This article was originally written for TheNintendoVillage.com, a website I founded and ran from 2018 to 2021.

Last week, an exploit surfaced in Pokémon Sword and Shield’s competitive online play that allowed players to hit the power button on their Switch to avoid racking up a loss, keeping their score from dropping as well as stopping their victorious opponent from gaining points.

It’s now been made clear that the Pokémon Company are aware of the bug, and have threatened to ban anyone using the exploit, possibly permanently.

Here’s their full statement:

“We truly thank you for supporting Pokémon Sword and Shield.
We are able to confirm that a number of players have been disconnecting from the Internet to manipulate their win/loss records for online battles and tournaments.
From now on, if we determine that players abuse this bug for their own gain in online battles and tournaments, we will not hesitate to temporarily ban or even permanently ban players from accessing online play in Pokémon Sword and Shield.”

Rightly so if you ask us! What do you think? Let us know in the comments.

Source: Nintendo Soup