Pokémon Winds & Waves Leak Confirms We'll Be Playing This Game Forever

It is still going to be a while until Pokémon Winds and Waves kicks off the series’ 10th generation, but a deluge of leaks is giving us a vague idea of what to expect from the Switch 2 exclusives. The duo’s official unveiling in February gave us a look at its unnamed, Southeast Asia-inspired region and its three starter Pokémon, but leaks have steadily trickled in ever since, prematurely hinting at everything from Winds and Waves‘ internal release date to the starters’ final evolution typings.

Pokémon took its time trending toward open-world games, with Scarlet and Violet‘s Paldea debuting as the series’ first seamless region. Winds and Waves have long been rumored to be even larger, a notion seemingly corroborated by a Gen 10 map leak showing locations spread across more than a dozen islands. Yet more unannounced details are now contributing to speculation that Pokémon Winds and Waves will be by far the biggest mainline games yet.

Centro Leaks has been one of the main sources of leaked Pokémon information for years, and has filled that role with a fairly reliable track record. The account is now quite confident that Winds and Waves will feature the highest number of new Pokémon in the series’ history, saying, “Around 300 new Pokémon are planned.” That total includes both brand-new Pokémon and regional forms or variants of existing Pokémon. For reference, below is every generation and the numbers of new Pokémon and regional forms they introduced (regional evolutions are included in the new column).

Generation	New Pokémon	Regional Forms
Gen 1	151	N/A
Gen 2	100
Gen 3	135
Gen 4	107
Gen 5	156
Gen 6	72
Gen 7	88	18
Gen 8	96	35 (36 counting Darmanitan forms)
Gen 9	120	2 (4 counting Tauros breeds)

Regional forms could end up flubbing the numbers quite a bit when it comes to new Pokémon in Winds and Waves. Gen 8 has so many because Pokémon Legends: Arceus included Hisuian forms on top of Sword and Shield‘s Galarian forms. It’s possible that Winds and Waves could have an adverse, high number of regional variants – we just don’t know yet. If we assume Gen 10 is close to the average, though, that still leaves an astounding number of new Pokémon being added to the National Pokédex.

No generation has ever introduced more than 156 new Pokémon, and if the leaks turn out to be accurate, Winds and Waves will take a significant leap over that benchmark, nearly doubling it. In conjunction with the leaked map, Gen 10 could see the biggest Pokémon games by quite a wide margin, making it a lengthy task to catch ’em all, though it may also greatly depend on the number of returning Pokémon.

Centro Leaks also claims that Winds and Waves new battle gimmick will give certain Pokémon weather-related forms, similar to Mega Evolutions or Gigantamax Pokémon, but again, the exact split between forms and brand-new Pokémon is unknown. As the series’ first pair of games exclusive to the Nintendo Switch 2, Pokémon Winds and Waves are expected to usher in a transformative new era, and it seems to be shaping up much bigger than all previous generations, both in size and number of new Pokédex additions.