Pokemon Bank App Comes With Free Celebi

The Pokemon Bank Nintendo 3DS app is about to launch and, with it, Nintendo is now offering a free Celebi to sweeten the pot. Just imagine: An adorable little Celebi to add to your collection, and all you have to do to get it is sell a fraction of your soul to Nintendo.

I’m being overly dramatic, of course, but that’ sonly because I’m still not sure how I feel about this whole Pokemon Bank business.

Pokemon is a pretty bizarre series in and of itself, when you think about it. Players take on the role of a “trainer” whose only influence in the evolution of their fighters is to blindly throw them into bout after bout. The adorable little critters then pummel each other until one of them fall unconscious. It’s a brutal blood sport in which a high value is placed on the best of fighters and, let’s face it, thanks to the digital world of today, there isn’t a Pokemon trainer alive who doesn’t fear one day losing their amazing collection of Mr. Mimes.

Thankfully, Nintendo is finally ready to offer a solution, giving players the chance to cram their bestest friends into a digital bank account, where they will remain forever trapped until you deem it a safe time to release them from their cold, dark prison.

As we reported a while back, the Pokemon Bank is set to arrive Stateside right after Christmas on Dec. 27, perfectly timed to take full advantage of all of those new trainers who just opened their brand new copy of Pokemon X/Y that was lovingly delivered by the big guy in the red suit. No, not Mario!

Basically, the bank gives you an online storage solution for those who have taken the “gotta catch em all” motto of the series to grand new heights. The bank will allow players to store up to 3,000 Pokemon in a cloud-based bank, where they’ll remain safe and sound until you’re ready to re-download them or transfer them into the next version of the game. My jab earlier about needing to sell a little piece of your soul to Nintendo comes from the fact that the app will set you back $4.99 per year.

No, that’s not a lot of money by any stretch of the imagination but, seriously, we’re talking about a miniscule amount of information being stored here, and Nintendo would rather charge gamers to use the service instead of build a little good will and offer it free of charge. Then again, if even a fraction of the series’ fans decide to pick up the Bank, Nintendo could stand to make a bundle off of this frivolous little app.

Annoying, but at least that whole Celebi promotion announced during this morning’s Nintendo Direct helps soften the sting. Basically, everyone will have access to Pokemon Bank free of charge for an undetermined period of time. Anyone who uses the Bank between now and Sept. 30 of next year, including during the free trial period, will be able to add a Celebi to their collection free of charge.