Italian players find way to get Raid rewards in Pokemon Go from home

Pokemon Go players in Italy weren't able to attend raids thanks to the quarantine - so they discovered a way to play from home.

Italian Pokemon Go players recently noticed that Raids were still showing up despite the state-mandated requirements to remain indoors due to concerns over the coronavirus. So they discovered a way to play Pokemon Go from home, while collecting Raid rewards without needing to Raid in the first place.

The phenomenon isn't exclusive to Italy. Cobalion Raids were also still showing up in Japan, Korea, and other countries until Niantic recently announced that Raid Hour would be canceled until further notice on the Pokemon Go live updates website.

Niantic also announced that they are hard at work cultivating Pokemon Go experiences that can be enjoyed at home over on Twitter, specifically mentioning the Special Research story event "A Drive to Investigate," which "has been designed to be playable without group gameplay." You can check out the tweet below.

Still, Italian players were eager to find roundabout ways of completing the now-defunct Raid from home. Keen players took to Reddit to express their concerns, wanting to catch the rare Pokemon Cobalion without compromising their safety or breaking the new rules set in place to contain the spread of COVID-19, commonly referred to as the coronavirus.

The replies were considerate, measured, and grounded in the reality of the situation. There are other ways to get Cobalion without risking your health or the health of others, and even if there weren't, these opportunities will come about again.

In fact, another post outlines that although Thundurus is the only Legendary Pokemon currently showing up as a potential encounter from GBL (Go Battle League) rewards, players are running into Cobalion quite often - and there's even a pretty high shiny chance.

To build on this, Cobalion's  catch rate was recently increased  from 2% to 4%.

And it has the chance to know Sacred Sword.

With Niantic investing more resources into making Pokemon Go playable from home, and players sharing information on how to make the most of it without having to leave the house, avid Pokemon Go players will still be able to play and participate in their favourite game without having to go outside or compromise efforts to fight COVD-19.

So if you were thinking about Raids, think again - enter the Go Battle League from home and you can still get the latest Raid reward. Failing that, play through the new stationary Special Research quests, or just don't play at all. Niantic is ensuring that there is no benefit to going outside, so do the right thing, and play Pokemon Go from home.