How to Play PokeBonk – Beginner Guide & Tips

Updated October 22, 2026 · Game version checked: PokéBonk 0.8.10 (Season 2) · Based on the game's in-game text and official patch notes

New to the game? You can play PokeBonk free on our overview page or on the official site. This guide only covers mechanics that exist in the current game (version 0.8.10, Season 2).

Your first run, step by step

1. Choose your partner. A new trainer picks Bulbasaur, Charmander or Squirtle. Compare them in the tier list.
2. Start Classic in Viridian Forest. It is the first region; later regions unlock as you complete earlier ones.
3. Keep moving. Your moves attack automatically. Your job is positioning: stay out of the horde, and use Shift to slide through the bosses' strongest attacks.
4. Collect experience and level up. Each level-up pauses on a set of cards. Early on, take new moves to fill your slots.
5. Open Poké Balls. Poké Balls on the map store items; opening one costs ₽ (Pokédollars), which wild Pokémon drop.
6. Wake the guardian. When you feel strong enough, interact (E) at the guardian altar. Defeating the guardian opens the portal to the next zone. The game's own tip: level up and open the Poké Balls first.
7. Clear all three zones to win the region and unlock the next one.

Classic vs Survival

Hard adds more and faster Pokémon, more elites and bosses that warn less. Nightmare brings bigger hordes, elites that burst when they fall and merciless bosses. A limited-time third mode, the Lavender Tower, runs during the Season 2 Halloween event.

Level-up cards: moves, vitamins, reroll, skip, banish

Each level-up offers cards that add a new move, upgrade a move you already have, or give a vitamin (a stat boost chosen at level-up; Season 2 has 26 vitamins). You also get limited uses of three buttons:

• Refresh / Reroll (F): replaces the cards you are offered.
• Skip (X): discards the cards in exchange for Pokédollars.
• Banish (Z): removes an option for the rest of the run. Tap the card again to confirm. Banishing a move's upgrade means that move will not upgrade again this run.

The pause menu shows each move's damage per second and your Ultimate's, which is the easiest way to see what is carrying your run.

Move fusions (Season 2)

Get two moves to their maximum level, then use Bill's Machine (one per map) to fuse them. The fusion takes the first move's slot and frees the other slot for a new move. Every League Pokémon has a signature fusion from two moves in its own kit. More in the Season 2 guide.

Evolution and your Ultimate

Your partner evolves during the run as it levels up (for example, the game says Caterpie becomes Metapod at level 8 and Butterfree at level 36). Some Pokémon do not evolve and instead get stronger at levels 24 and 44. Evolving can unlock extra moves you can learn. For a few Pokémon with branching evolutions you choose what to evolve into, which changes its type and power.

Your Ultimate charges as you fight. Press R (or tap the Ultimate button) when it is ready; you are invulnerable while it plays. If you prefer, turn on Auto Ultimate in Settings and it fires on its own when enemies are near.

Poké Balls, altars, Meowth and power-ups

• Item Poké Balls: cost ₽ to open and give items. Some fall from the sky as supply drops, and the first elite of an area drops one.
• Meowth's shop: Meowth sometimes passes by and sells items for ₽. He leaves after 45 seconds.
• Unown altars: stand in the circle to charge them and earn a blessing.
• Other altars: challenge altars (beat a wave for a Great Ball), cursed altars (a rare item for a curse), Gengar altars (harder, more XP and loot) and Porygon altars (trade one stat for another).
• Power-ups: TM discs appear on the map in Season 2, for example Swords Dance (×1.5 damage for 10 s) and Pay Day (double ₽ for 15 s).
• Big map: press M. Once the guardian falls, everything left to pick up is marked.

Catching Pokémon and growing your League

Your League is the roster of Pokémon you can start a run with. Each new Pokémon is unlocked with a challenge; once the challenge is done, that Pokémon appears in a later run for you to weaken and catch with a Poké Ball (press E nearby). If you do not catch it, it drops its prize instead.

Two things that confuse new players:

• Shiny catches count for your shiny collection and unlock a shiny look, but do not make that Pokémon playable. You still need to complete its challenge and catch it normally.
• Alpha Pokémon you capture in a run fight with you as support for that run only; they do not join your League.

The Lab and Stardust

Stardust is the Lab's currency. You earn it at the end of every run (more the further you get), by defeating bosses, catching shiny Pokémon and completing achievements and tasks. In the Lab you spend it on permanent upgrades and on unlocking items, which then start appearing in your Poké Balls and Meowth's shop.

Clans, leaderboards and seasons

PokeBonk has global, per-region and per-Pokémon leaderboards, plus Survival and time-attack boards. Leaderboards reset every season, while your League, Pokédex and Lab progress stay. Clans (up to 200 members in Season 2) score points from members' runs, have weekly missions and a weekly rivalry. You need a free account (not a guest) to join leaderboards and clans.

Beginner tips

• Learn one partner and one region before switching. It makes it easier to see what each upgrade changes.
• Slide (Shift) through boss attacks: you are briefly invulnerable during a slide.
• Spend ₽ on Poké Balls before waking the guardian.
• Check the pause screen for damage per second when choosing which move to upgrade.
• If the screen gets too busy, Settings has "Hide my attacks" and an attack-opacity slider.
• Create a free account if you play more than casually: guest accounts unused for 60 days are deleted.