Pokemon GO is celebrating its second anniversary in July, and it's doing so through special live events being held at different locations throughout the world. While not every Pokemon GO fan will be able to attend these events in person, they will still be able to contribute to global goals that, if met, will unlock special bonuses.
Niantic is calling this Professor Willow's Global Challenge. The first challenge will take place from June 30 to July 1, as the Safari Zone event takes place in Dortmund, Germany. If players in attendance at the Safari Zone event complete 100,000 Field Research tasks, they will unlock bonus XP for catching Pokemon. The rest of the world is being split into four distinct regions, with the first region being Europe, the Middle East, and Asia, the second region being the Americas, and the third region being Asia-Pacific.
Each region is challenged to collectively complete 5 million Field Research tasks, and doing so will unlock region-specific bonuses, like bonus battle raid XP for the first region, bonus hatch XP for the second region, and one hour lucky eggs for the third region. Bonuses will be live in Pokemon GO from July 2 to July 9, and if all these goals are met, players will unlock a bonus reward on July 7.
The second challenge will take place during Pokemon GO Fest in Chicago, from July 14 to July 15. The challenges are the same, but the rewards are different, and will be live July 16 to July 23. By successfully completing the required number of Field Research tasks during Pokemon GO Fest, those in attendance will earn bonus candy when catching Pokemon, whereas players in the first region will earn bonus candy for hatching Pokemon, those in the second region will have shortened egg hatching distance, and those in the third region will be guaranteed rare candy for completing raids. Again, if all the challenges are completed, a bonus reward will be unlocked, this time on July 21.
The third and final event that's a part of Professor Willow's Global Challenge has yet to be given an exact date, but we know that it will be a Safari Zone taking place in late summer in Yokosuka, Japan. The challenges are the same, but the rewards are different, with those participating in Yokosuka unlocking bonus stardust for catching Pokemon, players in the first region unlocking one hour star pieces, those in the second region unlocking bonus stardust for hatching Pokemon, and those in the third region unlocking bonus stardust for completing raids.
Finally, if players manage to complete all three events successfully, they will unlock something that Niantic is calling an Ultra Bonus Unlock. Details on what that may be or when it will be unlocked should come later this summer, as Professor Willow's Global Challenge gets underway.
Pokemon GO is available now for iOS and Android mobile devices.
Source: Pokemon GO