[Megathread] Pokemon GO

[sarym13]

Would you play an app that's like Pokemon Go, but with Ghostbusters, where you go around catching ghosts?

No.

This is Pokemon we're talking about here. Mainly why it is so popular.

[Lightwysh]

Would you play an app that's like Pokemon Go, but with Ghostbusters, where you go around catching ghosts?

They need to do a Zelda one where you go around breaking pots and fighting chickens. Pokestops would become single Boss battles and Gyms would be progressively difficult boss battles(kind of like endless proving grounds). You would get rupees to buy health potions and arrows. Progression would be building up your sword and bow to be able to do more damage to bosses and make it easier to kill more bosses. Gyms would be held by the person able to kill the highest level boss. It would decay hourly to allow new people to take over these dungeons.

[Deleted]

It would be fun if they'd create a standard fantasy rpg game similar to GO. Instead of capturing pokemon and collecting stuff from pokestops there would be events and quests that spawn in the open world and participating in them would give you EXP for your class, unique gear, rare crafting mats etc. There would be 'dungeons' where you would need to team up with a healer/tank/dps and something similar to pokestops where you can loot simple stuff such as potions and low-level crafting mats.

- - - Updated - - -

honestly now that i think about it, a 'Final Fantasy go' type game could work really well

[RoninaThorstone]

It would be fun if they'd create a standard fantasy rpg game similar to GO. Instead of capturing pokemon and collecting stuff from pokestops there would be events and quests that spawn in the open world and participating in them would give you EXP for your class, unique gear, rare crafting mats etc. There would be 'dungeons' where you would need to team up with a healer/tank/dps and something similar to pokestops where you can loot simple stuff such as potions and low-level crafting mats.

- - - Updated - - -

honestly now that i think about it, a 'Final Fantasy go' type game could work really well

So, weird thing... Final Fantasy Brave Exivus is good. You get cash currency "lapis" all the time so you don't need the cash shop at all.

[Roxinius]

niantic should be thankful this has pokemon attached to it because it would have died in 2 weeks

[Jester Joe]

Not sure how accurate it is but I've had good luck with pokehuntr.com today. Found myself a Machoke exactly where it said it was. So this is how life was with pokevision? Guess we'll see how long this site lasts.

Might be worth re-mentioning, as far as reasoning for pokevision going down, it seems to be that not only were they having issues keeping their site up, but they decided to shut themselves down out of respect for Niantic's complaint. I imagine without Niantic actually finding a way to shut down people from querying the server for locations or whatever, scanners won't be going anywhere anytime soon.

[Vvhooya]

Hmm this is my squad so far, lvl 23.

I kinda want Snorlax and Lapras now, need luck from 10k eggs lol.

Yeah this update seems harsh for new players.

[Roxinius]

Hmm this is my squad so far, lvl 23.

I kinda want Snorlax and Lapras now, need luck from 10k eggs lol.

Yeah this update seems harsh for new players.

its harsh for everyone you cant really track anything now i saw a syther pop up i dont have it so i started walking and after a while it was gone actually pissed me off

[Seegtease]

[IMG]http://i63.tinypic.com/2r7ukup.png[IMG]

Hmm this is my squad so far, lvl 23.

I kinda want Snorlax and Lapras now, need luck from 10k eggs lol.

Yeah this update seems harsh for new players.

Those Gyrados, though. I've only caught about 4 magikarp, 3 of them from eggs. At this rate, I won't have one for well over a year. My Arcanine and Vaporeon are my top 2. Got a 1747 Snorlax. I caught two Dragonite somehow, but they are 500 and 1000 respectively. Useless. And I have no candy to upgrade them. The idea that people could upgrade one that far blows my mind.

The ones I usually place in gyms are my 1400s, Nidoking, Rhydon, Clefable, Nidoqueen, Flareon.

[Nibúeanor]

I was reading last night about someone who had called into google for their refund(and go it), apparently the rep they spoke to said Google couldn't get in contact with Niantic. According to the rep, they had been trying all day yesterday because of the influx of refund requests, and that Google was considering removing the game from the store.

Considering Niantic is partially owned by Google (it was part of Google until last year even), this is really hilarious

[Vespian]

Official but limited response by Niantic. I have to say, the first comment below that is pretty spot on.
https://www.facebook.com/PokemonGO/p...40141879465704

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

Wen Chao:

This is an open letter from me and hopefully echoes the voice of many other fans of Pokemon Go. First of all, let me thank the Niantic team for creating Pokemon Go. It is impossible for me to express how much his game means for me, but I will try. It has gotten me to go out to enjoy the outdoors and exercise, connect and reconnect with others, and most importantly put Pokemon back into the spotlight. For once, I feel like the 15 years of Pokemon trivia and knowledge I have collected holds meaning for more than just me. Remembering what type the 700 some Pokemons are and what moves are super effective has never been so satisfying as when you are discussing what are the best Pokemons to take down a gym with a Dragonite with a girl (no sexism intended). And this is why I wish that Pokemon Go not only continue to have the success it has had, but become something and revitalize the entire Pokemon community.

To do that (this is where it gets a little ranty), I think what we need is better communication. Right now I think you are infinitely more troubled than I am about the recent events and declining popularity of your game. And am scrambling to fix the many understandable issues associated with the popularity of the game. So instead of harping on you about the tracker and how Pokevision was pressured into shutting down, I’m going to talk about more subtle things. The server side changes to attacks, the various mechanics change to capturing, and the removal of the battery save feature. These three things all have one thing in common, they all happened while leaving us in the dark. I know the changes to attacks were mentioned in the patch not long after, but the changes occurred server side long before the patch actually hit. Which was… confusing for a while since we had no idea what it meant, especially for those of us actually caring about battling. But whatever, you mentioned it in a patch that it was permanent and I think all and all it was a good balance change. The other two issues, however, was much worse.

Let’s start with the battery save since I have much fewer things to say about it. It is no secret and pretty obvious that it has been removed. Now I understand that there might be many, many valid reasons why this was done. For one, all it did was turn the screen black, not turn it off, which doesn’t save all that much battery on Apple devices. Also, it has been causing periodic crashes where the game would not turn back on after and the app had to be restarted. It’s fine, but what bugs me is that there was no word of it in the patch notes. It would have taken one sentence to explain it: “the battery save option has been removed due to related crash issues until improvements can be made”. Done! Easy and no one would have had a second thought. But now it’s an issue constantly brought up when people talk about the patch, not because they wanted it that badly, but because it was a hidden change.

A similar issue has occurred with the catching mechanics. Curveball physics seems to have changed or Pokemon distances have been messed around with. The curveball bonus went away, and when that was fixed the “Nice”, “Great”, and “Excellence” changes are gone. Pokemons seems to run away more now and attack/dodge wayyyy more. I’m sure I’m not alone in this. Is this a recent change or is it just because I’ve leveled more? I don’t know – and that is the problem, and what I think is the ultimate crutch of why the game has become less popular. We, the player base, just don’t know. It feels a little weird to mention the lack of tutorial given the hours I’ve already sunk into this game (a modest level 23), and yet, there are times where I have no idea what’s going on when it comes to capturing. Does getting a better throw mean better catch rate? Do curveballs improve catch rate? Did the physics and catch rates change or am I just sucking at throws/getting unlucky. More than the difficulty of finding Pokemons in the suburbs or unable to track down rare Pokemon spawns, the uncertainty is what frustrate me the most. I just graduated from my education degree, and something I learned from interning in schools is that people hate to be left out of the loop. A kid is much more likely to behave well if you give them a reason and explain to them the reasons and why things have to be a certain way instead of just telling them that’s how it is. What’s more, the solution is not to pretend something didn’t happen, because people will find out, especially now with the prevalence of internet. That is why I’m upset, not because things have changed, but because I have no idea whether they are changed for good or it’s a temporary bug, and because I have no idea why any of these changes occurred and what they mean for the game in the future.

I want you to know Niantic - I am not one of those people who will write in and threaten “I will quit your game”, or “I want a refund”. Instead, I really hope your game will continue to grow and that you will overcome this hurdle. I hope the community will forgive you over your recent decisions on many issues. But for any of that to happen, you have to talk to us, apologize for things YOU think YOU should apologize for and stand up for what YOU want to stand up for. I will stay of the game and hope that it continues to bring me more joy than frustration and believe that the Niantic team is there to create a game not just because of profit but because in their heart each and every one of them has an inner Pokemon Master wanting to make their childhood dream come true.

Sincerely,

Wen

P.S. Because internet Tl;DR. I love your game Niantic, but you gotta give us more information when you make a change.

P.P.S. This was written before this post. Which was a step in the right direction.

[Seegtease]

Some response is way, way better than no response. Silence can be deafening. It could have been better, but it sounds like they want to bring back tracking in some form. I don't see why they can't be more specific, but oh well.

[Nibúeanor]

Aaand it was removed... Just when I wanted to like it, it went away. Da fuck...

EDIT: I mean that quoted open letter

[Deleted]

My office is right on top of a Pokestop so I leave my game open 8 hours a work day at the least. Have not racked up any extra Kms- my avatar is still as stone.

Are you sure this is a bug with the patch or more a factor of sub-par GPS locating/tracking?

If you have Android, chance your tracking method to "GPS only". This worked since day 1.

[Sarevokcz]

Some response is way, way better than no response. Silence can be deafening. It could have been better, but it sounds like they want to bring back tracking in some form. I don't see why they can't be more specific, but oh well.

frankly, the only reason we got a response is because they were bombarded with 1star reviews and microtransaction refunds and wanted it to stop, atleast for a while, this sort of short, vague response without much substance might have been fine two weeks ago, but today? not even close. At this point, they have to convince people with actions, not few empty words of a PR...

[Nibúeanor]

Funny is how they seem to delete comments they don't like. That quoted open letter was among them but it's even worse. Some guy commented on that about 20 mins ago. I replied him something about the lines that when redditers find out about that they'll give them hell. He liked my comment so I went check and boom, both posts gone. They should really fire whoever is responsible for their PR, the lack of communication is terribad, but censoring voices you don't like... wow, just wow.

[Vespian]

Funny is how they seem to delete comments they don't like. That quoted open letter was among them but it's even worse. Some guy commented on that about 20 mins ago. I replied him something about the lines that when redditers find out about that they'll give them hell. He liked my comment so I went check and boom, both posts gone. They should really fire whoever is responsible for their PR, the lack of communication is terribad, but censoring voices you don't like... wow, just wow.

I just reposted it. (Clearly not Wen Chao).

[Roxinius]

So a new tracker has risen to fill the void left by pokevision

[Noxina]

So a new tracker has risen to fill the void left by pokevision

What tracker?

[Belize]

So... anyone seen the bug where pokemon youcan't are actually other pokemon?

What a shitshow