Want to make sure your Eevee evolves into Umbreon or Espeon in the Pokémon GO update? Here’s how

05:03 cherishe 0 Comments

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Because some things in life, like Pokémon training, are too important to leave up to chance.

After months of waiting, Pocket Monsters from the second generation of the Pokémon franchise are finally part of mega-hit mobile game Pokémon GO. As of this week, players can now find species that first appeared in the Pokemon Gold and Silver installments of the video game and anime series.

But catching wild Pokémon isn’t the only way to broaden your Pokémon roster. Some preexisting species have had their evolution options expanded, with the most notable example being Eevee.

In earlier versions of Pokémon GO, when it was time for Eevee to evolve, it could transform into fire-type Flareon, water-type Vaporeon, or electric-type Joltoen. Usually, the form taken was randomized. However, players could ensure they got the evolution of their choice by renaming their Eevee either Pyro, Rainer, or Sparky, a trio of Pokémon Trainer brothers who appeared in the anime and respectively owned a Flareon, Vaporeon, and Joltoen.

Fast forward to the anime’s Gold and Silver episodes, and a quintet of Eevee-training sisters appears. One of the siblings, Tamao, has an Eevee that’s evolved into the new dark-type Umbreon, while her sister Sakura has an appropriately pink psychic-type Espeon, yet another Eevee evolution.

So with Umbreon and Espeon added to Pokémon GO, developer Niantic has decided to keep the Easter egg tradition going. Got an Eevee that you’re ready to evolve? Change its name to Tamao before you do, and you’re guaranteed to get an Umbreon. Likewise, changing your Eevee’s name to Sakura will cause it to evolve into Espeon when the time comes.

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In the case of the Flareon, Vaporeon, and Jolteon evolution tricks, the Japanese version of Pokémon GO required different names (Atsushi, Mizuki, and Raizou, specifically, being the brother’s names before they were changed for the anime’s overseas release). In the case of Umbreon and Espeon, however, the same names will work whether you’re playing the game in English (and inputting the names using the Latin alphabet) or Japanese (and typing them in using katakana).

But while Niantic is generous enough to let you lock in your Eevee’s evolution, you can only utilize this technique once per evolved form. After using the trick to score an Espeon, we renamed yet another Eevee Sakura, but when it evolved, it turned into Vaporeon anyway.

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