The Game Awards are tomorrow and every video game company in the world seems to have something special for the occasion. For Pokémon GO there’s a brand new event that will run for 24 hours offering a few goodies for players to enjoy. What are they? The most important is that it will let you remove Frustration from your Shadow Pokémon, so if you like the more competitive aspects of the game be sure to take advantage. You can find out how to do this and more below with our Pokémon GO guide all about The Game Awards event, including how to remove Frustration and which Pokémon you should do that with.
What and When is The Game Awards Event in Pokémon GO
The Game Awards event will begin in Pokémon GO right when the show kicks off, at 4pm PT on Thursday, December 10th, 2020. While the show will only last a few hours the event will continue for a full day ending at 4pm PT on Friday, December 11th. What are all the bonuses during this time? It may not be as big as other events, including the Kalos Celebration that just wrapped up, but there’s some great stuff offered.
First off, Incense will be getting a boost so that it spawns more Pokémon while you sit on your couch seeing if The Last of Us Part 2 wins any awards. Catching those and any other Pokémon will also reward you with additional Stardust, though the exact amount hasn’t been revealed so we can’t say if it’s doubled or not. Also, Team GO Rocket grunts will be appearing more often at Poké Stops and in balloons, so be sure to fight them and rescue their Shadow Pokémon. And once you do, you can quickly remove Frustration with a Charged TM while the event lasts. Find out how to do this below.
How to Remove Frustration from Shadow Pokémon
During the 24 hours of The Game Awards event in Pokémon GO you’ll be able to use a Charged TM to remove Frustration from any Shadow Pokémon you have. While purifying them does the same thing, replacing it with Return which can be TM’d away as well, the Shadow form is more desirable for competitive play. They get an attack boost that makes even the weakest Shadow Pokémon more powerful than the strongest purified one, if they are of equal CP. So you’ll definitely want to do this if you have some meta relevent Pokémon and spare Charged TMs.
To do it just select the Shadow Pokémon and tap the menu button in the bottom right. From there select Items and tap your Charged TMs. Alternatively you can open the Item menu first and scroll to the Charged TM then tap it to open the Pokémon menu and select which to use it on. The game will confirm that they are about to remove Frustration and give it a random new charged attack, unless you use an Elite Charged TM that lets you pick it. Once you confirm Frustration will be removed and a new charged attack will take its place.
Which Shadow Pokémon to Remove Frustration From
Depending on how many Charged TMs you have you may have to be very cautious about which Shadow Pokémon you remove Frustration from. Only a few are truly relevant to either PvP (GO Battle League) or PvE (raids, Team GO Rocket battles, etc.), so make sure you focus on them first. To help, here’s a quick list of some of the best, including the very best move you can replace Frustration with. Most will require an Elite Charged TM though, since they are exclusive for events. Those are marked with an (E) in the list below. Even without the Elite Charged TM you may want to remove Frustration so that you can try to get the best moveset later on, like during December’s Community Day which happens this weekend. For this just use a Charged TM to remove Frustration then evolve the Pokémon to its final form on Saturday if they are included in the event.
- Metagross – Meteor Mash (E)
- Mewtwo – Psystrike (E)
- Swampert – Hydro Cannon (E)
- Salamence – Draco Meteor
- Moltres – Sky Attack (E)
- Zapdos – Drill Peck or Thunderbolt
- Dragonite – Draco Meteor (E)
And that’s our our guide for The Game Awards event in Pokémon GO, including how to remove Frustration and which Pokémon to do it for.
