Pokemon Spotlight Vol.1: Eevee & Its Eeveelutions

Welcome to Pokemon Spotlight! In this series, we're going to take a quick look at an individual Pokemon and talk a bit about its history in Pokemon Go, and maybe even look into some fun trivia along the way. Unlike most of our articles, the point of this series is not to take an in-depth look at a given Pokemon, but rather to take a step back and appreciate what they've done to Pokemon Go during their time in the game.

To begin our new series, we thought it would be best to take a look at one of the Generation 1 classics. We've all seen it and caught hundreds or even thousands in our Pokemon Go Journey, today we're taking a look at the Evolution Pokemon, Eevee!

In many ways, the story of Eevee is the story of Pokemon Go itself. This popular little bundle of potential was released alongside the game way back in June of 2016 as a member of the first wave from the classic Red/Blue (Red/Green in Japan) version 151 original Pokemon. When first joining the game, many players would be surprised to see that Eevee was shockingly common. This was a bit odd for many players, as Eevee was actually a one-of-a-kind Pokemon back in its release generation. The only legit way that a player could obtain this Pokemon way back when was to find a room hidden in the back of a building in Celadon City, where Eevee would be waiting for the player inside of a Pokeball.

Fortunately, Eevee has become more common in the main series as of late, though it's arguably a bit less common in Pokemon Go now as the spawn pool has quite literally grown by several hundred additional Pokemon.

On its release, Eevee only had its three original evolutions to look forward to: the Water Type Pokemon Vaporeon, the Fire Type Pokemon Flareon, and the Electric Type Pokemon Jolteon. In the main series, the evolution that you'd end up with would depend on a special stone that you'd expose your Eevee to, though in Pokemon Go the evolution was 100% random. It would later be discovered that an Eeveelution could be picked via a special trick. All that a player would have to do is give their Eevee a special nickname and they would be guaranteed to obtain the Eeveelution associated with that nickname once per account. This Naming Trick would also carry forward into future generations, with every Eeveelution sporting a once-only name to skip the random chance or additional requirements for that Eeveelution.

Fast forward a bit, and Eevee would gain its next two Evolutions; the Dark Type Pokemon Umbreon and the Psychic Type Pokemon Espeon, when the Johto Region was released back in February 2017. This would be followed by the release of the Grass Type Pokemon Leafeon and the Ice Type Pokemon Glaceon in May of 2019, and finally the Fairy Type Pokemon Sylveon in May of 2021. With the release of Sylveon, the Eevee Family is now complete in Pokemon Go... until Gamefreak decides that it's time to release yet another Eeveelution! 

Back in August 2018, Eevee took the spotlight as one of the original Pokemon to be featured in a Community Day. With Last Resort as its Event-Exclusive move, this was a big undertaking for many players, as we had five different Eeveelutions on the table at the time: Flareon, Jolteon, Vaporeon, Espeon, and Umbreon. Fortunately, Niantic gave us a two-day Community Day so that we could be sure to get everything that we needed. I remember that I spent the entire first day waiting at an Apple story in Indianapolis, Indiana to get a family member's iPhone battery changed. Fortunately, the mall that this Apple store was located in was also loaded with Pokemon spawns, so it all worked out for me in the end.

And then, thee years later, we had another Eevee Community Day! This was not to give the remaining Eeveelutions a shot at Last Resort, as that was being done with other event. No, this was to give them all their own unique moves as well. Vaporeon would learn Scald, Jolteon got Zap Cannon, Flareon gained Superpower, Espeon would be given Shadow Ball, Umbreon would obtain Psychic, Leafeon would be granted Bullet Seed, Glaceon would gain access to Water Pulse, and Sylveon discovered Psyshock. This would end up changing how the Eeveelutions would operate in the game to a certain degree, but almost exclusively in PvP. 

Since their inception, Eevee's many evolutions have all been considered "decent" attackers in raids, and have been considered solid budget picks. The one outlier here is Umbreon due to its more defensive stats, but it made up for that by being great in PvP instead. For this reason, chances are that many older players have at least a few Eeveelutions sitting in their box, unused for potentially years due to being outclassed yet still ready to do their best if they're ever called on again.

With a staggering total of 8 different Eeveelutions available, it can be a bit hard to keep track of how to obtain each of them. So let's take a quick look at the requirements for each for the sake of anyone not yet familiar with the tricks of the trade, so to speak.

Vaporeon is the Water-Type Eeveelution, released alongside Generation 1 with the original Kanto dex, it was definitely a staple back in its day. While never the strongest attacker, it was a great defender back in the day when Gym Defense was basically the entire point of Pokemon Go, so everyone wanted a Vaporeon in their pocket. Vaporeon is also one of the three random-chance Eeveelutions, so get ready for a roll of the dice on this one.

Evolution Requirements:

• 25 Candy: Random-Selection among Vaporeon, Jolteon, and Flareon
• Once Per Account: Evolve With The Nickname "Rainer"

Jolteon is the Electric-Type Eeveelution. Its position at the start of the game was a bit dubious due to the way that Super Effective/STAB Damage worked, but it became more valuable when that formula was changed, though it also dropped in utility quite a bit as soon as Zapdos hit the game. Sadly, it's also one of the least valuable Eeveelutions nowadays, as it's pretty outclassed on most fronts. Still, it's a good budget Pokemon for players just starting raids. It's yet another random-selection, so hopefully you have the nickname trick ready if you want one!

Evolution Requirements:

• 25 Candy: Random-Selection among Vaporeon, Jolteon, and Flareon
• Once Per Account: Evolve With The Nickname "Sparky"

The final random-selection Eeveelution, Flareon has always been a bit of a middle-of-the-road Pokemon. Never the best, but always useful in its own right. Much like Jolteon, it's been relegated to the "budget attacker" role as its primary use nowadays.

Evolution Requirements:

• 25 Candy: Random-Selection among Vaporeon, Jolteon, and Flareon
• Once Per Account: Evolve With The Nickname "Pyro"

One of the first "new" Eeveelutions, Espeon dropped as an easily overlooked yet very strong Psychic Type attacker. It had some very real utility for the once-important Machamp Solo in its day, though it was destined to be severely outclassed due to sharing a type with many of the absolute monsters of the Pokemon universe, including Mewtwo who didn't allow Espeon any sort of comfort in its role.

Evolution Requirements:

• 25 Candy: Walk 10km total and evolve during daytime while Eevee is still walking
• Once Per Account: Evolve With The Nickname "Sakura"

Arguably the biggest fan-favorite among the Eeveelutions, the Dark Type Umbreon dropped to... very little fanfare. We didn't have PvP in those days, so Umbreon's more defensive stats did it absolutely no favors in early-day Pokemon Go. Fortunately, it would later learn to stand as a defensive tyrant in PvP, where it was a force to be reckoned with in a few ways.

Evolution Requirements:

• 25 Candy: Walk 10km total and evolve during nighttime while Eevee is still walking
• Once Per Account: Evolve With The Nickname "Tamao"

Welcome to Sinnoh! Leafeon hit the game as one of the early "Lure" evolutions, that is to say that players were required to set one of the new special lures on a Pokestop and stand near it in order to enable the proper evolution. It was one of the better Grass Types in the game in its day, and is still at least decent for a non-Legend/Shadow/Mega to this day.

Evolution Requirements:

• 25 Candy: Evolve near an active Mossy Lure
• Once Per Account: Evolve With The Nickname "Linnea"

Glaceon was the other Sinnoh-based Eeveelution, and it's arguably the most useful in raids to this day. Ice is not a type that's super-populated by powerful Pokemon, so Glaceon is actually able to keep up with a fair bit of the meta even now. It's nowhere near the top choices, but it's still good in its own right!

Evolution Requirements:

• 25 Candy: Evolve near an active Glacial Lure
• Once Per Account: Evolve With The Nickname "Rea"

As of this posting, Sylveon, the lone Eeveelution of Kalos, is the last Eeveelution on the national Pokedex. It dropped alongside the Buddy Adventure system, and was the first exposure that many players would have to the new feature. With its fairly unique Fairy-typing, it's a solid pick among its Fairy brethren... though Fairy is traditionally among the weakest types in Pokemon Go in the first place.

Evolution Requirements:

• 25 Candy: Obtain 7 consecutive hearts while Buddied.
• Once Per Account: Evolve With The Nickname "Kira"

So is this a comprehensive overview of Eevee's history in Pokemon Go? No, not by a long-shot! We've had a number of events and several hats for the little guy and his Eeveelutions over the years that aren't even touched on here. However, this is at least a quick walk down memory-lane and a brief overview of what this impactful little semi-mascot for the Pokemon series as a whole has done for Pokemon Go since its inception. While its presence isn't as important as it once was, let's never forget the Eevees that have helped us to get to where we are today, and let's honor the Eevees that will help those who haven't yet made that climb as well.

So that wraps up Volume 1 of our Pokemon Spotlight. We're trying to expand our content a bit, but we still have more in-depth analysis and deeper articles on the way as well. Please let us know what you think of this series, and let us know which Pokemon we should cover next time (and yes, we WILL have a next time!)