Niantic tests new feature to speed up 'Pokémon Go' Raids

Image: Niantic

Niantic is testing a new feature that will speed up Pokémon Go Raids. The "Ready to Raid" button will let players in London, Osaka City, and Suita City skip the long wait time and start the Raid in 10 seconds. This applies to both in-person and Remote Raids. Niantic shared a gif of the feature on Twitter/X:

"We're testing a 'Ready to Raid' button in the London, Osaka City and Suita City areas. Trainers participating in Raids in these areas will be able to tap a button above their Raid Party to skip to a 10-second Raid countdown. This includes Remote Raids hosted in these areas."

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Niantic is working on a 'Monster Hunter' augmented reality mobile game

Image: Niantic

Niantic is taking the magic of Pokémon Go and bringing it into the Monster Hunter universe. The company collaborated with Capcom to create a "real-world hunting action RPG" called Monster Hunter Now. The gameplay is similar to Pokémon Go and the now-defunct Harry Potter: Wizards Unite, where you can team up with friends and strangers to play and use materials you gather to craft weapons and armour. 

The game will be free-to-play with in-app purchases. It will feature a simplified combat similar to Pokémon Go, with you tapping and swiping on your phone. You can fight in portrait or landscape to replicate the experience on PCs and consoles. While versions of those games have battles that last over five minutes, the maximum battle time on mobile will be 75 seconds. Niantic is now accepting sign-ups for its closed beta testing, which starts on April 25. If there are no issues, Monster Hunter Now will launch sometime in September.

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Niantic debuts Campfire AR messaging app for its titles

Niantic wants its users to stay within its ecosystem and chat with others playing the same games. And so, the company debuted a new social AR app called Campfire. This will let you converse with other Niantic games' users in the simplest terms. You can do things like organize for events, find new locations, and share content with other players. The company built it entirely for augmented reality. It's already live for Ingress, and it'll be coming to titles like Pokemon Go in the summer.

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'Pokémon Go' is now playable at higher frame rates on iOS

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Niantic has rolled out new updates to the Pokémon Go app, and for iOS users, you now have the option to play the game at higher frame rates. There's a new option that lets you "unlock your device's native refresh rate for higher FPS." The developer didn't mention the feature specifically in the changelog, so it might fall under the "various quality-of-life improvements" section. You can enable the functionality in the game's advanced settings. It'll show "native refresh rate unlocked" when it's enabled.

The feature is disabled by default, so you'll need to dig in the settings to access it. Before this update, players needed to use workarounds to get Pokémon Go running at 60 frames per second instead of 30fps. With this development, iPhone 13 Pro users can enjoy the game at 120fps. It'll work with older iPhones, but the hardware might not be able to handle it. 

Source: Engadget