Ahead of the release of Pokemon Legends: Z-A, another massive leak has rocked the series, this one sharing more than 70GB of information about the new game.
Information about the so-called 'Freakleak' began swirling over the weekend, with reports suggesting that the game's entire Pokedex is included among the information being shared. In addition, in-development builds of the game have also apparently leaked, along with more abstract information about the broader development process.
The reported size of the breach means that this leak is almost ten times larger than the game itself. Game Freak has confirmed the Pokemon Legends: Z-A file size is 7.7GB, a figure that's dwarfed by the scale of the leak. With so much information likely to be included in the reported 71 gigabytes of data and only a few days to go until the game's release on October 16, it's not yet clear how much, if any, of the leak still pertains to the final release version.
That said, Nintendo has been struggling with large-scale leaks like these for a while. 2020's 'Gigaleak' revealed the source code for a suite of older games, encouraging Nintendo to attempt to up its security. Regardless, 2022 saw widespread leaks of Scarlet and Violet, largely driven by retailers breaking the games' street date. The information in this new leak may actually stem from a breach in October 2024 - that 'Teraleak' included employee data and was acknowledged by Game Freak.
Speculation online hints that the leak included information about Legends: Z-A and the Generation 10 games expected next year, with the leakers having planned to hold on to the information they gleaned about future projects until it became more relevant to imminent projects. If that's true, then we're likely to see a repeat of this in the run up to those next-gen games, which are thought to intend to line up with the series' 30th anniversary in 2026.
Pokemon Legends: Z-A has got the shiny hunting sicko in me cautiously optimistic, but I hope the RPG doesn't repeat one of Scarlet and Violet's biggest mistakes.
