>>36501426>Also there wasn't really a good "digidex" like Pokemon has, which made it kind of difficult to keep track of digimon and their weird digivolution paths.That's because there are almost no rules to how a Digimon can digivolve beyond class progression (Fresh, Rookie, Champion, etc.) and typing, and even for those rules there are exceptions. Digimon have branching evolutions based on how you care for them, just like Tamagotchi. Digimon and Tamagotchi are two halves of the same whole but each was marketed to a different gender audience, with Digimon focusing on fighting and aimed at boys while Tamagotchi focused on caretaking and was aimed at girls. Both are owned by Bandai.
The Digimon cartoons tried to stay consistent with certain lines (Tanemon -> Palmon -> Togemon -> Floramon) but in the digital pet games a Palmon could digivolve into several other choices besides Togemon like Veggiemon, Ninjamon, Whamon, Sukamon, etc.
The same with Tamagotchi, if you cared for your pet and gave it good attention it could turn into a cool or cute one but if you abused it or neglected it either it would turn into an uglier version or just die.
Pokemon simplified all of that by limiting evolution to no more than 3 mons per branch, with the exceptions of alternate evolutions with stones. It also kept the linear progression that Tamagotchi had, while in Digimon your pet could digivolve back and forth. But unlike the other two, pokemon was incosistent with how pokemon died and generally tried to censor the idea for most media, not including the comics.
All of them are based on the mini electronic toys that were really trendy during the 90's. I don't think toys like that will ever be popular again now that everyone has smartphones.
