リモートレイドの仕様変更によるボイコット運動まとめ

Dear Niantic,
We are writing to you on behalf of your customers (the Pokémon GO Community). We want to start off by letting you know that we love Pokémon GO. Not just GO, but the Pokémon franchise in general. We are and always will be passionate, loyal and vocal about our thoughts and concerns. We want Pokémon GO to succeed, and we want to be able to play this game (the game we love) for years to come.
Unfortunately, we, as a whole, feel unheard. Time and time again, our questions go unanswered; Our concerns are not addressed; And most importantly our needs are not taken into proper consideration.
As of now, we are specifically referring to the April 6 remote raid pass update. We do not agree with your decision, and the majority of us want you to know that "Limiting Remote Raids to 5 passes per day" will harm:

• Rural trainers who lack adequate local community support
• Trainers with disabilities who physically cannot get outside to play
• Trainers who have severe social anxiety who struggle mentally to get outside to participate in in-person raids
• Trainers who work night shifts and cannot participate during the day
• Single parent trainers who are managing children, a household and a career with minimal time to spare

And most importantly of all, the Remote Raid changes will limit our global interaction with our trainers who we have developed tight bonds with over the last 3 years.
Every form of trainer has EQUAL and EVERY right to play and enjoy Pokémon GO.
At the end of the day, the world has evolved since the pandemic. The landscape of working, playing and interacting has evolved and changed. Trainers now work at home. Through the new work/ life dynamic, rich remote communities were built. These communities are just as viable and strong as in-person communities. These communities are unique, special and one of a kind. And we know from the bottom of our hearts that there is equal room to have both types of communities flourish simultaneously.

If Niantic's goal is to get trainers outside, reward players significantly for doing in-person raids.
Reward:

• GUARANTEED XL Rare Candy
• Increased lucky friend odds during first time in-person raid interaction
• Offer premium items such as Incubators, Star Pieces, etc from in-person raids

Incentivize the in person raids but do not take away and squander what we've built globally over the last 3+ years.
Without remote raids, the opportunity to attend live events to meet with our global Pokémon
GO friends will not be as enticing, exciting or robust.
We, as a global community, did not want the remote raid issue to come to this point, but as already mentioned, we are not heard. We are sad, distraught and discouraged because our interactions with our global friends will no longer be free to accommodate for every type of global Pokémon GO trainer.
Please, for the second time, #HearUsNiantic. Talk to your community. Talk to us. Let's
have a discussion.
The answer is beyond creating scarce limitation for remote raids but creating a rich incentivized environment to encourage local community congregation.
Sincerely,
The Pokémon GO Community.

The HearUsNiantic Pokémon Go movement has been growing in recent weeks due to Niantic’s lack of response to its community. Some fans have said they feel like they are being ignored, undervalued, and pushed out of a game they want to love but can’t do anything about it. It has led to a lot of players feeling rightfully frustrated and, above all, worried about the future of their beloved mobile game.

Until now, Niantic has been mostly silent in any responses to the trend. But in an interview on May 15 with Pokémon Go director Michael Steranka and senior producer John Funtanilla, Dot Esports spoke to them about the HearUsNiantic social media trend that has been growing in intensity these past few weeks following messy decisions to put a cap on remote raid passes on April 6, as well as an abundance of changes being made to the game that reverse many systems introduced over the COVID-19 pandemic that allowed players to participate without the need for as much traveling.

While Niantic as a whole has been virtually silent and has not responded at all to the movement, Steranka and Funtanilla talked candidly about their own views regarding both the community backlash and what part of the team felt about it. When asked for a comment regarding both the HearUsNiantic trend and remote raid pass changes, Steranka had this to say:
“Yeah, we’ve definitely taken note, you know, it’s hard to ignore, right? Like, I’m personally being tagged a lot in a lot of these tweets. So we read everything, and we see everything, it’s one of those things where we never want to go out and respond to two calls like that, unless we have something to actually show for it. And for us for the rest of this year, we really feel like actions will speak louder than words.

And we’ve been working really hard as a development team to put together a huge slate of new features, that players we hope will enjoy over the course of this year. So, you know, personally speaking, right, like, I’m pretty sure I used to do more remote raids than 99 percent of your readers, right?

That was like a very, very painful decision to make even for me. But when we look at sort of the overall health of the game, and the type of behaviors that remote raid passes were introducing, it just really didn’t align with the kind of experience we were trying to create. And I can honestly say like, even for me personally, it became sort of an unhealthy way to engage with the game, right? I would just sort of throw money at Poké Coins so that I can, you know, spam legendary raids as much as possible.

And we’re talking about legendary Pokémon they’re supposed to be the epic epitome of all Pokémon, you know, content. And this is something that players including myself are doing over a dozen times a day for some people over 100 times a day. And so that’s something that we really honestly let go on a little bit too long and ultimately needed to course correct.

So again, super, super painful decision that is not something we took lightly. But it’s something that we felt is necessary for the longevity of the game and to also ensure that we’re not really compromising on our mission.

And so yeah, we have no plans to directly address any of the HearUsNiantic things recently, because we’ll be sticking with the decision that was made. But instead, we’re hopeful that players will see a lot of the hard work that the team has been putting into this game for the past year because I think what we have coming out in 2023, is gonna really blow people away.”

Michael Steranka, Pokémon Go director
This was then followed by Funtanilla’s own thoughts:

“I would want to add one thing… just to echo Michael’s sentiment of coming onto this team, you know, like, everyone is incredibly passionate about the game. And I feel like sometimes that’s lost, that we’re confident in our decision. And like, I’m basically what we want to do is what Michael is saying is that we really want our actions to speak louder than words. But everyone liked it. There’s a lot of Michaels on this team, everyone’s playing the game, everyone, you know, like, wants to do remote raids, but we kind of have to understand, what we feel is best for the player experience.

I really want that. I’m passionate, it’s like leveling up super fast of everyone on the team. So that’s something that we see every day. Everyone lives and breathes this game.”

John Funtanilla, Pokémon Go senior producer
It remains to be seen if the wider team at Niantic will also address the issues fans have been asking for, but it appears Niantic is sure what it’s doing is right for the company’s core mission and won’t be reversing recent changes anytime soon.