The principle: one cry, six tries
Each round starts with a button that plays the mystery Pokémon's cry. You can replay it as many times as you like: take the time to listen two or three times before guessing anything, and headphones help a lot because some cries are short or subtle.
You then get six tries. On each try, you type a Pokémon name in the search field and select it from the list. The pool of possible answers only contains base species, about 1025 Pokémon: no Mega Evolution, no regional form, no Gigantamax. Every cry therefore maps to one and only one species, with no ambiguity.
Sorting cries into sound families
Nobody memorizes a thousand cries one by one. Your ear improves by sorting sounds into sound families, exactly the way you group silhouettes by shape. Before thinking of a name, describe the sound you just heard along four axes:
- Register: a deep, powerful cry usually suggests a massive or heavy Pokémon, while a short, high-pitched cry points to a small one.
- Length: some cries are split-second impacts, others stretch out and modulate. Length alone rules out entire families.
- Texture: a roar, a chirp, a growl, an electronic buzz, a metallic ring. Texture often tells the story of the Pokémon's body.
- Melody: does the cry rise, fall, repeat a motif? It is the most reliable signature for telling two similar cries apart.
With practice, this mental description becomes instant, and the field of suspects narrows before your first try.
8-bit cries, modern cries: the same melody
First-generation cries were synthesized on the Game Boy's sound chip, from a small set of base sounds whose pitch and speed the developers varied. That is why several Kanto cries sound like cousins: the most famous case is Charizard and Rhyhorn, whose cries are nearly identical. When two cries sound like twins to you, let the hint board be the referee.
Since the sixth generation, cries have been re-recorded in higher quality, but the original melody has almost always been kept: if you know the 8-bit version, you will recognize the modern one. The iconic exception is Pikachu, whose in-game cry was replaced from Pokémon X and Y onward by its anime voice. And be wary of the anime: Pokémon there say their own names, which has nothing to do with the games' cries. Knowing the show is no substitute for listening to the original cries.
Combining the sound with the hint board
After each try, a board compares your guess with the mystery Pokémon across several columns: generation, base stat total (BST), the two types, size, evolution stage and form. Green means an exact match, yellow means close, gray means far off.
The winning method makes your ear and the board work together. The audio provides the hypothesis: a deep, long cry suggests an imposing Pokémon, so a rather high BST and an advanced evolution stage. The board then adjusts your aim: if generation turns green, replay the cry while thinking only of Pokémon from that generation. Use your first try as a probe: pick a plausible Pokémon that tests your main intuition, then refine column by column.
A training strategy
The Cry quiz is the one where training pays off fastest, because auditory memory is built through repetition. A few effective habits:
- Start with the stars: starters, box mascots, legendaries, first-generation Pokémon. The Common mode draw favors well-known Pokémon, so memorizing the famous cries pays off immediately.
- Play every day: Common mode offers one daily cry and Replay mode an extra personal round, that is two cries a day to train your ear.
- Link the sound to the picture: at the end of each round, the Pokémon is revealed with its sprite. Replay the cry while looking at the image; that sound-image link is what anchors the memory.
- Keep the headphones on: the texture details that separate two similar cries often vanish on a phone speaker.
Game modes and scoring
The Cry quiz is played in Common mode (one cry a day, the same for everyone, refreshed at midnight Paris time) and Replay mode (a personal daily round, reserved for signed-in players). Your score depends on the number of tries used and on speed: the fewer tries you burn and the faster you answer, the higher it climbs. A Wordle-style emoji summary can be shared at the end of the round.
The cry also appears in the Daily Challenge. It is, however, deliberately absent from Sprint and PVP: those fast modes are a poor fit for an audio quiz. Finally, reaching a streak of seven wins on the Cry quiz unlocks the Jigglypuff avatar.