>Masuda: The basic concept of Pokémon is trading, so how could we make the trading more attractive? If you have a different Pokémon in your game, that's a different kind of Pokémon you can collect.
>You can finish collecting all of the Pokémon based on the Pokedex. What kind of abilities can that Pokémon have? What kind of an attractive character can you create?
>When Mr. Tajiri went to talk to NCL, Mr. Miyamoto actually suggested, "How about creating different cartridges? There are different Pokémon on each cartridge, and people are willing to trade the Pokémon."
nice meme, it's literally just because Miyamoto came up with the idea so people would actually use the trading feature. Version exclusives are the reason Pokemon became such a phenomenon; you heard from other kids at school or wherever about Pokemon that aren't obtainable in your version, and vice-versa, then you traded for them.
