'Pokémon GO' News, Update: Trading and PvP Battles Coming Soon
Pokémon trading and player-versus-player (PvP) battles have always been important features in previous "Pokémon" games, so players were surprised to see "Pokémon GO" launch without them. Pokémon trainers have been asking Niantic to add these features for months now, and it looks like they have been listening closely to their player base because trading and PvP battles are on the way.
In an interview with Waypoint, Niantic CEO John Hanke confirmed that the two features would be added in future updates. "It's going to be done soon," he said. He also revealed that one of the features would have been added to the game already if not for the server issues they had to address when the game launched.
"I'll take the massive wave of hysteria we enjoyed, and just deal with the fact that it's caused us to take a bit longer to get the rest of the features up. We're really happy to make our users happy," Hanke commented.
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During the interview, Hanke admitted that the gym battle system was not as fully-developed as he would have wanted it to be. But Niantic should continue to find ways to improve the feature. He also disclosed that the original in-game tracker would not be coming back, so trainers might as well get used to the Nearby tracking system that came out a couple of months ago.
"The tracker sort of fills a certain need within the product. I think the more interesting thing for me is not extending the tracker, but basically making the world richer and adding more ways to interact with new kinds of things in the world."
2017 is going to be another busy year of Niantic. They should introduce more Generation 2 Pokémon soon, and Hanke also talked about his desire to continue holding special events like the recently concluded Valentine's Day event. Trainers should have a lot to look forward to in the coming months.
