Pokémon Gen 10 game for Nintendo Switch 2 revealed in massive Game Freak hack

The developers behind Pokémon are victims of a ‘teraleak’ scale hack, which has leaked detail of new games, the Nintendo Switch 2, and employee data.

Pokémon developer Game Freak has become the latest studio to be severely impacted by hackers, following recent attacks at Insomniac and Rockstar Games.

Over the weekend, internal information from the company began to emerge online, including plans for several unannounced games, source code for past titles like HeartGold and SoulSilver, internal meeting notes, and prototypes of cancelled pokémon.

Game Freak acknowledged the leak in a statement on Sunday, confirming over 2,500 personal data items of former, current, and contract employees had been stolen from the company, after a ‘third party’ gained ‘unauthorised access’ to the developer’s servers in August 2024.

The studio apologised to staff and said it would contact those affected individually. In the statement, Game Freak insisted that it has since ‘rebuilt’ the server and is strengthening its security measures to prevent any future attack.

While Game Freak acknowledged the stolen information of employees, including names and contact information, it didn’t make any reference to other files which have made their way online.

The data breach has been described as a ‘teraleak’ by Pokémon fan accounts, but the information itself, in regards to unannounced projects, doesn’t appear to be as revealing as other recent hacks – although may be discovered as fans wade through all the data.

It’s important to note, however, that plans often change and it’s common for unannounced projects to be shelved partway through development, so many of the titles mentioned may never have been destined for release anyway.

According to the leaks, a ‘Splatoon-like’ multiplayer Pokémon game is in development from Game Freak and ILCA, the team behind Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl.

Details around the tenth generation Pokémon games, codenamed Gaia, have also seemingly emerged. The games, labelled ‘K’ and N’ in Japanese, are said to be in development for the Nintendo Switch and the Switch 2, which appears to have the codename ‘Ounce’.

Outside of games, plans for a new animated Pokémon movie set in Kanto (setting of the very first Pokémon game) have been discovered, along with a several anime shows and a live action Netflix series.

A Detective Pikachu sequel titled The Great Detective Pikachu has also apparently been in development since 2021, but it’s unclear if it’s been cancelled or not.

The only future Pokémon game we officially know about is Pokémon Legends: Z-A, a successor to Pokémon Legends: Arceus. It’s set to come out sometime next year but, according to the leak, the game was originally planned for 2024.

As announced in its reveal trailer, Pokémon Legends: Z-A is set in Lumiose City, first introduced in Pokémon X and Y, and will see the return of Mega Evolutions.

While the sheer amount of information and images (which we won’t share here) makes it easy for people to make up additional details, it’s clear that a considerable amount of information has been stolen.

Game Freak is one of the three companies with a stake in the Pokémon franchise, alongside Nintendo and Creatures, Inc. They don’t exclusively make Pokémon games though and do occasionally make other, smaller scale original titles, like Giga Wrecker Alt.