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Pokémon Center NY

The Pokémon Center in New York is the one and only official store for everything that is Pokémon. It is located in New York City, NY, in the Manhattan area, in the Rockefeller Plaza, which is where the Rockefeller Center is, along with the flags of many countries. The Pokémon Center is home of the few special events that Nintendo creates for players of the latest Pokémon GBA games. Such events include the handing out of Eon Tickets for use in Pokémon Ruby & Sapphire. These events allow players to get new Pokémon that can't normally be found in the game, or a Pokémon that has a special move that it can't normally learn by leveling up.

Of Course I Took Photos

These photos were taken in January 6 - 8, when I went to New York on the week of January 5 - 12, 2005. The Pokémon Center was in the middle of trying to restock their store after selling so much stuff for the holiday season. As you can see in the following article at Pokémon.com, they were going to close the store soon to restock it anyways. The reason these pictures are so dark is because for that whole week it was either raining, snowing, or cloudy.

This is the first view that you get when you enter the store. You can see that the mood of the first floor is set up with a carousel of Pokémon figures and a dynamic light that slowly changes colors. The left side of the room has lots of stuff for fans of the Pokémon TCG as well as the large staircase leading to the second floor. The center of the room has some popular video games inside of display containers, so you can walk up to the counter and purchase games there. When I went there for vacation, they were still selling limited edition GBA systems with Charizard and Venusaur prints on them. On the wall to the right of the purchase counter, there are supposed to be collectable figurines for all of the Pokémon, but they already sold out of the most popular Pokémon. The left side of the room has a giant Pokédex on the wall, and miscellaneous items which inludes holiday stuff and miniture Pokémon playsets. The Pokédex is far out of date and only contains the first 251 Pokémon, but I will descibe it later.

This Venusaur greets visitors of the Pokémon Center as they enter the store. Many people like to take pictures of their children next to this Venusaur. I think that this Venusaur is about 4 feet tall. The employees sometimes hang around here just to relax and talk. You can see the elevator to the second floor in these pictures, it's a slow elevator that is mainly used for handicap people. Behind the elevator is a kind of large square staircase.

This Groudon is also a popular character to take pictures with. Groudon can be seen through the window on the left side of the building, but some people who don't notice it may be in for a shock when they enter that door and look left!

This is another photo I took while standing near the middle of the first floor. The GameCube station always has Pokémon Colosseum on it with some GCN/GBA cables so that players can duel each other on it. Players don't use it as often as they use the second floor tables because it would be uncomfortable to always be standing up. If you look closely at the closest display container, there are boxes from the limited edition GBA systems featuring Charizard and Venusaur. The rest of the containers have Pokémon Mini systems, GC games, and GBA games. The wall has all sorts of Pokémon trading cards, mostly EX FireRed & LeafGreen because they were just released around that time. I love those giant card decorations over the wall of trading cards. The one in the middle is Charizard EX, and even though I don't play the TCG, I can tell you that that card does Charizard justice with an absolute 200 damage move the is immune to resistances and other protection effects. I should have taken a bigger photo of that card...

These are photos of the Charizard that is in the middle of the square staircase. That Charizard was the most amazing Pokémon figure in the whole store. I was in silent awe. As if Charizard didn't look cool enough just standing there, there was Rayquaza behind him. Charizard was in the position to breathe fire out of his mouth at any moment now, and you know that beautiful shot looks like. This is the most famous and destructive Pokémon of all time! Need I say more?

This was the triple poster set adorning the walls of the staircase. They were put up in celebration of the Aurora Ticket giveaway back in in October 2004. Deoxys' defense form is shown on the left, and Deoxys' Attack form is shown on the right. In the middle, you can read basic information about Deoxys.

This photo shows off more of the area at the top of the staircase. You can obviously see it is being watched by more Pokémon such as Heracross and Scizor, and you can see movie posters for all of the Pokémon movies in existance. The flyers near the windows are two-sided so you can see them from outside as well. To the far right, you can see a peice of the giant monitor that shows music videos of music that was inspired by the Pokémon TV series and movies. That music can be heard throughout the entire Pokémon Center. As you can see, there are extra glass rails to prevent small children and merchandise from falling off the second floor, making the Pokémon Center a much safer environment for kids.

This was just a simple extended room on the second floor. The merchandise here was most likely leftovers from the holiday season. In the middle of the room there was a little display showing a Pokémon Video (GBA) box. I don't remember what the text said, but it was probably something about the TV show.

This is the section of merchandise adjacent to the tables which are set up for people to play Pokémon cards together (I didn't take a picture of that). Its hard to tell what these tables where intended for, but at the time they just had more of those leftover Chickorita and Pikachu. Its funny how my favorite Pokémon are always the first ones gone and the ones intended mainly for kids are still there. This section is pretty much all the merchandise on the second floor except for the wall on the other side of the room which has Gamecubes and other Nintendo games.

These are two back-to-back shots behind the shelf with Meowths in the last two photos. In the first photo, this section where you can find all kinds of Pokémon badges to buy. These are $0.99 badges which have various small Pokémon drawings on them. I couldn't find any in-game badges though. There where a few Pokémon cards on display, but I'm not sure if they were special or not. The Pokémon Center had too many badges, so they were giving two away to everyone who purchased a FireRed or LeafGreen there. I bought LeafGreen there and recieved two random badges from behind the counter. In the second photo, the awesome looking Pokémon Colosseum poster is just a barrier for the Gotta Catch 'Em All station. I guess they use it so the room doesn't look so open. You can see a display of Pokémon TCG cards to the left. I think it was a complete display of the fossil series or something like that. I don't follow the TCG. If that wasn't enough cards to be a whole set, then there were more cards on the other side of the pillar.

This is the Gotta Catch 'Em All station. It is four flat-screen displays showing either Pokémon music videos, or information about Pokémon give-aways that can be recieved by placing your game in a slot in one of the four stands. Sometimes there are GameCube controllers coming out of the stands and you can play GC demos or Pokémon Pinball. This particular time when I went to Pokémon Center, they were giving away Pokémon eggs for a week after the date advertised on Pokémon.com. There were wireless points on all four stands with signals of various strengths. There was probably some kind of GameCube+GBAPlayer hardware with special software in the stands. I asked an employee if the employees set up the system themselves, and he told me that Nintendo of America sends out some guys to modify the system from time to time. They must do it at night or early morning because I remember one day the wireless Pokémon Egg giveaway was working then next day it was turned off. Look for a list of Pokémon I got at the bottom of this page.

This is the actual Pokémon Pinball machine. I would have loved to try it, but it was broken. I've seen this machine at the Pokémon Center a year before and it was broken back then too. Infact, I don't think this pinball machine will ever be fixed. It's a shame that they simply kept it on display without maintaining it.

Two upstairs photos of the pillar which goes straight through the middle of the store. I like how they made so many Pokémon figures just to decorate the store. I'm pretty sure these Pokémon are actual size. I can't believe having a size comparison in the GBA game Pokédex actually taught me something. Now that I think about it, these are the kinds of Pokémon which were allowed in the Petit Cup for Pokémon Stadium (Squirtle, Rattata, Caterpie). You can see part of the elevator to the left in the first photo which is where I was standing for the second photo.

I took this shot to show the dynamic lighting on the second floor. All those neon colors (red, blue, green, purple) would change slowly in an attempt to make the room look alive. I don't remember if a certain song had to be playing or what the Pokémon Ball would do from time to time, but I remember hearing lightning sounds from time to time and seeing the light around the ball flash white and red. It was pretty cool. Too bad I didn't get to take a shot of the event in progress.

Back on the first floor there is this Ultra Pokédex on the right side of the room (across from the straircase and elevator). Much to my amazement, the "Pokédex" is shaped like a GBASP which came out well after the release of Pokémon Ruby & Sapphire, and still the software on the machine only displayed Pokémon from the color and metal generations of games. As if that weren't enough, the Pokémon Center closed doors just a few days after my visit to New York. Your probably curious about the Pokédex: It has a touchscreen which you must use when searching for a Pokémon. You can not browse all the Pokémon one by one and you cannot specify a Pokémon by name or number because of the lack of a keyboard or number pad. The touchscreen and "GBASP Screen" are not the same, so you can have a Pokémon displayed while you search for another one unless you hit the clear button. The search options are typical to what you see on the official Pokémon.com website. You can choose Short-Tall, Light-Heavy, Color, Type1, Type2. You could also search by the first letter of the Pokémon's name (it had a list of letters on the touchscreen, but not a keyboard).

On the way out of the store, you tend to notice the display containers near the two doors. There was nothing spectacular on display, but I figured I should at least get a shot of it since it was holiday-themed. I asked one of the employees who was standing there if any of the cards displayed here were special or rare, and she said they were just average cards for the emphasis was on the card frames. You can also notice that there were hand baskets and FR/LG booklets behind and on the display case. I didn't see very many people using the handbaskets. The booklet was about some basic information on why you should buy FR/LG, like how you can complete your Pokédex with it and trade between GBA, Colosseum, and Pokémon Box. The second photo shows the advertisings on the outside of the window. Putting fake walls so the entire store doesn't look so open, its no wonder they need so many lights in there. I've never seen those televisions turned on in both of the times I've been there. Its like they ran the store with half-heart.

Gotta Catch 'Em All - Pokémon Gifts

Pokémon Center NY was giving away Pokémon eggs at their Gotta Catch 'Em All station. Of course, these eggs had to be hatched normally and the Pokémon contained inside of them would always be at level 5. None of these Pokémon have any attack moves, so you have to either level them up with an Exp Share or teach them an attack move with a TM or the Move Tutor.


Chansey		 Sweet Scent
Wish
Lickitung		 Heal Bell
Wish

Exeggcute		 Sweet Scent
Wish
Kangaskhan		 Yawn
Wish

Drowzee		 Belly Drum
Wish
Farfetch'd		 Yawn
Wish