Pokemon GO's community The Silph Road announced that it is shutting down, leaving players devastated by the news. Pokemon GO has experienced an eventful year because of problems and controversies caused by decisions made by Niantic. Although the Pokemon GO community remains active, a portion of players are frustrated, upset, and disappointed with the current state of the game
Exciting content has been released for the augmented reality game, such as the long-awaited global debut of Shaymin in Pokemon GO. Meanwhile, Pokemon GO's recurring problems have also been making headlines and generating commentary on social media. In addition to the bugs and errors that detract from the experience, players have been experiencing "astral hell" after Niantic nerfed Pokemon GO's remote passes. With that, it has become increasingly frequent to see comments like "Niantic doesn't care about Pokemon GO players."
The Silph Road, one of the most popular Pokemon GO communities, announced its end after Niantic ceased the partnership through the Community Ambassador Program. An official note says that The Silph Road has remained ad-free for the past 12 months thanks to Niantic's sponsorship. The text reveals that the only solution the site team members found was to shut down the project because it will not be possible to cover the high costs. Between March and August, The Silph Road will end all tools, programs, websites, channels, and community resources offered to Pokemon GO players, ending a seven-year journey.
Despite the end of the services and resources, The Silph Road will continue activities on Reddit, where the subreddit has over 800,000 subscribers. The note explains that this will happen because the subreddit's group of moderators operates independently of the site's staff. The Silph Research Group will continue researching game mechanics on the Discord server, and reporting findings directly on Reddit. In a note from Niantic, the studio thanks the partnership with The Silph Road, and announces that the Community Ambassador Program will soon receive a new format through Pokemon GO's Campfire feature.
Pokemon GO has received engaging content this year, but it's getting harder to ignore the dark cloud hanging over Niantic's game. In addition to the nerf on Pokemon GO's remote passes, players have noticed other issues, one example being the removal of in-game information like base capture rate and base flee rate from all Pokemon. The situation becomes a bit more tricky as players also complain that Niantic does not provide adequate feedback for the problems plaguing Pokemon GO.
Pokemon GO is available now on Android and iOS.