A fan-made Pokémon project is nothing new, but when one gets an official release it becomes big news.

After a 9 year development time, the fan-project Pokémon Uranium has been released. The game itself incorporates a lot of modern mechanics found in the Pokémon series, including mega evolutions, the new fairy type, and even introducing a new Pokémon-type specifically for this game, the Nuclear-type.

A full trailer to coincide with the release has been posted on YouTube, as shown below.

Pokémon Uranium sports over 150 fan-made monsters and hand-drawn sprites, mostly in the static style found in Diamond and Pearl series. All of the action takes place in the custom region of Tandor, and includes some of what you would expect from a Nintend0 made Pokémon game, such as the three starting type choices, the region Professor, and a villainous team. Some of the bigger changes include a new, scrolling UI and the ability to trade and battle other players online, which is a nice touch for a fan-made release.

The game itself is a standalone .exe file that can be downloaded only for the PC, for players who may be interested in trying it out for themselves.

Update: Due to Nintendo takedown requests, Pokémon Uranium has been taken down on the official website. The developers will continue to support the game.

Quick Take

Pokémon Uranium has always been one of the more well known fan-made Pokémon games. Pokémon in general tends to be a very popular choice for fan-made titles anyway, but this is the first time one of those titles has been officially completed.

Personally, I don't have much interest in Pokémon Uranium, but it is an interesting bit of history that the game has a final playable version out now. Of course, the question is, will Nintendo issue a takedown order for this game? Truthfully, I don't think it will matter much as the files can just be uploaded whenever at this point. Not to mention the fact that the game is basically free to play. We shall see if Nintendo responds at all, but good on the Uranium team for finally getting their game out.