Ever since the release of Pokémon Omega Ruby and Alpha Sapphire back in 2014, franchise fans have been wondering: “when’s Sinnoh?” To be more specific, they were wondering when the fourth generation Pokémon games, Pokémon Diamond and Pearl, would receive the modern remake treatment. For the last seven years, there’s been a torrent of rumors and misfires, to the point that “Sinnoh confirmed” became something of an inside joke in the community. Today, that inside joke stopped being a joke and started being a factual statement.
During the Pokémon Presents presentation held today, intended to tease some of the franchise’s upcoming projects and celebrate its 25th anniversary, The Pokémon Company dropped the news many had been waiting for: the Sinnoh remakes are coming. Pokémon Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl will be releasing for the Nintendo Switch some time later this year.
Interestingly, neither Game Freak nor The Pokémon Company are heading up this remake. Instead, it’s being handled by Ilca, the company that was contracted to handle the development of Pokémon Home. The game has two directors: Ilca rep Yuichi Ueda, and Game Freak veteran Junichi Masuda. Despite the change up in staffing, it’s been assured that these remakes will be entirely faithful to the originals, and even features the traditional stubby character sprites while traveling the overworld, though during combat, character models will be more in line with what we’ve seen from the more recent Pokémon games.
Sinnoh.
Remakes.
Confirmed.#PokemonBrilliantDiamond#PokemonShiningPearl pic.twitter.com/z0JIgXyh4x
— Pokémon (@Pokemon) February 26, 2021
Alongside the remake announcements, the presentation unveiled Pokémon Legends Arceus, a completely new game also set in the Sinnoh region, albeit in the distant past. Details about this game are a bit scarce, but they did show some footage of trainers in ninja-reminiscent garb traveling the land and catching Pokémon by manually throwing PokéBalls. Whatever it is, it’s slated for release some time in 2022.
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