Pokémon GO

Pokémon GO's official social media accounts have announced June 2021's Community Day will focus on the Land Shark Pokémon, Gible. The event will take place on Sunday, June 6, 2021, running from 11:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. local time.

Niantic has announced a Marill Limited Research event for this coming Sunday, May 9, 2021, from 8:00 a.m. to 10:00 p.m. local time. Complete event-exclusive Timed and Field Researches to encounter the Water- and Fairy-type Aquamouse Pokémon. If you're lucky, you may even run into a Shiny one.

Niantic has revealed that Swablu will be the featured Pokémon for May 2021's Community Day. The Shiny variant of Swablu will also be able to encountered. When you evolve Swablu into Altaria during, or within two hours after the event, it will learn Moonblast. The event will also include several bonuses, with eggs having 1/4 hatch distance when placed in an Incubator, and Incense lasting for three hours. A Community Day-exclusive Special Research story, Cotton-Winged Bird, will also be available for purchase, rewarding the players with items.

Niantic has announced Pokémon GO Fest 2021. It will be another two-day global event. This event will celebrate the 25th anniversary of Pokémon and the 5th anniversary of Pokémon GO. It will be held on July 17 to July 18, 2021.

Niantic has announced details of the monthly update for May 2021. The update will take place between Saturday, May 1, 2021, at 1:00 p.m. to Tuesday, June 1, 2021, at 1:00 p.m. PDT.

Niantic has announced a new event for Pokémon GO: Luminous Legends X. The Life Pokémon, Xerneas, a Legendary Pokémon from Pokémon X and Pokémon Y, will make its Pokémon GO debut. Dragon- and Fairy-type Pokémon originally discovered in the Kalos region, such as Spritzee, Swirlix, and Goomy will also debut in this event.

To celebrate the release of New Pokémon Snap on the Nintendo Switch on April 30, 2021, an event inspired by the photography-focused game and the Lental region will be held in Pokémon GO.

Niantic has revealed more details on the Sustainability Week event in Pokémon GO. In partnership with the Niantic Sustainability Campaign, Trainers can earn in-game bonuses by achieving various sustainability-related goals in the real world.

Niantic has sent out a warning to Pokémon GO players, alerting them to an issue with older versions of the game that might be preventing Skrelp and Clauncher from appearing. Both Pokémon had been set to make their debut with the Rivals Week event running from April 13th until April 18th. An ongoing issue also continues to impact Team GO Rocket encounters, and they have not been available in-game for the past few days.

Niantic has announced a new event for Pokémon GO, Friendship Day, an event that’s all about having fun with your friends and enjoying various bonuses while playing Pokémon GO. In this first Friendship Day, Grass-type Pokémon will be appearing more often in the wild. There will be a Collection Challenge to receive XP, and an increased chance of receiving Lucky Pokémon when trading with a friend. The event will take place on April 24, 2021, from 11:00 a.m. to 2:00 p.m. local time. Features Various Grass-type Pokémon will be appearing more often in the wild. Complete the Friendship Day Collection Challenge before the event concludes to earn 100,000 XP! Take part in the Friendship Day Global Challenge! For each hourly challenge you complete, you’ll earn 20,000 XP! Green confetti will be appearing on the map in celebration of Grass-type Pokémon! Bonuses You'll have an increased chance of receiving a Lucky Pokémon when you complete a trade with a friend. (Active until 5:00 p.m...

Earlier this month, John Walker wrote an article for Kotaku entitled “Pokemon Go's Eggs Aren't Lootboxes, They're Fun Presents”. In this article, John in effect tried to convince readers that something that walks like a Psyduck, quacks like a Psyduck, and holds its head in pain like a Psyduck, is in fact not a Psyduck. It didn’t take long until for the article to attract appropriate derision for its arguments, including from gaming luminaries like Jim Sterling. But what really concerns me is that John’s arguments also attracted a large defence force of people who, quite frankly, seemed to take personal offense at the idea that a mechanic they used in a game they enjoyed could possibly be a loot box. So with that in mind, I think it’s time we all had a bit of a chat about Pokémon GO’s various forms of loot boxes, why John’s claim that they're not loot boxes is just flat out wrong, and why these being loot boxes is something we shouldn’t be in denial over.

If you've been wanting to invite your friends to Pokémon GO but have lacked the motivation, you're about to be in luck. Pokémon GO will soon be giving players an incentive to lure friends on-board in the form of a referral program and reward scheme.

For the 10th anniversary of the Great East Japan Earthquake, which devastated the Tohoku region prefectures of Iwate, Miyagi, and Fukushima, Niantic has this week launched a new program in a similar vein to the Local Business Recovery Initiative the company launched last October to assist businesses and communities who had been hit hard by COVID.

Tech demos don't always make it to the open market, but they're often a good indicator of where we're heading. Pokémon GO developer Niantic recently partnered with Microsoft to build a proof-of-concept version of Pokémon GO, showing us one possible future for their mobile game. This version runs on Microsoft's HoloLens 2 headset and coincides with the release of their new Mesh platform, giving us a glimpse of the technology outside the office environment it was initially designed for.

Pokémon GO recently suffered from a technical glitch resulting in some Trainers gaining to access ticket-gated content for free during the Kanto event. While this was obviously great for those who were able to take advantage of it, this understandably devalued the tickets others bought and paid for. To make up for this, Pokémon GO is adding a bonus event to the Kanto tour for all ticket holders.

Cheating, in one form or another, has been been endemic in Pokémon GO ever since the global phenomenon first hit the streets in 2016. Many players may have seen initial efforts at things like location spoofing as simple time saves and effectively non-issues, or even outright required for play for some players with disibilities or living in remote locations with few PokéStops. From these relatively innocent beginning however, we've seen growing examples of more flagrant, outright cheating spurred by desires for an unfair advantage over other players, such as save game editing and bots, spurred several waves of bans from Niantic.

Fletchling has been announced to be the featured Pokémon for the March 2021 Pokémon GO Community Day event. This Community Day event will be held on 6 March from 11am to 5pm in all time zones. During the time period of the event Fletchling will be appearing more frequently in the wild and will be more likely to be encountered as a Shiny Pokémon. Fletchinder that evolve into Talonflame from 11am to 7pm in all time zones on 6 March will know the Community Day exclusive move Incinerate.

In a blog posted this week, Niantic CEO John Hanke has announced the launch of the Black Developers Initiative (BDI), as an extension of their existing Beyond Reality Initiative. The Black Developers Initiative will provide special funding for new projects from Black game development teams for the Niantic platform. Teams who are approved for BDI will receive five months of funding to develop a real-world augmented reality game, as well as direct mentorship and development support from the Niantic team themselves.

The Pokémon GO team have announced two upcoming events for Pokémon GO for mid-January and early February. Hoenn will feature as part of the Countdown to Pokémon GO Tour: Kanto, while Roselia will be the featured Pokémon for February's Community Day.

The creators of hacked versions of Pokémon GO and other Niantic mobile titles have agreed to a $USD 5 million settlement.