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Love and lures are in the air with ‘Pokémon Go’s’ Valentine’s Day update

Do you play Pokémon Go with your significant other? Could you find love with someone else who loves the walking-encouraging title? That is what developer Niantic is hoping will transpire with its Valentine’s Day event in Pokémon Go, which begins on Wednesday and runs until February 15.

Niantic’s new event isn’t designed to actually match people together romantically, but it will bring them together and make group play more profitable. That is because in this update, lures, the in-game items that attract Pokémon to Pokéstops, will last a whole six hours — 12 times longer than they usually do.

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That should mean a lot more loitering around particular hotspots, which will lead to you meeting more players than usual when you go out hunting for new pocket monsters to crush up into candies.

Of course, you’ll be hoping that the people you bump into on your hunt are on the same team as you. Even if competitive elements in Pokémon Go are relatively light, they are still there.

But in reality, everyone, whatever team they belong to and whether playing together or alone, will be able to benefit from the longer lure times, as it should mean they catch more Pokémon. That goes doubly so for pink Pokémon. Niantic has also made monsters like Clefable, Clefairy and Chansey all more common and Cleffa, Igglybuff, and Smoochum will be more commonly hatched from eggs.

Better yet, every Pokémon transfer, catch or hatch, will earn double candies, meaning you can evolve and level up your little monsters much quicker than usual.

The Valentine’s Day event will run from 11 a.m. (PT) on Wednesday to 11:00 a.m. (PT) on February 15. That is plenty of time to catch a good number of them, if not “em all,” but will you be able to find love along the way?

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Jon Martindale
Former Digital Trends Contributor
Jon Martindale is a freelance evergreen writer and occasional section coordinator, covering how to guides, best-of lists, and…
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