The Pokémon series has abandoned the Safari Zone concept, but The Pokémon Company should consider bringing it back for future entries. The Safari Zones of the Pokémon series were filled with the biggest variety of wild Pokémon, but that concept has been usurped by the Wild Area.

The Safari Zone has appeared in Pokémon Go, but it debuted in the mainline games. The Safari Zone concept first appeared in Pokémon Red and Blue. It was a massive area filled with exclusive Pokémon, like Chansey and Tauros. The player could only take a limited number of steps within the Safari Zone before being forced to return to the entrance. The player also couldn’t use their own Pokémon to battle the wild denizens of the Safari Zone. Instead, they had to risk throwing a Poké Ball or try to weaken the enemy with food or by throwing a rock. The Safari Zone is also infamous for having one of the earliest banned episodes of the Pokémon anime, due to a character constantly pointing guns at Ash and his friends.

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The last Safari Zones to appear in the mainline Pokémon series were in Generation IV: the Great Marsh from Pokémon Diamond and Pearl, and the Johto Safari Zone in Pokémon HeartGold and SoulSilver. This means that it’s due to return in Generation VIII, as part of Pokémon Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl. This raises the question of whether the Safari Zone will return in the mainline entries in the Pokémon series, or if the days of trekking through tall grass in search of 1% chance wild Pokémon are over?

Pokémon’s Safari Area / Wild Zone Possibilities

The Wild Area in Pokémon Sword and Shield was one of the biggest draws of the game, to the point where The Isle of Armor and The Crown Tundra were almost entirely composed of new Wild Areas. The map of the Galar region is built around the Wild Area, which takes up the center of the region. Future Pokémon games will need new designs for their regions, as everything can’t be Wild Area-focused going forward.

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The massive Wild Area in the center of the Galar region can become the new iteration of the Safari Zone in future games. They can be placed anywhere on the edge of the map and appear as an uncharted location. This gives the developers a place to hold live service-style events, like the recent one that involved beating one million Gigantamax Pikachu. It’s also a location that can house Pokémon that are gradually added to the game, assuming the developers repeat the Dexit decision to limit the number of Pokémon at launch. Using the Safari Zone as the location for new Wild Areas will allow The Pokémon Company to keep one of the best aspects of Generation VIII going forward, while still giving the developers a chance to craft new types of region maps and routes for future Pokémon titles.

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About The Author


Scott Baird
(2543 Articles Published)

Scott has been writing for Screen Rant since 2016 and regularly contributes to The Gamer. He has previously written articles and video scripts for websites like Cracked, Dorkly, Topless Robot, and TopTenz.
A graduate of Edge Hill University in the UK, Scott started out as a film student before moving into journalism. It turned out that wasting a childhood playing video games, reading comic books, and watching movies could be used for finding employment, regardless of what any career advisor might tell you. Scott specializes in gaming and has loved the medium since the early ‘90s when his first console was a ZX Spectrum that used to take 40 minutes to load a game from a tape cassette player to a black and white TV set. Scott now writes game reviews for Screen Rant and The Gamer, as well as news reports, opinion pieces, and game guides. He can be contacted on LinkedIn.

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