Pokémon GO Joins the 30th-Anniversary Mall Tour Across Asia-Pacific

Pokémon GO is joining Pokémon's 30th Anniversary Mall Explorations programme, extending the franchise celebration into shopping centres across Asia-Pacific. Beginning October 1 at Ombak KLCC in Malaysia and SM Mall of Asia in the Philippines, participating venues will offer Pokémon GO Timed Research and encounters with party-hat Pikachu. Additional stops are planned across the Philippines and Singapore through March 2027, with Hong Kong and Thailand locations still to be announced.

Players can claim the special Timed Research once at a participating mall and then have ten days to complete it. Lure Modules used in designated areas will last four hours, effectively turning the venues into extended gathering points for local communities. Pokémon and malls have a surprisingly natural relationship in Asian markets: both thrive on merchandise, social activity, air conditioning and the possibility that somebody will queue for something they did not know existed twenty minutes earlier.

For Pokémon GO, the collaboration is another example of the game's continuing pivot toward physical-location partnerships under Scopely. The most successful location-based events give players a reason to visit somewhere rather than merely dropping digital bonuses onto a map. A 30th-anniversary tour built around actual gathering spaces fits that philosophy rather neatly—and party-hat Pikachu remains apparently incapable of declining an invitation.