Episode Details

Lured Up Podcast 305

Stream Date - 4/23/2024

Publish Date - 4/26/2024

When the Rediscover GO trailer dropped the Community was hyped and social was filled with speculation and hope of how the game would be updated. The Rediscover Yourself campaign was first up, and we are sad to say that it was one of Niantic’s biggest misses to date. This isn’t poor servers or a latency filled experience, but rather a slew of unpopular decisions that Niantic has made to advance their new Avatar update. We will take a dive down the Community rabbit hole at the end of the episode.

We start things off with a recap of our Bellsprout Community Day experiences, and how triple Stardust is always a popular bonus. Our first gameplay story of the week is about how Sustainability Week has changed over the years, and unfortunately not for the better. We look back to 2021 when the event actually had a real world component to it by partnering with non profits to promote cleaning up the environment. Each year since then the event has lost some of its magic, culminating in this year’s event, which seems to be falling flat. Being overshadowed by the Rediscover Kanto spawns didn’t help things either.

Cleffa Hatch Day will be rounding out the month taking place during the final weekend of April. The big story of the week takes us back to the Community reaction to the Rediscover Yourself update. From missing genders, to clipping assets, to a very strange art style, there isn’t much if anything that is getting high praises this week. While inclusivity may have been the goal of this update, it may have backfired.

We look to a pair of articles from GO Hub that cut to the chase and identify many of the issues that the Community has with the update. The site also touches on the sensitive nature and purpose of the update outside of simply an avatar graphical update. The backlash online has been significant, and Niantic has been getting dragged on this one, with a lot of toxic energy fueling some pretty negative stuff. To be plain, this week has been a disaster.

We want to be clear that we really believed in this update, and see the importance of greater options when it comes to character creation. We also identify however, that the execution of the update completely replacing the existing Avatar aesthetic rather than simply being in addition to it, has us all scratching our heads as to why this Niantic handled it like this. There are other important things to discuss as well regarding the sale of digital goods and how purchased items may not look or fit the avatar in the same way that originally influenced the purchase. There is a lot to unpack here.

Bellsprout Community Day - https://bit.ly/LU304Bellsprout 

Sustainability Week 2021 - https://bit.ly/LU305Sustainability2021 

Sustainability Week 2022 - https://bit.ly/LU305Sustainability2022

Sustainability Week 2023 - https://bit.ly/LU305Sustainability2023 

Sustainability Week 2024 - https://bit.ly/LU305Sustainability2024 

Cleffa Hatch Day - https://bit.ly/LU305Cleffa

Rediscover GO - https://bit.ly/LU305RediscoverGO 

GO Hub’s Hot Take - https://bit.ly/LU305GOHubAvatar 

GO Hub’s Follow Up - https://bit.ly/LU305AvatarFeedback 

Rediscover Kanto - https://bit.ly/LU305Rediscov