Pokémon GO is still a huge success with mobile users but the game has seemingly taken advantage of its loyal fanbase. While fans are fine with paying for some items in-game, recent events have felt made fans feel that the game is filled with unfair pay-to-win scenarios.
Though fans knew they would have to cough up cash for certain things, the mobile game had been mostly lenient in that department for a few years. However, recent events have taken a turn, upping the ante with more paid Research Tasks than usual.
Unsurprisingly, this has led to some fans turning on Pokémon GO since most gamers despise any pay-to-win scenario. All fans can do is hope that Niantic and The Pokémon Company will listen to them, even if the mobile game makes billions of dollars yearly.
Many fans have taken their grievances to the Pokémon GO subreddit. One post, in particular, brought up how the current season has had three straight weeks of pay-to-win ticket events. What makes this more egregious is that the season launched three weeks ago, making this the greediest season so far.
Naturally, many fans are wondering if revenue for the game is down, hence the increase of these pay-to-win events. Obviously, Niantic and The Pokémon Company will never admit that they’re doing things for money but it would explain a lot of things.
“They probably saw that their revenue was down in comparison to last year (due to their own terrible updates of course) & decided to make some more paid events to make up some of the lost revenue,” says Nakaap.
Some fans also feel that this is just the nature of mobile gaming, as numerous titles have had pay-to-win events. Using industry standards isn’t a good excuse, though Free-to-Play games do need to make their money back somehow.
“Mobile game spending is down across the board. Don’t get me wrong, they’ve made some TERRIBLE decisions, but they’re far from alone and are still making bank. We delude ourselves in here about it, but niantic will still profit hundreds of millions of dollars this year,” explains MonteBurns.
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Pokémon GO is available now on iOS and Android devices.