Massively on the Go: Pokemon GO’s Tales of Transformation Season aims at player levels and cap

It’s been nearly five years since Pokemon Go’s Go Beyond update announcement lifted the player level cap from 40 to 50, and now the devs have announced that on October 15th, as part of the Tales of Transformation Season, the cap will be lifted to level 80. Yes, it’s a weird number and part of a whole other revamp of the current levels, but look at that header image! There’s so much to unpack there beyond just what may be vanity levels.

So now, as usual, Massively on the Go is going to help you through this transition to figure out what’s transforming and what’s just being shifted around.

⚔️GO Battle League: Tales of Transformation Update

Full schedule: https://t.co/zHO8MT4r86#pokemongo pic.twitter.com/x0RMT3sMXG

— G47IX (@g47ix) August 26, 2025

As always, we’ll start with the move/PvP changes, and there are a lot this time. JRE is breaking down the PvP changes so far, but as usual, little is said about PvE. In terms of overall mechanics, most of it’s good for you battling Rockets, but for Fast Moves, beware of Ember and Dragon Tail dealing less damage and Steel Wing granting less energy. Flame Wheel is getting buffed overall, and Breaking Swipe will once again debuff the opponent’s Attack 100% of the time but for “increased energy” costs. Fuzzy terms like that make an analysis pretty difficult pre-launch, so we’ll update this if any amazing changes come out.

However, the one big thing to look out for as a PvE player is Garchomp getting Breaking Swipe. Outrage isn’t bad, but Breaking Swipe is nice and spammy, allowing for easier dodges in raids, and thus may be at least a side-grade in raids for certain situations, if not an overall improvement, especially for Shadow Garchomp.

🚨 NEW LEVEL CAP! 🚨 80!
Starting October 15, the cap rises to Level 80 in #PokemonGO 🎉 pic.twitter.com/JIg2RcbHxC

— G47IX (@g47ix) August 25, 2025

For the season-wide changes, let’s start with the biggest one: the level cap increase in October. Essentially, it sounds like it’s a vanity change, with levels 70-80 being the new 40-50. We have no clues on the tasks, but as from some of the wording, my guess would be that the devs are going to drop at least some of the PvP requirements, if not the hyper-specific ones like beating Rocket Bosses with pokemon under a certain CP.

What’s rumored to be not happening is increased pokemon levels, which doesn’t surprise me. Increased levels means the devs need to rebalance content and potentially pokemon and moves, which is a lot of work I’m sure the devs don’t want to do. Assuming level 80 was chosen so that going forward the devs could increase the level cap by 20 every two years match the game’s age, I suspect that there’s a future pokemon level cap increase coming around summer 2026. This is purely speculation, though.

Speaking of speculation, one thing that isn’t speculation is the increased lucky friends chance at level 70+, which may pair with the remote trades that have been datamined. Whether or not remote trading is connected is unknown, but increased lucky friends should mean that getting in your daily friend interaction is a bit more meaningful, as would be cashing in those lucky friend trades you can set up with locals.

You also need to keep in mind that the level up rewards between 40-50, such as the level 50 jacket, will be retired. There’s currently an XP event going on, so if you’re close to leveling, that should help you out.

Welcome to Pokémon GO:
Tales of Transformation! 📖✨

Season highlights:
🐴 Keldeo returns (with Resolute Form)
🌱 Dipplin & Hydrapple
🦠 Gigantamax Garbodor
🏗️ Dynamax Duraludon
🔥 Shadow Groudon
🐉 Return of Mega Rayquaza
🤝 Weekly Challenges (new social feature!)

…and more!… pic.twitter.com/xSa3vYs62f

— G47IX (@g47ix) August 26, 2025

OK, now for the rest of the seasonal meat. First, season bonuses. The spin streak and friendship xp bonuses normally wouldn’t turn too many heads, but when it’s combined with October’s level cap lifting, I know some people will be quite excited. We also get a bonus XL candy from doing raid hours, but the guaranteed regular and XL candy from trading easier to appreciate. Combined with the friendship stuff, this season will be a great time to meet up with friends and get trade sessions in. Heck, meet during or after the Wednesday raid hour to really stack those bonuses!

Speaking of friends, we’re getting a new feature that I’m surprised the devs aren’t pushing more: weekly challenges! Pikmin Bloom already had this in 2022, though it was such a non-factor that I didn’t even mention it in my review (there were more significant issues to address). That being said, grouping makes tons of sense for POGO, especially the option for players to be randomly paired with others if they don’t have a local community.

It seems pretty simple: group up with friends, local or global, and do some activity to meet a weekly goal, then earn xp, friendship, and Acreus knows what else. It’s one of the season highlights, but there’s no blog on it yet, let alone a dev diary which the devs really really should try to get right after 10 years. If any big announcements are made, we’ll update this as we learn of them.

🤝 Trade Days — new Sunday bonuses!
Starting September 7th in #PokemonGO pic.twitter.com/9Rtl5VBtLK

— G47IX (@g47ix) August 29, 2025

We do have a late addition to the seasonal bonuses that’s related to friends: trading! Every Sunday this season will be a Trade Day, granting an additional special trade, two additional XL candies per trade, increased lucky trade odds, and a 10% discount on stardust costs. This won’t start until September 7th, though, so for any major candy-trade generation events, you may want to hold off a bit.

The hemisphere spawn separation and season rotations were a cute idea, but it sounds like it’s being dropped starting with the Transformation Season. Instead, we’ll supposedly see pokemon spawning based on pokedex entries. Yes, I am worried that means ghost pokemon in graveyards and poison types in landfills (devs, please be mindful of historical sites related to war atrocities this time), but time will tell where this takes us. I do fear it may make some pokemon more elusive, as the recent Toedscool/Wiglett Adventure Week reminded me that not all of us have easy access to all biomes, and that’s before considering snow.

Eggs changing each month is a welcome surprise, but outside of September’s 5k eggs containing Riolu, I don’t see much to be excited about. Related to this, though, will be the Go Pass for September. Instead of getting a Lucky Trinket guaranteeing the lucky status with a friend, you’ll get a second infinite incubator for the month plus a week after, which is probably why it’s debuting in the best looking egg month. Of course, this could change if the devs add it to other months with interesting egg contents. I mean, we do have Halloween in October, and that’s one of the best event seasons.

Somewhat related is the Research Breakthrough pool. I can’t even tell you what it is right now and I’m a daily player, but the new one having four rare pokemon or, as booby-prizes, two Mega evolvable stage 3 ‘mon? That’s not bad at all. Worse case scenario is you get Aggron, which at least gives some bonus stardust.

Speaking of Megas, during this season, players will almost have access to all the current ones in the games. Only Mega Mewtwo X and Y will be missing… if we get these Mega raids in before October 16th, the release date of Pokemon Legends: Z-A, when the main games will have over 20 new Megas. Unfortunately, of the upcoming POGO roster, only Mega Metagross matters in terms of utility.

As we alluded to in our article on investing in Megas, Megas generally are most useful for their utility skills, like granting bonus candies and xp. Mega Sharpedo shares a typing with Mega Gyarados but is super glassy, while Mega Camerupt shares its typing with Primal Groudon and gets one less type to boost (Groudon gets Ground, Fire, and Grass because its a Primal). It’s a shame that these weren’t released earlier when they may have been better appreciated.

The only reason Mega Metagross matters is that it’s a unique typing: Steel/Psychic. No other Mega currently shares these types, and we do occasionally see them overlap in event spawns. Also, it’s a fan favorite, to the point that even one of my lapsed players was happy to hear of its return (but will not return to the game for it).

Somewhat surprisingly, Keldeo and its Resolute Form will be the main focus of this season, it seems. Some players may remember that it was released way back at the end of 2022 as part of a paid research reward and hadn’t been mentioned since. Most of us figured the devs forgot about it, especially when it was noticeably absent from the 2025 Unova Tour. Players who already paid for Keldeo won’t be getting a second one and will simply get candy instead, which is not only a bit different from other special researches the devs did back then but also kind of a bummer if you’ve been sitting on a dud all this time hoping for a second crack at getting a good one.

I had warned readers that Hydrapple was something to consider back when its base form was released back in April, but I had thought we were at least a year away from that. We don’t know exactly when it’s landing, but the devs said it’ll be “throughout the season,” probably because they’ll release the middle evolution first and delay its final evolution.

As a reminder, its in the same power class as Snorlax and Gyarados, is still a Grass/Dragon type, but its stats are somewhat between Gyarados’ attack and Snorlax’s bulk, ultimately meaning it probably won’t have much raid value. Its double Ice weakness means you probably won’t want to drop it in any gyms except to gain candy and/or motivate teammates to keep the gym. It’s neat, but unless it gets some crazy moves, it’ll probably just be a ‘dex filler.

We also know Shadow Groudon will be coming back this season. It’s not as strong as its own Primal form, but it tends to outrank other Megas, so that’s worth raiding. We don’t know what else may be in normal raids, but Dmax Duraludon (not its Gmax form) will be the first time we see Duraludon at all.

This is significant because this is maybe the one time you may be motivated to do Max Battles. Not only is it a new pokemon, but it actually eventually gets a normal evolution, and its stats are on par with Mythicals and pseudo-legendaries like Dragonite. It’s more defensively oriented, but much as with Hydrapple, moves could make it better. The other nice thing is that because Dura gets a Gmax form, you don’t need to feel bad about evolving a Dmax!

Speaking of potential trash, though, we are getting Gmax Garbodor this season. It probably won’t be terribly useful, being a bit like Mega Camerupt after Groudon, except Garbo is competing with Eternatus, which is prohibitively expensive to raise and use. Poison isn’t a great type in general, so even the most useful one has limited use.

While unmentioned, the seasonal header also shows Mega Rayquaza. Most likely it’ll make an appearance at some point, but we don’t know when or in what capacity, so as usual, check back for updates, here or in other monthly POGO event round-up articles.

🌍 Pokémon GO Wild Area: Global!
📅 Nov 15–16, 2025 | 10 a.m.–6 p.m.

✨ Debuts: Impidimp, Morgrem, Grimmsnarl
🌙 Shadow Darkrai!!!
⭐ New Shinies: Unown W, Hatenna, Impidimp
💪 Mighty Pokémon appear in the wild!

🎟️ Ticket holders: Increased Shiny odds, exclusive Incense spawns… pic.twitter.com/d4Q3vTKf5h

— G47IX (@g47ix) August 27, 2025

There’s one last thing we need to talk about before moving on to the September-specific events: the second Wild Area event coming Globally November 15th-16th. That’s quite a bit away, but it’ll most likely steer some aspects of the season the same way Go Tours and Go Fest affect Winter and Summer. Admittedly, the first Wild Area was not great. The fact that it pushes Max battles will probably be a turn-off to many players after the Go Fest Finale, but at least this will let you actually keep the pokemon you battle, I think.

See, the devs have said a lot about the particle bonuses, especially for ticket holders (bonus generation, collection cap of 3,200, 3/4 cost to unlock moves…), but not what exactly we’d be raiding. My guess? At the very least, Gmax Grimmsnarl, if not also its counterpart, Hatterene. What’s interesting here is that Grimmsnarl and Darkrai, both Dark types, have already had their counterparts released, in that the Hat line’s been out for years and Darkrai’s counterpart, Cresselia, already had its Shadow version released, so Shadow Darkrai being released now mirrors Grimmsnarl’s release.

The other thing is that Impidimp, Grimmsnarl’s first stage of three, will be available in eggs during the event, much as Toxtricity was released in Max battles but its baby form was restricted to eggs. It could be a coincidence, as Impi will also be in the wild, but for now, I’m looking at it as a hint.

Again, I’m not a fan of the Max Battle system myself, and rarely is it useful/needed the way normal raids are, but it’s something. Mighty pokemon – which tend to have high stats, high levels, and are at least XL if not XXL sized – are coming back too. The Lake Trio will be available as Mighties for paid ticket holders, which is neat, but these ‘mon are just dex fillers.

Other Mighties you’ll be able to catch from Incense are slightly more inspiring, but mostly just Tyranitar, Houndoom, Gardevoire, and Garchomp, as getting one with good stats as a new player means it’s less painful to hunt for one to invest in for Mega Energy. Mighty Absol and Mawhile are OK too, but Absol is less useful and Mawhile’s Mega is pretty much purely for utility due to its low stats. Mighty Weavile and Honchkrow work as Dark and Flying newbie-friendly raid partners in a pinch.

Non-Mighty spawns of Impidimp and Hatenna, which can be shiny now, are neat but probably not useful. Inkay and Dreepy are nice bonuses. Audino for stardust and for those who want a good one to Mega work too. It does feel like there’s more of a theme going than last year (Dark and Fairy types, respectively), but it is looking like an event more geared towards collectors and (in particular) newbies.

📅 September Content in #PokemonGO!
⏳ Long-awaited return of Origin Palkia & Dialga
🐉 Mega Latias & Mega Latios
🔥 Lots of Mega Pokémon
⚡ New Feature: Mega Energy from Spotlight Hour catches! pic.twitter.com/JviR4pEK3z

— G47IX (@g47ix) August 27, 2025

For September specific content, let’s start with raids. Notice that at the start and end of the month, Palkia and Dialga have their Origin forms coming back during their week’s raid hours, with a chance to know their signature moves. It’s still BS, and that’s probably why the devs keep running these two. They are pretty useful in those forms, though, as are their shadow variants, so for vets, look at it as candy raids. Heck, newbies may want to do the same!

In between them, though, are the Mega Lati twins. Luckily it’s only for a week. Those invested in the Max Battle system may want to hit Latios harder to get more candy, as it’s a top Dragon and Psychic type (though admittedly there are options that are very close and far cheaper due to being non-legendaries, such as Metagross as a Psychic attacker). As Megas, they’re largely replaced by Rayquaza, but there may be times you want to save Mega Energy, timers, and/or it’s no big deal to “just” get utility on Psychic and Dragon types without Flying types included as well.

The devs finally seemed to get that most of us are over Shadow raids unless they’re useful, so gone are the 5-star shadow raids largely taking over the other spawns every weekend.

For non-Lati Megas, the devs are seriously stacking them this month. All the Kanto starters coming back is nice (though Blastoise, sadly, isn’t terribly useful). Bringing back Mega Gyarados with Pidgeot is a choice, as Gyarados had its raid day in August, much as the Origin duo did. Still, it’s one of many reasons Blastoise isn’t super useful in POGO, as it brings a Dark typing with its Water. The Ralts final forms’ Megas are useful enough, followed by Mega Kanga (which is a regional for most of us) and Mega Lopunny (which has better utility as a Normal and Fighting type). Closing September with the Steel Megas of Steelix, Scizor, and Lucario is neat, but honestly, Lucario should probably be most people’s aim.

If you survived the Go Fest Finale and aren’t sick of Dmax ‘mon, the only new thing to look forward to for September’s Max Mondays is Dmax Abra on the 15th. If you’re new, September 22nd and September 29th can’t be missed, as Chansey and Beldum’s final forms are deep in the meta, which Blissey dominating as both tank and healer. Plus, any ones you “over” invest in and replace can be dumped into gyms still. Ah, recycling!

Now for events. While it’s already live, don’t forget that xp event to help get you started on the level cap increase. I also recommend POGO Guides’ Friend Code section. Even a Californian like myself gets tons of requests, but there are also a lot of deadbeats who’ll just add you and take gifts and nothing else. I recommend setting up a profile that says what you’re looking for, “updating” the profile to get a boost, and then filtering out the trash from treasure.

📅 This September we’ll explore a brand-new region /s— Kanto Celebration in #PokemonGO! 🎉
✨ Regional Pokémon in Timed Research
⚡ Special moves via evolution
🕊️ Dynamax Kanto Birds in Paid Special Research pic.twitter.com/fwIkUAxGzQ

— G47IX (@g47ix) August 26, 2025

Yes, yes, I know, when isn’t there a Kanto Celebration? Here’s the thing, though: This event gives you a guaranteed XL candy for evolving, triple Mega time, CD moves for the Kanto starters, plus the Kanto regionals each get a day when they’ll spawn in the wild. Not too shabby!

🦈 Mega Sharpedo Raid Day
📅 Sunday, September 7, 2025
✨ Increased Shiny chance!#PokemonGO pic.twitter.com/IHfrMIRQXV

— G47IX (@g47ix) August 26, 2025

Oddly enough, the final day, September 7th, is when the non-Kanto ‘mon Mega Sharpedo lands its Mega Raid Day. Again, it has limited value, but it’s there for collection purposes at the least. Ignore the note about Mega Lucario, as that won’t generate extra XP or candy, and Mega Sharpy is super glassy. Bring a Primal Kyogre or any other Water or Dark Mega instead, but feel free to use any great Fighter you want (though looking through the counters list, I think there’s no pressure to stick with any one type).

🏝️ Pokémon Concierge Celebration Event in #PokemonGO!
📅 Sept 9–14, 2025

✨ Debut: Psyduck with a swim ring (shiny and background chance!)
🕶️ New free Aloha Shirt pic.twitter.com/IBfTzfbmur

— G47IX (@g47ix) August 26, 2025

Then we have the Pokemon Concierge event. Yes, the event starts about a week later than the Netflix new episodes arrive, but whatever. It’s a very small event that’ll clog your storage with another cute, unevolvable pokemon, but at least you get double catch candy, which should help you get more Palkia candy from raids. As it’s another Water type and there are several Electrics, I’d advise players to use Primal Kyogre during this event.

🌸 Flabébé Community Day is blooming on Sep 14!
🌍 Region-based flowers + rare White & Orange
💧 Florges gets Chilling Water
🥚 ¼ Hatch Distance, 2× Candy, 3× Trades & more!#PokemonGO #CommunityDay pic.twitter.com/6YfqkjBn7B

— G47IX (@g47ix) August 5, 2025

Perhaps unrelatedly, on the final day of the Concierge event is Community Day: Flabebe. Chilling Water isn’t a STAB move but could be useful in PvP, even though Flores is already pretty useful. Sadly, the event won’t unlock the region locked colors, but you need to earn only seven hearts to fully evolve it and it’s a 1/4 hatch event, so it’s not all bad.

September 16th-21st is the Psychic Spectacular Taken Over. It’s a bit odd that there’s no Psychic Spectacular on its own, but at least traditionally, the event involves both Psychic types and throwing pokeballs skillfully to earn bonus xp and/or candy.

The final two days of the event are a Shadow Raid Weekend, and I’m guessing it’ll be Groudon, despite its not being a Psychic type. I know, it’s weird, but I don’t make the games; I just analyze them, and yes, I’m probably crazy because I can predict the weird things these devs do.

For the sake of my mental health, we’ll move on to something Completely Normal from September 23rd-27th. This is a new event that probably has to do with Normal types, which will also be represented with their Normal Megas. We don’t know much more than that right now, so check back later for the normal updates we get throughout the month.

We get yet another Mega Raid Day on the 28th, and I’m guessing it’ll be Mega Metagross, as we get a Steel event soon after (more on that below), and I’m guessing that the devs will try to rush out these last few Megas before Pokemon Z-A comes out in October. As always, stay tuned for more information.

As mentioned, Steel Skyline comes September 30th to October 7th. I’m guessing this will be at least a Steel event, but possibly Flying too. Yes, we’ll have to update this later in the month.

And as tradition dictates, we’ll close out on the Spotlight Hours. Pidgey and double Evolution XP is certainly a throwback to the first years of the game, when evolving tons of Pidgey was considered an efficient way to level up quickly. Now that may seem easy to skip, but check out that little pink mark. It indicates that there’s a chance to get Mega Energy when catching them during the spotlight. Same is true for Aron at the end of the month.

If you thought that was neat, Trubbish on September 9th is also a double Stardust day. That’s important because Trubbish grants bonus stardust, so this is certainly a time to cash in quest reward stacks with a starpiece.

Gothita and double catch XP on the 16th is nice because it’s easy to hit with excellent throws, but that stacks with the Psychic event, so it could be a nerf. Double Catch Candy with Hoothoot is kind of a bummer, but you could raid during that time to make use of the bonus, while Aron closes out the 30th with double transfer candy and, again, catching it may grant Mega Energy, and on the first day of the Steel event to boot! Admittedly, though, that may be a sign that these catch-for-Mega-energy events may have little pay off, but I’d love to be wrong.

While not perfect, this season and month do look moderately promising, but let’s try not to get too excited, as details are still rolling out. As always, check back for updates as the devs bring them out, and stay safe out there, trainers!