On Friday, we met with representatives from Niantic’s Pokémon Go team and were super excited to share two upcoming updates to the hit mobile game. They provided us with details about the added experiences that will make a big difference in how you play Pokémon Go.
The first feature is called “PokéStop Showcase”. It’s a limited-time competition held at PokéStops that players initiate to compete against other players who own the same Pokémon. As an example they provided, including the size of the Pokemon last year allowed us to have a contest for the biggest Pikachu. At the end of the competition, the winner receives a medal for their achievement. The beauty of this contest is that once you enter, you can collect bigger Pokémon and re-enter from anywhere, as long as it’s open. Great for people who want to enter contests while traveling or things like micro-him leaderboards. Representatives said they are considering additional cosmetics and other rewards for contest winners in the future.
Delegates were especially excited about the second feature, Routes. A route is a player-created geolocated path that can be followed by the player or other players. Players choose a starting PokéStop location, choose a starting path, enter a path description, specify a category such as wheelchair accessible/art/casual, and walk the trail they want to create. Routes can be up to 12 miles long. Special Pokémon and items will be exclusive to player-created paths. Examples of using paths include creating trails of lesser-walked paths, bundling landmarks, and creating paths that climb bars. They were especially excited about the potential for more engagement from local players who could create more personalized community content. Niantic has potential features like landmark pinning and moderation of human and his AI-developed content, such as blocking off-limits areas and troll-only routes, as well as inappropriate phrases. , we will continue to improve our services.
The latest Pokémon Go update is set to enter early access in the coming weeks. We’re really excited to try it out, and I’m sure fans of the series will too.