30 Years of "Title Screen" (Pokémon Series Theme) — Pokémon 30th Anniversary 1996-2026

When Junichi Masuda composed the title screen music for Pokémon Red and Green in the mid-1990s, he could hardly have imagined what an icon this little title screen melody would become for the entire franchise. On February 27th, 2026, the Pokémon franchise turns thirty years old; appearing in various forms over those three decades, this song has set millions of Pokémon Trainers off on their adventures over nine generations of video games.

In celebration of this momentous anniversary for the series, I’ll be showcasing every rendition of “Title Screen” present in the core mainline series games (up to the date of recording) presented over the title screen visuals during which most of them play. The music tracks for nearly every game are lossless quality directly from the soundtrack CDs and timed by-hand in editing to match the title screens of the games, rather than simply being taken from game audio.

For this video, I opted to only include renditions of the Title Screen melody in which it is the sole or primary focus of the song. Many games contain a portion of it within certain other tracks, but it usually lasts for a small portion of a song that’s otherwise original; these will not be included to keep the focus on this melody alone. I’ve also opted to only include core main series games without any spin-offs. Pokémon Let’s Go, Pikachu! & Eevee and Pokémon Legends: Arceus have been included, however.

For the highest video quality possible and recording ease, video was captured from PC emulators running my own legally dumped ROMs of the original game cartridges up to Nintendo 3DS. For Nintendo Switch, a capture card was used with my Switch running the original game cartridges. All footage was captured from the North American versions of the games, with the exception of Pocket Monsters Midori which was included with Red & Blue to respect the original 1996 release.

A special thanks goes out to an anon on archive.org for their gorgeous CD rips from the soundtracks of Pokémon Red & Green up to Sun & Moon, EpiKL for their CD rips of the “Title Screen” tracks from Sword & Shield through Scarlet & Violet, and Sitting On Clouds for Brilliant Diamond & Shining Pearl and Let’s Go, Pikachu! & Eevee.

Pokémon Legends: Z-A was excluded as there is no CD release of the soundtrack as yet. I may make an updated video in the future as new games release and new arrangements of the series theme exist.

I claim no rights to the visuals or music presented here; I make no money from my videos and this video was put together as a fan paying homage to music from a beloved video game series to celebrate its momentous anniversary.
All rights belong to Game Freak, Nintendo, Creatures Inc., and The Pokémon Company.

Software Credits:
Emulators used: BGB 1.6.6 (Game Boy/Color), VisualBoyAdvance-M 2.1.11 (Game Boy Advance), melonDS 1.1 (Nintendo DS), Azahar 2123.3 (Nintendo 3DS)
Music conversion: MusicBee 3.6.9403 with flac.exe, fre:ac 1.1.6 with meh! to Windows Wave
Recording software: OBS Studio 32.0.2
Editing software: Adobe Premiere Pro CS6, HandBrake 1.9.2

Music Credits (Arranger(s), Composer):

0:00 Title Screen (Pokémon Red & Green) — Junichi Masuda
1:42 Title Screen (Pokémon Yellow) — Junichi Masuda
3:24 Title Screen (Pokémon Gold & Silver) — Junichi Masuda
4:48 Title Screen (Pokémon Crystal) — Junichi Masuda
6:02 Title Screen (Pokémon Ruby, Sapphire & Emerald) — Go Ichinose & Junichi Masuda
7:42 Title Screen (Pokémon FireRed & LeafGreen) — Go Ichinose & Junichi Masuda
9:18 Opening Movie (Pokémon Diamond & Pearl) — Go Ichinose & Junichi Masuda
11:02 Opening Movie (Pokémon Platinum) — Go Ichinose, Hitomi Sato & Junichi Masuda
12:46 Title Screen (Pokémon HeartGold & SoulSilver) — Shota Kageyama & Junichi Masuda
14:02 Title (Pokémon Black & White) — Go Ichinose & Junichi Masuda
15:21 Victory is Just Beyond the Horizon! (Pokémon Black & White) — Go Ichinose & Junichi Masuda
17:02 Title Screen (Pokémon Black 2 & White 2) — Go Ichinose & Junichi Masuda
18:55 Victory Lies Before You! (Pokémon Black 2 & White 2) — Go Ichinose & Junichi Masuda
20:37 Title Screen (Pokémon X & Y) — Shota Kageyama & Junichi Masuda
21:38 Title Screen (Pokémon Omega Ruby & Alpha Sapphire) — Shota Kageyama, Go Ichinose & Junichi Masuda
23:21 Title Screen (Pokémon Sun & Moon) — Go Ichinose & Junichi Masuda
25:09 Title Screen (Pokémon Ultra Sun & Ultra Moon) — Go Ichinose & Junichi Masuda
26:38 Title Screen (Pokémon Let’s Go, Pikachu! & Let’s Go, Eevee!) — Shota Kageyama & Junichi Masuda
28:14 Title Screen (Pokémon Sword & Shield) — Go Ichinose & Junichi Masuda
29:39 Opening Movie (Pokémon Brilliant Diamond & Shining Pearl) — Shota Kageyama, Go Ichinose & Junichi Masuda
31:25 Title Screen (Pokémon Legends: Arceus) — Hitomi Sato & Junichi Masuda
32:59 Title Screen (Pokémon Scarlet & Violet) — Yuri Habuka, Go Ichinose & Junichi Masuda
34:36 Title Screen (Piano Ver.) (Pokémon Scarlet & Violet — The Hidden Treasure of Area Zero) — Hiromitsu Maeba & Junichi Masuda