Nintendo finally pulls the curtain off of the next core iterations of the Pocket Monster franchise, Pokemon Sun and Moon, showing off just a glimpse of the titles.

At this point, gamers would be forgiven for not being at all surprised by the names of the next installments of the Pokemon series. Despite initial hype for their grand unveiling through a special Nintendo Direct, word prematurely got out in regards to how the new versions would be branded. As it turns out, initial reports ended up being correct, as Pokemon Sun and Moon are officially the newest games arriving for the Nintendo 3DS system in 2016.

The Direct presentation that formally and officially brought the existence of these titles to the attention of consumers was, admittedly, rather brief. As a result, absolutely no gameplay footage of Pokemon Sun and Moon was shown, with The Pokemon Company and Nintendo instead opting to showcase developers working on the project alongside brief flashes of concept art for the (potentially) new region that they depict. It was a rather underwhelming introduction to the forthcoming games that will undoubtedly leave trainers wanting more, but, with the software confirmed to arrive this year, it's obvious that Nintendo has something big planned for them.

Those hoping to catch glimpses of Sun and Moon and can so below:

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Despite there being little to no information about the games made public, The Pokemon Company did have a few other announcements for the projects. Primarily, that those picking up the re-releases of Pokemon Red, Blue, or Yellow on Nintendo 3DS will be able to trade the monsters they capture on the old-school and digitalized games to the newer versions through the existing Pokemon Bank service. As many fans will painfully recall, it wasn't previously possible to relocate the beasts in the transition from Game Boy to Game Boy Advance, so it's nice to see that the company has worked hard to ensure that that is not the case this time around.

At this point in time, a release for Holiday 2016 is the only known thing about Pokemon Sun and Moon, but there are still plenty of other things to keep fans entertained in the wait for more concrete details. Games such as Pokken Tournament, for example, will finally give players the opportunity to suit up as several infamous creatures in order to square off with a medley of other beasts in the first-ever Pocket Monster-focussed fighting game.

And, who knows, maybe Sun and Moon are really the true sequels to Pokemon Red and Blue that we wanted. The odds of that are looking incredibly unlikely, but Nintendo certainly still has a few cards up its sleeve that fans will have to speculate on in the meantime.

What do you think of Pokemon Sun and Moon? Will you likely be picking them up later this year? Get at us in the comments.

Pokemon Sun and Moon are set to arrive on the Nintendo 3DS in Holiday 2016.