The Pokémon Company had its latest info drop concerning Pokémon Sun & Moon today, leaving fans talking and looking forward to the reveal. However, the new trailer wasn't the only place where new information could be found - the website had some as well, and it revealed the return of a function that was present in Omega Ruby & Alpha Sapphire: QR scanner functionality.
Essentially, the QR scanner function allows players to register Pokémon in their Pokédexes without actually coming across them in the wild or facing off against them in a trainer battle.
Here's how it works, according to the official website:
Step 1: Scan QR code patterns. These can be found in various places in the real world, so the Pokémon Company encourages you to seek them out and scan them.
Step 2: QR code patterns correspond to a specific Pokémon, and once scanned, the Pokémon in question will show up in your Pokédex.
Step 3: The Pokédex entry will be identical to what would be seen if the the player saw it somewhere in the wild or fought one belonging to another trainer, with the habitat being revealed, but other details hidden. With that info, all you need to do is look said habitat up and seek out the Pokémon you desire.
The process is quite easy, and while it means that you can easily learn the locations of Pokémon that you might not have access to and have yet to encounter in battle, it doesn't remove one of the most interesting aspects of the franchise: actually capturing it.
More importantly, however, the QR scanner addresses one of the more annoying aspects about the Pokémon experience: learning the location of rare Pokémon. Some Pokémon have extremely low chances of appearing: Cryogonal in Black & White, for example, has an appearance rate of 5 percent at best.
If you never come across such a Pokémon in battle, it would be hard to ascertain its existence unless an NPC talked about it in-game or the player looked it up online. The QR Scanner circumvents this scenario by giving the players the entry. Of course, with that said, players still need to find the appropriate code pattern.
The fun with QR code patterns doesn't end there, however, as players can display the QR Code patterns for Pokémon that they've caught and let other players scan them to add those entries to their Pokédex.
As mentioned before, this isn't the first time a Pokémon game has had QR functionality. It was possible in Omega Ruby & Alpha Sapphire to use code patterns to obtain not just the Pokédex entry, but the Pokémon itself. With only the ability to add the Pokédex entry, this latest addition might seem like a downgrade, but there is actually one major factor that separates the two: the QR scanner functionality in Sun & Moon is legal, and runs no foreseeable risk of being patched out.