Pok'emon Power Magazine

In September of 1998, Pok'emon was introduced to the U.S. and the staff at Nintendo Power did their part to help give it the impact it got when brought to the states in the form of a smaller, short-lived magazine called Pok'emon Power. Each of these mini magazines came nestled inside of issues 111 through 116 of Nintendo Power issues.

The first volume.

Because Nintendo Power magazine was focused on giving sneak previews and reviews of games (as well as small strategy guides each issue) the magazine mostly focused on giving a monthly guide for Pok'emon Red and Blue, and it lasted only six issues, and some bonuses within the magazine were included.

To coincide with the network airings of the anime on Kids WB, episodes were illustrated into comic strip form included with each issue, this may have also been the first time that readers were introduced to the comic book format called "manga", though the norm of manga had a 'right to left' format, while the comics in this magazine had the usual left to right format.

A preview of the fan art section.

Comics weren't the only addition to the magazine, near the end of an issue had a section showing off drawings from fans mostly with Pok'emon creature designs with Professor Oak on the side giving little pieces of trivia for some of the Pok'emon featured in the art and it was a nice touch and even included which number in the Pok'edex they were at.

The sixth and last issue of the magazine featured a giveaway in which readers had the chance to add the rare and legendary Pok'emon, Mew to their Red or Blue games. Although it wasn't until years later that fans found an exploit to earn it in the game through a glitch, this was the only known way to earn it by legal means.

Lastly came the obvious inclusion of merchandise ads thrown in the pages, sometimes mentioning the home video debut of the anime mentioning the VHS tapes and soon to come DVDs. Issue 4 mentioned the Pok'emon Pikachu virtual pet handheld, showing off what you could do with Pikachu, and also showing the impressive Pikachu Volkswagen Beetle car.

(Phew!) Well I think I'll take a break from writing Pok'emon related articles for now. As always, see you next article!