Niantic recently rolled out Exclusive Raid Battle tests in selected areas around the world. The developer also increased the volume of available Exclusive Raid Battles in their test zones. According to a report from Pokemon GO Hub, more than a dozen of Exclusive Raids have appeared in selected locations worldwide. But Niantic made some changes to the new feature. Instead of a two-hour time window in Exclusive Raids, the developer decreased it to one hour, and Raid Passes are given to players 24 hours before the Exclusive Raid Battle will happen.

Where can we find EX Raids?

Exclusive Raid Battle tests are currently available in Japan and United States. The specific locations of Exclusive Raids in Japan are Tokyo (Kinshiku Park), Tokyo (Shibuya Hikarie), Tokyo (Shinagawa), Miyagi Prefecture (Gotokudai Park), Nagano Prefecture (Nagano City Chitose Shrine), Aichi-ken (Tsurumai Park), and Osaka prefecture (Tempozan Park), while United States players can go to San Francisco, CA (Francis Scott Key Memorial), San Francisco, CA (SFSU Ying Yang), San Francisco, CA (Dolores Park), Santa Clara, CA (Santa Clara), and Central Park, New York (Alexander Hamilton) to participate the Exclusive Raid Battles.

How to join EX Raids?

Players must have Raid Passes in order to participate in an Exclusive Raid Battle.

A Raid Pass can be easily bought from the “Pokemon GO” in-game shop for 100 PokeCoins, or it can be acquired if a player completed a current Raid Battle at the PokeGym where the Exclusive Raid Battle will take place.

Most requested features might arrive this year

Pokemon GO” creators have not forgotten its player’s most requested features.

In Bloomberg’s recent interview with Tsunekazu Ishihara, the president and CEO of The Pokemon Company, he stated that the Player-Versus-Player and Trading System are still coming to the game. Niantic is also making sure that their team is constantly looking for ways to make the features happen as soon as possible.

PVP Battle and Trading System feature were included in the game’s early plans, but they were abandoned because of the time and resources needed to code the features into the game.

Pokemon GO” players had hoped that the Player-Versus-Player, Trading System, and Legendary Pokemon would be among the "three major updates" that would happen this year. But it seems that it may take a while before players see those features, especially now that Niantic is planning to add more creatures in the game from “Pokemon Ruby” and “Pokemon Sapphire.” As for now, the developers have not announced the official release date of the new features.