Look, we were all young, excitable, and very much driven when it came to not only completing this electronic encyclopaedia of wildlife Professor Oak had handed over to us at the beginning of Pokemon Red and/or Blue, the very first entry in a gaming series and cultural phenomenon that would eat up kids' time and parents' bank balances for years to come. We were even more excited when we heard the news, thanks to the first movie spin-off from the animated series adapted from the games (phew), that there weren't just the 150 pocket monsters we had originally assumed. There was a secret 151st Pokemon called Mew, and you could find him in the game! Of course, Nintendo weren't going to give up such a rare, mysterious and powerful Pokemon easily. The accepted method of finding a Mew in the game was even more convoluted than digging up Missingno, the infamous glitch that looked awesome and totally screwed up your save files. You had to locate the truck parked outside the SS Anne early in the game by never actually boarding the ship, carrying on the rest of the game as normal, flying back and then surfing across the water to the strip of land where the car's located. You use strength to shove it out of the way, and you find Mew underneath! Nah, you didn't, but hey, you wasted so many hours on capturing all 150 actual Pokemon, what's a few hours more? In fact the only way to officially get Mew were a official events held by Nintendo as the games reached their first peak in popularity. Everything else was just a cruel hoax. Also: holding or rapidly pressing any of the buttons doesn't help you capture a Pokemon, the haunted Black edition of the first game isn't real, but you may actually have killed your rival's Raticate. Oops.
Tom Baker is the Comics Editor at WhatCulture! He's heard all the Doctor Who jokes, but not many about Randall and Hopkirk. He also blogs at http://communibearsilostate.wordpress.com/
