Free New Pokémon Game ‘Mon Line-Up Tease Has Left Us All Confused

The latest free Pokémon game, coming to Nintendo Switch and Nintendo Switch next month, has some glaring omissions from its roster.

Announced last year with an updated release date of 8 April 2026, Pokémon Champions is a free-to-play game all about battling Pokémon, stripping away story, open-world exploration, and more for a simplified experience.

It’s a bit like the Pokémon Stadium games though there’ll be no PvE battles, only battles online with other players.

Pokémon Champions will support both Pokémon Go and Pokémon Home, allowing players to transfer their own captured ‘mon directly into the game with all their original moves intact.

The catch is not all Pokémon will be supported. In fact there are some quite glaring omissions from the game’s roster that have left fans scratching their heads in confusion.

As reported by Centro Leaks, Pokémon Champions is a game all about evolved Pokémon.

The majority of supported characters are the final evolutions of select Pokémon, with their earlier forms unusable in the game. So for instance you’ll be able to take Gardevoir into battle with you, but not Ralts or Kirlia.

There are however exceptions to this rule, as spotted by fans. Many have drawn attention to in-game screenshots and gameplay shared during the recent overview trailer, where you can clearly see Pikachu as one of the available picks when forming your team.

saying this while Pikachu is in the screenshot 😭 https://t.co/nGVj4NdfkL

— Mr. Spidops (@LeleBestScarfer) March 25, 2026

Pikachu is of course the face of the franchise so it would be somewhat weird to not see them included but why restrict the game’s roster to final evolutions when you’re just going to cherry-pick non-evolved Pokémon anyway?

The answer probably comes down to balancing, as Mega Evolutions will make a return from Pokémon X & Y and Pokémon Legends: Z-A.

Players using Pokémon that haven’t evolved yet would likely be outmatched by this mega-powerful ‘mon so it makes sense to leave them out, at least for the time being.

You could also argue that there are simply too many Pokémon to include at launch nowadays, with most modern games featuring a procured selection on release date before expanding the line-up with DLC later.

The list of supported Pokémon is expected to grow as time goes on, and the developers have said other mechanics like Mega-Evolution may be explored later down the line, which might even the playing field a bit as far as non-evolved Pokémon are concerned.

Pokémon Champions will launch on the Nintendo Switch and Nintendo Switch 2 on 8 April.