Shout Out / Pokémon X and Y

• In Vaniville Town, your TV plays a movie about "a 72-year-old man who went on a journey with his beloved cat Pokémon."
• Santalune Gym's gimmick is you being forced to traverse a gigantic spider web. The last trainer you fight just before reaching Viola is a Lass named Charlotte. Speaking of the Gym Leader at the end of the spider web, Viola is a photographer.
• Once you will defeat a certain Preschooler on Route 4, she will say "Hey! Hey! Listen!"
• One female NPC in Lumiose City asks if you have heard the story of Beauty and the Beast, which, according to her, is about a prince who got turned into a Pokémon and a woman who loved him in spite of it. If the real life story is anything to go by, the Pokémon version probably originated in Kalos, the region X and Y take place in.
• One of the people in the Furfrou fanciers' cafe in Lumiose City mentions that he gives a good-bye kiss to each of his Furfrou before heading to work. All 101 of them.
• Two sleeping Skiddo's can be found outside of the Lumiose TMV Station. A nearby NPC will reveal that they were abandoned, and they've been waiting at the station's entrance every day for their owner to come back. Besides being a Tear Jerker, it's also a reference to Japan's famous Hachikō the dog.
• In Restaurant Le Wow, there is a man who's very audibly eating his dinner, accompanied by a "Gobble! Snarfle! Snarf! Gulp!"
• Restaurant Le Yeah contains a trainer called Garçon Georges.
• Clemont's Gym in Lumiose City has you progress forward by playing a round of "Who's That Pokémon?", where you have to identify a Pokémon by its silhouette. This is identical to the eye catches of the Kanto and Unova seasons of Pokémon: The Series.
• A Pokéfan on the path to Parfum Palace wishes she could take your Pokemon home with her.
• Defeating a Psychic trainer near Cyllage City will cause him to say that your Pokémon's power levels are definitely over 9,000.
  "Wow! You and your Pokemon's power levels are incredible! They're over 9,000 for sure!"
  • One NPC asks if Mega Evolution is like when your hair stands on end when you wake up.
• The Glittering Cave plays like an old-school dungeon crawler, with movement fixed to one-tile wide hallways, the d-pad rotating or turning around instead of sidestepping, and random encounters visible on the map.
• At Geosenge City, a Team Flare grunt will tell you: "Only Team Flare is stayin' alive, stayin' alive."
• A reference to one of Game Freak's own projects — a person in the Shalour City Pokémon Center will mention playing a game where you whack enemies to the beat of the music.
• A man in Laverre city mentions an old story about "the Froakie that transformed into a human" after saying that "They say that in the ancient days man and Pokémon were the same".
• A Team Flare grunt in the Poké Ball Factory says, "Don't worry, be happy!" which is an obvious shout out to the song of the same name by Bobby McFerrin.
• Upon being defeated, one Team Flare grunt will say "The future doesn't look very bright for me! Oh! I wonder if it's because I'm wearing sunglasses." That seems so familiar...
• On Route 15, you can find a Hex Maniac standing in front of a ruined building. What's her name? Carrie. And she has a Litwick in her team, another nod to the book.
• A Pokémon Ranger on Route 16 tells you that he is the Red Ranger. After being defeated, he offers you the position of Blue Ranger.
• The Anistar Gym starts off as a seemingly normal-looking tiny room until you step in the center and it reveals to be a huge maze filled with various Pokemon-themed constellations. Sounds like a subtle shout-out to a certain science fiction series, doesn't it?
• Near the end of the Team Flare arc, an admin declares that (paraphrased) 'No one will be able to stop our SCIENCE!'
• During your final battle with Lysandre, he adopts a strange tentacled harness that strongly resembles Doctor Octopus.
• The eighth gym leader Wulfric bears more than a few similarities to the similarly named Jarl of Windhelm.
• A trainer in Victory Road greets you with "After all the training I've received here on Victory Road, my body is ready!"
• If one plays the game in French and picks Froakie, the Fennekin Shauna will trade to the player at the beginning of the post-game will be nicknamed "Mulder". This also doubles as pun. You were just traded a fox named Mulder. Mulder's first name is "Fox".
• In the postgame, when helping Looker: In the third case, when you are told to catch the mysterious Pokéball Thief and Delinquent, Looker tells you "The game is afoot!", which is a shout out to the Sherlock Holmes Stories.
• The final chapter of the Looker quest line in the endgame is titled Here's Looking At You, Kid.
• A waitress at the Battle Maison challenges you to a battle with, "Meow, meow, I can haz battle, meow?" Similarly, a Furisode Girl at the Sushi High Roller restaurant will exclaim "Oh noes!" if you beat her.
• A Hex Maniac in the Battle Maison likes Classical Music, but says she will switch to New Age when she loses. And once she does, she wonders if it's the dawn of the Age of Aquarius.
• A Rollerblader in the Battle Maison says she's graceful on skates she should be on "So You Think You Can Skate?"
• Four of the Fairy Tale Girls at the Battle Maison are named after female characters from French fairy tales (Kalos being based on France). There's Aurore (Sleeping Beauty's daughter's name in the original Perrault version and Sleeping Beauty herself's name in the ballet version), Abricotine (a fairy princess in The Imp Prince by Madame d'Aulnoy), Blondine (Princess Belle-Etoile's mother in Princess Belle-Etoile, also by Madame d'Aulnoy), and Rosanella (the protagonist of a fairy tale by the same name by the Comte de Caylus).
• The games seem like they were designed with The Hunchback of Notre Dame in mind, both the original and the Disney version. Along with the France-based setting and the "beauty" theme, there's also a tragic, deformed giant heavily involved with a loved one, a genocidal Anti-Villain who is also tragic but nonetheless believes in mass extermination for the greater good^note which is closer to the original Frollo than the Disney version, a cathedral-like structure with the Pokémon League, and closing credits set to an Award-Bait Song and a parchment-like background^note lifted straight from the Disney version... all that's missing is the "parental abuse" subplot^note which was already covered in Black and White and later Sun and Moon.
• The unnamed male Team Flare admins bear a striking resemblance to Pitbull. Or Howie Mandel, as Marriland has stated.
• The "Defenders of Kalos" (Sycamore's assistants in their incredibly obvious disguises) seem very reminiscent of characters from the Kamen Rider series. (Hell, their theme music sounds very similar to some of the Kamen Rider themes!)
• AZ is a former King or "Lord" whom we don't know his real name. Lived for thousands of years, and ended a massive war by killing everyone on both sides, which the aftermath haunted him for the rest of his life. Does this sound familiar? ^note  Though due to the Timey-Wimey Ball, the massive deaths in Doctor Who were retconned
• The sound effect played at the end of the Dragon Dance animation sounds an awful lot like a sped-up version of the sound effect for beating a boss in Kirby Super Star.
• The short victory song for Super Training sounds like part of "I Dreamed A Dream" from Les Misérables in a major key. Certainly a song fitting Kalo's Frenchness but not at all the tone of the moment.
• One of the Flavor Texts for Super Training "Float like a Butterfree, sting like a Beedrill", a reference to Muhammad Ali's famous quote, "Float like a butterfly, sting like a bee," which was often his strategy during boxing, besides the Rope-a-Dope. Remember - you can't hit what you can't see.
• New Pokemon Sylveon has blue eyes, odango-like ribbons, and has the moon as a background as well as a moonlight-based damaging move. Sound familiar?
  • On the other hand, it's a Perpetual Smiler Weasel Mascot with strange cosmic powers and long, drooping bows near its ears. Contract?
  • Similarly, Mega Diancie from Omega Ruby and Alpha Sapphire bears an uncanny resemblance to Goddess Madoka - which is even more "unseeable" than the Sylveon/Kyubey comparisons.
• Xerneas shares similarities with The Spirit Of The Forest from the film Princess Mononoke. Both resemble deer-like creatures with elaborate antlers. Both are associated with the ability to bring life. And, both are considered powerful creatures of legend in both their respective franchises.
• The female Artist trainer class is essentially Ed with a paintbrush.
• Xerosic can be found wearing one blue glove, with the other tucked into his jacket pocket.

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