Pokemon Go developer Niantic is heralding an easier way for players of the mobile ARGs to connect with others with the official launch of Campfire, the studio’s social app that has rolled out globally to players this week for all of Niantic’s AR titles.
Campfire’s integration into POGO lets players tap a button to either host or find raid battles via a Team Up feature, find Flare activity nearby, chat with other users, and create a friends list. The app is being primarily lauded as a way for players to come together, coordinate, and form communities.
Unfortunately, Niantic’s behavior on other matters has caused additional discontent among players. For example, an increase in local interaction radius in POGO that was mostly welcomed by players has been reeled back because it was apparently a bug, while a an announcement from Niantic shared by a fan confirms that official channels will become read-only.
This is another hit to already reduced comms from the studio, and the community is also contending with the drawing down of player-run datamining and information hubs like Silph Road and PokeMiners, which have helped uncover Niantic’s malfeasance like privacy breaches attributed to Campfire despite the developer’s reported multiple attempts to obfuscate data.
Pretty sure this is the only topic folks are interested in today, chief:https://t.co/k27krZqqc8
Oh, that and this: pic.twitter.com/VAvEbib37E
— JRESeawolf (@JreSeawolf) June 28, 2023
