Niantic needs to act: The Direction of the game is worrying /u/EquivalentReality988 Pokémon GO – Discover Pokémon in the Real World!

Let’s take a look at the brief history of the game and see how it has evolved over time, to understand how we got to where we are now. If you are not interested in the history part, just skip to the section you find interesting. (“Early years”, “Pandemic”, “Return to normal”, “Everything sucks?”, “Are the players just crybabies?”, “Conclusion”, and “What should be done?”)

THE EARLY YEARS, 2016 – 2019:

2016 was legendary. Insane hype, everyone playing, you all know this. Sadly, there was very little to do, and the player counts started to drop pretty quickly.

2017 gave us Raids. The players started to form proper communities and group chats with other players, now that playing together had a purpose. It wasn’t just playing with your family and friends, but other players too.

2018 gave us trading, which further encouraged playing with others.

2019 gave us Team Rocket, which gave us some solo content, followed by Go Battle League soon after.

THE PANDEMIC

Then came 2020 and the infamous COVID era. Niantic had no choice but to put their philosophy of exploring and playing together to the bench and come up with solutions that kept the players interested in the game, to avoid the whole game collapsing.

Here’s a list of the changes applied in 2020:

• Introduction of Remote Raids: 100 coins per Pass, 250 coins for a pack of 3. No limit.

• Incenses work while not moving, and spawn Pokemon every 40 seconds

• Increased amount of Wild Spawns

• The Pokestop Spin Radius was doubled from 40 to 80m

• Community Days lasted for 6 Hours instead of 3

• One weekly Remote Pass for 1 Coin

These bonuses were in the game for over 2 years. They were temporary, but due to the length of the pandemic, they fundamentally changed the playing experience and the progress of the players.

Niantic did not plan these updates, but were forced to do them. However, they didn’t just keep the game alive: 2020 and 2021 were Niantic’s most profitable years by a large margin. This was also a time when they didn’t shove Tickets or real life money boxes to our faces constantly: the profit was achieved purely by player satisfaction and willingness to invest money in the game.

The experience of playing Pokemon GO was very player friendly: you could GO out when you had a chance, and there were plenty of spawns. Controlling Gyms was way more rewarding, because you could get a satisfying amount of items and upgrades with those Gym Coins. And if you didn’t feel like going out (or couldn’t), you could still attend Raids from home, or use an incense to have something to do. There were barely any events that were really powerful but lasted for a couple of hours, instead the time windows were really flexible.

THE REVIVAL ATTEMPT OF EARLY YEARS

In early 2022, the pandemic was over pretty much everywhere. Niantic wanted to implement their original ideas of social gameplay and exploration more heavily to the game again:

• Remote Raiding was limited and prices doubled

• Incenses no longer worked while stationary

• The Length of CD’s was cut to half

• No more weekly Remote Pass for 1 coin

This is where they dropped the ball.

The Playerbase had enjoyed the COVID era for so long that these were no longer temporary bonuses, but the normal state of the game.

The biggest problem was the way Niantic wanted to return to “the good old days”: They didn’t incentivize playing in the old way whenever possible, but pretty much enforced it. This resulted in the players feeling like the game got worse overnight, and seriously harmed the small communities and solo players whose enjoyment was relying on the ability to play the game when it suited them and access Raids remotely.

From the game balance point of view, the power creep of COVID had stayed for too long to be considered a temporary thing that could be just ended (without a serious backlash). Niantic’s attempt to close the Pandora’s power creep box by heavily nerfing the players’ access to Raids or to wild Pokemon was too steep.

This is not just an opinion: Niantic’s revenue from PoGo in 2022 was worse than during the pandemic, and seriously dropped during 2023. Niantic also laid off over 200 employees in 2023, almost 25% of their entire staff. Niantic took a serious hit by enforcing the “old Pokemon GO.”

SO EVERYTHING SUCKS SINCE 2022?

Not everything has been terrible since the removal of COVID bonuses.

Niantic has released pieces of content that can be participated in a larger time window and when the player wants to, and how they want to. These include the excellent Mega Evolution update, Showcases and Routes. Regular events that lasted for a week were still a thing, and combined with the Mega Evolution update, allowed the players to hunt for event spawns in a meaningful way when they had the time to do so.

Niantic also released Campfire, which has slowly grown to be an essential tool for community content in areas that have players. Group content has almost always been a part of the game, and it’s good to have a handy tool for it.

SO THE PLAYERS WERE JUST BEING CRYBABIES AND EVERYTHING IS FINE, THEN?

Not quite, to put it mildly.

The Fact remains that the way Niantic handled the removal of COVID bonuses seriously hurt the day to day playing experience for many players, and directly impacted Niantic’s revenue.

Niantic is a company, and companies exist to make money.

Since the removal of COVID bonuses, there has been a steady increase in paid Ticket events and events that last only for a couple of hours, but offer really good rewards. In other words, Niantic wants to capitalize on the player’s “Fear of Missing Out”. The recently added Gigantamax Battles are a prime example of this: heavily monetized, short time window, requires a community.

You don’t need to be an economical genius to see what’s going on here: if the players aren’t paying anymore, they need to be milked for money. This is a phenomenon that the playerbase has noticed clearly.

And at the same time, the free to play experience has become worse.

It cannot be repeated enough: Rediscover Kanto -update absolutely ruins the day to day experience, compared to the old week long events where you could hunt the event spawns.

CONCLUSION

The numbers speak for themselves: the Players enjoyed the game more during COVID, but Niantic wants the game to be played in groups in real life. And because the players won’t do that naturally, Niantic needs to enforce it by designing in-person only -content. The Playerbase doesn’t enjoy this either, which results in dropping revenue that Niantic needs to address.

We are in a state of the game where Niantic is trying to find ways to milk money from us, while disregarding the enjoyment of the playerbase.

The ever-increasing amount of paid content in narrow time windows makes the game feel more like a job than a hobby by the day, especially when the off-event experience is relatively terrible.

WHAT SHOULD BE DONE?

First, END REDISCOVER KANTO.

This doesn’t cost Niantic any money, but seriously improves the everyday playing experience, assuming they’d return the events to the format they used to be prior to April 22nd. Going out and catching Pokemon is the basic gameplay loop, and that should ALWAYS be a good experience.

Second (and this is where it gets speculative and opinionated), Niantic should prioritize the day to day playing experience of a regular Joe, in the spirit of player freedom. They should look at what made the COVID era so profitable, and act accordingly.

We poured them money when we could play how we wanted, when we wanted and where we wanted. It really shouldn’t be this complicated: people pay money for things they enjoy. If the game experience is bad to the majority, Niantic needs to compensate by increasing monetization to milk more money from the remaining players, which is a dangerous thing to do to any game with dissatisfied playerbase.

Niantic will NEVER get rid of the social in-person content. Not because they care about us socializing, but because they need our movement and location data to sell. They also need the meet up pictures for advertising the game on X/Twitter, to create an image of the game (and Pokemon brand as a whole) as a wholesome social experience. Furthermore, the forced in-person content allows them to make sponsorship deals with gargantuan companies like McDonald’s and Walmart, which most likely make them swim in dough.

However, they should try to find a balance between incentivizing the in-person content to players whenever possible, without making the players feel bad when they can’t attend.

In an ideal situation the playing experience is always fun and content is accessible for everyone, but the rewards from the in-person content are so good that the players will choose to attend whenever possible.

Let’s take a look at the brief history of the game and see how it has evolved over time, to understand how we got to where we are now. If you are not interested in the history part, just skip to the section you find interesting. (“Early years”, “Pandemic”, “Return to normal”, “Everything sucks?”, “Are the players just crybabies?”, “Conclusion”, and “What should be done?”)

THE EARLY YEARS, 2016 – 2019:

2016 was legendary. Insane hype, everyone playing, you all know this. Sadly, there was very little to do, and the player counts started to drop pretty quickly.

2017 gave us Raids. The players started to form proper communities and group chats with other players, now that playing together had a purpose. It wasn’t just playing with your family and friends, but other players too.

2018 gave us trading, which further encouraged playing with others.

2019 gave us Team Rocket, which gave us some solo content, followed by Go Battle League soon after.

THE PANDEMIC

Then came 2020 and the infamous COVID era. Niantic had no choice but to put their philosophy of exploring and playing together to the bench and come up with solutions that kept the players interested in the game, to avoid the whole game collapsing.

Here’s a list of the changes applied in 2020:

• Introduction of Remote Raids: 100 coins per Pass, 250 coins for a pack of 3. No limit.

• Incenses work while not moving, and spawn Pokemon every 40 seconds

• Increased amount of Wild Spawns

• The Pokestop Spin Radius was doubled from 40 to 80m

• Community Days lasted for 6 Hours instead of 3

• One weekly Remote Pass for 1 Coin

These bonuses were in the game for over 2 years. They were temporary, but due to the length of the pandemic, they fundamentally changed the playing experience and the progress of the players.

Niantic did not plan these updates, but were forced to do them. However, they didn’t just keep the game alive: 2020 and 2021 were Niantic’s most profitable years by a large margin. This was also a time when they didn’t shove Tickets or real life money boxes to our faces constantly: the profit was achieved purely by player satisfaction and willingness to invest money in the game.

The experience of playing Pokemon GO was very player friendly: you could GO out when you had a chance, and there were plenty of spawns. Controlling Gyms was way more rewarding, because you could get a satisfying amount of items and upgrades with those Gym Coins. And if you didn’t feel like going out (or couldn’t), you could still attend Raids from home, or use an incense to have something to do. There were barely any events that were really powerful but lasted for a couple of hours, instead the time windows were really flexible.

THE REVIVAL ATTEMPT OF EARLY YEARS

In early 2022, the pandemic was over pretty much everywhere. Niantic wanted to implement their original ideas of social gameplay and exploration more heavily to the game again:

• Remote Raiding was limited and prices doubled

• Incenses no longer worked while stationary

• The Length of CD’s was cut to half

• No more weekly Remote Pass for 1 coin

This is where they dropped the ball.

The Playerbase had enjoyed the COVID era for so long that these were no longer temporary bonuses, but the normal state of the game.

The biggest problem was the way Niantic wanted to return to “the good old days”: They didn’t incentivize playing in the old way whenever possible, but pretty much enforced it. This resulted in the players feeling like the game got worse overnight, and seriously harmed the small communities and solo players whose enjoyment was relying on the ability to play the game when it suited them and access Raids remotely.

From the game balance point of view, the power creep of COVID had stayed for too long to be considered a temporary thing that could be just ended (without a serious backlash). Niantic’s attempt to close the Pandora’s power creep box by heavily nerfing the players’ access to Raids or to wild Pokemon was too steep.

This is not just an opinion: Niantic’s revenue from PoGo in 2022 was worse than during the pandemic, and seriously dropped during 2023. Niantic also laid off over 200 employees in 2023, almost 25% of their entire staff. Niantic took a serious hit by enforcing the “old Pokemon GO.”

SO EVERYTHING SUCKS SINCE 2022?

Not everything has been terrible since the removal of COVID bonuses.

Niantic has released pieces of content that can be participated in a larger time window and when the player wants to, and how they want to. These include the excellent Mega Evolution update, Showcases and Routes. Regular events that lasted for a week were still a thing, and combined with the Mega Evolution update, allowed the players to hunt for event spawns in a meaningful way when they had the time to do so.

Niantic also released Campfire, which has slowly grown to be an essential tool for community content in areas that have players. Group content has almost always been a part of the game, and it’s good to have a handy tool for it.

SO THE PLAYERS WERE JUST BEING CRYBABIES AND EVERYTHING IS FINE, THEN?

Not quite, to put it mildly.

The Fact remains that the way Niantic handled the removal of COVID bonuses seriously hurt the day to day playing experience for many players, and directly impacted Niantic’s revenue.

Niantic is a company, and companies exist to make money.

Since the removal of COVID bonuses, there has been a steady increase in paid Ticket events and events that last only for a couple of hours, but offer really good rewards. In other words, Niantic wants to capitalize on the player’s “Fear of Missing Out”. The recently added Gigantamax Battles are a prime example of this: heavily monetized, short time window, requires a community.

You don’t need to be an economical genius to see what’s going on here: if the players aren’t paying anymore, they need to be milked for money. This is a phenomenon that the playerbase has noticed clearly.

And at the same time, the free to play experience has become worse.

It cannot be repeated enough: Rediscover Kanto -update absolutely ruins the day to day experience, compared to the old week long events where you could hunt the event spawns.

CONCLUSION

The numbers speak for themselves: the Players enjoyed the game more during COVID, but Niantic wants the game to be played in groups in real life. And because the players won’t do that naturally, Niantic needs to enforce it by designing in-person only -content. The Playerbase doesn’t enjoy this either, which results in dropping revenue that Niantic needs to address.

We are in a state of the game where Niantic is trying to find ways to milk money from us, while disregarding the enjoyment of the playerbase.

The ever-increasing amount of paid content in narrow time windows makes the game feel more like a job than a hobby by the day, especially when the off-event experience is relatively terrible.

WHAT SHOULD BE DONE?

First, END REDISCOVER KANTO.

This doesn’t cost Niantic any money, but seriously improves the everyday playing experience, assuming they’d return the events to the format they used to be prior to April 22nd. Going out and catching Pokemon is the basic gameplay loop, and that should ALWAYS be a good experience.

Second (and this is where it gets speculative and opinionated), Niantic should prioritize the day to day playing experience of a regular Joe, in the spirit of player freedom. They should look at what made the COVID era so profitable, and act accordingly.

We poured them money when we could play how we wanted, when we wanted and where we wanted. It really shouldn’t be this complicated: people pay money for things they enjoy. If the game experience is bad to the majority, Niantic needs to compensate by increasing monetization to milk more money from the remaining players, which is a dangerous thing to do to any game with dissatisfied playerbase.

Niantic will NEVER get rid of the social in-person content. Not because they care about us socializing, but because they need our movement and location data to sell. They also need the meet up pictures for advertising the game on X/Twitter, to create an image of the game (and Pokemon brand as a whole) as a wholesome social experience. Furthermore, the forced in-person content allows them to make sponsorship deals with gargantuan companies like McDonald’s and Walmart, which most likely make them swim in dough.

However, they should try to find a balance between incentivizing the in-person content to players whenever possible, without making the players feel bad when they can’t attend.

In an ideal situation the playing experience is always fun and content is accessible for everyone, but the rewards from the in-person content are so good that the players will choose to attend whenever possible.