"For generations, Pokémon have suffered at the hands of their cruel trainers. Help PETA free Pikachu and his Pokémon friends as they struggle for Pokémon liberation!"
— Blurb on PETA's official website
Pokémon Black & Blue is a Dark Parody of Pokémon by the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA). It's a short Adobe Flash game loosely based on the then-newest title, Pokémon Black 2 and White 2, with elements of Pokémon: The Series sprinkled about.
You play as a Pikachu who ran away from his trainer. Along your journey you fight various humans and recruit abused Pokémon to join your party.
Like all of PETA's games, it's an Author Tract on animal welfare and animal rights using Pokémon as its backdrop.
In 2013, a sequel titled Pokémon Red, White & Blue was released, which had Pikachu team up with a Miltank, a Jigglypuff, and Grimace to fight against the evils of McDonald's.
Both games are available on the games section of PETA's official website, with Black & Blue here
and Red, White & Blue here.
Tropes pertaining to Black & Blue include:
- Adaptational Ugliness: The Long-Haired Pretty Boy Cheren and the sexy Professor Juniper are both ragged and dirty.
- Adaptational Villainy: Every opponent bar Ghetsisnote is heroic in canon. Ash is the strongest example, going from a sweet All-Loving Hero to an abusive Jerkass.
- The Alcoholic: Cheren is portrayed as an abusive drunkard whose shirt is covered in blood. It also counts as underage drinking as
Word of God states Cheren is 14-15, meaning at the oldest he’s 17 as he’s depicted here (presuming Unova has similar laws to either NYC or Japan). - Bad People Abuse Animals: Essentially all trainers and professors. The game treats Pokémon battling as if it's a socially acceptable version of abuse and that humans only see Pokémon as tools to be used. It even says Pokémon battting caused many kids to start bullying each other.
- Batter Up!: Cheren has a bloody bat that he beats Pokémon with.
- Beyond Redemption: Curiously, Ghetsis is the only character in the game you can’t redeem, despite even Final Boss Ash Ketchum seeing the error of his ways at the end. Amusingly, this is actually completely in-character for him.
- Blush Stickers: Cheren has them to show that he's drunk.
- Bloodier and Gorier: The actual games reference a lot of violent things but they feature Bloodless Carnage. Here everyone is bloody and injured. It's even more-so this trope to the anime, which has shown blood less than ten times in twenty years of running.
- Breaking the Fourth Wall: Ghetsis does. It also spoils the ending to Pokémon Black and White:I don't want Pokémon freed—I want to control them. Didn't you finish the last game? There was a whole twist to the ending! It was great! Well, up until I was defeated by a kid.
- Canon Character All Along: The Pikachu you play as turns out to be Ash's Pikachu.
- Cooldown Hug: One of the original attacks is "Group Hug", which lowers the opponents attack.
- Ear Notch: Pikachu is missing a huge chunk of his ear.
- Enfant Terrible: Ash is only ten but is a ruthless, abusive trainer who only cares about money.
- Everyone Has Standards: A bizarre meta example — whereas all the other bosses see the error of their ways after fighting you, Ghetsis does not and you have no choice but to make him faint. It seems even PETA saw Ghetsis as a truly loathsome character.
- Final Boss: Ash Ketchum is the last opponent faced.
- Fur and Loathing: Ghetsis wears a coat made out full body Pokémon hides. It contains a Pikachu, Charmander, Bulbasaur, and a Aerodactyl.
- Happiness in Slavery: Subverted. Cheren thinks his Tepig feels this way but she doesn't.
- Heel–Face Turn:
- After being beaten Professor Juniper starts rethinking her views on Pokémon and gives up her Snivy.
- Applies to Cheren and Ash as well, though interestingly, it does not apply to Ghetsis (one of the few things the game gets right).
- Mad Scientist: Professor Juniper is a crazed scientist covered in blood who experiments on Pokémon.
- Messy Hair: Professor Juniper's normally neat and straight hair is a messy, puffy mess.
- Redundant Parody: Pokémon Black and White was already a discussion on the ethics of Pokémon battling, and Team Plasma in canon presents itself as essentially a Pokémon-rights group (and many members unaware of its true purpose are sincere Pokémon-rights activists). Curiously, late-game Black and White spoilers are casually dropped in Black and Blue, implying that someone behind the parody is familiar with the source material, so it's not quite clear why they did it like this.
- Repulsive Ringmaster: Ash wears ringmaster-styled clothes. He even uses a whip and bullhook (which are used on circus animals).
- The Reveal: The Pikachu is not a random Pikachu. He's Ash's Pikachu.
- Slasher Smile: Ash sports a toothy smile.
- Take That!: At Pokémon, though they were almost twenty years late to the party on that.
- Talking Animal: It's never explained why or how they talk, but all Pokémon can speak in the game.
- Wingding Eyes: Cheren has spiral eyes to show that he's drunk.
- Would Hurt a Child: The Pokémon have no issue beating up Ash, though admittedly he is the one with the whip and bullhook.
Tropes pertaining to Red, White & Blue include:
- The Cameo: Ash Ketchum makes an appearance where he has redeemed himself and offers to help Pikachu in exposing McDonald's cruelty to animals.
- Fat Bastard: One of the opponents faced is an overweight McDonald's customer who has mistreated his Jigglypuff.
- Final Boss: The final boss fight is against Ronald McDonald, who is really the CEO of McDonald's in disguise.
- Monster Clown: Ronald McDonald is portrayed as a fanged monster.
- No Name Given: Hamburglar is the first enemy faced in the game, but is only called "Mysterious Stranger".
- Take That!:
- In addition to once again accusing the Pokémon franchise of encouraging cruelty to animals, the game is itself an attack towards McDonald's, accusing the fast food corporation of teaching children that it's okay to torture and kill animals.
- The opening description of the game accuses Nintendo of releasing two versions of the same Pokémon game and having the audacity to release a slightly different version a year later. Made even more explicit in the ending, where it is facetiously stated that a sequel with minimal differences called Pokémon Purple - A PETA Parody will come out because it wouldn't be Pokémon if they didn't (soy)milk this thing for all it's worth.
- The McDonald's customer complains about his childhood being ruined and accuses the Pokémon of taking things too seriously after being defeated, a not-so-subtle jab at the people who criticized Pokémon: Black and Blue (and presumably PETA's other video game parodies).
