>>36157984When the business is hot, you can do no wrong.
When the business is cold, you can do no right.
Pokemon has been this successful over the years because it's been able to adapt to the changing times and interest levels of new audiences while also retaining its core brand identity so it's easily recognizable across generations. The Pokemon name is intrinsically linked with fun, positive memories for a lot of people, including detractors on this very board. The only way Pokemon could end up losing money would be if they did something so significantly off-base in their next big game that it turns general audiences away and gives the brand a bad reputation.
This could happen in two ways. One is by completely redoing the game so it no longer looks, feels or plays like a Pokemon game anymore in a way to pander to people who have no interest in Pokemon, only to eliminate the things that gave Pokemon its draw in the first place and alienate new and long-standing fans. The other is by pandering so hard to the addicted, often unpleasable "hardcore" fans to the point where it's almost entirely impossible for new players to get on board, driving potential audience away while the player count stagnates and gradually decreases.
The problem is Pokemon has become such a significant global cultural mainstay that the business is, generally, always hot, and therefore it'll hear little to none of the fan complaints, and there's actually very little it can do to tarnish its reputation, aside from going to a drastic swing in either the "casual" or "hardcore" direction.
Meanwhile, Digimon is sort of like the Sonic to Pokemon's Mario. One franchise doesn't do a whole lot to change things up, but gradually moves in an upward direction design-wise and still does the core thing it's known for well, while the other is constantly doing radically different things between games to get noticed.
