A Pokemon GO player has shared a baffling moment in the game with their fellow trainers, as they found themselves in a Porygon versus Porygon battle in mid-air. While fighting in mid-air would be bizarre enough, neither Porygon was actually selected for the Pokemon GO battle, making matters even more weird.
Pokemon GO has managed to maintain its popularity over the years with a regular influx of new Pokemon to catch, Team GO Rocket battles to partake in, and real world events that bring trainers together to play the game. Bugs can pop up in any game regardless of popularity or standing, as Pokemon Scarlet and Violet's glitches have recently demonstrated, but this is certainly one that would leave most players scratching their heads.
In the post shared by logimeme on the Pokemon GO subreddit, a screenshot shows the battle. According to the player, they engaged in a battle with a random Team GO Rocket grunt that was floating above in a balloon. However, instead of the usual battle arena and fight animations, the player found themselves hovering far above the world map, with two Porygons facing each other down. The map would be odd enough, but the bigger problem here is revealed by looking closely at the image: the battle is supposed to be between Melmetal and Totodile, not two Porygon.
Players in the comments have been quick to share in the puzzlement over the encounter, though some have also offered a bit of wisdom. Multiple reports have been shared on Pokemon communities that Porygon has a tendency to sometimes pop up briefly in place of the picked Pokemon on random occasions. Fans have theorized that it may be used as a placeholder if something goes wrong with loading the normal Pokemon's model, or while the intended model is still loading. Users expressed their amusement at the idea of the notorious artificial Pokemon made of computer code being utilized as a placeholder, or simply appearing as a programming bug.
While some are stuck on the idea of this strange bug, others are imagining what it would be like if battles could take place in the sky like this. With a huge list of flying-type Pokemon available, it would be an interesting feature to add to Pokemon GO. However, it would likely have to be restricted to battles between Pokemon that could fly in the air, or else it would end up looking silly like this Porygon battle.
Pokemon GO is available now for mobile devices.