In October, Niantic announced it would roll out the Wayfarer Tool to improve the overall experience its augmented reality games provided. This included support for the popular mobile title, Pokémon GO.
It was launched a few days ago, but due to the overwhelming response from the player base, Niantic has now had to temporarily disable PokéStop and Gym contributions. Here's the full announcement, via Twitter:
If you're not familiar with the 'Niantic Wayfarer' tool, it allows players (Wayfinders) to nominate and review new points-of-interest in the game. The goal, as previously explained, is to "inspire others to discover new places and things" and "highlight the positive and unique qualities of a place or community" – such as museums, art installations to historical markers.
It also means Wayspots won't be placed on unsafe locations, private property or the grounds of schools. The rating system (see video above) is how Wayfinders review points-of-interest and decide whether or not they should be added to a Niantic game. These submissions are accessible to players who have reached level 40.
There's no word about when exactly Niantic plans to relaunch PokéStop and Gym contributions, but when it does it will provide an update via its social channels. To read the full guidelines about contributions, head over to the official Niantic website.
Were you looking forward to making use of this new tool? Leave a comment down below.
[source perfectly-nintendo.com, via serebii.net]
Comments 5
As far as I'm aware they still haven't opened it up to people in the UK anyway
The school grounds rule is interesting; I know of an art installation on a school's property that's flagged as a Pokestop. Makes me wonder if that rule was added sometime after launch.
@Tyranexx
Normally school grounds are exempt from nominations, but the nomination process does not always have the tools needed to determine if it is a school zone. The reviewers I believe are from ingress and have as many tools available to them as we have ourselves. They normally use Google maps and street view to determine the accuracy of the reports. If that stop gets reported, it would probably be removed but that is unlikely unless there is an issue because all the games benefit from it being there.
@Tyranexx most likely, i mean when they first released this game the players where showing up everywhere, even in other peoples yards. one wondered into my yard and got trapped in a hidden pit i set up because of issues i've had with some of my exs that had ended up incarcerated at the end of our relationship after they got out of jail, prison or an asylum...
@LordGeovanni I suspect it was added via Ingress as it was there long before nominations opened in the US. I haven't heard any complaints about it, and I take care to drop by off school hours only. It's a madhouse otherwise. XD
@Shadowmoon522 I take care to not go tromping through people's yards if I can help it. Who knows what traps and savage beasts lurk in them....
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