The Pokémon Company is working on AI specialized for Pokémon battles based on chess AI 

The Pokémon Company recently announced their joint venture with the Japanese AI developer HEROZ to create Pokémon Battle Scope (referred to as PBS). The AI will be implemented for the first time in The 2024 Pokémon Dragon King Championships, taking place on February 25. 

Pokémon Battle Scope is AI designed specifically to interpret and make predictions in Pokémon Battles. It was developed based on a shogi (Japanese Chess) AI made by HEROZ and handles complex information related to Pokémon battles, such as Pokémon types and attributes, moves, items, weather conditions and fields.  

PBS will apparently be able to interpret the rapid flow of Pokémon battles as well as predict players’ next moves and their respective probabilities of victory. A sample UI screenshot (though marked as “still in progress”) shows the PBS at the bottom of the tournament screen, giving one of the two contestants an 87% chance of victory over the other. It also displays potential next moves for each player, along with their chances of success. For example, “Shadow Ball – 50%, Switch out for Dragonite – 22%, etc. 

The AI was likely developed as a way to tackle the problem of Pokémon battles being fun for the participants, but much less engaging for viewers – the press release by The Pokémon Company states that PBS will allow viewers to understand what’s going on in a battle even if they are less knowledgeable about the game’s mechanics or if they join the stream mid-battle or similar. 

PBS will make its debut on The 2024 Pokémon Dragon King Championships, a Japan-exclusive Pokémon Scarlet and Violet tournament taking place on February 25 in Tokyo, Japan. The tournament will be streamed live on YouTube.