Pokémon Go datamine hints at Winds and Waves starters arriving before the mainline games

Dataminers digging through Pokémon Go's code have found early references to Browt, Pombon, and Gecqua — the three starter Pokémon revealed for the upcoming Gen 10 titles Pokémon Winds and Pokémon Waves. The discovery, flagged on the Pokémon Go fan subreddit TheSilphRoad, has fans speculating the trio could debut in the mobile game well ahead of the mainline Switch 2 launch currently scheduled for 2027.

The three starters were unveiled at the end of the first Winds and Waves trailer: Browt is a monobrowed Grass-type bird, Pombon a flame-furred Fire-type dog, and Gecqua a sneaky-looking Water-type lizard. Finding data for them in Pokémon Go this early is unusual — the mainline games are still over a year away, and starter Pokémon have never previously been obtainable in Pokémon Go before their associated mainline titles launched.

That said, Pokémon Go has a small but real history of world-first Pokémon debuts. Meltan famously appeared in players' hands out of nowhere before anyone knew what it was, and Roaming Form Gimmighoul also made its debut in the mobile game. Pokémon Go also routinely adds new-generation species around the time of mainline launches to cross-promote, so the starters were always going to arrive eventually — the question is just when.

The timing would make sense from a promotional angle. Pokémon Go is celebrating its 10th anniversary this summer, with Go Fest Global 2026 set for July 11–12 as the centerpiece event. This year's Go Fest is free for all players and features the wide debut of Mega Mewtwo. Whether Browt, Pombon, and Gecqua show up around that window or later remains to be seen, but the datamine has fans watching closely.