What would it take? A Pokemon MMO

[Jeff]

The fake Pokemon Gameboy games were all hacked versions of existing games if I'm not mistaken. A game built from the ground up on the other hand wouldn't have copyright issues, unless of course, people put copyrighted stuff in there such as actual pokemon. As for adding more types, that's my idea for balancing the type chart. Grass, for example, is considered underpowered, but by adding Light (which on my type chart, Grass is strong against) it would be made stronger.

[Crystalmaster Mike]

The advantage of Fakemon for an MMO - no real Pokémon means no(blunt) copyright infringements - might also be a disadvantage, depending on how many Pokéfans are willing to forget about ever being able to use their beloved Nintendo-made Rhysorswine in the online game.
Then again, if some people would refuse to play it for lack of "real" Pokémon, it would decrease the chance of a server crash occuring.

Mind you I know of at least one other (bèta) online Pokémon game - Pokémon Volcano. Based on HTML, no less, it, up until now, offers only limited gameplay - no PokéMarts mean no way to buy extra PokéBalls.

[mr_pikachu]

EDIT: Okay, I've done a little more research since making this initial post... it looks like there are a number of Pokemon RPGs out there, from Pokemon Indigo and Pokemon Black to Pokemon World (part of Zango, apparently) and TPPC.

So, does anyone have any experience with these or others? Any useful knowledge that could be applied to a future project? Perhaps some insight as to how these RPGs have avoided legal issues with Nintendo, Game Freak, and so forth?

In any event, there doesn't seem to be quite as big of a void in the fan-made Pokemon MMO market as I would've guessed....