Pokémon Go developers, Niantic and The Pokémon Company announced last week that a tournament will take place this Wednesday, Oct. 13, on Twitch involving multiple streamers. The event will be streamed through the Twitch Rivals channel starting at 2 p.m. PT. The event is a part of the celebration of Pokémon Go’s 5th anniversary.
Pokémon Go is an augmented reality mobile app that revolves around traveling outside, catching Pokémon in the real world, and facing other trainers through gyms and online battles. The game has been very successful, amassing over $4 billion in lifetime revenue according to a 2020 report.
Twitch Rivals posted the rules and schedule for the tourney, starting with a one-hour period where each player will have to catch as many Pokémon as they can from their new and empty accounts. The event will have 18 creators, comprised of six professional players and 12 streamers. The competitors have not been announced yet. They will be divided into six teams containing one pro and two streamers. The competitors will have one hour to catch as many Pokémon as possible. During the capture phase, team members can train their Pokémon through items that they have found within the hour. They are not allowed to purchase any items or trade any Pokémon with non-teammates.
Once the capture phase is over, the preparation phase will begin in which the team members will use the items and Pokémon they acquired at that time to evolve and strengthen their Pokémon. Each team member will create their own six-Pokémon team. The detailed format of the tournament also states that Shadow Pokémon are not allowed and “teams can only draft a Pokémon (and its evolution line) once between the 3 team members. Ex: For Team 1 – Player 1 plans to use Bulbasaur in their roster. Team 1 – Player 2/Player 3 cannot use Bulbasaur, Ivysaur, or Venusaur in their roster.” The matches are played in Great League mode which means that only Pokémon up to 1500 CP can be used.
The battle phase is set up through a “round-robin tournament” style which will separate one of each team member into three groups. Thus, each group will be made up of six players with each player being from a different team. Every player in the group will battle each other through the Pokemon Go app using only three out of the six Pokémon that they have chosen for their team. Each match will be a “Best-Of-Three” and the winner will acquire one point for their team. Whichever team has the most points is victorious. The winning team will be walking away with the 1st place prize money of $6,400.