Game Freak explains where the Pokemon Pokopia name comes from

Pokemon is about to get its next spinoff game with the upcoming launch of Pokemon Pokopia. Now thanks to Game Freak’s Shigeru Ohmori, we’re able to learn about where the name actually comes from.

Ohmori spoke about this in a recent interview with Famitsu. It looks like there’s a few things at play here. Ohmori mentioned wanting to go with “a slightly looser” title, and using certain phrases that eventually led to “Poko A Pokemon” in Japanese.

Ohmori’s full words:

“From the start we wanted to have a slightly looser title than the standard ‘Pokemon…’ games. While searching for something that would make children want to play, something that expressed the newness and the slow-life feeling of the game, we arrived at ‘poco a poco’ (little by little, gradually). The feeling of the word also matches the image of placing blocks in a ‘poko poko’ way (Japanese onomatopoeia meaning ‘here and there’), so we arranged it in a Pokemon-style way and it became ‘Poko a Pokemon’, (the Japanese title for ‘Pokemon Pokopia’).”

Note: Words in parenthesis are translator notes.

Pokemon Pokopia comes to Nintendo Switch 2 on March 5, 2026. For a roundup of pre-order bonuses, head on over here.

Translation provided by Simon Griffon and SatsumaFS on behalf of Nintendo Everything.