Digimon (Japanese: デジモン, Hepburn: Dejimon; branded as Digimon: Digital Monsters), short for "Digital Monsters" (デジタルモンスター Dejitaru Monsutā), is a Japanese media franchise, which encompasses virtual pet toys, anime, manga, video games, films, and a trading card game. The franchise focuses on the eponymous creatures who inhabit a digital world, a parallel universe which originated from Earth's various communication networks.
The Digimon franchise began as a series of virtual pets created by WiZ and Bandai, intended as a masculine counterpart to the more female-oriented Tamagotchi pets. It was released on June 26, 1997 with the name Digital Monster, shortened for Digimon. This device shows to players a virtual pet composed entirely of data and designed to play and fight. In February 1998, the DigiMon fighting game was announced. It was developed by Rapture Technologies. The one-shot manga C'mon Digimon, designed by Tenya Yabuno, was published in the Japanese magazine V-Jump by Shueisha in 1997.
A second generation of virtual pets was marketed six months after the launch of the first, followed by a third in 1998. Each player starts with a baby-level digital creature that has a limited number of attacks and transformations and to make the creature stronger by training and nourishing the creature; when the player is successful in a workout, the Digimon becomes strong, when the player fails, the Digimon becomes weak. Two devices can be connected, allowing two players to battle with their respective creatures, an innovation at the time, however, the battle is only possible from the moment the creature is in the child level or bigger. Playgrounds and subways were where the majority of users of the apparatus were concentrated; the virtual pet was banned in some Asian schools, being considered by parents and teachers as very noisy and violent. The first Digimon were created by Japanese designer Kenji Watanabe, influenced by American comics, which were beginning to gain popularity in Japan, and as such began to make his characters look stronger and "cool." Other types of Digimon, which until the year 2000 totalled 279, came from extensive discussions and collaborations between the Bandai company members.
The original Digital Monster model that was released in 1997 sold 14 million units worldwide, including 13 million units in Japan and 1 million overseas, up until March 2004. By 2005, more than 24 million Digital Monster units had been sold worldwide.
