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Old 05-22-2014, 11:44 PM   #1
Talon87
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Fox News Interview from 2000 with U.S. Champion

The video speaks for itself.

This find was passed along to me tonight in a rare trip onto AIM by none other than Ian Garvey himself. Former U.S. national champion. (Some would say uncontested titleholder as we've yet to have a Singles tournament since he last took the title home. I'm pretty sure Ian feels this way.) Former member of the Universal Pokémon Network forums hosted by Jason Axelrod. And, unfortunately, one-time hacker of the Ultimate Pokémon Network forums hosted by our very own Kuno. Ian's relationship with the UPN community is certainly an interesting one.

But whatever your thoughts on the member formerly known as EeveeTrainer may be, I think this is a pretty cool find and I'm glad he elected to share it with us. The VGC tournament organizers seem to go out of their way to pretend like the Gen 1-era tournaments never happened. Even Bulbapedia has no mention of Ian nor the tournaments he won, this despite the fact that Ray Rizzo and a number of other VGC-era champions have their very own articles on Bulbapedia. (Ian doesn't even at least deserve a mention somewhere? ) Bulbapedia does write about a Pokémon Stadium tour, but this is neither the Nationals nor is it the World Championship for 2000. For starters, the article claims that the event it describes was only held for the USA and Canada. The problem is, even if this was meant to describe the North American Nationals tournament (and it doesn't -- because it lists some other little boy as the champion instead of Ian Garvey), there should still be an accompanying article for the world championships held in 2000 -- an international event. The national champions of the United States (EeveeTrainer), the United Kingdom (KarmaCharmeleon), and several other nations all came together to fight for the title of world champion in a Nintendo-sanctioned, much-publicized event. There's no way that this "Pokémon Stadium Tour" can be it. Yet that's the closest thing to a positive hit I can even find on Bulbapedia. Shameful.

It's been nearly 14 years since the 2000 tournament was held, so it's understandable that without a Bulbapedia article to back up my claims many younger fans doubt whether such a tournament even existed. That's where this video helpfully comes in. Not only do we see the journalists referring to the tournament (and to Ian by name as well) but there's a lot of other little helpful pieces of evidence in here as well. You can see Ian's t-shirt that clearly reads, "USA Champion Pokémon 2000." (Either the kid had his mom screen it for him to support a delusional fantasy or else, I dunno, it's authentic. You tell me. ) You can also hear them describing the organization of the National tournament. What happened was that there were four regional divisions (one for each quadrant of the country) and the four regional champions then competed for the title of national champion and the privilege to represent America at Worlds. Ian, the regional champion for the NorthEast division, won that contest and thus was crowned America's champion.

The closest thing I can find on Bulbapedia that acknowledges the tournament's existence is this block of text in the article about Pokémon's presence in Australia:
Quote:
In 2000, Sydney hosted the first ever Pokémon World Championship. It was held at the Sydney University in Sydney, Australia where players from Australia, Belgium, France, Germany, the Netherlands, Spain, the United Kingdom and the United States competed using Pokémon Red and Blue and Pokémon Yellow. At the same time, Pokémon Park was opened for the general public where they had the chance to play Pokémon Gold and Silver for the first time, watch the latest Pokémon episodes and see live performances.
The lack of Japan's name in that list is a pretty telling sign as to why the Pokémon Company, at the very least, might have elected to distance itself from these earlier tournaments. While they were Nintendo-sanctioned, the fact that they appear not to have included Glorious Nippon could speak to why Nintendo now wants to act like these were just a fluffy sensational thing that don't really count as real tournaments.

Or, of course, it could just be the VGCs' hard on for the Doubles format. After all, the old tournaments were held in the popular Singles format whereas the rebirth of the tournament scene as VGCs brought with it the unpopular Doubles format. I say "unpopular," but obviously the format had fans from the very start and obviously tens of thousands of players have warmed up to it over the years. But I don't think there's any denying that most fans still perceive Singles as the real deal and Doubles as a gimmick that Game Freak is trying to force us to like by constantly and obtusely shoving it in our faces. Could it be Doubles pride that leads the VGC authorities (and, by extension, Nintendo and Bulbapedia) to not acknowledge the Gen 1-era tournaments as official? Who knows.

Anyway. The More You Know™.
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Old 05-23-2014, 01:10 AM   #2
Doppleganger
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I feel like the lack of documentation for this is less an issue of a passive conspiracy to black out a period of Pokemon history and more like an issue of the involved parties moving on, with little investment or curiosity from newer fans as far as making the article. For one thing, a video like this is a great starting point for building an article about this long-lost tournament.
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