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Play While You Sleep – ‘Pokemon Sleep’ & More Announced at Press Conference

While everyone was waiting on next week’s big Pokemon Sword & Shield announcement, many were caught off guard by last night’s Pokemon Press Conference. With their main series title getting big reveals next week, what would the Pokemon Company reveal at this evening Press Conference? Well, in short: EVERYTHING else!

If you want to watch the full press conference, I’ll link that below. but in case you’re in a hurry, I’m going to sum up the biggest reveals from the night as well as the moment that collectively made viewers joyously scream “WHAT?!?!?!”

Pokemon Sleep – A New Way To Play?

What started as a fun clip showing how much Pokemon Go has evolved over the past few years ultimately turned into the set up for their biggest announcement of the night as we see the user pull out a flat pokeball-esque device as a Pikachu climbs into bed. This was the moment that you probably screamed “WHAT” – or at least my neighbors can confirm it was the moment I did.

As noted in the conference, Pokemon Go has helped people lead healthier lifestyles by encouraging them to “get up and go”. Now the Pokemon Company wants to further their promotion of healthy lifestyles by creating an app called ‘Pokemon Sleep’ which promises to “make sleeping entertaining”, reward trainers for their time sleeping and make them look forward to waking up every morning. It’s unclear at the moment if this new App would work in conjunction with Pokemon Go as it was also noted that Pokemon Go would add and reward use of a ‘rest’ function in game.

There is A LOT we still have to learn about this title as no gameplay footage or specifics were noted or alluded to; but I’m intrigued! The only thing we did learn was it’s scheduled 2020 release date as well as the so-called Pokemon Go Plus PLUS which would function like a Go Plus but also be able to track your sleep. Say what you want about the name, but Pokemon is going to single-handed fix a lot of our sleeping schedules.

Detective Pikachu Sequel Coming to Switch:

With the success of the movie, it’s no surprise that a new Detective Pikachu game would be announced. The original game first arrived on the 3DS in 2016 and after it’s cliff-hanger ending – no I’m not going to spoil it – it’ll finally be getting that sequel on the Nintendo Switch. Though this is not a movie tie-in game and the ending is going to be different from the film.

Play While You Sleep - 'Pokemon Sleep' & More Announced at Press Conference
Credit: Pokemon Company

Pokemon Home – New Storage Option:

Pokemon Home will be a new cloud-based service that will allow you to store any Pokemon from now only the Nintendo Switch games but also Pokemon Go AND the original Pokemon Bank on the 3DS. Additionally, this service will continue to support updates as new services grow and arise – beyond Pokemon Sword & Shield. It’s scheduled for release in early 2020.

Other Announcements – Pokemon Merchandise, Go Events & More:

  • A new Pokemon Center will be coming to Shibuya PARCO shopping center in Fall 2019 and will blend Pokemon and technology.
  • Nintendo Tokyo has also been announced and will work hand in hand with the new Pokemon Center.
  • Snorlax will begin spawning a lot more often in Pokemon Go until June 3rd. Additionally, these Snorlax will know the exclusive move ‘yawn’ and will be found lying down – as opposed to standing up. Though this will only happen on the catch screen. Once caught they’ll wake up so get your fun ‘Snorlax blocking my path’ photos while you can!
  • A new smartphone game titled ‘Pokemon Masters’ is being developed by DeNA and will bring together all of the fan-favorite trainers from every generation. More on this title will be coming in June.
  • Original Stitch’s line of custom Pokemon dress shirts – featuring 151 unique patterns based on the original 151 – will begin to be made available for the first time across the United States and Europe.

The Pokemon Company’s mission statement is to “enrich both the real world and virtual world with the Pokemon characters”; and judging by this Press Conference, they are making fabulous progress! I can’t see what’s to come and how this company will continue to ‘evolve’ through our lives!

Play While You Sleep - 'Pokemon Sleep' & More Announced at Press Conference
Credit: Pokemon Company

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