Following the news yesterday that a batch of recent updates made to Pokemon Go have removed the game’s ‘Steps’ system (and consequently stopped popular third-party websites from working), Niantic has released a statement on their Facebook page in an effort to explain why such drastic changes were made. If you were expecting a concrete answer, you may be left disappointed.
We have removed the ‘3-step’ display in order to improve upon the underlying design. The original feature, although enjoyed by many, was also confusing and did not meet our underlying product goals. We will keep you posted as we strive to improve this feature.
One has to wonder what Niantic considered confusing about the system – which dictated how close surrounding Pokemon were by way of displaying one, two or three steps by their image – but at least we appear to have confirmation that the feature will be reintroduced at a later date.
As for third-party support, Niantic has confirmed that stopping sites like PokeVision from working was intentional, as the developer felt that they were hindering their “ability to maintain quality of service.”
We have limited access by third-party services which were interfering with our ability to maintain quality of service for our users and to bring Pokémon GO to users around the world.
For now at least, it looks like the studio’s main priority is rolling Pokemon Go out to territories that are still waiting patiently to play, namely Brazil.
The large number of users has made the roll-out of Pokémon GO around the world an… interesting… challenge. And we aren’t done yet! Yes, Brazil, we want to bring the game to you (and many other countries where it is not yet available).
So, what say you, trainers? Are you satisfied with Niantic’s reasoning behind the changes, or do you consider their answers extremely underwhelming?
