'Pokemon GO' Update: Niantic Answers Rural Area Spawning Issue As New, Somewhat Boring Update Releases [VIDEO]
As much as Pokemon GO is a phenomenal game, numerous players who reside in rural areas have continuously lamented that the highly-popular augmented reality game does not provide enough resources for those who are living outside urban areas.
While the reason behind this has been pretty much unknown, a recent interview with Niantic CEO John Hanke has shed light on the lack of Pokestops and spawning areas in rural locations.
As it turned out, the lack of resources and monsters in rural areas could be traced back to one very notable factor- Niantic's previous game, Ingress. Prior to becoming the host of the largest mobile game in the world, the developer launched an augmented reality title called Ingress, which also required players to visit real-world locations to progress into the game.
When Niantic was creating Pokemon GO, the developer decided to accept crowdsourced requests for Pokestops, and since a huge number of them are similar to locations which were also requested for Ingress, Niantic quickly managed to fill its initial goal of having 15 million Pokestops in the game.
During the interview with Recode, Niantic CEO John Hanke even remarked that he experiences the lack of Pokestops himself.
"And what about in rural areas? The game is really popular, I play it in San Francisco, where I live, but I was also just in Miami, there are great locations. But when I go to visit my parents, who live an hour and a half north of here, it's a kind of a wasteland. And I wonder, should there be a way for people to add PokeStops or do something other than buys a million incense or lures?" he said.
Of course, with Pokemon GO continually growing, it will only be a matter of time before Niantic manages to expand the game to such an extent where even the most isolated areas will have an ample number of Pokestops and spawning points.
In other Pokemon GO-related news, Niantic has also launched the newest update to the game, which gives players who have earned medals for capturing one type of monster a greater chance of catching other Pokemon of the same type.
Thus, with the new update, players who have captured numerous water Pokemon will have a greater chance of capturing extremely elusive creatures such as Blastoise and Wartortle.
