Exploring Pokémon Through Data
Pokémon is one of the most famous video game franchises in the world, created by Nintendo and Game Freak in 1996. The name “Pokémon” comes from “Pocket Monsters,” which describes the game’s core idea: catching, training, and battling creatures called Pokémon. Each Pokémon has different abilities, moves, and elemental types (like Fire, Water, or Electric), which makes battles strategic and engaging.
The games follow a simple but exciting journey—players, called Pokémon Trainers, travel through different regions, catching Pokémon and training them to compete in battles. The goal is often to defeat powerful opponents, known as Gym Leaders, and ultimately challenge the Pokémon League to become the Champion. Some Pokémon evolve into stronger forms, while others are incredibly rare and legendary.
Over the years, Pokémon has expanded beyond video games into TV shows, movies, trading cards, and even mobile games like Pokémon GO. Today, there are over 1,000 Pokémon, each with unique stats and abilities. This makes Pokémon not just a fun game but also a goldmine of data—perfect for analysis and visualization. With so many numbers, patterns, and relationships, Pokémon offers a great way to practice data storytelling in a fun and familiar setting!
The Wild Data Appears!
If you’ve ever wondered which Pokémon is the strongest, which type wins the most battles, or how Pokémon have changed over the years, we have curated a list of datasets that include stats like Attack, Speed, and Defense, as well as types (Fire, Water, Electric, etc.), evolutions, and even where they live. Here is the list to start exploring!
- Pokemon Yellow Legacy (Source: Reddit)
- Pokemon Emerald Legacy (Source: Reddit)
- Pokemon Trading Card Stock Market (Source: Will Sutton)
- The Population of Pokemon Red & Blue (Source: Reddit)
- JRose11's Pokemon Red/Blue Solo Tier List (Source: Reddit)
- Pokemon of the Year, 2020 (Source: Pokemon2020.com and Kaggle)
- Pokemon UNITE Character Stats (Source: Unite-DB.com)
- Pokemon Evolution Trees (Source: Bulbapedia, PokemonFandom, Kaggle)
- Pokemon Game Boy Music Midi Files (Source: nayuki.io)
- Twitch Plays Pokemon Completion Times (Source: wikipedia)
- Analyzing Pokemon for Pokemon GO (Source: Kaggle)
- All 721 Pokemon Stats (Source: Kaggle)
- Nuzlocke Single Full Run (Source: Blake Feiza's IronViz 2025 entry)
- #GamesNightViz Starter Kit
Or choose one of the data sets from the #GamesNightViz Data Archive 💾 ... or even leverage on the current Data+TV IMDB dataset from Tableau too!
Get started here > https://www.tableau.com/community/tv
And of course, feel free to bring your own data! If you find anything interesting, we'll love to know about it too!
Trainers, Assemble!
We are excited to see what everyone comes out with but here's some topic ideas and inspiration from the community to get started:
- Type Matchups: A clear, interactive chart showing which types have the best advantage in battles.
- Strongest Pokémon: Comparing stats to see which Pokémon would win in a head-to-head battle.
- Pokémon Evolution Trees: Visualizing how Pokémon evolve from one form to another.
- Generational Trends: Seeing if Pokémon have become stronger, faster, or more unique over time.
🏆New🏆 Certification and Badges to appreciate your fantastic work!
From this month onwards, we will kickstarting a new initiative of certifying your participation in the community project through issuing an unique digital footprint, which you can add to your LinkedIn profile too 😉 We also looking at retrospectively awarding for past Season 2 challenges!
Also, the team will also pick their top favorites to award an additional badge which is as prestigious as it looks!
We can't wait to see what everyone comes out with! And if you're coming to Tableau Conference, come find us in the Data Village for a little surprise gift! 💖
How to Submit
- This challenge will run for two months, because telling a great story takes time (we know!) and Tableau Conference is just around the corner so we will be running this through 🔔 End of April 2025 🔔
- Post your submissions on Twitter with the hashtag #GamesNightViz and tag the team @WJSutton12, @datavizlouis, @consult_ant so we don't miss your great work!
- Submit your work the project tracker here: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLScMRc4dJ089gPvHMtFVPZ7DVgcwrqqxkonffLF5apAZOzFX3A/viewform
