Pokemon Go players delighted as Niantic gives out free Ultra Beasts

Pokemon Go players were surprised and delighted when they opened their apps to find stacks of free Ultra Beast and Necrozma encounters after Niantic randomly “reimbursed” them for problems with Go Fest 2024 Global.

Pokemon Go Fest 2024’s Global event took place the second weekend of July. Players had the chance to encounter and catch Ultra Beasts, as well as the Alolan Legendary Necrozma. Unfortunately, due to issues on the developer side, many trainers encountered catch glitches in raids on the first day of the event.

While it was said a make-up event would reimburse players who were impacted by the issues, nothing was announced following the conclusion of the Global celebrations.

However, on August 26, 2024, more than a month post-Go Fest, players logged into their games to find stacks of free Ultra Beast and Necrozma encounters waiting for them in the “Events” tab of the Research menu.

One player on X showed off a storage box menu loaded with Xurkitree and Necrozma. The image also shows a Shiny Necrozma further down the list. In the post, the trainer thanked Niantic for the haul.

Another trainer, thepokegohunter, explains how the encounters were quantified, stating that “The amount of each you get is relative to the amount of raids you did.” They show multiple encounter opportunities along with a hundo Buzzwole they scored from the reimbursement.

However, it doesn’t seem all the encounters distributed went to players who had missed out during Pokemon Go Fest. We have confirmed at least two encounters among the Dexerto team given to players who didn’t participate in the original event.

While a few players seemed to have scored a special reward on accident, it doesn’t seem to be an unwelcome interruption to gameplay.

Players on social media have tagged the majority of posts with “thanks Niantic,” and many have called this one of the best makeup “events” for in-game issues.

The positive reception by Pokemon Go players could potentially encourage similar types of compensation for event issues in the future.