Lost ‘Pokémon’ game that Nintendo shut down due to its popularity has been restored
By Bryan Ke
September 26, 2023
A lost first-person “Pokémon” game that Nintendo immediately shut down after it became popular has reportedly been restored and is now playable through the Internet Archive.
Details to know: The game, titled “Pokémon 2000 Adventure,” was launched as a promotional material tie-in to the film “Pokémon: The Movie 2000,” which was released in Japan on July 17, 1999.
Nintendo permitted Warner Bros. to create promotional material for the film ahead of its release in the U.S. on July 21, 2000, to help boost ticket sales, according to a video uploaded by the YouTube channel Did You Know Gaming (DYKG) on Sept. 18.
It was too good: The end product was reportedly so good that Nintendo immediately executed a cease-and-desist order to take “Pokémon 2000 Adventure” down after a million people downloaded the browser game in a month.
They freaked out: Eddie Ruminski, a programmer from Cyberworld who worked on the project, viewed Nintendo’s reaction as “the greatest compliment.” Ruminski further explained to DYKG that Nintendo thought Warner Bros. “breached the contract” and “exceeded the contract’s allowable scope.” He added that Nintendo “didn’t expect that promotion to include something that was legitimately a video game.”
Restoring the game: With the help of Ruminski, archivists Rufus10 and DoomTay and the team behind DYKG were able to partially restore the lost “Pokémon 2000 Adventure” browser game, which can now be played through the Internet Archive.
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