gamerant.com Pokemon Fan Uses 3D Printer to Make Lickitung With Retractable Tongue

While many fans are content to play a game and leave it at that, plenty become so entranced by games that they're driven to create art based off of the work. This is often true of Pokemon fans, who have created a wide range of artistic tributes encompassing nearly every standard art medium and some unusual ones, as well.

Some fans rely upon their hand-eye coordination and traditional art skills in order to bring their creations to life. However, with 3D modeling programs becoming more accessible and 3D printers being added to more and more households, now custom 3D printed Pokemon figures are being added to the list.

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This new Pokemon creation comes from Reddit user twolf201, who shared an impressively creative 3D printed Lickitung. 3D printers create full-fledged real-world 3D creations with filaments and other materials based on the designs of a 3D model on a computer. What makes this creation special is that it has a large retractable tongue, one of Lickitung's trademark identifiers. Twolf201 demonstrates the action on the print, with Lickitung's tongue spilling out of its mouth and then retracting. A slider on the back of the model allows the user to adjust how much of the tongue is revealed.

If the segmented nature of the tongue seems a bit unusual, that's because it was a creative bit of repurposing. Twolf201 mentions that they initially intended to design a watch band, but were struck with inspiration and utilized the design as a tongue in the Pokemon fanart, instead. While it doesn't match the look of a Lickitung's tongue perfectly, its segmented design allows it to be adjusted and flexible akin to a real tongue, rather than an unmoving stiff piece of material.

While the printed Lickitung isn't available for sale at this time, Twolf201 mentioned that they might print more and sell them in the future. However, for fans who own their own 3D printers, they have the option of purchasing the model on Twolf201's Etsy shop and printing it out themselves.

Pokemon seems to have a way of inspiring endless creativity in its fans, and no medium is off-limits. Recent achievements in Pokemon art have included recreating the iconic pocket monsters with lasers, yarn, and as tattoos. With hundreds of monsters to pick from, plus the myriads of NPCs and anime characters living in the Pokemon world, there's plenty of subjects to keep avid Pokemon fan artists busy for years.

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Source: Etsy

Sarah is an old-school gamer, and has been an editor and contributor for Game Rant since 2015. Sarah was introduced to the world of gaming via the Atari and original Game Boy. After meeting her first Chocobo in Final Fantasy Adventure, she never looked back. Sarah majored in game design in college and utilizes that knowledge to analyze games for her written content for the site.