Pokémon GO 10th Anniversary Celebration NYC Event: Mewtwo in Times Square

Trainers, Scopely is hosting a special livestream to commemorate the 10th Anniversary of Pokémon GO. The company has revealed next to no information about the livestream, but a substantial number of content creators have been invited to New York City to participate in the event. Pokémon GO Hub is among these creators, bringing you live updates from NYC as the event unfolds!

Additionally, separate livestreams will be hosted by popular Twitch and Youtube content creators, including Mystic7, AwesomeAdamTV, and Landoralpha. These content creators are going live around the same time as the official stream, at 6:15 p.m. EST LIVE in NYC! Follow along with the latest updates below! 👇

Updates

All updates are in local New York time (ET). Important news highlighted like this. 

• 8:40 p.m. – Mewtwo raids in Times Square have concluded and the crowd is slowly dispersing, following a brilliant in-person experience. It’s hard to explain and to relay the experience and sounds of an in-person raid of this size, but it was really well executed. The fight was tap-to-win as usual Raids, but the whole setup was great. I felt pretty proud that a game we support and cover has taken over the entire Times Square, almost all of the billboards. Scopely did a good job with this event, we have no idea how the livestream looked like, but on the grounds it was fine. We hope this live updates article helped you get a sense of the event.

• 8:37 p.m. – It’s Mewtwo Mega X and Mewtwo Mega Y! The entire Times Square is taken over by Pokemon GO, just like the trailer. All the screens are counting down and there are massive sound effects. We are unable to post photos due to internet issues, but trust us you will want to see them. What an experience!
• 8:10 p.m. – Unity Raid eggs have appeared on the two Gyms in Times Square and the Gyms have a special effect.

• 8:00 p.m. – Loud Luxury is performing on the Times Square. Rotating raids continue and it seems that the catch rate is guaranteed.
• 7:30 p.m. – rotating Legendary Raids, free popcorn and water is available for everyone at the venue. Not much is going on aside from the occasional caster motivating the crowd. It’s very hot and humid and not easy to wait 
• 7:00 p.m. – the first Unity Raid will be at 8:30 p.m. and there will be a live performance by a band before the Raid. All bets are that the featured Pokemon is Mewtwo. We have been instructed to update our app and download full assets for this event.

• 6:56 p.m. – Unity Raids, a special type of Raids is being hosted tonight at the Times Square event. There are thousands of Trainers waiting in line, with the first Unity Raids scheduled for 8:30 PM. The atmosphere is insane, we are smack in the middle of the Square and it’s all Pokémon GO wherever you look at 
• 6:47 p.m. – Scopely took us to Times Square and its chaotic as you might imagine. See here
• 6:20 p.m. – the official streams are live now on Youtube and Twitch. There is an unofficial stream of the Times Square as well where you can see the area.
• 6:15 p.m. – There is some action in the venue lobby, Scopely staff seems to be grouping and somewhat nervously chatting, I think we are getting ready to go to Times Square. Interestingly, not everyone at the Press Briefing are Pokémon GO content creators, there are many other content creators as well. Scopely also shared an image of the reception area on Times Square:

• 5:45 p.m. – At this point, they are just keeping us in the hotel until it’s go time. Come back around 6:30 pm ET time.
• 5:33 p.m. – We got a quick interview with Michael Steranka, he answered most of our questions with some degree of information, including if they are aware that Arceus hasn’t been introduced, and what about that Gym rework. Look forward to that article tomorrow.
• 5:30 p.m. – The creators will be participating in a special memory at the Times Square tonight evening. The developers have not confirmed or denied that its the iconic Mewtwo raid from the Trailer.
• 4.55 p.m. – We are sent to enjoy some food. We will be returning to this livestream around 5:30 p.m. local time to share the location of the tonights “special memory” that will be taking place in NYC and which is related to the original trailer.
• 4.53 p.m. – Mark Van Lommel takes the stage. He will share more information about the logistics now. We will be allowed to record but with no audio. 
• 4:51 p.m. – Here we go. Wu has shared that we will make a special memory for the next 10 years tonight outside. We are not allowed to share the location of this memory before 5.30 p.m.
• 4:50 p.m. – Wu is going over successes and their scaling up story. The game has been slowly growing closer to the vision from the trailer. He is again saying that they are constantly trying to reach what the original trailer promoted.
• 4:47 p.m. – Even Google was surprised by Pokémon GO’s demand. By the end of the July 5 launch week, Pokémon GO has taken up the majority of a single datacenter, becoming the largest single computing cluster on the planet. Mind you, this was 10 years ago, but it is still baffling.
• 4:46 p.m. – Wu shared that their core metric during early days was Poké Balls per second (PBPS), and that metric was increasing exponentially every day since the game’s release on July 5, from 800 PBPS to over 40,000 PBPS in the first 5 days. This created incredible stress on the servers, leading to player lockouts and the infamous “loading screen of death” in the early days.
• 4:42 p.m. – Wu is sharing some more stories from the early Pokémon GO development, including the March 2016 Field test. Participants were picked by using their Ingress account experience, prioritising higher experience Ingress players. 
• 4:39 p.m. – Wu is showing screenshots from early Pokémon GO development, including the first Gym and the first Poké Stops. The first Gym looked like 3 red rectangles stacked one on top of another.
• 4:37 p.m. – Wu is mentioning the original Pokémon GO trailer. Trailer has been the north star for product development at multiple occasions, with a focus on making Pokémon feel real. Maybe we are actually going to raid Mewtwo at Times Square?
• 4:32 p.m. – Wu’s family is also heavily involved with the game. From his wife through his kids, all of them play Pokémon GO daily. His favourite Pokémon is Psyduck. He spent a Golden Bottle cap on that Psyduck. Not a great idea admittedly. 
• 4:29 p.m. – Ed Wu is sharing some updates and anecdotes about his personal life and how he arrived to work at Niantic. He is sharing Ingress stories and how it all connected with the Pokémon Company people.
• 4:26 p.m. – Ed Wu (President of Games divison at Scopely) takes the stage. 
• 4:25 p.m. – Steranka is starting to talk about the next 10 years of Pokémon GO. They are aiming to keep Pokémon GO as a forever game. There are three main content areas that they will focus over the next 10 years:
  • Community: a special focus will be given to Gyms and how they play along with bringing together Communities
  • Core Memories: they want to offer much more opportunities for players to have strong memories together, highlight special moments.
  • Multi-Generational Play: Pokémon GO has to adapt to being played by multiple generations
• 4:21 p.m. – We are seeing more background about Steranka family today and the way they enjoy Pokémon GO. We will omit any details to protect their privacy in this article.
• 4:18 p.m. – Steranka shares that around 400,000 Ticketed players per year attend Pokémon GO events today. All of the issues from early GO Fest events have been resolved over the years.
• 4:15 p.m. – Steranka talks about GO Fest 2017 Chicago, the problems it had, and how it was incredibly difficult and problematic. “FIX YOUR GAME” is displayed on the screen as a reminder to the angry crowd chanting during the event. Steranka shows text messages of support and worried friends that were sent to him during that event. He shares that it was probably the worst day in his life.
• 4:13 p.m. – After hours and hours of hunting for Farfetch’d, Steranka and his wife were able to get a Farfetch’d. He reminisces how happy they were and realising at that moment that Pokémon GO was something way more powerful than a game.
• 4:10 p.m. – Steranka is sharing personal stories and images about his history with the franchise, from his early days, over living in Japan, helping build Smogon, and finally joining Niantic games to work on Pokémon GO. He is deeply invested in the franchise and genuinely loves the Pokémon world, so much that he “gently nudged” his wife to go to Japan for their honeymoon to catch Farfetch’d
• 4:06 p.m. – Michael Steranka takes the stage, greets the content creators, Scopely developers and the Japanese members of the original Pokémon GO dev team. His favourite Pokémon is Machamp.
• 4:04 p.m. – More than 70 Content Creators are here, and there is well over 100 people all together at the event, including visitors from the Pokémon Company
• 4:00 p.m. – A special Press Briefing has begin in New York City. We are allowed to share updates, but no photos or videos from the event. Lasts roughly 45 minutes. 
• 1:00 p.m. – No signs of Mewtwo or other Trainers/content creators around Times Square or Central Park. We canvassed the area, but nothing significant has popped up yet.

Backstory

Over the past several weeks, fans have been closely following reports of invitations sent to local Community Ambassadors for a mysterious event in New York City. Adding to the speculation, Scopely released new 10th Anniversary artwork this week showing Mewtwo in what appears to be Times Square.

Longtime Trainers will immediately recognize the location as the scene of the massive Mewtwo battle from Pokémon GO’s original reveal trailer, released 10 years ago. With that history in mind, Times Square would certainly be a fitting backdrop for today’s anniversary celebrations.

The mystery does not stop in New York, either. Something unusual is also happening in Japan, where Mewtwo has reportedly vanished from its iconic container at Pokémon Center Shibuya, leaving the display completely empty. Adding even more fuel to the speculation, the official Pokémon GO Japan account has suggested that Mewtwo has disappeared from PokéStops as well.

At this point, it feels less like a coincidence and more like the beginning of a larger Mewtwo mystery. With Pokémon GO’s special livestream taking place on July 9, and Pokémon GO Fest 2026: Global just around the corner, all signs seem to point toward something big being teased.

Has Mewtwo escaped? Is this connected to Mega Mewtwo? Or is Pokémon GO setting up one of its biggest anniversary reveals yet?