Huge Pokémon Gold and Silver source code leak reveals some very beta-looking pocket monsters

Pokémon Gold and Pokémon Silver were released in Japan in 1999, before coming to Australia and North America in 2000 and Europe in 2001. The games were huge commercial and critical successes: Over 23 million units were sold. The full source code for the popular titles has now been shared online, and it has revealed drawings of a considerable amount of unused Pokémon and some beta versions of more well-known monsters.

The sprites discovered in the code for Pokémon Gold and Pokémon Silver include placeholder designs and previously unknown monsters, and fans have already been busy selecting their favorites. The designs for Pichu and Celebi have been highlighted for their differences to how they looked in the final product, and as for Wobbuffet, the leaked source code has a sprite for the psychic monster that looks like a black-and-white kidney bean with an eye drawn on it (see image below and source links).

It appears the beta version of Wooper has been one of the most positively received designs extracted from the source code for Pokémon Gold and Pokémon Silver so far, and the unused Pokémon sprites have also been attracting plenty of attention as gamers try to work out their possible types and evolutions. The Pokémon series began in 1996 with Pokémon Red and Blue and is now the highest-grossing franchise of all time, ahead of Star Wars and the Wizarding World (Harry Potter), with estimated total revenue of US$95 billion.