Game Freak’s Nintendo Switch 2 exclusive was left out of Pokémon Worlds entirely. Updates arrived for every other major Pokémon title. Winds and Waves received none.
So the fanbase started digging on its own. A 4chan leak, now making the rounds via well-known Pokémon leakers such as Centro, has given them fresh material to fight over.
What the screenshot actually shows
The image appears to be the inventory user interface for Winds and Waves. The layout itself isn’t surprising — it’s more or less standard for a Pokémon menu, and it’s all but guaranteed to be polished before release, given that unfinished texture models are still running in the background.
But the menu isn’t what matters here. It’s the Pokémon listed within it.
Generic placeholder art covers half of the entries. Two of them borrow placeholder art from Moltres, the fire-type legendary bird that debuted in Pokémon Red and Blue.
The Moltres pick isn’t random
Text in that portion of the menu says “Gokurakucho,” a term that translates loosely to bird of paradise. Two distinct entries appear: “Gokurakucho 1” and “Gokurakucho 2.”
Two readings follow from that. Gokurakucho either has an evolution, or Winds and Waves is stocked with more than one bird of paradise.
From a design standpoint, that would be a windfall. Birds of paradise exist in enormous variety, and almost every one of them already looks the part of a Pokémon. Credit for that belongs to the birds, not to Game Freak.
One real bird fits suspiciously well
Limit the search to Indonesian birds of paradise — the region Winds and Waves reportedly draws from — and the Red Bird of Paradise jumps out. Paradisaea rubra, for those who prefer the Latin.
Its coloring matches Moltres. And it’s nearly Legendary-rare in the wild, confined to a handful of small islands.
Extinction isn’t imminent, though numbers are falling. Officially, it’s classified as “Near Threatened.”
None of this is settled. Those Moltres icons may be pure placeholder art bearing no relationship at all to the creature that eventually appears. Getting replaced is what placeholder art is for.
There’s a second leak, and it’s about the starters
The Moltres situation accounts for just one of the two Winds and Waves monster leaks going around. The second is an image billed as a “riddle” pointing to the final stage evolutions of starters Browt, Pombon and Gecqua.
It comes from the same leaker behind the UI photo, make of that what you will.
No one will verify any of it before the game is out. Since Game Freak keeps final stage evolutions under wraps until launch, these riddles will stay unfalsifiable for some time.
Interpret them as you see fit. Personally: I expect Gecqua’s final form to be a magical creature of some sort, maybe psychic, with Browt filling the fighting-type slot for this generation.
If so, the cursed fire/fighting starter streak may be over at last. Rest in pieces.
What’s confirmed, and what isn’t
Nintendo Switch 2 gets Pokémon Winds and Pokémon Waves in 2027. Battles in the RPG remain turn-based, but reportedly won’t feel quite like what players are accustomed to.
Beyond that, all anyone has is a JPEG of a menu containing two orange birds, plus a content drought severe enough that people are poring over it like scripture.