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Pokémon GO: The Data Behind America’s Latest Obsession

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Re: Pokémon GO: The Data Behind America’s Latest Obsession

#91

Post by ZenoArrow »

MBCook wrote: post #46
voltagex_ wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Niantic are either too busy or really don't care about social media. There's lots of people pointing out real problems with the game. I hope it's not like Ingress all over again, where the only way to get something fixed was to know someone at Google.

Since it has the Pokémon company's brand (and therefore Nintendo's) I really hope to be a great app. One of the things I love about Nintendo with how well they polish all their software. Instead it's very clear to me that it's a Google app with Pokémon branding. Release fast, bugs are OK, we can fix them later. Don't worry about the fact that the iOS version feels like an Android app and is somewhat obnoxious to use.…

Pokemon Go isn't made by Google, it's made by Niantic. Niantic were originally linked to Google, but have been independent since October 2015.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Niantic,_Inc.

Re: Pokémon GO: The Data Behind America’s Latest Obsession

#92

Post by taigeair »

NamTaf wrote: post #88

If Google had any sense, they would be throwing a tonne more at this. It may be Ingress with less features and a Pokemon skin but that latter part is exactly the mainstream appeal they need to make AR big. This is their big chance to create a new market. If they sort out the bugginess and roll out decent features in the next couple of months to keep retention, they're onto something big. At near-on midnight on Saturd…

Does it ask you to login all the time too? My session gets expired very quickly.

Re: Pokémon GO: The Data Behind America’s Latest Obsession

#93

Post by NamTaf »

taigeair wrote: post #92
NamTaf wrote: post #88

If Google had any sense, they would be throwing a tonne more at this. It may be Ingress with less features and a Pokemon skin but that latter part is exactly the mainstream appeal they need to make AR big. This is their big chance to create a new market. If they sort out the bugginess and roll out decent features in the next couple of months to keep retention, they're onto something big. At near-on midnight on Saturd…

Does it ask you to login all the time too? My session gets expired very quickly.

From what I understand, it'll ask a new login if the servers crash between usage sessions of the app. I've not had to log in today, for example, but yesterday I had to two or so times. The login bug is relatively low-priority to me - all it does is force me to switch to the 2FA app and then untick the music in settings. Compared to other bugs, that's trivial.

I'm still occasionally seeing bugs with gyms - for example, instantly kicking me back to the gym screen as soon as I try to battle - but that's fixable by going and battling another gym. I've yet to see a way to solve the other big gym bug wherein enemies stay at 1hp but never die or do anything until the timer runs out.

Otherwise, the standard client/server sync bugs (pokeballs sitting on screen doing nothing if you lose server connectivity during capturing it) and client-side bugs (battery saver mode cuasing the game to become completely unresponsive to touch sometimes when you bring it back by turning your phone upright again) are the main gripes.

Re: Pokémon GO: The Data Behind America’s Latest Obsession

#94

Post by 2bitencryption »

fphhotchips wrote: post #55
MBCook wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can put up with a fair amount. There are some Z-buffering issues that don't really matter. I've seen occasional glitches with the way the background works in AR. But how can you not remember if I've me that the sound? How can you not remember I logged in? With a handful of ultrabasic bugs it feels like they just didn't even try. If they are network issues why do I get stuck in a try again later screen were the only…

I completely agree with this. The network issues, and the lack of tolerance for GPS issues would be frustrating but acceptable if they were handled properly. As it is they're absolutely infuriating when combined with the way the app just dies when it encounters them. It's incredible that an app that's been in beta for months still has 20 un-recoverable different freeze states that I've found in 72 hours. My girlfrien…

There is NO graceful handling of loss of network connection at all. Many times I've been out throwing Pokeballs at a Pidgy, then my phone catches the nearby Starbucks wifi and switches over. In the brief period of no connectivity during the switch, the game loses connection, and just... dies. All actions stop. The animations keep playing on loop, but it's impossible to throw another pokeball, impossible to leave the minigame, etc.

This doesn't just happen when in "catch a pokemon" minigame mode. This happens at all screens. The game was programming to expect full, 100% network connectivity, and if it loses that for even a brief moment, the whole thing comes crashing down, requiring a full kill and reset.

Re: Pokémon GO: The Data Behind America’s Latest Obsession

#95

Post by 2bitencryption »

syngrog66 wrote: post #84
georgeecollins wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Speaking as someone who has helped develop two extremely successful mobile games "objective" goodness is pretty meaningless. People have more patience than you expect for a game that captures their imagination and will put up with buggyness. In the long run, if a game isn't polished it will lose because of retention. But pure technical polish is often overrated.

your comment is gold to it I'd add that this is also the difference between the $20/hour programmer and the $200/hour programmer -- speaking in broad strokes, knowingly, and if you'll indulge me charitably. Because the difference between the commodity "let's ship something!" programmer/engineer and the one who truly knows his/her stuff, and who truly thinks about and knows about and cares about the edge cases, the bi…

> to it I'd add that this is also the difference between the $20/hour programmer and the $200/hour programmer

You could have a hundred "$200/hour programmers" on the team for this app, but if management says they need to ship three weeks early to catch the buzz, or something like that, it doesn't matter. We can't say the developers were bad. I mean it's possible, given how poorly the game handles network disconnections, among other bugs. But unfortunately we don't live in a utopia where the guys writing the code get to decide when they want to release. Or if features get added in the last minute. Etc.

Re: Pokémon GO: The Data Behind America’s Latest Obsession

#96

Post by 2bitencryption »

krapp wrote: post #76
MBCook wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know that's an excuse that lots of developer seem to use these days. It's fucking bullshit. I'm so tired of people releasing utter crap and claiming it's OK to fix it later. You know what happens when you do that? You turn off a huge number of people and poison the brand. It's not like if they waited an extra months to actually fix the issues (which were apparently well known in Beta) the Pokémon brand would've bee…

>I'm so tired of people releasing utter crap and claiming it's OK to fix it later. You know what happens when you do that? Apparently what happens is your app becomes one of the most downloaded in history. The truth is, those "lazy developers" are right. They can release utter crap and fix it later. People will put up with it simply because of their emotional investment in the brand, and it will make money regardless…

> The truth is, those "lazy developers" are right.

I don't understand why this discussion is about the developers. Do you think Tim, who writes network code for the iOS version, gets to say when they launch?

No. Some top dog at Niantic says "We're launching early to catch the summer buzz while kids are out of school." And Tim says "But we don't handle network disconnects gracefully yet." And top-dog man says "Can you still catch Pokemon and battle at gyms?" And Tim admits, "Yes, you can." And top-dog says: "We launch tomorrow, then."

Re: Pokémon GO: The Data Behind America’s Latest Obsession

#97

Post by 2bitencryption »

spike021 wrote: post #62
MBCook wrote: post #12

The amazing thing to me is that, at least on iOS, the game is pretty objectively bad. Of course that hasn't stopped me from sinking a lot of time into it this weekend. I've spent $10 on it, which is easily a record for free to play game for me. The server issues are one thing, but the game doesn't even get lots of basic things right. If the server goes away, or sometimes if I'm just out of the app too long, I have to…

I've had issues where I definitely successfully capture a pokemon, but either lose connection due to being underground on transit or the servers 'crashing', so I wind up not having the pokemon saved to my record. Makes me think they aren't doing much, or any, local caching.

Don't think it'd be solved by local caching. All that logic should be remote anyway. The local client shouldn't decide if a Pokemon was caught or not, the server should.

What the client should be doing is gracefully reconnecting and picking up at the state it left off in... which it certainly is NOT doing right now.

Re: Pokémon GO: The Data Behind America’s Latest Obsession

#98

Post by Nullabillity »

NamTaf wrote: post #88

If Google had any sense, they would be throwing a tonne more at this. It may be Ingress with less features and a Pokemon skin but that latter part is exactly the mainstream appeal they need to make AR big. This is their big chance to create a new market. If they sort out the bugginess and roll out decent features in the next couple of months to keep retention, they're onto something big. At near-on midnight on Saturd…

Google doesn't own Niantic anymore.

Re: Pokémon GO: The Data Behind America’s Latest Obsession

#99

Post by tonfa »

fphhotchips wrote: post #50
MaxLeiter wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ingress ultimately hard more complicated gameplay and less brand appeal

Ingress also had an invite-only launch, which meant that by the time lots of people got into the game, the portals were all super high level and playing the game was difficult. Pokemon Go is already showing signs of the same problem at Gyms, where newer players are going to have to grind for days to take on a gym that their team doesn't already own.

Wasn't high level portals a good thing for ingress? It made the social aspect more important. New players would meet experienced ones and quickly level up.

Re: Pokémon GO: The Data Behind America’s Latest Obsession

#100

Post by tgtweak »

Nullabillity wrote: post #98
NamTaf wrote: post #88

If Google had any sense, they would be throwing a tonne more at this. It may be Ingress with less features and a Pokemon skin but that latter part is exactly the mainstream appeal they need to make AR big. This is their big chance to create a new market. If they sort out the bugginess and roll out decent features in the next couple of months to keep retention, they're onto something big. At near-on midnight on Saturd…

Google doesn't own Niantic anymore.

Ouch.
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