Posted on 7 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in Mobile, News | 6 Comments

Niantic CEO John Hanke has penned a new message about Pokemon GO on the company’s official website.

The main point of the letter was to highlight the importance of maintaining service. Niantic said it was delayed in bringing out the game across Latin America “due to aggressive efforts by third parties to access our servers outside of the Pokemon GO game client and our terms of service”. Third-parties were blocked to free up resources, transition to new features, and avoid cheating.

Hanke also said that Niantic has “heard feedback about the Nearby feature in the game and are actively working on it.”

The full message reads:

Things have been pretty crazy here at Niantic over the last few weeks but despite all of the ups and downs we get up every day inspired by the original goals of Niantic – to create an experience that encourages healthy outdoor exploration and social gameplay. Every positive story we hear (like this one from the UK) motivates us to keep working to support the game and continue the roll-out. Running a product like Pokémon GO at scale is challenging. Those challenges have been amplified by third parties attempting to access our servers in various ways outside of the game itself.

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Posted on 7 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in News | 7 Comments

Niantic has acknowledged a new bug within Pokemon GO. The game’s latest issue, which affects throw accuracy, is increasing escape odds and omitting the XP bonus. Thankfully, a fix is said to be in the works.

Here’s the official tweet from Niantic:

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Posted on 7 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in Mobile, News | 12 Comments

Niantic has issued a new status update for Pokemon GO on Facebook to provide players with the latest information about the game.

The company first confirmed Pokemon GO’s roll-out throughout Latin America. We already mentioned its availability in Brazil and Mexico, but the game should now be released across Central and South America as a whole.

Niantic also addressed complaints regarding the removal of the Battery Saver mode on iOS. It was taken away “as several users were experiencing it to be buggy, but we are fairly confident that a fix for this should roll out within the next several days.” Also mentioned is how the team has “been working long hours to fix many other bugs and bring some exciting new features to Pokemon GO in the future.”

The full notice reads:

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Posted on 7 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in Mobile, News | 2 Comments

Update: Now live in Mexico as well. iOS here, Android here.

Pokemon GO has made its way to yet another territory. Folks in Brazil can now begin to download the game.

On iOS, the official page is located here. Android users can find Pokemon GO here.

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Rumors of Articuno appearing in Pokemon GO sprung up in full force yesterday. Niantic quickly commented on the situation, and indicated that the legendary Pokemon was not official. The company has now followed up by taking action.

In a statement, Niantic noted that “a few Legendary Pokemon got into a few accounts when they shouldn’t have”. It has also “revoked” these creatures from Trainers’ accounts.

The full statement reads:

“We recently noticed that a few Legendary Pokemon got into a few accounts when they shouldn’t have. To preserve the game’s integrity and as a measure of fairness, we have rectified the situation and revoked the legendary Pokemon from the Trainers’ accounts.”

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When Pokemon GO launched in Japan, it did so by partnering with McDonald’s restaurants across the country. Close to 3,000 locations became either PokeStops or Gyms. Developer Niantic is now looking into additional sponsorships, CEO John Hanke has stated.

Fortune reports that Niantic is in talks “with several companies”. New relationships could be formed similar to the deal with McDonald’s.

During the GamesBeat 2016 conference, Niantic mentioned that paid sponsorships can reduce Niantic’s reliance on in-app purchases by players to generate revenue. “It’s tough to understand where you want to draw the line,” he said. With sponsorships, Niantic felt “we wouldn’t have to cave to that pressure to just dial it up a little more.”

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Pokemon GO has achieved over $160 million in net revenue across iOS and Android, according to Sensor Tower. It’s also estimated that the app is bringing in several million in net revenue per day, and will increase as more regions receive access.

Niantic put out a new Pokemon GO update recently which had not been well-received. However, Sensor Tower notes that “the average iOS user of Pokemon GO in the United States spent no less time in the app since the update than in the week before it dropped. In fact, average daily usage for the past three days actually increased slightly to about 26 minutes”.

While average daily usage is down a tad as of late, it’s “still very high compared to other top mobile apps and games.” Pokemon GO also stacks up favorably to Facebook. The game is opened roughly six times each day, which is unaffected by the latest update.

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There’s been a lot of talk today about someone potentially obtaining Articuno in Pokemon GO. The legendary Pokemon was supposedly spotted in Ohio, with one player claiming that it was received from Niantic as an apology. Plenty of debate has been going around as to whether or not this Articuno is official, but we can now say that there is a serious hole in the story.

The supposed Articuno “was not from Niantic,” a representative told Geek. The spokesperson said that “it’s either a spoof or someone hacked the game”. Niantic is still “looking into it” and there aren’t “clear answers at the moment.”

Perhaps what we have on our hands is an elaborate fake. Or maybe it was a result of Pokemon GO’s latest glitch. In any case, it’s certainly not official.

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Pokemon GO is suffering from another notable glitch following the game’s latest update. At random times, once a Pokemon is caught, it turns into something else entirely – which also appears to be random.

This video shows Poliwag turning into Rattata:

There’s been an uptick in reports about the glitch over the past 24 hours or so. Niantic will likely need to send out another update to address the issue.

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The latest incidents with Pokémon GO (removal of the footprint display, shutting down third-party tracking sites) caused quite a stir in the community. Niantic has now offered up a statement on these changes. For the footprints and the 3-step glitch, they stated that the feature itself was confusing and that they were working to improve it. For third-parties, they suggest that that these services were harming their services and making things, such as expanding to new countries, more difficult. They also note that the game is coming to Brazil soon. You can read their full statement below:

Trainers,
As many of you know, we recently made some changes to Pokémon GO.
– We have removed the ‘3-step’ display in order to improve upon the underlying design. The original feature, although enjoyed by many, was also confusing and did not meet our underlying product goals. We will keep you posted as we strive to improve this feature.
– We have limited access by third-party services which were interfering with our ability to maintain quality of service for our users and to bring Pokémon GO to users around the world. The large number of users has made the roll-out of Pokémon GO around the world an… interesting… challenge. And we aren’t done yet! Yes, Brazil, we want to bring the game to you (and many other countries where it is not yet available).
We have read your posts and emails and we hear the frustration from folks in places where we haven’t launched yet, and from those of you who miss these features. We want you to know that we have been working crazy hours to keep the game running as we continue to launch globally. If you haven’t heard us Tweeting much it’s because we’ve been heads down working on the game. But we’ll do our best going forward to keep you posted on what’s going on.
Be safe, be nice to your fellow trainers, and keep on exploring.
The Pokémon GO team

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