinja. It has the look of an empty carapace/husk pokemon.
2:50 I like how it's the same shape as Missingno
Ahh finally someone else who noticed that! I wonder if it was intentional
A theory I've seen floating around the Unown Rock Gecko thing, is that if you look under it, it seems to have an eye like Unown. So I wonder if it could've been a potential Unown evolution. It'd probably be the same for every form. But the "!" and "?" Unown were introduced gen 3. So possibly there was something to do with them? Like it being a body with a single "tail" does give the exclamation mark silhouette
I can see psychodog also looking a bit like what an imaginative person would think of with necrotized (via the dark black spots) brain synapse nodes along its body, leading to the possible ghost/psychic type.
15:28 That might be a beta design of Gigalith,4 legs spiked head,fangs and rock like appearance, and its colors are kinda similar to the shiny of Gigalith
14:40 wanted to let you know that the image you used is a Whip Spider, not a Whip Scorpion. Two different arachnids, both are horrifying. ✨
Saw some interesting discussions on them before. For the dog, a lot of people were mentioning the Hound of Tindalos, which is a freaky extradimensional skeletal time dog from extended Cthulhu mythos.
1:43
"Car furry"
Disintegrates
Yes 👍
I think "BadFish" certainly led to Huntail, but it also seems to have Palafin elements. One image is standing up on its tail as if the fins were feet, just like Palafin.
Huntail actually comes from a scrapped eel Pokemon from gen 2 called Gurotesu, It was in the files of the '97 prototype and even made it to '99 before getting replaced with Chinchou a few months before the final release
The early designs for Huntail in gen 3 even look much more like Gurotesu than even the final design does, so I doubt Badfish has anything do with Huntail
The psycho dog i like to believe eventually became zygarde 10% ,the dog form
“psychodog” design wise also reminds me of a thylacine or tasmanian tiger. The yokai inspiration also makes sense here because one of the last known living thylacine was kept in a zoo before dying due to its handler accidentally forgetting to open its shelter at night.
The trio at the end definitely feel like they were intended as the regional trio for Hoenn. The most likely thing I think is they were the prototype ideas for the regis before they pivoted and chose to base them more off of elemental golems instead. You can kinda see they have a similar design ethos as the legendary birds and beasts, so maybe they were angling for some kind of simian or dinosaur design before electing to change up the formula
The fact that psycho dog is a counter design to absol design is crazy, I could imagine absol but this calm and kind character and psycho dog but this character that seems cool and trustworthy but is the one causing harm that absol is trying to warn you about,
This would make the dark type being evil thing more complex an am evil because of my typing and more like am evil because of my actionw.
17:00 almost makes me think of Necrozma. Like maybe they came back to this when it was time to design him.
Yes, they have similar body-shape
Looking at that blue sprite of Physcodog it definitely would have been a top tier favourite pokemon for people
I love that the Game Informer magazine you showed had Legend of Dragoon on the cover, because straight up, that's what a lot of these designs reminded me of.
They could use a lot of these in future generations, they would fit well for a great lakes region. Local lore of the area is filled with ghosts and monsters
The last one could be a very early shedinja. The eyes and the chiton like armor, along with the colour look about right.
Ooo! I like that idea a lot
I may have seen this somewhere on another video, but I think the ghost dog looking thing may have been a very very early idea that would become Zygarde (10% form at least). Mostly based on the fact it seems very much it's trying to convey something being built anatomically (with the visible nerves and appendages that disappear into nothing). Thought it was a pretty
cool theory.
16:54 this is likely a Shedinja concept art. Frontal eye holes are spot on. Limb structure is very similar to its previous evolution Nincada. Skull and bones theme is fit for ghost type. Even body art may be reference to burial imagery, same as halo in final design.
Lockstin has so many sleep related sponsors I'm convinced he's actually a servant of a Hypno
one thing i saw about the concept art in 12:06 is that it looks strikingly similar to a stethacanthus, first of all it just looks like a shark straight up, and second, the "fin" on the back looks strikingly similar to a stethacanthus, idk if that adds anything its just something cool i noticed
I wish they kept that creepy/monster ascetic. As an artist these really do look interesting and creative. Also makes the trade mark Pocket monsters more accurate lol.
I would honestly LOVE if you covered more unused pokemon designs or scrapped pokemon in general, they're such a good window into the designers' design process when making pokemon, and a lot of them have very interesting inspirations of their own
Just to clarify something about the armored scorpion: that image isn't depicting a 3 stage family. The drawing on the lower left is just the same monster on the lower right, but as seen from above.
This fits perfectly with the scratchpads found among ORAS files. There we can see some esrly sprites for Metagross and Beldum, but also a very rough sprite of what would eventually become Metang, still lacking many details compared to Metagross (who was essentially finished) and Beldum (who had an earlier, more literal dumbbell design).
Funny thing is, through Akidearest's recommendation, I started reading fan translations of a manga called "Nikubami Honegishimi", and in chapter 5 (the most recent one to be translated), they go into some detail about the rituals done to create inugami...since it's a horror/ghost story manga, I didn't dwell on it much, but I'm actually disgusted to learn that all that was real.
4:15 Angy Leopard Geckos sound really cute, but I always feel bad for scaring them
I'm suprised the ancient shark Stethacanthus wasn't brought up in regards to the beta rayquaza? That was the first thing I thought of when I saw the flat dorsal fin
Lockstin, the last three are similar enough that make me think they are the Regi trio, the blue ine is Regice, the rocky one is Regirock, and and the last one is registeel.
In my opinion the lion wolfs with salt or stone are potentially Eevee evolutions, they just have not been pokemonized yet, i think rock type and ground type
I have an idea for a video
A pokemon timeline
From pokemon who existed before time or outside of time (celebi, arceus etc.)
To prehistoric pokemon (fossils, relicanth)
Paradox
Ancient post human (baltoy, claydol)
Legends arceus time(porygon due to rift, hisiuian forms)
Modern man made (muk, garbodor, genesect, mewtwo)
Future (paradox)
Thank you so much for actually taking the time to properly put concept art in its context before getting into the designs. The way some other people have been discussing them, either looking at them uncritically or complaining about designs that didn't get cut, has had me feeling really gross about the whole situation.
"Bad Fish" looks almost identical to the Stone Fish, the spines down its back and on the front fins really give it that vibe. And it's born from a rock!
Everyone I knew was fawning over the other concept leaks, but these I was so BEYOND excited for.
I am an artist that loves horror, and loves animals and monsters. Combining the two is what I do all the time. So seeing these concept artworks were so surreal, and yet they felt like they fit right in.
The style is perfect, I love each and everyone one so much
Honestly the last three are my favourite there.
Cause I absolutely love when Pokémon have ”non-descript” monsters. Like, not just something based on an animal when you can clea😢tell what it is, but when it looks ambiguously monstrous, with maaaaaybe some clues of there being real life inspiration behind it.
16:51 idk but the moment I saw this design, I kinda heard ting lu's cry in my head, it fits and it makes it look more complete
The N64 microphone is hilarious NGL xD
Someone on Twitter pointed out the gecko unown stone thing has the same shape as MissingNo, and yeah... I can see it
“Not-Rayquaza” looks like it’s straight out of a Fossil Fighters game, particularly the Krona vivisaur.
the blue thing at 15:05 looks a lot like an early version of Dialga to me, while the sandy one at 16:05 does have some vague elements of Heatran, along with vigoroth and rhyperior. i feel that some elements from them were definitely kept around as ideas, such as the body shape and general pose being given to vigoroth, the tail and the rocky body being given to rhyperior, and the big rocky fingers and stance is probably parts that influenced heatran
Wonderful analysis. All of your research helps make sense of these crazy concept Pokémon 😅
0:35 Oh, that's why I love these designs so much! PS2-era JRPGs (mostly FFXII and Shadow Hearts Covenant) gave me a love for monster design in games. Psychodog is my favorite: love the creepy look and the iridescent colors.
The "Psycho Dog" gives me some serious Hound of Tindalos vibes from how angular and intangible it looks. Could easily work as a Ghost/Psychic or Dark/Psychic type.
These concepts are rad as hell, love a game like this. Definitely puts the monster in pocket monsters.
The psycho dog looks like it could've been reused for Zygarde. It reminds me of the 10 percent form.
The very first time i saw the psycho dog art i thought of Lovecraft's hounds of tindalos, extradimensional dog like creatures that manifest out of the corners of places. The way its body is so ethereal and immaterial and made out of geometric angles immediately brought it to mind. Im pretty sure the hounds of tindalos are also blue on top of that
I feel like the ghost/psychic dog definitely has qualities of a Hound of Tindalos, a Cthulhu mythos monster
"the Hounds are said to inhabit the angles of time, while other beings (such as humankind and all common life) descend from curves. "
"It is said that they have long, hollow tongues or proboscises to drain victims' body-fluids."
"They can materialize through any corner if it is fairly sharp-120° or less. When a Hound is about to manifest, it materializes first as smoke pouring from the corner, and finally the head emerges followed by the body."
The obelisk has a LOT of missingno vibes that i think its crazy NOT to mention. The bottom part being bigger, the mysterious lettering, the chaotic vibe, and so on
The strange designs are one thing but the art style is underrated af
The art style is from smt
SMT =Sin Megumi tensai
Definitely interesting when you take into account that Gen 3 was originally going to be a hard reboot to the franchise before they decided against that
Honestly, PsychoDog looks like it was an early concept for one of Zygarde’s forms. The 25(?)% form to be specific. Especially since it has a snake tongue. I wouldn’t be surprised if they reused and retooled the concept art in gen7.
3:35 im getting heavenly delusion ptsd
4:24 I'm willing to bet Friender from Neo-Human Casshern was the partial inspiration. The head looks very similar.
These designs are so cool, their art style gives the vibe of “if pokemon were darksouls” or some other more serious grim-dark game. Very cool
When first seeing a few of these, it gave the vibe of an old short game franchise that failed to be popular when it came out, but then suddenly becomes really popular modern day with its designs and is basically a "why wasnt this super popular when it came out?" Situation