A Pokemon Go fan has called for changes to the game’s regional exclusive mechanic after a “disappointing” month-long trip to Australia.
Similar to how the mainline series has regional exclusive monsters, Pokemon Go introduced a real-world equivalent called regional exclusives.
As the name would suggest, regional exclusive Pokemon only show up in certain regions of the world. For example, Farfetch’d only appears in Eastern Asia, Mr. Mime only appears in Europe, and Kangaskhan only appears in Australia.
However, one Pokemon Go player has called for changes to the “forgotten” regional exclusive mechanic after they analyzed the results of a month-long trip to Australia.
Pokemon Go fan wants revamp for regional exclusive mechanic
A post on TheSilphRoad subreddit titled, “Regionals barely exist – analyzing my month in Australia,” critiqued the regional exclusive mechanic in an in-depth thread.
The OP began the post by saying while some trainers simply think the mechanic is unfair, they want to discuss, “how as a mechanic that does exist in the game…they are increasingly disappointing and seem somewhat forgotten.”
The trainer noted that during their 4-week trip, they caught 36 Kangaskhan, 46 Chatot, 10 Sawk, 13 Pansage, three Zangoose, three Heatmor, 11 Pa’u Oricorio, two East Sea Shellow, and zero Blue Flabebe.
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While this seems like a decent haul at face value, they explained their grievances. “Of these species that are inaccessible where I live, 6 have had their Shinies released, but I saw nowhere near enough to hope for a shiny encounter. This is partly because the regionals still vanish whenever an event is on.”
The OP shared some ways to revamp the mechanic, like permaboosting regional Shiny rates, increasing regional spawns at airports, creating special incense or lures for regionals, or putting regionals in the 7km Egg pool.
Many applauded the post and the concepts for improvement, like one trainer who said, “Man I love when people point out a real issue and bring real suggestions for how to fix. Great post OP.”
Others agreed the regional exclusive feature needs some work. “I don’t like regionals. I think the idea is neat. Implementation is junk,” said one fan.
While regional exclusives are an interesting idea for a location-based, augmented reality game, it may be time for Pokemon Go to revamp the mechanic.