Pokemon GO's update is apparently MIA

One of Pokemon GO's limitations is its evolution system. In order to evolve a Pokemon, you need a specific type of candy. You obtain this candy by catching that particular Pokemon. For instance, if you capture a Squirtle, Wartortle or Blastoise, you'll obtain three Squirtle candies. You can also gain an additional piece of candy for "transfering" a Pokemon to the professor, which is basically like deleting it from your list.

Obviously, since certain Pokemon are not easy to find, evolving them can be a royal pain. You might be able to catch enough Squirtles to evolve to a Wartortle, which requires 25 Squirtle candies, but can you nab enough of them to promote him to a Blastoise (requires 100 Squirtle candies)? Niantic had to find a way around this.

Recently, they announced a new buddy system that would resolve this issue, plus allow you to travel with your favorite Pokemon at your side on the map screen. For every few kilometers walked, you gain some candy relevant to your selected buddy. This is supposed to be part of a new update, which Niantic announced as live on Saturday.

It's now Monday afternoon, evening in some places, and many users have seen neither hide nor hair of a new update (Android version should be called 0.37.0). It's not known why the update isn't showing for everyone, but some suspect that it has to do with rooted and jailbroken phones. Niantic is taking measures to curb cheating, which means disallowing rooted and jailbroken phones from using the app, despite the fact that some rooted and jailbroken users may not be cheating. The current speculation is that this uproar influenced Niantic to reconsider the current update and further patch it so that rooted phones can still play without worry.

Hopefully the update should be up soon, or Niantic may be facing another torrent of criticism. In the meantime, I'll just keep hatching eggs and planning trips to various parts of town with different Pokemon set as its commons.

Source: Forbes

Comments 5

honestgamer Staff Sep 12, 2016

I have no problem with Niantec blocking access to the game or updates when someone is using a rooted phone. That's the easiest way to cheat, and it's important to the Pokemon GO experience that as few people get away with cheating as possible. Most people with rooted phones seem to be trying to cheat someone (even if they don't see it in quite those terms), whether it be game developers or phone carriers or whatever else, so it's not like their absence from the Pokemon GO community is likely to hurt anyone.

I've noticed when new updates go live, it takes a long time for them to reach my phone (which isn't rooted). I think a possible alternative reason for that is firmware. Carriers push firmware at different times, and might even take a few weeks to do it, so that could maybe be relevant in a case like this one.

JoeTheDestroyer Blogger Sep 13, 2016

Another thing I've read is that Niantic is rolling the update out slowly. Apparently, it's molasses slow, because relatively few players reported having it.

I just downloaded the update this morning. Squirtle is now my buddy.

wolfqueen001 Sep 16, 2016

Yeah; I think it popped up on mine about the same time as yours. It updated automatically and the notes for the update didn't even mention the changes (at least that I saw), but it's there.

The problem I have with how the buddy thing is supposed to work is that, from what I understand, once you assign a buddy you can neither un-assign it or battle with it. So while I'll probably ultimately choose Charmander as mine, I need a weaker one than the one I've got to make it worthwhile.

JoeTheDestroyer Blogger Sep 17, 2016

You actually can switch your buddy. I checked my buddy screen, and there's an icon on the bottom right that allows you to change them out. As far as battling with a buddy, I'm not sure. I primarily battle with a Vaporeon like 80% of the people in my area (my second choice is either Flareon or Golduck), and there's no need to earn candies for that one.