Nintendo Life’s Gen IV poll is live — which Sinnoh favourite will survive the 30th-anniversary

Why this Nintendo Life poll actually matters

This caught my attention because Generation IV is the season when Pokémon stopped feeling like a kids’ pastime and started acting like a full-blown cultural moment. Nintendo Life’s daily poll series – running through the final days before Pokémon’s 30th anniversary on 27 February – is asking readers to pick their single favourite Pokémon from Gen IV’s 107-strong Sinnoh roster. The result will tell us less about objective popularity and more about what modern fans are nostalgic for, and which Sinnoh icons still spark the strongest reactions.

• What’s happening: Day Four of Nintendo Life’s poll series focuses on Generation IV (Diamond, Pearl, Platinum).
• How it works: Readers choose one favourite from 107 Sinnoh Pokémon; each daily poll runs for five days, and winners advance to a final poll.
• Why now: The series wraps around Pokémon’s 30th anniversary (27 Feb 2026), feeding nostalgia and anniversary chatter.
• What to watch: Expect familiar Gen IV heavy-hitters to dominate, but polls reflect readership demographics and campaigning power as much as raw love.

Breaking down the Gen IV vote

Generation IV carried a lot of weight: it introduced competitive staples, memorable evolutions, and a handful of franchise classics that still appear in mainline media and competitive rosters today. Nintendo Life’s format is simple and effective for anniversary coverage – one day, one generation, five-day voting windows — and it funnels results into a final bracket where the winners from each generation face off. That makes individual daily polls more than nostalgia exercises; they’re mini-tournaments that reward engaged communities.

Important mechanics to keep in mind: each day’s poll is open for five days, so recency bias and social campaigning can swing results. The readership of Nintendo Life skews toward a particular slice of players — often long-time Nintendo fans — so the outcome will reflect that audience as much as global fandom.

Which Sinnoh Pokémon are likely to shine (and why)

There are predictable contenders that tend to perform well in community votes: Lucario, Garchomp, and Infernape are perennial favorites for design, competitive relevance, and franchise visibility. Empoleon and Togekiss also get regular praise for aesthetics and utility, while legendaries like Dialga and Darkrai carry lore-driven fan love. Gen IV produced a lot of “cool” designs that aged well — the risk is votes splitting across similar archetypes (lots of pseudo-dragons, starter lines, and evolutions), which can let an underdog slip through.

Why this timing matters — the 30th anniversary angle

The series is explicitly timed to hit the 30th anniversary on 27 February 2026. That’s meaningful: anniversaries concentrate memory and discussion, and they encourage players who might not usually vote to join in. Gen IV’s presence in that mix is boosted by the fact that its core entries started on Nintendo DS (Diamond, Pearl, Platinum) and later saw remakes and continued relevance on Nintendo Switch — a generation that bridged handheld and modern console eras for many fans.

What this means for fans and the broader conversation

Community polls like this are fun, lightweight ways to measure fandom heat. They’re not scientific, but they’re great at surfacing which characters still get people excited enough to click. Expect social media pushes from fan groups, threads arguing over underrated Sinnoh picks, and maybe a few surprises when niche favorites outperform big names because their fans turned up in force.

At the same time, be aware that these polls can flatten nuance. Competitive usage, cultural impact, and design quality all mean different things to different groups of fans; a final “favourite Pokémon” bracket will reflect the loudest and most organized voting blocs more than an objective hierarchy of design or importance.

TL;DR

Nintendo Life’s Generation IV poll is a bite-sized nostalgia tournament that matters because of timing and community energy. It won’t settle academic debates about the best Pokémon, but it will show which Sinnoh icons still inspire loyalty as Pokémon hits 30 years. Expect Lucario, Garchomp, and Infernape to be front-runners, but don’t be surprised if an underdog sneaks through thanks to focused fandom.