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 throughout 2018, 2017 and 2016.
This week we will be taking a look at week 44 of this year, which takes into account October 29th to November 4th.
Week 44 of 2018
This week of 2018 was hectic, between Gengar Day, a Safari Zone, a new feature that is still figuring out all the kinks, and some new Field Research, Trainers are ready to relax!
Gengar Day
With Halloween over and Trainers ready to see what was in store next, Niantic announced Gengar Day, similar to the previously seen Legendary bird Trio Days, Gengar Day would feature Gengar in Raids worldwide for a period of 3 hours. During this time Trainers would be able to fight at the chance of encountering a Shiny Gengar.
Safari Zone Tainan
To finally end what could possibly be the last Safari Zone of the year, Tainan basked in the glory of Pokémon, with the regional Relicanth, and rare spawns such as the Unown, and Bagon. Worlwide however, everyone celebrated with the appearance of Shiny Pinsir and their increased Spawn Rates.
Adventure Sync
Easily one of the greatest quality changes in the game’s history, Adventure Sync was released, allowing Trainers to switch to step tracking instead of geographical tracking, and allowing Trainers to track distance even when Pokémon GO is closed! This would reward Trainers with bonuses for reaching certain distances, and more.
Field Research
Trainers were eager to finally catch the new research reward; Shedinja, but were disappointed to see its lack of functionality in terms of lore. Although this was the case, Shedinja also brought along a slew of Bug-type research task, and introduced us to Shiny Caterpie.
Here’s the full list of November’s Field Research tasks:
Week 44 of 2017
This week of 2017 brought more Shiny news than anything, new shinies in the code, new shinies in the game, and well, why not throw in a couple of Legendaries while we are at it?
Legendary Migration
After 2 months of Raiding the Legendary Beast Trio, it was time for them to migrate one last time, of course switching regions once again to the areas they previously had not visited. Although they were sought out, Trainers weren’t in any rush with a month left to go.
Mini-News – New Shinies
With the Halloween 2017 Event still going on, different Shiny Ghost-type Pokémon were starting to appears as the days went by. On this occasion, Shiny Shuppet (along with Shiny Banette) was released, just in time before the Halloween event would end, giving a few extra lucky Trainers the chance to find it.
Game Data Changes – New Models, Moves, and Shinies
This time around, brand new models for Ho-Oh and its shiny variant along with Celebi were discovered, 7 brand new moves including some from Generation III were found in our APK mine, and the Shiny Gastly family was discovered in the Network Traffic!
Week 44 of 2016
After the success of the Halloween Event, this week of 2016 had Niantic making changes, although small, at the time they were game-changing.
Mini-News – Rattata and Pidgey Nerfed
With the Halloween event over, Niantic set to change the Egg hatches and spawns for Trainers, starting with the biggest spawn of them all; Rattata and Pidgey (and Zubat). They reduced their spawn rates significantly, and even removed them from the Hatch list for Eggs. While this happened, Eevee started to appear in hatchable Eggs.
Final Notes
Last week was all about Halloween, meanwhile, this week is all about getting over it and finding something new to do, fortunately, with the new Adventure Sync function, we can at least be a bit inspired to go out and walk. When it comes to just how much we can do at a given time, Niantic has our hands full, while today we are hunting for Shiny Gengars (19 Raids and not a single Shiny), two years ago, we were celebrating the departure of Pidgey.
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 2017? How about from 2016? How has your Pokémon journey evolved since then? Be sure to tell us in the comments below.
Curious to see how this week stacks up compared to last week? Take a look at Week 43 of Pokémon GO History here.
Have fun, and stay safe, Trainers!