Pokémon Go gets integration with Scarlet & Violet, plus Pokémon Sleep update

On Monday’s Pokémon Presents livestream, the company behind the hit megafranchise announced an integration between its latest main series games, Pokémon Scarlet & Violet, and the Niantic-produced mobile hit Pokémon GO. The Pokémon Company also shared a long-awaited update on its sleep-tracking app, Pokémon Sleep.

Already in Pokémon GO, players can obtain regional variants of the butterfly Pokémon Vivillon by collecting in-game postcards from other trainers around the world. Now, Pokémon GO players can send those postcards into their Pokémon Scarlet & Violet games on the Nintendo Switch, which will cause that specific Vivillon variant to spawn. Then, on the Pokémon GO side, this will trigger the Pokémon Gimmighoul to appear in its roaming form. Normally, Gimmighoul can be caught as a Pokémon that lives inside of a treasure chest, which is also part of its body (yes, it’s weird, don’t ask), but in roaming form, it’s just a silly little grey guy with a golden coin. The Pokémon can evolve into Gholdengo after trainers collect 999 Gimmighoul coins.

This integration is similar to the link between Pokémon GO and the Nintendo Switch games Let’s Go Pikachu & Eevee. Like Gimmighoul, the only way to catch a Meltan in Pokémon GO is to connect the game to your console, which triggers a mystery box event. Meltan evolves into Melmetal, a very useful and powerful Pokémon for PvP battling.

Pokémon Scarlet & Violet will also soon be compatible with Pokémon Home, a subscription-based mobile app that allows players to transfer Pokémon across games. Once that integration is up and running, players will be able to transfer their roaming form Gimmighoul to their Scarlet & Violet games, making it the only way to use the Pokémon in that form.

Speaking of Pokémon Scarlet & Violet: Yes, we now know for sure that there will be a DLC. However, the first part of the expansion content “The Hidden Treasure of Area Zero” won’t be available until fall, with a second part following in winter. When Scarlet & Violet was released, riddled with glitches, we saw how bad things can get when Pokémon staff are rushed to churn out new games — so as far as I’m concerned, they can take all the time they want.

In other mobile Pokémon news, the Pokémon Company finally shared an update about Pokémon Sleep, an app that the company has been teasing since 2019.

“The idea behind Pokémon Sleep is to be a game that makes you look forward to waking up in the morning,” said Pokémon Company COO Takato Utsunomiya. That sounds a little bleak!

The game takes place on a small island, where we encounter a big Snorlax, along with Pokémon sleep researcher Professor Neroli (how do I get that job?). If you leave your phone by your pillow as you sleep, the game will record your sleep and analyze it — of course, we don’t know yet whether or not this data is actually accurate or useful.

Your sleep will be characterized as dozing, snoozing or slumbering, and Pokémon that sleep the same way you do (… according to this sleep researcher fellow) will gather around your Snorlax. The app will be available on iOS and Android this summer.

To tie Pokémon GO and Pokémon Sleep together, the Pokémon announced the Pokémon GO Plus + accessory (no, that’s not a typo, and yes, it is pronounced “plus plus”). Like the existing Pokémon GO Plus, the gadget can spin Pokéstops and catch Pokémon for you in Pokémon GO. The new device also tracks your sleep and can sing you lullabies in a Pikachu voice, if that’s your thing. This device, available for purchase on July 14, will later allow players to bring their sleep data into Pokémon GO for special bonuses.

We don’t know yet if Pokémon Sleep will be a paid app, or if it will have in-app purchases. But Pokémon GO has been hugely successful, even if it doesn’t feel as culturally ubiquitous as it was in 2016. In June, the game surpassed $6 billion in all-time revenue.