The Grass-type, Fire-type and Water-type Pokémon that first accompany you in "Pokémon Black" and "White" are old news, both in the U.S. and Japan, where they showed up in a trailer prior to the game's overseas release. The starters' proper names in North America, however, are just now coming to light, and it looks like they're going to be called Snivy, Tepig, and Oshawott, respectively. Moreover, the name of the games' new region ("Isshu" in Japanese) is getting localized to something different as well.
English "Black" and "White" carts will have you hunting down and taming Pokémon in the "Unova" region, according to PokemonBlackWhite.com (via Siliconera). All of the bridges, mountains and buildings will still look the same, though.
Reshiram and Zekrom, the two legendaries for this installment of the series, will both keep their names phonetically intact, along with their Dragon-Fire and Dragon-Electric special abilities.
The Spring 2011 North American release window for "Black and White" also remains unchanged, so the localization process must be on schedule. That still leaves quite a gap between now and launch day, but such is life. Maybe you can begin planning, scripting and designing costumes for your off-Broadway Pokémon musical to perform for the "Black" and "White" talent competitions in the meantime. A little extra practice and rehearsal time never hurt anyone.
What do you think of the localized "Pokémon Black" and "White" names? Are you glad that Nintendo decided to leave the legendaries alone? Share your opinions with us in the comment section below.