'Pokemon Go' Announces Surprise Friendship Weekend Event

Pokemon Go has announced two weekends that will take place later in February.

As widely expected, Pokemon Go announced that they would be holding a Valentine's Day event in a newsletter recently distributed to fans. The event will feature increased spawns of certain pink Pokemon, but no other details were announced. This follows similar events in 2017 and 2018 that also centered around pink Pokemon.

However, while players were expecting the Valentine's Day event, they weren't expecting the announcement of a second event, which will take place beginning tomorrow, February 8th and running through February 11th. The event is designed to increase players' friendship with one another, as Friendship will be "doubled" for the weekend. So, by opening a gift sent by another player, you'd get credit for two days' worth of Friendship Interactions instead of just one. The higher one's Friendship level is with another player, the higher bonuses you receive from battling in Gym Battles and Raids with each other and the less Stardust it costs to trade Pokemon.

In addition, all players will be able to make trades a bit more easily this weekend. All trades will require half the amount of Stardust and give double the amount of Candies. Since the event also takes place during Pokemon Go's Lunar New Year event, players will also have an increased chance of getting a Lucky Pokemon when they make trades.

Pokemon Go continues to push small mini-events as a way to break up the monotony of playing the game every single day. In addition to its monthly events and Community Day mini-events, we're also getting special weekend events and mini-events to fill up the calendar. Considering Pokemon Go is approaching its third anniversary this year, it's probably a wise move on Pokemon Go's part to keep players as engaged as possible.

(h/t Serebii)