>>715229827>>715227472>Digimon won't just evolve randomly, there is usually a theme going on with their evolution paths,I mean, in a lot of Digimon media, the theme is very loose or nonexistant, but yes, IDEALLY evolution trees have some kind of visual or thematic connection.
Bandai has really put a lot of effort into this with recent Digimon designs: Not only do they tend to harken back to 90s style Digimon aeshetics, but they're often designed with intentional cues to multiple existing digimon that could serve as evos and prevos, often ones that haven't been used much or have always been missing obvious evolutionary relatives
Pic related is a good example