We got a lot accomplished in a relatively short period of time during the latest Pokemon GO Community Day.
Pokemon GO isn’t nearly the all-encompassing phenomenon that it was when it launched in the magical summer of 2016, but that’s okay. The game has grown better with time, and it still has a loyal group of players, some of whom you probably saw walking around on Saturday for the game’s latest Community Day.
If you’ve been away from the game long enough to not know what that means, a Pokemon GO Community Day happens once a month — always on a Saturday afternoon, and only for a few hours. Each one is focused on a specific Pokemon, and for July 2018, it was Squirtle who got some time in the spotlight.
Along with Squirtle spawning just about everywhere, the most recent Community Day offered some additional nifty bonuses, as all do. These included 1/4 egg hatch distance — meaning you only need to walk 0.5 km to hatch a 2-km egg — lures that last for three hours (long enough that one lasted the whole event) and the chance to evolve any Squirtle caught during the event into a Blastoise that knew the exclusive Hydro Cannon move. On top of that, there were Squirtles out wearing sunglasses that you could only catch for a limited time.
To prove that it’s worth it to be out playing during Community Day, here’s what we were able to accomplish in just over an hour on July 8, not even half of the Community Day time:
- Caught dozens of Squirtles, including Shiny and event-specific varieties. Thanks to other players placing lures at PokeStops all over our area, it wasnt even that hard to find places where Shiny and sunglass-wearing Squirtles around, so we ended up evolving one into a Shiny sunglass Blastoise with Hydro Cannon. That alone would be pretty sweet for an hour.
- Leveled up multiple times. Our work account was level 20 when we started and ended the hour at level 23. Granted, that was helped a lot by becoming better friends with two other players, but the bonuses in effect plus a Lucky Egg or two meant we were routinely getting four-digit XP every time we caught a Squirtle on a first throw or great throw.
- Hatched multiple eggs, even without walking 5 km total. The 1/4 hatch distance is super helpful, especially for the new-ish 7-km eggs you can get from gifts. It’s not a bad idea to stock up on incubators before a Community Day for this very reason.
Best of all, there are so many people out playing that if you stopped because you weren’t sure how many people in your area were still into the game, you’ll see everyone out for those few hours seeking the same things we discussed here.
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If you’ve given up on Pokemon GO for good, Community Day likely won’t be enough to get you to change your mind. But if you still have the game on your phone and swipe by it wondering if you should jump back in, trust us when we say that whenever the Community Day arrives in August, that’s the time to clear an hour from your schedule on a Saturday afternoon and take the plunge. It’s definitely worth it.