New Pokémon Go third-gen datamine points to a pretty huge mistake (update)

Pokémon Go dataminers continue to find signs that the third generation of Pokémon is close to debuting in-game. A set of new details about them has been uncovered from recent update files — including a surprising, almost amusing error on Niantic’s part.

Members of The Silph Road have shared code that points to the gender ratios of every gen-three Pokémon. With many of them, the numbers are familiar; these ratios are typically identical to those from the traditional games. That means we can expect female starter Pokémon to be a lot more uncommon than male, for example.

But among the data entries are two very obvious mistakes. Latios and Latias are a pair of legendary monsters that trainers shouldn’t expect to be able to find or catch in Pokémon Go for some time, considering their inherent rarity. The dragons are direct counterparts of each other, with the exclusively male Latios joined by Latias as his female companion.

Somehow, Niantic swapped this defining detail within Pokémon Go’s code. Based on what The Silph Road community dug up, Pokémon Go’s Latios is 100 percent female, while Latias is 100 percent male. That probably won’t have any bearing on gameplay — these two Pokémon can’t breed, in-game or in general — but for fans who know their Pokémon biology inside and out, it’s kind of a shocking switch.

We’ve reached out to Niantic about the gender swap and will update accordingly, although it should go without saying that the developer has been mum about the seemingly close launch of new Pokémon for the mobile game.

Update: Niantic confirmed that the Latios and Latias gender swap error has been corrected as of the latest version update for the game, available now.