‘Pokémon GO’ Postpones All Safari Zones Due To Coronavirus, Offers Bonuses For Keeping Tickets

Pokemon GO

Niantic

Due to coronavirus, Pokémon GO is now postponing its largest meet-ups of the year extending all the way into May. That would be its trio of Safari Zones, and the ones that were planned in St. Louis (that was supposed to be next weekend), Liverpool and Philadelphia have been postponed indefinitely with more information to come about when they might be rescheduled. But like everything else, no one seems comfortable thinking about events possibly returning any time before this fall, and even that could prove to not be long enough, depending on how this pandemic unfolds.

So what’s happening with people who already bought tickets for the event? There are a few options here.

You can request a refund of your tickets through the in-app support system. You have until March 25 to do so for St. Louis, April 15 for Liverpool and May 6 for Philadelphia, around when those events were about to start.

If you don’t request a refund, you will be able to automatically attend the rescheduled event, whenever that might end up being, but Niantic is not giving a timetable for that now for the reasons I just mentioned.

There are also bonuses to keeping your ticket intact, as it seems Niantic is trying to minimize refunds if they can. Here’s what they’re saying about all three event ticket holders:

“As an added bonus for those who retain their tickets, we will activate the Safari Zone Pokémon encounters and Special Research globally during the original scheduled event hours (in your local time zone) so that you can still enjoy the event from wherever you are in the world. Only ticket holders will be able to experience this bonus event.”

Pokemon GO

Niantic

So, you will be able to get the Safari Zone Pokémon spawns and research even if you’re not going to the event and staying wherever you are. Not bad. This is in addition to a second, real event coming later.

Past that, for Liverpool and Philadelphia, if you bought the City Explorer Pass, it will still work that weekend for a few of the bonuses like incense and lure duration and reduced egg hatch distance. Other stuff like exclusive research and the explorer raid won’t work until the new event is scheduled.

Pokémon GO faces a unique challenge during this pandemic as a game that wants you to be outside playing with other people which is core to the experience, and totally antithetical to a pandemic situation. They’re doing the best they can, but obviously cancelling these big meetups was going to be inevitable. Stay tuned for more details about further changes to the game.

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