Earlier this week, Game Freak and Nintendo announced that they will be beginning to permanently ban players in Pokemon Sword and Shield who are found to be intentionally disconnecting from matches in order to manipulate their ranking. The news came after an increase in the abuse of a bug which would prevent losses from counting towards player score.
Earlier this month, news began to spread about an exploit which would allow losing players to disconnect from the battle right before the win, preventing the loser from losing points, and the winner from gaining points in Pokemon Sword and Shield‘s Ranked Battles. The bug was performed by turning off the Switch into Sleep Mode, which would disconnect players from the internet instantly. Game Freak is nipping the issue in the bud, and beginning from this week onward, players found to be guilty of this misconduct in either Ranked Battles in the Battle Stadium. during online tournaments or live tournaments will risk being permanently banned from all online features. This includes battling, trading, and online Raid Battles.
According to the company, they will be strictly monitoring for usage of the exploit from now on, in order to ensure that players can continue to have fun in a fair manner.
Pokemon Sword and Shield is available on Nintendo Switch. You can find out more about the currently-ongoing Raid Events here.
