Niantic responds to Pokemon Go boycott after #HearUsNiantic trends

Niantic has issued a response to the Pokemon Go community’s concerns over gameplay changes after thousands of fans got #HearUsNiantic trending on Twitter.

After weeks of voicing their concerns over changes to Exploration Bonuses, the rift between the Pokemon Go community and developers Niantic reached boiling point on August 5, when players took part in a boycott known as ‘Pokemon NO Day‘.

The issue many players have is that features introduced in response to the global health crisis in 2020 are now being reverted. As well as increasing safety, the community has argued that the features improved quality of life and made the game more accessible for disabled players.

Niantic explained their decision by stating that they wanted players to get back to “exploration in the real world” like when the game first launched, but the changes have been met by almost universal negativity, from casual players to well-known influencers.

Now, after weeks of silence, Niantic have issued an official response to the boycotts. In a blog post titled ‘A response to our Pokemon Go community’, the company said they were “humbled” by the feedback from players and promised to take it into consideration.

“We have heard your feedback about one change in particular – that of the PokéStop and Gym interaction distance,” they wrote. “To address the concerns you have raised, we are taking the following actions.

“We are assembling an internal cross-functional team to develop proposals designed to preserve our mission of inspiring people to explore the world together, while also addressing specific concerns that have been raised regarding interaction distance.”

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Niantic promised to “share the findings” of this task force by the next seasonal update, which takes place on September 1, 2021. They also confirmed that they will be reaching out to community leaders to “join us in this dialogue” over the coming days.

While Niantic haven’t confirmed whether they will go back on their decision to end the Exploration Bonuses, many in the Pokemon Go community are cautiously optimistic to finally have a response from the company.

“I know this is not exactly the end result we wanted but we requested a response by EOD Monday and got it the same day,” wrote the popular Trainer Club on Twitter. “Baby steps in the marathon of making Pokemon Go great is our mission.”

Elsewhere, Joe Merrick, the founder of Serebii, wrote: “Let’s hope that this actually provides results and isn’t just a means to placate us for a month.”

Trainers will simply have to wait to find out whether or not Niantic will implement the changes they’ve been asking for. Until then, keep up to date with the latest news on our Pokemon Go home page.