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Croagunk has been revealed to be the newest playable Pokkén Tournament character, as shown on a livesteam earlier today. The fourth generation Pokémon was already considered one of the game’s stronger support characters, but Croagunk will now have his shot at the center stage. In footage from the livestream Croagunk appeared to have a projectile heavy play style, with some projectiles relying on RNG (Random Number Generation) in similar fashion to Guilty Gear’s Faust.

The reveal certainly is a shock to the Pokkén Tournament community, which had been anticipating the announcement of a different Pokémon, Empoleon. Data referencing Empoleon was found within the same patch files that hinted at the addition of Darkrai and Scizor to the game’s cast, but in an ironic turn, the data miners who discovered the update data dismissed new files referencing Croagunk, as it was already a support character. Players had gone so far as to piece together a movelist for Empoleon, making Croagunk’s announcement even more of a surprise.

Along with the new character the new arcade patch will bring nerfs to Sceptile and Braixen, along with changes to Chandelure, Gengar, and Darkrai and potentially more. The patch notes were released during the livestream but have yet to be translated. So far it has been reported that Chandelure’s Minimize will no longer dodge grabs, and several Pokémon will lose the ability to create unblockables using throws alongside projectiles.

There is still no word on when or if Darkrai, Scizor or Croagunk will be available on the Wii U version of Pokkén Tournament.

Sources: Pokkén Livestream; Circa|CatFight; Jetsplit