Pokémon Go fans pay for shiny Mew but are blocked by near-impossible research task

Niantic is under fire once again after an event featuring Shiny Mew kicked off in Pokémon Go on July 6.

Players can pay $5 to unlock the Masterwork Research to catch the precious species, and many were frustrated when welcomed with a near-impossible task as the Research’s first step. The Masterwork Research includes a lot of challenging tasks to complete, divided into three ambitious pages. And many players might get stuck just at the first one: “Earn the Platinum Kanto Medal.”

To get this Medal, players must catch all 151 Pokémon from the Kanto region. Not only this is a big challenge for newer players but also for many others since some Kanto Pokémon are region-locked.

“No way I just paid $5 only to get blocked by Kangaskhan,” wrote a user in a popular Reddit thread from July 6. The species can only be found in Australia. The Kanto Pokédex also includes Farfetch’d as Eastern Asia-exclusive, Mr. Mime for Europe, and Tauros for North America.

There were occurrences where all those rare Pokémon became temporarily available, such as included in Egg spawns and Mega Raids all over the world, but they are still very rare. Kangaskhan might be the most challenging of all to get, however, since it’s exclusive to the smallest area in the world.

Related: Pokémon Go player immediately regrets catching perfect Shiny Bulbasaur

Pokémon Go players are voicing disappointment on social media, saying they didn’t expect to receive such difficult tasks for something they paid for.

It’s still unclear whether Niantic anticipated this difficulty for players by planning to introduce an event featuring region-locked species from Kanto. Since Mew is from that region, it could make sense, but it’s still shrouded in mystery.