Pokémon Go Has a Brilliant April Fool's Day Surprise — And The Best Part is It's Not a Joke

Pokémon Go is celebrating April Fool's Day with a large in-game astonishment — and the champion portion is that it truly isn't a joke.

Today sees the long-awaited motorboat of fan-favorite carnal Mimikyu, the ghostly Pokémon who dresses up successful a Pikachu costume. Fans person been clamouring for Mimikyu's merchandise for years, with its continued non-appearance each Halloween present thing of a meme successful the game's community.

This week, developer Niantic announced what appeared to beryllium a reasonably bland-looking Electric-type Pokémon event, scheduled to instrumentality spot implicit the April Fool's Day week. Fans had hoped that thing much was afoot — and indeed, arsenic April 1 arrives astir the world, Pokémon Go yet delivered.

Load up Pokémon Go contiguous and you'll spot Mimikyu silhouettes appearing connected your radar. Could this beryllium a trick, though? After truthful long, surely the carnal wouldn't conscionable motorboat connected April Fool's Day? Many fans person said they assumed this was a prank by Niantic, designed to get their hopes up lone for the rug to beryllium pulled... but no, this truly is the accomplishment of Mimikyu, with much to travel this evening.

As good arsenic appearing successful the chaotic and successful random lawsuit task rewards, today's Spotlight Hour, taking spot from 6 to 7pm section time, volition spot accrued Mimikyu spawns successful the chaotic alongside that of Pikachu. Several different Mimikyu encounters tin besides beryllium recovered successful the existent event's pass, which had been obscured with "?" until now.

Of course, each of this had been somewhat spoiled by datamined accusation floating astir societal media that pointed to Mimikyu's upcoming release. But for the bulk of Pokémon Go's playerbase who don't beryllium online, contiguous volition bring a caller taxon to drawback that should travel arsenic a precise pleasant surprise.

Mimikyu is 1 of the Pokémon franchise's astir beloved creatures, though nary 1 has seen its existent quality and lived to archer the tale. Underneath its crooked Pikachu disguise, the existent Mimikyu lies hiding. "Its existent quality is unknown," reads Mimikyu's Pokédex introduction from 3DS rubric Pokémon Sun. "A student who saw what was nether its rag was overwhelmed by panic and died from the shock." A akin introduction from Pokémon Ultra Moon reveals different specified tale: "A gust of upwind revealed what hides nether this Pokémon’s rag to a passing Trainer, who went location and died painfully that precise night."

Last week, it was revealed that The Pokémon Company was already considering a aboriginal wherever the full fig of pouch monsters disposable hits "maybe 10,000" species. At the clip of writing, the Pokémon franchise extends to 1,025 taxon — including the 3 caller starter creatures already unveiled for adjacent year's Switch 2 games Pokémon Winds and Waves.

Tom Phillips is IGN's News Editor. You tin scope Tom astatine [email protected] oregon find him connected Bluesky @tomphillipseg.bsky.social