Pokémon Veteran James Turner Rejoins Franchise Following Work on The Plucky Squire

Pokémon development veteran James Turner is returning to the world of pocket monsters, after previously leaving to make The Plucky Squire.

Turner is notable as being the first Westerner to officially design Pokémon, working for years at the series' core development studio Game Freak. Four years ago, however, Turner departed the company to co-found his own studio, All Possible Futures.

This fledgling team then released innovative indie platformer The Plucky Squire, which saw 2D characters leap from their storybook home to explore 3D surroundings. It's unclear what's next for the studio or any potential sequel now Turner has moved on again.

Last night, Turner revealed via a post on X/Twitter that he had begun a new role as Creative Director of Pokémon Art and Design at The Pokémon Company International. While this doesn't sound like a development role — meaning Turner's days designing species may be over — it will be interesting to see what he does next.

Of course, next year is a landmark moment for Pokémon as the franchise's 10th generation games, Pokémon Winds and Pokémon Waves, finally arrive for Nintendo Switch 2. Powered by Nintendo's newest console, early footage of the series' next adventures looks hugely ambitious.

Turner designed some of Pokémon's more unusual creatures, such as the ice cream-like Vanillite, colourful fish Bruxish, hulking whale Dondozo, haunted teacup Sinistea, and the sushi-esque Tatsugiri. Other designs he's credited for include the Gene Simmons-inspired Obstagoon, haunted tree Phantump and Ultra Beasts such as the muscled insect Buzzwole and big-jawed Guzzlord.

In the meantime, The Plucky Squire is certainly worth a look if you fancy some clever dimension-hopping platform puzzling. "A beautiful storybook adventure filled with brilliant wordplay-packed puzzles and clever dimension-hopping mechanics," IGN wrote in our The Plucky Squire review, which returned a 7/10, "but it drags on a bit too long after it's already used up all of its best ideas."

Image credit: James Turner.

Tom Phillips is IGN's News Editor. You can reach Tom at tom_phillips@ign.com or find him on Bluesky @tomphillipseg.bsky.social