With updates, activities, events, and more coming out every single week in Pokémon GO, we thought it was about time to take a look at this week, and how it stacks up with what we have seen in previous years. “This Week in Pokemon GO History” is a series on GO Hub that takes a look at this calendar week from 2019, to 2016.
| This Week in Pokémon GO History Index | |
|---|---|
| Segment: | Featuring: |
| 2019 | Palkia Introduced / New Generation IV Wave |
| 2018 | Pokémon Forms Leaked / RTX Unown Event |
| 2017 | New Pokéstops and Gyms |
| Final Notes | My closing thoughts on this week of Pokémon GO |
This week we will be taking a look at week 05 of this year, which takes into account January 28th to February 3rd.
Week 05 of 2019
This week of 2019 gave us a new Legendary Pokémon to battle and a new wave of Pokémon and evolutions!
Palkia Introduced
With the departure of Groudon and Kyogre from Raid battles, many Trainers were expecting Rayquaza and its shiny variant to follow. However, this was not the case. Instead, Trainers were surprised to see that Palkia would be making its way to Raid battles for the first time in Pokémon GO. Of course, along with it, we came across the quite confusing Raid Boss shakeup.
New Generation IV Wave
This certainly wasn’t the evolution event Trainers had speculated in the past, but who are we to complain? Pokémon GO released a slew of new Generation IV evolutions and Pokémon. Not only this, but certain Pokémon move-pools were changed, along with moves’ effectiveness. And finally, Raid Boss difficulty was enhanced!
Week 05 of 2018
This week of 2018 brought us some newly leaked Pokémon forms, a very exclusive event, and vandalism?
Game Data Changes – Pokémon Forms Leaked
This time around, we were able to find code referencing the different forms for Deoxys and Castform. Along with this, we also found some references to a “shiny filter” something that we can see available today. Finally, some new avatar items were found.
Mini-News Roundup – RTX Unown Event
With RTX coming into the light, Niantic decided to surprise Trainers at the event with the increased spawn rates of Unown R, T, and X. Besides this, we saw the first instance of OSM Vandalizing. Where Trainers were successful in writing a controversial message in the in-game overworld map.
Week 05 of 2017
This week of 2017 brought us a new wave of Pokéstops and Gyms and a bit of a funny code to laugh at now.
Game Data Changes – New Pokéstops and Gyms
Before we had the availability to request stops, we had to rely on Niantic updating the game with new ones, and luckily on this occasion Trainers were surprised with a wave of brand new Pokéstops and Gyms. Following this, a new update came to iOS and Android Users, unfortunately, however, this update also caused Pokémon GO to crash on multiple Android devices. Finally, we found code referencing the possibility of Celebi being an incense spawn (yes I know this is ridiculous now, but back then we only had speculation to keep the community going!).
Final Notes
I find it funny now to see what we were looking at years ago. I know that in today’s busy Pokémon world, it is quite easy to speculate future additions. Yet, back in 2016 and early 2017 we had to rely on the crazier side of our minds, looking at impossibilities in the game because in all honesty that’s all we had.
Do us a favor, tell us about this week in your own Pokémon GO history, what was your best catch this week? How about your best catch this same week of 2018? How about from 2017? How has your Pokémon journey evolved since then? Be sure to tell us in the comments below.
Have fun, and stay safe, Trainers!