The Pokemon Genning epidemic is threatening the franchise’s future

Genning is becoming a widespread issue in Pokemon Scarlet & Violet online gameplay, and every player is at risk of falling for it. Here’s what you need to know about Genning and how it’s threatening the Pokemon franchise.

Pokemon Scarlet and Violet players are constantly trading Pokemon with friends and using other online features like co-op play and the Battle Stadium. But doing so runs the risk of getting into contact with Genned Pokemon.

To put it simply, Genning is a method of cheating that involves altering the game’s data and Pokemon. It’s commonly used to generate perfect IV Pokemon with competitive EVs, or even shiny locked Legendaries. But there are cases where Genning goes beyond these functions.

Genned Pokemon have made their way into competitive play on several occasions during the past few years. The first detected case was in an official tournament in 2007, and the most recent one happened during the 2023 Pokemon VGC Regionals in Yokohama.

But even non-competitive players are constantly exposed to the dangers of Genning and most of them remain unaware of this fact until it’s too late, and their accounts receive some kind of penalty during online play.

So, how does one recognize Genned Pokemon from legit ones? That seems to be the root of the problem. To know if a Pokemon is legit, you need to pay careful attention to its IVs and ID number. Those are the most common indicators but you also need to check its EV spread, weight, and size.

If any of these attributes are suspiciously over the norm, or if the Pokemon has any move in its moveset that doesn’t belong to either an Egg move or to that species, then you likely have a Genned Pokemon.

One of the main issues with Genning is that it’s increasingly difficulty to catch before it’s too late. Innocent players might fall into the Genning trap just by using the Wonder Trade feature. The other way legal players can fall into the trap of Genning is by participating in Genned Raids in S&V.

Genned Raids appear as regular Tera Raids, but the data of the reward Pokemon might be altered, forcing every player in the Raid to fall victim to the issue. If the rewards for a Raid are too good to be true (Ex: 20 Herba Mystica) then you might have unknowingly participated in a Genned Raid.

Nintendo have been in a constant battle against Genning seeping into online features of Pokemon games. They’ve applied countermeasures through Pokemon Home, which automatically detects Genned or illegal Pokemon and marks them as untransferable.

The problem remains that more often than not, the victims of Genning are the players getting banned. The Pokemon community has implemented their own countermeasures to prevent this from happening, even creating an online blacklist to prevent legal players from exposing themselves to this danger.

The lack of awareness remains the main problem here. Whether you’re a new player joining the Pokemon trainer ranks now, or you’re a veteran player enjoying your travels across Paldea. It’s important to understand what Genning implies, and the risks it brings with it.

If the Genning issue is not properly addressed in future Pokemon games, it could hurt the longevity and popularity of those games, since online features are responsible for sustaining the player count in the long run.

Looking forward to Pokemon Legends ZA and the mainline game beyond S&V, we might see new and improved countermeasures against this problem. We will have to wait and see if Nintendo decide to cut the problem at its root, or if Genning will remain a constant threat to the franchise’s future