10 of the hardest Pokémon names to spell

Recognising a Pokémon from its silhouette is one thing. Writing its name correctly, letter by letter, in a grid that forgives nothing, is another story altogether. Here are ten names that trip up even the most experienced trainers, with the trick to remember them.

1. Feraligatr

Johto’s crocodile is spelled without the “o” of alligator: it ends in “-gatr”, not “-gator”. The reason is technical: in the games of that era names could not be longer than ten characters, and “alligator” had to squeeze in. Trick: count the letters, there are exactly ten.

2. Exeggutor

Two “g”s, two “t”s? No: two gs and a single t. The name plays on “egg” and “executor”. Think of it as “ex-EGG-utor” and you won’t get it wrong again.

3. Crabominable

Crab plus abominable snowman, merged into a single twelve-letter word that doesn’t repeat the middle syllable: it isn’t “crab-abominable” but CRAB-OMINABLE. It comes from a generation where the ten-character limit had been lifted, and it shows.

4. Farfetch’d

The apostrophe is the real enemy. In the crossword symbols and spaces disappear, so it becomes FARFETCHD, nine letters all in a row. The same goes for its regional evolution, Sirfetch’d.

5. Mr. Mime

The full stop and the space vanish: in the grid it’s MRMIME. It looks like a typo, but it’s right. Watch out for Mime Jr. and Mr. Rime too, which follow the same logic.

6. Dhelmise

An anchor possessed by seaweed, with a silent “h” after the “D” that nobody pronounces and everybody forgets. Think of helm, the ship’s wheel: D-HELM-ise.

7. Kommo-o

The Jangmo-o, Hakamo-o and Kommo-o family has a hyphen in the name. Without symbols it becomes KOMMOO: two “m”s and two final “o”s, one double after the other.

8. Fletchinder

Eleven letters, halfway between fletching (the feathers of an arrow) and cinder. The tricky part is the “-tchin-” bit: write it slowly.

9. Stakataka

The otherworldly brick wall has a rhythmic name that sounds like a tongue-twister. It’s three syllables, “ka-ta-ka”, after “Sta”: S-T-A-K-A-T-A-K-A. Nine letters, four of them “a”.

10. Blacephalon

An explosive clown with a name that recalls cephalon, the head. The trap is the “ph” instead of an “f”. If it looks odd, that’s because it’s right.

The final tip

In the PokèVerba crossword the length of the word matters: before writing, count the squares. If the name you have in mind has a letter too many or too few, you’re probably falling into one of these traps. Put yourself to the test with today’s crossword.