Pokemon Ultra Sun Update 1.2 «2K»

By late 2018, the competitive meta for Ultra Sun/Ultra Moon was a beautiful, broken mess. The dominant strategy involved Mega Salamence, Primal Groudon, and a ticking clock. However, version 1.1 had a notorious bug: during Z-Moves involving complex animations (like Extreme Evoboost or Clangorous Soulblaze), players on slower original 3DS models would sometimes experience a “desync.”

This meant that while your screen showed your Eevee landing a boosted Baton Pass, your opponent’s screen might show you using a regular Tackle. The match would continue, completely out of sync, until one player’s game inevitably crashed or time out.

Version 1.2 rebuilt the animation priority for seven specific Z-Moves. It’s invisible to the naked eye, but dataminers discovered that the patch actually downgraded the particle effects on older 3DS hardware to keep the frame rate locked. It was a small mercy for those still rocking an original 2011 3DS—a way of saying, “We know the Switch is out, but we haven’t forgotten you.” pokemon ultra sun update 1.2

Before 1.2, Dusk Mane Necrozma and Dawn Wings Necrozma had an unintended interaction with the item "Ultranecrozium Z." Players could hold the Z-crystal, transform into Ultra Necrozma, and retain the stat boosts from the previous turn.

In the grand history of Pokémon patches, Pokémon Ultra Sun Update 1.2 may not be as flashy as Scarlet/Violet’s DLC or as famous as X/Y’s Lumiose City save fix. But for the 3DS generation, it was the final seal of quality. By late 2018, the competitive meta for Ultra

It transformed Ultra Sun from a slightly buggy, online-fragile game into a rock-solid farewell to an era. Whether you are a shiny hunter relying on the GTS, a VGC veteran revisiting 2018 rulesets, or a new player discovering Alola for the first time on a used 3DS, install Version 1.2.

Don’t risk the save corruption. Don’t accept the broken Bank transfers. And certainly don’t miss out on the chance to battle with Zeraora. Further Reading:

Alola’s final patch is its finest.

Further Reading:

Have you experienced any glitches with Pokémon Ultra Sun? Did Update 1.2 fix them? Share your story in the comments below.

Released in December 2017, this update was primarily designed to prepare the game for compatibility with the Pokémon Bank update and to enable online competitive features.