Galar Region’s most annoying squirrel crashes into Pokemon Go Dynamax debut

Pokemon Go is debuting Dynamax battles on the mobile app. However, this iconic mechanic from Gen 8’s Galar Region is being rung in by an annoying Normal-type that hardly deserves the honor.

The Pokemon Go Max Out season kicks off on September 3, 2024, and it will finally bring players to the Galar region. We will get to catch Dreepy to evolve into Dragapult, add the Galarian starters to our Pokedexes, and try out a new mechanic – Max Battles.

This is one of the best things to happen in Pokemon Go in years and one that could potentially rescue the mobile app, which has struggled to keep player interest after changes made to gameplay in 2022. As a big fan of Sword and Shield, and an even bigger enthusiast of super-sized Pokemon, Max Battles are something that has me interested in picking the game back up.

When details about the first event for the Max Out Season, Go All Out, dropped on PokemonGoLive, the first choices for the Dynamax mechanic debut were confusing. Kanto Staters and Wooloo aren’t super exciting, but they are understandable. However, it is shocking that Skwovet made the cut for this momentous occasion.

Skwovet is Galar’s Rattata, and no one is impressed

Niantic/The Pokemon Company

Skwovet isn’t new to Pokemon Go. It first debuted during the Ultra Unlock Part 3: Sword and Shield event on August 20, 2021. Since then, Skwovet, and its first stage evolution Greedent, have not been remarkable in the mobile app.

Neither is useful in the Go Battle League, and taking them into Raids is completely pointless when there are options like Lugia, Zacian, or any other Legendary. Unfortunately, in most instances, Skwovet does exactly what it did in Sword and Shield – take up space in storage boxes or get underfoot when out exploring in the wild.

Even in Sword and Shield, few people carried this little squirrel to the Championships. Some trainers have been won over purely based on Skwovet’s cute factor, but it really is the most generic, early-route normal-type filler for Gen 8. Players catch it early because they need to fill the team with something, and then it ends up abandoned in the PC for the rest of the time, forever stuck at level 15.

Why Skwovet for Pokemon Go Max Raids?

So why pick this unremarkable companion as a spotlight for the debut of such a highly anticipated mechanic? Because this is a Galar event, and Niantic needed to include some Gen 8 species. Unfortunately, not including Legends or Galarian Forms, only 10 Galar-specific Pokemon have debuted for players to catch.

Of those 10, only three are basic types that could feature reasonably in One Star Max Battles. Because of this, Wooloo and Skwovet got the spotlight, even if it wasn’t something Skwovet particularly deserved.

While I understand that Niantic likely wants to save Gen 8 debuts for events throughout the Max Out season, including a few in this event would have made it a bombshell of an event.

Options like Milcrey or Sinistea would have been perfect for smaller Max Battles, or even Yamper, who has become something of a Galar Mascot over the years.

In short, by trying to use the already available Gen 8 species they had on hand, Pokemon Go has accidentally given the spotlight to one of the most annoying filler Pokemon of the entire Galar Region.

While this doesn’t detract from the importance of Dynamax being debuted in the mobile app, it definitely hampers some of the excitement that will be felt jumping into colossal battles for the first time while. Hopefully, this oversized squirrel won’t be too much of a buzzkill, and Pokemon Go trainers will be able to load up on enough Wooloo to make their first Max Battles a satisfying event.