Items in Pokémon GO
Bob McFadden
Data mining has revealed some details about the items found in Pokémon GO. We now know that all items are each divided into one of the following categories: Medicine, Food, Pokéball, Boost, XP Boost, Incubator, Inventory Upgrade, Incense, Disk, or Camera. And in future updates to the game, almost all of those categories will involve more depth than you think.
Medicine
Medicine includes two item types: Potions and Revives. There are four Potions: Potion (heals 20 hp), Super Potion (50), Hyper Potion (200), and Max Potion (100%). There are two Revives: Revive (50%) and Max Revive (100%).
Food
The Food category contains five types of Berries, although only the Razz Berry is actually accessible in the game so far. The Berry types are: Razz, Wepar, Pinap, Nanab, and Bluk.
Pokéball
The Pokéball category contains four Pokéballs, which are called in-game: Poké Ball, Great Ball, Ultra Ball, and Master Ball. While this may seem comprehensive to fans of the First Generation, the core series includes 26 different Poké Ball variants, so there is still plenty of room to add more types in the future.
Boost
The mysterious Boost category contains three items that are yet to be revealed in the game. These items are all classified under the ‘Battle’ type: X_Defense, X_Attack, and X_Miracle. One can assume that Trainers will soon be able to give their Pokémon a boost in battle using one of these three items. Each Pokémon has three stats: Attack, Defense, and Stamina. While the purposes of Attack and Defense are pretty obvious, Stamina determines the amount of Hit Points that a Pokémon has. Perhaps the X_Miracle item would temporarily increase a Pokémon’s Stamina stat in battle.
XP Boost
The XP Boost category contains the Lucky Egg. It has a variable for the XP multiplier, which is set at 2. This may suggest the potential to add a ‘Super Lucky Egg’ with a higher multiplier in the future, which might be harder to obtain, such as via events. Or perhaps a ‘Somewhat Lucky Egg’ which is more easily obtained, such as rarely via Pokéstops, but only has a 1.5 multiplier. Another thing that could be adjusted in future XP Boost variants is the duration. The duration of the XP Boost is measured in milliseconds for some reason, as opposed to the other durations which are usually listed in seconds. The duration of a Lucky Egg is 1800000 ms, which is equivalent to thirty minutes.
Incubator
The only Incubator type currently in-game is called the “Basic Incubator” in the code, although we have the normal and unlimited versions. But a variable for the number of ‘uses’ may suggest that longer-lasting ‘Sturdy Incubators’ may be available for purchase in the future, (disposable incubators in the beta lasted for 5 uses, for instance, rather than the current 3). There is also a ‘distance multiplier’ variable which could allow them to make a ‘Speedy Incubator’ which hatches eggs at a faster rate. And there is even an ‘incubator type’ variable, which currently just has the ‘Distance’ type. But it shows that they could later add incubators which hatch in different ways. (Perhaps incubating over a period of time, rather than distance.)
Inventory Upgrade
The Inventory Upgrade category allows you to upgrade your Item or Pokémon storage space, by 50 per upgrade. Each such upgrade costs 200 Pokécoins. Item inventory space begins at 350, and Pokémon inventory space begins at 250. Inventory space for each caps at a total of 1000.
Incense
The Incense category currently only shows one incense type, although it used to show more, such as Floral and Spicy incense. It has the following enlightening variables: ‘incense lifetime seconds’ is 1800, which equals 30 minutes. ‘standing time between encounters sec’ is 300, which means that if you are standing, the incense will cause Pokémon to appear exactly every five minutes. The variable ‘moving time between encounter sec’ is 60, which means that Incense can cause Pokémon to spawn as frequently as once a minute if you are moving. And ‘distance required for shorter interval meters’ is 200, which means that you have to travel at least 200 meters in order to trigger the more frequent spawns. The different types, if added in the future, might make it so that certain incenses are more effective than the ‘ordinary incense’ for standing (floral) or more effective for walking (spicy).
Disk
The Disk category is for the Pokéstop modules. The only type, currently, is the Lure Module, which is called the ‘troy disk’ in the code. However, the founder and CEO of Niantic, John Hanke, has expressed that modules are definitely the future of this game. There will be many more ways to customize and improve existing locations in the game, and I can’t wait to see what else they add, apart from lures.
Camera
John Hanke stated at SDCC that only about 10% of the planned content is currently available in the game. And as you can see, there is an enormous amount of potential for many more items to be added to Pokémon GO in the future. Not mentioned here are additional items, such as ‘Honey’ which still have images stored for them in the APK, although references to them in the code have been removed. What is Honey, and what purpose will it serve? What other items will be added to the game that we can’t even predict right now? Only time will tell, but one thing is for sure. There is still a long and exciting path ahead for future updates in Pokémon GO.
