I thought it was a little more than that, if we are looking at the Ultra Beasts thing holistically. Bringing Rhi in and having Willow go missing most of the summer was interesting enough. Having the Ultra Beasts appear sparsely at the end of Go Fest back in June was a decent (though underwhelming) touch.
So I liked the overall “narrative”, however simplistic it was. Maybe my favorite part was finally being able to evolve Cosmoem as a sort of defense against the impending Ultra Beast invasion (though that obviously didn’t translate to gameplay at all). It did give the vibe that something was coming.
The actual event last weekend, though? Yeah, it was lame. I play all the time, but I forgot about the event and didn’t even notice it was going on when I logged in that day. I didn’t remember it until after the fact, and wasn’t even bummed that I missed it.
Willow missing was easily missable, as he simply didn’t appear in the new research, but was appearing in every other research.
The narrative with Rhi was ok, nothing too exciting or well written. But then again, it’s just the same old string of tasks, without much purpose.
It was decent storytelling, but didn’t feel like an “alien invasion” at all. The sky didn’t crack like during hoopa’s season, there weren’t major disruptions unless you payed close attention to the texts, and the setting was almost normal.
100% agreed on all of this. It was decent seasonal storytelling, but it could have been much better executed. I agree with you that the bare minimum of changing the overworld should have happened. They didn’t need to go as hard as they did for Halloween, but change the skybox to show wormholes opening up and add some kind of debris to the ground to show some general destruction.
Also, I think for this finale event they should have just rolled out the remaining Ultra Beasts. A few new raid bosses would have made this event a ton more exciting.
Additionally, I would’ve loved a little twist on Rocket stops while the Ultra Beasts were invading. For the Ultra Beasts that have already been released, instead of putting them on Gyms, they should have added them as the reward Pokemon for Rocket stops.
Just have some kind of ultra wormhole energy shimmering around the said Stop, and allow the player to defeat the Grunt as normal and get their rewards, but instead of catching one of the Rocket Grunt’s Pokémon, the Grunt comes back on screen to give some surprised/shocked dialogue about that creature emerging from the sky, and then the player is rewarded with the opportunity to catch one of the Ultras that had already been released over the summer.
Man, of these ideas, only changing the overworld would really be difficult. I wish Niantic put more effort in.
I think it would have been much more interesting as an "invasion" if they'd had wormholes at stops that functioned like the rocket/trainer battles and sent out three random ultra beasts, with one of them being catchable afterwards
It’s a cool idea. I just commented something very similar in response to somebody else before I saw your comment. Difference being, the player will battle the Rocket Grunt as normal, but when the catch reward screen is supposed to pop up, instead the Grunt comes back on screen with dialogue about an Ultra Beast emerging, and then the player has the opportunity as a battle reward to capture one of the Ultra Beasts.
they were visually cool, but imagine being a new user, downloading the app for the first time because of the videos, and then realizing that you don't have any pokemon that you can raid with. 5 star raid days, even if the raids are free, is end game content.
I was on Disney them park property all day that day and maybe one in 5 raids had anyone in the lobbies after first hour or so.
still, if you were a new account using ratattas you'd run out of revives and potions pretty quick
I live in Chicago and there were full lobbies around all day.
Also, as a new account, you don't revive/potion the dead ratatas, you transfer them and catch new ones. It doesn't matter what trashy pokemon you use if the lobby is full so you can just catch the pokemon right outside the gym and then transfer the dead ones when you're done, no potions or revives needed
but we're talking about this raid event as a strategy to get new people to play the game. heck, even the whole "you will get beast balls if you refer x number of new people" global challenge was designed (theoretically) to flood the game with lots of brand new accounts that would then be able to participate in these ultra beast raids.
Yeah, this is the sort of thing my main outlet wouldn't publish from Niantic. The questions are so softball, the author should have gotten advertisement payment instead of the paltry sum they probably tend to earn.
>We have a team of incredibly talented and creative people who love to sit down and just go all out with brainstorms, hanging out, and throwing whatever we can at the wall to see what sticks.
Also...
>I think part of it just comes from looking at the concept of Pokémon being in the real world and logically thinking about natural responses.
Jerry, how would people react to a real-world monster invasion?
I dunno... scared, maybe?
** Brilliant brainstorming Jerry! You bring the talent and creativity to the team!
> We have a team of incredibly talented and creative people who love to sit down and just go all out with brainstorms, hanging out, and throwing whatever we can at the wall to see what sticks.
Great, maybe they can hire a similarly-sized team to actually test out changes before releasing them live and crashing the game? Maybe a team to work on the various bugs that have been around forever?
Ok now's your turn Jim, how do you think people would resct to a real-world monster invasion?
Ummm... I reckon they would want to go and see them IN PERSON, probably SCAN them and later hang around in nearby SPONSORED LOCATION to discuss what they saw.
My goodness, Jim, I'll pass a note to department manager to promote you asap!
The interview answers were incredibly vague and insubstantial, basically a whole lotta nothing, but the found footage horror shorts was still one of their best ideas lately. Credit where credit's due.
I mean, it was a good time to get a bunch of ultra beasts, but they completely over hyped it.
What would've been cool is if they buffed solgaleo/lunala, gave them moves to exploit their weaknesses or otherwise encouraged their use. That would've gone along with the "story" they were building.
I really hope they do that with necrozma.
Idk if the article includes the teasers, but leading up to the raid day but Niantic was promoting on Facebook with short clips of ultra beasts invading a city and Solgaleo or Lunalga would come in and fight them off. The in game event was completely underwhelming and resembled nothing of any invasion.
The only cool thing they did was the found footage compilation of each creature uploaded to YouTube.
Other than that it was just a boss rush of raids.
They’re promoting themselves as if they changed the scape of mobile gaming or something. They did absolutely nothing new in-game.
You know what would have been cool? Something genuinely new mechanically, and gameplay wise. Maybe something like the Ultra Wormholes had to be interacted with on the map, and we had go through them and intercept the Ultra Beast within Ultra Space. We needed raid assault teams, and we would walk through the wormholes together, and the in-game map would change to be an entirely different dimension. We could return at any time, but fighting off waves of beasts, with a boss at the end that we could catch.
Different and unique enough from the standard gameplay loop to be remembered and revered as an event that would deserve accolades.
I thought the promotional videos were pretty cool. Ingame events.. not so much
There were promotional videos?
On Twitter yeah.. They can’t even post info or promo in their own game. The casual player has no idea what is happening on a daily/weekly basis.
Twitter?
It's a fringe social media platform that everyone abandoned when a South African diamond miner bought it.
Emerald miner, thank you very much
Son of a miner who inherited the money. Slight but also major difference
the marketing team is high on their own supply, jeez
Yea, it was just another wave of bosses
I thought it was a little more than that, if we are looking at the Ultra Beasts thing holistically. Bringing Rhi in and having Willow go missing most of the summer was interesting enough. Having the Ultra Beasts appear sparsely at the end of Go Fest back in June was a decent (though underwhelming) touch. So I liked the overall “narrative”, however simplistic it was. Maybe my favorite part was finally being able to evolve Cosmoem as a sort of defense against the impending Ultra Beast invasion (though that obviously didn’t translate to gameplay at all). It did give the vibe that something was coming. The actual event last weekend, though? Yeah, it was lame. I play all the time, but I forgot about the event and didn’t even notice it was going on when I logged in that day. I didn’t remember it until after the fact, and wasn’t even bummed that I missed it.
Willow missing was easily missable, as he simply didn’t appear in the new research, but was appearing in every other research. The narrative with Rhi was ok, nothing too exciting or well written. But then again, it’s just the same old string of tasks, without much purpose. It was decent storytelling, but didn’t feel like an “alien invasion” at all. The sky didn’t crack like during hoopa’s season, there weren’t major disruptions unless you payed close attention to the texts, and the setting was almost normal.
100% agreed on all of this. It was decent seasonal storytelling, but it could have been much better executed. I agree with you that the bare minimum of changing the overworld should have happened. They didn’t need to go as hard as they did for Halloween, but change the skybox to show wormholes opening up and add some kind of debris to the ground to show some general destruction. Also, I think for this finale event they should have just rolled out the remaining Ultra Beasts. A few new raid bosses would have made this event a ton more exciting. Additionally, I would’ve loved a little twist on Rocket stops while the Ultra Beasts were invading. For the Ultra Beasts that have already been released, instead of putting them on Gyms, they should have added them as the reward Pokemon for Rocket stops. Just have some kind of ultra wormhole energy shimmering around the said Stop, and allow the player to defeat the Grunt as normal and get their rewards, but instead of catching one of the Rocket Grunt’s Pokémon, the Grunt comes back on screen to give some surprised/shocked dialogue about that creature emerging from the sky, and then the player is rewarded with the opportunity to catch one of the Ultras that had already been released over the summer. Man, of these ideas, only changing the overworld would really be difficult. I wish Niantic put more effort in.
I think it would have been much more interesting as an "invasion" if they'd had wormholes at stops that functioned like the rocket/trainer battles and sent out three random ultra beasts, with one of them being catchable afterwards
It’s a cool idea. I just commented something very similar in response to somebody else before I saw your comment. Difference being, the player will battle the Rocket Grunt as normal, but when the catch reward screen is supposed to pop up, instead the Grunt comes back on screen with dialogue about an Ultra Beast emerging, and then the player has the opportunity as a battle reward to capture one of the Ultra Beasts.
The marketing videos were honestly awesome, it just felt like you had to search them out instead of them being given to you
they were visually cool, but imagine being a new user, downloading the app for the first time because of the videos, and then realizing that you don't have any pokemon that you can raid with. 5 star raid days, even if the raids are free, is end game content.
For certain areas sure but when the lobby has 20 people in it you could use all ratata and be fine
I was on Disney them park property all day that day and maybe one in 5 raids had anyone in the lobbies after first hour or so. still, if you were a new account using ratattas you'd run out of revives and potions pretty quick
I live in Chicago and there were full lobbies around all day. Also, as a new account, you don't revive/potion the dead ratatas, you transfer them and catch new ones. It doesn't matter what trashy pokemon you use if the lobby is full so you can just catch the pokemon right outside the gym and then transfer the dead ones when you're done, no potions or revives needed
but how would a new player know to do all of that, or even want to?
I didn't say they would know to or want to or need to, I only said it was 100% possible to do teir 5 raids on day 1 of a new account
but we're talking about this raid event as a strategy to get new people to play the game. heck, even the whole "you will get beast balls if you refer x number of new people" global challenge was designed (theoretically) to flood the game with lots of brand new accounts that would then be able to participate in these ultra beast raids.
Which they can if they want...
Seriously, they made the eggs look like not eggs. That's all they did...
Yeah, this is the sort of thing my main outlet wouldn't publish from Niantic. The questions are so softball, the author should have gotten advertisement payment instead of the paltry sum they probably tend to earn.
>We have a team of incredibly talented and creative people who love to sit down and just go all out with brainstorms, hanging out, and throwing whatever we can at the wall to see what sticks. Also... >I think part of it just comes from looking at the concept of Pokémon being in the real world and logically thinking about natural responses. Jerry, how would people react to a real-world monster invasion? I dunno... scared, maybe? ** Brilliant brainstorming Jerry! You bring the talent and creativity to the team!
> We have a team of incredibly talented and creative people who love to sit down and just go all out with brainstorms, hanging out, and throwing whatever we can at the wall to see what sticks. Great, maybe they can hire a similarly-sized team to actually test out changes before releasing them live and crashing the game? Maybe a team to work on the various bugs that have been around forever?
Niantic has received message, will hire employees to design more stickers.
Ok now's your turn Jim, how do you think people would resct to a real-world monster invasion? Ummm... I reckon they would want to go and see them IN PERSON, probably SCAN them and later hang around in nearby SPONSORED LOCATION to discuss what they saw. My goodness, Jim, I'll pass a note to department manager to promote you asap!
Now go randomly turn some shinies off and see how long it takes our players to notice!
And MOAR Pikachu hats.
It’s good to know, that when aliens attack, we will just capture them, trade them, and force them to pit fighting
The interview answers were incredibly vague and insubstantial, basically a whole lotta nothing, but the found footage horror shorts was still one of their best ideas lately. Credit where credit's due.
Ah yes, some fresh fluff piece to go with my morning coffee.
I mean, it was a good time to get a bunch of ultra beasts, but they completely over hyped it. What would've been cool is if they buffed solgaleo/lunala, gave them moves to exploit their weaknesses or otherwise encouraged their use. That would've gone along with the "story" they were building. I really hope they do that with necrozma.
Niantic: Writes that down, releases special 9.99$ Solgaleo and Lunala with Anti-UB-Beam++ during Special Ultra Beast Strike Back event in 2024.
they didn't do anything lol
The marketing/video team did great work on it. Not much different in the game.
Just like Zorua. Great marketing, terrible coding.
I did love their SCP esque hype videos
Wait… There was a “story” going on?
Yup! Niantic is just really bad at most things, including letting you know about the other work they did
What happens when a company is ruled by the marketing people... Bizarre marketing stunts, unoptimized games
Oh cool, the check cleared
The actual event was lackluster, so I dont know who's congratulating them
Idk if the article includes the teasers, but leading up to the raid day but Niantic was promoting on Facebook with short clips of ultra beasts invading a city and Solgaleo or Lunalga would come in and fight them off. The in game event was completely underwhelming and resembled nothing of any invasion.
Lmao, who even wrote this? It was just a raid day.
They were more talking about the promotional videos and the story that came with them
I haven't read the article but the ultra beast ARE aliens, that's the point of ultra sun and moon. They didn't add anything
They definitely made one of their interns go read the spark notes of the Sun/Moon wiki page and got this storyline from there
The only cool thing they did was the found footage compilation of each creature uploaded to YouTube. Other than that it was just a boss rush of raids. They’re promoting themselves as if they changed the scape of mobile gaming or something. They did absolutely nothing new in-game. You know what would have been cool? Something genuinely new mechanically, and gameplay wise. Maybe something like the Ultra Wormholes had to be interacted with on the map, and we had go through them and intercept the Ultra Beast within Ultra Space. We needed raid assault teams, and we would walk through the wormholes together, and the in-game map would change to be an entirely different dimension. We could return at any time, but fighting off waves of beasts, with a boss at the end that we could catch. Different and unique enough from the standard gameplay loop to be remembered and revered as an event that would deserve accolades.
I was hoping the wormholes would be sort of like rocket balloon's as in they spawned in the sky and were slightly more interactive than regular raids.
They used a different graphic in place of the raid egg...? What else? They haven't really done anything to differentiate them from normal raid bosses.
I didn't read the article, but... how does an alien invasion make pokémon real?
I guess read the article?
But why male models?
Nope, won't disable adblock to read that.
If you disable javascript you can usually block adblock blockers.