With the Halloween season fast approaching,Pokemon GOplayers only have a few more days to take advantage of the Mega Raids tocapture their own Mega Venusaurbefore it’s replaced by the more thematically appropriate Mega Gengar this weekend.
But that’s no longer the only major change happening this week. Earlier today, Niantic announced that is partnering with Verizon to bring exclusive benefits to players based in the United States, as well as to further improve thePokemon GOexperience for Verizon users.
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For starters, as of today, Verizon users can obtain tickets for a Special Weekend on Saturday November 7th from 11am - 2pm local time, where they can take part in a Timed Research event to earn more XP, Incense, Stardust, and more. During this event, players can encounter Chansey, Spoink, Absol, Bronzor, Gible, and Sewaddle. Incense used during that time period will also attract special Pokemon, namely Bulbasaur, Charizard, Squirtle, Pikachu, Unown V, Unown Z, Sableye, Patrat, Minccino, and Ferroseed, with their being a possibility of that last one appearing in its Shiny form. Verizon users can also now get Verizon themed clothing for their avatar.
This isn’t the first time Verizon has struck a deal to have exclusive content in a video game. Only this year,Verizon-themed outfits could be acquired inMarvel’s Avengers, though that was mocked and derided by some for both the obvious advertising and the fact thatAvengerswas offering so much exclusive content between the various versions.
And judging by the responses on Twitter, most fans don’t seem impressed by the deal, pointing out how there’s no equivalent in any other country. Plus, while Niantic is still offering content for all players, it does state that it will only apply to certain regions of the US, meaning there are going to be a lot of American players that will still be left out, since they may be unable to access the free offerings.
Content being locked to separate regions is already controversial within gaming. For example,Final Fantasy: Crystal Chronicles,despite being a multiplayer focused game, has no local multiplayer and the online multiplayer is region-locked, meaning friends based in different countries can’t play together, a decision was met with near universal criticism.
Other players aren’t thrilled that two more varieties of Unown are locked behind the Verizon exclusivity, especially since Unown are otherwise very difficult to acquire. Niantic even did something like this before when itpartnered with GrubHub, which offered an opportunity to catch the G and H Unown.
In other news, it’s been discovered that in the upcoming Crown Tundra DLC forPokemon Sword and Shield, players canonly catch one of each Legendary Pokemon, but the catch is always guaranteed.
Pokemon GOis available on Android and iOS devices.
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