Coming off of an exciting weekend in Mebourne at the Oceania International Championships, the Pokemon VGC has another action-packed weekend coming up. We’ve got two major tournaments, an online International tournament and big announcements for the upcoming World Championships and North America International Championships.

Let’s get you up to speed.

A Two-Tournament Weekend

This weekend marks two major tournaments for the Pokemon VGC scene in the form of a regional championship in North America and a special event over in Europe. The North American regional will be taking place in Collinsville, Illinois while the European special event will be happening in Cannes, France.

Both tournaments have heavy implications for both North American and European players who are either looking to secure their invites to the World Championships or a travel award to the upcoming European International Championships in Berlin later this year.

CriticalHitGG will be providing a live stream from Collinsville on their Twitch channel, and while there’s no VGC stream for Cannes, players can keep up with the TCG side of things courtesy of LimitlessTCG.

An International Challenge with a Shiny Gift

Battles for the February International Challenge have commenced! Players registered for this online event will have until Sunday to complete up to 45 battles and achieve the highest rating possible. A small amount of Championship Points are on the line, but these could prove crucial for players pushing to reach their Worlds invites.

What’s special about this particular International Challenge is that all players participating have the opportunity to earn a shiny Tapu Bulu. This is the first time ever that Tapu Bulu has been available in its shiny form, and will join the other previously released shiny Island Guardians: Tapu Koko and Tapu Lele.

Don’t worry Tapu Fini fans, you won’t likely have to wait much longer for its shiny form to be released.

World Championship Dates Revealed!

We already knew that the Pokemon World Championships was returning to Washington D.C. in 2019, but now we know exactly when and where the main event is going down. The 2019 World Championships will return to the Walter E. Washington Convention Center this August from the 16th to the 18th. Pokemon fans may remember this location from all the way back in 2014 when Sejun Park’s Pachirisu shocked the world with its unprecedented win.

Speaking of dates for events, the North America International Championships come back to Columbus, Ohio this year. However, they will taking place a bit earlier than usual. Instead of the traditional July 4th weekend slot, the 2019 North America International Championships will take place June 21-23.

Both of these events will happen under the Ultra Series ruleset which will likely showcase the full potential that the VGC 2019 metagame has to offer.

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Images from Poke-Regionals, LimitlessTCG, Pokemon Ultra Sun and Ultra Moon, Ken Sugimori and The Pokemon Company International