Since an update raised the Pokémon GO level cap from 40 to 50 late last year, players around the world have been racing to hit the new max. This morning, Twitch streamer FleeceKing became the first player to reach level 50, with a little help from a timely Niantic fix for a progress-wiping problem.
Rather than simply have players earn experience by catching virtual pocket monsters, Pokémon GO’s final 10 levels require players to perform specific tasks, from catching Pokémon under specific circumstances to trading with other players. These are time-consuming tasks that in many cases cannot be rushed. One of the requirements for level 49, for example, is that players must send 500 gifts to friends. There is a limit of one gift per friend per day, as well as a cap of 200 friends per account, so this particular requirement was quite the hurdle. Or at least it was, until a bug reset players’ progress towards level 49 completely.
FleeceKing chronicled the saga of this tragic bug on Twitter. At around 11:30 PM ET yesterday, he tweeted to developer Niantic’s help account regarding having his progress towards level 49 reset completely. Five hours later, the fix was in. Rather than resetting players’ progress to where it was prior to the bug, Niantic bumped players who encountered the issue directly to level 49, as reported by Eurogamer.
Though FleeceKing expressed regret over the fix—he would have preferred to have his actual progress restored instead of a bump—he was quick to take advantage of the boost, hitting level 50 at around 11:15 this morning. You can watch the triumphant moment in the Twitch clip below.
Where does one Pokémon GO from here?