Everything a run depends on, in the order you will meet it: controls, cards, evolutions, the enemies that actually threaten you, rifts, weather, the gacha and co-op — then the habits that separate a two-minute run from a twenty-minute one.
You never press an attack. Your Pokémon fires the equipped move automatically, so both control schemes exist purely to keep you moving and to let you swap moves.
On a phone, hold the device in landscape. A virtual joystick spawns wherever your finger touches, which means you can steer from whichever corner is least crowded.
| Action | On PC | On phone or tablet |
|---|---|---|
| Move | WASD or the arrow keys | Drag anywhere on screen |
| Switch move | 1–4, Q/E, or click the move icon | Tap the move icon |
| Pause | Esc | Top-right button |
| Pick a level-up card | 1 / 2 / 3, or R to reroll | Tap the card |
| Choose a held item | 1 / 2 | Tap the item |
Your first card should give you something that removes bodies: a projectile, a burst or an orbit. Single-target damage loses to volume, and volume is what kills you early.
Wide circles drag the horde into a tail behind you, so most of them are never next to you. Straight lines and backtracking both feed new enemies into your face.
The first ten levels arrive fast. Use them to push one move up rather than spreading across five, because an unevolved move at level 1 is close to dead weight.
Circles and lines filling up on the floor are attacks about to land. Stepping out of the shape is worth more than any defensive upgrade you can take.
Experience comes from everything you kill, and each level stops the game to offer three cards. The pool is always the same three families: a new move, an upgrade to a move you already hold, or a boost to the partner itself.
Because the offers are random, the real skill is steering the pool. Every move you pick up removes a slot that could have been an upgrade for your core move, and vice versa.
Concentrate, then diversify
Get one move to max level and evolve it before you run four half-finished moves. A single evolved attack carries the mid game.
Pierce beats raw damage against crowds
A projectile that passes through four enemies multiplies its value in a swarm. Raw damage numbers only help when the enemy count is low — which is exactly when you are safe anyway.
Stat cards are the safest pick
When both move offers are bad, take a boost. Speed in particular keeps you alive, because movement is your only defence.
Rerolls exist for a reason
If a reroll is available, spend it when the alternative is a card that does nothing for your build.
An evolution is not automatic. You need two things at once: the base move at max level, and the specific upgrade card that move asks for. When both are true, a golden evolution card enters the level-up pool and converts your move into its stronger form.
There are 59 evolvable moves out of 64. Seven different upgrade cards serve as the key — Power, Vigor, Reflexes, Sprint, Armor, Synthesis and Magnet — and which one you need depends on the move, not on its type.
Power
The most common key. It unlocks evolutions for straightforward damage moves such as Ember, Water Gun, Vine Whip and Rock Throw.
Vigor
Pairs with moves that trade speed for weight, like Tackle becoming Take Down or Body Slam becoming Giga Impact.
Reflexes
Feeds the evolutions that add shots, jumps or pierce, such as Hyper Voice into Uproar or Thunderbolt into Zap Cannon.
Sprint
Drives movement-flavoured moves: Quick Attack to Extreme Speed, Flame Wheel to Flare Blitz, Bubble to Surf.
Armor, Synthesis and Magnet
The rarer keys. Armor covers turrets and fields, Synthesis covers orbits and trails, Magnet covers the psychic and ghost evolutions.
Four moves never evolve
Swords Dance, Agility, Harden and Aqua Ring deal no damage at all: they are stat engines, and they stay as they are.
These are not the only answers, but each one solves a specific problem: crowd clearing, boss killing, or simply not dying while you do either.
Around-the-body defence
The aura handles the trash that touches you and the projectile handles anything that survives. It is the most forgiving shape for a beginner because it removes the need to aim.
Beam boss killer
Beams are slow but hit an entire lane, which is exactly what a rift legendary needs. Trails keep the surrounding trash off you while you line the shot up.
Chain and crowd control
Chains scale with enemy density, so they love the swarms that would otherwise overwhelm a single-target build. Slows keep the pack inside the chain's range.
Turret and kiting
The turret keeps damage flowing while you are busy running. Dashes buy distance when the map pinches you, and dashes are the only moves that also reposition you.
Most of the horde is interchangeable. A few archetypes are not, and they are the ones that end runs even when your damage is fine.
Healers
They undo your progress on the pack around them. Kill them first, even if it means walking out of your safe circle to do it.
Shielders
They soak your damage for everyone nearby, so a full-health bar you cannot reduce is usually a shielder standing behind three friends.
Summoners
They create new enemies faster than you clear them. If the screen is not getting emptier, look for the one standing still.
Exploders
They close the gap and detonate. Treat the ground marker around them as a hard 'leave now' signal.
Beam casters and bosses
They telegraph with a filling line or circle before firing. These markers are your entire defensive toolkit: no upgrade stops that damage, only movement does.
A rift is a rare portal that appears on the map. Walking in takes you to an arena built from one of the legendary's types, complete with its own terrain and weather. You fight alone against the legendary; fall and you are simply returned to the map.
In co-op the whole room goes in together, which is by far the safest way to farm them. A win is always worth ×10 gacha tickets, and tickets are the only way to unlock more partners at speed.
There are 18 arenas
One per type, from Eternal Meadow for Normal to Enchanted Forest for Fairy. Dual-type legendaries pick one of their two types at random, so the same legendary can pull you into a different arena.
Terrain is a mechanic, not decoration
Lava burns, ice is slippery, water slows you down. A slippery floor makes your own dashes travel further than you planned, which is a real risk during a boss pattern.
Check the type chart before you enter
A rift is the one fight where a super effective move is worth switching partners for: ×1.6 against a legendary is the difference between a long fight and a lost one.
Five weather states can roll on the map and inside arenas, and each one shifts which types are strong during that stretch of the run.
Rain
Water is boosted and Fire is weakened.
Harsh sunlight
Fire is boosted and Water is weakened.
Sandstorm
Rock, Ground and Steel are boosted while everything else suffers.
Snowfall
Ice is boosted, everything else suffers and slows down.
Fog
Ghost, Fairy and Psychic are boosted, and the arena becomes harder to read.
Two currencies matter. Coins buy permanent upgrades for a specific partner and only apply while you are playing that partner, so spreading them thin is the same as not spending them. Tickets feed the slot-machine gacha, which is split per region.
Neither can be bought with real money. Your income is purely a function of how long you survive and how many rifts you clear.
Regular Pokémon
Drop tickets now and then during a run, so simply surviving has a passive return.
Bosses
Drop tickets sometimes, on top of the run's normal income.
Rift legendaries
Always award ×10. If you want partners faster, rifts are the lever.
Shinies
Appear in the wild at 1 in 4096 and can also come out of the gacha, independent of the ticket economy.
Held items turn up as level-up choices and you can only carry one at a time, which makes the pick a real decision rather than a stacking problem. Leftovers-style regeneration, Choice Band-style damage and Life Orb-style risk-and-reward each define a different run shape.
Permanent upgrades are the other half of the equation. They are bought with coins and they belong to one partner, so the fastest way to feel stronger is to commit to a single favourite and build it out.
Online rooms support up to four players. You add each other by nickname, one of you opens a room and the rest join.
Experience is shared
You do not compete for levelling, so there is no reason to spread out beyond what the arena demands.
Reviving is positional
Standing next to a downed teammate brings them back, which makes 'everyone together' a survivable default and 'everyone apart' a fast loss.
Split roles deliberately
One player on crowd control, one on beams for the boss. Two generalists and two specialists beat four generalists in a rift.
Rifts are shared
The whole room enters a rift together, which is the least risky way to farm the ×10 ticket drops.
Concentrate: push a single move to max level and evolve it, spend coins on the one partner you actually play, and farm rifts in co-op so that the ×10 ticket drops arrive reliably.
Upgrades, until your core move has evolved. Every extra move you pick up dilutes the level-up pool and delays the evolution that carries the mid game.
It depends almost entirely on movement discipline rather than on your build. Players who circle instead of retreating routinely double their survive times without changing a single card pick.
Coins, tickets, collection and permanent upgrades all persist. In-run levels and moves reset every time, which is what keeps the roguelite loop intact.
Keyboard and mouse on PC, touch on phone and tablet in landscape. There is no attack input in either scheme, because your Pokémon attacks on its own.
This guide. If you are here for a specific partner or matchup, jump straight to the Pokédex or the type chart instead.
The game is free, opens in a tab and saves your progress in the cloud if you make an account. Pick a partner and see how long you last.