The Bubbly Basin DLC for Pokémon Pokopia is out, and players are already digging through its new water-themed region. Coverage from Polygon and VGC over the past couple of days maps out what the expansion adds: a fresh area to explore, new Pokémon to attract, extra outfits and hairstyles, and one of the game's most involved habitat puzzles yet.
What the Bubbly Basin adds
The centerpiece is the Bubbly Basin itself, a seaside zone dotted with landmarks that will be familiar to longtime Pokémon players, including a Cerulean Gym, Bill's House, Nugget Bridge, and Cerulean Cave. According to VGC, the standout is the Mermaid's Gym Habitat, described as the final habitat in the DLC and the most complicated to complete.
Unlike the game's simpler habitats, the Mermaid's Gym asks you to hunt down a spread of collectible items scattered across the map before it will fill in. VGC lists the full requirement:
- Marine Sofa x1
- Decorative Great Ball, Dive Ball, Lure Ball, Heal Ball, Net Ball, and Quick Ball (one each)
- Six pedestals or exhibition stands
The payoff is Starmie, which VGC notes is the only Pokémon that spawns at that habitat and is a nod to Cerulean City gym leader Misty. The decorative Poke Balls are tucked behind breakable walls and sludge in spots like the town square, Bill's House basement, and Cerulean Cave, and treasure maps can point you toward them if you'd rather not go straight to the locations.
New cosmetics and Dream Island loot
Since Pokopia lets you dress up your Ditto stand-in, the DLC also folds in new looks. Polygon, which updated its outfits guide on August 6, catalogs several Bubbly Basin additions found as "human records" (magazines, books, tablets, and letters marked with a yellow sparkle on the ground). Those include a Mermaid outfit, a Preschooler outfit, a Triathlete outfit, and the Crested hair and Ponytail hairstyles.
On top of the fixed-location finds, the randomized Dream Islands now hide DLC-exclusive extras. Polygon points to a Rad outfit, a Cheerful outfit, and the Messy short and Side tails hairstyles among them. The outlet warns these are rare, saying it found every legendary Pokémon on the Dream Islands before turning up more than a handful of the new outfits, most of them stashed inside submarine-like structures.
As with the base game, once you unlock a piece you can mix and match at a mirror, so the new gym-leader-inspired gear slots in alongside older finds like the Team Rocket hat.
What this means for players
If you drifted away from Pokémon Pokopia after finishing the main island's story requests, Bubbly Basin is the reason to come back: it layers on a new region, a chunk of extra Pokémon to attract, and a habitat puzzle meaty enough that guides are already being written for it. Polygon notes it was still missing one cosmetic at the time of writing, so expect the full picture of what the DLC holds to keep filling in over the next few days. For anyone tracking the game's post-launch support, this is the clearest sign yet that Pokopia is being treated as a spin-off worth expanding rather than a one-and-done.