The virtualization of Pokemon Go
A few days ago I visited a gym at the outermost part of a wharf. With perfect line of sight in all directions and with obviously not a single person nearby I could see the blue gym melt down to zero and then be taken over by a red GPS spoofer.
A few days later the gym was blue again and had reached level 8. Despite harsh weather I decided to prestige the gym from 32 000 to 40 000. With numb fingers and droves of fainted Pokemons I finally reached 40 000 only to find that a blue GPS spoofer had sneaked in and taken the position I had struggled to bring about. The experience was highly demotivating.
Now, if GPS spoofing becomes more prevalent an increasing number of players that play by the rules will be demotivated and reduce their time spent on Poke gyms and ultimately reduce their time spent on Pokemon Go, the percentage of GPS spoofers in the trainer community will increase. As the GPS spoofing plague reaches a tipping point it will be very difficult for Niantic to reverse the trend (if they even care). Pokemon Go will for a large amount of players be a virtual experience where people hop between various gyms to fight each other without leaving the comfort of their homes.
I am personally not in favor of the virtualization of Pokemon Go as the Augmented Reality setup has contributed to a healthy life-style change, with frequent long walks, on my side.
My questions to forum members:
Do you think Niantic care about the "virtualization" of Pokemon Go (after all people could still buy incubators and event packages while being fully virtual players)? Could a fully virtual Pokemon Go be a stimulating experience and should Niantic instead of battling the trend embrace the development and try to profit from it (if you can't beat them, join them)? What is your personal prediction on the development - how will the situation look like a year from now and what factors are likely to contribute to this development?Answers
In Ingress, Niantics other game, spoofing is a huge unresolved problem as well. Ive also heard devs mention an altimeter reading to prevent spoofing as spoofing programs cant give accurate altitude readings just GPS coordinates. My guess is that they cant stop the spoofers because of restrictions by android/google and crapple. Otherwise why would they not stop it? They know how cancerous spoofing is to their pride and joy cash cow game. Employees at Niantic have salary money in play which is a serious incentive. They want their game to be successful more so then any of us.
In ingress they combat spoofing by holding live events with top tier rewards. If you go to the Ingress website they have pics of the events and they are small. A PoGo event with Mew2 would most likely have hundreds of thousands of people showing up I dont see how a video game company is gonna organize a profitable "super bowl" event like this with 70 employees. I think thats why we have not seen legendaries yet. I think if they can add more features and minimize the gym collections the game can still be great.
I think this is definitely something they should embrace and consider incorporating into the official game and I have an idea of how to do it. The idea that having PoGo in its current form is a level playing field is ludicrous. Home location, work location, income level and physical capabilities already tilts the game in favor of certain people in certain situations. I for instance work basically on top of a Pokestop so I'm able to almost fill my bag up every day before heading home to hunt. This gives me an advantage. Other people have the luxury (or unfortunate luck) of walking to work every day and therefore can hatch eggs just walking to work. Some people can afford to drop $100 a week on incubators and PokeBall s while the rest of us have to actually hoof it to a Pokestop or do 1 egg at a time. A lot of people live outside cities or live in smaller towns with limited to no gyms and limited to no spawns. Some people are confined to wheelchairs or hospital beds and have no ability to play at all. I would propose Niantic add a joystick function that would have a set time limit for each day that you could take a virtual walk to hunt, hit Pokestop s, compete at gyms, etc. Additional time would be available for purchase in the store along with everything else. Particularly for children in the hospital this would allow them a chance to play, and Niantic would even be able to give out additional time for certain people or as part of special events, etc. I can already hear the people who will say, "well just get a Gameboy and play the regular Pokemon games." It's not the same. I know I would play almost nonstop if I could at least play some from home. It's still interesting having the location grounded in reality even without physically being there. Smartphones are ubiquitous and personally my preference for gaming. As has been said, there is little Niantic can do to combat this, they may as well make this available to all.
I dont have the problem with taking my time and go outside. My probleme is that the whole city im living is a capitol big city, but there are no good spawns. Maybe one or two every 700 pidgeys or ratatas. But nothing else. the only way you can get better pokemon is buying incubators and harching the eggs, but thats Really expensiv. If i would have saved the money i spent for incubators i couldve travelled to usa and just by catching i would have gotten all. Btw giving youre account to a friend to catch a taurus is literally gps spoofing too. What stupidity
I've ran into a few spoofers/cheaters and it really makes me question why I still bother playing. I reported one guy and sure enough I see his pokemon back in gyms a couple weeks later. So why do I bother reporting it?
If it becomes a regular occurrence where I am I will quit playing. Just not worth it for all the effort I put in.
