Behind the Scenes of the Pokémon World Championships 2023

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The Pokémon World Championships is the biggest tournament of any Pokémon trainer’s calendar, where the best players in the world compete for up to $10k in prize money. This year, Shohei Kimura was crowned the king of Pokémon Scarlet and Violet, with a common core of Flutter Mane, Urshifu, Amoonguss, Iron Hands, Chien Pao and Landorus that many people were playing with. However, fewer people were talking about the winning teams this year, and instead talking about the drama going on behind the scenes, from disqualifications and disconnects, to hacking in Pokémon.

Here’s why the Pokémon community is in uproar about the Pokémon World Championships.

Why were so many people disqualified from the Pokémon World Championships?

This year there were a record number of people disqualified from the tournament following hacking checks. The checks were far stricter than usual leading many people who have usually flown under the radar to get caught. The Pokémon Company has kept tight-lipped about the disqualifications, so we are mostly relying on the word of the players themselves in order to get the full picture. What we do know officially is that hacked Pokémon are and have always been illegal, and that if you are found to have a hacked ‘mon in your team, then it will be removed. If you have fewer than four ‘mons left after this, then you are automatically disqualified.

Top players using third-party software to create their desired Pokémon and hacking them in, instead of building them from scratch, has been an open secret in the community for years. If you go back just a few years, you can see the teams of perfect IV shiny legendary Pokémon, and know just how unlikely it would be to build that team yourself. In the past, getting the Pokémon with the stats you wanted required hundreds of hours of breeding, resetting, and beating Pokémon that made building the perfect team feel like an impossible task. However, the times have changed.

Scarlet & Violet has made building a Pokémon easier than ever before. You no longer need to breed or reset, and you can build your perfect ‘mon in game in less than an hour. This is likely why checks have become stricter, as people have fewer excuses for hacking. There are a few exceptions. Some Pokémon will want the minimum stats in Attack to counter moves like Foul Play and confusing moves, while others will want minimum Speed in order to operate well under Trick Room. While getting maximum stats is easier than ever, minimum stats still require the breeding and reset methods.

There is also the complication of the latest regulation. Regulation D included Pokémon from outside of Scarlet & Violet for the first time. This made obtaining the right Pokémon more difficult, not only because you have to own Sword or Shield, and Pokémon Legends: Arceus, but because the latter doesn’t allow you to check stats in-game. Some trainers claim they were disqualified for Pokémon they traded with friends that they didn’t know were hacked. Pokémon advised people to only use ‘mons they had raised themselves, but people argue this goes against the ethos of the series.

There are two schools of thought on the use of hacked Pokémon, with the community pretty much divided straight down the middle. Many think hacking Pokémon is cheating and should be punished. Hacking Pokémon in instead of building them yourself gives you the unfair advantage of having more time to practice with them. On the other hand people argue that there is no in-game difference between legitimate and hacked ‘mons, and that Pokémon games don’t yet have all the tools necessary to build the perfect team.

Who was disqualified from the Pokémon World Championships?

As Pokémon has not officially announced the list of disqualified players we only have the players’ words to go on. Following disqualification many people took to Twitter to talk about their experience. One of these is Federico Camporesi, who had their Ursaluna disqualified on day one of the tournament. Despite only having five Pokémon to play with, they qualified for day two and were allowed to catch and build a legitimate Ursaluna to use the next day of the competition. Camporesi ended up finishing in fourth place, and so overcame their initial punishment.

Aside from the players that admitted to disqualification, we can identify players by when they were knocked out. Suspicion has fallen on Gavin Michaels, the winner of the Oceania International tournament this year after they were knocked out with just two losses. There could be a number of reasons they dropped out. They could have chosen to drop out themselves after the losses, or due to other external factors. However, the most likely explanation is a disqualification. It should be noted that Michaels was removed from the official list of day two placements.

Most of the players who have admitted to disqualification are lesser known players which you can find by looking at their social media accounts. We will likely never know exactly how many players were disqualified, as looking at when players were knocked out doesn’t give the full picture. However, we do know that this is an issue that affected many players.

What were the disconnection issues at the Pokémon World Championships?

Again, Pokémon has not gone public about this, and we only have the players’ words to go on. A number of the players who made it to the Top 16 have claimed that their game disconnected during the match leading to a Sudden Death situation. The most famous of these is Emilio Forbes who claims they had a guaranteed victory over Malmö Regional Champion Mattie Morgan. However, once the game disconnected, the pair faced a Sudden Death situation where both players have just three turns to knock out the most Pokémon possible. Forbes lost this, and Morgan advanced, leaving the former devastated.

Forbes claims The Pokémon Company were incredibly apologetic about the situation, but it appears that the Forbes / Morgan match was not the only one affected. As many as six out of the eight Top 16 matches could have suffered disconnects, according to other players at the Championships. Spectators could only view one Top 16 match, the one between Víctor Medina and Taro Okada which did not suffer from disconnection issues.