Pokémon Aaah!

Pokémon Aaah!
"The world's ONLY Pokémon website!"
PA!'s logo since 2000
Language	English
Status	Active (restarted)
Run	Varied: 1999-2004 (original) 2004-2012 (archival) 2012-2019 (random updates) 2019-Present (current)
Date opened	April 10, 1999
Creator	Philippe Van Lieu, aka Nick15
Current owner	{{{owner}}}
Forum	PA! Discord Server
Mascot	Missingno.
Website	Main Page

Pokémon Aaah!, or PA!, is a Pokémon website created and mostly maintained by Nick15 that mostly focuses on various off-beat aspects of the Pokémon franchise, such as fan made (fake) Pokémon TCG cards, print run and power creep data for the Pokémon Trading Card Game, and statistical data about Pokémon types. It was originally active between 1999 and 2004, with regular updates starting once again in 2019.

Overview

During its initial 1999-2004 run, PA! was probably best known for popularizing graphical fan made (fake) Pokémon TCG cards, as well as having spoilers of upcoming Pokémon TCG sets before even their Japanese release. PA! also had a mischievous side, creating and maintaining various hoaxes and other fakes to fool the Pokémon community at large. Furthermore, it kept a highly detailed database of all TCG sets of the time; when PA! ended, that database later helped form the foundation of Bulbapedia's own TCG articles.

Since its return in 2019, PA! has focused on more random and off-beat aspects of the franchise. For example, with the release of Pokémon Sword and Shield, a new "Galar language" was included and used on all signs, posters, etc, in game; PA! began work on decoding what the language is saying, and has gone further than other attempts. This is just one of several other plans for content relating to the more obscure and random parts of the franchise.

History

Original Run (1999-2004)

PA! started in April 1999, initially titled Pokémon AAAH! TCG America. The site's name was a reference to Pokémon's initial fad status, as if someone was screaming the name of Pokémon out of annoyance—"Pokémon?! AAAH!!"—as well as its focus on the Pokémon TCG; its initial popularity came from graphical spoilers for Jungle and Fossil, as well as simple Pokémon TCG fake cards. During this early stage, Nick15 was joined by his best friend, IVIegaX.

In June 2000, Nick15 completed the first-ever graphical Pokémon TCG fan made fake card, Fake Edition. The set contained 200 cards total and took one year to create.

In October 2000, two ex-staff members of PA!, The Echidna and Purity, left PA! in order to start their website Pokémon Zeo!, later joined by IVIegaX. The original plan was to run two websites with names starting with both an "A" and a "Z", thus covering Pokémon "from A to Z", but that plan didn't materialize.

In March 2001, Nick15 was having ISP issues which also kept PA! offline. When Bulbagarden webmaster Anenga heard of this, he invited Nick15 to be hosted as part of Bulbagarden's hosting plan. During this time PA! could be found at pa.bulbagarden.com, and as a bonus to fans, it showcased the upcoming "Version 5.0" site design.

In August 2001, Nick15 started college and thus transferred the site to then co-webmaster, PokemonMasterX (PMX). PMX would introduce "Version 6" the site, and negotiated with The PokéMasters for them to PA!'s host.

2002, however, turned out to be an annus horribilis for PA!. First off, rising server costs would cripple The PokéMasters, forcing it to shut down in February 2002. This in turn took PA! offline. To make matters worse, the copy of PA! that PMX had was also accidentally deleted, leaving PA! offline and without a site. This prompted Nick15 to return to help with rebuilding. Unfortunately, PMX would leave in October 2002, making Nick15 sole webmaster once more. But just when "Version 7" was about to go online, a hard drive crash deleted all of Nick15's work, taking PA! once again offline. It wouldn't be until January 2003 that PA! would be back to stay, finally with a new dedicated host and site design.

The last major change for PA! came in February 2004, when Nick15 created FakeCard.com, with the goal to cover creating fan-made fake cards for other games along with Pokémon, such as Yu-Gi-Oh! and the newly released Duel Masters. PA! thus become a section of the larger website. However, this version of the site would be short lived, as Nick15 was ready to move onto other projects, and regular updates would ultimately end the following May.

With PA! and FakeCard.com ceasing regular updates, Nick15 worked with several major Pokémon to ensure his work would not fall into obscurity. For example, the Pokémon Labs agreed to take on Nick15's fake cards and TCG data in order to continue the work that PA! started. Nick15 also transferred his fake card blanks to WaterPokémonMaster of PokéBeach, which still has a strong fan-made fake card community to this day. Finally, when Bulbapedia launched in 2005, many of Bulbapedia's TCG-related articles were created using the information and graphics from PA!'s TCG sections as a foundation.

Interbellum (2004-2019)

Although PA! would cease regular updates, versions of the site would remain online for nostalgia purposes. It eventually became one of the few remaining primary sources of Pokémon news and events of that time.

In December 2009, "pokemonaaah.com" was re-acquired by Nick15, after having been owned by domain squatters for several years; it was later attached to a March 2001 archive of PA! for nostalgia purposes.

In January 2012, PA! finally returned as a website that would update, albeit only as a simple blog for Nick15 to share Pokémon-related ideas and musings. The site's initial main focus was covering print run data for TCG sets, but later expanded to cover reviews and info about then-current gen game. In particular, Nick15 created an AR Marker Generator utility for the Pokédex 3D and Pokédex 3D Pro app for the Nintendo 3DS.

Current Run (2019- )

When Sword and Shield was released in 2019, PA! was updated once again to cover Nick15's research on the Galar language. However, as this research proved to be extremely popular, it helped convince Nick15 to restart regular updates once again and start work on creating new content for the site. Work on this new content is still in a preliminary stage, but Nick15 absolutely plans on seeing things through. It also helps that Pokémon didn't fade into obscurity since pausing PA! back in 2004, and that sites like Bulbagarden and Serebii.net focus on regular Pokémon news and data; frankly it's probably more popular than it's ever been, thus ensuring that PA!'s return won't be so much of an uphill battle, and also because PA! won't need to focus on covering stuff everyone else has.

PA! was later joined by Nick15's best friend, IVIegaX, now known as Teslalyte; Teslalyte would be focusing on PA!'s Discord server and helping with other "under the hood" work.

External links

Current Sites

• PokemonAaah.net - Pokémon Aaah! The Website, currently updating "website"
• Pokémon Aaah @ Facebook - Official Facebook page for PA!
• Pokémon Aaah! @ Twitter - Official Twitter account for PA!
• Pokémon Aaah! Discord Server - Official Discord server for PA!

Archives and Nostalgia

• FakeCard.com - FakeCard.com, archive from 2004
• PokemonAaah.com - Pokémon Aaah!, archive from 2001
• A more detailed history of PA! and FakeCard.com

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