5 Quality of Life Features I’d Like to See in Pokemon GO

I do enjoy Pokemon GO, but sometimes the game feels like it’s wearing me down, that some basic actions are rather tedious and annoying, only fixed with a little bit of trial and error. So I’ve gone and made a little list of features and changes that I feel would make Pokemon GO a little bit more user friendly!

The ability to view attacks or elements when picking Pokemon for battle

I’ve got a good 10 Houndooms, all of which have got different attacks and different CPs. Most of them have dark attacks, but a couple of them have either a fire fast attack or a fire charge attack. While these have their uses, when I’m picking Pokemon for battle (especially in raids where types matter a lot), it’s a pain in the ass trying to remember which Houndoom has what ability. Sure, I could sit there and name each Houndoom after its abilities, but there’s only 15 characters available and that’s just a band aid to the problem.

The issue is exasperated when it comes to Pokemon like Tyranitar or Mewtwo, which are much more popular and have much more varied attacks. I have two Mewtwos with Focus Blast, one with Thunderbolt and two with Psychic (because I used charge TMs on them). Which one is which? I don’t know!

I suggest that, either via a toggle in Settings or just when choosing your party, the names of each Pokemon attack or the elemental symbols for their attack types should be displayed next to the Pokemon. This way, players can easily differentiate between the same Pokemon with different attacks.

Hide Specific Pokemon

Some Pokemon simply aren’t fit for battle. You don’t want them to fight. They have bad attacks or you just in general hate them but don’t have the heart to throw them away. Or maybe you just don’t want to have ALL your Moltresses recommended to you before a raid. There’s already options to favourite Pokemon and create parties in preparation for Raids and other battles, but there’s no option to stop a Pokemon from being picked.

It’s not too bad when you have Pokemon for specific fights, like Mewtwo Raids, but maybe I don’t want to take my shitty (but high CP) Granbull into a fight, and maybe I don’t want to take a low level Cacturne into a gym battle, only recommended because it has a dark attack.

A little icon, similar to the favourite icon, would be great to stop things showing up before battles.

Extra Search Filters

This sort of ties into the first QOL feature I mentioned. Simply put, the search for your list of Pokemon should allow you to specify more keywords. Currently you can do things like type “shiny” to show all shiny Pokemon, or “lucky” to show all luckies, but this could so easily be expanded!

For example, you can currently search for “fairy” and the game will show you all Fairy type Pokemon you own. But not all Fairy type Pokemon have Fairy type attacks. Searching for “fairy attack” should show only Pokemon who have a Fairy attack. It would also be handy to be able to search by attack name, so you can search for “crunch” and have the game show you all Pokemon with that move.

Searching by region would also be pretty handy. Sure, there’s the Pokedex, but if I type in Kanto, looking for Kanto Pokemon to evolve to get a gold medal, I can’t do that, I have to do an awkward back and forth between my Pokemon list and the Pokedex. This will be more of a problem when Generation 4 comes out completely. Plus, you can already search for “Alolan”, so why isn’t this a feature?

The Ability to Transfer or Donate Eggs

This one speaks for itself. Sure, Alolan Pokemon can be pretty good, but they clutter up your egg inventory and quite often there is NOTHING you can do about it. Either you buy more incubators or you get rid of them one at a time and refuse to open gifts until your egg slots are filled with non-Alolan eggs. And even then, since 2km and 5km eggs finish quicker, you can end up filling up with more Alolan eggs even after getting rid of them all.

The ability to do something with all these unwanted eggs, whether it’s being able to transfer one a day or being able to trade them to other people would make a lot of players very happy.

Quick Appraisals

I like Sparky McSparkface, the joyful fellow who informs me whether a Pokemon is good or awful, but he does go on a bit. Same goes for Edgy McRedPerson and Bluey McWhyIsSheLikeSpock?with their appraisals. That’s fine if you just caught a Raid Boss, but if you’ve been out catching all day, tapping through that screen constantly to get to the meat of the appraisal then move onto the next Pokemon is tiring.

Simple solution, let Sparky, Fiery and Icy give you all that information in one tap. Maybe at the bottom of a Pokemon screen, underneath where it says a Pokemon is caught, add a button that gives you a quick appraisal all in one place. Alternatively, display the information from an appraisal after you’ve appraised a Pokemon for the first time.

Frankly, easier appraisals would also mean less people using Calcy IV and Pokiegenie and all that.

Anyway…

Yeah. What he said.