Two Weeks Without Team Rocket

In the middle of April, a Pokemon GO update broke Team Rocket fights. The bug didn’t affect everyone, but it would basically soft-lock the game. So, to keep the game playable, Team Rocket was disabled. Honestly? I thought this would be fine. I’d survive without Team Rocket, even if I was at 5/6 radar components. It’d be fine, right?

Well, no.

I kinda lost interest in the game.

I was actually kinda surprised by this. Originally, I thought I’d be fine. But I quickly stopped opening the game as regularly. Normally, I’d use Team Rocket fights for the stardust and a chance at a shadow Pokemon. It was just a fun way to stomp some NPC punk and maybe get a cool Pokemon out of it.

I also noticed that these were the only real way I got the “battle with your buddy” hearts. The alternatives just weren’t as fun. Gyms are easier but less accessible, especially since a lot of places are back in lockdown. Your other options are PvP or raids, but these are just as tedious. Training against the Team Leaders gives basically no rewards, while one’s buddy often doesn’t fit in a PvP team. I mean, I was walking a 400CP Noibat, how do I put that in a PvP team against 1500CP Pokemon? Raids aren’t too bad for buddy hearts and for a battling fix overall. But, unless I want to spend money or waste precious resources, I’ll only do one or two of those a day. If I can even be bothered to. Therian Forme Landorus isn’t that interesting,

With no Team Rocket to fight, this meant that, when I did open the game, it’d be almost at random. There were no grunts to fight, so no rocket radars to obtain, which meant no boss fights. But also no balloons. So there was no point opening up the game to get my guaranteed balloon battles. And definitely no reason to leave the game open to see if my nearby Pokestops get taken over.

Doesn’t help that the recent events have been pretty lame.

Most of the recent events during this time have been very samey. Just a bunch of event-related spawns, plus maybe some timed research. Sure, there’s been some newly released Pokemon, and a few new shinies, but, well, that’s kinda always happening. Sure, it’s nice to see some new Pokemon debuting into Pokemon GO, but once they leave, they might as well stop existing. And most of the time, you don’t get the new shiny anyway.

The Rivals event was even supposed to have boosted Team Rocket fights. After all, the Team Rocket leaders have a rivalry with Spark, Candela and Icy Cow. That part however was quietly removed, and we just got another samey event.

I suppose one downside to not being able to do Team Rocket fights is the inability to use the Super Rocket Radar. April’s Shadow Pokemon was Zapdos, which has some use as a general electric attacker. But that’s going to have a make-up period in June after Shadow Moltres leaves.

Even now though, still kinda lost interest.

And part of it is because the balloons don’t feel fixed. I often have to restart my game several times to get the balloons to appear. It becomes a chore, just to get a balloon and fight some grunt. Maybe I’m just getting tired of the game. The samey events really don’t help.

That being said, we do have Xerneas coming to Pokemon GO. A new raid boss, plus some new Pokemon overall, are pretty good. Alright, I find Spritzee and Swirlix kinda creepy. But Goomy is a cute Pokemon and a new Pseudo-legendary. We’re also getting a chance to obtain shiny Galarian Ponyta, despite it being relegated to research tasks. So I definitely can’t complain.