Pokémon GO’s newly added Zorua ends one player’s years long “Pikachu only challenge”

A Pokémon trainer who set out to only catch Pikachu in Pokémon GO has seen their self-imposed challenge come to an unfortunate end.

Twitter user @UltipZ_ingress is a die-hard Pikachu fan who set out on a sweet, but perhaps crazy, challenge to only catch Pikachu in Pokémon GO. It appears they began their journey in September of 2017 and even reported that they captured their 10,000^th Pikachu in December of 2021.

@UltipZ_ingress continued catching Pikachu after reaching the 10,000 Pikachu milestone, but this month disaster struck. As @UltipZ_ingress puts it, “A Pikachu I caught transformed into another Pokémon.” One of the Pikachu that @UltipZ_ingress had captured was actually a Zorua.

Zorua and Zoroark were recently officially added to Pokémon GO. Zorua is a Pokémon that first appeared in Pokémon Black and White and is known for its Illusion ability.

In Pokémon GO, Zorua will appear in the wild disguised as your Buddy Pokémon. For example, if you have Bulbasaur set as your Buddy Pokémon, Zorua will appear as a Bulbasaur and shed its disguise to show its true form only after being captured. It’s this ability that brought tragedy to @UltipZ_ingress’s challenge. @UltipZ_ingress thought they had captured another Pikachu only for it to reveal itself as Zorua.

捕まえたピカチュウが突然変身して別のポケモンになりました。
私は2017年9月17日からピカチュウのみを捕まえる縛りでポケモンGOを始めましたが予期せぬことで突然トレーナー人生を終えることになりました。#ポケモンGO #ピカチュウ pic.twitter.com/OLt55liJXy
— アルチ【秋田フリー☕マスター】 (@UltipZ_ingress) October 29, 2022

Tweet Translation:
A Pikachu I caught suddenly transformed into a different Pokémon. I’ve been playing Pokémon GO with the self-imposed restriction of only catching Pikachu since September 17, 2017, but my life as a trainer has suddenly come to an end.

@UltipZ_ingress expressed their shock after years of playing by saying, “It was like an assassin disguised as the thing I trusted the most..” However, @UltipZ_ingress also received comments saying, “It was announced that Zorua would be added, so it’s your own fault for not gathering the information.” @UltipZ_ingress later reflected on the event and admitted as much saying it was a blunder brought about only by their own lack of gathering information.

@UltipZ_ingress plays a variety of location-based games besides Pokémon GO. Considering that they play a wide variety of games, it’s likely that they didn’t keep up with the information about Zorua being added. However, @UltipZ_ingress has hinted that they plan to rise from the ashes and take on yet another challenge, much to the admiration of Twitter users. We look forward to seeing what @UltipZ_ingress’s rebirth as a new trainer has in store.

Written by. Nick Mosier based on the original Japanese article (original article’s publication date: 2022-10-31 12:20 JST)