Pokemon Go players call out “wild” absence of special forms

Niantic has added a wealth of special ‘mons to Pokemon Go since the game’s launch in 2016 but there’s still work to be done, according to players.

Especially where companion media is concerned, the Pokedex still has some obvious holes – namely an alternate form of the Legendary bird, Lugia.

Shadow Pokemon have been obtainable in Go since 2019, but one player on Reddit has been holding out hope that a variant of Shadow Lugia seen in Gale of Darkness will eventually debut in the mobile game.

The conversation began with a simple question. The original poster asked the community which special forms they’d like to see in the game, before adding “For me, it’s 100% Shadow Lugia … it surprised me they didn’t do this when Shadow ‘mons were initially introduced since it already existed.”

Naturally, responses to the OP showed solidarity in hoping Lugia’s sinister form reaches Pokemon Go. “For real. Been wishing for this version since Shadows came out in PoGo,” said one user.

“Shadow Lugia isn’t in the game yet? What’s the point of having Shadow Pokemon without their ultimate version?” another added.

Another suggested how Niantic could add Shadow Lugia in the future:

“Once Gale of Darkness came out Lugia should have had its Shiny form switch or just given two. Now that we have gotten different region forms, I’d say make Shadow Lugia a tradable region form where it could be more of an attacker in terms of stats instead of a bulky tank in its regular form.”

Others took the opportunity to put forward their personal requests.

“All the anime specials. Crystal Onix, pink female Butterfree, waterproof Sandshrew, giant Onix, etc,” said one, referring to early episodes of the anime series.

“The fact we never got Crystal Onix is wild to me. Same with GoD Shadow Lugia,” opined one commenter surprised by the continued absence of both.

“Given they did Armored Mewtwo, I’m surprised they didn’t do Shadow Mewtwo as a tie-in to Pokken Tournament.”

Sadly, wishes and dreams are exactly that. Niantic has never indicated that any of the above are headed to Pokemon Go.

The developer tends to introduce special ‘mons such as these as part of limited-time events, however, so if Shadow Lugia, pink Butterfree, and crystal Onix ever make the jump to Pokemon Go, you can expect a big song and dance to accompany their arrival.