Pokémon

Satoshi Tajiri's starting point is said to be insect collecting in the new housing developments of Machida — catching them as a boy, showing them off, trading them. When he looked at the Game Boy's link cable and thought about uses beyond battling, the idea arrived: if there were something appealing enough to want to trade, that alone could be a game. Game Freak, founded on roughly 50 million yen in royalties from an earlier title, took on contract development work to stay afloat through a cash crunch during production, and after six years brought this game into the world in 1996. Trading over a link cable became the heart of the largest franchise on Earth.