• Hey, guest user. Hope you're enjoying NeoGAF! Have you considered registering for an account? Come join us and add your take to the daily discourse.

CEO of Niantic booed onstage at Pokemon Go Fest. App unplayable, many still in line

Stilton Disco

Stilton Disco

Member
So this is why there's an Arcticuno at the gym at the end of my road, mocking me with the fact there's never enough players at once anymore to ever beat any of the high level raid bosses. That's nice.

Was there meant to be an alert when you first log in of an event going on? Because this is the first I'm hearing about any of this.
 
H

HowZatOZ

Banned
So in other words the game is actually still raking in dollars and has so many damn people interested? I was actually surprised seeing how many people still playing Go these last few weeks in Brisbane, Australia. Sort of disappeared but has come back on a blaze of fire.
 
H

H.Protagonist

[-_-]/
Principate said:
Holy shit, I was like "are they talking about uk Chester? They are!" Fucking hell growing up there that is surreal.
Click to expand...

Haha. I thought the same thing (that's my area-ish). It's a dead zone in Knutsford, though. Might have a gander today and see if anything's going on in town, but it's been all crap pokemon for months now, so I have no real expectations. Game is such a letdown the way it's been handled.
 
B

butzopower

proud of his butz
Stilton Disco said:
So this is why there's an Arcticuno at the gym at the end of my road, mocking me with the fact there's never enough players at once anymore to ever beat any of the high level raid bosses. That's nice.

Was there meant to be an alert when you first log in of an event going on? Because this is the first I'm hearing about any of this.
Click to expand...

I got like 3 push notifications about it from the app over the last week.
 
W

wrowa

Member
Stilton Disco said:
So this is why there's an Arcticuno at the gym at the end of my road, mocking me with the fact there's never enough players at once anymore to ever beat any of the high level raid bosses. That's nice.

Was there meant to be an alert when you first log in of an event going on? Because this is the first I'm hearing about any of this.
Click to expand...

There probably still are enough players (if you don't live in some rural area, that is), but these days the playerbase is more organized from what I understand. Like, in my area there's a local Pokemon Go Discord server with hundreds of people that specifically plan to which raids they'll be going in order not to waste anyone's time.
 
Stilton Disco

Stilton Disco

Member
butzopower said:
I got like 3 push notifications about it from the app over the last week.
Click to expand...

Huh. Weird. Must have turned notifications off for it recently then. My bad.

Still couldn't make a dent in Arcticuno single handedly though. It's incredibly frustrating seeing dozens and dozens of raids going on around me constantly, but I've literally only ever had one other person join me in the first few weeks after they were introduced, and that was on the first day.

I keep trying because you get a free raid pass each day, and live in one of the biggest, busiest towns in my county, so I live in hope, but it really seems like nothing more than a massive tease to keep you playing rather than a genuine attempt to add content and value to the experience.

wrowa said:
There probably still are enough players (if you don't live in some rural area, that is), but these days the playerbase is more organized from what I understand. Like, in my area there's a local Pokemon Go Discord server with hundreds of people that specifically plan to which raids they'll be going in order not to waste anyone's time.
Click to expand...

There's a Facebook group here, but they're far less active than they used to be, and tend to all operate in an area and at times that are simply a pain in the arse to work around my family.

For a game that otherwise works perfectly with a laid back approach, and as someone who walks miles and miles every single day, Raids and the zero prep time, highly organised approach needed to do anything about them, is a complete anathema to that.
 
S

SatoAilDarko

Member
AoM said:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CFm8SJ0VOaA
Click to expand...

This is really good. You can definitely make one twice as long though.

They shouldn't have cut the beginning short CEO speech. It didn't really save any time.

Also missing the part where the Team Instinct Representative (yellow shirt) Mike keeps cutting out and then the camera holds too long and she looks down.

Also that main presenter really seemed to almost completely be overwhelmed emotionally at the end. When she said to close up to see her cry I think she really was about to and jokingly like she played it off. Feel bad for her.
 
D

demosthenes

Member
They launched bonuses today? Double candy on catch, double candy on turn in and a friend had all her 10ks change to 3.33km.

My eggs are at 10k still.
 
P

Principate

Saint Titanfall
H.Protagonist said:
Haha. I thought the same thing (that's my area-ish). It's a dead zone in Knutsford, though. Might have a gander today and see if anything's going on in town, but it's been all crap pokemon for months now, so I have no real expectations. Game is such a letdown the way it's been handled.
Click to expand...

Yeah I used to have a wonder about the when the game launched as I was visiting friends and family at the time. Was a good excuse to go for a walk and you'd occassionally see people around as it was at the peak of it's popularity at the time. The pickings were pretty slim. The issue is once you fall off from the curve in terms of dedication there's absolutely nothing interesting to do outside catch more pokemon. Might as well not even bother with gyms and the like. Trading pokemon is the core of the experience it's what gets you to interact with other people as far as the cards were concerned they should have had that at launch or close to it.

Funnily enough all it managed to do was get me to play fire red on the advance (and I doubt I was alon in that sorta thing). It weird though so because you have friends and friends of friends in the area and city is not that big so I'm just wondering "do I know these people, do I know friends that know these people?"
 
G

GreatestHits

Member
It's a pretty tough spot for Niantic to be in. I don't think anyone is truly qualified to pull off what they're trying to do. So all you can do is give it your absolute best shot and learn from your mistakes. I don't know their higher management at all but I'd wager to say this is basically a huge lesson for everyone involved. They just leveled up and got a ton of experience points from this debacle. Also, with it being pokemon, they will probably get a lot more chances to get this thing right. So I feel for everyone who was majorly disappointed but I think this all could have a happy ending eventually.

Also, if anyone makes fun of you for something you're passionate about... who cares. Assholes will always be assholes, just shake your head and wish em well and keep having fun. Their opinions are usually laced with self loathing and insecurity and don't require any engagement from you. "Get a life, fek, er go hev' eh pint' " speaks for itself IMO ; )
 
S

SuomiDude

Member
Azuran said:
Remember when people use to say Pokemon Go was the future of the franchise?

lol
Click to expand...
It's a great game to go with the mainline games though.

This event has been a success for Niantic it seems btw, there's been tons of people catching Articunos and Lugias, especially the 2nd Lugia we had today got like 50 people gathering to one place, we had to make several groups against Lugia so everyone would fit in, it was crazy. Gladly we use Facebook to organize our group so we know pretty much every nook of the town if there's a raid going on. Got 3 Articunos out of 4 raids, but sadly 0 out of 2 Lugias. Well, maybe tomorrow's a better day for Lugia.
 
J

JoeM86

Member
SuomiDude said:
It's a great game to go with the mainline games though.

This event has been a success for Niantic it seems btw, there's been tons of people catching Articunos and Lugias, especially the 2nd Lugia we had today got like 50 people gathering to one place, we had to make several groups against Lugia so everyone would fit in, it was crazy. Gladly we use Facebook to organize our group so we know pretty much every nook of the town if there's a raid going on. Got 3 Articunos out of 4 raids, but sadly 0 out of 2 Lugias. Well, maybe tomorrow's a better day for Lugia.
Click to expand...

The Legends aren't part of GO Fest though. GO Fest itself was still an unmitigated disaster
 
A

Apathy

Member
Spork4000 said:
Not Niantic's fault, get enough cell phones in one place and they stop working.
Click to expand...

So a company that makes apps for cell phones didn't plan ahead when they asked people that use their products to congregate in one area. Somehow not their fault that that thought this was a good idea and didn't see the obvious issues?
 
A

AlexFlame116

Member
Funny this is that this thread and the other one about the livestream made me decide to download Pokémon GO again to see how it is now compared to the last time I played it.

I remember why I stopped. I don't know which team to go with.
 
S

SuomiDude

Member
JoeM86 said:
The Legends aren't part of GO Fest though. GO Fest itself was still an unmitigated disaster
Click to expand...
The legends were part of the Fest actually. It was everyone's (in the world) responsibility to catch as many Pokemon as possible during specific time to open a legendary raid battle for the Go Fest people, who in turn if beating the raid would open legendaries to the rest of the world. That idea failed though due to nothing working in the Go Fest, but in the end we still got 2 legendaries out of it, so all's good.

Btw, although the Go Fest was a disaster to Niantic, this legendary, double exp, stardust etc. event is a huge success to them. Even I finally spent real money to get the special box with 6 raid passes to (better) take part in the legendary raid, and pretty much everyone I know playing the game did the same. So although Niantic lost tons of money due to the failed Fest event, they also gained tons with the after-event. In the end, I'd say they're actually winners here.
 
J

JoeM86

Member
SuomiDude said:
The legends were part of the Fest actually. It was everyone's (in the world) responsibility to catch as many Pokemon as possible during specific time to open a legendary raid battle for the Go Fest people, who in turn if beating the raid would open legendaries to the rest of the world. That idea failed though due to nothing working in the Go Fest, but in the end we still got 2 legendaries out of it, so all's good.

Btw, although the Go Fest was a disaster to Niantic, this legendary, double exp, stardust etc. event is a huge success to them. Even I finally spent real money to get the special box with 6 raid passes to (better) take part in the legendary raid, and pretty much everyone I know playing the game did the same. So although Niantic lost tons of money due to the failed Fest event, they also gained tons with the after-event. In the end, I'd say they're actually winners here.
Click to expand...

I wouldn't be so sure. Public perception is everything
 
J

jkanownik

Member
oti said:
There was absolutely no way they could have kept all those players for a whole year. That's just completely unrealistic.
Click to expand...

It is higher than any other games' peak and that is US only. Supercell averaged 25M DAU across 4 games at last report. You can absolutely get to 10% long term retention in mobile at that scale. It is not hard to come up multiple scenarios ( retention or monetization base) that get to $1B more than they made.
 
H

H.Protagonist

[-_-]/
Principate said:
Yeah I used to have a wonder about the when the game launched as I was visiting friends and family at the time. Was a good excuse to go for a walk and you'd occassionally see people around as it was at the peak of it's popularity at the time. The pickings were pretty slim. The issue is once you fall off from the curve in terms of dedication there's absolutely nothing interesting to do outside catch more pokemon. Might as well not even bother with gyms and the like. Trading pokemon is the core of the experience it's what gets you to interact with other people as far as the cards were concerned they should have had that at launch or close to it.

Funnily enough all it managed to do was get me to play fire red on the advance (and I doubt I was alon in that sorta thing). It weird though so because you have friends and friends of friends in the area and city is not that big so I'm just wondering "do I know these people, do I know friends that know these people?"
Click to expand...

Yup. Used to really make me want to walk around more when I was taking the baby out, added a bit of fun to the outing, but now it just feels so pointless. There's never anything interesting to catch and no one in town is really bothering either. I'd love a more social aspect of it - boards to leave messages for other players, chat, anything. It definitely had a more community feel to it back at the start.
 
Z

ZeoVGM

Banned
Mr-Joker said:
At one event someone threw a bottle at the host, not a great look for the Pokémon fan base.

shitheads02ksu.gif




Ah yes, the old traditional attack and mock something that they don't understand tacit.

Pfft sad losers.



They're getting a refund plus $100 in Poké coins.



Considering that Niantic aren't able to get the game running at the basic level when it launched and still aren't, how can they be expected to handle trading and battling worldwide.
Click to expand...

Yeah nope, that GIF is not acceptable. I don't care how much of a mess this event was. You don't assault women on stage.
 
Reptars Revenge

Reptars Revenge

Member
ZeoVGM said:
Yeah nope, that GIF is not acceptable. I don't care how much of a mess this event was. You don't assault women on stage.
Click to expand...

lol weird you just say women. Nobody should get shit thrown at them unless it's a comedy show and it's custom. Also to the other guy cmon "not a great look for the Pokémon fan base" pshhh there's a few horrible people in every group
 
P

PhoenixDawn

Member
Finally got home from Chicago, so I guess I can drop a few words about my experiences. It was pretty much a complete shitshow at the start in the actual park in terms of playing the game. The actual set up of the park was amazing, and if the servers had actually worked it would have been basically the perfect event in my mind. The pokestop walking route and free raids/timed events would have been great to keep people engaged while walking around. However, obviously the servers shit the bed and it was an absolute trainwreck inside. People were getting extremely restless, and there definitely was about to be a riot or something inside until they promised the refund/pokecoin rewards.

However the refund/coins was small time in comparison to the true savior of the event in my eyes, which would be expanding the borders of the stops/spawns to 2 miles around the park. That did an amazing job of getting people spread out while still engaged with the game and recreating the magic of the early release period. The attendees were, with very,very few exceptions, super friendly and excited to play the game and talk about the game/share rumors of nearby unowns. Hearing rumors of an unown or seeing it on the nearby or even just seeing people start hurriedly traveling somewhere was exciting and the momentum of the crowd traveling there was awesome. I wish the whole event would have just been that from the start, and I can only hope if they somehow make it another year with this game and hold another go fest that they would learn from that and only use the park as a central hub for maybe ceremonies/photo ops/activities while having the actual game playable within the larger area of the city.

Also, my group was in the car and about to leave the city when we saw the lugia pop at the fountain. My god I have never ran faster in my life, all passengers just jumped out of that car and joined the swarm. That was magical and definitely should be what future events are focused on (if they even happen again after this debacle)
 
Z

ZeoVGM

Banned
I love people randomly feeling the need to defend men simply because I said "woman."

Clearly, men shouldn't have shit thrown at them either. Relax.
 
T

t26

Member
H.Protagonist said:
Yup. Used to really make me want to walk around more when I was taking the baby out, added a bit of fun to the outing, but now it just feels so pointless. There's never anything interesting to catch and no one in town is really bothering either. I'd love a more social aspect of it - boards to leave messages for other players, chat, anything. It definitely had a more community feel to it back at the start.
Click to expand...

The social aspect is basically on Discord now. People post when they spotted a rare Pokemon and upcoming raids, meeting up for raids, chat about random stuff, and post picture of interesting things.
 
P

PeakPointMatrix

Member
Azuran said:
Remember when people use to say Pokemon Go was the future of the franchise?

lol
Click to expand...
For a lot of casuals that will never buy a dedicated handheld again (eg the majority of people), Pokemon GO is the only way they'll ever have anything to do with the franchise again in the future.
 
S

SyntheticDiz

Neo Member
Well there is a precedent for Niantic screwing the pooch with Pokemon Go. The game was nigh unplayable for many of us until a few weeks after release, so this event being unplayable for large swaths of people is par for the course. It's unfortunate as well. You'd think that the Pokemon IP would be handled with the care it deserves, especially because it's an extremely popular IP.
 
J

JoeM86

Member
SuomiDude said:
And it seems to be great atm. Probably not for the Fest partakers but for the general audiense it's been great.
Click to expand...

Yeah, they've done a good job at distracting people with the legendary Pokémon, but it won't last and they need to be held accountable.
 
B

Broken Hope

Member
Spork4000 said:
Not Niantic's fault, get enough cell phones in one place and they stop working.
Click to expand...

So why didn’t they liase with the phone companies to have mobile masts on site?

Here in the UK when we have big concerts like Glastonbury the mobile companies install mobile cell towers with a ton of spectrum enabled so people can still use their phones.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

  • Locked
Pokémon Go Fest attendees are filing suit against Niantic
2
99
13K
Reptars Revenge replied
Pokemon GO Fest's livestream is absolutely must-see
8 9 10 11 12
585
97K
Acerac replied
Pokemon Go events announced
9
3K
SirBukkake replied
Pokemon GO not out in Japan yet, targeting end of July (due server capacity)
32
6K
SinCityAssassin replied
Niantic on Pokemon GO – Masuda and Miyamoto’s involvement, regular updates planned...
2 3
148
31K
Kozak replied
Top Bottom