Pokemon I miss seeing in the wild
Pokemon GO currently has the second most Pokemon available to catch, after Pokemon HOME, only just edging out Ultra Sun and Moon. When Pokemon Sword and Shield came out, we had Dexit, and a LOT of Pokemon were cut out of the game, you could no longer catch them all. Scarlet and Violet continued this trend, with there only being about 400 Pokemon in the complete Pokedex for the game and its current DLCs. However, while you can almost catch them all in Pokemon GO, a lot of it relies on luck, and a LOT of Pokemon can only be caught during specific events. Sure, you get seasonal spawns, but they’re both not very good and often blurred out by event Pokemon.
Because of this, there are lots of Pokemon that I used to see regularly but never see at all.
Skarmory
Funnily enough, Skarmory is what made me start this list. The other day, I actually saw a Skarmory in the wild. I hadn’t seen one in a long time, so I went and caught it. Then I looked up all my Skarmories and saw that I hadn’t caught a Skarmory in 6 months. This thing was never that common, but it’s always had a boosted shiny chance, to the point where I have 12 shinies. In fact, I only have two Shundos (shiny hundos, or 100% IVs) and one of them is a Skarmory I caught during a GO Fest that I didn’t even know was a hundo until I got home.
But yeah, these guys were never THAT common, but it’s weird that they’ve gone from rare spawn to basically extinct.
Mudkip and other Starter Pokemon
While the Kanto starters always seem to hang around, the same can’t be said about the other Starter Pokemon. While yes, I did see a TON of Rowlet for its Community Day, and we did just have Hisuian Typhlosion in a raid day, the Starter Pokemon themselves are few and far between. The only exception, aside from the aforementioned Kanto starters, are the Paldean starters. Although I feel like that’s only the case because last season’s research required you to evolve one.
Seriously though, I haven’t seen a Mudkip in months. I only saw a Tepig the other day because of a Power Up Pokemon 5 Times research task, and even then, I have only ever gotten Tepig from that task – its sibling Pokemon Snivy and Oshawott are non-existent.
Tropius
Now, Tropius hasn’t disappeared completely for me, but it IS now stupidly rare. The flying banana tree Pokemon is the only regional that Cyprus gets (outside of continental and hemisphere regionals) despite being in Europe (meaning no Mr Mime or Mime Jr) and also despite being close to Greece, Egypt, Turkey and Israel (meaning no Sigalyph either). Tropius now only seems to spawn between events and only in sunny or windy weather. Despite that, it’s been windy a LOT lately, and I still haven’t seen one. And no, despite supposedly spawning on Routes, I haven’t seen one on there either. I suppose at least I got my Hundo before it disappeared.
Houndour
It seems that Houndour has been relegated to a Halloween Pokemon. This guy was super common back when I started playing, and was one of the first Pokemon I ever evolved. Houndoom was also one of the earliest evolved Pokemon I ever caught, my first evolved Pokemon being a 98% Persian that I wasted 11 Pokeballs on when I was level 3. Either way, Houndour was a staple fire Pokemon since it appeared a lot in sunny weather, and it was also the first dark type a lot of people caught. These days though, although it did briefly appear in 1-star Rocket Raids, its appearance was brief and was swiftly replaced by the much less useful shadow Teddiursa. And it only ever gets brought out for Team Rocket stuff outside of Halloween.
Despite that, there’s a Team Rocket event coming up, and Houndour is nowhere to be seen. Boo.
Yes, I know I have like 3k Houndour candy, I just want more of the cute little doggo.
Rattata and Pidgey
For the constant love we get for Kanto, it’s weird that these guys don’t appear at all. They’ll appear for a brief event then disappear again, despite being some of the most famous Pokemon around. After all, EVERYONE knows Rattata and Pidgey, they’re often some of the first Pokemon people have ever caught. But no, whenever a Kanto event pops by, these guys get ignored.
It’s not just the Kanto early birds though. The same applies for other regions too. When was the last time you saw a Starly, for example? Instead, we are constantly stuck with the retarded-looking and dead-eyed Pidove.
Roselia
Roselia was another staple of Pokemon GO back when I started playing, and it’s one of the few raids I failed to beat (mostly because raids were harder back in the day, I was level 5, I had no idea what Pokemon types were good and I only had one fire type, a Houndour at 500cp). It used to spawn everywhere, mostly because Cloudy and Sunny are the more common weather types, and was just all-round a common sight. Even when Budew and Roserade were released, Roselia remained common, and it even got a Community Day. However, when Seasons came out, Roselia vanished. Completely. It didn’t even come back for Valentines Day despite being the rose Pokemon. At the same time though, Roserade is one of the best grass types available, beating out even Frenzy Plant Starter Pokemon and only falling behind Megas, Shadows (because +20% fat damage is OP) and the Ultra Beast Kartana.
It’s been MIA for so long that I genuinely wonder if we’ll ever see it again.
Thing is, these Pokemon aren’t alone. There are LOTS of Pokemon that appear once in a 3-5 day long event then disappear for months on end. Legendary Pokemon are even worse, and there are plenty of people who have been stuck on a research task for years because a Pokemon simply hasn’t turned up. The “Take A Snapshot of a Landorus” task has only just become doable again, 2 years since the trio came out.
It’s insane. And annoying. But I guess, with over 1000 Pokemon, this sort of thing is going to happen sometimes.