Pokémon Go’s long-awaited player-versus-player Battle League rolls out this week via a preseason trial. As expected, it’s a semi-regular tournament with in-game rankings and rewards.
By earning wins against other players and levelling up your rank, you’ll earn Stardust, items and Pokémon encounters. The higher the rank, the better your rewards. Pikachu Libre – a wrestling-themed Pikachu seen in various other games – is one of the prizes, along with various themed avatar items.
We also now have confirmation of how the feature will be monetised. To begin with, you’ll get five matches for free. After that, you can earn five more matches by walking 5km – which you can do a total of three times a day.
Alternatively, you can pay via PokéCoins to top up your 5km of walking (though only if you’ve already walked at least 2km). How many PokéCoins will this cost? We don’t yet know, though the amount will decrease as you get closer to your next 5km total.