The Pokemon GO community has shared a warning from Niantic about possible bans being deployed if players are caught using a popular in-game cheat. Monopoly GO publisher Scopely bought Pokemon GO off Niantic earlier this year, but the latter’s original teams were kept on to continue developing the game. However, Niantic’s community team still appears to be servicing the game.
Pokemon GO was first launched in 2016 as an augmented reality mobile game in collaboration with Nintendo and The Pokemon Company. Trainers can use their mobile’s GPS to discover, capture, train, and battle virtual Pokemon within a free-to-play system. There’s plenty to look forward to in the year ahead, including Pokemon GO’s Summer Concert event that’s scheduled to take place very soon, but trainers should be wary going forward if they’re using a popular but frowned-upon exploit.
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Posted on Reddit by Future-Mongoose, a screenshot was shared on TheSilphRoad subreddit highlighting a warning from a Pokemon GO player. The message noted that the development team was aware of the Micro GPS Drift exploit, or some are calling it a bug or glitch, and Niantic considers abusing the glitch a violation of the Terms of Service. The user confirmed Niantic can detect GPS Drift using its “anti-cheat teams,” and the message confirmed players abusing the exploit may get their account flagged by the system. Furthermore, the post stated multiple teams were working to patch the exploit with a projected fix in the next 6-12 months. Unlike Pokemon GO iPhone players who were wrongly accused of cheating last year, Niantic has GPS drifters firmly in its crosshairs.
Pokemon GO Players Warn of Potential Banning While Using Micro GPS Drift
In the AR game, hard graft is rewarded, including one Pokemon GO player who reached 1 billion Stardust. Niantic exercising its anti-cheat protocols are designed to put a stop to players abusing the system, but some trainers are worried genuine in-game drift could result in them getting banned. One Redditor noted that their avatar tends to drift when they switch apps to reply to a text, causing concern that the developer will mistakenly target them. The exploitative Micro GPS Drift, however, involves players deliberately toggling their GPS on and off or switching out of the game to provoke drift and get their avatar closer to gyms.
On a more positive note from the ban news, Pokemon GO is about to break its own rules during the Summer Concert, by featuring a special Pokemon globally instead of regionally. The event will celebrate the music of the Pokemon video game series composer and The Pokemon Company’s Chief Creative Fellow, Junichi Masuda, and trainers can bag special event bonuses while listening to an arrangement of Masuda’s music in the background.
WHERE TO PLAY
- Genre(s)
- Augmented Reality, RPG
