This year’s Global GO Fest was organized during the first weekend of June. After the conclusion of Pokémon GO Fest, 2022 fans had mixed opinions regarding this year’s event. A lot of criticism was flung around social media which was particularly focused on lackluster shiny rates. This isn’t the first time that Pokémon GO received criticism. Usually, Niantic doesn’t address this criticism but this time the director of Niantic responds with his views on the matter that happened in Pokémon GO Fest 2022.
Niantic responds to the criticism by fans on Pokémon GO Fest 2022
Niantic director Michael Steranka said to Dot Esports that “we understand that for some Trainers, the biggest way they judge the quality of a Pokémon GO event is on how many Shiny Pokémon they catch. We heard from Trainers who shared how lucky they were this year in terms of Shiny Pokémon caught, while others shared how their experience was the opposite. If Shiny Pokémon are too prevalent, it degrades the game in the long term. Pokémon Go Fest events are about coming together for a weekend of fun catching, raiding, battling, and exploring. Ideally, the totality of the content of a given event makes you feel like the event is a good value-the Special Research, the bundle of in-game items such as raid passes and Incense, the Global Challenges, the spawns, the storyline, and so on”.
Devaluing of shinies is a frequent criticism against the AR game from gamers. Shinies are quite prevalent in Pokémon GO. The game has standard rates of around 1 in 500. The main series has a shiny availability rate of 1 in 8192.
So, shiny Pokémon are much more common in GO than in any other Pokémon game. A lot of shinies are given in the game during every year’s GO Fest. It is kind of unusual to see the company going backward and saying that “too many shinies degrades the game.“
Final Thoughts
This year’s Pokémon GO Fest 2022 saw Niantic set a precedent in terms of shinies available during the event. This precedent led to the backlash from fans regarding paid event shiny rates. There were many discrepancies in this year’s GO Fest, one of them was the vanishing Pokémon error but the company has not made any statement regarding it. Hopefully, Niantic takes these criticisms as feedback from the fans and prepares the upcoming events accordingly without further dividing the Pokémon GO community.
What are your thoughts as Niantic responds to criticism by fans on the Pokémon GO Fest 2022? Let us know in the comments below!
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