Pokemon Legends Arceus could change the entire franchise timeline

Warning: The following article contains spoilers for the game Pokemon Legends Arceus.

If you are a fan of the theories of Minkowski, Einstein and Whitehead (or you watched Loki), you might be familiar with the concept of a nexus point in the time stream. Think about the stream of time like a stream of water. You place a rock, that we’ll call a nexus point, into the stream. The singular flowing stream now has a temporary break where we get to see a stream where the water was forced left and a second stream where it was forced right. Now imagine you backed up a truck of pebbles and dumped them into the stream. That’s life.

You slipped on the steps, you probably created a nexus point in which there is now a reality in which you died there. You might have a reality in which the only change is you ended up dating someone else. Peter Clines’ science fiction book “The Fold”, while just being an incredible read (and audiobook) also digs into it really well into the theory.

Oof, you didn’t come here for all that did you. But I bring it up for a reason. In Final Fantasy 7 Remake, fans were startled when their complete remake deviated from the original story in surprisingly different ways. Things that were supposed to happen went the other way. Characters made different choices. And the timeline was not only aware of this but sent swarms of angry spirits to deal with this.

We don’t know what the nexus point for this was, unfortunately, because the series will probably go the way of Xenogears in which each chapter takes so long to release people just stop buying them because they don’t remember what happened previously.

But Pokemon doesn’t have that lore issue. Their lore has always been hinted at and theorized but never actually confirmed. Textbooks don’t explain how the world came together, storybooks do. So while they can talk about Regigigas creating the Sinnoh island by dragging smaller islands together with rope, the truth of the matter is that Regigigas is 12’2″ and rope just didn’t exist back then. So we know precious little about what actually happened.

All we really have are the stories that involve how other people took advantage of these stories. We know that Archie and Maxie wanted to use Kyogre and Groudon to either flood the world or dry it out. We know that Ghetsis wants to rule over his country. We know Giovanni had a series of remarkably bad plans that defy logic. But the thing they all had in common was that they used the lore written in books written long ago to attempt some truly foolish things.

But now, in Pokemon Legends Arceus, you’re literally helping write those books. And not only that, you’re writing them with the knowledge you gained from being from the future. Because in the game, time travel is real and it can definitely have ramifications. For example, Ingo, from Pokemon Black and White, has landed in the game with no idea how he got there with part of his memory gone.

This may have created a branching timeline in which Ingo disappeared. Heck, if you play as a male presenting character, you’ll notice that you start with the same “Logo T-Shirt white” that you start the game wearing in Pokemon X and Y, possibly stating that there’s a timeline where a hero never stepped in.

Not only that but I also talked about over on this article about descendants that I have a theory that while Volo is clearly the descendant to Cynthia, I think Cogita IS Cynthia with full knowledge of Volo’s plans. There’s also the weird coincidence that Volo’s evil plan is almost exactly Cyrus’ plan is weird.

Long story short, the events of this game could have major ramifications and possibilities. Now, it is possible that these are the main timeline events considering it’s YOUR work that inspires Kamado to get into research (leading to his ancestry being Professor Rowan, and in doing so gives control to Cyrelle who is the descendant of future Team Galactic leader Cyrus. But what if it isn’t.

This nexus point could create a branching point in the Pokemon games. A way for there to be one series of games for the serious Pokemon competitive players that want the traditional eight gyms, final four, the tradition of Pokemon games, AND the second series of games that follows the Pokemon Legends Arceus timeline in which they might do a “Pokemon Legends Mewtwo” in which it’s the story that follows the Red/Blue(Green) storyline with some new surprising changes featuring a game world that is very similar to Pokemon Legends Arceus’ look and playstyle. You could go through the entire series of games, revisiting familiar lands and stories but surprising veteran players with unexpected twists.

I would love to see this happen. Pokemon loves revisiting the past and this would be an excellent way to experience Kanto and Johto for the first time all over again. There wouldn’t have to be a brand new Pokedex with a slew of new entries. It could still be the original ones from the game. Only now, something’s off.

What do you think? What’s a Pokemon story you’d love to see a changed timeline of? Let us know in the comments and, if you’re still playing Pokemon Legends Arceus, don’t forget we’ve torn through it with a handy index of walkthroughs, inventories, and other fun stuff.