From the April 5th to 7th, 2024 The International Pokémon European Championships (EUIC) 2024, one of the biggest Pokémon tournaments of this season, took place in the halls of ExCeL London. I was allowed to come with over ten thousand People on site in the large hall watch as the 4,500 trainers fight against each other in their battles for Pokémon Go, Pokémon Unite, Pokémon Crimson and Purple and also the Pokémon trading card game. These attendance figures do not include those of the Pokémon Center and PlayLab, as these attractions were located outside of the main competition hall. The EUIC is the second International Championships this season and brings high scores when it comes to collecting the final points for the Worlds, which will take place in Hawaii this August.
Pokémon: At the EUIC 2024 in London
Since I was already in the ExCeL for the Pokémon Worlds 2022, I took the opportunity to compare the EUIC 2024 a little with the World Championships. Despite less stage design and only one hall for the games themselves, the offering is comparable to that of the Worlds in 2022. Spectators and visitors who did not take part in the competition also had a lot to do: there were booths with games like ring toss, a large area with old consoles where you could try out the previous generations of Pokémon games and some other activities in the Hall, like origami or face painting. This was a wider range of additional activities than at Worlds. By the way, you can see all the activities and the course of the weekend much better in the video above.
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Of course I spent most of the time in front of the big stage. The atmosphere at such championships cannot be compared to what you are used to when you watch a stream or organize a tournament against friends. Fans of Pokémon GO and Pokémon Unite in particular knew how to heat things up. No matter where you sat, the Go fans constantly celebrated their favorites with loud shouts – it was not uncommon to see crowd surfing. Nevertheless, I was most impressed by Unite, whose winners were announced on Saturday. It's probably the team game that gets you so excited here. No matter which team, you can quickly get in to understand the teams' tactics, strengths and weaknesses.
The fact that the rounds are only ten minutes long (for comparison: a TCG match lasts 60 minutes) also makes it easy to get started. The fact that two participants from Germany sat next to me while watching and talked about their experiences naturally made the matches even more exciting. “My team is already out, but just being able to play on stage in front of thousands of people was a special experience,” said one of them.
In the end, we are left with a very positive impression and, above all, happy faces among the winners who are now looking forward to Hawaii. Of course it's a bit of a shame, just Nils Dunlop (Sweden) from Europe on the podium, but that doesn't take away from the great performance of the other winners and the entertainment that all participants gave us. The Pokémon Company International also does a good job at the EU International Championships. If you like to play Pokémon a lot just for fun, it might even be worth visiting closer to London instead of planning an expensive trip to the other end of the world.