Problems with pokemon go

Problems with pokemon go

-----Pokemon Tracking-----
-Tracking was functional and well recieved during the first week of release but was disabled shortly afterwards. There has still been no valid explanation as to why.
-The disabled version of tracking was eventually renamed to 'sightings' which showed pokemon within 200m of yourself. This was not ideal, but still usable.
-The 'sightings' are now being replaced with 'nearby' which is usable if you happen to be near pokestops which also happen to have pokemon spawns directly near to them, but is completely useless for knowing of any other pokemon spawns that arent near pokestops. A pokemon could be 100m away from you and you would not know about if a pokestop isnt there unless you chance upon it.

-----Social Aspects-----
-No method to interact/communicate/see other trainers. A simple friends list or messaging system would improve gameplay incredibly.
-The game is marketed as an MMO but largely plays like a single player game. Supposedly Niantic wants it to integrated into the real world although they are constantly blocking real world techniques people are using to attempt to improve the experience.



-----Distance Tracking-----
-Distance tracking is extremely inaccurate in pokemon go without explanation as to why.
-Background tracking exists, but is enabled only when using the Pokemon Go Plus accessory purchased separately. Supposedly this has also been spotty with the Pokemon Go Plus recently as well.


-----Catching----
-Pokemon jumping affects the height of your throw (Obviously it should not affect it)
-Rewards from catching pokemon have no scaling whatsoever. Catching a level 1 krabby gives the exact same rewards as catching a level 30 kingler. Transferring the kingler also gives the same reward (1 krabby candy) as transferring the krabby. Scaling rewards for catching and transferring pokemon would mean that any pokemon is worth catching, rather than evolution spawns often being ignored due to increased difficulty in catching for no additional reward.


-----Stats-----
-CP formula is balanced terribly and does not reflect real pokemon stats causing many pokemon to be far weaker than they should be. (UPDATE: the formula has now been reworked and now more closely resembles true strength, although not perfectly.)


-----Gyms-----
-Gyms are ordered by CP. As many pokemon have different CP potentials, this results in teams fighting with each other to get a better position in the gym so they won't be knocked out. Another side effect is that players try to simple add their highest CP pokemon to gyms regardless of their actual defending capabilities
-Some simple options for fair ordering options include: Pokemon level, Trainer level, Order added to gym
-GPS drift around gyms will result in you being locked out from the gym for 3 minutes (previously 10 minutes). The reason for this is still uncertain.
-Prestige gained for training gyms does not reflect the effort put into it, especially compared to attacking gyms (this used to be fine but for some reason was changed extremely drastically).
-After training friendly gyms the spot opens for everyone, which results in your own team mates from stealing the spot you put in time, effort and resources for which can become extremely demotivating and depressing.
-Prestige calculations for training gyms take into account the highest pokemon in the party with no regard to which pokemon you actually battle with. This is assumed to be a shortcut for the developers rather than a plain oversight so the server does not have to care about which pokemon are battling, although it is unacceptable as it makes training even more difficult than it already us for no good reason.
-Battling gyms automatically predicts a party for you for each fight, although the algorithm to decide on your party does a poor job of picking an ideal team. A 'favourite' system for a party of 6 pokemon of some sort would address this. (Not the favourite pokemon system, it is not efficient for this purpose).
-No ability to see which gym a pokemon is stationed in in the case that you forget.


-----Events-----
-Events are extremely low effort and poorly thought out. The changes required by niantic are simple number tweaks. No content is actually added. (The tweaks are fine, but they should be a side portion of the event. Themed activities, cosmetic rewards, unique even themed rewards (e.g. halloween incense to keep that can be used to draw the halloween pokemon at a later time), temporary items are just some ways to include actual content for an event.
-The high gains and low effort for these events is unfortunately well received and the low effort is overlooked due to the extreme benefits pushed (e.g. double candy, 4x shorter buddy distance). This reinforces that it is ok for this to occur and will harm the game in the long run as niantic will believe it is fine to simply change numbers and call it a day. This trend has been seen over halloween as well as the daily bonuses release and 'thank you' celebration where each was simple number tweaks and nothing more.


-----Balancing-----
-No thought is put towards balancing any content in the game. For some time since release charge moves were so weak that they were not worth using at all. Eventually the move damages were reworked and the gap between strengths was narrowed, although some moves still stand out as extremely poor performing (e.g. bulldoze) which causes a lot of disappointment when investing time into evolving a pokemon to receive such a move.


-----Developer Communication-----
-Game often has stealth changes with no communication from Niantic about the change even occurring or why it was implemented. Examples include tracker removal (eventually Niantic made a broad statement about it after extreme pressure from the community although there is still no valid replacement to this day), constant limitations impeding gameplay (speed limits on pokemon appearances, sightings, and now pokestops being unusable while a passenger
-Niantic offers no explanation for the many existing bugs in the game, whether they are aware of them, whether they are intended, or whether they are being addressed.
-Niantic has stated they have no plans to implement PVP any time soon which is a core component of pokemon games. The gyms are a poor excuse for a battle system, and a good portion of the appeal of pokemon is the battling.
-Missing pokemon have no explanation. Ditto is still not in the game and there has been no reasoning given. The assumption is that niantic are unable to figure out how to implement his abilities. (UPDATE: Ditto is now in the game but there is still no explanation for why it was not released until now)


-----Amount of content-----
-While updates are semi-frequent, the content pushed in each update is abysmal