In 1999, printing a photo taken in a video game was the stuff of science fiction. Pokémon Snap made it possible, though, thanks to kiosks installed in stores in the United States and Japan: the Pokémon Snap Stations. Players brought their cartridge there and left with a sheet of stickers of their best shots. Here is the story of these kiosks, which never came to France.
From an initial idea to an in-store kiosk
Printing was at the heart of the project from the start. When the game was still planned for the Nintendo 64DD, the console’s disk drive add-on, the team imagined that photos could be saved and then transferred to another medium to be printed. During development, a HAL Laboratory technician, Masayoshi Tanimura, printed photos from the game as stickers with a video printer; the result won over Nintendo’s commercial partners. The idea took shape with the Pokémon Snap Station kiosks (see the game’s history).
Where and how it worked
| United States | Japan | |
|---|---|---|
| Retailer | Blockbuster (game and movie rentals) | Lawson (convenience stores) |
| Price per sheet | 3 dollars | 300 yen |
| Payment | By credits loaded onto a card, available in five illustrations: Bulbasaur, Charmander, Squirtle, Pikachu or Jigglypuff | |
The principle was simple: the player inserted their Pokémon Snap cartridge into the kiosk, chose the photos to print, and the machine produced a sheet of stickers.
#0001BulbasaurGrassPoisonBulbasaur card
#0004CharmanderFireCharmander card
#0007SquirtleWaterSquirtle card
#0025PikachuElectricPikachu card
#0039JigglypuffFairyNormalJigglypuff card
What was inside
Beneath its Pokémon-themed casing, a Pokémon Snap Station was not an exotic machine: it was a Nintendo 64, connected to a printer plugged into the fourth controller port, with a special version of the cartridge in charge of the printing tasks. A cartridge adapter made it possible to switch from this printing program to the player’s game, in order to read their photos.
Pokémon Stadium too
The kiosks weren’t only used for Pokémon Snap. Pokémon Stadium offered a mode that took and saved photos of Pokémon, which could also be printed at the Pokémon Snap Stations. Special casings were made to promote Stadium: there are therefore two variants of the kiosk.
A commercial lever
These kiosks mattered to the game’s success in the United States. Pokémon Snap became the most rented game in the country in autumn 1999, and IGN attributed its success to well-targeted promotion and the partnership with Blockbuster. The detailed figures are in reception and sales.
And in France?
No Pokémon Snap Station was installed in France or, to our knowledge, in Europe. The game came out here in September 2000, more than a year after the United States, without this printing feature. For French players, the first official way to share their photos came in 2007 with the Wii version, able to send shots to the console’s Message Board (see playing Pokémon Snap today).
