Oh, 20th anniversary of Pokémon Crystal Version.

Meaning it's been 20 years since the first playable female trainer, Kris! https://twitter.com/livedoornews/status/1338137853545603072

Kris was designed by Sugimori and set the new standard for Pokémon games moving forward in regards to gender options.

A version of Kris, named Marina, would also appear in the Pokémon Chronicles anime. She also made cameos in the Pokémon DP anime.

She also appears in Pokémon Adventures manga, with the name Crystal. She dons various outfits, including the outfit Lyra, the female trainer in HeartGold and SoulSilver, wears.

Kris wouldn't appear in another Pokémon game until 2019's Pokémon Masters, where she's one of the 5* trainers.

The concept of a female player character goes back further, however. Sugimori designed one for the original Pokémon Red and Green. She would join the Pokémon Adventures manga as Green (Blue in Japan) and made her game debut in Let's Go Pikachu and Eevee.

The Pokémon Gold prototype has data for an unfinished female trainer as well. Though not confirmed, people have speculated the female trainer on this 1997 MicroGroup cover by Sugimori could have been her design.

And between then and the release of Crystal we had these early screenshots of the game, showing a very different design from the final Kris.

And yes, this is the best quality screenshots we have.

Though fan-made recreations, like this one by Ghost-MissingNo, exist of this early version of Kris.

(src: https://www.deviantart.com/ghost-missingno/art/Beta-Crystal-Sprites-for-G-S-C-564595350 )

And that's the end of my thread about Pokémon Crystal and Kris' 20th anniversary.

Merry Krismas!