Pokémon GO Task Force Releases Statement On Game’s Future

By M. Kang

Posted on September 7, 2021

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Pokémon GO recently announced that it would remove several of the game’s pandemic-initiated features. Fans criticized the company’s announcement, particularly as many of these changes not only helped players stay safer while playing the game, but were also considered necessary quality of life changes.

In response to the passionate outcry, developers Niantic not only reversed course on an interaction distance decision (keeping the 80m interaction distance vs. 40m), but they also created a task force in order to access how the game could be better moving forward.

In a released statement on Pokémon GO’s website, the Task Force detailed the ways they were taking into account community feedback after the recent update. After speaking with leaders, the team at Niantic announced the following steps:

First, it reaffirmed that the 80m interaction distance was here to stay. While reducing the interaction distance was intended to make players go out to explore more, the development team will instead look to different ways on incentivizing players to do so.

Second, the team will be backtracking on its original efforts to enable country-by-country rewards and events as the highly volatile pandemic continues to be felt and monitored by different governments. Instead, seasonal events will be connected to Pokémon GO’s internal season and all bonuses starting with the Season of Mischief will be global.

Finally, the development team will work to better communicate with fans and community leaders. Starting in October, they will “begin publishing a developer diary every other month to share the latest priorities, events, and features for the game” as well as setting up conversations with community leaders.

To read the full announcement, see here.