Random Pokemon Showcases

During the 7th Anniversary Event in Pokemon GO, we were introduced to a new feature in Pokemon GO: Showcases. Appearing on random Pokestops, you’d have the opportunity to put your Pokemon in a Showcase, and whichever Pokemon had the best stat – in this case, size – would win their owner some small rewards. These showcases would only appear on specific Pokestops, and you can enter any Pokemon that matches the criteria. In the case of the 7th Anniversary event, it was “biggest Squirtle”.

However, these showcases were initially brief, and they disappeared for most of the rest of the event, mainly because the Showcases weren’t visible to all players, due to some sort of bug. Luckily, Showcases came back for the Squirtle Community Day, and the criteria were the same: who has the heaviest Squirtle. Oddly, these two contests lasted different amounts of time. The first one lasted a day, the second one lasted about three days. I saw a third Showcase after the Anniversary event, during the Pokemon Sleep crossover event, there was another showcase, this time featuring the heaviest Snorlax. However, I didn’t manage to get to that showcase, as it didn’t seem to last as long.

These showcases are actually quite interesting. They automatically score your Pokemon and suggest you submit the one with the highest score. I don’t know what the highest score is, but considering that the Squirtle I used was an XXL one that was worth 900ish points, I assume it caps out at 1000. The scoring seems to be a bit of a mystery, and I don’t know if they will all be based on biggest Pokemon. As of writing though, there’s only been three showcases and two were for Squirtle. So it’s all a bit up in the air.

Out of the two Squirtle showcases I did, I came first in both. The showcases can feature up to 100 trainers, but where I play, the most I saw was 7 trainers entering a showcase. The showcase shows you your rank if you have entered a Pokemon, or recommends a Pokemon if you haven’t entered yet. You can’t seem to submit the same winning Pokemon twice, but it’s not exactly clear. Luckily, you can select any Pokemon, and it doesn’t interfere with anything. You can evolve it, transfer it, whatever, and it still kinda works. It also shows you the ranks of other players who participate in the showcase.

After the showcase ends, you are then rewarded based on how well you did. From the first showcase, I got some stardust, some experience and an Incense. The second showcase rewarded me with a super incubator, which is a pretty generous reward.

I would have gone out and done more showcases, but there was only one in the area where I live. Out of 21 pokestops, only one of them had the showcase emblem, and all three showcases spawned on that one Pokestop. And I’m not going out in this heat to run around and see if there are any more. That being said, there’s no showcase (again, as of writing) so I wouldn’t be able to see one anyway.

Either way though, these showcases are pretty cool. I’d love to see more of them.