Orre, Almia & Relation to Sinnoh

[galacticarticuno]

It's my understanding, that in the games at least, one cannot access the tail region of Sinnoh.

Spoiler: Pokemon to Real World Bulbapedia

Reading information on Almia Region (Pokemon Rangers) and Orre (Pokemon Colleseum), theory speculates that Almia might, at least, be potentially the tail section of Sinnoh. Then again, looking at the trivia page of Sinnoh it says the following:

Only the southern part of the now-Russian island of Sakhalin is referenced in the region. In the 1855 Treaty of Shimoda, Russia and Japan agreed to split the island, with Japan receiving the southern end. While Japan gave Russia full control of Sakhalin in 1875 in exchange for the Kuril Islands, Japan was again given the southern 2/5ths of the island after the Russo-Japanese War in 1905, and would retain control until 1945.
-source: Sinnoh - Bulbapedia, the community-driven Pokémon encyclopedia

Pulling up Sakhalin:

Pulling up Almia's bulba page, information is the following:

Almia introduces a vast selection of different geographical elements, such as a volcanic island, a desert and a valley that is constantly covered in ice. It seems to be based on the "tailpiece" of Hokkaido, which Sinnoh region is based on, though the relation between the two is unknown. It also geographically resembles Greece and Turkey, but the relationship between them is also unknown.

Source: Almia - Bulbapedia, the community-driven Pokémon encyclopedia

But it say in design concept it is possibly based on the Oshima and Hiyama subprefectures of Hokkaido, the real-life inspiration for the Sinnoh region.

I understand that Almia & Fiore have their own games in the Ranger games. A quick check of the Fiore region says:

Fiore (Japanese: フィオレ地方 Fiore-chihō) is the setting for the first Pokémon Ranger game. Its name is Italian for "flower". It may be somewhat far from the Sinnoh region, since in the in-game Manaphy event, Professor Hastings suggests sending the Manaphy Egg to Sinnoh as a response to the term "somewhere far away."
Source-https://bulbapedia.bulbagarden.net/wiki/Fiore

In reference to all of this:

1. Do you believe that Almia, Fiore and by extension Orre on are on different continents so to speak from Kanto, Sinnoh, Johto, Sevii Islands?
2. Should Ash (or say new protagonist if Pokemon ever got rid of Ash) visit these side regions?

I know it's impossible to really come up with a canon map of Pokemon if one were to factor in the anime, side regions (fiore, almia, orre) & potentially the TGC. But I think we can gather that:

1. Kanto, Sinnoh and Johto are all relatively on the same continent with the Sevii Islands being off the coast of Kanto.
2. Hoenn is somewhere in whatever ocean southwest of Johto.
3. If we factor in that Almia is potentially the tail end of Sinnoh and potentially connected to Orre through the desert, then that means they're within walking distance but a ferry ride perhaps away from Sinnoh.
4. Kalos is supposedly based on France and Galar on the United Kingdom (personally it looks more like England/potentially Wales to me)...so those could be feasibly reached by train and be close together.
5. Unova is likely on a different continent due to being based on New York.
6. Alola, if we go that it is based on Hawaii is likely somewhere southwest of Unova.
7. If we factor in the Orange Islands from the anime, then that strikes me as being somewhere off the coast of Johto, just to how they went from Kanto to Orange Islands to Johto.

Anyway, I guess what I am asking is... Do you think Orre & Almia are potentially connected? We know from the map of Almia that there's a desert but that it doesn't extend very far.

For me, head canon, I imagine this:

1. Kanto, Johto, Sinnoh are relatively the same places in game.
2. Sevii Islands are off the southwest of Kanto.
3. Orange Archipelago is somewhere off of Johto.
4. Galar & Kalos are somehow connected, possibly within train distance.
5. Almia & Fiore are on the same continent, somewhere north of Sinnoh.
   Hoenn is somewhere southwest of the orange archipelago & Johto/Kanto.
6. See in my head I see Unova being on a different continent since it's meant to be based on NYC (I think). Alola would be generally where Hawaii is so off the southwest of this huge continent with Unova generally where NY is. But going on the delacor islands page), it seems that is not the case, and it might be on the same continent as Galar & Kalos.
7. Oblivia Islands, south of Fiore and Almia (again according to its page).
8. Delacor Islands apparently is somewhere between Unova & Kanto (according to the bulbapedia page).

So, if we assume this all generally restricted to say one part of the world (let's go with eastern hemisphere) that means there may be other continents out there with other yet unexplored regions. Either way we know Unova is not on the same continent as Kanto due to Ash having to take a plane there so it must be far away.

Out of curiosity, do you think that Gamefreak/Nintendo has ever thought of having Ash or someone starting their journey from Orre or Almia/Fiore/Oblivia Islands? We know there must be someone from ranger series due to the pokemon rangers seen in...what was it? The Heatran episode and then...another episode but it doesn't come to mind....the lady with the plusle and minun partners I think.

On the topic of the tail end of Sinnoh. Do you think Gamefreak might ever allow players to ever access that area? Or do you think it could be considered part of another region.

Do you think we might see the island above that belongs to Russia potentially in a game region based on Russia?

 

[Cute Charm]

Orre may as well be in the southwest area of whatever continent Unova is located considering it's based off of Arizona.

Fiore ans Oblivia are still in Japan and therefore probably connected to the Japanese regions, but they're located also south of where Sinnoh is.

Almia probably is the only place that has any Sinnoh connections being located in the tail part of Hokkaido.

That also begs the question where Shinjoh is even located? Is it next to Almia? Who knows.

 

[Daenerys]

I thought Almia was part of the Sinnoh landmass, but that's only based on its shape and the fact that a lot of Gen 4 Pokemon live in Almia. But tbh we'll probably never get an answer because it's not like the designers who came up with Almia will ever do an AMA or an interview to give us insider info on a 10+ year old game.

 

[Fredster]

I actually did some research on this during the first lockdown (I needed to keep my curious mind busy in those difficult times lol). I replayed & datamined some games and I found that not everything you find on the net is correct regarding Pokemon geography.

But tbh we'll probably never get an answer because it's not like the designers who came up with Almia will ever do an AMA or an interview to give us insider info on a 10+ year old game.

Sadly you're probably right. Maybe we could reach out in some way to Director Katsuyoshi Irie or Producers Hiroyuki Jinnai and Hiroaki Tsuru since they seem to be involved in all forms of spin off stuff and they may be still willing to answer on these forgotten regions, but I wouldn't count on it.

I thought Almia was part of the Sinnoh landmass, but that's only based on its shape and the fact that a lot of Gen 4 Pokemon live in Almia.

I've always thought the same, however I'm not sure anymore after considering that this would make Haruba Desert (in Almia) south of Sinnoh and north of Johto (since it's confirmed that Sinnoh is north of Johto). Something like this:

This doesn't seem right climate-wise. Since we are in the Northern Hemisphere, Sinnoh is colder than Kanto and Johto, which are temperate. It doesn't make sense to have a hot desert in between them. Real Japan has mountains there, and this is also suggested by official games and anime maps of Kanto/Johto.
Also, two other places are confirmed to be between Sinnoh and Kanto/Johto:

• Sinjoh Ruins, which is a very cold place north of Lake of Rage.
• If you consider the anime to be canon, north of Pewter City is the Kingdom of Rota, a medieval-like state that it's more like Germany than a desertic area.

So I don't really know. Sinnoh is never mentioned in Shadows on Almia (I searched "sinnoh" after extracting the text from the ROM), not even in the Manaphy event (while in the same event in Fiore it's said that Sinnoh is "far away").
Weird for a place that is supposed to be near it, there would be npcs talking about how they came from Sinnoh etc.

If we factor in that Almia is potentially the tail end of Sinnoh and potentially connected to Orre through the desert, then that means they're within walking distance but a ferry ride perhaps away from Sinnoh.

I think the desert connection theory between Almia and Orre is pretty weak. Other than the desert, they have nothing in common.
I actually concluded that Orre must be south, near Hoenn, because:

• In XD, it's said that since the majority of Orre is a wasteland, it doesn't have wild Pokémon, so the S.S. Libra is used to ship Pokemon to Orre from other regions. Now, the majority of the mons we find there are from Gen3 and the other are from Gen2 and Gen1. It's very likely that Pkmn are regularly imported in Orre via boats from important ports nearby (Slateport and Lylicove) and/or from Vermilion/Olivine (remember that Hoenn is south-west of Johto: confirmed by an anime map, real world Japan, and the Embedded Tower in southwestern Johto being built by Hoenn people (in HGSS). Plus, in Emerald you can reach one of the Sevii Islands by boats, which are south of Kanto).
• The abandoned ship in Hoenn was named SS Cactus before. It's south of Hoenn, near Slateport. I think you can see where I'm going here.

• Kalos is supposedly based on France and Galar on the United Kingdom (personally it looks more like England/potentially Wales to me)...so those could be feasibly reached by train and be close together.

We have no evidence of a Galar-Kalos connection, but I can tell you this.
Couriway Town, in eastern Kalos, has got a train station that is said to "bring trainers from a long way away here". It's implied by various dialogues that when Sycamore first went from Sinnoh to Kalos he arrived just there (leaving the hidden message that you can find in the station).
If we consider that Sinnoh is north of Johto, he must have took a train from some station in southern Sinnoh not visible in the games, then probably passing through Goldenrod station (where the magnet train for Kanto also arrives) and going west for Couriway.
Kalos being west of Johto would make perfect sense. It's got lots of Gen1/Gen2 pokemons, much more than other regions. Everything between France and Japan probably doesn't exist in the pokemon world, or it's shrinked, otherwise Sycamore would've taken a plane instead (they exist in both the games and the anime).

We could place Galar north of Kalos, like you said, and that would mean it's directly west of Sinnoh. That would make sense since the Regi temples in the Crown Tundra are similar to the one in Snowpoint. We should rotate Galar 180° so:

• being in Northern Hemisphere, the more north you go the colder it gets
• the Crown Tundra is north, around the same latitude of Snowpoint (also given the snowy weather)
• the Isle of Armor is not in the way between Galar and Sinnoh, and is where Ireland is in the real world (also it's got the same shape)
• Crown Tundra = Scotland in the north, Wyndon = London in the south, makes sense.

• Alola, if we go that it is based on Hawaii is likely somewhere southwest of Unova.

Likely, and it's also somewhat near Kanto/Johto, since Malie city is said to be influenced by those cultures. Also lots of Alolan forms are mons seen in Kanto.

• Oblivia Islands, south of Fiore and Almia (again according to its page).

I can confirm this as I've read it somewhere in the game, but I don't think they mean Oblivia is directly south of them. More like "Italy is south of England" kind of thing.
I would actually put Oblivia near Alola as they have strikingly similar architectures. Check this out: Compairson of Oblivia and Alola's 1st islands | Pokémon Sun and Moon
Sadly I couldn't datamine the Oblivia game as they used a different format than the older games and there are no tools that can easily extract the text from the ROM.

 

[チカロ]

I'm sorry if this doesn't go there; this is my first post.

Okay okay okay, so I'm a big map nerd, and after spending a solid 20 minutes looking at the different pokemon maps, I noticed a little something from Hisui's map.

Now, for those of you who don't know, the side region, Almia, from the Rangers series, is supposedly based on the tail-piece of Hokkaido, and maybe a little bit of Aomori, too. However, if you look at the ingame map of Hisui, you can see that where the tail-piece of Hokkaido would be, is noticeable.

I was just wondering what you guys thought. Obviously, other changes to the map from Hisui to Sinnoh were made (namely in East Sinnoh).
Also again, sorry if this isn't where it should be (I don't want to get in trouble from my first post) or if my English grammar is horrible!

 

[ripplefieldz]

unfortunately, i feel like the devs probably just straight up forgot almia existed :[ the fact that they mentioned alola's ride mons instead of guardian signs' ride mons, which are actually based in legend like hisui's instead of being Just Some Guys, feels kinda like a testament to that tbh.

 

[Nitro Indigo]

How often do Game Freak reference spinoffs? There's the camera minigame in Alola that's clearly a reference to Snap, the most popular spinoff among 90s kids, and maybe that Gengar PokéDex entry that says it used to be a human is a reference to Rescue Team... Any more?

 

[Fredster]

I'm sorry if this doesn't go there; this is my first post.

Okay okay okay, so I'm a big map nerd, and after spending a solid 20 minutes looking at the different pokemon maps, I noticed a little something from Hisui's map.

Now, for those of you who don't know, the side region, Almia, from the Rangers series, is supposedly based on the tail-piece of Hokkaido, and maybe a little bit of Aomori, too. However, if you look at the ingame map of Hisui, you can see that where the tail-piece of Hokkaido would be, is noticeable.
View attachment 157150
I was just wondering what you guys thought. Obviously, other changes to the map from Hisui to Sinnoh were made (namely in East Sinnoh).
Also again, sorry if this isn't where it should be (I don't want to get in trouble from my first post) or if my English grammar is horrible!

The official artwork map seems to be less clouded: https://archives.bulbagarden.net/media/upload/2/22/Legends_Arceus_Hisui.png

I find the trees in the lower left corner interesting. Are they palms? In what seems a desert? Looks familiar to me:

 

[Blitzter]

Doesn't the cave of being in Unova connect to Sinnoh?

Them being closer together would explain some of the things you see in Unova like the Japanese school uniforms and fertile shrine, also the Rancher/Cowgirl trainers you see in Sinnoh with western names.

 

[Blanc]

Doesn't the cave of being in Unova connect to Sinnoh?

I believe so, yes! Thank you for pointing this out, I remember there was a cave from Unova to Sinnoh, but I forgot which, it’s been a hot minute.

Them being closer together would explain some of the things you see in Unova like the Japanese school uniforms and fertile shrine, also the Rancher/Cowgirl trainers you see in Sinnoh with western names.

A very interesting idea I never thought about! This makes a lot of sense actually. In some JP forums I frequent, many were also theorizing this connection between regions is how Ingo made his way over.