Spooky Pokemon Go glitch is turning Alolan Pokemon into ghosts

Meg Bethany Koepp
Spooky Pokemon Go glitch is turning Pokemon into ghosts

A bizarre Pokemon Go glitch is causing some wild ‘mon to appear completely invisible. Trainers are perplexed as to why they’ve suddenly been getting into encounters with ghosts.

Glitches in Niantic’s mobile game are nothing new, with players coming across downright weird ones like “MissingNo” appearing and overworld spawns in compromising positions.

The latest sees wild Pokemon showing up as invisible for some Trainers, with only a shadow to prove they’re actually there, just like a ghost.

Pokemon Go Season of Alola wallpaper screenshot.
Some Alolan Pokemon are turning invisible on the map!

Pokemon Go glitch makes encounters invisible

The bug was brought to attention in The Silph Road subreddit on March 13 by user ‘supersoniiic‘, who shared a video of their Alolan Sandshrew during the Community Day.

“Invisible Sandshrew,” they captioned it, with the screen recording showing the encounter – but with no Pokemon to be seen. Instead, a single black shadow appeared.

The fan was able to throw a Poke Ball and catch it like any other normal wild ‘mon, making the glitch purely visual.

Players in the comments revealed they’d also run into the same bug and speculated it could be tied to the Alolan ‘mon’s textures.

“Also had it with Alolan! Probably texture issue,” one reply read. “Or he wanted to be a kantonian and accidentally erase its matter into the void.”

“I noticed this once during the event,” another wrote. “As I recall, it was an Alolan encounter.”

So there you have it. If you find yourself encountering a ghost instead of a Pokemon, don’t panic – your dreams won’t be haunted, it’s most likely a texture glitch.

The Season of Alola officially kicked off in March 2022 and finally added the much anticipated Pokedex from Sun & Moon to the mobile title.

About The Author

Meg was Weekend Editor at Dexerto before leaving us in April 2022.