I dunno about the West, but I personally believe that in 1999, Sonic Team had potential for chao to compete against the Pokémon franchise. Granted chao were a sub-game to Sonic Adventure at the time, but I truly believe they were on to something that would've rivalled Pokémon as a franchise.
But they didn't. Likely because they didn't see it's potential as I did.
I don't think so. One of Pokémon franchise's successful factors is because it was released on Game Boy, which was cheap and affordable.
People would prefer that compared to buying a Dreamcast plus Chao's GD game.
Game Boy's lifespan was almost ended at that time (Pokémon brought them again to life), that's why they were very cheap.
Not to mention its portability factor too helped it to be easier to spread its games to friends.
If only SEGA's Game Gear was as success as Game Boy, that would be a different story.
With the DCEU done for and the new DCU to take it's place, it may not be as dark and gritty as before.
(But I still think that, if they wanted to, they could retcon The Batman film to take place in the DCU. Granted, Matt Reeve's dark and gritty taste on Gotham contrasts against James Gunn bright and hammy Metropolis, but I believe the two could make it work if they collaborate.)


Unfortunately James Gunn's still undecided whether his Batman would be based on Matt Reeve's or not.
His version of Batman in his mind (shown in his Creature Commandos TV series), who is bulky and brick house, is really different with Matt Reeve's skinny Robert Pattinson.

Well, we had one large reptile and a clever quicker reptile in the story.
Yeah, but not as evil.